A few years ago, one of my author friends reached out to ask me if I’d like to be in an anthology that was geared around female sleuths.
At the time, I was writing a standalone psychological thriller (The Third Nanny), and I wasn’t sure where I was going to with my Secrets of Redemption psychological thriller series (I had just completed Book 5 of what would end up being a 9-book series, but at the time, I didn’t know I still had four more books to write).
But regardless, neither of those books or projects fit the “female sleuth” theme.
Of course, that didn’t stop me from saying yes. I had six months to figure it out. Surely I could come up with a female sleuth story that somehow tied into my published books by then.
And sure enough, about a week later, Charlie Kingsley whispered into my ear, and just like that, two stories fell into my lap. A Grave Error, which was the first Charlie Kingsley story and the one that ended up in the anthology, and The Murder Before Christmas, which ended up being Book 1 of the Charlie Kingsley Mysteries.
When I wrote A Grave Error, I knew that wasn’t Charlie’s first case. The first person who called Charlie for help was Nancy, who owned The Redemption Inn, as the resident ghost had been blamed for a murder.
I knew I wanted to write it at some point, I just wasn’t sure when. The series arc that had been slowly building out would be disrupted, and I was unclear on how it would all fit together. Could I go back in time even as the series moved forward? How would the readers react?
But, as these things go, it all fell easily into place when the time was right. Darla made an appearance in A Cornucopia of Murder, and I knew then that Charlie’s first case had to be the next book. And I also knew it would be the perfect fit for my Charlie Kingsley Cozy Novella series, a side series of standalone novellas that cover shorter cases.
And thus, A Room For Murder, was. Readers will get a peek at how it all began, from first meeting Wyle to Pat becoming her sidekick. It’s available in eBook, audio and paperback, and you can grab your copy here.
