Writing
TV Nerd
One of my favorite authors — and people — Alafair Burke gave me the opportunity to totally geek out and talk about the crime television shows I love now and loved as a kid. Suffice it to say, after rambling on in print about everything from “Moonlighting” to “Hawaii Five-O,” from “The Wire” to “Battlestar…
Read MoreIt Doesn’t Get Old
Last week I received the galley (an early proof for reviewers) of my upcoming book DIE FOR YOU, which will publish in June 2009. It’s beautiful – another stunning cover from the folks at Random House. And when it arrived I was washed over with the same sense of thrilled excitement and gratitude as I…
Read MoreMusic Behind Black Out
This week I wrote an essay for largeheartedboy.com about the music I was listening to when I wrote BLACK OUT. Music plays a large part in my process and that was especially true for this novel. From LargeheartedBoy.com: In the Book Notes series, authors create and discuss a music playlist that is in some way…
Read MoreThe Disease
T he desire to write is a disease, a congenital condition. Writers are born with the germ. We don’t contract it later on. Hopefully we discover what’s wrong with us early, otherwise perhaps we wind up institutionalized rather than published. I am sure there’s a cure — a traditional education, a 9-5 job, or an…
Read MoreThe Lost Girl
The theme of “the lost girl” is something I find surfacing in my work again and again. She turns up missing, murdered, abused, neglected. She’s helpless, powerless, unable to circumvent the horrible things that befall her. In earlier novels, my protagonist true crime author Lydia Strong* has an obsession with lost girls, never realizing until…
Read MoreAm I Really Blogging About My Blog?
Currently, I blog the way I take supplements, that is to say infrequently but with great earnestness and optimism. I enjoy the idea of blogging, the concept that I might muse about the issues I face daily – the writing life, the mother-writer balance, the joys and pains of my chosen profession. Notes from the…
Read MoreAspiring Writer to Published Author | The Journey
I used to give this talk with some regularity when I first went from being an aspiring writer to a published author. I chose this topic because my journey is somewhat unique, because I have a great deal of experience in the publishing industry, and because initially people weren’t that interested in hearing from an…
Read More