SHERRYL CLARK chats to Paul Burke about her new Judi Westerholme novel MAD, BAD AND DEAD. Melbourne, poetry, structure and pace, the innocents caught up in crime, keeping it grounded and Finland.

MAD, BAD AND DEAD: A dead employee. A missing child. Anonymous phone calls in the dead of night. Judi Westerholme's troubles aren't over yet... Already struggling to juggle co-running Candlebark's pub/bistro along with her new childcare responsibilities, Judi does not need her life to become any more complicated. Yet, as usual, complications arrive in spades: she starts receiving threatening, late-night phone calls before discovering one of her employees, Kate, shot dead in her bed. Judi finds herself caught up in a murder investigation, as well as the hunt for the Kate's fourteen year old daughter, who has been missing since the murder. Add in the uncertainty of her relationship with Melbourne-based D.S. Heath and the fact that her estranged mother's nursing home keeps urging her to visit, and Judi might finally be at breaking point.

Sherryl Clark has had 40 children's and YA books published in Australia, and several in the US and UK, plus collections of poetry and four verse novels. She has taught writing at Holmesglen TAFE and Victoria University. She completed a Master of Fine Arts program at Hamline University, Minnesota, and has just finished a PhD in creative writing. Her three adult crime novels are TRUST ME I'M DEAD, DEAD AND GONE & MAD, BAD AND DEAD.

Recommendations
Garry Disher - the Paul Hirsch mysteries
Emma Viskic - Those Who Perish
Vikki Petraitis - The Unbelieved
Catherine Lee - Dark Justice

Produced by Junkyard Dog
Music courtesy of Southgate and Leigh
Crime Time

Paul Burke writes for Crime Time, Crime Fiction Lover and the European Literature Network. He is also a CWA Historical Dagger Judge 2022 .

Produced by Junkyard Dog

Crime Time

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