Write what you know, they say. It’s excellent advice. And yet I—a fully credentialed introvert who spends most days in a comfy chair—decided to write characters who are experts in Krav Maga, speedboats, snipercraft, and fast cars, which are things way outside my daily experience.
This means I live in research mode. I literally cannot turn it off.
True story: I once passed out on an airplane. Nothing serious, just a little vasovagal episode. But my very first conscious thought when I woke up on the floor outside the cockpit, surrounded by concerned flight attendants, was I gotta pay attention because I can use this in a future book.
My second thought was, Oh no, am I dying? But it was a distant second.
Even though I do most of my initial research online (from that previously mentioned comfy chair), to understand a subject well enough to write about it, I have to experience it firsthand. This has led me to adventures way out of my comfort zone, including, but not limited to, the following:
• Driving a Ferrari — My instructor kept telling me the car would go much faster, and I kept puttering that fine piece of Italian engineering around the course like I was a stereotypical granny on her way to Sunday services. Because the list price for that particular Ferrari was $247,000.
• Training in a firearms simulation room — In the first practice scenario, I managed to bring down the bad guy, but I also took out a businessman, a TSA agent, and a honeymoon couple. In the second scenario, the bad guy got me within seconds. I managed to return fire, but instead of hitting the shooter, I pinged a random squirrel (a first, the instructor said).
• Clearing a building as part of a faux SWAT team — I failed at this because even though I remembered to post up at the rear entrance, I forgot to never turn your back on an active threat. Oops.
• Diving with real sharks — I actually had a lot of fun doing this; it’s one of my peak life experiences. Not so much for the guy who didn’t know it was a shark dive until our boat was surrounded by sharks.
I’ve rappelled, boxed, processed fingerprints, and learned to pick locks. I’ve toured archaeological digs, Civil War battlefields, 911 call centers, and haunted cemeteries. My current research slate includes revisiting a certain infamous lake in North Georgia (one with a particularly horrific backstory) but I will not be dipping a toe in that cursed water, no way, no how.
My imagination will have to suffice.
CROOKED WAYS
Series: A Tai Randolph & Trey Seaver Mystery, Book 7
Genre: Private Investigator Mystery
Format: Print, Digital
Amazon | Books2Read
Tai Randolph doesn’t like tailing adulterers. Or photographing cracked sidewalks. Or staking out insurance scammers.
But being an apprentice PI means doing what she’s told, filling out paperwork, and following the rules, all the rules. It’s a bit chafing for someone whose amateur sleuthing playbook included dodging, lying, and occasional light blackmail.
But then her past comes knocking. Literally.
After a decade in the wind, Tai’s Aunt Rowena reappears, and she’s convinced someone is trying to kill Beauregard Boone, the complicated ex-felon at the heart of Tai’s twisted family tree. It’s an intriguing case, even if it means returning to the coastal islands of Savannah, Georgia, a city that keeps breaking Tai’s heart over and over again.
Not that life in Atlanta is uncomplicated. Trey Seaver—her partner in both romance and crime solving—is keeping a secret. Her new job comes with a moral rectitude clause, so she has to be on her best behavior at all times. And unless she scrapes together some extra bucks, the electric bill is going to be paid late. Again.
But in Savannah, all she has to worry about is vehicular homicide, flying bullets, and an enemy who has been laying low for a long long time. Tai’s got a choice to make: Safety and security where the only risk is boredom? Or risk and reward where the consequences could be deadly?
About the author
Tina Whittle is a mystery writer living and working in the Georgia Lowcountry. Her Tai Randolph & Trey Seaver series—featuring intrepid not-quite-professional sleuth Tai and her ex-SWAT partner Trey—has garnered starred reviews in Kirkus, Publisher’s Weekly, Booklist, and Library Journal. A two-time nominee for Georgia Author of the Year and a Derringer finalist, Tina enjoys birdwatching, walking in cemeteries, and reading tarot cards. You can learn more about her and her work at her website at www.tinawhittle.com.