Abby Geni

Abby Geni is a graduate of the Iowa Writers’ Workshop and the recipient of an Iowa Fellowship. “Captivity” won first place in the Glimmer Train Fiction Open and was included in The Best American Short Stories 2010; it was also selected for inclusion in New Stories from the Midwest.

She is the author of the novel The Lightkeepers and the story collection The Last Animal.

From Geni's Q&A with Deborah Kalb:

Q: How did you come up with the idea for The Lightkeepers, and for your main character, Miranda?

A: The whole thing began with my love of mysteries. A few years ago, I read everything by Agatha Christie and Georgette Heyer and Dorothy Sayers, and I became enamored with the perfect architecture of a mystery plot, in which everything that happens has to happen. Even the red herrings and tangents of the story must be there to enhance the tension and keep up the suspense.

I knew that I wanted to write my favorite kind of mystery, which takes place in an enclosed setting with a limited array of suspects. That idea simmered on a back burner of my brain for a long while before I began writing The Lightkeepers.

As far as my discovery of Miranda, I came to know her through her letters. The novel is epistolary - written in the form of letters Miranda is penning to her dead mother - which gave me a unique window into her mind. I loved getting to know her through what she chose to write to her mother and how she chose to describe her daily life.

It's not the easiest way to create a book, and I don't know that I'd tackle an epistolary novel again, but...[read on]

Visit Abby Geni's website.

The Page 69 Test: The Lightkeepers.

Writers Read: Abby Geni.

--Marshal Zeringue