Author Cricket McRae: ‘Wined And Died’ Released Today

It’s my pleasure to welcome author Cricket McRae back to Thoughts in Progress as she launches her mini-blog tour for the latest installment in her Home Crafting Mystery series, WINED AND DIED.

I’ve asked Cricket to share a bit about her current release and about mead making. Cricket will be stopping by periodically today to respond to your comments and answer any questions you might have.

Thanks for hosting me on the first stop in my blog mini-tour, Mason! I’m delighted to guest on Thoughts in Progress.

 

The fifth Home Crafting Mystery, WINED AND DIED, officially releases today. I’ve included soap making, food preservation, spinning and cheese making in previous books in the series. This time the colonial home craft that serves as the backdrop to murder and mayhem is mead making.

“Something is brewing in Cadyville, and it's not only dandelion wine. Sophie Mae is intrigued by a recently discovered cassette recording in which a therapist fearfully contemplates her client's murderous threats. When the same therapist ends up dead, Sophie Mae is lured into another intoxicating investigation, one that explores the age-old art of mead and wine making.”

In this book, Meghan is visiting her long-distance beau in New Jersey, and Barr and Sophie Mae are caring for Erin. As a result, the precocious almost twelve-year-old takes on a larger role in the investigation than usual. Add in a little soap making, a big business contract, a new employee for Sophie Mae, a bit of drug dealing and a family of oddballs who own the local meadery and let the games begin!

Mead is honey wine, the most simple of which is a fermented combination of honey and water. Some say it was the first recorded alcoholic beverage, though others argue beer came first. However, honey could ferment without the help of any human interaction. 

Hives in the hollows of trees, especially certain species in Africa, would flood during torrential rains and then the sweetened water would ferment due to the natural yeasts in the air. Indeed, I found a recipe for mead that consists of basically mixing honey and water and leaving it on the kitchen counter to ferment. It’s much the same recipe that I give in the back of WINED AND DIED for making homemade ginger beer using sugar, water, and ginger.

Though Paleolithic peoples may have accidentally discovered the mood-altering gift of the gods, the Egyptians, Romans and Greeks developed hive systems and harvested honey specifically for mead production – the nectar of the gods and high-born alike.

There are many sub-varieties of mead, and the primary one in WINED AND DIED is a methaglin. A methaglin is a mead brewed with spices and herbs. The term is a combination of the Latin word for medicine with the Old Irish word for liquor. The alcohol extracts herbal constituents better than plain water or oil, and in the past the sweet taste of mead would have masked unpleasant tastes from medicinal herbs. Nowadays, however, the herbs and spices are added more to enhance the flavor of honey wine.

The idea for incorporating mead into this book came from my friends Bob and Amy who, one evening after dinner, brought two small bottles up from the basement, popped them open, and reverently poured the contents into four champagne flutes. Elixir of the gods, indeed. They brewed it using champagne yeast, and brut dry, sparkling and light, it tasted like no other mead I’d ever tried. I had to find out more, and then, of course, I had to write about it.

Kirkus says of WINED AND DIED, “…a tutorial on mead and a dash of soapmaking, all wrapped around a credible mystery.”

Thanks again for hosting me, Mason!

Cricket, thank you for guest blogging. It’s always fun to find out what Sophie Mae is up to while learning new recipes and tips I can use. Mead making sounds like fun, I may have to give it a try.

Now for a bit of background on Cricket. Her books are available in trade paperback and as downloads for Kindle and Nook. In honor of the recent release of WINED AND DIED, you can enter to win a free Author Website ($900 value!) from the creative folks at Bizango Websites for Writers until July 29, 2011. For more details and information on how to enter, please visit her blog at  www.hearthcricket.com . For more information about Cricket or her books, check out www.cricketmcrae.com .

Have you ever tried your hand at wine or beer making? If so, what was the outcome? Remember if you have any questions, Cricket will be dropping by off and on today. I appreciate each and everyone of y’all. Thanks so much for stopping by. Be sure to check out the 5th installment in Cricket’s Home Crafting Mystery series. 

Guest Blogger, Cricket McRae

It’s my pleasure to welcome author Cricket McRae as the special guest blogger here today at Thoughts in Progress.

Cricket joins us today to celebrate her latest release. I ask her to tell us about her new book and the Home Crafting Mystery Series. Cricket will be dropping back by during the day to answer any questions you might have and respond to your comments.

Thanks for inviting me to Thoughts in Progress, Mason. How awesome that I get to be here on the release day for Something Borrowed, Something Bleu!

In the book, Sophie Mae returns to her home town of Spring Creek, Colorado (which bears an eerie resemblance to the town I live in now) when her brother's suicide note turns up after eighteen years. The violence of the past rears its head in the present as she delves into his life and death, juggles a cranky eleven-year-old, a Zenned-out father and a mother who is determined to plan a fancy wedding rather than allowing Sophie Mae and Barr to make a quick trip down to the courthouse. 

The impetus behind this fourth Home Crafting Mystery was threefold. I wanted to feature cheese making, bring Sophie Mae back to Colorado for one book, and finally address her brother's suicide.
 
The backdrops for my mysteries are colonial home crafts or pioneer skills. I couldn't write effectively about them if I weren't a bit crazily obsessed with them myself. So far I've written about soap making, food preservation, and spinning, and there's a story behind every one of those activities. There's a story behind the cheese making in Something Borrowed, Something Bleu, too.

When I lived in the Seattle area and still worked for That Big Software Company, I often spent my weekends getting back to basics and making things from scratch. Dipping candles, growing vegetables, putting up pickles and jams, that sort of thing. It wasn't until after I left that job that I began my handmade toiletries business (now defunct -- I'd rather write about it). But while I was still working I came across the section in Carla Emery's Encyclopedia of Country Living about cheese making. It was pretty basic, but it sparked a memory from Little House in the Big Woods where they make huge rounds of cheese and store them in the attic.

Online I discovered The New England Cheese Making Supply

Company. Fifteen minutes and a few dollars later I'd placed my order. The cultures, rennet and an instruction pamphlet arrived within the week. Fresh cheeses? Bah -- too easy. Much like I began writing novels rather than short stories, I plunged into the hard stuff that takes a lot of time and patience. I made Cheddar and Monterrey jack, which were actually quite easy, though tedious. They aged for months and finally I had my first taste. Pretty good, actually, and satisfying because I'd made them myself.
 
Since then I've taken classes on how to make mozzarella, feta, paneer, queso fresco, fromage blanc, etc. and still make those on a regular basis, as well as yogurt and piima-cultured butter. I just couldn't resist teaching Sophie Mae -- and maybe a reader or two -- how to do the same things.
 
As for setting the mystery where I live now, Sophie Mae's hometown is mentioned as being in Colorado in the very first book in the series, Lye in Wait. I'd lived in the Pacific Northwest for almost twenty years by then, and had no idea I'd move back to Colorado. But I did, and that provided me with the perfect opportunity to bring her home for one book.
 
In addition, her brother's suicide years before was one of the driving reasons Sophie Mae felt compelled to investigate the life -- and death -- of the neighborhood handyman who drank lye in her workroom in Lye in Wait. So the first book in the series set up the fourth. Yes, it was a way to avoid the dreaded Jessica Fletcher Syndrome, where more people are murdered in one small town than is remotely feasible. But as I wrote books two and three, I really wanted to know more about Sophie Mae's background, her family, and what happened to her brother. Something Borrowed, Something Bleu was the answer.
 
If you want to know more about the Home Crafting Mystery Series my website is www.cricketmcrae.com . And on my blog, www.hearthcricket.com , I talk about writing, food, gardening, and various domestic arts.

~Cricket

Cricket, thanks so much for blogging here today on the release of Something Borrowed, Something Bleu. Learning additional background on Sophie and the series has been interesting. Remember, Cricket will be available to answer any questions you might have about her latest release, the series or her writing.