I'm pleased to welcome Brandi Bradley to Cozy Up With Kathy today. Pretty Girls Get Away With Murder is Brandi's most recent book and it was released last week.
Kathy: Pretty Girls Get Away With Murder is a noir novel set in an outwardly charming Southern town. What makes discovering dark secrets so intriguing?
BB: I don’t know the psychology of it, but I do know it’s why Dateline is still so popular. Around the time that the Murdough case was on everyone’s feed – like everyone I knew sent me an article about it – I remember going to my whiteboard and slapping a post-it on it that read, “The myth of the good Southern family.” Everything looks so pretty on the outside, but the inside is gross and sometimes rotten. And there is a sense of glee when powerful people fall or witnessing the process of taking down people who get too big. I think it affirms those suspicions that all those images of perfection were just a performance.
Kathy: In the book a young entrepreneur is killed and everyone points the finger at his ex-girlfriend Gabbi, a "New Age, neo-hippie, miracle-manifesting, smokeshow". That's quite a description! As someone who could also be branded as New Age and woo woo, I wonder why do these terms raise ire and cause people to assume the worst?
BB: I am also a little woo woo and I think it works on both levels. I think some people are going to be annoyed and roll their eyes, while others are going to be intrigued. Living in the south is interesting because the same people who might refer to someone as being a New Age neo-hippie with ire, are also collecting crystals or visiting a psychic once a week.
Kathy: The book is told through the shifting perspectives of three women, Lindy, Gabbi, and Jenna. Why choose to do this instead of focusing on one point of view?
BB: I always knew I wanted to write from multiple viewpoints because I wanted to show how alike and different all these women were. And I liked being able to write from a biased perspective – their idea of what they witnessed and how it’s different from what another person witnessed. Years ago when I read Big Little Lies by Liane Moriarty, I loved how she had each chapter a different perspective and knew I wanted to try that.
Kathy: What first drew you to noir?
BB: I like noir because there is an inability to trust anyone, and yet, the detective is almost always foiled because they trusted the wrong person or because of assumptions they made. I like noir because women are both sexy and smart– even if they are inclined to stab you in the back when they pull you in for a kiss. I like that mysteries are solved even if there is no justice. I don’t love the cynicism, but you can’t have it all.
Kathy: Do you write in any other genres?
BB: I’ve written a few memoir pieces that I am proud of. And I have written a ghost story once, although I would never call myself a paranormal writer. When I first started to get a handle on the kind of writer I wanted to be, I was always drawn to stories that people would gossip about from the viewpoint of the people dealing with the fall out. And often, that’s what mysteries and noirs are. People dealing with the fall out of someone else’s choices. And now I realize how much I love working in the mystery genre. There are so many different approaches to mystery that I am excited to explore.
Kathy: Do you have a favorite character? If so, who and why?
BB: At some point, all the characters were my favorite, especially the more shady ones. I had a lot of fun writing Ned Rockford, this charming guy who’s been propped up by the Good Old Boy System for a long time. These guys always have a plan – either coordinating their legacy or digging themselves out of a hole they got themselves into, but they’re almost always forgiven because they are charming and entertaining. And everyone knows they can’t trust them. Writing that character was a lot of fun.
Kathy: Did you have a specific inspiration for your book?
BB: Often I will have these little inspirational triggers where I will read or watch a story and I’ll think, I want to write that, but not that. So I’ll make a note on my whiteboard that will say something cryptic like “Woman on Woman stalking with a witchy vibe”. When I started Pretty Girls, I was reading a lot of stories about women who were being labelled “crazy” by ex-boyfriends and families of ex-boyfriends. And it grew from there.
Kathy: What made you decide to publish your work?
BB: I got tired of waiting to be “discovered”. I’m not a 20-year-old literary ingénue with a patience problem. I am a 40+ woman who has written novels before, gone to school for an MFA, a Ph.D., and yet could not get the literary world to pay attention.
I traditionally published some short pieces, but when it came to getting an agent for my novels, I kept coming up against road blocks.
For decades I had been walking around waiting to be seen as a novelist, waiting to be discovered, waiting to be chosen and eventually I was like, “This is exhausting. I’m choosing myself!”
I sat down and made a list of what I would need to make it happen for myself. I started an LLC, I bought ISBNs, and I contacted editors and designers. I set a launch date and spread the word.
And now, this is the second book I have published myself, and the best part was I didn’t have to ask permission or run my ideas through a committee.
It’s the hardest job I have ever had, but it’s also all mine, every good decision and bad decision. And that’s so liberating.
Kathy: If you could have a dinner party and invite 4 authors, living or dead, in any genre, who would you invite?
BB: Megan Abbott, Joyce Carol Oates, Donna Tartt, Charlotte Bronte.
But I am too much of a fan girl to be expected to act like a reasonable human being around writers I admire. More than once, I have made an ass out of myself at a conference for rambling or spontaneously crying, so I have resigned myself from appreciating them from afar.
Kathy: What are you currently reading?
BB: I just downloaded The Woman Who Fooled the World by Beau Donelly and Nick Toscano because I want to read it before I watch Apple Cider Vinegar on Netflix. Right now I’m consuming a lot of stories about medical fraud and factitious disorder.
Kathy: Will you share any of your hobbies or interests with us?
BB: Lately I’ve been baking a lot of bread. I love to be in my kitchen, and I’ve been watching short videos on no knead bread.
I like to crochet blankets and knit scarves as gifts. Many people who saw me at book festivals this year probably saw me knitting or crocheting.
I’m a planner person, so I adorn my Filofax with stickers and washi tape. It keeps me organized and decorating it gets me excited to review a to do list.
Kathy: Name 4 items you always have in your fridge or pantry.
BB: Chalula hot sauce, Rancho Gordo heirloom beans, Junior Mints, Seltzer, Topo Chico when I splurge, but more likely Kroger brand for everyday
Kathy: Do you have plans for future books?
BB: I want to write something in the same universe as Pretty Girls, but not the same characters. It’s another Southern small town noir, but with an amateur detective/writer who chooses to help a local high schooler search for a missing man. It’s my loving tribute to Murder She Wrote, but darker.
Kathy: What's your favorite thing about being an author?
BB: I’m never bored. When I run out of content to consume, I can always make my own. And all that content I’d been consuming is research for future projects. So it feels very cyclical. I read things and then turn them into new things.
I have always taken the advice from Toni Morrison that if no one is writing the book you want to read, you should write it yourself. And lately I have been burned out by all my content – books, podcasts, TV shows – and it’s not because there isn’t anything good out there. I mean Yellowjackets just dropped a new season. I just know it’s time for me to write a new book.
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Blurb:
When a young entrepreneur is killed, everyone in town points fingers at his New Age, neo-hippie, miracle-manifesting, smokeshow of an ex-girlfriend, Gabbi – including the victim’s best friend, Jenna. As detective Lindy D’Arnaud and her partner Boggs search for a motive, they begin to wonder if this is a case of jealous violence or shady business dealings gone sour.
In Lindy’s personal life, things aren’t much clearer. When Lindy’s wife’s ex-boyfriend–and sperm donor to their baby–decides to move back to town, she finds herself competing for her wife’s affection. Can they be postmodern in Western Kentucky where living as a queer person is tenuous enough already?
Told through the shifting perspectives of Lindy, Gabbi, and Jenna, “Pretty Girls Get Away With Murder” is a twisty page-turner for fans of Southern noir and NBC’s “Dateline.”
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