Mystery Beckons Her
(Book 1 in The Flying Sleuth Series)

Glamorous even in death, the murder of a starlet upsets the Hollywood community, as the flying sleuth, a flight attendant with a degree in criminology, annoys the detective who can't calm their frayed nerves. Both the detective and her pilot boyfriend, want her to stop interfering in the case, but her determination and sense of justice ultimately solves the case.

Identity Intrigue
(Book 2 in The Flying Sleuth Series)

Flight attendant, Lucine Muir, is enjoying her job and condo on the beach in Florida, when she breaks her leg, and a man is murdered in Coconut Grove. Unexpected romance comes calling when an orthopedist loses his identity. She helps resolve the mystery with her sleuthing skills, and sails through stormy waters with her typical panache.

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Steaming Odyssey
(Book 3 in The Flying Sleuth Series)

From the glamour of Houston, to the steamy tropical jungles of Central America, it will take all of Lucine Muir's courage to stay alive while deceived by a covert operator masterminding American political affairs in El Salvador. Lucine thought she was only working as a Spanish translator for a coffee export business while she had a few days off as a flight attendant, never imagining she was immersed in the scandalous Iran Contra Affair. A Flying Sleuth Thriller

The Genesis of the Novel Steaming Odyssey

My madcap visit to El Salvador to escape suburban boredom began with a flight on TACA out of Houston, Texas to El Salvador via Belize, in 1984.  When a friend, a daredevil editor of Soldier of Fortune Magazine, needed a Spanish interpreter, and since my husband, a pilot with Continental Airlines was on strike, I figured I could use a job.

Although we only spent twenty minutes on the ground in Belize the camouflaged anti-aircraft guns covered by jute tentacles of net were silent indications of a no-nonsense approach safeguarding the runway.  A reminder that we would soon be disembarking in a country enmeshed in a war with Marxist guerillas.

Having spent July 1960 in Cuba visiting a friend while Fidel Castro assured the world he was not a communist, I was eager to see for myself the exact extent of the Soviet Union's rapacious reach.

Upon arriving at San Salvador's airport, we were given a warm welcome courtesy of Colonel Bustillo, and an escort of soldiers carrying M-16s, and taken to a waiting private plane which flew us to Ilopango Air Force Base.  My friend, alias, 'Iguana,' exchanged pleasantries and gifts with Major Arrevalo, and then we were whisked away like a bullet in the night to the Sheraton Hotel.  En route to the affluent residential section private bodyguards holding Uzis were stationed outside houses with huge metal gates and broken glass on top of the walls.

As our motley group ate supper in the patio restaurant while enjoying the balmy tropical evening, my first thought as I glanced around the tables was that all the men, whether American advisors, or Israeli agricultural advisors, or Latin businessmen, all had black leather cases on the tables with the zippers open in case the handgun inside was needed since we were in a "war zone." Suddenly paranoia set in and was to remain my faithful companion the entire week of my sojourn in Cuscatlan, as the Mayans had named it.

Until 1979, when the military overthrew the dictatorship of Gen. Humberto Ortega, and El Salvador's insurgents began terrorizing the tiny country the size of Massachusetts, tourism declined.  We passed the sleepy little town of Chalchuapa, which had remnants of a civilization dating back 1500 years with a pyramid of Tazumal, a photographer's paradise.  From there we drove to meet Lt. Col. Jorge Adalberto Cruz, Commanding Officer of Morazan Department at the Ilopango Air Force Base, where a group of the latest Huey helicopters sat on the tarmac surrounding Vice President Bush's presidential helicopter.  "Those four million dollar beauties are what we really want from the USA but with Washington not wanting to get into the war, we are happy to take the old ones left over from Vietnam," a pilot told me.

A sudden thought crossed my mind, if we didn't stop the Marxists in Central America, we would be facing them on the Rio Grande.  Later that evening, a handsome man wearing a Marine uniform walked into Col. Bustillo's office, and that was when my translating work began in earnest. I thought he was rather rude in not introducing himself to me, but then Lt. Col. Oliver North, was never there.  Supposedly, neither was I.

And now you know why I wrote the book:  Steaming Odyssey, as a novel. None of us were ever there!

Alinka Zyrmont