In Praise of Overlooked Women. A post by Laura Jensen Walker

RHYS BOWEN: It is my pleasure to host Laura Jensen Walker today. A lady after my own heart, writing about overlooked women in WWII. I am also determined to highlight bravery that has long been ignored and in this book Laura features some of the very bravest of all. What's more, Laura is the real deal, an airforce veteran herself. Tell us about them, Laura:

LAURA JENSEN WALKER:

Thank you, Rhys, and the rest of the Reds for having me here today—my first time on Jungle Reds! (And thanks to dear Catriona McPherson, for introducing me to Rhys.)

I’m thrilled to bits to share that my historical debut, DEATH OF A FLYING NIGHTINGALE, releases on 9/10. It is my privilege to shine a spotlight on a group of WWII women heroes that history has overlooked—the Flying Nightingales.

As an Air Force veteran formerly stationed at an RAF base in Oxfordshire a lifetime ago I was captivated to discover these courageous, forgotten women on an episode of Penelope Keith’s Hidden Villages. On this episode Britcom star Penelope interviewed a woman named Lilian West in the village of Down Ampney in the Cotswolds. Lilian, then in her late-nineties, thought she might be the last living member of the Flying Nightingales—air ambulance nursing orderlies—from World War II.

I was gobsmacked as I listened to Lilian relate that at the age of seventeen she joined the RAF as a volunteer nursing orderly in the Women’s Auxiliary Air Force. Lilian shared how she and the other air ambulance “nurses” were given only six weeks of training before being sent to combat zones—including the blood-soaked beaches of Normandy one week after D-Day—to bring home the wounded and care for them on the flights home.

Since the planes the nursing orderlies—dubbed “Flying Nightingales” by the press—flew on carried supplies and munitions, they couldn’t display the Red Cross emblem. Which made the Nightingales open to German gunfire. On the flights back to England, the nursing orderlies weren’t allowed to wear parachutes. They were expected to remain on board with the wounded if the plane crashed—twenty-four wounded men to a plane with a single nursing orderly on board to care for them all. The Nightingales changed bandages, emptied colostomy bags, cleared tracheotomy tubes, wedged sick bags beneath the chins of the wounded, and provided tea and comfort to soldiers with horrific injuries.

As a squeamish person who can barely stand the sight of blood, I couldn’t have borne the sights and smells those brave women endured: men with missing limbs, eyes, ears, noses… Horrible burns treated with butter. Gaping holes in chests and stomachs. Unimaginable. And yet, these courageous, British women kept calm and carried on, and never lost a man in their care.

Lilian West turned out not to be the last remaining Flying Nightingale—sadly, she died a year before I began writing this book—but her introducing me onscreen to this brave band of sisters made me say, “This needs to be a book!”

It was the honor of my life to meet via email Edith “Titch” (Lord) Joyce, in Australia, the last remaining Nightingale, it appears. Edith (106 years old) and I corresponded regularly through her daughter Colleen with Edith graciously answering my myriad questions about life as a Flying Nightingale. She kindly gave me permission to include her anecdotes in my book and I sent her a small token of thanks. Colleen filmed her mum thanking me across the miles. When I saw this unassuming, lovely lady on my phone say, “I’m very happy about all that you’re doing and hope the book is a success…” I burst into tears.

It was my fervent desire for Edith to hold a copy of DEATH OF A FLYING NIGHTINGALE in her hands. Sadly, she died a few months after her 107th birthday long before the book’s release, which broke my heart. Luckily, I had emailed her daughter an early version and Colleen read it aloud to her mum. I am forever grateful that Edith got to hear the story of her and her fellow Flying Nightingales in this novel before she left this earth. I wept when Colleen said her mum “loved” hearing the different anecdotes she’d shared with me in the book.

Fly high, Edith. 

Three very different young women serve as air ambulance “nurses,” bravely flying into WWII combat zones and risking their lives to evacuate the wounded: Irish Maeve joined the RAF after her fiancé was killed, streetwise Etta fled London’s slums in search of a better life, and farm girl Bety enlisted to prevent the wounded from dying like her brother.

Newspapers have given these women a romantic nickname, “The Flying Nightingales.” Not that there’s anything romantic about what they do. The horrific injuries they encounter daily take their toll, so when one of the Nightingales is found dead, they wonder: Was it an accident? Suicide? Or something else? After another nursing orderly dies mysteriously, it becomes clear that someone is killing the Nightingales.

Inspired by true events, this novel is a tribute to a group of overlooked WWII heroes who kept calm and carried on while the fighting raged about them. These courageous women proudly did their bit for King and country and found solace and camaraderie in the lasting friendships forged in war.

Bio:

Former journalist Laura Jensen Walker is the award-winning author of several books including the bestselling, Agatha-nominated Murder Most Sweet. Captivated by the tales of an overlooked group of WWII RAF women—the Flying Nightingales—Air Force veteran Laura knew she had to tell their story. You can find Laura at https://laurajensenwalker.com.

Give Me Food!

 RHYS BOWEN:  I was doing an interview the other day when the interviewer said, "I notice you include a lot of food in your books. Do you love to cook?"

The answer to this is that I love to eat, but after all these years of feeding four children, entertaining for my husband's job and having family descend on us I have had enough cooking for one lifetime. What I'd really like is to have Mrs. Patmore to make everything once I've come up with the menu.  Or better yet, to have her come up with the menu too. I'm rather tired of having to decide what to eat.

But I do love reading about food. One of my favorite book memories is the picnic on the river in the Wind in the Willows. I've always wanted a picnic like that. And I adore travel books about Tuscany and France with details of meals.  So I also like writing about food. It's a great way to eat vicariously without the calories.

It's strange that my two new books have exactly the opposite food experience: THE PARIS ASSIGNMENT takes the reader to France in WWII when people are starving. The Nazi occupiers decreed that adults could have 1200 calories per day and old people only 800. That was if food was available. When my heroine makes it to Paris after she escapes German imprisonment one of the first things she notices is there are no pigeons. They've all been eaten.

Quite the opposite experience in my upcoming THE PROOF OF THE PUDDING. The story features a new French chef for my heroine, Lady Georgiana. He comes with dubious credentials but he certainly knows how to cook. There are two banquets in the story, each filled with food items that I love: fresh crab, asparagus, duck breast, floating islands, and fruit tarts.  Of course, being a mystery novel, one of these items is not entirely what it seems...

I had to give Lady Georgie a French chef as she's been eating so poorly for much of the series and lately has had her former maid Queenie to cook for her. Queenie's cooking is not bad but is very much of the stodgy variety eaten by the working class in England to provide enough calories to keep warm in unheated houses. Lots of suet puddings, spotted dick, bubble and squeak, shepherd's pie. Hardly items one can serve to upper class friends when you live in a stately home.  So Queenie is relegated to assistant cook where she can't do any harm... or can she?

I try to visit France every year and relish all the little treats: the pain au chocolat for breakfast, the fresh strawberries from the market and, of course, the patisseries. We have nothing like the pastry shops here in America. Tiny works of art, and so inexpensive too. Okay, now I'm hungry just writing this. 

So who else enjoys reading about food in books? Do you think descriptions of meals detract from the mystery? In the case of my new book they are all vital clues!

THE PROOF OF THE PUDDING comes out on November 7. I'll be signing at the Poisoned Pen in Scottsdale on November 4 and at Murder by the Book in Houston on November 9. See you there?

Compare and Contrast in the latest Billy Boyle WWII Mystery by James R. Benn

JENN McKINLAY: I am absolutely delighted to have the brilliant (and fellow SCSU alum) James R. Benn here today to talk about his latest work in the Billy Boyle World War II mystery series, which comes out TODAY! 

JAMES R. BENN: Compare and contrast . . . 

How many times have you seen those words in a school assignment? 

Comparison analyzes things that are similar, while contrasting discusses things that are different. A compare and contrast essay analyzes two subjects by comparing and contrasting both. It’s been a while since my last college English class, but the phrase kept popping into my mind as I was writing Proud Sorrows, the eighteenth Billy Boyle WWII mystery (Soho Press, September 5, 2023).

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There are several components to the plot of this novel, but two disparate groups stood out in my mind as prime candidates for a good, old-fashioned compare and contrast. 

The first group is the Ritchie Boys. Ever heard of them?

Most people haven’t. 

I’d heard the name but had only a vague understanding of who they were until I delved into their story. As I researched the plot for Proud Sorrows, I thought this could be the book in which to include them. The more I learned, the more certain I became. Here are the basics:

The Ritchie Boys were a secret Military Intelligence Service program created to interrogate German prisoners of war. Over 15,200 servicemen were trained for these duties at Camp Ritchie in Maryland, and that name ultimately became the moniker of the highly classified project. The men who participated in these specialized interrogations were sworn to secrecy and for decades remained silent about their experiences.

A class at Camp Ritchie, Maryland, 1943.

GIs who trained at Camp Ritchie were not actually called “Ritchie Boys” during the Second World War. That name was popularized after German filmmaker Christian Bauer released a documentary called “The Ritchie Boys” in 2004. 

Some writers use “Ritchie Boys” to refer to all the soldiers who were trained in intelligence at Camp Ritchie beginning in 1942. Others use the term only to refer to the 2,200 German or Austrian Jewish refugees who trained at Camp Ritchie after having immigrated to the United States to escape Nazi persecution. And who often arrived in the States as young children without their parents.

As natural-born German speakers, their expertise in the language and understanding of German behavior made them highly valued, and very effective, interrogators. These men often found themselves interrogating rabid Nazis, the very kind of men who had abused them when they lived in Germany. Extracting intelligence information to save Allied lives and shorten the war was their best revenge.

Martin Selling had endured three brutal months in the Dachau concentration camp before finding haven in America. Ultimately, he trained at Camp Ritchie and served in Military Intelligence. Here he is questioning two recently captured SS soldiers.

Ritchie Boys worked at every level, from frontline units to headquarters and POW centers such as the fictional Marston Hall in Proud Sorrows. A postwar intelligence study attributed 60 percent of actionable intelligence in the European theater to the Ritchie Boys using their specialized interrogation techniques.

Their job was not without danger. In the opening days of the Battle of the Bulge, Kurt Jacobs and Murray Zappler, Ritchie Boys attached to the 106th Infantry Division, were captured when their unit was overrun. One of the former German prisoners identified the two men to his commander as “Jews from Berlin.” The commander ordered them to be shot on the spot, stating, "The Jews have no right to live in Germany."

That Nazi officer, Captain Curt Bruns, was himself apprehended and executed after a court-martial in 1945. He was the first war criminal to be executed by the United States Army for war crimes after World War II. 

The more I read, the more I was struck by how dedicated and committed these men were. They joined the Army as soon as war was declared and suffered from both anti-Semitism and bureaucratic confusion in equal parts. They were still German citizens, and it took the Army a while to realize how useful they could be. Once Fort Ritchie was in operation, each class of soldiers marked their graduation by being sworn in as citizens of the United States.

Many Ritchie Boys made it their personal mission to find family members left behind in Germany as the war drew to a close. It was a hopeless search.

There’s a counterpoint to the Ritchie Boys within the pages of Proud Sorrows. Let’s compare and contrast the young men who fled Nazi persecution in the nation of their birth with those Britons who sought to embrace fascism and emulate the Nazi ideology.

British fascists.

Great Britain saw its own fascist movement in the 1930s. Oswald Mosley and the British Union of Fascists was foremost among these, numbering 50,000 at one point. Other groups were smaller, but even more pro-Nazi and anti-Semitic. All were outlawed in 1940 and their leaders interned, including Archibald Leese of the Imperial Fascist League, which plays a role in Proud Sorrows. 

A supporter of the Imperial Fascist League carries their flag at a prewar demonstration.

Although support for these fascist organizations rapidly declined with the start of the war, leading figures such as Mosley and Leese still held to their anti-democratic beliefs. As 1944 rolled around, and with the threat of German invasion a distant memory, most of the British fascist leaders were released from prison. 

One of these leaders was Archibald Ramsay, the head of The Right Club. The Right Club was one of the smaller British fascist parties, organized as a home for those who found the BUF to be not anti-Semitic enough. Upon his release, Archibald Ramsay reintroduced the 1275 Statute of Jewry to the House of Commons. He'd had a seat in the Commons before his detention, which was never revoked. The 1275 statute was the original document put forward by King Edward I which strictly limited the rights of Jews in Great Britain. 

And this is where the compare and contrast assignment comes in.

While the Ritchie Boys did all they could to help their adopted country free people from oppression, the British fascists acted as a mirror image. While they had been born into a free country, they willingly worked to give up that freedom and welcomed the boot heel of oppression.

These extreme right-wing groups favored the Duke of Windsor (the former King Edward VIII), a Nazi sympathizer. Each of the leaders plotted in one way or another to place themselves at the center of a Nazi puppet state, hoping for a German victory early in the war. Meanwhile, the Richie Boys risked their lives to stop Nazi aggression, putting themselves in harm's way.

As I wrote, I was continually struck at how diametrically and morally opposed the two groups were. The Ritchie Boys emerged as victors after much suffering and struggle and have been rightly lauded for their contributions. The British fascists, on the other hand, were imprisoned, their names now synonymous with shame, disgrace, and betrayal.

And as long as we're talking about compare and contrast . . . watch the past to understand the present.

James R. Benn is the author of the Billy Boyle World War II mysteries. The debut, Billy Boyle, was selected as a Top Five book of the year by Book Sense and was a Dilys Award nominee, A Blind Goddess was longlisted for the IMPAC Dublin Literary Award, The Rest Is Silence was a Barry Award nominee, and The Devouring was a Macavity Award nominee. Benn, a former librarian, lives on the Gulf Coast of Florida with his wife, Deborah Mandel.

Rhys and Lucy Celebrate Pub Days!

RHYS BOWEN: Hooray, hooray, it's publication day! Champagne all around! Raising a glass to our readers!

It’s always a time for celebration when one of the Reds has a new book out. And today it’s a double celebration because we have two new books—I am excited to launch my new stand-alone THE PARIS ASSIGNMENT, into the world, and Lucy is equally excited for the pub day of her latest in the Hayley Snow Key West series, called  The Clue in the Crumbs. And so we decided to have a little chat about them.  (and this is a photo of the last book launch we did together. What fun that was!)

So congrats, Lucy! And hooray that Hayley is back with us. It’s interesting that we share a pub date, you with a light and fun cozy and me with probably the darkest book I’ve ever written. I think we’re showing the full scope of Jungle Reds! Is this lucky number 13 in the series? Did you ever think it would go on this long? Are you finding it more fun to write now that you know the characters and the setting so well? Or is it harder to come up with new and fresh ideas?  I know these are a lot of questions at once. 

LUCY BURDETTE: Huge congrats to you too, Rhys! It’s an honor to share a launch date with you. I couldn’t even guess what number published book this is for you! I love writing a long series, because the further I get into it, the better I know the characters. Honestly, it feels like the long-term psychotherapy I used to do in my other career as a clinical psychologist—uncovering layers and layers. I don’t ever get bored with my setting because Key West is such a many-layered town, with many visitors and a rich history. The longer I live there, the more I understand about the place, and the more I can show readers.

 But now here’s a question for you, since THE PARIS ASSIGNMENT is a stand-alone. You have so much experience with both long-running series and single titles. Isn’t it harder to think up a whole new set of characters and an entirely new setting? How do you feel about leaving Madeline and her son Oliver behind when you’ve invested so much in them (and put them through multiple wringers!)?

RHYS: I think it's book 55! And It’s definitely more work to write a stand-alone because I have to begin by researching a whole different world and getting to know a new set of characters. As you know with your series, when you begin a new book it’s like going back to a family reunion. You know the characters. You know how they will react to certain incidents. The challenge is to make each new story fresh and interesting. When I write a stand-alone I do enjoy getting to interact with a new set of characters, putting them through the wringer and then walking away. Although I have to tell you I get emails all the time asking when there is going to be a sequel to any of my stand-alones.

So, about your new book: I loved the Scone Sisters in the last book and I’m so glad you brought them back. Did you have that in mind when you introduced them last year? Did they come to you before you went to Scotland? When you were writing A SCONE OF CONTENTION did you know you wanted to use them again?

LUCY: Thanks for that Rhys, I love those characters too! I’m not too good at planning ahead.  I knew I wanted to include the town of Peebles, Scotland after we visited it in 2019 during the Solstice celebration. When Hayley Snow went to the home of Violet and Bettina after the shocking loss of Violet’s son, she had no idea what she would find there, and neither did I! But the sisters really popped as I wrote about them, and they got along like a house afire with Miss Gloria. Miss Gloria is a very popular character in this series, and I loved imagining highlighting the three older women in another book. Since they had won a contest with their cinnamon scone back in Scotland, a baking show seemed like the logical solution.

But since we’ve mentioned setting a couple of times, I have to ask you about the research that goes into a book like THE PARIS ASSIGNMENT. It’s a very complicated plot that swings through England and France and finally Australia, and covers some horrific events that happened over the course of World War II and beyond. How do you research a huge project like this one and decide what to cover and what to leave out? I can remember in one of the blogs you wrote for JRW that you wrote out stories in two separate timelines and actually spread the pages out in a hallway so you figure out how to weave them together. How did you manage the structure of this big sweeping story?

RHYS:  I didn’t have to spread the pages on the hall floor for this one as it’s all a sequential story going from 1930 to 1947. But I did have to do lots of research. I started when we rented a house on the Seine River near Fontainebleau and I saw the chateau and the forest and thought what a great setting it would make. Covid intervened and I had to wait until last year to go back and choose my houses in the Marais, take a river trip to see what the locks feel like and check out the museum of the resistance. In the meantime, I read the autobiographies of several real women who were spies/couriers in Nazi occupied France. I read the training manual for exactly what their training entailed (I would have quit the first day) and realized how incredibly brave they were. They knew the survival rate was twenty five percent and yet they signed on.

And part of the book takes place in Australia. I didn’t have to research that much as I lived there, was married there, my parents moved there and I used to spend a good portion of each year there until my mom passed away. I love the feel and openness of the Australian countryside so it was lovely to revisit it in the book.

So are you having a launch party, Lucy? Any events our friends should know about?

LUCY: : Yes! Big double book launch tomorrow night for A CLUE IN THE CRUMBS and THE INGREDIENTS OF HAPPINESS! This will be at RJ Julia Bookseller on Main St. in Madison CT. Call 203-245-3959 to reserve a seat. (Cake! Wine! Books!) How about you?

RHYS: I did a virtual event at the Poisoned Pen last night. There are signed books if you’d like one. And a live event coming up at Book Passage in Corte Madera, CA on August 19. I’ve also done/am doing numerous interviews/podcasts/chats etc. I post them on my Facebook page (www.facebook.com/rhysbowenauthor

So thank you to all of you who are our loyal readers. We appreciate you so much! If you like this latest one do please post a review on Goodreads, Amazon, or wherever else grabs you.  It really helps get the word out. 

Travel Guide to Jersey

RHYS BOWEN: As you know by now, I have been on the other side of the pond this week. But no longer actually in England. I am in Jersey (old Jersey, one of the Channel Islands). A first time visit for me. We decided to visit because it was one of the places we had never been. Also it's one of the places that John's eccentric and wandering grandmother once lived.

And it's been fascinating. So many things I didn't know: for example: it is not part of the British Isles. It is self ruled, not governed from Westminster. Although it's just 14 miles from the French coast it has been British since William the Conquerer came over in 1066. And yet all the place names and surnames are French. Some people still speak the old patois.  The feeling, however, is completely British. No pain auchocolat but good old fish and chips. And all the British shops.

Most of us knew that the Channel Islands were occupied by the Nazis in WWII, but it has been chilling to see the visible clues to that occupation: bunkers, gun placements and the tunnels--miles of them dug with slave labor from Eastern Europe. I've picked up several locally written books with tales of bravery, heroism and betrayal. These stories have made me wonder what I would have done to survive? Stolen bread and risked getting shot? Betrayed a neighbor for extra food? Hidden an escaped prisoner of war? People did all of these and many paid with their lives. 

One story showed the islands spirit. They were all required to hang out white flags of surrender as the army invaded. Some people chose to hang out their white undergarments!  The occupation is obviously still very present in the collective memory of the island. The main square is Liberation Square. Buses go from the Liberation terminal. There's a Liberation statue and a Liberation Tree memorial. 

The island's history has been fascinating, including the largest neolithic passage tomb in Europe. I started to go down that passage in total darkness but confess that I retreated about halfway. There's the little chapel on a rock where St Helier (after whom the main town in named) lived as a hermit in the middle of the bay.

There are plenty of castles, built over the centuries, and the bus that goes out to Elizabeth Castle sometimes turns into a boat.

Another fascinating thing is the tides--some of the biggest in the world. At one point the bay is entirely covered in sea, two hours later it's all sand. And so my head is buzzing with story ideas--cut off by the tide, German occupation, etc etc.... there may be a book here!

And so my head is buzzing with story ideas--cut off by the tide, German occupation, etc etc.... there may be a book here!

Rhys on Little Girls

RHYS BOWEN: Please raise a glass to celebrate with me. I have finished my new stand-alone, the one I am tentatively calling IN AN ABANDONED PLACE, but might end up being called THE FORGOTTEN VILLAGE, THE LOST VILLAGE, THE LOST GIRLS, THE LAST LITTLE GIRL  etc etc. Stay tuned!

Anyway, as I've mentioned in previous what we're writing weeks, the story is about little girls in various time periods...three girls who disappeared on their way to be evacuated in WWII, one little girl who has vanished in London in 1968 and a heroine who visits an abandoned village and has a flashback of memory, realizing she's been there before, which starts to unravel everything she knows about her own life.

Probably the most complicated book I've ever tried to write. Every piece of one story fills in a missing piece of another story so there was a lot of juggling about what to tell and when.

One of the vehicles I've used was to show some small random scenes from the point of view of various missing girls in the book. I never say which girl is which. I want to reader to try to guess and then put that piece into the puzzle as we learn more.

Here is one of those scenes:

A Little Girl

 The little girl was finding her suitcase too heavy and the gas mask bumped up and down across her front as she walked. It was warmed than usual and she felt hot and clammy in her good coat. But Mum had insisted she wear it. “You’ll be cold once it’s winter,” she said. “And then you’ll thank me that I made you wear it.” 

 The little girl dumped the suitcase and opened the buttons of the coat. That was better. She stood on the corner, gulping in big breaths of air that blew in from the river. She was quite excited about going to the country. She had only been out of London once, on a school outing to the seaside for the day. That had been exciting. She wondered if they’d be taken anywhere near the seaside now. Her mum didn’t know. “You’ll find out when you get there,” she had said. The little girl could see that her mum was upset she was going. That was why she didn’t want to come to the school with the other mums. She claimed she had to be at work in the factory on time but the little girl suspected it was because she knew she was going to make a fuss and cry. 

 The girl lifted her suitcase again. It weighed a ton. She reckoned her mum had packed every single thing she owned into it. On she staggered, waiting for the traffic light to turn before she crossed the busy street. 

Then she turned into a quiet backroad.Here it was peaceful after the traffic noise. Nobody else in sight. Only the sound of a radio voice giving the morning news from an upstairs window. It wasn’t far to the station now. She could see its roof, sticking up behind the rows of houses. The suitcase handle was making her hand burn. She put it down and spat on her palm. 

She wasn’t aware to begin with, of the big black car that drew up beside her. 

     “Do you need a lift somewhere?” The man inside the car had wound down his window. 

     “It’s all right. I’m only going to the station,” she said. 

     “The station? By yourself? Are you running away from home?” He asked it almost as a joke.

     “No!” She could tell the man was teasing in that annoying way grownups had. “I’ve got to meet my class an we’re getting on a train out to the country,” she said. “We’re being evacuated.” 

     “Well, I’m driving past Victoria Station, as it happens. How about I take you that far? That will save you lugging that heavy suitcase, won’t it?” 

     The little girl hesitated. She had been warned about strangers. But the man looked like someone’s uncle. What’s more he had a posh voice and he was wearing a uniform, so he must be all right. And the suitcase was jolly heavy. 

     “Thank you, sir,” she said. “It’s very kind of you.” 

     “Not at all. We all have to help each other when there’s a war on, don’t we?” He came around and opened the back door. “Put your case in there.” And then the passenger door. “Hop in. That’s right. Off we go, eh?” 

 And off they went.  

Was he a good guy or a bad guy? There are both in the book , in face one aspect of the story is the blurred lines between right and wrong. I'm really pleased with it now I've finished. My agent has seen it. She said she started reading and didn't move until she'd finished, so that's a good sign, isn't it?

I'm off to England in a few days, seeking out more hidden stories like the abandoned village. In fact I'm going to Jersey in the Channel Islands that were occupied by the Nazis during WWII so I'm hoping for juicy details from there. I'll give updates on my Facebook page.

And any brilliant title ideas?

What We're Writing: Rhys is Juggling!

 RHYS BOWEN: Why do I do this to myself? I could stick to writing fun and funny mysteries in which my sleuth solves a murder in under three hundred pages. A linear plot. A cast of characters that I know and love.

Instead I set myself a challenge every year of writing something long and complicated. 

Which is what I'm doing right now.  

I'm writing yet another book set in two time periods with actually three story lines intertwining. One story involves an abandoned village in World War Two (remember I posted photos of it). Another involves a missing child in 1968, yet a third involves three little girls who vanished while being evacuated during the war, and... oh no, there's a fourth story line... the heroine's own personal story and what happened to her during her own childhood. And there is a love story ( of course. Have I ever been known to write a book without a touch of romance).

Each of these has to have clues that help to solve the others. We have to find out the clues in the correct order so that every revelation makes the reader go "Oooh, now I know what happened to that other child"

So it feels as if I'm juggling, constantly keeping several balls in the air, while at the same time filling in pieces of the jigsaw puzzle. This causes me to wake in the middle of the night thinking, "Wait. No we need to go to Devon and find the shop before she visits the ex girlfriend."

In spite of all this it's coming along quite well. I'm at page 265 with probably a hundred or so to go and I do know where I'm heading now.  I'm currently calling it IN AN ABANDONED PLACE. But I'm also toying with THE LOST GIRLS, THE LAST LITTLE GIRL, MISSING, FLASHBACK etc etc. Suggestions welcome.

 So here is a snippet. I've tried to decide what I can share with you that won't give too much away.

They came out through the gate and now started along the village street. In what had been cottage gardens weeds now ran rampant, brambles tumbled over walls. There was no sign that people had once lived here, no washing on a clothes line, no toy dropped when a child was called in to a meal. Nothing.

                “This is all there was of it?” Marisa looked around. ‘Hardly much of a village.”

                “There was a big house too, off to one side up there,” Dave said. “I think the village was built for the bloke who owned it. So he had his workers living on the spot. Or perhaps some of them were fishermen. There was a harbor.”

                They continued forward, stepping over the great fissures and craters that had formed.

                “They certainly gave this place a beating,” Marisa said.  She looked back at Liz.

                Liz was standing, staring down the street, frowning.

                “What’s the matter, Liz?” Marisa asked. “Have you spotted something?”

                “I’ve been here before,” she said in a puzzled voice..

“You can’t have,” Dave said, chuckling. “It’s been off limits since the war. It was taken over by the army in 1943 to prepare for the invasion. You weren’t even born, were you?”

                “I was born in 1941,” Liz said.

                “So you’d only have been two when the people were turned out,” Dave said. “You don’t remember much from when you are two, do you? I know I don’t.”

                “They say some people remember their birth,” Marisa said. “That’s why they are claustrophobic, coming down that long dark tunnel.” And she laughed.

                Liz was still frowning, looking around her. “I’m sure I was here once.”

                “Maybe another village like it. There’s plenty of them on the coast here,” Dave said. “But probably not during the war. The coast was mostly off limits for civilians. They had mines and tank traps on the beaches.  And this wouldn’t have been the sort of place you’d come on holiday. No hotels or caravan parks nearby in those days.”

                Liz shook her head. “I can’t remember anything else. It just came to me that I’d been here. I’ve no idea when.”

                “Like I said, it would have to have been before 1943 and you’d only have been a toddler.”

                They continued walking. Liz stopped, looking up at the shell of what once had been the two story building. “There was a pub called The Big Boat,” she said.

                “The Big Boat?” Dave looked amused.  He examined the building. “I suppose that could have been the pub. It’s the only big building on the street.”  He trod gingerly over to where a door had once been and peered inside. “Can’t see much in here,” he said. “just rubble where the upstairs floor has caved in.”

                “But there is a metal hook on the side,” Marisa said. “Where a pub sign might have hung once.”

                She too tiptoed forward and peered into tall grass. Then she stopped, looked up, her mouth open.  “There’s a pub sign,” she said.

                Liz and Dave went to look. The painting on it was faded and discolored but they could just make out the shape of a ship in full sail and the words THE GOLDEN HINDE.

Just one of the puzzle pieces. Hopefully all will be clear by the end, and will make sense! AND the reader will be able to follow.

So do you like complicated books like this or do you prefer the straightforward whodunit?

Choosing Your Words With Care: a guest blog by Liz Milliron

 JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING: Liz Milliron is a well-loved member of the Jungle Reds community, and we're always delighted to able to spotlight one of her mysteries. Today, she's back with THE TRUTH WE HIDE, the fourth book in her Homefront Mysteries series, and Liz, I promise I won't make any jokes about Buffalo. After all, in the early '40s it was a vital defense industry and shipping location, and Liz was brilliant to use it as the background for her feisty heroine's investigations into sabotage, class conflict and corruption.

Along with music, clothing, slang and technology, the historical fiction writer has to deal with some of the less-savory aspects of by-gone eras. Even in my youth (which doesn't feel all that by-gone!) we used words and held attitudes I shudder to think of now. How does an author thread that needle? Liz is here to tell us. And for one lucky commenter? A free copy of THE TRUTH WE HIDE!

 

Thanks Julia and all the Reds for welcoming me back. It’s always such fun to be in front of the curtain.

 

Words have power. As writers, we know this. We spend a lot of time searching for just the right word to convey exactly what we mean. Sometimes I think a thesaurus is a writer’s best friend – at least her second-best one. No weak verbs or “almost-but-not-quite-right” words need apply.

 

But what happens when the word you want isn’t, well, nice?

 

I’m not talking about mere profanity. Most of us have that one sorted. Sometimes the boundaries are set by your sub-genre expectations. No character is going to trot out the “F” word in a cozy. In other cases, it might be the preference of the author. In my historical Homefront Mysteries series, I’ve chosen not to use profanity. Not because it didn’t exist in the 1940s, and not because I’m writing a historical cozy, but because it doesn’t fit the atmosphere I want to create. Betty, good Catholic girl that she is, wouldn’t swear. At least not where her mother could hear her.

 

No, what I’m talking about are those words that people use, or maybe used to use, that we know are simply not acceptable.

 

In my latest Homefront book, The Truth We Hide, I deal with the homophobia that existed in the 40s. Part of that is the words straight people used to describe members of the LGBT+ community. I’m not going to write them here because this is a family-friendly blog. We all know the words I’m talking about and we’d never use them.

 

But people in the 40s did. Frequently. Even casually. There was my conundrum. Did I want Betty to?

 

On one hand, I want her to be a product of her time. She’s a young Catholic girl growing up when homosexuality was very much not acceptable. On the other hand, I want my readers to like Betty. If she’s casually spewing slurs, is that possible?

 

To help me out, I turned to friends Edwin Hill and John Copenhaver (if you haven’t read their books, stop reading this blog now and go order them). Both were fabulously supportive. Not only did they support my decision to write the book in the first place, John provided a wealth of research sources for learning about LGBT culture of the times. One of the things he addressed was language. “All the slurs you can think of were used,” he said (I’m paraphrasing).

 

I made my decision. I wouldn’t shy away from bad language. But I’d use it sparingly and wisely. Betty doesn’t at all. Only one character is a raging homophobe – but he’s a murder suspect. I felt good about it — until my editor asked me if I was sure. People would be upset with me. Did I really want to go there?

 

I went back to Edwin and John. I explained how I’d handled it. Had I crossed the line?

 

Once again, they proved the crime fiction community is generous to a fault. Both praised my decision and said (again I’m paraphrasing), “Roll with it.” People were, and continue to be, ugly. Even “good” people use bad language out of ignorance. It’s important to remember the ugliness of the past – and that such ugliness still exists.

 

I asked both Edwin and John for blurbs. I was ecstatic at their overwhelmingly positive responses. Mission accomplished.

 

As a historical writer, I’ve been asked a couple of times what my best tip is. It’s this: Respect your chosen time period. There are lots of good aspects, but there are bad ones, too. Don’t ignore the negative. Deal with it – but in a way that modern audiences will see as respectful. Don’t shy away from the ugly because it’s important to know where we started, how far we’ve come, and how very far we still have to go.

 

Readers, how do you feel when an author uses facts or language of a time period that is no longer acceptable?

May 1943. Betty Ahern is studying for her private investigator’s license when a new client—Edward Kettle—hires her to clear his name after he was dismissed from his job at the American Shipbuilding Company. When Edward is brutally murdered, the dead man’s sister hires Betty to finish the original job and find the killer.

The job hurls Betty back into the world of wartime espionage, but with a twist: Edward Kettle was a homosexual. Did he know something about underhanded activities at American Shipbuilding? Or was his secret life the motive for murder?

Once again, Betty must unravel the mystery, which requires uncovering truths that others would prefer to keep hidden—a job that threatens not only her morals and beliefs, but also her life.

                     

Liz Milliron is the author of The Laurel Highlands Mysteries and The Homefront Mysteries, set in Buffalo NY during the early years of World War II. You can can learn more about her mysteries on her website, and you can friend her on Facebook, trade book recommendations on Goodreads, and follow her on Twitter as @LizMilliron. You can also get a free first chapter by signing up for her newsletter.