In Memoriam: Baci

This week we had to say good-bye to our faithful friend and true member of the family, "the ill-behaved fix terrier" who appears in my author bio. Rather than talk about her loss, I thought I'd repeat an earlier post celebrating her presence in our lives. We'll miss you, girl.

I am not a dog person. I never was. As a child I was deathly afraid of them, and I dragged my feet for years when my boys begged for one. When the last kid was finally toilet trained, I had run out of excuses. (I had stipulated that I would not be cleaning up dog poop and the human variety. At which point my then four year-old handed me his pack of Pull-Ups, declaring he no longer had need of them.)

 Because I detest dog hair and one of my sons has asthma, we looked for a non-shedding breed. The day we went puppy shopping, I had my eye on a quiet little gray schnauzer. My boys had other ideas. The minute we opened her crate, our future dog, a wire-haired fox terrier, bounded out to meet us by grabbing my son’s shoelace in her little puppy teeth and dancing around his feet.

“That’s our dog!” my youngest exclaimed.

I eyed her dubiously. “She seems a little crazy.”

Avoiding a direct response, my husband said, “Look, she’s the same breed as Asta. You love the Thin Man movies. Don’t you want your own little Asta?”

So I caved like a house of cards.

And she was—and still is, even thirteen years later— completely and utterly precious. Primarily white, she has black and brown markings, luminous brown eyes, and a perfect little nose that appears to be made out of black licorice. She was so affectionate the day we met her, we named her “Baci,” which is Italian for “kisses.”

 

And then reality set in. She was hideously difficult to train, and still goes in the house when the mood strikes her. Because she jumps and barks so much, she upsets her stomach to the point of vomiting; her favorite spot for this activity is behind my kitchen table. And no matter how many times I scrub that floor, on a warm day when the windows are open and the wind is just right, the faint odor of dog vomit still wafts across my kitchen. She nips at people’s ankles and goes berserk when the doorbell rings. The day after I spent a fortune on a DKNY coverlet and shams, she made her way into my room and left her “mark” (read dog pee) on it. I have had to replace bedding, rugs, people’s torn clothing, and the odd French door. And despite frequent grooming, she still ends up smelling like an old sock.

There were moments I fervently wished she would run away and never come back. And yet, after a recent scare when we thought she had doggie cancer, I cried for two days. It turned out to be a highly curable (and very expensive) infection.

My boys and my husband adore her. And truth be told, so do I. I look into those big brown eyes and see a kind of love. I like to believe it’s directed at me, and not the toast crusts I drop at her feet every morning.

Farewell, Barbara Michaels

 Today I was saddened to hear of the passing of Barbara Mertz, who wrote under the pseudonyms of Elizabeth Peters and Barbara Michaels. A trained Egyptologist, as Elizabeth Peters, Mertz wrote the well-known Amelia Peabody mystery series. But it's her romantic suspense novels as Barbara Michaels that I adore.

 I discovered them right after college, when I'd already read and re-read all of Mary Stewart. I devoured them all (in chronological order, natch) and then waited breathlessly for the next ones to appear. Like Stewart's stories, they feature plucky heroines, mysterious old houses, restless ghosts, and quirky yet attractive male characters who serve as the love interest.

The Barbara Michaels stories are just good old-fashioned reads for a rainy night. And I think it's time to work my way through them again. Back in May, I attended the Malice Domestic mystery conference. Mertz was in attendance, but I was too shy and overawed to seek her out. Now I'm sorry I wasn't a bit braver.

These words appear on her website today: "At 85, Elizabeth Peters (aka Barbara Michaels) is enjoying her cats, her garden, lots of chocolate, and not nearly enough gin."

A life well-lived, and books well-written. She'll be greatly missed.

Greetings From Asbury Park

Asbury Park holds a place in my heart like no other. Growing up in the 60s in a family of limited means, our "vacation" each summer was a day in Asbury. We started in the morning with a trip to the Monte Carlo pool, with its cheerfully painted Adirondack chairs. We stored our stuff in a locker room that sported a sign with a 40s style bathing beauty in a red swimsuit. After a morning swim, we walked through the cool underground tunnel that led straight to the beach, where we spent the afternoon until it was time for dinner at the Homestead Restaurant.

Sometimes we took a ride in the swan boats on Wesley Lake, but we always ended up on the boardwalk, riding the carousel, eating Kohr's custard and taffy from Criterion, always stopping to sit on the reversible benches--where you  could either watch the people or the ocean. I always chose the ocean.

 As you can see from the photo, going to Asbury is a tradition in my family, one that started during World War II. Most of the men in the family were away, so my grandmother, my mom and two uncles, as well as a number of assorted great aunts would spend a week in one of the more modest boarding houses. It was a women and children's vacation during the week, and on the weekends, the men who were either too young or too old to serve would come down and visit. After the war, the tradition continued into the early 50s.

On the rides down during our day trips, my mom would tell me stories of Asbury's heyday. My favorite was her description of dances held around the Monte Carlo pool, where a band played out on a floating platform in the middle of the water. It was easy to imagine the ladies in their 40s updos, dancing with their soldier husbands and boyfriends to Big Band music.

But the Monte Carlo pool, like many of Asbury's landmarks, is long gone. My heart broke when the carousel was dismantled, when Convention Hall and the Paramount fell into disrepair, and when the Palace Amusement building was demolished. But after years of economic decline, recent revitalization efforts in Asbury are revealing hopeful glimmers of its glory days (to quote its most famous champion, The Boss). And while Asbury is no longer the dream resort of my youth, it's a place I'll always love--even in all its shabby splendor.

What I'm Reading: July Edition

A recent trip the library found me laden with a stack of mysteries, most of which were historicals. I've started with Nicola Upson's Fear in the Sunlight, the fourth book in her series in which Golden Age mystery writer Josephine Tey is featured as not-so-amateur sleuth.

As Tey is one of my favorite mystery writers, I was drawn to this series immediately. What's fun about this entry is the appearance of Alfred Hitchcock and his wife Alma, who play pivotal roles in the story. Upson skillfully captures the setting of England between the wars, and has nailed Hitchcock, both as a man and a director. Though the murder scenes are a bit graphic for my taste, I love the complexity of Upson's work. And how cool is that cover?

 

Next up is G. M. Malliet's Wicked Autumn, the first entry in her Max Tudor series. Max is a former MI-5 agent-turned-vicar in a small English village. When the universally unpopular Wanda Batton-Smythe ends up dead, Max finds himself involved. I'm a fan of Malliet's Inspector St. Just mysteries, and I'm excited to dive into Max's adventures in quaint Nether Monkslip. I'm also hoping Malliet has a love interest lined up for the attractive vicar!  Malliet's work hearkens back to Golden Age writers like Christie and Sayers--perfect comfort reads.

 Finally, Jacqueline Winspear's latest Maisie Dobbs mystery, Leaving Everything Most Loved, features private investigator Dobbs looking into the disappearance of an Indian woman in 1930s London. I'm intrigued to see how Winspear handles the issues of class and race, and if she resolves Maisie's complicated love life. (Can I say here that I don't love James Compton as a partner for Maisie? Is there not an attractive Scotland Yard inspector out there for her?)

As one who harbors a secret wish to write historical mysteries, these writers serve as real inspiration--and a great distraction from my deadline!

Christie's Characters: Outsiders and Observers

My summer reading often involves re-reading favorite works that help me clear my head for my own writing. In the case of Agatha Christie, I get the added benefit of learning from a master of the genre while I read.

I just loaded a bunch of Christie on my Kindle, and discovered to my delight that there was a Miss Marple I'd somehow missed: 4:50 to Paddington. The "4:50" of the title is a time, and refers to a train on which a murder occurs, witnessed by an elderly lady from a passing train on the opposite tracks. The authorities, of course, chalk it up to her age and an overactive imagination, but her friend Miss Jane Marple believes her, and sets out to solve the case.

Jane Marple, like Christie's other famous detective, Hercule Poirot, is an amateur sleuth. Both tend to be one step ahead of the police, and both have a way of getting witnesses to talk to them. But here's what Christie understood so well about her two characters: they were outsiders, and as outsiders occupied a unique position--that of observer.

Among the English upper crust, Poirot is a foreigner. His slicked-back hair and waxed mustache are a joke, as is his accent. Those around him--including the various murderers he foils--don't perceive him as a threat. He's not one of them, so they ignore him. They don't reckon on the fact that nothing escapes his notice.

I'm a Miss Marple fan, but I wasn't always. As a young reader of Christie, I had no interest in an elderly lady who sits in a corner knitting, and therein lies her power. Then, as now, elderly ladies are all but invisible in society; they usually hold little power, and they are easily dismissed by others (as is the case of the woman in the book I'm reading now). But they sure as hell pay attention, something I appreciate much more as I get older. Miss Marple, with little to do except watch people, has an understanding of human behavior beyond that of the various Scotland Yard inspectors she foils.

When I set out to create an amateur sleuth of my own, I made her a mystery writer. (In fact, Victoria's main character, Bernardo Vitali, might be considered the Italian version of Poirot.) As a writer, Vic is also an observer. She takes in the small details of physical appearance and personality that others might miss. And as a writer of mysteries, she's conversant with the why and how of murder. But unlike Poirot and Miss Marple, she makes her share of mistakes.

As does her creator. . .

Cicadas in My Pantyhose: Tales from the New Jersey Apocolypse

In last week's NY Times Magazine, cicadas landed on the so-called "Meh" list. "Meh" as in, no longer trending, and we don't really care anymore.

Easy for you to say, you black-clad hipster toiling away in a treeless Manhattan. Sure, you can be as "meh" as you want about it. You don't have to look down into their beady little red eyes.They're not stuck on your purse and riding with you to work. They're not dive-bombing your head when you try to take your walk.

You don't open your dresser drawer at 6:30 in the morning and find THIS:

 When they first hit, I was pretty sanguine about it. Bugs don't really bother me (unless they sting) and I was fascinated by their weird, otherworldly singing, which sounded like something from a fifties sci-fi film.I got used to them in my trees, on my deck and all over my car tires.

But I draw the line at my fine washables. After making this gruesome discovery, I called out to my husband with a request I can safely say he'd never heard before: Honey, can you come get the cicada out of my underwear drawer?

Of course, it could have been worse. At least I saw it before I got dressed. . .

 .

The Food of Love

As I was working on the draft of Marinara (the book, not the sauce) my editor advised me to keep the focus of the series, Italian food, prominent at all times. (Which was a bit like telling me to put my lipstick on before I leave the house.) Let's just say I need reminding about a number of things, but the importance of food isn't one of them.

It wasn't hard to keep food front and center of the story, since food happens to be front and center of my life. I never understand those people who rush through a meal, or those alien beings who say things like, "I only eat because I have to," or "Food isn't that important to me"--words that cause me to gasp and clutch my Italian heart.

What's more important than a meal lovingly prepared? Than sitting across the table from the people who mean the most to you in the whole world? Than that first taste of your grandmother's Sunday sauce?

Much as I love Shakespeare, he was wrong when he said "Music is the food of love."

Food is the food of love.

Sunday Sonnet: Robert Frost

Here's one that everybody loves, perfect for a spring day when everything is in bloom:

Nature's first green is gold,  

Her hardest hue to hold.

Her early leaf's a flower;

But only so an hour.

Then leaf subsides to leaf.

So Eden sank to grief,

So dawn goes down to day.

Nothing gold can stay.

I Confess--

 That I stole my tagline, “Cozy mysteries with romantic interruptions,” from Dorothy L. Sayers. Sayers was the author of the Lord Peter Wimsey mysteries; published primarily in the 30s, the Wimsey mysteries are prime examples of the “Golden Age” of British detective fiction.

Wimsey is an aristocratic sleuth who takes up detecting as a hobby after he returns to England after World War I. While I love all the books, in the early ones Wimsey is a bit of a flat character. It isn’t until the series introduces Harriet Vane, a mystery writer wrongfully accused of murder, that he becomes fully dimensional. Though Sayers swore she’d never have her sleuth involved in a romance, she spins out a wonderful one over several books that culminate in the marriage of Harriet and Peter. In fact, Sayers got so enthusiastic about the love story that she was accused of having a crush on her own character, a topic I addressed in my Rosemary D blog.

The last book in Sayers’ series, Busman’s Honeymoon, carries this subtitle: “A Love Story with Detective Interruptions.” So with a little tweaking, it became a way for me to define my stories. But let’s call it an homage, shall we?

I don’t know about you, but I really need some romance in my mysteries. (I need some mystery in my romance, too, but that’s a post for another day.) Giving your detective a love interest humanizes him or her, and it gives readers something else to wonder about—will they get together or not?—besides the murder. And it keeps us turning pages. As much as I respect Sayers’ formidable skills with a mystery, it was the love story that kept me coming back to the books.

My own “saucy sleuth,” Victoria Rienzi, has not one, but two love interests. There’s her old love, now working as a chef in her parents’ restaurant, and a new guy, a rough-around-the-edges woodworker from New Orleans who may not be what he seems. Each one is a likely suitor for my character; each guy has his own brand of appeal. But which will Victoria end up with?

Well now, that’s a mystery isn’t it? And you’ll have to stay tuned to find out. . .

If I'm Gonna Kill 'Em. . .

I figure I might as well feed them first. So before any victims bite the dust in my books, at least they get a good meal.

 The idea for the Italian Kitchen Mysteries originally came from my agent, who thought an Italian restaurant would make a great setting for a cozy series. I thought if that restaurant were on the boardwalk at the Jersey shore, it could open up all sorts of fun possibilities.

My fictional restaurant, the Casa Lido, is a vintage classic. It’s got a great old bar, wood paneling, and of course, red-checked tablecloths. (I like to think it’s the kind of place Bruce might stop in to on the way home from a gig.) In keeping with the series’ theme, each book will feature a couple of family recipes that figure into the story.

 And since the Casa Lido is across from the boardwalk, there are plenty of other food options: great Jersey pizza, sausage and peppers, fresh seafood and homemade lemonade. Not to mention our own Kohr’s custard and salt water taffy. You can just smell it all, can’t you?

So I hope you'll join me as my mysterious journey begins. Murder and Marinara debuts this October, but if you'd like a taste, be sure to check out the excerpt here on the site. 

I’m so pleased to be kicking off my Rosie G website today. This gorgeous site was created by Waxcreative Design, Inc. Molte grazie to the fabulous Emily Cotler and Maxamaris Hoppe for bringing my vision to life.