Matt Ingwalson
I don't have any mysteries in my life. At least, not in the old-fashioned, whodunnit sense.
What I do have is a vague sense of paranoia that constantly alerts me to the ways my everyday life could go horribly wrong. And many of my books begin with that.
For instance, every new parent knows how it feels to walk into a nursery at night and not be able to see your baby. Then your eyes adjust to the darkness and you realize everything is as it should be. But what if it wasn't? What if your child had simply vanished? That paralyzing question inspired my first Owl & Raccoon mystery, The Single Staircase .
Another example. Most people have probably stayed up too late, gone to the wrong party, and hopped in bed with a stranger. You can almost always wash your hands and chalk it up to experience. But the narcissism of the characters in Regret Things drives them to keep making worse and worse decisions until finally the past catches up to them.
At the end of the day, I'd like to think that the real mystery in all my books isn't just whodunnit. I'm after the big mystery. How do ordinary families react to secrets, violence and horror? I think my latest, The Baby Monitor: A Novella of Family Horrors , is the best answer to that question yet.
What I do have is a vague sense of paranoia that constantly alerts me to the ways my everyday life could go horribly wrong. And many of my books begin with that.
For instance, every new parent knows how it feels to walk into a nursery at night and not be able to see your baby. Then your eyes adjust to the darkness and you realize everything is as it should be. But what if it wasn't? What if your child had simply vanished? That paralyzing question inspired my first Owl & Raccoon mystery, The Single Staircase .
Another example. Most people have probably stayed up too late, gone to the wrong party, and hopped in bed with a stranger. You can almost always wash your hands and chalk it up to experience. But the narcissism of the characters in Regret Things drives them to keep making worse and worse decisions until finally the past catches up to them.
At the end of the day, I'd like to think that the real mystery in all my books isn't just whodunnit. I'm after the big mystery. How do ordinary families react to secrets, violence and horror? I think my latest, The Baby Monitor: A Novella of Family Horrors , is the best answer to that question yet.
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