Daisy Pettles released her third book in the Shady Hoosier Detective Agency series, CHICKENLANDIA MYSTERY, and answers our questions about the book and writing.
How would you describe the plot of the book?
The Chickenlandia Mystery is Book 3 in my Shady Hoosier Detective Agency humor series, which the Indie Reader describes as “Murder She Wrote meets the Golden Girls … where the fun is infectious.”
The Plot: Pawpaw County, Indiana, is all atwitter about Ma and Peepaw Horton’s annual Chickenlandia Festival. The mood turns dark though when the Horton’s prize-winning rooster, Dewey, and his best laying hen, Ginger, vanish, leaving behind no clues, except for a ragged trail of tail feathers. Also missing: Gertie Wineagar, local sourpuss, and BBQ chicken cook-off queen. Senior sleuths, and lifelong gal pals Ruby Jane (RJ) Waskom and Veenie Goens, suspect Hiram Krupsky, Pawpaw County’s self-proclaimed Chicken Wing King, of master-minding the crime spree in an attempt to sabotage the Horton’s free-range chicken ranch. The senior sleuths, who need a way search for clues inside Krupsky’s chicken empire, get an unexpected “in” when Hiram slips into his leisure suit and commences to court a reluctant RJ. Follow the Hoosier senior snoops as they attempt to sort the good eggs from the bad in this hilarious small-town crime comedy.
Who is your favorite character and why?
Veenie (Lavinia) Goens is my favorite character. She is 71 years old, half-blind from macular degeneration, and dresses in chubby girl outfits that she plucks from the two-dollar deals-and-steals bin at the Goodwill. She’s like that one crazy, old aunt everybody has in the family who screeches out whatever pops into her head. She may be growing old, but she refuses to grow decrepit, or dated. Her one God-given talent, nosiness, makes her a perfect leading lady for the junior detective job she takes in order to supplement her social security.
The book series pivots on Veenie’s relationship to her 67 year-old gal pal, Ruby Jane (RJ) Waskom. RJ is a solid, dependable, get-it-done gal, who is constantly reining Veenie in.
It’s pretty much an Ethel-Lucy, Stephanie Plum-Lula set-up. The series which won the Indie Reader and the Next Generation Indie Book Award gold medals for Best Humor Book 2019, rely sharply on humor. The series also won a Best Mystery E-Book IPPY Award for its characterizations and plotting.
I turned 60 this year, so this series and its “aging” leading ladies help me explore some of my own feelings and frustrations about rolling over the hill as an aging Baby Boomer.
Is there a setting in your book that you would like to visit?
The setting in Chickenlandia, the tiny river town of Knobby Waters, Indiana, is a fictional amalgam of several tiny towns that are sprinkled across rural Jackson and Lawrence Counties, where I grew up. My dad was born in Greasy Creek, Indiana, and I have one sister who lives there still. Part of the fun of these books for me is that I get to re-visit and blend together all the small towns I knew as a child.
The one specific place in Pawpaw County that my readers mention that they themselves would love to visit is the emergency Pie Shed. It’s an old tool shed run by an elderly pair of farmers. The shed has been converted to a self-serve, 24 hour, pick-up station for home-baked pies. Anyone who has ten dollars can drive up and pick up a pie anytime. Customers deposit their pie money in a sap bucket that is nailed to the door.
One of the theme songs of the comedy podcast that we are developing based on the Shady Hoosier Detective Agency books is: “Remember when you’re feeling blue, stop and eat a pie or two.”
In actuality, I have neighbors in Underhill, Vermont, where I live most of the year, who operate such a Pie Shed in their yard. That enterprise, Poorhouse Pies http://www.poorhousepies.com/, has appeared in Yankee Magazine, and the PBS documentary film on the search for the best American pies.
Personally I think every community would benefit from having a 24-hour emergency pie shed dedicated to helping folks relieve life’s more stressful moments.
Which of your skill sets were useful constructing the plot?
I am horrible at plotting. If I were better at it I’d write suspense thrillers or procedurals where one has to have a tight grip on structure to bring the action to a satisfying conclusion. My strengths are character and dialogue. It took me decades to learn dialogue, but once I did I discovered that for character-driven books--the Shady Hoosier Detective Series is very character driven—plot comes from character.
I studied as a therapist. People fascinate me. I think people have deep and enduring threads in their personalities. We tend to act predictably across time and situation. Comedy relies on characterization and timing. That’s probably why I write in the comic crime section of the mystery genre. It highlights my natural talents. When I write these books I have no idea who “did it,” or why, but strong and consistent characterization helps me wrap up the action in the end.
What meal and drink do you think would pair well with your book?
Whenever I write these books I find myself craving the food of my childhood, everyday food that is still popular in rural, Southern Indiana. The diet there is heavily laden with meat and processed foods: think fried bologna sandwiches, double decker melted Velveeta cheese sandwiches on white bread, fried squirrel legs, and taters (in all forms).
One of my favorite places in fictional Pawpaw County, Indiana, is Pokey’s Tavern and Pool Hall which is famous for its cheesy mystery meat sandwiches and hot greasy onion rings. I have a lot of fun with the food in Pawpaw County, which can include such delicacies as crock pot possum and deer chili. I eat horribly when I write these books and am always glad when a book is completed and I can back to my normally healthy diet.
Daisy Pettles is the pen name of Vicky Phillips, born in rural Indiana, and raised in the tiny farming community of Medora. As a child, she was fed a steady diet of books, pies, and Bible stories. She was a therapist before becoming an Internet entrepreneur and award-winning writer. She currently lives in a cloud of peace and quiet at the end of a dirt road in Vermont. The Shady Hoosier Detective Agency, crime comedies set in fictional Knobby Waters, Indiana, is her debut mystery novel series.