My wandering mind recently wondered…how many words were in the English language. The answer, like so many, is … it depends. If you count every technical and archaic word, the number is around 600,000 according to co-pilot. The number in use is more like 200,000-300,000 with individuals using about 10% of that. (I’m pretty sure I don’t know 20,000 words, but we’ll go with it). So then I asked, “Hey AI, using 200,000 as the number of commonly used words in modern English, how many words could be added if a 27-letter alphabet was used?”
Now, I’m not buying either answer literally. BUT, adding a 27th letter opens up mind blowing possibilities. Maybe it can solve problems like having too many to’s. It makes you think.
Branch River Fire Fighter Barrett Turner was alone at the firehouse when an infant was abandoned in the Safe Haven box. New to the process, Barrett called the number posted on a flier for Child Protective Services. The woman who was dispatched, Tricia Vickers, took the baby and subsequently…tried to murder him! Now Barrett is working double time to keep little Davey safe and figure out why so many people have it out for the blue eyed sweetie.
Listen to Part 1 here or wherever you get Mysteries to Die For podcast
Subscribe to Mysteries to Die For new website to stay up to date on episode releases! https://m2d4podcast.com/
ABOUT Jason Little Jason Little is a Texas-based writer with a knack for spinning tales that keep readers hooked. His contributions to Mysteries to Die For are packed with twists, suspense, and unforgettable characters. When he’s not crafting mysteries, he’s writing fiction on his blog at JasonLittleWriting.com, where you can dive into more of his stories and musings.
A life insurance agent by day, Jason is also a proud dad of two, a loving fiancé, and a dog enthusiast. He’s big on exploring VR worlds, staying active, and finding inspiration in everyday life.
Follow him on X at @jasonlwriter and stay updated on his latest projects, or drop by his blog to read more and connect—he’d love to hear from you!
About Safe Haven We are not going to talk about infanticide but I will give you a little background on Safe Haven Baby Boxes. Many states have laws allowing for the safe and legal surrender of infants, something that was enacted to combat the abandonment of babies. Founded in 2015 by Monica Kelsey of the small city of Woodburn, Indiana, Safe Haven Baby Boxes are constructed boxes that hold a baby similar to a bassinette. These are installed in secure locations, including fire stations, with alarming to indicate to those inside that a child has been placed inside. The babies are attended to within minutes and ultimately entrusted to the local Child Protection. https://www.shbb.org/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Safe_Haven_Baby_Boxes
Eleanon Shady is dying. She has turned to her trusted attorney, Brenda Salsbury, to find her heir, the nephew she hasn’t seen for thirty years. The problem is three men claim to be John Shady. Now Brenda and her partner in training Dylan need our help to protect Nora’s estate and transfer it to her rightful heir. Here are the candidates:
John Sarasota, the sunny John who would be fun to have an umbrella drink with
John Chicago, the impatient John who leads with attitude
John Spokane, the sulky John whose spirit animal is eeyore
Listen here, on our new podcast website m2d2podcast.com, or wherever you get your podcasts!
ABOUT TG Wolff
Like you, I’m not one thing. I’m a writer, an engineer, a wife, and a mother. What is first on the list depends on the day. Beyond the title I claim, I’m a person who loves learning and thoroughly enjoys a good puzzle, is creative and gets bored easily. I hold a BS in Civil Engineering from Case Western Reserve University and an MS in Civil Engineering from Cleveland State University, which gives me absolutely no background in writing, but I do it anyway. Writing mysteries and engineering isn’t as different as you’d think. Both require using logic and process to get from a starting problem to a solution.
A Cold, Cold World is a cop mystery. Sheriff Bet Rivers is facing her first real challenge: the snowstorm of the century is bearing down on the small town of Collier, WA. She has a plan for keeping the main loop clear, the residents warm and healthy. Now she just needs to worry about her only deputy’s 9-months-pregnant wife and the dead body found on Iron Horse Ridge.
Bottom line: A Cold, Cold World is for you if you like classic mysteries against a background of life in action.
Listen to the first chapter and full review here or wherever you find Mysteries to Die For podcast
Elena Taylor spent several years working in theater as a playwright, director, designer, and educator before turning her storytelling skills to fiction. She writes the Sheriff Bet Rivers mysteries, featuring a female sheriff filling her late father’s rather big shoes in her small, mountain town. She also writes the quirky Eddie Shoes mysteries under the name Elena Hartwell. Elena is a senior editor with Allegory Editing, a boutique editing house, where she works one-on-one with writers to shape and polish manuscripts. Elena’s favorite place to be is at Paradise, the property she and her hubby own south of Spokane, Washington.
A note from the author: A Cold, Cold, World is available now in hardback, audio, and ebook. Paperback release is April 2025
A Cold, Cold World is promoted by Partners In Crime Tours, who represents a network of 300+ bloggers offering tailor-made virtual book tours and marketing options for crime, mystery and thriller writers from around the world. Founded in 2011, PICT offers services for well-established and best-selling authors, as well as those just starting out with their careers. PICT prides itself on its tailored packages for authors, with a personal touch from the tour coordinators. For more information, check out their website partnersincrimetours.com
Hello everyone! The break for the holidays was the perfect time to push out some changes to Mysteries to Die For. Just in time for our 8th Season: Anything but Murder, Mysteries to Die For is breaking off of TG Wolff’s writer website to a stand alone site:
Better organized and dedicated to the mysteries you love to solve, m2d4podcast.com is the site for:
Season 8 podcasts available days before it drops
NEW Author page with links to your favorite author’s episodes and website
Past seasons more readily accessible
UPDATED Toe Tags book reviews organized by date and by mystery type
Better companion anthology page
Follow the link and subscribe to m2d4podcast.com to keep receiving the (almost) weekly emails with episode and Toe Tag announcements.
Friday, January 10 it begins….
Join us for Episode 1: Who Shot Liberty’s Valence by Ed Teja where a startup pharma lab has gone up in flames. Suspected arson is the crime in this murderless whodunnit.
What’s next for TGWolff.com?
Over the coming weeks, the Mysteries to Die For content will transition out allowing tgwolff.com to focus on TG’s adventures in writing, both for podcast episode and full length mysteries.
Thanks for being a subscriber and we hope to see you on the new site and for the new season!
I am fortunate in that the Toe Tags I do as part of Mysteries To Die For exposes me to many authors and titles I wouldn’t ordinarily find on my own. Add to that list the books that are recommended by other readers and the ones my husband gives me and, well, I read a lot of mystery, crime fiction, and thrillers. This post contains those that I gave 5 start ratings to. To earn 5 stars from me, a story has to have flawless logic, no loose ends, great characters, and, of course, be entertaining. Happy Reading Detectives!
It’s 1895 and Payne McPherson has arrived at her professor’s home for a study session to find her hanging from her French doors. She turns to Cleveland police detective Cian Kelly for help and appoints herself his assistant. Their investigation takes a sinister twist when they find the remnants of a hangman game her professor lost. And she wasn’t the only one.
Listen here or wherever you get Mysteries to Die For podcast.
Lethal Standoffis an amateur sleuth mystery. A hostage standoff by a desperate man has innocent lives in the crossfire. After a hostage crisis ends with loss of life, Hostage negotiator Carrington Reed and reporter Levy Ehrlich follow through on promises to seek answers and protect a suspect’s family. But if solving problems were that easy, they would have been solved already.
Bottom line: Lethal Standoff is for you if you like your mysteries and thrillers woven into the life and faith of your detectives.
DiAnn Mills is a bestselling author who believes her readers should expect an adventure. She weaves memorable characters with unpredictable plots to create action-packed, suspense-filled novels with threads of romance. DiAnn believes every breath of life is someone’s story, so why not capture those moments and create a thrilling adventure?
DiAnn is passionate about helping other writers be successful. She speaks to various groups and teaches writing workshops around the country. She’s an avid reader, loves to cook, and believes her grandchildren are the smartest kids in the universe. She and her husband live in sunny Houston, Texas.
For historian Christian Shaw, nothing ruins Family Game Night faster than murder. Prosector Joe Poli Dead is late joining the game night when he has to work regarding the death of Sandra Kule, one of the heirs and working owners of Kule Ice Cream. The suspects, let’s just say they’re all in the family. The police like her sister Barb for the deed, but Joe isn’t so sure. Now Christian is using her specialized knowledge to root out the truth.
Listen here or wherever you get Mysteries to Die For podcast
ABOUT Sorry The game Sorry was created in England in the late 1920s by William Henry Storey, who registered it as a trademark in the UK in 1920 and receive a US patent in Aug 1930. The patent link is in the show notes. The patents describes in detail the parts of the board, the men, the cards, and how to play. Mr. Storey went on to say “the above apparatus used as above described is calculated and has been proved by experience to be a prolific source of amusement and provides a game which calls for the exercise of a great deal of judgment while being dependent in a measure on an uncertain factor such as is calculated to add to the excitement of the game, though due to the choice of moves allowed when certain cards are turned up, the influence of the element of chance as a determining factor is much reduced in comparison with the skill exercised by a player in choosing his moves.”
Several sources cite the Indian game Pachisi as inspiration or basis for Sorry. The link to the Wikipedia page is in the shownotes. Rather than a square board, Pachisi uses a cross-shaped board. The goal is to move all of your pieces onto and around the board before the other players. The number of spaces moved is determined by throwing shells and counting how many land upright. There are several variations of the game, some dating back to 1100-800 BC.
ABOUT Kathleen Marple Kalb https://kathleenmarplekalb.com Kathleen Marple Kalb describes herself as an Author/Anchor/Mom…not in that order. An award-winning weekend anchor at New York’s 1010 WINS Radio, she writes short stories and novels including the Ella Shane and Old Stuff mysteries, both from Level Best Books. As Nikki Knight, she writes the Grace the Hit Mom and Vermont Radio mysteries. Her stories have appeared in Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine, Black Cat Weekly, online, and in anthologies, and been short-listed for Derringer and Black Orchid Novella Awards. She, her husband, and son live in a Connecticut house owned by their cat.
SORRY NOT SORRY is part of Kathleen’s Old Stuff Mystery series. When Hollywood comes to a small Connecticut town, it should be the stuff of dreams…but a fading movie star drops dead on-set and a whole different kind of stuff hits the fan. Historian Christian Shaw uses her knowledge of old things to track the killer in THE STUFF OF MURDER, Kathleen Marple Kalb’s new Old Stuff Mystery, out now from Level Best Books.
The Machine Murders: Desert Balloonsis a serial killer story. Death has again found Interpol Chief Data Scientist Dr. Manos Manu. Hot air balloon pilots are being murdered in the United Arab Emirates, frozen to death high above the earth. Manos is dispatched to Dubai to support analysis by a software he led the creation of. But to generate correct answers, the software needs data, data that hides in the dark traits of men.
Bottom line: The Machine Murders: Desert Balloons is for you if you love high-tech code nearly as much as you love mysteries.
Listen to the mystery set up chapters here or wherever you get Mysteries to Die For podcast
Strengths of the story. The greatest strength of this story is the expert detail presented in the development, testing, and augmentation of machine learning systems. In his day job, CJ Abazis runs a software company and his expertise shines through here. The Machine Murders isn’t the typical high-level use of IT common in television shows like NCIS or Criminal Minds. Instead, the program is a rich as character as any of the humans and the language is true to life.
Much of this story is set in the Emirates. I found it to be a new and fresh scene, with texture and depth that supplemented the mystery. The justaposition of the uber high-tech with the traditional Arab culture made for fascinating reading. I cannot comment on how accurate Abazis’ representation of the culture was, just that it was well developed and added to the story.
The Machine Murders is structured as an extended story told in two parts. The first, Island Buoys, kicks off the story of Dr. Manos Manu and the use of machine learning models to hunt for the killer. The second, this story called Desert Balloons, picks up shortly after the end of the first. I have not read the first. The author does introduce the continuing Interpol characters and software basics to new readers. I do wonder if the machine learning would have been easier to follow if I had read Island Buoys.
As to how the logic stands up from the finish looking back, the result is fair. This is a mystery where the solution isn’t driven by testimony or evidence. The machine does the reasoning, using the additional information Manos identifies. We aren’t privy to actions or history of the suspects to be able to assess the logic of the solution and, as such, have the rely on the results from the computer system as correct. Manos confronts the killer, giving readers a satisfying end that the guilty party was found, but I was left with questions.
Overall, the pacing of the story did well to hold my attention. There were a few sections where I did not follow the change from one scene to another. While these ultimately did not affect the outcome of the story, I was pulled out of it as I went back to re-read. The thriller elements were written to align with a main character that was a chief data scientist, with Manos using his brains rather than fighting he way out of situations.
While the greatest strength of the story is the detail of machine learning, it is also the element that makes its less than accessible for some readers, including myself. Being an average technology end user at best, I simply could not follow the directions given to modify the code or or appreciate the results it generated.
The Machine Murders: Desert Balloons is unique in the mystery world for making the software itself a main character and is a must read for lovers of machine learning, artificial intelligence, and systems programming.
The Machine Murders: Desert Balloons is promoted by Partners In Crime Tours and is available from AMAZON LINK and other book retailers.
About CJ Abazis
CJ Abazis manages a software company in Athens, Greece. His Machine Murders stories were written in Greek and translated to English. You can find out more about the stories on CJ’s website and social media outlets.
TG Wolff 