Interview with Michele Martinez author of MOST WANTED

As part of serving on the Board of Trustees of my local library here in Bel Air, MD, I have the opportunity to attend many workshops and special events. Last June, I went to the Book Expo in New York City. If you are not familiar with this event, it is probably the most important event in the publishing business. It is open only to book sellers, librarians and those in the publishing field. So unless you fit in one of those categories, you can not go! Advanced copies of books are given away for free, as well as promotional materials such as bookmarks, book bags and posters. Honestly, I spent the day walking around in utter amazement as publishers basically threw books at you hoping that you would like their author and eventually purchase their books for your organization. Many authors attend the event, tirelessly signing their books. I met Melissa Banks, Jack Klugman and Carly Phillips to name a few. As an avid reader, let’s just say it is like being a kid in a candy store! However, as with any event, there is just not enough room for everyone to be there. For the authors that can not attend, their books are piled nicely in stacks randomly placed around the exhibition hall for distribution.

It just so happens that on that day I stumbled upon the book MOST WANTED. I will be the first to tell you that I do judge a book by its cover. I know what you’re thinking, but at least I am honest! While my genre of choice is romance, I do like to read a mystery every once in a while. However, I picked this book up solely for my husband who reads mostly crime stories. The cover was intriguing and the book jacket made it sound like a scene right out of C. S.I., one of his favorite television shows. Well, my gut instincts were right. He could not say enough positive things about this debut novel. He passed the book along to my mom who read the book in a day.  Not only was he hooked, but my mom became a Michele Martinez fan as well. With two glowing recommendations, I was convinced that this book must be a winner. I put aside my romance novels and delved in. After a few late nights of staying up way past my bedtime, I finished it. Moms (and sometimes husbands) are always right.

As I have mentioned before, I lead a book club for stay-at-home moms and I knew this murder mystery would pique their interest. Even though they do not come out and say it, I know they may not particularly care for all of my selections, especially the romances. So, I crossed my fingers and sent Michele an e-mail asking her to call in for our discussion. Most of the time, I never get a response. To my surprise, Michele immediately e-mailed me back and enthusiastically agreed.  We corresponded via e-mail for about a month or so and set up the date.

When the night arrived, we all gathered around the speaker phone at the library and listened to Michele answer each and every question that we asked of her in full detail. She was funny, informative and so down-to-earth. We had such a good time that afterwards, we sent her a photograph of our book club so she could "meet" all of us. If you go to her web site, you can see the photo displayed in her photo album. Honestly, how cool is that? To top it off, Michele has a special offer included with this interview, so be sure to read the entire article. You will not be disappointed!! If I had to describe her in one word, it would have to be gracious. Michele Martinez is a class act. I am so honored to be able to call her a friend.

Here is what she had to say............

JEN: What made you leave behind your successful law career and become an author? Has writing always been a secret passion of yours?

MICHELE: I went through a lot of years struggling to balance being a prosecutor with being a mom to my two boys (who are now 6 and 9). It was a tremendous amount of stress, but I loved the job and felt very committed to it. Finally, while I was in the midst of doing a case on a very brutal push-in robbery crew, I started having really bad nightmares. One of the nightmares was so vivid that I woke up and wrote it down the next day, and decided it would make a really cool opening scene for a book. Once I realized that, I became possessed with the idea of writing this novel that was developing in my head. That nightmare became the push-in robbery sequence in MOST WANTED and led to my career switch.   

JEN: Surely the most obvious question, but one which we all want to know, is your character Melanie modeled after yourself?

MICHELE: Melanie and I share a number of important characteristics. We were both federal prosecutors and moms, and struggling to make those two roles fit together. We both grew up in modest circumstances, of half-Puerto Rican heritage, but them went to Ivy League schools and became professionals and had top deal with the self-confidence issues that creates. Other than that, I would have to say Melanie is really her own person. She has a different family, marriage, child, office, apartment etc. etc. and that all adds up to not being so much modeled after me.   

JEN: Were you still working as a prosecutor when you wrote MOST WANTED?

MICHELE: When I started it, yes. But I didn’t begin writing in earnest until after I left the U.S. Attorney’s Office.

JEN: How did your peers feel about you writing a criminal suspense novel? Has anyone confronted you about a character appearing to have some of his/her similar character traits?

MICHELE: My peers were supportive, but yes, some people definitely asked if Bernadette was based on my old boss. (She isn’t! My old boss was tough, but she had a heart of gold.) A lot of my peers openly say they want to do just what I have done and ask for my advice.

JEN: Describe for us how you felt when you were a prosecutor when you crossed the police tape and entered a crime scene. What thoughts would run through your head?

MICHELE: I was always struck by how the crimes committed out in the open, in and among lots of people. At least that was true in New York. I remember once going to the scene of a particularly brutal murder I was presenting evidence about to a grand jury, though I went there long after the fact. (Often, we relied on autopsy and crime scene photos rather than visits because the cases were assigned to us well after the crimes took place.) In this case, the murder occurred in a garage that was part of a complex of perhaps six single-car garages all attached together. I had this image in my head of some weird, isolated garage in the middle of nowhere, but it was just a normal garage, with lots of people around. The only place I visited that truly seemed scary was a big landfill out in Brooklyn that was used as a dumping ground for bodies by both organized crime and a lot of street gangs. That place, you could walk through it and because it was actually isolated and creepy, you felt like murders could take place there. But mostly, crime scenes just seemed strangely normal.

JEN: In your opinion, how accurate is the television show C.S.I.?

MICHELE: Sorry, I have never seen C.S.I. But I can tell you that "The Wire~ on HBO is phenomenally accurate.

JEN: MOST WANTED was so fast-paced and suspenseful. How did you go about writing it? Plot or characters first? Outline form or simply chapter by chapter?

MICHELE: Thank you! With MOST WANTED, I wrote and re-wrote and revised it so many times. I did have an outline, and I also revised the outline a lot. I always write a detailed outline before I begin a book-length work, and then deviate from it at least some. Only once I start writing do I really figure out what is going on in the story. The whole process is very strange and magical. I always feel that the story pre-exists and I am living it along with the characters.

JEN: How long did it take for you to complete the book? How many publishers did you solicit before landing a contract?

MICHELE: MOST WANTED took about 2 ½ years from when I began writing it to when it was sold, but I was not working full-time on writing it during that period. I was also doing things like figuring out how to get an agent, how to write a query letter, how to network to meet an agent, waiting to hear from my agent, etc. All that took time.

JEN: What does it feel like interviewing a criminal in jail?

MICHELE: It’s a little uncomfortable, but you get used to it. There is a palpable sense that you are the only woman there among hundreds of men who don’t see women a lot. There is a bit of restrained violence, but no real sense that you are in danger because you are there with your agents, and there are COs all around. Being locked in feels claustrophobic!

In terms of actually interviewing defendants, again, I never feel threatened because they were handcuffed and the agents were right there. Most of the defendants would lie a lot in the beginning, and you would have to work through that. Generally speaking, interviewing defendants was completely fascinating and often really exhilarating, especially if you felt you were getting really good information.

JEN: In the novel, what made you choose to have Melanie and Steve in an unhappy marriage?

MICHELE: This is going to sound like a non-answer, but it’s not. It goes back to what I said about how the story pre-exists and I experience it along with the characters. I don’t feel like I chose to give Melanie an unhappy marriage. That’s just the situation she was in when she came to me.

JEN: Throughout the novel, I constantly feel sorry for baby Maya as she is shuffled from one sitter to another. Does this accurately depict the life of a prosecutor?

MICHELE: I think it accurately depicts moments in the life of any woman who has a truly demanding job and little support from her husband. For Melanie, though, remember that this book takes place over a period of less than a week, and a week in which she is working on her most demanding case ever. Bernadette criticizes her for the fact that she’s been rushing out the door at five ever since Maya was born. So before the Benson case, Melanie was home a lot more.

JEN: In the book, Melanie blamed herself for the deaths of her witnesses. Was it difficult for you to clear your head at the end of the day and leave the job at work?

MICHELE: Yes. The job was very stressful that way. Plus, and this is especially true when I was deputy chief of narcotics and responsible for in- taking all drug cases in the district. I used to get paged all the time at night.

JEN: The prosecutor in MOST WANTED is involved in solving the crime as well as apprehending the suspect. Is that typical? I always thought that was more of the detective’s work.

MICHELE: As a federal prosecutor, I spent more time investigating cases than trying them or appearing in court. What I didn’t do was go out and confront the suspects in person- that part (like when Melanie ends up confronting Slice in the burned-out basement) is fiction, thankfully.

JEN: If your book were made into a movie, who would you want to see play Melanie and Dan?

MICHELE: That’s so hard!! For Melanie, how about Eva Mendes? For Dan, wow, I have never found the right guy. Who do you think?

JEN: I would like to see my favorite Desperate Housewife, Eva Longoria, play Melanie and Matthew McConaughey play Dan.

JEN: If you had to choose 3 adjectives to describe yourself, what would they be?

MICHELE: Optimistic, dedicated, caring

JEN: I know that your new book THE FINISHING SCHOOL will be released on my birthday, January 3, 2006. (Good choice of date, by the way!!) What can you tell us about it?

MICHELE: The story opens with Melanie summoned from her bed in the middle of the night a couple of weeks before Christmas to view the bodies of two beautiful teenagers found dead in a Park Avenue penthouse. Melanie’s instincts tell her that what initially looks like a drug overdose is in truth something even more sinister. The girls were students at an exclusive Manhattan private school and the daughters of wealthy families with dangerous secrets to protect. They were also deeply involved in a dangerous New York City nightclub scene. Melanie is committed to finding the truth, but she has to contend with the complications of her own personal life, as she is paired again with the hard-to-resist FBI agent Dan O’Reilly, and as the investigation takes her to Puerto Rico, where she confronts her own troubled past.

JEN: Any public appearances scheduled?

MICHELE: Yes! My tour starts in January and I would love for everyone to come out to one of my events and meet me. Here is my schedule!

Get a FREE COPY of MOST WANTED by Michele Martinez!

The holidays are coming early this year! How does a free copy of Michele Martinez's hit debut novel MOST WANTED sound? It's the first in the critically acclaimed Melanie Vargas series of thrillers that Janet Evanovich called "an absolute must read." And Michele will send a free copy of MOST WANTED to the first 50 readers of FreshFiction.com who enter! She'll even pay the postage! Just go to the "Contact Michele" page of her website by clicking on this special link and send her a message saying "I read FreshFiction and I want MOST WANTED!", along with your name and mailing address. That's all there is to it. And while you're there, be sure to explore the rest of Michele's exciting website and learn more about her and the next Melanie Vargas adventure, THE FINISHING SCHOOL, on sale January 3rd!

I hope you have enjoyed my interview with Michele Martinez, and now you have no excuse for not reading her book! A big thanks to Michele for this spectacular and generous offer. Please be sure to e-mail me at Fresh Fiction and let me know what you think of her writing. I have no doubt that you will become a Michele Martinez fan. Just let me know if you start a fan club. I want to join!

Next month, I will bring to you an interview with Leslie Caine. If you are unfamiliar with her work, she writes The Domestic Bliss Mysteries. As she says, her books are like "Nancy Drew meets Martha Stewart." I am so excited about this interview and I hope you are, too.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Until next month.....Jen