The Long and Winding Road -- And a Castle Staircase, Too

I'm oh-so-close to finishing this draft of my latest mystery. The good news for my hopes of finishing the book in a timely manner is that I'm heading out to Left Coast Crime, a fabulous mystery convention where I'm sure to be inspired by mystery authors whose books I love -- and who I only know about because they managed to let themselves type "THE END." 

Winding roads and labyrinthine staircase photos are in order for my current state of mind:

The middle of nowhere (officially)
AKA the dead of winter in beautiful Cornwall, England

Mont Saint Michel, France

One of my favorite mystery novels of all time takes place at Mont St. Michel along the Normandy coast in France: OLD BONES by Aaron Elkins. The tides that surround this fortress set the scene for the mystery featuring "skeleton detective" Gideon Oliver.

As you can see in the photo above, the island can be reached by a narrow man-made road that sits above the tide. But it's much more fun to think about the quickly-rising tides that cover the quicksand that surrounds most of the island. And when you're on the island looking out at sea through the fog, it's easy to imagine a time when the tide would trap you on the island abbey.

A castle in Wales with winding staircases to nowhere.

(I know, I know, I wanted to do this blog so I could organize my photos, and "castle in Wales" is hardly descriptive. Promising to post photos is definitely helping, but I've still got some gaps in my notes)

--Gigi