Monday 23 March 2020

Join me for a light-hearted Conversation with author, John Anthony Miller #HistoricalFiction #interview @authorjamiller






A light-hearted Conversation with author, 
 John Anthony Miller


MA: Hi John, welcome back to The Coffee Pot Book Club. Before we begin, please tell my readers a little about yourself.

JM: Hi Mary Anne, thanks for having me. My name is John Anthony Miller, and I live in southern New Jersey in the U.S., very close to the city of Philadelphia. I’ve been writing professionally for about six years, and Sinner, Saint or Serpent is my seventh novel.


MA: So, let’s start with a really tough question. If you could live anywhere in the world, where would it be? 🤔

JM: I’ve been very fortunate; in that I’ve travelled extensively so I have many places to choose from. Wherever I lived, I would want to be close to my family. If that was possible, some of my favourite places are Cornwall, the Italian Lakes – Maggiore, Lugano, or Como – and Switzerland.



MA: Cornwall — Oh, how I wish I was there! ️ For me it would be a toss up between Cornwall and Scotland — I think Cornwall might win. What would you consider to be your greatest strength?

JM: My greatest strength is an exceptional memory. I can read something and file it away in a dark corner of my mind, and then discuss it or use it in a book months later. I can recall dates, birthdays, chance meetings, just about anything associated with numbers, even for those I’m barely acquainted with. But I cannot, to save my life, remember names!

MA: I am the complete opposite, I have to write everything down! 🧐

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What is your biggest regret?

JM: My biggest regret is that I didn’t take my writing seriously for a long time. I wrote, but never dreamed it was good enough to be published. One day I decided it was time to find out, took an on-line writing class with an editor from one of the major publishers, and within two years I had written my first book, found a literary agent, and was published.

MA: Believing in your own abilities always seems to be so incredibly hard. Describe your perfect day.

JM: I get up very early, usually by five a.m. I have a cup of tea, do some social media, and sometimes go to the gym or for a walk. After that, I retreat to my office and work on my book, emerging for a quick lunch, return to my office, and come back out at dinner. Sometimes I’m back in my office after dinner for another hour or two. An alternative, would be time spent with family, which nothing can replace.


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Quick-Fire Round


MA: What is your most embarrassing memory?

JM: I’ll skip this – far too many to mention!!!! 🤣

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MA: Fine dining or a picnic?

JM: Definitely a picnic, somewhere along the water – a river, lake or the ocean. I’m very simple, easy to please, and don’t like crowds. Fine dining has its place occasionally, but definitely not my preference.

MA: What makes you angry? 

JM: Something that makes me angry, or maybe irritated is a better description, is anything that wastes time. I read a book about the mind and it claimed, as we get older, our subconscious catalogues what we like to do – even if it’s lounging on our living room couch watching Doc Martin. When faced with wasting time, or doing something we don’t want to do, our subconscious references what we enjoy – hence, the irritation.

MA: If you could choose a magic power, what would it be?

JM: If I had a magic power, I would time travel – as long as I knew how to get back!  I think it would be very exciting to visit different historical periods to see if they’re really as I imagine they were.


MA: Thank you for taking time out of your day to chat with us today!!

If you would like to learn more about John’s fabulous new book then you know what to do SCROLL DOWN!





Sinner, Saint or Serpent
By John Anthony Miller



New Orleans, 1926

When a leading businessman is found murdered, investigative reporters Justice Harper, known for his fairness, and Remy Morel, his sassy counterpart, are determined to find the killer. There are three suspects, all prominent women in New Orleans society. The sinner is Blaze Barbeau, a real estate magnate with a checkered past. The saint is Lucinda Boyd, who lost her family business to the victim. And the serpent is a spooky voodoo queen named Belladonna Dede.




Excerpt

New Orleans, Louisiana
May 18, 1926 at 7:37 p.m.

August Chevalier sat in the parlor of his Royal Street mansion, eyes wide open, a bullet hole in the center of his forehead with a line of blood trailing down the bridge of his nose. He seemed surprised by death’s arrival, or by whoever delivered it, as if meeting his maker had been the farthest thing from his mind at the time.

I studied the body from the foyer, leaning against the white molding of the arched entrance, watching the investigation. The corpse sat on a Victorian couch, lavender with lion’s paws feet, a book lying askew beside it. The Prince, by Machiavelli, was a political discourse that supposedly gave good advice for handling enemies to business folks like Chevalier. He should have read it just a little bit sooner.

There was an Art Deco table in front of the couch with a glass top and floral wrought iron frame that matched the fence that circled the property. Chevalier’s left leg was stretched out beneath it, a nick on the sole of his Italian leather shoe. Like most rich folks, he wore expensive clothes – a silk blue shirt and darker slacks with barely a wrinkle in them.

Even though I had no right to be at the crime scene, I was there just the same. So I just kept looking around the room, scribbling notes on a pad I always carried with me. There was a small leather bag on the floor near the leg of the couch, just beside the body. The string keeping it closed had come undone, and there was a trail of gray powder, a few streaks of vermillion and chunks of something that looked like bones or small animal parts scattered across the Oriental carpet. I knew it was a gris-gris bag, a voodoo charm used to ward off evil or bring good luck – or any number of things that the creator might make for the purchaser. They were popular in New Orleans, especially among the superstitious. And even those that weren’t.

A grandfather’s clock stood against the far wall, a leather chair beside it, while a mahogany desk sat just under the side window. It was flanked by two cypress bookshelves, the spines of decorative leather volumes visible as you entered the room. A few papers were arranged real neat on the desktop, with a torn envelope and a folded letter that was a bit crumpled tossed near one edge. It looked recently opened, read and discarded, the contents perhaps not to the liking of the addressee. The writing on the envelope, visible from my location whereas the letter itself was not, showed fine penmanship, a swirling cursive with a flair for the dramatic, sex of the originator unknown. I leaned toward female. Most men I knew, including myself, were just not that neat.

Pick up your copy of
Sinner, Saint or Serpent





John Anthony Miller


John Anthony Miller was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania to a father of English ancestry and a second-generation Italian mother. Motivated by a life-long love of travel and history, he normally sets his novels in exotic locations during eras of global conflict. Characters must cope and combat, overcoming their own weaknesses as well as the external influences spawned by tumultuous times. He’s the author of the historical thrillers, To Parts Unknown, In Satan’s Shadow, When Darkness Comes, All the King's Soldiers, and For Those Who Dare, as well as the historical mystery, Honour the Dead. His latest novel, Sinner, Saint or Serpent, is a jazz age murder mystery set in New Orleans. He lives in southern New Jersey with his family.
Connect with John: WebsiteFacebookTwitter.





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See you on your next coffee break!
Take Care,
Mary Anne xxx