Author Ray Moore is a dapper Englishman who loves living in The Villages and writing mysteries with a delightful twist. He taught English to Secondary School students for 38 years before retiring and moving to Florida. On his first day of retirement, his wife reminded him he’s always wanted to write but never had the time—now there was time.

An ardent fan of Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson, Ray wrote his first story about the two characters he most admired. However, the Literary Estate owns the trademarks and asked for their share. Ray went back to writing and came up with his own skillful characters.

“I knew I didn’t have the knowledge to write police procedurals, but I did want a detective like Sherlock Holmes,” Ray says. “Lyle Thorne is a former Metropolitan detective who has become a vicar for the Church of England. People know he was a detective sergeant, so they come to him when there are puzzling cases.”

The stories—and each book is a series of five short stories—are set in the Edwardian period in a town based on the small town where Ray grew up. Reginald Knowles is the scribe in the series, and he’s writing the stories of Lyle’s cases after the vicar’s death.

Ray enjoys writing true puzzles, such as having a man who’s a daily jogger go into a tunnel and never come out. He says the mystery isn’t solved until the last page of the book.

With his love of literature, Ray also writes a Critical Introduction series where he draws on his many years of teaching the classics. His books are available on Amazon and Amazon.co.uk, Barnes and Noble, Kobo ebook Store, and Smashwords.

Like Sherlock Holmes, Ray has his own philosophy of solving crimes. “The truth is in plain sight,” he says. “It’s just the last thing you’d expect.”

photo: fred lopez