 Good evening everybody Thank you for being such a Lovely large crowd. We are really excited to kick off 2024 Arlington author salon with this event Can everybody hear me in the back? Yeah, okay excellent So here we are 2024 we started the series in 2015. I know right so and it is still going strong so Tonight we have three authors as we always do Who like last time came to us as a preformed group, which really made our work easier? and with a theme and an idea which I'll get to in a minute and As you'll see each one started off in a different field And so that is actually going to be something that we're going to discuss at the end, which is that? How and why they came to writing as a new chapter in their life not necessarily One and then the other sometimes overlapping but Because of this topic we thought it might be of particularly interest to the audience because I know there are a lot of people In the area and probably a lot in the room who might be contemplating writing as well So we're altering our usual format by just a little bit They will each reader or author will have about more like 10 to 12 minutes instead of the usual 15 so that then we can have a Moderated conversation and the Q&A at the end if you've just come in there are some Seats in the back, which I think is what people in the back were just circulating about So hold your please hold your questions to the for the end because we will have ample time for that Couple of other items before we really get started I want to thank as always our host Emily and the staff of the fantastic kickstand cafe This cafe serves as an office for many local writers, and we're grateful for that I also want to give a shout out to my co-organizer Whitney sharer Who started this with me back in 2015 huge thanks as well to Sarah Regan of the staff of Robin's library Robin's library is our partner in this and so she helps to run the salon and is critical to its success and to the staff of ACMI for Filming the event and putting together a really nice video that they post online. So we'll be sending that link around Again there are I think there are a couple more seats in the back There's certainly more space so if you want to take the moment now to wind your way over you're welcome to do that The program this program is funded in part by the Arlington Libraries Foundation And so tonight's event is sponsored in part by them the Arlington Libraries Foundation is the Primary fundraiser for Robbins and Fox branch libraries and is dedicated to helping open the doors to all those who are curious Creating an inclusive space for the Arlington community and ensuring the library's future as the cornerstone of the community for generations to come So we're grateful for their support Books will be for sale because we believe in authors making money from their books. So Thanks to the Book rack and Mike over there owner and manager of the book rack who will be selling books So please at the end make your way over there support the authors buy some books get them signed Have your selfie taken With with the authors. We all love that kind of stuff So I think that's it. Please make sure your phones are on silent and not going to make doody-doo sounds in the middle And there we go. So our first author is Grace Dane Mazer and she is the author of the hinges meditations on the portal of imagination trespass a novel silk stories and The Garden Party, which I believe is the book that is here for sale Another novel after studying painting at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston She started again at Harvard where she received her BA and PhD There she spent a decade or so immersed in wait for it Silk moths and their micro architecture Before leaping out of biology for fiction Most recently on the fiction faculty of the MFA program for writers at Warren Wilson She has also taught at Harvard Extension School and Emerson. So please join me in welcoming grace So How wonderful to be here. I didn't know about these events and I'm I'm uh just stunned Uh, thank you everybody I'm going to read a little bit from The Garden Party It's a novel takes place in Brookline, Massachusetts in 1991 Uh, the reason for that is I wanted no cell phones when people got isolated I wanted them to be really isolated at the ends of the world Anyway, it's the night before the wedding the rehearsal dinner It's a weird dinner party The groom's family the Cohen's are academics artists and activists They've invited the barlows a family consisting almost entirely of lawyers for dinner in the garden The two families don't really know each other They're wary shy verging on dislike While the bride's family the barlows are arriving the groom is still naked up in his room One of his sisters is locked in her room trying to figure out what on earth to wear And the other one is perched high up on the slate roof of the Victorian house observing The bride who arrived early has run up to the pond in tears with the dog The groom's father pinned our Cohen Realizes that he would rather his son marry an oak tree than the barlow girl And the groom's mother Celia Cohen Wonders why everyone around her is nuts two dozen people All of them wishing to be somewhere else And we're in everybody's head Don't worry The book has a seating plan I needed it to write the book and people need it to read the book We're in everybody's head as we watch up and down the length of the table New forbidden unions are forming while old unions dissolve The host of the garden party the father of the groom is Pindar Cohen He's an old-fashioned scholar of ancient Babylonian cooking recipes The oldest one dating from 3,700 years ago He's seated next to a woman. He really can't stand The mother of the bride Philippa Barlow. She's an estate lawyer Don't be afraid that I really come down hard on all the lawyers. I get very friendly to them later on I was advised that I was doing that former thing and then I I paid a lot of attention to the lawyers and I got into their heads and Then the book became a lawyer heavy. So I moved back Anyway, we're going to hear some of Pindar Cohen's thoughts that get quite abstract and forgive me for that, but it has to do with my My show and tell Which I'm warning you now is one piece of baklava and one piece of kataifi and you'll see why And the reason I brought them is You'll get to Think about them both as sensory objects and as models of a sort Anyway, here we go Pindar saw that he had to figure everything out right then while Philippa was speaking to him For what if what if death came and grabbed his arm instead of Philippa Barlow Shang hide him and pulled him away to where he would no longer be capable of doing his work Dread flowed through him making each vein a thoroughfare of consciousness The bats darting overhead no longer looked like helpful and comical fruit eaters They were dark little ideas Too quick to catch He wanted to throw something at them He saw too that he couldn't jettison his conversation with Philippa Sitting there beside him only because of the upcoming marriage of their offspring He could not even slight her but would have to concentrate on her as well as on the thing that mattered The nature of time This other activity would have to remain invisible to Philippa to everyone He would have to pay attention to everything even the dinner party Which with its snorts and wheezing and sudden laughter Reminded him of the sounds a sea serpent might make when surfacing in a warm ocean Its head over there ready to jump into the unknown upper world and grasp and comprehend the universe Its tail over there where the young children were sitting Ready to follow wherever the four parts might lead Leaving in the end its wake traveling behind Do you think that my father is flirting with your mother broke in Philippa? Excuse me said bindar the old ones flirting Oh said bindar as though he had not noticed this He realized that he'd been thinking of his conversation with Philippa as an interruption But that would only be true if time were linear a single line with a unique direction Which was absurd The arrow wasn't even the proper shape of distance We tend he thought to consider distance as though we had nothing but a yardstick Or a string and a stone to measure it with But we experience it as some sort of sprouting and folding and buckling When we distill it to a single dimension in order to describe it by measurement We lose the whole richness and feeling of distance He looked now in the direction of Philippa's gesture Oh, he said again our parents Do you think so? Pindar turned his thoughts back to time What exactly was a moment? Was it the shortest span of time that could be represented by art? Perhaps moments were like sheets of gold leaf Hammered ever so thin Each leaf the locus for new thoughts Time would then be a matter of lay layering So that each second had a stack of moments on top a baklava of time Was this why his new Babylonian fragment had the word layers and then a gap where a piece was chipped out and then time Or was that word branches rather than layers? Perhaps time wasn't flat after all In that case no sheaves like baklava, but filaments like kataifi Those nests made of shredded pastry drenched with syrup or honey He saw the pastry threads as silver now Each strand branching into new trees of silvery time Growing out from each second All of them inhabited by breath For breathing had become necessary to his conception of time inspiration and expiration He needed the gods to breathe into him breathe through him like a flute And a bit later His old thought demons approached now Trying to lure him away with reason This was not rational they said to picture crucial things like time In terms of honey soaked Middle Eastern pastries It was foolish to seek illumination in the middle of a dinner party He was supposed to get his son adam married Be reasonable his demons said Work for communal blessing and put off this selfish and dicey search Until the guests are gone your desk is clean your mind uncluttered and your memory clear But what if he should die? That was the flaming weapon he shook at the demons he called holding back and sloth They always carry him in pairs or quartets his demons. He could almost see them They had multiple wings and bore the heads of men and oxen Eagles and lions They told him he should not expect to figure out anything during a party Revelation he replied now was never an act of reason At this they bowed slightly all four of them linked at the tips of their wings Then twisting like smoke they backed away So pindar would do it now He would slip seconds made of lapis lazuli among the beaten golden sheets of time He would do it while sitting next to phillipa barlow Listening to her talk about refrigerators about ping pong and tennis and vacuum cleaners And if he got anywhere If he untangled any of the knots Then he would always link his findings with phillipa Simply because she had been at his side when he did this Due to the conjugal patterns of this gathering And by being there then she would achieve and deserve a place in his mind A bit horrible but necessary And he would have to feel for her A sort of love Thank you Thank you grace. That was wonderful. So much great imagery. Thank you um I have questions, but I'm going to hold them, of course. So our second author is leslie banatine who received Go for it. You can clap Receive the 2018 bosc literary journal fiction prize the 2019 two sound festival of books literary award And the ghost story dot com 2020 summer fiction prize She's had work in the boston globe Smithsonian and the christian science monitor as well as many literary magazines And her debut collection of short stories on accustomed to grace, which is kind of funny because we just had a grace reading Was published by calisto gaia press in 2022 As a freelance journalist leslie has covered stories ranging from druids in massachusetts To relief workers in bolivia She writes extensively on popular culture and her most recent non-fiction book halloween nation was shortlisted for bram stoker award. So welcome leslie This is fine. Thank you. Thank you so much um, i'm going to read from the very beginning of a story in a cuss on accustomed to grace and it's um I tried to write a love story And so it's the story of jack and susanne and they start out here And they end up there and that's not you know giving anything away It's a love story and it's called the patron saint of bachelors and toothaches susanne Draw 12 cards The blonde is late. Oh, let me just say the sage can go out My sensory item is sage Yeah People can take one susanne Draw 12 cards The blonde is late and now she's whining about traffic So I put on my wise indian face and hold up my hand to signal her to shut up She draws the cards Empress I say And tap a shiny blue nail forefinger on the one at the top of the spread mama hates that I work my terrible business out of the garage, but I pay rent so really I decorated it with fake new mexico looking blankets and glued beads and feathers on the bottom of the lampshades I painted the side door the bright blue and orange you see in pictures of santa fe And no one has ever asked do I a half sue who's never been to a powwow not even a new age one Would do that if they ask I tell them I saw it in a vision But people are uncurious They only want to hear about themselves I already know what this lady wants I can smell it on her She's got a husband with a locked phone and a lot of new shirts and she wants to know if she's still in the game People come to fortune tellers for the same reason they hire private detectives Most of the time they don't want the true answer I do Since I was born I've wanted a baby Since I was a teenager I've been looking for the right guy to have it with it's a spiritual thing I know in my soul that my child will change the world My question is simple. Where is that guy? When I was 20 an italian psychic who said she was related to leonardo da Vinci cupped her hand over my heart and said feel that And I felt a ping Not some angely hot flash But more like someone flicking an elastic band at my heart and she said when you meet your soulmate, that's what you'll feel He cares about you. I tell the blonde after I've given her a rundown of her other cards Which have more to do with her work and her mother and her stomach Give him time the empress is about potential Gestation there will be a change in him within the month. He'll tell you everything This urge to finish a story is strong in people She sighs as if she's been holding her breath for the whole 45 minutes of the reading I light a sage stich Gesture for her to stand. She does dutifully arms locked to her side Eyes closed I draw figure eights in the air with the smoke and hama tune that sounds vaguely native american I saw this sage thing in a movie about mexico city People love it The blond's fingers tremble as she lays 320s a 10 And a five on the table between us then another 20 a tip You drop this I say holding the macy's card. I pinched from her purse when she hung up her sweater I could never be harsh in the presence of generosity jack The whirls are agitated. They smell rain The alpha lifts her nose to taste the wind sussing out movement smell humidity light Her head swivels and I feel two beads of fire lit amber lock on me I'm low only feet away dead rabbit in my fist A hawk has been circling above dropping altitude with each pass rabbit in its sights I pitch the rabbit low toward the alpha. She flies 120 pounds of buff lightning Snags it locks it under her front paws the enraged hawk banks upward What's the eating mommy? I see a little girl maybe six watching through the zoo's exterior fence It's a she and she's having her lunch. I say squatting down to the kids height. It's a rabbit The mom gives me a filthy look Hey, it's a zoo. What do you think we feed them? I soften my tone. We like to give them food They'd have in the wild that way when we release them out in arizona. They'll know what to eat We need to stop the wolves forgetting who they are The kid looks at me with her brows knit up in a squiggle, but i'm not sure which word she doesn't get wild release arizona Did it kill the bunny? No, the bunny was already dead I try to smile at mom, but she avoids my eyes People donate won't kill all the time. I tell her in a confidential tone I thought mom would soften. I'm wrong again Let's go see the ducks. She chirps The girl allows herself to be let off, but she looks back at me every two steps. I wish I'd kept my mouth shut I've got only 30 more days of community service and I already have two strikes The first I let the highest synth macaw on the children's zoo nearly bite a woman's finger into Home school mom type wanted to show her kid how to feed the bird and I did let her get too close my fault Second pulling a two-inch nail out of the hoof of a Himalayan goat with the grab and grab end of hammer But how was I supposed to know that's not how it's done? You've got to use better judgment. Darla warned me after the macaw thing. I know boss. I said Would you like some stranger sticking their fingers in your face think of it from the animal's point of view Darla wasn't talking about the stupid bird She was talking about the deer Everyone's always bringing up the deer and every time every goddamn time my stomach does flip flops And I'm back in my mind with benny and joe on benny's 28th birthday We're out of our minds drunk and benny decides we need to shoot arrows into spot pond to see who can send them The furthest but it's after one in the morning and we can't see a damn thing because it's so dark And joe comes up with a brilliant idea that we should go bow hunting And benny gets this maniac look and points to the zoo and before I know it We're climbing the fence to the deer enclosure and joe gets an arrow off that nails one And it's running around the edges of the pen and we're all hollering and it keeps throwing itself against the fence And they keep shooting off arrows and the deer's hooves are sparking on the rocks and then it crumbles and i'm paralyzed Convinced that the dying deer is looking me in the eye And I can feel everything It feels and I fall on the ground and I cry and I hear benny yelling You're such a wuss jack five years probation 1200 hours community service with animals Suzanne I wave goodbye to the frizzy blonde and breathe in the lilac It's spring and the earth's shooting out yellow everywhere and there's that headachey sweet smell of wet bark mulch It starts to rain and the wind kicks twigs against the garage My legs itch like there are a thousand flies in my bones So I decide to go to a run and burn off some of the buzz I head toward the pond Concentrating on the even slap slap slap of my sneakers on a wet pavement the sound of my breath Past dunkeys across mont vail ave Through the puddles on the dirt path along the water my braid flogging my back The pond is agitated a wet wind chops the surface I sit on a big rock for a minute and something in me wakes A low sound that starts deep and swells until it reaches my throat and prize open my mouth It's a love song Mama taught me when I was a kid I never understood the woods, but I sang it out my bedroom window on summer nights Hoping for some stranger boy to hear me and come by Tons no wahoo kay Walky yah mkay After I feel better Thanks, I whisper to the water I run back towards my garage and about a half a mile in I find a baby mobile someone dropped I rinse it off in a puddle and bring it home to add to my things for the baby collection Which fills nearly half the garage. I am that sure I will have a kid The italian psychic was four years ago four years and no king Every time I get anxious waiting for my real life to start I repeat my matra Patience and gestation The empress is my favorite card Jack A quiet whale is coming from the pond a song The world slows Like someone grabbed a hold of it and stopped its spin for just a second Then let it go again I climb on top of the feed shed to see if I can find the source of the sound A wet snort in the cup of araben Fluttering of wings on water frantic chatter from the lemurs Blades whistles rinse flaps all rising in a demand for food company peace territory The now now now of animals all I see is a woman jogging along the shore I'll stop there Thank you, Leslie Used to go back up for our next reader Um, okay. Our third presenter is hank filipi ryan She is the usa today best-selling author of 15 novels of suspense She's also won multiple prestigious awards for her crime fiction including five agathas five anthonies and the coveted Mary higgins clark award You might also recognize her as the on-air investigative reporter for boston's w hgh tv And she has won 37 m e's 14 edward armor moral awards and dozens of other honors For her groundbreaking journalism National book reviews have called hank a superb and gifted storyteller Her novels have been named best thrillers of the year by library journal new york post real simple magazine and many others Her current book, which is now in its second printing is the cat and mouse thriller the house guest, which is over there Hank lives in boston with her husband a renowned criminal defense and civil rights attorney. Please welcome hank And now i'm gonna take you gonna take the class photo everybody waves Okay, that's great. We'll do the class video Okay Okay, now it's real Is perfect So my book the house guest is a thriller that means i cannot tell you what it's about But it is a twisty turning series of mind games twisty. So that's why we have twizzlers There are also luggage tags because you know the house guest If you don't get a luggage tag, I have more don't worry about it. There are many So there was a question on twitter at one point that said can you describe your book in five words? Which I thought sure I can do that and then it turned out to be not that easy But for the house guest I came up with the words greed betrayal divorce Female empowerment. I made that one word And revenge greed divorce betrayal female empowerment and revenge So the house guest is two smart women Facing off in a high stakes psychological cat and mouse game to prove their truth About a devastating betrayal But which character is the cat? And which character is the mouse? And here in chapter one is where they meet Alyssa swirled the olives in her martini thinking about division She stared through her chilled glass to the mirrored shelves of multicolored bottles in front of her at the hotel bar division as in divorce Not only the physical division hers from bill, but what would happen after the lawyers finished? They'd already created a ledger of their lives together and then started the mcallon's financial division Which would be followed by the devastating subtraction Bill had subtracted her from his life That was easy math with a lift of his chin and a slam of the front door and a squeal of Mercedes tires She'd asked him why he was leaving her begged to know yearned to understand But bill mcallon always got what he wanted no explanation offered or obligatory She had done nothing wrong Zero That's what baffled her terrified her She jiggled the fragments of disappearing ice division The weston house the australial cottage the jewelry her jewelry The first editions the important paintings club membership the silver money The lawyers human calculators who cared nothing about her Would discuss and divide and then bill would win bill always won All she'd done for the past eight years was addition She'd added to their lives added to their social sphere organizing and planning to be bill's wife Fulfilling her job to make him comfortable and enviable and the image of benevolent success She more than accepted it. She'd embraced it and all that came with it and then this I need a break. He told her that day She pictured that moment now a month ago. She could almost smell him a seductive mixture of leathery orange green aftershave and his perennial power Bill talking down to her Literally and figuratively wearing one of his pale blue shirts expensive yellow tie loose and careless khaki pants and loafers A break as a pit as if his life was her was a video He could put on pause while he did more important things What things The music from the speakers in each corner of their vermilion hotels earnestly chic dark paneled bar floated down over her Some unrecognizable tune all piano and promises muffling conversations and filling the silence A couple sat on one end of the bar knee to knee on vacation on business clandestine impossible to tell At the other end a sport coated man tie a skew used one finger to find the mark maraschino cherry in his brown drink He popped it into his mouth and licked his fingers before he went back to scrolling his phone Alyssa was in the middle alone She drew in a deep breath all peaty scotch and lemons and strangers and a lucid perfume alone Alyssa felt her shoulders sag assessing the other parts of her life grouped on bill's side of the ledger She understood he did it was difficult when a couple split Social allegiances were tested Moieties strained She jabbed at the closest green olive with a little plastic stick But bill had taken the friends Every single one of them And now at the club at the gym at the mall. Alyssa only got pitying glances fingertip hidden whispers As if they in their hot house world of affluence and connection understood something she didn't When she and bill first met that night at the charity event. They both had big plans now only he had them When she wasn't bill's wife anymore, who would she be? And did she have the power to change that? Her phone lay on the zinc bar its glowing screen taunting her with the proof No matter how many times she looked at it her calendar messaged her new reality You have no events No events Only blank days one after the other calendar doubt in front of her She scrolled back through her past the listings grayed out now ghosts of occasions Charity balls gala dinners speeches by successful entrepreneurs and a fundraiser where they'd auctioned off a day with bill mccallan That went for thousands Everyone loved bill and somehow calculating again. Alyssa was the plus one Now in the excruciating math of marriage addition division She was the minus Nothing changed for him bill was always jetting off to new york or chicago or someplace exotic She reached into that shoulder bag hanging from the curved back of her bar stool slid her hand into a side pocket and pulled out a postcard showing palm trees like they used to see in st. Bart's Bill she knew it was bill had sent the unsigned postcards pictures of tropical flowers and cobalt skies Simply to provide his own manipulative entertainment Here's where you aren't He was taunting her distant and nasty and gloating Here's where you will never be again Here in weston where she was she had slush Spring in massachusetts her husband 15 years older was off having fun That didn't seem fair May i get you another the bartender high cheekbones and multi pierced ear paused in front of her wiping out a champagne flute with a blue striped towel She looked at her watch pretending Oh, no, she said how did it get to be so late? Other one will be expecting me Uh the bartender held up the flute to a row of tiny lights twinkling above them Of course if you're sure Alyssa watched as he checked the glass for spots then turning away from her slid it into place on a thin wooden rack She stared at the pale place on her finger where for eight years three months and 27 days her wedding ring had been A piece of jewelry the universe prescribes to indicate one is married and happy and off limits There was no piece of jewelry There was no piece of jewelry denoting sorrow or confusion or disequilibrium or fear Now her once welcoming house was empty And when the lights got dark and long the nights got dark and long it terrified her She knew bill was lurking watching Waiting bill was present in every shadow in every noise She hated being alone in that house hated it She'd rather be in a random bar alone by herself than in that house. Maybe she'd simply drive around forever Just the check she said to the bartender But it's early The voice beside her inquiring hesitant startled her She hadn't noticed anyone walking up behind her and Alyssa was not here to find companionship or conversation In fact, the last thing she wanted was to talk to anyone What would she even say even the simplest of questions? How are you could send her to tears? The newcomer's fingernails were bitten and nubby And her pilling sweater just the wrong shade of blue and uneven across her shoulders She slung a rattled canvass took canvas tote bag over the back of her stool Her curly wild hairstyle had been an unfortunate decision as was her hair's artificially not quite auburn color But that was unfairly judgmental And the world wasn't all about Alyssa Westland mcallon It felt like it was now, but this woman was proof it wasn't Thank you so much all three of you Excuse me. I'm not dancing. This is not pole dancing. This is trying to untangle myself here So what we are going to do now is to have a conversation So yeah, if Whitney you would add a couple of chairs And then do you three want to should we sit? You've been standing a lot. Okay, so we will sit here. I realize that in the back you might not see as well So I'm going to moderate a conversation Among the The authors and then we'll open that up to questions When if and when you do have a question just signal and we'll call on you Tell me your question and I will repeat it a so that everybody here can hear it But also so that on the recording people can hear the question So do I yeah, I'll take a chair two others feel awkward to stand here and um, we'll pass the mic around Okay, when we have questions you can sit wherever that's fine I can be at an end Okay, okay here. We're good Okay, excellent Come and join us Don't trip. All right. Perfect Great, so Okay, those were amazing fantastic fun and very different readings Uh, you all three have had previous careers Uh, and sometimes the careers have overlapped with writing But this is perhaps an obvious question But one that I think many people are wondering what inspired the change or what inspired you To kind of turn that corner and go ahead and write a book several books 15 books Um, so I'll pass the mic around you. I'll let you decide who's gonna answer first Me oh Okay, um Well first I went to art school And the reason I went to art school was because at 17 I had just been kicked out of college and I had made some telephone calls to my boyfriend who was giving lectures in Czechoslovakia And my parents Kind of urged me to get a job So I got a job at the museum of fine arts and That was fantastic for a teenager every lunch hour The museum was mine. And one of the things I realized was that not only was I a hopelessly Illogical Adolescent, but even worse my I was not trained And I decided at that point That I would go to the museum school and I knew they couldn't teach me to draw or probably even to paint But I was quite sure they could teach me to sit still and look at things And I did I did that stayed there for three years and then realized there's a whole world out there and I started again as a freshman at harvard in biology because this was The mid to late 1960s DNA the structure of DNA had been discovered the previous decade And biology was hopping So I stayed all the way through in biology And I was among these incredible silkworms that looked like jade moving and I thought I would stay there forever But I was reading a book in The history of science called the structure of scientific revolutions By thomas kuhn and not understanding it and the book describes the shift in modern physics from the physics of newton to the physics of einstein and I could understand that much, but I wasn't getting it in my gut So I cast around for what is what's really going on here Well, it's a whole profession changing its mind What goes on when we change our minds? I had no idea, but I'd been through art school. I'd been through biology school I didn't want to go to another school. So I thought I speak english I'll write a novel It gets worse For two years I Tried to straddle biology and and writing and I had this Romantic cockamamie idea that you never talk to other writers. You never go to a workshop You never Look for any criticism whatsoever. You stay alone in your garret and you simply write and and then Somebody showed me the comments on her manuscript From her advisor at an mfa program and I realized oh my god, there's There's a whole world here that I don't know and I can either stay in this damn garret alone And make up things from first principles, but it will take me my entire life. I better go get an mfa and so I applied and Almost by return mail was rejected So I called them up and I said I have a harvard phd in biology on the basis of what did you reject me? I told you it got worse and they said on the basis of your writing Go and take a workshop So my first workshop was at harvard extension and uh, and then finally they let me into the The mfa program uh at warren wilson in north carolina And that was marvelous and finally I got to go back and teach there But that switch into writing was really Because I didn't understand something and I wanted to to look at it. Maybe in another way How do we change our minds? So that that first novel was it's in the back of my closet Um It's the first pancake that you throw to the dogs I had spent 30 years looking at folklore and popular culture in the history of holidays mostly halloween and uh Previous to that I had written everything from obituaries to advertising. I wrote about batteries and tube socks I wrote articles on the mud on baseball and why frodo's cape is covered with corn starch to make it look like snow everything I did was Nonfiction it was all had to be sourced footnoted verified and I for some For no reason took a class at harvard extension called the beginning short story And I was in the classroom terrified because everyone was about 20 years younger than me um, this is maybe 15 years ago and they all looked smart and Energetic and full of life and I thought oh my gosh. I'm in the wrong place But when I did the first assignment I I don't on me. I mean this is very basic and simple, but you can make this stuff up And you didn't have to footnote it or get three people to agree it was true And I it was like finding a room in my house that I didn't know was there And so I've done nothing since then But that We should talk about that making stuff up part. That's that's really important I think it's really important It's so funny because Ever since I was a little girl I had wanted to do something that would change the world That would leave a mark that would make a difference that would sort of have it matter that I lived So when I got out of college and I got on my change the world kick I went into politics. I hesitate to tell you this and I worked for several political campaigns back home in indiana Sadly no candidate I ever worked for actually won And that is when the universe is telling you find another career. So this was 1970 And I went I decided I would change I would change the world by being a reporter So I went to the biggest radio station in indianapolis and remember again 1970 Went to the biggest radio station in indianapolis and I said i'm here to apply for a job as a reporter And the news director said well, that's great We do need a reporter. Where was your last radio reporting job? So I i'm an english major, you know, this I have nothing so I said well, no, no I've never been a radio reporter and he says that's okay television. No No newspapers. No, he says have you ever Written anything and I said no And he said did you go to journalism school? No, he says were you on the school paper? No, he said when you were a little girl, did you hand out mimeograph newspapers door to door? No, you know, no, I didn't do that. I was a shakespeare major. I was reading So he finally says, you know, you seem like a very nice young woman And I probably could teach you how to be a reporter But I don't have time he said besides you're supremely unqualified for this job He said can you give me one good reason why I should hire you and I said well, yes, I can I said your license is up for renewal at the federal communications commission right now and you don't have any women working here And then I then I just smiled and the next day I had my first job in broadcasting I mean it is interesting and we should talk about this jane pauli calls us the class of 1970 Those of us who started in any part of the commercial world in the 70s Did have to work harder and be better and be tougher and be a little brazen and a little brave And a little confident about that. So I've been a reporter every day since then I've been a reporter for 43 years and one day about 16 years ago I was 55 I had a really good idea for a book And I came home and I said to my husband so you know, I've got a great idea for a novel I'm gonna write a book and jonathan says Great, honey He says, do you know how to write a book and I said and I remember it so well I said, how hard can it be? You know, I've read a million books And I soon learned how hard it could be but um that journey of confidence You know that crazy audacious idea that you could write a book and I think that's what we were all talking about Is really a big step Well, those are those are three incredible stories actually of how you came to this and they have but they have a few things in common. They have um intellectual curiosity Serendipity and hutzpah among among other things. Um, so those are great to hear and I think uh Um, I mean I had my next question was gonna be you've kind of already answered it through this is you know, what What made you think that you could write a book? Um, but you know, I think for all of those writers who are here Until you've written a book you think you can write a book. It's not until after you've written the book that you realize Maybe you couldn't write a book So, um, are there subjects or characters or settings or uh specific elements that you put into your books that you feel That you could not have done Uh, if you had started into a writing career much earlier in life Here we'll start somewhere else. We'll start we'll go go go backwards now I think that's such an important question Because one of the things I've learned as a reporter and as a writer is that you can't do anything quickly It takes a long time. You can't tesser Into writing a book and I would never ever have been able to write the books I have without my 40 some years of experience as a reporter and I can tell you specifically why What is a good story is the same? Whether it's fiction or nonfiction exactly as you were talking about Leslie You need a character that you care about An important problem that needs to be solved You track down clues and follow leads and in the end You want to you want the good guys to win and the bad guys to get what's coming to them And you want some justice and you want to change the world a little bit and you want to change people's lives And whether it's investigative reporting or whether it's writing fiction Um, it's the same thing you want the world to be different for the readers or the viewers and writing suspense You know in television, I don't want you to change the channel when my stories are on it's so easy to go click Nope. Nope. Nope. Nope. Nope. I'm not going to watch that anymore And so I don't want you to put my books down either. It's that same pacing that same rhythm I want you to miss your stop on the t remember when there was a t I want you to miss your stop on the t I want you to miss your stop on the t so that rhythm that pacing and the and the answer to the question Why do I care? Is so prevalent in both nonfiction and in fiction and I learned that as a reporter. Did you too? Yeah, yes, you're so you're very right I Would say that Not yes, I will say something different the um The view you have at 70 is different from the view you have at 40 or 50 or maybe even 60 Not only is there so much more material you've met some more many more people done so many things You've got all this stuff to work with But also in a different frame the process is different because now with all these decades behind me I have more patience That if I'm working on something and it's not coming it will come I know it will it has before it has enough times before That I know that that will it will come the character will speak the setting will change it will work And I also have learned over a lot of years to recognize when there's energy In a story be it fiction or nonfiction you see the energy you feel the energy And that's something I couldn't have done a couple of decades ago I think I know when it's alive and when it's not alive and And also the last thing is it's fine to get criticism. I don't think I was like that a couple You know it even a decade or two ago, but criticism is a good thing And I have learned that as well After much experience with criticism Your your idea of the process is so perfect and the fear and the panic and one of my new mantras is as a writer Is that I say embrace the panic dance in the storm because I have learned after all these years that Right when the panic comes when I think oh, I didn't ask the right question The story is not working. The people are not talking to me every time I hit that wall Soon after the answer will come. That's the moment that signals you're going to get this It's just going to take a minute So now when I panic or worry or have this pang of fear I think yay, this is the panic because the answer will come soon I certainly agree with with both of you and and wouldn't Know better than to just repeat it But one thing I would add is that when I was much younger I wasn't ready to look at humans. I loved looking at silk moths and caterpillars And thought oh humans. They're so messy And and people when I was going into biology from art school The first thing people asked me was are you going to become a biological illustrator? Well, no as I told you they didn't teach me to draw And I wanted to do very basic biology with molecules and I wanted nothing bigger than insects and but people said are you going to become a doctor? No, because there again you had to deal with humans Now Looking at humans for one thing when I was in biology, I had to be dark adapted So because I was spending most of my time on the electron microscope and the screen there at least in the old days was very dim So you had to stay dark adapted all day long And if I went out into the corridors, I would kind of scuttle like a crab keeping away from the windows And I knew if ever I was outside I was playing hooky And now as a writer I can go outside and watch people and it's just the most amazing thing. It's it's where it's at Well before before we open it up to questions. I have one last question which is Do any of you have any advice for any of these humans? in the in the light Who might be contemplating writing or maybe have begun a project and Yeah, I guess that's the question like any kind of words of advice and then we'll open it up to questions There's nothing harder And for me, there's nothing more exciting when I first started writing and I was still basically a biologist I couldn't sit down at my desk because I was kind of Dancing and whirling around the room just at the pleasure of playing with words for hours that Just gives me chills Uh, and it's so hard And I love it even when I rip up more than I write during a day That may be why I'm one of the slowest. I'm the slowest writer. I know I would say It's it's something you do alone, but you are not alone Which is something that I've learned when when you write you have all the books you've ever read in your head It's it's not like you're out there on the ocean on the raft with a coconut You've got a lot behind you and there are also people around you or I have found Great people to read drafts of what I've written and to Give comments and that there's a whole community that's out there to support Young writers new writers emerging writers. So it's not a lonely thing You are alone But it's not a lonely thing I think we're used I think we're used to school Where you get an assignment and you write the thing and then you turn it in And someone says bad or good and it's done and over Writing a novel or a short story for your joy and for your passion and for your pleasure Isn't like school It's a process no one ever has to look at it until you want them to And every day the story the story changes and every day your mind changes and every day your character changes You can't fix a blank page But you can fix something that you've written So when in doubt it's hard as grace says but it's it's hard just go on There'll be days that you're happy and joyous and the and the muse is speaking to you and the words are coming And they're coming out of your fingers so quickly that you can't even believe that you wrote them And you look at them later and think I wrote that oh, that's not bad And there are other days that I'm like the No She Delete and you can't think of anything but just keep going There are days I'll tell you this so quickly There are days when I look at my words and I think that is the worst sentence that anyone has ever written in the history of the planet And then I think okay, that's yep You're right sister just go on and write one more bad sentence and another bad sentence and another bad sentence Because eventually it will come Because the muse only comes when you're working And if and if you give up she's not there The muse only comes when you're working If you're not working she gets into a pout Thank you Okay, so we're gonna take some questions. I remember I'm just going to repeat them and then Have the have these lovely panelists authors Answer so who wants to throw out the first question? Okay, go ahead Okay, so the question is from somebody who's a copy editor been a copy editor for quite a while Working on a first book a novel Yeah, and has read steven king's book on craft on writing which is excellent highly recommend it And in that book he recommends writing the first draft in what was the phrase With the door closed This is if you're lucky enough to have a door to close Anyhow, um, so The question is what do you think of that advice? You know, should I be showing my work or should I get through the whole first draft with that door closed? I love that book on first of all bless you for being a copy editor. You're a joy and a glory and we need you That's fantastic I love steven king's on writing. It's inspirational and fabulous bird by bird as well as something else. I'm sure you've read Writing with the door closed. I wonder if that might mean Don't worry about it. Just don't worry about it. We all spend so much time thinking should I do this Should I do that? Is there a thing if I only knew the thing that other people know then I wouldn't be like this? No, no, there's nobody knows anything And nobody knows what works. It's that Somerset mom thing about there are three rules for writing a bestseller But no one knows what they are And that's funny, but it's true. It's really true My my goal in writing a first draft and I have a yellow sticky on my computer that says this It says advance the story Advance the story advance the story. Just keep going The first draft was going to be terrible if I have showed my first draft to anyone. It would be like the wavings of a lunatic Because i'm just trying stuff out. I'm just seeing so when you a first draft Is just the writer Seeing what the story is You're in search of the story. You don't know what it is until you write it So you're impatient. You want to see if it's good. It doesn't matter at this point. See what the story is They know you can go back and and make it better. So just don't worry Does that help at all? Okay That's the final answer Okay, any other questions Come on. There's a lot of you somebody has a question. There's one way in the back over there okay, so the question is from our Audience member here who often wonders when reading books what parts are autobiographical on the author's part if any part is She has not had yet the pleasure of reading grace's work But has read that of hank and leslie and wants to know since they have a what did you say macabre outlook on life Which parts of their work might be autobiographical? None of the things in my stories have happened to me No, no, I have never carried a corpse from cemetery to cemetery But all of them are made of tiny pieces of things I know and people I know and things I've experienced So for me, they're very true But the actual events Have not happened to me. So they're not autobiographical. They're just made of me If that makes any sense Francesca is one of the greatest author of greatest editors of all times She has read five or six of my books seven or eight times and they would not be what they are without her. Thank you Um, and so I didn't know you thought I was macabre No, I'm teasing I'm teasing I'm teasing. Um, I think um What what what happens in a novel? Is that the first book is kind of Autobiographical because that's what you have that's sort of the low hanging fruit on the surface And I'd been a television reporter for 30 some years at that point and that others. I have some good stories But as leslie says You take it's like a rubik's cube. You take your experiences a little bit from here like a magpie a little bit from here a little bit from here and Can twist and polish and change and make a completely different story So my novels are not about me. They're not about my life But what are our books? If not ourselves, we write what we know and we write who we are And that's why I mean you heard the voices in all of our three Readings completely different completely recognizable and that's because we write who we are and that's the way it comes out Thank you This is given somebody time to think of a question Yes, don't be shy. We're all friendly here Yes, ah, how did you three meet? Sorry, I've never met hank before although I've read her work. I haven't read your work yet but we have a friend in common and uh leslie wrote me and asked if I would uh be part of this amazing amalgam Likewise, I met hank on email, but this is the first time we've met in person I met gretchen online. This is the first time we've met in person So the answer is here here So now this group of three is actually group of 70 For the next event Other questions Yes The question is do any of our authors here also write poetry or experiment with poetry? I don't do it publicly, but in the summer my husband and I write poems to each other every night After dinner and before the light goes away. See what the next event is going to be I do not I'm married to a poet I don't I'm married to a lawyer Okay, any other questions One last one Yeah Answers or planners for those of you who are not familiar with this. Let me just explain the phrase Among writers there are supposedly two groups, which again, I don't really believe in categories But there's a category of those who plan or plot their books ahead of time And there's a category of those who fly by the seat of their pants and they are pantsers My first book the one that's still in the back of the closet 40 years later I worked out the geometry between every two characters like a buckminster fuller dome And I thought that I should make the novel the way the silk moth eggshell grows Which is first it sets up a geometry of fibers Then it expands the geometry Then it makes it more dense And then it adds surface ornamentation and that was going to be the final phillips of style Half way through the character said, this is shitty We're going to do what we want to watch just watch And from then on it was like I was recording and not inventing and I thought I was going crazy As I said, I was in my garret and I hadn't read any books of what it feels like to be a writer And I didn't know that this is what you're aiming for Every book since or every piece of writing since I sit down and I have very little idea what's going to happen And usually even if there's a trace of an idea, it's gone by very soon after and that what gets What gets me so delighted is I figure out what i'm thinking about by seeing what comes out on the page Definitely pancer No idea what's going to happen at the end. I would save a lot of time if I did know Because then you could write your way there, but I have no idea from scene to scene even What they're going to say and what they're going to do every every the characters Plot comes out of character for me. So there's two or three people in the room The next thing that happens happens because of what those two or three people are doing or saying to each other So that's how you just never know how it's going to end I would do anything for an outline I would do anything to know how to do that But sort of like being a television reporter How do I know what happened until it happens? And it doesn't happen until I write it. So Pancer panel here. I have no idea What what even the book is about until I write the next line and the next paragraph and the next scene And people say, oh your posters are so twisty. There's those are surprising and I'm like, yeah, could you believe that happened? Talk about a surprise ending. I surprise myself every time and that's the magic of it I mean sue grafting used to call that the magic of writing that just exactly as you were saying the Transcribing on a good day. You're just Something is coming out of you that is not that is not calculated. It is just flowing through I heard a wonderful interview between lee child and steven king Can you imagine? And they each described that phenomenon that on the good days on the good days, they were not writing They were just completely transcribing one more fast thing about that is that george rr Martin doesn't call them plotters or panzers. He calls them architects and gardeners Because the architect makes the scaffold exactly as the silk worm does The architect may you can picture the architect makes the scaffold and then puts the walls up in the dry wall And then eventually puts in the wallpaper and then the couch and then the silverware Um a a gardener has a seed of an idea Plants it cultivates it waters it watches it takes care of it and sees what blossoms And so either way for the for first time authors either way can work Whatever way works for you Is the way that's your way and if your way doesn't work try another way There's a million ways, but there's not one way that only if you knew it it would work another way of saying that is Each book is as hard as the one before That is true and in between the um gardener and the architect Is the landscape architect we have This is my next book This is actually what i'm trying to do. I'm trying to go from being the architect to being the gardener But I have to stop the landscape architecture We have one last I saw one hand before we end. Yes It's so inspiring Oh, thank you. That is a nice ending to say that this evening is inspiring All right Thank you Thank you to our wonderful authors. Don't get up yet This is like the teacher who says it's time for class to end and everybody like starts Putting all their bags together and you can't hear what's going on So I do want to just make sure that you all remember that there are books for sale And I hope nobody leaves without a book Um, and you're looking at me like am I forgetting something? Yes. Thank you. Um, the next salon actually is going to be on poetry So we might need to add a fourth a fourth person Um, which will be on April 4th. April is national poetry month So that we will have some local poets and um, what else if you are not on our mailing list, you should be And so there's a sign up there if you came with a friend who was not on the list or something Please thank you. We need we need a pen. I will provide a pen You are on the list. I always put the panelists on the list. Um, so great So thank you so much for coming and um, the authors were happy to sign the books And we're gonna wrap it up. Thank you again to kickstand and the staff for staying late Beyond closing time And that's it. All right. Thank you