Release Day for The Adoption
Inspiration for The Adoption
The subject for my dark, twisty domestic thriller, The Adoption, set in Tampa, Florida, began with an email from my editor at Bookouture. They had a theme they wanted me to consider for a domestic thriller. Would I be willing to discuss?
My previous book was a crime procedural thriller, The Hunted Girls, the second in the Agent Nadine Finch series, but I’ve always wanted to write a domestic thriller. I jumped at the offer, eager to hear what they had in mind. During our video call, my editor said they were keen to have me write something about adoption, a perfect family with a new baby and then something that threatened them all. With that vagueness in mind, I let my subconscious go.
I developed my protagonist, Dani Sutton, a bright, happily married wife of a local judge who is crushed by guilt after causing the auto accident that put her twin sister in a wheelchair and left Dani unable to have the children they desperately wanted. During her recovery, she relies on her husband and love of her life, Judge Tate Sutton, who has been her rock throughout this tragedy.
The story begins with Dani returning home from the hospital to learn that her husband has somehow secured an adoption. At first, the couple is deliriously happy. The baby girl arrives, making the dream of parenthood a reality. But Dani is anxious, worrying that her husband might have used his position to bend the rules to get them their daughter. And shortly after Willow comes home to the Suttons, Dani notices a woman watching her and the baby. At first, she justifies this as normal. After all, she used to regard mothers with envy and longing. Perhaps this is the same situation. But when the unsettling stranger appears at her home, she cannot dismiss her concerns. Her husband is supportive, but never sees this threat. Soon, dark secrets regarding Dani’s auto accident are revealed and the menacing woman returns to threaten the adoption and the baby.
As I plotted the story, I was certain that my heroine would have suffered a brain injury leaving her unable to remember some key details of her life and marriage. I had a good grasp on what dark secrets from her past were still barreling towards her.
The struggle was how to have her unable to recognize her tormentor. The answer came from a condition I discovered in a book by neurologist, brain researcher and author Oliver Sacks. I recalled Sacks referring to face blindness, a condition where a person’s brain is unable to piece the individual aspects of a face into a recognizable whole. Giving my heroine this condition opened up all sorts of trouble. Even with the combination of the dark secrets, questionable adoption and the face blindness, I have to say that one of the twists should take readers by surprise. It certainly took me by surprise. I was writing along and suddenly I realized that what I and my heroine, Dani, believed was wrong. The revelation came as such a shock, it took my breath away.
I think you’ll enjoy my story about one couple, one baby and one birth mother and hope you will pick up a copy of The Adoption releasing in May 11, 2022.
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