Bristol author Allison Keeton displays her newly published mystery novel Blaze Orange. Keeton will read from the novel, which is set in a fictional Midcoast town bearing more than a few similarities to Round Pond, at the Bristol Area Library on Wednesday, July 9. (Sarah Masters photo)
A fictional murder in a semi-fictional Midcoast Maine town is the subject of the new novel “Blaze Orange: A Midcoast Maine Mystery,” by Allison Keeton. The Bristol author will read from “Blaze Orange” at the Bristol Area Library on Wednesday, July 9.
As “Blaze Orange” opens with Raven Ouellette, a resident of the fictional Secretly, Maine, discovering human remains in the woods.
Keeton said that opening scene is based on a true story with a slight modification. Keeton’s yellow Labrador, Lily, ran off the path one day in the Damariscotta woods, and Keeton chased after her.
“When I turned around, I was in the middle of pieces of a deer. I just screamed and screamed,” Keeton said. “Then I thought: what if it was a person? And that’s where it started.”
That may be where “Blaze Orange” started, but Keeton has been writing nearly her whole life, starting with poetry at age 7. Keeton went on to earn a Masters of Fine Arts from Lesley University in Cambridge, Mass. Her first book, her thesis, was a middle grade novel set in 1963.
Over 14 years, Keeton wrote six more novels, including “Blaze Orange.” She pitched her novels to various agents, occasionally drawing interest but never achieving representation.
When Keeton moved to Maine, she joined the Maine Writers and Publishers Alliance. That is where is got the advice to forgo an agent and pitch directly to small publishers.
Keeton wrote the “Blaze Orange” manuscript and submitted it directly to a small press, Level Best Books, in December 2023. On Jan. 12, 2024, Level Best Books offered Keeton a three-book contract. A multi-book contract is a “crazy dream,” Keeton said.
“Blaze Orange” went through months of revisions and was finally released in January. An audiobook version is coming soon. The next book in Keeton’s Midcoast Maine Mystery series is set to be published in February 2026.
Keeton credited novelist Steve Berry with inspiring her perseverance.
“Berry said his first eight novels are in a drawer. ‘You just have to keep going.’” Keeton said. “It gave me permission to be a loser, to kind of fail.”
Keeton said a writer can write and rewrite until a story feels exhausted. Then a writer tries again. The good news is that Keeton has a ton of ideas, including at least 12 more Midcoast Mysteries, she said.
Keeton has always been intrigued with mysteries, asking “What if?,” and trying to solve something. When she was about 8 years old, Keeton read her first Nancy Drew book: “The Hidden Staircase.”
“I went around and I knocked on all of our walls,” Keeton said. “I remember my father saying ‘I’m sorry to disappoint you, but I built the house, and I did not build a hidden staircase.’”
Her father directed Keeton to ask her aunt, who lived in an 1840s farmhouse.
“I went down there and knocked on all her walls. I didn’t find anything, but she let me,” Keeton said.
Keeton grew up in rural northeast Connecticut. Her father was a volunteer fire chief and her mom did lots of volunteering. Keeton said Bristol reminds her of her hometown, especially the sense of community.
After college, Keeton and her husband settled in Longmeadow, Mass. His mother owned a home in Damariscotta, so Keeton got to visit the area many times. They hoped to make a home in Maine someday.
Early in the COVID-19 pandemic, Keeton and her husband were both laid off from their jobs, so they decided it was finally the time to move to Lincoln County.
Keeton was rehired to her position in employee relations, which she continues to work full time from home. She also has two dogs she walks one or two miles every morning. Then Keeton spends 90 minutes writing every morning before work.
Keeton said she writes cinematically, meaning she tries to capture the scenes as she sees them play out in her mind. She does not know everything about every character all at once, but she hopes she is creating people who have a fullness to them.
“They aren’t flat, they have fears and get upset, they’re human,” Keeton said.
She said her neighbors have credited her for capturing real Maine people, not caricatures. That might have something to do with Keeton’s habit of writing down interesting sayings when she hears them, which she has done since she was a child.
As for her most recent imperfect main character, Keeton does not see much of herself in Ouellette, but there are some similarities. They both cook Thanksgiving dinners for their families. They both have yellow Labradors. And they are both nosy.
“I guess her being nosy is me, I’m nosy. I’m definitely nosy. I’m always looking into something, I’m always suspicious,” Keeton said, relating it back to her job in employee relations. “You’re an interviewer, you’re a researcher, you’re poking around in something … There’s lot of he said/she said and you have to make decisions and take your best stab at an answer.”
Keeton will read from “Blaze Orange” at the Bristol Area Library, at 619 Old County Road, on Wednesday, July 9, at 5 p.m. For more information, go to bal.tidewater.net.
For more information about Keeton and “Blaze Orange,” go to akeetonbooks.com or find the author on Instagram, Facebook, and X, formerly known as Twitter.
