Meet the Author Monday: Susan Page Davis

Welcome to this week’s Meet the Author Monday interview with our guest, Susan Page Davis. Susan has written over a hundred books, from historicals to mysteries, and several are award winners. But we want to know more about Susan that you can find in a bio. So, let’s begin. Welcome, Susan. Why don’t we start off with something easy. Tell us a bit about yourself.

I was born and spent most of my life in the state of Maine. I went to college just outside New York City, which was a major shock, but it stretched my experience. After I got married, I moved to Oregon, then back to Maine, and later to Kentucky. Each time I moved, I tried to noticed all the things that were different in my new environment. God has blessed me in allowing me to write more than 100 novels. My husband, a retired news editor, and I are the parents of six grown children and grandparents of eleven.

As someone who has lived in the same place all my life, I find all your moves a little daunting. Though I would like to visit some of those places. Let’s talk a bit about your life as a writer. Do you have any writing routines or habits you follow for a productive writing day?

Yes, I’m usually at my desk by 7:30 in the morning, and I work most of the morning at writing and writing-related tasks. These might include editing, promotions, planning, research, interviews, and so on. If I haven’t finished the tasks I’ve assigned myself for that day, I continue in the afternoon. I’m usually done work for the day by three or so.

You’ve got more self-discipline than me! You’ve got a new book, Scream Blue Murder, releasing soon. What prompted this particular story?

In December 2021, a string of tornadoes ripped through our area. Having grown up in New England, I had never seen tornado damage firsthand, and it was eye-opening. Since I’m writing a series of mysteries set in western Kentucky, I decided to put a tornado in my next book, and here it is. Scream Blue Murder. It releases March 7.

Tornado damage can be devastating, but you’ve got me wondering what part the tornado plays in your mystery. Does it help solve the mystery or create more of one? No. That isn’t for you to answer now. We don’t want any spoilers. You’ve lived a lot of places, but if you could go anywhere to write for one month and money wasn’t an issue, where would you go?

I’ve always had a hankering to see Switzerland. I’m not much of a skier, but I’d love to see it and soak up the atmosphere.

That sounds fun. If you could spend the day with any three authors, living or dead, which ones would they be and why?

Ellis Peters (Edith Pargeter) to pick her brain about her intricate plots that always come together; Ellen Withers, who is a recent friend, and I just love her and her story that I’m reading; Dick Francis—I just love his mysteries in the horse racing world.

Sounds like a good line-up for growing in the craft of writing mysteries. What are the most fun, most feared, and most tedious parts of being an author?

Most fun is definitely having written “the end.” Most tedious for me is fact checking and reading galleys.

Fact checking definitely eats away at your time as an author. But it is so important. Speaking of getting all the little details right, we grow as authors as we write. Looking at your list of books, if you could go back and rewrite an early book, would you do it?

I’m laughing, because I’ve actually done that. In this day of self-publishing and print-on-demand, that’s not at all hard to do. When the rights to one of my older books are reverted to me, I go over it and make changes. Most see minor tweaks, but one or two have had some larger adjustments. I’ve also rewritten some older stories that were never published, because now I can see why they were never published and make them better.

Thank you, Susan Page Davis, for joining me with a Meet the Author Monday Interview. I’ve enjoyed getting this peek behind the curtains into your life as a writer. I’ve definitely learned some things about you that I didn’t know before. I’m sure our readers are in the same boat.  And readers, don’t leave yet. I’ve got more on Susan’s new release. You don’t want to miss finding out what part that tornado plays in the mystery. 

ABOUT SCREAM BLUE MURDER:

A tornado rips through town, and Campbell McBride and her dad take shelter. Afterward, they try to help others who were hard hit, and a body is discovered in the debris of a cottage near their friends’ home. Was the man dead before the twister struck? The owners of the ruined cottage hire True Blue Investigations to help identify the victim and find out how he got on their property. Meanwhile, among the volunteers, Campbell meets her mother’s old school friend, Jackie. It seems Jackie married her mom’s former boyfriend—and now she has eyes on Campbell’s widowed father.

Where to get your copy of Scream Blue Murder: scrivenings.link/screambluemurder