Play Dead: An Allie Babcock Mystery Number 1 (Thorndike Press Large Print Mystery Series) - Hardcover

I got the idea for this book from an article
Hi, fellow book/dog lovers! I got the idea for this book when reading an article a couple of years ago about a woman here in Boulder who took her dog to doggie day care, but that the dog had to get an antidepressant every day because he had separation anxiety. I remember thinking, "Only in Boulder," and then thinking...wait a minute! What a great idea for a sleuth--a dog behaviorist whose client is depressed after witnessing the murder of his owner!

Though that was the seed for the mystery, taking it from there to a novel meant first and foremost developing the character of Allie Babcock. I based her on my daughter, who is 12 and wants to be a veterinarian someday. That meant projecting myself into my daughter's head twenty years in the future. It's worked well, in that readers of this series plus my other series, THE COLD HARD FAX being my latest, have universally remarked upon how the voices of both main characters were very different, and yet both were very appealling. Interestingly, though, this exercise of projecting myself as my daughter aged another 20 years also meant that I would do the same for myself. Allie's mother is a continuing character in the series. The readers of the first draft of PLAY DEAD said, "Love Allie Babcock. Her mother sure is a (female dog), though." Apparently my husband will have a challenge living with me in a couple of decades.

I truly had a great time writing this book, and I hope you have a great time reading it. My favorite aspect of the book is the insights that Allie gives into dog behavior. One quick tip here before I close: dogs do not have the same cause-effect understanding as people. Disciplining a dog for bad behavior even as little as three seconds after the fact is largely ineffective. You truly need to "catch them in the act," or better yet, anticipate. Happy reading!

Leslie O'Kane is the author of The Cold Hard Fax, the latest book in her Molly Masters mystery series. She lives with her husband and two children in Boulder, Colorado.