Carol J. Perry - Bewitching Mysteries

Sometimes a person’s future seems written in the stars. Such is the case of Seminole writer, Carol J. Perry. Born on Halloween Eve and raised in Salem, Massachusetts, Perry is the author of the Witch City Mysteries, an entertaining series of cozy mysteries with a paranormal twist.

Perry didn’t start out creating spooky stories. “I knew in 7^th grade I wanted to go into advertising,” she says. “My high school guidance counselor told me the only way I could do that was to become a secretary.” So Perry enrolled in Boston University’s College of Arts and Letters.  After her freshman year, she received a job offer from a local fuel company where she’d been a participant in an “Oilman for a Day” program. “I’d been assigned to the ad manager who was so impressed with me that she wanted to hire me as an assistant for a lot more money than my dad was making at the time,” Perry recalls. “So at the age of 19, I had a job writing ad copy.”

After marrying and having a child, Perry was offered a job as ad manager for a large department store. For the next 13 years, she wrote advertisements, radio commercials and catalogs. She even wrote some articles for trade papers. Perry thought of herself as a non-fiction writer until she moved to Florida.  She joined a writing class at the Madeira Beach Library, and after hearing a speaker talk about middle grade fiction, decided to give it a try.  She wrote a novel called Sandcastle Summer and was offered a publishing contract. Sandcastle Summer was followed by four more middle grade novels and two biographies.

After she joined a second writers group, Perry began toying with an idea for a mystery. She wrote the first chapter, submitted it to a contest, and won first prize. This led to a new publishing contract for Caught Dead Handed, the first in what would become the Witch City series. Set in Salem, the novel introduces Lee Barrett, a newly-widowed Salem native who returns home to interview for a job as a reporter with WICH-TV. After discovering the body of the station’s call-in psychic, Lee is offered her job. When she starts seeing strange apparitions reflected in an obsidian ball, Lee finds herself on the trail of a killer. According to Perry, Lee Barrett was inspired by real-life psychic Linda Bennett, the host of “Metaphysically Speaking,” a local television show, who “taught me all the psychic stuff.”

Caught Dead Handed was followed by Tails, You Lose where Lee takes a job as an instructor in an art academy housed in a haunted department store. When the handyman is found murdered, Lee begins seeing visions that lead her to the killer. The third book in the series, Look Both Ways, has Lee purchasing an antique bureau with secret compartments and an intriguing history. When she discovers the bludgeoned body of the antique dealer, Lee tries to unravel the bureau’s secrets and find the murderer. Look Both Ways was praised by RT Book Reviews as “…an entertaining paranormal cozy with plenty of secrets and "blond-haired, blue-eyed suspects to keep the readers guessing until the very end."

Perry’s fans will be happy to know that she has no plans to stop writing.  Book # 4, Murder Go Round was released at the end of January. New York Times best selling author Carolyn Hart calls it “Highly original and great fun. A triumph of imagination with twists and turns to delight readers.”  In this book Lee and boyfriend Detective Pete Mondello, with the aid of Lee’s Aunt Ibby and their very wise cat, O’Ryan, set off on another adventure in Salem—involving an antique carousel horse, a silver samovar, a long-dead Russian princess and of course, murder. Book #5, Grave Errors is due to release in August, and Carol is currently working on Book #6, It Takes A Coven. Fans will be happy to know, she has a contract for three more Witch City Mysteries. “The hardest thing about being a writer is finding the time to do all I want to do,” she says. “I’ll have to live to be over 120!” – something that might be in the cards for this bewitching writer.

For more information, visit the author’s website at www.caroljperry.com. You can meet Carol in person at her book signing/book talk at the Gulf Beaches Library, Madeira Beach, FL on Saturday February 4, from noon to 3:00.