A high-class brothel that entertains New York’s most powerful men, the Double Standard Sporting House funds a free clinic for women. When the Tammany Hall criminal syndicate takes over the city in 1868 and starts kidnapping girls, the house’s owner Nell “Doc” Hastings cannot stay quiet—especially after sixteen-year-old Vivie arrives at the clinic bruised and bleeding.
Resolving to seek justice for Vivie and girls like her, Doc builds an unlikely alliance with religious reformers, a rare honest ward cop, and an alluring newspaper publisher she can’t seem to keep away from. Even with their help, Doc will have to use her sharpest tools—secrets, guile, and a surgical blade—to prevent a dark turn in the sex trade.
Full of intrigue, friendship, and love, this timely story of a heroine erased from history by the sexual double standard reminds us that women help and heal one another, even when shameless criminals come to power.
Interview
As a former history teacher and historical fiction writer, I always like to find out how a historical fiction/nonfiction author gets from an idea to the actual book. With that, my first question is, what inspired you to write The Double Standard Sporting House?
My delightful, flamboyant grandmother once told me that her Aunt Beadie was a madam. It was a total fabrication, but before I sorted that out, I wondered how a smart middle-class girl with a large, supportive family could end up in prostitution. The answers are: rape and seduction.
I began to imagine a smart girl, skilled in medicine, finding herself in the demimonde, and making the best of the options left to her. She builds an elite brothel to finance her free clinic. When it’s threatened by predatory men, she has a strong community to help her fight back.
How did you go about researching your subject?
About six months into the 2020 lockdown facing a Massachusetts winter at home, I dug into research. I spent about a year reading on the history of prostitution, the Tammany Hall political syndicate, and 19th century medicine.
Your main character is Nell “Doc” Hastings. How and why did she become your protagonist?
Doc is excluded from the practice of medicine because she’s a woman, and then punished for having greater skill than mediocre men. Exclusion followed by insult is a fair summary of being a woman in the 19th century, and sometimes now. Doc embodies traditional feminine strengths in caregiving, compassion, and community.
What in your background helps you in writing a historical fiction book?
I have a doctorate in American history, and have been reading and researching for decades.
A brothel would obviously bring about certain health concerns for women, especially during the 1800s. How did you come to link Nell’s brothel to her funding a free clinic for women? Also, what was the health care system like for women in the lower-income parts of society?
Cast out of ‘respectable’ society as damaged goods, Doc finds surprising freedom and autonomy in the demimonde. Prostitution was far more widespread in the 19th century than in the 21st. In 1868 New York when women had very few ways to earn money, 30% did sex work at some point in their lives, compared to 1-2% now. The only industry controlled by women, prostitution was also just about the only way for single women to accrue real wealth. Reduced to their sexual and reproductive functions, these women made the best of it. Owning the house allows Doc to run her clinic as she likes, serving the most vulnerable women without men telling her what to do. Ironically, she would have provided far better healthcare to prostitutes than respectable women received from fancy doctors.
Medicine in the 19th century was just beginning to professionalize. There were plenty of quacks with medical degrees, and plenty of skilled healers who’d never been to school. Women’s particular needs were little studied or prioritized, of course. Poor women would have had difficulty accessing care, and most likely would have seen midwives or traditional healers, especially in the country. Charity hospitals and free clinics served poor women in the cities, but often refused care to women they deemed morally undeserving.
How does society today resemble the time period and events in The Double Standard Sporting House?
Gangs of heedlessly corrupt, powerful men still prey on and abuse girls and women all the time, and cover it up, as we see in the news every day. Conservatives are torching women’s reproductive freedom, and endangering our health and our lives. They shame us for carrying the burden of childbearing, and punish us for demanding full agency and autonomy. Women have more rights now than they did 150 years ago, but fewer rights than we did a few years ago.
1 in 4 women in the US has been raped, and 50% have suffered active harassment. Misogyny is different but arguably as strong as it was in 1868.
It seems to me that historically, the achievement of power through corruption, or maybe even through honest methods, comes at the expense of women, at least historically. What are your thoughts?
Indeed. We live in a patriarchal society set up for the benefit of half the population, and our culture represents only half the experience of humanity, yet male dominance is so pervasive we often can’t see it. The hierarchical, competitive, acquisitive, individualistic drives associated with masculinity are anti-democratic, and are killing our planet. It leads men to treat women as less-than-human vessels for reproduction, and to demean and de-value everything associated with femininity, like empathy and compassion. Feminism does not seek to replace patriarchy with female domination, it seeks to promote democracy, equality, and an orientation to the common good.
Finally, why should people read The Double Standard Sporting House?
It’s a good story, one that may help readers to see prostitution, and women’s historical exclusion from most opportunities, in a new light.
Nancy Bernhard is a journalism historian and yoga teacher, fascinated by how survivors of sexual and political violence heal through storytelling and movement. Having earned a BA in religion at Dartmouth, a PhD in American History at the University of Pennsylvania, and taught at Harvard, Bernhard turned her indignation over the sexual double standard into an absorbing tale rooted in the 19th century history of Tammany Hall. She was born in Brooklyn, and lives with
her family in Somerville, Massachusetts. https://www.nancybernhard.com/
Betty Floyd’s uncle risked his life when he signed the Declaration of Independence, yet she is the epitome of British loyalty and social grace in 1779. Attempting to ignore the war, she attends New York’s balls and soirees with the Crown’s officers, but the city is a dangerous place for someone with Patriot ties. When a soldier she has befriended is murdered at a British prison, Betty is driven to choose sides and join General Washington’s covert spy group, the Culper Ring.
Her social calendar provides the perfect backdrop to dance with the enemy, and she catches the eye of the charming Major John André, Britain’s Director of Intelligence. Garnering timely information for the Patriots becomes a never-ending balancing act, amid heightened collision between duty to her country and deepening feelings for André. When the slightest misstep could expose her and the entire Ring, a traitorous plot conducted by Benedict Arnold unfolds, and Betty is led to the very brink of death. Will she outwit the enemy, or will her flirtations with danger cost her everything?
Interview
What in your background brings you to write historical fiction?
I’ve always enjoyed stories set in the past, and it’s so true how one wrong detail can throw off a reader and pull her out of the story. Sometimes I see it in dialogue, where the author will use a word or phrase that we understand now, yet wouldn’t have been used in the novel’s time period.
Well-written historical fiction has always drawn me in and taken me back in time. In turn, I love bringing a long-ago world alive to readers and making sure I do enough research to get it right and immerse them in the way things looked, sounded, and felt.
What brought Betty Floyd to be the focus of your second novel?
The idea for the novel began when I saw a list of important women in American history. One name stood out, or rather, a number—355. I wanted to know more, so I studied all I could find about George Washington’s Culper Spy Ring and 355, the elusive female spy, whose name remains unknown to this day. One book listed several possible candidates for 355, why each might have fit the bill, and also why not. One was Betty Floyd, and although there are few concrete facts about her, what we do know led me to consider the possibility of her involvement with the Culper Ring and write her story. The most intriguing, edge-of-your-seat historical fiction I’ve read in a long while. Wirgau’s authentic for the period writing, impeccable research, and great attention to historical detail brought daily life during the Revolutionary War and the Culper Spy Ring vividly to life. Through To Outwit Them All I walked the British occupied streets of New York City through a Patriot spy’s eyes, ever aware that one wrong move could be her last. Once begun, I could not put this book down. Brilliant. –Cathy Gohlke, Christy Hall of Fame author of This Promised Land
Obviously, according to your readers, you got the atmosphere right for the setting of New York during this time period. What was your research process?
In addition to books about the Revolution and the Culper Ring, I poured over maps of old New York and peppered historians with questions. I watched videos of 18 th century dances, studied colonial customs and manners, cooking techniques, and the purpose of ladies’ many clothing items. But the best research, and the most fun, was taking two Revolutionary War-centered tours in lower Manhattan, where I walked the same streets as the Culper Ring and visited some of the same locations they did. The tours were supplemented with excerpts from original newspaper articles and broadsides, giving a sense of what people were thinking and what they cared about.
How does being part of various writers organizations help with your writing?
I’ve been active in several organizations since I started writing, and I probably would not have stuck with it without them. I’ve learned so much through classes and writers conferences, and the friends and connections I’ve made through the years have been priceless.
You have a new book out but people always want to know what’s next. So, what’s
your next project look like?
My heart is drawn to unsung women in history. I’m doing more research into American Revolutionary women, but I haven’t fleshed out a definite idea yet.
What is your writing process like? Are you an outliner or do you start writing and see what happens with an idea of where you want to go?
First, I like to be inspired by a real woman from the past and see if there’s enough about her to build a story. I do a rough story arc, but for both of my novels, it took me a while to know where to start. I made loose outlines, jotting down a few phrases to keep me on track, and often stopped to consult my research before continuing. I’m not sure it was the most efficient process, but I wanted to keep the facts straight and it worked for me. I did several thorough edits as I layered in dialogue, descriptions, etc. In the future, I’d like to improve on my outlining.
What helped you make that final decision to become a published author?
I had been writing short stories and articles but hadn’t thought about writing a book until I stumbled on an amazing untold story of a twelve-year-old Titanic survivor. I knew it would make a good novel and I wanted to share it with others. It’s been very successful, and I wanted to write more and better novels. I think I’m like many historical fiction authors who have a strong desire to get a story out to the world that might otherwise be misunderstood or never known.
If you were on a deserted island and could have only books by one author, who would it be?
Books by Cathy Gohlke. Her novels are set in different time periods and locations, but they’re all about family, friendship, love, forgiveness, faith, and perseverance in the midst of great struggle. I could read them again and again.
A Michigan native, Peggy Wirgau now lives in Arvada, Colorado. She loves bringing history to life for readers, writing about real unsung women who faced extraordinary challenges and became heroes. Her debut novel, The Stars in April, is based on the true story of a twelve-year-old Titanic survivor.
Her second novel is set to release in October 2025. To Outwit Them All is based on the true story of the only female member of George Washington’s Culper Ring. Now available for pre-order!
Peggy has also written for Appleseeds, Insight, Learning Through History, and contributed to Why? Titanic Moments by Yvonne Lehman. Her blog features in-depth Titanic stories, and her followers include descendants of the ship’s real-life victims and survivors. See Blogfor more details.
A graduate of Michigan State University and George Mason University, Peggy is an active member of American Christian Fiction Writers, Historical Novel Society, and Colorado Authors League. She loves to travel and explore historical sites. She and her husband have two adult children and three grandchildren.
“Ambitious . . . themes of family, friendship, and personal integrity shine.” —Kirkus Reviews
“A highly engaging journey of connection and transformation and an innovative read for this present age.” —Rita Williams-Garcia, Newbery Honor author of One Crazy Summer
Welcome to The Vale, a world that grows by the power of imagination
A magical new phenomenon from the New York Times bestselling author and executive producer of the Loveboat, Taipei series (adapted to the Netflix film Love in Taipei).
Thirteen-year-old Bran Joseph Lee has spent half his life building the Vale, an immersive, AI-generated, virtual-reality environment using technology created by his inventor parents. It’s a lush fantasy world complete with a Blue Forest, a Castle, and adventures with his mushroom-obsessed Elf named Gnomly—a much better place to spend his days compared to his real life, where his parents have suffered through the failed launches of one invention after another.
Bran wants nothing more than to see his Elves come fully to life, a hope that seems on the brink of reality when he enters the Vale in a multi-million-dollar competition to fund its further development. But instead, things in the Vale begin to go wrong: The sunlight is fading. A beautiful girl appears from nowhere. A wizard is stealing from the Vale’s inhabitants. And the strangest part of all is that none of this is the young inventor’s doing.
Can Bran and Gnomly uncover the truth of what is happening before both their worlds are destroyed?
Look out for The Vale—Origins, the short film prequel to The Vale starring three-time Tony Award winner Lea Salonga, coming to film festivals and screenings near you!
“Exposes both the wonder of AI and its pitfalls, and the elastic boundary between. Storytelling at its best!”
—Kathi Appelt, National Book Award Finalist and Newbery Honor author of The Underneath
The Vale
THE REVIEW
At 13, Bran Joseph Lee is a computer coding whiz kid inventor of the AI generated game, The Vale, a game world of fantasy with castles and, of course as every 13 year old gamer needs, a mushroom loving elf named Gnomly.
Sounds good so far. It’s the good part of Bran’s life as the real world is much different. He and his family find themselves living in dire straits with little to eat and Bran, with The Vale, is their last hope as he enters the came into a competition.
Bran begins to notice The Vale is changing, and not by his design and he must find out why and save The Vale before it’s too late.
In addition to Gnomly, Bran comes across an evil wizard and a mysterious girl. You can imagine what happens to a boy who spends all of his time programming comes face to face with a girl in his virtual world. No, not that. But he does experience emotions and feelings in The Vale.
The book is not all about the game, it’s also about the real world of Bran. How the real life situations he’s in are handled, along with his time in the game as a back and forth kind of thing, but it’s well done and more connected than you might think, but then shouldn’t it be connected?
As I find with many books that need to establish a world, The Vale starts out a little slow, but then you find you’re moving along faster than you think.
I would let a middle school student and up read the book.
Abigail Hing Wen is a tech leader, filmmaker and the New York Times best selling author of Loveboat, Taipei and companion novels Loveboat Reunion and Loveboat Forever. She executive produced the Paramount+ book-to-film adaptation LOVE IN TAIPEI, a romantic comedy starring Ashley Liao and Ross Butler now out on Netflix August 9, 2024.
Her debut middle grade novel, The Vale, launches September 16. It’s short film prequel, The Vale — Origins, stars 3x Tony Award winner Lea Salonga and is Abigail’s directorial debut.
Her fourth young adult novel, Kisses, Codes and Conspiracies is an Amazon Editor’s Pick and Amazon Best Book of the Month.
Abigail holds a BA from Harvard, where she took coursework in film, ethnic studies and government. She also holds a JD from Columbia and MFA in writing from Vermont College of Fine Arts. In her career in tech, she has negotiated multibillion dollar deals on Wall Street and in Silicon Valley, worked in venture capital and hosted Intel’s Artificial Intelligence podcast. She and her work have been profiled in Entertainment Weekly, The Hollywood Reporter, NBC News, Forbes, Fortune, Cosmopolitan, Bloomberg, Google Talk, People en Espanol and the World Journal, among others.
Abigail lives with her husband in the San Francisco Bay Area. She enjoys long walks, and hanging out with friends and family. She loves music and dances to it when no one is watching.
The True Story of Captain Kidd: An American Hero and Antihero for the Ages By Samuel Marquis
There comes a time in every rightly-constructed boy’s life when he has a raging desire to go somewhere and dig for hidden treasure.
—Mark Twain
My ninth-great-grandfather Captain William Kidd stands today as not only perhaps the most famous piratical plunderer of all time but the swashbuckler most responsible for the buried-treasure mythology that continues to fascinate historians, writers of all stripes, pirate aficionados, treasure hunters, and the general public. I have heard the passed-down family tales of my treasure-chest-burying-scoundrel of an ancestor since I first learned to walk, and although many of them have proven to be complete balderdash, they have made a lifelong impression on me. As Mark Twain understood, hidden treasure is a powerful allure for a young lad —and for that we can thank the “trusty and well-beloved Captain Kidd,” as he was celebrated by King William III of England in 1695 before being transformed into the “most notorious arch-Pyrate ever to sail the seven seas” a mere three years later. As British pirate scholar Patrick Pringle has written, it is unlikely that Captain Kidd “will ever be displaced as the Great Pirate.”
However, despite his villainous reputation, how much of an “arch-Pyrate” was Captain Kidd really and how much of our enduring fascination with both the man and myth can be chocked up to our love of roguish outlaw legends, deeply entrenched American folklore, and the supernatural? The answer is more surprising than one would imagine.
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A quick historical sketch tells us that Captain Kidd (1654-1701) was an educated man who could read and write and trace his roots to a common but respectable Protestant Christian family from Soham Parish, Cambridgeshire, England. Having gone away to sea at an early age as an apprentice or cabin boy from the port town of Dundee, Scotland, he possessed ample nautical skills developed from the hard experience of a life at sea and thorough training in mathematics and navigation. He also had a little salty roguishness in him from spending two decades in the Americas from the mid-1670s through the 1680s sailing, fighting, and drinking with rowdy, violent, and vulgar buccaneers and merchant seamen. Whether he did in fact serve under the most famous buccaneer of all time, Sir Henry Morgan (1635–1688), remains unknown, but there is no doubt that William Kidd was a patriotic English privateer during his twenties and early thirties, sticking it to imperial Spain with the fate of the two bellicose empires hanging in the balance.
In his era, the early Age of Enlightenment (1685-1815) and middle Golden Age of Piracy (1650-1730), Kidd was a respectable privateer not a pirate, meaning his activities were sanctioned by the English government through a “letter of marque,” a license authorizing him to legally attack, capture, and plunder enemy ships in wartime. Yet, like many sea rovers in his day, his ultimate fate, as well as his perch in history, would depend on the not always clear distinction between legal privateer and outlaw pirate. Privateering as a seafaring profession for both patriotism and profit has existed at least as far back as the Roman Republic, and privateering ships and the privateersmen who manned them (both are referred to as “privateers”) served the function of an auxiliary, cost-free navy that were recruited, commissioned, and unleashed upon the enemy when the resources of combatant European nations were overextended.
While the Anglo-American, Dutch, and French buccaneers of the seventeenth century Caribbean were most certainly ruffianly and profligate, they were licensed privateers not renegade pirates, and Kidd lawfully plundered the Spanish on land and by sea in the Gulf of Mexico and West Indies to weaken Spain’s grip in the New World. The buccaneers’ lifestyle was built upon a modern-like, egalitarian political framework. Their homegrown system of direct democracy resulted in a unique brotherhood defined by honor, trust, integrity, and lending a helping hand to those in need. It played a huge role in nurturing Kidd’s core democratic value system and generosity. During his seafaring career, he went out of his way to help the unfortunate and he employed African Americans, Native Americans, East Indians, and Jews as share-earning stakeholders aboard his privateering ships-of-force, making him rather progressive and tolerant compared to the vast majority of his contemporaries.
In 1688, Kidd made New York his home port and bought valuable waterfront property in the city, and from July 1689 through April 1698 he fought as a licensed privateer in King William’s War against France (1689-1697), following William and Mary’s seizure of the English throne in the Glorious Revolution to ensure a Protestant succession. By May of 1691, he was a bona fide New York war hero, gentleman, and man of affairs married to the most dazzling socialite in town: the twice-widowed, twenty-year-old Sarah Bradley Cox Oort. With his “lovely and accomplished” wife Sarah, the wealthy New York privateer and merchant ship captain, jury foreman, and model citizen would have two daughters, Elizabeth and little Sarah, and in 1695 he was recruited by a group of wealthy London investors to lead an expedition to the Indian Ocean to battle the French and hunt down freebooters as King William III’s lawfully licensed privateer.
The plan was for Kidd to hunt down the Euro-American pirates of Madagascar, legally seize their ill-gotten riches, and keep them for not only himself and his privateering crew but for the king and lordly sponsors from the powerful Whig party that dominated the English government. Among Kidd’s wealthy London financial backers was Lord Bellomont, a powerful Whig House of Commons member and soon-to-be royal governor of New York, Massachusetts, and New Hampshire. Kidd was to capture the “predators of the seas” and their freshly plundered riches after they had raided the royal treasure fleets of the Great Mughal and other East Indian shipping between the Malabar Coast of India and Mocha and Jeddah in the Red Sea. Based on the New York privateer’s sterling reputation, the investment group not only issued “the trusty and well-beloved Captain Kidd” two special government licenses but built a 34-gun warship, the Adventure Galley, to his specifications.
Unfortunately for Kidd, his nearly three-year-long voyage turned out to be an epic disaster and turned him overnight into one of the most notorious criminals of all time. His great misfortune was that he had followed in the wake of the English pirate Henry Every, who had pillaged the Great Mughal’s fleet and encouraged the mass rape of the Muslim women aboard one of the plundered ships. A year into the expedition to the far side of the world shortly after Every’s debauchery, Kidd and his crew had still not encountered a single enemy French or pirate ship that could be seized as a legitimate prize and they had suffered one disaster after another, including raging storms, a tropical disease outbreak, severe thirst and starvation, and repeated attacks by the East India Company, Portuguese, and Moors (Muslim East Indians). Increasingly desperate to earn some money under their standard “no prey, no pay” privateering contract, a large number of his New York and New England seamen wanted to become full-fledged pirates themselves and plunder the ships of all nations to garner the prodigious riches of the East. However, the law-abiding Captain Kidd would not allow any violations of his two legal Crown commissions, one to fight the French and the other to hunt down pirates.
During the grueling voyage, Kidd accidentally killed his unruly gunner, William Moore, a man with two prison sentences to his name, by smacking him in the head with a wooden bucket while quelling a mutiny; and he lawfully seized two Moorish ships, the Rouparelle and Quedagh Merchant, that presented authentic French passports and carried gold, silver, silks, opium, and other riches of the East. However, while these wartime seizures were 100% lawful and he never once himself committed piracy in India, he soon thereafter looked the other way during the capture of a Portuguese merchant galliot that presented official papers of a nation friendly to England. His seamen sailing separately from his 34-gun Adventure Galley in the captured Rouparelle seized from the Portuguese vessel two small chests of opium, four small bales of silk, 60 to 70 bags of rice, and some butter, wax, and iron. Though a measly haul, the act technically constituted piracy even though Kidd wasn’t directly involved in the capture. He only allowed the seizure to pacify his mutinous crew, who had by this time divided into “pirate” and “non-pirate” factions aboard his three separate privateering ships; and in reprisal for the damage inflicted upon the Adventure Galley and severe injuries sustained by a dozen of his crewmen from two Portuguese men-of-war that had attacked him without provocation months earlier.
Despite the countless challenges he faced during his perilous voyage and a second full-scale mutiny because he refused to go all-in on piracy, Kidd miraculously made it back to the American colonies from Madagascar with around £40,000 ($14,000,000 today) of treasure in his hold and the French passports that proved he had taken the Rouparelle and Quedagh Merchant legally in accordance with his commission. However, when he and his small band of loyalists reached Antigua on April 2, 1699, they received heartbreaking news. The Crown, at the urging of the East India Company, had sent an alarm to the colonies in late November 1698 declaring them pirates and ordering an all-out manhunt to capture and bring them to justice. With the Englishman Henry Every and most of his plundering, gang-raping outlaws still at large, Captain Kidd was now Public Enemy #1 in the world.
He decided to try to present his case for his innocence and obtain a pardon from his lead sponsor in the voyage, Lord Bellomont, who had by this time taken office as the royal governor of New York, Massachusetts, and New Hampshire. After burying a portion of his legally obtained treasure on Gardiner’s Island in Long Island Sound and distributing a number of goods to several trusted community leaders and seafaring friends as a precautionary measure, Kidd sailed into Boston on July 3, 1699, to meet with Bellomont, who had promised him a full pardon. But with Kidd now a wanted criminal and Every still at large, Bellomont and the other London backers, members of the once powerful Whig Junto that had fallen from power to the spiteful Tories, wanted nothing to do with the scandal. Having merely lured his business partner into Boston by dangling the possibility of clemency before him, Bellomont treated Kidd with suspicion and arrested him and his loyal seamen shortly after their arrival to port.
After being stripped of all his lawfully seized plunder and enduring six months of incarceration in Boston, Kidd was shipped to England to stand trial. Abandoned by his wealthy Whig sponsors who had been supplanted by the revitalized Tories, he was found guilty and hung in public shame on May 23, 1701, where he proclaimed his innocence before a drunken, jeering mob of Londoners. Days later, his corpse was coated with tar and hoisted in a gibbeted iron cage downriver at Tilbury Point near the mouth of the Thames, where it would remain for the next twenty years to serve as the English State’s grisly warning to other would-be pirates of the fate that awaited them if they dared threaten England’s valuable trade relations with India by pursuing the short but merry life of a pillaging freebooter.
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The question of Captain Kidd’s guilt or innocence has been hotly debated by historians and the reading public ever since his gruesome public hanging. However, it is important to bear in mind that Captain Kidd was not a 100% innocent man. Even by the sketchy standards of the early Age of Enlightenment, he was guilty of at least one act of piracy during his Indian Ocean expedition, or at least of failure to lift a finger to prevent his crew from committing piracy in the taking of the Portuguese galliot; and, possibly but not definitively, one count of manslaughter in a fit of passionate rage against his mutinous gunner William Moore, who had two prison sentences to his name, one for striking his captain, before sailing with Kidd.
At the same time, although Kidd was not a fully innocent man by the legal standards of his age, he was most certainly no pirate like Henry Every, which is an ironic twist that many people find hard to reconcile for the man who has been called “the most famous pirate of all time.” As one historian has put it, “His innate respect for order, his sense of duty and mission, his past life as an honest, successful seaman, as faithful husband and loving father, and above all, his ambition for the future—all these factors precluded Kidd from ever becoming a true pirate. If he committed piracies, they were acts of expediency, even acts of survival.” Thus, the most famous “arch-Pyrate” of all time was no outlaw pirate in temperament, inclination, or practice. Contrary to our embellished tropes over the centuries with characters like Long John Silver, Captain Hook, Captain Blood, Captain Jack Sparrow, and rocker Keith Richard’s as Captain Teague, the father of Sparrow, Captain Kidd never forced anyone to walk the plank, swilled rum with treasure chests overflowing with gold, silver, and jewels at his feet, or roared catchy pirate phrases like “Arrgh!” or “Shiver me timbers!” or “Dead men tell no tales!”
The real Captain Kidd was simply a bold adventurer at the wrong place at the precisely the wrong time in the wake of the Henry Every debacle. But even more critical to his ultimate fate, he was backed by the worst kind of sponsors imaginable. Not only did the Machiavellian Lord Bellomont coerce him into leading a virtually impossible expedition to the Indian Ocean to hunt down pirates, by threatening to seize his crew and ship in 1695 when Kidd initially turned down the command of the voyage, he and his fellow Whig noblemen dropped him as soon as he became a potential liability. Though these unspeakably powerful leaders gave the pirate-hunter firm, up-front assurances that they would stand by him in his difficult mission, they threw him overboard like ballast at the first whisper of trouble to protect their lordly reputations.
Unlike the largely unknown real pirate Henry Every, Captain Kidd’s story has been told and retold in thousands of accounts, from the heavily biased broadsheet newspapers and ballads of his day, to the countless books and journal articles produced over the past five centuries, to the Hollywood swashbuckler films of the silver screen during the past century. And yet, the tale of this humble-born New York privateer—who rose up by his own bootstraps to become the “trusty and well-beloved Captain William Kidd” of the King of England himself—has been lost to us in a foggy haze of legend, myth, and propaganda for the past four centuries.
“When the legend becomes fact, print the legend,” proclaimed fictional reporter Maxwell Scott in the classic 1962 Western film The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, directed by John Ford. But when it comes to my ancestor Captain Kidd, such an approach cannot suffice. For the simple truth is there was an actual flesh-and-blood Captain Kidd, and the story of that Kidd, my real ninth-great-grandfather, is far more fascinating, nuanced, action-packed, and ultimately tragic than the caricature of mythology and pop culture.
Few historical figures have cropped up at so many important turning points on the global stage, come into contact with so many historically noteworthy individuals in such a short period of time, have seemed to be everywhere at once, had more lies spread about them in their own lifetime, or cast such a long shadow for five consecutive centuries and counting. Case in point: Kidd’s trial was the greatest courtroom drama of the eighteenth century, and one of the biggest political scandals in British-American history, rocking the New World and the Old and threatening “to tip the subcontinent of India to the Maharajahs.” But it was nothing but a sham proceeding to make sure Captain Kidd hung for the crimes of Henry Every and the other real Red Sea pirates of the 1690s.
But once we peel away the onion layers of mythology and propaganda to uncover and illuminate the real Captain Kidd, as judged by the moral standards of his era, we realize that he was a good, honest, and courageous man given an impossible mission and sponsored by dirty, rotten scoundrels who threw him to the wolves. Thus, at the end of the day, the supreme irony at the heart of Captain Kidd saga is that the man widely considered “the greatest pirate of all time” was no pirate at all. Behind the Kidd myth was a real man: a son, a husband, a father woven into the tapestry of early America, rendering him for all the ages a unique yet flawed colonial American hero (or perhaps better anti-hero), whose life story by a simple twist of fate happened to be fascinating, exciting, bizarre, and heart-rending enough that Washington Irving, Edgar Allan Poe, Nathaniel Hawthorne, and Robert Louis Stevenson have all made him immortal in their most celebrated works.
It is for this reason that the legendary Captain Kidd has had the last laugh on us all.
Captain Kidd: A True Story of Treasure and Betrayal
Samuel Marquis
About Sam:
The ninth-great-grandson of legendary privateer Captain William Kidd, Samuel Marquis, M.S., P.G., is a professional hydrogeologist, expert witness, and bestselling, award-winning author of twelve American non-fiction-history, historical-fiction, and suspense books, covering primarily the period from colonial America through WWII. His American history and historical fiction books have been #1 Denver Post bestsellers and received multiple national book awards in both fiction and non-fiction categories (Kirkus Reviews and Foreword Reviews Book of the Year, American Book Fest and USA Best Book, Readers’ Favorite, Beverly Hills, Independent Publisher, Colorado Book Awards, and others). His historical titles have garnered glowing reviews from bestselling authors, colonial American history and maritime historians, U.S. military veterans, Kirkus Reviews, and Foreword Reviews (5 Stars).
You can get Captain Kidd: A True Story of Treasure and Betrayal at Amazon.
Publishing a book is a creative triumph—but making it visible on Amazon requires structure, planning, and a deep understanding of the platform’s inner workings.
The Amazon Author Formula Workbookby Penny Sansevieri is a strategic, hands-on resource created for authors who are ready to shift from uncertainty to action. This workbook offers a clear, customizable roadmap for improving discoverability, sales, and reader engagement across every stage of the Amazon experience. With over a dozen worksheets and guided exercises—covering everything from metadata and pricing to Amazon Ads and launch timelines—it encourages authors to move beyond surface-level fixes and engage with what’s really holding their book back. Every tool is backed by years of field-tested strategies and includes a downloadable version for easy printing. Whether you’re launching your first title or course-correcting a backlist, this workbook helps you take measurable steps toward long-term success on Amazon.
Amazon Author Formula WorkbookThe Amazon Author Formula
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What inspired you to create a workbook version of The Amazon Author Formula?
I’ve worked or consulted with thousands of authors over the years, and I know that learning is one thing — applying it is another. The workbook was born out of a desire to bridge that gap. It’s designed to guide authors through hands-on exercises — refining keywords, polishing descriptions, rethinking pricing — with space to brainstorm, track, and implement. Think of it as a strategic playbook that turns learning into lasting results. And it absolutely plays off of The Amazon Author Formula, so using the two side by side works extremely well.
Title Brainstorming
What’s one of the biggest mistakes authors make on Amazon?
They ignore their retail page. Authors focus on ads or social media without realizing that every campaign leads back to that Amazon page. If it’s not converting — if your keywords are off, your description is vague, your book cover is lackluster, or your categories are wrong — no amount of traffic will help. That’s why so much of the workbook focuses on refining that page. Every tweak improves your relevancy and increases your chances of showing up in searches.
Category and Sales Rank
Can the workbook help if my book has already been published?
Absolutely. In fact, most of the authors using the workbook already have books out. The beauty of Amazon’s system is that it’s fluid — you can update keywords, adjust pricing, optimize your book description, and test new ads. The workbook helps you evaluate what’s working and make strategic changes that keep your book competitive.
How is this workbook different from just hiring someone to do it for you?
Hiring an expert can be helpful — and I work with plenty of authors one-on-one — but not everyone has the budget for that. The workbook gives you the framework we use with our clients, but puts the power back in your hands. It’s built for authors who want to learn the process and make smarter, more confident marketing decisions going forward. You don’t just get answers — you learn how to ask the right questions about your book’s positioning, pricing, keywords, and more.
What part of the workbook do most authors find the most surprising or eye-opening?
The keyword research section! A lot of authors think they know what readers are typing into Amazon — but when they go through the keyword planner in the workbook and start researching real shopper behavior, it’s a total mindset shift. Most authors realize they’ve been using keywords that are too vague, too competitive, or simply not aligned with how readers actually shop. That section alone has helped so many authors increase visibility almost overnight.
Can this workbook help new authors who haven’t launched yet?
Yes, and honestly — I wish every author had this workbook before they launched. There’s a whole section on planning a successful book launch, including how to build momentum with ARCs, how to set a smart (and competitive) price point, and what to have in place before you run Amazon ads. Whether you’re still writing or getting ready to publish, the workbook acts like a roadmap so you can avoid costly mistakes and start strong from day one.
Penny Sansevieri is widely recognized as one of the most forward-thinking minds in book marketing. As the founder and CEO of Author Marketing Experts, she’s built campaigns for thousands of authors—many of whom have gone on to land spots on the New York Times, USA Today, and Wall Street Journal bestseller lists. But Penny’s work goes far beyond launch campaigns. A bestselling author of 24 books, she has also taught at NYU, hosted the Book Marketing Tips and Author Success podcast, and developed workshops that equip authors with lifelong marketing skills. Her approach blends deep technical know-how with a fierce commitment to empowering indie voices. Whether it’s category optimization, ad strategy, or brand positioning, Penny brings clarity, structure, and real results to every author she works with.
Some love stories don’t end. They just evolve—into memory, into longing, into something we carry forward with every breath.
Ten years after the death of her first love, Robin is doing her best to build something new. Back then, Jed was the kind of love that defined her—brilliant, elusive, and deeply flawed. He never promised permanence, but he wrote her a play that outlived him. Now, as Robin begins to fall for Nick—who is safe, honest, and everything she didn’t know she needed—she’s keeping a secret. She’s about to perform in Jed’s play. As rehearsals begin, dreams resurface, and Robin finds herself trapped in a quiet tug-of-war between grief and hope, memory and possibility.
In The Next Breath, Laurel Osterkamp explores how we make peace with our past without letting it define our future. It’s a story about emotional honesty, the complexities of long-term grief, and how love—real, flawed, and enduring—rarely fits into simple endings.
Laurel Osterkamp
Laurel Osterkamp writes character-rich, emotionally nuanced novels that speak to women navigating love, loss, and reinvention. A Minneapolis-based teacher, runner, and pop-culture enthusiast, Laurel has authored The Side Project, Favorite Daughters, and the Amazon #1 bestseller Beautiful Little Furies. Her work blends the introspective depth of literary fiction with the warmth and relatability of contemporary romance. Find her atlaurellit.com or on Instagram.
The Next Breath
Your book is set in Des Moines, Iowa. Have you ever been there?
I have been there many times because my best friend lives in Kansas City and I live in Minneapolis. At least once a year, we drive a few hours either north or south, and meet in Des Moines. I love that city because there are many fun memories connected to it.
What is your next project?
Currently, I’m working on a novel titled My Winter Song to You. It’s a fake dating, friends-to-lovers, holiday romance inspired Shakespeare’s “problem” play, The Winter’s Tale. And it takes place in Sugar Pine, Colorado, where I also set my novella, I Bet You Think About Me. (You can download that novella FREE when visiting laurellit.com!)
What is the last great book you’ve read?
I just finished Emma Grey’s Pictures of You. I was riveted! She does a great job with the dual-POV, flashback/flash forward structure. Such a great job, that she makes it seem easy, but it’s anything but. And, the story captures the feelings of love young while also dealing with some very serious topics with care.
What were the biggest rewards and challenges with writing The Next Breath?
While writing The Next Breath, I wanted to make sure I wrote about cystic fibrosis in a realistic way, so I did a lot of research. Same is true for feelings of loss and grief. But, both my biggest reward and challenge was writing Jed’s play within a novel. I started writing plays before I ever began writing novels, so it wasn’t completely out of my comfort zone. However, I was kinda dumb, to set it up in the novel that Jed’s play is REALLY GOOD. I put a lot of pressure on myself. And, it’s while performing Jed’s play that Robin finally confronts her grief. This was definitely the most difficult scene I’ve ever had to write, ever, in any book of mine. But also the most rewarding.
If your book were made into a movie, what songs would be on the soundtrack?
My theme song is constantly changing, usually to fit the POV of whichever character I’m writing from at the moment. Not sure what that says about me, but oh well. When I was writing from Robin’s perspective, Sara Bareillis’ “Brave” really resonated. I imagined her mother singing it to her from up above.
Tell us about your longest friendship.
I met my best friend Shauna in kindergarten. We were goofing off during gym class and became instant BFFs. Now, decades later, she’s like my sister. No one knows me better than her. (She’s the one I meet up with in Des Moines at least once a year.)
Thrillers rooted in real science always hit harder—and Deadly Odds 8.0 is one that kept me thinking long after the final page. Allen Wyler has created a terrifying scenario: What if someone could hack your pacemaker?
The novel begins with a sudden death outside a Seattle church. A man collapses, and emergency responders can’t save him. Within hours, a prominent medtech CEO receives a threat—backed by undeniable proof—that an anonymous hacker can remotely kill anyone with an AI-enabled cardiac implant. The only way to stop the murders? Shut down the company. It’s an impossible demand that throws the medical world into panic. Arnold Gold, a former casino hacker turned cybersecurity expert, leads a team of brilliant digital investigators. They’ve been laying low—but this case is too dangerous, too personal, and too urgent to ignore. As they peel back layers of digital deception, they find themselves confronting a foe whose motives may be more personal than political—and far more lethal than anyone expected.
Allen Wyler
Allen Wyler’s background as a neurosurgeon adds an unmatched realism to the pacing and the stakes. His ability to weave together medicine, ethics, and action is what sets his thrillers apart. You can find more about his work and career at allenwyler.com.
How did you research your book?
Because my Deadly Odds series touches on hacking and cybersecurity and I’m not a hacker, I need the help of a range of specialists from FBI agents to honest-to-God hooded dudes hunched chugging Red Bull while clicking away at keyboards: the kind of vandal your computer fears. Sooo, over the years I’ve developed a great cadre of sources to keep my ideas and descriptions factual. They’re a group I’m deeply indebted to.
What’s the hardest scene or character you wrote—and why?
This installment features Prisha Patel, Arnold’s second in command. (I’ve fallen in love with her character). In 8.0 she’s fleshed in a pivotal role. Problems develop when Vihaan, her jealous husband, falsely accuses her of a romantic involvement with Arnold. Leaving her to face some serious soul searching and ultimately a series of life-changing decisions. Prisha, you rock, girl!
What sets your book apart from others in your genre?
I’m not aware of another series in this genre that incorporates technology with mystery in such an easily understood presentation as the Deadly Odds series does.
Where do you write—home, coffee shop, train?
The mechanics of entering words into the computer take place at my desk, but my real writing—the creation of ideas and modifications–occur while walking my little Shib Inu through her favorite park, the University of Washington arboretum.
Why did you choose this setting/topic?
Great question. My Deadly Odds series is set primarily in Seattle with a few of the earlier installments in Honolulu. So, the Seattle setting was obvious. Since I deal with technology, the story needed to be present day. Because several of my stand-alone books were successful medical thrillers, for this installment I decided to focus on the issue of hacking medical devices. Pacemakers were an ideal subject to focus on. In other words, the setting and topic seemed to simply fall into place.
Which authors most inspired you?
Several authors do: John Sanford, Robert Cray, Michael Connelly, Don Winslow, Joseph Finder, and numerous others.
What’s your go-to comfort food?
Oh, man! I love several: BBQ Ribs, really good fried chicken with chunky potato salad, and Fran’s truffles (a local Seattle chocolate store). Oh, and don’t forget Talenti Salted Caramel Truffle Gelato.
If you could time-travel, where would you go?
Into the future 50 years to find out what happens to our country in this extraordinarily divisive time. Will our democracy survive? How severe will climate change become, and can we reverse it? I have so many questions with no clear idea where we’re headed.
What’s something that made you laugh this week?
Every morning, I throw the covers back on my bed so the sheets can air out until I make it later. Often my sweet Shiba Inu jumps up and sleeps directly on the spot I’ve just vacated. Today, when I returned to make the bed, she wouldn’t move. So, I made it around her. Just her little face was protruding from under the covers. The sight totally cracked me up!
Every now and then, a book comes along that feels like a dare—and Snoop, Come Home accepts it with glee.
This riotous parody by Jeff Whitcher drops Snoop Dogg into the pastel-colored universe of Peanuts and watches the chaos unfold. From the first panel, it’s clear this isn’t just a novelty joke. Instead, it’s a lovingly constructed satire that takes the conventions of Schulz’s classic strip and filters them through a cloud of West Coast hip hop, existential musing, and yes—marijuana. The neighborhood kids stumble through Snoop’s lingo, Lucy rebrands as a wellness guru, and Charlie Brown remains woefully unprepared for this new era of chill. Illustrated with remarkable fidelity to the original comic, every page is both a tribute and a takedown, full of double entendres, deadpan punchlines, and moments that make you laugh before you realize how clever they really are.
Jeff Whitcher
Jeff Whitcher has built an unconventional literary career by asking, “What if?” What if unicorns had depression? What if astronauts were lost in suburbia? What if childhood heroes sparked up and went full hip hop legend? A social worker by day and a dad to five full-time, Jeff finds his creative outlet in storytelling that dances along the edge of the surreal. He’s authored over 40 books that range from charmingly weird to wonderfully inappropriate, and he shares his passion for quirky music through his YouTube channel Vinyl Destination. Get to know his world at jeffwhitcherbooks.com, and follow his latest creative detours on Instagram at @jeffwhitcherbooks.
You can get Snoop Come Home: A parody on Amazon here.
Why did you choose this setting/topic?
I thought it had a lot of comedic potential and was surprised that no one had made the connection before. I grew up watching all the Charlie Brown holiday specials and so in some ways this is a cannabis-clouded love letter to Charles Schultz.
How did you research your book?
The research mainly consisted of re-familiarizing myself with the old Peanuts cartoons and strips to get a feel for how the characters interacted with each other and the world around them.
What’s the hardest scene or character you wrote—and why?
I think the hardest was the character of Snoop because I wanted him to be authentic to who he is and yet still capable of interacting and behaving in a way that was not altogether different from the original Snooper character.
Where do you get your ideas?
I try to take inspiration from pop culture, social media, entertainment, YouTube, anything that lends itself to parody or satire.
What sets your book apart from others in your genre?
I find that a majority of books in this genre use a double entendre as a starting point or contain humor that is sexual in nature. This book embraces the absurdity of a pop culture icon like Snoop Dogg smoking pot around a bunch of cartoon kids.
What helps you overcome writer’s block?
Sometimes taking a break releases the self-imposed pressure to write something amazingly creative. I find that inspiration often comes when I’m NOT trying too hard to look for it.
Do you write every day? What’s your schedule?
I write or illustrate most every day. A typical schedule for me is waking up early and writing for an hour, then writing on my lunch break at work and finally sneaking in some writing before I go to bed. Because I have a full-time job separate from being an author I get a majority of my writing done during breaks, lunchtime or weekends.
If your book became a movie, who would star in it?
Snoop Dogg of course! I’m not sure who would be the obvious casting choices for the other Peanuts to be honest.
Which author(s) most inspired you?
Shel Silverstein, Dr. Seuss, Judy Blume and Woody Allen. I love writers who aren’t afraid to push the comedy envelope, so to speak.
You can get Snoop Come Home: A parody on Amazon here.
When life doesn’t go as planned, sometimes you have to rewrite the narrative. In The Side Project, Laurel Osterkamp explores how people evolve—and how the stories they cling to can either hold them back or set them free.
Rylee never imagined she’d still be in Bemidji, Minnesota, years after high school, caring for her younger brother and working dead-end jobs. Carson was supposed to have the perfect future, until parenthood altered his course. The two haven’t spoken since their painful breakup—until fate places them in the same writing workshop. Assigned as creative partners, their dynamic quickly reignites old feelings. But what begins as a casual “side project” turns into an emotional reckoning, as they confront the choices they made and the truths they’ve avoided. With raw honesty and layered emotion, Osterkamp guides readers through the ways we protect ourselves—and the courage it takes to be vulnerable again.
With each of her books, Laurel Osterkamp continues to redefine what contemporary romance and women’s fiction can do. Her characters are honest, imperfect, and filled with a yearning to become whole. She writes from a place of personal insight, drawing on her work as an educator and her experiences as a mother and partner. Fans of emotionally grounded fiction will find something real and resonant in her work. Follow her at @laurel_osterkamp or explore her books at laurellit.com.
There wasn’t a huge amount of research involved, but I did need to read up on the type of brain tumors teenagers are most likely to get. I’d already spent a lot of time in Bemidji, but I convinced my family that I should take a road trip up to Bemidji on my own, just for the night, so I could walk around taking pictures and imagining my characters’ lives there.
What’s the hardest scene or character you wrote—and why?
The last scene between Rylee and her mother, Summer, was difficult to write because finally, they were being honest with each other and dealing with their grief. It was a challenge to find the right level of emotion and to give each of them their own unique voice.
What’s your favorite compliment you’ve received as a writer?
That’s so hard, because I often forget the compliments I receive, unlike the criticism, which is always tattooed on my brain. But last night I received this message from a huge BookTok influencer, after she finished reading The Side Project:“I just finished! Man, I’m crying happy tears. This was so different… and it was SO good.” I can’t overstate how happy that compliment made me!
Do you write every day? What’s your schedule?
Sometimes, if there’s a lot of laundry or grocery shopping to do, I skip writing on Sundays. Otherwise, I write every day, in the afternoon and/or early evening.
Any quirky writing rituals or must-have snacks?
My favorite writing quirk is when my cat, Toffee, snuggles up next to me while I sit on the couch with my laptop. When I get stuck, I’ll pet her and ask for her advice. She always has great ideas!
Why did you choose this setting/topic?
I’ve always felt that northern settings where they wear a lot of flannel are romantic. When I began writing The Side Project, I’d just finished an MFA program in Creative Writing. I liked the idea of exploring how writers can be sort of snobby toward each other when it comes to writing genre fiction, especially romance. And there’s definitely a stigma when it comes to self-publishing. The Side Project is not self-published, but Rylee is a secret self-published romance author and afraid to let the people in her life know this. So The Side Project is a combination of several topics and settings that are close to my heart.
If your book became a movie, who would star in it?
Winona Ryder (at 23) as Rylee
Andrew Garfield (at 27) as Carson
Jessica Chastain (at 27) as Dana
James Van Der Beek (at 27) as Jack
Which author(s) most inspired you?
This answer is specific to romance writing, but Emily Henry and Carley Fortune inspired me in a huge way. After reading their novels, I was ready to transition from writing women’s fiction to contemporary romance. I love how they use the expected romance tropes that readers love, but they also write layered stories with complex characters and lyrical prose.
What are you binge-watching right now?
My fifteen year-old daughter and I have moved on from Beverly Hills 90210 to Dawson’s Creek. We’re on the first season, where Pacey gets involved with Tamara the teacher. It’s amazing how problematic that storyline is! My daughter is all, “She’s grooming him!” She’s also furious at Dawson’s mom for having an affair. It makes me happy that my daughter is so smart about this stuff.
Laurel Osterkamp writes smart, emotionally rich fiction about messy relationships, creative reinvention, and the kind of love that leaves a mark. She’s the award-winning author of nearly a dozen novels, including Favorite Daughters and the #1 Amazon bestseller Beautiful Little Furies. Her newest novel, The Side Project, blends second-chance romance with literary flair—perfect for fans of Emily Henry, Annabel Monaghan, and anyone who loves bookish love stories with bite.
In addition to her novels, Laurel’s short fiction has appeared in literary journals across the web. When she’s not writing (which is rare), she teaches adult ESL and middle school enrichment classes, goes running with twisty audiobooks in her ears, and educates her daughter on the cultural importance of Beverly Hills, 90210.
She lives in Minneapolis with a family that loves to argue and cats that love to hiss. Ramona Quimby is her spirit animal.
Violet Sellers is blue, and for good reason. She’s repressing a shocking secret she won’t tell anyone, especially her comfortably middle-class parents. When she makes a new friend in school, Jules Marks, who lives on the “other side of the tracks” with his five little sisters, she is introduced to a dark world of self-abuse. As Violet learns about Jules and his shifty mother, Lee, she retreats further into her shell. Her parents, Gloria and Skip, are horrified and do their best to find out what happened to their adolescent daughter while bending over backward to keep the whole town from knowing their business. Jules has an aunt and uncle who know his desperate story, and they finally get a chance to free him and his sisters from a loveless world of poverty. Meanwhile, a spinster named Margaret Burns watches and waits. She knows all about redemption and she’s got a master plan up her sleeve. Margaret and most of the quirky characters in Violet is Blue eventually learn to dance between the worlds of the “haves” and the “have nots” in ways none of them ever anticipated.Welcome to Book 2 in The Women of Paradise County Series.
Violet is Blue
You mentioned on the Women Living Well After 50 podcast (I watched it on youtube) that teachers were important in your journey to being a writer. How did they encourage you? Do you want to include their names?
I have had some incredible teachers throughout my lifetime, but the two who set me on my writing path are: Jane Reed and Connie Moore. I had them both when I was in high school in my hometown, Cuba, Missouri. I was a good student, but I didn’t have that one thing that I felt good at. I wasn’t athletic, or particularly talented at music, or much of anything. These two incredible women, although they had very different teaching styles, helped me recognize that storytelling was my jam. There were good stories already written that were there to appreciate in more thoughtful ways, but there were just as many out there for me to do their telling. It felt magical, and I’ll never forget feeling like I had something I could sink my teeth into and feel excited about it. I dedicated my first book, God Bless the Child, to the two of them and established the Reed Moore Scholarship in 2024 in honor of them. The first scholarship was awarded this spring, and I’m honestly as excited about this as I am the book series!
It took 18 years for you to bring your first book, God Bless the Child, to the world. When did you begin Violet is Blue, the second book in the trilogy of standalone books? What was the process like?
Much like God Bless the Child, I’d had a good chunk of Violet is Blue scratched out already. What I had not done, was share it with my editor, David Tabatsky. The truth of the matter is that when I reached out to David again after all those years, I wanted him to read Violet is Blue, which was in short story form, and a few other pieces I’d been working on. David was happy to read these, but it goes further. I really do have to give him the credit for recognizing that these two short stories had the potential to be adapted into full novels, and that they could work as a series with God Bless the Child. It had never crossed my mind, but once we started diving into it, I was re-energized. I’d always dreamed of getting one book published, but the universe had something bigger in mind! I’m grateful that David urged me to give God Bless the Child another look and to reconsider it as the foundation of something bigger. I’m knee-deep in writing House of Teeth, the third book in the series. That’s how The Women of Paradise County Series was hatched. It’s been thrilling, and I’m so thankful for his vision and belief in me.
You’ve said that minor characters from the first book, God Bless the Child, get a little more time in your new book, can you tell our readers who they might be?
Absolutely! Reverend James Pullman and his parents, Richard and Ruth Pullman, are essential to the story arc in Violet Is Blue. No spoilers, but let’s just say that James has unfinished business that needs serious tending in Book 2. We learn a whole lot more about Richard’s role in enabling his son’s behavior. Readers also discover more about Ruth’s backstory, especially her complicated relationship with her big sister, Gloria. The impacts of James’ unbridled misdeeds are as deep and wide as the berth others around him have given him.
Having read your post on girtalkhq.com about the main characters of Violet is Blue, although there doesn’t appear to be necessarily overt examples of what the average person might consider mental illness, there are obvious cases of damage that has been done. Are the mental hardships of your characters a conscious effort by you in Violet is Blue, or, since you don’t outline a story, as you’ve mentioned in other interviews, you just let it happen?
The characters throughout all the books in The Women of Paradise County series are working through a wide range of quite natural responses to traumas they’ve endured. Some of these are very specific events, but just as many are rooted in circumstances that take their toll: poverty, mental illness in families, and living in sustained periods of uncertainty and frequent upheaval. Even though these are fictional characters, their responses are quite natural. In Violet is Blue, this is manifested in ways big and small, including how the main character Violet Sellers and her newfound friend, Jules Marks seek relief through self-harm. People come to new spaces and situations carrying varying levels of resilience and coping. Exploring this has always fascinated me. I just let things happen like I think they might in real life.
Your characters have such specific parts to play in your stories, have you ever run into a situation where the character refuses to let you take her in the direction you planned for her to go? If so, what did you do? I ask because I’ve had that happen when I intended for a character to be a positive favorite in the story, but for some reason she just didn’t want to be that, so I didn’t fight her and let her go her own way.
Goodness, yes! There are certain characters that I love very much, and it would be so easy to let them stay protected by allowing them to be one dimensional. This is lazy writing. Characters deserve to be interesting, and readers can handle complexity. One of my favorite characters in Violet is Blue is a waitress named Clarice Downs. I love this woman so much, but she’s also prominent in the next book in the series, House of Teeth. I’m in the middle of writing this as we speak, and Clarice makes some choices that tarnish her halo. I must let her do what she’s going to do. She can be a saint and a sinner, and as her creator, I have to let her explore both parts of herself. It makes these characters more believable.
How did your first book, and life experiences during the time of its journey to being published, lead to your writing Violet is Blue?
When I initially finished God Bless the Child, I did a fair amount of pitching to agents. That’s a humbling process, but just part of the deal unless you’re famous. I think it’s important to keep your rejection letters to remind you of the struggle. It’s a rite of passage that most of us must power through. During that time, I did get a request from a potential agent for the whole manuscript. Excited, I sent it right along and waited for feedback. She called back to say she loved the book, but she wanted me to remove the main character, Mary Kline. She thought this character and her circumstances were just too cliché. I just couldn’t see a way to move forward and decided not to proceed. It was heartbreaking, but I knew the book couldn’t stand up without Mary. I felt sorry for myself for a while, put the manuscript aside, and started writing something else. That something else was the beginning of Violet is Blue. The initial creation is always my favorite, most satisfying part of the process. Life kept getting in the way, too. It took nearly 20 years to get these stories back into the light, and in a connected way, but I wouldn’t change how things unfolded.
Who was the easiest character to write? The most difficult?
Mary Kline, the primary character in God Bless the Child, was by far the easiest to write. She literally came to life with a pencil and a stack of yellow legal pads in a café while I waited for my youngest daughter to do preschool a few times a week. I can’t explain how Mary emerged from my brain onto the page, but I’ll always have a soft place in my heart for this character. The most difficult character to write in the whole series is a young woman named Pearl. She’s essential to the story, but we only hear about her through the voices of other characters. She does not have a voice in the story, and that’s intentional on my part because in real life and during the time this story is set, a young woman like Pearl would not have much of a voice at all. Readers must learn about her through the lenses of others.
Diet Coke or Coke Zero?
Diet Coke! Without a doubt, I will always choose this nectar of the gods over any other non-alcoholic beverage.
If you could have dinner with one author, living or dead, who would it be and what would you ask them and what would you have for dessert?
At this moment in time, I would want dinner with William Shakespeare. I would probe deeply about the longstanding authorship question. Mr. Shakespeare, did you really write these plays? I’d need all the details and documents, and we could do this over a cream puff sprinkled with powdered sugar. Lots of it!
Since she first fell in love with writing in high school, Anne Shaw Heinrich has been a journalist, columnist, blogger and communications professional. Her first article appeared in Rockford Magazine in 1987. She’s interviewed and written features on Beverly Sills, Judy Collins, Gene Siskel, and Debbie Reynolds.Anne’s writing has been featured in The New York Times bestseller The Right Words at the Right Time, Volume 2: Your Turn (Atria) and Chicken Soup for the Soul’s The Cancer Book: 101 Stories of Courage, Support and Love.Her debut novel, God Bless the Child, is the first in a three-book series. She and her husband are parents to three adult children. Anne is passionate about her family, mental health advocacy and the intrepid power of storytelling.
What happens when the cameras stop rolling and the war is over? The Bridge offers a gripping answer in a story that spans both battlefields and the quieter struggles that follow.
The Bridge
The Bridge by Alan Ramias
Synopsis:
A War That Won’t Let Go. A Memory That Can’t Be Buried. A Story That Refuses to Fade.
Moving between the intense conflict of Vietnam’s Mekong Delta and the hushed halls of a Chicago film studio, Alan Ramias’s The Bridge explores not just the war itself, but the lasting psychological scars it leaves behind. Through a powerful mix of fiction, poetry, and documentary realism, Ramias paints a portrait of soldiers returning home only to face a different kind of battle—one fought with silence, guilt, and the need to make sense of loss. The novel’s characters are as deeply scarred as the landscapes they inhabit, and their stories echo with the complexities of survival, memory, and the truths that refuse to fade.
Alan Ramias brings a rare depth of perspective to his fiction, shaped by his time as an Army reporter in Vietnam and his later work consulting with global corporations on performance and strategy. His decades of experience navigating complex systems and human resilience inform the layered storytelling of The Bridge, a novel that blends personal history with a profound understanding of the psychological aftermath of war.
Captain Kidd: A True Story of Treasure and Betrayal
You can get Captain Kidd: A True Story of Treasure and Betrayal at Amazon.
Review:
One word I use a great deal when reviewing Samuel Marquis’ historical offerings is ‘detail’. I’ll use it even more this time. Why? Because I love detail when it comes to history, even historical fiction, as long as it works with what’s being written. Even though I love history, I did get my degree in History Education. If it’s all just facts, I get bored and drift away, unless I’m doing the research. Text with history needs to also tell the story to help the reader be engaged and retain what they are reading. Marquis always makes it work. An example is his WWII trilogy, filled with detail that brings reality to the fiction he incorporates to make it all come together. I highly recommend the trilogy to anyone who is a history fan. And unless you’re a complete WWII history nerd, a term I use with admiration and affection, you will learn things you didn’t know before, something I always find a plus in any book I read, no matter the genre.
Before Captain Kidd: A True Story of Treasure and Betrayal Sam wrote the non-fiction Blackbeard: The Birth of America, giving him a good familiarity of writing about a similar setting.
Sam brings that same attention to detail, even more so, in Captain Kidd: A True Story of Treasure and Betrayal, the story of his ninth-great-grandfather. And who better to tell the story than Sam?
Unlike many who have taken on the story of Captain Kidd, Sam does not treat him as either fully a martyr or hero. No captain during the Golden Age of Piracy was fully one or the other. Those treated as one or the other either escaped scrutiny for their questionable acts, or were thrown to the wolves in spite of their more noble actions.
As you read Sam’s book, you’ll discover that Captain Kidd had his shades of gray, but what I enjoy is how Sam gives the information you need to develop a more complete picture or opinion of the man and how he might have come to make the decisions he did, and if the things he was accused of matches the man. We also get to see what historians discover but rarely gets disseminated to the masses, either in textbooks, or in any other mass media form, including film.
Sam shows us how Kidd ended up involved in the fateful adventure on the opposite side of the world from his beloved wife Sarah and children. An adventure that ends years later in his trial and execution in London.
I found it enjoyable to learn about Kidd’s time in New York and the important parts he played during his time there. It was during this time, I believe, Kidd made a bad decision that led to the disaster of the rest of his life. A decision that left his wife Sarah a widow with two children, and all ostracized by New York society that once held the Kidd family in high regard.
It is not often we learn about the details of Kidd’s journey through his beloved Sarah’s first two marriages, to their final union and onward to the fallout on Kidd’s family from his conviction as a pirate.
Sam goes into more detail than you normally find about Kidd’s piracy trial and how he really never stood a chance of having his innocence believed. There were powers at play that wanted and needed Captain Kidd to be found guilty. That part of the story, the part behind what I will call the railroading of a sea captain, is interesting in that it has nothing to do with Kidd at all.
Who would like this book?
Anyone interested in the true story of the more mythical Captain Kidd. Those who enjoy the history of the Golden Age of Piracy and finding out more of the behind the scenes action that dictated various actions of others outside of Captain Kidd.
You can get Captain Kidd: A True Story of Treasure and Betrayal at Amazon.
Samuel Marquis
About Sam:
The ninth-great-grandson of legendary privateer Captain William Kidd, Samuel Marquis, M.S., P.G., is a professional hydrogeologist, expert witness, and bestselling, award-winning author of twelve American non-fiction-history, historical-fiction, and suspense books, covering primarily the period from colonial America through WWII. His American history and historical fiction books have been #1 Denver Post bestsellers and received multiple national book awards in both fiction and non-fiction categories (Kirkus Reviews and Foreword Reviews Book of the Year, American Book Fest and USA Best Book, Readers’ Favorite, Beverly Hills, Independent Publisher, Colorado Book Awards, and others). His historical titles have garnered glowing reviews from bestselling authors, colonial American history and maritime historians, U.S. military veterans, Kirkus Reviews, and Foreword Reviews (5 Stars).
Kinney’s Quarry is the kind of thriller that keeps you up at night—blending action with a sly sense of humor as Kinney and Reed scheme their way through deadly conspiracies and shifting alliances. Whether they’re faking assassinations or outwitting hired killers, the pace is electric and the twists are genuinely surprising.
What gives the book its edge? Verlin Darrow’s one-of-a-kind life. With tales of living in a women’s dorm, outdriving tornados, and meditating with gurus, Darrow’s experiences add depth and a wink to every scene. His background as a psychotherapist lets him dig deep into motives and psychology, making even the most outrageous moments feel real. Check out his extraordinary journey atverlindarrow.com.
Kinney is a Black Ops agent who has a near death experience and is no longer willing to kill anyone. He considers himself to be a benign sociopath, using his skill set in the interests of national security. When he is recruited by a shadowy organization to help them assassinate a foreign leader, he goes undercover, gets caught up in a conspiracy, and with his partner Reed, solves a series of mysteries to stay alive. Throughout the book, he finds a way to see the humor in what he encounters, even as he’s kicking butt.
In your book you make a reference to creating a new state. How did you come up with this idea?
Years ago, I read about the quite real movement to create a new state from the northeastern region of California and parts of Oregon and Idaho. Once I tried to incorporate a similar notion in an abortive thriller about Texas (I was young. It was awful.) The new Western state, promoted since the 1800s, was to be called Jefferson—as I mention in my book.
Your book is set in the Silicon Valley area. Have you ever been there?
Most of Kinney’s Quarry is set in the Silicon Valley area—about forty-five minutes south of San Francisco. I live just over a mountain from there, and worked in the valley for quite a while. I did have to research another part of California I’d never been to, relying on stock photos, for the most part.
Who was the hardest character to write? The easiest?
I struggle with female characters and regret choices I made about them early in my writing career. I was happy with the ones in Kinney’s Quarry. This time, the hardest character to write was the head of the unnamed government agency that Kinney works for since even I wasn’t sure if he was a good guy or a bad guy until the end.
How did you do research for your book?
I’m very much a seat of the pants writer. I start with one idea, one character, and one setting. Then I see where it goes, inventing any details that come along. Afterwards, I check to see what I came up with that doesn’t match reality, and I change things.
Do you have another profession besides writing?
Yes, I’m a psychotherapist. I’ve also been a professional volleyball player, a singer/songwriter, a newspaper columnist, a storeowner, a short order cook, a factory worker, a taxi driver, a university instructor, a tech recruiter, a carpenter, and an NCAA coach. The first half of my life was continuity-challenged.
How has your work as a psychotherapist influenced your writing and the books that you write?
In therapy, clients work toward change and I do my best to facilitate this process. I offer wisdom, practical suggestions, compassion, and humor. Some people need psychic glue to keep from falling apart. Some need solvent to loosen up concretized points of view. Others need to reframe the stories they’ve created about what’s happened to them. Some need to release their feelings. It’s the same with characters in a book. If they don’t go through changes, I’m not engaged as a reader for long. I know how and why people change, and my work is infused with realistic portrayals of these, even as fantastic things happen to my characters.
Is there one particular job or career that stands out to you as the most rewarding or exciting?
Being a therapist has proven to be the most rewarding career/job I’ve ever had. Playing professional volleyball in Italy was certainly the most exciting. As a therapist, I utilize all my hard-earned life experience, insight, professional skills, emotional and spiritual development, and whatever else gets pulled out of me in sessions in service to others. As I’ve aged, a lot of things that used to be important to me have dropped away, leaving helping whoever I can as the remaining worthy activity. After all, we’re truly all in this together.
What is your next project?
I’ve finished a mystery set in a spiritual community, narrated by the leader, who tries to help solve two murders. I concocted what I think is a catchy title, which may be vetoed up the line—Warning: Characters In This Mystery Are Closer Than They Appear. This one is idea-laden since I served a similar role years ago before graduating myself and everyone else out of the organization.
What philosophy can you share to help fellow writers ?
Don’t fight reality. It’s bigger than you are and it will win. Be realistic and work within the realm in which you have ownership. Let go of the rest—the outcomes that are beyond your illusion of control. Focus on a good faith process and find a way to cooperate with the way things need to be down the line. As Stephen Batchelor wrote: Anguish emerges from craving for life to be other than it is. I think this especially applies to writers, given the state of our industry.
Fantaisie by Michael Kenneth Smith is a historical novel set in the volatile years after World War II. Former Polish RAF pilot Jan Orlinski accepts a job flying cargo from Paris to the Belgian Congo, only to discover that his missions may involve more than he’s been told. Meanwhile, Sophie Gordon—banished from Britain due to her father’s past—takes on a covert role misleading Soviet spies, until she is captured and imprisoned.
Michael Kenneth Smith is the author of six historical novels, including The Postwoman, an international Amazon bestseller based on the true story of WWII resistance fighter Andrée De Jongh.
While researching for Fantaisie, I hit a roadblock trying to accurately portray the mechanics of the two-seater Messerschmitt Bf-109G-12 that plays such a crucial role in Jan and Sophie’s escape. Aviation forums and history books offered conflicting information, and I was struggling to visualize how a fighter pilot accustomed to a Hurricane would adapt to German controls.
My breakthrough came at a small aviation museum outside Paris where they had a partially restored cockpit section. The curator, noticing my intense interest, introduced me to an elderly aviation engineer who had worked on restoring various WWII aircraft. Though he’d never flown them in combat, he understood their mechanical differences intimately.
He spent an afternoon explaining the quirks of the Bf-109’s control systems, even sketching diagrams of the cockpit layout and explaining how the handling would differ from Allied planes. His technical knowledge paired with his storyteller’s ability to convey the sensory experience of these machines transformed what would have been generic flying scenes into something much more authentic.
When the book was nearly finished, I sent him the chapter featuring Jan’s escape flight. His note back simply said, “I could feel the wind through those bullet holes in the wing fabric.” That validation from someone who truly understood these machines meant everything.
Welcome to ancient Thebes, where two women — Neferet and Bener-ib — are quietly changing their world one patient (and one murder investigation) at a time. In N.L. Holmes’s rich and addictive historical mystery series, a physician and her partner set out to run a neighborhood dispensary… only to be pulled into a series of bizarre and dangerous crimes that demand not just compassion, but cunning.
From Flowers of Evil’s cryptic last words of a dying florist, to Web of Evil’s tangled family secrets in a weaver’s village, Wheel of Evil’s deadly chariot investment scheme, and The Melody of Evil’s murdered musician at a family celebration — each book delivers a standalone mystery steeped in atmosphere and soul. It’s historical fiction with a sharp investigative edge.
You can get the Hani’s Daugther Mysteries at Amazon.
If you were stuck on a deserted island, which 3 books would you want with you?
Wind in the Willows and The Perelandra trilogy of C.S. Lewis to take my mind away to a beautiful place, and Germinal by Zola to make me realize things could be worse.
Which authors inspired you to write?
I couldn’t put names to them now, but all the wonderful books I read as a child made me think that writing was the coolest thing a person could do. What tipped me over the edge was the fact that my cousin published a young adult book. That seemed to make it sound doable.
How long have you been writing?
I’ve been writing fiction for eleven or twelve years. Before that, it was just poetry and, of course, academic articles. Poetry really adds to one’s fiction chops, but I’m afraid academic writing has to be unlearned – it’s all about not having a distinctive voice. It does help in terms of using the language skillfully and knowing grammar.
What genre do you write and why?
I write historical novels set in the Bronze Age, mostly Egypt or the Hittite Empire. As an archaeologist, that’s a no-brainer for me! For a long time, I’ve been concentrating on mysteries of one sort or another because I like to read them, and so do a lot of people who might not care about antiquity otherwise. I think a well-researched historical novel can teach readers a lot about the past while entertaining them.
How did you do research for your book?
I had a lot of general background from teaching a class on Ancient Egypt, but I hit my library again for specific knowledge about various professions, etc. I find names from ancient manuscripts about village life or lists of tomb owners.
In your book you make a reference to ancient Egyptian medicine. How did you come up with this idea? What made you write a book about medicine?
The Egyptians’ medical skills were world-renowned in their day. They had observed by trial and error over millennia and written down the results of their experiments, so that a young doctor like Neferet could look in a casebook and see what her elders had done to treat those symptoms. A lot of it was herbal, much like traditional medicine today. This was always one of the most popular lectures when I taught my Ancient Egypt class, and it gave me a certain forensic capability for my sleuths.
Where do you get inspiration for your stories?
I began the Lord Hani Mysteries, from which this series is spun off, when I met the real Hani in a set of ancient documents called the Amarna Letters. There were references to a lot of diplomatic missions carried out by this man, so I took him as my protagonist and gave him a personality and a family. When Hani’s arc was completed, I zeroed in on his youngest daughter, a headstrong, unconventional girl who seemed likely to follow in her father’s footsteps.
There are many books out there about ancient Egypt. What makes yours different?
There are even a lot of mysteries set in Egypt, but this series has a female protagonist who is a physician, so she’s automatically privy to a lot of mayhem. Her father is a diplomat, and that draws into her orbit various foreigners as well. Plus, for those who like cozy mysteries, this is one, with the addition of Egyptian “tea time” vibes and heroic pet animals.
What is your next project?
I’m working on another Neferet mystery that features the world of cooks (each of these books deals with a different profession). I also have in mind a prequel to the Lord Hani Mysteries, because there’s one more real historical adventure of Hani to make use of.
You can get the Hani’s Daugther Mysteries at Amazon.
N.L. Holmes
Author Bio:
N.L. Holmes is an award-winning novelist and former archaeologist with a Ph.D. in Classical and Near Eastern Archaeology. She spent years excavating in Greece and Israel, teaching ancient history, and bringing the past to life. Her firsthand experience with ancient cultures adds a rare level of authenticity to her work — transporting readers deep into the heart of ancient Egypt with rich historical detail and compelling storytelling.
Set during the excitement and tumult of the second wave of feminism and the sexual revolution, this coming-of-age novel about female friendship in the 1970s will appeal to fans of Kristin Hannah’s Firefly Lane.
It’s 1976, the second wave of feminism is in full swing, and three cousins share an apartment at Yale. Two are seniors; the third is starting graduate school. Each is seeking her own path in both love and work—but all three women, not quite knowing how to use the new freedoms available to them, alternate between supporting and undermining each other in their efforts.
Julia, the most conventional of the three, wants the security of her monogamous relationship with Ben but is attracted to other men. Anna plans on traveling the world to escape her boyfriend and alcoholic mother. Robin, who is bisexual, has various partners as she dreams of open relationships. All fall under the spell of a charismatic musician, Michael, who is too wounded to be available. By the end of a year of experiments and necessary mistakes, the cousins will make crucial decisions that will determine the course of the rest of their lives.
This prequel to Levine’s first two critically acclaimed novels, The Geometry of Love and Nothing Forgotten, dramatizes the struggles that women have faced and continue to face while entering adulthood in a world not quite ready to accept them as equals.
Three Cousins
Pre-order Three Cousins at Amazon. Release date April 8, 2025.
Why did you choose the second wave of the women’s movement as the backdrop for Three Cousins?
The choice was dictated by the narrative structure of my series. Three Cousins is the prequel to two other novels I’ve written, The Geometry of Love and Nothing Forgotten, and takes place in the characters’ college years, which were also mine. I did my B.A. at Wellesley College in the mid 1970s when being in a women’s college meant being saturated with feminism. As I recreated that period (albeit I moved the action to Yale), I remembered how my thinking and my relationships were impacted by the emerging feminist voices of the time.
As I was reading I noticed that each cousin had a different type of relationship with her parents, with the mothers being somewhat the glaring ones. How important were they to the development of how the cousins end up as they are?
The three mothers form a foil for the protagonists. As a hinge generation between the social conservatism of their Jewish immigrant mothers and their more liberated daughters, the three mothers have had their share of frustrations and limitations. One of the book’s themes is the way in which daughters must liberate themselves from their mothers in order for their generation to progress beyond the previous. The moms also provide comic relief. They have hilarious responses to the vicissitudes of being female.
As important as the mothers are, I also saw the differences of the fathers and how they handled situations. What importance do you think they had in the cousins’ development? I am particularly thinking of Anna’s father.
The fathers are indeed important. Julia’s dad is generally present and supportive whereas Robin’s is absent. Anna’s father could be called irresponsible and disappointing: he clearly loves his daughter, but he chooses not to defend her against her alcoholic mother. Of course, it’s common in dysfunctional families that one parent is abusive and the other looks away.
How did you keep yourself honest about the ups and downs of the feminist movement while some authors like to show only the, I guess, positive impacts on the women involved? I wanted to point out some specific moments of honesty but that would be revealing too much. I was thinking of Robin and Julia for the most part.
The feminist movement extended hopes and ideals that were not always easy to enact. For example, Julia would like to be independent and successful, yet she also craves the security of a conventional monogamous relationship; she consequently loses some of her drive and self-direction when she settles down with her boyfriend. As for Robin, who is bisexual, she dreams of polyamory, but isn’t prepared for the internal and relational conflicts that accompany that lifestyle. And having ideals doesn’t protect you from the misogyny of parents or male friends and professors.
Readers of women’s fiction, especially those of a historical era, always like to ask the same question… How much did you pull from your own experiences, in this case with your cousins?
I was influenced by my mother’s side of the family: my mom and her sister grew up in Brooklyn next door to their two cousins. Three of them remained close throughout their lives; the fourth moved to Italy to be independent. Then, growing up, I myself had close relationships with my cousins. But if the family structure in Three Cousins was inspired by mine, the actual characters are amalgams of many people, including friends I had in college. And on a certain level they are also archetypes of different attitudes young people have as they come of age. Julia is Prudence, Anna is Adventure, and Robin is Experimentation.
With different ways of navigating the women’s movement, today as well, do you think it strengthens or weakens familial bonds between women?
Short of doing a sociological study, I’m not sure I can answer that. But I do think that women’s issues are generally more out in the open than they were in the 1970s. The movement is now more inclusive and intersectional, which in turn may make it easier for women in a family to discuss harsh experiences like sexual and domestic abuse, discrimination in the workplace, homophobia, and racism. And conversation leads to mutual support and strengthened relationships.
You mentioned two other books in the series about the cousins. Can you tell us a little about them and any future plans?
The overall plan is to create five novels that follow these three cousins over the span of their lifetimes. Three Cousins catches all three in college. The Geometry of Love centers on Julia in her 30s, then her 40s; it’s a love triangle story and a tale about artists and muses. Nothing Forgotten follows Anna’s adventures in Italy in her 20s then fast forwards to her 50s. The next novel will focus on Robin. She is the wildest of the three, polyamorous and a spiritual seeker, so I’ll have fun with it. A fifth and last novel will bring all three cousins back together in their 60s or later.
Are you a full time writer or do you have another way to nourish the body and soul?
I balance writing with my hypnotherapy practice. For relaxation and exercise, I hike and do nature photography, which I took up at the beginning of the pandemic. Mostly I take pictures of birds, documenting wildlife in the San Francisco Bay Area. You can see my photography on Instagram @jlcreativearts
How has being a hypnotherapist influenced your writing?
Hypnotherapy is a creative process: In hypnosis we use the visual imagination constantly. I have had a lot of practice visualizing memories, fantasies, and scenes. It is also a training in accessing and using the gifts of the subconscious. My creativity has certainly been enhanced by my profession. Additionally, I’ve had the privilege of being inspired and enriched by my clients’ struggles and resilience. Being human isn’t easy.
Who are the authors that have influenced you most?
The list is very long, but here are a few, all of them classics. American: Henry James and Edith Wharton (subjects of my Ph.D. dissertation and book, Delicate Pursuit: Discretion in Henry James and Edith Wharton). French: Stendhal, Flaubert, and Marcel Proust. British: Virginia Woolf, Lawrence Durrell, and E.M. Forster. Russian: Chekhov and Turgenev.
Julia’s story.2015 Top Ten Women’s Fiction Title — American Library Association’s Booklist
“Spanning 1987 to 2004, the novel’s scope and sweeping character arcs will appeal to fans of Meg Wolitzer’s The Interestings . . . Julia’s emotions, insecurities, and pleasures are laid bare and recall Isadora Wing in Erica Jong’s Fear of Flying . . . An outstanding first novel.”
— Booklist, starred review
“Jessica Levine has crafted a lyrical and realistic examination of the complications and exhilarations of romantic entanglements. . . . Julia is a compelling and relatable protagonist. “
— Foreword Reviews
Nothing Forgotten
Anna’s story.
Nothing Forgotten
A Booklist top-10 women’s fiction pick for 2019
Winner Next Generation Indie Book Award (Second Novel)
Finalist Next Generation Indie Book Award (General Fiction)
First Place, Northern California Publishers Association (General Fiction)
Merit, CIPA EVVY Book Award, (Women’s Fiction)
“A vivid travelogue . . . reminded me of the Italian television series . . . that proved compulsively engrossing, ‘The Best of My Youth,’ . . . delicious insights into Italian life.”
— San Francisco Chronicle
“Fans of Emma Straub, Anne Tyler, and Liane Moriarty will adore Levine’s treatment of domestic drama . . . . Immersing the reader in Roman decadence and San Francisco’s modernity, Nothing Forgotten is an intricately layered, deeply heartfelt, and bittersweet novel.”
— Booklist, Starred Review
“. . . an example of women’s fiction at its best. Its exploration of history, memory, family, and the particular struggles of women looking for experiences and love is enjoyable, memorable, and thought-provoking all at once.”
— Foreword Reviews
“A richly detailed story of passion and failure, deception and honesty, with anticipation and nostalgia. It is about making hard choices and living with those decisions, and the twisted ties that hold a family together.”
— Story Circle Book Review
About Jessica:
Jessica Levine
Jessica holds a B.A. from Wellesley College, an M.A. from Teachers College, Columbia University, and a Ph.D. in English Literature from the University of California at Berkeley, where she was a Mellon Fellow. After receiving her Ph.D., she decided not to pursue an academic teaching career, but to become a hypnotherapist. She trained at HTI (Hypnotherapy Training Institute) and has been practicing for 20 years. Jessica also has had a rich and varied experience teaching creative writing, composition, and literature in universities, high school, adult education, and the private sector. In 2014-15, Jessica held workshops on writing the novel at the American Library in Paris. Previously, she taught at the University of Toronto, New York University, and the University of California at Berkeley. She is the author not only of novels but also of a literary history, Delicate Pursuit: Discretion in Henry James and Edith Wharton. Visit her at her website.
Set during the excitement and tumult of the second wave of feminism and the sexual revolution, this coming-of-age novel about female friendship in the 1970s will appeal to fans of Kristin Hannah’s Firefly Lane.
It’s 1976, the second wave of feminism is in full swing, and three cousins share an apartment at Yale. Two are seniors; the third is starting graduate school. Each is seeking her own path in both love and work—but all three women, not quite knowing how to use the new freedoms available to them, alternate between supporting and undermining each other in their efforts.
Julia, the most conventional of the three, wants the security of her monogamous relationship with Ben but is attracted to other men. Anna plans on traveling the world to escape her boyfriend and alcoholic mother. Robin, who is bisexual, has various partners as she dreams of open relationships. All fall under the spell of a charismatic musician, Michael, who is too wounded to be available. By the end of a year of experiments and necessary mistakes, the cousins will make crucial decisions that will determine the course of the rest of their lives.
This prequel to Levine’s first two critically acclaimed novels, The Geometry of Love and Nothing Forgotten, dramatizes the struggles that women have faced and continue to face while entering adulthood in a world not quite ready to accept them as equals.
Pre-order Three Cousins at Amazon. Release date April 8, 2025.
About Jessica:
Jessica Levine
Jessica holds a B.A. from Wellesley College, an M.A. from Teachers College, Columbia University, and a Ph.D. in English Literature from the University of California at Berkeley, where she was a Mellon Fellow. After receiving her Ph.D., she decided not to pursue an academic teaching career, but to become a hypnotherapist. She trained at HTI (Hypnotherapy Training Institute) and has been practicing for 20 years. Jessica also has had a rich and varied experience teaching creative writing, composition, and literature in universities, high school, adult education, and the private sector. In 2014-15, Jessica held workshops on writing the novel at the American Library in Paris. Previously, she taught at the University of Toronto, New York University, and the University of California at Berkeley. She is the author not only of novels but also of a literary history, Delicate Pursuit: Discretion in Henry James and Edith Wharton. Visit her at her website.
Beneath the serene facade of Whidbey Island, danger silently weaves its way through the community. Deputy Sheriff Roger Wilkie thought he’d seen it all, but when the sinister leader of a polygamist religious sect and his ruthless enforcer unleash chaos, Roger is thrust into a deadly game of cat and mouse.
Wilkie knows the chilling truth, but capturing these elusive and cunning killers is an almost insurmountable challenge. With the help of the island’s colorful residents-including a physically intimidating former inmate who always seems to be in the thick of things-and two German Shepherds with uncanny detection skills, Wilkie navigates a world of tongue-in-cheek dialogue and razor-sharp sarcasm. This pulse-pounding thriller will keep you on the edge of your seat until the very last page.
Cozy Mysteries, mostly for an enjoyable humorous journey that takes the reader somewhere else, if only for a little while.
What makes your books different from other cozy mysteries out there?
The locales and perhaps the sarcastic sense of humor from the principal characters.
How did you come up with the ideas for your books?
Because of many hours spent on the ferries to Whidbey Island, I had always entertained the idea of a murder on one of my trips. Ferry Tails was my chance to bring the thought to life.
Where do you get inspiration for your stories?
Mostly the quirky characters I bump into while living on an island.
How did you do research for your book?
Much of the background for Ferry Tails is the result of my travels in Southern Utah and Arizona. My friendship with a retired Ferry Captain was invaluable in detailing the inner workings of the Washington State Ferry System
Your book is set in the Puget Sound area. Have you ever been there?
I live there.
Which was the hardest character to write? The easiest?
The most difficult was the leader of the breakaway religious cult. The easiest, of course, was Roger Wilkie.
How long have you been writing?
Off and on since my high school newspaper.
Do you write every day?
Pretty much. Unless I’m playing golf.
What is your writing schedule?
Every morning about 9 am until I get too stiff to sit in the chair.
Do you have another profession besides writing?
Nope.
What advice would you give budding writers?
Sit down and write. Then when you’re done for the day, think about what you’ve written, but write without thinking first—that’s when the real you happens.
What is your next project?
A mystery surrounding a murdered CEO of a pharmaceutical company whose demise is the result of an unknown organism.
What is the last great book you’ve read?
It’s an old one, but Word of Honor by Nelson DeMille made an indelible impression. Probably because I was a junior officer in the US Army during the same period as the story.
If your book were made into a movie, what songs would be on the soundtrack?
Ted Mulcahey has lived most of his life in the Pacific Northwest. He is an Army Veteran, sales and marketing VP, entrepreneur, business owner, avid reader, one of nine children, and proud husband who attributes his sense of humor to his mother and his wife.
For fans of Georgia Hunter’s We Were the Lucky Ones and Anita Abriel’s The Light After the War comes a historical narrative about the lives of Jewish immigrants in the early twentieth century and one woman’s journey through adversity toward personal freedom.
At an early age, Gitel questions the expected roles of women in society and in Judaism. Born in Belorussia and brought to the US in 1911 as a child, she leads a life constrained by her religious Jewish parents. Forbidden from going to college and pushed into finding a husband, she marries Shmuel, an Orthodox Jewish pharmacist whose left-wing politics she admires. They plan to work together in a neighborhood pharmacy in Chicago—but when the Great Depression hits and their bank closes, their hopes are shattered.
In the years that follow, Shmuel’s questionable decisions, his poor health, and his bad luck plague their marriage and leave them constantly in financial distress. Gitel dreams of going back to school to become a teacher once their one daughter reaches high school, but an unexpected pregnancy quashes that aspiration as well. And when, later, a massive stroke leaves Shmuel disabled, Gitel is challenged to combine caring for him, being the breadwinner at a time when women face salary discrimination, and being present for their second daughter.
Offering an illuminating look at Jewish immigrant life in early-1900s America, Gitel’s Freedom is a compelling tale of women’s resourcefulness and resilience in the face of limiting and often oppressive expectations.
Gitel’s Freedom
THE REVIEW
The change in Rayzel’s life from the moment she leaves Berisov, Belarus to South Bend, Indiana has more of an impact than Rayzel or anyone probably realizes. Not just in her life but also in that of her daughter and granddaughters to come.
What does a mother who doesn’t speak English, and basically refuses to learn to do so, which isolates her from the community around her, do in raising her daughter in a strange land? She keeps Gitel on a short leash, although that, to some extent, seems to be the implied way for observant Jews of the time. The sons have way more freedom than Gitel ever has.
I’ve read some reviews of Gitel’s Freedom that miss many of the book’s points and even misinterpret the meaning of others. This is an unfair treatment of the author and her creation. Believe me, if I didn’t like the book or didn’t believe what I’m saying, I wouldn’t mention it.
Themes throughout the book are shared by Gitel and her daughters in some form: fighting for their educational freedoms, and fighting for their social freedoms. The differences come from their situations and the decades they occur in. They all have obstacles but all know if you want something, you have to figure out how to reach the goal. You keep going. Faye and Ilana, Gitel’s daughters, learn that from their mother, even if they don’t immediately realize it at the time. They all face similar problems but due to their situations growing up, and situations in the moment of the problems, they all deal with them differently.
Gitel and Faye internalize their emotional responses, while Ilana, who was born much later and was partly raised by her sister Faye who was an American girl by this time, tends to express or at least show her displeasure more openly.
You can see the change from how Rayzel was upon arrival in South Bend in 1911 to how Ilana ends up being in Chicago in the 1960s, through the four women of the story.
Ilana ends up becoming that girl of freedom that Gitel wanted to be when she was young, but only through Gitel’s trials and with the aid of Gitel’s first-born American girl, Faye. Faye the Bridge, I’ll call her.
The story is honest in showing that not everyone is perfect, that no one is. Even if raised to accept and be one way, you aren’t always like that inside, even if portraying acceptance on the outside. It shows the realistic impact strife can take on even the most optimistic person. How even Gitel can allow her husband’s thoughts of their situation to seep in, even if it’s only a momentary thought. How strife can change someone, unexpectedly, for the good.
We get to see the honesty of the women’s feelings about their situations. The frustrations are mostly kept internal. But children will be children, and teen girls will be teen girls. And we get to see how each of the generations thinks from their points of view.
I can relate to Gitel in that I’m now my mother’s caregiver. It’s not something I ever expected to be. We aren’t that close but I’m the only child and it’s my responsibility to take care of her, even if that means I’m now an hour away from my own family, who I maybe get to see once a month for about four years now. I get her frustrations, her disappointments, and her wanting freedoms, and a break from the weight of it all. And I can understand her eventual feelings at the end. It’s not awful, as some believe it to be. It’s something that she has slowly seen coming for years, and been dealing with for all of that time.
Other things I really enjoyed about the book are the historical aspects. Very accurate ones. As many of you may know, I have my degree in History Education and have continued researching and reading history over the course of 30+ years. I’ve been doing ancestry research for a few years now. Yankel’s coming to America and the four years it takes to establish a living and earn enough to pay for passage for seven family members is exactly right. You can look at the family stories and the passenger lists of arrivals. My own family arrived in the 1600s and 1700s to America and much the same thing happened. The men came. Established a life. Then sent for the rest of the family.
I enjoyed the history of the lead-up to the first election of FDR, the optimism, the aftermath, the good, and the letdowns. The social justice aspects of the stories of Gitel and her children were a nice addition. Showing the organizations and how they worked in a relatable story form helped easily put them into perspective and into action. The slow progress of race relations leading to integration.
Reading some reviews for the book, I’ve noticed reactions to Gitel and her friend Sophie’s closeness and Gitel’s reactions to the comfort she feels from Sophie. To me, it seems appropriate for the story and puts some aspects of the story in better perspective. It actually, for me, might explain a lot if I want to interpret it one way over another.
The writing style of Gitel’s Freedom is easy to read and isn’t trying to be more than it needs to be. In fact, I think the language and structure starts off simpler and slowly advances along with the family’s time in America and their assimilation and actually being Americans. There is somewhat of an urgency or franticness, I think, to the way Frayzel thinks, less so with Gitel, although even though she doesn’t realize it there is still her mother’s influence on some of her thinking and reactions, and by the time of Faye and Ilana, they’re American girls… for good or bad. It all makes sense.
In all, I think this book is a good read to observe the way the members of a family progress through time from one generation’s place in time and views, to another’s.
IRIS MITLIN LAV grew up in the liberal Hyde Park neighborhood of Chicago, Illinois. She went on to earn an MBA from George Washington University and an AB from the University of Chicago, and to enjoy a long career of public policy analysis and management, with an emphasis on improving policies for low- and moderate-income families. She also taught public finance at Johns Hopkins University and George Mason University, and in 1999 received the Steven D. Gold award for contributions to state and local fiscal policy, an award jointly given by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management, the National Conference of State Legislatures, and the National Tax Association. Her first novel, “A Wife in Bangkok,” was published in 2020 by She Writes Press. “Gitel’s Freedom” is her second novel. Lav and her husband now live in Chevy Chase, Maryland, with Mango, their goldendoodle, and grandchildren nearby. Learn more about her life and work at: www.irismitlinlav.com
For fans of Georgia Hunter’s We Were the Lucky Ones and Anita Abriel’s The Light After the War comes a historical narrative about the lives of Jewish immigrants in the early twentieth century and one woman’s journey through adversity toward personal freedom.
At an early age, Gitel questions the expected roles of women in society and in Judaism. Born in Belorussia and brought to the US in 1911 as a child, she leads a life constrained by her religious Jewish parents. Forbidden from going to college and pushed into finding a husband, she marries Shmuel, an Orthodox Jewish pharmacist whose left-wing politics she admires. They plan to work together in a neighborhood pharmacy in Chicago—but when the Great Depression hits and their bank closes, their hopes are shattered.
In the years that follow, Shmuel’s questionable decisions, his poor health, and his bad luck plague their marriage and leave them constantly in financial distress. Gitel dreams of going back to school to become a teacher once their one daughter reaches high school, but an unexpected pregnancy quashes that aspiration as well. And when, later, a massive stroke leaves Shmuel disabled, Gitel is challenged to combine caring for him, being the breadwinner at a time when women face salary discrimination, and being present for their second daughter.
Offering an illuminating look at Jewish immigrant life in early-1900s America, Gitel’s Freedom is a compelling tale of women’s resourcefulness and resilience in the face of limiting and often oppressive expectations.
IRIS MITLIN LAV grew up in the liberal Hyde Park neighborhood of Chicago, Illinois. She went on to earn an MBA from George Washington University and an AB from the University of Chicago, and to enjoy a long career of public policy analysis and management, with an emphasis on improving policies for low- and moderate-income families. She also taught public finance at Johns Hopkins University and George Mason University, and in 1999 received the Steven D. Gold award for contributions to state and local fiscal policy, an award jointly given by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management, the National Conference of State Legislatures, and the National Tax Association. Her first novel, “A Wife in Bangkok,” was published in 2020 by She Writes Press.“Gitel’s Freedom” is her second novel. Lav and her husband now live in Chevy Chase, Maryland, with Mango, their goldendoodle, and grandchildren nearby. Learn more about her life and work at:www.irismitlinlav.com
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