Peggy Rothschild's "Playing Dead," the movie

Featured at My Book, The Movie: Playing Dead by Peggy Rothschild.

About the book, from the publisher:

Molly Madison is a former cop and P. I. Three months before the book begins, she relocated from Massachusetts to California to escape the rumors and suspicion about her possible involvement in her husband’s murder. Now working as a dog trainer, Molly is getting to know her new beachside town. She’s thirty-seven and has two dogs of her own, Harlow, a golden retriever, and Noodle, a Saint Berdoodle. When she takes her dogs to Playtime Academy to try out their classes, everything’s going great—until one of her dogs discovers a dead body. The universally unpopular victim was seen having a heated argument with Felicity—another agility handler—earlier in the day. Molly doesn’t believe Felicity is a killer, but her new friend won’t tell her what the fight was about. With a murder charge hanging over Felicity’s head, Molly begins investigating—with the help of her dogs.

I don’t usually picture actors when I’m writing. In Playing Dead, the lone exception was the character of Shondra Davis. The entire time I was writing her, I pictured Erica Tazel. But as I widened my thought process to dream-cast my book, the following actors came to mind:

For Molly Madison, I can easily see the wonderful Mary Elizabeth Winstead. She’s played a range of characters in her career and her portrayal of Nikki Swango in Fargo was perfect. She’s great at messaging inner strength—as well as physical strength—and does so well with light touches of humor.

Miguel Vasquez is a detective in the Pier Point Police Department and Molly’s boyfriend. The two rushed into a relationship and now Molly suspects her smart, sexy man is...[read on]

Visit Peggy Rothschild's website.

Q&A with Peggy Rothschild.

The Page 69 Test: Playing Dead.

My Book, The Movie: Playing Dead.

--Marshal Zeringue