Writing About Older Women by Jean Henry Mead
When I wrote my first mystery novel, after five nonfiction books and a Wyoming historical novel, I agonized over my protagonist. How old should she be and what should she be like? Then a phone call from an old friend, who likes to reminisce about our single days, helped me decide. The two of us had a lot of fun together and she could always make me laugh. I reasoned that now that we were no longer young, why not write a book about two senior women who reluctantly decide to solve the murders of their friends and club members. Dana Logan and Sarah Cafferty were born on my computer screen and came to life in the Valley Retirement Village in California’s San Joaquin Valley, where I lived for more than a dozen years and met my friend Marge. I call my two amateur sleuths seniors but they’re actually baby boomers in their early sixties. Feisty and adventurous, they claim to be able to compete with younger sleuths, with the exception of roller blading and scaling tall buildings. ...