Marilyn's Musings

I never thought I’d write mysteries. The only thing I’ve ever really wanted to do is write, though, and I read mysteries from a very early age. I especially loved the U.K. authors: mid-century ones like Dorothy L. Sayers, Agatha Christie, Michael Innes, more modern ones like Phil Rickman, Martha Grimes, Tana French. Clever writers with clever, twisting plots. A lovely read, but not my—to stay on the British side of the pond—cup of tea really, not as a writer. I wrote (and still write) historical fiction, vast sprawling novels that followed families through generations or a country through its medieval crises. I focused on the characters, on making a century come alive for the reader through getting to know the people who lived in it. And then I realized that my favorite mysteries, while well-plotted, also brought the reader into lives and thoughts and emotions of people. As much as I wanted Deborah Crombie’s Duncan Kinkaid to solve the murder, I also wanted to know...