with Susan M. Boyer
We are delighted to welcome Agatha Award-winning mystery author Susan M. Boyer to Omnimystery News today.
Susan's second mystery to feature PI Liz Talbot is Lowcountry Bombshell (Henery Press; September 2013 trade paperback format) and we recently had the chance to talk to her about it.
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Omnimystery News: Congratulations on winning an Agatha Award for Best First Novel for Lowcountry Boil, which introduced Liz Talbot. Why did you choose to create a recurring character?
Photo provided courtesy of
Susan M. Boyer
Susan M. Boyer: I wrote a recurring character — many recurring characters, actually — to give my readers an extended family. I wanted to create a world inhabited with characters readers would want to revisit again and again. Also, I enjoy exploring the characters more fully with each book. I intend for the characters to change over time, but slowly. My main character, Liz Talbot, experienced personal growth in coming to terms with her past and her relationships with her romantic interests in the first two books. She will continue to learn as she goes, as I think that parallels reality — we all learn as we go.
OMN: Are the books in this series cozy mysteries?
SMB: They are traditional, private investigator mysteries. They are also romance novels. The romance plays out over the course of the series. Some readers have categorized them as cozy, and I would agree there are definitely cozy elements: small town setting, humor, light tone, recurring family characters, lots of food. However, there are also some non-cozy elements: some language and sexual situations.
OMN: Tell us something about your new book that isn't mentioned in the publisher's synopsis.
SMB: My series has a paranormal element. Liz Talbot's best friend from childhood, Colleen, is a guardian spirit — one who has passed from this world to the next and been sent back with a mission. Colleen plays a role in the second book, Lowcountry Bombshell, but, like other secondary characters, her role will vary from book to book. We don't see as much of her in book two.
OMN: How similar are you and Liz?
SMB: On a personal level, Liz always gets to say the things I would've liked to have said in any given situation. She is somewhat like me, only braver, smarter, younger, and thinner. Her experiences, situations, and the cases she solves are all completely fictional, as are the people in her life.
OMN: Complete this sentence: "I am a mystery author, and thus …".
SMB: I am a mystery author, and thus you should consider carefully what you say in front of me. Some variation of it could end up in my next book. I never write about real people. But I am much inspired by the things they say and do. If I overhear you wishing you could saw up your brother-in-law and feed him to the alligators, I could go off on a tangent and invent a character who actually does somesuch thing. This could be a problem for you if you ever actually committed said crime.
OMN: Describe your writing process for us.
SMB: I have biographies for the main characters, and sketches for the others. I also created family trees for them using ancestry software. When you've created an entire town from whole cloth, you want to make sure you don't marry off folks in book 5 who you established as cousins in book one.
I start with a loose outline, but then let the story develop and the characters take me where they will. I revise the outline often as I write.
OMN: The lowcountry of South Carolina is a beautiful setting for a series. But where is Stella Maris?
SMB: My books are set on a fictional island, but the island of Stella Maris sits just north of Isle of Palms, South Carolina, which is a real place. While I write true to the lowcountry in general, everything on my imaginary island is just that — a figment of my imagination. But when my characters leave the island and set foot in actual Charleston area locations, I take few liberties. I use real places, street names, businesses, etc. There are a few exceptions to that rule: a fictional security company located in Charleston, a fictional convenience store, and everything related to the Charleston Police Department aside from one of its locations. There may be others that don't come immediately to mind. But generally, I want readers from the area to recognize my literary landscape when my characters venture into Charleston, Mt. Pleasant, Isle of Palms, or the surrounding area.
OMN: What kinds of books did you read when you were young?
SMB: I loved Nancy Drew books. I wanted to be Nancy Drew. I write a private investigator series so I can live vicariously through my character. She gets to do things I only dream about doing.
OMN: What's next for you?
SMB: The next book in the Liz Talbot series, Lowcountry Boneyard, releases May 6th, 2014, followed by Lowcountry Bordello in October.
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Susan M. Boyer has been making up stories her whole life. She tags along with her husband on business trips whenever she can because hotels are great places to write: fresh coffee all day and cookies at 4 p.m. They have a home in Greenville, SC, which they occasionally visit, and they run away to the beach as often as possible.
Susan's debut novel, Lowcountry Boil, is an Agatha Award winner for Best First Novel, a 2012 Daphne du Maurier Award for Excellence in Mystery/Suspense recipient, and a 2012 RWA Golden Heart® finalist.
Learn more about Susan and her books on her website SusanMBoyerBooks.com or find her on Facebook and Twitter.
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Lowcountry Bombshell
Susan M. Boyer
A Liz Talbot Mystery
Private Investigator Liz Talbot thinks she's seen another ghost when she meets Calista McQueen. She's the spitting image of Marilyn Monroe. Born precisely fifty years after the ill-fated star, Calista's life has eerily mirrored the late starlet's — and she fears the looming anniversary of Marilyn's death will also be hers.
Before Liz can open a case file, Calista's life coach is executed. Suspicious characters swarm around Calista like mosquitoes on a sultry lowcountry evening: her certifiable mother, a fake aunt, her control-freak psychoanalyst, a private yoga instructor, her peculiar housekeeper, and an obsessed ex-husband. Liz digs in to find a motive for murder, but she's besieged with distractions. Her ex has marriage and babies on his mind. Her too-sexy partner engages in a campaign of repeat seduction. Mamma needs help with Daddy's devotion to bad habits. And a gang of wild hogs is running loose on Stella Maris.
With the heat index approaching triple digits, Liz races to uncover a diabolical murder plot in time to save not only Calista's life, but also her own.
