Bridgeport (Born) Academic Makes Mystery Writer Debut
Bridgeport native and former Stratford High School teacher Kathleen Kelley Reardon has made her debut as a novelist with “Shadow Campus” (Blue Mustang Press, $14.95), about the mystery surrounding the attempted suicide of a young professor on the eve of attaining tenure.
The woman’s estranged brother travels from New England to Los Angeles for a reunion that leads to the reexaming of the childhood event that caused their split.
The book’s family is from Bridgeport and the brother character is a builder living in Ridgefield.
Reardon left Stratford High to earn her Ph.D, teach at the University of Connecticut and then at the University of Southern California. At the moment, she is on a leave from USC and living in Rhode Island.
Reardon has published 10 nonfiction books on communication, negotiation and politics. She is also a regular blogger for Huffington Post.
Reardon’s books have included, “They Don’t Get It, Do They? Communication in the Workplace — Closing the Gap Between Men and Women” and “Comebacks at Work: Using Conversation to Master Confrontation.”
In an email last week, Reardon told me that she thinks of her novel as the “House of Cards” of academia.
“… Laura Stepp, Pulitzer-prize winning journalist and author of `Unhooked,’ wrote to tell me she was `hooked from the beginning.’ Forbes called it a `masterful debut mystery’ and Christiane Amanpour is reading it,” the writer noted.
Reardon said she enjoyed writing “Shadow Campus” so much that she is working on two mystery sequels.
jmeyers@ctpost.com; Twitter: @joesview
