Goodreads asked Mary Simses:

Where did you get the idea for your most recent book?

Mary Simses The idea for Blueberry Café came from something I heard on the radio one morning. A woman was telling a story about how her grandmother died, and how right before she died she said, “Erase my hard drive!” I kept wondering what was on that hard drive that the grandmother wanted to keep secret. It finally led me to the idea of an eighty-year-old woman, reflecting on her life and wanting to make amends for something she had done in the past. It was the idea of uncovering a secret that I really liked. I used a letter as the vehicle for opening the story, rather than a computer, because I wanted something more old-fashioned and more tangible.

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