St. Clements Bluff – Book 1 in The Heart of St. Mary’s County Series

Raleigh Buckler’s perfect life in rural St. Mary’s County, Maryland, has just come to a shattering end.  Her naval test pilot husband, Grant, has been killed in a flight accident, and Raleigh is left to pick up the brittle shards of that life.  She prefers to stay hidden away in her grief but is unwillingly dragged out of it by the contents of her husband’s will.

Grant has left Raleigh St. Clements Bluff, a house she didn’t even know he’d owned.  The last known owner was a distant uncle of Grant’s, William “Junior” Buckler.  Junior was from the “other side” of the Buckler family.

Raleigh learns from an old family scrapbook that St. Clements Bluff is a river front estate with a history as a stop on Harriet Tubman’s Underground Railroad.  Given that Tubman lived on Maryland’s Eastern Shore, it is an exciting—but not necessarily surprising—revelation.

This seemingly noble background is darkened as Raleigh discovers that the house’s story as a safe house for escaping slaves is just the beginning of its dark and winding history.

Three Notch Safari – Book 2 in The Heart of St. Mary’s County Series

Becca Garvey’s life has just been burned to the ground by her husband’s announcement that he is abandoning her to pursue his “dream” of becoming a beach bum. Left solely responsible for not only their thirty-acre homestead in Hollywood, Maryland, but a free-spirited daughter and her increasingly dotty mother, Becca is determined to face an uncertain future with optimism.

She believes that her farm—which is really only Becca’s collection of tamed exotic animals like donkeys, llamas, and miniature horses—might be her ticket to financial solvency. Her plan is to create a unique place where children and adults alike are encouraged to not only interact freely with the animals but also to have weekend “experiences” with them. If she can create that, she just might find herself with a profitable venture.

However, animals are not always cooperative, and not all of Becca’s neighbors are enthused about her vision of a tourist attraction in their quiet, pastoral setting. She must buy new animals, learn how to care for them, train them, and create an experience for customers…all while balancing the concerns of her neighbors and the disruptions of jealous busybodies.

One of those busybodies will do anything to stop Becca.

The Cedar Point Affair – Book 3 in The Heart of St. Mary’s County Series

Diane Alvey is a public affairs officer for the U.S. Navy’s Patuxent River Naval Air Station and is creating a History Hall to document the air station’s origins.  She has just uncovered a secret stash of papers and ephemera…which includes Frances Parker’s World War II diary.

Frances Parker is a brand-new member of the U.S. Navy WAVES, or Women Accepted for Volunteer Emergency Service.  Along with multitudes of other women, she is attempting to navigate her way through life during dangerous and uncertain times.

It is August 1943, and war has come to St. Mary’s County.  The newly built air station is home to aircraft and ordnance testing, as well as a growing population of workers coming together to defeat a common enemy.

It is also home to murder.

When someone close to Frances is found dead, everyone around her is convinced that it is an accident…or so they say.  Frances is suspicious of so many people seeming to sweep the matter away, but she is threatened by unknown forces when she attempts to uncover who really committed the foul deed.

Intrigued by Frances’s riveting story, Diane sets about trying to learn why someone may have been murdered during the early days of the naval base’s construction…and who was responsible for it.

When Diane unveils the shocking truth, she learns that she’s not the only one who knows what happened all those years ago…and someone will stop at nothing to prevent the truth from getting out.

The Madness of Moll Dyer – Book 4 in The Heart of St. Mary’s County Series

The only happiness for the Dyer household during the brittle Devon winter of 1634 is the birth of Mary Margaret “Moll” Dyer.

Adored by her dada, mama, and granda, love is the only thing in abundance in Moll’s life. Her bright tresses and sparkling green eyes are a reminder of warmth but a promise of trouble, even while her Catholic heritage makes Moll an endless target for the religious persecution sweeping England.

With her life pierced with taunts, accusations, and grinding poverty, Moll escapes by accepting an indentured servitude contract on a Caribbean sugar plantation. But her fellow servants are suspicious of the red-haired “witch” who seems to curry favor with the plantation’s mistress.

When a rebellion forces Moll off the island plantation and to the burgeoning Maryland colony, she believes she has finally found peace and security. But she struggles to establish herself as a respectable innkeeper, and when someone close to her is accused of witchcraft, madness threatens to engulf Moll.

Facing betrayal by personal enemies and mounting accusations by authorities of wrongdoing, Moll fights to maintain her independence…and her life. But the new colony might just be Moll’s undoing.