Look and Listen

Biography

Kit Ehrman grew up a mile from the Baltimore City line - - not a likely place for a “horse person,” but when she was working for the government, she came across a copy of Dick Francis’s In the Frame and was hooked. She read every one of his mysteries that she could get her hands on, quit the government job, and went to work on a horse farm, thus kicking off a long career working with horses. Well, there’s a lot of down time mucking out stalls, so she got into the habit of making up stories in her head. One thing led to another, and when she turned to writing, those stories grew into the Steve Cline mystery series. Many of her experiences, impressions, and observations are reflected in the stories. For example, while she was working foal watch at a huge breeding farm in Pennsylvania, a serial arsonist was burning down vacant barns in the surrounding neighborhoods. She says, “To this day, I still remember how spooky it felt to look down the barn aisle around two in the morning and see an orange glow on the horizon and know another barn was burning.” That incident kicks off the third book in the series, Cold Burn. From the fancy hunters and show jumpers that display their prowess as they soar over challenging obstacles to the sleek, often high-strung, thoroughbreds that compete at the racetrack, the horses are as integral to the stories as the mysteries themselves. The series follows the adventures of Steve Cline, a young man who grew up privileged and wealthy but finds himself alone in the world and penniless at the age of twenty-one. Ehrman also has a short story in Derby Rotten Scoundrels, an anthology of mysteries surrounding the Kentucky Derby, written by members of the Ohio River Valley Chapter of Sisters in Crime, presented by Silver Dagger Mysteries. Kit Ehrman has worked as a groom, veterinary assistant, foaling attend-ant, and barn manager at numerous horse facilities in Maryland and Pennsylvania and currently lives in Indiana. She is a member of Mystery Writers of America, International Thriller Writers, Inc., and Sisters in Crime. The Steve Cline mystery series is published by Poisoned Pen Press.

Inspiration

Horses and great mysteries.