1--What is the title of your latest release?
ANOTHER FINE MESS (Bless Your Heart #2)
2--What’s the “elevator pitch” for your new book?
From the publisher: “Another Fine Mess brings the Evans women back around in this unputdownable, crackling, rollicking mystery of humor, heart, and horror.”
3--How did you decide where your book was going to take place?
This sequel picks up exactly four weeks after the events of Bless Your Heart, as the remaining Evans women prepare to welcome their first full moon (dun dun dun).
4--Would you hang out with your protagonist in real life?
The Evans women are modeled after my mother and grandmothers, most of which are now gone. I’d give anything for one more moment with my Ducey and Nana, so absolutely yes!
5--What are three words that describe your protagonist?
Each of the Evans women shares the spotlight in this series, but I think they could be described in sum as bold, brave, and determined. They are women who suffer no fools, who take charge of their own fates, and who love each other fiercely, no matter the cost or the consequences.
6--What’s something you learned while writing this book?
One of my favorite discoveries while writing was that ghost wolves are real—and reviving in Southeast Texas!
7--Do you edit as you draft or wait until you are totally done?
I’m a very iterative writer, so I am constantly editing and rewriting as I go. I usually aim for a certain number of pages per day, then let those sit overnight so that I can begin the next day’s writing session by re-reading—which always includes some number of tweaks.
8--What’s your favorite foodie indulgence?
It may come as no surprise to my readers, but there is always Blue Bell Ice Cream—usually Homemade Vanilla—in my freezer, and an entire fridge drawer stuffed with fancy cheeses.
9--Describe your writing space/office!
I’m the kind of writer who moves around during the day: Usually, I begin at the kitchen table with my laptop and coffee pot to watch the critters arrive at dawn. I’ll migrate to my office mid-day to take meetings and answer email, then work on the next day’s outline on my whiteboard until the early evening (Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy are on at 7pm and 7:30pm, respectively). When the world begins to quiet for the evening, I’ll sit down in the dark wherever feels right and keep going until I tuck into bed to read.
10--Who is an author you admire?
I read somewhere that Salman Rushdie, another early-morning pajama-writer, believes there is a “little package of creative energy that (is) nourished by sleep” and I likewise feel this to be very true, so I admire that sort of thinking.
11--Is there a book that changed your life?
I always give the same answer to this question: Interview with the Vampire by Anne Rice, which was not my first horror book nor my first favorite book, but the one that changed everything.
12--Tell us about when you got “the call.” (when you found out your book was going to be published)/Or, for indie authors, when you decided to self-publish.
Well, Another Fine Mess is the planned second in a series, but I remember when the “call” came for Bless Your Heart as if it were yesterday. I’d had a furniture delivery that morning. The couch didn’t fit, and I was driving (very disgruntled) to the furniture store to work out the issue when my agent called with the news: we have an offer. We had a wonderful chat with my new editor at Minotaur about a week later, and the rest, as they say, is history.
13--What’s your favorite genre to read?
I don’t tend to stray too far outside the lanes of darker fiction, though I tend to read both a little lighter and a little darker than I write. I like to think it helps me find my own balance and get to know the work of the incredible writers I am lucky enough to share shelf space with.
14--What’s your favorite movie?
In no particular order (or perhaps in an order than shifts dependent on the day): Death Becomes Her, Practical Magic, Witches of Eastwick, Steel Magnolias, and Stepford Wives.
15--What is your favorite season?
Fall. Always fall.
16--How do you like to celebrate your birthday?
My birthday is at the end of April, which coincides nicely with Earth Day, so a favorite tradition is to watch a nature documentary for my birthday.
17--What’s a recent tv show/movie/book/podcast you highly recommend?
I recently watched Shogun and enjoyed that and have just started White Lotus (who in their right mind doesn’t just adore Jennifer Coolidge?!) and am enjoying that so far.
18--What’s your favorite type of cuisine?
Mexican, with Indian as a close second.
19--What do you do when you have free time?
Play with Finn, my service golden retriever, of course!
20--What can readers expect from you next?
Next up is a brand-new suburban slasher: DOLLFACE. Pitched as Barbie meets Scream, DOLLFACE follows horror author Jill Marshall, who has just moved to suburban New Jersey, hoping to fit in with the new PTA moms and maybe not weird everyone out with her Final Girl coffee mug. You know. Make some real friends.
But then a plastic face-masked serial killer begins slashing their way through town, one overly made-up mom at a time. The police are incredulous. The moms are indignant. And Jill is slowly wrapped into a killer’s murderous spree, until she might just be the last woman standing.
A Novel
Making sure dead things stay buried is the family business ...
For over a hundred years, the Evans women have kept the undead in their strange southeast Texas town from rising. But sometimes the dead rise too quick–and that’s what left Lenore Evans, and her granddaughter Luna, burying Luna’s mother, Grace, and Lenore’s mother, Ducey. Now the only two women left in the Evans family, Luna and Lenore are left rudderless in the wake of the most Godawful Mess to date.
But when the full moon finds another victim, it’s clear their trouble is far from over. Now Lenore, Luna, and the new sheriff—their biggest ally—must dig deep down into family lore to uncover what threatens everything they love most. The body count ticks up, the most unexpected dead will rise–forcing Lenore and Luna to face the possibility that the undead aren’t the only monsters preying on their small town.
Mystery | Horror [Minotaur Books, On Sale: April 15, 2025, Hardcover / e-Book , ISBN: 9781250324238 / eISBN: 9781250324245]
Lindy Ryan is an award-winning author, anthologist, and short-film director whose books and anthologies have received starred reviews from Publishers Weekly, Booklist and Library Journal. Several of her projects have been adapted for screen. Ryan is the current author-in-residence at Rue Morgue. Declared a “champion for women’s voices in horror” by Shelf Awareness, Ryan was named a Publishers Weekly Star Watch Honoree in 2020, and in 2022, was named one of horror's most masterful anthology curators. Her novel Bless This Mess is currently a finalist for the Bram Stoker Award. Born and raised in Southeast Texas, Ryan currently resides on the East Coast. She is a professor at Rutgers University. You can visit her website for more info.
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