What I Did On My Summer Vacation!

 RHYS BOWEN: I have just returned from a short trip to England. It was all very intense as the object was for John to see all his family members.  His sister lives in Cornwall in a fifteenth century manor house (she married into an important Cornish family). Her sons and their families mostly live within reach so we had one big family meal after another.

One of the things I love about being in Cornwall is eating my favorite foods. Cornish pasties:

Cream teas:

The good news is that all calories leave when you pass the Cornish border.

The driving is always interesting as the roads are, well, rather narrow.

One of my favorite excursions is to St. Michael's Mount. This time the tide was up but when it's out you can walk across.

Then we went on to Bath and I spent two lovely days wandering around my home city, evoking memories and enjoying the new spa with rooftop pool. 

In London an extra treat. It was the Chelsea Flower Show and the main street in Chelsea and turned itself into Chelsea in Bloom with every shop doing a fabulous flower display:

As I look at this photos I'm already filled with nostalgia. It seems like a simpler, more sane life over there. 

What are your vacation plans this year? Who is going abroad?

My Perfect Summer Day

 RHYS BOWEN: I don’t know about you, but every year, at the beginning of summer, I look forward to those perfect lazy summer days. I’ll take a picnic to my favorite little beach on the Bay. I’ll drive up to wine country and sit in a vineyard, I’ll take the ferry across to San Francisco. And then suddenly it’s September and I realize I haven’t done any of those things I’d wanted to. 

Summer has slipped away from me again, stolen with busyness–that book deadline. Those unexpected guests, the doctor appointments.

This year will be different. This year I will write on my calendar, at least one day a week: RHYS ESCAPE DAY.  And nothing will come in its way. Clare and I had our picnic here yesterday--smelly cheese, crusty bread, olives and chilled white wine. Not bad.

Which makes me think: what would be my perfect summer day? A picnic, definitely. There is something so romantic and old-wordly about sitting on a rug in the shade, eating cold chicken or ripe peaches (if the wasps will kindly keep away. Any recommendations for that?)

Then beautiful scenery: a beach or the mountains or a perfect garden. Then the question: good company or blissful solitude. Should that picnic be alone or shared?

I remember two picnics that stay in my memory: When I was working at the BBC two friends had the same time off one day. We bought a picnic at Selfridges food hall, took the train to Kew Gardens and rented a rowing boat. We drifted down the Thames until we came to a tree overhanging the bank. Then we moored and ate our picnic: cold chicken, crusty bread. Good cheese. Grapes. Cold white wine.  About as perfect as you can get.

Another blissful picnic was when my mother turned 75 in Australia. We sat in the shade on the cliffs over the Pacific. My brother and his wife provided the food. It was every type of seafood: lobster, oysters. Local crab. Prawns. Several salads. A cheese board. Champagne. We ate until we couldn’t eat any more. Then went down the cliff to swim. Came back. Tried another oyster. That was still my most perfect meal.

I can’t duplicate that but I am going to try this summer. I’ll keep you updated.

(This is China Camp, fifteen minutes from me, where I often take my picnic to eat. )

Now it’s your turn, Reds. What is your perfect summer day? Perfect summer meal?

JENN McKINLAY: Oh, Rhys, you’ve made me nostalgic for picnics. My parents were big on Sunday picnics by the lake or the ocean. It really was the perfect way to spend a Sunday afternoon. I really have neglected the Hooligans horribly, no picnics that I can remember unless you include food by the campfire while camping. A perfect summer day for me would be spent with an ice cold lemonade, a cheese board and a box of pastries, sitting on a blanket with pillows under a  shade tree, reading a book. Anyone is welcome to join me, but they have to BYOB - bring your own book!

HALLIE EPHRON: Ah, picnic. I love it when someone else puts it together. Because a perfect summer day definitely has a lovely menu but please, no prep. 

When we lived in Manhattan ages ago the destination would have been Sheeps Meadow in Central Park with food picked up at Zabars. Here in New England my favorite summer place is a cottage on an island in Casco Bay, hanging out with my kids and grands, walking along the shore, dipping my toes in the icy cold water, boiling lobsters and just-picked corn, lining up at the local ice cream store, exhaling and sitting on the porch and watching the sun set. 

JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING: My perfect summer day/meal is a lot like Hallie’s, because it’s on the Maine coast. I’d start with baseball in the afternoon, watching our Portland Sea Dogs at historic Hadlock Field. Then, off to a lobster shack for all the goodies Hallie described, but made by someone else! I’d finish off by sitting under the stars on some friends’ patio, enjoying an icy drink while talking around the firepit. 

I have to tell you all - you don’t know summer until you’ve visited Maine!

DEBORAH CROMBIE: Rhys, I will happily take your perfect summer day! A little boat on the Thames with a picnic is just too Wind in the Willows perfect.

There will be no picnics here in Texas!! It's too hot, too humid, and too buggy. I would, however, love to sit on my deck in the cool morning with my cup of tea, watching the birds and the hummingbirds at their feeders and enjoying my flowers. Then, lunch on a patio at a nice restaurant. A nap in the afternoon, with a good book, then cooking something easy on the grill in the evening. Bliss!

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: I wake up. Someone brings me coffee, or I smell the fragrance from downstairs.  Three newspapers, a sesame bagel, and absolutely no responsibilities for the entire day. Oh, I cannot even imagine. Nothing due, no deadlines, and a great idea in the back of my mind.  It doesn't need to be glam or elaborate or planned, I just get to soak up the niceness.

LUCY BURDETTE: All of those sound so lovely! My mother was a beach hound so we spent many a summer day at the Jersey shore with sandwiches and lemonade made from a frozen can of slush. These days, I would skip the sand in the sandwiches part and order a perfect tuna melt with potato chips at the snack bar at the beach club. That would be washed down with an Arnold Palmer, half iced tea and half lemonade. Then I’d go sit in the shade and watch the grandkids frolic in the Sound.

RHYS: What about you Reddies? Your perfect summer day?

Oh and I've just realized its Friday 13th. Drive carefully, watch out for idiots!

Chance Encounters and Random Thoughts.

 RHYS BOWEN: Mystery writers are not like normal human beings. I woke up this morning thinking “Could I inject cyanide into a tangerine, put it in a bowl of tangerines where it might not be eaten for days, by which time I’d be in another country—perfect alibi?

Then I wondered: would it change the color of the fruit? Have an instant nasty taste so that the person thought that fruit was bad and discarded it. And then… where can I buy cyanide to try this experiment? And what if John ate my experiment by mistake?

This is how mystery writers start their day.

Our thoughts are not your thoughts. And we learn to be open to plot ideas, possible characters, fascinating facts we can use.

We sis in restaurants and observe people at the next table. The way she is digging lines in the tablecloth with her fork indicates she’s really angry with him even though she’s smiling and nodding. Is she planning to use that tangerine?

We overhear phrases that spark whole scenarios. My best one ever was swimming laps next to someone who was carrying on a conversation as they swum. As I approached I heard her say “Of course the gun belt weighs you down.”  Whoa. I slowed my pace to theirs.

When a flight is delayed I spend the time observing my fellow passengers. Who looks like the potential terrorist? How easy would it be to switch bags with that little old lady? I could write a whole book based on one airport delay.

So much of mystery writing is serendipity. Clare has told you about the research she is doing for our next Molly book. We thought it would be fun to do a book about new technology, airplanes and motor cars. Then Clare found that the Wright brothers were at a motor race on Long Island at exactly the right time, a race sponsored by Cornelius Vanderbilt and attended by Consuela Vanderbilt, now Duchess of Marlborough, who had left her husband and was secretly meeting a race car driver. And she is Mrs. Belmont’s daughter—Mrs. Belmont whom we used in our last book. A champion of women’s suffrage Bingo. We had a story given to us with all our characters in one place. Thank you New York Times.

I had a great gift a couple of weeks ago in Cornwall. My sister in law had people to coffee including a couple from Scotland. I am currently writing a book set on the Isle of Skye and involving boats. As I chatted with the man it turns out his father worked in the fishing industry as a young man, and put me straight on so many facts. I had an alibi for a crime that the fishing boat was out at sea for three days. Not so, he said. Herring spoil quickly and have to be brought into port overnight. Rats. Rethinking needed. He told me so many interesting things, most of which I can’t use but the story will be more authentic because I know them.

The most interesting: before harbors were built fishermen chose wives with broad shoulders. Why? Because the wife had to carry her husband out to his boat on her shoulders so that he didn’t get wet. If he was out all night in freezing cold hypothermia could set in if he started off in wet clothing. I said I’d choose a thin and delicate little husband!

Now it’s your turn, Reds. What serendipitous fact did you learn that changed a book you were writing?

What's The Tea. A guest post from Clare Broyles.

RHYS BOWEN: As you read this my daughter Clare is staying with me and we're plotting together. Not how to get rid of my husband or her husband, but our next Molly book. Clare is the researcher par excellence and is coming up with great plot ideas for us, from reading the New York Times for every day we want to write about. I'll let her tell you what she's thinking:

CLARE BROYLES: What's the Tea.

A few years ago I had to ask my teen age children what those words meant. I was tickled to learn that spilling the tea means telling the latest gossip. I love that the modern slang sounds so archaic. It reminds me of Oscar Wilde characters elegantly serving up scandal with their cucumber sandwiches.

                And scandals are ripe grounds for mystery writers. We all know they can be deadly. In fact, in Molly Murphy’s 1900’s New York the press was just as eager to get their hands on a scandal as they are today. And people were just as eager to read about them.

                It’s June, so I am in California with Rhys, starting the research for the next Molly book. For those of you who have not read the series; Molly Murphy came to New York as a young women in the early 1900’s. After twenty-two novels full of many mysteries we have arrived in October 1909 to begin Molly 23. As I always do, I am reading the New York Times for each day in which the book takes place. And what am I looking for? The tea! The gossip and scandal of the day.

Every morning I read the paper from 1909, and in the afternoon I come back to my own time period. It can be jarring going back and forth between gossip from 1909 to gossip from 2025. 1n October 1909 it was front page news when a poet called out the prime minister’s wife declaring her, “The Woman with the Serpent’s Tongue.” In 2025 P Diddy made Jane piece her nipples. 1n 1909 Miss Adah Durlacher of New York married  the Marquis de Fauconcourt on Saturday only to receive a letter on Tuesday from the owner of Fauconcourt to say they had seen the announcement of her marriage and there was no such person as the Marquis de Fauconcourt. She swore to stand by him anyway. In 2025 an accident reconstructionist is proving that there is no way John O’Keefe could have cut his arm on the back taillight of Karen Read’s car. Looks like a police coverup to me!



Research is such a rabbit hole. I can’t stop! Now I am back in 1909 with a man named Lord Montagu protesting that he is being wrongfully accused of running away with Lady Crofton, when it is a much younger (and more handsome) Montagu who is actually the culprit!

                What is it about us as a society that gossip and scandal are a form of entertainment? I have to admit that I follow the stories above with fascination. Is it a type of Schadenfreude – a gladness that we are not the ones whose lives are on display? Is it the same guilty pleasure that makes me watch Hoarders to feel that my house is very clean and My 600 Pound Life to feel that I am in pretty good physical shape? Or is it a natural curiosity about how human beings try to gain power and influence in their own sphere and then experience deep distress when that position is lost? Saving face and maintaining our position in whatever society we occupy is a primal human need. We know that our survival often depends on it.

What about you? Have you ever felt the hot, prickly shame of having done something that you hope no one ever finds out?  It doesn’t have to be a scandal worthy of the New York Times but just a bad decision. Have you ever cracked a friend’s china or stained their coach with red wine and wanted to slink away unnoticed? Then you have felt that uncomfortable sensation, and a wish that you could go back in time five minutes and undo the damage, afraid they will never invite you back.

As I begin my research, the scandals are what catch my attention because scandal, whether in polite or impolite society, can be a serious business. One question Rhys and I have to ask is, “Would someone be willing to kill to avoid a scandal?”

                And from the pages of the New York Times to the myriad of true crime television and podcasts, the answer is a resounding yes.

RHYS: I don't think we dare ask for confessions. I'm certainly not confessing (not that I ever spilled red wine on a friend's couch and I'm sure Clare didn't either!)

Rhys on Home

 I’ve just returned from a trip to England, mainly to let John be with his many relatives. It was a lovely time, full of big family dinners, delicious lunches, cream teas and an endless stream of people coming and going. I enjoy being there, I love Cornwall and John’s family, but it is not home. Cornwall was somewhere we took vacations when I was very young. As sort of magical place that was different.

We also spent some time in London. London again is a place I know well. I spent a big chunk of time there, both at university and then living on Queen Anne Street behind Oxford Circus, working for the BBC at Broadcasting House (I could get up at eight thirty and be on the set by nine!). But again London is not home.

Which made me consider what exactly home is. I have lived in California for over fifty years. I have raised a family here, but is it home? I do find myself longing for the simple life in England, going to the village shop or the pub and meeting the neighbors. California is always fast paced, lots of traffic, new buildings.

So it was interesting for me to spend a few days in Bath, the city of my birth. I didn’t live there after the war when my parents moved to Kent where my father ran a factory, but I was a frequent visitor. My aunt Gwladys lived there, my godmother,--I could almost say my fairy godmother because that’s what she felt like to me. A single woman who had had a high powered job in the Admiralty during the war only to be kicked back to a secretarial position when the men came back. She quit and started teaching business instead. Long summer vacations gave her plenty of opportunity to travel and she traveled constantly. Everywhere she went she brought me back a doll. .I have them all in a cabinet and can name where they all came from.

From a very early age my parents would put me on a bus in London and Aunt Gwlad would meet me in Bath. There we would do exciting and different things: we’d go to a Persian restaurant and sit on cushions to eat. We went to plays and the opera. We visited her many and diverse friends like the old lady who lived alone in the mansion above the city, and we’d often have morning coffee with her friends in the Pump Room where an ancient orchestra played.

I left John in the hotel and wandered around Bath on my own. That was the road to my grandmother’s house, a lovely Georgian with molded ceiling. That’s the Francis Hotel where we once had an elegant lunch with my aunt’s haughty friend. And Pultney Bridge had a wool shop where I once was bought yarn and skirt material. It all came back to me. Look John,Jollys. They used to have lovely cream cakes (it was now shuttered). I remembered swimming in the Roman Baths before they discovered the bacteria content was not safe!  This time I indulged in the safer but more expensive new Thermae Spa with its rooftop warm pool. Such a treat.

I think a place knows when you were born there. I could feel it whispering ‘welcome home’ to me, and then, more disturbingly, ‘you don’t want to leave again, do you? You could come back here. Live a simple life here. Sit in the Parade Gardens and watch the river fall down the weir.’  So tempting. But we packed our bags and caught the train to London. Now home will have to wait until next year.

So Reddies, do you have a place that is definitely home for you? Or are you still looking and hoping to find it?

The Perfect Summer Read.

 RHYS BOWEN: I came home from England this week to some good news. My upcoming book, MRS ENDICOTT’S SPLENDID ADVENTURE, is named one of the best books of summer by Book Bub. Also a really good Kirkus review (amazing, right?)

https://www.bookbub.com/blog/best-books-summer-2025?position=seemore&source=multicontent&target=title

As you probably know it’s a story about a woman who makes a new life for herself in a small Mediterranean village.  Also as most of you know, I love to travel, and my favorite haunts are around the Mediterranean–French Riviera, Italy, Greece. Unfortunately my travels have been limited recently, due to John’s precarious health so most of my travel has been done vicariously, via books.

Being part of this lovely list has made me wonder what is my perfect summer book. Nothing scary or too tense. A happy or at least satisfying ending. And a gorgeous setting. So thank you, Jenn, for writing Paris is Always a Good Idea a couple of years ago. Set in three places I adore.

I always love a touch of romance in the book, a touch of mystery… a strange letter, or, in the case of my new book, a mystery surrounding the owner of an abandoned villa. 

Several books set in Italy come to mind. I loved Julianne Maclean’s THESE TANGLED VINES, about a woman who inherits part of a vineyard in Tuscany. Or THE BEAUTIFUL RUINS, set on the Italian coast. Last year I remember reading THE HOUSE ON THE CERULEAN SEA. Not the sort of book I usually read but I was fascinated and ended up loving it.

There is nothing nicer than sitting on a beach, in the shade of a tree, on a veranda looking out over a lake with a glass of something long and cool and a good book, is there? I’m looking forward to that this summer. 

So Reds, it’s your turn. What are your summer books. What have been recent favorites?

LUCY BURDETTE: we’ll talk more about what we’re reading next week, but Rhys made me think about Ann Mah’s THE LOST VINTAGE and Juliet Blackwell’s OFF THE WILD COAST OF BRITTANY. I think a lot of the appeal of summer books is setting–going someplace in the book and in your head that you can’t or won’t actually be visiting!

JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING: I’m going to suggest something WAY different, but it’s been a favorite book since I was in high school: THE STORIES OF JOHN CHEEVER (1978.) Yes, I still have my battered paperback copy I got in high school! First, short stories are ideal for summer, when your want to get some reading in and then jump in the pool or start the BBQ. Second, even though the stories range over the seasons, many of them are set in what feels like an eternal WASP summer that’s been utterly lost in time. 

Third, the writing is magnificently beautiful. And fourth, Cheever’s characters, unlike the folks in the contemporary beach reads I also love, are not having a good time. You can digest a short story and then walk away, thinking, “Thank God I’m where I am,” as opposed to when I read one of Nancy Thayer’s books and I walk away wishing I could be summering in Nantucket!

JENN McKINLAY: Congratulations, Rhys! That is wonderful and I can’t wait until August 5th to grab a copy of Mrs. Endicott’s Splendid Adventure. This is such a great question, Rhys! And thank you for the nod to Paris is Always a Good Idea (I have some BIG news in regards to that title that I can’t share yet – SORRY! I hate it when people post that sort of thing and yet here I am doing it anyway – lol). 

Anyway, for me summer is always about a BIG book. When I was a teen, summer was when I tackled Gone with the Wind, The Bastard (John Jakes), Watership Down, and The Once and Future King. Now as an adult, I go for high fantasy like A Court of Thorn and Roses (a few years ago) or since we’re all studying Japanese for next year’s trip I will endeavor to read Clavell’s Shogun or something similar. Suggestions on Japanese historicals, anyone?   

HALLIE EPHRON: Yay Rhys! Big congrats!! 

I’m afraid my idea of a “summer book” used to be a really long slow read that I could take on vacation. I remember going 2 months through Europe on Eurail with Gunther Grasse’s THE TIN DRUM. 600 pages. I loved it but the only thing I remember about it was a particularly grisly  scene that involved a horse’s head and eels. I was young and and a stronger stomach.

And speaking of “late to the party” and lighter reads, I’m looking forward finally to THE MAID by Nita Prose and Elizabeth Strout’s OLIVE, AGAIN.

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: Yes, so much fun to read a big immersive summer book - - like THE WINDS OF WAR which I remember absolutely devouring on vacation. I bet that’s still good. I wonder… I can always tell my summer paperbacks, because they are all fluttery with salt water and sunscreen and get sand in the bindings. I love that! Oh, andI know I read THE OTHER SIDE OF MIDNIGHT by Sidney Sheldon, one loooong-ago summer, and I still think about it.  Oooh, and VALLEY OF THE DOLLS. (Right?)   And yes yes, THE GODFATHER! 

The summer I met Jonathan, I remember being at then-his house, and reading  THE GREEN MILE, by Stephen King, which came out in weekly (if I remember correctly)  little chap books. so you could only read several chapters  (maybe 10?)  at a time, and then you had to wait till the next week  for the next installment. It was absolutely riveting. and every memory of that book is also filled with sunshine and the fragrance of Bain de Soleil. 

RHYS:  Hank, I remember the Winds of War. I bought it for John when we had a getaway to Acapulco. He started it on the plane. He sat in the hotel room, the perfect hotel room on the beach, and read it while I went to swim, went to Lunch, went to the Folklorico show etc etc. He did not leave that blasted room once! But he finished the book in a weekend.

How about you, Reddies? What is your idea of the perfect summer book?

DEBORAH CROMBIE: Woo hoo, Rhys!! That is fabulous, and I wish I was going on summer vacation just so I could read Mrs. Endicott again. 

I can't remember when I've read a big summer beach-hammocky sort of book, but I'd like it to be long and not something I'd ordinarily pick up. I have been contemplating a reread of Lord of the Rings, so….

Meet the REAL Real Book Spy!

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN:  What a perfect guest for this Sunday! Do you know Ryan Steck, the author and editor? If you don't, you certainly know his iconic TheRealBookSpy, where he’s the founder and editor in chief. Ryan has been named an “Online Influencer” by Amazon and is a regular columnist at CrimeReads.  

 

Anyone who knows and loves and cares about thrillers—well, you’ll meet all your faves at TRBS.

 

Steck lives in Michigan with his wife and their six kids, where he cheers on his beloved Detroit Tigers and Lions during the rare moments when he’s not reading or talking about books on social media.  I cannot imagine when he sleeps. We’ll have to ask him!

 

But his most recent Matthew Redd book, Gone Dark, comes out on June 17 from Tyndale Fiction.  But of course, Reds and Readers, you will hear about it here first!

 

And a copy of GONE DARK to one very lucky commenter!

 

Hank: How have your personal experiences influenced this story? Or have they?

 

Ryan Steck: Oh, wow. In a number of ways! Out of all my books, Gone Dark is the most personal for me. Not only does it continue to explore themes that I’m intimately familiar with—such as adoption, addiction, evolving relationships, and growing families—but it also features a new character named Jack, and I’m really excited for readers to meet him. While I love big, action-packed adventures, this book has more raw emotion than anything I’ve written before, and most of them come from my real-life experiences.

 

Hank: You’ve described Matthew Redd as being “with” you for a long time. How has he changed from his original incarnation until now?

 

Ryan Steck: Well, in a sense, Redd has always been Redd. I’ve always heard his voice, and I usually tell people that in any given situation I might find myself, I know exactly how I should handle things . . . and I also know exactly how Matty Redd would handle things. His way is usually more action-packed than mine! But one thing that has certainly changed over the years is that Redd is now a family man.

 

 He’s no longer the lone wolf operator readers first met in Fields of Fire. He has a wife and kids, and their family is still growing. He has his war dog, Rubble the Rottweiler. He has his best friends, his biological father, and—in this book, without giving anything away—his inner circle widens a bit.

So that’s all pretty new, and while I like seeing the side of Redd that cares for others and has even learned to trust them, his opening himself up like that is a bit of a double-edged sword because now he has more to lose when bad guys come knocking.

 

Hank: I love Rubble—that’s so perfect. But you have such a wonderful group of supporting characters.  Which one has changed the most over the series?

 

Ryan Steck: I think if I had to pick just one character to highlight here, I’d have to go with Emily Redd, Matty’s wife. Certainly, in this book, you see just how devoted she is to her husband, and I really love their relationship. In many ways, albeit with far fewer gunfights and bad guys, their relationship and what they deal with mirrors that of my own marriage with my wife.

 

We, too, have a big family, so I’m familiar with those dynamics, but my wife has always had my back and supported me, just as Em does Redd. And in turn, I’ve always been there for her through anything she may face, including some really tough medical issues over the past few years. So, I do draw influence from my wife when writing Emily, certainly. I’d also say that Mikey, Redd’s faithful best friend, has really come a long way, too, and more than ever, you see him step up when Matty needs him in Gone Dark.

 

Hank: So tell us about the book! What was the most exciting part of writing this story?

 

Ryan Steck: The entire story concept for this book came from my wanting to pair Redd with Jack, a little boy who is on his own and on the run, in need of someone to protect him. I’ve actually never been more excited for my readers to meet a character than I am for them to get to know Jack, who, in a lot of ways, reminds Redd of himself when he was a kid. So, anytime Redd and Jack share the page together, those are some of my favorite moments in the book. There’s another scene that involves a train that, without spoiling it, was also a lot of fun for me to write. I think my readers will know why when they see it.

 

Hank: You include real-world issues in this book-- drug addiction and forest fires, for example. Why?

 

Ryan Steck: I wanted to write something with a tad more heart and suspense, but I also wanted to explore themes that are important to me. I’m a recovering alcoholic and have now been sober for going on fifteen years. I’ve also struggled with accidental opioid addiction, meaning that I was prescribed pain pills following surgeries in my past, only to end up really addicted to them and had to get help. These are tough issues that I am intimately familiar with and now felt like the right time for me to finally address some of this stuff in my writing.

Beyond addiction, you see Redd grow into his faith a bit more with this book, and that was really important to me as well.

 

Hank: A romance question for you!  Many authors leave their couples in an almost perpetual will-they-won’t- they loop. But you have Matthew marry his high school sweetheart, and they are about to have another kid. What are the advantages and challenges of having a strong married couple in a novel?

 

Ryan Steck:  You know, this is a great question. I’ve covered thrillers for over a decade on The Real Book Spy, and I’ve worked as an editor for a long time as well. And I can’t tell you how many characters have had their wives or significant others killed at some point. In fact, many of them have lost several loved ones in a similar fashion, usually when the bad guys come looking for the hero and can’t get to them, so they kill the wife or girlfriend to hurt the hero and draw them out. I get it, and I appreciate those stories, but that’s not what I wanted for my series.

Now, I’m not saying that nothing will ever happen to Redd or Emily. I can’t make that promise, but I don’t ever want to leave readers hanging between books, and I sure don’t want my readers to always worry that their favorite character might be killed off. I’ll never say never, but I think Redd and Emily drive this series together, so it’s more about how will they get out of this? As opposed to will they get out of this?

 

All of that said, it absolutely can be a challenge to manage so many characters and relationships. I know other authors, friends of mine, who have killed off their hero’s love interest simply because they couldn’t find a role for them in future stories. And I get that, believe me, now more than ever. I’m currently writing the fifth Matthew Redd book, and trust me, It’s a challenge to account for everyone and all of Redd’s loved ones and family members sometimes, but I also think it makes for a richer reading experience.

 

Hank: Your faith is so important to you---how has it been affected by your writing journey?  Or has it?

 

Ryan Steck: Since becoming an author, I’ve been really blessed to live out my dream and tell stories for a living, but that doesn’t mean things are always smooth sailing. We kept it pretty private, but my wife has faced a number of challenging health issues over the last three years. As a believer, I’ve always clung to my faith, but certainly, it’s harder to keep your eyes on the Lord when you’re in the middle of a storm.

 

More than anything, hearing from readers has emboldened me to speak about my faith more.  I’ve gotten emails from so many people who’ve reached out to share the personal struggles they’ve faced while reading my books, thanking me for providing an entertaining distraction from whatever they’re going through. Those letters and messages are very humbling, but they’re also a reminder that everyone has something going on in their life, and I’ve tried to remember that when interacting with others.

 

Hank: Oh, such a perfect way to end our chat and start the discussion!   Let’s talk about those will they/won’t they relationships.   Tracy and Hepburn, Cheers, Moonlighting—you know the ones. Which ones in books do you love?

 

And what questions do you have for the fabulous Ryan?

 

And a copy of GONE DARK to one lucky commenter! 

 

Down The Rabbit Hole We Go!

Don't forget! Join us for REDS AND READERS HAPPY HOUR Saturday June 7 at 7 PM on Facebook! Prizes and surprises! And all the news.

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: It’s from Alice in Wonderland, isn’t it? That we go “down the rabbit hole” into research? How many of us have visited there?

And –how many of us can get out? That may be the better question. Why does every answer lead to another question?

Because–because we are lucky.

And here is Kate Woodworth with her own particularly unusual adventures.  And she speaks for us all! Who but a writer could have such a fabulous and hilarious journey?

Once You Were Normal. Now You Write Fiction

By Kate Woodworth

You know how it goes: You’re struggling with a line of dialogue and a thought rushes past, holding a stopwatch and muttering “I’m late! Deadline!” Next thing you know, you’re down the rabbit hole, telling yourself that research is necessary. Are there chestnut trees on Maine islands? What about skunks? How do zoning issues get resolved in small towns? What’s a swimmeret?

You are now deep in Tunnel One. The original question has disappeared. The ticking of the deadline clock is no longer audible. Instead, you hear the murmuring of future readers growing louder. They are wearing deerstalker hats and looking for your missteps with high-power magnifying lenses. You should quit researching. Get back to work!

For motivation, you show some pages to a trusted friend, hoping for an enthusiastic, “It’s GREAT! Don’t spend time researching! Just write!” Instead, you get: “I don’t believe your main character knows anything about farming.” Unsurprising because, of course, you don’t know anything about farming. No more internet research. It’s time to talk to experts.

Suddenly, you’re in a world that resembles the real one, except that strangers are willing to answer random questions simply because you have identified yourself as a writer. All those years trying to amass education and experience so as to appear credible in the working world, and now all you need to tell people is that you like to make up stories and they’ll explain how to trim a goat’s hooves and all the ways a tomato crop can fail.

Some things—like birth—are hard to witness unless you live on a farm, and so hours are lost watching lambs being delivered on YouTube. Others—like lobster courtship and mating—are so surprisingly fascinating that you find your friends backing away, unwilling to listen yet again to your nattering about the convenience of sperm packets that can be stored for a year or more.

By now, you’re essentially living in the research rabbit hole.

Sometimes your body is present, doing the required life things. But in your head, you are finding unexplored…important unexplored…tunnels. Why, exactly, is the Gulf of Maine warming faster than almost every other body of water on the planet? Do lobsters have lips? Scampering wildly from question to question, you run headfirst into someone who lives the life you’ve given your character: an actual lobsterman. Retreat!

You cold call unintimidating pseudo-experts, like captains who take tourists out for an “authentic lobster cruise”. You elbow aside a honeymooning couple from Colorado and a seventh grader with an essay due. You screen out your spouse’s murmured apologies.

“Research,” he says, by way of explanation, perhaps hoping to convince others you’re a scientist.

You ace the quiz on how to sex a lobster (it’s all about the swimmerets). Your hand is first in the air when your guide captain for volunteers to hold a lobster. When he asks, “Who wants to kiss a lobster?” you don’t hesitate. You pucker up. Dozens of cameras click. You wonder about kissing another “man” in front of your husband but decide it doesn’t matter. You didn’t kiss the lobster on its lips (too close to those claws!) and, besides, it’s research.

What’s the strangest thing you’ve done as part of researching your book?


HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: I am still laughing about “I don’t believe your main character knows anything about farming.” That’s SO perfect.

So yeah, what’s the strangest thing you’ve done as research–or, how about this, what’s a cool thing you learned when you were looking for something else?

OR–tell us the first thing in your search history right now. Mine is: "Do chipmunks eat rat poison?” SO important!

AND: Whoa. Look at Kate's book cover below. Isn't it gorgeous?



About the Author

Kate Woodworth is the author of Little Great Island, a novel about the power of love and community in the face of climate change on a small Maine island, and of the monthly Substack, Food in the Time of Climate Change…which gives her plenty of reasons to wander the research rabbit hole. For more, visit katewoodworth.com.

About Little Great Island

On Little Great Island, climate change is disrupting both life and love

After offending the powerful pastor of a cult, Mari McGavin has to flee with her six-year-old son. With no money and no place else to go, she returns to the tiny Maine island where she grew up—a place she swore she’d never see again. There Mari runs into her lifelong friend Harry Richardson, one of the island’s summer residents, now back himself to sell his family’s summer home. Mari and Harry’s lives intertwine once again, setting off a chain of events as unexpected and life altering as the shifts in climate affecting the whole ecosystem of the island…from generations of fishing families to the lobsters and the butterflies.

Little Great Island Illustrates in microcosm the greatest changes of our time and the unyielding power of love.

Buy the book: https://bookshop.org/p/books/little-great-island-kate-woodworth/21515752?ean=9781960573902&next=t

The Case of the Empty Safe

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: Usually we do a big introduction here, but there's no introduction big enough, no words ground enough, no fanfare loud enough to do this justice.

All Rise!

Reds and Readers, I present to you the fabulous inimitable iconic life-changingly brilliant Laurie R. King.

The Case of the Empty Safe

    by Laurie R. King

Diamonds and rubies and emeralds, nestled into a weight of gold and silver and sparkling enamel: the “Irish Crown Jewels” were slabs of ceremonial bling showy enough for a modern rapper.

 Presented to Ireland by William IV as a sign that their Order of St Patrick would henceforth be the equal of the English and Scottish Orders of Garter and Thistle, the Regalia—Star, Badge, and Collars—were worn for high formal occasions such as investitures. 

They were kept in a modern safe in an impregnable castle—a safe with only two keys, both in the hands of the senior Irish herald and chief genealogist, Arthur Vicars. Who, in June, 1907, was thrilled by the upcoming visit of King Edward VII and Queen Alexandra, the high point of which (so far as Vicars was concerned) would be a grand ceremonial investiture, of which he was in charge. Four days before the King’s arrival, Vicars—a busy man—handed his key and a ceremonial collar to an assistant, telling him to lock it in the safe with the other spectacular bits of Regalia.

Plenty of Bling!

But when the man went to turn the key, he found the lock already open. The Jewels were gone.

They were never recovered.

No arrest was ever made.

117 years later, a woman who makes her living writing unlikely mystery stories went looking for a nice, entertaining crime. Her protagonist, Mary Russell, had long ago mentioned a charming but criminal uncle—a rogue, rather than a hard villain—and considering the state of the world, the writer decided that a black sheep was just the ideal company for what looked to be a difficult year.

Now, the writer could have invented a crime out of whole cloth—we writers do lie for a living, after all—but there was something about this particular bit of early 20th century history that had caught her imagination. And the crime was definitely something that a gifted con-man might have got himself involved with.

Besides, I didn’t have to get on a plane to do the research, since I’d been to Ireland a couple of times before.

Hence: Mary Russell meets the Theft of the Irish Crown Jewels. The 1907 true-life crime had everything: mystery, money, outraged royals, shocking scandal, the famous and the infamous. It was in Russell’s past (the series is currently in 1925) but not necessarily in the past of her husband and partner, Sherlock Holmes. The main problem was, researching the details led me into a story that was so wild, with so many bizarre twists, that I began to wonder if my own fictional elements would get lost amidst the magnificent complexity.

However, after eighteen books, I trust my characters to stand up for themselves, so in I dove.

Sir Arthur Vicars

Arthur Vicars is where it all begins. The Ulster King of Arms was an unlikely source of thrill: a not-quite-aristocratic member of the gentry, he was a man dedicated to being important—in a society where ancestors define one’s standing, the genealogist is king. However, deciding fates and rubbing shoulders with literal kings makes a person less concerned with the mundane tasks of the actual job.

 For example, when when that shiny new safe was bought to go in the stoutest strongroom in Ireland, built in the newly renovated genealogical offices, Vicars didn’t bother to check that it would fit through the door. Since that left him with the option of admitting error or demolishing the strongroom, he chose a third option: quietly tuck it into the library instead, a room used by anyone who wanted to research their family ties.

And being a man given over to self-importance, Vicars’ friends—or perhaps that should be “friends”—found it easy to manipulate him. Especially since he had no head for alcohol. One wild evening sherry party the previous winter (had he taken two glasses of wine, or three?) found him waking in his office the next morning with bits of the Regalia draped around his neck like costume jewelry. 

Another time, a piece disappeared entirely, to be returned in the post a few days later. Har, har—what a joke to play on old Vicars!

Among those rather dubious friends were actual aristocrats, politicians, and society figures.

Such as Lord Haddo, who was probably responsible for those jokes with the Regalia, and whose father, ironically, was the Duke whose investiture was interrupted. And Francis Bennett-Goldney, mayor of Canterbury (later discovered to be a compulsive kleptomaniac.) 

Then there was the handsome young staff officer and shining star of the London salons, who bore the famous surname of Shackleton, being the explorer’s younger brother.

The Charming Captain

Rich ground for a crime writer, I’m sure you will agree. And that’s before I even got to the rumors that JP Morgan had been involved. Or the fact that Arthur Vicars was shot by the IRA a few years later and his house set afire. Or that Vicars’ half-brother was a wealthy eccentric with a passion for gardens, Bulgarian orphans, and Irish wolfhounds.

And to top this all off, Francis Shackleton, who had charmed Vicars into appointing him his right-hand man in the Office of Arms, who paid half the rent for the Dublin house they shared although he only spent a week or two there each year, who operated at the top of London society the rest of the time…was arrested a few years after the Jewels theft, when the huge Mexican land fraud he had created came to light.

A fraud that he never actually stood trial for.

As I dug away, uncovering one colorful character and situation after another, there remained one key, glaring question: why had the crime not been solved? From the beginning, even the local Dublin police knew it had to have been an inside job. There were a limited number of suspects. Scotland Yard was there within a few days, lest anyone worry that the locals were being paid off. Arthur Conan Doyle (a distant relation of Arthur Vicars) offered his help. A Viceregal Commission was brought together to interview witnesses and lodge a report.

But not a single diamond ever surfaced. Not one arrest was made.

The only person who paid a price was Arthur Vicars—and he only lost his beloved position because of his irresponsibility, not because anyone thought he had actually stolen the things himself.

And there, of course, lay the key. That circle of shady friends who sipped sherry and played jokes on their host? Within days, it became known that many of them had certain… reputations.

And although most of the time, no one cared if a person was quietly homosexual, Europe had recently seen two enormous international scandals that rattled governments and ruined lives, and England’s relationship with Ireland was already shaky.

Vicars himself blamed Francis Shackleton from the outset, and yet, investigating officers walked cautiously around the socialite with the important friends and the celebrated brother. The Viceregal Commission was held behind closed doors, out of concern for what Shackleton might say. And when the explorer’s brother did eventually sit down in front of the Commission and openly threaten to tell all?

Then thanked him for his help. They closed the investigation and presented the King with the blandest of results. Scotland Yard’s report disappeared entirely.

But I’m a mystery writer. I happen to also be a compulsive researcher, but primarily, I’m looking for a story. And so I examine my rich field of possibilities, and I see who was standing over to one side, and who might have a reason to stay quiet, and I say…

Well, that would be spoiling things, wouldn’t it?

Knave of Diamonds is out June 10.


HANK: Standing ovation, standing ovation! And I absolutely cannot wait to read this! Reds and readers? 

What do you think of this tale?

HOW does Laurie do it?

(And are you a Mary Russell fan? Why? I dare you to say no :-)

Laurie R. King is the bestselling author of nineteen Mary Russell-Sherlock Holmes novels, five Kate Martinellis, two Stuyvesant-Greys, five standalones, novellas, anthologies, and a new series featuring SFPD Inspector Raquel Laing. She has won the Agatha, Anthony, Edgar, Lambda, Wolfe, Macavity, Creasey Dagger, and Romantic Times Career Achievement awards, has an honorary doctorate, and is both a Baker Street Irregular and an MWA Grand Master. If you go to https://laurierking.com, you’ll find her newsletter, links to her social media, an excerpt of Knave of Diamonds, and pages of book club kits and other Fun Stuff.

Knave of Diamonds

Mary Russell adored her black-sheep Uncle Jake, but she's assumed that his ne’er-do-well ways brought him to a bad end somewhere—until he presents himself at her Sussex door. Yes, Jake is back, and with a tricky problem for his clever niece. Namely, the 1907 theft of the Irish Crown Jewels that shook a government, enraged a King, and baffled the police. Her husband, Sherlock Holmes, was somehow involved—and yet Jake expects Russell to slip away without telling Holmes.

Conflicting loyalties and international secrets, blatant lies and blithe deceptions: sounds like another case for Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes.