First Line Friday #17: Fallen Sparrow

Now available from Midnight Ink, Barnes & Noble, Amazon, Indiebound, and your local bookseller!

Q&A with D.A. Keeley!

This week, we sat down with D.A. Keeley, author of the Peyton Cote Novels. His most recent, Fallen Sparrow, was released in early June.

Midnight Ink: How long have you been writing?

D.A. Keeley: I wrote my first “book” when I was six. I wrote a story one weekend, bound it with string, and told the librarian at Readfield Elementary School I wanted her to put it on the shelf. She did, God bless her. I sold my first novel when I was 29. My first five were under my own name (John R Corrigan), my sixth was under KA Delaney, and now I’m DA Keeley writing about Peyton Cote, a US Border Patrol agent and a single mom.

MI: What influence have other authors had on your writing?

DAK: As a dyslexic, reading never came easy. I had a great middle-school teacher who told me to read “something” every day. I read The Hockey News cover to cover every week. In high school, my mother handed me Robert B. Parker’s Ceremony. I remember hitting the passage “It’s a way to live. The rest is confusion” and thinking, What a great summary of detective fiction. I read everything Parker wrote, then moved to Chandler, and Connelly, and Hemingway, and—you get the idea. A highlight (along with being a finalist for a Maine Literary Award this year) was having Mr. Parker blurb my first novel Cut Shot. I learned so much about writing by reading the Spenser novels and listening to them on audio. It impacted not only what I write by how I write: I listen to every word I write using text-to-speech as part of my editing process.

F. Scott Fitzgerald, Toni Morrison, Fyodor Dostoevsky, Hemingway, and Philip Levine are all writers I adore.

MI: If you weren’t a writer, what would you be doing?

DAK: I turned down a minor league hockey tryout to go to grad school. Maybe I’d be kicking around a rink sharpening skates.

MI: If you have a job outside of writing, what is it?

DAK: I teach and chair the English department at Northfield Mount Hermon School, and I’m probably the only crime writer on the planet who is a dorm parent to 60 teenage girls.

MI: What is your favorite thing to do when you’re not writing or working?

DAK: Anything with my three daughters and wife. We spend as much time as a family as we can at Old Orchard Beach, Maine, body surfing and playing on the beach.

D.A. Keeley's daughter Audrey with Schnoodle Edie

MI: Who is your favorite mystery sleuth and why?

DAK: Spenser is probably tops. Although, that’s like asking a little kid what his favorite sport is—my answer changes depending on who I’m reading right now (which, by the way, is Naomi Hirahara).

MI: Do you have a favorite murder case from a book (either yours or another author’s)?

DAK: I love true crimes. I was a newspaper reporter during and after college. I’m a news junky.  

MI: What was your inspiration for this series? Tell us about Peyton Cote.

DAK: When I lived in Presque Isle, Maine, I played hockey on Sunday nights with Customs and Border Protection agents. That led to ride-alongs with a CBP agent. I learned so much from those—details that I hope add authenticity to the novels. I got a call from the CBP last summer saying these ride-alongs were no longer allowed, so I am indeed lucky to have had the opportunity. At the same time, I was teaching at Northern Maine Community College. And I was blown away by the will and determination I saw in the single mothers who attended my classes. I tried to create, in Peyton Cote, a woman with these attributes. Peyton is an accomplished agent and a single mom who struggles to balance both of those worlds. She's got an ex-husband who drives us all crazy, and a highly traditional mother who thinks she failed because she raised a daughter who carries a gun. As the series progresses, Peyton's love life gets more interesting, and her homelife more complicated, two aspects of the series I love writing.

MI: How does this series compare to your past works?

DAK: The “procedural” qualities are similar to my Jack Austin PGA Tour novels, in that I research my butt off to make sure things are authentic. I am VERY lucky to have Kevin Steven, former deputy chief of the CBP, serve as something of a technical consultant. He has answered emails for three years, telling me everything from whether or not agents tuck their pants into their boots, to his philosophy on the Texas border crisis. I've always strived to make my books authentic, and Kevin (and his wife and daughter, who read them) have been great resources.

I love writing series, seeing how the characters grow and change or time. But Jack is a lot like me. Peyton Cote, for obvious reasons, is not. But the books are similar in that I like to deal with the human condition. For instance, Fallen Sparrow is—to me—much more a book about lost friendship than a thriller.

MI: Do you have a pet? Tell us about him/her.

DAK: Edie (like the ice cream) is a two-year-old Schnoodle. I got her in Pennsylvania. Left a 2 a.m., arrived at an Amish farm a 9 a.m., paid, stayed 30 minutes, and drove home. Got back at 2:30 that afternoon and had her at the bus stop to surprise my daughters by 3. I highly recommend the book The Art of Raising a Puppy by the Monks of New Skeet. This book makes me look like a much better dog trainer than I am.

Edie

MI: What food could you live off of for the rest of your life?

DAK: Sandwiches. Red Hook beer.

MI: Do you have a favorite recipe?

DAK: Garlic steak.

MI: What’s your favorite part about being an Inker?

DAK: I LOVE working with Nicole and Terri. I’ve been on this treadmill for nearing 20 years, so I know how lucky I am to work with an editor and publisher who treats my books as if they were their own.

Fallen Sparrow is available online and in bookstores now!

Midnight Ink | Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Indiebound | Your local bookstore

Visit D.A. Keeley online.

June 2015 Releases Available Now!

Don't miss Midnight Ink's latest releases!

"Compulsively readable."

—Publishers Weekly (starred review) on Corrupted Memory

“This edgy and emotional thrill ride will captivate readers.”

—RT Book Reviews (four stars) on Fallen Sparrow

Now available from Midnight Ink, Barnes & Noble, Amazon, Indiebound, and your local bookseller!

Celebrating Women's History Month #4: Serie-ous Women

Here at Midnight Ink Headquarters, we find that the best way to celebrate Women's History Month is to talk to our authors whose books feature strong female protagonists. Every day this week, return to this blog to find out more about the ladies portrayed in our various series and stand-alone releases this year!

Don't miss our previous posts in this series!
Day 1, Day 2, and Day 3.

Linda Joffe Hull

Linda Joffe Hull is on the national board of Mystery Writers of America and is a member of Sisters in Crime and the Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers. Awarded the 2013 Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers Writer of the Year Award, Hull is the author of the Mrs. Frugalicious Shopping Mystery series for Midnight Ink and has also published The Big Bang with Tyrus Books. A native of St. Louis, Hull now lives in Denver with her husband and three children. Visit her online at www.lindajoffehull.com or at mrsfrugalicious.tumblr.com.

Maddie Michaels is the wife of TV financial guru Frank Finance Michaels. When he loses all their money in a Ponzi scheme, she reinvents herself as bargain shopper/coupon clipper Mrs. Frugalicious to save the family from financial ruin. Luckily, Maddie is able to look at the dire situations she faces with humor and optimism.  In her latest adventure, Sweetheart Deal (November 8, 2015), Maddie is in Mexico finding deals on destination weddings and timeshares. When faced with both murder and the maddening issue of playing happily married for her new reality show, The Family Frugalicious, she does so with her trademark pluck.

Sallie Bissell

Sallie Bissell is the author of the award-winning Mary Crow mystery series. A native of Nashville, Tennessee, she graduated from Peabody College (now part of Vanderbilt University) and now resides in Asheville, North Carolina. Bissell is a member of Mystery Writers of America and Sisters in Crime. Visit her online at www.salliebissell.com.

Mary Crow was born because I find people who bridge different cultures fascinating. Mary’s half-Cherokee, half-white. She works in an urban, male-dominated American legal system; yet she was raised in the mountains, in the more matrilineal traditions of the Cherokees. The murder of her mother devastated her, but ultimately led her to become a take-no-prisoners criminal prosecutor. Over the years, though, she’s realized that guilt is not often black or white, but gray. In Judgment of Whispers (September 8, 2015), new evidence reopens an old murder case and reawakens rumors that have never died. Mary must find the truth amid some horrific innuendo.

D. A. Keeley

D.A. Keeley has published widely in the crime-fiction genre and is the author of six other novels, as well as short stories and essays. In addition to being a teacher and department chair at the Northfield Mount Hermon School, and a member of the Mystery Writers of America, Keeley writes a bi-weekly post for the blog Type M for Murder. Keeley divides his time between Massachusetts and Maine. You can learn more about the author and series at: www.dakeeley.blogspot.com or on Twitter @DAKeeleyAuthor.

Peyton Cote is a single mother and a top-flight US Customs and Border Protection agent. I love writing her for many reasons—she’s dedicated, tough, and smart -- but she also struggles, like any single parent, to balance her work and home lives. Her strength is founded upon her childhood: she was raised in the farming community where she now works, and she knows what it feels like to lose it all—her family did; they lost the farm, literally. This offers both internal struggle and great empathy when dealing with the people a border patrol agent typically deals with, those individuals desperate to better their lives and the lives of their loved ones. These conflicts are never more apparent than in Fallen Sparrow (June 8, 2015), where Peyton’s past (in the form of a long-lost friend) collides with her duties as a CPB agent, and the teacher of her son, who has just been diagnosed with dyslexia, is smack dab in the middle of it all. 

Nina Milton

Nina Milton has been publishing short stories and children’s books for thirty years. She has won many literary competitions, including the Crossroads Competition, Kent Festival Prize and the Wells Literary Short Story Competition. Milton holds her Masters in Creative Writing from Bath Spa University. Milton, a Druid, drew from her background to create the realistic depiction of shamanism presented in the Shaman Mystery series. Visit Milton online at www.kitchentablewriters.blogspot.com.

As a hard-knock kid, Sabbie Dare knew she was different—she saw through the veil that hides other planes of existence. 

Now she has a shamanic therapy business, she’s still facing trouble because clients bring danger with them. 

In Beneath the Tor (December 8, 2015), a friend dies after a night of dancing, and Sabbie investigates the abusive emails the bereaved husband receives. Sabbie can’t resist untangling this mystery, using confused help from the spirit world, but to get closer to the truth, she must penetrate the deranged mind of a killer, whose madness is taking down innocent victims, one by one.

Return to this blog tomorrow for our final round-up, including: Maegan Beaumont, Mark Stevens, Laura DiSilverio, and Catriona McPherson!

August 2014 Books Available Now!

Don't miss Midnight Ink's newest releases! 

"Packed with thrills and high-octane action, Bitter Crossing is an impressive debut with a fearless heroine you'll want to follow for many adventures to come."

—Tess Gerritsen, New York Times bestselling author of the Rizzoli & Isles series on Bitter Crossing

"A classic country-house mystery, with modern day twists and turns adding to the fun."

—Booklist on Murder at Midnight

"A lively debut."

—Kirkus Reviews on Terminated

Available now from Midnight Ink, Barnes & Noble, Amazon or your local bookseller!