Throwback Thursday, in which I decide to write an ebook exclusive.

Oh the thrill of it! Writing a book without any publisher parameters, without having to submit a synopsis for approval and best of all, a chance to exercise my underworked sense of humor! I’d had the idea to write a mystery about a city girl who lands in the Arizona desert had been rattling around in my brain for a long time. Here’s the blurb for Desert Desperate. 

The Arizona desert is lovely in August. 

If you’re a cactus. 

If you’re not green and prickly it’s like standing in the bottom of a volcano hoping your SPF 15 will do the trick. So how does Simone Greevey, a twenty something e-zine editor from San Francisco wind up wearing a duck costume in sweltering Seepwillow, Arizona? In Desert Desperate, Simone loses her job and her fiancé in one fell swoop and runs to the arms of her eccentric aunt, owner of the Ruddy Duck trailer park, a hundred miles from nowhere.There she meets Chaz Tagliola, a guy who doesn’t know Jimmy Choo from Jiminy Cricket, a man with a passion for God and the one thing Simone has tried to forget about for the decade since her father’s death. Before her suitcase is unpacked; Simone’s aunt disappears, leaving Chaz and Simone to lead a five day junior high school Bible study camp. Bug lightings? Hot dog roasts? Cactus jam recipes? It’s a whole new world for a San Francisco girl. Throw in a mysterious park tenant and a breathtaking natural discovery and the stage is set for Simone to learn a divine lesson that will rock her world in a big way.

I had a blast writing it, however it’s dangerous to be left running wild with your own cleverness, so I enlisted professional editors, proofreaders and cover designers. It was such a thrilling experience, that I’ve done it a second time as well, with Deadly Sands.

I’m the first to admit that ebooks can be a horrendous waste of money, riddled with errors and thrown together at best. So how do YOU decide which ebooks to buy? Does it have to be from an author you know? Or maybe you rely on recommendations. All comments get you entered in the December drawing!