Family History Mystery

Unscheduled Murder Trip Bodies turn up in the strangest places in the Maryland Mountains. Digger Browning lost her job and her uncle. Then she found her reinvigorated uncle sitting on the kitchen table in the Ancestral Sanctuary, the home she inherited from him. A bigger surprise was tripping over a body while taking pictures at the abandoned former train depot. Digger begins to think the body she found is linked to a long-ago disappearance in her town of Maple Grove. She digs into old records and wonders if the fifty-plus year-old murder relates to her current business and a modern-day death. As she tries to make sense of the past and present, Uncle Benjamin's spirit roams the Ancestral Sanctuary and goes where Digger goes, including the graphic design firm Digger founded with her friend Holly. He never hesitates to offer a pithy comment. Meanwhile, Digger's friend Marty wonders if Digger's odd mutterings mean she's losing it. He gets more convinced when Digger seems to call to her uncle as someone takes pot shots at the two of them. What happens when an apparition's medium tells others about the ghost that she alone sees? Will Digger have to lose Uncle Benjamin to get close to anyone else?

Mountain Rails of Old, third book in the Family History Mystery Series.Digger's mountain hides some aspects of its past. Rumor says it hosted a stop on the Underground Railroad, and it boasts remains of the first schoolhouse west of Cumberland. She never paid much attention to the abandoned cottage and its long-gone occupants until she accompanied her friend Marty, who wanted to photograph it for a potential news story. Everything changed when Uncle Benjamin made a huge discovery nearby. What really happened to Samantha and her ten-year old daughter fifteen years ago? If it hadn't been for a growling raccoon, Digger might not have tried to find out.Her friend Holly doesn't like the ancestors Digger found for her, and Marty thinks she's distanced herself rather than level with him about how she feels. She doesn't realize that her search for the waystation for escaping slaves will cross paths with efforts to bring Samantha home. And that path doesn't lead to a safe haven.Join Digger, Marty, and Uncle Benjamin as they sometimes operate at cross-purposes to solve old mysteries and unlock the mountain's secrets. Western Maryland at its elusive best.

Digger Browning had had a falling-out with her reporter friend Marty and she isn't sure they can fix it. To distract herself, Digger and her very pale Uncle Benjamin sort through boxes in the cellar of the Ancestral Sanctuary. They find a carefully wrapped (but broken) ornament Uncle Benjamin's late wife, Clara, found and cherished. It had been made by the Meadow Mountain Ornament Factory, which burned in 1948. Digger is surprised she never heard of the firm, especially because of its sad ending. She meets Hank, a man whose family owned the firm. He's puzzled about why his great grandmother never talked about the company or its demise. He and Digger learn a young man died in the fire, though his body wasn't immediately discovered and could not be identified. Audrey, the great granddaughter of Garrett County slaves, briefly met the young man, who had been passing through town. He told her his first name was Abraham, and she believes people didn't try hard to identify him because he was a stranger and because he was African American. People cared less than they would today. Hank commits to trying to learn who he was and erecting a meaningful stone marker in the local A.M.E. Cemetery. The search is a chance for to do some research with Marty -- even if they are barely talking to each other. A snowstorm complicates things, but gives Digger a chance to get wise counsel -- and occasional teasing -- from her cousin Franklin. It also gives Marty a new appreciation for Maple Grove as he helps dig out the town. The snowed-in silence of Christmas Eve brings reflection and maybe a chance to make things right again. Digger and Franklin also realize that Aunt Clara kept that ornament in memory of young Abraham. Maybe the damage can heal. Elaine L. Orr writes four mystery series, including the fourteen-book Jolie Gentil cozy mystery series, set at the Jersey shore. "Behind the Walls" was a finalist for the 2014 Chanticleer Mystery and Mayhem Awards. The second book in the River's Edge series--set in rural Iowa-- "Demise of a Devious Neighbor," was a Chanticleer finalist in 2017.The Logland series is a police procedural with a cozy feel, and began with "Tip a Hat to Murder" in 2016 The Family History Mystery series, set in the Western Maryland Mountains began with "Least Trodden Ground" in 2020. The second book in the series, "Unscheduled Murder Trip," received an Indie B.R.A.G. Medallion in 2021.She also writes plays and novellas, including the one-act play, "Common Ground" published in 2015. Her novella, "Falling into Place," tells the story of a family managing the results of an Iowa father's World War II experience with humor and grace. Another novella, "Biding Time," was one of five finalists in the National Press Club's first fiction contest, in 1993. "In the Shadow of Light" is the fictional story of children separated from their mother at the US/Mexico border.Nonfiction includes :Words to Write By: Getting Your Thoughts on Paper: and :Writing When Time is Scarce. She graduated from the University of Dayton and the American University and is a member of Sisters in Crime and the Independent Book Publishers Association. Elaine grew up in Maryland and moved to the Midwest in 1994.Her fiction and nonfiction are at all online retailers in all formats -- ebooks, paperbacks, large print, and (on Amazon, itunes, and Audible.com) audio in digital form. Paperbacks can be ordered through Barnes and Noble Stores as well as t heir online site.Support your local bookstore! The family history mysteries by Elaine L. Orr take you to Garrett County in the Mountains of Western Maryland. Explore life today with Digger, a local graphics artist who has a knack for discovering things others might want to stay hidden. She gets perspective from her late Uncle Benjamin, who reappeared on her kitchen table soon after the last shovel of dirt fell onto his grave. His advice can be helpful, annoying, or witty - it depends on whether you want to hear it.