Guest Post, Marla Cooper, Mysteries

Guest Chick: Michelle Chouinard

Marla here. I’m thrilled to welcome Michelle Chouinard to the blog today as she celebrates the release of book two in The Serial-Killer Guide to San Francisco series, starring Capri Sanzio, the fictional founder and co-owner of SF Killer Crime Tours. I recently caught up with Michelle at Bouchercon in New Orleans, and, yes, we took a ghost tour together!

Hello, my name is Michelle, and I’m addicted to city walking tours—an addiction that recently delivered me into the waiting clutches of a haunted toilet.

But more on that in a minute.

The question authors get asked more than any other is ‘Where do you get your ideas from?’ We all have our strategies for stoking the creative fires, and one of mine is to put on my walking shoes, open my eyes, and let the world guide me to wondrous things. I know what you’re thinking—wouldn’t a bus tour be just as good, and a lot more comfortable? Sure, a bus tour will whiz you around in air-conditioned luxury as you catch glimpses of all the major sites in a city in no time flat. In Paris, for example, you can see Notre Dame, the Eiffel Tower, the Arc du Triomphe and the opera house all in less than an hour. And since time is precious, that’s a very efficient way to see as much as possible. 

But that approach only allows you to experience one dimension of the city. When you get out and walk along the streets, you see it in five dimensions—maybe more. One of the best meals I’ve ever had in my life came because I caught a whiff of chowder outside a Ketchikan restaurant. When I heard the unexpected bleating of a goat on the streets of Paris, I followed the sound around a corner and stumbled onto a festival celebrating the Alps. Tears have poured out of me unexpectedly when I stumbled onto a holocaust memorial outside the Legion of Honor in San Francisco. None of these surprises would have been mine if I hadn’t gone out on my own two feet and explored. 

The best part about a walking tour is it allows you to discover the city’s true character. After being warned my whole life that Parisians were ‘rude,’ you’ll imagine my surprise when a Frenchwoman stopped unbidden to help me find my way as I struggled to match my surroundings to my map. Later that same day, as I passed through the square in front of Notre Dame, I caught sight of another Frenchwoman feeding the sparrows out of her hand; when I had no luck trying to do the same, she spotted me, strode over, corrected my technique via gesture, and within seconds I had five little sparrows perched on my fingers. As my husband and I followed the Freedom trail in Boston, no fewer than six locals struck up conversations with us about hockey thanks to the logo on his hat; this progressed to good-natured ribbing and pub recommendations. Walking down the street shows you the shops people patronize every day, lets you overhear local conversations, and puts you in the thick of real people living their real lives. And that’s story-writing gold.

Okay, sure, I hear you saying—but what does this have to do with a haunted toilet? I’m so glad you asked. On a recent conference trip to New Orleans, I hijacked a couple of friends into taking a ghost/vampire/Vodou tour of the French Quarter. About halfway through we went into a small hotel for a bathroom break. The building was historic, at least a few hundred years old, and like most old buildings it had a few quirks. In this case, the water in the lobby toilet was boiling hot—literally, to the point where steam came up off of it.

Now, in any other city, there’d be a simple sign explaining that to the patrons, but this was New Orleans, and there was no way any New Orleanian would let an opportunity like that be wasted. The woman overseeing the piano bar warned us earnestly to be careful—the toilet was haunted, she said, and we were likely to feel the spirit of the ghost raising up and warming us as we availed ourselves of the facilities. I can’t imagine anything more perfectly New Orleans that that, just like I can’t imagine anything more San Francisco than the smell of patchouli wafting out to me as I walked down Haight street this past spring. 

So, you can bet I’ll be taking any and every walking tour that presents itself to me, and I highly recommend you do that same. In the meantime, you can be darned sure a supposedly haunted toilet will make it into one of my books, someway somehow.

Readers, what’s your city tour vibe: Ghosts? Food? History? And what’s your favorite tour you’ve been on?

About Michelle:

M.M. Chouinard is the Edgar-Award nominated, USA Today, Publishers Weekly, and San Francisco Chronicle bestselling author of The Serial-Killer Guide to San Francisco series, the Detective Jo Fournier thriller series, and the standalone psychological thriller The Vacation. She has a Ph.D in developmental psychology from Stanford University and was one of the founding faculty members of U.C. Merced. She enjoys caffeine in all forms, amateur genealogy, crafting, baking, and Halloween. She has three cats, a dog, and a husband who technically keeps her from being a crazy cat lady.

Website: www.mmchouinard.com

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/mmchouinardauthor

Twitter: https://twitter.com/m_m_chouinard

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mmchouinard/

TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@m.m.chouinard

Newsletter signup: https://mailchi.mp/1942c1705c36/the-rap-sheet

26 thoughts on “Guest Chick: Michelle Chouinard”

  1. I love this, Michelle! The last time my wife and I were in NOLA, we took a ghost tour through the French Quarter. It was an evening filled with horrific stories and memorable oddities, not the least of which was our tour guide, who claimed to be a vampire! How about that for story material!

    Liked by 3 people

    Reply

  2. Glad you’re here, Michelle! Congrats on A Tour to Die For! I, for one, would prefer not to use a haunted toilet…maybe a sink would be okay.

    For L.A., I think the vibe would be good food paired with glamour.

    This past summer, I did a tour of The Cotswolds, which was fun (1/2 walking, 1/2 riding in a car). I’ve also always wanted to do a foodie tour…

    Liked by 2 people

    Reply

  3. Michelle, welcome to Chicks, and so nice to meet you! What a fun post. Now I regret missing the ghost tour in NOLA. Sort of. I’ve heard some ghosts bring a chill to the air. Hope that one in the toilet wasn’t steaming mad. Tourwise, I have to say the architectural riverboat tour through Chicago. Fascinating–centuries and decades of clearly-defined change that literally shaped the Second City. (And now I know how Chicago got that nickname. Doesn’t mean it’s second best–it refers to rebuilding after the Great Fire.)

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

  4. Michelle! As you know, I’m always up for a good ghost tour. And wait — you’re telling me that that toilet wasn’t really haunted?! Congratulations on book two in your fabulous series!

    Liked by 3 people

    Reply

  5. Walking is my favorite thing to do in any city I’m visiting. And I don’t sign up for tours; I simply get out a map and start walking. As you say, it’s the best way to get to know the real city–by hearing, smelling, touching, and seeing all the details along the streets as you pass by.

    Thanks so much for visiting the Chicks today, Michelle–and, being from NorCal, that comment about smelling patchouli wafting down the street in the Haight totally cracked me up.

    Liked by 3 people

    Reply

  10. Michelle, I’ve done several NOLA haunted tours and would have loved to do another! I’m sorry you didn’t rope me into yours. (And BTW, was the tour guide odd and quirky? That seems to be a job requirement!)

    I will always walk, when given the opp. In fact, Jer and I just got back from Paris last night and we put on 15K or more steps a day! Our final day in the Marais, I made a list of all the interesting sites in the neighborhood and we hit them all. We chose this instead of hitting the big museums.

    The one thing I will do when it’s available is a boat tour. That often allows you to see things you wouldn’t otherwise, or get a diff view of a city. We did one on the Seine twice because the first time was after we arrived and couldn’t check into our hotel yet and I slept through the whole cruise!

    Liked by 2 people

    Reply

  11. Michelle, thank you so much for visiting with us. Love, love, love you post. Congratulations on A Tour to Die For. I enjoy walking tours, whether they’re through nature sites or historic sites. As you stated, you see so much more on the ground.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

  12. Michelle,

    great post. I really enjoy it. My goal is to see Alcatraz someday.

    I live outside of DC, so of course there’s historical tours. Imagine that! There is also at least one haunted tour, that I haven’t been on yet. And there is a Ryers tour as well. I need to find that book, I do have it. Maybe someday people will show up for Malice early, and we can do a group field trip.

    my favorite goes to, is in Philly though.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply
  13. Pingback: 🎃 Welcome to Spooky Season – Chicks on the Case

Leave a comment