Jolie and Scoobie High School Misadventures
When Jolie Gentil’s parents leave her with Aunt Madge for her junior
year so they can ‘work things out’ in their marriage, she’s
angry. She knows no one at Ocean Alley High School. Some kids snub
her, but she makes friends with the irreverent Scoobie. He’s quirky
and fun, but he’s skipped school and smoked pot in the past, so
people avoid him. Jolie learns how to shoot a squirt gun from under
the boardwalk and tries not to flunk geometry. She also learns that
the family she babysits for has a secret, one that puts Jolie in
danger. You’ve met Jolie and Scoobie as crime-solving adults. Check
out their high school friendship. Same humor, different challenges.
Plus a couple of hints about why Jolie wants to get to the bottom of
murders when she’s all grown up.
Appraisal For Murder
Jolie Gentil moves to Great Aunt Madge’s Jersey shore B&B, taking her
cat Jazz, and joining Madge’s pair of prune-eating dogs. It’s not a
retreat from her embezzling ex-husband, just a smart change. Jolie
rekindles friendships, dodges a low-level wise guy, and tries to
figure out her new life. She hasn’t seen her high school classmates
in ten years, and they weren’t all buds. Why care if a couple of them
are murder suspects? Because finding a dead body when you’re
appraising a house grabs your attention.
Jolie balances fear of a smart-mouth wise guy with a belief that her
friends are innocent. Her murder suspects include one accused’s
ex-wife and beneficiaries of the dead woman’s will. Jolie keeps
searching, but will someone’s plans leave her alive to find the truth?
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Rekindling Motives
When Jolie Gentil gets tapped for some appraisal work at her tenth high
school reunion she does not expect to find the skeleton of Richard
Tillotson in an antique attic wardrobe in the vacant house. He
vanished just after his sister married his business partner in 1929.
Jolie sees a link to the Tillotson-Fisher family’s Prohibition era
business and works with friends Scoobie and Ramona to gather clues
from old photo albums and ledgers. The albums lead to Mary Doris
Milner, Richard’s girlfriend, who has fond memories of him and is
certain of who murdered him. But, she couldn’t prove it then and he’s
long dead, too.
The present day murder of Mary Doris tells Jolie and Scoobie they are on
the right track. Did the secret she kept all these years finally kill
her, and will solving Mary Doris’ murder lead to a culprit in a
decades-old crime? Between running the food pantry at Christmas and
escaping a burning building, Jolie wants to figure out who the modern
killer is before someone else gets hurt.
When the Carny Comes To Town
Though she never liked the idea of sitting on the plank above the dunk tank
for the food pantry’s carnival fundraiser, Jolie never dreamed what
Scoobie saw that day would leave him battling for his life. Scoobie’s
ex-con mother shows up and there’s a murder to add to the mix. Soon
Jolie is doing more than appraising real estate. Even that is
complicated by home burglars. She grudgingly seeks help from her
nemesis, reporter George Winters, and tries to stay ahead of a
kidnapper and murderer so she can take charge of her world again. Can
she keep her friends safe? Will Scoobie recover enough to plan
another silly fundraiser?
Any Port in a Storm
Jolie Gentil and friends are putting the finishing touches on the Talk Like
a Pirate Day fundraiser for the food pantry and trying to figure out
who’s breaking into some of the houses Jolie appraises. When she
realizes a new face in town is leading high school kids into trouble,
Jolie’s mad and lets him know it. Hayden offers to help her mind her
own business, and people at the fundraiser hear her give him what
for. A hurricane’s on the way, and when a corpse turn up under the
pirate ship the next day, Jolie’s looking like a suspect.
Trouble on the Doorstep
From Hurricane Sandy to Cozy Corner B&B repairs to Aunt Madge’s
wedding in three weeks. If Jolie can handle that surely she can deal
with a sobbing woman who shows up at midnight playing a scary message
on her phone. Pooki is frantic about her husband’s whereabouts and is
definitely ditzy. A shady deal for storm repairs at the Ocean Alley
Senior Complex seems to be at the root of Steve Oliver’s hit-and-run
death and missing business partner, Pooki’s husband, Eric. When
Eric ends up dead at the B&B, Jolie digs for clues as she burns
muffins and appraises houses. Can Jolie find the murderer and expose
fraudulent repair bids – without getting hurt?
Behind the Walls
Finalist for Chanticleer 2014 Mystery and Mayhem Award. It’s fun to buy a
house. Unless someone wants what’s hidden behind the walls and is
willing to kill for it. Jolie is pursued by a purse thief and a
burglar, but the guy she’s most worried about is the one who left
an elderly auctioneer dead on her porch swing. Suspects abound, but
they aren’t all going to live to tell their story.
Vague Images
Bad enough that Jolie ends up in the emergency room because she avoided a
deer. Worse to find a dead woman in the hospital restroom. In between
appraising houses and feeding her pet skunk, Jolie’s on the lookout
for a runaway teenager and whoever planted the dead woman in her
path. Thanks to best bud Scoobie, she’s also planning a crazy
fundraiser for the food pantry. Just when Jolie’s ready to leave
the murder investigation to the police, she gets a surprise—and
it’s not a good one. Will her need to know see her hurt—or worse?
Ground to a Halt
When Jolie Gentil goes to buy a cup of coffee, she finds Java Jolt empty.
A bigger surprise is seeing proprietor Joe Regan later, badly
injured. A potential killer thinks Jolie has something he was hiding.
Jolie needs to figure out who’s telling the truth and how far the
thugs will go to find what they want. Only solving the puzzle will
keep Jolie safe, protect a vulnerable Iraqi War vet, and make sure
she stays alive. But if Jolie keeps searching, her budding romance
with Scoobie may grind to a halt.
Holidays in Ocean Alley
Aunt Madge’s brief stay in assisted living (don’t stand on a stool to
hang garland) would be uneventful, except for the body that falls
into her apartment along with a Christmas wreath. After years of
telling Jolie not to be a busybody, Aunt Madge turns to Jolie’s
boyfriend Scoobie to help find clues. Told from Madge and Scoobie’s
points of view, with help from some feisty seniors.
The Unexpected Resolution
A midnight wedding, Army veterans who face repercussions of two
different wars, and a very startling wedding guest. A 9-1-1 call
during the wedding changes everything. Jolie has to help Scoobie
figure out what he wants to know, and determine who seems to want
someone in his family dead. Book 10 in the Jolie Gentil cozy mystery
series brings together the close-knit group of friends and zany Ocean
Alley townspeople for a very special event – and a murder.
Orr is the Amazon bestselling author of the ten-book Jolie Gentil
cozy mystery series, which is set at the Jersey shore. “Behind
the Walls” was a finalist for the 2014 Chanticleer Mystery and
Mayhem Awards. First in her River’s Edge mystery series was “From
Newsprint to Footprints,” followed by “Demise of a Devious
Neighbor.” Iowa nice meets murder. “Tip a Hat to Murder”
is set in rural Illinois, and is the first of the Logland mystery series.
Ground,” published in 2015. Her novella, “Biding Time,”
was one of five finalists in the National Press Club’s first fiction
contest, in 1993. “Falling into Place” is a novella about
family strength as a World War II veteran rises to the toughest
occasion.
writing-related topics. Nonfiction includes “Words to Write By:
Getting Your Thoughts on Paper” and “Writing in Retirement:
Putting New Year’s Resolutions to Work.” She also authors online
classes about writing and publishing.
the Midwest in 1994. Elaine graduated from the University of Dayton
with a BA in Political Science and from the American University with
an MA in Government. She worked for GAO and the National Academy of
Public Administration for many year, and for two Iowa members of the
U.S. House of Representatives — one Republican and one Democrat.
and has
taken fiction courses from The Writer’s Center in Bethesda, MD, the
University of Iowa Summer Writing Festival, and Georgetown
University’s Continuing Education Program. She is a regular attendee
at the Magna Cum Murder in Indianapolis and the Book Bums Workshop in
West Liberty, Iowa.
