Naomi Hirahara, Libby Fischer Hellmann and Stephen Gallagher have joined Top Suspense, and you can read some amusing & informative interviews with them on the Top Suspense blog. Here's an excerpt from the interview with Stephen:
TSG: What are your influences?
A mixed bunch of American pulpsters and British postwar thriller writers; I'm particularly drawn to novelists who demolish all barriers between low and high art for the sake of a thrilling tale. I like good contemporary suspense and I also like a great historical, as long as there's a streak of darkness in it.
TSG: Your muses?
The ghosts of Arthur Conan Doyle, James M Cain, Gavin Lyall, and all the dogs I've ever owned, and the woods we've roamed in while I worked out my stories.
TSG: Your first sale?
An adaptation of my first radio serial. Radio drama was the first and most valuable step in my education. Unlimited landscapes with a tight focus on plot and character.
TSG: Your biggest, most memorable thrill as a writer?
Driving down to Santa Monica in October 2008, seeing a giant billboard advertising one of my TV shows while the trail for another played on the car's radio. In a convertible it would have been a perfect moment; in a rented Hyundai it was still pretty good.