THE ONLY WAY FOR JOANNA TO LEARN IN A HURRY IS TO TAKE A CRASH COURSE LIKE THE ONE THEY OFFER AT THE ARIZONA POLICE OFFICERS ACADEMY

An assassin’s bullet shattered Joanna Brady’s world, leaving her policeman husband to die in the Arizona desert. But the young widow fought back the only way she knew how: by bringing the killers to justice . . .and winning herself a job as Cochise County Sheriff.

Still mourning her loss, Joanna Brady needs to be strong and supportive for her nine-year-old daughter, Jenny. She also has responsibilities to the people who elected her Sheriff. Joanna has the heart and instinct for her new job, but not the experience–which is what brings her to Phoenix for a pre-Thanksgiving crash course in police training . . . and into the mystery of an imprisoned husband her gut tells her did not murder his estranged wife. Suddenly Sheriff Brady has a lot more to worry about than classes and the visiting family pre-holiday chaos. For her impromptu investigation is drawing a serial killer too close for comfort–and closer, worse still, to Joanna’s little girl.

Writing a Joanna Brady book is a whole lot like being in therapy, only more fun. I get to write all the lines–Eleanor Lathrop’s, Joanna’s, and Jenny’s as well. In the process I’ve learned things about myself and come to terms with some of the conflicts and misunderstandings in my own family life.

When I’m writing about a character, I try to put myself inside that person’s head and react as he or she would react. If I can’t understand a particular character’s motives for doing something–if what he or she is doing or saying isn’t believable to me–then it won’t be believable for my readers, either.

Sometimes people who start out as fans become friends. That was the case with Jim and Carol Norman. When I wrote this book, I decided to pattern one character, the lady detective from Peoria, after Carol who was tiny and beautiful and whose glorious black hair resembled a mound of licorice-flavored cotton candy. At the publication party for Tombstone Courage, I told Carol about her coming appearance in Shoot/Don’t Shoot. She was excited and looking forward to her cameo appearance.

Then, after the book was written and before the book was published, Carol Norman was killed in a drunk driving incident--not accident--along the Oregon Coast. When the galleys came, I was afraid what had been a nice gesture when Carol was alive might now prove to be a further loss to her devastated husband. I called my editor and told him the situation. I asked for and received permission to change the character’s physical appearance if that was what Jim Norman wanted. He said, "no", that "Carol had been so excited about the prospect of being a character in a book that he didn’t want me to change a thing". But I did. I left the detective’s physical appearance as written, but I changed her name. . . to Carol.

JAJ