Seven years or so ago, my friend Nona and I started a book club. Invitees were an assortment of wonderful women who over the years are some of my dearest friends on the mountain and beyond. I never would've met some of these women if not for Steel Azaleas, the name we gave ourselves. We're scattered across the Cumberland Plateau but meet once each month for fellowship and a book discussion.

I think anymore, we all would agree that the book selections are secondary to our bond in friendship. (Linda Leaming was so gracious to join our group last month to discuss the marvelous Married to Bhutan.) Our core group has remained intact except for one who moved away. Because we are somewhat diverse, so have our book selections become.

This month we're reading Open and Shut by David Rosenfelt. My eyes just about rolled out of my head when the book was delivered to my front stoop. I'm not much of a detective book fan. Not one bit. Grrrrr. Yet, every year we usually read one - and every year I surprise myself with the pleasure of off-roading into this genre. After all, who could possibly resist writing like this spoken by the attorney in our current selection, "And I still represent people who think Beef Wellington is a wrestler."

OMG! I love that sentence. And it's the perfect example why every year I develop a short-lived crush on detective stories. I so enjoy the clickitty-clack of dialog snapping like gum that's lost its flavor. I get giddy waiting for the next outrageous metaphor colored miles outside the lines. I swoon. Midst the temporary madness, I wonder why we don't read more detective novels! They're fabulous! Clever and well-written and so much fun!

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Years ago I was good friends with an author of detective novels - T. Jefferson Parker. If you're a detective novel fan, you know him. After friends introduced us, we hung out for a year or so - his wife had recently died after a long illness and my long marriage had failed. We got together once each week for tennis, dinner, a movie - whatever two heartbroken lonely people do. We never invited romance into our friendship - we were healing territory for each other. Jeff eventually found love again and married. I married the Zinc Group. (Inside joke) I'm still looking for love... I wouldn't make a very good detective.

I always dutifully attended Jeff's signing events when a new book arrived. I always spent the big bucks to buy the hardcover, but beyond his first book, Laguna Heat, I never read any of them. Not one. It was years later when I haphazardly picked up one and discovered he'd given most of his friends a cameo - including me. Since that discovery, I've wondered if he ever wondered why I never mentioned it. *laughing*

Okay. Gotta dash back to Open and Shut - the suspense is killing me.