I wrote several essays, did a number of interviews, and appeared in various media outlets to support the release of LAST SEEN. I thought it would be cool to share these items here directly. This piece first appeared in the Strand Mystery Magazine on July 2, 2025.
It’s hard not to romanticize the idea of a small town. We see it again and again in movies, TV shows, and books. The charm, the sweetness, the community. The escape from the meaningless anonymity of the big city to the meaningful, collaborative, romantic small town.
But the genres treat this deceptively sweet setting differently. Where a romance is all about finding love and acceptance at a slower pace, crime fiction is determined to uncover the dark, unsettling secrets that exist. That rich vein trope—you can never go home again—capitalizes on this. The character has successfully broken away from the small-minded, boring, suffocating world they grew up in. They have evolved. They have escaped.
But a horrible secret draws them home. A secret that affects the entire town, and sometimes, one so dark and unsettling that it becomes lore. And then all hell breaks loose.
Yes, on the surface, small towns are charming and coveted, but look closer, and they almost always hide a dark side. They are perfect foils for writers looking to create a sense of isolation that allows darkness to flourish. Monsters hide in the shadows and prey on the innocent. It’s not like that doesn’t happen in the larger towns and thriving metropolises, but in a more insular setting, it feels more personal, and therefore more hurtful. When the monster successfully hides in a smaller population, it means that everyone, in some way, is complicit. Therein lies the great horror behind the reality: There is an understanding amongst the townsfolk, and they are willing—nay, want—to turn a blind eye to the truth. What could be scarier than willful ignorance?
It’s brilliant fodder for fiction, but what happens when it’s true? When you come from that isolation and darkness? There are plenty of writers who fit the profile of their own characters; I am no different. I grew up in such isolation that it wasn’t even a real town, per se, just a community in the woods of Colorado. The “town” was ten miles away, sporting an elementary school, a Conoco gas station, a post office, and a bar.
Oh, the stories I could tell you. And that’s what fascinates me as a writer exploring these settings—my stories, your stories…they are universal. This universality is what draws readers to the small-town setting. The suspense is baked in. We know there is a monster hiding in the closet. We know something is going to leap out from under the bed. We delight in the tension this anticipation brings.
But what if there’s more? What if this sublime isolation creates the criminality we’re interested in exploring? Isolation makes people get creative, for good and for ill. Great art comes from the quiet spaces, but great harm does, too.
I’ve always been interested in exploring the duality of isolation. Do bad people seek out isolation in order to commit crimes? Or does the isolation drive them mad? Worse still, do criminals seek isolation and find one another, thereby amplifying their dark deeds? Those conundrums underlie the foundation of every small-town thriller I write. I come to the page from a place of sublime beauty and great isolation.
Growing up, I knew there were undercurrents. It’s impossible not to have them when a community numbers less than 200. It wasn’t until I was older that I was able to comprehend the vast network of crimes happening in my area. Crimes that went unpunished, crimes that were whispered about but not allowed into the daylight. Crimes that ended in horrifying ways—suicides, lives ruined, permanent scars. Crimes that, if the community were truly aware of, would have certainly been stopped. Right?
And there’s the rub of the small town. The whole point is to mind your own business, while of course sticking your nose into everyone else’s at every turn. It’s fun when it’s gossip, when the tongues wag and the rumor mill kicks into gear. But when your indiscreet gaze lands upon an actual crime or a criminal, it is encouraged to slide past. Why people shy away from calling out criminality is another deep well for literary exploration. The best books resolve these long-hidden crimes with justice served, and the community is changed for the better. If only reality were so forgiving.
My latest novel has two small-town settings—both fictional but based on towns I’m familiar with.
Marchburg, Virginia, is a gothic mountaintop town with a private girls’ school at its heart, and a deep history of dark crime in its past. (Readers of GOOD GIRLS LIE and THESE COLD STRANGERS will recognize the setting.)
Brockville, Tennessee, came from a dream I had about a small town with a writer’s retreat at its core. It was a visit to the very real Serenbe, outside Atlanta, a planned biophilic community, that brought it to life.
Both of my small towns have elements of real life, real towns, and real people in them, but the similarities stop there. The rest comes from the vivid imagination I was gifted with from my own isolated upbringing. Exploring the philosophical underpinnings of the averted gaze drives much of my work.
It’s always a challenge to write about a small-town setting, blending reality and fiction to create something that captures the inherent joy and fears, yet remains so over the top that the reader is left wondering what, exactly, is happening down the street at their neighbors’ house. The fun is in creating a place that unsettles. That disturbs. That makes the reader look over their shoulder when they’re walking down the street. Ultimately, the goal is to lift the curtain and make it clear that no one is truly innocent, and the guilty must be held accountable.
But that’s fiction. The reality is not as simple. For the rest of us, there is hope and closure, but true small-town horrors can never be scrubbed clean.
Do you have a favorite small-town setting?
Of course I like this post about small towns. Well said.