Samantha Downing & Wendy Walker Instagram Chat

It was no joke tonight (despite it being April 1st) that there was a book event…one of my favorite things. I joined the Instagram live chat with Wendy Walker and Samantha Downing hosted. We learned that Samantha had written 15 books and been writing as a hobby for 20 years before she was ever published. WIth my Lovely Wife she joined a writer group in New Orleans. One of the women in the group said, “she knew a guy”. She shared the story with her friend in New York who was a Non-Fiction publisher. But he shared with a fiction publisher and Berkley and had two book deals within three days. It’s always fun to me to hear how authors I love got their start. How they have become found and brought to my hands and eyes today. Samantha says that so many of her early things she deleted off of her computer because if she dies, she doesn’t want anyone finding it…

They introduced and talked about the new novella, Sleeping Dogs Lie, available on Audible now. She had to push herself and was limited to 20,000 characters to totally tell the story. And she had to think abut how this will be a "listening experience  not just a reading experience." Samantha talked with her writing group what makes the best audio experience...Her first novella with multiple narrators. If you haven't checked it out, I highly recommend that you give it a listen. 

Her next book is out this summer, For Your Own Good. This is her first novel she's written with multiple narrators, all in third person. She wanted to write this book initially about a teacher and it grew from here. I know our book club cannot wait to check it out: Teddy Crutcher has won Teacher of the Year at the esteemed Belmont Academy, home to the best and brightest.He says his wife couldn't be more proud—though no one has seen her in a while.Teddy really can’t be bothered with the death of a school parent that’s looking more and more like murder or the student digging a little too deep into Teddy’s personal life. His main focus is on pushing these kids to their full academic potential. All he wants is for his colleagues—and the endlessly meddlesome parents—to stay out of his way.It's really too bad that sometimes excellence can come at such a high cost.

For now, I'll leave you with the synopsis for Sleeping Dogs Lie as you can get your hands on it at this moment. And as Wendy Walker said, "kill all your darlings" and have a good night. 

 

Shelby works as a dog walker in northern California, and she’s just finished up her bi-weekly trip to the park with a husky named Pluto. When she brings him back to his house, she finds his owner - Todd Burke, a well-known local businessman and founder of an organic supplements company - lying on the bathroom floor, dead. A detective arrives on the scene. As she interviews Shelby, the body is inspected by a medical examiner, and more cops search Todd’s home, it becomes clear that the victim’s life was less picture-perfect than his clean-cut persona might lead you to believe. 

Posted by book lover: Brittany P.