An article about the creation of the Ashley Enright Investigations series.

Naples woman keeps teens mystified
By Charles Runnells
crunnells.news-press.com
Originally posted on August 09, 2006

Every summer, Lauren Smith and her brother tried cracking the mystery. The locked safe stood in her grandmother's garage. Tempting them. The dusty thing had been there since her grandmother moved into the house years before. And no one ever bothered calling a locksmith.

So whenever they visited, the duo spun the safe's dial and tried every combination they could imagine. They even used a stethoscope once to listen to the tumblers. No luck.

"We had no idea what was inside," recalls Smith, 47, of Naples. "It could have been anything. It could have been the crown jewels." Sadly, Smith and her brother never solved The Mystery of the Locked Safe.

But these days — thanks to her growing series of children's mysteries — Smith gets to solve other mysteries all the time. She does it through her fictional alter ego: a 12-year-old amateur sleuth named Ashley Enright, who seems to stumble upon one head-scratcher after another.

The first book in the series — "Ashley Enright Investigations" — came out in May. It's put out by Publish America, which specializes in writers that might be passed over by other publishers. A sequel is already scheduled for later this year...
... Even so, Smith doesn't have to look far to find Ashley Enright fans. Her own niece and nephew love the books, and they can't wait for the third, fourth and fifth installments (Smith's already working on all three). "It's an easy read," says Kaity Schroeder, 13, of Pennsylvania. "And it seems like these things could really happen."

Smith's nephew, Tyler Schroeder, actually gave Smith the courage to submit the 46-page book to a publisher. After she finished it in November, she e-mailed a copy to Tyler. When she showed up to visit for Thanksgiving, he greeted her at the front door with wide eyes. "He said, 'This is the best book I've ever read,' " Smith says. "And I thought, 'Oh, I might really have something here.' "

Tyler, 10, said the mystery — which involves a mysterious light flickering in a Maine lighthouse — kept him turning pages. "It seemed real," he says. "Ashley seems like one of the kids on our block."

Smith usually writes out her books in longhand, while sitting in doctor's offices or wherever else she happens to be. She hasn't gotten around to writing about that dusty old safe. Not yet anyway.

But who knows what might happen in future Ashley Enright adventures? Not even Smith knows for sure. That's part of the fun of writing them, she says.

"I'm always thinking, 'What's going to happen? What's going to happen?'" she says. "It's like I'm investigating along with them."