After More Than Two Decades at the Met, Erica Miner Has Plenty of Murder-Worthy Material
Having spent much of my career in the performing arts, I cannot resist arts-centered mysteries, and Erica Miner’s Julia Kogan Mystery series is one of my absolute favorites! Erica’s background gives her series such richness, and I’m delighted to feature her on my blog today as she celebrates a new release in her series.
First off, congratulations on the release of OVERTURE TO MURDER, the third book in your Julia Kogan Mystery series. Can you share with our readers a bit about OVERTURE TO MURDER and what inspired your series?
Thank you, Lynn! In OVERTURE TO MURDER, our intrepid violinist sleuth Julia heads to the San Francisco Opera, under inordinate amounts of pressure as she replaces the ailing concertmaster, Ben, who has suffered serious injuries in a hit-and-run accident, which Julia suspects might not have been accidental. When one prominent company member becomes the victim of a grisly murder, Julia cannot resist becoming involved in the investigation. As in her previous sleuthing at the Metropolitan Opera and Santa Fe Opera, Julia once again discovers that fiery artistic temperaments, and danger lurking in the dark hallways and back stairways of an opera house, provide a chilling backdrop for murder. This time, however, it’s not only her own life that is in peril. 
Your background as a professional violinist with the Met gives your series such authenticity. To what extent did your colleagues over the years inspire the characters you’ve created, both your protagonists and villains?
To every extent! In my Opera Mystery series, I get to kill off all the people who made my life miserable (just kidding; not). But seriously, the musicians and others with whom I worked were quirky, fascinating, and maddening: wannabe stars, detestable divas, snarky stagehands, not to mention my orchestra colleagues. The entire place was a goldmine from which I could create and develop limitless numbers of characters who fit right in with the mysterious atmosphere of my murder mysteries. Julia admittedly is based on me when I first started out at the Met, though she is a good deal braver than I ever could be! Villains were inspired by everyone from lothario-type opera singers to heads of departments who in real life who would never dream of being villainous. Other characters are comprised of combinations of characteristics drawn from people I knew well over the years. It’s a never-ending parade!
How has Julia grown and changed personally and professionally during the course of your series? 
Julia has transformed from the starry-eyed neophyte making her debut at the Met on opening night in the first book, ARIA FOR MURDER, to the savvy, experienced musician and first violinist leader of the San Francisco Opera Orchestra in Wagner’s challenging ‘Ring’ and investigator in OVERTURE TO MURDER. One Amazon reviewer really nailed her character: ‘‘There is nothing like a heroine violinist capable of practicing a tricky passage from a Wagnerian opera score while simultaneously pondering the clues she has collected during a murder investigation.” But now she can’t afford to be as cavalier about her own safety as she has been in the previous books in the series: she has a family of her own that she must protect from danger.
I noticed that each book features a different location for Julia. What kind of research did you do on each setting?
I didn’t have to do research for ARIA FOR MURDER, since it takes place at the Met, where I was a violinist for 21 years. I knew the place inside out: well enough to recall all the back hallways and dark stairways, as well as invent dangerous places that fit in with the plot. For the second book, PRELUDE TO MURDER, which is set at Santa Fe Opera, I had to do huge amounts of research, both online and on site, as I’d never been there. It was absolutely fascinating to learn about the history of Santa Fe, the second oldest city in the US, and the Spanish conquistadores who subjugated the natives there. While in Santa Fe, I had a chance meeting with a Navajo Tribe member whom I fictionalized in the book! It was wonderful to visit the wealth of unique locations from which I could choose plot settings, most of all the Santa Fe Opera House. It is a unique, amazing space, filled with intriguing people and places that fit in perfectly with my theme: an architecturally soaring, captivating theatre in the middle of the New Mexico desert. And I was provided access to the people who worked there, who gave me detailed tours of their various departments, providing inspiration for countless scenes and characters in the book. But in some ways, San Francisco Opera is closest to my heart. I have dear friends and relatives who worked there and lived in the Bay Area. I spent so much time visiting there over the years. Researching the history of San Francisco, from the Gold Rush and the miners to the Italians who founded the opera company, I found myself going down endlessly fascinating rabbit holes. Did you know opera in the city started out as music hall entertainment for the gold miners, and the influx of Europeans there raised that to a level sophisticated enough to attract the so-called beautiful people? It’s all woven into the plot of OVERTURE TO MURDER. 
Can you share with our readers a bit about your writing process?
A related question: What’s a typical writing day like for you?
My practice discipline as a performing musician has carried over to my writing life. In order to give my full attention to whatever I’m writing, whether it’s a novel, screenplay, lecture or music review, I have to clear the decks before I can sit down at the computer. That means waking up early, doing breakfast, exercise, and all the usual early morning activities. Then I am ready to devote most of the day to become the totally committed wordsmith I want to be. I do take breaks for tea or lunch, but I get back to the writing as soon as possible. By late afternoon I usually run out of steam, so I give myself a break unless I get a second wind in the evening. If I’m on a deadline, I make another cup of tea and go back to it until late.
You also write about opera and lecture on its history. How do you balance your various professional commitments?
With great difficulty! I like to joke with my other “retired” friends that we’re busier now than we were when we had full time day (or in my case, day and night) jobs. I try to organize all my dates for book deadlines, lectures, blog posts and other events in various files on my desktop and in my e-calendar. It’s kind of a lost cause. My desktop is a prime example of overpopulation. It’s so overcrowded, I’d be too embarrassed to show it to you! Nonetheless, whatever the commitment, whether in person or virtual, I try to give it a hundred and ten percent.
Do you plan to continue the series? (I hope so!) And what are you currently working on writing-wise?
I’m being very close to the vest on another sequel, but it has been mentioned in an exchange with my publisher (stay tuned.) Meanwhile, as I was just admitted to membership in the Music Critics Association of North America, about which I’m quite excited, I will be spending the coming weeks dreaming up pitches for some of the musical organizations listed there—and hopefully writing lots of articles, which can also provide inspiration for my fiction.
What advice would you give anyone who aspires to write mysteries?
Read everything you can about the genre. Take classes in the craft. And read, read, read the great mystery writers, from Agatha Christie on.
Anything else you’d like to add, or wish I’d asked that I didn’t?
I’d like to thank you, Lynn, for featuring me once again on your fabulous blog, and all you readers who take the time to avail yourselves of the great content you can find here. And remember: the only thing better than a great story is a great story with music!
BIO
After a successful career as a violinist with New York’s Metropolitan Opera, award-winning writer, lecturer, arts journalist, and screenwriter Erica Miner transitioned into writing full time. In her Julia Kogan Opera Mystery series, she draws on her experience with her two great loves, music and writing, to create fanciful plot fabrications that guide readers through a dramatized version of the opera world by revealing the dark side of that fascinating milieu.
In 2022, Level Best Books published the first in Erica’s Opera Mystery series, Aria for Murder, (finalist in the 2023 Eric Hoffer Book Awards and Chanticleer Independent Book Awards), in which talented neophyte violinist Julia Kogan witnesses the murder of her mentor, a famous conductor, during a performance at the Met, soon finds herself entangled in the murder investigation, and becomes the killer’s next victim. The equally thrilling sequel, Prelude to Murder, (‘A skillfully written whodunit of operatic proportions’—Kirkus Reviews; a Distinguished Favorite in the 2024 NYC Big Book Awards), which takes place at Santa Fe Opera, released in 2023. Book 3, Overture to Murder, set at San Francisco Opera, releases in Oct. 2024.
When she isn’t plumbing the depths of opera houses for murderous mayhem, Erica frequently contributes reviews and interviews of real-world musical artists for the well-known arts websites BroadwayWorld.com, us.Bachtrack.com, and LAOpus.com. Her writings also have appeared in PNWA Magazine, Vision Magazine, WORD San Diego, Our City Istanbul, and numerous E-zines. She has lectured about writing and opera for groups from coast-to-coast and internationally, and has been interviewed numerous times on radio and online podcasts.
CONTACT:
Buy links for Overture to Murder:
https://www.amazon.com/Overture-Murder-Julia-Kogan-Mystery/dp/1685127819/
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/overture-to-murder-erica-miner/1146432661
I LOLed at your ‘killing off people who made your life miserable’ joke, Erica. Yours are the most beautiful covers. Best of luck with your latest– OVERTURE TO MURDER!