As an English major, I’ve read a lot of books. That’s probably not surprising. I grew up reading Nancy Drew mysteries, Babysitters Club stories, Sweet Valley Twins and Sweet Valley High sagas (let’s be honest, some of these were like soap operas), and The Cat Who … mysteries, among many, many other things. I actually think I read over half the books in our small town library when I was little. When I ran out of things that were appropriate, I grabbed whatever, aside from the books with the shirtless men that were stacked in one of the windowsills there. I still ended up with some questionable things, though. I read East of Eden in eighth grade and quietly realized that there was an intimate scene in there that probably wasn’t meant for little readers. Don’t tell Mom. I remember reading it from an analytical standpoint, thinking Well that’s interesting, and then dropping it back in the book drop. Maybe the librarian should have steered me in another direction, lol.
In college, I read tons of classic literature, but I really liked the earlier stuff, Victorian and anything before that, mostly because I was guaranteed not to deal with anything too spicy or aggressive. It seemed like most “serious” literature after the Victorian age featured abuse of some form, not always moving the story along, and I wasn’t a fan.
Basically, I like a happy ending.
Toward the end of my master’s program, I was fascinated by the creativity that the fantasy realm brought to the world of books. It not only gave a good answer for what to do when tech failed us (I really want a teleporter), but it also had rules, which I love. The idea of creating an entire world that had to follow a new set of rules was tempting to me, so I started writing the first series I worked on, a middle grade fantasy series. But there were elements of mystery throughout, puzzles to solve and questions to answer.
My love for mystery books from my childhood kept coming back.
Of course, for years, while I was getting my degrees and then working on my career, home, and relationships, I found that there was little time to read. I was bonding with people by going out for drinks, hosting a barbeque, or grabbing lunch. It’s hard to read as a group, and I wasn’t aware of book clubs. I don’t know if there were any where I lived either.
After writing four middle grade fantasy books and one chick lit, everything came to a screeching halt when my first daughter came into the world in 2012. No time to read or write; however, I read a lot of children’s books. Obviously, I decided to write a couple when my kids were little because they were short enough that I could write them quickly, and I could illustrate them when the girls were playing.
I didn’t write for a while after that until 2021, when the big mystery that eventually became Braving the Shore would not leave me alone: how do you take the horrible thing that someone did (in a show I watched) and turn it into something accidental, benign? Something that could be an innocent mistake. I finally turned that into the crux of the book and banged out that story in six weeks.
Mystery kept calling me, along with sweet romance. I loved the idea of having puzzles to solve and also having that relationship and happy ending. In today’s society, it’s nice to have a comfort read, and it’s fun to have something to untangle that you know will turn out well. So I kept writing that type of book and did four more.
This fall, when I was nearly done writing Ashes and Other Inheritances, I returned to my roots. I found a copy of The Cat Who Knew Shakespeare in Woolly Bear Books, Carnegie, Pa., and devoured it. After that, I went on a nerdish quest: Can I get the whole series? The answer is yes, and I found almost the entire set of this series in one lot on eBay. They are exactly as I remember them, not only cozy mysteries with characters I love, but also a perfect setting, a world from the author’s imagination that I would love to visit. Reading them again feels like home.
And it’s been interesting to see where my own writing habits come from, the way things are phrased, the way stories developed. I have a lot of influences from my life and from contemporary romance, but I also see my childhood love of mystery novels in my own work.