May 20 – 26: “Can you describe the challenges of inserting children into stories?”

As characters, children can provide humor, simplicity and tension to stories. This week, ITW Members Cat Connor, Michael Stanley,  William Dietrich and Kat Martin will answer the question: “Can you describe the challenges of inserting children into stories?”

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Cat Connor lives in the Wellington Region of New Zealand. Drinks too much espresso and spends her days writing thrillers (the _byte series) accompanied by her greyhound, Romeo. She loves wine, hanging out with friends, and believes music and laughter are essential. Also, Cat knows where you hid the body.

Michael Stanley is the writing team of South Africans Michael Sears and Stanley Trollip. Michael writes a column for The Big Thrill on mystery thrillers in South Africa.  Stanley has lectured for the MWA University and will be presenting a workshop at Craftfest. Their novels are set in Botswana and have been finalists for the Edgar and other awards, and they won a Barry for DEATH OF THE MANTIS.  DEADLY HARVEST has just been released.

William Dietrich is the New York Times bestselling author of a dozen novels, including the Ethan Gage series of Napoleonic adventures that have sold into 30 languages. He has also written several nonfiction books about his native Pacific Northwest, shared a Pulitzer as a journalist at the Seattle Times, and taught at the university level.

With more than fifteen million books in print, Kat Martin is the New York Times bestselling author of over fifty Historical and Contemporary Romantic Suspense novels.  Before she started writing in 1985, Kat was a real estate broker.  During that time she met her husband, L.J. Martin, author of thirty western, non-fiction, historical, and suspense novels.  Kat is a graduate of the University of California at Santa Barbara.   She is published in more than twenty foreign countries.