Hallie Shepherd is a screenwriter, actor, and producer. She is a Pacific Northwest native who now lives in LA with her filmmaker husband.
Call Off the Dark is her debut novel.
At CrimeReads the author tagged "nine suspense novels with unforgettable settings." One title on the list:
Attica Locke, The Cutting SeasonRead about the other entries on the list.
The story takes place at Belle Vie, a fictional antebellum sugar plantation in rural southern Louisiana. When a female migrant worker is found dead at the edge of the property, Belle Vie’s Black manager is drawn intothe plantation’s history of slavery and her own family’s connection to the land.
The inspiration behind the setting comes from a real place: Oak Alley. The author attended a wedding there and describes feeling a mix of rage and revulsion as well as longing and love toward the pre-Civil War landmark. I visited Oak Alley myself during a 2007 trip to New Orleans, and I can see how it inspired such a beautiful but deeply unsettling place for the story.
Locke’s prose draws you into the lush, dreamy landscape, with its terrible history pulsing beneath the surface.
The Cutting Season is among Stacy Willingham's eight top mysteries with southern swampy settings, Karen Dietrich's eight top red herrings in contemporary crime literature, T. Marie Vandelly's top ten suspenseful horror novels featuring housebound terrors and Wil Medearis's seven favorite novels that explore real estate swindles.
--Marshal Zeringue
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