I grew up reading crime fiction and, especially in the '80s, women were just there to be saved or screwed.

I have a few unusual fans, as you can imagine, so I try to protect the privacy of my home life.

As a Southerner, I love obstacles for my characters.

Alafair Burke understands the criminal mind. Long Gone is both an education and an entertainment of the first order. This is a very clever and very smart novel by a very clever and smart writer. The dialogue crackles, the plot is intriguing, and the pacing is perfect.

The plot is very important because writers have to play fair with their readers, but no one would care about the plot if the character work wasn't there. So, basically every book I work on starts with me thinking not just about the bad thing that's going to happen, but how that bad thing is going to ripple through the community, the family of the victim, and the lives of the investigators. I am keenly aware when I'm working that the crimes I am writing about have happened to real people. I take that very seriously.

I've always been drawn to historical fiction.

Even Gone With the Wind had a shocking, cold-blooded murder.