When I asked KP Mackie to come out from behind that genderless byline and tell me if she was a man or a woman, she wrote that she was flattered. “I thought for sure my writing screamed ‘female.’”

It doesn’t.

As I noted here, when introducing KP as a Script Project runner-up for a previous submission, she is, like all good writers, able to speak naturally in the voices of her various characters, no matter their age, race or sex.

This week, KP's second submission again narrowly missed being selected for out script. In it, she describes an emotional scene between Celeste, whose husband has just been killed, and her daughter Rachel, and the women sound vulnerable and real.

But listen to this exchange between mayoral aide Brent Gold, a character she created for the submission, and Detective Deland, when the cop shows up at the mayor’s office to investigate:

When Deland brushes past him, Gold sniffs the air.

This dialog sounds not only convincingly male, but also much like the hard-bitten patter popularized in the work of Raymond Chandler and other great L.A. noir writers of his time.

How does KP feel about being named runner-up twice in a row? “Bridesmaid again is great,” she writes.

She’ll no doubt be a bride soon, if she keeps trying.

Or possibly a groom.