Mystery Novel is Available for Pre-Order!

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It’s happening. Really happening. Away to Me—my mystery novel about behaviorist Maddie McGown and the murder of one of her best friends—is launching February 24^th, 2026, but is available to order now on Bookshop, Amazon, and Barnes and Noble. I’ve read and loved novels all my life, and have read mysteries ever since I was in my teens. I love good writing, cherish it. I’m one of those possibly obnoxious people who will stop reading, get whoever’s attention (usually Jim), so that I can read them some combination of words that makes my heart sing.

But you know, if you know my work, that I’ve only written non-fiction. I loved doing it, and believe still that good non-fiction can be the highest form of excellence in literary endeavors. But writing fiction is a whole other world. Doing it well is challenging, to say the least.

On the one hand—what freedom! Anything can happen! You get to make it all up! On the other hand—how challenging! Anything can happen! You have to make it all up! You have to make a decision at every moment about what is going to happen next. And, it has to have plots that are believable, and it has to keep readers engaged, and have characters that are engaging and consistent, or consistently inconsistent. You have to decide voice, and setting, and the character of the characters, and time, and and and . . .  Bottom line: Writing fiction is very hard, and very, very fun. I loved it.

It continues to be a journey for me, from first ideas, to writing and rewriting (repeat ad infinitum), to learning how to be a better writer, to getting a book published if you are lucky, and eventually bringing it out into the world. I thought many of you, who I know are voracious readers, might be interested in what that process looks like.

The first, most important, and never-ending part for me is learning more about the craft of writing. Although I’ve written a lot, I’ve only taken one class in creative writing a long time ago. I knew I’d have a lot to learn about writing fiction, and in the process, learn to up my game. Here’s one example of my evolution (and the inevitable editing and editing and editing that goes on in the completion of any good piece of writing):

This was the opening sentence, written in August of 2019: (I had a loose idea of the plot, knew the setting I wanted, and who the protagonist would be.)

The woods stood dark and silent, an audience to the mist rising in an amphitheater of spring-green grass inside the forest.

Compare that to the version that actually begins Away to Me in its published form:

On that day, burned into my brain like a cattle brand, the woods stood dark and silent, an audience to the fog rising in an amphitheater of spring-green grass.

See the difference? This is a murder mystery, and I’m not spilling the beans when I tell you that the one of the protagonist’s best friends is shot dead at a sheepdog trial in the opening chapter. Look at what that first sentence foreshadows—something awful is going to happen (burned like a cattle brand), there is going to be a mystery to solve (dark and silent, fog rising), and the novel happens in a rural setting (cattle brand, woods, spring-green grass).

[By the way, here’s a similar scene from Labor Day weekend, early Saturday morning at the Midwest Championship Sheepdog Trial! (But nothing awful happened! It was a great day once the fog lifted.)]

So, you write. (And you read the books of others, voraciously.) You come up with a plot, you revise it, change it, run it by others. For me, I worked with a writing coach Susanna Daniel of the Madison Writer’s Studio, went to two writer’s workshops put on by the same (great) organization, read books about writing fiction, gratefully soaked in the advice from a group of smart, literate friends who did some early readings, exchanged writings, advice, and encouragement every month with NYT best-selling writer, Cat Warren of What the Dog Knows fame, and profited from readings and advice from my agent, Jennifer Gates of Aevitas Creative. Plus, lots of readings and suggestions from Jim and dear friends. In other words, the author of Away to Me, as is common for many novels, is “Patricia McConnell and a Host of Others.”

Then, after writing and revising and deleting truckloads of non-essential words, it’s time to try to get it out into the world. If you’re lucky, you’ll have a decision to make: You can self-publish (not all that hard now through many outlets), you can go with a “hybrid,” in which you have to pay to have your book published, but the house carefully vets who they accept), or you can go the traditional route, and try to get a known and respected publisher to give you an advance, nurse your book, and use their knowledge and reputation to get your book some attention in the tsunami of new books that flood the stores and airwaves literally every day.

One could write a book (and many have, here’s one) about the advantages and disadvantages of each, but I’ll leave it that I was tempted by the wonderful people at the hybrid Little Creek Press in Mineral Point, WI. However, I was lucky enough, thanks to a great agent, to get offers from two traditional publishers, including the one I choose, Kensington Books. Yes, I’ve published my own books, and yes, I’ve had success with three books published by Ballantine and Atria, but getting fiction published by a well-respected house is, as one friend said, ” a rare success indeed.” I don’t mean that to brag, just that I’m truly grateful.

The disadvantage of a big-time publisher is the timing. If I’d gone with Little Creek Press, the book would’ve been out last spring. Kensington Books bought my book in August of 2024, with a pub date a year and a half later. I actually said to Jen, my agent, “do they know I’m 75?” But with a respected publisher like Kensington Books, that’s the name of the game. Two years is actually more common.

But, lots happens within that period of time. At one point your editor, (the one who had to advocate to the rest of the house to have your book taken), goes over what you sent and returns it with suggestions. Some can be trivial and easy fixes, some much harder. If you have a good editor (I do! Wendy McCurdy), you talk it out. You hold onto your vision, the editor makes suggestions based on their knowledge and experience. In my case, I dumped an entire chapter, combined two other into one, and made some changes to one of the characters.

You make the revisions, send the manuscript back, maybe or maybe not make some more. Once you have a final “accepted” manuscript, you get part of your advance, and the book goes to a line editor, who goes through it with an eagle eye for everything from grammar, to whether to write Border collie or border collie (that’s a blog unto itself), to keeping dates and times consistent. You get it back and either accept their changes or argue against them. Then . . .  it goes to typesetting, and you look at it again, now under lots of time pressure to make your absolute last and final changes (any after that cost you money.)

Around this time you await the draft of the cover with baited breath. No matter how great the insides, we all know that, to visually oriented primates like us, the cover can make or break a book. And the thing is, it’s not your call if you have a big-time publisher. Your contract, mine included, says something like the author has “consultation rights,”  but the final decision is not in your hands. The first draft of a cover for The Other End of the Leash was such a visual nightmare that I told my editor I wouldn’t be in the same room with it. I wish I could show it to you, but, because it was an in-house draft, that wouldn’t be ethical. I was told I had 24 hours to come up with something else. Luckily, a sympathetic editor took pity on me, and found the photo you now see on the cover. The rest is history.

The evolution of the covers on my next two books wasn’t as dramatic, but I’ll just leave it that it was a struggle to find a great cover. I was so happy when the publishers agreed to use what’s below for the cover of the paperback ofThe Education of Will, instead of a photo of Willie’s face that was on the hardcover. (Truth, that’s Maggie in the photo, not Willie.)

And so, like most authors, I waited with no small amount of angst to see what Kensington was going to come up with. And look what they did! The cover is so powerful and creative that it took me a minute to settle with it, and/but I LOVE it now. I made a few tiny suggestions, which they listened to with so much care and respect that I still feel like sending them flowers.

And then–still with me?–you meet your PR person, brain storm about who should be sent ARCs (advance review copies) for blurbs, start talking about all the rest, from articles in magazines to talks in book stores. That’s where I am now, six months before the book comes out on February 24, 2026. It’s been crazy busy the last month, but things will cool down until a few months before, when interviews on podcasts and radio shows get finalized. If you’re lucky, you’ll be busy busy in the weeks before and after. All this is complicated by the fact that life happens, and who knows what will be going on in the world when your book is launched. A friend of mine had a book come out on 9/12. The day after, yeah, that 9/11. Once the book’s time is past, it’s past. If something dramatic happens when your book comes out, your interviews are cancelled, and that is that. The freight train of new books never stops, and if your book gets run over, there’s little to do but start the next one.

Tired yet? I admit that I am a smidge. But I hope you’re excited to read it; I’m thrilled that it’s finally coming out into the world. It comes out Feb 24th, 2026, but you can “pre-order” it now from Bookshop, Barnes and Noble, or Amazon.

MEANWHILE, back on the farm: Lots going on! Last week Jim and I were treated to a perfect fishing trip by Tom Hauge of Wisconsin Green Fire. We got the winning bid in the fund raiser for WGF in which Adrian Wydeven  and I spoke about dogs and wolves. I was happy to find another way to support Green Fire, and hoped to have a lovely morning out on a beautiful lake. We got that and more, including great conversation with Tom, retired from 37 years in the DNR, and two fabulous trout dinners. Winner winner fishy dinner.

Soon after, we got hay delivered, and the best part is that my job was to take these photographs. Normally I’d be moving bales off the truck onto the elevator, but got spoiled by Bently, Gary, and Luke in the photo below.

Jim helped stack the bales in the upper barn, but he too was spoiled by younger Gus and Justin, out of the photo, who did the lion’s share of the work.

Right now we are at the Midwest Championship Sheepdog Trial, enjoying some gorgeous weather, smart sheep, skilled handlers, and some breath-takingly talented dogs. Below is Rose Anderson’s Deri, just some snaps I got with my cell phone.

Yesterday we took a day off and went up to Duluth, a happening town if there ever was one. Here’s a shot of Duluth’s harbor from the Skyline Parkway. A great way to enjoy early fall.

Time to put down the clacky thing (says Maggie) and focus on our own dogs. May you and your own dogs savor the beauty of this time of year. See you next time.