My Weblog

Assembling Sid the Skeleton

by Leigh Perry/Toni L.P. Kelner

This post was originally written for Writerspace back in the Fall of 2013, and appeared around the time A Skeleton in the Family, the first Family Skeleton mystery, was released. I'm repeating it today because I'm on deadline for the fourth Family Skeleton mystery. I had a great idea for a blog post--really!--but it just isn't happening today.

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I know what you’re thinking. How hard can it be to assemble a human skeleton? The hip bone’s connected to the thigh bone, the thigh bone’s connected to the leg bone, the leg bone’s connected to the... And so on. But that oh so helpful mnemonic only works with real skeletons. (Plus you’d need over 200 verses to make sure you include all the bones.) The skeleton whose assembly I’m writing about is the kind that walks and talks, and that requires just a bit more thought.

You see, in A Skeleton in the Family, the first in my Family Skeleton series, Georgia Thackery moves back home with her teenaged daughter and has to face the family skeleton. Which is a skeleton. Named Sid. Sid walks, he talks, he makes bad jokes. And he won’t go back into the closet until Georgia helps him solve his own murder.

So the lyrics of ‘Dem Bones just wasn’t cutting it. Though I didn’t have to physically assemble Sid, my fictional ambulatory skeleton, I did have to lay out the rules by which he operates. And in devising those rules, I had two works to inspire me: the movie Who Framed Roger Rabbit and the book The Long ARM of Gil Hamilton. Hey, they may be unusual choices for a mystery writer, but both are technically mysteries.

In one scene of Who Framed Roger Rabbit, detective Eddie Valiant accidentally gets handcuffed to Roger, and since they don’t have a key to the cuffs, they go through all kinds of problems to get the thing off. When Eddie finally gets a saw and starts hacking at the cuffs, Roger slips out of them to give him a better angle to work. Enraged, Eddie says, “You mean you could've taken your hand out of that cuff at any time?” And Roger replied, “No, not at any time, only when it was funny.”

That led to my first decision. Sid can do a lot of things, even if they don’t make a lot of sense, as long as they’re funny. Well funny to Sid, anyway--he has a low sense of humor. (Since I write his jokes, I should probably cop to the fact that I also have a low sense of humor.)

So Sid can pop his skull off of his shoulders and put it on somebody else’s, and still keep talking. In fact, he can let all his bones fall apart, and then pull them back together again. He give somebody a hand--literally. Moreover He can sigh dramatically without the benefit of lungs and make Bambi-eyes without eyeballs. Whether you chalk this up to Georgia being delusional or his being a atypical skeleton or a combination of the two is up to the reader.

Jokes aside, there has to be a reasonable limit to Sid’s “powers,” or else you get a detective who solves mysteries so quickly it’s no fun. That why Batman is the Great Detective, and Superman just isn’t. For a great example of setting limits in a paranormal setting, I looked to The Long ARM of Gil Hamilton.

The book, written by Larry Niven, is actually a trio of science fiction stories about Gil Hamilton, a police officer who lost his arm but realized he had psi powers by which he could manipulate a kind of imaginary arm. It’s weaker than a regular arm, but on the plus side, can reach through walls. But here’s the kicker--the imaginary arm is no longer than his real one had been. Even though he knows logically he should be able to reach as far as he wants, he can’t get pas that mental block. I gave Sid a similar mental block. He can’t do anything he doesn’t believe he can do.

So in the first book, Sid falls apart to fit inside a suitcase and uses his arm even though it’s not attached to the rest of him, because he’s in the same room. But in the second book--still in progress with the working title The Skeleton Takes A Bow--Sid is nearly helpless when his skull is in a different building than the rest of his body. He can talk, and presumably bite if somebody came close enough, but that’s about it. His body doesn’t wander around aimlessly like a chicken--or a skeleton--with its head cut off.

Here’s hoping that connecting the humor to the limits will help me hold Sid’s bones together.

The Best Books to Movies--Jon Land explains the magic

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: Have you ever heard Jon Land teach? He is simply a rock star. Incredibly thoughtful, with an astonishing depth of understanding about the essence of thrillers and storytelling. We read books, sure, and, sure, we love movies. But how does that transformation successfully occur? No better person to explain the magic than the creator of the iconic Caitlin Strong thrillers: Jon Land.

THE TEN (+1) BEST BOOK TO FILM THRILLERS

By Jon Land

THE GODFATHER: According to legend, producer Robert Evans bought the rights to the book before Mario Puzo had even finished it, and proceeded to shepherd a faithful adaptation that many consider to be the best film ever made. Francis Ford Coppola received the lion’s share of the credit for that, but everything he put on the screen is drawn straight out of the book. From the opening wedding reception to the blood-soaked finale, this cinema classic is chock full of the themes that turned a gangster story into a Shakespearean masterpiece.

JAWS: Steven Spielberg diverted just enough from Peter Benchley’s huge bestseller to turn a simple monster movie into a blockbuster that changed film forever. The lack of a working mechanical shark taught audiences that less is more, the scenes shot from the shark’s POV (coupled with the steady beat of the John Williams score) perhaps the most imitated in film. This reinvention of Moby Dick at its heart is an exploration of machismo and the nature of heroism in the hands of a filmmaker discovering his own greatness. T

THE EXORCIST: Perhaps the most faithful adaptation ever, this is also rightfully considered the scariest film ever made. William Peter Blatty’s one-sitting, much-imitated horror tale was adapted by William Friedkin into a masterwork of elegantly paced terror. An exploration of faith set against an archetypal battle between good and evil and featuring some of the most famous scenes and one of the greatest openings in film history.

MARATHON MAN: The film was every bit the equal of William Goldman’s seminal thriller about Nazis in New York menacing grad student Babe Levy, as played by Dustin Hoffman so well that we forgot he was much too old for the role. We lose Goldman’s iconic portrayal of the deadly assassin Scylla from the book, but the torture scene played with Mephistophelean menace by the great Lawrence Oliver is a cinema tour de force that did for going to the dentist what Jaws did for swimming in the ocean. T

THE BOYS FROM BRAZIL: Ira Levin’s cutting edge thriller about Hitler clones running rampant across the globe gave us Lawrence Oliver (again) playing a Nazi hunter who comes to the shattering realization that the Fourth Reich is alive and well under the leadership of Josef Mengele as envisioned by Gregory Peck. An archetypal prologue opens the door to the unraveling of a monstrous mystery pealed back, in book and film, one magical layer at a time.

ROSEMARY’S BABY: Speaking of Ira Levin, he rewrote the rules for the modern horror thriller in this classic that were similarly rewritten by Roman Polanski in the film version. Mia Farrow passed on joining then husband Frank Sinatra in The Detective to play the role that made her a star. She appears in every single scene of this terrifying treatise on urban paranoia where the neighbors next door are witches who want to steal your baby, only to learn it’s even worse than that. And that final scene, when Rosemary meets her baby for the first time, remains one of the most powerful in film history. 

THE SILENCE OF THE LAMBS: Essentially a sequel to Red Dragon (made into the equally great Manhunter), this masterpiece of psychological horror features true star turns by both Anthony Hopkins and Jodie Foster faithfully playing Thomas Harris’s Hannibal Lecter and Clarice Starling. A riveting cat-and-mouse game comprised of riveting moments of repartee and, oh man, that scene where Lecter stages his jaw-dropping escape.

THREE DAYS OF THE CONDOR: One of the great political thrillers ever made chopped three days from a solid book by James Grady in fashioning the quintessential tale to emerge from the paranoia spurred by Watergate. Like Babe Levy, our hero is an ordinary man caught up in extraordinary circumstances he can’t control but ultimately does. How great is the movie? I’ve probably seen it a dozen times and still can’t make sense of everything. Worth watching just for the final encounter between Redford and Max Von Sydow’s deadly assassin Joubert, so memorable for what follows the line, “It will happen like this…”

JACK REACHER: I’m going on a limb with this one, since so much criticism has been leveled over the diminutive Tom Cruise playing the bruising Jack Reacher in an adaptation of Lee Child’s bestseller One Shot. Size aside, though, Cruise captures Reacher’s stoic sensibility and nomadic, gunfighter mentality that has made him this generation’s James Bond. A throwback to pre-CGI action films.

THE FURY: John Farris’ taut, twisty paranormal thriller as reimagined by Brian DePalma, this might be the best Hitchcock film Hitchcock didn’t make. Blessed by a haunting score by John Williams, this perfectly paced shocker contains as many memorable scenes as any movie of its kind. Way ahead of its time and distinguished by a brilliantly villainous turn by the great John Cassavetes that will blow your mind (Pun intended!). 

SEVEN DAYS IN MAY: A screenplay by the great Rod Serling from the novel by Fletcher Knebel, and star turns by Burt Lancaster and Kirk Douglas as antagonists, imagines a coup d’etat in Washington that remains shockingly credible to this day. This one spawned numerous lesser imitations that didn’t even come close to measuring up to an all-too plausible plot to realize the unthinkable.

THE TAKING OF PELHAM ONE TWO THREE: Joseph Sargent’s adaptation wondrously captures the furious pace of John Godey’s starkly original tale of high-end thugs who hijack a subway car. A great caper tale turned into quintessential crime noir thanks to virtuoso performances by Walter Matthau and Robert Shaw trading barbs amid the ideal blend of humor and thrills. Oh, and by the way, skip the remake. Please. Okay, those are my picks. Now, how about yours? Any you’d like to add?

HANK: Well--LOVE these! But adding:  Day of the Jackal! (The real one, with Edward Fox.) (Speaking of skip the remake…) C’mon Jon, you left that one out so I could embrace it, right? A perfect perfect story, and one of the few movies that lures you to fully root for the bad guy. Plus, we know from moment one that DeGaulle doesn’t get assassinated—but every time we see the movie, we wonder—will this be the time The Jackal succeeds? Love it!

As you well know, the book is Six Days of the Condor--Hollywood cut it to three.  I have told James Grady I would not be writing today without his  book. 

Got to agree about Rosemary’s Baby. And I had no idea my idol Rod Serling wrote Seven Days in May. So life-changing for me back then. Is there a movie of On the Beach?

And can you come over? I have never seen The Fury. But enough about me. I could talk about his forever.  How about you, Femmes and readers?

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Jon Land is the USA Today bestselling author of 38 novels, including eight titles in the critically acclaimed Caitlin Strong series: Strong Enough to Die, Strong Justice, Strong at the Break, Strong Vengeance, Strong Rain Falling (winner of the 2014 International Book Award and 2013 USA Best Book Award for Mystery-Suspense), Strong Darkness (winner of the 2014 USA Books Best Book Award and the 2015 International Book Award for Thriller and Strong Light of Day which won the 2016 International Book Award for Best Thriller-Adventure, the 2015 Books and Author Award for Best Mystery Thriller, and the 2016 Beverly Hills Book Award for Best Mystery. The latest title in the series is Strong Cold Dead, was published on October 4 and about which Booklist said, “Thrillers don’t get any better than this,” in a starred review. Land has also teamed with multiple New York Times bestselling author Heather Graham on a new sci-fi series, the first of which, The Rising, will be published by Forge in January of 2017. He is a 1979 graduate of Brown University and lives in Providence, Rhode Island.

STRONG COLD DEAD 

ISIS comes to Texas in the 8^th thriller to feature Caitlin Strong.

In her storied career as a Texas Ranger, Caitlin has confronted all manner of evil, but nothing that’s prepared her for the terrorist group’s pursuit of a devastating weapon on Lone Star State soil. The land in question lies on an Indian reservation where a drilling operation steeped in mystery and controversy is about to commence under the auspices of billionaire Cray Rawls.

But Rawls is only one of Caitlin’s problems. The fact that her own surrogate son Dylan, the oldest boy of her reformed outlaw lover Cort Wesley Masters, has joined the Natives protesting the incursion onto their land demands her involvement, even before she realizes such noble ends are actually cloaking nefarious means in their own right. There’s also a twisted genius who’s uncovered the true secrets of that land, a young man with whom Caitlin shares a past now in a position to deliver Armageddon from Texas’ canyonlands.

To save millions from a horrible fate at the hands of ISIS, Caitlin and Cort Wesley must sort through a web of death and deceit as tangled as the blood-soaked grounds of the reservation that hold an ancient secret. A secret that’s the source of a battle rooted in the past and now destined to determine the shape of the future.

From One Media to Another

I’ve been fortunate to have several television deals, and I can tell you from experience, the two forms of entertainment are utterly dissimilar. If you suppose I mean seeing the action of a plot rather than reading the action of a plot, you’re mistaken. Sure, that makes a tremendous difference; not everything that reads beautifully on the page films beautifully. And an actor’s interpretation of your character can be quite surprising.

But here’s the difference that means most to me: scheduling. In publishing, there is little spontaneity. You have a deadline. You have to stick to it. Then comes the other steps necessary to produce a book: the cover is scheduled to appear, the copy editor and editor have a time budget to work, the author has to have this new incarnation back in by a certain date, and the actual printing is figured into the schedule of a printing company.

This is all far in advance, right? It often takes a year to produce a book, after the manuscript is on the desk of the editor.

Television is not like this, and that’s putting it mildly. When I was asked to visit the Midnight set in Albuquerque recently, it was hard to find a day when the rest of the cast would be there. I was due to film an interview at noon. I filmed it at five-thirty p.m. I know it cannot actually be this way, but it seems like the production schedule is determined on a day-to-day basis.

I could not deal with this state of affairs, after years of being in the publishing industry. It feels haphazard and random to me, and I feel insecure and jangled when I’m swept up as part of it.

Maybe that’s mutual. Sometimes the people I deal with (and they’re all hardworking and talented people) can’t get the rigidity of the publishing world. For example, it’s hard for them to see that a signing schedule is not something that can be lightly re-booked.

Maybe we seek our industry because of our predilection for the style of the thing?

Charlaine Harris

Thanksgiving Wishes from the Femmes Fatales

Donna Andrews: Wishing everyone a Thanksgiving where there's nothing but peace and good fellowship around the table.

Dana Cameron: I'm wishing everyone who celebrates a happy and peaceful Thanksgiving, and a happy and peaceful Thursday to those who don't!

Charlaine Harris: That my family will have joy from being together.

Dean (Miranda) James: My wish is for kindness, compassion, and tolerance this holiday season.

Toni L. P. Kelner: I wish that my new stove will actually be delivered and installed in time for us to roast our turkey, and failing that, that we find a good restaurant to eat Thanksgiving dinner at. As long as we four Kelners are together, the rest is just gravy. Not that we’ll get to make gravy if we don’t get our new stove installed, of course.

Catriona McPherson: My thanksgiving wish is that no one regrets letting me make the pies.

Kris Neri: I wish that we all experience genuine gratitude for all of our blessings.

Hank Phillippi Ryan: That each and every person does one wonderful thing for someone else.

Marcia Talley: I wish everyone will be able to relax and enjoy the food, fun and companionship and not come to blows with their drunken brother-in-law over politics.

Elaine Viets: And I wish this quote Oscar Wilde comes true: "After a good dinner one can forgive anybody, even one's own relations."

Hope

One of my beloved teachers, the late professor Maria Hogan Butler, once quoted these lines to me in a letter -- words of encouragement when I sorely needed them. They come from Robert Browning's "Epilogue to 'Asolando'."

"One who never turned his back but marched breast forward,
Never doubted clouds would break,
Never dreamed, though right were worsted, wrong would triumph,
Held we fall to rise, are baffled to fight better,
Sleep to wake."

Hope can be a tenuous thing, but as we march forward, hope will be there.

Happy Thanksgiving, one and all!

 

What's *that* about?

Catriona writes: it's my extreme pleasure to welcome back to Femmes Fatales today an old friend on a return visit. Simon Wood comes trailing clouds of glory this time, having just sold his . . . wait for it . . . millionth book. (Millionth copy, I mean; not millionth title.) And Simon is blogging about a topic on which he's something of an expert. He's dyslexic so he writes novels; he's afraid of heights so he learns to fly; he's a self-confessed easy mark for anything scary so he delves into horror. Weird, huh?

And now, here's Simon:

I’m drawn to weird—weird things, weird people, weird situations, etc. Some people (let’s call them normal folks) steer clear of it. Me, I’m fascinated. The mundane and the ordinary don’t do it for me. I’ll take the improbable any day, and that is always at the weird end of the spectrum. That's where I find answers to my two favorite questions—what-if and why!

So what do I mean by weird? Well, I have a couple of examples.

First, there’s Marilyn Hartman. She’s the serial stowaway from the Bay Area who has been trying to sneak onto planes around the country and in a number of cases, she’s managed it.  Psychologists have evaluated her and her statements have changed so often that I feel she’s telling them whatever she thinks they want to hear. When she’s interviewed on TV, there’s a sparkle in her eye that makes me think she’s yanking everyone’s chain. So why is she doing it? God knows, but boy, would I love to interview her. There’s a reason behind her behavior—and I’m not sure even she knows it—but I’d love to find out.

Second, there’s Malachi Love-Robinson. He’s the teenager who’s been arrested for practicing medicine without a license in Florida. What has me fascinated about this guy isn’t the crime itself but his persona (for the want of a better word). I can’t make out if this guy is a hustler or simply deluded. There’s something about him that feels like it’s a performance which doesn’t clarify the situation either way.

For my latest book DECEPTIVE PRACTICES, I was drawn to a different kind of weird--and one of my own making.  I misread the TV 
Guide when I saw an entry for a TV movie about a wife who hired someone to hurt her cheating husband.  I thought that was right up my street and watched it.  It had nothing to do with it.  I reread the Guide and found it didn’t say anything of the sort about.  I didn’t know if my misreading was wishful thinking or divine intervention.  Either way, I had an idea for a book!  And the following was born:

Do you have a cheating spouse? Has counseling failed? Want to get even with them? Then hire Infidelity Limited to teach them a lesson…

 Olivia Shaw grew up poor on the wrong side of the tracks, but with her thriving real estate practice and a solid marriage, her life finally feels stable . . . until she discovers her husband is cheating. Enraged, her sister offers her a solution: Infidelity Limited, a firm that promises to rough up her husband and scare him straight.

Overnight, Olivia’s life is upended as she, like all of Infidelity Limited’s clients, is drawn into a dark web of blackmail and murder. Now, Olivia is emerging as a prime suspect in her husband’s death. As a dogged detective closes in, she has only one option—take down Infidelity Limited before it’s too late.

God bless my dyslexia and my love of the weirder side of things because I think DECEPTIVE PRACTICES is a doozy.... Do you have weird news stories and true life happenings that grab you and don't let go? I'd love to hear them.

Catriona writes: Me too! Tell us in the comments section (we all agree not to nab them for plots, right?)  

Bio:Simon Wood is a California transplant from England. He's a former competitive racecar driver, a licensed pilot, an endurance cyclist, an animal rescuer and an occasional PI. He shares his world with his American wife, Julie. Their lives are dominated by a longhaired dachshund, six cats and three chickens. He's the Anthony Award winning author of Working Stiffs, Accidents Waiting to Happen, Paying the Piper, Terminated, Asking For Trouble, We All Fall Down and the Aidy Westlake series. His last thriller THE ONE THAT GOT AWAY has been optioned for a movie adaptation. He also writes horror under the pen name of Simon Janus. Curious people can learn more at http://www.simonwood.net.

Winter Is Coming

by Donna Andrews at the Femmes Fatales.

Yes, winter is definitely coming. If you're a Game of Thrones watcher--and I am, at least for the time being, with the caveat that the minute they kill off Tyrion Lannister I'm gone--the phrase carries with it a thrill of danger and menace--white walkers with unearthly blue eyes appearing out of a year-long snowstorm, threatening the end of civilization.

No, not that kind of winter.  Just an ordinary winter, bringing with it all the ordinary and utterly predictable miseries, discomforts, and blahs. I love the changing of the seasons--the first few warm days in spring, and the first few cool days in autumn. Once summer or winter settle in for real . . . not a fan.  Especially not of winter.

So I'm going through my usual start-of-winter routine.  Reminding myself, to begin with, of what I dislike about winter, and then countering that with what I do like.

The first part of the double whammy is the dark. You'd think a night owl like me wouldn't mind so much, but I do. Getting up in the dark, and having the light disappear in what feels like the middle of the afternoon--depressing.  So I remind myself that at least I live in times when we can make plenty of light to counter the dark--and thanks to the new LED bulbs, leaving a million lights on to lift my mood won't be nearly as expensive as the air-conditioning of summer. And since I no longer commute to my day job, no more commuting home in the dark. Worst comes to worst, I can always get one of those lights that simulates daylight to help people battle seasonal affective disorder. Meanwhile, I'm  focusing on a mental picture of myself sitting in my comfy reading chair, with a pool of light spilling over my page.

That mental picture also includes an afghan over my feet. Hate the cold, especially cold feet.  The afghan's at the ready, along with a thermal blanket for days when the afghan isn't quite enough.  And I've got the electric floor mat set up under my desk. My home office, where I spend long hours not only writing but blogging, Facebooking, and emailing, is almost a basement, and has linoleum flooring over concrete slab.  In the summer, that makes for a pleasantly cool environment, but in the winter the floor gets pretty frigid. Thank goodness for the electric floor mat, along with the electric mattress pad that lets me take the chill off the sheets at night. Much easier than the hot water bottles I'd be constantly filling in olden times.  But still: brrr.

Cold. Dark. Ugh. And some of the predictions are for an unusually cold and snowy winter this year.

But there are consolations.  I filled my birdfeeder today. I don't bother with the feeder in the late spring and summer, when the birds can find plenty to eat all around them. But when the winter starts setting in the way it has today--gale force winds and temps heading for the twenties--I set up Cafe Andrews.  One feeder on the deck, visible from the kitchen window.  One on a pole outside the sliding glass doors at the back of my office.  I have a chair by the window, and a place to stash my camera, and I can paparazzi the birds to my heart's content. That gray winter light--yeah, not exactly cheerful, but it makes the colors pop.  And there's something about the winter landscape, pared to the bone, that's more interesting to photograph. And then when you add in snow--glorious!  I prefer snow that gives good photography opportunities without shutting down the power or the roads. But as long as I've got my camera, I'm cool.

Okay, I'm sure there's something else I like about winter . . . I've got it: the end of one garden season and the time to start planning for the next. I was not a particularly good gardener this summer. Too many other things going on.  Didn't do much planting.  Or weeding.  But that's the great thing about gardening--every year you get a fresh start. Okay, if you had a diligent season, your garden's in better shape than it was last year this time. But if you didn't--it's okay. All is forgiven. You've got the next few months to plan and make resolutions. As a gardener, I'm definitely at my best in winter.

I could probably think of a few more things I like about winter, but I think I'll leave it there. Taking pictures. Planning my garden. And being able to spend time tucked up in my comfy chair with a good book. 

Although if anyone wants to suggest any other silver linings to the clouds of winter, I'm all ears.

 

I Can't be Harry Potter

by Toni L.P. Kelner/Leigh Perry

I love the Harry Potter books, and dip into them often when I need cheering up or distraction. (And I've needed a lot of cheering up and distraction this past week.) During dark times, I enjoy watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Star Trek, and The Flash. I crave comic book heroes like Ms. Marvel, Squirrel Girl, Batman, and Superman. I need to see these heroes kick butt and take names, and cheer them as they fight for what's right.
At night, when nobody else is around, I might even fantasize about being Buffy, or Barry Allen, or Captain Picard, or Squirrel Girl. But it's only fantasy--I know I am not going to be that kind of hero. I'm too old, too out of shape, too afraid... Too something.But that's okay. Very few of us are going to be that kind of hero. Heck, even in the most heroic of tales, the majority of characters aren't that kind of hero. Look at the myriad of characters in the Potter books who aren't Harry, the rest of Star Fleet, the Scoobies, even Alfred the Butler. They do their parts, too, often things that the heroes can't do. (Does Captain Kirk know how to use a tricorder?) I think one reason I like writing and reading about amateur sleuths is that the Miss Marples, the Aurora Teagardens, and the Emma Fieldings don't go out to change the world. They're just trying to deal with their own small parts of the world. That's a goal I can imagine myself achieving.

So when I'm trying to think of what it is I can do to improve the world, while I may admire the heroes, but what I aspire to be is something more modest. I may not be able to kill a demon, but I could research for Buffy. I can't command a starship, but I could clean some dilithium crystals. I can fly or beat up criminals, but I can call for help when help is needed. And maybe if I keep writing, I can inspire other non-heroes, or at least cheer them up a bit.

Your Moments of Grace

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: On this post-Veteran’s Day, a story. My Dad and I were once in a library of a home, and he saw a paperback anthology of poetry, the familiar one edited by Louis Untermeyer. And he said—“Oh, this is just like the one I carried during the war.” (He was a POW after being captured in the Battle of the Bulge.) I said—“You carried a book of poetry with you? Why?” And he said: To remind myself there is beauty in the world. A moment of grace. And here is an equally beautiful library story from author Susan Van Kirk.

                                                                 

                                                   A Moment of Grace

Anne Lamott, writer of Small Victories: Spotting Improbable Moments of Grace, has been in my thoughts lately. Strangely enough, one of those “ah ha” moments of grace happened to me recently. Growing up in Galesburg, Illinois, a town of 38,000 back in the early 1950s, I soon discovered reading.

Every week I headed to the Galesburg Public Library with my mother. It was built in 1901 and had a huge, double-wide marble staircase that you faced when you came in the front door. The second story was a marvel, and part of the floor was made of glass cubes. How intriguing for a little girl of six or seven.

But the very best part of this library was the children’s room, holding marvelous wonders, including a doll house that was filled with miniature furniture and people. This doll house drew me like a magnet. The front was glassed in so I couldn’t actually move things around. But just peering in at the various tiny miniatures each week was astonishing.

I always saw details that I hadn’t noticed before.

In the back were windows that looked into the rooms from a different angle. I was in heaven. My mother had to pry me away from this eighth wonder of the world every visit.

At that time, my father was managing the Drive-In Theatre several miles west of Galesburg. Our family often spent evenings out there in the summer, and as an adult I have such happy memories of those times.

One night in particular, though, was filled with terror and tears: May 9, 1958. We were near the end of the movie and people began getting out of their cars and looking back to the east. Eleven years old, I had no idea what was going on. But then, in the inky, close darkness, we saw fire lighting up the night sky.

My father drove us back to town where we were horrified to see my beautiful library, my cherished and second home, going up in flames. Hundreds of people were standing behind the barricades watching the firemen fighting valiantly to save the building. The crowd was hushed, staring in disbelief. Hardly anyone spoke. The roof collapsed onto the second floor, and eventually the astonishing second floor—filled with books, chairs and tables, and glass squares—fell into the ground floor.

Later we found out an exhaust fan in the attic had caught on fire, and the men had trouble fighting the fire because the water pressure was too low in the hydrants. While 40,000 books were salvaged—many water-damaged—the city lost 200,000 books worth half a million dollars.

But the most horrible losses of all were four letters signed by Abraham Lincoln and valuable items from the history of the city and the genealogy of families in the area. I will never forget that night and the terrible loss of so much history and beauty. Last week I stopped in the Galesburg Public Library, the small modern structure that sits on the same site as my old, well-loved Carnegie building.

I stopped in the children’s room to see what it looks like these days, and suddenly I saw a dollhouse. It seemed familiar. The librarian told me it was the original dollhouse, one of the few things they had saved from the fire that night fifty-eight years ago.

I checked it out, fascinated.

I saw the tiny rooms just as I remembered them, with the children’s bedroom upstairs and the rocking horse just waiting for them. I gazed in wonder, thinking about how my eyes had looked at these same tiny rooms so long ago, long before I grew up and had children and grandchildren of my own. I touched the glass, the same invisible wall that I had touched when I was five or six, and suddenly I was back there in that library with my mom, and we were looking at that perfect reproduction of a well-loved rural home of the 1950s, and pointing out the marvelous miniatures we liked. It brought back a tumbling jumble of happy memories of those Saturday mornings at my favorite library, when my parents were still alive and my world was smaller and quieter.

A very special moment of grace.

And what about you? Have you have a special moment of grace lately?

MARRY IN HASTE

 It is 2012 in the small town of Endurance, and wealthy banker, Conrad Folger, is murdered and his wife, Emily, arrested. Emily Folger was one of Grace Kimball’s students in the past, and Grace knows Emily could never murder anyone. So, Grace joins Detective TJ Sweeney to investigate the murder, and they uncover a dark secret.

In 1893, Olivia Havelock, age seventeen, moves to Endurance to seek a husband. She finds one in Charles Lockwood, powerful and wealthy judge, but her diary reveals a terrifying story.

Two wives—two murders a century apart—and a shocking secret connects them. Marry in Haste is a story of the resilience of women, both in the past and the present.

 

 

 

 

Susan Van Kirk grew up in Galesburg, Illinois, and received degrees from Knox College and
the University of Illinois. She taught high school English for thirty-four years, then spent an additional ten years teaching at Monmouth College.

Her first Endurance mystery novel, Three May Keep a Secret, was published in 2014 by Five Star Publishing/Cengage.  In April, 2016, she published an Endurance e-book novella titled The Locket: From the Casebook of TJ Sweeney. Her third Endurance novel, Death Takes No Bribes, will follow Marry in Haste.

Social Media:

Website and blog:  http://www.susanvankirk.com

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/SusanVanKirkAuthor/

Twitter:  https://www.twitter.com/susan_vankirk

GoodReads:  www.goodreads.com/author/show/586.Susan_VanKirk

 

LIFE AS WE KNOW IT

Whether you’re happy about the outcome of the presidential election or not, here’s the great thing: it’s over. No more ranting and rebuttal, no more hashing over the same arguments (ad nauseum). No more preaching to the choir.

It’s time to look forward, to resume life as usual, to hope for the best. If you can’t feel capable of that, it’s at least time to brace for the worst. Either way, we’re in a different phase of being. The decision is now out of our hands.

In my own life, my grandchildren continue to be adorable and incredibly smart. My house, though the water damage is not repaired yet, is at least peaceful. I’ve lost two friends this year through severe illnesses. I miss them, but have to accept this as part of life.

I’ve just signed a new book contract with a new publisher, and I’m very excited about my professional future. In the spring, “Midnight, Texas” will be on the air on NBC. The next Aurora Teagarden movie (for Hallmark) will be filming soon. I have other irons in the fire.

And I have a book to finish before Christmas, another Aurora Teagarden. Hers is a pleasant world to visit, and I’m having a good time during the process of working out the intricacies of the mystery.

This may be the calm before the storm, but I’m enjoying it.

Charlaine Harris