I’m Dr. Philip Brockton, the fourth. I’m a guy who looks good in uniform—especially of the Civil War variety.

Most of you won’t know who I am, or if you do remember me from Sarah’s first book Too Many Crooks Spoil the Plot, you may not like me very much. I’m Ditie’s ex-boyfriend, and I’ve taken a lot of flak for how I broke up with her.

Thank you, Dru Ann, for giving me a forum in which I can speak for myself and clear the air.

I’ll start with a simple question. How do you break up with someone and leave her smiling? The answer is you don’t. What’s called for is a quick and precise excision, so that’s what I did. Dragging it out would only have made everyone more miserable.

I would have made a good surgeon, but I chose oncology instead. Most surgeons live for their work. I live for other things, like Civil War reeanactments and getting every bit of Southern history exactly right.

Oncology was a perfect fit. I like research, and I’m good at getting grants. I can do my work and still have time to enjoy the rest of my life.

I currently practice in Manhattan, and I’m highly successful at my job. I should be on the annual list of Best Doctors in New York, but every year I get excluded. The whole thing is political, and I’m a Southerner. That means I have three strikes against me with the Harvard crowd.

I’m not about to renounce my Southern heritage for some stupid list, and I’ve always planned to end up in Atlanta working with my dad.

If you want to know the truth, my heritage was a big factor in my break-up with Ditie. She isn’t from the South and she never really tried to fit in. She wasn’t interested in the Atlanta social scene. She never cared about her looks, never practiced saying the right things to the right people. She couldn’t even use a little Southern tact when that was called for. Our relationship was doomed from the start.

That’s what I told myself the first time around. Now, I’m not so sure.

Ditie was really good for me. She boosted my niceness factor about 200%. She always saw the best in me, thought I was golden like her dad. She and I had great talks about history and books when we weren’t cramming for a medical school exam, and she loved the fact I chose oncology as my specialty.

Her dad had died of cancer, and it broke her heart. She planned to be a cancer doc herself until she discovered how much she loved working with kids.

I tried to tell her being a pediatrician wouldn’t make her rich, far from it, but she wouldn’t listen. Ditie can be very stubborn.

She is also naive. She was young when she entered med school and so idealistic. I knew the realities of medicine from my dad, but she never wanted to hear any of that. She kept on her rose-colored glasses. Still has them on as far as I know.

Her naiveté worked for me. She never doubted my honesty or commitment to my profession. But she also never understood my passion for Civil War reenactments. Ditie never came to see me in action during med school. She always said she was too busy and that she couldn’t understand why anyone would want to reenact a period of time that was so violent and brutal.

Now, things seem different—maybe. She has a kid, Jason, not her own but close enough. He loves make-believe battles and playing war.

She also has a boyfriend who is an Atlanta detective. I don’t care for him, and he doesn’t care for me.

Then there’s Lurleen, Ditie’s best friend. Lurleen never liked me from the start. I don’t know why. I was never mean to her, but she got it in her head I was a self-centered son of a . . . well, you know where I’m headed. She had the good sense not to tell Ditie what she really thought of me, but I wonder now if she might be poisoning the well.

I don’t know where everything will end up. I’m beginning to see what I had with Ditie— how she made me a better person. She’s still not what my parents would consider a beauty or someone with the right Southern attitude. But if I ask for help, she gives it. Right now, that’s what I need from her.

All I want from you, dear readers, is that you keep an open mind when you hear about me in Sarah’s new book, Into the Frying Pan.

You can read more about Phil in Into The Frying Pan, the second book in the “Ditie Brown” cozy mystery series, released May 28, 2019.

Mabel Aphrodite Brown has quickly learned that motherhood can sometimes be a real skirmish. But when death visits a Civil War reenactment, it’s murder that’s a battlefield . . .

In the thick of a hot, muggy Atlanta summer, all Ditie Brown wants to do is keep her kids occupied and get them ready for school in the fall. When her ex-boyfriend, Phil Brockton, shows up for a Civil War reenactment, she thinks it might be fun and educational for the kids. Plus, her best friend Lurleen wants to put on the costumes and get in on the action, and Ditie isn’t one to rebel.

But things go south after a cannon misfires, resulting in the death of Phil’s med school rival. Was it an accident or something more sinister? Ditie soon realizes the past rarely stays buried, and her digging reveals longstanding enemies, killer motives, and new jealousy. When another reenactor is “accidentally” shot, the pressure is on for Ditie to solve the murders—or else her friends may be history . . .

Includes Family-Friendly Recipes!

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About the author
Sarah Osborne is the pen name of a native Californian who lived in Atlanta for many years and now practices psychiatry on Cape Cod. She writes cozy mysteries for the same reason she reads them—to find comfort in a sometimes difficult world. The first two books in her Ditie Brown Mystery series are Too Many Crooks Spoil The Plot and Into The Frying Pan. Visit her at doctorosborne.com or on her Facebook Fan Page of Sarah Osborne, Mystery Author. She loves to hear from readers.

All comments are welcomed.

Thanks to Sarah Osborne for donating a kindle copy of Into The Frying Pan. Contest ends June 1, 2019. Please leave comment in box below. The winner will be notified by email (so check your spam folder). Good luck everyone!