At a very early age I had the compelling need to capture life and then explain it to whoever would listen. Usually nobody. At the age of six I wrote an epic poem about heaven and angels. Nobody listened. At the age of nine I wrote a play called “Nevada”. I shamelessly stole the title from a Zane Gray novel. The play took place in a barroom and dealt with the intense exciting world of cowboys and dancehall girls. The play ends on the climactic note of the villain being sent to his room. Already I was developing a firm moral basis that would serve me well in the mystery genre. 

Growing up in Southern California I read Raymond Chandler, Ross Macdonald, Nathaniel West and in his Hollywood period, F. Scott Fitzgerald. They turned Los Angeles upside down. When driving my car along Sunset Blvd. toward the ocean I no longer saw a rosy sun-streaked sky. I saw a smear of blood. Seductive palm trees turned lurid. Blondes were not just sex symbols, but capable of murder — an inverted power but a power nonetheless. As in The Day of the Locust, movie fans didn't adore, they rioted and destroyed. Hollywood bred a dangerous desperation between the buyers and sellers of dreams. I was hooked. But Hollywood discovered me before I could discover it.

“However, more than glamour of setting, what makes Ms. Howe’s work stand out is keenness of insight.”
— Ellery Queen Magazine 

  

I stopped in front of my favorite shoe store. There they were. A pair of black and white spectator pumps. I longingly admired how the black shiny patent curved around the pristine white leather. I delighted at the little holes punched along the edge of the patent so the white leather peeked through. I appreciated the curve of the sexy heel.
...spectator shoes. Think of the possibilities. If I slipped my feet into them what would I observe? Witness?
— Maggie Hill, Beauty Dies