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True Crime Author Roundtable
 Why are we fascinated by the criminal mind? What makes them tick and what makes readers want to dive into their worlds? AuthorsOnTheWeb.com recently got the opportunity to ask these questions and more to a panel of experts.
Join 12 world-renowned true crime authors --- Burl Barer, Gretchen Brinck, Michael Fleeman, Brian J. Karem, Susan Kelly, Don Lasseter, Irene Pence, Sue Russell, Robert Scott, Carlton Smith, Carlton Stowers, and Dina Temple-Raston --- as they discuss sensationalism, the "human" side of villains, the dangers of research, garish book covers and much more.
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| Burl Barer |
 Burl Barer is an Edgar Award winning author and two-time Anthony Award nominee with extensive media, advertising, marketing, and public relations experience. He's also one of the best names in mystery and true crime writing today!
While Barer contributed his media savvy to numerous publications and projects over the years, it was his internationally acclaimed 442 page critical/biographical study of Leslie Charteris' enduringly different Robin Hood of Modern Crime, Simon Templar, which earned him the highest honor from the Mystery Writers of America --- The 1994 Edgar Allen Poe Award. The Saint: A Complete History in Print, Radio, Television, and Film not only received the Edgar, but also an Anthony Award nomination from the World Mystery Convention.
Contracted by the estate of Leslie Charteris to pen a minimum of three new novels in the popular Saint series, Barer completed Capture the Saint, the first original Saint novel in thirteen years. Film rights to the previous 52 Saint books were acquired by producer Robert Evans. Paramount Pictures released the Saint, starring Val Kilmer, in 1997.
Barer's Headlock, the first novel in a new private eye series, came out in September 2000 from Deadly Alibi Press. Kensington Publishing released Murder in the Family in August 2000 as part of their Pinnacle True Crime series. Head Shot, another true crime for Pinnacle, based on the St. Pierre murders in Tacoma, Washington was released in October 2001 and Barer is currently hard at work on yet another true crime book for Pinnacle.
Burl Barer's Website
Browse Burl Barer's books on Amazon.com.
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| Gretchen Brinck |
 Gretchen Brinck, MSW, author of true crime book The Boy Next Door, Pinnacle, 1999, is a medical social worker and a true crime buff. After earning a BA in creative writing at Stanford University, she worked in a mental hospital, then with impoverished people in the Deep South, before returning to school for a masters degree in Social Work. Her first job in that profession Child Welfare Worker in Bethel, Alaska, where she covered fifty-three Indian and Eskimo villages. Many adventures later, she ended up back in California, divorced with three small children. She worked with developmentally disabled people, then became a medical social worker/case manager in a hospital in San Francisco.
All these years she avidly read mysteries and true crime book and attended workshops about criminal profiling and victims’ rights and needs. During the eighties, while some of her short stories came out in small magazines, a boy on her son’s soccer team was murdered. She became deeply emotionally involved in the case and observed its effect on her children and the community. The news provided cryptic information about the investigation. She believed the murder was connected with the disappearance of another local boy three years earlier, and with another boy’s murder in Sacramento, but police did not acknowledge these connections for years.
Still working full time, she spent weekends and vacations on research, interviewing and writing, work that took six years. The Boy Next Door came out in 1999 and became a selection for Doubleday Book Club.
Gretchen Brinck is now working on a mystery tentatively named Amaranthe’s Child, which is to be the first of a series.
Browse Gretchen Brinck's books on Amazon.com.
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| Michael Fleeman |
 Michael Fleeman is the author of the recently released "If I Die ..." from St. Martin's --- the story of a Las Vegas woman who murdered her millionaire husband.
Browse Michael Fleeman's books on Amazon.com.
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| Brian J. Karem |
 Former President George Bush called him "rude." Former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich refused to be interviewed by him, saying, "I'd rather talk to anyone else." And syndicated columnist Carl Rowan once said of Brian Karem that he wished "...we had a hundred reporters with the guts and irreverence that (Karem) displayed."
Brian Karem, 40, is an award-winning investigative reporter, writer, producer, published author and former correspondent for Fox Television's America's Most Wanted. Karem has won major awards for two documentaries, "Texans at War" and "Good to Go" which chronicled the Persian Gulf War through the eyes of the members of a Combat Support Hospital. He was also one of the first reporters in the world to enter Kuwait City during the Gulf War, arriving just after that city's liberation from Iraq.
Karem's first book, Shield the Source, (New Horizon Press, 1992) chronicles the events that occurred in 1990 when he became one of the first television reporters in the country ever to be jailed for protecting a confidential source. He was jailed four times and spent more than two weeks behind bars before being freed. He subsequently appeared as a guest on a variety of national news programs including Nightline and CNN's Crossfire discussing the situation and its ramifications. Karem Vs. Priest is now considered a precedent setting case in providing journalists with the ability to protect their sources (Mass Media Law, 1993). Karem was the recipient of the National Press Club's Freedom of the Press Award for his actions in that case.
His second book Above the Law a true crime book was published by Pinnacle Press in August of 1999 and has sold close to 40,000 copies. His third book Innocent Victims also a true crime book is was published in November of 2001. Spin Control a book of short stories and essays published in June of 2000 has been lauded by ABC News, Newsday and Salon.com as a "Must Read" and a "wake up call" for journalists and has sold nearly 20,000 copies.
Browse Brian J. Karem's books on Amazon.com.
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| Susan Kelly |
 Susan Kelly was born in New York, brought up in Massachusetts, and holds a Ph.D. in English from the University of Edinburgh. She has taught at Tufts, Harvard, and the Cambridge (Massachusetts) Police Academy. Her 1995 book The Boston Stranglers offers proof that Albert DeSalvo, who confessed to being the murderer of eleven women between June 1962 and January 1964, did not in fact kill any of them. The book, which caused the case to be re-opened, has been featured on Good Morning America, Dateline, 48 Hours, NBC Nightly News, Unsolved Mysteries, National Public Radio, and in the New York Times and People Magazine.
Kelly's crime novels include The Gemini Man (nominated for an Anthony Award for Best First Novel of 1985 and one of the top ten books in the National Mystery Readers Poll the same year), The Summertime Soldiers, Trail of the Dragon, Until Proven Innocent, And Soon I'll Come to Kill You, and Out of the Darkness. The Boston Stranglers is being made into a feature film by Paramount Pictures and will be reissued in paperback by Pinnacle Books in March 2002.
Browse Susan Kelly's books on Amazon.com.
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| Don Lasseter |
 Don Lasseter has written five true crime books for Pinnacle, plus sixteen magazinearticles that were reprinted in Pinnacle's anthology books about murders. In addition to being a crime writer, Mr. Lasseter is a WWII historian who frequently lectures on the subject in schools, at service clubs, and for veteran's groups. He accompanies his talks with slide packages entitled "WWII, Then and Now," consisting of photos he took while actually retracing most major battles in Western Europe and in the South Pacific. Taking black and white combat photos with him, Mr. Lasseter laboriously searched for the exact spots on which the photographers stood, and shot the same scenes as they look today. He accumulated over 1500 such pictures associated with various battles including the Normandy invasion, Battle of the Bulge, crossing the Rhine, taking Berlin, and other major engagements.
A native Californian, Mr. Lasseter resides in Orange County. He has served as guest lecturer in criminology classes at California State University, Fullerton. Hollywood history is Mr. Lasseter's third major interest. His personal library includes an extensive collection of movie books, and he takes pride in being able to name hundreds of old character actors whose faces are often seen in classic films. One day, Lasseter says, he will write books, both fiction and non-fiction, about the golden era of film production and the people involved.
If you would like more information about his books or his interests in WWII or Old Hollywood, please feel free to write him at 1215 S. Beach Blvd. #323, PMB, Anaheim, CA 92804.
Don Lasseter's Website
Browse Don Lasseter's books on Amazon.com.
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| Irene Pence |
 In the mid-nineties, Irene became involved in true crime when she wandered into a story that was too good not to tell. She knew the characters as neighbors of friends and decided to write a book about it. Now with three books published, she is busy researching her fourth. Her first, A Clue from the Grave, came out in 1997, and is in its fifth printing. It was followed by Triangle the next year, which is in its second printing. Buried Memories was published in 2001.
Born in Omaha, Nebraska, Irene received a BS in Business Administration from the University of Nebraska, and later a masters in education from Arizona State University. She taught college level business for several years, and has been published in Business Education Journals. She has taken course work in creative writing at Southern Methodist University. The Dallas Morning News awarded her their Golden Pen Award.
Browse Irene Pence's books on Amazon.com.
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| Sue Russell |
 Sue Russell is a Los Angeles-based, internationally syndicated journalist, and the author of several non-fiction books. Her latest, Lethal Intent, to be published by Pinnacle Books in November, is a true crime book about serial killer Aileen Wuornos, the Floriday highway hooker who murdered seven men and received six death sentences. Wuornos, who recently waived all remaining appeals, is currently awaiting execution on Death Row in Florida. Her other books include Damsel of Death, Star Mothers, and Sensual Beauty.
Photograph by Joel Sussman.
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| Robert Scott |
 Robert Scott discovered that true-crime writing is incredibly interesting. "You have to be part journalist, part detective and part analytical writer for the true-crime market." Besides Rope Burns (Pinnacle, September 2001) Robert has another Pinnacle book, titled Savage, scheduled for release in April 2002. It details the deadly exploits of cross-country serial killer Benjamin Pedro Gonzales.
Robert is currently working on a book for Pinnacle set in the High Sierra of California and Nevada. He's written true-crime articles for Connecticut Magazine, Rhode Island Monthly and is working on a project for Maxim Magazine. Robert is a member of the Authors Guild, ASJA (American Society of Journalists and Authors) and ACWL (American Crime Writer's League).
Even though he resides in northern California, he spends considerable time on the road doing research on his true-crime writing. "Every corner of America has something that's beautiful, interesting and thought-provoking, especially its people," he said.
Browse Robert Scott's books on Amazon.com.
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| Carlton Smith |
 Carlton Smith was an award-winning journalist for The Los Angeles Times and The Seattle Times in the 1970s and 1980s. A finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in investigative reporting in 1988, he now works full-time as a true crime author. He lives in San Francisco.
Browse Carlton Smith's books on Amazon.com.
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| Carlton Stowers |
 Author/journalist Carlton Stowers' books include bestsellers To the Last Breath and Careless Whispers --- both winners of the Mystery Writers of America's Edgar Allen Poe Award as the Best Fact Crime Book of the Year --- Innocence Lost, which was nominated for a Pulitzer, and his autobiographical Sins of the Son.
Stowers' books have been selections of the Literary Guild, Mystery Guild, Doubleday Book Club, True Crime Book Club, Preferred Choice Book Club, Playboy Book Club and Guideposts Book Club, and five have been optioned by motion picture production companies. Careless Whispers inspired the CBS Movie of the Week, "Sworn to Vengeance," and Open Secrets was the basis for the ABC mini-series, "Telling Secrets."
A staff writer for the Dallas Observer, Stowers has written articles for numerous other publications, among them Sports Illustrated, Time, People, Good Housekeeping, TV Guide, Money, and Paris Match.
Stowers' Partners in Blue, a 100-year history of the Dallas Police Department, received a citation from the Dallas Police Association. He has written two non-fiction children's books, A Hero Named George and Hard Lessons, which are used by numerous elementary schools as part of their anti-drug and anti-gang programs. His most recent children's book, Strength of the Heart was written with Marcus Allen.
Recently the 59-year-old author has focused much of his attention on books that examine the cause and effect of crime in America. The Houston Press has called Stowers "the dean of Texas true crime writers," and famed novelist Jonathan Kellerman notes that "when the dust clears, a handful of writers will be recognized as masters of the true crime book. And Carlton Stowers will be at the head of that class."
Carlton Stowers's Website
Browse Carlton Stowers's books on Amazon.com.
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| Dina Temple-Raston |
 Dina Temple-Raston spent her early journalism career as a foreign correspondent in China and Hong Kong and was a longtime White House reporter for Bloomberg Business News. This is her first book. She lives in New York City.
Browse Dina Temple-Raston's books on Amazon.com.
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