Kathleen Marple Kalb releases A Fatal Overture, an Ella Shane historical mystery

 

The multi-talented Kathleen Marple Kalb returns with a great new cozy mystery! 

Kathleen Marple Kalb likes to describe herself as an Author/Anchor/Mom…not in that order. She’s the author of the Ella Shane historical mystery series for Kensington Books, including A FATAL OVERTURE, and A FATAL FIRST NIGHT, named to Aunt Agatha’s Best Of: History Mystery 2021 list. She grew up in front of a microphone and a keyboard, working as an overnight DJ as a teenager in her hometown of Brookville, Pennsylvania…and writing her first (thankfully unpublished) historical novel at sixteen. After a news career with stops in Pittsburgh, Vermont and Connecticut, she’s now a weekend morning anchor at 1010 WINS Radio in New York City. As Nikki Knight, she’s also the author of the contemporary Vermont Radio Mystery, LIVE, LOCAL AND DEAD, out now from Crooked Lane. Her short stories appear in anthologies, and her story “Bad Apples” was an Honorable Mention in the 2021 Black Orchid Novella Contest. She, her husband, and son live in Connecticut, in a house owned by their cat.

WHERE TO FIND ME:

Website: https://kathleenmarplekalb.com/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Kathleen-Marple-Kalb-1082949845220373/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/KalbMarple

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/kathleenmarplekalb/ 

What would you write if you knew you couldn’t fail?

Something just for fun, like the part Princess Diaries, part romantic suspense, part modern cozy mystery piece that I work on between projects. It’s bonkers and genre-bending, but it’s relaxing sometimes to use everything I’ve learned about craft just for my own enjoyment…and ignore the rules if I want to!

How do you know when your story is finished?

When I can read it through without any real questions about characters, plot or voice. If I think something doesn’t quite hang together, my editor – and readers – will absolutely catch it, too. I don’t let anything out of my hands until it’s the best I can possibly make it. Even then, I’m often not done. The wonderful thing about working with good editors is that they see improvements writers can’t because we’re too close to the story. At least for me, it’s not “The End” until my editor and I agree that it is.

Do you write part-time or full-time?

I think of it as a full-time job, and approach it that way. If I added up all the hours I spent on writing, editing, social media and connecting with other writers, I would definitely be working north of 40 hours a week. A lot of that is fun, though, so it’s not really a fair calculation. However much actual time I spend on writing, I treat it with the same professionalism I bring to my “real” job as a radio news anchor: I’m always on time, prepared, and ready to accept changes or constructive criticism in the professional way it’s meant.

How long on average does it take you to write a book?

When I really have time to write, I can get a full manuscript in about two months. I don’t have a traditional first draft because I go over the previous day’s pages when I start writing in the morning, so that full manuscript is in decent shape, but still a few weeks away from a form I’m willing to show anyone. If I was working on only one project at a time (not my usual approach), I could finish a book in three to four months.

What is the most difficult part of your artistic process?

Patience. I have none. A lifetime in newsrooms has made me very good at making fast deadlines, and very bad at letting things unfold. One of the biggest things I’ve had to learn as a writer is to give story and plot ideas time to “cook.” It’s easier if I’m working on several projects at once – I can take a break and let one settle, and write something else, then switch, and bring fresh eyes to each.

What is your next project?

I’m polishing the next Ella book – no spoilers! I’m also working on a couple of different cozy mystery ideas. My NaNoWriMo project was to finish something I’d been working on for years, and I really loved the process, and the story, so I’m polishing that too. And of course my crazy little side project!

 

A FATAL OVERTURE finds trouser diva Ella Shane facing her biggest challenges yet: murder, marriage – and her potential mother-in-law. The mother and aunts of her swain, Gilbert Saint Aubyn, Duke of Leith, show up at her townhouse demanding to know when she plans to marry him…only to find a body in their hotel bathtub. As Ella and Gil try to work out their marriage contract, Ella’s newspaper reporter pal Hetty gets mixed up in the murder…and an old friend of Ella’s informs her that someone is trying to take out a contract on Gil. They may be able to work out a happy ending – but it won’t be safe, or easy!

Buy: A Fatal Overture (kensingtonbooks.com)

https://www.kensingtonbooks.com/9781496727244/a-fatal-first-night/

https://www.kensingtonbooks.com/9781496727268/a-fatal-finale/

Cozy mystery author Nikki Knight releases Live, Local, and Dead.

 

Welcome to radio news anchor and cozy mystery author, Nikki Knight (aka Kathleen Marple Kalb!

Nikki Knight is the pen name of award-winning New York City radio news anchor Kathleen Marple Kalb. She’s been on the air since she was a teenage DJ in her small Western Pennsylvania hometown, working in newsrooms in Pittsburgh, Vermont, and Connecticut – and never losing her love of radio, or her hatred for snow. She also writes the Ella Shane historical mystery series for Kensington, and her short stories appear in several anthologies. Her Vermont story “Bad Apples” was an Honorable Mention in the 2021 Black Orchid Novella Contest. She, her husband, and their son live in a Connecticut house owned by their cat. 

WHERE TO FIND Nikki:

Website:  https://kathleenmarplekalb.com/nikki-knight

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/NikkiKnightAuthor

Twitter:  https://twitter.com/NikkiKnightVT

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/kathleenmarplekalb/ 

How many hours a day do you write?

I’m entirely at the mercy of school and work schedules! If my son has a full school day, and I didn’t take an extra early-morning shift over the weekend, I might get most of the six-hour school day at the laptop. If I worked extra (I have a three-hour commute each way to the NYC radio station), I’m probably going to take a nap first. If it’s a short school day – who knows? When we were doing Virtual School, I would write while my son was in class across the room…and we somehow made it work. I like to say I write whenever I have five free minutes and a flat space for the laptop, and it’s true!

What is your favorite childhood book?

Hands down, ANNE OF GREEN GABLES! I loved the main character, who’s so intelligent and feisty – and not easy! I loved the community around her. And, growing up in the western Pennsylvania back-country, I just adored the whole escape to Prince Edward Island. My family went to P.E.I. once when I was really young, and it was wonderful being able to go back with Anne. Even now, I dig out my old Anne’s once in a while when I’m stressed.

What is the most difficult part of your artistic process?

Finding – and taking – the time to really let ideas mature. Between the scramble for writing time, and my newsroom training in deadlines, I’m just not good at letting things sit.  But it’s so important, to walk away for a while, and return with fresh eyes, or to just sketch out a few points and turn it over in my head before writing. I have to remind myself to do that, but when I do, the work is much better.

Five years from now, where do you see yourself as a writer?

Hopefully, still writing a couple of series, and short stories in between. And, please sooner than five years, actually seeing readers and other writers in person! I was a lockdown debut, and I’ve never signed a book for a live reader or gone to a conference. Starting a writing career alone in my basement was pretty ugly, and I’ll probably be one of those annoying people who is EVERYWHERE when it’s really safe again!

How many unpublished and half-finished books do you have?

Actually, a lot! Next installments in each series ready to go. Plus, complete first books in three new and entirely different cozy series. Not to mention a couple of sample chapter and proposal packages. Oh, and one utterly insane women’s fiction thing I wrote as a kind of brain-cleanser after my first try at a Vermont mystery didn’t sell! That one probably isn’t saleable, either, but it was really important to know that I could write something else.

Was there a person who encouraged you to write?

When I was a kid, my mother bought me legal pads to write on, and I always “borrowed” my Grandpa’s classic mysteries. Fast-forward to my son going to kindergarten, and I say to my husband, “Maybe I’ll try writing while the kid’s at school.” He tells me to go for it, and backs me all the way, through two brutal years of querying and submission – much of it during his own treatment for lymphoma. And then there’s my son. One day, I was crying over a bad rejection, and the then-seven-year-old hands me a quarter and says, “I’ll buy your book.”

I still have the quarter…and he gets every first copy.

 

LIVE, LOCAL, AND DEAD (2/8/22) follows New York City DJ Jaye Jordan’s new start at a tiny Vermont radio station, after her husband survives cancer but their marriage doesn’t. She thinks she’s got enough trouble with protests because she replaced angry talk with love songs…and then the talk show host turns up dead in a snowman in front of the station. Plus, her second-chance romance with her old crush – the governor – turns out to be much more dangerous than either of them expected. Add in a colorful cast of locals, the cranky station cat Neptune, and Charlemagne the Moose, who has flatulence issues…and it’s more fun than anyone should be allowed to have in maple sugaring season.

 

Buy: https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/695810/live-local-and-dead-by-nikki-knight/