Elizabeth Blake Books In Order

Publication Order of A Jane Austen Society Mystery Books

Elizabeth Blake is the pseudonym of Carole Bugge who also writes as CE Lawrence. She has written more than a dozen novels, six novellas, poems, and short stories. She has received a lot of accolades and starred reviews over the years. Blake has received starred reviews from the likes of Ellery Queen, The Boston Herald, Booklist, Publishers Weekly, Library Journal, and Kirkus. Her short stories have been featured on many magazines and anthologies and she has won many awards and for her short fiction. She won the Eve of St. Agnes Poetry Award, the Jean Paiva Memorial Fiction award, Jerry Jazz Musician Short Fiction Award, the Chronogram Literary Fiction Prize, the Maxim Mazumdar Playwriting Competition, the Euphoria Poetry Competition and has been a two-time nominee for the Pushcart Poetry Prize. She has also been a finalist for the Henrico, MSU, and McClaren Playwriting Competitions and has been invited to read her works at the Colony Café, Merritt Books, Mercy College, the Knitting Factory, Barnes and Noble, the Gryphon and Inquiring Minds Bookstores. Her novel “A Day in the Life of Comrade Lenin” was an Honorable Mention for Best Fantasy and Horror Stories by St. Martin’s. She also holds the distinction of being the only writer to ever get her submissions included two years in a row into The Mystery Box and Vengeance 2013 and 2012 anthologies. This was quite a feat given that there were more than 600 submissions to the anthologies published by the Mystery Writers of America and edited by Brad Meltzer and Lee Child.

Blake has also been involved with musicals and plays and is a notable playwright. Her work has been presented in diverse places such as the Manhattan Punchline, The Bay Street Theatre, The Alleyway Theatre, the Open Book, The Players Club, and the Playwrights Horizons among many other theaters in New York City. She got a sponsorship from The Paper Mill Playhouse after winning the TCG Playwriting Award for two years in a row. She is listed at the Byrdcliffe Arts Colony Woodstock as Writer in Residence in addition to being International Writers Retreat Fellow in Scotland. On TV she was the head writer for “Human Relations 101” the television sketch. The National Achievement Awards named her juror in the fiction and playwriting categories. A woman of many talents, she has a Bachelors in English and German from Duke University from where she also learned voice and piano. She has taught at Woodstock, San Miguel, and Cape Cod Writers Conferences. She is now a professor of creative writing at New York University.

Elizabeth Blake is a self-confessed science geek and in fact, wrote a play named “Strings.” However, she did grow up in the country and her playground was Lake Erie and the woods, which meant she has a deep connection to nature. She perhaps got the inspiration for the title of her series A Jane Austen Society Mystery from the Audubon Society Field Guide to North American Mushrooms, which she bought and read for hours. She would then get into hunting, harvesting and cooking wild mushroom though so far none of her friends have been killed by her bizarre habits. Nonetheless, she has killed a few of her characters using her vast knowledge of toxic plants and chemicals. Blake does like to model some of her characters in Pride, Prejudice, and Poison such as Erin. Just like Erin she has the tendency to grab whatever is closest in her closest, which means that you will often find her hanging out in yoga tights. However, she is more lazy than vain as compared to Erin. Nevertheless, she does love to dress the Full Cougar with uncomfortable high heels, expensive clothing, and elaborate makeup when she is up and about. For Blake it is an expression of her comfort with her sexuality, vanity as well as an obsession with men.

“Pride, Prejudice, and Poison” is Elizabeth Blake’s first novel in the A Jane Austen Society Mystery series. It is similar in style to the mystery novels by Stephanie Barron or Laura Levine series with its morbid merger of murder and manners. In this debut that draws inspiration from Jane Austen, Blake writes about Erin Coleridge, the owner of an antiquarian bookstore. Erin bookstore is in Kirkbymoorside in North Yorkshire where most villagers love to spend time. The Jane Austen Society which she is a member also meets at her used bookstore once every month. But at one of the meetings, things go bad and the old guard gets into an altercation with the young Turks. The meeting takes a break for tea though tempers have not yet cooled down. But then Sylvia Pemberthy the club’s president falls dead, presumably poisoned. Erin now needs to find out who killed the president and if she was the only target. The charismatic Sergeant Rashid Jarral and the shy but handsome Detective Inspector Peter Hadley are the first respondents on the scene. There is a long list of suspects that includes Kurt Becker’s the president’s lover and Suzanne his tightly wound wife. It could also be Jerome the cuckolded husband who may have decided to finally do something about the threesome situation. Jonathan Alder a prominent member of the society may also have had the president in her sights. He had been one of the most vocal in his attacks against Sylvia the night before. But then Jonathan Adler is targeted and he narrowly avoids death. Erin does not think she any time to help bit the town’s cat lady named Farnworth persuades her that her intuition will be needed to help solve the case. But the killer may be more devious than they imagined.

2 Responses to “Elizabeth Blake”

1. SHERRY ROBBINS: 6 days ago

   Loved both books Hope another is soon to follow.

   Reply
2. Lois Butler: 2 years ago

   I have read both your mystery books and loved them. Hopefully another is soon to follow!

   Reply