Jennifer McMahon

Jennifer McMahon's new novel is The One I Left Behind.

From her Q & A with Pam Lambert at Publishers Weekly:

What inspired this novel?

I was looking at a milk carton one morning and—my mind goes funny places sometimes—I’m like, “Wow, wouldn’t it be really creepy if you just found a milk carton and opened it and there was a hand inside?” And then my mind continued to work, and I thought maybe it’s not just one hand, it’s a whole series of hands. I had that one image and then I asked myself all these questions, like, who’s the killer and who are the women the killer is taking, and I had to start writing to find out.

That’s a pretty frightening image.

I have a friend who calls me the queen of the nightmares because I’ve always had really bad nightmares. I keep a notebook by the side of my bed, so I’ll wake up in the night from a bad dream and my heart’s pounding and I’m really scared, but I write it down, and sometimes I get ideas for books that way. Some people say, “Write what you know.” My thing is, “Write...[read on]

Learn more about the book and author at Jennifer McMahon's website.

The Page 69 Test: The One I Left Behind.

--Marshal Zeringue