Stride

The hero of my series is a Duluth police lieutenant named Jonathan Stride.

When I was creating Stride in my first book IMMORAL, I didn't want a stereotypical, grizzled, emotionless detective.  I wanted someone who at his heart is a passionate man.  He struggles with his emotions, and sometimes they get the better of him, whether as a detective or as a man.  Sometimes his passions blind him to the truth of a case, and he makes mistakes as a result of it.  He's not a super-hero.  He's flawed and human, and I think that's why readers relate to him.

Stride is obviously the glue that holds the series together, but he doesn't dominate the stage.  Readers will occasionally tell me - approvingly - that Stride is sometimes a supporting character.  He lets other voices carry the book.  In that way, readers get pulled into the psychological suspense, by getting inside the head of the other characters, not just Stride.

On  the other hand, I tell people who are new to the series that my fourth book, IN THE DARK, is a great place to start.  That's because this book, more than any other since IMMORAL, is very much Stride's book.  I wanted a story that allows the reader to get to know Stride and the influences that shaped him.  So this story takes you deep into Stride's past and to an unsolved murder from thirty years ago that involved people who were close to Stride's heart.  That summer of violence was a big part of what made him the man he is.  In this new novel, he must confront those events and finally resolve them - and deal with the loss and grief he never fully accepted.

Can a suspense novel make you cry?  This one just might.  By the end, I hope you'll feel close to Jonathan Stride and his past.