I do so because I believe Pearl Buck’s words: “To understand today, you have to search yesterday.” Searching yesterday, as in all of 2014, I found that I’d forgotten about some celebrity deaths, undoubtedly because I’ve been more concerned about the ones here at home. Still, they lived, they entertained Read more…
I’ve been away since last Wednesday, and I’m kicking myself for not writing this sooner. Just because I didn’t, though, does not mean that today’s date–the two-year anniversary of Skylar Neese’s disappearance–has not loomed large on my mind. How could it not, given that the book about her murder comes Read more…
In less than a year, I wrote two books. In the midst of that, my sister died, my husband contracted a bone infection, and another loved one had a meltdown of sorts. Then, after meeting an extremely stressful deadline, I found I couldn’t write. It’s been a month now and Read more…
If you’re an author living in today’s warp-speed world—unless you’re one of those reclusive J.D. Salinger types—you’d be crazy to turn down an opportunity to go on NBC’s Dateline or Dr. Phil. Well, even if you are a reclusive type, unless you have a rich uncle handing out greenbacks so Read more…
While I’m traveling to and from the hospital taking care of a family member, my coauthor Geoff Fuller wrote this guest blog about Rachel Shoaf’s sentencing yesterday. Rachel, still 17, was sentenced as an adult to 30 years in prison. At the press conference held by Prosecutor Ashdown yesterday, I Read more…
Silence can be golden—unless its presence is so loud, so abrasive, that it drowns out everything else in the room. One week later, Shelia Eddy’s guilty plea is still on our minds. Some people say they have cried for hours, others for days. Still others wake up from nightmares about Read more…
I can’t say how many expressions passed across Shelia Eddy’s face from the time she walked into Judge Russell Clawges’ courtroom until she took her seat and began sobbing, but I can tell you she’s one of the most difficult people to read I’ve ever seen during the 25 years Read more…
Many years ago as a young news reporter, I learned what happens when a government agency attempts to violate their employees’ right to free speech. They live to regret it. Almost without exception, it pays to be painfully honest when faced with a sensitive situation—such as the death of a Read more…
No one saw a single smile from Shelia Eddy in court today. What we did see was a bespectacled teenager wearing an updo who looked much younger than when she last appeared in court. My own guess is that Eddy, who turned 18 on Sept. 28, got a quick lesson Read more…
The contrast between defense attorney and client couldn’t have been more stark: His voice boomed. It was by far the loudest in the courtroom. Distinct and certain, everyone seated inside the wood-paneled room could hear him without the need to lean forward, fearful of missing a single syllable. Hers was Read more…