What memories do you have from Indiana Univ. of Pa?
Beautiful campus. Great value. Learning how to learn. Making Dean’s list three times. My classrooms in Wilson Hall where I wondered what it would be like to be a detective.
For how long have you been working in the church?
About five years working at the soup kitchen in the basement.
Was being a police officer always in the plan?
I wanted to be a professional baseball but I lacked the talent. I worked at a gas station where my local police department filled up. I got hooked on their stories. What developed your interest in criminology? The idea of becoming a college-educated police officer. It was novel at the time (1972-1975)
Is criminology, an art or science, and why?
Strictly speaking it is both. We studied investigation and did laboratory work.
Being a real-life private detective, does writing crime fiction novels get any easier?
Yes with dialogue, description, setting and story ideas.
Do you take inspiration from your real-life experiences as a detective while writing your novels?
Yes, but I have also had great detective fiction on my coffee table and night stand. I am as informed by Sherlock Holmes and Matthew Scudder and all of Joseph Wambaugh’s cops and what I did and saw on the street.
Were all the books planned in advance in the six-book FBI agent Marsha O’Shea police procedural series?
No, each book led to the next in Marsha’s series character arc.
What would you label as your muse, if not inspiration, behind your work?
Observing a situation and asking what if followed by what if and what if until a premise bubbled to the surface
What is the one mistake most authors make, regardless of experience?
Eschewing editors and proofreaders. Need both to make your writing enjoyable.
Do you think one can ever retire from writing? Sure Would you?
Sure. I’ll always be a reader though.
Besides writer's block, what are some frustrating things that can happen that can sap an author's creative juices or energy to write?
I don’t believe in writer’s block. How do you overcome that? I just make sure that the premise excites me. If after I write the synopsis, if I don’t think that I want to create an outline for a 55,000 to 80,000 book, I don’t.
What are some things you would do differently if you could go back in time to right before you wrote and published your first book?
Joined a study group and a critique group
What is the sweetest fan-mail that you have ever received?
A friend jokingly cursed me in a 5 star review saying that he stayed up half the night to finish my thriller.