Exploring Stories and Mysteries with Gigi Pandian | Lead with Storytelling

In this episode of Lead with Storytelling, Sochi Azuh sits down with Gigi Pandian, USA Today bestselling mystery author and locked-room mystery enthusiast, for a wide-ranging conversation about travel, puzzles, food, research, and the craft of creating mysteries that keep readers guessing.

Gigi shares how being the child of anthropologists from New Mexico and southern India—and travelling with her parents from a young age—shaped how she sees the world and eventually inspired her fiction. She recalls a formative summer in Scotland at age ten, exploring ruined castles, discovering Scottish ghost stories, and learning to experience the world with curiosity.

We get into her love of locked-room mysteries, from childhood fascination with Scooby-Doo to discovering John Dickson Carr, and what these seemingly impossible puzzles can teach us about storytelling. For Gigi, the puzzle only works when the characters genuinely care about solving it—and when readers care about the characters.

Gigi also takes us behind her writing process, including the four notebooks she filled while researching one novel, why she writes her first ideas on paper, and how simply walking through the world can spark the seed of a story.

And because food is another important part of Gigi’s storytelling, we talk about cooking, travel, family, and the ways food can deepen characters and relationships. From her father’s cooking and his habit of feeding neighbourhood children to the chef character she developed while learning to cook herself, food becomes another way into the stories we tell about ourselves.

We also talk about:

Writing across multiple mystery series

The evolution of the Jaya Jones Treasure Hunt Mysteries

Why Gigi alternates between series

Theatre, set design, and her cinematic imagination

Why she wants the writing itself to become “invisible” so the story can take centre stage

Discovering story ideas close to home

Art crime and museum visits

Mystery recommendations and the global world of locked-room fiction

Her anthology All the Crime in the World: Locked Room Mysteries and Impossible Puzzles from Across the Globe

Why stories matter as a way of connecting with people

And we finish with a rapid-fire round covering ruined castles, morning writing, pancakes, favourite fictional mysteries, and the question we ask every guest:

Why do stories matter?

Watch the full conversation and join us down the mystery rabbit hole. 🎙️📚

Connect with Gigi Pandian:

More Books by Gigi Pandian: https://www.gigipandian.com/about

Subscribe to her Newsletter: https://www.gigipandian.com/subscribe