Michelle Chouinard has written eight previous USA Today and Publishers Weekly bestselling mysteries under a different name. She has a Ph.D. in developmental psychology from Stanford University and was one of UC Merced’s founding faculty members. Michelle enjoys caffeine in all forms, amateur genealogy, baking, and anything to do with Halloween or the zombie apocalypse. Her latest novel is The Serial Killer Guide to San Francisco and she recently talked about it with Daryl Maxwell for the LAPL Blog.
What was your inspiration for The Serial Killer Guide to San Francisco?
One day during the pandemic, while I was waiting outside the vet in my car for my cat to be finished, I settled in to listen to a true-crime podcast. One about The Doodler, a serial killer active in San Francisco, had just come out, and as I listened to it, I realized I recognized a number of the areas they were discussing. My mind wandered, thinking how they should have a tour of the locations, how that might spark memories from the time that could help solve the case, like a serial-killer tour type of thing—and while I quickly realized that would be a horrible way to solve a crime, my mind ran with the concept as a book idea.
Are Capri, Morgan, Inspector Petito, or any of the other characters in the novel inspired by or based on specific individuals?
Nope! They all came from the dark corners of my mind…
How did the novel evolve and change as you wrote and revised it? Are there any characters or scenes that were lost in the process that you wish had made it to the published version?
The book became less about Capri’s grandfather’s accused killings and more focused on the modern-day copycat killings. I edited out a fair amount of archive digging Capri does to help solve her grandfather’s accused killings because while I find that sort of thing fascinating and could read chapters and chapters of it, I think most people aren’t archive geeks like me! It’s good it ended up on my cutting floor.
In your Acknowledgements, you refer to San Francisco as your muse and say that you have loved the city since a very young age. What is it about San Francisco that inspires you? Do you have any favorite places? A hidden gem that someone visiting should not miss but would only learn about from a resident?
There’s so much I love about San Francisco, but I think what it boils down to is that San Francisco embraces anyone and anything that marches to their own drum. I always stumble on something that surprises me, and those surprises always inspire me. I have tons of favorite hidden gems and could list them out for you by neighborhood! To keep it short, I’ll just say that Wilson and Wilson is a noir-detective speakeasy that loosely inspired Lenny’s in my book. Giorgio’s Pizza is the very loose inspiration for Salerno’s, and if you want to get a sense for the sort of surprises I’m talking about that hide in plain sight, go to Buena Vista Park and spend a day among the hidden tombstones…
Did you need to do a bit of research about serial killers, past and present, in writing The Serial Killer Guide to San Francisco? If so, what was the most interesting or surprising thing that you learned during your research?
I’ve been researching serial killers since I was a child and discovered that a serial killer in the area had been using a one-horned goat ‘unicorn’ to meet young women at an area renaissance faire—a fair my family regularly attended. Something about that close call stuck with me, and I’ve read everything I can get my hands on ever since (and ended up getting a Ph.D in developmental psychology). One of the most surprising things I learned was that it’s not true that serial killers can’t stop killing once they start, and it’s not true that white males are overrepresented as serial killers.
You mention in your Acknowledgements that you went on walking tours in San Francisco as research for the novel. What tours did you take? What was the most interesting or surprising thing you learned?
I’ve done so many, from gold rush tours to sugar-empire tours to even paranormal ghost tours! Every tour has at least a couple of interesting surprises (for example, in San Francisco, street names are stamped into the cement of each street corner. Why? Because after the 1906 earthquake and the associated fires, we learned the hard way that we needed more permanent markers in the event of future disasters.) Overall, the tour that surprised me the most was the Tenderloin tour because it’s a neighborhood that doesn’t get a lot of love but, that has an incredible amount of social and musical history.
Have you ever taken walking tours in other cities? If so, what kind of tour did you take, and where was it?
Yes! Whenever I travel, I do walking tours because they’re the best way to get a real feel for a city. I’ve taken all sorts of walking tours, from those that focus on architecture to history to those that take you to places where fictional scenes took place in books/movies. One of my favorites is the Freedom Trail in Boston because the red line makes it so simple to follow, and it’s so historically significant. I also did a haunted tour of Salem, Massachusetts, that was incredibly fun.
Is there a tour that you want to take but haven’t yet had the chance?
I’d love to do both a Jack the Ripper tour and a Sherlock Holmes tour in London.
The Serial Killer Guide to San Francisco has a wonderful cinematic quality and would make a marvelous film or television series! If/when it’s adapted, who would your dream cast be?
Thank you so much! I’d love to see Rachel Weisz play Capri, and Patrick Dempsey to play Petito.
Your biography states that you have a Ph.D. in developmental psychology. How does your background in psychology inform or influence your writing of mysteries?
I think the most direct way it informs my writing has to do with character development, that is, with building characters who behave a certain way because of things they’ve experienced in the past. The dance between nature and nurture has always been fascinating to me, as has the question of protective factors—why do two people who experience a similar kind of trauma respond to it in very different ways, some negative, some positive? I think these questions are so central to who we are, both individually and as a species, and I love exploring them in my heroes and my antiheroes.
The ending of the book seems to indicate that readers may be able to join Capri and Inspector Petito on some further adventures (and your website lists The Serial Killer Guide to San Francisco as the first of the "Serial Killer Guide" series). What are your plans for the series? Do you have an idea at this time how long the series will be and how many books will be necessary to tell the story you want to tell?
My current contract is for two books, and the second one is in the editing process. Hopefully, readers enjoy it, and I can write more! I have scores of ideas for adventures I’d like to take Capri on. But I also like to make sure that every book I write, even if it’s a part of a series, has a satisfying conclusion both in terms of the mystery and in terms of my protagonist’s arc. Capri will keep growing and learning, but in each book, she’ll get to an important place she needs to go.
What’s currently on your nightstand?
The Troubling Death of Maddy Benson by Terry Shames; All Hallows by Christopher Golden; A Talent for Murder by Peter Swanson.
Can you name your top five favorite or most influential authors?
Agatha Christie
Sue Grafton
Janet Evanovich
Christopher Moore
Douglas Adams
What was your favorite book when you were a child?
Was there a book you felt you needed to hide from your parents?
No, but I got in trouble for reading Agatha Christie once in my English class. In my defense, I’d finished my classwork and my homework and had nothing else to do!
Is there a book you've faked reading?
Not that I can think of…
Can you name a book you've bought for the cover?
I can’t! I’m sure it’s played a role, but I’m big on reading blurbs before I buy…
Is there a book that changed your life?
When Things Fall Apart by Pema Chodron.
Can you name a book for which you are an evangelist (and you think everyone should read)?
Mistletoe Mysteries, an anthology of Christmas/holiday stories.
Is there a book you would most want to read again for the first time?
Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follett or The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown. Both are such amazing examples of storytelling in very different ways.
What is the last piece of art (music, movies, TV, more traditional art forms) that you've experienced or that has impacted you?
The film Woman of the Hour. While it’s a fictionalized depiction of Rodney Alcala’s crimes, it does an amazing job of exploring how terrifying it can be to be a woman just trying to get through life in this world—and not just because of serial killers.
What is your idea of THE perfect day (where you could go anywhere/meet with anyone)?
It would involve taking a walking tour of a beautiful city with my dog by my side, eating some amazing food, then curling up with my cats to read a good book. With, of course, lots of caffeine pitstops along the way!
What is the question that you’re always hoping you’ll be asked but never have been?
Do you ever get creeped out by your own killers?
What is your answer?
Absolutely. If I don’t have to take at least one mental health break from writing a killer, I know something’s wrong. If my killers don’t frighten me, how are they going to creep out anybody else?
What are you working on now?
I’m editing the second book in the Serial-Killer Guide Series, and am juggling two psychological thrillers, one a closed-circle murder mystery and one about someone who stumbles on the body of a stranger—in their own bed.
