by Sandra Parshall My husband and I have a running argument about crime in small communities. He doesn’t think it’s realistic for a sparsely populated place to have regular outbreaks of murder and mayhem. But he’s never lived in a small town or county. I have, and I don’t even raise an eyebrow at the [...] Read More →
Blog at Poisoned Pen Press
End of Summer
September brings to Ohio those crisp days when you pull out the sweatshirts and jeans again, after the summer hiatus. Of course, it was in the mid-nineties just the other day, which is indicative of Ohio’s weather termperament. As one newscaster around here likes to say, “If you don’t like the weather in Ohio, just [...] Read More →
Why would you kill?
Forget my murderous thoughts when someone else finishes the coffee – and doesn’t write it on the grocery list. Forget my fanatical coveting of that last cookie. As I finish the revisions for my second Pru Marlowe mystery, I’ve been thinking a lot about what would seriously drive me to murder or other major crimes. [...] Read More →
Eagles I Have Known
My maternal grandfather, Frank S. Smerchek, was an Eagle, a Sokol. Although most sources say “Sokol” means “falcon” rather than Eagle. But we knew him as an eagle. His parents migrated from Moravia in the 1800s.
September is Murder and Mayhem Month
Yes, it’s true. It’s always murder and mayhem here at Poisoned Pen Press, but during September, a reader’s blog called Novel Reaction is also celebrating our chosen passion. Mystery novels and authors will be featured all month long, including yours truly, a few others from PPP, and the Poisoned Pen! I’ve written about “nowadays” and [...] Read More →
Writing is Like Dieting
In thinking about how to describe what it’s like to write a novel to people with no frame of reference, I’ve realized that writing is frighteningly akin to dieting….
Love and Tragedy: Why I Write Crime Novels
(Somehow the last half of this got cut off and I just couldn’t figure out how to edit it. So I’m reposting the whole thing.) “When I decided to become a police officer I knew I’d have to deal with the hard side of life. Beaten children, raped women, accident victims, blood and gore. But [...] Read More →
Love and Tragedy: Why I write Crime Novels.
“When I decided to become a police officer I knew I’d have to deal with the hard side of life. Beaten children, raped women, accident victims, blood and gore. But that’s not the hardest part, is it? It’s the goddamn tragedy of people’s lives.” Constable Molly Smith to Sergeant John Winters, Among the Departed. [...] Read More →
So you want to be a writer…
We’ve been admonished to blog for readers, not writers. But I’m going to do it anyway for two reasons. First, a surprising number of my readers are aspiring writers. Second, I made a pledge all the years I was struggling to get published and nobody would help me: That if I ever “made it,” I [...] Read More →
Home Cooking
I’m busily working on my sixth Alafair Tucker Mystery, which as any novelist knows, entails a lot more than just writing it. For the last couple of weeks, I’ve been testing the recipes that will go in the back of the book. I’ll be glad when this research phase is over, since 1910s American country [...] Read More →