Crazy things I have done in the name of research! 

• Attended the FBI's Citizen Academy, which included firing machine and handguns on the gun range. 
• Taken firearms training simulation with the FBI, the police, and at a civilian facility.
• Taken out everything from under the kitchen sink and crawled under it to prove to the copy editor that you could so fit a dead body under there.  
• ​Called the lab that handles toxicology testing for autopsies to ask if they would check for carfentanil (drug used on elephants).
• Talked to a vet at animal hospital to ask about the signs of strychnine poisoning (and then brainstormed how the imaginary dog could be saved).
• Gone on a very quiet police ride along in a tiny Wisconsin town (although at one point we had a prisoner in the back seat - a kitten! - because the police doubled as animal control).
• Gone on a very busy police ride along in Portland with a cop whose real name is Tequila. 
• Taken a knife-fighting class.
• Taken a knife-throwing class.
• Taken a class on close combat training where I was the only woman and the only non-cop in attendance.  At the end of the class, someone sat behind you in your car and attacked you with either a training gun, a training knife, a rope or a plastic bag. 
• Taken a class on how to respond to an active shooter situation. 
• Taken classes with Multnomah County Sheriff's Office Search and Rescue. 
• Spent a day with Portland police criminologists.  
• Taken many self-defense classes, including a four-hour anti abduction class where we had to fight with our hands tied and our heads hooded. 
• Attended the Writers Police Academy many times in both Wisconsin and North Carolina. 
• Was the first novelist to attend the Urban Escape and Evasion class, where I learned how to get out of duct tape, rope, zip ties and handcuffs as well as a million other useful things. 
• Became a certified Wilderness First Responder.  
• Toured derelict RV's held by the Portland Police Department.