Literary Profiles: Katharine Schellman, author of the new mystery The Last Note of Warning, talks about her writing life, favorite book recommendations, & more
Behind the scenes of how Katharine writes and her great under the radar book recs
Hi Readers!
I’m so excited to share the third issue of my series, Literary Profiles! This series allows me to lean into my curiosity about people and their reading lives. This is a curated Q & A with someone (think booksellers/managers, bookstagrammers, librarians, authors, other Substackers, etc) from the book world and will explore how they read, what they read, and much more.
Today, I’m thrilled to welcome author Katharine Schellman to ItsBooktalk & More. Katharine is the author of several books, but today she’s going to tell us more about her new mystery The Last Note of Warning, her writing process, and what books she loves to read.
I read The Last Note of Warning in June and I loved that it’s a mystery set in NYC during Prohibition, and that I could jump right into book three without having read the other two! The audio is also great. In case you haven’t yet read The Last Note of Warning, here’s the premise….
The time is the 1920s, the place is New York City. Prohibition is a dangerous time to be a working-class woman in New York City, but Vivian Kelly has finally found some measure of stability and freedom. By day, she's a respectable shop assistant, delivering luxurious dresses to the city's wealthy and elite. At night, she joins the madcap revelry of New York's underworld, serving illegal drinks and dancing into the morning at a secretive, back-alley speakeasy known as the Nightingale. She's found, if not love, then something like it with her bootlegger sweetheart, Leo, even if she can't quite forget the allure of the Nightingale's sultry owner, Honor Huxley.
Then the husband of a wealthy client is discovered dead in his study, and Vivian was the last known person to see him alive. With the police and the press both eager to name a culprit in the high-profile case, she finds herself the primary murder suspect.
Sounds atmospheric right?
Welcome Katharine! Can you tell readers a bit about who you are?
Thanks so much for having me! I’m Katharine Schellman, a former actor and, once upon a time, a political consultant. These days, I write historical mysteries. My two current series are the Regency-set Lily Adler mysteries and the 1920s-set Nightingale Mysteries.
The Lily Adler books are a bit like Bridgerton, but if everyone was worried about getting murdered instead of getting married. The Nightingale books are a little darker and dramatic, with a working-class, queer heroine who escapes her daytime life by partying at a speakeasy, but gets pulled into the criminal underworld that makes the party possible.
What does a day in your life typically look like?
I always struggle to answer this question because the truth is, there is no typical day. Between writing, my day job, irregular childcare, and extended family responsibilities, my schedule can change almost daily.
Today, I have one kid at daycare and the other who had camp only in the morning. My husband has multiple on-site meetings, so I’m the primary parent on-duty and am squeezing in work in 20-minute blocks of time. This weekend, I have an event out of town, so I’ll spend Saturday traveling while my family stays at home. And next week, one kid will be in daycare and the other in full-day camp, so I’ll be working closer to 9-5 hours for three out of five days.
Tell us about your new book, The Last Note of Warning. This is book 3 in your Nightingale series, but it’s the one I’ve started with and I have to say, I thought you did a fantastic job of introducing characters, providing just the right amount of backstory so I knew how characters were connected, but nothing about what happened in the previous books that would spoil the stories.
Actually, what you did provide in this book made me super intrigued to go back to the previous 2 books and find out the whole story. I absolutely loved reading about this time period, especially The Nightingale itself- did you base it on a real club from the past? I loved getting to know Vivian - is she based on any real life woman?
Thank you so much, I’m so glad you enjoyed the book! The 1920s is such a fun era to research and write in. The characters and places, including the Nightingale, aren’t based on any specific people or locations that existed at the time. But they all draw on a lot of real information about immigrants, speakeasy culture, and the very different experiences that people had during Prohibition depending on their economic and social class.
Let’s talk about your writing life - your new book is set in NYC during Prohibition and you vividly paint a picture for readers of the atmosphere, setting, and language of the time- can you tell us a bit about what your research & writing process actually looks like and how difficult (or not) was it to create such an authentic story?
I tend to start with big picture research, looking at the broad cultural influences of the time such as the impact of Prohibition, the rise in immigration, movement from rural to urban life, and the changing roles of women. Once I feel like I have a good handle on the world my characters are in, I can figure out how they’ve been shaped by it and how they’re going to interact with it. That’s when I start outlining and then writing.
The smaller details, like whether there was a subway stop in a certain neighborhood or how much dinner would cost at a cheap restaurant, get filled in as I write. But even that level of research always turns up surprises. While I was working on The Last Note of Warning, I discovered that in the 1920s, there was a nationally famous drag ball that happened regularly in Harlem; thousands of people would attend each one and the event (including masquerade winners) would be written up in local newspapers. Once I learned about that, it had to go in the book.
I’m thrilled to know it felt like an authentic, lived-in world to you. I will say, every single book I’ve ever written has historical inaccuracies, sometimes by accident, but often deliberately if I decided a detail didn’t serve the story. They’re just not always where people expect!
I would love to know more about plotting a mystery. Do you know from the beginning “who did it?” How easy or difficult is it to create interesting clues, red herrings, foreshadowing etc?
The one time I tried to write a mystery without an outline, it was an absolute mess that was the length of a book and a half. So now, I always outline. For me that outline really is the first draft. I’ll spend a few weeks on it, going scene by scene, to figure out the plot, the individual character arcs, and how those all interact with each other. That way, when I sit down to write, I always know I’m moving in the right direction.
That’s not to say things don’t change from the outline; they absolutely do. And then they change again in the next draft. And the next. And the next. It’s honestly a good thing I have an editor and a production team who finally cut me off and say “We’re done, that’s the book. We have to print it now.” Otherwise, I’d probably be able to keep editing forever.
Can you share details about your creative life? Readers love knowing details about how authors spend their days - where you write, when you write, do you have a writing routine?
As a related question, how do you balance your creative life with things like social media? Do you spend time on it during your day and if so, do you find that it enhances or hinders your creative life? Do you think too much pressure is put on authors to have social media platforms and then to be present/active on them?
I used to think I needed a regular routine and a lot of structure to write, but these days, I honestly don’t. Sometimes I get hours of focused writing time with no one else around and no interruptions. Sometimes I’m drafting in the front seat of the car while my kids sing at the top of their lungs in the backseat and my husband drives us all to South Carolina because an important family gathering is starting the same day that I have a book due to my editor.
More often, it’s somewhere in between. I think that’s one reason outlining is so helpful for me. I don’t have to get into any kind of creative zone or wait for inspiration to strike. I know where I need to jump in, so I can.
In terms of social media, I don’t know any writers who don’t struggle with the balance between creative work and promoting that work. I think the trick is to find the kind of promotion that works best for you and your readers. For some people, that’s videos on TikTok or having a Substack newsletter. But I also know writers who do almost no social media because they can connect better with readers by doing events or giving talks.
There are times it gets frustrating to try to find time for both. But being able to connect directly with readers, rather than always having to go through an intermediary like a publisher or a newspaper, is actually an incredible thing. Mostly, I’m very grateful for it.
What are your best writing tips?
This one is hard! Writing is such a personal process, and everyone approaches it differently. Giving universal advice feels impossible. I think my best tip is that I don’t think writer’s block exists. If I feel like I have writer’s block, it’s a sign that one of two things needs to happen. Either I need to take better care of my physical and emotional self, or I need to stop being a perfectionist.
In the first instance, that might be getting some exercise, spending time with friends, or getting more sleep. It can feel counterintuitive, but taking time away from writing can often make the writing better. In the second instance, it means I need to stop trying to find the perfect words and just put some words down. There are no perfect words in a first draft, that’s why we edit.
Let’s talk reading recommendations….
What types of books (genres) do you enjoy reading?
I’ll honestly read everything. (Though I don’t read horror or thrillers before bed.) As long as I feel like I can connect with the characters, genre doesn’t matter to me.
Do you have recs for books you used to research the Jazz Age and/or Prohibition?
The Poisoner’s Handbook by Deborah Blum is about poisoning crimes in New York City in the Jazz Age and the development of forensic medicine that happened in response to them. It’s packed with information, but reads like a thriller. I picked up The Historical Atlas of New York City at the Tenement Museum, and it’s a great resource for everything from where different immigrant groups lived to the growth of public transit over time. And Flapper by Joshua Zeitz is all about the changing roles and expectations of women in the Jazz Age.
I’m also incredibly grateful to the librarians and archivists who have spent countless hours digitizing historical collections and resources over the past few decades. I’m able to do so much of my research online, and that makes my job so much easier.
What would you recommend for readers who’ve read your books and now want more novels set during the Jazz Age?
I love Nekesa Afia’s Harlem Renaissance Mysteries. They’re also set during the Jazz Age in NYC, and the characters are amazing. The first book in the series is Dead Dead Girls. I also highly recommend Denny S. Bryce’s Wild Women and the Blues. It’s a dual-timeline genre bender with mystery, romance, and family secrets.
A book that changed your life or perspective was...
The Chronicles of Prydain by Lloyd Alexander. I started reading them when I was seven, and they were the first books that really made me fall in love with books as a creation and a world, not just as individual stories.
Your favorite book (or books) of all time would be….
That’s like asking me to pick a favorite child. I can’t do it! Different books have meant so much to me at different points in my life.
I used to reread I Capture the Castle by Dodie Smith every year, but now Paris in Love by Eloisa James speaks more to the phase of life that I’m in. My favorite Jane Austen used to be Persuasion, but now it’s Sense & Sensibility. I used to say my favorite Agatha Christie was Death on the Nile, but now I’m more likely to name drop The Body in the Library.
Both The Dark is Rising Sequence by Susan Cooper or The Earthsea Cycle by Ursula K. LeGuin were hugely formative reads for me growing up. And The Girls at the Kingfisher Club by Genevieve Valentine was the first book that really made the Jazz Age come alive to me.
I think I’m constantly finding new books and new favorites, and I really love that.
The last book that kept you up reading late into the night was….
Lavender House by Lev AC Rosen. The main character, Andy Mills, is a former SFPD detective who was outed and fired during the Lavender Scare in the 1950s. He’s pulled into investigating a murder for a wealthy but reclusive queer family. I picked it up for a recent trip to LA because I wanted a California book to read, and I realized when I landed that I had already read half of it! I tried to pace myself after that so I could enjoy it for more of the trip, but I still stayed up late to finish it.
Any other books you love to recommend?
Is it weird if I end with a children’s book? Both my kids have recently fallen in love with Ben Hatke’s picture books, which is pretty remarkable considering the five year age difference between the two them! But his books so sweetly written and beautifully illustrated. There’s something for every age in there, including adults. I think picture books really don’t get enough credit for how remarkable they are.
Katharine, thank you so much for taking us behind the scenes of your writing process and for sharing so many fantastic book recommendations!
KATHARINE SCHELLMAN is a former actor and one-time political consultant. When not writing about mystery, history, and other improbable things, she can be found in her garden or finding new ways to skip steps while baking. She currently lives and writes in the mountains of Virginia in the company of her family and the many houseplants she keeps accidentally murdering. Her books include Last Call at the Nightingale, The Last Drop of Hemlock, and her newest The Last Note of Warning. Katharine is on Instagram @katharinewrites
Thank you so much for having me, Renee! Such fun questions to answer. ❤️📚