Music is a huge part of my life and my writing life. I have lots of playlists for my research, writing, and editing time. It is always on in some form or fashion at our house. I love how a song can evoke past memories.
Jules Keene runs a glamping (glamorous camping) resort nestled in the beautiful Blue Ridge Mountains in Virginia. Fern Valley is a few miles west of Charlottesville. Her parents bought the traditional campground back in the 1970s before she was born, and after her divorce from the Idiot, she returned home and helped her dad update the campground and restore vintage trailers. Jules saved a bunch of classics from the scrapheap and preserved their history and created some upscale places for her guests to visit. She used her background in interior design to theme and decorate each one.
Here’s the playlist I created for Vintage Trailers and Blackmailers, the first book in the Jules Keene Glamping Mystery series. The songs speak to Jules’s character and life in the mountains of Virginia.
Adam Ant’s “Goody Two Shoes”
Alabama’s “Mountain Music”
Alabama’s “Pass it on Down”
Ben E. King’s “Stand by Me”
Bruce Hornsby’s “Mandolin Rain”
Bruce Hornsby’s “The Valley Road”
Bruce Springsteen’s “Dancing in the Dark”
Bruce Springsteen’s “My Hometown”
Charley Pride’s “Mountain of Love”
Chuck Berry’s “My Ford Mustang”
Darius Rucker’s “Homegrown Honey”
Darius Rucker’s “Southern State of Mind”
Don McLean’s “American Pie”
Don McLean’s “Starry, Starry Night”
Gloria Gaylor’s “I Will Survive”
Ike and Tina Turner’s “River Deep, Mountain High”
Jake Owen’s “Barefoot Blue Jean Night”
Jason Aldean’s “Tattoos on This Town”
Joan Jett’s “I Love Rock ‘n Roll”
John Denver’s “Take Me Home, Country Roads”
Johnny Cash’s “Ring of Fire”
Keith Urban’s “Jeans on”
Mark Wills’ “Nineteen Something”
Marvin Gaye’s “Ain’t No Mountain High Enough”
Marvin Gaye’s “Mercy, Mercy Me”
Rachel Platten’s “Fight Song”
Rascal Flatt’s “Fast Cars and Freedom”
Robbin Thompson’s “Candy Apple Red”
The Beach Boys’ “Fun, Fun, Fun”
The Beatles’ “Here Comes the Sun”
TLC’s “Waterfalls”
Toby Keith’s “Whisky Girl”
Tom Cochrane’s “Life is a Highway”
Tracy Chapman’s “Fast Car”
Wilson Pickett’s “Mustang Sally”
I love the concept for this series. If camping were that awesome when I was a kid, I would never have whined about it. Jules Keenes’ campground is filled with upscale vintage camp trailers each with their own themes; birding, wildflowers, fishing etc. Business is doing well with the resort booked up and big events on the calendar. Ira Perkins is a long term guest, ostensibly writing a book and prickly about his peace and quiet. He turns up dead in the woods behind his trailer and sets off a series of unsettling incidents at the campsite. It soon becomes apparent he isn’t quite who said he was and Jules feels the need to put the mystery to rest before it begins to affect her business.
This is a terrific opening to Jules and Fern Valley. The author has done a terrific job of introducing us to the staff at the resort and the community that surrounds it, giving the reader a real feel for that part of the Blue Ridge Mountains. I love the descriptions of the trailers and I am excited for her partnership with Jake to add tiny homes to her offerings. There seems to be romance in the air as well. With Jules plans to extend the tourism season beyond summer, this series seems poised to offer up some fun mysteries to come.
I received an advance review copy for free through Great Escapes Virtual Book Tours, and I am leaving this review voluntarily
There is nothing like finding a dead body, clad only in red satin thong, on your property to jolt you from a quiet routine. Jules Keene, owner of the posh Fern Valley Camping Resort in the Blue Ridge Mountains, is thrust into the world of the Dark Web when one of her guests, Ira Perkins, is found murdered in the woods near her vintage trailers. Jules quickly discovers that the man who claimed to be on a writing retreat was not what he seemed, and someone will go to any length to find what he left at her resort. Jules, along with her Jack Russell Terrier sidekick Bijou, has to put the rest of the missing pieces of a blackmailing scheme together before her business is ruined.
Jules’s resort, set in the heart of Virginia’s Blue Ridge Mountains near Charlottesville in the quaint town of Fern Valley, offers guests a unique vacation in refurbished and upcycled vintage trailers. Hoping to expand her offerings, she partners with her maintenance/security guy to create a village of tiny houses, the latest home DIY craze, but a second murder of a reporter interrupts Jules’s expansion plans. Curiosity gets the best of her, and she steps up her sleuthing to find out what Ira Perkins was really doing and what he hid at her resort.
Purchase Link – Amazon
Through the years, Heather Weidner has been a cop’s kid, technical writer, editor, college professor, software tester, and IT manager. Vintage Trailers and Blackmailers is the first in her cozy mystery series, the Jules Keene Glamping Mysteries. She also writes the Delanie Fitzgerald mystery series set in Virginia (Secret Lives and Private Eyes, The Tulip Shirt Murders, and Glitter, Glam, and Contraband).
Her short stories appear in the Virginia is for Mysteries series, 50 Shades of Cabernet, Deadly Southern Charm, and Murder by the Glass, and her novellas appear in The Mutt Mysteries series.
She is a member of Sisters in Crime – Central Virginia, Sisters in Crime – Chessie, Guppies, International Thriller Writers, and James River Writers.
Originally from Virginia Beach, Heather has been a mystery fan since Scooby-Doo and Nancy Drew. She lives in Central Virginia with her husband and a pair of Jack Russell terriers.
Author Links
Website and Blog: http://www.heatherweidner.com
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