Patricia Bradley Interview

Q: Let me start with asking you to tell us a little bit about yourself.
A. I live in a small town in Northeast Mississippi, four miles from the Tennessee border and 25 miles from Alabama’s. Besides writing, I love to work with clay and when my hands are clean, knit. Suzy, my gray and white tabby and Tux, my black and white tuxedo cat, own me. I love dreaming up stories of murder and intrigue and catching the bad guys.

Q: When did you first realize you wanted to be a writer?
A. I was thirty-five. Until then I was a reader, reading anything I could get my hands on, including the backs of cereal boxes. Before that, if I didn’t have anything to read, I would get bored, but now that I have all these people living in my head clamoring to tell me their stories, I’m never bored. lol

Q: Do you find certain themes reoccurring in your books? If so, what are they and why? If not, what is the theme in your current release?
A. There are several themes running through my books: forgiveness, second chances, the feeling of not being enough–these often run through my books, and does in Obsession.

Q: Would you tell us about your current book release OBSESSION?
A: Natchez Trace Ranger and historian Emma Winters hoped never to see Sam Ryker again after she broke off her engagement to him. But when shots are fired at her at a historical landmark just off the Natchez Trace, she’s forced to work alongside Sam as the Natchez Trace law enforcement district ranger in the ensuing investigation. To complicate matters, Emma has acquired a delusional secret admirer who is determined to have her as his own. Sam is merely an obstruction, one which must be removed.

Sam knows that he has failed Emma in the past and he doesn’t intend to let her down again. Especially since her life is on the line. As the threads of the investigation cross and tangle with their own personal history, Sam and Emma have a chance to discover the truth, not only about the victim but about what went wrong in their relationship.

Q: Where did the idea for this story come from?
A. The first time I traveled the Natchez Trace all the way to its terminus in Natchez, I stopped by Mount Locust and fell in love with it. Mount Locust was one of the first inns on the Trace, if you could call it an inn. It was really only a four-room cabin—“guests” slept on the porch and in summer, the yard. It was several years before a larger structure was built, a four-room, two-story annex known as Sleepy Hollow. While the cabin survived all these years, Sleepy Hollow did not.

Q: Who/what has influenced your writing career the most?
A. Susan May Warren. Back before I was published, I knew I had a good story, but no editor wanted it. A friend referred me to Susan May Warren and My Book Therapy. I attended the first Deep Thinker’s retreat. By the time the fourth retreat rolled around I’d revised and polished that first story (that became Shadows of the Past) and had a three-book contract. I will always thankful for Susan’s and Rachel Hauck’s teaching at those retreats.

Q: Would you share with us what you are working on now?
A. I just turned in Crosshairs, Natchez Trace Park Rangers, Book 3. Investigative Services Branch (ISB) ranger Ainsley Beaumont arrives in her hometown of Natchez, Mississippi, to investigate the murder of a three-month-pregnant teenager. While she wishes the visit was under better circumstances, she never imagined that she would become the killer’s next target—nor that she’d have to work alongside an old flame.
After he almost killed a child, former FBI sniper Lincoln Steele couldn’t bring himself to fire a gun, which had deadly and unforeseen consequences for his best friend. Crushed beneath a load of guilt, Linc is working at Melrose Estate as an interpretive ranger. But as danger closes in on Ainsley during her murder investigation, Linc will have to find the courage to protect her. The only question is, will it be too little, too late?

Book 4 is percolating in my brain and is due to my editor June 1.

Q: Is you were a dessert, what would it be and why?
A. Good question…maybe something sweet and tart at the same time?

Q: Is there something about you most people wouldn’t know?
A. Through the Pilates class I’ve taken for fifteen years, I can still touch the floor flathanded.

Q: Is there a place you have always wanted to visit? A vacation spot, historical monument, overseas, etc?
A. Alaska, Hawaii, Scotland, Ireland, Europe, a return visit to Israel…