#CRAFTS WITH ANASTASIA--FORENSIC ARTIST CARRIE STUART PARKS CRAFTS A CLASSIC AGATHA CHRISTIE STYLE MYSTERY

Carrie Stuart Parks is an award-winning, internationally known forensic artist. She travels across the US and Canada teaching courses in forensic art to law enforcement professionals including the FBI, Secret Service, and RCMP, and is the largest instructor of forensic art in the world. Her bestselling mystery/suspense/thriller novels have garnered numerous awards. She has also written and illustrated bestselling art books. Learn more about Carrie and her books at her website.

 

I grew up on a ranch in north Idaho where we had cattle, horses, chickens, and dogs. Both my parents were expert horseback riders—with my dad a champion bareback bronc rider from his college days. I wanted to incorporate the horse element into my next mystery/suspense/thriller, Woman in Shadow. 

 

Originally the setting was the Stanley Basin of central Idaho, just a mountain pass away from Sun Valley. Overlooking the spectacular Sawtooth Mountain Ranges, Stanley has a population of around sixty-three in the winter but hosts several million visitors in the summer. I honeymooned there alongside the Salmon River in a rustic cabin. 

 

Instead, I invented the town of Targhee Falls, in Idaho near Yellowstone National Park. I wanted to write the Idaho version of the classic who-done-it Agatha Christie story—a group of people cut off from the outside with a killer running amok. The Mule Shoe Ranch is a “primitive facility” charging a fortune for very rich people to enjoy the great outdoors—while dining in a five-star restaurant and being pampered by the staff.

 

As in all my books, dogs are featured and in this case were actual characters. Maverick, an Anatolian Shepherd, and Holly, a lab mix. Holly is based on my editor’s dog and named in his honor.

One of Carrie's paintings

Another common feature of my books is introducing some type of forensic angle. Darby Graham, the protagonist, is a forensic linguist. I’m a forensic artist and use the deception angle of forensic language—statement analysis—to assess the statements of victims or witnesses of crime.

 

Woman in Shadow 

 

A woman off the grid. 

 

Darby Graham thinks she’s on a much-needed vacation in remote Idaho to relax. But before she even arrives at the ranch, an earthquake strikes. Then a barn on the edge of town is engulfed in flames and strange problems at the ranch begin to escalate, and Darby finds herself immersed in a chilling mystery.

 

A town on fire. 

 

More fires erupt around town, and a serial arsonist sends taunting letters to the press after each. As a forensic linguist, this is Darby’s area of expertise . . . but the scars her work has caused her are also the reason she’s trying to escape her life.

 

A growing darkness. 

 

As the shadows continue moving in, pieces of the town around her come into sharper focus. To make it out alive, Darby must decide if she can trust the one man who sees her clearly.

 

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BOOK CLUB FRIDAY--INTERVIEW WITH MYSTERY AUTHOR JEANNETTE DE BEAUVOIR

Today we sit down for a chat with mystery and historical fiction author Jeannette de Beauvoir. Learn more about her and her books at her website.

When did you realize you wanted to write novels?

I wrote my first novel when I was eight years old. It was awful. I’ve kept improving on it since then!

How long did it take you to realize your dream of publication?

I was first published when I was in graduate school, though soon thereafter one of my publishers went out of business, which rather put a damper on that experience!

Are you traditionally published, indie published, or a hybrid author?

Traditionally published.

Where do you write?

I’m terribly conventional: I love my desk. I have set it up to be both functional and inspirational, with everything I need to hand. There’s a tray filled with objects that are meaningful to me: a vase with fresh flowers, a calendar, a lamp, some books, and (of course) my MacBook. Oh, and my fountain pen collection.

Is silence golden, or do you need music to write by? What kind?

I’ve always preferred silence, but recently I’ve been trying to listen to Radio Classique out of Paris in the background while I work. I turn it off a lot, though, to focus.

How much of your plots and characters are drawn from real life? From your life in particular?

I’m very influenced by real events, whether they’re historical or present-day. My ex-husband used to say that any of my books could be subtitled, “Jeannette goes to therapy,” and in a sense that’s true: I figure things out by writing about them. Sometimes it’s just because stuff happens that you could never make up, and I grab it for my stories.

Describe your process for naming your character?

I took one of the Great Courses on the history of espionage and was quite taken with Sydney Reilly, the spy Ian Fleming based his James Bond character on. I liked his story and liked his name, too, so I adapted it for my protagonist in this series. It’s really important to find the right name, I think, especially when you’re doing a series, because you’re going to be stuck with that name for a long time! (And if I had it to do over, I’d probably give her a different name, as more than one person has gotten confused and thought Riley was her first name!)

Real settings or fictional towns?

Almost exclusively real settings. I love being able to delve into a real place, learn its history and secrets, and bring readers into a relationship with it. I love when people come to visit Provincetown they find that the places Sydney frequents are real, that many of the people she knows are real, and that they already feel at home here.

What’s the quirkiest quirk one of your characters has?

Sydney works at an inn that has a world-class restaurant. The quirk isn’t so much with a character, but in the way others refer to her: the inn’s diva chef Adrienne. We haven’t yet met her, but her influence on everyone who works at the inn is clear. And everyone says, “our diva chef Adrienne.” (I don’t know that I ever want her on stage, so to speak: I’d probably never be able to do justice to her after all this buildup!)

What’s your quirkiest quirk?

I’m not sure I have any, which makes me sound completely uninteresting! Though people who know me might have an opinion on it…

If you could have written any book (one that someone else has already written,) which one would it be? Why?

Trapeze by Simon Mawer. I was just starting to write a similar book—something about the women who parachuted into France during World War Two, amazingly brave people—when I read Trapeze and realized he’d written “my” book. And that he’d done a far better job of it than I would have.

Everyone at some point wishes for a do-over. What’s yours?

The Catch-22 of publishing is that you want your books out there to be read, but once they’re published you can’t change anything about them. And the more you write, the better you are at it. I can’t re-read any of my books, because I want to do them over again.

What’s your biggest pet peeve?

People who don’t travel well. I live in a tourist destination, and many of the people who come here are respectful. Some aren’t; in fact I have to think that some behave in ways they wouldn’t at home. Every summer it makes me crazy. Come and visit, but be nice.

You’re stranded on a deserted island. What are your three must-haves?

As many books as possible, an unending supply of Diet Coke (the kind with ginger and lime), and my cat Beckett. That actually sounds pretty much like paradise.

What was the worst job you’ve ever held?

In college I worked at a chocolate-chip cookie place. It was right across the way from a bar, and drunk people used to stumble over and demand raw cookie dough, or buy and eat too many cookies and then throw up. I don’t think I’ve had a chocolate chip cookie since.

What’s the best book you’ve ever read?

“Best” is such a difficult term. Staying inside my genre, it’s probably December by Phil Rickman. I’ve re-read it countless times.

Ocean or mountains?

Oh, ocean. I live on Cape Cod.

City girl/guy or country girl/guy?

City. I live in a small town now and while I love it, I need to get infusions of urban life on a regular basis. I spend a lot of time in Boston and Montréal.

What’s on the horizon for you?

Book Five of the Sydney Riley series, The Christmas Corpses, is coming out in November. There will be another book in 2020, but also a young-adult novel I’ve been working on; I’d like to finish that and see if there’s any interest in it.

A Killer Carnival

A Sydney Riley Provincetown Mystery, Book 4

This year’s P’town carnival parade begins with a real bang: a float exploding. No one’s been hurt, but wedding planner (and float decorator) Sydney Riley finds herself once more at the center of a mystery. Was the explosion meant to kill her? Why has her boyfriend’s sister, Boston Police Commissioner Karen Hakim, suddenly shown such an interest in the carnival goings-on? Are there really white supremacists at work on Cape Cod? Is her boyfriend Ali keeping secrets from her? Sydney will need to rely on her usual cast of characters and a few new ones for help in finding out what’s going on… before this killer carnival takes any more victims.

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SCUBA DIVING IN THE GALAPAGOS WITH AUTHOR SUZANNE STENGL'S HEROINE

Suzanne Stengl has been telling stories since she was a child. Then, it was stories about fairies and mermaids, told to her sisters when they were supposed to be sleeping. As a teenager, she wrote long diary entries and short pieces of fiction that no one ever read. Learn more about Suzanne and her books at her website. Today Suzanne is being interviewed down in the Galapagos. 

Hello everyone. I’m American Woman travel editor Serena Brower and I’m here with Suzanne Stengl, the author of light paranormal cozy mystery novella The Ghost and Christie McFee.

I found Suzanne in the little village of Puerto Baquerizo Moreno on the island of San Cristóbal in the Galapagos Islands. Or as they say here, Las Islas Galápagos.

We’re enjoying some ice tea in an open air restaurant beside the ocean and watching the sea lions lazing on the beach.

SB: I’m glad to finally meet you, Suzanne. Do you have time for a few questions about your book, The Ghost and Christie McFee?

Suzanne: (pouring a pitcher of water over her head…) I have all the time in the world.

SB: It’s really hot here, isn’t it?

Suzanne: It sure is. Forty-five degrees Celsius. In the shade.

SB: Whoa. (fanning herself) What’s that in Fahrenheit?

Suzanne: You don’t want to know.

SB: I understand you have some pretty authentic details about scuba diving in your book?

Suzanne: Yes, authentic. I’ve experienced every one of them.

SB: I’m beginning to understand how hot it would be wearing a 7 mil neoprene wet suit in this heat. Do you really need a wet suit? The water doesn’t look that cold.

Suzanne: The water temperature here ranges from 64 to 86 degrees Fahrenheit at the surface, depending on the season. Of course it gets colder as you go deeper. So you need a wet suit.

SB: If it’s as low as 64 degrees Fahrenheit, that’s similar to the temperature of Lost Lake, isn’t that right?

Suzanne: Yes, it’s similar. And in both places, in a wet suit, the temperature is perfect – once you’re underwater. It’s beautiful. (She looks out at the ocean.) There’s a wreck right here, in the harbor.

SB: A wreck?

Suzanne: A sunken ship. It makes an artificial reef. A place for algae to grow and invertebrates like barnacles and corals and oysters. They provide food for the smaller fish, and then the smaller fish in turn provide food for the larger fish.

SB: (fanning herself) I don’t know how the tourists can stand wearing a wet suit until they get in the water.

Suzanne: Most tourists live aboard boats and dive from them. Their sleeping quarters are air-conditioned. (She dumps another pitcher of water over her head.)

SB: Do the staff care about you doing that?

Suzanne: No, they’re used to me.

(The waitress brings another pitcher of water, and another pitcher of ice tea, and sets them on the table.)

Suzanne: Muchas gracias.

SB: OK, let’s talk about your book. The opening scene in The Ghost and Christie McFee has your heroine on a dive boat. And she’s seasick. Have you personally experienced that?

Suzanne: I sure have. We did an 8-day tour aboard the Yolita here, in the inner islands, with a group of 16 passengers and 5 crew. Every one of the passengers got sick on the first day. Including Rolf.

SB: Rolf is your husband?

Suzanne: Yes, he is. He’s a traveler.

SB: You’re quite the traveler too, I must say.

Suzanne: No, I’m not. I’m a tourist. There’s a difference.

SB: Then, you’re quite the tourist.

Suzanne: I’m the tourist from hell. (She dumps more water over her head.) I should have known I’d get seasick, since I also get carsick, and bus sick, and avoid roller coasters. And like I said, everyone got sick for a day. But since I’m so good at being seasick, I did it for the full eight days.

SB: That must have been horrible!

Suzanne: Parts of it. Parts of it were great. The food was excellent. Although it would have been even better if I hadn’t been so nauseous. And the passengers aboard the Yolita were incredible. Mostly young travelers, all interesting people. The sixteen of us would sit around the big table for meals. For the first few days, French was the default language and then we changed out a few passengers and the default language became English. We had Italian, Swiss, British, Swedes, one guy from California, and the French.

Blue-Footed Booby

Every day we walked different trails on different islands and saw the endemic plants and animals.

It was a mixed blessing, being on shore. No seasickness, but the heat was extreme. For me, anyway. Before I left the boat, I’d soak my shirt so I could be cool for a time. At the end of the hike, I’d walk into the ocean. I love my Tilley hat . . . because I can dip it in the water and douse my head, when it isn’t possible to jump in completely.

SB: When would it not be possible to jump in completely?

Suzanne: If it was a beach that the sea lions had claimed. They can be territorial.

SB: (glances uneasily at the sea lion occupying the bench in front of her.)

Suzanne: I don’t know why they love those benches, but they do.

SB: Okaaay . . . So, you slept aboard the boat? Weren’t you seasick while you were trying to sleep?

Suzanne: Yes. Some nights, when we were making a long open water crossing between islands, it was especially rough. Many of us would lie on the sundeck and watch the stars.

SB: And that helped the seasickness?

Suzanne: Yes. The stars don’t move so they are a reference point. It’s like focusing on the horizon in the daylight. And it was fun, lying there with everyone. Kind of like a pajama party.

SB: Hmmm. But with being so seasick, weren’t you afraid you’d be sick while you were diving? That couldn’t be good.

Suzanne: It’s a real leap of faith, for someone like me – a non-adventurous tourist – to sit in a zodiac fully loaded with dive tank, 7 mil neoprene and 13 pounds of weights. And feeling nauseous. If you throw up underwater, it’s important to keep the regulator in your mouth.

SB: ewww.

Suzanne: Otherwise, you’ll drown. But I learned to deep breathe until we tipped over the side. And then all of a sudden, I was underwater and no longer rocking and I was out of the heat. My head was instantly clear and, for about 30 to 40 minutes, life was normal. At least, it was normal for my head and my stomach. The rest of the world was not normal.

SB: Not normal?

Suzanne: No, it was amazing. Sea turtles, sea lions, penguins, sharks, rainbows of fish. And when we weren’t diving, we were snorkeling. Snorkeling with the little penguins is something I will remember forever.

SB: Too bad you can’t forget about this heat. Can you pass me that water jug?

Suzanne: Sure. Help yourself.

SB: (dumping water over her head) I’m glad it’s not this hot in Bandit Creek.

Suzanne: ¡Yo también!

SB: Does your heroine Christie McFee get over her nausea and learn to love diving?

Suzanne: You’ve just read the first chapter so far, right?

SB: Yes.

Suzanne: Then you’ll find out in chapter two. More ice tea?

SB: Please!

The Ghost and Christie McFee

A new diver, an underwater ghost town, two ghosts—

Even though Lost Lake is renowned for claiming the lives of divers searching for the legendary gold buried in its depths, Christie McFee is determined to explore the Lake’s underwater ghost town. And when a ghost from the past convinces her to join the treasure hunt, she throws her usual caution overboard. 

Sure that the talk of ghosts is strictly for tourists, Gaven St. Michel, local Divemaster, is confident he can keep Christie’s lovely body from being added to the Lake’s count—until another ghost appears amid the watery graves in Bandit Creek. 

Will Gaven be able to protect Christie as she drifts deeper into the murkiness of this unsolved mystery from long ago?

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BOOK CLUB FRIDAY--GUEST AUTHOR SHANNON BAKER

Shannon Baker is the Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers’ 2014 Writer of the Year and the author of the Nora Abbott Mystery Series, which includes Tainted Mountain, a 2013 New Mexico/Arizona Book Award finalist, Broken Trust, and Tattered Legacy, slated for a March 2105 release. Learn more about Shannon and her books at her website. 

Fact versus Fiction

I am not the kind of writer who can make up whole worlds from my imagination. My plots always come from real stuff, the cool facts I read about. For instance, when I moved to Flagstaff and found out about the controversy to pump manmade snow on the San Francisco Peaks—land sacred to 12 tribes—I had to write a story about it

I needed a protagonist in the center of the storm who had everything at stake. That turned out to be Nora Abbott, owner of the ski resort. Driven, insecure, timid and ferocious in equal measure, Nora sprang onto the pages.

In my research about the tribes involved, I stumbled across the Hopi. Suddenly, my book took off in a whole new direction that lent itself to a mystery series. My Hopi research turned up so many intriguing aspects of their history, culture, and beliefs I couldn’t address even a fraction in one book. So I was excited when I was offered a three-book deal. Tainted Mountain delves into the Hopi prophesies and explains a little bit about their ceremonies. It introduces kachinas and their role in Hopi lives.

For Broken Trust, I wanted to focus on a different aspect of Hopi’s connection with the world. Hopi are concerned about end times. According to Hopi beliefs, we now live in the fourth world and we’ve just about messed it up so badly we’re approaching the end of this world and emergence to the fifth world. Sad news for most of us, since not very many will survive to start the fifth world.

In Broken Trust, Nora returns to her favorite place, Boulder, and lands a job at an environmental trust. (Coincidently, I also moved back to Boulder while I was working on this book.) But all is not as it seems. The trust is a hotbed of conflict and corruption. Nearly a half million dollars is missing and Nora’s predecessor is murdered.

Nora’s mother pops onto the scene with her own drama. She is determined to hook Nora up with handsome Cole Huntsman. Cole has been waiting for a year to let Nora get over the death of her husband and the traumatic events in Flagstaff, but he’s ready to start a relationship with her. In the meantime, with the help of quirky staffers at the Trust and an Ecuadorian hunk, Nora uncovers a plot that could destroy one of the most pristine locations on the planet. 

And how, you might or might not be asking, is such monumental destruction possible? That was the really fun part for me. I got to research conspiracy theories surrounding HAARP (High-frequency Active Auroral Research) and using weather as a weapon of mass destruction. This stuff is scary/interesting. I spent hours watching Jessie Ventura and others present the case that the shadowy Powers That Be are planning to control our minds/kill us all/wreak havoc on the environment. I dabbled in learning a little (very little) about Tesla towers and the potential for sustainable energy.

When I sold Tainted Mountain I was happy and proud of my new baby. We all know the analogies of writing and publishing books to having babies. I don’t know if anyone else felt this way, but when I was expecting my second baby, I worried I’d never be able to love it as much as I loved my first one. And even though I’d planned and wanted the baby with all my heart, part of me was jealous it would come between me and my firstborn. Weird, I know. But I kind of had the same misgivings about creating a series and wondering if I’d love the second book as much as the first.

The book is here and, just as it was with my kids, I do love book two as much! I learned a lot between book one and two and even more between two and three. It turns out I like writing a series and I’m glad Nora got to live on.

What about you? What is the most interesting or fun fact you learned while reading fiction?

Broken Trust

Nora moves to Boulder and  lands a job as an accountant at an environmental non-profit. But the trust is rife with deceit and corruption. Nearly half a million dollars is missing and one person has already been killed for knowing too much. Complicating matters are Nora's uninvited visitors: her mother, Cole Huntsman, and a Hopi kachina that technically doesn't exist. As the body count climbs, Nora races to stop a deadly plot to decimate one of the planet's greatest natural resources.

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