My Novel Magic Guest today writes cozy mysteries–Golden Retriever Mysteries. Read on to find out how his own wedding may have provided inspiration for Blessing of the Dogs–the latest in the series.
Wedding Mishaps
by Neil Plakcy
Your wedding can be one of the most important days in your life. But even with lots of planning, you can still run into trouble.
While my own wedding wasn’t an emergency, it did have to happen pretty quickly. My husband and I had been together for over twenty years, with no need to marry, until I began contemplating retirement.
My parents left me a good example. My father was seven years older than my mother, so statistically speaking, he was likely to pass away first. So when he retired, he took less on his pension than he could have, so that my mother would be able to inherit it. That was a sound financial decision since she outlived him by twenty-five years. During that time, she was covered by his retiree insurance as a supplement to Medicare, and she got about $500 a month after the insurance cost was deducted.
I’m in a similar situation with my husband—he’s six years younger than I am. When we investigated doing the same thing, we realized we had to be married to take that option. It was the tail end of Covid-19, and we didn’t want to expose anyone to a big party. So we recruited a couple to accompany us to the courthouse, knowing the husband would take photos.
The mishaps? I parked in the wrong garage, leading us on a winding way through government buildings. My husband left his driver’s license at home, and we had to return to get it—and I discovered I’d lost the parking ticket!
I guess we were both nervous.
We’ve all heard of people who get cold feet as a ceremony approaches, and brides (and grooms) left at the altar. My favorite mishap has been recreated in my recent book, Blessing of the Dogs. Miss Brown (first name eliminated to protect the guilty) a young woman I knew in high school invited me to her wedding.
She decided it would be cute to dress her parents in brown, like their name. And that she wanted her bridesmaids to wear big flowing gowns and picture hats, in varying shades of pastel. Her own look, however, was very modern—a slim silhouette with a turban on her head. The end result was that they all looked like they’d come from different weddings.
The wedding in my book is relatively error-free, except when the groom’s golden retriever (and his co-sleuth in this mystery series) escaped from his handlers and romps down the synagogue aisle on his own, stopping to sniff and lick guests along the way.
I’ve been to weddings where the bride and groom smeared each other’s faces with wedding cake, which seemed pretty passive-aggressive to me. Especially if the bride spent time and money on makeup for her special day. I’ve seen endless videos of people falling into their wedding cakes, sliding on slippery floors and so on. My favorite is a clip from the recent movie Red, White and Royal Blue where Alex and Henry get into a fight resulting in the wedding cake falling on them.
Nothing that dramatic happened at my wedding, once we found the right office and had the right documents. We went out for lunch with our friends and celebrated and so far, we’ve lived happily ever after.
That’s what I hope for the couple in Blessing of the Dogs as well.
Though their HEA is going to continue to be interrupted by murders to solve – even on their upcoming honeymoon!
Blessing of the Dogs by Neil Plakcy
Steve Levitan and Lili Weinstock are on their way to the altar—but dognapping and murder get in the way.
The theft of the vice-mayor’s dog unveils a widespread pattern of canine thefts. Could those poor pooches be on their way to a testing lab or a puppy mill? And how does that case play into the death of a Billy Joel tribute act? Could the caterer they’ve hired be responsible?
It will take all of Steve’s hacking skills and Rochester’s talent for nosing out clues to close these cases before Steve and Lili can walk down the aisle… or will a killer ruin their happy ending?
Blessing of the Dogs blends humor, heart, and an intriguing puzzle only Steve, Rochester and readers can solve. It’s the perfect new installment for fans of this charming series.
Meet Neil Plakcy
Neil Plakcy has written over fifty novels and short stories in mystery, romance and adventure. His golden retriever mystery series was inspired by his first golden, Samwise. Long walks with his current goldens give him plenty of time to think up new crimes and solutions—and Brody and Griffin provide love, entertainment, and endless piles of fur on the floor. Fortunately, he has a robot vacuum called Clean Latifah to take care of that.
