🎬 BEHIND THE SCENES:

  Writing True Crime (When Your Pets Are the Criminals)

Every author gets asked the exact same question: “Where do you get your ideas?”

For most writers, the answer involves deep research, plotting boards, or vivid dreams. For me, the answer is usually standing in my kitchen, licking a roasting tray clean, or refusing to step away from my keyboard (pp. 12, 25, 30).

Welcome to a special look behind the curtain of the Menagerie Investigations Bureau (M.I.B.) (p. 13). Today, I'm sharing how real-life domestic anarchy inspired my latest collection, Mayhem Menagerie: True Crimes Volume 1 (p. 2).

📝 From Living Room Chaos to Published Pages

The concept for this book didn't start at a desk (p. 20). It started out of pure survival (p. 20). When you share a home with a Pointer-Beagle hybrid who possesses the moral compass of a toddler with a biscuit, you quickly realize that if you don't document the crimes, no one on the outside will believe you (pp. 20, 29, 31).

What began as a way to log active food heists quickly expanded into a full Household Crimes Division Dossier (p. 2). I realized our home wasn't just a house—it was a highly active jurisdiction under constant threat from a rotating cast of furry and feathered fugitives (pp. 2, 13).

🔍 Meet the Real-Life Cast of Characters

While Miles takes the heat for primary operations like The Great Amazon Meat Heist, the book allowed me to properly profile the entire syndicate operating under our roof (pp. 10, 29):

• Sanjay (The Kingpin): Our sleek black cat who specializes in keyboard sabotage and psychological manipulation (pp. 24-26). He treats the dog team as his personal henchmen (p. 26).
• Guinness (The Nervous Witness): A compact Black Lab mix who functions as our emotional support lighthouse (pp. 37-38). He has perfected the art of looking profoundly guilty for crimes he didn't even participate in (p. 39).
• The Feathered Felons: From Bronzy, our emotionally volatile turkey hen who paces doorways like a Victorian widow, to Olive, a gremlin in a ball gown who lays eggs in locations that completely defy the laws of physics (pp. 33-35, 41, 43).

⚖️ The Golden Rule: Do Not Negotiate

People often ask if writing this book helped me train or reform the animals (p. 6). The short answer is: absolutely not (p. 8). As detailed in Section I of the dossier, the offenders do not respect the laws of nature, common sense, or household boundaries (p. 7). They thrive entirely on human weakness (p. 8).

But while my kitchen counters may never be truly secure, they provide endless inspiration (pp. 13, 30). Writing Mayhem Menagerie was my way of turning missing roasts and shredded grocery bags into something we can all laugh at (pp. 12, 30-31).

🕵️‍♂️ NEED MORE SUSPENSE IN YOUR LIFE?

If you think the high-stakes tactical manoeuvring of a Beagle stealing a Sunday roast or raiding Amazon grocery bags is thrilling, you should see what happens in my books (pp. 10, 12).

When I am not fighting a losing battle against the "Biscuit Bandit," I am a published author of gripping adult fiction and imaginative children's stories (p. 30). If you want to escape into a completely different world (one where nobody is actively trying to eat your sandwich), visit The Directors Bookshelf  right here on the blog to grab your next read!