M. Brian Hartz
The book jacket for Where the Dead Sleep and a photo of author Joshual Moehling.
In his grisly debut, 2022’s And There He Kept Her — a finalist for the prestigious Lambda Literary Award in the LGBTQ+ Mystery category — Minneapolis-based writer Joshua Moehling introduced readers to Sheriff’s Deputy Ben Packard. A gay man seeking a fresh start in rural Sandy Lake, Minn., Packard returns in the dark yet witty Where the Dead Sleep (Poisoned Pen Press, August). Both books contain “a kernel of Minnesota true crime at [their] heart,” according to Moehling, while also tipping the police procedural on its side. He will read Friday, Oct. 20, at Central Library in the Lower-Level Program Room at 7:30 p.m.
Isthmus: What influenced you to create a protagonist like Ben Packard — and what convinced you he deserved more than one book?
Joshua Moehling: I wrote a book prior to And There He Kept Her with the same setting of Sandy Lake. That book had a gay sheriff’s deputy in it who had a very, very minor role. The manuscript was good enough to get a few agents to read it, but they all eventually passed on it. I didn’t know how to fix that book, but I was taken with the setting and curious about the deputy. Where did he come from? What was it like to be a gay man in a small town? What was it like to be a gay man in law enforcement? That was a story I wanted to tell. Later, when I looked for comparable titles, I realized there are very few contemporary crime novels with a gay protagonist working in rural law enforcement. That made me even more excited to try to tell this story.
I knew nothing about writing a police procedural before I started. Luckily, I had already read dozens of books by William Kent Krueger, John Sandford and Michael Connelly. I thought I knew enough to at least try. Sometimes ignorance is a great place to start from. It allowed me to focus on the story and the characters, then come back and layer on the details that hopefully make it more real.
Ben Packard’s story starts long before the events of And There He Kept Her. There’s a story arc involving a missing brother that I knew from the beginning was going to take more than one book to resolve. Watching Packard try to build a life in this small town is as interesting to me as watching him try to solve murders. I hope readers think so, too, and will keep coming back to see how things turn out for Packard.
What are the main challenges of writing a series vs. standalone titles (and how many more books can readers expect in this series)?
The nice thing about writing a series is you’re not starting from zero with every book. You have a setting, you have a protagonist, you have side characters. On the other hand, you’re also limited by the constraints you’ve set for yourself. Every book can’t involve a new serial killer when the setting is the same small town. (The number of people murdered in this rural county already stretches the limits of belief.) Packard is unlikely to ever race around the world to stop a trained assassin from killing world leaders at a G8 summit. You have to come up with a believable crime and believable characters for the world you’ve built for yourself.
The third Ben Packard book is already written. I have a contract for one more after that. I hope one day there will be as many Packard books as there are Will Trents or Easy Rawlinses.
Why do you think readers are drawn to mysteries set in small Midwestern towns? And how do you strive to make your small-town stories different from others in the genre?
Mysteries set in a small town push against people’s notions of these places being quiet, safe spaces where nothing bad ever happens. Small towns are the perfect setting to dramatize events that wouldn’t make a ripple in a big city. The interconnectedness of the community means the vibrations are widely felt and have the potential to create unexpected reactions.
Small towns may all appear the same but I think they are as unique as the people that inhabit them. I try to create interesting characters and put unexpected humor among the dark deeds to make my books stand out from the crowd.
