Carrie Stuart Parks is an internationally recognised forensic artist and creator of the award winning Gwen Marcey suspense series featuring an FBI trained forensic artist who is always being thrust out of her studio into life and death action.

Six things you'll learn from this Joys of Binge Reading episode:

How Carrie found her mentor through a thoughtful Christmas gift

Why writing "kept her sane" in dark times

The 'Don't Lie To Me' workshops that contribute to Gwen's character

The two things behind Carrie's writing success

How book research led her to Pentecostal serpent handlers

Why she breeds Great Pyrenees Mountain Dogs

Where to find Carrie Stuart Parks:

Website: www.carriestuartparks.com

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/CarrieStuartParksAuthor/

For more details, a full transcript follows:  Note – this is a “close as” rendering of our full conversation with links to key points. (Not totally word for word)

Jenny: Hi there: I’m your host Jenny Wheeler, and today Carrie Stuart Parks is talking about writing inspirational suspense.

But before we hear from Carrie, just a reminder that the show notes for this BingeReading episode are available at the website, thejoysofbingereading.com

That’s where you’ll find links to Carrie’s website and books, as well as a free E book, and information on how to subscribe to our podcast so you don’t miss future episodes.

And now here’s Carrie. Hello there Carrie, and welcome to the show. It’s great to have you with us.

Carrie: Thank you Jenny and I am absolutely thrilled to be here.

Carrie Stuart Parks - thriller author

Jenny:  You obviously are a very talented artist - you give forensic art workshops and you have written several how to paint and draw instruction books - so what was the “Once Upon A Time” moment or process that led you to express yourself through writing rather than through pencil and paint?

Carrie: The original writing I did was for 'How To Books.' I decided I really needed to put down what I taught my students in a book rather than explain it over and over again.

So I ended up doing five books with my husband Rick on how to draw and how to watercolour paint. And I thought that all I could do was write non fiction  - "here's how to sharpen your pencil." Eventually I moved over to writing novels, but it wasn't until I'd been writing non fiction books for a number of years that I ended up in this place.

Jenny:  Yes and it's a very different process writing novels to writing fiction. Was there something that led you to make that jump?

Carrie:  Yes, and it's a strange story!  I have a girl friend who has absolutely everything and every year I spend hours looking for the perfect Christmas gift for her. Well this one year I just couldn't find anything. So I thought maybe I'll just  write a little short story about people who go on this adventure.

So I wrote this story about two gals who go on this adventure. A murder mystery kind of a thing.  And I gave it to her for Christmas.  And she'd be reading it in bed and laughing out loud and her husband said "What are you reading?"

And she said "well there's this really funny short story" and she read it out loud to him.  He rang me up the next day and he said "I want to come over to your house" and I said "OK" and he came over and said "I think you have writing talent. I think you can write fiction and I am happy to teach you how to do it better."

Well the gal I gave it to was Barbara Peretti, and the guy who came over was Frank Peretti (famous as the author of The Present Danger and Piercing the Darkness - editor note)  So for the next eight years the 'Dean of Christian Writing' was my personal mentor.

Writing mentor Frank Peretti and Carrie Stuart Parks

Jenny: Gwen is similar to you in many ways - for a start she is a forensic artist - and in other ways of course she is very different...   Tell us about those similarities and differences.