5 questions with Susanna Calkins!

Terri Bischoff

Today please welcome Susanna Calkins! Susie is the author of the award-winning Lucy Campion historical mysteries (with Minotaur/St Martins). Her books have been nominated for 7 awards, including the Mary Higgins Clark Award, the Agatha for Best Historical and the Bruce Alexander Historical Mystery Award (Lefty) and she was awarded the Sue Feder Historical Mystery award (Macavity). She lives with her husband and two sons outside Chicago. And she is an all around great person! I love to hang out with Susie at conferences. :) So without delay, here are the five questions she chose to answer:

What is your job experience?

Ha! In addition to this writing thing I do, I’ve sold tickets and candy in a movie theater, been a projectionist (for an ill-fated stint when I managed to let an entire film spool out onto the dusty projection room floor), ran amusement park rides (after just a few hours of training—not recommended!), worked in a Girl Scout camp (and I still know hundreds of truly wacky songs, warped only in the way that scouts can make them); flipped a few burgers, made a few shakes, served as a resident hall counselor, and taught history at the college level for many years. But nothing compares to my time as a pirate in London (I was a living history specialist—tour guide—aboard the Golden Hinde for six months, and ran pirate parties on the weekends for little British kids.) A lot more exciting than my current job, where I work with faculty to develop their teaching and do research on learning (boy, I almost fell asleep describing my current occupation).

Is your desk messy or clean?

I cannot abide a desk. Out of necessity, I have one at my ‘day job’, which I do keep pretty neat and organized. But I can’t write there. Not one creative word. That desk is the death of creativity. So I like to write in coffee shops, spreading out so no one can sit too close to me unless I’m in the mood for eavesdropping. Then I only use my laptop to draw interesting conversationalists in, because I’m fascinated by the crazy stuff people will talk about when they think no one is listening...

What would your autobiography be called?

KNOW WHO THE MURDERER IS—A True Story of Meandering, Indecision, and Confusion

I wrote my first historical mystery, A MURDER AT ROSAMUND’S GATE, over the course of ten years, scene by scene, without any knowing the identity of my murderer, even though as the antagonist he (or she!) was the entire driver behind my story. I was so interested in the impact of the murder of a young 17^th century serving girl on her plague-ridden London community, and the toll it took on a man wrongly accused of her death, that I truly forgot about the “mystery” part of the story. I had to go back and basically learn the craft of mystery writing, so I could shape that stack of 300+ disconnected pages into the novel that it one day became. And in some ways, the story of that novel is the story of me as an author—how I came to find myself as a writer, and in this wonderful world of books and readers that I’ve happily discovered for myself.

What is your perfect murder weapon?

While I appreciate the arcane poison (who doesn’t?), I am drawn to the everyday objects that should not be murder weapons. Studying murder weapons is how I got into this mystery writing thing in the first place. When I was graduate school I began to study the gender patterns of domestic homicide in 17^th century England. My (somewhat simplistic) thesis was that men killed differently than women, but they both used the tools that surrounded them. So for women, the tools came from the home—spinning needles, herbal concoctions, cooking implements, and the easy one, pushing your victim into the hearth. (Think of the kids pushing the old woman into the fire in the gingerbread house—a homicide of convenience). Men tended to use tools of their trade (awls, hammers, nails) or from the field (pikes, hoes etc). I don’t know if our murder weapons are so gendered today, but it is interesting to contemplate!

What is your favorite unsolved mystery? I don’t have a famous one, but years ago, my high school ring flew off my finger in my bedroom. I didn’t see it right away, so I looked everywhere! Under my bookcases and desks, through my stacks of clothes etc. And search as I might, I never ever found it. I’m really hoping that this mystery will be solved for me one day, because it truly bugs me. Where did it go? (Of course, when I do find it I’m sure I’ll be struck anew by how hideous the thing was. But still it’s a mystery that I would like to see solved! I imagine that it will be found hundreds of years from now, and people will wonder who in the world this person could have been....).

Also, you can head on over to Susie's website to learn more:

www.susannacalkins.com

Find me on twitter: @scalkins3

[email protected]

A Murder at Rosamund’s Gate (2013)

From the Charred Remains (2014)

The Masque of a Murderer (2015)

A Death Along the River Fleet (2016)