To celebrate the release of her new psychological thriller The Housemaid, we asked author Freida McFadden to tell us all about herself, giving 'six things' she'd like her readers to know. Here's what she had to reveal...
Freida McFadden, The Housemaid
1. I am not a brain surgeon. I would imagine this statement applies to most authors, but it’s a question I get asked a lot, so I want to clear it up once and for all: I am not a brain surgeon. I am, however, a brain injury trained physician. I see patients who have had all ranges of traumatic and non-traumatic brain injuries, and I help manage their recovery. But I’m not a surgeon. I don’t get to drill holes in people's brains. I don’t get to remove any skulls. I don’t get to do anything cool like that. So please stop asking me what it’s like to feel the brain!
2. I have one child and one teenager. I suppose I could say that I have two children, but I really feel like a teenager is a completely different sort of category. I think they might be a different species altogether. I would ask her opinion on this, but I’m pretty sure if I did, her answer would involve something about not caring.
3. I wrote my first novel when I was 11. Yes, I have been doing this a long time (it’s not polite to ask how long). My first novel was about a woman whose husband was murdered, and there were a lot of suspects. And now that I think about it, I don’t remember who the killer turned out to be. But it was a shocking twist that nobody could have possibly seen coming, I’ll tell you that much! If you’d like to know, the answer lies in a marble notebook somewhere in the depths of my mother’s spare bedroom.
4. I'm originally from New York City. What does that mean? Well, it means that I’m very particular about my bagels. Very particular. And my pizza. It means I didn’t get my driver’s license till I was 22, because who needs a car when you have the subway? And when somebody says “the city,“ they’re obviously referring to New York City—I don’t care if you are in California, New York is obviously where you are headed this weekend if you said you are going to a club in the city.
5. I love to bake mini cupcakes. One day, I was watching Cupcake Wars, and I was like, this needs to be part of my life. I was going to write that I like to make cupcakes, but considering the only cupcake tin I have used in the last five years is my little tiny one, I felt like I had to modify that statement. Mini cupcakes are far superior to normal sized cupcakes. I’m pretty sure they don’t even have any calories, although that statement may need to be fact checked.
6. My favourite book series when I was a kid was The Baby-Sitter's Club by Ann M. Martin. Oh, how I loved Kristy, Mary Anne, Claudia, and Stacey and their babysitting adventures! I even read all the super specials, the mysteries, and even the super mysteries, which were like regular mysteries except more... super? My other absolute favorite author was Judy Blume, especially that one book she wrote about the girl who comes of age. You know which one I mean.
In summary, my favourite place to be is hanging out in Greenwich Village, eating a mini cupcake and a bagel, reading a Baby-Sitters Club super mystery, and definitely not doing surgery on someone’s brain.
About the Author
#1 Amazon bestselling author Freida McFadden is a practicing physician specialising in brain injury who has penned multiple Kindle bestselling psychological thrillers and medical humour novels. She lives with her family and black cat in a centuries-old three-story home overlooking the ocean, with staircases that creak and moan with each step, and nobody could hear you if you scream. Unless you scream really loudly, maybe.
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