BELFAST — On Tuesday, July 12, at 6:30 pm the Maine Writers Talk About...series of author talks at the Belfast Free Library continues with a Sisters in Crime panel discussion, The Good, the Bad and the Imaginary: Writing a Lot of Crime in a Low Crime State. The "sisters" are Jen Blood, Kate Flora and Lea Wait, and they will discuss why they choose Maine as the setting for their crime novels.

Statistically, Maine is a low crime state, yet it is a magnet for crime writers. Why do so many choose Maine as the setting for their stories? Is it because Maine offers all the elements of a good mystery? And what are those elements? Come to this discussion to find more from these esteemed mystery writers.

Blood, a Midcoast Maine native, is a freelance writer, public speaker and author of the bestselling Erin Solomon mysteries. She holds a Master of Fine Arts degree in creative writing/popular fiction from the University of Southern Maine, and is a regular blogger with Maine Crime Writers.

Flora is the author of 14 mystery and true crime books. Death Dealer, her latest true crime, is an Agatha and Anthony finalist. Grant You Peace, her latest Joe Burgess police procedural, won the 2015 Maine Literary Award for Crime Fiction. Flora is a former editor and publisher at Level Best Books, former international president of Sisters in Crime, and a founding member of the New England Crime Bake conference and the Maine Crime Wave.

Maine author Wait writes the Agatha-finalist Shadows Antique Print mystery series, the most recent of which is Shadows on a Maine Christmas, and the Mainely Needlepoint series, the most recent of which is Thread and Gone. Wait also writes historical novels set in 19th century Maine for readers ages 8 and up. She also contributes to the blog with other Maine mystery writers, mainecrimewriters.com.

The Maine Writers Talk About...series, made possible with support from the Friends of the Belfast Free Library, is free and open to the public. The next talk in the series will be on Tuesday, July 19, with humor essayist Tom Sadowski and Eddie Adelman giving a talk titled, This is NO a Laughing Matter.

For more information, call the library at 338-3884 ext. 10.