Debbi Mack interviews crime writer Mark S. Bacon on the Crime Cafe podcast.

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Amazingly, this week I managed to scrape up transcription show notes. Click here to download a copy in PDF.

Debbi (01:44): Hi everyone. Our guest today started his writing career as a police reporter, and apparently one of his stories became an important part of a big lengthy murder trial. He's also done advertising and marketing and worked as a copywriter for Knott's Berry Farm. That's a familiar name to me cause I used to live in California. Not only has he written and published three mysteries and the book of flash crime fiction called Cops Crooks and Other Stories in 100 Words, but he's written business books, including Do-it-Yourself Direct Marketing, which was named Best Business Book of the Year by Library Journal and made the Book of the Month Club. His articles have appeared in major newspapers, including my own favorite, the Washington Post, and his latest novel is The Marijuana Murders. His name is Mark Bacon. Hi Mark. Thanks again for being so patient as to wait long enough for this interview.

Mark (03:17): Thanks for having me. Well, the last few months, I've just been hanging around like everybody else.

Debbi (03:17): Oh yeah, yeah. That's what we're all doing. We're all hanging around and zooming. A lot of the zooming going on. Um, let's see. I love your shirt by the way. That's great. Um, very, very festive looking. Um, and uh, you have three books out so far in the Nostalgia City Mysteries, is that correct?

Mark (03:17): That's right. I'm working on number four.

Debbi (03:20): And that's for the series also?

Mark (03:21): Correct.

Debbi (03:23): Awesome. Now you said the inspiration for the series came from working at Knott's Berry Farm. Can you talk about that a little bit?

Mark (03:31): Sure. Early in my career, I was a copywriter for Knott’s Berry Farm and I wrote ads and commercials, but occasionally I would get a chance to go out into the park and work on special events. And I got to meet some of the costumed employees who entertain the guests, people who wore those giant heads and people who were gunslingers and so on. And so I got to know a little bit about what it's like behind the scenes at a theme park. And I always thought that it might be an interesting place to hold a murder mystery or to set a murder mystery because a theme park is great during the day. But at night when everybody's gone, when the rides are stopped, everything is silent. And the only motion is the shadows of the trees. It can be a little scary and I thought it'd make a great place to kill people.

[A] theme park is great during the day. But at night when everybody's gone, when the rides are stopped, everything is silent. And the only motion is the shadows of the trees. It can be a little scary and I thought it'd make a great place to kill people.

Debbi (04:34): That's cool. I like that. Let's see. Have you ever seen the show Playing God in Central Florida, something like that. [It's On Becoming God in Central Florida.]

Mark (04:46): No, it doesn't, it doesn't ring a bell.

Debbi (04:49): It revolves around a woman who works at a theme park. That's the only reason I ask.

Mark (04:54): Oh, okay. Well there's lots of those in Florida.

Debbi (04:56): Yeah. it's,