BIOGRAPHY FOR E. KELLY KEADY
MEET KELLY AT BOUCHERCON®36 IN CHICAGO
THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 1, 2005
10:30-11:30 A.M.
“I Did It Myself, The Plus and Minus of
Self-Publishing”
I am basically a product of my Twin Cities upbringing, a
Catholic kid growing up in the Midwest.
As a child, my father, a Navy veteran and retired Honeywell/Bull sales
executive, regaled me with stories of an exciting and colorful world beyond the
borders of his home state of Minnesota.
At home in Plymouth, Minnesota, my mother’s penchant for reading all
genres let me visit these far away ports of call from my father’s tales. As a young reader, I devoured the likes of
Leon Uris, James Michener, John Steinbeck, Gore Vidal, Robert Ludlum, and I
could not keep my head out of the World Book Encyclopedia.
After
Benilde-St. Margaret’s High School, I left the comfort of home for a Jesuit
education at St. Louis University, in St. Louis, Missouri. Graduating cum laude with a Bachelor
of Arts in Political Science and French, I returned to St. Louis University for
my law degree. My undergraduate and
graduate education also included frequent trips abroad, including studying for
a year at Universite d’Orleans, in Orleans, France.
After
St. Louis, I returned home to the Twin Cities to practice law. Although my legal career has spanned the
gamut from a clerk on the Missouri Court of Appeals to a trial lawyer licensed
in Minnesota, Iowa, and Wisconsin, my practice focuses on mostly on eminent
domain law--representing people who have had their property taken from them by
the government. This unique practice
takes me from coast to coast. Although
I travel extensively, I prefer my life in Minneapolis with my wife and two
children (a six-year-old and a one-year-old).
The concept for The Cross of St. Maro originated in a
car wash. With the soap and jet streams
pulsating, I envisioned a movie scene where someone is murdered in a car
wash. As opposed to developing a fear
of car washes, the scene developed piece by piece into a story for a
novel. After two years of research and
writing, I finished a first draft of a manuscript in June 2001. The storyline revolves around a religious
billionaire’s plot to thrust the United States into invading Syria by manufacturing
a terrorist attack in New York City.
After 9/11, some publishers
did not deem this storyline appropriate. So, the manuscript landed on the shelf
for a while. During this time, I kept
revising the manuscript as well as working on the next novel in the
series. When the United States invaded
Iraq (as opposed to Syria in my novel), I decided to publish the novel
myself. My wife put together a talented
group of people including two copy editors, a typesetter, and a graphic design
artist (they work with her at Target and are all listed in the
acknowledgements). Working nights and
weekends, we somehow converted my manuscript into the hardcover version of The Cross of St. Maro.
The
Bookcase in Wayzata was the first bookstore to carry carried my novel. I had grown up in the Plymouth/Wayzata (MN)
area, so even if no one ever bought The
Cross of St. Maro, having it on the shelves of my Mom’s local bookstore was
a good tribute to my parents.
However,
the novel did sell.
Border’s
Books and Music soon accepted me into their local stores. By the time Christmas rolled around, The Cross of St. Maro was in every Twin
Cities’ Barnes & Noble store as well.
Sales have been, and continue to be, great. The first edition sold out (although I am sure Pat and Gary at
Once Upon a Crime Mystery Book Store in Uptown Minneapolis have a few
squirreled away), and the second edition (still under my Magdalene Books
imprint) is on its way to selling out.
Some of
the local papers have hopped on the bandwagon too. The Sun Newspaper called The
Cross of St. Maro “three-hundred-and-ninety-eight pages of
solid suspense” while the Southwest Journal says it “follows in Da Vinci’s
footsteps”.
The Cross of St. Maro
also has become more than just a local Twin Cities interest story. Not only
have I had signings in Duluth, Rochester, Mankato, Des Moines, St. Louis, San
Francisco, and even in New York City at the Barnes & Noble Greenwich
Village. Online reviewers across the
country give the novel five out of five stars.
The Cross of St. Maro received
further national attention on May 23, 2005, when, out of thousands of entries,
the novel earned an Honorable Mention for the Independent Publisher’s Best
Mystery/Suspense/Thriller. In addition,
I have been invited to discuss The Cross
of St. Maro and my publishing experience at Bouchercon® 36 (the world’s
largest mystery convention) over the Labor Day weekend in Chicago. The convention is dedicating a full day to the
thriller genre.
As
fringe benefit of this whole experience, I have had a chance to meet a lot of
great people, not only other authors, but booksellers and fans of the
thriller/mystery genre as well.
I expect
to finish the manuscript to my next novel, involving many of the same
characters, shortly.
The Cross of St. Maro
By E. Kelly Keady
Magdalene Books
398 pages
ISBN 0974973807
www.crossofstmaro.com