Eve K. Sandstrom earned a degree in journalism at the University of Oklahoma and also studied with Carolyn G. Hart and Jack Bickham in the OU Creative Writing Program. She spent more than twenty-five years in the newspaper business, working as a reporter, editor, and columnist at The Lawton Constitution in Lawton, Oklahoma. She took an early retirement to write fiction full-time.

She was born in Oklahoma, as were five previous generations of her mother's family. Both her grandfathers and her father were in the oil business, once the backbone of Oklahoma's economy. One grandmother was born in the Choctaw Nation, and Eve is a member of the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma. Eve is a graduate of the University of Oklahoma.

When Eve started a new series set in this location, her editor requested that she use a pen name for the new series, and Eve picked the middle names of her three children, Betsy Jo, Ruth Anna, and John Carl. "JoAnna Carl" was born.

Therefore JoAnna Carl and Eve K. Sandstrom both write mystery novels which rely on regional settings for atmosphere, background and clues. JoAnna writes about the shores of Lake Michigan and has been reviewed in Michigan newspapers as a "regional writer." Eve writes about Southwest Oklahoma and once won an award for the best book of the year with an Oklahoma setting.



Joel Goldman (who writes legal thrillers and is from Kansas City) has agreed to be our Toastmaster.

Joel Goldman is the author of Shake Down, a thriller to be published in April 2008 by Kensington Publishing Corp. as a Pinnacle paperback. Shake Down introduces FBI Special Agent Jack Davis who struggles to hold his life together while tracking down a cold blooded killer who executed five people. He is also the author of the Lou Mason thriller series which includes the Edgar-nominated The Last Witness and Shamus-nominated Deadlocked.