Some of us are lucky to have best friends. It’s rare to have
multiple best friends simultaneously, but I’ve been blessed to have two best
friends my entire life. They are sisters, and they were my next door neighbors
forever.
We grew up sharing scraped knees, Barbies, favorite songs,
and chicken pox. We listened to rain on a tin roof, caught blue crabs in tidal
creeks, and confided our deepest darkest secrets to each other. We forged friendships
that have spanned more than fifty years.
So, when I decided to create a character foil for my amateur
sleuth Baxley Powell, I wanted her to have the same rich and enduring
friendship I’ve had. Newspaper reporter Charlotte Ambrose appears in every book
of the Dreamwalker cozy mysteries, but she was in Baxley’s life long before the
series.
In firming up their backstory, I decided this pair had been
inseparable since grade school. Charlotte struggles with her weight, with
confidence, and with upward career mobility. As a fulltime employee at a weekly
paper, she can get title promotions, but the job remains the same, no matter
the label. Meanwhile, Baxley struggles with her unusual skill of communicating
with the dead, her burning desire to be normal, and her decision to suppress
her psychic abilities for most of her life.
As children, teens, and adults, Charlotte and Baxley needle
each other when they need an extra push. They support each other when things go
wrong and cheer for each other’s successes. They’re in and out of each other’s
houses all the time. Charlotte is the sister Baxley never had, and Baxley’s
parents are Charlotte’s second set of parents.
This closeness works out well for best friends in real life
and for characters in stories. For instance, when everyday things that happen to
us, we turn to our friends first. Our friends are our sounding boards and our
barometers. They tell us when we’re messing up, and they rat us out to our
folks when we need it. The same goes for Baxley and Charlotte.
In book one of the series, Gone and Done It, Charlotte helps Baxley through the decision to
become the Dreamwalker. She helps Bax when the admission of power totally
whitens Baxley’s forelock. On the flip side, Baxley clues her friend into the
first murder the county has had in forever. That’s solid gold and pure
adrenaline for an ambitious reporter like Charlotte.
In the second Dreamwalker mystery, Bubba Done It, Charlotte gets first dibs on reporting the banker’s
death, but her astute observations shape the overall police investigation.
There’s a lot of give and take in their relationship and a squabble or two for
good measure. As always, Charlotte remains the brains of the pair and Baxley
the pluck.
And now we’re to book three in the series, the subject of
this book release blog tour, Doggone It.
With several months of dreamwalking under her belt, Baxley enjoys a more formal
relationship with the sheriff’s department. The increased work and pay make her
life as a single mom easier, but the more cop work she does, the less she can
confide in Charlotte in real time. With Charlotte being a member of the press
and Baxley on the side of law and order, a rift in their friendship threatens.
In addition, Charlotte’s reporting of two previous murder
cases shakes up the pecking order at the paper and gains her notice throughout
the state. She’s sure her next murder story will springboard her to a bigtime career.
While Charlotte pursues fame and fortune, Baxley keeps a low profile. The
people she meets are either dead, criminals, family of the dead, or cops. Her
dreamwalking clients drop by at all hours of the day and night, leaving her
little time for her friend.
Adjustments must be made if Baxley and Charlotte are to
remain close friends.
Read more about Baxley
and Charlotte in Doggone It!
This post originally aired at Storeybook Reviews on October 20, 2016 http://storeybookreviews.com/2016/10/guest-post-giveaway-doggone-it-by-maggie-toussaint/
