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MUGSHOT
Patricia Sprinkle
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MUGSHOT
Patricia Sprinkle
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Meet Patricia Sprinkle
Don’t tell anyone, but this Southern writer wasn’t born in the South. My dad left North Carolina to serve churches in the coal fields of West Virginia during World War II, and I was both born there. My folks returned to North Carolina when I was two, though, so I grew up amid people who called me “honey” in soft, lazy drawls and children who were strictly taught to say “ma’am” or “sir” to grownups. I grew up loving sweet iced tea, mild winters, and summer days so hot that all you could do was sprawl on a cool floor and read.
I had only one caveat as a budding writer: after taking a class on Southern Writers up North and being horrified at interpretations placed on what I considered the way folks naturally are, I vowed NEVER to be a Southern Writer.
After college I spent a winter writing in the Scottish Highlands, trying to determine if I had the discipline or the talent to write for publication. I was fortunate to sell a few things, but discovered it was hard to eat on what I could earn. Because I like to eat, I took a series of writing jobs in the next few years. I edited trade magazines for the grocery and convenience store industry, I was a staff writer for the Presbyterian denomination, I was the PR director for a junior college, and I was a free-lance PR writer for realtors and non-profit organizations.
At the same time, I submitted articles, short stories, and a few brief plays and got so concerned about world hunger that I wrote curricula, articles, and even a book on the subject. Those years taught me to work with editors, meet deadlines, squeeze a sentence down to its essential words, and hone my writing skills.
One evening my husband took a look at the budget and inquired, “Why don’t you write a mystery to pay for the ones you keep buying?” I immediately knew what I wanted to write. I had worked briefly for a man I disliked so much, I wanted to put a body in his basement.
Since we were living in Chicago temporarily at the time, and since I was determined not to be a southern writer, I set MURDER AT MARKHAM in Chicago. By the time I was finishing the book, we were living back in Atlanta, where a seminar on “The Southern Writer” made me realize that even if it was set in Chicago, I had written a southern book. Even my characters were southerners, including the hard-bitten Chicago detective, who hailed from Tupelo, MS. In spite of my best intentions, I am a Southern writer. Once I accepted that, writing got much easier.
This month SINS OF THE FATHERS, the second of my new genealogy series, comes out. I like that book. It deals with many generations of a family on a Georgia barrier island and how actions in the past continue to haunt the present. It also deals with Confederate privateers, pirates, mosquitoes, and a shotgun wielding lady named Agnes. I hope you’ll like it, too.
Next February, the tenth and final book in my Thoroughly Southern series comes out. It is called WHAT ARE YOU WEARING TO DIE? and deals with two young mothers who are murdered wearing clothes they normally wouldn’t be caught dead in.
Some folks want to know why I am stopping a series when all of the books stay in print and continue to sell well. My answer is that MacLaren Yarbrough, my magistrate protagonist, and I have been together so long I’m beginning to identify with her. We both need a little space.
What next? I’m mulling over some general novels I’d like to write, but suspect they’ll all have bodies in them. After all, we do have to write what we know.
You can learn more about me and my books at these two locations:
www.patriciasprinkle.com
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In high school I decided to be a writer and set my sights on Vassar College because of its creative writing program. I figured writing is like architecture: nobody can give a person the gift to envisioning a building, but experts in the field can save them grief by teaching them from experience which building materials work best for different kinds of stress.
Since 1988 I have published nineteen mysteries and am working on my twentieth. I also wrote two novels, THE REMEMBER BOX and CARLEY’S SONG, based on growing up in North Carolina during the tumultuous years of 1949-1951. CARLEY’S SONG was a finalist for the Christie Award for the Best Contemporary Christian Novel of 2002 and both books will be re-issued in 2008 by BellaRosa Press.