Hello mystery and coffee lovers. My name is Alexandra Walters and I am the creation of mystery author Lorie Ham. She thought I might enjoy sharing with you a little more about myself and the little town of Donlyn where I live. So, in the spirit of good coffee why don’t we start with the NoName Café, the place where everyone in Donlyn ends up at some point during the day.

The Café first showed up in Murder In Four-Part Harmony. We needed a place to hang out and solve murders while being nourished, and a coffee shop of some sort seemed ideal, especially with Donlyn being a small town. It was decided that the best place for it would be downtown. The NoName was modeled after a combination of a diner/coffee shop that used to be in downtown Reedley, California (the town Donlyn was modeled after) called Maureen’s, and the Diner in the Andy Griffith Show. It has a nice homey fifties diner sort of feel to it. Something that has seldom been mentioned in following books is that connected to the Café was a little bookstore. Not sure if Lorie just forgot about it, or decided it wasn’t relevant to any of the other stories.

The Café’s name came about in a very odd way. While writing the first draft of Murder Lorie didn’t want to take the time to name the coffee shop, so just typed No Name Café. Well the name stuck and went on to not only be the place to meet in Donlyn, but has become a place online to find book reviews, author interviews and good coffee at http://www.lorieham.com/

Here is an excerpt about the NoName from the new book, The Final Note, coming in October of 2009:

The NoName Café was the place to go in downtown Donlyn. Not only did you find good food and a pleasant atmosphere, but at some point during the day almost everyone passed through the NoName. Early morning you’d find the local farmers, mid-morning local businessmen taking a coffee break, and lunchtime you often found the housewives enjoying lunch out before the kids got home from school. In the afternoon, the school kids would come by for the best milkshake and fries in town, and at dinner you could see almost anyone. So where better to hear what was happening in town?

Red haired waitress Missy Callahan is the face of the NoName, always there to scurry up and serve myself and anyone else who walks through the door. She is also a fountain of information about everything and everyone in Donlyn. Not that long ago her life was changed with the arrival of a baby boy named George.

While NoName serves standard diner food, it also has a drink created by my boyfriend, private investigator Stephen Carlucci. The drink is called OrangeUp and is a combination of orange juice and 7Up. As far as I know, Donlyn is the only place in the world that serves this drink.

If you want to go to the NoName Café you have to content yourself with going there in the books and online, as you can no longer find it’s counterpart in downtown Reedley, but you can find numerous small town café’s and diners that come close such as the Main Street Café on G Street (Main Street), or the Pub. You can also find other familiar Donlyn haunts like Valentino’s Italian Restaurant (which actually exists not only in Donlyn but in Reedley as well) on G Street. Just off G Street, you can find the Reedley Opera House, which was the inspiration for Donlyn’s Moonlight Café.

Well that’s it for this time around folks, hope you enjoyed the inside info. I need to get back to solving the latest murder in The Final Note, but I’ll check back soon. In the meantime, you can enjoy the NoName Café book reviews and author interviews on the website, and enjoy the Café in the other books in the series.

Oh yes, one more thing, check back soon, Lorie said she’s going to try and put up a few picks of the inspirations for some of these places.

Happy reading and good coffee,
Alexandra Walters, gospel singer and amateur sleuth

Favorite coffee/tea of your favorite mystery authors!

What kind of coffee and tea are your favorite mystery authors drinking, and where do some of them prefer to drink it?

Krista Davis
http://divamysteries.com
Equal Exchange Organic English Breakfast Tea.

Marilyn Meredith's
http://fictionforyou.com
Chai Tea I make myself and favorite place to drink it is at home.

Carola Dunn
www.geocities.com/CarolaDunn/
Tetley's English Blend and at bedtime Stash Lemon and Ginger.
Lovejoy's in San Francisco

Bill Cameron
bc@billcameronmysteries.com
Shade-grown Guatemalan, or maybe a blend of Sumatran and Central African beans
Starbucks at the corner of SE Division and 20th in Portland

Neil Plakcy
www.mahubooks.com
Teavana called "Coconut Aloha."

Patricia Stoltey
www.patriciastoltey.com
Douwe Egberts Dark Roast
La Dolce Vita Gelato Caffe in Fort Collins, Colorado

Kelli Stanley
Five Star July, 2008
www.kellistanley.com
Latte from Peet's Coffee, old fashioned drip Maxwell House or Chase and Sanborn
Peet's on West Portal in San Francisco; Tully's in San Francisco; Shotz Coffee and Drive-Through in Fortuna, CA

Lonnie Cruse
http://www.lonniecruse.com
Pumpkin Pie decaf from Kirchoff's Bakery in Paducah.

Vicki Lane
www.vickilanemysteries.com
The Brain Freeze -- at Malaprop's Cafe (part of a Terrific bookstore --
also called Malaprop's and located in Asheville, NC

Betty Webb
www.bettywebb-mystery.com
Full bore whole bean stuff from Trader Joe's and grind it up myself.

Jan Brogan
www.janbrogan.com
A skim milk cappuccino, one sugar
Blue Moon in Medfield, MA.

Vinny O'Neil
www.vincenthoneil.com
Gingerbread latte at the Seattle's Best cafe in the Borders Bookstore in Cranston, Rhode Island.

Rhys Bowen
www.rhysbowen.com
In summer- one of the Frappuchinos at Starbucks.
In winter-Einstein's Bagels in Phoenix AZ

Meredith Cole
www.culturecurrent.com/cole
Cappuccino at Atlas Cafe (Havemeyer and Grand Street) in
Williamsburg, Brooklyn.

Sandra Balzo
www.sandrabalzo.com
La Minita.
That Coffee Place in Brookfield, Wisconsin.

Karna Small Bodman
www.karnabodman.com
Starbucks/Verona

Shane Gericke
www.shanegericke.com
Lion Kona Coffee (from Hawaii)
Caribou Coffee

Gail Lukasik
www.gaillukasik.com
Green & white tea.
Gourmet dark expresso
Chocolate Chicken in Egg Harbor, WI (Door County).

Albert Bell
http://www.albertbell.com
French Vanilla Capuccino at my local gas station.

Baron R. Birtcher
www.BaronRBirtcher.com
Tropical Noir (100% Kona coffee, estate-grown by yours truly, and available for purchase through my website)
Lava Java, on the bay in Kailua-Kona, Hawaii.

Ken Isaacson
www.KenIsaacson.com
Starbucks Mocha Latte
"Pies By Design"

Elaine Viets
www.elaineviets.com
Favorite tea is Dragon Well, loose, not bagged.
Kerry Cottage Saint Louis, MO.

Julie Hyzy
www.juliehyzy.com
Favorite coffee - whatever dark blend is brewing (with just bit of cream)
Favorite tea - Cinnamon Sunset
Barnes & Noble café

John Foxjohn
www.johnfoxjohnhome.com
Regular coffee
IHOP

Ashna Graves
www.ashnagraves.com/
Homeroasted http://www.orlegacycoffee.com/index.html

Hailey Lind
www.haileylind.com
Peet's French Roast
Peet's recently honored me with "Peetnik" status and sent me a gift card and bag for writing about Peet's in my books!

Beverle Myers
http://www.beverlegravesmyers.com
Latte with double expresso at Heine Brothers at Eastern Parkway and Bardstown Road in Louisville, Kentucky.

Vicki Delany
www.vickidelany.com
Princess of Darkness brand
Oso Negro in Nelson, B.C.

Elena Santangelo
www.elenasantangelo.com
Black Indian tea: Assam blends or Darjeeling

Sheila Connolly
www.sarahatwellwriter.com
Peet's in Berkley.

Sharon Rowse
www.sharonrowse.com
Decaf French Roast
Calhoun's ( www.calhouns.bc.ca ),
in Vancouver, BC.

Rob Walker
www.RobertWWalkerbooks.com
Joe's Cafe at BAM, books-a-millon and Taylor Books and Coffee Shop, both in
Charleston, WV, if not at the Capitol Market at Frog Creek Books
and Capitol Brew, also in Charleston.

Pat Browning
http://www.authorsden.com/patbrowning
http://pbrowning.blogspot.com/
Twinings Prince of Wales
Irwin Street Inn, Hanford, California

Jack Getze
Mild-roasted Columbian offered at the
St. Petersburg, FL shop of Bad Ass Coffee of Hawaii
http://www.badasscoffee.com/

Mary Reed
http://home.epix.net/~maywrite/
Black Coffee
Black Silk Coffee and Earl Grey Tea

Chris Grabenstein
www.ChrisGrabenstein.com
Dunkin' Donuts French Vanilla.
Addicted to coffee

Margot Justes
www.mjustes.com
Starbucks is the coffee shop of choice
Starbucks coffee and Twinings Tea

Aileen G. Baron
www.aileengbaron.com
Twining's Earl Grey, French Roast (decaf) and Bedouin coffee

Luisa Buehler
www.luisabuehler.com
Mocha Madness
Favorite coffee shop Joyful's Cafe

Chester Campbell
http://www.chesterdcampbell.com
Cappuccino French Vanilla

Alexandra Sokoloff
http://alexandrasokoloff.com
Anything but Starbucks
Twinings' Blackcurrant
The Tea Shop at the Huntington Gardens, Pasadena, CA

Lorie Ham
www.LorieHam.com
Starbucks Caramel Machiato
A little coffee shop in Scotland