A New Years Gift for You!

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: With apologies and appreciation to Clement Moore...and maybe Dr. Seuss. Here's this year’s Jungle Red Holiday Greeting!  

'Twas the night before Christmas

And all through this site

Not a blogger was working

Not even to write.

Our books are all saved on our cloud files with care

In hopes that bestseller lists soon would be there.

Our new novels were nestled all snug in their beds

While visions of royalties danced in our heads.

The Jungle Red sisters, five east and two west

Had just settled our brains for a well-deserved rest.

When in magazine 'views--There arose such a clatter

We opened the things to see what was the matter!

On the magazine pages we found Julia and Lucy!

With  “Trimmings” and “Evil Days” getting praise oh-so-juicy.

Hallie’s “Night Night” is coming! Let’s have a cheer!

Hank’s “Truth” was anointed a BEST of the Year!

Debs’ Gemma and James are in book now—sixteen?

And Rhys is completely our multi-book Queen.

And what to our wondering eyes should appear

Another run of “Her Majesty’s”? Susan's nailed her career!

 

But what makes us the happiest—keeps every day new?

We knew in a moment—it’s our blogging crew!

You listen, you chatter, you join in the game

We cheer you, we love you, we call you by name!

Thanks, Thelma! Thanks Edith! Thanks darling Joan E!

Both Karens, and Lesa, and our Michele D.

Hail Ramona, and Kathy, Tiger and Clare

We hope Brenda and DebRo will always be there

Here’s to Reine, and to Triss, and to Mary (there’s two)

To Jack, Mark and Lisa—good tidings to you!

Same for Karen (in O), and Gram Cootie as well,

And dear Mary Garrett--the stories she’ll tell!

To Pat, and to Marianne, and Keenan (she’s new!)

To PK and Ellen—we always thank you!

Kaye Barley, we love you, and love to Don, too.

(We know that Wimsey’s a breakthrough for you!)

 

Our guest bloggers were stellar:

Fairstein and Fay

The Bains and the Todds came to brighten our day!

To Delia, and Kristopher (king of the LIST!)

To Rodrigo, our genius--consider you're kissed.

Hail to Rosemary Harris, and Jan Brogan, too--

Hail “Anonymous” also--love hearing from you!

And hail to Miss Edna, we all raise a toast

You brought us all happiness—we miss you the most.

We had memories, recipes, tales of our youth

We’ve had jokes, and disasters, and telling the truth.

To the top of the lists! To the top of them all!

We’re revising, and writing, and sharing our call!

As dry words before our reviser’s pen fly

When they meet with cliché, and we fix them (we try):

We’re almost at New Years, and our thoughts go to you

May you write perfect books, may your wishes come true!

May you waste not a word, may you write fresh and new

And fill all your stories with mysteries and clues

And remember: on days that things don’t turn out right

And you wonder if this was a fraud and a fright

You have sisters on line—there are sev’n of us here!

And each one is wishing you all-the-year cheer.

And we all say—we love you! ‘Fore you click from our site--

Happy Holidays to All

—and long may you Write!

HANK: Happiest of holidays, dear Reds! And I do have present for you-- an author copy of TRUTH BE TOLD! Just say hi (or whatever you like) in the comments--and you are entered to win! 

I'm Dreaming of.....

RHYS BOWEN: This week as well as celebrating Red Julia’s new book, I am also celebrating the release of the paperback edition of my last year’s hardcover, The Twelve Clues of Christmas ( New York Times bestseller).  If you bought this book, you’ll know that it took place at a country house in England and I tried to create exactly the kind of Christmas I longed for—uncommercial , simple, good food, good friends, good fun..

I suppose like many of us,  I have a deep yearning for the old-fashioned Christmas of long ago. I want the yule log burning merrily while the family sits around the fire. I want the carol singers at the front door. Crackers. Mince pies. The holly and the ivy. God rest ye merry gentlemen.  I've tried to recreate it from time to time, but it never quite works. Maybe that is because we have so much year round these days that it's hard to make magic at the holidays. When I was growing up Christmas at my grandmother's house was simple in the extreme. My own kids and grandkids would probably find it boring. 

We would drive to my grandmother’s house on Christmas Eve, bringing with us the Christmas tree (trees were smaller in those days). We’d decorate it while my grandmother served hot punch and mince pies. We’d string paper chains around the house.  After supper we children would be put to bed, but of course we stayed awake, hoping for a glimpse of Father Christmas.  At midnight the grown-ups went to midnight mass at the local church. I couldn’t wait to be old enough to join them. It was magic sitting in the old church, listening to the choir singing those wonderful hymns and then walking home through the frosty night, our breath coming out like dragon-fire.  At home we were greeted with more hot mince pies and sausage rolls.

                Our presents appeared in pillow cases at the foot of our beds. We opened them at first light, sitting up in bed surrounded by wrapping paper. I suspect we ate the sugar mice right then.  The day itself was simple—highlighted by the turkey at lunch. Snooze afterward then the magnificent Christmas cake, frosted to look like a snow scene with little porcelain figures on it. And small presents had miraculously appeared on the tree and were handed out after tea. We children were required to put on some kind of entertainment—a pantomime or charades. Then a cold turkey supper and bed.
 
I suppose it was so special because it was the only time in the year we ate turkey, or dates or saw tangerines in the stores. We rarely had presents apart from birthday and Christmas. Today when everything is available all the time and we have so much more, it’s hard to create the thrill of treats. We try hard—that’s why stores start blaring Christmas music at us in October.  We up the ante by requiring bigger and better presents—remember the ad to “put a Lexus under the tree?”  Right. We want that feeling of a special occasion but we don’t know where to find it.

                I’ve gone looking for it myself on several occasions—one year we rented a cabin in the snow with friends. We arrived to a picture perfect Christmas card scene. We awoke next morning to rain. It rained non-stop all week. No snow, no skiing, just bored children imprisoned in a cabin with no TV.

                One year we took a Christmas market cruise down the Danube, going around the markets in each small town. It was quite magical with the booths and the lights and the smell of sausage and cinnamon and hand carved toys. I loved it. John complained “How many more carved angels do you need to see?”

And one year we decided to do away with commercialism and make handmade gifts.  I made dolls and quilts and others made candles and pillows and scarves. When we exchanged gifts on Christmas morning we tried to be thrilled and excited, realizing the supreme effort each one of us had made. But it’s really hard to get excited about a fleece pillow or a painted bottle. I was the first to crack. “Okay,” I said. “I did go to the store and bought these little extras.”

                “So did I,” one daughter said. “I did too,” said another. And laughing we handed out real, store-bought gifts. I guess we’re not Little house on the Prairie after all.

                So how about you? Do you still have nostalgia for long-ago holidays? Do you seek to recreate them?

And if I'm allowed a sliver of BSP for once, may I point out that the paperback of Twelve Clues is at a special price right now and makes a terrific stocking stuffer! You can find it at your favorite indie store, or at Barnes and Noble or online at Barnes and Noble or Amazon
But wait==there's more. I'll give away a copy of the book to the best comment of the day!

 

With "The Seance Society" Michael Nethercott conjures a "fair" mystery

HALLIE EPHRON: Michael Nethercott looks like he could be a character in his debut mystery novel, "The Seance Society," in which a scholarly Irishman with a penchant for quoting Celtic bards and Shakespeare solves mysteries.



Michael, I was fascinated by the machine that your characters use to communicate with the dead. Tell us about the Spectricator. Did you invent it or is it based on a historical (I hope) artifact?



MICHAEL NETHERCOTT: Well, Hallie, if my brain can be considered an historical artifact, then I could say yes to that. But, to be honest, I conjured up the Spectricator myself.

No doubt, various devices were used in the past to try to reach or record the deceased, but this particular machine was my own idea. It was fun coming up for a description of the thing: “a chaos of coils, wires, dials, meters, glass tubes, antennas, and God knows what else.”
Since the contraption popped out of my own head, I had free range to fashion it in any way I saw fit.

In coming up with the name, I actually ran through about a half dozen choices before landing on Spectricator. Each time I’d come up with what I thought was a nifty one, I’d Google it and find out that there really was a machine with that particular name. None of those instruments were ghost-related though— more’s the pity.     



HALLIE: Did you ever mess around with anything like a Ouija board or a crystal ball or magic tricks when you were a kid?



MICHAEL: Owned a Ouija board, and fooled around with it a bit, but nothing too devoted or intense. It was pretty much relegated to the game shelf with Clue and Monopoly.

However, in our large extended Irish family, there were plenty of haunted tales that filtered down to us kids: the ghost of a little girl in my grandparents’ house, an invisible line in that basement dividing the living from the dead, deceased relatives who’d return to say farewell... I didn’t fully learn most of these stories till I was older, but even as a child the whispers of them seemed to hover around family gatherings.

Those spooky Irish accounts have certainly influenced my writing in general and this novel in particular.  


HALLIE: Even (and most especially) the great Arthur Conan Doyle was obsessed with communicating with the dead -- but that was after the Great War when so many young men had been lost and so many were grieving. Still I've spoken to so many people who have had vivid dreams that they were visited and often comforted by dead relatives.

Is your book full of believers or disbelievers?


MICHAEL: I’d say they run the gambit. There are characters in this novel who claim to frequently see spirits, some who believe in them without any actual encounters, and some who scoff at the notion entirely.

My detectives, Lee Plunkett and Mr. O’Nelligan, in a sense represent two sides of the coin. Lee is a true-blue skeptic, very dismissive and suspicious of those who champion the otherworldly. He cheerfully mocks “all this ghostly, bump-in-the-night malarkey.” Mr. O’Nelligan, on the other hand, has a different take on things. Irish-born and poetic, he’s much more open to paranormal possibilities.

At one point he tells Lee, “In my own ramblings, I’ve beheld a thing or two that lean towards the supernatural.” Later in the book, he spins a fireside ghost story about his younger days in the old country.

Did it truly happen? Did any of the ghostly claims in the book happen? I leave that up to the reader to decide. The Séance Society is a “fair” mystery, meaning that a flesh-and-blood agency is responsible for the murder, but there are certainly supernatural undercurrents in play.        



HALLIE: When I met you, you'd just won the Black Orchid Novella award for "O'Nelligan's Glory." We have a lot of aspiring writers who read Jungle Red, and I'm wondering if you have found shorter forms a good avenue to nailing a contract for a full length novel?



MICHAEL: With my O’Nelligan/Plunkett mysteries, I had a nice progression in developing the characters. I’d completed a novella and a short story with those sleuths before I wrote my full-length novel. So, craft-wise, I was able to expand on my protagonists and really get to know them over several adventures.

This may have paid off in terms of landing a contract—in that I was hawking a manuscript with characters that already had a publishing history (in Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine.) Also, having won the Black Orchid, I think I had a bit of “street cred” when I went to find an agent, and also when my agent approached the publishing houses. At the very least, they perhaps figured, “Well, this guy has already penned a thing or two that was print-worthy, so let’s see what he’s got.”

I guess my takeaway from this is that If you have laurels, don’t rest on them—and don’t hide ‘em under a bushel either. (And I’m pretty sure that’s all the metaphor mixing I’m allowed for one day.)


HALLIE: Though I'm firmly on the skeptic side. In fact, a background character in the book I'm writing now is the great magician Milbourne Christopher who founded CSICOP, a society of skeptics.

The whole question of what we mortals think comes after fascinates me. I once went to a "spiritualist" group meeting and watched them (try to) commune with the dead. I also went to memorable weekend conference of skeptics where my main takeaway was the word badonkadonk (long story). For another project I interviewed grief counselors who spoke to the enormous potential therapeutic power of dreams of the dead coming back to reassure the living.

So what you about you? Reds? Are you a believer or disbeliever? Seen a ghost? Talked to a dead relative? We're dying to hear from you.

Michael Nethercott will be part of or conversation today, and one lucky commenter will win a copy of his new book, "The Seance Society."

“The Little House Books: A Literary Deception?”

ROSEMARY HARRIS: Today's guest is Susan Wittig Albert, one of my first friends in the writing community. The author of the best-selling China Bayles mystery series, her latest novel was inspired by another beloved series - and a rather infamous literary deception...

Susan Wittig Albert : As many readers have learned—sometimes to their surprise—a book isn’t always what it seems to be. Take The Education of Little Tree, for example. Published in 1976, it was marketed as the true story of an orphaned boy who was adopted by his Cherokee grandparents in the Appalachian mountains of Tennessee during the Great Depression. The book was a huge financial and critical success, selling more than 9 million copies. But 15 years later, readers learned that the author, “Forrest” Carter, was in fact Asa Carter, a KKK member and 1970 Georgia white supremacist gubernatorial candidate. Little Tree, from beginning to end, was a fiction. The disclosure didn’t dampen the book’s popularity, however. Oprah put it on her book club list (and then took it off again), and it was made into a movie.

Then there was Clifford Irving’s claim that Howard Hughes had hired him as a ghostwriter for his memoirs and sold McGraw-Hill on the project, to the tune of $765,000. Howard Hughes came out of seclusion to say that the project was a fraud, and Irving got 17 months in jail. But he got a book out of it, after all. The Hoax was made into a film starring Richard Gere.

And if you’re looking for additional examples, check out the list of 100+ literary hoaxes on Wikipedia.

Now, I’m not suggesting that the writing of the Little House series, the iconic pioneer books for young readers—should be described as a “literary hoax.” But there’s certainly a mystery around the books—and a deception at the heart of it—which for me adds to their enduring interest.

You remember the series, don’t you? 
The eight Little House books were written in the 1930s and 1940s. The series eventually produced a wildly popular TV program (Little House on the Prairie, which enjoyed an eight-year run and endless reruns), as well as dozens of related children’s books. The named author was Laura Ingalls Wilder, who was known to her neighbors as a contributor of short essays to The Missouri Ruralist and an excellent producer of eggs for market.

Over the decades since the first book’s publication, readers, teachers, librarians, and critics have marveled that this farmer’s wife (in her 60s when Little House in the Big Woods was published) could have written so many polished, publishable books. In fact, Ursula Nordstrom, one of the series editors, marveled at their extraordinary quality: “None of the manuscripts ever needed any editing. Not any. They were read and then copy-edited and sent to the printer.”

Laura must have been, in one critic’s phrase, “an untaught literary genius.” Not quite. 

Laura Ingalls Wilder did have some remarkable stories to tell about her pioneer childhood, which she wrote down in a pencil manuscript called “Pioneer Girl.” That document became the source for the eight Little House books, all published by Harper. But while Laura produced the penciled drafts, the typescripts that went to the publisher were the work of her daughter, Rose Wilder Lane, a writer of books and magazine fiction and nonfiction who produced two bestsellers of her own and 70-some magazine stories and articles during the years she worked on her mother’s books.

Those are the facts behind my novel, A Wilder Rose, which is based on a careful reading of the daily diaries Rose kept in the 1930s. These unpublished diaries (held in the Herbert Hoover Presidential Library) detail her work on her own fiction and nonfiction and on her mother’s books. They confirm—at last—just how much time and effort Rose contributed to the rewrites of Laura’s stories.

But Rose told no one of her work on her mother’s material. She sold the first book to Marion Fiery at Knopf, claiming it was her mother’s independent work. In her correspondence with her literary agent, George Bye (who also represented the Little House books) and with the editors who acquired and worked on the series, Rose insisted that she had no involvement with the books beyond being her mother’s “consultant.” And she never mentioned the books in her copious correspondence with other writers.

Laura, for her part, submitted Rose’s finished typescripts as if they were her own, sending them with a signed cover letter (sometimes drafted by Rose) to literary agent George Bye, who then sent them on to the Harper editors. The copy-edited manuscripts were returned to Laura, who gave them to Rose for checking, then returned them to the editors via Bye.

It’s not likely that the co-authors thought of their project as a literary deception. For both of them, writing was a commodity, and they wanted to sell books. The Wilders, retired from their subsistence farm, had no source of income except for Rose, who had supported them with an annual cash subsidy since 1920 and was eager to find or create a source of reliable income for her parents. When the stock market crashed in 1929 (Rose lost not only her own money but the funds she had invested for her mother), she turned to marketing her mother’s pioneer stories, hoping they would bring in some cash. And they did. Over time, the royalties provided the Wilders with a fine living, freeing their daughter from her financial obligation.

Rose’s motives for the deception also involved her professional status. She did not want to be seen as a ghostwriter, especially for “juveniles.” (Children’s literature at that time did not have the status it enjoys today.) She felt that ghostwriting, if it were known, could damage her reputation as a writer—although in the years 1932-1934, she ghostwrote five “true-life” adventure books for Lowell Thomas, again keeping her work secret.

But whether Laura and Rose intended to deceive, deceive they did. Laura was celebrated as the series author both before and after her death in 1957, and especially after Little House on the Prairie became required viewing for families across the country. Her name is on several literary awards and on libraries and reading rooms. When literary researchers of the 1980s began to suggest that Rose had something to do with the books, the idea was not popular. In fact, William Holtz’s 1993 biography of Rose, The Ghost in the Little House, provoked such a hurricane of indignation from Laura’s devoted fans that subsequent scholars approached the question of authorship only tentatively. Readers were enchanted by the romantic picture of a sweet little old lady, sitting down all by herself to write (in longhand!) the true stories of her pioneer childhood, perhaps by the light of a kerosene lamp. And since Rose herself was frequently presented as a rather unpleasant woman who was given to fits of depression, it became fashionable to discount her influence. As far as readers were concerned, Laura’s sole authorship was established fact.

All of this was in my mind when I sat down to write A Wilder Rose. Set in rural Missouri during the Great Depression, it tells the true story behind the Wilder myth. To me, it doesn’t matter how the Little House books were written or by whom: they stand securely as fictional representations of a vital part of our American heritage, as seen by a child of pioneer parents.

But I believe that we need to know the truth that lies behind the fictions that shape our perceptions of ourselves and our histories. I hope that A Wilder Rose will encourage readers to understand the Little House books in the context in which they were written, and appreciate them for what they are: the work of a remarkable mother and daughter, who for compelling personal reasons, concealed their collaboration.

Susan is the author/co-author of over 50 books for adults and 60 for young readers. You may read more about her work at www.susanalbert.com. For more about A Wilder Rose (including free downloads of reader resources), visit www.aWilderRoseTheNovel.com. The book is available in print and eBook formats from online retailers.

ROSEMARY: I seem to remember hearing something about this when I was a bookseller, but I never knew the whole story! Next people will be saying Shakespeare didn't write all those plays - oh wait...

Susan will be stopping by to say hello today and she has generously offered one lucky JR reader a signer copy of A Wilder Rose - so weigh in on Laura, Little House and Literary Hoaxes and it may be you.

Win a copy of Cold White Sun by Vicki Delany

ROSEMARY HARRIS: Jungle Red pal Vicki Delany is back this month to tell us about her latest release.

“When I decided to become a police officer I knew I’d have to deal with the hard side of life. Beaten children, raped women, accident victims, blood and gore. But that’s not the hardest part, is it? It’s the goddamn tragedy of people’s lives.”

 Constable Molly Smith to Sergeant John Winters, Among the Departed by Vicki Delany

 

VD: It’s conflict and tragedy, not love, that makes the world go round. Which is why I write crime novels.

 

Mystery novels, or as I prefer to call them, crime novels, are frequently disparaged as not being important or literary. Particularly in Canada, where I live, the very idea of a crime novel being short-listed for an important award would have people rolling in the aisles in laughter.

Which seems a strange mind-set to me.

Crime novels, it has been said, show the human psyche under pressure. Crime novels take (usually) normal people and put them through a heck of a lot. Some survive, some do not. Physically as well as mentally or morally.

Crime novels allow the reader to ask him or herself: what would I do in this situation? What would I do if this happened to me? How far would I go to save my child/defeat my enemy/get revenge/save myself? What would I do for money/for love? Would I do the right thing, or would I fail?

In the latest Constable Molly Smith book, A Cold White Sun, tragedy strikes a comfortable family.  A family much like yours perhaps.

Cathy Lindsay, middle-aged, middle-class, married mother of two, high school English teacher, gunned down by a sniper one sunny winter’s day walking her bichon frise on the snowy trail above town. Cathy is not the sort of woman to be the target of what appears to be, if not a professional killer, a highly motivated and trained amateur.  And Trafalgar, B.C. is not the sort of town where things like that happen. The police have no motive, no suspects, no clues. What if, they fear, Cathy was not the intended victim? Does someone else in the close-knit town of Trafalgar have a target on their back?

Although on the surface A Cold White Sun is about the police investigation into the killing, it’s really about the reactions of those close to Cathy Lindsay. Particularly her husband, Gord. We know from the beginning that Gord is not the killer, although the police have their suspicions. He struggles first with understanding what has happened, and then wonders how he’s going to live the rest of his life without Cathy.  Gord has two children still living at home, a borderline juvenile delinquent named Bradley and a sweet little girl, Jocelyn, who at ten years old faces a future without her mother’s support and guidance.

For the rest of her years, Jocelyn would miss her mother. There would be an empty place at her wedding; no one to give her kindly advice on the birth of her first child. No shoulder for her to cry on when life got too hard. No one to tell her to buck up, and suggest they chase away her worries by indulging in some retail therapy.

No one to tell her the facts of life.

Gord put his head in his hands and wept.

He wept for himself as much as he wept for his daughter. All that Cathy had done, all that she had been in their lives, would now fall on him.

He knew he wasn’t up to it.

 

              A Cold White Sun, by Vicki Delany

 In my writing and my reading, I have little interest in chasing vampires or diabolical maniacs threating to explode nuclear weapons, or in rogue government agents fighting the system to save the world.  What I want to read about, and to write about, is ordinary people living ordinary lives, facing extra-ordinary tragedies.

 It’s through the lens of the crime novel that we can explore people under extreme pressure.  The use of a crime or a mystery allows the author to up the stakes for the characters, but the essential humanity and the complex range of human emotions are what’s all-important.

Hold your sympathy for Gord. He’s not perfect (not many of us are) and he begins to think that the unexpected death of his wife just might help him out in the long run. You see, there’s this woman in Victoria.

Love and death and tragedy.  They fit seamlessly together in a crime novel.

 

As they do in real life.  

Why do you read crime novels?  Leave a comment and you’ll be entered to win a copy of A COLD WHITE SUN, from Poisoned Pen Press.

Vicki Delany is one of Canada’s most varied and prolific crime writers.   Her newest book is A Cold White Sun, the sixth book in the popular Constable Molly Smith series from Poisoned Pen Press. She is also the author of standalone novels of psychological suspense, and the light-hearted Klondike Gold Rush books from Canada’s Dundurn Press.   
Visit Vicki at www.vickidelany.com,www.facebook.com/vicki.delany, and twitter: @vickidelany.

 

 

BOOK CLUB DAY!

BREAKING NEWS: If you are in a position to review or spread the word about an Audible copy of HEIRS AND GRACES, please contact Rhys for more information. She has a few copies....RhysBowen at comcast dot net 

AND Rosemary Harris's THE BITCHES OF BROOKLYN is free to download today and tomorrow only! Click here.

 


LUCY BURDETTE: It seems odd to me that mysteries and crime fiction can be lumped into a category of non-book club books--in other words, escapist reading, nothing worth discussing. We couldn't disagree more! With September around the corner and book clubs resuming meeting or planning their reads for the year, we thought we'd make a few suggestions. From each red, a book, a couple of discussion questions, and something memorable to eat along with it.

I'll start:)

TOPPED CHEF, the third book in the Key West food critic mystery series by Lucy Burdette

Things to discuss:

1.  TOPPED CHEF opens with Hayley worrying about her first negative review. How do you feel about restaurant reviews, either online or in newspapers? Do you trust them? Do you write them? Do you feel critics should write about their negative experiences as well as their positive?

2. One of the most challenging parts of writing a mystery with an amateur sleuth has to do with her stake in solving the mystery. Were you convinced by Hayley's insistence on getting involved in this story? How does this fit with her character?Find the whole list of discussion questions for TOPPED CHEF here:

What to eat: Lime cupcakes with lime cream cheese frosting


Recipe here.

  
HALLIE EPHRON: THERE WAS AN OLD WOMANThings to discuss:

1. The theme of remembering and honoring the past is prominent in There Was an Old Woman. Evie has dedicated her life to the preservation of memories, and Finn keeps all of the artifacts from the old Snakapins Park in his basement. Do you think it is important to preserve the past, and why? Are some things better left forgotten?

2. Evie and her sister Ginger are polar opposites. Evie played soccer; Ginger was a girl scout. Evie sees Ginger as the dutiful daughter and herself as the one who runs away. How might these two different personality types both have been shaped by the experience of growing up with an alcoholic mother?What to eat: Discuss it over Chinese Dim Sum.

 

ROSEMARY HARRIS: Now this is fun. I'm not in a book club these days. I went to a fabulous book club meeting in San Francisco last year. The members had agreed to read THE BITCHES OF BROOKLYN and act as my focus group. It was a blast.

Possible discussions -
1. Friendships - old and new - are at the heart of Bitches. Each of the women in the book, Jane, Tina, Rachel, Clare and Abby, questions the meaning of friendship, particularly childhood friendships. Are they better left in the past? What are the risks in trying to rekindle (no pun intended) old relationships?

2. Every decade of life brings its own set of issues. What are the insecurities each of the women faces?

3. All five of the women have called each other Bitch since high school when it was an epithet thrown by a jealous classmate. Now it's a term of endearment for them. What do you think about the word?

My gals are good eaters. Hallie's already claimed Chinese takeout and more's the pity readers can't camp out in Jane's Brooklyn bakery so I'd have to say a medium-priced Italian restaurant. Red-checkered tablecloth. With a bottle or two of good wine.RHYS BOWEN: This is most timely for me as I have an author buzz going out to zillions of bookclubs next week with questions about my new book, Heirs and Graces. So here are some questions I gave to them.

1.    Lady Georgiana seems to have a privileged life. What are some ways in which her life is not so rosy?
2.    This story centers around the heir to a great estate. Discuss that whole concept, plus other instances of property entailment disrupting lives in literature

3.    These Royal Spyness books are funny�gentle satire of English aristocracy. But there are always serious undertones. What are some in this book?

And food to serve? Well, it has to be a classic English tea party with thinly sliced cucumber sandwiches, warm scones topped with strawberry jam and cream. Mmmm. Now I'm feeling hungry (or peckish as my characters would say)

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: OH, fabulous. I'm  tempted to discuss THE OTHER WOMAN, with all its juicy discussion possibilities about infidelity, and sex as power, and the conflict in failing marriages. But let's go with THE WRONG GIRL, coming Sept 10!

1. The book opens with Jane's friend Tuck suspecting the adoption agency that's  reunited her with her birth mother has made a mistake---and, as she says, "sent that poor woman the wrong girl." As a reporter, I know that's happened in real life. What if that had happened to you..do you think--just based on instinct--you would know it? (Do you know anyone searching for their birth parents? Did they find them?)

2.  The Wrong Girl also takes an inside look at the state's foster care system--where children need homes--and there aren't always enough of them. HAve you been in foster care, or known someone who was? Have you ever taken in a foster child? Or wanted to? Why or why not? How well did that system work?

Food? Well,  Jane is always rushing, and I'm tempted to say fast food! But it's in Boston, so let's say luscious creamy clam chowder from Legal Seafoods with those little round crackers and a twist of pepper,, accompanied by a crisp white sauvignon blanc.DEBORAH CROMBIE: Oh, fun! (And I want everybody's food!) Here are a couple of questions for readers of The Sound of Broken Glass:

1) We see in the back story that young Andy Monahan is the caretaker of his alcoholic mother. How does this affect his ability to form relationships when we meet him again, fifteen years later? Do you believe it's possible for children of alcoholic parents to form happy and stable relationships as adults?

2) The seed of much that happens in this novel is bullying. How might Andy's life have been different if he'd had adult support in dealing with the boys who bullied him? Do you believe that Nadine was bullied as well? Were there characters who could have stood up for her and made a difference in the course of her life?

Now, food! I think my book group should have delicious, hearty sandwiches from The Jolly Gardener pub in Putney--roast beef with horseradish; thick, sharp English cheddar slathered with Branston pickle; roast turkey with cranberries--accompanied by a big platter of fresh fruit, good beer, and crisp Sauvignon Blanc. (My characters have theirs with tea, but they're working!)JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING: This is a perfectly timed subject, because I need to supply my editor with questions for THROUGH THE EVIL DAYS, my November release. Like Rhys, I'll be having an author buzz going out to book groups (though not for another couple of months) and St. Martin's library division posts discussion questions online. Pro tip for book club organizers: lots of publishers do this! If your group is reading something that doesn't come with discussion suggestions in the back of the book, check the publisher's website.

1. At one point, Russ tells Clare, "I won't say a word against [having a baby]. But don't expect me to pretend to be happy about it." Is his attitude reasonable, given that they agreed, as a couple, not to have children, or is he being stubborn about not getting his way?

2. Officers Hadley Knox and Kevin Flynn are assigned to work together to try to find Mikayla Johnson, the missing girl. At the same time, they're becoming closer personally. Should they put the brakes on their relationship? Is it unprofessional for them to get involved again, especially during a high-stakes investigation?

3.  There are many types of families in THROUGH THE EVIL DAYS: Clare and Russ and their impending baby, Mikayla and her dysfunctional, criminal parents,  Hadley and her ex fighting over custody. What do these relationships say about the effect of parenthood on couples and on individuals? What is the author saying about the responsibilities of parenting versus the pleasures of having a child?

For an accompanying meal: Russ and Clare have a hearty, delicious stew in their remote lakeside cabin, perfect for a book group discussion on a cold November night. Of course, they don't have any alcohol, but I would recommend a nice Cotes-du-Rhone and some crusty bread to sop up the broth.

Don't forget to leave a comment--best book club discussion ever? best meal eaten with a book group? And you'll be entered in a drawing for an advanced copy of THROUGH THE EVIL DAYS.