Okay, so just who are you, Pat? I live in the Pacific Northwest and have four great kids with four even greater granddaughters! For umpteen years, I've been a grant writer, helping a variety of nonprofit organizations and public agencies. I love gardening and drink Irish breakfast tea-and oh, yes I'm a Pepsi fan. In fact, I won a short mystery story contest about that recently.

How did I get started writing mysteries? By reading them as a kid. Bet you read Nancy Drew, the Hardy Boys and Sherlock Holmes, too! Louise May Alcott is the author who most inspired me to become a writer. And Ross Macdonald with his Lew Archer series was my model for writing mysteries-though I "don't do PI."

I write mysteries because I like the old-fashioned theme of them: in the end, justice must be served. Over time, this premise has changed or been ignored, but I like to think it can happen with my characters. Happy Reading!

How did Death Stalks the Khmer come about? I've worked with the Cambodian refugee community in the Puget Sound area for 11 years. The families I've worked with have haunting stories of their experiences during the Khmer Rouge years from 1975-1979. During that period, an estimated 2 million Cambodians died cruelly under the Pol Pot Khmer Rouge regime. The Cambodian (Khmer) culture is rich in tradition, ages old and fascinating. I wanted to share something of that unique culture and felt that it could be done as a true whodunit built around the story of refugees struggling to acculturate into American society. In the novel, a Cambodian refugee couple, the Hahn Lys, are shot and killed in their Seabell apartment. Bridget O'Hern is called in to be a liaison between the Seabell police and the Khmer community. Bridg hears the community whispering that the couple died because they had bad karma. Bridg believes the Hahn Lys' deaths are rooted in the horrors of the Khmer Rouge times.

Tell us about your sleuth - Bridget (Bridg) O'Hern is named after my great-grandmother who came from Tipperary, Ireland. She had a reputation of being a grand storyteller, so I hope a genetic thread ties me to her venerable tradition. My amateur sleuth Bridg is 48, and in her debut mystery, she "comes of age." Granted, it's belatedly. She's no teenager. But in her debut in DEATH STALKS THE KHMER, she is recovering from a deep depression caused by long-term emotional abuse. She's overcoming her past, looking to the future. As her sidekick C. J. Johanson tells her, "Now you're seeking your bliss." Bridg consults with nonprofit organizations, which helps her to get into different locales and to be with different people where, of course, murder and mayhem happen. Oh, yes, did I tell you that Bridg lives in a place actually called St. Mary's Corner in western Washington? It has some famous history that I'll tell you about at another time.

When did you first start writing?

I was a kid, and I remember that I sent a story that I wrote about horses to the Horseman Magazine. It was rejected--my first but not last rejection--and that was probably the beginning of my writing career.

Why do you write?

Truthfully, it's not always for the joy of it. I find writing very hard work. I recast sentences and change words constantly. Actually, that's considered counter productive, but I still tend to write that way. But to answer your question, I write to reach out, to create resonance with readers. I write to create a bridges of understanding about something through words and images, and I write mysteries because I love a good whodunit. In the traditional mystery genre, the underlying thesis is that justice will be
served. I with agree with that, even if it doesn't happen in real life quite so often or easily.

What sort of books do you like to read?

I like to read mysteries including English mysteries (P. D. James), and I like police procedurals or cops/detectives that I can follow over time and through a variety of cases. I like John Brady's Inspector Minogue. I also like biographies and am waiting for my sister to finish "John Adams," so I can read it. Between writing grants for a living and writing stories and working on two novels, my reading time is limited.

Who is your favourite author or has influenced your writing?

No doubt about it: Louisa Mae Alcott from my childhood. I loved Jo in "Little Women" and "Jo's Boys" and Jo was a writer, too, you may remember. Ross Macdonald absolutely is the quintessential author of the kind of
mysteries and writing style that I think was classic and excellent literature. He is hard to copy, but I tried to mimic him when I first started out (poorly, I might add).

If you could meet any character from a book, who would it be and why?

Actually, I'd probably like to meet Father Tim and some of the Mitford Town's slew of quaint characters in Jan Karon's appealing Mitford Series.

What are you currently working on?

I have about a half dozen stories that I'm plugging along with and that are in various stages. I have three that are quite dark, and apparently, I have to get them out of my system. (I usually don't do "dark.") I'm
finishing the first book-length manuscript on my children's mystery series. It features a trio of fifth-grade, multicultural sleuths called the Stanley Street Irregulars. They've been published in short story form before. I
have concepts, settings and some outlining done on another three books in the Bridget O'Hern series. Book 2 is set on the Oregon coast and is done. In Book 3, Bridget goes to Ireland to look up her Irish roots in "Death Returns to Athenry." Just writing this makes me realize that I'm busy!

What have you found to be the best way of promoting your book?

Gaining name recognition within the writers, fans and others in the mystery fiction realm. The Internet is priceless, practical and so speedy in terms of having access to potential readers and industry folks. Getting good reviews certainly helps, too, and also doing a variety of speaking presentations. Since I'm with a POD publisher, I have to do most of my own promotion/marketing (make that all of it, actually). I'm building readers
one at a time. My website and newsletter help, too. I have found a niche of readers who are Norwegian Elkhound owners because they found out that my sleuth has one. The mystery readers among them are absolutely delighted to find a mystery series where an Elkhound trailing after the protagonist. So now
my site is now a member of the Norwegian Elkhound webring.

And finally, what advice would you give to writers starting out?

Read a variety of literature including the genre you want to write. Persevere and don't give up. Expect some dry spells. Switch and try different kinds of writing, including short stuff. I belong to a Flash Fiction list where we critique each other's material, some as short as 25 words. I've come to realize how critical every word can be and it's relationship to its fellow word. Kind of like people and humankind, relationships are important. Finally, believe in yourself. I recommend "The Artist's Way" by Julia Cameron as a way to believe in your creative self.