What's it all About?

Hello fellow flashers!  No, please button up your trench coats, I don't mean that kind of flasher.  I mean the gals out there who feel like coal-burning furnaces that kick into high gear at the most inopportune times of day and in the middle of the night, waking you up as the rivers of sweat pool in the most unexpected places.  That's who I mean.  Welcome to Mental Pause where I will share excerpts from my first novel as I delve into the self-publishing realm and prepare for the launch on March 8th... International Women's Day.  It's a women's fiction/suspense/murder mystery sort of hybrid which I'm told by some of my early readers has some funny moments. I was relieved to hear that as it was totally intentional but I wasn't sure if people would be annoyed that I was poking fun at a not so fun state of being (peri-menopause) and some serious subject matter!

Starting on January 1st (why not, right?) I will share chapter excerpts each week, leading up to the book launch - 10 weeks will give you some juicy bits from the first 10 chapters.  During that time, I also invite everyone to share their best, most horrible, funniest, emotionally challenging or humiliating mental pause (aka menopause) moments.  It's very reassuring to know that there are others out there feeling like they're losing their minds!  It's just another phase like the terrible twos only it's not as acceptable to have a tantrum in the middle of the grocery store when there's no Nutella left on the shelf!

Welcome to Abbie's emotional jalopy ride!  Here's a taste of Mental Pause - the novel:

-->

Abigail Slocum, a forty-something, average, middle of the road, housewife and mother of teenage twin boys, is trying desperately to keep her outwardly idyllic life together while spiraling into a dark pit of menopausal insanity. Her mind races with suicidal, murderous thoughts so outside of her normal character that it frightens her.  The only person she can share the graphic images from her hormonally addled mind with is her recently separated best friend, Rachel, and the mysterious and titillating Joan, a new friend from Rachel's singles support group who left her husband after coming out of the closet. 

Women have survived this female passage of life since the beginning of time!  Why was Abbie having so much trouble handling it?  As the battle to maintain her sanity rages on, Abbie, Rachel and Joan stumble into unfortunate, borderline comical, circumstances that lead to all night parties, sex and drugs and two suspicious deaths (three if you count the Pit Bull). Abbie’s cop husband, Conrad, tries desperately to understand what’s happening to his normally sweet wife.  While Conrad vies for promotion, the Slocum family gets embroiled in a media frenzy that swirls around a murder trial in which Abbie is the primary suspect.  Will she plead temporary insanity?