As Close as You Can Get to True Crime While Still Breathing!

And a Chance to Win a $25 Gift Card & More Free Book Links...What Could Be Better?

Mar 07, 2025

For you true crime lovers, on March 25th, I’ll be releasing the first of a multi-volume series of true crime travel guides called Vacations Can Be Murder: A True Crime Lover’s Travel Guide. These are written under my own name, Dawn M. Barclay, as opposed to my fiction pseudonym, D.M. Barr.

The first volume covers the six states of New England, and includes information on the major crimes that occurred there, including addresses; where to read for more information; true crime and haunted tours; hotels and restaurants that are either haunted or have a crime/justice connection; museums and other attractions that are crime- or justice-related; locations of the prisons and burial sites; and itineraries that bring it all together to make for easy touring. There’s even a Victim Resources Guide included for each state. No other than Katherine Ramsland, author of 73 books and a familiar face from Forensic Files, has called the book “a gem of a travel guide.” I’ll have buy links up next month, but check out this trailer here:

Question of the Month: Win a $25 Gift Card!

How would you cast the movie version of Deadly when Disturbed?

Send responses to dawnbarclayauthor@gmail.com with “Question of the Month” in the Subject Line. You must list at least three characters and the actors or actresses you think would be great portraying them. I will randomly select one answer and send a $25 Amazon gift card to the reader who submitted it!

Deadly When Disturbed Audiobook!

Great reviews still coming in for the e-book and paperback. Be sure to check out the audiobook, dropping March 18th! Here are the buy links for the print, and I’ll publish the audiobook links in the April newsletter:

Google Books (with links to Books-a-Million and Indiebound)

FREE BOOKS!

My gift to you: some links to free books offered by some other mystery, suspense, and romance/romantic suspense authors for you to download.

Here are the links:

Suspense (ends March 10th so act right away!) https://books.bookfunnel.com/suspense-thrillers/gkwk3l9yfl

Thrillers: https://books.bookfunnel.com/mystery-thriller-readers/69by5bxgli

More Thrillers: https://books.bookfunnel.com/chilling-thrillers/styxvjnigm

Romance: https://books.bookfunnel.com/sinfullyaddictiveromance/rw9fykryxw

More Romance: https://books.bookfunnel.com/massivefreeromancebookfairmarch/mj15i7ok1r

Thanks for reading Barr Sinister: The Suspenseful World of D.M. Barr! This post is public so feel free to share it.

What have I been up to?

Award Nods: I’ll be throwing my hat in for the Edgars for 2026 for Deadly When Disturbed, but for the Anthony Awards, given out at Bouchercon this September, cross your fingers for the anthology I co-edited, New York State of Crime: Murder New York Style 6, and the short story I wrote that appears inside: Orchestral Removals in the Dark. You can purchase the book by clicking on the graphic below:

Audiobooks: Currently under production: audiobooks for The Queen of Second Chances, Simple Tryst of Fate, and Saving Grace: A Psychological Thriller.

Anthologies: I’m hard at work, editing submissions for Ya Got Trouble: Crime Fiction Inspired by Broadway Show Tunes, to be published in May 2026 by Down & Out Books. Another open call for stories for a different anthology will go out later this summer.

New Purchase Outlets: While all my paperbacks are available at Bookshop.org (supporting small, independent bookstores), the e-books will soon be available there as well.

Appearances: Several events were postponed in February, due to weather. I will be at Big Red Books in Nyack on April 27th from 12-2pm for Indie Author Day. (Their definition of “indie authors” includes those published by small presses.) I moderated a panel for Sisters in Crime New York/TriState called “Ripped from the Headlines: Fictionalizing True Crime, and I hope to be speaking at Sleuthfest in May in St. Petersburg, Thrillerfest in New York City in June, and Bouchercon in New Orleans in September.

I read from my new short story, “I’m Still Here” at Rough and Ready in New York City on March 3rd. Here’s proof!

May be an image of 1 person, clarinet, oboe and flute

My latest post from Miss Demeanors, titled Writers: Eight Ways to Combat FOMO, ran on March 6th. Click on the photo below to be linked to the post. It’s a great blog (voted #25 in the top 400 mystery/suspense blogs for 2025) so be sure to subscribe.

Here’s the link, just in case: https://www.missdemeanors.com/writers-eight-ways-to-combat-fomo/.