We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Laurie Fagen a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Alright, Laurie thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. What did your parents do right and how has that impacted you in your life and career?
My parents were always supportive of me, no matter what my choices were. Coming from a small rural town in Iowa, the thought of making a living out of acting was pretty far-fetched, yet they encouraged me to follow that dream, helped me with college, came to my shows and never once said “That’s not a good career choice.”
I soon discovered that on my own, and laid out of college — they call it “gap years” now — knowing that I would go back, once I had a better handle on what I wanted to do with my future.
After doing some traveling, living in Los Angeles for a couple of years, I decided to go back to college where I got a degree in radio and television and had a 25-year career in commercial radio, commercial and cable television and print.
My parents — my father was a farmer and insurance agent, but had been a war correspondent in WWII and Korea; and my mother, a homemaker, mother of four and social service worker had been an English/Journalism teacher — were positive, loving, encouraging people who were able to share in my successes living long ages to 92 and 97 respectively.
I couldn’t have done it without them!
Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.
As evidenced by one of her email signatures, Laurie Fagen is a “serial entrepreneur” — a writer, artist and singer.
A long-time “writer by habit,” she’s written for commercial and cable television, commercial radio, corporate video, magazines, newspapers, murder mystery plays, musical stage products, crime fiction and podcasts.
While she was getting her bachelor’s degree in radio and television at Arizona State University, she worked for KTAR NewsRadio in Phoenix, providing live traffic reports from a single-engine aircraft above the city. After graduation, she worked as an assistant producer with Preston Westmoreland, booking guests for his talk show, while continuing to report on Valley traffic.
Television called, and Fagen returned to her home state of Iowa to work as a reporter/photographer for KWWL-TV, an NBC affiliate in Waterloo. She initially covered the state capital, then later landed the crime beat, covering the Waterloo Police Department, Black Hawk County Sheriff’s Department and Courts. She was also an anchor and editor in addition to her reporting and videographer duties.
Remembering why she left Iowa in the first place, Fagen returned to the Valley of the Sun to work for the City of Phoenix Public Information Office. Finding a video camera in another department, she lead the city’s efforts in creating internal employee training and other video programs, and later founded The Phoenix Channel, the City’s government access cable television station. She created, wrote, produced and anchored a number of the shows that still exist today, discovering that there is life after television news.
Fagen started her first business, Word Painting, as a writer, producer and director for corporate video, which led to a 13-year career providing marketing, sales, training, informational and other types of video programming for businesses. She also wrote magazine articles, a Fiesta Bowl parade script, murder mystery plays, two documentaries and other projects that included for KAET-TV, KPNX-TV, Phoenix Suns, Educational Management Group, Randy Murray Productions, and more. She was an adjunct professor at Scottsdale Community College, teaching a corporate video class.
She started her second business, Fagen Designs, as a fiber and jewelry artist, just before she and her late husband, Geoffrey Hancock, purchased a community newspaper in Southern Chandler. The couple published the Ocotillo News, which was later renamed SanTan Sun News, for 13 years. Under their ownership, the paper grew from 16-20 pages with a circulation of about 7,000 to an average of 80 pages twice a month with more than 38,000 printed.
At the same time she was overseeing the news division for the SanTan Sun News, she and a business partner operated a contemporary art gallery in downtown Chandler, AZ, called Art on Boston, for three years. The gallery also had studio spaces for artists to work in and provided art classes, until the economic downturn of 2010, but Fagen continues to promote fine art and fine artists on her Art Online AZ Facebook page. She is also a jazz singer around the Valley as Laurie Fagen & Friends.
Fagen and Hancock continued the newspaper operation until Hancock’s death in 2013, at which point she sold the paper to a local publishing company.
Fagen turned to writing fiction for the first time, and has two novellas and three novels in the “Behind the Mic Mysteries.” The series is about intrepid radio reporter Lisa Powers who covers the crime beat for her Chandler, AZ radio station; helps police solve cold cases; and because she’s in a gritty crime world by day, writes campy murder mystery podcasts by night. Crimes include arson, homicide, domestic violence, assault and more. It’s like going behind the scenes of a radio reporter’s work. “Fade Out,” “Dead Air” and “Bleeder” are available in ebook, print and audiobooks, which Fagen also narrates. Fagen took actors into a studio to perform the characters in the “podcast” portion of her audiobooks, complete with sound effects and original music by her son, Devon Hancock and brother Loren Fagen. She has also been published in numerous short story anthologies, including the latest “Mystery in MB” for the Los Angeles chapter of Sisters in Crime’s “Entertainment to Die For.”
Fagen launched “Murder in the Air Mystery Theatre” podcast in Jan. 2023, and the second season begins Sept. 6, 2023 with 15 episodes dropping weekly until mid-December. Listeners can hear short mystery stories, author interviews and radio-theatre-style segments from her crime fiction audiobooks. Also new this year: AuthorXtra, a promo of additional authors. They are available on Apple, Spotify, wherever podcasts are heard, or her YouTube page youtube.com/@readlauriefagenmurderintheair or here: https://murderintheairmysterytheatre.buzzsprout.com
What do you find most rewarding about being a creative?
The most rewarding aspect of being a creative is in the “making” of it – whether it’s writing a book, performing on stage, creating polymer clay jewelry or designing a fiber art wall quilt, I also enjoy the marketing end of being an artist, but I’m not crazy about the “selling” part of it – trying to find the right market and actually selling the pieces.
Is there mission driving your creative journey?
The driver in my life – whether it was in business as a television reporter, or publisher of a newspaper or artist with products to sell has been my “inherited” workaholic tendencies. My father was an entrepreneur and worked several jobs during his career, and I know I take after him.
I also don’t require much sleep, so I am almost constantly doing something.
Sometimes I wonder what it would really be like to “retire” – but what do people do???
Contact Info:
- Website: www.ReadLaurieFagen.com; www.FagenDesigns.com; www.LaurieFagen.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/read_laurie_fagen/ and https://www.instagram.com/read_laurie_fagen/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ReadLaurieFagen/ https://www.facebook.com/FagenDesigns/ https://www.facebook.com/LaurieFagen/
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/laurie-fagen-9815a1b/
- Twitter: @LaurieFagen
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@readlauriefagenmurderintheair
Image Credits
#1 and 2, close up of hands and headshot at sewing machine: Lauri Koo singing headshot: Cherrie Lonkar, HelloYouPhotography.com