Dead Reckoning by Lea O’Harra
Publisher: Sharpe Books-UK (Sept 29, 2022)
Category: Crime Fiction, Family Life, Kidnapping
Tour dates: January 5-31, 2023
ISBN: 979-8361831937
ASIN: B0BGYG3HGX
Available in Print and ebook, 289 pages
Description Dead Reckoning by Lea O’Harra
Indiana, January 2010.
It’s a hot summer’s day in 1984 when twelve-year-old Gilly and her friend Sally find a dead new-born in a shoebox in the cemetery of their tiny town. Deciding to keep their discovery a secret, they bury the body in Gilly’s yard.
The results are disastrous. Flowers are mysteriously left on strollers. Two local children disappear and end up dead. A suspect is arrested and confesses, blaming the deaths on the girls’ having taken the dead baby.
Gilly grows up but is haunted by what’s happened. As a young woman, she flees the town and its memories, going all the way to Japan.
Returning with her Japanese husband Toshi to attend her mother’s funeral, Gilly finds the past is not past. She’s threatened, and someone is putting flowers on strollers again.
When another child is abducted, Gilly knows she must discover the truth about what happened all those years ago before more lives are lost.
Praise Dead Reckoning by Lea O’Harra
“Both a drama and a thriller, full of twists and human insight.”-Thomas Waugh
“The immediate declaration of past events, the discovery and concealment of the dead baby, provides a gripping start to this book.
The story is simple yet powerful, immediately drawing the reader into a world that identifies the challenges of growing up in a small town in Indiana.
The book tackles the casual racism that is often overlooked, with great clarity. Although this is a crime novel it is also a powerful story about how a single childhood event can influence the future.
It compels you to share the history and become part of the small-town network. Through a nexus of characters, we see how relationships that are made in our formative years, affect our lives.
The story is more than a crime novel. It also serves to gives a fascinating insight into life in a small town in the USA, through the eyes of somebody who never really wanted to return.”-ReallyPoshScouser, Amazon
Praise Lea O’Harra
“Lea O’Harra offers us a whodunnit set in a Japan labouring under the weight of cultural imperialism, a country where the characters find that their friends and lovers are really strangers and imperfect ones at that…-Nick Sweet, author of the Inspector Velázquez series
’With her deep knowledge of Japanese culture, superb writing, and sensitivity to human foibles. O’Harra has crafted a cross-cultural whodunnit sure to please Japanophiles and mystery lovers alike.”-Suzanne Kamata, author of Losing Kei
Awards Lea O’Harra
Autumn 2017 “Lady First” was awarded ‘finalist’ status in the crime fiction section of the Beverly Hill Book Awards.
‘Lady First’ was also a finalist in the National Indie Excellence Awards in 2018.
Interview with Lea O’Harra
TR: Please tell us something about ‘Dead Reckoning’ that is not in the summary. (About the book, characters you particularly enjoyed writing etc.)
LO: I based the setting of Dead Reckoning on my hometown of Rolling Prairie – population 500 – located in the northwest corner of Indiana. But unlike Bryon (the dangerous town depicted in my novel) Rolling Prairie was an idyllic spot for a child. Sited in rural countryside midway between two large cities ignorant of its very existence, the town’s streets at that time were nearly empty of traffic, and we could freely and safely ride our bikes everywhere. There were vacant lots to play baseball in, lots of trees to climb, and we loved frequenting a place called Bozek’s that had a pinball machine, booths with juke boxes, and a soda fountain. Naturally, some of the characters in the story bear a slight resemblance to people I knew as a child, but mostly they are composites of various characteristics I observed.
TR: I always enjoy looking at the names that authors choose to give their characters. Where do you derive the names of your characters? Are they based on real people you knew or now know in real life? How do you create names for your characters?
LO: While novelists like Charles Dickens were in the habit of giving names to characters reflective of their personalities (with a character called Flora, for example, exhibiting fresh and attractive qualities), I observed no such etiquette in Dead Reckoning. I simply tried to use names that were common in the States at that time. The exception is ‘Gilly,’ short for ‘Gillian’. It is a name which, I imagine, most Americans would rarely have encountered in the mid-eighties and would tend to pronounce, at first glance – that is, seeing the name written and not having heard it before – with a hard rather than a soft ‘g’.
TR: Where did you get the inspiration for your cover?
LO: My publisher, Sharpe Books, chose the cover.
TR: Which actress would you like to see play Gilly from ‘‘Dead Reckoning’ if it were optioned for a movie or series? Are there any other characters you would like to match with actors or actresses? If so, please do so here.
LO: I would choose the following actors to play the three main characters of Dead Reckoning in their adult versions: Millie Bobby Brown to play Gilly Kataoka, Sadie Sink to play Sally Pawlowski, and Joe Keery to play Tim Collins.
TR: What draws you to the crime genre?
LO: I like the crime genre because I believe all life can be found in its pages. This is not true of many other genres. Romances, for example, of course focus on stories about love. But crime fiction includes hate as well as love, and it can cover so much else, so much more. Like travel literature, it can describe the scenery and customs of far-distant lands. Like biographies, it can delineate the subtle components and nuances of individual character. Like historical fiction, it can convey us to worlds past. I’m mainly drawn to crime fiction because I’m fascinated by the human condition: by personalities, by the circumstances that can drive people to that most extreme of acts: murder.
TR: Describe the room you are sitting in as though it was a scene that Gilly was describing. (either as a child or adult)
LO: I feel the familiar surge of affection on entering our living room. It’s a space that’s welcoming, like being embraced by an old friend. I automatically relax. My troubles fade. On this cold winter’s day, I’m drawn to the fire, hypnotized by the flames in the wood-burner visible through a large window at the front of the stove. They writhe and sway, casting flickers of light and shadow on walls and ceiling. A few feet from the hearth, there’s a bentwood rocking chair and two light blue sofas at right angles to each other, one covered by a patchwork throw. A baby grand stands apart, aloof in a corner. With a Beethoven sonata on the lid and the bench drawn back, it seems to invite me to sit down and play. A grandfather’s clock ticks away the minutes in this handsome paneled space filled with paintings and books, the hardwood floor covered by faded Turkish carpets.
TR: When did you first have a desire to write? How did this desire manifest itself?
LO: I’ve wanted to write since I first learned to read. I think it’s natural. If you love reading, you probably also love writing. I can still recall the tremendous excitement I felt when the alphabet my first-grade teacher insisted we memorize and learn to painstakingly reproduce on paper – in small and capital letters – crystalized into words. Into meaning! Suddenly I was standing at the gateway not only to the world of literature and history but of every subject. The experience gave me an exhilarating sense both of flight and escape that I’ve only experienced twice since. The first was when I learned how to ride a bike and the second, when I first flew in a plane. As for writing, I began keeping a diary as a child. I also recall trying to write a novel when I was nine or ten and then shredding it up and throwing it away, disconsolate at the feebleness of my effort. Meanwhile, I was known as a bookworm, always carrying something to read with me wherever I went and even hiding a novel under my pillow when I went to bed.
TR: What is next for Lea O’Harra?
LO: I have begun a fifth novel, another standalone mystery. It is set in three countries: America, England, and Japan. I hope to finish it within the next six months.
About Lea O’Harra
Lea O’Harra has published three crime fiction novels set in rural modern-day Japan: Imperfect Strangers (2015); Progeny (2016); and Lady First (2017). These comprise the so-called ‘Inspector Inoue Murder Mystery’ series originally published by Endeavour Press (UK). She has also had a story included in Best Asian Crime Fiction published by Kitaab Press (Singapore) in 2020.
In the spring of 2022 Sharpe Books reissued the Inoue mystery series and, in September 2022, published Lea O’Harra’s fourth novel, Dead Reckoning, a stand-alone set in her tiny hometown in the American Midwest.
Website: http://leaoharra.com
Twitter: https://twitter.com/leaoharra/
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