Maybe I read too many Sam Spade books when I was a teenager. I thought being a PI would be exciting. And it was, but not always in a good way. After an irate client tried to make my nondescript face “descript,” I applied for what I assumed would be a nice, safe position as a claims adjuster for an insurance company: Universal Heartland Liability and Casualty Assurance Company of America, Incorporated (the company with a heart ❤). Maybe I should have joined the army. At least they would have issued me a gun.

My name is John Smith, and before you ask—yes, I’ve heard all the jokes. And it’s better than being named John Doe. People poke fun at my generic name but they don’t associate it with toe tags and morgues.

I try to live a life as ordinary as my name. I don’t want to stand out; I’m not ambitious. I just want to go with the flow and enjoy the little things. But lately my days have started by being dive-bombed by crows as I race from my house-boat to my car, a yolk-yellow Saturn that not everyone appreciates as much as I do. At work I have to walk past our disapproving office manager who I believe stole the key to my office so I can no longer lock my door. After work I return home to the kitten my mother gave me as a gift. He lives up to his name Wild Thing, and, unfortunately, he doesn’t like me. I’d drop him off at a shelter, but my neighbor’s daughter would never forgive me. She wanted to keep Wild Thing, but her father refused because the kitten terrorizes their German Shepherd.

Then there’s my mother. Her goal in life is to get me married off so she will have grandchildren. Even my poker buddy friends have tried to line me up by creating a profile of me on a dating app. Since we were all a bit drunk at the time, my only conclusion is that the dating pool must be pretty poor for anyone to have responded to the ad they wrote along with the picture they took of me.

That’s my life—crows hate me; my cat hates me; my mother will do anything to get a grandchild or two, and I regularly lose money at poker games I host. The bright spot—literally—in my life is my yellow car. I love driving it while singing, mainly commercial jingles. Given my avoidance of anything associated with the word “exciting,” and the fact that most of my professional work involves assessing people’s fender-benders and lame excuses for their accidents, it’s more than a little surprising that I recently found myself investigating art theft, kidnapping, blackmail, and murder. I went from failed PI to hero, but it wasn’t exactly intentional. To find out how it happened, read In$urance To Die For.

In$urance To Die For, A John Smith Mystery Book #2
Genre: Cozy Mystery
Release: April 2024
Format: Print, Digital
Purchase Link

If laughter is the best medicine, John Smith belongs in everyone’s medicine cabinet.

In In$urance to Die For, a scam artist’s plan for making money off of insurance turns deadly.

John Smith, an insurance investigator as ordinary and nondescript as his name, is determined to protect his company’s reputation, but his investigation is frequently interrupted by his war with local crows, the gift of an uncontrollable kitten who hates him, and being signed up for a dating app by prankster poker players. He ends up with more enemies than Harry Potter and discovers that sometimes being a klutz is a life-saving skill.

About the author
Charlotte Stuart PhD got her start in academia and left a tenured position to go commercial fishing in Alaska. Her current passion is for writing character-driven mysteries with twisty plots. Most include at least a dollop of humor, but she describes her “In$urance” series as “Murder with a Laugh Track.” Her books have placed or made finals in various competitions including: 1st Place in the Chanticleer International Mystery & Mayhem Book Series Award, a Reader Views Silver, a Global Book Bronze, and finals in Foreword Indies, Killer Nashville’s Silver Falchion and Eric Hoffer Awards.