When did you realize you wanted to write novels?
When I was about nine years old, after reading Little Women for the first time.
How long did it take you to realize your dream of publication?
Several decades. I first attempted novel writing in my late twenties, but then I spent many years doing things other than creating fiction.
Are you traditionally published, indie published, or a hybrid author?
All of the above. My first novel, Never Before Noon, was published by a small traditional press that later folded. I regained my rights and republished the novel. By then, I had already independently published the second book in the trilogy, Never Until Now, because the small press was foundering. I also indie-published the trilogy’s final installment, Never More Human. My latest book, Chasing Ashes, is a hybrid publication with Celestial Echo Press, whose owners, Ann Stolinsky and Ruth Littner, I had already known for a decade as writers and the editors behind Gemini Wordsmiths.
Where do you write?
At my dining room table, where I have more room to spread out. Also, a better view than my tiny office offers.
Is silence golden, or do you need music to write by? What kind?
I need silence now, after too many years listening to news radio while I was an editor at newspapers and public media.
How much of your plots and characters are drawn from real life? From your life in particular?
All of my published novels include journalists—I worked as a reporter or editor for decades. And I try to keep my plots true to the era in which they are written. In my vampire books, for example, the reporter is covering the pre-Brexit European Union and eurozone. I wrote those novels when I was a business editor at the Philadelphia Inquirer. Chasing Ashes includes a scene loosely inspired by an incident I observed with two of my college roommates many years ago, and several characters in that book are composites based on those roommates.
Describe your process for naming your character?
My main Chasing Ashes character, reporter Laura Cunningham, is a reserved, hardworking, and fiercely loyal woman who grew up in the suburbs of Philadelphia. I gave her a name that felt strong and steady, not trendy or something pegged to the decade in which she would have been born. But I named the protagonist of my vampire novels after my first cat, Chloe, who was my pal during many early novel-writing sessions.
Real settings or fictional towns?
Both, though many of the fictional settings are based either on places where I have lived or where friends have lived.
What’s the quirkiest quirk one of your characters has?
Laura suffers from stage fright in Chasing Ashes, complete with nausea and panic attacks.
What’s your quirkiest quirk?
I’m claustrophobic, so I’m extremely uncomfortable in library buildings with tall shelves all around. As a hungry reader and a writer, I’m obviously grateful for libraries, but I can’t remember when I last had a library card. Probably in elementary school.
If you could have written any book (one that someone else has already written,) which one would it be? Why?
Room by Emma Donoghue. The claustrophobia of the setting struck a chord, as did the child’s POV. Amazing.
Everyone at some point wishes for a do-over. What’s yours?
I wish I could remake some career decisions made when I was just out of college. I thought I knew all there was to know. Hah!
What’s your biggest pet peeve?
Finding toothpaste blobs in the bathroom sink.
You’re stranded on a deserted island. What are your three must-haves?
The people I love most, books, and warmth. I’d prefer a deserted tropical island.
What was the worst job you’ve ever held?
In college, I made credit collection calls for a major retail-store chain that was also noted for its catalog sales. On Saturday mornings, I would contact military families stationed overseas. No fun calling Okinawa, who knows how many time zones away, to ask why the refrigerator still hadn’t been paid off. Lots of awkward pauses on that far end of the phone line.
Who’s your all-time favorite literary character (any genre)? Why?
Jo March. She’s smart, talented, a bit impulsive but wise enough to see her mistakes and shift gears as needed; a 19th-century woman who figures out the work-family thing in her own, unconventional way.
Ocean or mountains?
Ocean
City girl/guy or country girl/guy?
City, but not downtown. I like a small yard and a front porch.
What’s on the horizon for you?
My romantic mystery, A Poetic Puzzle, will be published February 1st. A second book in the series I call Verse Case Scenarios (only half-joking here) is in progress. Fingers crossed.
Anything else you’d like to tell us about yourself and/or your books?
I try to inject humor and family dysfunction into all my books. I’m a funny, snarky girl too chicken to try improv or stand-up, so there you go. Just don’t give me a straight line.
Reporter Laura Cunningham’s childhood friend and college roommate vanished the day a deadly fire destroyed The Challenge, a residential counseling center for troubled students. Not something Laura could just forget—not after a year, not after almost twenty-five. So Laura writes a true-crime book demanding a new investigation, and envisions uncovering past secrets. What she can’t imagine is the fresh torment her book will unleash.
