Gifting Readers With a Sense of Fun by Laura DiSilverio, Guest Blogger

Since I'm on a mystery reading kick these days, I especially enjoy introducing our Colorado mystery authors and their new releases. Laura is one of those Coloradoans, and she's currently making the rounds on her virtual book tour for Die Buying. You can find her schedule for her blog appearances on her website.

Don't miss the note below this post. Laura will be donating the profits from this book to a very special cause.

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Gifting Readers With a Sense of Fun by Laura DiSilverio, Guest Blogger


I had a health scare this spring, the kind where you wonder if you’re going to be around to see your children graduate from high school. Thankfully, surgery fixed everything and I’m back to my usual activities and my normal energy levels (although I’m still trying to knock off the last couple of pounds that crept up while I couldn’t work out for almost three months). Anyway, my point is that the scare made me stop and think, about a lot of things, actually, but especially about my writing. Specifically, it made me evaluate what I’m writing.

For a couple months during the crisis and after the surgery, I had a heightened sense of mortality, of the very, very brief time we all get on this planet. I felt like I needed to say all the important things I have to say right now, that I needed to abandon writing my cozy, humorous series and write things that were darker, more literary, more “forever,” more profound. I was stressing myself out because I enjoy writing my Swift Investigations series and my Mall Cop books, but I thought I should be doing something more “meaningful.” I suspect many of us come up against that kind of self-evaluation, maybe as a result of a life change—marriage, divorce, empty nest—or because of a significant emotional experience of some kind.

Then, a couple weeks ago, I spoke to a book club, the Silver Sneakers group at the Pueblo YMCA and one of the women said, “You know, part-way through Swift Justice, I realized I was having fun reading this book. I can’t remember the last time I had fun reading a book.” It was a casual comment to her, but it meant a lot to me. Making someone happy, making readers laugh, gifting them with a sense of fun, if only for the few hours it takes to read a book, is meaningful. It’s worthwhile. We all cope with a lot of ugliness in the course of our daily lives (especially if we read a newspaper or watch the news) and it’s healthy and good to escape that once in a while, to listen to music that takes us away, or to watch a movie or read a book that makes us laugh, to sit on the deck with a glass of wine in the evening and think about nothing much except how pretty the begonias are or how amazing hummingbirds are as they fight for dominion at the feeder.

All of which is not to say that I won’t ever write something besides mysteries. I have more storylines and ideas and thoughts to express than I could get on paper in a dozen lifetimes. But, for now, I’m happy with where I’m at and what I’m doing. I hope you are, too.

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Laura DiSilverio is donating the profits from her first Mall Cop book, Die Buying, to the Wounded Warrior Project because her protagonist, EJ Ferris, was medically retired from the military after an IED shredded her knee in Afghanistan, and because Laura and her hubby are both veterans grateful for the service of others.

You may “Like” Laura on Facebook or visit her website at laura.disilverio. Find her very interesting bio on the website as well.