Severance Packages

Severance Packages is the second book in my Jane Doe Mystery / paranormal series.
It's set in Sunbury, Victoria, Australia where I lived for 30 years. I'm now starting the third book in this series, Haunted Heart, which I'm setting in Roxburgh Park, where we now live in a retirement estate. Life is busier here, and it's hard to find a quiet time at home to write! Please check out my website for more information about my books at
http://wendylaing.com and see my featured book Severance Packages at Mystery Authors site. cheers Wendy Laing

Interview with Mystery Author April Star

MysteryAuthors.com is proud to have bestselling mystery author April Star with us for an interview today. Thank you for joining us.

M.A.: Tell us a little about your featured mystery, THE LAST RESORT.

A.S.: The Last Resort is book two in my wanderlust mystery series and continues to take us on the RV trip of a lifetime, this time with "Newlyweds" Laura and David. Set in a historical town in Florida, where more than just waves crash up on the shores. A mysterious bottle pulls Laura and David into a twisted honeymoon adventure.

M.A.: Can you share with us (without giving anything away, of course!) a personal favorite moment or line in your book?

A.S.: I would have to say it was the trial of the murderer. I enjoyed the research, the way the character’s all seemed to come alive in the courtroom. Justice prevails and I discovered how much I enjoyed being a part of the world of forensics, truth and justice.

M.A.: Why mysteries? What makes them so compelling for you to write?

A.S.: I’ve always loved mysteries. Not just in the reading sense, but also in real life. To uncover the mysteries of why and what causes this or that; whether it be something of nature or humankind, I just love to try and unravel anything that just doesn’t quite make sense or that might be mysterious. I also enjoy the adventure, the endless “what ifs” that occur when plotting, and setting up all the twists and turns and red herrings.

M.A.: What about other work? Do you write in any genres other than mystery?

A.S.: Yes. I have written romance, non-fiction personal essays, poetry, and children’s books.

M.A.: What was your funniest writing-related moment?

A.S.: Probably when my mother and I walked in three hours late for a writer’s conference in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida. A flat tire detained us, that and the fact that as we waited for a tow truck, my mother insisted on becoming a hub cap collector. By the time we arrived at the conference, we were greasy, sweaty, and the main speaker, children’s author Jane Yolen, was long gone!

M.A.: So, what's your current writing project? Is it a mystery, too?

A.S.: Of course! I’m actually working on two projects. I’m finishing up book three in the wanderlust mysteries, It’s Check Out Time, and I’m half way through Murder in Paradise, first title in my new Paradise by the Sea Mysteries.

M.A.: Other than MysteryAuthors.com, do you have any websites where readers can find out more about you and your work?

A.S.: Absolutely! They can, of course, visit me at www.authoraprilstar.com, Mystery Writer’s of America, International Thriller Writer’s. I’m also at MySpace and Facebook.


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Make a Free Book Trailer!

What do you think of this nifty(if I do say so myself) preview of Patricia Harrington's mystery novel, DEATH COMES TOO SOON? Trailers like these are gaining a lot of popularity, and can be done easily with little or no money. I've made quite a few trailers like these using Windows Movie Maker...and have created a how-to in order to share the secret with others.

Interested in learning more? Take my free online workshop on how to make your own trailer! In this step by step tutorial, you work at your own pace using Windows Movie Maker to put together a book preview with images, music, voice over, and even live video. Learn how to add text subtitles, fancy special effects, and more--even if you've never made anything like it.

So give it a try! You might be surprised how fun and easy it is to create your own promotional trailers--fun enough to become quite addicting! Good luck.

DIY BOOK TRAILER WORKSHOP

Interview with Mystery Author Steve Haberman

MysteryAuthors.com is proud to have bestselling mystery author STEVE HABERMAN with us for an interview today. Thank you for joining us.

M.A.: Tell us a little about your featured mystery, MURDER WITHOUT PITY.

S.H.: MURDER WITHOUT PITY occurs in contemporary Paris rife with Extreme Right demagogues. Within this setting is dogged state criminal investigator Stanislas Cassel, grandson of a French propagandist for the Germans during their WWII Occupation. Ashamed of his family’s infamy, Monsieur Cassel avoids anything political. Instead, he buries himself solving small crimes, which he calls his Little Miseries. One Little Misery case is the murder of a pensioner.

Enter a beautiful Jewish woman, acutely aware of the Extreme Right’s present day menace because French Nazis killed her parents during the Second World War. Monsieur Cassel retorts she exaggerates their menace. Only when tragedy strikes does he awake to his blindness and understand a truth: a larger evil beyond his Little Miseries, as the Occupation portended, lurks. This newly found wisdom, tragically earned, propels him on to solving who killed that pensioner.

M.A.: Can you share with us (without giving anything away, of course!) a personal favorite moment or line in your book?

S.H.: No special lines. But there are several chapters I especially like…the one where protagonist Cassel discovers a cache of documents vital to solving the case of who murdered the pensioner and a pivotal Paris metro scene. Also the first chapter.

M.A.: Why mysteries? What makes them so compelling for you to write?

S.H.: I really prefer thrillers because I like worldly people (journalists, spies, and hoteliers, for instance) and because of the tension a well written stories can generate, i. e. John Le Carre’s Spy Who Came in From the Cold or Alan Furst’s Second World War novels or what I’m now reading, Fall From Grace by the late Larry Collins. Also like some Eric Ambler because he came up with the idea, I believe, of the innocent, caught up in something beyond his experience.

M.A.: What about other work? Do you write in any genres other than mystery?

S.H.: Don’t write in any other genre. Just stick to the thriller genre. That type will keep me busy till the end of my days.

M.A.: What was your funniest writing-related moment?

S.H.: One fault-finding reviewer commented some dialogue sounds like that spoken by the late Peter Lorrie. Not quite sure how that person arrived at that since I can’t remember when I last saw that late character actor in a film. Sometimes reviewers are spot on; other times their comments reflect more about them than about the subject reviewed.

M.A.: So, what's your current writing project? Is it a mystery, too?

S.H.: You betcha. I’m working on a second thriller about a contemporary topic, terrorism. Part I takes place mostly in San Diego where the protagonist, a relatively inexperienced CIA agent, teams up with a very experienced local FBI agent, to investigate a double murder in London. Part II takes place mostly in London, Paris, Brussels, and beyond, cities I’ve visited in past travels.

Have the final title plus the beginning, middle, and ending sections. Now I’m working over and over the rough spots.

M.A.: Other than MysteryAuthors.com, do you have any websites where readers can find out more about you and your work?

S.H.: My own website, parismurdermysteries.com, which is dedicated to mysteries set in or around the City of Light.


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Interview with Mystery Author Eleanor Sullivan

MysteryAuthors.com is proud to have bestselling mystery author Eleanor Sullivan with us for an interview today. Thank you for joining us.

M.A.: Tell us a little about your featured mystery, ASSUMED DEAD.

E.S.: After a John Doe arrives unconscious to the intensive care unit of St. Teresa’s Hospital, head nurse Monika Everhardt learns he might be a man thought killed in NYC on 9/11. At the same time a recently remarried widow is in a coma following a vicious beating, and her husband is suspected of attempting to murder her for her money. As complications develop and both patients hover near death, Monika struggles to uncover the truth before her patients die.

M.A.: Can you share with us (without giving anything away, of course!) a personal favorite moment or line in your book?

E.S.: I love it when Monika figures it out, her “ah ha” moment. I feel just like it’s happening to me!

M.A.: Why mysteries? What makes them so compelling for you to write?

E.S.: I was a scientist, used to putting together research projects, and every piece had to fit, be accounted for to be sure that no extraneous variables could contaminate the results. Mysteries are the same. I love teasing out all the pieces, making sure they all fit together in the end. And I think everyone likes to see that justice prevails in mysteries, even if it doesn’t in real life.

M.A.: What about other work? Do you write in any genres other than mystery?

E.S.: I write textbooks for Prentice Hall, but mysteries are my love.

M.A.: What was your funniest writing-related moment?

E.S.: Planning to set several scenes in a corner bar in South St. Louis (not the most savory of neighborhoods), I asked my son-in-law to accompany me. Then my grandson wanted to go along. So there sat a middle-age woman, a much younger man, and a child (two of us had soft drinks), watching people pass money to the bartender for their illegal bets when a drunk fell off a barstool. What had I gotten myself in for, I wondered.

M.A.: So, what's your current writing project? Is it a mystery, too?

E.S.: Yes, but it’s a historical mystery, the first of a new series set in a strict, religious society in 1830s rural Ohio. In Cover Her Body, a 16-year old girl is murdered because she’s pregnant but the only person who suspects it wasn’t an accident is Adelaide, a young midwife, who puts her own life in danger when she tries to find the killer.

M.A.: Other than MysteryAuthors.com, do you have any websites where readers can find out more about you and your work?

E.S.: Be sure to check out my website: www.EleanorSullivan.com

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Interview with Mystery Author Deborah Shlian

MysteryAuthors.com is proud to have mystery author Deborah Shlian with us for an interview today. Thank you for joining us.

M.A.: Tell us a little about your featured mystery, Rabbit in the Moon.

Deborah Shlian: Rabbit in the Moon is the third novel I have co-written with my husband and also our most ambitious book. It’s an international suspense/thriller that takes place in China, Macao, Hong Kong, Korea, Los Angeles and Washington, DC – all places we’ve either lived in or traveled to many times. Rabbit in the Moon contains at least three main stories:

First, it is the story of Dr. Ni-Fu Cheng, a Chinese physician who has spent his entire career searching for the secret of longevity only to finally face the fact that not only may his discovery NOT save the world, but it could possibly destroy it.

Second it is the story Ni-Fu’s grand daughter- strong-willed Dr. Lili Quan, American born Chinese and medical resident in Los Angeles, who has spent her 28 years fighting against her Chinese identity. When the story begins, her life seems to be coming apart – her mother has terminal cancer; she’s challenged her chief of medicine whose recommendation she needs for a coveted geriatrics fellowship. On impulse, she accepts an invitation to study in China - ostensibly to fulfill her mother's dying wish. But in fact, she’s been lured there. Little does she know that she will become a pawn in a deadly international scheme as greedy and ambitious men vie to gain control of her grandfather's discovery.

And third, it is the story of Chi-Wen Zhou, a young man close in age to Lili, but worlds apart in terms of culture and how they each view the world.

Within the novel, Lili and Ni-Fu and Chi-Wen meet and ultimately change each other’s lives.

Our story is set against what we feel is probably the most tumultuous seven weeks in recent Chinese history: from the rise of the democracy movement on April 15th, 1989 to its fall with the June 4th massacre at Tiananmen Square.

M.A.: Can you share with us (without giving anything away, of course!) a personal favorite moment or line in your book?

Deborah Shlian: : One of my favorites is the scene in which Lili returns to her childhood home in San Francisco just after her mother’s death. Her relationship with her mother has always been rocky, but while going through the apartment Lili finds evidence in a memory box her mother kept of a young woman not terribly unlike herself. It is a revelation that makes Lili decide to visit China and learn more about her roots.

M.A.: Why mysteries? What makes them so compelling for you to write?

Deborah Shlian: The mystery genre requires a certain discipline in terms of how you tell your story i.e. how and when you reveal clues to solve whatever puzzle you’ve created for the reader and/or your characters to solve. At the same time, a good mystery should have interesting characters that are every bit as compelling as those you might find in a more “literary” novel.


M.A.: What about other work? Do you write in any genres other than mystery?

Deborah Shlian: My very first book was a romance novel that I wrote under a pen name and that was fun. My other published novels, Double Illusion and Wednesday’s Child have been called psychological suspense/thrillers.

M.A.: What was your funniest writing-related moment?

Deborah Shlian: It’s not really funny, but sometimes characters become so “independent” that they almost tell you what they would do in a particular situation. I have written a scene that I thought was fine and then days later, it’s as if the character is talking to me (in my head of course), telling me that the lines he or she is supposed to be speaking aren’t true or the situation just doesn’t work for them! It’s quite weird.

M.A.: So, what's your current writing project? Is it a mystery, too?

Deborah Shlian: I am currently finishing the second novel in a soon to be published series featuring Sammy Greene, a 20-something radio talk show host who becomes an amateur sleuth. The first book, Dead Air will be out December, 09. The one I am just finishing is called Devil Winds, date of publication to be determined by our publisher. This series I am co writing with a physician friend in Los Angeles named Linda Reid. Once that is done, Joel and I would like to start a sequel for Rabbit in the Moon.

M.A.: Other than MysteryAuthors.com, do you have any websites where readers can find out more about you and your work?

Deborah Shlian: My books can be ordered through any bookstore or online. Most are now on Kindle and e-book as well. Check out my website at: http://www.shlian.com


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