Behind The Book Beach Reads & Deadly Deeds With Allison Brennan

The past two to three years I’ve been very fortunate to do a Q&A and Behind The Book Q&A with New York Times Bestselling Author Allison Brennan. I am delighted to be doing another Behind The Book with Allison Brennan discussing her upcoming standalone, Beach Reads & Deadly Deeds, coming out this summer! If you enjoy mysteries or are a diehard Allison Brennan fan, if I were you, I would preorder Beach Reads & Deadly Deeds which will be available on June 17^th!

Q: Welcome back Allison! Reading Beach Reads & Deadly Deeds took me to a beautiful destination with a mystery to solve. For those who haven’t read Beach Reads & Deadly Deeds, would you please give a brief description of the novel? 

A: Workaholic financial planner and book lover Mia Crawford is forced by her boss to go on vacation to an all-inclusive resort in the Caribbean. She intends to have fun and find a vacation boyfriend, because when she returns home, she’ll have a promotion and more responsibility … and no time for anything else. When she arrives, she realizes she’s in over her head, learns one of the guests has gone missing, and because of a mishap with her grandmother, she didn’t bring a book to read. She picks one up at the gift shop free table and after she starts reading, realizes that someone wrote in code in the margins … and that person knew a lot of secrets about people currently on the island, both staff and guests. And could the missing guest be the one who wrote in the margins? Was she blackmailing people? What happened to her? 

You said brief, LOL, but I never explain my books well.

Q: Where did the idea for Beach Reads & Deadly Deeds come from? How long did it take you to write it?

A: Full disclosure: the initial idea wasn’t mine. I was asked to write a book about “a woman on vacation an all-inclusive resort finds a book where someone wrote in the margins and finds herself in the middle of a mystery and finds love in the process.” I had been wanting to write a stand-alone, so this offer came at the right time. But I was given less than a page of notes. It was challenging to come up with why someone would write in the book, what it meant, who was missing, why was she missing, and who on the island had a reason to “disappear” her. It took me a lot of time and thought creating St. Claire and the people who inhabit the world, because I knew as a character-driven mystery, this would be doubly important. 

As far as how long it took me … the first hundred pages took me over a year because I wrote them on spec, meaning I wasn’t under contract for the book. I had to fit in writing between my other books. I’d spend a weekend on it, then put it aside. Then come back for a couple of days, then put it aside. Once I sold the book, it took me about four months to finish it. (I just checked, and I turned it in on June 17, 2024 – exactly one year before publication!) 

Q: It was hard for me to choose a specific favorite scene. I enjoyed out of all the others because the entire novel was excellent! I will say I love Mia & Brie’s fast friendship and how it quickly became like a sisterhood of sorts. Which scenes were your favorite to create? 

A: I love how Mia and Brie bonded and became friends. There’s a 12-year age difference, but they have a lot in common. And Brie is smart. Both characters were easy to write because I have three daughters – two of them are close to Mia’s age, and one not much older than Brie. 

I’ll admit, I loved a lot of the scenes in the book because they are very different from what I normally write. One of my favorites was Jason catching Mia skinny-dipping at the lagoon late at night. And I really enjoyed the scene where Mia and Brie followed two people who were acting suspicious. I also liked Mia sleuthing on St. John – which is more than what I’m used to writing! And I loved figuring out the mystery near the end – there isn’t just one code in the book! I didn’t know what it was until I got to that point … and then it took me days to figure it out, and I liked writing about the horny honeymooners. 

Q: I love how the theme throughout the novel was Mia had to learn that life isn’t about surviving day after day & some risks were worth taking and that’s what true living is. Was this the lesson & reminder that you wanted readers to learn and remember while reading the novel?

A: I never want to preach to readers or hit them over their head with a theme. But yes, I knew that Mia needed to learn that she couldn’t plan her life (she’s 30) to only start living when she retires. She is super responsible (for very legitimate reasons) which is a terrific trait, but she takes that to the extreme. A lesson, for lack of a better word, that I wanted to impart is that lies and secrets always have a way of coming out, so honesty is the way to go.

My goal is always to entertain. I am cognizant that my readers are giving me something precious: their time. I want to earn that by giving them a satisfying story where, when they close the book, they think it was time well spent. 

Q: If/when Beach Reads & Deadly Deeds were to become a movie or limited series, who would be your dream cast to play the characters you created? Some of my recommendations are Margot Robbie for Mia, Ben Barnes or Max Irons for Jason (especially if Max doesn’t mind dying his hair dark for the role) & Sydney Sweeney for Brie. 

A: All great ideas! (And I love Margot Robbie!) There’s a personality on Instagram who I love, Madison Humphrey. She has great comic timing and would totally fit Mia, according to my daughter. Sydney Sweeney might be a bit old to play an 18-year-old. Maybe Landry Bender (from The Sitter) for Brie. Sophi Knight looks a lot like how I pictured her, or Jenna Ortega who I adore. I don’t know about Jason … I can’t find an actor who looks like him in my head, LOL. 

Q: Before writing Beach Reads & Deadly Deeds, have you ever been to Saint Clair & Saint John? Even if you have not, the descriptions are so colorful I feel as though while reading the novel I was there. 

A: I’ve never been to the Caribbean! I did a lot of research about St. John and “walked” down the streets using Google Maps. But St. Claire is completely fictional – I designed the island exactly how I wanted after looking at hundreds of photos from a variety of islands and resorts.