Welcome to author Laurie Heidtman!! Tell us a little about yourself!
I’m retired from the nine-to-five life and live with my husband, two dogs and two cats on private land inside Daniel Boone National Forest in Kentucky. I have loved fiction since before I could read and, according to my mother, made up stories based on the pictures in the books. Now that I no longer have the excuse of not enough time, I’m fulfilling my lifelong dream of writing novels. Over the years, I’ve paid the bills by being a dancer, a bartender, a police officer, a registered nurse and a technical writer. Now I’m drawing on that life experience and my two English degrees to create stories that I enjoy writing and hope readers enjoy reading.
The
photo above is from 2018. The medal is the bronze medal from 2017 Wishing Shelf
Independent Book Awards.
I write mysteries and thrillers under the name
Laurel Heidtman, and I write cozy mysteries and romantic suspense under the
name Lolli Powell.
Websites:
Facebook:
Laurel Heidtman: https://www.facebook.com/Laurel-Heidtman-Author-1493519914256076/
Lolli
Powell: https://www.facebook.com/lollipowell
Twitter:
BookBub:
Laurel
Heidtman: https://www.bookbub.com/profile/laurel-heidtman
Lolli
Powell: https://www.bookbub.com/profile/lolli-powell
What is your
latest release?
Bottoms Up (6/12/21), the fifth in my
Top Shelf cozy mystery series that I publish under my Lolli Powell pseudonym.
What are you
working on now?
The Ghost Wears A Badge, the first
book in a new cozy series called The Spirit of the Law. I don’t plan on
releasing it till I have the second book finished or almost finished.
Was there a
person who encouraged you to write?
Several creative writing teachers in
college encouraged me. And while my mother didn’t specifically encourage me to
write, she always made sure we had books (both ones I could read on my own and
ones she read to me) in the house even though we were very poor. Loving to read
books is the first step toward loving to write them. And reading a lot of
fiction is the best way to learn to write fiction.
What would you
say are your strengths as an author?
Varied life experiences. Those include
growing up really poor (as in no-running-water-or-central-heating poor) during
the fifties and sixties. My family (I was an only child; my mother and I lived
with my maternal grandparents) didn’t have a television till I was 13, but as I
said, we always had books in the house. I’ve also worked in many different and
widely varied professions. I spent my twenties as a dancer and sometimes
bartender, during which time I also paid my way through a B.A. in English with
a Creative Writing Emphasis. After I graduated (at age 30), I became a police
officer and spent my thirties in a cruiser. At age 40, I was ready for a change
and went back to school for a Master’s in Technical and Scientific
Communication, worked for a short time as a technical writer, then returned to
school again for an Associate Degree in Nursing. I worked approximately four
years as a registered nurse on mental health and substance abuse units, then
took another technical writing job with a company that wrote software for large
court systems. I did manuals, and later, online help. They allowed me to work
mostly from my home (on private land inside Daniel Boone National Forest), and
I did that until I retired from outside work. I often say I never could decide
what I wanted to be when I grew up, but the truth is, I always wanted to write
fiction. But like a lot of people, I ended up following the path of “find a
profession you can depend on.” Sure, I wrote on and off during those decades of
doing other things, but I never really concentrated on it till I had more time
in retirement.
How often do you
write, and do you write using a strict routine?
I write most days. There are always
times I can’t work it in, like when I have appointments or errands I have to
run. We’re 10 miles from a county road, 26 miles from the closest supermarket,
so errands can take a while. I also edit for a few other writers, so sometimes
that interferes with my writing. I don’t have a strict routine, as far as
writing at a certain time. With dogs and cats and just waking up, I seldom get
started writing or editing before 10AM, but more often it’s afternoon.
Five years from
now, where do you see yourself as a writer?
With (I hope) 15 to 20 more books than
I have now. I currently have 14 that I’ve self-published under both the Laurel
Heidtman and Lolli Powell names, plus a couple of boxed sets. I’m gradually
getting better about writing faster, and if I can do 3 to 4 books a year, I
will be happy. This year has been good for me so far in terms of sales and
pages read increasing, and I can see no reason why that won’t continue. I
believe that writing and self-publishing (and probably traditional publishing
as well) has to be looked at as a long game. Write books that entertain people,
learn to market the books, and you’ll eventually find your readers. To
paraphrase a well known movie phrase, write it and eventually they will come.
WHISKEY KILLS
On sale for 99¢ from October 8 through October 14!!
Whiskey with a murder chaser!
Big cities are known to be dangerous, but former New Yorker and bar owner Ricki
Fontaine is finding the small town of Waterton, Ohio, is proving to be the
murder capital of the world—well, at least her world.
The new Top Shelf is open for business, but business as usual for Ricki and the
Shelf translates to another dead guy. Ricki’s friend, Ruby Fogarty, is charged
with murdering her boyfriend by clubbing him to death with a bottle of whiskey.
The police consider the case closed, but Ricki is convinced Ruby is innocent
and sets out to find the real murderer. Although Waterton police detective
Gabriel Russell is crazy about Ricki, he isn’t too crazy about her trying to do
his job.
The killer’s not too happy about it either.
THE BODY ON THE BARSTOOL (A Top Shelf Mystery)
Get cozy with The Body on the
Barstool!
New Yorker Erica
"Ricki" Fontaine's n'er-do-well uncle has dropped dead and left her a
dive bar in a small Ohio River town. Now she's trying to change the Top Shelf
from a bar known for its Friday night fights into the kind of drinking
establishment where you can bring your granny. But finding her ex-husband dead
on a barstool at opening time one morning just might put a kink in those plans.
UNDERCOVER (A Kisses and Killers Thriller)
Luke Savage is a DEA
agent assigned to go undercover in a criminal organization that wants to expand
its “business.” Bree Kelly is a local cop assigned to go undercover with him.
She thinks he’s an arrogant sexist. He thinks she’s an irritating liability.
Their cover? They have
to pose as a loving couple—and they don’t even like one another.
The assignment could
last for weeks or even months as they try to uncover their target’s plans and
who the organization has on the inside of local government and police
departments. The success of the assignment—and their lives—depend on them
working together as partners. But can they trust one another even though they
don’t like each other? Can they share an apartment for as long as necessary
without killing one another?
And the biggest question
of all—will the loving couple act stay an act?
getbook.at/KissesandKillersSeries
CATCH A FALLING STAR (An Eden Mystery)
Missing treasure,
criminals, cops, co-worker hostility, the surprise appearance of an ex-lover,
and murder — definitely not what mystery novelist Kate Rawlings expects when
she accepts a summer teaching position at her alma mater in the peaceful
college town of Eden, Kentucky.
Michael Mabry was Kate’s
lover in college, but did she ever really know him? Thirty years later, he’s on
the run from his partners in a Chicago museum heist in which two people were
killed and a valuable ancient Indian artifact called the Shooting Star was
stolen. Michael escaped with the Star and his life, but he needs money to get
out of the country. After so long, Eden should be the last place anyone would
think to look for him, but his partners and an insurance investigator with his
own agenda are hot on his trail. Kate finds herself suspected of involvement in
the heist, but when a murder occurs in Eden, she also finds herself suspected
of murder.
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