If anyone can create a good local murder, it’s crime writer Allison Leotta. As a former federal prosecutor, she never gets details wrong about inadmissible evidence or the execution of search warrants. As a D.C.-area local, her characters never have offices on the 50th floor or flee to the Georgetown Metro station. Her crime novels portray D.C. in all its realistic glory. (Her most recent book includes the villain leading FBI agents on a car chase down Independence Avenue and squeezing through the gates of the Smithsonian’s Enid Haupt Garden in a Smart car).
Leotta talks about the ways the nation’s capital succeeds (or occasionally fails) as a setting for thrillers, and how other popular media set in D.C. have led audiences to applaud—or wince.
Her new book, A Good Killing (Touchstone) is available for signing.
