My dark thrillers are often described as eerie and atmospheric. Setting is no mere passenger to my plot. Often, place—as well as the protagonist’s voice—inspires much of the story arc before I’ve even started writing.

I snapped this picture of my workspace after very little staging. At times, despite my best efforts, the table becomes a depository for snail mail. I removed a few bills; otherwise, it’s accurate. The table is a zinc-top number that my wife and I found in the...

Thirty-seven years ago, I married a Swiss, and we moved to his hometown of Bern in the German-speaking part of Switzerland. Bern is a city surrounded by a river, the Aare, with a cobblestoned medieval core, the Altstadt or Old Town.

I’ve written entire drafts in hotel lobbies or on the bare floor of a storage room, anywhere I could find a quiet moment. After every writing session, any notebooks, research books, painstakingly arranged notecards, etc. would all have to be bundled up, and hauled out again next session.

For most of my decade-plus career as a published mystery novelist, I’ve worked in what I call my “accidental office,” a converted breakfast nook that sits off the kitchen in our 1930 house in Columbus, Ohio.