Gnome Alone

Christmas is coming… and so is murder… It’s holiday season in small-town Doyle, and the town is pivoting from UFO tourism to Bigfoot Days. What’s the owner of a UFO-themed B&B to do? Stop the shift, of course. And control-freak Susan Witsend is just the woman to put the alien back in… Christmas? But when Bigfoot is blamed for a mass garden gnome theft, Susan is drafted to track down the kidnapped gnomes. The holiday season hits another sour note with the murder of a member of her caroling group. Are Susan’s organization skills up to juggling missing gnomes and tracking down a killer in time to ring in the festivities? Because as Susan and friends unwrap motives and alibis, she finds herself adding more names to the naughty list. She may have to face some hard truths about her own limits and about just how far a not-so-jolly killer will go… Gnome Alone is book five in the laugh-out-loud Wits’ End mystery series. A fast-paced and funny mystery packed with quirky characters, pets, and murder, it’s perfect for fans of Jana DeLeon, Janet Evanovich, and Donna Andrews. Get cozy and beam up this hilarious mystery today! Susan’s Bigfoot Investigation Protocol at the back of the book!

It's a cozy collection of Kirsten Weiss's funniest Christmas mysteries! In Deja Moo, a holiday tradition turns deadly, but is the San Benedetto paranormal museum to blame? In Gnome Alone, Christmas is coming to small town Doyle and Susan's UFO-themed B&B… and so is murder… And kidnapped garden gnomes... And... Bigfoot? In Gingerbread Dead, Tea and Tarot room owner Abigail is having a hard time getting into holiday mode. Will solving a quirky murder may take a Christmas miracle? Three holiday mysteries from three of Kirsten's comedy cozy mystery series. If you love laugh-out-loud mysteries, you'll love this collection. Buy it now!

In this folkloric examination of mass-produced material culture in the United States, Jeannie Banks Thomas examines the gendered sculptural forms that are among the most visible, including Barbie, Ken, and G.I. Joe dolls; yard figures (gnomes, geese, and flamingos); and cemetery statuary (angels, sports-related images, figures of the Virgin Mary, soldiers, and politicians). Images of females are often emphasized or sexualized, frequently through nudity or partial nudity, whereas those of the male body are not only clothed but also armored in the trappings of action and aggression. Thomas locates these various objects of folk art within a discussion of the post-women's movement discourse on gender. In addition to the items themselves, Thomas explores the stories and behaviors they generate, including legends of the supernatural about cemetery statues, oral narratives of yard artists and accounts of pranks involving yard art, narratives about children's play with Barbie, Ken, and G.I. Joe, and the electronic folklore (or "e-lore") about Barbie that circulates on the Internet.

This book of poems is meant for everyone, although some of the poems are written primarily for children. These are interspersed with other poems some of which, it is expected, will be better comprehended by mature readers. It is the authors sincere desire that the reader be as enthused by the contents of this book as he, the author, was in writing it.