Barbara Nickless is the #1 Amazon Charts and Wall Street Journal bestselling author of the Sydney Parnell crime novels. The series has been optioned for television and has won two Colorado Book Awards and twice won the Daphne du Maurier Award of Excellence. Her standalone spy thriller was released in January 2025. Barbara’s essays and short stories have appeared in Writer’s Digest, Penguin Random House, and other markets. She also teaches creative writing to veterans at the University of Colorado in Colorado Springs.

Among other things, Barbara and Carter discuss navigating PR as an author, Barbara’s research in Singapore for her espionage thriller, and transitioning from writing series to standalones. At the end of their conversation, they make up a mysterious story using a line from Cara Black’s Murder at la Villette.