It’s release day! The Red Arrow Murders is out!
It’s been a long journey with Walter Anchor. The idea for a ghost detective came to me when I was working on To Be a Fool, which came out in 2013. I started his first story while that novel was finishing up. I was having so much fun with it that he and Emily have a cameo in To Be a Fool.
The initial thought was very simple. If JJ Lynch (the ghost in Shuffled Off and To Be a Fool) can write his stories, what other kinds of ghosts and other kinds of stories can be created in this fascinating world where ghosts tell their own stories.
And I needed someone very different from JJ. Someone older. Someone with a very different history (failed actor turned dentist fit the bill there). Someone what would approach the afterlife very differently.
The other part of the equation was a 2012 writers conference I went to put on by Kevin J. Anderson. He was talking about his forthcoming Dan Shambles: Zombie PI series. That combined with the thoughts of other ghosts telling their own story and there we go. If a zombie can be a PI why not a ghost? And what if the ghost was trying to solve is own murder? That is how Walter Anchor was born.
So here we are and in The Red Arrow Murders, it’s time for Walter to finally solve his own murder, to find out exactly how he died.
I won’t give anything away, but I can tell you it’s not quite what Walter expected.
This is a different story for Walter and Emily. It’s the longest story so far and more intense in a lot of ways. It’s winding up this phase of Walter’s afterlife and brings to a culmination Walter’s journey from the five previous cases (there’s a nice series page for Walter where you can see all the books). It also hints a new direction for Walter.
I’m really excited to be at this point with Walter. That initial idea has blossomed in ways I couldn’t have imagined. I hope you all have enjoyed his adventure too.
The Red Arrow Murders is on sale for $0.99 (in the US) for the next few weeks.
Here’s the blurb:
Walter Anchor spends his afterlife solving murders in the hope of one day solving the toughest murder of all. His own.
But when he and his partner and best ghost-friend Emily stumble upon a series of murders committed for a ghost to find, for Walter and Emily to find, everything changes. Can he face the reality of his own death, save the woman he still loves, and do the unthinkable before anyone else dies?
From the author of Shuffled Off: A Ghost’s Memoir comes a murder mystery unlike anything seen before.
Get your copy today or see all the books in the series.
