We are delighted to welcome author Kristi Belcamino to Omnimystery News today.
Kristi is the author of the Gabriella Giovanni mystery series, the most recently published entry being Blessed Are Those Who Mourn (Witness Impulse; November 2015 trade paperback and September 2015 ebook formats). We recently had the chance to catch up with her to talk about her work.
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Omnimystery News: What is the best advice — and harshest criticism — you've received as an author?
Photo provided courtesy of
Kristi Belcamino
Kristi Belcamino: The first agent who asked to read my full manuscript gave me the harshest feedback. He read it in a week (which is amazing in of itself) and then rejected it. He told me that it "didn't measure up to the heavy hitters" in the crime fiction world. Instead of letting his words devastate me, I realized I had queried my book way before it was ready. I spent a year learning how to write, giving myself what I call a Home School MFA. At the end of that year, shortly before I got multiple offers of representation from agents, I sent it back to this agent, saying, "Will you give it another look, I made a rookie mistake and pulled the trigger too soon." This time he rejected it based on his own personal taste, but not on the writing!
OMN: What are some of your outside interests? And have any of these found their way into your books?
KB: When I was a kid I was obsessed with chess. As I grew older I devoted less and less time to it and eventually gave up my dreams of becoming a chess master. Instead, I made my main character, Gabriella Giovanni, a chess master. My hobbies now boil down to reading and watching movies, which really don't make very exciting scenes in books. I take that back. Anything can be the basis of an exciting scene, such as a murder at the movie theater or something!
OMN: Speaking of movies, what kinds of films do you enjoy watching?
KB: I love all film! I am not high brow at all in my taste in film. I will watch Dumb & Dumber and a flick by François Truffaut with equal pleasure. When I sit down with my husband to watch a movie, however, our favorite type of film to watch together tends to be Sci Fi. We will look for that first — say on Amazon Instant Video or Netflix — and only if there is nothing new (we've usually seen all the Sci Fi offerings) will we move to look in another category such as comedy or mystery.
My favorite films reflect my taste, I think: The Outsiders, The Unbearable Lightness of Being, The Godfather, The Dreamers, Henry and June, Before Sunset and Before Sunrise.
OMN: Suppose your mysteries were to be adapted for television or film. Who do you see playing the key roles?
KB: When I was writing my first book in the Gabriella Giovanni series, Blessed are the Dead, I had definite actors in mind for the characters. I even had pictures of the actors hung on my wall above my desk. I envisioned Italian model and actress Elisabetta Canalis as Italian-American Gabriella Giovanni. She was sexy but could also pull off the girl next door look. For Giovanni's love interest, Irish-American Detective Sean Donovan, I was stuck on Irish actor Colin Farrell. I've been searching for years for the right actor to play one of my very favorite characters, photojournalist, Chris Lopez. I'd welcome suggestions from readers of my series. Hint. Hint.
OMN: When selecting a book to read for pleasure, what do you look for?
KB: Life is too short to read a book that is not immediately engaging. I will give a book ten pages and if I'm not intrigued, I'll put it aside. It is brutal but true. I want to immediately be excited by the writing and the character. I want to sit and read it start to finish. If I feel that way, I know it's a great book and I'll read it. I don't read something out of guilt or because I feel like I "should" anymore. I minored in literature in college. I don't need to read out of necessity. I read for pleasure only.
When choosing a book to make it into my To Be Read Pile, I most often go for recommendations from friends or an awesome, compelling cover.
OMN: Create a Top 5 list for us on any topic.
KB: Top 5 Favorite Bands:
1. U2;
2. Wood and Smoke (local L.A. band, now broken up);
3. The Cure;
4. Concrete Blonde; and
5. The Verve.
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Kristi Belcamino is a writer, crime reporter, and Italian-American mama who makes a tasty biscotti. As a reporter, she flew in an FA-18 jet with the Blue Angels, raced a Dodge Viper at Laguna Seca, and attended barbecues at the morgue. Kristi now works part-time as a police reporter at the St. Paul Pioneer Press. She lives in Minneapolis with her husband and her two fierce daughters.
For more information about the author, please visit her website at KristiBelcamino.com and her author page on Goodreads, or find her on Facebook and Twitter.
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Blessed Are Those Who Mourn by Kristi Belcamino
A Gabriella Giovanni Mystery
Publisher: Witness Impulse
San Francisco Bay Area reporter Gabriella Giovanni has finally got it all together: a devoted and loving boyfriend, Detective Sean Donovan; a beautiful little girl with him; and her dream job as the cops' reporter for the Bay Herald. But her success has been hard-won and has left her with debilitating paranoia. When a string of young co-eds starts to show up dead with suspicious Biblical verses left on their bodies — the same verses that the man she suspects kidnapped and murdered her sister twenty years ago had sent to her — she begins to question if the killer is trying to send her a message.
It is not until evil strikes Gabriella's own family that her worst fears are confirmed. As the clock begins to tick, every passing hour means the difference between life and death to those Gabriella loves …
— Blessed Are Those Who Mourn by Kristi Belcamino
