VJ Books Presents Author Barbara Parker!
 Mystery writer Barbara Parker (Jan. 28, 1946 - Mar. 7, 2009) was born in Columbia, South Carolina. She spent much of her childhood in the mountains of North Carolina, until the family relocated to Florida. She graduated from the University of South Florida, where she studied drama and history before going on to law school at the University of Miami. Married by this time with a daughter and a son soon to follow, Parker worked for a time as a prosecutor in the state attorney's office, then for eight years as a sole practitioner.
It wasn't until the mid-1980s, after a divorce, that it occurred to her to change careers, and then only by accident. Parker decided to take up writing as a hobby, but the hobby became a new way of life. While still practicing law she completed her first novel. Unable to do justice to both writing and her legal career, she gave up the law, went back to school, and earned a master's degree in creative writing from Florida International University (Miami). Parker first published in paperback a love story with elements of mystery to it. Her first suspense novel, Suspicion of Innocence, was her master's thesis and also a finalist for the Edgar Allan Poe Award for best first mystery novel by an American author. It was later made into a TV movie.
Parker was noted for the meticulous research that went into her novels. She attended police seminars, visited Cuba, hung out with a rock-and-roll band, and talked to sources as varied as fashion models, medical examiners, and ballet dancers. Her years in the legal profession were hardly wasted: The cast of characters who paraded through her office, and the lawyers and judges with whom she came into contact, have all helped her become a successful fiction writer.
Barbara Parker died at age 62.
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Mattew Palmer Bibliography
Suspicion Series
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Suspicion of Innocence (1994)
- Suspicion of Guilt (1995)
- Suspicion of Deceit (1998)
- Suspicion of Betrayal (1999)
- Suspicion of Malice (2000)
- Suspicion of Vengeance (2001)
- Suspicion of Madness (2003)
- Suspicion of Rage (2005)
Other
- Blood Relations (1994)
- Criminal Justice (1997)
- The Perfect Fake (2006)
- The Dark of Day (2008)
- The Reckoning (2009) (unfinished)
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