Author Edgar Swamp will see his name under a different genre of fiction this October when he releases “Amber Hollow,” the San Diegan’s first mystery.
Departing from his writing styles, such as “Gyre Mission” and “Blackout,” Swamp takes readers through a fictional village named Amber Hollow in Wisconsin in the 1990s. The mystery tells the story of two detectives determined to solve the murders of more than 500 people.
To tap into this setting, Swamp said he visited his home state to research the area but he also refrained from using any current-day technology.
“I had to research the state to see where I could place this village in proximity to real cities so that I could realistically incorporate them, as well as familiarize myself with some of their local customs to make the narrative authentic,” Swamp said. “I also had to adapt the story to the type of technology they would have utilized at the time, the communications devices employed, such as pagers, landlines, CB radios and car phones. To make this specific story work, I had to be free of the shackles of our modern technology, like GPS tracking and social media like Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. The entire World Wide Web to be exact.”
Although it’s a departure from his usual “snarky writing style,” as Swamp described, “Amber Hollow” is still a page-turner that he hopes will appeal to a wider audience.
“With ‘Amber Hollow’ I am relying entirely on the characters and the story to tell a tale that I feel is just as shocking and grotesque as my other books, while avoiding gratuitously graphic depictions that might alienate potential readers who otherwise may enjoy the story,” Swamp said. “I intended this to be a horror novel in disguise as a creepy Whodunit.”
But Swamp said he’s most excited to pay tribute to Wisconsin, the city of Green Bay and the 1990s in his latest novel.
“I had so much fun writing this book that I’m eager to share it with anyone who has a hankering for cheese curds, reliving the early ’90s, hiking through the dark, scary, Northern Wisconsin woods, and historical serial killer lore encapsulated in a detective Whodunit,” Swamp said. “This is a story I really wanted to tell with characters I really care about.”
“Amber Hollow” is expected to be released on Oct. 15. For more information about Edgar Swamp or “Amber Hollow,” go to www.edgarswamp.com.
