Edith Maxwell's Blog, page 99

Wicked Wednesday- Anticipation

Jessie: Peering longingly out the window when she should be working on her next novel!

All this month we are discussing anticipation. Sometimes I think it should be called anticipatience! So Wickeds, how patient are you? How about your sleuths? Do you think patience is part of the writing process? If so, which parts of it require the most patience from you?

Edith/Maddie: Right now I have five short stories AND a new series proposal out on submission. I am not feeling at all patient waiting to hear about them. Otherwise I am a pretty patient person, something parenthood taught me. I’m also writing the fourth Cozy Capers Book Group Mystery – Murder in a Cape Cottage – in which my already obsessive protag Mac is trying to solve two century-old murders in the week before her wedding. It isn’t going along very fast (which leads to tension and suspense, both great things in a mystery), and she’s getting more and more impatient.

Liz: Oh boy – patience is probably my least favorite word in the dictionary! I have basically none. Maddie is a lot like me – she has very little patience for most things, especially fools! Violet is a bit different – out of all my characters she’s probably the most patient, except when her mother, Fiona, throws a magickal monkey wrench into her world.

Sherry: I’m fairly patient with most situations, but when I get my dander up about something watch out. Chloe is more impatient than Sarah. As to writing — I get impatient for first reviews, hoping they will be good.

Julie: I am patient with other people, especially small children. Though when pushed, watch out. Lilly Jayne is such a fun character to write. She’s patient with her gardens. But she is impatient with incompetence and stupidity. Which makes her an excellent sleuth.

Jessie: My patience tends to extend easily to people and less so to glitches in technology. My leuths all seem to be equally willing to take the time it takes when it comes to their interactions with others. As far as writing goes, I think patience is a super power. Without it, everythign is so much more difficult. The writing process itself, awaiting reviews or news on submissions and even the business side of production of the books themselves are all helped enormously by a heaping heling of it!

Readers, are you patient about some things but not others?

Guest Barbara Monajem and #Giveaway!

Edith here, loving all the spring flowers. And happy to host fellow historical novelist Barbara Monajem again. She has a new Lady Rosamund mystery out today and is giving away a copy!

Widowed Lady Rosamund spends the first months of her mourning in the Lake District, where it’s safe and peaceful, and murders are exceedingly rare. Luckily, she is rescued from this tedium by a house party comprised of playwrights, poets, and actors—an immoral set of persons with whom no respectable lady should associate. Even so, she hardly expected to wake in the wee hours to find one of the guests lying dead.

As if that wasn’t troublesome enough, Gilroy McBrae is at the same party, masquerading as a footman to investigate a series of thefts. Was the sudden death an accident—or murder? Almost everyone had reason to loathe their unpleasant fellow guest. Rosie must set aside her confused emotions about McBrae and work with him to find the culprit before an innocent person is accused of the crime.

Here’s the problem: Corvus, one of the main characters in my Lady Rosamund series, is a caricaturist – an 1811 version of today’s tabloid photographers.

I really, really don’t like the tabloids. I mean, have you looked at the headlines? Most of what they say ranges from unlikely to impossible, and it’s usually mean and nasty. If that wasn’t bad enough, some people actually believe them, and it does a lot of harm. I often wonder if the tabloid journalists and photographers have any conscience at all.

And yet, the equivalent of two hundred years ago is one of my main characters, and as the series progresses, I have to deal with his conscience. His caricatures can be very nasty indeed, and although they always contain a grain or more of truth, it’s often exaggerated and twisted for effect. Sometimes he (hopefully) makes people think, and often he provides amusement for the beleaguered lower classes, but sometimes he actually causes harm. I want Corvus to come across as basically a good person—a man with principles who cares about the poor and has a mission to poke at the consciences of the rich and powerful—but is that possible?

Sigh. Lady Rosamund is essentially a kind-hearted person, and she’s beginning to have an influence on what Corvus draws, so far mostly for her own sake and that of her family members. On the other hand, she mustn’t be allowed to extinguish his creative spark. That wouldn’t be good for either of them, especially as their relationship deepens.

What this leads to is me, the author, wondering how far Corvus can go in mocking the upper classes in 19th century England without crossing the line from good guy to jerk. Every time I dream up a caricature for him, even if the victim deserves it, I cringe a little, thinking of the mortification the victim will suffer, and what the consequences might be. Maybe it’s a bit weird to feel sorry for people who don’t even exist, but secondhand embarrassment is normal for me. I find it hard to read scenes in books or watch movies where I know the characters are about to get hurt or embarrassed—and if I’ve read or seen it before, it’s often worse, because I know exactly what will happen next.

Readers: What do you think? Can a caricaturist be unkind and also a good guy? Do you feel secondhand embarrassment? Answer these or make up your own question and answer it. One commenter will win a copy of Lady Rosamund and the Horned God.

Rumor has it that Barbara Monajem is descended from English aristocrats. If one keeps to verifiable claims, however, her ancestors include London shopkeepers and hardy Canadian pioneers. As far as personal attributes go, she suffers from an annoying tendency to check and recheck anything and everything, usually for no good reason. Hopefully all this helps to explain her decision to write from the point of view of a compulsive English lady with a lot to learn about how the other ninety-nine percent lived in 1811 or so.

As for qualifications, Barbara is the author of over twenty historical romances and a few mysteries, for which she has won several awards. On the other hand, she has no artistic talent and therefore is really stretching it to write about an artist who draws wickedly good caricatures. But she’s doing it anyway, because he’s irresistible. To her, anyway. Not so much to the aristocratic lady. Or at least not yet.

Playing to Strength

Jessie: Tucked up cozily inside in New Hampshire working away on another novel!

A few months ago I took an online class, Strengths for Writers which I enjoyed immensely. An important component of the class was the Gallup Strengths test. I found it to provide a great deal of food for thought. According to the test my top strengths include Input, Strategic, Learner, Intellection and Futuristic.

What it all boiled down to is that I love to gather information, think about how best to use it, dive deeply into some topics to achieve mastery, noodle on lots of things and to imagine and plan the future. None of this came as a surprise. I am unwaveringly curious, I love to learn new things and I am never without goals and plans for what could be next.

What was surprising was the pleasure I have found in finding ways to support those strengths on a daily basis. Since taking the class I’ve embarked on a morning routine that includes high quality input in the form of a curated reading list and a newspaper subscription. I’ve scheduled weekly planning and review sessions for my writing career and my personal life to please both my strategy and futuristic inclinations. I take long walks with my dog wearing my noise cancelling headphones in order to think without interruption. I bought an annual subscription to both SkillShare and Curiosity Stream for my enthusiastic learner.

I’ve even convinced myself to go ahead and prioritize making time for input and learning in a really deliberate way by gathering resources and materials. I put time on my calendar each day to learn the things I set out to like sketching, painting and meditating. I ordered an art supply catelogue, downloaded an app called Daily Art and asked for a Muse Band as a Christmas gift.

I am not sure that I have ever been happier or have felt stronger. I feel like I am swimming with the current instead of against it. With so much in the world that feels ill at ease, confined or constricted at present, it is a delight to simply flow along with what comes easily to me. I hope each of you are finding ways to celebrate your own strengths and best ways of being in the world! I am absolutely convinced that everyone benefits when we all are able to bring our strengths to the world around us!

Readers, is there something new you would like to learn? Writers, have you taken any of the Strengths classes with the Write Better Faster Academy or a writign class you would recommend?

Guest Peggy Ehrhart and a Giveaway!

Happy Friday readers! Liz here, excited to welcome Peggy Ehrhart, author of the Knit & Nibble Mysteries, to the blog! Just a warning, you’ll probably be hungry after this post… Take it away, Peggy!

History in the Kitchen: The First Ladies Cook Book

We have a new president (Yay!) and a new vice-president, whose spouse is not the “Second Lady” but the “First Gentleman”—an illogical identification, as many have pointed out, since he isn’t married to the new First Lady. Anyway . . .

This seemed a fun time to pull out my copy of The First Ladies Cook Book. It’s an entertaining work published by Parents’ Magazine Press with input from the Smithsonian Institution and the National Historic Trust. After a brief overview of each presidential administration, it focuses on what the presidents and their families ate and served to their guests while in the White House, starting with George Washington and ending, in the 1969 edition I own, with Richard Nixon. The role reversal signaled by Kamala Harris and her husband would have seemed outlandish for most of our nation’s history, when it was assumed that the president’s wife—or a stand-in, like a niece—would handle the domestic aspects of White House life.

For the most part, information about dishes served at dinners, both grand and simple, was culled from diaries, letters, account books, and newspaper reports, and recipes for the dishes were reconstructed from cookbooks of the respective eras. In some later cases, the actual White House recipes were available.

Trends in food preparation and service influenced entertaining at the White House, particularly the receptions and state dinners that are such an important adjunct to governing. In Washington’s era and for some time beyond, the table was laden with nearly all the food at once. A shoulder of bacon, a roast beef, a crab dish, a cut of mutton, and a roast goose might share space with beef pies, apple pies, and much else. The “modern fashion” of serving meals in courses was first noted in the administration of Pierce (1853-57). 

Recipes range from Washington’s Beefsteak and Kidney Pie, Polk’s Tennessee Ham, Taylor’s Deviled Crab, Fillmore’s Saddle of Lamb, and onward—up to Poulet à l’Estragon and Soufflé Froid au Chocolat (Kennedy), and finally Nixon’s Vanilla Soufflé with Vanilla Sauce. The book ends with a photo of the Nixon feast, recreated for the book, that might have preceded the soufflé: Cheese Straws, Smoked Salmon with Capers on Buttered Pumpernickel, Brie with Crackers, Stuffed Tomatoes, Beef Wellington, and Hearts of Palm and Watercress Salad. 

Lincoln, notoriously, was barely aware of what he was eating, though he appreciated good coffee and enjoyed chicken, so from his administration we get Fried Chicken and two versions of Chicken Fricassee.  

A few recipes reflect regional influence. Buchanan ate shoulder of pork stuffed with sauerkraut as an homage to his roots in Pennsylvania Dutch territory, and the section on LBJ includes Pedernales Chili.  

Fun facts:  Thanksgiving was first celebrated in the White House under Polk, and the first White House Christmas tree was set up under Harrison.  

Truman’s tastes were more proletarian than most. One of his favorite dishes was reportedly Tuna and Noodle Casserole. Here’s my version, using the recipe from the book.

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And here’s the recipe: 

Truman’s Tuna and Noodle Casserole

1 7-oz. can of tuna, drained

6 oz. egg noodles (about ½ package)

4 tbsp. butter, divided

1 ½ cup milk

¼ tsp. salt

1 ½ tbsp.. flour

¼ tsp. pepper

¼ lb. sharp cheddar, grated

2 hard-boiled eggs

Parsley

Boil the noodles in salted water until tender, about 12 minutes. Drain and set aside.

Make your cheese sauce: Melt 2 tbsp. butter and stir in flour. Blend until smooth using a wire whisk if you have one. Add the milk and stir until the mixture comes to a boil. Blend in the cheese and salt and pepper. Cook and stir for 3 minutes longer.

Butter a medium-sized casserole (1 ½ qt. is good). Put in half the noodles, then all the tuna in a smooth layer, then the rest of the noodles. Pour the cheese sauce over all, dab with the rest of the butter in small bits, and bake at 350 degrees for 30 minutes.

Before serving, garnish with sliced hard-boiled egg and sprigs of parsley.

If anyone is interested in their own copy of The First Ladies Cook Book, used copies in various editions abound, for as little as $5. Just search online for “The First Ladies Cook Book.”

Readers: Do you have a favorite recipe, made by you or by someone else, that you value for its link with an important event or experience in your life? One random commenter will receive a signed copy of Knitty Gritty Murder. (U.S. and Canada only, please!)

Peggy Ehrhart is a former English professor with a doctorate in Medieval Literature. She currently writes the Knit & Nibble mystery series for Kensington. Her amateur sleuth, Pamela Paterson, is the founder of the Knit & Nibble knitting club, and Peggy herself is a devoted crafter, dating from her membership in 4-H as a child in southern California. Visit Peggy online at www.PeggyEhrhart.com .

About Knitty Gritty Murder: A Knit & Nibble Mystery

Pamela Paterson, founder of the Knit and Nibble knitting club in quaint Arborville, New Jersey, gets pulled into investigating the murder of farm-to-table enthusiast Jenny Miller when Jenny is found strangled with a circular knitting needle in her own community garden plot.

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Anticipating Typing “the end”

by Julie, enjoying the spring in Somerville

I am working on book #5, tentatively titled The Plot Thickets, which is due on May 1. Don’t bother to remember the title for next year, when it is released. There is a strong chance my editor will want to change it. But I digress.

This month, we’ve been talking about anticipation. As I anticipate typing “the end” and hitting submit on this manuscript, I will confess that I have a lot of conflicting emotions.

At this point, I’m sick of reading and rereading the book. There, I said it. Editing requires adding details and polishing. It also requires making sure that the book makes sense. Is the timeline accurate? Are all the right characters in every scene? Did changing a clue in chapter five completely screw up chapter twelve? Answer, of course it did.

Every time I go through it again, I find more to finesse. I do think part of this is due to the fact that I’m a better writer now, on what will be my tenth published novel, than I was at the beginning of this journey, and so I spend more time on the editing process. I purposely give myself a lot of time for this part of the work. As I mentioned, it’s easy to get sick of my book at this point. I vacillate between being amused and being convinced it’s terrible. By April 30 it will be in good shape, of that I have confidence.

But I also dread finishing the book. I enjoy spending time with Lilly Jayne, Delia, Ernie, Roddy, Tamara, Warwick and the rest of the citizens of Goosebush. When I’m writing, I transport myself there, to this place that only exists in my imagination. I can feel the warmth of Lilly’s greenhouse, taste the brioche Ernie baked, hear Roddy’s deep voice as he and Delia discuss clues, and see the wonders of Alden Park as it is being transformed. The plots are complicated, and require introducing new people and situations, some of whom continue from book to book. Though I know that I am the writer of Lilly’s adventures, there is magic in their creation. I’ll miss the magic when I type “the end”.

But before I type those six letters, I have a few more things I need to do. Gardening friends, do you have any spring tips that I can include in the book? I’ll be sure to thank you in the acknowledgments. I always leave this to the last minute, and could use your help.

Click on the picture below to send them to me, or leave a tip in the comments below.

Dear readers, do you have anything you anticipate with both pleasure and dread?

Wicked Wednesday-Anticipation

Jessie: In Northern New England, enjoying spring!

This month we are chatting about anticipation. Yesterday was release day for Edith’s latest Quaker Midwife Mystery, A Changing Light which involves change and progress.

So, this week I want to ask you about the sorts of things you are eagerly anticipating for the future? What are your sleuths hoping their futures will hold?

Sherry: Congratulations on the new book, Edith! I love the cover and am so happy for you! I’m hoping for a post pandemic world where we don’t have to wear masks and life can return to normal. My protagonists are hoping they will quit finding dead bodies, sadly that won’t happen!

Barb: Congratulations, Edith! I, too, love this cover. I’m hoping to finish the $%^&* book I’m working on, the tenth in the Maine Clambake Mystery series. Buoyed by a warm Maine spring (so far) Julia is eagerly awaiting the opening of the Snowden Family Clambake season. (Though she may stumble over a body before that happens.) Jane Darrowfield is working in her garden in Cambridge, Massachusetts hoping her efforts now will pay off later.

Jessie: Congratulations, Edith! Sherry, I hope your sleuths never run out of bodies! Barb, I know you will finish the book one way or another! As for me, I am anticipating time at the beach very soon! This is the first year that I can head up as soon as I would like since my youngest is off at college for the first time and I think I will likely go up in May since the beach is so lovely at that time of year! My sleuths are anticipating new adventures with their business and with skullduggery in the village. Beryl has her eyes on a small aeroplane and Edwina is feverishly working away on her novel!

Liz: Congrats, Edith! So exciting. Jessie, I’m with you on the beach! I can’t wait to sit on the sand and go swimming. As for my sleuths, Maddie is hoping that she can talk Grandpa Leo into more cats for the cat cafe, and Violet is anticipating that more witchcraft and mayhem are going to appear in her life despite her best efforts to retain some semblance of normalcy!

Julie: Congratulations, Edith! I’m looking forward to the beach and cookouts. Both a wonderful way to spend time with people I care about. I’m working on book #5 in the Garden Squad series now, and can say for certain that everyone is looking forward to Alden Park reopening soon. Lilly’s hoping there won’t be any more dead bodies found, and for this book, she’s in luck. The next one, though…

Changing – or Staying the Same?

Edith writing from a spring-filled north of Boston.

I’m delighted to celebrate release day with all of you for A Changing Light, my seventh Quaker Midwife Mystery!

Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose – the more that changes, the more it’s the same thing. This book is all about change – in the world, and in midwife Rose’s life.

You might detect one change from the cover. See how she’s a bit more full of figure there? Because you will read about it on page 2, it’s not much of a spoiler to say that, yes, Rose is pregnant with her and David’s first child (if you aren’t up to date on the series, they were married the previous fall in Agatha-nominated Taken Too Soon)! She’s been spending the whole series helping other women deliver their babies. Now it’s her turn.

Other changes in 1890 Amesbury are also exciting ones: the horse-drawn trolley is being electrified. More people have telephones. There’s talk going around of a radical new horseless carriage.

Helen Marble Bailey and her son, SR, in a Bailey electric car beside the Merrimack River in 1910.

But other things don’t change. Old people die of natural causes. Tuberculosis is an epidemic with no cure and no vaccine, despite the medical profession knowing it is caused by bacteria.

One of the research books I read

Jealousy, revenge, spite, passion are all emotions that have always led to murder – and still do. Here’s the book’s blurb:

Midwife Rose Carroll sees signs of progress and change everywhere. Her New England mill town presents its 1890 annual Spring Opening, when world-famous carriage manufacturers throw open their doors to visitors from all over the globe. This year’s festivities are tainted when a representative from a prominent Canadian carriage company is murdered, and plans for a radical new horseless carriage go missing. Faced with the question of whether the two crimes are connected—and a list of suspects that includes some of Amesbury’s own residents and any number of foreign visitors—Rose delves into a case with implications for the future, even if the motive for murder is one of mankind’s oldest.

I loved writing this book, learning new facts about the past as well as making up the fictional story. I hope you love reading it!

Readers: What’s your favorite invention from before 1900? I’ll send one lucky commenter a set of my spiffy brand-new Quaker Midwife coasters!

Please join Nancy Herriman and me tonight on Facebook for our joint historical launch party. No Darkness Like Death, her next Old San Francisco mystery, also releases today, and it’s one of my favorite series.

And please register here for my Zoom conversation with the fabulous Hallie Ephron, one of my teachers and mentors – on April 22. I’d love to see you all there in the chat room – and we’ll have prizes!

Another long (slightly less strange) trip

by Barb, posting from Portland, Maine for the first time in 2021

My husband and I just completed our annual 1800 mile drive from Key West, Florida home to Maine. I posted about this trip last year. Driving in the beginning of the pandemic, when we knew next to nothing about the novel coronavirus–how it spread or how to treat it–was harrowing.

Since we make the same trip at the same time every year, I thought describing this year’s journey, compared to last year’s, might tell us some interesting things about how far we’ve come–and how far we still have to go.

The visit

Last year, we arrived in Key West blissfully unaware and watched in horror as the pandemic crept up on us. All the bars closed at 5:00 pm on Saint Patrick’s Day, not to reopen. Slowly, hotels were emptied, then short-term leases, then our own long term lease could not be extended.

This year, the town was open for business–sort of. The bars and restaurants along Duval Street were for the most part operating, except for those that sadly hadn’t made it through the pandemic. However, Key West has long been a town where people cut loose and misbehave, and this year, misbehaving sometimes included mingling, maskless, in crowded spaces. So Bill and I avoided downtown.

Though there were visitors, crowds weren’t nearly at normal levels. For one thing, usually people visit from everywhere in the world and lots of Canadians stay all season. Not this year. And there were no cruise ships discharging thousands of passengers into the streets everyday.

It was a weird year to be sure. No house guests, no indoor restaurant dining, no live theater, or movies. A lot of the reasons we love Key West were not on the agenda. We did learn to throw dinner parties in our backyard quite effectively. Our table is six and a half feet long and one couple could perch at each end. We went to hear music outdoors. We dined in other people’s backyards, courtyards, and on porches and had a few dinners and breakfasts outdoors in restaurants. I swam in our backyard pool everyday. In short, we were very happy to be in Key West, even with restrictions.

When we left Maine in December, we assumed our age group would be vaccine eligible in April, right around the time of our return. However, when we got to Key West we discovered, somewhat to our surprise, that we were eligible in Florida. A lot of you have experienced this. When you’re not eligible, you accept it. But once you are you become obsessed with finding an appointment. We had our first Moderna shot the first weekend in February and the second the first weekend in March, so by the time of our trip home we were more than two weeks past our second shot. What a difference that made.

The trip

Last year’s drive was terrifying. Most of the states were passed through were operating under some sort of stay-at-home order. There were police road blocks at the top of the Florida Keys and on the Georgia/Florida border. We were using Clorox wipes on our car door handles inside and out every time we pumped gas. In each hotel room I wiped everything including the TV remote and the light switches. We had to be really strategic about where to eat and finding rest stops. We made the trip in three days. I texted my son’s family, my brother and his wife, and my daughter’s family as we rode by their exits.

The drive this year was more relaxed, though hardly normal. I posted this photo last year of the Port St. Lucie-Fort Pierce rest area. It was empty and the only open services were the restroom and the little store.

I wish I’d thought to take a photo this year. There were lots of people, though not quite the volume you’d expect to see on the Thursday before Easter. Everywhere we stopped, in every state, 99.8% of people were masked and people stood patiently, politely, and distantly as they waited to order or pay.

Last year I concluded my post by saying, “Every person we met was polite and respectful and doing their absolute best.” That was true again this year. I feel like people are more polite now than I have ever experienced. My son thinks it’s because of the masks. Normally, we use smiles to communicate with strangers–thanks, excuse me, your turn. Cut off from that, instead we speak to one another. I don’t know if that’s true, but it sure makes me feel great when it happens.

This year we did the trip in five days instead of three. We spent Saturday and Easter morning with our (vaccinated) son and daughter-in-law and picked up a little stowaway. Then the three of us had dinner Sunday night with my (vaccinated) brother and sister-in-law. None of this would have been imaginable last year.

Our stowaway

Last year when we arrived home, our niece and her best friend were here. They had fled their college in Manhattan in mid-March, telling their friends they would see them in “a couple of weeks”–once we had flattened that curve. They stayed with us until mid-May. They were both musical theater majors and I loved hearing them singing and dancing during their online classes.

This year, my granddaughter is here, taking her second grade classes remotely. I love listening to those, too. She just informed my husband, in her very serious eight-year-old voice, that when her teacher had to be absent for a couple of days, they didn’t have a substitute, but did their homework “asynchronously.” As someone who was present at the birth of learning on the Web, I got a little teary.

Readers: How about you? How does this spring compare to last spring? Has your life changed again or are you still waiting?

Location, Location, Location – Welcome Guest Alicia Beckman

I’m so happy to welcome Alicia Beckman who you probably know as Leslie Budewitz. She has a new name and a new book out! It doesn’t get better than that. I read an early draft of the first few chapters and know it’s fantastic! Look for a giveaway at the end of the post!

Leslie: Part of the joy of writing is taking my readers to a place I love. Just between us: It isn’t always real. My Food Lovers’ Village Mysteries, written as Leslie Budewitz, are set in fictional Jewel Bay, Montana, which closely resembles the small northwest Montana town where we live. I had to change the name, I always say, so I could kill people. Both towns share a stunning setting, on a river at the foot of a mountain range, near a massive glacial lake, but I’ve renamed streets and businesses, moving restaurants, and adding shops as the series progressed. And because writing, like reading, is partly wish fulfillment, I created a green belt around the bay and a beautiful library and community center just this side of the very real one-lane bridge.

The challenge in my Spice Shop Mysteries, set in Seattle, where I went to college and lived for several years after law school, is presenting a real city on the page. Cities are always changing and a business described in one book may have moved or closed by the next. I try to keep up by making regular visits for research—and by research, of course, I mean eat—as well as scrolling through the local paper and neighborhood blogs. My BFF lives nearby and is happy to ground-truth a street or scout a location. But reality has its restraints. I can make up a business, but I can’t mess with landmarks or the one-way streets.

When the story that became Bitterroot Lake, my suspense debut, began to take shape in my mind, I recognized the setting instantly. Just as quickly, I knew it wasn’t a real lake or town. Deer Park, Montana laid itself out like some inner city planner was hard at work. A few features I can trace to other towns—it sits at the southern end of the lake like Polson, Montana and McCall, Idaho. Streets split to go around the courthouse, literally in the middle of town, as in Kalispell and Choteau, Montana. My brain flipped through images of real-life mills, past and present, and recalled visits to old cemeteries to create McCaskill Land & Lumber and Valley View Cemetery

How to keep track of the town growing in my mind’s eye? I literally sketched it out, marking the café that any small-town resident will recognize, the law office where the murder victim is found, the florist with the grumpy woman behind the counter. (“Shouldn’t that woman be happy, working with flowers all day?” my protagonist Sarah McCaskill Carter asked her grandmother when she was a child. “She’s had a hard life,” came the reply, and therein lies part of the tale.)

The lake, too, came into being as though drawn on some cosmic map, “shaped like an uneven piece of elbow macaroni, Whitetail Lodge at the outer edge of the bend, town to the southeast, hidden by the curve.” In reality, a small lake called Little Bitterroot, home to blackflies and trout and a few family cabins, sits in the general vicinity of my fictional lake, though there’s no other resemblance. Not until the first draft was nearly finished did I realize that would be the perfect name for both lake and book. But you’ll recognize the place, I’m sure—the historic lodge facing a church camp across the water trophy homes towering over trailers, tensions between money and history, old and new. I hope you can travel back with my characters when they pore over old family photo albums to see the steamboat that traversed the lake well into the 1930s. Maybe you can even picture, as I can, the intrepid blasters and wielders of pickaxes, carving out of rock the road leading there and back again, as Bilbo Baggins said.

Who doesn’t love a map in a book? My friend Francesca Droll, a graphic artist and painter, took my sketches and created a real map. As we talked over the story, we realized the reader didn’t need to see both lake and town; the better choice was to create an inset focusing on the area around Sarah’s family lodge. Working with her helped me visualize the scene more clearly, and I appreciate the patience she showed as I tweaked the locations of the roads and moved buildings like tiny, two-dimensional Monopoly pieces.

It’s all very real to me. I hope, when you’ve visited the place on the page, you’ll feel you’ve been there, too.

Readers, do you prefer a fictional setting or a real one? Flip back and forth as you read, consulting the map? Create a picture in your head? Tell us, for a chance to win a copy of Bitterroot Lake.

ABOUT THE BOOK:

From the cover:

When four women separated by tragedy reunite at a lakeside Montana lodge, murder forces them to confront everything they thought they knew about the terrifying accident that tore them apart, in Agatha Award-winning author Alicia Beckman’s suspense debut.

Twenty-five years ago, during a celebratory weekend at historic Whitetail Lodge, Sarah McCaskill had a vision. A dream. A nightmare. When a young man was killed, Sarah’s guilt over having ignored the warning in her dreams devastated her. Her friendships with her closest friends, and her sister, fell apart as she worked to build a new life in a new city. But she never stopped loving Whitetail Lodge on the shores of Bitterroot Lake.

Now that she’s a young widow, her mother urges her to return to the lodge for healing. But when she arrives, she’s greeted by an old friend–and by news of a murder that’s clearly tied to that tragic day she’ll never forget.

And the dreams are back, too. What dangers are they warning of this time? As Sarah and her friends dig into the history of the lodge and the McCaskill family, they uncover a legacy of secrets and make a discovery that gives a chilling new meaning to the dreams. Now, they can no longer ignore the ominous portents from the past that point to a danger more present than any of them could know.

Publisher: Crooked Lane Books (April 13, 2021)

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Alicia Beckman makes her suspense debut with Bitterroot Lake (Crooked Lane Books, April 2021). As Leslie Budewitz, she’s a three-time Agatha-Award winner (2011, Best Nonfiction; 2013, Best First Novel; 2018, Best Short Story) and best-selling author of the Spice Shop mysteries, set in Seattle’s Pike Place Market, and the Food Lovers’ Village mysteries, inspired by Bigfork, Montana, where she lives. A practicing lawyer, she’s a national board member of Mystery Writers of America and a past president of Sisters in Crime.

A Toast to My Fellow Nominees

I was speechless the night I got the call that From Beer to Eternity had been nominated for an Agatha Award for Best Contemporary novel. As I listened to the voicemail I started gasping—repeatedly. My husband came running out to see what was wrong, but nothing was wrong. It was absolutely beyond right.

After the call, I waited, wondering who would be nominated with me. Five days later the list came out and I couldn’t be happier to be nominated with this group of incredible authors and women.

Donna Andrews nominated for The Gift of the Magpie – I met Donna at a Chesapeake Chapter of Sisters in Crime meeting about eight years ago. She’s a legend. I didn’t even have the courage to go over and say hello. As time I went on and I observed her at meetings, I came to love her sense of humor. I remember talking on the phone to Barb Goffman about something. Barb suggested I call Donna to find the answer. I said, “I can’t call DONNA ANDREWS.” I was still in complete awe.

As time passed I got to know Donna better and realized I really could call her. She helped me with a plot problem for my third book All Murders Final. I ended up helping her with two garage sales. Donna is a woman who would give you the shirt off your back if you asked her to and I love having her as a friend.

Ellen Byron nominated for Murder in the Bayou Boneyard – I met Ellen at Left Coast Crime in Phoenix, Arizona. Julie Hennrikus was up for an Agatha Award for Best First Novel that year. Many of the nominees – including Ellen – were there and they asked me to take a picture of them. How fortunate they did because Ellen became a friend after that.

Ellen stands out in any room with her beautiful hair and big, lovely personality. I liked her immediately. We’ve seen each other at conferences and gotten closer. I’ve loved watching her success as she received more and more nominations and awards for her books. I even got to meet her husband and in-laws when we gave Ellen a ride after Malice a few years ago. Once the Agatha list came out, Ellen called me to say congratulations (that is just so Ellen!) and we had an over-the-phone celebration. Ellen is a fierce advocate for other authors and generous with her time.

Louise Penny nominated for All the Devils are Here – ah, Louise I admire you from afar. I’ve been at several conferences Louise also attended. Whether she’s on a panel or receiving an award, Louise is always charming, funny, and her ease in front of a crowd is something I marvel at. Louise is an example of how to be a gracious author.

Lori Rader-Day nominated for The Lucky One – my first contact with Lori was via an email when Robin Burcell put us on the same debut author panel at the 2014 Left Coast Crime in Monterey. Lori moderated the panel and it became clear to me early on that she was smart, witty, and a take-no-prisoners woman. We stayed in touch and after one Malice Domestic, my husband and I gave Lori a ride to the airport via a car tour of the monuments in DC. I say we kidnapped her. We ended up in the middle of a demonstration and there was a LOT of traffic. We managed to get her to the airport on time–barely. (She forgave me. And Ellen aren’t you lucky that we delivered you promptly back to your family?!)

We stayed in touch and watched each other’s careers grow. When I became president of Sisters in Crime, I knew I wanted Lori to run to be my vice president. I was worried she’d say no and I didn’t have a backup plan. Thank heavens she said yes. All those traits I noticed when we were on the debut authors panel served her and Sisters in Crime  well when she was president and as she continues to serve as immediate past president. I’m the lucky one (see how I did that) to have Lori as a friend.

As you can tell, being nominated is thrilling, but to be nominated with this group of women, makes it even more special. So cheers to all of you. I’m lucky to know you. And cheers to all the 2020 nominees in all the categories. You can find the complete list here.

Readers: Do you like to read books that are on lists of awards?