Armed with a handgun and a word processor, Immigration Officer Cindy Goyette spent her time on the night shift, creating fictional friends to help her pass the lonely hours between border crossers. A portable black-and-white TV canceled the unexplained noises coming from the ancient jail cells in the creepy basement. The resulting book will stay in the closet where it belongs, but the seed was planted, and she’s been writing ever since.

Cindy spent her ensuing years as a probation officer, dealing with hardened criminals with hard-luck stories that sometimes kept her up at night. Every day was an adventure. She survived by finding humor where she could. She often joked about writing a book and then did just that.

The Probation Case Files series was born. The books follow the wild and crazy life of Probation Officer Casey Carson, who has a knack for being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Book one, OBEY ALL LAWS, follows Casey as she rushes to find her missing cousin while a one-eyed, badass, angry gangster tries to stop her. In book two, EARLY TERMINATION, the gang continues to haunt her while she tries to figure out why her clients are dropping like flies, thus earning them an early termination from probation.

Tell us about your new release: In EARLY TERMINATION, there are two ways to get off probation early. The first is to be a model citizen and complete all requirements imposed by the court. The second is to die. In Early Termination, Phoenix probation officer Casey Carson’s clients aren’t civic-minded, but they are dropping like flies.

She’s on a gang’s hit list and a detective’s suspect list and is torn while two very hot men are vying for her heart. As more clients die and a probationer accuses her of brutality, she becomes the focus of the investigation. Casey risks losing everything in her race to find the actual killer, but doing so will put the target squarely on her back. She will need to find the person responsible for lightening her workload before she’s the one terminated.

Tell us about your path to publication: It’s been a long road. I started writing about Casey in the mid-1990s. I neglected the book for years, but I occasionally revised and refined it. By 2015, I had a version much like the published story. Querying isn’t for sissies. After countless rejections, I met my first agent at a conference. She tried to sell OBEY ALL LAWS for years before she gave up and talked me into writing a cozy mystery. We amicably parted ways around then. She’d given up on the book, but I didn’t. Having given the book one final overhaul, I sent it to Level Best Books. And to my surprise, they offered me a three-book deal. I also sold them the cozy: book one, DIAMOND IN THE RUFF, A Wiggle Butt Manor Mystery, is scheduled to be released in May 2025.

In June, I signed with my current agent, who is trying to find a home for my standalone suspense. Working with her has been a dream come true, as she really believes in my story and is an editing ninja. I’ve learned so much from her.

Tell us about your writing process: I consider myself a panster, meaning I write without planning; I start writing and see where it goes. But being under contract means I have to produce two books a year. Since book one took about twenty years, I had to become more disciplined. It helps that I recently retired and can devote more time to writing, but I’ve also had to do some planning. I have somewhat of a road map, but the characters still surprise me. I’m working on book three in the probation series now and I didn’t see the ending coming until I wrote that last chapter. For me, that’s the best part of being a storyteller, telling it to myself!

Who are your favorite authors? There are so many. I was immersed in Janet Evanovich’s Stephanie Plum Series when I started writing Obey All Laws. The greatest compliment I’ve received is when people compare my book to hers. Not that I’m worthy, but it gives me a thrill each time I hear it. Jodi Picoult and Alice Hoffman don’t write in the same genre as me, but I buy and devour all of their books. Right now, I’m reading The Deadening by Kerry Peresta and looking forward to losing myself in the rest of the series.

Where do you place your settings—real or fictional locations? The probation series takes place in Phoenix, where I lived and worked as a PO for most of my career. I now live in Washington, but I visit the Valley of the Sun once a year and do my research to keep the ever-changing Maricopa County locals current. I took poetic license with the probation office where Casey works. It’s a mixture of the different buildings I have worked in. I made up the Pacific Northwest island village of Orca Cove for the cozy, but it’s loosely based on Astoria, Oregon, and Friday Harbor in the San Juan Islands. It was fun to create my own town.

Do you have any advice for new writers? Don’t give up. Had I known it would take me so long to be published, would I have kept writing? Absolutely. I write because I have to. The process is cathartic, even if I’m the only one reading it. These stories are inside of me, and I don’t feel good if I don’t put them down on paper. But I have to say, talking to readers and attending book clubs is the greatest high. When people talk about my characters like they know them, I know I’ve served them well.

How do our readers contact you?
Website: https://www.ccgoyette.com
X: @cindy_ccgoyette
Facebook: Cindy Goyette Author
Instagram: cindy.goyette
Bluesky: @cindygoyetteauthor.bsky.social.

Memberships:
Sisters in Crime
Public Safety Writer’s Association

Buy link:
OBEY ALL LAWS,
EARLY TERMINATION
LOST & LOADED, A Gun’s Tale,

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