Character Interview: Amelia Slater from Greg Messel's Shadows in the Fog




We’re thrilled to have here today Amelia Slater from Greg Messel’s Shadows In The Fog.  She’s coming to us all the way from the great state of California.  It is a pleasure to have her with us today at The Literary Nook!

Thank you so for this interview, Amelia.  Now that the book has been written, do you feel you were fairly portrayed or would you like to set anything straight with your readers? 
I feel I was fairly portrayed but I found out some things I didn’t know at the time. I was horrified to find out that there was a thug hiding in my closet watching me undress. I was deeply disturbed to find that out. There was also my farewell dinner with my stewardess friends. They started telling stories about all of these guys who were aggressively pursuing me. I want to clarify that stewardesses attract a lot of unwanted attention from men. I didn’t do anything to encourage these lecherous guys who were enamored with me just because I was a stewardess. 

What do you believe is your strongest trait? 
I like a good mystery. I like trying to figure out puzzles which is why I have so enjoyed my brief career as a private eye. 
Worst trait? 
Sam would tell you that it’s my curiosity. I have to admit that my inquisitive nature has got me into a few jams. 
Do you have a love interest in the book? 
Do I ever. My husband, Sam Slater, are still newlyweds. Sam is the love of my life. I met him in the fall of 1957 and it was pretty much love at first sight. 
At what point of the book did you start getting nervous about the way it was going to turn out? 
Two gangsters grab me and put a black hood over my head and kidnap me. I keep wondering what they are going to do to me. It was the scariest moments of my life. I then had to walk a long ways in a rain storm to escape them. I wasn’t sure if I was going to make it. 
If you could trade places with one of the other characters in the book, which character would you really not want to be and why? 
I wouldn’t want to be Melissa Michaelis. She’s the woman that we—me and my husband, Sam Slater, have been hired to find. Her life was tipped upside down. She’s been missing for three years but has suddenly resurfaced. I don’t want to give too much away but I wouldn’t want to be Melissa.
How do you feel about the ending of the book without giving too much away? 
I’m satisfied with the ending. Sam and I barely survive our encounter with the ruthless gangsters in Chinatown. I didn’t know about some of the things which happened to me while I was kidnapped and drugged in Chinatown until I read the book. That made it more frightening.
What words of wisdom would you give your author if she decided to write another book with you in it? 
There is another book being written about us. As the new book “Cable Car Mystery” begins it is the summer of 1959. I would like to spend a quiet summer at my beach house but Sam and I seem to not have much luck staying out of trouble. 
Thank you for this interview.  Will we be seeing more of you in the future?
I’ll see you in “Cable Car Mystery” when it comes out later in 2015. 
About the Author

Greg Messel has spent most of his adult life interested in writing, including a career in the newspaper business. He won a Wyoming Press Association Award as a columnist and has contributed articles to various magazines. Greg retired from the corporate world and now lives in South Jordan, Utah with his wife of over 40 years, Carol Madsen Messel. They have three adult children who are married and have 11 grandchildren.

Greg has written eight novels. His latest is "Shadows In The Fog" which is the fifth in a series of mysteries set in 1959 San Francisco. "Fog City Strangler," "San Francisco Secrets," "Deadly Plunge" are sequels to the first book in the series "Last of the Seals." His other three novels are "Sunbreaks," "Expiation" and "The Illusion of Certainty."

Greg is currently working on his ninth novel--the sixth in the mystery series--"Cable Car Mystery"--which will be published in late 2015.

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About the Book:

The story begins on a stormy morning in February of 1959. The front page of the morning paper is dominated by news of the plane crash which killed rock ’n roll stars Buddy Holly, the Big Bopper and Richie Valens. 

Private Eye Sam Slater is hired to perform what he thinks is a routine two-day job as a favor for a friend. However, it all goes terribly wrong when a young San Francisco policeman is gunned down while sitting in a parked car with Sam. 

The murder sets off a chain of events which will pull Sam and his wife and partner, Amelia, into a dangerous web of intrigue in the dark, shadowy alleys and back rooms of San Francisco’s Chinatown. 

In the winter of 1959, Amelia resigns as a TWA stewardess and is now Sam’s full time partner in the private eye business. 

Sam and Amelia inadvertently come in conflict with the San Francisco mob boss after helping a crusading newspaper reporter who is working to expose corruption in Chinatown. Now a mysterious dark car follows the Slaters every where they go. Sam and Amelia discover a hidden world of corrupt cops, gambling parlors, brothels and human trafficking exists right under their noses. 

At the same time, a rising California politician hires Sam and Amelia to find his daughter who disappeared without a trace three years earlier. The search is prompted by the sudden appearance of a letter from the woman, who was presumed dead. 

As Sam and Amelia pursue these cases, they discover that all the clues lead them back to Chinatown. The Slaters want to avoid taking on the San Francisco crime lords head-on. However, when Amelia is kidnapped in an alley during the Chinese New Year’s celebration, Sam plunges himself into danger desperately searching Chinatown to find her before it’s too late. 

The reader will be drawn into fast moving events which culminate in a harrowing conclusion as Sam Slater races against the clock on a foggy night in Chinatown.

“Shadows In The Fog” is the fifth book in the the award winning Sam Slater Mysteries Series but is a stand-alone thriller in the tradition of great whodunits.

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