Bio

C. Hope Clark was born and reared in the South, from Mississippi to South Carolina with a few stints in Alabama and Georgia. The granddaughter of a Mississippi cotton farmer, Hope holds a B.S. in Agriculture with honors from Clemson University and 25 years’ experience with the U. S. Department of Agriculture to include awards for her management, all of which enable her to talk the talk of Carolina Slade, the protagonist in her first series. Her love of writing, however, carried her up the ranks to the ability to retire young, and she left USDA to pen her stories and freelance.

The Carolina Slade Series has taken several awards from the small Phillip Mangelsdorf Award for best opening paragraph to Alabama Writer’s Conclave Competition, The Writing Show Chapter Competition as judged by bestselling mystery author C. J. Box, finalist Daphne du Maurier Award for Excellence in Mystery/Suspense sponsored by Romance Writers of America, and semi-finalist status (top 100 out of 10,000) in the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Contest. Two books won Killer Nashville’s Silver Falchion Award for mystery, and three books received EPIC e-Book Awards. Salkehatchie Secret won best mystery at the Imadjinn Awards.

Hope’s second series is set entirely at Edisto Beach, South Carolina, her home away from home. The Edisto Island Mystery Series continues to sell exceptionally well, especially along the Carolina coast, and the first book, Murder on Edisto, was chosen to represent the state of South Carolina in the Route 1 Reads program as a sterling representation of the state’s setting.

Already having an amateur sleuth and a veteran police woman, Hope went for the trifecta by writing a third series, based upon the experiences of a female private investigator in Quinn Sterling. The Craven County Mysteries, both books 1 and 2, released November 2021.

Hope is married to a 30-year veteran of federal law enforcement, a Senior Special Agent. They met on a bribery investigation within the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the basis for the opening scene to Lowcountry Bribe. Hope and her special agent live on the rural banks of Lake Murray outside of Chapin, South Carolina, forever spinning tales on their back porch, bourbon and coke in hand.

She also currently manages FundsforWriters.com, a weekly newsletter service she founded that reaches 25,000+ writers  to include university professors, professional journalists and published mystery authors. Writer’s Digest has recognized the site in its annual 101 Best Web Sites for Writers for two decades.

She’s published in The Writer Magazine, Writer’s Digest, Guide to Literary Agents, Writer’s Market, Chicken Soup, Next Step Magazine, College Bound Teen, Voices of Youth Advocates (VOYA), TURF Magazine, Landscape Management, Jasper, SC Wildlife and other trade and online publications. She speaks at writers’ conferences, book clubs, libraries and bookstores. Hope is a member of Mystery Writers of America, International Mystery Writers, International Thriller Writers, Southeastern Writers Association, and MENSA.

She is published by Bell Bridge Books.

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