Professor L.A. Smith taught me the best writers are those who write about things which interest them and about which they know a lot about the topic. I didn't choose to write about a detective because I ever served in law enforcement, which I didn't. I chose to write about a detective because I've long had an interest in forensic science and the crime solving process. I'm an avid fan of law enforcement programs, both real and fictional. What you read in my novels may not always be accurate, but I've done the best research I could to make the novels as believable as possible.
      I've often read books or watched television programs and was left "hanging" by not knowing how or why a particular person acted or didn't act in a certain way. The original idea for my first novel came from one such instance. In an episode of one of my favorite dramas, the main character's wife is killed by a vengeful criminal. Instead of crying or taking time to mourn, the husband goes after the man who killed his wife. Maybe the crying and mourning came later. Perhaps they never happened. Such are the drawbacks of television dramas and their limited time and space for character development. I may never know what happened in this man's private life.
      So I sat down and wrote a short story about the way I think a man who is really in love with his wife would react. I had the characters of that series in mind at the time. After reading what I had written, I thought I could write an entire novel around a similar plot. Knowing I needed an original plot and my own characters, I wrote down my cast of characters and a brief outline of the plot. The novel grew from there.
     What began as a simple idea to answer my own questions about a single episode of a crime drama grew into a world all its own. Many of the subplots may have been introduced in many other crime novels or dramas, but I hope I've woven them in a way which is totally unique and captivating.