Nineteen tales of lust, love and longing! Yummy!

By CAROL PHILLIPS

Guest Contributor

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Carolina Crimes: 19 Tales of Lust, Love, and Longing, was formed from a simple directive: write a crime story about sex. From there, the Carolina Sisters (and Brothers) of Crime let their imaginations loose. This anthology has stories for everyone, from the ice cream in “Ice Cream Allure” by E.B. Davis to the violence in “The White Van” by Joanie Conwell; from the futuristic sex in Marjorie Ann Mitchell’s “The Game” to the historic
“Pound of Flesh” by Sarah Shaber.

Commissioned by Sisters in Crime, Triangle Chapter, and edited by Karen Pullen, a founding member of the chapter, with an introduction by Margaret Maron, the anthology contains works by several leading mystery writers in Chatham County, NC.

“Heart Surgery” by Toni Goodyear tells the story of a woman scorned as she plans her ingenious revenge. Goodyear, a former journalist and freelance writer won the NC Press Association Award for feature writers. She recently completed her first cozy mystery, Trouble Brewing in Tanawha Falls.

Jessica Key photo

Karen Pullen’s “The Fourth Girl,” is a light-hearted tale of a laid-off teacher who is bequeathed an independent life in a town that minds its own business by an aunt she barely knew. Pullen, whose short fiction has appeared in numerous journals, published her first novel, Cold Feet, in 2013. You can find her at karenpullen.com.

Meanwhile, in “Happy Pills,” by Linda Johnson, an octogenarian uses sex to steal pills for her black-market drug business. Johnson has published two novels, Trail of Destruction and A Tangled Web and often allows people to read her short stories for free at LindaJohnson.us.

Ruth Moose entertains with the flash fiction, “Mama’s Boy,” a story about a mother’s revenge for her son’s marrying the woman she liked least of all his girlfriends. Moose, a poet, fiction writer and retired UNC professor, won the St. Martin’s Press 2013 Malice Domestic competition for Doing it at the Dixie Dew, published in 2014. For more, see RuthMoose.com.

And finally, but certainly not least, is Judith Stanton’s “Big Girls Now,” in which a wife discovers her husband’s unlikely obsession and the work of a rare murderer. Stanton, also a retired UNC professor and scholar, is a RITA finalist. Two of her Regency romances were recently reissued while her contemporary suspense, A Stallion to Die For, continues to get top reviews on Amazon. Look for her at: catcrossing.com.

Hank Phillippi Ryan, a Martha Higgins Clark award winner, writes about this anthology:

I’d call this anthology a guilty pleasure – but I don’t feel guilty at all. This array of deliciously seductive stories will have you laughing out loud, shivering with delight, applauding the Carolina sisters’ gorgeously diabolical imaginations – and turning pages as fast as you can. Terrific!”

And I can’t say it better. To find it on Amazon: www.amazon.com.

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Triangle Sisters in Crime is a chapter of the international organization Sisters in Crime. “We are authors, readers, publishers, agents, booksellers and librarians bound by our passion for the mystery genre and our support of mystery writers. We welcome Sisters and Brothers in Crime from anywhere who have an interest in the Raleigh-Durham-Chapel Hill mystery community of North Carolina. www.trianglesinc.com.


Carol Phillips has short stories in the Red Clay Review and County Lines: A Literary Journal, and poems in Haiku Journal. She is working on a collection of short stories while completing a memoir about her mild traumatic brain injury. A member of the NC Writers’ Network since 2006, she enjoys the literary and art world of Chatham County.