My Life and Times
Though born and raised in Missouri, I've lived for twenty years in Palo Alto, California, where my two mystery series featuring homemaker/writer Bridget Montrose and vagabond Liz Sullivan take place. After doing newspaper work, public relations work, technical editing, and romances, I really enjoy writing mysteries.
I set most of my books where I live, to avoid all that tedious research, but my fictional Palo Alto shares only physical characteristics with the real one, and perhaps a certain mind-set. The characters and local events are made up--that's the fun part, after all. I have a couple of things in common with my fictional sleuths--I garden, and I write for a living. My life is much duller than theirs, believe me. In fact, I'm thinking of getting myself a fictional life, which I can make much more exciting.
I love writing mysteries. It's like letting your life get wildly out of control, and then--presto!--imposing order on it. Talk about personal satisfaction--I certainly can't get my real life cleaned up like that. But there's also the deeper satisfaction we all achieve as mystery readers. The books we love do involve violence, even when it's off-screen. But in fictional crime, that violence is contained, and turned from randomness to something motivated by human passions, something we can understand. And then, at the end, there is justice. That's certainly better than what we get from the newspapers or TV.
For more information on Lora Roberts [Smith], visit the website Lora shares with Nuns, Mothers and Others Mystery Writers.
