Nancy Means Wright & Broken Strings

Hi all!

Please help me welcome Author Nancy Means Wright to my blog today!

Book Title:  Broken Strings



Author:  Nancy Means Wright



Release Date:  May 7th 2013



Publisher:  GMTA Publishing, LLC



Presented by:  As You Wish Tours

Interview with Nancy Means Wright



Genre:  Mystery



What sparked your passion for books and the art of a good story?



   It all began with my father’s early gift of a little orange book I still have called 100 Best Poems



for boys and Girls. I was thrilled with verses by Robert Louis Stevenson, Emily Dickinson, Amy



Lowell and others. After that it was the page turner Nancy Drew books, and I wrote my own



about a brother’s kidnapping--although my mother threw it out.  I read constantly after that, in



daytime and with a flashlight in bed. And in high school moved on to Huckleberry Finn and Jane



Is there a particular book that changed or affected your life in a big way?



   I guess it was Austen’s Northanger Abbey, with the exuberant character Catherine who loves



Gothic novels and has a vivid imagination. Even imagining that a friend’s father has committed a



murder!  I think it was that character who got me writing mysteries.



What has been your best moment as a writer?



   Probably when I won an Agatha award at a Malice Domestic conference and I was so surprised



and tongue-tied I could only say, uh, “thank you,” when I staggered up to the podium. After that



cameras flashed in my face and to get away from the unaccustomed adulation, I only wanted to



get to the bar and have a whiskey on-the-rocks. And did!



   I greatly admire Kate Atkinson, who wrote, among other wonderful books, Case Histories,



and Started Early, Took my Dog. Her protagonist is the delightful, reluctant detective Jackson



Brodie. The writing is brilliant,  iconoclastic, and filled with black humor as one might call it.



I’ve read everything she’s written, whether mystery or wholly literary. Can’t get enough of her!



What do you do when you’re not writing?



   I garden, take walks, exercise, lunch with friends, sing in a chorus, take in lectures and plays at



nearby Middlebury College, travel, and read, read, read.



What are the most important attributes to remaining sane as a writer?



   Probably taking long walks or trips, leaving my ears and eyes open to everything that goes on



around me. I invariably come home with new ideas, plots, and characters.



Did you have a moment when you realized you were meant to be a writer?



   In truth, I can’t think of a “moment.” I do know that it came on me early. Asked to write an



autobiography in elementary school, I wrote “I’m going to be an actress and a writer.”  I ended



up doing both, although professionally only as a writer. The acting/directing has been mostly



community based—though I love it. And I use theater techniques in my writing.



What genre do you personally read?



   Half mystery and half literary novels and stories. Also plays, and poems before I turn out the



   The latest is described below: Broken Strings, a contemporary mystery novel set in rural



Vermont, in which I’ve a puppeteer sleuth.  My sister was a puppeteer, and so was my motherin-law. My spouse and I are using her beautiful handmade marionettes to help launch the novel



with a one act show I’ve written. My son directs a Very Merry Theatre here in Vermont, and



we’ll teach seven of his teenagers to operate the puppets—and hope no one tangles the strings, or

BRIEF SYNOPSIS



When puppeteer Marion collapses during a performance of Sleeping Beauty, her friend Fay



Hubbard promises to carry on. But Fay already has her hands full with three demanding foster



children, Apple and Beets, who have a fractious jailbird father—and sixteen-year-old Chance,



who has a crush on a much older guy in a band called Ghouls. And now Marion’s husband



Cedric seems more interested in a drop-dead-gorgeous French teacher than in any string puppets.



And who is the mysterious Skull-man who warns of death if the show goes on with one of



Marion’s offbeat endings? When an autopsy reveals that Marion had swallowed a dose of deadly



crushed yew—and a friend finds her sister dangling from a rod like a marionette, a shocked Fay

Nancy Means Wright has published 17 books, including 6 contemporary mysteries from



St Martin’s Press and two historical novels featuring 18



(Perseverance Press). Her two most recent books are the mystery Broken Strings (GMTA



publishing) and Walking into the Wild, an historical novel for tweens (LLDreamspell). Her



children’s mysteries have received an Agatha Award and Agatha nomination. Nancy lives in



Middlebury with her spouse and two Maine Coon cats.

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www.asyouwishtours.com

Please thank Nancy for joining us today! Check out her book!

Keep Writing!
Jodie Pierce