A WRITER'S NOTEBOOK: Everything I Wish Someone Had Told Me When I Was Starting Out. Learning to write well is a solitary and often frustrating task, but help is on the way. Here is the distilled experience of 50 years of writing (and writer's block) that covers the following in detail, as well as 21 other topics: CharacterPlotSetting DialogPoint of ViewVoice & Tone Self-publishingFinding an AgentPromotion The author shares his experience in writing and publishing 19 books. Save yourself dozens of serious mistakes and years of wasted effort This book is the bottom line on all aspects of the writer's experience.

Twenty Centavos Does an artist really see things differently? Painter Paul Zacher, preparing for a gallery show in the Yucatan, is unwillingly drawn into a murder investigation in his home town of San Miguel de Allende, Mexico. A prominent antiques dealer has been shot in the head, and a twenty centavo coin found in his mouth. Zacher draws on the help and expertise of his Mexican girlfriend, Maya Sanchez, and his retired detective friend, Cody Williams, to comb the prosperous expatriate community for clues as he tries to stay out of the way of the police. The action ricochets from the heartland of colonial Mexico to the steamy jungles of the Yucatan, as Zacher inches closer to the killer, only to find himself marked as the next victim. Twenty Centavos is the first book in the Murder in Mexico mystery series.

The Fifth Codex It's a routine job for painter Paul Zacher, now getting a reputation for his abilities as a detective. Simply facilitate the authentication and transfer of what could be a genuine Mayan book (codex) from the 1500s, of which only four others are known. But when the book's inflammatory message proves to be at the core of a three-way struggle among the Mexican government, the rebels of Chiapas, and a private collector with deep pockets, the conflict escalates. Kidnapping follows murder as the three forces compete for possession, until Zacher commits what looks to everyone like an act of coldblooded execution. The survival of the Zacher Agency and Paul himself are gravely in doubt in this, the second of the ten books in the Murder in Mexico mystery series.

BRUSHWORKWhat looks like a routine portrait commission for a flamboyant former vice president of the United States quickly turns to disaster when he is murdered after only one session. The artist turned detective, Paul Zacher, becomes intrigued by the reason for his presence in San Miguel, but his curiosity turns to desperation when accumulating evidence indicates that Zacher himself is the killer. When a reading of the victim's will reveals the motive, Paul and Maya are forced to flee across central Mexico to avoid arrest for murder. After one of the most ruthless conglomerates in the country lines up with the police against the Zacher Agency, Paul goes on the offensive and sets a trap that exposes the plotters. When he is nearly trapped himself, he is forced to kill one of them in a face-to-face shoot out.Brushwork is the third mystery title in the Murder in Mexico series.