It’s not that Iowa and the Midwest make better settings than other regions, it’s that Iowa is what I know, where I feel most comfortable, where I call home. Willa Cather, my favorite author, said it best: “Let your fiction grow out of the land beneath your feet.” I love this quote so much that I have it hanging near my desk as I write.

Excerpt

Read on for a sneak peek at Heather Gudenkauf’s next chilling thriller, The Overnight Guest!

August 2000

On August 12, 2000, Abby Morris, out of breath with sweat trickling down her temple, was hurrying down the gray ribbon of gravel road for her nightly walk. Despite her long sleeve shirt, pants, and the thick layer of bug spray, mosquitos formed a halo around her head in search of unexposed flesh. She was grateful for the light the moon provided and the company of Pepper, her black Lab. Jay, her husband, thought she was unwise to walk this time of night, but between working all day, picking up the baby at daycare and then dealing with all the chores at home, 9:30 to 10:30 was the one hour of the day that was truly her own.

Not that she was scared. Abby grew up walking roads like these. County roads covered in dusty gravel or dirt and lined with cornfields. In the three months they’d lived here, she never once encountered anyone on her evening walks, which suited her just fine.

“Roscoe, Roscoe!” came a female voice from far off in the distance. Someone calling for their dog to come home for the night, Abby thought. “Ro-sss-co,” the word was drawn out in a singsongy cadence but edged with irritation.

Pepper was panting heavily, her pink tongue thick and nearly dragging on the ground.

Abby picked up her pace. She was almost to the halfway spot in her three-mile loop. Where the gravel met a dirt road nearly swallowed up by the cornfields. She turned right and stopped short. Sitting on the side of the road, about forty yards away, was a pickup truck. A prickle of unease crept up her back and the dog looked up at Abby expectantly. Probably someone with a flat tire or engine trouble left the truck there for the time being, Abby reasoned.

She started walking again, and a feathery gauze of clouds slid across the face of the moon, plunging the sky into darkness, making it impossible to see if someone was sitting inside the truck. Abby cocked her head to listen for the purr of an engine idling, but all she could hear was the electric saw buzz serenade of thousands of cicadas and Pepper’s wet breathing.

“Come, Pepper,” Abby said in a low voice as she took a few steps backward. Pepper kept going, her nose close to the ground, following a zigzagging path right up to the truck’s tires. “Pepper!” Abby said sharply. “Here!”