1. I am a morning person, not by choice, but because of my two cats, Ghost and Marmalade, who insist that I get up at sunrise to feed them breakfast. And coffee, I have to have my two cups to begin my day or I don’t function. It’s not easy running your own business and being a mystery magnet at the same time.

My shop, Jellies, Jams and Weddings is located on Main Street in Whipper Will Junction; my apartment is on the second floor of the building. It’s convenient in bad weather as I can always make it to work. Or, depending on how you look at it, not so convenient because I can never call in saying that I can’t make it to work.

Growing up, my gram and her jellies were loved by everyone. When she died, she entrusted me with her secret recipes and I used them as the launching pad to start my new business. I try to cook every day, but a lot of times I get sidetracked following new clues.

I took classes to become a certified wedding planner before I had decided to open my jelly shop. It’s not an easy job, dealing with Bridezillas and their mothers, but when the wedding comes together it makes all the arguing and complaining worthwhile and it does supplement the income of the shop in the off-season months.

It’s eight o’clock and time to open. Janice Spenser will clock in at nine. As employees go, she is one of the best and has covered my butt many times when I have had to leave the shop during working hours. She also has an awesome sense of humor which keeps me smiling.

The register is set up and the shelves have been checked and stocked. I unlock the front door, hang up the open flag and am ready to face another day.

There is always a pot of coffee going in the backroom for my customers and for Sheriff Puckett who visits every afternoon to fill his travel mug and socialize.

Once Janice is behind the register, I am free to put together any gift baskets that have been special ordered or that are needed to fill up the holes on gift basket wall. I spend a lot of time on my laptop placing orders for the shop or researching things that the sheriff tells me to keep my nose out of. Old habits are hard to break.

We usually eat lunch at the bride’s consultation table. Most days, I will go upstairs and make lunch for Janice and myself; another perk of living above the shop. If we want something different we order lunch from The Whipper Will Diner and one of us will go pick it up. My hunky fiancé, Greg Stone, will either call me or drop in for a short visit while we eat.

My afternoons are spent gabbing with my customers, making more gift baskets or running out the door to follow up on some new information that falls in my lap.

At least twice a month I have to escort Gladys Twittle, the Town Mouth, out of my shop. She walks around, listening to what my customers are saying and then repeats everything she has overheard while she sits on the first stool next to the register at The Tilted Coffee Cup every morning. She is a real piece of work.

At four-thirty, we pull out the closing list and start to get things ready for the following day. Neither of us likes to clean the public bathroom, so we flip a coin to see who gets stuck doing it. The open flag is brought in and the door is locked at five o’clock.

Janice leaves by the backdoor as I close out the register. The cats are waiting eagerly at the top of the stairs looking for their supper. As they chow down, I hide the deposit bag in the half empty kitty litter bag under my bathroom sink. If anyone manages to get by the alarm system, who would look in a bag of kitty litter for anything valuable?

Greg own the local flower shop on Main Street. We both put in full days and neither of us feels like cooking at the end of the day. Five nights a week we meet at the diner and have a nice quiet supper together. Sunday, our only day off, is spent together doing things that we enjoy.

If it were not for the mysteries that I become involved in, my life would be the same routine, day after day. I love the locals, I love my shop, but my passion is solving mysteries, much to the chagrin of my mother and my fiancé.

You can read more about Tabby in Jammed With Murder, the third book in the “Jams, Jellies, and Murder” mystery series. The first book in the series is Bodies and Blueberries.

Snow is falling and Christmas is just around the corner in Whipper Will Junction, but it seems that the Christmas spirit is definitely not warming everyone’s heart. Mrs. Piper, the town librarian, is murdered while doing research in the library basement.

In the midst of preparing for the town’s annual Christmas festivities, local jam and jelly shopkeeper, Tabby Moon, is drawn into investigating the murder, and discovers that it might have some interesting connections with a bank robbery that took place twenty-three years ago.

The list of potential suspects grows and grows, one after another; with even a resident ghost being watched! Can Tabby find the murderer and still hold on to her Christmas spirit?

Find out by visiting Whipper Will Junction; where the gossip is plentiful and so are the bodies.

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Meet the author
Donna Walo Clancy was born in 1959. She now resides on Cape Cod in Massachusetts. Happily divorced, with three grown children, she enjoys walking the beaches with her metal detector, photography and day trips exploring new places. An avid concert goer, she has been known to hop in a car and follow a band up and down the east coast. Her first passion is writing followed closely behind by reading.

All comments are welcomed.