Dana Stabenow
http://www.stabenow.com
I was born in Anchorage, Alaska on March 27, 1952, and
raised on a 75-foot fish tender in the Gulf of Alaska.
When I wasn’t seasick I wrote stories about NORMAL
children who lived on SHORE, and made my mother read them.
Probably some of my best work.
In 1964, the Great Alaskan Earthquake occurred during my
twelfth birthday party. It was then that I realized I was
destined for greatness, always supposing I survived the day.
I graduated from Seldovia High School in 1969 and put myself
through college working as an egg grader, bookkeeper and
expediter for Whitney-Fidalgo Seafoods in Anchorage.
I received a B.A. in journalism from the University of
Alaska in 1973 only because the dean of students called me
into her office the previous fall and, looking kindly at me
over the tops of her glasses, asked me if I planned on
graduating with the rest of my class the following spring.
This was the first time someone had suggested that perhaps I
might not. She further informed me that participation in
Lathrop Dorm’s second floor keggers did not, in fact,
count as credit. Well.
After graduation I spent one more summer knee-deep in
humpies and blew everything I earned on a four-month
backpacking trip to Europe with Rhonda Sleighter, college
roommate and one of the dedicatees of Play With Fire.
There, I discovered English pubs, German beer and Irish men.
Fortuitously, upon my impoverished return home (I think I
had something like twenty bucks and change in my pocket when
I stepped off the plane) construction began again on the
TransAlaska Pipeline, and answering whole-heartedly to the
call of the cash I worked for Alyeska Pipeline at Galbraith
Lake and later for British Petroleum at Prudhoe Bay.
I made an obscene amount of money and went to Hawaii a lot.
That was in the days when it cost $322.21 r/t
Anchorage-Honolulu-Anchorage, and a flight to any of the
outer islands was included. Sigh.
In 1982 I turned 30. Was this what I wanted to do with the
rest of my life, work on the Slope and party in Hawaii?
Well...but no. I left the Slope for the last time on August
17, 1982 (but who’s counting?) and enrolled in
UAA’s MFA program, from which I graduated in 1985. My
goal was to sell a book before I went broke and I just
barely made it: Second Star was bought by Ace Science
Fiction in 1990. It fell with an almighty thud on the
marketplace and was never heard from again. Oh dear.
In 1991 my editor sniffed out the existence of the first
Kate Shugak mystery and offered me a three-book contract.
“What makes you think I can write any more of
these?” I said. “Shut up and sign,” said she.
“Great,” I said when she called to tell me A
Cold Day for Murder had been nominated for an Edgar
award, “what’s an Edgar?” After a long
pause, she explained. “Great,” I said.
“Does any money come with it?”
It won in 1993. And the rest was madness.
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Books
A Taint in the Blood
September 1, 2004
Thirty-one years ago in Anchorage, Alaska, Victoria Pilz
Bannister Muravieff was convicted of murdering her
seventeen-year-old son William. The jury returned a quick
verdict of guilty, believing the prosecutor's claims Read more...
Wild Crimes
September 1, 2004
From Edgar Award winner Dana Stabenow comes an all-new
mystery anthology featuring wild men, wilder women, and
the wildest crimes imaginable...
Go where the wild things are—whether on unruly and
lawless Read more...
Better to Rest
("A Liam Campbell Mystery")
September 2, 2003
A string of recent successes has put Liam back on the fast
track to Anchorage, which threatens the new life he's made
in Newenham with pilot Wyanet Chouinard. But his Read more...
A Grave Denied
September 1, 2003
Everyone knew Len Dreyer, a handyman for hire in the Park
near Niniltna, Alaska, but no one knew anything else about
him. Even Kate Shugak hired him to thin the Read more...
Better To Rest
September 1, 2002
"Alaska's finest mystery writer" (Anchorage Daily News) has
given readers a hero to cheer for. Alaska state trooper
Sergeant Liam Campbell is the representative of law and
order in the Read more...
A Fine And Bitter Snow
June 1, 2002
Nothing Gold Can Stay
September 5, 2001
A postmistress in a remote Alaskan village is murdered. At
first it looks like a robbery gone bad, until the bodies
begin to pile up and Alaska state trooper Read more...
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