Hot Blood, Cold Mind – The book Ann Elizabeth Smith wrote under the name A.E. Strongbow. She sent the manuscript to Blaine DeLano, whose mother, Audrey, who handled all author correspondence, returned it unopened per their policy. The accompanying email stated that Smith made the sacrifice, and took a risk by making the killer the central character, the protagonist, telling the story through his eyes. “It is his blood that is hot, his mind that is cold.”
Smith claimed that the Deann Dark book that was published after she sent this book, Sudden Dark was a “twisted bastardization of” her work. She claimed that DeLano’s character, Lucius Osgood, was a ripoff of her character, Evan Quint, although Osgood was a struggling artist rather than a successful businessman and had a beard.[1]
The opening line was: “With skill and grace, with focus and cunning, he tracked his victim like a sleek predatory wolf to a plump, senseless lamb, but never showed the shine and keenness of his fangs.”[2]
References:
- ↑ Dark in Death, Chapter 10
- ↑ Dark in Death, Chapter 22