Hello, my name is Remy Loh Bishop. I am currently an appraiser for the LaneWilson Showroom in the San Francisco Bay Area. LaneWilson is my safety net.

My father is in real estate and I grew up tagging along with him, touring open houses. I fell in love with vintage furniture and antique heirlooms. I had a knack for researching and valuing items. It was my hobby while I was educated in criminology and DNA forensic analysis. Little did I know appraising would one day be my lifeline to a career change.

I still consider myself a Forensic Lab Technician with the Sacramento DA’s office. This is despite the fact that I was asked to resign under the suspicion of evidence tampering.

No, I didn’t do it.

I continue to carry a clipped article from the San Francisco Chronicle labeling me as the reason why a killer still runs free. I read that article every morning before I start my day, it’s a reminder that until I clear my name my life is in shreds. There’s not much energy for anything else.

That’s why my parents, Mitch and Belinda Bishop, hover over me in concern. I’m from mixed race heritage. My Chinese mother and African American father brought cultural blending to their four children. The fact that my mother can fix a mean gumbo, and my Dad has perfected Hunan chicken was an everyday, no big deal at our house.

My wounded psyche isn’t helped by the fact my mother hovers over me and calls me her “chick with a broken wing.” That’s because on top of everything else, my fiancé practically left me at the altar for another woman and an ashram. My father is more understanding but equally concerned, his theory is to kick us chicks out of the nest and see what happens.

Today, I’m helping a new client, Audra Dunlap. She wants to find an antique clock her son inherited from his grandmother. Her son died tragically, and she wants the clock back. She clutched our brochure indicating that the clock was up for sale at our last auction. She attended, but it never came up for bid. Her son never would have sold the clock, and a “bait and switch” tactic is a showroom no-no. It’s the sign of a disreputable house and LaneWilson put the “e” in ethical. Grayden Lane, my boss, says the clock was pulled by the owner at the last minute. But suspiciously he’s at a loss as to identify the seller—and the paperwork is not forthcoming. Grayden considers Audra a pest and out of touch with her son, who was probably shy about telling his mother he sold the clock.

Maybe, but I agree to help her. I’m sucker for sob stories.

Not long after Audra says goodbye, a stately looking man enters, who according to his business card is Edmund Keiffer. He tells me his aunt has a George II mirror that he would like to have appraised. Specifically, he wanted me to appraise it, and I would like nothing better. Grayden would kill for a new client and I would have the first star on my record.

Had I known about Mr. Keiffer I would have turned him down.

Having these customers come through today, helped to keep me distracted from my new purpose in life—finding out who framed me. I loved my job as a forensic tech and I loved plowing through evidence, no matter how trace it was, to get at a victim’s real story. I still use my forensic instincts, only now to ferret out the value of artifacts and their stories, for appraisal.

As I turn out the lights to go to sleep, there’s a thought that crosses my mind. I think I know how I can prove my innocence.

Unfortunately it means I have to break the law to do it.

You can read more about Remy in The Appraiser, the first book in the NEW “Remy Loh Bishop” traditional mystery series, released August 13, 2019.

Remy Bishop is a thirty year-old divorcee living in the San Francisco Bay Area. She is recovering from being fired as a forensic technician for falsifying lab results. She’s determined to clear her name and nail the person who forged her signature. With her parents help, she changes careers.

She has just secured her first paid position as an appraiser at the LaneWilson auction house when she takes on a client, a man who wants her to appraise an antique for his aunt. Remy visits the grand mansion and is pleased to find the antique is the real deal. When she returns for a written contract she discovers the client is murdered, the house is empty, there is no aunt and the antique is missing. Remy is the only person who had contact with the man and the antique. Now she’s a suspect in his death.

Meantime, she had agreed to help an elderly woman find a family heirloom, which the elderly woman is accusing the auction house of stealing. A pattern of crime and deceit begin to weave together a picture but not the one Remy thought.

She continues to push back on the murder even as she walks the thin line of once more being accused of evidence tampering. It isn’t until she’s the prime suspect in a second murder that her own background comes to light and she discovers that betrayal comes easy to some and murder even easier to others.

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About the author
R. Franklin James is the 2018 placed winner of the Northern California Publishers and Authors best fiction award. She grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area, graduated from UC Berkeley, and flourished in a career of public policy and political advocacy. In 2013, the first book in her award-wining, five-star Hollis Morgan Mystery Series, The Fallen Angels Book Club, was published by Camel Press. Five books later, The Identity Thief, was released in 2018. She is writing a new series: Remy Loh Bishop Mysteries. Book one, The Appraiser, will be released in 2019. James resides in northern California with her husband. Her website link is rfranklinjames.com.

All comments are welcomed.