Today Nick, the cat, is visiting Ascroft, eh? to tell us about Hiss H for Homicide, the latest novel in the Nick and Nora mystery series.

Welcome, Nick. Let’s get started, shall we?

Tell us about the novel that you live inside. Is it part of a series? If so, please tell us about the series too.

Nick the cat:  Meow, yes, HISS H FOR HOMICIDE is the fourth in the Nick and Nora mystery series.  My human, Nora Charles is an ex-investigaive reporter who returns to her hometown of Cruz, California, to run her deceased  mother’s sandwich shop.  She adopts me, a tubby tuxedo cat who formerly belonged to a PI who right now is MIA.  I help her solve  mysteries by communicating with her via my favorite toy, Scrabble Tiles. In Hiss H for Homicide Nora and I try to clear Desiree, her mother’s friend and a romance writer, of murdering her writing partner who was going off on her own with a steamy tell-all!

Does the writer control what happens in the story or do you get a say too?

Well, the writer thinks she controls it but I have to tell you, once I get started detecting I just cannot be stopped!  Call it feline intuition, meow.

How did you evolve as the main character?

Nora and I both share the spotlight as main characters, but I have to admit I have a bit of an edge. After all, I’m cool, I’m cute, and I’m a cat. What more could anyone ask?

Do you have any other characters you like sharing the story with? If so, why are you partial to them?

I really like Ollie – Oliver Sampson, my former owner’s partner.  He’s what humans refer to as a ‘cool cat’. I also like Chantal, Nora’s bestie. She’s the one who encouraged Nora to adopt me.  I do hate, though, when she wants to try out her new cat collars that she designs on me!  I’m just not a cat who likes to be confined by anything!

What’s the place like where you find yourself in this story?

I am usually the one who figures everything out—it’s that feline intuition, remember—and the ways I communicate my findings to Nora are prevalent throughout the book.

Is there anything else you’d like to tell readers about you and the book?

Fans have asked for more of this series since Penguin discontinued it in 2016 and four years later, thanks to Beyond the Page, Nick and Nora are back!!!  and, I hope, better than ever.  I hope fans will agree it was worth the wait.

Thank you for answering my questions, Nick, and good luck to you and your author, T.C. LoTempio, with Hiss H for Homicide, the latest book in the Nick and Nora mystery series.

Readers can learn more about Nick and his author, T.C. LoTempio by visiting the author’s website, her Facebook page and Rocco’s blog.

The novel is available at the following online retailers:

 Amazon – B&N – KOBO – Google Play

About T.C. LoTempio: While Toni Lotempio does not commit – or solve – murders in real life, she has no trouble doing it on paper. Her lifelong love of mysteries began early on when she was introduced to her first Nancy Drew mystery at age 10 – The Secret in the Old Attic.  She and her cat pen the Nick and Nora mystery series originally from Berkley Prime Crime and now with Beyond the Page Publishing.  They also write the Cat Rescue series from Crooked Lane and the Pet Shop series, originally published by Midnight Ink and continued in 2021 with book two, KILLERS OF A FEATHER, from Beyond the Page.