Savvy Everywoman Is on the Case in City of Angels

Dianne G. Pugh was “outed” as a novelist recently.

Her colleagues at M/D Systems, a Los Angeles software firm, learned of the marketing executive’s secret life as a mystery writer from the Los Angeles Times, which praised her first novel, “Cold Call,” as “a very expert debut.”

What’s appealing about this picture is that the early-morning scribe not only broke from the pack of those craving a nibble from a publisher, but she did so by introducing a character cut convincingly from an office life familiar to many.

“As at Scott Turow’s Chicago law firm, you do wonder what they’ll say at the water cooler,” wrote Times critic Charles Champlin.

In Pugh’s tale of murder and revenge, Iris Thorne is a 35-year-old, MBA-toting, fashion-conscious, tough-but-tender L.A. stockbroker who wards off the sexist swine in her firm by projecting steely self-confidence. Meanwhile, she lets her ice thaw outside the office in a casual relationship with a carefree sailboater who doesn’t commit.

The office gofer is stabbed to death on the street, and Iris, the victim’s only real friend at work, refuses to accept the cops’ ho-hum hunch that it was a drug-related hit.

Enter a detective who had once been her boyfriend (and still pines). Toss in a web of mobsters and crooked offshore holding corporations. Iris investigates the killing while fumbling each morning for a usable pair of pantyhose, speaking often (but never frankly) to her mom, cold-calling prospective clients about promising stocks and battling freeway madness in a cherry-red ’72 Triumph.

Pugh, who retired her own cherry-red 1972 Triumph TR6 from the road (but still owns the car), says Iris is less an autobiographical figure than a representative career woman.

“I didn’t care for a lot of the women in mysteries,” she said, naming no names. “The strong women, the private eyes, are too hard-boiled for me and I didn’t relate to them. That’s what motivated me. I wanted to make Iris a working everywoman--the kind who simply comes to the office and hacks it out every day.”

Pugh, a native of Los Angeles, presents the city in a flattering light. It is expansive and beautiful in her book.

“Yeah, Los Angeles is crazy,” Pugh said, “but if you were born here, it’s your hometown, you know?”

Bottom line: Iris is here to stay.

New York agent David Chalfant parlayed Pugh’s manuscript into a two-book deal with Pocket Books, which has about 8,000 copies in print (better than typical for a first novel) and plans to publish a recently completed sequel. Headline Publishing has done a British edition. Creative Artists Agency is shopping the film rights.

Pugh plans to keep her day job for now, working like Iris and enjoying a different kind of triumph.

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Off the Racks: The cover of Fast Company, a business magazine launched this month with a graphic look designed by Roger Black, imparts its message with an illustration described as “the Fast Company baby” taking the “old economy boardroom by surprise.”