How it all began
Twenty years ago this month, SACRED COWS was published. I still remember getting the phone call from my agent. I was at work at the New Haven Register, putting together the weekly Car & Truck section (yes, I was the Car & Truck editor, but that's another story), when Jack called to tell me I'd won the Sara Ann Freed Memorial Award and Mysterious Press/Time Warner would publish my first novel. I entered the manuscript in the competition named for Sara Ann Freed, a longtime editor of mysteries who had died in 2003 after a battle with cancer. She'd edited Marcia Muller, Margaret Maron, James Patterson, and Kate White, among others. Mysterious Press, her imprint now run by Kristen Weber, had decided to publish a debut novel in her name. Jack had been shopping the manuscript around, but so far had only gotten rejections. When I asked him if I should submit it to the competition, his response was, "Well, it won't hurt." It certainly didn't. SACRED COWS ...
