March's Featured Author - K. B. Jackson

Fellow Pacific Northwesterner, K. B. Jackson is known as the "Sasquatch Lady" in some circles. Kate is in no way big, hairy, and stinky, but she does write a fabulous middle grade series called the Sasquatch Hunters. I've read the first two books in the series and absolutely loved them! Oh, and did I mention The Sasquatch of Hawthorne Elementary won an Agatha Award? And the other two in the series are BOTH nominated for an Agatha this year???

On top of all that, Kate writes two mystery series. Here we're featuring the first in her Cruising Sisters Mysteries, Until Depths Do Us Part. Full disclosure, while I have read boos in both her middle grade and Chattertowne Secrets series, I haven't read this one yet, but as great as the others are, I have no doubt this series is just as good. Depths is ALMOST to the top of my TBR pile, and I better hurry it up. There are already three books out in this series!

Here's what to expect:

Sudden riches lead to a world of trouble...

Newly widowed Charlotte McLaughlin is adrift following the sudden death of her husband of twenty years and the shocking discovery of the lavish double life he lived while purportedly traveling for business.

When Charlotte's only nephew and his fiancée are notified that their secluded wedding venue has flooded, her sister Jane suggests an alternative venue: a Thanksgiving week cruise from Seattle to Alaska aboard the private residence ship where Charlotte's husband had purchased a two-bedroom unit without her knowledge. What better way to get closer with her family and banish memories Charlotte can't bear to touch now?

But the bride is found dead less than twenty-four hours after departure, and the head of security holds the groom on suspicion of her murder. Charlotte and Jane must figure out who is responsible for the murder before their nephew goes to jail for a crime they're adamant he couldn't have committed. Then a second victim is discovered, and Charlotte becomes even more certain there's a killer on the guest list.

I asked Kate a couple of questions about her inspiration: You've set the sisters afloat where they wind up entangled in murder mysteries. Why did you choose to put them on cruise ships? Have you ever run into any mysteries aboard a cruise in real life?

My initial idea for a cruise ship setting came from a friend who used to work on a cruise ship playing trombone. He met his wife onboard. She was a hair stylist on the ship. He told me about some of the below deck drama and how sometimes the above deck drama and below deck drama collided.

I was also in a retro tv phase (Golden Girls, Love Boat, Murder She Wrote). Initially I was going to make my sisters significantly older because I'd enjoyed writing the character of Mildred, the octogenarian town historian in my Chattertowne Secrets series. Inevitably I decided to model the sisters after my Grandma Charlotte and Great Aunt Jane. Charlotte died young-62- and my recollection of her and Jane from their fifites was that they had a lot of fun together. But sisters (being sisters) also have a complex dynamic and I'm always down for writing family dynamics into a story.

As for my own cruising experiences, I never witnessed any murders other than my husband murdering the soft serve ice cream machine every time we passed by.

Hey! That sounds reasonable to me. You have to get that soft serve while you can! I adore that you modeled the sisters after your Grandma and her sister. Having used my own Grandma for inspiration, I'm really dying to get into this series now! Thanks so much for answering my questions!

Readers - pop over to Kate's website to find out more about her books and sign up for her newsletter so you don't miss a thing!

A little more about Kate:

Kate B. Jackson (K. B. Jackson) is an Anthony Award finalist, a 2-time Silver Falchion Award finalist, and the Agatha Award-winning author of the Chattertowne Secrets mystery series (Level Best Books), the Cruising Sisters Mystery series (Tule Publishing), and the middle grade mystery/adventure series Sasquatch Hunters (Reycraft Books).

From the time she read her very first books with chapters, Elizabeth Gail and the Mystery at Johnson Farm, Kate was hooked on reading, particularly mysteries. Whether it be Nancy Drew, Encyclopedia Brown, a Choose Your Own Adventure, From the Mixed-Up Filles of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler, or The Westing Game, she had her nose in a book. It's no wonder, then, that she majored in English at the University of Washington. After a long hiatus while she raised her four (now grown) children as a stay-at-home mom, Kate got back to the task of writing. At first it was a silly blog about the antics of her family and home life, then came the request for her to submit a short story.

She completed her first novel, Secrets Don't Sink, in 2019 and a year later signed with Dawn Dowdle of Blue Ridge Literary Agency. Following Dawn's sudden death in Autumn 2023, Kate signed with Paula Munier of Talcott Notch Literary Agency.

When she's not writing about secrets, sisters, Sasquatch, and murder, Kate enjoys traveling with her husband and unearthing family secrets via ancestry research. She lives in the Pacific Northwest.