From the start, I wanted to make “place” as much a participant in my now 32-volume Joe Gunther series as the humans driving the plots. The books are set in Vermont, so the famously touted beauty and natural drama of that state supplied an easy starting point. But in addition, I wanted to ferret out…
CHAPTER 1 Warren Kitzmiller looked around the large, almost empty morgue, tugging at the sleeve of his starched white lab coat and painfully aware he should be presenting a more detached demeanor. He was standing alone beside a flayed, cold, gray corpse, spread out in a grotesque parody of a post-Thanksgiving feast. It was supine…
Tom Hanks made a charming (and drooly) movie with a dog. Stephen King wrote a big book (followed by a movie) about a dog (if maybe a slightly less endearing one). One of the funniest, most gruesome scenes in A Fish Called Wanda featured dogs. Small ones and one LARGE one. And Lassie. Rin Tin Tin. I…
CHAPTER FOUR Searching the Weeds “Brattleboro Reformer. Rachel Reiling speaking.” “Hi, Rachel. It’s Anne Proctor, from Proctor and Harris? Remember me?” “Sure.” Rachel pulled up her contacts on the screen and rediscovered that Proctor and Harris was a funeral home in Westminster, and thus the source of some biographical tidbits in the past—not that she’d…
Describe the first time you pictured Joe Gunther in your head. Joe came to me first as a voice, more than as a physical type. What I wanted was a go-to spiritual model that every other character (and the readers) could consult in moments of confusion and stress. At various times, I have played the…
Meet Archer Mayor: New York Times-bestselling Vermont crime writer Archer Mayor has written thirty-one books in his Joe Gunther series, about a Vermont police detective who solves crimes in all corners of his native state. He is a past winner of the New England Independent Booksellers Association Award for Best Fiction and the latest book…
Margot Mayor is New York Times bestselling author Archer Mayor‘s partner-in-crime and the Director of Marketing, New Projects and Publicity at archermayor.com. Join her for a discussion about how she tapped into a mystery book club and set up a think tank to get useful feedback regarding the trajectory of the Joe Gunther novels. Bonus: Comment on…
Join Archer Mayor, New York Times bestselling author of the Joe Gunther police procedural series, as he shares how writing has provided a healthy outlet to explore his experiences as an emergency responder. And sign-in/comment on the post below for a chance to win one of three advance reader copies of Bomber’s Moon, Book #30…
“Crosscut” is the very first short story from Archer Mayor’s much-loved Joe Gunther series. Going into the previously unexplored history of VBI Detective Sammie Martens, Archer Mayor reveals the story of how Sammie first met Joe Gunther and Willie Kunkel. Sammie Martens, raised by a single mother in a chaotic household, returns home after leaving…
Every Wednesday, we here at Criminal Element will put together a list of Staff Picks of the books that published the day before—sharing the ones that we are looking forward to reading the most! This week, Vince Flynn’s Mitch Rapp series continues with a new installment from Kyle Mills and Joanne Fluke adds a holiday-themed prequel story to…
