Blood Ties and Deadly Lies by Ang Pompano

 LUCY BURDETTE: It's always a pleasure to host my good friend Ang Pompano to the blog. Welcome Ang!

ANG POMPANO: Hello, Reds! It’s great to be back. I always feel at home here because Lucy, Hallie, and Hank were among the very first “real authors” I ever met. And they were so kind to me. Over the years, through conferences and book events, I’ve also had the pleasure of meeting Jen, Deborah, Julia, and of course Rhys. Each of you has been so encouraging that you truly feel like family.

And speaking of family…

Have you ever taken a DNA test? If so, did you discover anything that surprised you? Did you trust the results?

Those were the questions on my mind as I started writing Blood Ties and Deadly Lies, the second book in my Blue Palmetto Detective Agency series.

In the first book, When It’s Time for Leaving, retired cop Al DeLucia heads to Savannah to take over the detective agency given to him by the father who abandoned him. Al’s not exactly the sentimental type. If he has a soft side, it’s buried under layers of sarcasm, skepticism, and New Haven street smarts.



Al's Sachem Creek


Now, in Blood Ties and Deadly Lies, Al’s past crashes into his present when his high school nemesis, Abe Cromwell, a guy Al once dreamed of throwing into Long Island Sound, shows up with a wild story. Abe’s been arrested for assault and claims Al is his brother. Not a long-lost half-brother. A full-blooded, DNA-certified sibling.

Al doesn’t buy it. But something about Abe’s claim gets under his skin. When an old friend dares him to return to their hometown of Sachem Creek, Connecticut, to finally win the cross-Sound kayak race he was once cheated out of, Al agrees. Not to help Abe, but because he’s got a score to settle.

What Al doesn’t expect is to be handed hard DNA evidence that suggests Abe might be telling the truth. Before long, he and his partner Maxine are pulled into a case involving murder, family secrets, and a trail of lies that leads all the way back to colonial New England.

I won’t spoil how it’s possible for Al and Abe to be full brothers because trust me, it’s a twist. But I will say this: DNA doesn’t just tell you who you are. Sometimes, it tells you who you aren’t.

Writing this book got me thinking about how many people have taken DNA tests only to discover unexpected siblings, family secrets, or completely new cultural roots. It raises uncomfortable and fascinating questions. What really makes someone family? Is it blood? Loyalty? Shared history? And when a stranger shows up with scientific “proof” and says, We’re related, how do you even begin to trust that?

So I’ll ask you:

Have you ever taken a DNA test? Did you find anything that surprised you? Did you trust the results? And would you go to bat for someone just because the science says you share the same genes?

Ang Pompano is a mystery author, editor, publisher, and food blogger.  He writes the Blue Palmetto Detective Agency, and the Reluctant Food Columnist series, both published by Level Best Books. In addition to his writing, Ang is a co-founder of Crime Spell Books and serves as co-editor of the Best New England Crime Stories anthology. He lives in Connecticut with his wife, Annette, an artist, and their two rescue dogs. His latest novel, Blood Ties and Deadly Lies, drops on July 1. Learn more at www.angpompano.com

Buy Link: https://amzn.to/43NNlaM 

Eating Our Way Through Paris by Lucy Burdette

LUCY BURDETTE: You know how much Hank loves it when a week turns out to have an unexpected theme? This week has two, searching for a place and food. Today you are going to eat with me in Paris, a trip that pushed me to really think about both food critics and chefs.

I was determined—some might say obsessed—about not wasting time on bad meals. You can’t imagine how much I researched where to eat before we set off. I’ve been collecting blog posts for years from David Lebovitz, Dorie Greenspan, Meg Zimbeck (who writes Paris by Mouth and puts out a yearly list of what she believes to be the top 50 restaurants in Paris), and many more.

To make things even more complicated, Lindsay Tramuta published a book with Eater (an online zine) called the Eater Guide to Paris right before we left. I was overwhelmed with possibilities! I had every kind of question circling through my mind: what kind of food do we want to eat? Should it only be French? Should it be fancy French or casual? Should it be confined to the center of Paris where we’d be staying, and if not, how far would we be willing to travel? Could we eat two big meals a day? Estimates of the number of restaurants in Paris fall around 40,000. How could we possibly choose the best when we were there for only eight days? How could anybody make a list of top 50 restaurants, not just in Paris but anywhere? This adventure gave me new insight into the challenges of restaurant critics.

(If all this is making you a little queasy, you might want to skip the rest of this very very foodie post🤪)

Luckily, my traveling companion (John) was relaxed about the whole adventure. He offered opinions when I asked him, but did not try to meddle with my ongoing obsession. I’ll share with you some photos of the meals we really loved. Stay tuned in the future for how some of this will end up in a book…

Pizza is not easy to find in Paris, good pizza that is. We took one of David Lebovitz's suggestions and traveled out to the 11th arrondissement to eat at Oobatz. This was a white asparagus and wild asparagus pizza, alongside a lovely salad. 

We eschewed the suggestion to have the chef's specialty. 

What is the chef's special? John asked.

Nothing specific, it’s whatever he feels like putting on your pizza, the server said.

Since we’d just read that some of his ingredients involved innards, we stuck with the asparagus.

I’d been dreaming about dinner at Café des Ministères which I regretted missing on my last visit, but it was too hard to get a reservation. This time I stalked the site until I grabbed one. I had been dreaming about their stuffed cabbage for years! Here it finally was and I swear to you, it was as big as a human being’s head! They brought it to the table, sliced it open and then poured on crème fraîche. We couldn’t even eat half of it. John ordered a cassoulet which was divine, filled with sausage, duck confit, and molten hot white beans.

Juveniles Wine Bar was the only restaurant we repeated from my last visit and as far as I know, it’s my favorite place in Paris. I had a roast chicken with potatoes and vegetables in an amazing sauce, whereas John ordered sausage in a pool of cheesy mashed potatoes. I could not pass up the rice pudding with caramel sauce on the side.

The next day went on a market tour of Rue Montorgueil, which is known as a foodie street, run by Amanda from Jane Bertch’s La Cuisine Paris. Everything we tried was amazing but this goat cheese was a standout, rolled in beautiful dried flowers and stuffed with a rose coulis. (I don’t even like goat cheese much, but this will definitely become a plot point…)

This was a lunch we had at Le Cornichon. I had what was essentially fish and chips on a homemade slaw (do notice those gorgeous frites in the background) and John had a little steak with a big glob of melted fois gras on top. 

Holy cholesterol, Batman! Fortunately, we were walking miles and miles a day.

This was another astonishing lunch at a Lebanese restaurant called Kubris. The best thing I ate was roasted cabbage with Aleppo pepper butter, shanklish, cri-cri peanut, pickled apricot and oregano. So many flavors! 

And then a stuffed eggplant shawarma. John once again enjoyed the sausage. 😂. 

I will stop there to give us all a break! And maybe give you time to grab a snack. One regret is that we barely had the chance to order dessert because we ate so much of the other food. This calls for another trip...

How does a normal person go about choosing a restaurant in a strange place? Inquiring minds want to know…

The Expats: Imagining Another Life @LucyBurdette

 LUCY BURDETTE: You've heard that John and I were in France for 10 days at the end of May. In Paris, we had the amazing opportunity to meet American, English, and Australian people who have moved from their home countries to France. This fascinates me! After I tell you about some of them, I would love to hear whether you would have either the urge or the nerve to move somewhere unfamiliar.

First, we had a glass of wine with a group of people who follow Heather Stimmler’s Secrets of Paris blog and newsletter. Heather is an American who moved to Paris in the 1990s. She started giving tours and now has a paying blog with exactly as the name says, secrets of Paris: places to go, how to get into a popular museum, meetups for those interested in socializing. At our table were two couples who have sold everything in the US and now rent apartments in Paris. We were interested to hear about their experience with medical care (good!), Learning the language (so hard!), making French friends (not easy.) One of the men is a musician who spends a lot of time playing with others and also listening to music so he’s met people that way. Another of the women knits and has joined knitting groups. John interviewed one of the men from our cocktail group and I know you will enjoy reading that article. 

We also took a tour with an English man who moved to Paris with his wife in the 90s. He’s built a business giving tours and doing podcasts through his website, the Earful Tower. His introduction into the world of Parisian people came through playing basketball. 

The real Emily in Paris, whom you’ve heard me speak of, came to Paris from London (she is Australian by birth) and then met and married a Parisian man. They now live in Paris with their two small children and his daughter from a previous marriage. She says her in to Parisian life is through her kids and also other expats in the city. She feels she will never be accepted totally as a French person. 

The Real Emily in Paris

Jane Bertch, who we've featured twice on the blog here, is also an American who first moved to London, and then to Paris in the banking world. She got the idea to found la cuisine Paris, and has written a memoir about the transition called the French Ingredient. She seems so comfortable in her new life! You can also read the cookbooks and newsletters of Dorie Greenspan and David Lebovitz, Americans who have mostly transplanted themselves to Paris and feel very much at home, while at the same time are aware of not being French.

Lucy with Dorie and Jane

My takeaways from meeting these folks? A big move like this is really hard! It’s important to love the city that you are joining and be patient with yourself. Parisians are not famous for easily accepting people. The truth is, much as I love that city, and would love to know it more thoroughly, I have a deep tap root that connects me to the US. Along with friends and relatives that I would miss dearly. Plus a husband who wouldn’t go. So alas, I can’t see myself joining the ex-pats. I will have to do this through my fiction.

What about you, Reds? Can you see yourself moving to another country? If you’re tempted, where would it be and what draws you there?