PJ Tracy: it's in the genes
Excerpts from the interview by Lynn Kaczmarek in the April/May 2005 issue of Mystery News
At 4:00 on that Friday afternoon I knew this interview would be unlike any other. After all, usually when you call someone for an interview, they actually answer the phone...After my third attempt, PJ and Traci Lambrecht finally did (and interrupted my fevered reading of the last pages of their latest book, Dead Run. They were mortified, of course, and even more so, I'm certain, since I've brought it up again. I raise it only to set the stage for this interview -- it started out a little off-kilter. And you'll find that this appears to be a theme for the mother/daughter writing team known as P.J. Tracy.
Some thirty plus years ago, PJ Lambrecht was writing short stories, magazine articles and romance novels -- she had a young daughter to put through school, after all. The young daughter, Traci, grew up to become an opera singer, Russian major, screenwriter, and PJ's writing partner. (Not to mention that stint with the rock band...) Together the two wrote a slew of romances -- something like 18. Having reached their limit of hot kisses and passionate embraces, PJ and Traci moved right on to dead bodies. Logical.
Monkeewrench was published in 2003 and aside from winning the Anthony and Gumshoe awards for Best First Novel and the Minnesota Book Award for Popular Fiction, it also introduced us to the Monkeewrench gang...Monkeewrench is written in a familiar, easy-going style-- there's plenty of wise-ass banter to keep me happy and heart-pounding action to leave me turning pages late into the night. But it's the characters I remembered weeks later...
...Live Bait followed and shifted the reader's attention to the detective team of Leo Magozzi and Gino Rolseth. When I reviewed Live Bait for Mystery News, I said it was "a very different book with a new comfortable sense of humor." But one shouldn't be fooled by the easy humor -- this is not a funny book. And that made it all the more intriguing to me...
...Dead Run is again a totally different book from the prior two in the series. It's a no-holds-barred thriller with the clock ticking, literally, right to the end...
...As I write this and remember our conversation that Friday, I can picture the two authors in the Minnesota farmhouse, each with a wine glass in hand with PJ's husband standing there in holey jeans and a sweatshirt, smelling of power-steering fluid and laughing. It feels like home to me. These two funny, talented women have not only created a spectacular series of books, but even more importantly have built a strong and joyful relationship -- one that comes through loud and clear in the sound of their combined voices.
Read the complete interview in the April/May 2005 issue of Mystery News