We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Caroline Giammanco a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Caroline, appreciate you joining us today. Let’s kick things off with your mission – what is it and what’s the story behind why it’s your mission?
I came to writing later in life. I’ve worked as a junior high and high school English teacher my entire career, and I was a capable writer, but I never felt the need to publish until 2013. That’s when I met my husband in an unusual circumstance, and our shared experiences led me to deciding the time had come to write something meaningful. We met in a maximum-security men’s prison when I taught the GED program. The Great Recession had caused my beloved public school to undergo budget cuts, and I needed a job, so I applied with the Department of Corrections.
I worked there for a year before Keith Giammanco walked into my life. I hired him as one of the inmate tutors in my classroom, and our instant friendship and connection never faded. Here we are, in 2024, still together and still dedicated to one another. His crimes made national headlines, but his story was more complex than just another crime story. A single father with sole custody of twin daughters, the Great Recession took its toll on him as well. He went from being a successful stock options trader to being without a means of supporting his children or himself. Desperation led him to make a series of terrible mistakes which resulted in his robbery of twelve banks in the St. Louis area using notes. He never had a weapon, and when he was arrested, he took full responsibility in federal court. He was sentenced to six years and four months.
We grew up hearing Americans are free from double jeopardy. No one can be prosecuted twice for the same crimes. That’s not true. After he pleaded guilty in federal court and was sentenced, St. Louis County used his guilty plea and conviction in federal court as evidence against him in state court. For half of the robberies, the ones that happened in St. Louis County, he was convicted and sentenced to twenty years.
I wrote Bank Notes, which now is published in its second edition form as Bank Notes Revisited: The Updated True Story of the Boonie Hat Bandit. It does not glorify the crimes. Nor does it whine or make excuses. Keith has owned up to his shortcomings and bad choices. It does, however, tell a cautionary tale of how a middle-class guy next door took a dark path that forever altered his life and the lives of those he loves. The book follows him into the maximum-security prison where we met, and he tells the story as an average citizen seeing the realities of life in prison.
A few years after Bank Notes was published, I wrote a memoir of my own experiences with the Missouri Department of Corrections. My harrowing tale began well before I met Keith, including death threats against me that were ignored by the prison administration and custody staff. Growing up as the daughter of a deputy sheriff, I was familiar with how law enforcement is supposed to work, as well as how it sometimes doesn’t. Inside the Death Fences: Memoir of a Whistleblower documents my journey from public school teacher to blowing the whistle on corruption within the DOC. I’ve testified before state House of Representatives sub-committees, conducted several radio, television, and print interviews on the topic, and have done my part to make our communities safer by shining a light on what really happens on our tax dollar.
After writing the emotionally difficult true crime books, I needed a creative outlet that was more fun than fundamental. I began writing science fiction and paranormal short stories. My series of those collections is entitled Into the Night. To date, four volumes have been published and I have three more completed with more on the way. I have also written western short stories, and those I call my Into the Sunset series.
My husband has been my biggest supporter and my most enthusiastic reader, and I have him to thank for inspiring me to publish in the first place. Everyone needs a cheerleader like Keith.
As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?
As I mentioned earlier, I’m a public school teacher. I’ve already detailed the how and why of writing my true crime books, but I want to give some background information into why science fiction/paranormal and westerns.
Growing up, I was the youngest of four children. My oldest sister, Roberta, graduated high school and left for college before I was born, but Andrea and Luke were constants in the home when I was a child. Our mother, Charlotte, encouraged us to think of the “what ifs” in life, and that included discussions of aliens, ghosts, and any other fun topic like that. We were definitely not in the occult camp. These were discussions about the possibilities of the universe, not adoration of anything evil or unseemly. We enjoyed watching The Twilight Zone and Night Gallery, two incredible series by the great Rod Serling. We also had fun scaring ourselves late at night watching Kolchak: The Night Stalker. None of us were, or ever have been, fans of gore or slasher movies. We loved the suspense of the shows I mentioned, however.
Following the publication of Inside the Death Fences, I decided it might be more fun to create monsters than to tell about the real ones. I was right. While my first two books are meaningful and ones the world should read, I’ve had a lot of fun coming up with unique scenarios with twists and turns to entertain myself and the readers.
The westerns joined my writing menagerie a year or two after I began writing my Into the Night stories. I grew up in Missouri, but I went to college at the University of Arizona. I also lived and worked in New Mexico for several years before I returned to Missouri. I read Louis L’Amour books, and for a time I lived not far from his ranch. The terrain, people, and atmosphere of the West left its mark on me, and I’ve enjoyed incorporating the places I’ve lived and loved into my stories. Some of my westerns are science fiction or paranormal, but others are traditional westerns. My Into the Sunset series is currently only available as western shorts in ebook form, but in 2025 I’ll publish paperback compilations.
Other than my writing, I occupy myself teaching and taking care of my animals on my farm, I love my family and enjoy keeping up with them. I have two sons, Keith has two daughters, and we have three grandchildren.
For you, what’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative?
I love writing character-driven stories that readers connect to. If a reader doesn’t love or hate a character, they aren’t as willing to follow along with the plot. Being authentic and creating characters who have both strengths and weaknesses is important. When readers reach out to me to let me know they laughed, cried, or were emotionally affected by my stories, it’s the best possible reward I can have.
Looking back, are there any resources you wish you knew about earlier in your creative journey?
I wish I’d met my PA, Susan Catt of Oracle BookArt & PA Services, LLC, years ago. It’s wonderful to have someone who embraces what I do as an author and goes the extra mile to publicize my works. Oracle BookArt has been a godsend, and life would have been easier as a writer if I’d had her in my camp a long time ago.
Contact Info:
- Instagram: @carolinegiammanco
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/BoonieHatBandit
- Twitter: @GiammancoBook