- What were you in your life before you became a writer? Did this influence your writing?
I worked for 42 ½ years at Merrill Lynch where my favorite job was a salaried stock broker. The job included complaint desk problems which, believe it or not, I loved—except, sadly, trying to fix problems occasionally made me loose respect for some of the brokers. Also, I was a “Me Too,” as were many. In my case, I had my fanny patted. It’s funny, I left Merrill many years ago, but I recently stumbled on some notes I’d taken about abuse, and I felt my innards start to tighten up as if it were yesterday. But back to my job, I had to keep a list and turn it in weekly of everyone I’d talked to, their issues, and how they were resolved. I wish I’d kept a copy. People were so forthcoming, I think I could have written a book. After all, taxi cab drivers, sex trade workers, ER workers do it. I consider it an opportunity lost.
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2. 2 Are you genre specific or general? Why? I don't mean genres like romance, mystery, fantasy etc. There are many subgenres of the above.
Genre-specific bores me. I have written three non-fiction books about Tacoma’s history, two murder mysteries which (or is it, ‘that’?) take place in Tacoma, a historical novel also set in Tacoma, and one taking place in late 19th century England. I love my home town and it has great history.
3. Did your reading choices have anything to do with your choice of a genre or genres?
Anne (of Green Gables,) Jo (Little Women) March, and Betsy Roberts (of the Betsy, Tacy and Tib books) were always my favorites and the heroines wrote books which meant, I had to, too.
Many years ago, I had a friend who was editor of a local, monthly newspaper. At that time, the daily paper had discontinued its history column, so she asked me to write a column for her paper. At the time, in addition to working, I was going to night school, finishing my BA, and working at the Western Washington Fair every September to pay for it, so I walked to the library on my lunch hour to research, and then wrote the column at night after I’d finished studying. She eventually, left the paper but I continued writing for it, and then I graduated which gave me time to be a columnist for a weekly paper. Boy, that was fun. I often got to pick my own stories because I heard so much about what was going on around town from our clients at Merrill. One article I wrote was on local brew pubs which had just started coming on. I drove all over the county, interviewing brew masters and taking my husband who did the sampling because I don’t like beer. That led to my being interviewed on a local radio station which led to my occasionally doing color commentary for Tacoma’s triple A ball team, which led to my own radio program. Sometimes I hosted all the programs on a four-hour shift, but mostly it was my own program. When the station was bought out, I called another local station and talked my way into a show. It’s always on Tacoma history and I’ve been doing that weekly for about twenty-five years.
4. What's your latest release?
Wynters Way, the 19th century, historical novel set in England came out last fall. I started it after a trip to Great Britain, though we spent most of our time in Cornwall where my mother’s family comes from.
5. What are you working on now?
A Feather for a Fan is the novel set in Tacoma circa 1878. It was such fun to write, I am now working on its sequel. All the characters are five or so years older, so their experiences are completely different. I call what I do ‘Forest Gumping.’ Remember how his face was super-imposed into pictures of groups of famous people? In as much as it works into the story line, my characters see, meet, or are involved in things that really happened. The kidnapping of Puyallup Indian children is a good example, and Gramma Staley really was the local psychic.
6. Where can we find you?
Uh—not sure how to answer that. I’m on Facebook, and I blog for BWLauthors.com. Via KLAY 1180 am where I broadcast, maybe.
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