Death at High Tide by Hannah Dennison

Jenn McKinlay: I am absolutely thrilled to have one of my very favorite wine drinking pals, um, writing mates visiting all the way from the gorgeous Devon countryside to celebrate her latest release DEATH AT HIGH TIDE. Hannah and I have been friends for many years and many series now, and I am always pleased to see her even if it’s mostly on Facetime these days when we do one of our marathon catchups. Hi, Hannah! Welcome to the blog!

Available Now!

Hannah Dennison: Thanks so much for inviting me to Jungle Red Writers today. I have been a guest on this amazing blog a few times now and I feel very honored to have been invited back!

Eighteen months ago my domestic situation changed in a way that I could never have imagined. After twenty-five years of living in California followed by a short stint in Oregon, I found myself moving back home with my two Hungarian Vizslas, for good.  

My daughter picked me up at Heathrow airport and drove the two hundred miles to a tiny hamlet in south Devon where my sister Lesley was waiting in what would become my new home—a beautiful barn conversion that she had found for me to rent—along with a bottle of celebratory champagne. 

Although we’d been super close growing up, Lesley and I had drifted apart as the years passed, especially after my move overseas. As the oldest, I used to be the bossy one but I discovered that it was Lesley now who ruled the proverbial roost. As my mother, (a feisty ninety-year-old), said, “Your sister holds the rolling pin.”  

Lesley is a force of nature and has to be one of the most optimistic people I know. As a single mother of three grown-up sons, her life hadn’t been easy. She’s been an Avon rep, Brown Owl for the local Brownie pack and was a Weightwatchers lecturer for two decades. These days she works as an estate manager for a country house that was the location for the recent remake of My Cousin Rachel that starred Rachel Weisz. 

A relationship with a sister is like no other. Who else can I belt out songs from Queen, Genesis and David Bowie with or drive our mother to distraction with our signature—and disgusting—Hot Snot Bogey Pie schoolyard rhyme?

Sisterhood can be both wonderful and challenging. I find that being labeled Eeyore to her Tigger is still extremely irritating. “That was fifty years ago,” I’d grumble, sounding very Eeyore-like. If I were any character in the Pooh stories it would have to be Kanga. 

That’s the thing about sisters. They have a knack of telling it like it is. They also have an amazing ability to recall embarrassing moments that we’d much rather forget. But it was Lesley who insisted that I’d always wanted to be a writer—something I hotly denied. 

But six weeks ago, whilst going through old photo albums and storage boxes my sister presented me with a few handwritten pages with the words First Draft scrawled in pencil. “You see,” she said triumphantly. “You always wanted to be a writer.”

This First Draft was a murder-mystery story about two sisters, “one scatterbrained and one practical” that find a dead gamekeeper in the forest. I must have been twelve when I wrote it and even though it was, literally, just a first draft I was surprised that I had actually plotted the whole story out with bullet points. I honestly couldn’t remember writing it. Of course after that first rush of excitement Lesley presented me with another envelope. “Oh, and here’s that rejection letter from Woman’s Own magazine.” And it was at that moment I knew why I’d buried my writing dream. 

It concerned a love story that my twelve-year old innocent self (who had never been kissed) had sent off to a woman’s magazine. The return of my short story with NO, written in big red letters across the generic buck slip promptly stopped me picking up my pen again for a very long time.

Hannah and Leslie in a helicopter on a research trip 

So it seems fitting that my new series is about those two sisters but Death at High Tide was already in production when we found First Draft in that storage box. It must have been percolating in my sub-conscious for decades. In Death at High Tide there is no gamekeeper in the forest but there is plenty of murder. But most of all it’s about sisterhood. 

There is a saying, “Sisters by blood, best friends by choice,” and to that I shout Amen!

What about you, Reds and Readers, any sister stories out there to share?  

What's being said: 
"Winning...Two murders and a high tide cutting off the police heighten the suspense. Intriguing characters and an intricate plot lift this twist on Agatha Christie’s And Then There Were None. Cozy fans will look forward to further skullduggery on Tregarrick." ―Publishers Weekly

"Thrilling....Vividly described setting, effective plot twists, and a strong portrayal of sisterly love distinguish this 'locked island' mystery." ―Booklist

DEATH AT HIGH TIDE released on Aug 18th! 

Death at High Tide is the delightful first installment in the Island Sisters series by Hannah Dennison, featuring two sisters who inherit an old hotel in the remote Isles of Scilly off the coast of Cornwall and find it full of intrigue, danger, and romance.

When Evie Mead’s husband, Robert, suddenly drops dead of a heart attack, a mysterious note is found among his possessions. It indicates that Evie may own the rights to an old hotel on Tregarrick Rock, one of the Isles of Scilly. 

Still grieving, Evie is inclined to leave the matter to the accountant to sort out. Her sister Margot, however, flown in from her glamorous career in LA, has other plans. Envisioning a luxurious weekend getaway, she goes right ahead and buys two tickets—one way—to Tregarrick.

Once at the hotel—used in its heyday to house detective novelists, and more fixer-upper than spa resort, after all—Evie and Margot attempt to get to the bottom of things. But the foul-tempered hotel owner claims he's never met the late Robert, even after Evie finds framed photos of them—alongside Robert's first wife—in his office. The rest of the island inhabitants, ranging from an ex-con receptionist to a vicar who communicates with cats, aren't any easier to read.

But when a murder occurs at the hotel, and then another soon follows, frustration turns to desperation. There’s no getting off the island at high tide. And Evie and Margot, the only current visitors to Tregarrick, are suspects one and two. It falls to them to unravel secrets spanning generations—and several of their own—if they want to make it back alive.

"From the Comfort of My Couch"

INGRID THOFT
One day I was sitting with my sister and her daughter discussing books, and we started talking about autobiographies.  We mused about what we would entitle our autobiographies, and although I don't remember most of the conversation, I do remember my niece's suggestion for my sister's book.  She declared that it should be called "From the Comfort of My Couch," which cracks us up to this day.  

My sister is the most tenacious, courageous person I know—in matters of life, however, not thrill-seeking.  In fact, it has become a hobby of mine to find photos and videos that will get her feet sweating and prompt an unequivocal "heck no!" from her when I share them.  

Some of these photos and videos are from my own adventures.  My husband and I have made it our mission to take pictures while scuba diving that we're sure will get a reaction.  For instance, my encounter with a giant Potato Cod fish on the Great Barrier Reef freaks her out no matter how many times she's seen it.

On a recent scuba diving trip, we filmed a shark swimming towards us with the great deep blue sea behind him, which is another one of her favorites—sharks and the infinite creepiness of the ocean.

Photo courtesy of Video Vision 360/Natura Vive

I also like to bring travel opportunities to her attention, like the Natura Vive Skylodge in Peru.  What could go wrong, sleeping in a glass pod 1,312 feet above the floor of the Sacred Valley?  Her first question (and mine) was how do you answer the call of nature?!

And how about learning to wing walk on her next vacation?  That sounds exciting, and I'm sure it will get more than just her feet sweating!

Truth be told, I have no interest in sleeping cliff side in a glass pod or walking on an airplane wing mid-flight, but her reaction is so satisfying, I can't stop making these types of suggestions. 

I asked her if I could write about this, and she was happy to indulge me, but she insisted that I include two things that really give her the willies:

The perspective of looking up at cruise ship from below:

This is the best I could find!  Note the man in the tiny skiff.

and hot dog eating contests!

Go figure!

What do you say, Reds and Readers?  Do your feet sweat when you see a shark?  Do hot dog eating contests give you the willies?  Do you lovingly torment your siblings in a similar fashion?

Traveling in Packs

LUCY BURDETTE: As Rhys mentioned last week, the Bouchercon conference Jungle Red panel was great fun. We so enjoyed meeting many of you who read this blog! I’ve been thinking since then about how much I love being part of this pack. (And you know if you are reading this, you are part of our pack!)

But I recognize that not everyone finds comfort in a group. And not every writer needs one. What makes one person thrive in a group, while another might warily keep her distance? This is probably oversimplified, but even though women are sometimes characterized as catty and backstabbing, I think we might be better with groups then men. And I think for me, having a sister only 11 months older who was utterly welcoming set my mental framework. I started out in a little pack and since then, have always sought one out. How about you, reds and red readers—are you happier trav’ling life in a pack? Or do you manage better on your own?

JENN McKINLAY: I am definitely a pack animal, but I also need lots of alone time and am a-okay with traveling alone, so I think I have one foot firmly planted in each camp. Like you and your sister, my brother is only 11 months older than me and we did everything together as kids so I definitely am used to having a pal or hooligans by my side. That being said, I need to be alone to let my imagination loose. While at Bouchercon, I attended many events with friends, like dinner with the Reds, but I also cut out for a few hours on Saturday morning to go to the top of the CN Tower by myself and stomp around Toronto on my own. I am an active sort and I like to walk at my own pace, eat what I want, loiter where I choose, and people watch without having to converse, but then when I want a pack I go find one.

HALLIE EPHRON: Pack animal here, guilty as charged. Particularly at a conference where alone I feel so self-conscious and anxious. In high school, my greatest dread was lunch because I did NOT have a group I belonged to. So I drifted trying to look busy, like I was going somewhere rather than admit that I was eating alone. I suppose if that's the worst thing that happens to you in high school, you've gotten off easy. Now I treasure my friends and a twosome or more some is my preferred way to spend leisure. Writing I like to do alone.

DEBORAH CROMBIE: I am a bit of both. I'm perfectly happy traveling by myself and doing things on my own, and I'm very seldom uncomfortable. (Although I have to admit when I did a Michelin-starred tasting dinner in the Cotswolds last month, I was the only single diner in the restaurant. Only about halfway through the dinner did it occur to me that other people might think it odd. I was perfectly happy--and I got to eavesdrop on the other diners!) 

But I'm also very social and love doing things with friends. I think it's a perfect mix. The extrovert fuels the introvert needed for writing and long stretches of time alone.

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: Huh. That's a great question. I am often alone during the day, and that's more than fine. (Happy, too, when Jonathan comes home.)  I am happy by myself exploring a strange place,  happy with dinner by myself out of town. It's fun now, and I guess I learned it by begin a big loner in high school and college.  But now I also adore being in a pack, hanging and flowing with pals.  Dinner with a pal or two? Bliss.  The Jungle Reds-in-motion? All wonderful, and our connections at Bouchercon still bring tears to my eyes. 

INGRID THOFT: I have three older sisters, so I grew up traveling in a pack.  These days, I like a bit of both:  Time spent with others, but also plenty of time on my own or with the hubby.  I'm not wild about coordinating travel itineraries with others because I think that everyone has his or her own travel style, and it can be hard to mesh them.  Do you like to get to the airport really early?  At the last minute?  Do you ever check a bag?  What kind of accommodations do you prefer?  I think it's great to meet up for meals or other events, but also to build in time for recharging my batteries without having to worry about anyone else's preferences.  

RHYS BOWEN: I'm definitely a pack animal too. Having been a solitary child, growing up at the big house in the country, I relished being in college and doing things with friends. I still do.  I have had the same groups of hiking friends for thirty plus years. We have taken many fabulous trips around the world together and always have such a good time. However, there are times when I have overload and need to be on my own for a while, just to re-charge. 

JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING: I'm on the same part of the spectrum as Debs and Ingrid. I'm very sociable, and love being with friends. One of the things I'm being mindful of, since Ross passed away, is getting out of the house and meeting a friend or friends at least once a week. On the other hand, I enjoy time spent by myself: I love solo travel and what is nicer than staying by yourself in a good-quality hotel room?


One of my most cherished escapes is spending a working week at my agent's house in Nantucket, all alone during the off-season. I'll see a couple of friends while I'm on the island, but most of the time, it;s just me and the book - and I like it that way. But when I'm at a conference or vacationing, I want to be surrounded by my people all the time. What's the point, otherwise?

LUCY: And Julia, we cannot wait until you are traveling with the Red pack again soon! Red readers, are you a pack animal, or do you prefer to go it alone?

What We're Writing? Hank says: Sisters,Sisters!

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: I love when there's a theme! And better yet, we didn't plan it.

 Yesterday Hallie talked about her sisters--and all the writing prompts that come from them.
I have three sisters,Nina, Nancy and Liz. (Less famous, but none the less just as fascinating.)  But I don't so much write about them as about sister relationships.

Which (because this is What We're Writing Week and I get Tuesdays!) brings us to WHAT YOU SEE--my new Jane Ryland book about surveillance, hidden cameras, and clandestine video. (It comes out October 20. But you can order it right now, just saying.) 

WHAT YOU SEE--which illustrates, of course, that What You See is not always the truth---is the first real up close introduction to Jane's younger sister Melissa, who, because she's like that, insisted on being called Lissa for her entire life until recently, when she decided Melissa was more appropriate for a partner-track lawyer, and so eschewed nicknames.

Melissa, because she's like that, is also getting married the weekend of WHAT YOU SEE, and has come to Boston to pick up her flower girl, 8-year-old Gracie, the daughter of her fiancé Daniel and his ex-wife. And take her back to Chicago for the festivities. (Jake and Jake are going to the wedding! But more on that another day.)

Jane is embroiled in her first story in a long time--trying to clinch a job at Channel 2, and the murder she's been assigned to cover might just be her ticket back to TV. It's noon, in summer, and she's in Curley Park, just outside Faneuil Hall Marketplace, where law enforcement and EMTs are now converging on a murder scene.

But in the midst of it all, Lissa, I mean Melissa, calls Jane. After some explanation of how her fiancé  is stuck at the airport in Geneva, she drops the bombshell.  "We can't find Gracie," Melissa says.

And so--a snippet of Chapter 8.

Chapter 8

   “You can’t find Gracie?” Jane closed her eyes briefly, trying to blank out the crowd and the whirling red lights of the ambulance and the muttering undercurrent as gawking onlookers dissected the scene before them, voices dimmed in respect or horror. Melissa had finally gotten to the point, but that didn’t mean Jane understood it.

“What do you mean, ‘can’t find’ Gracie?”

“What part of ‘can’t find’ do you not understand, Jane?” Melissa’s voice, taut and demanding, grated through Jane’s cell. Melissa was relentless when things didn’t work her perfect way.

Jane poked an available finger into her non-phone ear, trying to block out the wail of an approaching siren. Failed. She looked up, frowning, scoping out the situation. The EMTs still knelt by the victim. Why did they need another ambulance? She couldn’t shoot any video while she was talking on the phone. She turned her back on the whole thing. She’d give Melissa thirty seconds. Thirty charitable seconds.

“I understand ‘can’t find,’ Melissa.” Jane kept her voice careful, no need to add to her sister’s distress. “You mean Gracie’s late coming home for lunch or something? She’s not where she’s supposed to be?”

“Her mother—have you met her? Robyn with a y? Is going nuts,” Melissa said. “She’s the neediest person imaginable. But anyway, Gracie. She comes home from school for lunch. Thanks to Daniel’s incredibly generous child support, they send her to Brookline Charter, close to their—well, anyway.” Melissa was interrupting herself now, no need for Jane to try.

Jane kept her eyes closed and head down, the only way she could focus and not be distracted by little things like, say, her job and a murder. Both of which she was now, to her certain detriment, ignoring.

“. . . but they haven’t come home,” Melissa was saying. “Robyn called the school, but she says they said Gracie left with her stepdad as usual, and that was that. We’ve called him, but he’s not answering his cell.”

Jane’s call-waiting beeped in, an insistent little chirp that demanded her attention. Channel 2. Of course, wanting to know what she’d discovered. “I’m on the phone with my sister” was not a good answer.

“Hang on,” Jane said.

“Ja—!”

Jane winced, frustrated with this whole juggling thing. If Gracie was really gone, truly gone, whatever “gone” meant, naturally that trumped anything. But Gracie was with her stepfather, right? And Melissa always overreacted.

“This is Jane,” she said.

“Jane? You there? What’s the scoop? Is there a suspect? Can you confirm a murder? This is Derek at the assignment desk, BTW. It’s been more than fifteen mins since we got you past the rookie cop—you need any more help?”

“I, um—” He was kidding, right? Jane didn’t need any help.

“You got video?” Derek kept talking. “Interviews?”

“Definitely,” she said. She looked up, squinting. Noontime shadows made dark puddles at each onlooker’s feet. Two of the EMTs were standing now, the other pointing the medical examiner to the man sprawled on the brick walkway. They clicked open the legs of a collapsible metal gurney. The crowd stepped back, as one, as if the medics needed additional room for this delicate procedure.

“Listen, Derek, no cops are talking yet. The ME is here. They’re moving the victim now. Gotta get a shot of this, gotta go, I’ll call you back.” She hung up before the editor could give her more instructions. Or more criticism. Jane had this, no problem, she simply needed to do it her way. Back to Melissa.

“Lissa, it’s me, I’m sorry, I had to—”

“She’s fine.” No more stress in Melissa’s voice?

“What?” Jane tried to process what her sister said. “She’s what?”

“Fine. She just called, she’s fine. She’s with her stepfather. Robyn’s husband, Lewis. Evidently the left hand didn’t know—anyway, I’ll keep you posted on the drill for the rest of the day soon as I can.”

“Great,” Jane said, happy Melissa was not there in person to witness the massive eye roll. But Jane had been the good sister, on the outside, at least. Now she could go back to her real life without a guilty conscience. “Glad it all worked out, Liss.”

“So we’ll see you tonight, then? And finally get to meet your Jack?”

“Jake,” Jane said. Counting to ten, backward, got to nine. “Jake Brogan.”

“Jo-king,” Melissa singsonged. “TTYL.” And hung up.

The woman was a partner-track lawyer, for God’s sake. Who would say ttyl out loud? But at least Gracie was fine. Another personal life disaster successfully solved.

Now to get her professional life back. She picked up the video camera and headed for the action. The ambulance doors were still open. She hadn’t missed a thing.

*******************************

HANK: But of course, it's only Chapter 8. 

So let's talk about sisters and weddings, just like Jane and Melissa. Jane's the maid of honor.  What's your favorite sister-wedding story?  Or what's your favorite FICTIONAL wedding? (I think I vote for---The Philadelphia Story.)

And  pssst. I have an ARC.  So one lucky commenter will win the advance reading copy of WHAT YOU SEE! 

Sisterhood of the Traveling St. Patrick' Day

Me, Mom, Barb. Note the missing teeth.

JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING: St. Patrick's Day. Clover, green, leprechans (all hard to envision as i look out my window here in Maine and see nothing but snow, snow, snow.) Irish pubs, parades, corned beef and cabbage, GOING MY WAY and  FINIAN'S RAINBOW.  For me, however, St. Patrick's Day has always been, first and foremost, the day I became a sister. 


My first, my very first memory is of standing in my parents' sun-drenched Montgomery bedroom, peeping into the bassinet that held brand new baby Barbara. (We called her Barbie, of course, a nickname she outgrew before high school. Now she's Barb.) Our later encounters were not so gentle; my mother has a story of the time I dragged my hapless sister in a necklock from her crib to the kitchen, announcing, "The baby was crying." Fortunately the lack of oxygen didn't cause any permanent damage. In our middle childhood, I would tease Barb mercilessly - my favorite was to shriek, "Oh no! You have garments on your back!" I like to think I was responsible for expanding her vocabulary.

She was homecoming queen. With laser eyes, natch.

I was always a little jealous of my sister. She was a beautiful child, with big blue eyes and huge fluffy blonde curls and a heart-melting smile. I had glasses and an eye patch and went without my front teeth for three years after they got knocked out. She had school birthday parties, always St. Patrick's themed, with a green clover cake (my mother always crafted beautiful homemade cakes for us) or green cupcakes for twenty. My birthday was in June, always too late for a school celebration and too early for Independence Day. (Not that I'm complaining. My mom compensated by having our annual  trip to the amusement park on my natal day.) When we were college-aged and in our early twenties, Barb never had to pay for booze on St. Patrick's Day - boys would line up to buy her drinks when she announced it was her birthday.

At the 2009 Inaugural Ball with her HH.

She's grown up to be equally enviable. She's lovely and funny and vivacious, runs a successful face-painting business (no, I am not kidding!) has three handsome boys and a husband who looks like King Leonidas in 300 (no, I'm not kidding about that, either.) I'm not jealous, though, just happy that I have such a wonderful sister in my life.

Reds, please raise your steins of green beer and wish Barbara Scheeler a happy birthday! Who are the sisters and practically-sisters who make your St. Patrick's Day fun?


LUCY BURDETTE: What a nice tribute to your sister--happy birthday Barb! I have to say my older sister, (an "Irish twin" just eleven months older), was very gracious when I came along. We shared a room for most of our years, and teased our younger brother and sister without mercy. Oh, there was the one time that she and my cousin talked me into drinking kerosene from a tap, but I believe that was a friendly mistake:). I still remember the Ipecac, which now I realize was entirely the wrong remedy. 

I have to share my favorite St. Patty's day photo, which was taken by Hallie's husband Jerry several years ago in Key West. These girls have to be sorority sisters, don't you think? Tonka was in doggie heaven....


HALLIE EPHRON: Love that picture, Lucy! Tonka is a real show stopper. Chick magnet. And he basks so effortlessly.

I do not remember when my baby sister (Amy, 4 years younger) was brought home from the hospital. My mother had a baby nurse so it made very little impact on me. I do remember being left holding her on on the couch while my mother went to the bathroom. She rolled off.

Yes, I tortured her growing up. But not nearly as much as she tortured me. She refused to play the roles I assigned her -- baby to my mother, student to my teacher, slave to my queen.  Checkers, decks of cards, Scrabble pieces invariably ended up hurled to the floor with her refusing to pick them up.  But I've always been serenely secure in the knowledge that no matter how hard or how fast she pedals, I'll always be the older one.  Turns out she got the better end of that deal, too.


RHYS BOWEN: Am I the only one who doesn't have a sister? Not fair. I always wanted one but only had a brother seven years younger than me who was a little brat who scribbled with crayon over my homework (he's now an Episcopal minister so I guess he got better with age). And St Patrick's day was not celebrated at all in England. I'm feeling deprived all around. But I've had a wonderful group of women friends all my life--my college friends, with whom I still get together, my hiking friends who are my main therapists, and my mystery friends who turn work into fun. 

SUSAN ELIA MACNEAL: Happy birthday, Barb! Like Rhys, I have no sisters. My mother was Scottish/Protestant and so she would tell me to wear orange on St. Patrick's Day and there were no treats. I always felt a bit deprived of the "Everyone is Irish" thing — but drank a lot of green beer in college to make up for it. Now, for my son, I'm making a green ombre cake. My husband just said, "What is ombre?" And I replied, "Many shades of green." And then he shot back: "50 Shades of Green — isn't that Irish porn?"

DEBORAH CROMBIE: Happy birthday, Barb!! 

No sisters, here, either, alas. But I've been lucky in sisters-in-law; my brother Steve's wife, Dorothy, my husband's sister, Tracy, my husband's brother Jason's wife, Julisa.  Adore them all. And then, of course, there are my Jungle Red sisters!  Raising a green beer to you--as long as I don't have to drink it! (Pic is from Thanksgiving, with Julisa Gary on the left and Tracy Wilson Burns on the right, lovely sises-in law!)

JULIA: Dear readers, I hope you'll join us in birthday wishes, St. Patty's Day reminiscences, and stories of sisters in the comments section!

                        Thanks for being such a great sister, Barb. Happy Birthday!

The Bad News..and the Good news

HANK: Here's where I usually write the introduction to the day's blogger. But right now, I have tears in my eyes and the letters are blurring.

Let's just let our dear friend Toni Kelner talk.

When is Lung Cancer Good News? 

                  by Toni L.P. Kelner

My big sister Brenda has lung cancer.

And that’s good news.

Before you conclude that I am the worst baby sister in the history of sisterhood, let me give you the background. Some months back, after a particularly nasty case of pneumonia, Brenda was diagnosed with lung cancer.

I was terrified for her, and so very angry, but I refused to consider the possibility that she wouldn’t get better. She’s really ornery. She’s been known to break a stick over the head of a man hitting her husband, and to break the back windshield of a car swerving to purposely hit a cat. I couldn’t imagine that she couldn’t beat a puny ole’ tumor.

She went through a round of chemo, and responded very well to it. The tumor shrank quite a lot a lot, and the doctors were pretty sure they could avoid surgery.

Then, about a month ago, cancer was detected in her kidney, indicating that her cancer had spread. I hit the web for information, and what I found was devastating. Without going into the horrifying details, when lung cancer starts to spread, the prognosis is very bad. They start talking about months of life, not years. Also, once lung cancer spreads, it often heads for the brain. Brenda needed to have that checked, too. She was immediately put onto another course of chemo and scheduled for a brain scan.

I don’t think I need to tell you what my feelings were, especially not when it fell to me to tell my parents and my other sisters.

That’s where it stood as of August 24. Today I found out the latest test results, and I laughed and cried at the same time. Brenda’s cancer has not spread to her kidney. Nor does she have a second cancer developing. The cells found in her kidney are almost certainly leftovers as the cancer is being flushed from her system. As for the brain, she gave me the best straight line in the world when she said, “The brain scan? They didn’t find anything.” We laughed for five minutes straight.

Of course she still has lung cancer, which isn’t exactly a walk on the beach. She has some other health problems, too. But compared to what she could have had--what we thought she did have--they all seem minor. Like the tumor in her lung, they are shrinking in importance. 

It’s all a matter of perspective.

As a writer, I think that one of the best things we can do for our readers is give them a kind of perspective. As in, “Yes, my job was annoying today, but at least there wasn’t a serial killer lurking in my office building,” or “Maybe I wish my husband would trim his toenails before bed, but at least he’s not a werewolf.” 

In An Apple for the Creature, the latest anthology from editing team Charlaine Harris and me, we give readers all kinds of perspectives on the horrors of school days.

 Was your high school bad? At least your principal wasn’t a devil. Is that training seminar you have to attend for work a pain in the tail end? At least you don’t have to learn how to deal with vampires. Do you have to work with a total idiot for your college project? At least your idiot didn’t accidentally raise a demon. Have you lost touch with old friends? At least you’re not a new werewolf who doesn’t know any other werewolves.

Perspective is everything.

So my big sister has lung cancer. Just lung cancer. And that’s good news.

HANK: Toni, we love you. And much love to your dear sister. She's very lucky to have such a wonderful--and TALL!--baby sister. Right, gang?   

Amy Ephron's "Loose Diamonds"

HALLIE EPHRON: Today I'm happy to introduce my sister Amy Ephron to Jungle Red. I played 'good daughter' to her 'troublemaker' -- I crossed at the crosswalk and she danced on the double yellow line. I always wanted to play "school" and she never wanted to be the student.

AMY EPHRON: I'm happy to play school, any time you want to and if you want, I'll even sit in the corner.

HALLIE: Now she tells me.

I love Amy's book of essays, "Loose Diamonds…and other things I’ve lost and found along the way," which is just out in paperback. I was gobsmacked when I read the very first essay, that she and her friend used to play "Secret Garden" (which was my favorite book, too) by conjuring a plan to sneak into our next-door neighbors' garden where they'd dig up weeds and uncover baby crocuses. Of course they found neither.

I would never in a million years have snuck into a neighbor's garden (see "crosswalk" above). And frankly it astonishes me to discover that Amy was going about having a life when I wasn't there to tell her what not to do. And now I get to ask: Where did you get that adventurous spirit, that questioning of the rules that may have driven my parents' nuts but has served you so well as an adult?
AMY: Answer:  Total lack of competent adult supervision.

But more than that, I remember feeling very adventurous and confident as a child, which in retrospect makes no sense as we really lived in a somewhat dangerous environment. But curious and interested was a part of my nature (and somewhat mischievous, although I wasn't really a trouble-maker).

I also think in some ways what attracted you to mysteries is somewhat the same thing:  that on the outside everything looked fine, but really we were all holding onto a secret that no one else knew, which can be the basis of a very good mystery.  AA wasn’t in vogue, therapy wasn’t fashionable, and our both our parents were on a collision course of their own.  Secrets.

There is a new piece in the paperback edition of “Loose Diaomonds” called “Secrets” but it’s not really about this – although it sort of is. There’s a section in that essay, if Hallie was upset about the sneaking into the Cabelerro’s garden, which will give her shudders. (Luckily, I didn’t get caught.)

HALLIE: In the opening essay "Loose Diamonds" you talk about losing things but cherishing the memories, which I think is so poignant. I confess, I sometimes deliberately "lose" things -- like an amber glass bud vase that I got as a wedding present. Do you?

AMY: Who gave it to you?  Why did you lose it?  Did it have a terrible shape or a terrible history?

HALLIE: Not saying who (my secret!) It was, ahem, not my taste and because of who I am I knew I'd have to put it out...somewhere. So I put it out of its misery.
 
AMY: I think one of the things about “Loose Diamonds…and other things I’ve lost and found along the way” is that it involves questions like that, loss, intentional or unintentional loss, touchstones, tricky relationships, marriage, divorce, post-modern life, the difficulties of being a woman, the difficulties of modern life, and we all have them – and there’s a bound-in readers guide that I spent way too much time on that’s exactly about that.

Confession:  I think I once left my Filofax on the back of my car intentionally because someone I was involved with wasn’t calling me back and he had a really unlisted number and I was scared I’d call him four more times.  By the way, I inadvertently did lose my Filofax again last week when I was unceremoniously dumped out of a cab in Charlotte, North Carolina in a torrential downstorm, the last night of the DNC and everything fell out of my computer case and I was so upset about my moleskins which had notes in it, I missed that the Filofax had dropped.  The convention was amazing.  But since I doubt there’s a lost and found – although you never know, I’m going digital.  

HALLIE: What I love about these essays is that they sound just like you! You run off with an idea like an meandering stream -- you start with the red patent leather shoes that got you thrown out of The Buckley School, wander through musings about Mom and her egg cups and chutney dishes, and wind up in a very sad place that I won't spoil, and a lovely Aha! moment. Can you tell us a little about how your writing and how you get from the red shoes in an essay to the end?

AMY: I don’t know, it’s all a little elliptical, I love the sort of lyrical concept of starting one place and ending up in another.  I hate outlining cause I think it limits where you might end up, what left turn you might take along the way.  I have signposts with my work – but I hate to outline. 

One of the things our parents used to do, despite dysfunction, is family dinner. The big thing was to bring out the old Louis Untermeyer poetry collection and we would pass it around at dessert and all read a piece and through that, I think we all got a sense of (or I did anyway) sort of lyrical minimalist conceptual writing that in some ways is similar to poetry and it was always so interesting to see what each of us picked and how we delivered it. 

HALLIE: Really? I remember mom reciting poetry, but passing around that poetry collection??? Sorry. Go on...

AMY: But I don’t believe in rules, structural or otherwise, I think the ‘you can’t get married after 30' thing is ridiculous and ‘you can’t get a job after 42’ is counter-productive.  We live in very changing times.  In some ways, I think I got this from our mother who never questioned that she could be successful and that she could break a glass ceiling.  Glass ceilings come in all shapes and sizes. 

HALLIE: The one thing that all the Ephron sisters share is being opinionated. Amy, did you ever start an essay thinking you were writing with one opinion, and gotten to the end and changed your mind?

AMY: Nope.

HALLIE: (Laughing.) I think I knew that. And let's end with just a bit about how to reach you and your wonderful web site for foodies, One for the Table. 

AMY: Thanks for having me! Please follow me if you want @amyEphron (twitter & facebook) or at AmyEphron.com, I’d love to hear what you’re doing. And if you have a recipe or a piece you want to post about emo and food or your mother’s favorite recipe, or a political screed, or a fight w/your iphone, pls pls send it to me at ("Editor" at "oneforthetable" dot com) the on-line magazine I publish that specializes in food, politics, and love, and that sometimes has the pleasure of guesting Hallie Ephron. 

HALLIE: So, gentle Reds, did you and your sister inhabit alternate universes? And what "loose diamonds" have you lost?