Marilyn's Musings

In fiction authors know to steer clear of circumstances that are considered too coincidental. Readers and reviewers will call them out on it. However, in real life coincidences often occur fairly frequently. For instance, when my husband and I lived in Philadelphia, every few months we’d drive up to New York City for a weekend of museum hopping and Broadway shows. On countless occasions we’d wind up bumping into people we knew from Philadelphia. Considering the population of Philadelphia and how many people are on the island of Manhattan on any given day, what were the odds of this happening even once, let alone half a dozen times over the course of three or four years? Still, it’s not a trope I’d ever use in a book. Truth might be stranger than fiction, but coincidence stretches the suspension of disbelief too thin for most readers. However, coincidence did play a role in the creation of Literally Dead , the second book in my Empty Nest Mystery series. An unbelievable...