Ursula Archer Plays Mind Games With Her Readers In ‘Five’

At WBSM, we love celebrating phenomenal people with fabulous imaginations. Whether we're talking about Walt Disney or a bestselling novelist, they all have the ability to transport us to new other worlds that somehow reflect our own lives, needs and sometimes, even our nightmares. 

In Five, Austrian author Ursula Archer takes her first turn as a suspense novelist after penning numerous children's books and young adult novels. "The story takes place in Salzberg... where a woman is found murdered in a meadow with coordinates [tattooed on her feet] that mark a hideout where a horrible surprise is waiting," Archer told us.

But what marks this novel as unique is that the agents who work the case must use geocaching, a modern-day scavenger hunt using a GPS device, in order to trace one clue to the next. In this case, the hunt is more grisly than most treasure hunts, as the agents search for one body part after another!

The heroine in this story is Beatrice, a woman who leads an extraordinarily difficult life. "She is a single mom," Archer said. "She has an ex-husband who terrorizes her in every way and she has a traumatizing experience in her past."

Beatrice's character rings true because like many modern women, she is juggling so much that she wonders if she'll ever be able to succeed at anything. "When I got my first glimpse of Beatrice," Archer said, "I got the impression that she is in a terrible hurry so I tried to figure out why she was so nervous, so busy."

Archer, a mother herself, attributes the novel's concept to her son. "I came across geocaching as a way to get my son to go outdoors again because he started engaging in computer games a lot." Archer wanted a way to get him hiking, or at least taking walks with the family again, and that's when she came across geocaching.com. Suddenly, her son didn't even realize that he was hiking!

The mind games in Five all culminate in a five-stage plot that will keep you turning the pages with delight. Check out the rest of our revealing interview with international bestselling author Ursula Archer, and then go purchase Five which is available online and in bookstores now. But first, enjoy our delightful conversation below!