Tuesday Thrillers: guest author Robin Lamont

Please welcome Robin Lamont to my blog, she is the author of a Thriller novel called, If Thy Right Hand. she is blogging today and  how a Broadway actress became a writer!

 To say that I’ve had varied career would be an understatement.  Broadway actress to private investigator to lawyer to author (with a brief stint in radio advertising in between).

In some ways I feel that I’ve been writing all my life.  When I was about ten years old, living in Brooklyn, I decide to publish a family newsletter.  I interviewed my parents and my six siblings and reported on various events in our lives.  Soon I tired of school and home news and decided to venture further afield.  So one afternoon, I walked down to the Brooklyn Navy Yard and interviewed a couple of dock workers about their jobs, just like Studs Terkel.  When I proudly handed out the next newsletter, complete with stirring interviews, my father had an adverse reaction to his daughter’s lone foray to the Brooklyn Navy Yard.  As I recall, that was my last publication.

My first real career was in theater.  I attended Carnegie Mellon University to study acting, and in my junior year did a show that my friend John-Michael Tabelak created called Godspell.  The show went on to open in New York – and I went with it.  I was privileged to sing the song “Day by Day’ which went on to become a top Billboard hit.  My love of singing and music inspired me to write songs; and I put together a small portfolio of tunes, stylistically leaning toward country and western.  I even wrote the score to a small independent film for kids called Summerdog.

My acting career went fairly well, as long as pop/ rock musicals were in vogue.  When the movie of Godspell was cast, I was lucky enough to be chosen to join that cast.  I went on to play Sandy in Grease on Broadway, which was about as much fun as you can have and call it work.  After that, I developed a role in another Broadway-bound show called Working, in which I sang James Taylor’s hauntingly beautiful song, Millworker. 

Most actors need a day job, and I was no exception.  So I signed on with a small private investigations firm that hired actors to work undercover jobs to ferret out counterfeiters. Our boss at the time called it the “ultimate street theater.”  I can’t honestly say that I did much writing at that job.  But it certainly provided me a look into the seamier side of New York, where I came into contact with an array of unusual characters.  Many of those characters inspired my new novel Wright for America, which should be out in February of 2012.  

Some those characters were real-life bad guys.  So realizing that I needed a day job for my day job, I applied to law school.  Several years later I found myself an Assistant District Attorney in Westchester County, NY, where I practiced for nearly eight years.  Working in law requires an immense amount of reading, and because I spent much of my time as a prosecutor in appeals, I wrote constantly.  True, legal writing can be tedious.  But I developed a new appreciation for words and their impact.  As a layer, one is not supposed to be too “artistic”; you write facts and argue the law.  But the use of language in explaining the facts and arguing the law as applied to those facts, I felt, could sometimes make or break a case. 

When I finally left the DA’s office, I brought with me a strong desire to tap into my earlier creative juices.  I wanted to bring to life the heartbreak I’d seen working at the DA’s office and the crazy situations I’d encountered as an investigator.  I hope I have captured some of the former in my novel If Thy Right Hand.  Although a suspense novel, it deals with the insidious nature of child sex abuse, where there can be a cloudy line between abuser and abused.  I’m so pleased that the book was chosen for Suspense Magazine’s Best of 2011 list. 

As for the wild adventures I had as a private investigator, I will let my next book Wright for America tell the tale.  In the meantime, I am always happy to converse with readers and other authors, and I can be contacted via my website www.robin-lamont.com.

Thanks for this opportunity to blog and write yet a bit more!

If Thy Right Hand Blurb:

When her autistic son is accused of abusing two young boys, an impassioned prosecutor's world falls apart. She becomes caught between his claim of innocence and her lifelong dedication to putting sex offenders behind bars. Things take a deadly turn when Ilene Hart discovers that someone is killing sex offenders with a biblical sense of retribution. In her pursuit to keep her son from becoming the next victim, she must confront her misperceptions about herself, her children, and the sometimes cloudy line between abuser and abused.

Author Robin Lamont worked as a Broadway actress, playing lead roles in Godspell, Grease, and Working. Her original cast recording of "Day by Day" and her film version of the song have drawn fans from around the world. Following an eight year stint as an undercover private investigator, she earned her law degree and practiced as an Assistant District Attorney in New York, where she lives with her family.