Welcome LynDee Walker and the Turner and Mosley Files!

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By Liz, so delighted to welcome LynDee Walker back to the blog! She’s celebrating her new release, The General’s Gold, the first book in the new Turner and Mosley Files series co-written with the also-amazing Bruce Robert Coffin. I can’t wait for her to tell you all about it. Take it away, LynDee!

The human brain has always fascinated me—I think that borderline obsession is one of the reasons I wanted to be a writer in the first place, really. Why do people do the things they do? Is sort a central question in many novels, particularly mysteries. Fiction gives us the opportunity to live many lives, to peek inside others’ heads and see what drives and motivates extraordinary acts, whether they’re of bravery or horror.

In recent years I’ve grown particularly interested in the differences in how our brains work. When my oldest daughter was little I learned almost accidentally in a conversation with her that there are people who don’t “see” a story in their head as they read. I was flabbergasted when my child told me this about herself, but I started talking with other moms and littles and learned that many of her peers who didn’t enjoy reading had brains that worked like hers. It was stunning to me that not everyone’s worked like mine does.

So a couple of years ago when my publisher told me there are talented writers who don’t constantly have to fend off a barrage of new characters and plot ideas zipping around their heads every day, I was shocked—and of course, immediately intrigued. 

I rarely have a day, working or not, when some shiny new idea squirrel doesn’t go trotting through my mind (they go slow and high-step like Pepé Le Pew from the old WB cartoons). I have a thick, thick ideas file that has far more story genesis bits in it than I will ever be a able to write. 

That conversation was happening in the first place because one of my ideas—the one that would eventually turn into my new book with Bruce Robert Coffin, The General’s Gold—had snagged the publisher’s attention and created some excitement, but everyone there tries very hard not to kill me with deadlines, which I appreciate so much. Back then, given my 2022 contract obligations and goals, I might have had time to start thinking about these books around 2027. So the publisher suggested we look for a writing partner to build this series with from the ground up. Someone who had been published, had a track record and an audience, but was in an idea drought. 

“There are writers who don’t have an extreme over abundance of crazy plot and character ideas running around their brains all the time?” I asked when I was through gasping. 

“It’s peaceful,” I was told. 

So we started searching, and a few weeks later I was forwarded a list of authors looking for co-writing gigs. On it, I was delighted to see my friend Bruce Robert Coffin’s name, because I like Bruce as a person and had read his award-winning Detective Byron novels, so I knew he had talent. So we talked. And talked. I explained my idea for a series about people with unlimited resources and loads of free time who chase around the globe having big adventures and hunting treasure and solving mysteries. Somewhere along the way we decided what we were trying to create was “like Only Murders In the Building meets Indiana Jones.” We wanted fresh, fun, throat-gripping, pulse-pounding books that could appeal to everyone from my seventh grader to my 70-something in-laws. I had talked to dozens of readers at events that spring about how much they wanted to read something fun, with adventure and some good-old-1980s Carrington and Ewing style lavish surroundings in a book that could make them laugh. 

Bruce asked if we could try a sample chapter, and I agreed that was a good idea, and it turned out to be exactly what I was looking for. So we decided we would throw in to build this series together, figuring by the end of this first book we’d either be better friends or hate each other. 

I am happy to report that the result was the former—we are true partners in this endeavor, are great friends now and have both had such a wonderful time bringing these characters and their stories to life.

Thanks to our friends the Wickeds for inviting us on to celebrate the release of the first book in The Turner and Mosley Files, THE GENERAL’S GOLD—I hope y’all find as much fun reading about Avery and Carter as we do writing about them!

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Published by Cate Conte / Liz Mugavero

Cate Conte writes the Cat Cafe Mysteries and the Full Moon Mysteries. As Liz Mugavero, she writes the Pawsitively Organic Mysteries, the first of which was an Agatha Award nominee for Best First Novel. She lives in the Boston area with her rescue pals.

12 Thoughts

  1. I am standing at my desk (at 5 AM) clapping for both of you! I can’t wait to dive into this new project.

    I’m so glad you and the wonderful Bruce found a way to work together AND stay friends. Can you tell us more about the back and forth collaboration?

    Also, I’m with you on my brain being an overactive idea mill. Squirrel is a great image for that!

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  2. Sounds like a book/series that I would love to read. Congrats to the both of you on your new book!!

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  3. I can’t wait to read this book (and the rest of the series when it comes out)! I’m currently up to my eyeballs in edits on two different book and prep for Malice. My reward to completing all that is going to be a weekend with Turner and Mosley!

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  4. I’m so excited for this book!

    Regarding the notion of having tons of ideas vs. not having an abundance of them. I’m somewhere in between. Sometimes I have ideas but nothing that I put down on paper. Every night when I go to bed, I am always trying to work out that first chapter of the mythical book I’d like to write. And I’ve woken up from a dream with a fully realized character that would be part of that book.

    But then I have times where I’ve got nothing OR have no gumption to write down anything that does come to mind to preserve in the event I do set about to write that future best-selling mega successful and critically acclaimed masterpiece*

    (*…just kidding, that’s not going to happen.)

    LynDee and I were guests on the same episode of Kristopher Zgorski’s We Are What We Read series on Youtube and since then I’ve slowly been trying to read at least one book by each of the authors that were on that episode (assuming I haven’t read them before).

    I’m also a fan of Bruce Robert Coffin who I’ve met at one of his signings (pre-pandemic).

    So when I read about this book it immediately went on the MUST BUY list.

    Here’s to great success for the first book and the next two coming down the pike!

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  5. WOW! Checked out THE GENERAL’S GOLD and it’s now on my TBR list. Sounds absolutely amazing and I know it’s a book I’m going to very much enjoy reading and reviewing.

    It is fascinating to see and hear how other’s brains work so completely different than our own. Sounds like you found the perfect partner for this book and series and that you can have a relationship that your friendship grows. Keep them coming!
    2clowns at arkansas dot net

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  7. Lyndee, I love the idea of this book because I’ve always loved action/adventure stories. It’s downloaded and next on my TBR pile. Congratulations on the successful collaboration!

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  10. Can’t wait to dive in to this book. Two of my favorite authors on one page – nirvana! Always curious about how collaboration works. Thank you for the glimpse behind the curtain.

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  11. Welcome to the Wickeds, LynDee! I heard Bruce speak about The General’s Gold on Tuesday night and immediately went home and bought a Kindle copy. Can’t wait.

    I think I visualize everything I read though I’m not certain of it. What I am sure of is that I hear every word I read. Like you, I was astonished when I learned this is true of only about 50% of readers. I thought everyone did–but somehow those other people go straight from visual to comprehension by-passing the aural. I think it makes me a stronger prose writer, but also a slower reader, which can be a challenge in this business with research and blurbs and copy-editing and so on.

    I don’t have stories constantly in my head at all. I have to sit down with a pen or keyboard to access them. I wish I was one of those natural storytellers but that’s not where my talent lies.

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