Why do you write the genre that you write?
I write historical mysteries because I’ve enjoyed them since childhood, beginning with Nancy Drew and going on to Agatha Christie. But the reason I write the Deadly Series is entirely different.

Where I used to live, I belonged to a church with a minister who’d grown up in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and he goes back there every year to do missionary work. As a result, our small town received a large number of refugees from the Congo and many of them attended our church. They had to learn a new language, new customs, even a new climate. This was a small town without a large number of available jobs and being comfortable with our language and culture was a necessary prerequisite. I found this assimilation fascinating, a process that is still ongoing. Who knows how the stories of these people will end? These are stories that are still being written.

On the other hand, the story of the German and Austrian Jews who escaped from Nazi Germany to England is now a few generations old. I used the process of opening and closing borders, of learning a new language and new customs, as the background to the Deadly Series murder mysteries set in England before and during World War II. I used this situation as a stand-in for the immigration going on in America today, to study these very human stories through the prism of time.

Of course, these stories have a well-plotted mystery at the heart, as do all the stories I love to read and write.

Tell us how you got into writing?
I’d always wanted to write and had tried my hand at it, but it wasn’t until my youngest graduated from college and my husband became disabled that I had the time and the need for something to do while staying close to the house that I began to work at it seriously. Eighteen manuscripts later, I finally produced something worth publishing.

What jobs have you held before, during and/or after you’ve became a writer?
I was retired by the time I became an author. Before that, I worked as a microbiologist in a couple of hospitals and then put in 26 years at AT&T, starting as the office typist and ending as a communications technician, before taking early retirement to care for my husband.

Where do you write?
I write in my office, preferably a study or bedroom that faces the front of the house. Basically, I’m nosy, or as I like to think, I have the curiosity of a writer. I prefer two desk top computers, one for the internet and one for writing only.

What is your favorite deadline snack?
Chocolate chip cookies.

What is next for you?
The ninth in the Deadly Series, called Deadly Rescue, that sends Olivia to Denmark just before the invasion of Denmark and Norway.

What are you reading now?
For research, I’m reading London at War by Philip Ziegler, a book I inherited from my mother this past year that has proven to be a gift from her from beyond the grave. For fun, I’m rereading Robert Barnard’s wonderful mysteries.

Where can we find you?
You can find me at kateparkerbooks.com where you can sign up for my newsletter, and on Facebook at  author.kate.parker.

Now to have some fun . . .

Vanilla or chocolate
Chocolate. Always chocolate.

Pizza or burgers
Burgers with cheese, tomato, lettuce, onion, and
mustard, served with chips (fries) with ketchup.

Broccoli or squash
Depends on the squash. I love spaghetti squash, but I prefer broccoli
to summer squash or zucchini. Acorn squash is pretty good, too.

Breakfast, lunch, or dinner
Breakfast, or at least breakfast foods.

Mountain or beach
The beach! There is something so relaxing about
the waves constantly beating on the shore.

Introvert or Extrovert
Introvert. Twice while I worked at AT&T, they gave our group
Myers-Briggs tests. I came out at the farthest end of the introvert scale both
times. That may explain why I enjoy the solitary pursuit of writing so much.

And even more fun . . .

You are stranded on a deserted island. What are your three must-haves?
I think I’d prefer to be stranded on a desserted island. Sorry about the pun,
but that’s my first requirement, cookies. Then there must be tea to drink
with the cookies. And number three? A desktop computer attached to an
electric line and with internet access. I guess my desserted island
isn’t deserted since it has electricity and internet.

My bio
Kate Parker has spent most of her life in Virginia and the Carolinas where she raised her family. Now retired from child-rearing and the day job, she loves to travel, seeking out new worlds to explore and new story ideas to build on. She still hopes to find the elusive time travel machine with which to travel in time as well as place.