 On Thursday October 8th, Meredith Public Library welcomed New Hampshire author Jessie Crockett to the library. She presented to an audience of approximately twenty. The mystery book club read her work, Live Free or Die, which she discussed and she spoke briefly about her series, Sugar Grove Mysteries. |  Live Free or Die is a crime novel that opens with Gwen, the postmistress and assistant chief of the volunteer fire department arriving on the scene of a fatal fire. She teams up with the state fire investigator, Hugh, to try and come up with who murdered the owner of the local museum and why. As the story unfolds the reader is introduced to a number of flawed characters, one of whom is presumably the murderer. Jessie notes that writing about perfect characters would be boring and would likely bore the reader as well. |
Jessie also writes paranormal historical fiction under her married name, Jessica Estevao, and has a book about to be published set in Old Orchard Beach, Maine, in 1898. Two thirds of the book are written from the perspective of the female lead who is pretending to be a psychic, while the other third is written from the perspective of a male detective. When asked if she has difficulty writing in a male voice or even having prominent male characters, she said that she did not, and found a great deal of success writing men who exhibited attributes that men would find admirable, such as strength of conviction and depth.
Jessie has lived in New Hampshire since she was eight, when her parents moved from Maine,
Jessie has lived in New Hampshire since she was eight, when her parents moved from Maine,