We are honored to have a guest post from Pamela Crane, author of Little Deadly Secrets, on the blog this week. Little Deadly Secrets is the latest addictively readable domestic suspense novel from USA Today bestselling author Pamela Crane. In this book, we meet Mackenzie, Robin, and Lily. They have been inseparable forever, sharing life’s ups and downs and growing even closer as the years have gone by. They know everything about each other—or so they believe.
Welcome, Pamela!
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My kids call me the Mental Mommy. We even made matching t-shirts. Before the pandemic, we wore them to our library so that I could easily find my children amid the book stacks. (Because what other kid would wear a shirt that says Proud child of a Mental Mommy?) The nickname could have evolved because there are four of them and one of me, and since they outnumber me, some days Mommy goes a little…well, mental. When I asked my oldest daughter where they came up with it, she told me it’s because I write stories about domestic drama, particularly mothers and their wild families. I remember sighing with relief (yay, they didn’t think I was a bad mom!)…until she elaborated that she, too, wrote a short story about murder and motherhood. I’m sure I’ll be paying for her therapy over it someday.
Sure, being a mom makes it hard to write. Sneaking in a chapter here, a paragraph there, around naps and snacks and virtual learning (God help me). But motherhood also gives writers an advantage. It stretches you in ways you never imagine—both in how it fills you with a sacrificial love more limitless than the skies, and pushes your buttons more than a trigger-happy child on an elevator. The range of emotions parenthood equips you with is enough to fill a Fyodor Dostoyevsky page count, and the drama (oh, the drama!) would make Shakespeare’s quill pen tremble.
My books are as honest as life. We rarely see this in literature, the darker side of motherhood. Instead we read about the ever-patient mom with kids who are rarely seen or heard. In real life, kids are noisy, messy, curious, always talking over you, screaming a thousand “Mommy’s!” a day. There’s a lot of drama that comes with parenting—whether your child is little or big—and to me, it makes a more exciting family dynamic in fiction. That’s what I write about. The little and big messes that come with family—and in the case of Little Deadly Secrets, include a dash of murder.
If you’re a parent, you know what I’m talking about. When your toddler paints his bedroom in poo. Or when your five-year-old plays hairdresser and cuts her sister’s hair in a style even the 1980s would disown. From there the problems grow bigger, like when your pre-teen uses his first swear word (he certainly didn’t learn that word from me!). By the time they hit puberty, lying is an art form. Don’t get me started on the teen drama. I’m faint just thinking about it.
You’ll find “Mental Mommy-hood” woven into my drama because life with kids is full of it. Kids are natural rebels, wanting their own way, watching the world around them, wondering how they can tame it for their own. So I feature those rebellious children, angsty teens, and miniature spitfires…then tell my children never to act like Mommy’s characters.
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Thank you, Pamela!
Be sure to download an egalley of Little Deadly Secrets, available August 18, 2020, from Edelweiss+ and NetGalley.
-Lainey