MEMBERS

Officers:

Annette Dashofy, President
www.annettedashofy.com
www.annettedashofy.blogspot.com
adashofy@yahoo.com
Annette is a Yoga instructor who writes and has recently become an area representative for Avon. Her short stories, one of which was 2007 Derringer Award nominee, have been published in Spinetingler Magazine and Mysterical-E. In addition to being the current president of the Pittsburgh MMR Sister in Crime, she is the area representative for Pennwriters and a past conference coordinator. She lives in Washington County with her husband of 26 years and one very spoiled cat.

Tamara Giradi, Vice President

Tamara is a freelance write rfor the Pittsburgh Tribune Review and the Valley News Dispatch and a part-time writing instructor at Westmoreland County Community College. Her short stories have been published in New Writing Dundee and Scores, two Scottish anthologies and Love Stories from the Heart, published in the U.S. She is looking for an agent to represent her young adult paranormal These Walls Can Talk about Leia Angeletti, a 17-year-old ghost hunterwho's only fears are disappointing the people she loves, that is until she learns she's better at picking up paranormal activitythan the expensive equipment she carries. Leia learns what her newfound psychic ability can do when she investigates a restaurant that disappears. With a psychic look back in time at an unsolved murder, she learns if she's not careful in her search for the kill, she may not be hunting ghosts anymore. She might just become one. An Allegheny County resident, Tamara is also a member of PennWriters and Backspace and hard at work revising and editing her second young adult novel Broken.
 

Martha Reed, Secretary/Treasurer
reedme36@verizon.net

Martha works in Product Development for a large mutual fund company. Her short fiction has appeared in Pearl 26, Spinetingler Magazine and Mysterical-e and she is currently working on a John and Sarah Jarad Nantucket Mystery. Please visit her web site: marthareed.com to view sample chapters and interactive links to her published work.

Members:

Mary Ann Aug

Sharon Benedetti
Sharon is an IT consultant who travels the U.S. for work and loves to travel to exotic places for fun. She has worked as a certified massage therapist, spoken at conferences on angels and spirituality, and is a former journalist for a small town paper. Sharon occasionally lectures to adult education students on fiction writing fundamentals and technique. Sharon and her muses are at work on a first novel.

Tory Butterworth
Tory works in mental health during the week and uses writing to maintain her mental health on weekends. Her nonfiction work-in-progress explores the origins of compulsive eating. She is also working on a psychological suspense novel that takes place in a corrupt mental hospital.

Kristine Coblitz
Kristine, a past president of the chapter, is a freelance editor and fiction writer. She lives just north of Pittsburgh with her family and is working on a stand-alone contemporary mystery novel.

Cathy Moffat Corn
After busy careers as an RN in critical care units and as a massage therapist in downtown Pittsburgh, Cathy's ready to sit down and write. She's published nonfiction in Bluegrass Unlimited, Pennsylvania Magazine, The Pittsburgh Press Sunday Magazine, and UK women's magazine Annabel. Fiction being her first love (especially the mystery novels of Mary Stewart), she's seeking an agent for Once in a Blue Moon, a paranormal adventure novel set in Madagascar (the perfect blend of mystery, adventure, romance, and fairy dust). Second in the series (currently well under way) is Smell the Plumerias, set on the big island of Hawaii and showcasing the dolphins that swim in its waters.

Lisa Curry
Lisa works part-time as PR director for a community access television station and part-time as a freelance catalog copywriter. Her work has appeared in a variety of corporate publications, newspapers, and magazines, as well as in three CHICKEN SOUP FOR THE SOUL anthologies. Lisa's as-yet-unpublished medieval mystery won first place in the Pennwriters Novel Beginning contest and second place in the historical category of the RWA Daphne du Maurier Award for Mystery/Suspense. She lives with her husband, two sons, two dogs, two cats and two turtles. She is secretary of Pennwriters and is currently working on a contemporary mystery.

Rebecca Drake
www.Rebecca-Drake.com
rebecca@rebecca-drake.com
Rebecca is a former journalist, freelance copywriter, and technical writer who turned to crime fiction to escape the label of soccer mom. Her books include DON'T BE AFRAID, THE DEAD PLACE, and THE NEXT KILLING.

Colette Garmer

www.colettegarmer.com

Colette Garmer has been writing for close to twenty years off and on. She has a suspense novel finished but has relegated it to "under the bed" status hoping someday to dust it off and run an edit.  She had many comical short columns in The Entertainment Guide, a publication that went out of business. She co-authored a women's fiction manuscript with another writing pal. Then she tried Romance for a while where she won a contest with Silhouette Desire where she had to describe her novel in two sentences. After attending the RWA nationals in 2003, she was charged up and ready to go. She has a manuscript finished in the romance genre and a few work in progresses. Lately she has been working on a Narrative Non-Fiction and had attended the Springdale Writers Group. But suspense is her first love so she joined Sisters in Crime. She is a Property and Casuality Insurance Agent in Cheswick and resides with her husband and lovable Italian Greyhound in Brackenridge.

Kathleen George
georgeke+@pitt.edu
www.kathleengeorge.net
Kathleen teaches theatre at the University of Pittsburgh where she has directed many plays for the mainstage and the Three Rivers Shakespeare Festival. She is the author of a short story collection, THE MAN IN THE BUICK, and four novels, TAKEN, FALLEN, AFTERIMAGE, and THE ODDS, which has been nominated for the 2010 Edgar Award for best novel. She is married to writer Hilary Masters.

Mary Alice Gorman
www.mysterylovers.com
Mary Alice and her husband Richard Goldman own the Mystery Lovers Bookshop, Western Pennsylvania's center for crime and mystery. She is a regular book columnist for Mystery Scene Magazine . Mary Alice's skills as a teacher, organizer, fundraiser, career counselor, and advocate have made for a perfect career in bookselling.

Susan Gottfried

www.westofmars.com
Susan loves to curl up with a good mystery, but when it comes to writing, she's all about rock and roll. You can follow the adventures of Trevor Wolff and his fictional band on Susan's blog, or you can join the Trevolution by picking up a copy of The Demo Tapes: Year 1, which collects twenty-five of Trevor's best adventures into one handy, portable volume.

Edie Haines

Kathryn Miller Haines

kathrynmillerhaines at mac dot com

www.kathrynmillerhaines.com

When she's not working in the library system at the University of Pittsburgh, Kathryn performs with and co-manages Mystery's Most Wanted and is an award-winning playwright. She's the author of the Rosie Winter Mystery Series (HarperCollins), set in the theatre community of World War II New York. The fourth book in the series, When Winter Returns, will be out in May, 2010. She is also the author of a new series for young adults, also set in World War II. The first book will be released by Roaring Book Press in 2011.

Pat Hart
Pat works as a marketing consultant and freelance writer specializing in business-to-business communications. Pat recently finished her first novel, GO FISH, a murder mystery set in Pittsburgh's advertising industry, and is seeking a literary agent. Currently, Pat is working on a literary memoir titled "Don't Touch the Dragon Boogers."

Laurissa Kastle

Laurissa is a member of Pennwriters, Sisters in Crime, and a writer’s critique group. She is an avid reader, and loves nothing more than to read a good mystery, or anything, for that matter, as long as she’s reading. Laurissa is currently working on a traditional mystery manuscript, and several short stories.

Lois Lamanna

Debra Lee
www.debralee.net
Debra is the mother of two grown sons. She shares her home in the central part of Pennsylvania with her husband, Richard and several felines. Debra is a member of Pennwriters, Sisters in Crime, and Epic.

Lisa Lepovetsky

Rhonda Marks

Nancy Martin
www.NancyMartinMysteries.com
nancy@nancymartinmysteries.com
Nancy is the author of the bestselling Blackbird Sisters Mystery Series and a brand new series OUR LADY OF IMMACULATE DECEPTION, coming in March, 2010. Set in Pittsburgh, the series features the misadventures of Roxy Abruzzo, a tough girl from the Rust Belt “with a heart of black and gold.” In her 26-year career, she has published 45 novels in four genres--romance, historical, suspense, and mystery. Nancy was the winner of the 2009 Lifetime Achievement award for mystery writing from Romantic Times magazine. She is also one of the Book Tarts on www.TheLipstickChronicles.typepad.com.

Brian Mullen

Janice Palko

Cynnie Pearson

Brenda Roger
www.edithsingerhandbags.com
Brenda is a handbag designer, museum educator, and lifelong sewer. She is currently working on a mystery with a sewing protagonist. Brenda is a graduate of Seton Hill University in Greensburg, Pa. She lives in Murrysville, Pa., with her husband and two English Springer Spaniels, one of which is a rescue dog from www.MAESSR.org. Brenda wrote an essay about her obsession with sewing patterns that will be published in an upcoming edition of Threads Magazine.

Krista Santora

Judy Schneider
www.franticwoman.com
Judy is the co-author of THE FRANTIC WOMAN'S GUIDE TO LIFE, a practical guide packed with hints, tips, and tricks to help busy women survive in today's hectic world. It's published by Warner Books.

Gina Sestak
Gina is a highly unsuccessful fiction writer who lives surrounded by unsold manuscripts. Her published work includes two non-fiction books on legal topics (which she co-authored), articles, and poetry. When not reading, writing, walking, folk dancing, doing yoga, or interpreting dreams, she shares her home with two large tomcats and earns her living as a lawyer for a public utility company.

Lila Shaara

www.lilashaara.com

Lila is the author of EVERY SECRET THING and THE FORTUNE TELLER'S DAUGHTER.

Kathy Shoop

Susan Spencer-Smith

Sandy Stephen
Sandy is a member of Pennwriters, Sisters in Crime and Mysterywrights, a writer’s critique group. She has worked as a technical writer/editor and with a Master’s Degree in Art History taught at local colleges and universities. She completed several novels, including the first in a culinary series about a personal chef and also a suspense thriller (which took third place in the Pennwriters’ great beginnings contest). She is currently working on a new suspense novel. Several of her short fiction pieces have been published online. Sandy lives in the North Hills with her husband and their two kitties.

Heather Terrell

www.thechrysalisbook.com/

Heather Terrell is a lawyer with more than ten years’ experience as a litigator at two of the country’s premier law firms and for Fortune 500 companies. She is a graduate of Boston College and of the Boston University School of Law. She lives in Pittsburgh. Her first novel, The Chrysalis, was released in 2007. Her second, The Map Thief, was released in August, 2008. Her third novel, The Book of Kildare, will be out in March 2010.

Judith Evans Thomas
www.judithevansthomas.com
jetset.judith@gmail.com
Judith is a journalist and author. Her celebrity interview column "Overheard" and lifestyle column "JET Set" have appeared monthly in Pittsburgh Magazine since 2003. She is also the co-author of 30 books in the Born To Shop travel series published by Bantam Books. She is currently at work on a mystery series.

Joyce Tremel
www.joycetremel.com

joyce@joycetremel.com
Joyce is a former employee of a surburban police department. She has a second degree black belt in Taekwondo and was a trainee instructor for two years. Her short story, Agatha, is featured in the Spring 2009 issue of Mysterical-E magazine. Her flash story, The Disappearance of Sarah was a finalist in a short story contest sponsored by The Graveyard Shift. She is currently working on a funny mystery featuring police secretary, Irma Jean Bennett.

Jan Yanko