From Iris Johansen's overstuffed brain spring child killers, terrorists, torturers and spies.

But, she'll tell you she's a "pretty boring" person.

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A homebody who likes chain restaurants, shopping malls and big Broadway musicals, Johansen is a thriller writer who finds her own thrills in quiet moments spent in her Kennesaw home with her family, friends and dogs.

Johansen came to writing later in life, after a career spent as a reservations agent for Eastern Airlines. But she'd loved reading and writing since she was a little girl in post-World War II St. Louis:

"I think I wrote something about shoplifting in the fourth grade. A story about shoplifting." She laughs. "Not from personal experience."

Seems even as a child she knew the difference between "boring" real life and exciting stories.

Johansen has written more than 70 books and made the New York Times Best- Sellers list 20 times, most recently with "Quicksand," which features recurring character Eve Duncan, a forensic sculptor from Atlanta.

Next up is "Silent Thunder" (St. Martin's Press, $24.95), due in stores Tuesday, about a marine architect who discovers a message hidden behind a panel in a decommissioned Russian submarine.

INSIDE

The author, 68, talks about her airlines career, her fans' e-mails and about co-writing "Silent Thunder" with her son, Roy, who is a graduate of Sprayberry High School and Georgia State University, and is a screenwriter and author in Los Angeles.