In the summer of 2020, when Covid was rampant, not to mention terrifying, and travel was near impossible and ill-advised, my lovely mum passed away. She lived in Switzerland, I was in Canada, and the travel restrictions meant I couldn’t say goodbye in person. It was a gut-wrenching, heart-breaking decision—one of the hardest choices I’ve ever had to make in my life.

After she passed, I threw myself into writing Never Coming Home, which published in May 2022. It may be a story written from the antagonist’s point of view, and yes, Lucas is a very, very bad man considering he hired a pro on the dark web to get rid of his exceedingly rich but equally annoying wife…however Lucas also has a wicked sense of humour. I loved writing that book, and it made me laugh out loud. Lucas, with his despicable ways and all, saved my sanity that year when everything around me felt so hopeless.

I enjoyed writing humour so much, it got me thinking—could I go back to my romantic-comedy roots (my first book, Time After Time, was a rom-com). If so, how, and when would I do that? I didn’t want to stop writing thrillers but do both if possible, so I played around with a few ideas. To be honest, I didn’t do much with them until my agent asked if I’d thought about writing a romantic-comedy. Now that’s what I call serendipitous!

The Christmas Wager published on September 26, 2023 under the pseudonym Holly Cassidy, and The Christmas Countdown is scheduled for October 2024. It’s truly a delight to explore the lighter side of life before going back to my fictional murderous ways. Writing crime and romantic comedies has turned out to be a great balance for me. I hope you’ll enjoy exploring both, and learning more about my softer romantic-comedy side here.