Sally Jo Pitts is an award-winning author who brings experience as a private investigator, licensed lie detection examiner, high school guidance counselor and home economics teacher to the fiction page.
Having worked thirty years alongside her late law enforcement husband in his private investigations agency, she learned to teach by day and snoop by night. Currently, she draws on real-life experiences to pen faith-based stories of romance and mystery.
Her works include the Hamilton Harbor Legacy romance series, the Seasons of Mystery detective series, and the romantic suspense Sweet County Secrets series.
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Can you share a bit about your background and what first sparked your passion for writing?
I have an innate love for learning and learning to write has been a part of that passion. As a youngster, for fun, I wrote storylines that played out like movies in my head. In elementary school, I enjoyed reading Nancy Drew, Hardy Boys and Alfred Hitchcock stories, so when given creative writing assignments I liked to write some kind of mystery or a story with an unexpected twist at the end.
After taking creative writing in high school, I anticipated majoring in English in college, but life choices took me in a different direction. I ended up teaching home economics, became a high school guidance counselor, and worked as a private investigator in my husband’s detective agency after school, weekends, and summers. My writing consisted of lesson plans, individual education strategies, and investigative case reports.
What was the pivotal moment that made you decide to pursue writing as a full-time career?
When I retired from education, I took a college level creative writing class to keep my teacher certification active. The course sparked a new desire to write. On an out-of-town trip, I attended a one-day Christian writer’s workshop in South Carolina. Meeting with real writers was a thrill. Since then, I have attended several writing conferences and retreats and am blessed to have met and learned from many authors about crafting story. I felt I had returned to my roots and desire to make up stories of my own.
How do you develop your characters? Do any of them draw from real people in your life?
The romance angle in Sweet Double-Cross, book #2 in my Sweet County Secrets romantic suspense series, is based on a real-life romance.
My main characters, Kirt and Trudy, are imaginary but the spark for their love-at-first sight meeting comes from my friend in a Bible study group. Her husband of fifty-five years proposed the night they met on a blind date!
When I heard their story, I was hooked. I wanted to use a blind date proposal in the romantic suspense I was brainstorming at the time. To find out why he proposed, I went to the source. I interviewed my friend’s husband, and he shared what he was thinking.
From there came the challenge of creating a believable scene for the marriage proposal on the night my characters first meet in the story.
A scientific mission turns into a harrowing day of death and destruction.
Dedicated biologist Trudy Fields is passionate about her invasive plant species research in northwest Florida. When real estate developer Kirt Mayfair arrives in Sweet County to learn how to eradicate a kudzu infestation on property he plans to purchase, Trudy is assigned to assist him. Their instant connection surprises them both—especially when Kirt impulsively proposes marriage.
But research and romantic interest take a deadly turn when someone shoots and kills a colleague of Trudy’s on the way to the isolated kudzu experimental island. On the run from a ruthless killer with precision sniper training, Trudy and Kirt must navigate treacherous terrain, dangerous wildlife, and a shocking conspiracy.
As bullets fly and bodies pile up, Trudy discovers Kirt is hiding his own secret. Amidst unexpected attraction and lethal betrayal, can the two survive this double-cross?
Ebook giveaway: Sweet Double-Cross
I’m giving away an ebook copy of Sweet Double-Cross. Please subscribe to my news at https://sallyjopitts.com. Those subscribing in the next five days after this posting will be entered to win.
