Not Another Newsletter!

The Time Has Come, the Walrus Said

Pub day for Wicked River is finally here. It's hard, even as a writer, to convey how I feel. It's almost exactly three years since I last had a book out. THREE YEARS. That's a hiatus I never wanted. Before this, my first three novels came out just a little over a year apart. I had dreamed of being a book-a-year writer. I think now that maybe I jumped to it too quickly and needed to be snapped back to an earlier phase in every writer's career. You can read more about how that happened to me on Daniella Levy's excellent Rejection Survival Guide blog. Now, thanks to the conviction of my agent, the dream team at my new publisher, and a story that began when my own real life honeymoon went awry, I have a new book out.

Wicked River

The only thing more terrifying than being alone in the wilderness is...finding out you're not alone.

#1 New York Times bestselling author Lee Child says Wicked River is "a who-is-my-husband-really story, a horror-in-the-wilderness story, and a Manhattan-family-drama, all rolled up in elegantly propulsive prose, and shot through with sinister suspense" while Booklist calls Wicked River "a tense exploration of survival and psychological manipulation with a raw, sharply drawn setting".

Wicked River has been compared to John Fowles' The Collector (Library Journal) and James Dickey's Deliverance (New York Times bestselling authors Chevy Stevens and Andrew Gross) as well as the bestselling series by C.J. Box and by Nevada Barr (Booklist).

You can get it from your favorite independent bookstore (Wicked River was chosen as a May Indie Next Pick) or Barnes and Nobles nationwide (Wicked River will be on a special three-for-the-price-of-two-thrillers display) and Amazon—to complete the trifecta, Wicked River will be a featured selection in Amazon's growing number of bricks and mortar locations nationally!

Hitting the road

Tomorrow I head out on a spectacular tour arranged by my publisher. I am excited, a little in shock, not to mention a tad intimidated. I will be away from my family for five weeks. Before this, I hadn't been away from my family for five days. I wrestled with the meaning of this in a piece on Career Authors. It drew a great deal of ire on Facebook, in addition to support. I'd be interested in your take, my newsletter readers. Am I doing the right thing for my family? An okay thing? A good thing even?

Seeing you on the road makes doing this so much fun. If you are near an event location, please come out and hear the real life honeymoon horror that inspired my new novel! Even though I'm nowhere near as brave as my heroine, Natalie, there was blood, actual blood, in the story I'm going to tell on tour. Blood. I mean, just call me Jack Reacher.

Tonight I will be at one of my favorite bookstores, Moonstone Mystery, for a launch party hosted by a bookseller who gets a gold medal for support of new authors. If you can come tonight, please do—there will even be a dessert buffet! You could also visit Moonstone on some future trip—I promise you'll walk out with a treasure. Or just order your next mystery from there!

A Big Thrill

One last thing that came my way on pub day—thanks to managing editor (and author) Nancy Bilyeau and reviewer (and YA author) Dawn Ius, I became a cover girl! Yup, it's true.

I mean, I'm sure Cindy Crawford—dating myself here—isn't worried about the competition, but appearing on the cover of The Big Thrill was a life moment for me. Please read the feature, subscribe to the magazine, and become part of the most informed mystery, suspense, and thriller readers in the world. It's free, by the way.

A Lethal Spectre

I want to give a quick shout-out to my friend, author Donna Fletcher Crow, whose latest book, A Lethal Spectre, just came out this past April.

"Oh the places you'll go," wrote Dr. Seuss

I'll be going a lot of places this month!

If I am a little slower to respond to your wonderful notes, posts, and tweets over the next month or so, please bear with me. I've never done this much traveling alone in my life! Know that your support, interest, and warmth are some of the things that make this writing life so rewarding and I am grateful to you every day. I hope to see you on the road!