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Cheryl Bradshaw Shares the Story Behind HUSH NOW BABY (Sloane Monroe Mystery Series Book 6) in this exclusive NOOK Blog Guest Post.
I’m often asked where I get the inspiration for the stories I write. With my primary genre being mystery, and all of my books dealing with murder in one form or another, the question is usually posed with a great deal of hesitation. The inquisitor is curious, but also leery of my answer.
The answer is a simple one. Forensics fascinates me, and people’s psyches fascinate me. I find myself drawn to a person’s backstory, to the motivational factor that drives a person to do what they do — to engage in an extramarital affair, to steal, to lie, to kill. Dissect any serial killer and there’s almost always a pattern, life events leading up to the pivotal moment when he or she snaps, finally acting on the urge of taking a human life.
As a child, I remember sitting in the car waiting for my mother to exit the grocery store. Back then there weren’t cell phones or electronic devices to help pass the time. I was left with my imagination, and my imagination created stories. I’d watch people shuffling out of the store, paper sacks in hand, and wonder what their lives must be like. What did they do for a living? Were they rich or poor? Happy? Sad? Suffering? Sometimes I thought I knew just by the expressions on their faces.
Any real, raw, heartfelt emotion is a base for a good story. We all feel it, and we all identify with it. Twenty years ago, I gave birth to a beautiful baby girl. I’d always dreamed of a having big family, so I was ecstatic. Two years later when trying for number two it became apparent I was battling with infertility. At first I was undaunted. I was young. I had several years to figure out the problem. Now, eighteen years later, the battle rages on, and I’ve chosen a new direction.
Over the last year, my husband and I have been trying to adopt. Through this process, two birth mother’s chose our family, but in the end, both decided to keep the baby. I couldn’t blame them. In the midst of feeling my own pain, I felt theirs too. The heartache of a birth mother’s loving decision to give up her child is just as intense as the heartache an adoptive family feels when they’re waiting, hoping the next call will be the one that changes their lives forever. And so I wait.
My own journey of adoption inspired me to write the book Hush Now Baby (Sloane Monroe Series, Book 6) about a newly adoptive mother named Serena Westwood, who wakes in the middle of the night to the sounds of her crying baby. Bottle in hand, she tiptoes to the crib, looks in, a wave of panic gripping her as her real nightmare begins. Inside the crib, there is no baby.
In telling the story, I drew on my own experiences to help capture the despair of the story’s characters. The mother who successfully adopts, only to lose the child shortly after bringing him home. The birth mother who anguished over her decision about the best life for her baby. The kidnapper with his own agenda. The passion of the characters coupled with the mystery surrounding who took the baby and who will lose their life in an effort to save him makes this book one of my favorites of everything I’ve written.
