Spotlight on VICE AND VIRTUE by @LibbyKlein Plus a #Giveaway #SpotlightSunday

Spotlight on Vice and Virtue 

This year we say hello to a new kind of hero. Layla Virtue's career as a cop hit rock bottom in one incendiary moment that will forever live in Potomac County Police infamy. Now she finds herself living in the Lake Pinecrest Mobile Home Park trying to launch her backup career as a rock star about twenty years too late. 

She's competing against high school kids with garage bands who still live in their parent's basements and will work for tacos, while she's trying to pay the lot fees on her run down single wide.

At least she's alone and that's how she likes it. Far away from whispers of judgment and looks of pity. Until three women from her AA group decide to make her their fourth. She tries to shake them, but they are hanging on like Layla is bound to be their new bestie. Then there's this guy who keeps showing up on her front porch out of the blue.

Layla's dead broke so she can't afford to say no to any gig. That's how she gets stuck playing guitar for an eight-year old's birthday party surrounded by screaming kids who only want to hear Baby Shark.

 When the birthday party clown dies on stage, Layla knows she has to get out of there fast. This is her old precinct. She knows what's coming next.

She's too slow to escape the harsh scrutiny of her former colleagues, and before she knows it she's caught up in the world of trophy wives and trust fund kids where everyone has a secret, and a luxurious walk-in closet full of skeletons, trying to find out who killed the clown, and why?

 Layla's broken, but strong. Fragile, but fierce. She'll need a lot of help to make it in this life. If only she'd stop shutting everyone out. 

Vice and Virtue is full of humor and my love of Classic Rock, pulling from my life growing up with a musician for a father. 

My Life is Murder meets Mom meets Gilmore Girls meets Spinal Tap. 

Don't just take my word for it. Here are some reviews by people you might just recognize.

Read along to the Vice and Virtue playlist on Spotify.

Buy links  including Audiobook

Giveaway

I'll give a copy of Vice and Virtue to a lucky reader who can tell me their favorite classic rock song in the comments below. 

Layla Virtue, a blue-haired, 30-something recovering alcoholic and former cop is trying to reinvent herself as a musician—between AA meetings, dodging eccentric neighbors at her trailer park, and reconnecting with her mysterious dad—in this ​unforgettable new mystery brimming with hilarity and heart.

Layla is taking her new life one day at a time from the Lake Pinecrest Trailer Park she now calls home. Being alone is how she likes it. Simple. Uncomplicated. Though try telling that to the group of local ladies who are in relentless pursuit of Layla as their new BFF, determined to make her join them for coffee and donuts.

After her first career ended in a literal explosion, Layla’s trying to eke out a living as a rock musician. It’s not easy competing against garage bands who work for tacos and create their music on a computer, while all she has is an electric guitar and leather-ish pants. But Layla isn’t in a position to turn down any gig. Which is why she’s at an 8-year-old’s birthday party, watching as Chuckles the Clown takes a bow under the balloon animals. No one expects it will be his last . . .

Who would want to kill a clown—and why? Layla and her unshakable posse are suddenly embroiled in the seedy underbelly of the upper-class world of second wives and trust fund kids, determined to uncover what magnetic hold a pudgy, balding clown had over women who seem to have everything they could ever want. Then again, Layla knows full well that people are rarely quite what they seem—herself included . . .

Libby Klein writes ridiculously funny murder mysteries from her Northern Virginia office with a very naughty calico Persian named Miss Eliza Doolittle, and a sweet black Lab named Vader. She can name that tune for 70s and 80s rock in the first few notes, and she's translated her love of classic rock into her Layla Virtue Mysteries. Libby was diagnosed with an autoimmune disease that prevents her from eating gluten without exploding. Because bread is one of her love languages, she includes the recipes for gluten free goodies in her Cape May based Poppy McAllister series. Most of her hobbies revolve around travel, and eating, and eating while traveling. She insists she can find her way to any coffee shop anywhere in the world, even while blindfolded. Follow all of her nonsense on her website www.LibbyKleinBooks.com/Newsletter/

Libby's World #LibbyKlein #SpotlightSunday #Giveaway #Figaro #Halloween #Mischief Night

 

Welcome to Libby's World

Where we celebrate all things chocolate, coffee, cats, and cozy. Full of gluten-free baking and sarcasm. Just so you know, Sir Figaro Newton (pictured above) is pretty much in charge.

I grew up in South Jersey where the sass comes from. I did not always want to be a writer. That seemed so far above my abilities it didn't even enter my mind that it could be possible. Instead, I worked a host of minimum-wage jobs that allowed frequent visits to the orthodontist since I was raising four kids in braces. My absolute favorite job was working in a bookstore. There was something very gratifying about putting the books in order on a bookshelf. My kids learned very young that the way to get out of trouble fast was to make me laugh. Humor has always been one of my love languages. Along with coffee. Here I am with my writing partner, Miss Eliza Doolittle. I have typed entire scenes one-handed just like this. I wrote my first book, Class Reunions Are Murder at the urging of my husband who had a lot more faith in me than I had in myself. And you'd better believe that I was both thrilled and stunned when it was published. It's a very fictionalized version of my life including my real-life cat, Sir Figaro Newton, and my real-life grandmother as Aunt Ginny Frankowski. Here we are below. I'm the one ripping open that present.

Growing up I wanted to be a pastry chef. That was before I was diagnosed with Celiac and Hashimoto's. Two diseases that mean gluten is your enemy. Gluten is the protein structure in most baked goods that makes them light and fluffy and stretchy so they rise and get all tender and chewy and lovely. Without gluten, most baking becomes a matter of magic and trickery. How can I make this dough think it's bread and not a yeasty doorstop? Being an avid reader of culinary cozies, I quickly learned how impressionable I am to the power of suggestion. If the main characters are eating cupcakes, I start craving cupcakes. The only problem is that cupcakes make me explode. When I began writing my series about a plus-sized, middle-aged woman with Hashimoto's starting life over in her hometown of Cape May (a lot of coincidences there) I wanted to include gluten-free recipes for people like me who could normally only lick the page. Now we can eat the book goodies too. All my recipes in Mystery Lovers' Kitchen are gluten-free.

As my series has grown, I've loved bringing my readers a taste of Cape May. The beach, the landmarks, the culture. My Halloween book is my most recent release where I introduce you to a South Jersey holiday - Mischief Night. A real event that happens the night before Halloween also known as prank night. Aunt Ginny signs Poppy up to host a gourmet dinner tour and neglects to mention that it's a Haunted House tour complete with ghost stories. Stories about ghosts that they don't have. Or do they? People are starting to call Poppy's Bed and Breakfast the Murder House even though no one has ever died there. Until now. The entire book is full of fun Halloween pranks, a Paranormal TV Show investigation, and Owen Rodney - Pet Psychic. Here's my clan as the Addam's Family including a Pugsly Fig. And below is five of my eleven grandchildren! I'm really not that old. When properly motivated, your kids can make you a grandparent in your mid-thirties.

Some Random Facts About Me

As I've gotten older I've become dyslexic. That means a lot of typing, backspacing, and retyping. I've typed entire words completely backward. Even I was impressed. I'm not always sure what's wrong with a word, I just know the red squiggly line means it's wrong.

I have always been a cat person. I give off a cat lady vibe, and wherever I go, cats in the area will chase me down meowing for attention.

I've been married for thirty-seven years, and my father still owes me a car for not getting divorced before my second anniversary.

I have written and performed in plays at my church. Here is me in one of my costumes. You're missing the hot pink velour pants. I look a lot like one of my best friends when she's not in costume. That may or may not have been an accident.

I can't remember most of my childhood or adolescence anymore, but I can name 70s and 80s rock songs by the first couple of notes.

I don't like seafood. Nothing. Nada. Not even ______ fill in the blank. 

If you want to spend more time in my world, come on over to my website and sign up for my Mischief and Mayhem Newsletter. It comes out monthly most of the time and includes Figaro's self-help column which isn't that helpful unless you consider catnip holistic medicine. If you have a problem you want to receive some utter nonsense for, send Figaro a message. Here he is in his office waiting to make fun of you like he does me.

Enter my Giveaway!

Leave me a comment on my post and I'll let Figaro select a random winner to receive one of my books. US and Canada only. The giveaway ends Monday at midnight, MISCHIEF NIGHT!

Meanwhile, this is happening on my desk.

Poppy McAllister discovers that gluten-free Halloweens can scare up another case of murder in the latest installment of this delightful culinary B&B mystery series! - Kirkus Reviews

Poppy is none too pleased when her B&B is coerced into participating in the Cape May Haunted Dinners Tour during Halloween season. Though her knack for finding dead bodies has given the place a spooky reputation, the Murder House is a completely undeserved nickname. At least it used to be . . .
 
While Poppy wrangles with some guests who can’t stop squabbling with each other—including a paranormal researcher, a very quirky pet psychic who freaks out her portly Persian, and an undercover tabloid reporter eager to catch her staff in a lie—one of them winds up facedown in a plate of tiramisu. And now she has bigger worries than getting her house TP’d . . .
 
Includes Recipes from Poppy’s Kitchen!
 

Libby Klein grew up in Cape May, NJ where she attended high school in the '80s. Her

classes revolved mostly around the Culinary sciences and Drama, with one brilliant semester in Poly-Sci that may have been an accident. She loves to drink coffee, bake gluten-free goodies, collect fluffy cats, and translate sarcasm for people who are too serious. She writes from her Northern Virginia office where she serves a very naughty black smoke Persian named Sir Figaro Newton. You can keep up with her shenanigans by signing up for her Mischief and Mayhem Newsletter on her website. www.LibbyKleinBooks.com/Newsletter/