Thank you, Rocco for having me as a
guest on your blog. One of my favorite cats I’ve had looked a lot like you. He
was a tuxedo cat, and I named him Fred Astaire, but called him Freddy. When I
brought him home as a tiny kitten, Miss Molly, the collie I had at the time, instantly
fell in love with him, but he wasn’t sure about her. Soon they became best
friends, and he’d cuddle and sleep with her. Watching them play was funny and
had everyone laughing. Freddy would sneak around corners and attack her. He’d
ride on her back, wrestle with her ears, or hang from her front ruff while she
walked. Sometimes Molly would have his whole head in her mouth. I now have two
tabby house cats, Moggie and Brat Cat, a beautiful tri-color collie, Maggie,
two totally useless ponies except that I love Puffy and Phoebe. Then there are
the feathered critters; six hens, an old guinea fowl and inside Pavarotti, my
canary, and two African ring-necked doves I got for my classroom more than
fifteen years ago that live on and on and on.
Rocco:
Tell us a bit about yourself and how you became interested in writing.
I kept a journal as a teenager and
wrote poetry and short stories. I’ve always been an avid reader devouring
books, especially horse books as a child, and when I’d read all those in our
small rural school library, I found Albert Payson Terhune, who wrote books
about collies. That’s when I fell in love with collies. Always liked cats, too,
Rocco, but there weren’t as many books about them in those days. Raising four kids
born less than five years apart from start to finish didn’t give me much time
to write more than letters to my sisters away at college. Then when I started
college as a nontraditional student in my early forties after the death of my
oldest son from cancer, I was hooked on almost every class I took for my degree
in elementary education. Literature and writing classes were the best. I
graduated with lots of extra credits because I took an overload every semester.
It was in college that I started seriously writing poetry and getting it
published.
I taught third grade in the small
college town of Hiram, Ohio and loved teaching this age. While teaching, I went
on to get a masters in English, not because I wanted to do anything with it,
but because I loved reading and writing research papers about different
authors, books, and discussing ideas with adults. This background led me to
writing. I’ve always been an avid reader and every room of my house has books
in it overflowing the book shelves they’re on. Now I’m still writing poetry, my
mystery series and short stories; I’ve had four appear in anthologies and
several in e-zines and one in Crimespree Magazine.
Rocco:
Tell us about your gardening mystery series. Where did that idea come from? Do
you garden?
On, my do I garden! When I became
newly single after many years of marriage, I bought a small farm with an old
house badly in need of repair. Once the house was habitable I started on the
lawn and gardens. Except for many trees, some ancient lilac bushes, an old rose
bush and some peonies, it was in miserable shape. The problem with being on
one’s own is that almost everything is done by just me. Another problem is that
with no one to rein me in, I have a compulsion to buy every rose, daylily,
shrub, tree and flower that attracts me. Also, on the yearly vacations I’ve
gone on with my sisters, we often visit large public gardens which give me so
many ideas. That means my gardens – and there are many of them since I have
acreage - keep growing and growing and getting weedier and weedier, too, I
might add. So my love of gardens, which all my siblings share, makes gardening
a natural theme for my series. That old saying “write what you know” fits here.
Rocco:
You’ve also written a middle-grade mystery. Do you find writing for the YA
audience more challenging, and if so, why?
The Sherlock Holmes Detective Club
is my only one so far. It was part of a writing activity I did with my
students. I brought in an old suitcase and told my students I’d found it on my doorstep.
The kids went through it looking for clues. We actually had a Sherlock Holmes
Detective Club where my students read mysteries in pairs. I supposedly put an
ad in the found section of the newspaper, and we got three responses; thanks to
a friend, cousin and sister. From the letters it was obvious it could only be
Alice Van Brocken. When the students got a thank you letter from her she told
them she’d witnessed a jewel robbery and the police didn’t believe her because
she was an elderly white-haired lady. She’d found a clue they might be in
Columbus, Ohio. The students wrote back telling her about themselves and
advising her to be careful. From October until May, Alice wrote my students
from all over the country as she followed those thieves and getting into very
dangerous situations. The letters came to my students postmarked and unopened
from all the places she was supposed to have been thanks to family and friends
all over the country. Two days before the end of the school year, Alice shows
up in person (one of my sisters) and the kids were so excited. Instead of going
out to recess they only wanted to listen to her and have her sign autographs.
The book is almost all, either Alice’s letters to my students or letters from
the students narrowed down to 6 girls and 6 boys, and edited only slightly for
spelling and grammar with some narration in between chapters. Their names were
slightly changed, too, but for the most part their letters are authentic third
grader letters.
Rocco:
Tell us about your latest release.
Ladies
of the Garden Club is
the third in my series. The Blue Rose was
first and Daylilies for Emily’s Garden was second. My books follow the
months; the first June, the 2nd July, and the 3rd in August. My
protagonist is Catherine Jewell, who is part time botanist at Elmwood Gardens
and owner of a small nursery – Roses in Thyme. The Portage Falls Police Chief
is John MacDougal, who also owns a used bookstore with his mother. They meet in
the first book and gradually they become friends with a beginning love
interest. In Ladies of the Garden Club three women in the garden club are
poisoned. Since Catherine recently presented a workshop on poisonous plants at
Elmwood Gardens, she’s considered a suspect by Joe Salcone, an officer with the
Portage Falls police force. Added to that, the first victim was found dead in
one of her greenhouses at Roses in Thyme making her look even more suspicious.
Many favorite characters return in this book as well as some new ones.
Rocco:
What are you working on at the moment?
My next book in the series taking
place in September is The Body in the
Goldenrod. I’m
hoping to have it out sometime in August. In this book a Civil War Re-enactment
is going on at Elmwood Gardens and someone gets murdered. I also have a subplot
going on with John MacDougal’s mother telling Catherine about a backpacking
trip she took in July (Daylilies for
Emily’s Garden) in which there was a murder. Since John was very upset
about his mother taking off with a handsome environmentalist she’d just met,
she can’t talk about it with him, but Catherine is a supportive and
non-judgmental listener.
Rocco:
Are you a plotter or pantser?
A little of both. I write a bio for
my murderer in advance. I have a general plot idea, but from then on I let the
chapters flow from some subconscious level that often surprises me when they’re
done. I do keep a short synopsis of each chapter on a chart that lets me know
what characters appear in it and a line or two of what happens as well as the
day and time of day. Then I can see when it’s time to bring back certain
characters.
Rocco:
What is the craziest thing you’ve ever done?
Some would say taking up
backpacking at the age of sixty. Others might say buying an old house with a
leaking roof and two collapsed basement walls and an ancient electrical wiring,
and I’m sure others could think of many other things, too.
Rocco: What do you hope readers will most take away
from your writing?
I want them to fall in love with Portage
Falls, a fictional little town in NE Ohio, and even more with my sometimes
quirky characters. I love hearing that few readers actually solve the murders
before the end even though I leave clues. I love knowing fans are asking when
my next book is coming out.
Now that I am sixty myself,I admire you spunk! I am so sorry to hear about your son,Gloria, but it is a great homage to him that you put your energy into helping others. I wish you even greater success!
ReplyDeleteSince I have won several books already from Rocco's blog, I will look for our works but let somoeone else win this time.I don;t want to be a hog!
Your style comes across well in this interview. I like it. It makes me think we would have some delightful conversations over tea (or wine or whatever),
ReplyDeleteRocco we a buds on Facebook and I don't tweet
libbydodd at comcast dot net
Tonette, how generous of you, but I do hope you read The Blue Rose and let me know what you think of it. I can be reached through my website www.gloriaalden.com/
ReplyDeleteLibby, I would love to get together with you if you're ever in NE Ohio. I enjoy meeting new people. One of the two book clubs I belong to always has wine before or with our dinner.
Gloria, I shared this link on FB. Hope you get a few more looky-lews. Don't need to draw me, I already have the book.
ReplyDeleteA new series and author for me. This sounds like a really great series.
ReplyDeletenlb1050(at)yahoo(dot)com
Thanks, Pat. I haven't had time to go to Facebook since before I left for California.
ReplyDeleteNancy, if you're the winner, I hope you enjoy the series. I know the book store that handled my books at Malice, recently emailed me and wanted me to send more of all three of my books. That was a good sign, I think.