Chris Roerden

, Female

United States

Profile Information:

Hometown:

Hometown is NYC (yup, Manhattan), though I now live in Greensboro, NC, after spending most of my life in wintry Maine, Wisconsin, and both upstate and downstate NY.

About Me:

I'm a book editor who went independent in 1983 after many years of working in publishing in New York. I'm thrilled that DON'T MURDER YOUR MYSTERY won the Agatha Award for best nonfiction of 2006. If you were at Malice in 2007, you know that I was speechless, literally. To my continued amazement, the book went on to become a finalist for the Macavity Award and the Anthony Award, also finaled for ForeWord Magazine's Book of the Year award, and was picked up by the Writer's Digest Book Club as an alternate selection. These late-in-life honors are very exciting for me, and prompted my publisher to ask me to revise the book for all genres, which I did in 2008 under the title DON'T SABOTAGE YOUR SUBMISSION. It's my 11th and final book.
Back when I started my family, a family transfer took me to Albany, NY, and then to southern Maine, where I wrote my first book, a history of Cape Elizabeth, ME. The research for it convinced me of how much I didn't know, so I enrolled at the U of Maine, Portland. To my surprise the English Dept. invited me to become an instructor of writing. I did that for three years until the next transfer, to Syracuse, NY, where I supervised the writings of independent study students for SUNY-Rochester. Another transfer and I taught writing at the U of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, where I also introduced classes in publishing. Meanwhile I'd become active in the women's rights movement, became president of a state organization of 3000 members, was in charge of communications, and learned to feel comfortable speaking in public. When I returned to full-time work as an editor, I became president of a Midwest trade association of 250 commercial publishers and university presses. I also ghosted books for clients, produced a game, and taught one summer in South Korea (teaching communication skills to Korean teachers of English as a second language).
Now I enjoy the climate of North Carolina, edit mysteries at home, and conduct workshops throughout the country on writing to get published.

I Am A:

Editor

Website:

http://bellarosabooks.com

Books And Authors I Like:

I like the 215 authors whose passages I've spotlighted in DON'T SABOTAGE YOUR SUBMISSION, which is the latest version of DON'T MURDER YOUR MYSTERY - now for all genres. Same advice, 130 NEW examples. The differences, plus the index and complete bibliography of the 215 authors excerpted, can be found on www.snurl.com/25as7. (Maybe you are there - I'm still in the process of informing all 215!)

Movies And TV Shows I Like:

The Sixth Sense is my favorite movie for the same reason that the only fiction I edit is mystery, thriller, and a little fantasy: the story appears simple but turns out to be multi-level and complex; the clues are well-done; and the solution works. As for my fave tv series: The Closer, without a doubt.

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