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A Writer Writes: Writing an Amateur Sleuth Mystery Novella
Updated on: 24 June 2021
Hello, Book Lovers!
I’m super excited to announce that I’m writing an amateur sleuth mystery novella. I love reading. Through reading books, I’ve developed interests that have filtered through into the writing of my fiction novels. So, at the end of 2016, I decided to read more books within my genre.
In previous years, I adopted the philosophy of reading anything that piques my interest, and to a certain extent, I still do. But, as I finished reading The Brass Hall by Kevin Tumlinson, I became interested in the archaeological elements in this book. This newfound interest led me to search Amazon for the next book in the series, The Coelho Medallion. After finishing reading the second book, I started to develop an idea of writing a conspiracy thriller or action-adventure novel trilogy around an archaeologist, which I later named Maximilian Nicholls.
An Amateur Sleuth Mystery Novella
This new idea inspired me to merge my two-story worlds into a novella in a similar way that J F Penn has done with her Day of the Vikings novel. In this novel, she introduced a character, Daniel Blake into the world of ARKANE. The character Daniel Blake has his own trilogy, the London Psychic Crime Thrillers, which I love.
After careful consideration of my current fiction-writing workload, I decided to take a similar approach to test the reading market to see if I could find readers who are interested in my Maximilian Nicholls conspiracy thrillers. At the moment, I’m advertising the James Lalonde amateur sleuth mystery series as a nine-book series. I chose this option to give readers an understanding that the series is more than just three books. But realistically, I plan to write these books for three years, to start off and then for as long as there is a demand.
So, I’m excited to announce that I’m writing an amateur sleuth mystery novella titled, ‘Missing.’
A Quick Update
I know this is going to sound alarming, but I’ve not been happy with the first book in the James Lalonde Amateur Sleuth series, Missing. My unhappiness has led me to create a third edition with new scenes, improvements to the old ones, and a more satisfying ending.
This week, I sent the third edition, which is titled “Suspicion”, off to my editor. I’m so excited because I’m very close to publishing this new first-in-series novella. And, I plan to make this novella available for free to my James Lalonde Insiders reader club.
Happy reading, book lovers!
Amelia xx
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A. D. Hay (Amelia)
Amateur Sleuth Mystery Author
Amelia writes amateur sleuth mysteries under the pen name A.D. Hay. She is the author of The Lawn, Suspicion, and Duplicity—the first three stories in the James Lalonde Amateur Sleuth Mystery series. The Candidate is the first book in the Rookie Reporter Mystery series. And she is the author of the stand-alone murder mystery The Locked Room. When not absorbed in a gripping page-turner or writing my James Lalonde series, Amelia loves to travel around Europe, drink tea and rosé, and eat pizza. She is also obsessed with journalism, art history, and is a closet religious thriller fan. She is also the host of The Authorpreneur Podcast and the Mystery Novel Nerd Podcast. Right now, she is writing a cozy mystery short story, which will eventually be the first instalment of a series, the second book in the Rookie Reporter Mystery series and the third James Lalonde novel.
