From the Booking Desk:

Cindy Callaghan is the Agatha-Award-Winning author of the most delightful middle grade novels – one series of which is now a hit Amazon television show as well. I have had the pleasure of meeting Cindy at the Malice Domestic Mystery Convention and I can tell you her passion for the stories she tells is immediately evident the moment you start talking with her. I am thrilled to have her here as part of the Composite Sketch series and hope that if you have young readers in your life, you will introduce them to the worlds Cindy Callaghan has created.

Name: Cindy Callaghan
Location: Wilmington, Delaware

This person from my personal life was such an inspiration: 

Is it cliché to say it was a teacher? Around third grade I penned my first masterpiece…it was the sequel to the hit movie Grease. And this music teacher…Mr. Hunt…directed my class production of Hair Oil! I mean, who does that? He took a little girl’s dream and made it a reality. 

One of the people I admire most in the crime fiction community is:

Michael Connelly. Here’s the background…I was a reluctant reader as a kid. That’s right, no finding me under the blanket with a flashlight reading Nancy Drew. Nope. Despite this, I always wrote…stories, plays, poems, songs. It wasn’t until after college that I found myself browsing a Borders and I picked up and bought a book. Probably my first time. It was The Poet, by Michael Connelly. I loved it. So, I went back and read all of his books.  Then moved from author to author doing the same thing. He got me hooked… so hooked that I thought, this is what I want to do.  

STALKER ALERT! If this fictional character were real, they would likely need to get a restraining order against me:

Mitch McDeere from The Firm. I finished the Grisham book in a day and I still think about Mitch. Adam Cassidy from Joseph Finder’s Paranoia is a close second. They actually have similar qualities…they’re the low man on the totem pole pulled into a high-stakes mystery. While I love Harry Bosch, I always imagined he was a little too old for me, but then Titus Welliver plays him in the Amazon series, and, I mean, well, that changes everything, right? And since he’s a cop and all, he’d be pretty hard to stalk.

People are always surprised that I am a fan of this individual (singer, actor, or artist): 

I love Sinatra. Sinatra music makes me feel like I’m “home.” There’s something cozy, romantic, reminiscent…I can sing along or just absorb it.

My personal catch phrase is (or should be): 

“Make your own luck.” That is, things don’t just magically “happen”… you make them happen through hard work, good deeds, networking, growing, learning. Good timing always helps.