Q. Why did you write this particular story?

A. It starts with my childhood in Illinois. I grew up on a farm, and my father was a farm manager and interested in nature preserves. This whole conflict between natural use of land and productive use of land is a fascinating subject. It's the idea that any kind of land can be pulled out of productive use, and have a concrete slab put on it or be turned into a nature preserve where its not productive, is an interesting area of conflict. And that conflict can get rather brutal.

Q. They're fighting over a nature preserve versus a parking lot?

A. It's even more complicated than that. There are some sinister elements out there who plan to use a rather large, factory-type building for stolen goods and drugs. It's a conflict among several different groups of people that want to use the property for different things.

Q. Your character of Sylvia Thorn, a circuit judge has a Vietnam War vet for her brother, Willie Grisseljon. Is that a real name?

A. These people are of Norwegian heritage and I wanted to mutilate a Norwegian name so no one would recognize it. I wanted to make sure it didn't get tied to anybody that I know from Norway.

Q. Okay, so Willie's the sidekick.

A. Yes. He's conservative. He's very cautious. He's always trying to talk Sylvia out of doing the destructive things she does, whether it's constructing a martini or nosing into other people's business. He often gets caught up in what's going on, and ends up being with her as kind of a co-partner in whatever jeopardy she manages to get herself into.

Q. Oh, right. Willie and Sylvia try to uncover what is going on. Of these two characters, which one is the lead?

A. Sylvia is the amateur sleuth. Willie manages to push himself into the middle of everything Syliva does. Even though she pretty much bails him out of a bad situation - he came home from the war and was having difficulties and he was homeless for a while, yet he considers himself her protector.

Q. Are you planning on writing another book with these characters?

A. Yes. With some of the response, I found out that people like Willie a lot. I decided to give Willie a bigger role than I had originally intended. The second Sylvia and Willie mystery is going to be set in Laughlin, Nevada and Oatman, Arizona. I'm really excited about this one because I had more fun writing it than I did the first one.

Q. You worked out some of the kinks in the writing process?

A. That's part of it. I put a little more fun in this one. This is hard, balance of humor in a murder mystery and still have a serious crime is kind of fun.

Q. Do you plan on making this into a series?

A. I hope so. When I first started, I was only considering a Sylvia-like character, but then I thought if I gave Sylvia a brother, that would ensure that my own brother would read the whole novel. And what I found out is that there are a lot of [female] readers out there who have brothers, but there aren't very many brother and sister combinations in mystery stories, in mystery series.

Q. Is Sylvia going to be happy sitting on the bench after this visit with her brother?

A. Well, I can tell you this much, she definitely runs into serious career problems at the end of book one.

Q. Now that you've created, and refined a manuscript into a published book, what do you do differently? How have you changed the writing process with your second book?

A. It was totally different. In the first one I just sort of took off on a wing and a prayer. I wanted to write a mystery. I wanted to craft a mystery. I didn't have a lot of information about how to do this except for reading a couple of books. So I had to go back and do extensive revisions after the first one. I decided with the second one that I would do at least a scene outline.

Q. Oh?

A. Yeah. And I actually followed that outline for a while. And it worked well to get me going. But then I found that my mind, when I 'm not at the computer writing, is always working on stuff. Then I'll sit down at the computer and off I'll go like my fingers aren't even attached to my brain. They're certainly not attached to the outline I wrote. I’ve got to go back and put in some things I left out.

Q. That happens to you, too?

A. Oh, yeah. So I go back to 'Chapter such and such' and make sure this character's name is right. The revision process may be as bad as it was on the first book, whether it be a description or a clue that should have been planted early on and was not.

Q. Speaking of writers’ groups…

A. Did I lead you there?

Q. You sure did. I just wrote an article for the newsletter about taking part in critique groups. What is your opinion on how helpful critique groups are to a writer?

A. I think they’re critical. I don’t know that I would have ever gotten published without critique groups. I have belonged to them off and on for years while I’ve done years of practice writing between everything else that was going on in my life, I always worked full time. I've been to writers' conferences and so forth, but without a critique group, I don't think unpublished writers are really focused enough on what they're doing. I took a writing class here in Fort Collins in 2003, a local author put it on and he did a wonderful job. Out of that class, the critique group I’m in now was formed. It has been absolutely invaluable. I credit them for their knowledge. They all know what they’re doing. I expect all of them to be published one day.

Q. What authors, whose books do you read?

A. Oh gosh, I read everything. I buy books faster than I can read them, and then I get books from the library. I can’t keep caught up. I read a lot of mysteries, of course. I read everything. What I’m reading right now is The Postman Always Rings Twice. A writers conference is going to be held back in Muncie, Indiana. The book will be used in the conference, and I’m going to go to that. I have all the Harry Potter books and have only managed to make it thru the first three...a little behind on that one.

A. Well, it's not because I don't want [to read] them, it's because the stacks are everywhere. I need to pare down my collection, pass these books on to other people. It’s obviously becoming an addiction. I think it’s a common addiction for writers.

Q. Of authors that you’ve read, do you think any of them have influenced your style of writing?

A. As much as I read, I would think that probably everything I’ve read has had some influence. I’m a lot more aware now, of course, when I read of what good writing is. Also what good editing is. I think that probably as many years as I’ve been reading and as many books that I have read, I can’t imagine that it wouldn’t be possible for them to have influence. You know, it would just be impossible. But any specific author I can think of, no.

Q. So what do you do when you’re not writing?

A. I like to read….I used to love to garden but my garden is now full of weeds and thistles so I can’t claim that as an activity this year. When I get in the mood and actually start watching TV shows, I crochet. I keep my hands busy. And I do a lot of extra work for my critique group. And for some other people I’ve met over time, just reading things and making suggestions and marking stuff. That’s kind of fun. I’ve joined a couple of writers’ groups and I hope to get a little more active with them, about what’s going on, Sisters in Crime being one of them.

Q. Now that you’ve gone thru the publication route, are there any words of wisdom you’d like to pass on to the rest of us?

A. Oh, my goodness. If I had known then what I know now…Even tho I had been told that the promotion was a lot of work. Number one, I did not start early enough, I did not join organizations that I should have, for instance Mystery Writers of America and Sisters in Crime. I should have joined them way before I was published.

Q. That’s one thing we’d like to do is have the published authors inform the ‘newbies’ of all the ins and outs of this.

A. Well, actually I suggested that topic for a panel at Left Coast Crime (to be held in March of 2008 in Denver). I’m thinking about doing something like that for a library. So I’m going to try to put together all the things I wish I had known then. I actually have [to put] them down on paper so maybe I'll be able to do something with that...

Q. Well, Patricia, I almost called you Sylvia…Is there anything else you’d like to add about your book, about your second book, about you as an author?

A. I will tell you about me...I could tell people that I'm a late bloomer because I did not publish until I was over sixty. The truth is, in my opinion, there are many authors first published over sixty. What it is, it takes years and years of writing to put down life experiences. Most people who are published later on in life, also have boxes, at least one if not multiple boxes of essays, unpublished manuscripts, beginnings of novels that never went anywhere. And I do.

Q. Doesn’t Stephen King have such a box?

A. I wouldn’t be a bit surprised. I think probably most people do. There’s an awful lot of people who don’t get published until they’re over forty. Most people have to work and raise a family in the interim. It has to do with life experience. Only superstars get published in their twenties.

Q. How exactly did you find a publisher, or an agent?

A. I don’t have an agent yet. I’m still working on that. I’m working on that at the Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers conference, and with query letters. The way I got published is work-shopping at the Colorado Gold Conference and the workshop leader was a freelance editor at Five Star Publishing. I listened to what she had to say and went home and did a few more revisions and sent it in. It was accepted. It was unbelievable