W.A. Winter

W.A. Winter is the pen name of writer William Swanson. HIs new suspense novel, MY NAME IS JOE LAVOIE, is available in stores and online. See

[W.A. Winter @WAWinter2]

I was recently asked to name the five best crime novels of the past 50 years. Here's what I said: https://t.co/xWwqN0RTvU

[W.A. Winter @WAWinter2]

MY NAME IS JOE LAVOIE launched online on 8/16/22 with help from StarTribune writer Curt Brown and Once Upon a Crime Books. Thanks to all who helped and tuned in.

[W.A. Winter @WAWinter2]

50 years ago today, FBI agents rescued Virginia Piper after she was taken from her Orono, MN home by masked gunmen. Mrs. Piper was physically unharmed, but most of the million-dollar ransom paid by her husband was never recovered, and no one spent a day in prison for the crime.

[W.A. Winter @WAWinter2]

"Underneath my profane exterior, I'm very concerned with decorum, probity, and morality, and I have a painfully developed conscience." James Ellroy whose White Jazz I'm currently re-reading.

[W.A. Winter @WAWinter2]

"Her first name was India––she was never able to get used to it. It seemed to her that her parents must have been thinking of someone else when they named her."
The funny, sad, impeccable opening lines of #MrsBridge

[W.A. Winter @WAWinter2]

Had occasion to revisit Evan Connell's #MrsBridge, probably for the third or fourth time since my first reading. A great novel that drew the fulsome praise of readers and critics, but maybe not as much as it deserved. Its sequel, #MrBridge, was good, but not as good.

[W.A. Winter @WAWinter2]

People ask why I chose W.A. Winter for my pen name. Well, because W.A. Frost was already taken.

[W.A. Winter @WAWinter2]

Management has just eliminated the last reason to watch the Twins in 2021. Buxton will play a couple games in August before going back on the IL. Donaldson will continue his overpriced underproduction. And Sano will strike out three times a game. Is it hockey season yet?

[W.A. Winter @WAWinter2]

Tampa Bay hasn't won the Cup yet, but they will, tomorrow night. The Lightning don't lose two games in a row.

[W.A. Winter @WAWinter2]

I'd be OK if we skipped the pre- and post-game interviews entirely. When was the last time you heard a fresh and interesting question and a commensurately memorable reply? Probably not since Ali died.

[W.A. Winter @WAWinter2]

RIP Jim Klobuchar. Wise, funny, and compassionate. One of our town's greatest storytellers.

[W.A. Winter @WAWinter2]

I'm having dinner tonight with the last person I dined with in a restaurant before the pandemic lowered the drapes. That'll be coming full circle, won't it?

[W.A. Winter @WAWinter2]

I'm getting very positive feedback from the 4/27 launch of THE SECRET LIVES OF DENTISTS via #OnceUponaCrimeBooks. Thanks to all the virtual attendees and to Larry Millett for joining me on stage.

[W.A. Winter @WAWinter2]

I watched 10 minutes of the Oscars last night. Now I can't get "Always," #StevieWonder's incredible anthem to eternal love, out of my head.

[W.A. Winter @WAWinter2]

I thought the Twin Cities media––print, broadcast, and online––did an excellent job, all things considered, covering the #Chauvin trial. Talk about rising to an unprecedented occasion.

[W.A. Winter @WAWinter2]

Why am I still receiving Esquire magazine, a pathetic, pretentious, bore-ass ghost of its once great self? I don't think I've paid for it in a couple of years.

[W.A. Winter @WAWinter2]

Two weeks after #HemingwayPBS Papa is on my mind: the incomparable beauty of his early work, the idiotic barbarism of the aficionado and great white hunter, the misogyny and the cruelty, the awful late work, the genuine bravery of a broken man. RIP EH.

[W.A. Winter @WAWinter2]

I wondered what Burns and Novick could tell me about #HemingwayPBS that I didn't know from a lifetime of reading him (and about him). After Episode 1, I'm happy to say, "Plenty."

[W.A. Winter @WAWinter2]

Granted, my viewing has been hit and miss during the past several days, but I've been impressed by the local TV coverage of The Trial, especially Lou Raguse's commentary on Ch 11.

[W.A. Winter @WAWinter2]

My introduction to Walter was his 2005 comic masterpiece, Citizen Vince. The protagonist is an aging East Coast hood who's been relocated to Spokane after ratting out his guys. Now he makes crullers and longs to be a registered voter, if he can live that long.