Welcome to Between the Covers Summer Series, where# we put the spotlight on our South Florida authors.

Hi, I'm Anne Bok, and joining me is awardwinning,# best-selling author Joanna Campbell.

She has a new book, Wednesday Wicked Ways.

Joanna writes# four different cozy mystery series and this one is the latest book in the Friday night mystery# series.

Welcome.

Hi.

How are you, an I am great.

Thank you for being here because we always have a# great time.

And you know that I love your female protagonist.

Thank you.

All of them.

Thank you.# But I got to say that Craig Collins has a special place in my heart.

Give us her backstory if you# would.

I'm delighted too.

Craig is a young woman who went through journalism school, married a# guy who was a TV star, and they moved to Decatur, Illinois, which is officially, in case you didn't# know it, the armpit of the world.

And once they got there, he was caught doing some things he# shouldn't.

And she wound up having to take a job.

And even though she was trained to be a reporter,# she winds up selling newspaper advertising.

Okay.

The book is the in the Friday night mystery club.# There is a Friday night mystery club.

She is one of the members.

Give me a little bit about who# the other people are in this group.

They are quite an eclectic group.

That's Yes, they are.

The# woman who lives across the hall from from Craig, they live in this house that was converted.

It was# a a big old craftsman sty style house and then it was split up into four apartments.

The woman# across the hall is Z Xandra and she is black and she works for a bank.

Then upstairs there's# Rosie with her son Julio and they escaped from murky circumstances in Mexico.

And then across# the hall from from them is Pu.

And Pru is an exotic dancer.

Plus, they're joined eventually# by another woman named Winnie, who is a local softball star.

This is a great group of women# here.

Now, let's go back.

It's 1986.

Yes.

So, that is important to this story.

Craig has this# pile of debts from this nasty divorce.

She's also supporting her elderly grandmother.

All of the# women in this story are struggling in some way to make ends meet.

They need their income.

They# need their jobs, but they're all facing sexism and they're all really working in a man's world.# So, give us a little bit about that.

Well, back in ' 86, we were told that if we wanted to have# a real job, we would have to dress for success.

and we were allowed onto the playground to play# with the big boys.

But that meant that we had to put up with certain things.

And all of these women# find themselves in circumstances that they're not terribly happy about.

And they're really unfair# circumstances.

All they want is the chance to earn a living.

And every time they turn around,# they're hitting another roadblock.

And as we said, it's sexism.

It's e everything goes goes into# this working situation.

Did you actually work that job that Craig has, did you do ad sales?# I absolutely did.

And at the time when I was selling newspaper advertising, the newspaper# was in the top 10 in the United States as for cost per ad and Decar was in the top 10 in the# United States for unemployment.

In fact, that's how I met my second husband.

Um, he was one of my# accounts and I like to say I service the account.

All right.

I love the humor.

Something else that's# very humorous in the book is Craig's grandmother, who It's not humorous that she has a stroke# and she only knows one word, but it's a word that we can't actually say on public television.# That's right.

But you do love putting humor in.

Yes.

Yes.

The word that she says is is like shoot,# but it's not that word.

And Craig's grandmother, who would have never said that word under normal# circumstances, is left with only that word.

And Craig reflects that with the proper inonation,# that word can mean a variety of things.

And her grandmother is is a hoot.

Her grandmother# is a master at this.

You write several series with women protagonists.

four that I can think# of.

How do you make sure that they each have their own distinct voice?

I don't know.

I think# it's that they're so real to me as people and sometimes somewhere in the writing process, I'll# I'll look at the dialogue and I'll think, "Oh, so and so wouldn't say this and so and so wouldn't# say that."

Um, I think it's it's just that you have to tune your ear towards certain things.

And# again, I know them very well.

They're real to me.

They they're real to your readers, too.

One thing# that I think as a reader that they have in common is that for in most cases, all of these women are# trying to rebuild their lives.

Yes, that's a good point.

That works well for the story, doesn't it?# Yes, it does.

Because they really have to have something.

Your characters have to have something# to struggle against.

Otherwise, there's no point to the story.

And it's a delicate balance because# you don't want them to be so down and out that the book is a downer and you want them to have spunk# and have fun, which they all have, but there's still the the internal struggles that they have.# They're they're not only the physical struggle struggles like with panty hose.

You remember panty# hose?

Oh my goodness.

Yes.

Don't ever bring that back.

Oh, you could tell if it was going to be# a good day or not by whether you had panty hoes, right?

That didn't have a runner.

That didn't have# a runner.

Yeah.

You've written somewhere around, and tell me if I'm wrong, 80 books.

Yeah, that's# what my assistant tells me.

That's incredible.

But then I also read somewhere that you said# it took you 30 years to write the first Friday Night Mystery.

So, square that for me.

Well,# I started writing it actually I guess it was more like 40ome years ago and I didn't have the# skills and I didn't know enough about how you put together a book and I think I was too close to# it.

Now when I when I work on this book I have the the beauty of hindsight because I know how# far we women have come and I also know how fast we're moving backwards.

So, as I write this# book, I think of my young nieces and I think, what do they need to know about what happened and# and their part today in keeping those hard one uh strides that we've made.

I am so glad you brought# that up because I read it.

Yes, it's 1986, but there are some things that are absolutely relevant# to right now.

Yes, they are.

And it's really sad and and it's kind of surprising.

In fact, I think# if they hadn't been so relevant to me, I wouldn't have been able to feel so emotional about it as I# was writing them.

Because when you think about it, you know, because change happens so incrementally# and and in so many small and myriad ways, you say to yourself, you you don't notice it.

You don't.# But now when I look back in hindsight at what we went through, there's a scene in that book where# there's a woman who's who needs to nurse her baby and the her employer will not give her any slack.# They won't provide her a place to go.

They don't want her to be doing that on the premises.

I don't# know that that would happen today.

But I as I was thinking of this book, I was remembering that# because it actually happened to somebody I knew.

Of all your characters, who do readers# say that they gravitate to the most?

Oh, it's probably still Kiki Loenstein because there# are 20 books in that series, so they've known her the longest.

Um, I think that after that it's# Carameia down here in Florida because that book is set in Florida.

But I think Craig's going# to be she's going to come into her own.

And the reason I think that is because women who are# grown-ups.

We we can look at that and say, "Yeah, that's the way it was."

And I remember working# for a man who thought he could touch my butt.

I remember being asked once, "Do you have a bun# in the oven?"

which was a crude way of saying, "Was I pregnant?"

And I think that when women# see that in the that book, they're going to say, "That was what it was like."

And that's# what it was like for me.

That is exactly how it was like.

You're a master of the cozy# genre.

And as much as they're comfortable, what I like is that they're characterdriven.

Yes.# Why do you think readers are drawn to the cozy?

I think that we want a happily ever after, but we# don't necessarily believe that that only comes from a relationship with a man.

And in cozies,# there's almost always a happily ever after.

There's some sort of justice for whatever# crime it was.

My cozies are a little edgy.

They're probably on the borderline between# cozy and traditional women's fiction.

What I like is that because it's a cozy, I can use the# characters to discuss things, social changes, things, and show the variety of opinions that# people had, but show them in a kind of safe way for the reader.

I I think the the genre is perfect# for social issues.

I like it because yeah, there might be a murder, but there's always going to be# justice at the end.

Yes.

And it will never be too gory or too gross or too miserable.

It is always# such a pleasure to talk to you.

Thank you so much for being here.

The new book is Wednesday Wicked# Ways.

Joanna Campbell, I can't thank you enough.

And an it goes ditto from me to you.

I'm Anne Bok.# Please join me on the next Between the Covers.