I write fiction as well as non-fiction and do corporate work for a few clients, but when I write my novels I try to be careful with non-fiction aspects. If I am writing in a particular locale I will create restaurants and such things that don’t necessarily exist, but I won’t put hills in South Florida or alligators in Paris. I try to be especially careful when working through plot details, so my scuba instructor husband (also retired Army) frequently helps me with technical items or I seek out other experts when required. For both Shades of Murder and Shades of Truth, I had a legal angle that was important to each story. Naturally I turned to my uncle, a retired judge, and my cousin, a current judge, to check these points before I included them in the plot. Naturally, I then listed them in the acknowledgements section of the books.

A few days ago, I received a delightful email from an individual residing in North Carolina who had found the three Shades books on Kindle and enjoyed them, but was curious about the acknowledgement to my uncle and cousin. She was from the small town close to them and had in fact, gone to junior high and high school in the same town where they live. She too was a graduate of Northwestern State University in Louisiana and said they had a little enclave of NSU grads that got together occasionally. We had a great email exchange and aside from having gained a new fan, it was a wonderful reminder of how it is indeed a small world and how the Internet has enabled us to have an increased level of connectivity. (Yes, I know that some people don’t always think that increased connectivity is a good thing.)