Blessed, with a Side of, Mystery

She knew it would not be easy. She knew there could be rough patches. What Sarah Pastor did not know was that the loneliness could be almost crippling. Still, she followed God's plan for her life, to be a preacher, never looking back. That's why the young woman counted it as a huge blessing when Blanche Christiansen, an older woman and member of Sarah's church, became her best friend.

But one day her friend's daughter called and asked Sarah to check on her mother. There she found Blanche's body, and a note. It was a list of scriptures that formed a code about who, why, and how the older woman had been murdered. Lee, an inexperienced young detective, could not solve the case without Sarah's help to decode the note. This comes from The Coded Note, the first of four mysteries in Blessed, with a side of Mystery.

From the Author:

"Okay. This was actually the first idea I had for a mystery. Long before I started writing or before I felt the need to start. This book was actually the ninth book. Finally, I was ready to tackle this subject. I thought it was a cool idea for a person to leave clues. Imagine someone knows they are going to die. How could they leave clues behind to tell who did this to them? I thought if this victim knew the Bible well enough they could leave references that would not mean anything to the murderer, but to a Bible scholar it would give all the information needed.

"I chose to make the main character a woman preacher. They're still kind of rare, but in the 1940's and 50s it was unheard of, but my maternal grandmother pastored churches in southern Illinois. She died before I was born but I still think of her as a hero. For that reason, I had to make Pastor Sarah a hero. As with all my stories the people are all fictional as are the towns. Even here I made up the denomination. An internet search did not uncover any group called Disciples Union. I used that name again in another series."

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