Now that you know what I look like (thanks to the photographic genius of our art director Kevin Henegan), you now have the exciting opportunity to hear what I sound like! Yesterday,  I was interviewed by Benjamin LeRoy, publisher of Bleak House Books (profiled in my April 15 mystery feature "The Killer Genre"),  for the company's new "The Future is Bleak"  podcasts., a weekly series of audio interviews with authors, editors, and other members of the mystery community. (Fabulous title, by the way!)

While Benjamin did a great job of editing out my umms and aaahs and made me sound fairly intelligent, I still cringe at the sound of my voice (like nails on a blackboard). How I long to have Terry Gross's mellifluous NPR  Fresh Air voice or even my mother's own dulcet tones,, which  had a kind of Tallulah Bankhead "hello dahling' quality. (A high school teacher of drama and history, my mother years ago directed a memorable all-female production of The King and I that she retitled The Queen and I.; the six-year-old me played one of the children.)
 
Thinking about my nasal voice got me meditating on that moment in film history when the first talking picture first appeared, ruining the careers of many silent film stars. (As an example, see the classic 1952 movie Singing in the Rain.). Would the brave new world of podcasting do the same thing to talented authors saddled with high-pitched sqeaky heavily accented  voices (a la Lina Lamont; again see Singing in the Rain.) On the other hand, Truman Capote didn't too badly for himself with the unusual voice God gave him.

In the meantime, Bleak House has an interesting series going; check out their interview with hot new thriller author Marcus Sakey (The Blade Itself).  And they have even more ambitious plans: a ten minute video about the publishing process to be Youtubed. Benjamin kindly asked me to participate. It should be fun, even if I am not quite ready for my close-up.