Best-selling author Barbara Parker is best known for her “Suspicion” series featuring Miami lawyers Gail Connor and Anthony Quintana. Their edgy romance plays out against a backdrop of crime, cultural clashes, and subtropical heat. Initially a prosecutor in the state attorney’s office in Miami, Parker switched to private practice, specializing in real estate and family law. What began as a diversion—writing a short story for her son—blossomed into a new career.

Parker obtained a master’s degree in Creative Writing in 1993. Her first mystery novel, Suspicion of Innocence, released in 1994, was nominated for an Edgar Allen Poe award by Mystery Writers of America. She has penned seven others in the series and two stand-alone novels, all of which have received critical acclaim.

Innocence was followed by Guilt (1995), Deceit (1998), Betrayal (1999), Malice (2000), Vengeance (2001), and Madness (2003). Her latest novel, Suspicion of Rage (February 2005), takes the reader to Cuba.

The two novels not in the series are Blood Relations (1996), set in the modeling industry on South Beach, and Criminal Justice (1997), in which a young lawyer is caught between a drug dealer and the DEA.

Of researching a book, Parker says, “This is the best part of writing—when people from all sorts of backgrounds let you into their lives, and you come away with ideas and impressions that otherwise never would have occurred to you.” Most interesting experiences? Attending homicide investigation seminars; riding along with patrol officers; being there when detectives worked a crime scene; listening as a medical examiner described the autopsy process; going backstage at a rock concert; learning how a photographer shoots fashion models and how a Bertram yacht is made; taking notes at a ballet rehearsal, walking through Havana with a list of dissident organizations stashed in her backpack . . .

“My novels have taken me on a great adventure,” Parker says, “and I hope to share that with my readers.”

Parker has appeared at numerous conferences, book-and-author luncheons, and writing groups. She has two grown children—a lawyer and a graphics designer, who live in D.C. and New York. Parker makes her home in South Florida a few blocks from the ocean with her pug, Max.