Crime Bake Photos

I've been so busy, busy, busy that I'm really late with this.  And since I've got one more post after this (since today really is Nov. 22 and not November 9), this may end up being one big jumble.  Suffice to say: I had a 3 day blast with many panels, fun, a banquet, killer dessert, etc.  It was great to see friends who are really famous authors!

That's Judge Michael Ponsor on the left, author of (fictional) The Hanging Judge.  My Emily used to play with his daughter, Annie.  I'm two thirds of the way through Kate Flora's (right) Death Dealer which is a true crime novel.  

Here I am with Craig Johnson, the big special speaker/guest of the weekend.  He authors the Longmire books and the TV show made from his books is SO popular, Neflix has just picked it up to create a season 4.  Yahoo! I love the TV series too.

I chuckled at this picture -- as if he needed a name tag.  He wore "The Hat" everywhere, including taking a nap (with The Hat over his face) in the hotel lobby.

And yes, Craig Johnson is tall! You can see this because he is standing next to average height people.

Above is the "make up a story" panel.  That's Hank Philippi Ryan (TV anchorwoman and now much lauded award winning mystery author) with the $100,000 smile.  She's really a personality kid!

The moderator of the above group was Hallie Ephron (below).

This was a very funny and fun time.  We were at tables and there were cards in the middle of the table.  We each had to pick either a setting or a villain's name or a hero's name or a crime.  They had a paper bag for each category and the panel took turns drawing one card.  So one time we had [insert silly name] from Turners Falls who stole books and the bad guy was [insert other silly name].  We laughed and laughed and played the game three times.

My very favorite new thing was the Crime Scene.  We had to gather as much forensic evidence as we could and see if we could figure out "who done it."  We had actual CSI (state police) people telling us about it on the last day.  Little did we know it was a recreation of an actual crime scene!

Yup, there were two (count 'em) dead bodies (or db's as we like to call them).  These photos only show a small portion of the clues. I have lots more so that I could refer to them later, but unless you're into it as much as I am ... it's boring!

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And I thought of you all ... here is Death by Dessert!

And on the last day ...

I think the horse had let wind and I was reacting to that.  Actually, they had put Craig Johnson's face/head on John Wayne's body.  These two cardboard standups were decorations for the Saturday BBQ.

A good time was had by all!