Article and Interview by Elise Cooper
She Thought She Was Safe by Terri Parlato has the author venturing away from her series with Detective Rita. This is a stand-alone thriller shows how people are not whom they seem and monsters lurk behind facades.
The plot has Emma realizing she needs a new start. After the unexpected death of her mother and the collapse of her marriage, Emma is looking for a place to escape to. She discovers the identity of her father, something her mother had kept hidden. Emma contacts her biological father, Alex Spencer, a wealthy and famous author of historical mysteries. After a DNA test confirms she is indeed his daughter, he invites her to stay at his secluded Victorian home on Cheshire Lake in Maine. Emma is looking forward to getting to know her father better and enjoying the peacefulness of the lake.
But her arrival is anything but peaceful. Emma’s arrival is met with hostility from Alex’s other daughter, her half-sister, Sunny, who manages his career and is fiercely protective of him. Sunny makes it very clear; she isn’t thrilled about Emma’s sudden appearance. Then there is the mystery behind the death of her father’s sister Mary. Emma begins to feel a strange connection to her along with a growing curiosity about what really happened.
Then a neighbor is found dead and another one disappears. She also begins to experience buried memories, leaving Emma to question if she has stepped into a nightmare she may never escape.
The setting also plays a role with its isolation of the property. The setting around Cheshire Lake felt eerie and almost gothic at times, leaving readers to wonder if something is not quite right. She realizes her survival depends on recognizing red flags. Emma realizes she is in immediate danger because those around her want to make sure secrets are kept.
Readers will be hooked from page one. The tension created adds to the unease of Emma who does not know who to trust.
Elise Cooper: Idea for the story?
Terri Parlato: My editor told me not to write a detective Rita book, so I went back to my family’s roots back in New England. I wanted to do a small-town murder mystery in Maine with some gothic vibes. My husband and I traveled to Boston and Maine. I thought I wanted to write a story about family, incorporating that with my love of history by having the main character, Emma’s father, a best-selling author of historical fiction. All these came to together for the story.
EC: How would you describe Alex, the writer father?
TP: He is spoiled, people make excuses for him, self-centered, can turn his emotions off and on, strong-willed, spoiled, a narcissist, someone who enjoys money, and thinks himself as an optimist.
EC: How would you describe Emma?
TP: A librarian. Feels like an outsider to her new family. Faces adversity head on. She is somebody that is looking for some stability and a family.
EC: What about Sunny, Emma’s half-sister?
TP: I have stepsisters and brothers, half sisters and brothers, but none of them are anything like Sunny. She feels superior, is mean, confrontational, possessive of her dad, and wants everything to center around her and her family. She feels superior to Emma and is not supportive. She feels threatened by Emma and does not want her to have any relationship with her father. I see her as a villain through and through.
EC: What is the role of Emma’s ex-husband, Ben?
TP: He was the reason Emma left her life behind. There were some things that happened that she wanted to get away from. She is a woman in her thirties who recently lost her mother and has her husband turning out to be a total jerk. She needed a new start and here comes her dad who is willing to help her out.
EC: What was the role of Alex’s sister, Mary?
TP: Even though Mary is dead Emma feels a sense of kinship with her. She connected to her.
EC: Next book?
TP: It is not a Detective Rita book. I am writing it as we speak and sending portions to my editor to see if he likes it. The story is set in the Northeast, right outside of Boston. It is very different from this book. It is about a group of forty people who have been friends since elementary school. After this horrible thing happens, they are the only survivors. I try to write a different book each time.
EC: THANK YOU!!
