Cathy Cash Spellman's Blog
June 14, 2019
What Led Me To Jane Street?
As many of you know, I never wanted to do anything in life but to write books, from the time I could hold one, never mind read it. My childhood home had books on every horizontal surface and plenty of vertical ones, as bookshelves abounded. My parents read to me… my father recited poetry, my mother demanded I be allowed into the local library’s adult stacks when I was 6, as she thought children’s books irrelevant, when adult books could be found at the same address.
The library – an old castle brought brick-by-brick from Europe to my tiny hometown – was my refuge. A tower-room housing classics, became my daily heaven on earth.
What romantic soul could ask for more inspiration than a castle tower where two suits of 14th Century Armor and the greatest books ever written were my only companions.
Writing Novels
When I finally got to write novels and my first one, So Many Partings, made it to The New York Times Bestseller List, my dreams had come true and for 15 years they remained that way, as I was blessed with a number of bestsellers in 22 countries, as well as a movie.
Then tragedy nova’d my world, as my two beloved daughters each developed severe illnesses that ended in their deaths. During their illnesses, I struggled to survive emotionally and financially, as being a mom took center stage. I kept writing, but I didn’t even try to publish, and the book world was changing around me, as self-publishing and electronic readership had altered the picture dramatically.
Most people were reading on Kindles and Nooks, ordering on iPhones, and an Indie publishing industry was in full swing. I had so many saved-up stories that were trying to get out of my head, my biggest question was where to begin...
Two New Series
I found myself drawn toward series, when I began to write again for publication. I wanted to create characters people could love, admire, empathize with – characters whose lives my reader-friends would want to share in an on-going way.
LARK’S LABYRINTH, a mystical mystery that begins in current day Greenwich, Connecticut, and propels a young mother and her nine-year-old daughter into terrifying dangers and astounding adventures, was my first book back into publishing! I loved my characters and the world of warring Secret Societies and ancient mystic secrets they were privy to.
Happily, you, my friends, embraced Cait, Lark, Hugh and the rest of the LARK’S LABYRINTH’s current-day crusaders with immense enthusiasm, asking me to tell you what happens to them next. I’m thrilled to say the second book in the Sacred Secrets Mysteries is scheduled for early 2020 release.
A Murder on Jane Street
All of which brings me to my newest thriller, A MURDER ON JANE STREET, due to be released on July 16. It’s the first in a mystery series set in Manhattan.
A whole new set of characters – this time a close-knit family with Irish roots, living in a brownstone in Greenwich Village – are the characters I hope you’ll learn to love and worry about! They have serious detecting skills in their DNA and a group of flamboyant, loyal, Good Samaritan pals who want to help solve whatever needs solving.
Fitz is a well-respected NYC Police Chief, now retired and the owner of a mystery bookshop on Bleecker Street. Maeve, his eldest daughter has inherited her mother’s psychic gifts. She’s an astrologer/healer and part owner of a Tea Shop. Rory, her younger sister, is a brainy lawyer who has followed her heart and turned her talents to finding, rehabbing and flipping old houses in the Five Boroughs of New York. Finn is Maeve’s 22-year-old daughter, an artist/photographer with a keen eye and a big heart, who seeks out stories to tell with her artful lens.
The Donovans are very close to each other and to a time when families lived with or near each other, supporting each other and the old virtues of home and hearth – love and loyalty, shared dreams and shared adventures. A time in which everybody brought something vital to the table – frequently over Sunday dinner.
In the Donovan family’s case, each has unique talents – they all love a good mystery and the chance to test their detecting skills. They also have some amazing friends who rally to their side when the going gets tough.
The family compound is a brownstone on Jane Street – which brings us to my story.
Here’s a sneak peek at the book that will be released July 16:
A Murder on Jane Street
She was born in a castle.
She died on Jane Street.
What happened in between
Could topple the U.S. Government
When Fitzhugh Donovan, retired NYPD Police Chief, gets a desperate call for help from the mysterious old woman who lives next door to him in Greenwich Village, he doesn’t have a clue that an unspeakable crime from the past is about to be freed from Pandora’s Box.
When just hours later, the old woman is brutally murdered and the police write it off as a random home invasion, Fitz doesn’t yet know that a wall of international conspiracy and corruption stands in the way of justice for this cipher of a woman, who was so much more than she appeared.
But, the old lady had asked him for help and died hard before he could give it. His Irish cop conscience can’t abide that. Fitz gathers an intriguing band of family and friends (who dub themselves the Bleecker Street Irregulars) to help him ferret out the truth.
I hope the shocking secrets the old woman died to protect, the willingness of ordinary people to do the right thing, and a couple of unexpected love stories will keep your heart on edge, as Fitz races to find a way to keep the people he loves alive in the face of terrible odds.
An Invitation from Cathy
I invite you to join me, Fitz and the Bleecker Street Irregulars to seek wild justice on Jane Street.
I can’t wait to hear from you after you do!
The library – an old castle brought brick-by-brick from Europe to my tiny hometown – was my refuge. A tower-room housing classics, became my daily heaven on earth.
What romantic soul could ask for more inspiration than a castle tower where two suits of 14th Century Armor and the greatest books ever written were my only companions.
Writing Novels
When I finally got to write novels and my first one, So Many Partings, made it to The New York Times Bestseller List, my dreams had come true and for 15 years they remained that way, as I was blessed with a number of bestsellers in 22 countries, as well as a movie.
Then tragedy nova’d my world, as my two beloved daughters each developed severe illnesses that ended in their deaths. During their illnesses, I struggled to survive emotionally and financially, as being a mom took center stage. I kept writing, but I didn’t even try to publish, and the book world was changing around me, as self-publishing and electronic readership had altered the picture dramatically.
Most people were reading on Kindles and Nooks, ordering on iPhones, and an Indie publishing industry was in full swing. I had so many saved-up stories that were trying to get out of my head, my biggest question was where to begin...
Two New Series
I found myself drawn toward series, when I began to write again for publication. I wanted to create characters people could love, admire, empathize with – characters whose lives my reader-friends would want to share in an on-going way.
LARK’S LABYRINTH, a mystical mystery that begins in current day Greenwich, Connecticut, and propels a young mother and her nine-year-old daughter into terrifying dangers and astounding adventures, was my first book back into publishing! I loved my characters and the world of warring Secret Societies and ancient mystic secrets they were privy to.
Happily, you, my friends, embraced Cait, Lark, Hugh and the rest of the LARK’S LABYRINTH’s current-day crusaders with immense enthusiasm, asking me to tell you what happens to them next. I’m thrilled to say the second book in the Sacred Secrets Mysteries is scheduled for early 2020 release.
A Murder on Jane Street
All of which brings me to my newest thriller, A MURDER ON JANE STREET, due to be released on July 16. It’s the first in a mystery series set in Manhattan.
A whole new set of characters – this time a close-knit family with Irish roots, living in a brownstone in Greenwich Village – are the characters I hope you’ll learn to love and worry about! They have serious detecting skills in their DNA and a group of flamboyant, loyal, Good Samaritan pals who want to help solve whatever needs solving.
Fitz is a well-respected NYC Police Chief, now retired and the owner of a mystery bookshop on Bleecker Street. Maeve, his eldest daughter has inherited her mother’s psychic gifts. She’s an astrologer/healer and part owner of a Tea Shop. Rory, her younger sister, is a brainy lawyer who has followed her heart and turned her talents to finding, rehabbing and flipping old houses in the Five Boroughs of New York. Finn is Maeve’s 22-year-old daughter, an artist/photographer with a keen eye and a big heart, who seeks out stories to tell with her artful lens.
The Donovans are very close to each other and to a time when families lived with or near each other, supporting each other and the old virtues of home and hearth – love and loyalty, shared dreams and shared adventures. A time in which everybody brought something vital to the table – frequently over Sunday dinner.
In the Donovan family’s case, each has unique talents – they all love a good mystery and the chance to test their detecting skills. They also have some amazing friends who rally to their side when the going gets tough.
The family compound is a brownstone on Jane Street – which brings us to my story.
Here’s a sneak peek at the book that will be released July 16:
A Murder on Jane Street
She was born in a castle.
She died on Jane Street.
What happened in between
Could topple the U.S. Government
When Fitzhugh Donovan, retired NYPD Police Chief, gets a desperate call for help from the mysterious old woman who lives next door to him in Greenwich Village, he doesn’t have a clue that an unspeakable crime from the past is about to be freed from Pandora’s Box.
When just hours later, the old woman is brutally murdered and the police write it off as a random home invasion, Fitz doesn’t yet know that a wall of international conspiracy and corruption stands in the way of justice for this cipher of a woman, who was so much more than she appeared.
But, the old lady had asked him for help and died hard before he could give it. His Irish cop conscience can’t abide that. Fitz gathers an intriguing band of family and friends (who dub themselves the Bleecker Street Irregulars) to help him ferret out the truth.
I hope the shocking secrets the old woman died to protect, the willingness of ordinary people to do the right thing, and a couple of unexpected love stories will keep your heart on edge, as Fitz races to find a way to keep the people he loves alive in the face of terrible odds.
An Invitation from Cathy
I invite you to join me, Fitz and the Bleecker Street Irregulars to seek wild justice on Jane Street.
I can’t wait to hear from you after you do!
January 31, 2018
How and Why of Bless the Child
Bless the Child
Who knows where stories come from? Bits and pieces of information lodge in a writer’s brain and sometimes they coalesce into a story that hooks you into writing it.
Bless the Child had two such irresistible hooks for me: One was a phone call from a dying friend who said she thought she was Possessed by an evil entity and asked my help in finding an exorcist! ( That was quite a shock and a story for another day!)
The other hook was reading an extraordinary book by a former Catholic priest and exorcist, Malachy Martin, who had been the Vatican’s Historian in Residence for two decades.
Father Martin was a linguist who spoke more than a dozen languages, many of them ancient. The book, Hostage to the Devil was a true account of his investigations into possession and exorcism. It was both brilliant and terrifying… definitely not a book to be read alone in the dead of night!
The two events caused a story to germinate in my mind, but it took several years and the catalyzing event of having a friend beg me to find her an exorcist to save her soul, to propel me into getting it all onto paper.
I began doing what writers can’t help doing… hypothesizing a series of scary what ifs that went something like this:
What if your drug addicted daughter left a newborn baby on your doorstep and disappeared?
What if she came back several years later and took the child you love into a dangerous Satanic Cult?
What if that child turned out to have powers that made her mankind’s last hope in the war between Good and Evil?
Would you risk body and soul to save her?
I just couldn’t get these questions and the storyline they created out of my head. To understand where my research took me, let me set the scene a little.
In my book, Maggie O’Connor, is a 42 year old grandmother who is about to answer these what ifs… maybe with her life.
She’s also about to do battle with Satan, she just doesn’t know it yet.
Maggie finds the law won’t help her save her granddaughter from the Satanic cult. Only an exorcist priest believes her story, and a rabbi who practices Kabbalah knows too much not to believe her. Ancient memories of an Egyptian prophecy are beginning to rise within her terrifying dreams and suddenly it seems that everybody wants thisbeloved child – even the Devil himself.
I wondered where in this world, to begin the arcane research I’d need?
I figured I’d have to bone up on Christian Mysticism, heresies, the Kabbalah, Ancient Egypt, the New York City Police Department, Satanism, ritual magic and the childcare issues that are plaguing
the legal system, as more and more children are being raised by grandparents.
Exorcists willing to discuss the subject without a lay person are scarcer than snowflakes in Hell, but because of the fluky fact that I had actually attended the exorcism I mentioned earlier, I had a surprising credential with which to open discussions… or maybe it was just the grace of God that directed me.
Over the course of my researching, three remarkable exorcists entered into serious dialogue with me and revealed information that’s so seldom shared with a layperson, that after Bless the Child hit the bestseller lists, a Cardinal asked me to explain to him how on earth I’d pulled it off! (see I Meet a Cardinal).
Exorcists are always the intellectual crème de la crème of their respective churches. Linguists, scholars – courageous men whose integrity is absolutely unimpeachable. Each one I interviewed told me that their empirical experience had convinced them that there is a disembodied evil intelligence in the universe that is inimical to mankind.
When you hear men of such intellect, education and moral principle say such things with absolute conviction and tales of specific experiences, trust me, you pay attention.
They told me stories of
Demons speaking in long dead languages.
The ability of the “Possessed” to change form and language.
They said the criteria are very specific for a person to be declared “possessed” rather than mentally deranged. The afflicted person must be able to do things humans ordinarily cannot. Like speaking in unfamiliar tongues or levitating, or exhibiting super human strength, or telekinesis, or reading the thoughts of those around him. Sometimes even knowing the most intimate sins of those in the room, whom it considers the enemy.
They said they had seen it all... and I believed them. I knew The Exorcist (book and movie) was a fictionalized true story taken from the archives of the Georgetown Archdiocese.
People ask me if denominations other than Catholics, experience Possession. The answer is a resounding yes. In the Episcopal Church and some other Christian denominations, exorcism is called Deliverance. Mystical Jews also believe and have rituals to use if needed.
I decided to interview Rabbis who study the mystical Kabbalah and the fun really began. I was not Jewish, male, or Hebrew-speaking so I had to go through an interview process with Rabbinical scholars and almost got to meet the famed Rebbe Schneerson of the Lubavitchers, (see The Gates of Hell are Where? on my website for that story) but a week or so before I was to meet him, the Rebbe had a stroke, and never regained his health.
Some very intriguing things had happened to me during my research and writing of Bless the Child. Every time I talked with one particular priest, the phone line would go dead or become too statick-y to hear. My recording equipment often wouldn’t work at all when I was recording someone speaking about exorcisms. Books fell out of bookshelves and hit me on the head, then landed on the floor open to exactly the knowledge I needed.
Information and extraordinary people were placed in my path at so many turns in the road, I felt I was being led to where I was supposed to go in order to tell the story with authenticity. There was a distinct sense of being guided in my work...sometimes into directions I had not consciously chosen to pursue.
I went to the New York City Police Department and talked to detectives whose specialty is Cults. One particular detective, who’d been recommended to me as “the cop’s cop,” by a Judge I knew was absolutely wonderful and became my guide to police procedure and to understanding the complexities of the people who guard us.
I was so touched by the combined toughness and sensitivity of this man – a two-time Viet Nam Vet who spoke of a child’s murder with tears on his cheeks – that much of Malachy Devlin’s character – one of the two love stories in Maggie’s life in Bless The Child – grew out of his stories, strengths and tears.
During my research and writing of Bless the Child, I learned a great deal about the nature of Good and Evil, (See What I Learned from Bless the Child's Research if you're interested in what some very heavy-hitter mystics had to say!) and an equal amount about the incredible scope of the human spirit. I believe this book is really a story about the humanity’s astonishing ability to love despite the cost, and the transcendence of Goodness itself.
That’s what our life’s journey is all about, I think… prevailing, not simply enduring, rising beyond what we ever thought we could, because we love so much and – if you believe as I do – because we take our strength from a Higher Source.
Researching BLESS THE CHILD was a wild ride – it entailed far more than I’d bargained for.
I’d like to tell you about it!
How Bless the Child Got Written
Who knows where stories come from? Bits and pieces of information lodge in a writer’s brain and sometimes they coalesce into a story that hooks you into writing it.
Bless the Child had two such irresistible hooks for me: One was a phone call from a dying friend who said she thought she was Possessed by an evil entity and asked my help in finding an exorcist! ( That was quite a shock and a story for another day!)
The other hook was reading an extraordinary book by a former Catholic priest and exorcist, Malachy Martin, who had been the Vatican’s Historian in Residence for two decades.
Father Martin was a linguist who spoke more than a dozen languages, many of them ancient. The book, Hostage to the Devil was a true account of his investigations into possession and exorcism. It was both brilliant and terrifying… definitely not a book to be read alone in the dead of night!
The two events caused a story to germinate in my mind, but it took several years and the catalyzing event of having a friend beg me to find her an exorcist to save her soul, to propel me into getting it all onto paper.
What If…
I began doing what writers can’t help doing… hypothesizing a series of scary what ifs that went something like this:
What if your drug addicted daughter left a newborn baby on your doorstep and disappeared?
What if she came back several years later and took the child you love into a dangerous Satanic Cult?
What if that child turned out to have powers that made her mankind’s last hope in the war between Good and Evil?
Would you risk body and soul to save her?
I just couldn’t get these questions and the storyline they created out of my head. To understand where my research took me, let me set the scene a little.
The Plot Thickens
In my book, Maggie O’Connor, is a 42 year old grandmother who is about to answer these what ifs… maybe with her life.
She’s also about to do battle with Satan, she just doesn’t know it yet.
Maggie finds the law won’t help her save her granddaughter from the Satanic cult. Only an exorcist priest believes her story, and a rabbi who practices Kabbalah knows too much not to believe her. Ancient memories of an Egyptian prophecy are beginning to rise within her terrifying dreams and suddenly it seems that everybody wants thisbeloved child – even the Devil himself.
The Research Trail
I wondered where in this world, to begin the arcane research I’d need?
I figured I’d have to bone up on Christian Mysticism, heresies, the Kabbalah, Ancient Egypt, the New York City Police Department, Satanism, ritual magic and the childcare issues that are plaguing
the legal system, as more and more children are being raised by grandparents.Exorcists willing to discuss the subject without a lay person are scarcer than snowflakes in Hell, but because of the fluky fact that I had actually attended the exorcism I mentioned earlier, I had a surprising credential with which to open discussions… or maybe it was just the grace of God that directed me.
Over the course of my researching, three remarkable exorcists entered into serious dialogue with me and revealed information that’s so seldom shared with a layperson, that after Bless the Child hit the bestseller lists, a Cardinal asked me to explain to him how on earth I’d pulled it off! (see I Meet a Cardinal).
Finding an Exorcist
Exorcists are always the intellectual crème de la crème of their respective churches. Linguists, scholars – courageous men whose integrity is absolutely unimpeachable. Each one I interviewed told me that their empirical experience had convinced them that there is a disembodied evil intelligence in the universe that is inimical to mankind.
When you hear men of such intellect, education and moral principle say such things with absolute conviction and tales of specific experiences, trust me, you pay attention.
They told me stories of
Demons speaking in long dead languages.
The ability of the “Possessed” to change form and language.
They said the criteria are very specific for a person to be declared “possessed” rather than mentally deranged. The afflicted person must be able to do things humans ordinarily cannot. Like speaking in unfamiliar tongues or levitating, or exhibiting super human strength, or telekinesis, or reading the thoughts of those around him. Sometimes even knowing the most intimate sins of those in the room, whom it considers the enemy.
They said they had seen it all... and I believed them. I knew The Exorcist (book and movie) was a fictionalized true story taken from the archives of the Georgetown Archdiocese.
Deliverance
People ask me if denominations other than Catholics, experience Possession. The answer is a resounding yes. In the Episcopal Church and some other Christian denominations, exorcism is called Deliverance. Mystical Jews also believe and have rituals to use if needed.
I decided to interview Rabbis who study the mystical Kabbalah and the fun really began. I was not Jewish, male, or Hebrew-speaking so I had to go through an interview process with Rabbinical scholars and almost got to meet the famed Rebbe Schneerson of the Lubavitchers, (see The Gates of Hell are Where? on my website for that story) but a week or so before I was to meet him, the Rebbe had a stroke, and never regained his health.
Weird Stuff
Some very intriguing things had happened to me during my research and writing of Bless the Child. Every time I talked with one particular priest, the phone line would go dead or become too statick-y to hear. My recording equipment often wouldn’t work at all when I was recording someone speaking about exorcisms. Books fell out of bookshelves and hit me on the head, then landed on the floor open to exactly the knowledge I needed.
Information and extraordinary people were placed in my path at so many turns in the road, I felt I was being led to where I was supposed to go in order to tell the story with authenticity. There was a distinct sense of being guided in my work...sometimes into directions I had not consciously chosen to pursue.
Call the Cops!
I went to the New York City Police Department and talked to detectives whose specialty is Cults. One particular detective, who’d been recommended to me as “the cop’s cop,” by a Judge I knew was absolutely wonderful and became my guide to police procedure and to understanding the complexities of the people who guard us.
I was so touched by the combined toughness and sensitivity of this man – a two-time Viet Nam Vet who spoke of a child’s murder with tears on his cheeks – that much of Malachy Devlin’s character – one of the two love stories in Maggie’s life in Bless The Child – grew out of his stories, strengths and tears.
Good and Evil
During my research and writing of Bless the Child, I learned a great deal about the nature of Good and Evil, (See What I Learned from Bless the Child's Research if you're interested in what some very heavy-hitter mystics had to say!) and an equal amount about the incredible scope of the human spirit. I believe this book is really a story about the humanity’s astonishing ability to love despite the cost, and the transcendence of Goodness itself.
That’s what our life’s journey is all about, I think… prevailing, not simply enduring, rising beyond what we ever thought we could, because we love so much and – if you believe as I do – because we take our strength from a Higher Source.
