July 24 – 30: “Do names reflect the character of the character?”

This week is all about character: A first name can date an individual, do character names reflect the character of the character, and do they offer their own tensions by defying a time period? We’re joined by ITW Members D.P. Lyle, Peter James, Donna Warner, Patrick Oster, Jonathan F. Putnam, Richard Billingsley, Billy Lyons and Meredith Anthony.

~~~~~

Meredith Anthony is the author of the new thriller, HELLMOUTH, featured in the July issue of The Big Thrill. She is the co-author of LADYKILLER, which received over 30 rave reviews. Her short stories appear in ELLERY QUEEN MYSTERY MAGAZINE and ALFRED HITCHCOCK MYSTERY MAGAZINE. Her mystery play, MURDER ON THE MAIN LINE, has had readings and development productions in New York and Philadelphia. She lives in New York City.

Peter James is one of the UK’s biggest selling crime thriller writers. He’s had eleven consecutive Sunday Times No 1 bestsellers with his Detective Superintendent Roy Grace series, published in 37 languages in 52 countries, with world sales of 18m copies. He is the recipient of the 2016 CWA Diamond Dagger for sustained excellence, and in 2015 was publicly voted by WH Smith readers as the Best Crime Author of All Time. He lives with his wife, Lara, and a menagerie of animals near Brighton in Sussex, where he was born and raised, and in Notting Hill, London.

Billy Lyons became an avid reader and writer of horror fiction in early childhood. He is the author of two published short stories. “Cell 334” was published in the November 2014 edition of Another Realm Magazine. “Black-Eyed Children, Blue-Eyed Child” was published in High Strange Horror, a horror anthology published in 2015 by Muzzleland Press, where Billy is a contributing writer of book and magazine reviews. Blood and Needles is his debut novel.

Richard Rowland Billingsley is the author of weird fiction. He is from Austin Texas and lives in Fayetteville Arkansas. He is a member of both the Horror Writers Association, and the International Thriller Writers. His book, Trance Logic was published by New Pulp Press. Trance Logic is the first book in a continuing series about Rainbeaux Le Blanc, a psychic spy demon fighter.

D. P. Lyle is the Macavity and Benjamin Franklin Silver Award winning and Edgar (2), Agatha, Anthony, Shamus, Scribe, Silver Falchion, and USA Today Best Book (2) Award nominated author of 17 books, and the co-host of Crime and Science Radio. He has worked with many novelists and with the writers of the TV shows Law & Order, CSI: Miami, Diagnosis Murder, Monk, Judging Amy, Cold Case, House, Medium, Women’s Murder Club, The Glades, and Pretty Little Liars.

Jonathan F. Putnam is a writer and attorney.  A graduate of Harvard College and Harvard Law School, he is a nationally recognized trial lawyer and avid amateur Lincoln scholar.  His books in the Lincoln & Speed mystery series include Perish from the Earth (just published on July 11, 2017) and These Honored Dead (2016).

Donna Warner’s novella, Targeted, published Nov. 2015, is book #1 in the Blair and Piermont crime thriller series. It’s set in the Caribbean on Roatán Island, Honduras. Book #2, Death’s Footprint, published Apr. 2017, takes place in Canada’s historic Québec City. Both Targeted and Death’s Footprint are co-authored with award winning mystery author, Gloria Ferris. A keen cottager, Donna enjoys the challenges of climbing in and out of her kayak without getting dunked and trying to outsmart fish. Home is a country property on the outskirts of Guelph, Ontario. She is a member of International Thriller Writers and the Crime Writers of Canada.

Patrick Oster, now writing fiction full time, was a managing editor at Bloomberg News and has worked as a journalist for Business Week in Europe, Knight Ridder in Mexico and covered the White House, State Department and the CIA as Washington Bureau Chief of The Chicago Sun-Times. He is the author of the nonfiction book, The Mexicans, a Book-of-the-Month selection. His award-winning comic thriller The Commuter was published by the Argo Navis imprint of Perseus Books. He also wrote the spy thriller The German Club. He is a member of the International Thriller Writers.