Cold Cases, Hollywood and Homicide with Kellye Garrett

This is a first for It's a Mystery podcast!

Award-winning mystery author Kellye Garrett reads to us from a work-in-progress, which is a first for this show.

When the publisher of her first two mysteries shuttered their doors, Kellye pivoted and began working on this domestic thriller. You'll hear her read from that book and then we discuss her two Detective By Day books and how they are still impacting readers, the #ownvoices movement, and how writing for the TV show Cold Case helped Kellye when it came to writing fiction.

This week's mystery author

Kellye Garrett’s Hollywood Homicide, about a semi-famous, mega-broke black actress, won the Anthony, Agatha and Lefty for best first novel. It’s also one of BookBub’s “Top 100 Crime Novels of All Time.” The second, Hollywood Ending, was featured on the TODAY show’s Best Summer Reads of 2019 and was nominated for both Anthony and Lefty awards. She serves on Sisters in Crime’s national board and is a co-founder of Crime Writers of Color.

To learn more about Kellye and her books visit KellyeGarrett.com

Press play (above) to listen to the show, or read the transcript below. Remember you can also subscribe to the show on Apple Podcasts. And listen on Stitcher, Android, Google Podcasts, TuneIn, and Spotify.

Interview transcript with Kellye Garrett

Alexandra: Kellye Garrett's mystery, Hollywood Homicide, about a semi-famous mega broke Black actress won the Anthony, Agatha and Lefty for best first novel. It's also one of BookBub's top 100 crime novels of all time. The second in the series, Hollywood ending was featured on Today Show's best summer reads of 2019 and was nominated for both the Anthony and lefty awards.

Kelly serves on Sisters In Crime's national board, and is cofounder of Crime Writers of Color.

Welcome to the show. Kellye.

Kellye: Thank you so much for having me, Alexandra.

Alexandra: Oh, it's my pleasure. So you're going to read to us today. This is kind of unusual and I'm so excited. You're going to read to us from a work in progress.

Do you want to set it up for us?

Kellye: Sure. It's a bit more serious than my other books, but it's a stand alone. It's like a Lori Raider day or a Megan Miranda type book. Still very much about a woman, first person narrative, looking into a mystery.

Alexandra: As we mentioned in your bio, you've got two books in the Detective by Day series.

Tell us why you've switched to do this book about different characters.

Kellye: For two reasons. First, my publisher closed, Midnight Ink, before my third book came out. And they still have the rights for the first two. So, for right now I can't write any more of those books.

And although I've always loved cozies,