NaNoWriMo 2005
This year, like in my first year of NaNo-ing, I return to mystery rather than fantasy, and my Astin Redcross and Jules Winterborough stories. It's rather fun starting a new story with them in a period I haven't written much about before.
My profile at NaNoWriMo.org
Recently married, Astin Redcross and Jules Winterborough are not living together, because Jules is stuck in London setting up a nightclub with three friends while Astin is teaching in Cambridge. Both recognise the problem of their current separation but don't see a real solution for it; neither wants to limit the other in their life, and neither of them wants to intrude.
Astin returns to Cambridge after a weekend celebrating the official opening of Jules's nightclub and is soon afterwards asked to lead the university inquiry into the suspicious deaths of two female students, helped by his old friend Benjamin Lindsay. Before he can good and well settle in and start his own inquiries, a third death occurs, clearly connected to the others, and the Cambridge university community goes from staunch denial to deep panic, while Astin discovers his position has really landed him into an awkward and possibly very dangerous place, with the police grappling in the dark for answers. Throwing himself at the case, he soon finds himself caught up in an intricate web of leads going nowhere.
Not sure where to go next and what he can do more, Astin takes the weekend off and goes to his estate, where he finds Jules, who has quite the revelation for him, forcing him to deal with his previously suspended doubts and worries concerning his previous unstable family life. Just as the both of them are settling into a new kind of relationship (one which actually involves living together), a fourth death occurs, the details of which appear to indicate that the perpetrator has finally made some mistakes that the police can work with, and that the answer must lie within the university community itself. Complicating matters is the arrival of the latest victim's boyfriend, the son of an old friend of Astin's. Astin recruits Jules to investigate, and while doing so she finds out more of her husband's past than either of them was bargaining for.
The contents of these pages are © 2003, 2004, 2005 by Carterhaugh
All rights reserved. No part of the text on these pages may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the author.