Welcome! Present Tense is written by Caitlin Wahrer, author of The Damage, and Andromeda Romano-Lax, author of two suspense novels—What Boys Learn (2026) and The Deepest Lake—as well as Annie and The Wolves, Plum Rains, Behave, The Detour, and The Spanish Bow.
Our posts publish (usually!) on Thursdays.
Join us as we explore the world of suspense fiction and wander beyond it, jumping genres, blurring boundaries, making new friends, and indulging our nerdy sides as we investigate books, publishing, the writing life, and anything else we can’t stop thinking about.
Curious how the project got started? Here’s Caitlin’s side of the story.
And here, a sampling of our tricks & treats:
Reverse outlining lessons from an Edgar winner
At a recent reading I gave someone asked me just how I came to write crime fiction. I told her the truth: mostly by accident. I often say to my students that if you had told me in my late 20s, when I was starting graduate school, that I was going to be known as a crime writer, it would have been like telling present-day me that in another five years I wil…
How to Gone a Girl in 3 Steps
Last month I wrote about why I think story structure is so important when you’re writing suspense. When I’ve worked with young writers, I’ve taught the three-act story structure early on. It’s my favorite to work with, it’s easy to understand, and like many a thriller, it comes with a midpoint twist.
Agatha Christie, Lesson #2: "The importance of books, re-reading, solitude and time"
This is the second in a monthly series. The first installment is here. If you’d met Agatha Christie as a child, you wouldn’t have guessed you were meeting a bestselling author in the making. We can’t reshape our early years, but we can hope to cultivate some of the habits and advantages Agatha had: a love of reading, a special love of
