Barbara Bretton's Rolls-Royce

I am eating lunch at the counter in Atlantic City when Nicky DellaNova sits down next to me. I know he is Nicky DellaNova because he bellowed his name to the hostess at the entrance to the coffee shop.

“You got a cigarette?” Nicky asks.

I shake my head. “I don’t smoke.”

“You got a match?”

“Sorry.”

“So what are you doing here?” Nicky asks, as if smoking were the only possible reason a woman would be in the coffee shop.

I gesture toward my salad and iced tea. “Having lunch.”

“Have a burger why don’t you? Get some protein.”

"Plenty of protein right there," I say, pointing toward my chicken Caesar.

"You call that protein? You want protein, you eat beef. Case closed."

He wears a dark blue velour running suit with wide white stripes running up the sides, virgin running shoes, black socks, and serious bling. This is Atlantic City. He blends right in.

Nicky is a big man who is good-looking in a loud, Brooklyn kind of way. We had his type in Queens, too, when I was growing up. There’s a sweetness buried beneath the bravado. You just have to get through the bluster to find it.

“Bacon cheeseburger, fries, cuppa coffee,” Nicky tells the waitress then turns back to me. “So what’re you doing here?”

I tilt my head in the direction of the casino one hundred yards away from where we’re sitting.

“Yeah,” says Nicky DellaNova. “I’m a big gambler. That’s why I’ve been married four times.”

“Ah,” I say in my best noncommittal voice. “A romantic.”

“Yeah,” he says. “It’s a curse.”

“My grandfather’s a romantic too,” I say. “He was married five times.”

“You a romantic like your grandpa?”

“Not me. I just have one husband.”

“That’s too bad,” he says and he laughs.

“Why is it too bad?”

"That's like eating salad every day for the rest of your life."

"Lots of people eat salad every day."

"Okay, babe, then it's like driving one car for the rest of your life. Can’t do it.”

“Sure you can,” I say. “You find a car you like, you keep it tuned up, it lasts forever.”

“Nah,” says Nicky DellaNova. “Sooner or later it rusts out and you’ve got to start shopping around again.”

“Not if you have the car rust-proofed,” I say. “Lifetime guarantee.”

Nicky laughs again. “No such thing as a lifetime guarantee. Not in this world. Besides, don’t you ever want to trade up? Just because you start with a Chevy don’t mean you gotta end up with one.”

“What if you like Chevys?”

“Nothing wrong with liking Chevys, but sooner or later everyone wants to own a Caddy.”

I’ve never been much of a Caddy fan myself. Too flashy. Too easy to come by. “What if you already have a Rolls? What then?”

He peers at me so closely that I can make out the faint outline of soft lenses resting against his corneas. “You got a Rolls?”

“What if I do?” I say. “Let’s say I went out and bought a Rolls the day I got my license.” Let’s say I found that Rolls the first day I walked into my very first showroom and let’s say I still like sliding behind the wheel.

“You gotta love a Rolls,” he concedes. “Even the old ones.”

“And they look great,” I say. “Especially the old ones.”

“I hear you, babe, but even a Rolls gets boring if that’s all you drive.”

“If driving a Rolls gets boring, maybe it’s not the car,” I say. “Maybe it’s the driver.”

Nicky DellaNova considers my words while he folds a handful of fries into his mouth. “My Uncle Joey had a showroom on Utopia Parkway. He had Chevys and Fords and Buicks and Chryslers and even some of those Mercedes jobbies.” He takes a bite of his cheeseburger and continues talking. Little bits of pinkish beef dot his lower lip. “One day a guy comes in, one of those skinny guys with the fancy suits like you see in the city. So he walks up and down the lot with Uncle Joey right behind him. 'Take a test drive,' Uncle Joey says, pointing to a big white El Dorado. 'How ya gonna know what you like if you don’t get behind the wheel?'” He gulps down some coffee, folds in another fry. Nicky DellaNova knows more about pacing than most Hollywood screenwriters. “So this guy stops, he lights up a cigar, looks at Uncle Joey and says, 'Ya got any used Rolls-Royces around here?' And Uncle Joey says, 'You gotta be kidding. Once you get yourself a Rolls, you don’t go trading down to a Ford.'”

“Listen to your Uncle Joey,” I say to Nicky DellaNova as I catch sight of my husband standing in the entrance to the coffee shop. “After a Rolls-Royce, everything else is second best.”


Barbara Bretton is the USA Today bestselling, award-winning author of more than 40 books. She currently has over ten million copies in print around the world. Her works have been translated into twelve languages in over twenty countries. Barbara loves to spend as much time as possible in Maine with her husband, walking the rocky beaches and dreaming up plots for upcoming books. Her newest novel in the Sugar Maple series, Laced With Magic, is available now.

Bohemian Highway

--Adrienne Miller

I have a favorite plotting spot and it comes with a side salad and a bowl of minestrone soup. How’s that for service?

Its a ways away. A couple hours drive. Far enough that I feel like I’m getting away, but not so far that I think twice before loading up the family and making a day of it.

Its better if Tom drives, that way I can stare out the window as we pass over the bridge, through the wetlands, and up the freeway. Thats when the ideas start coming--just a trickle at first. Its not until we take the off ramp in the middle of Cotati that my imagination really gets going.

Sonoma County. I’m in love with it. 

We start rolling down those long country roads, the sound of my latest story soundtrack playing, and I watch it all go by. The patches of wildflowers along the shoulder. The cow pastures. The Russian River. The vineyards. And, my favorite, the apple orchards. 

I don’t know the names of the roads we turn on--maybe Tom does--but I know them all by landmark. There’s the left at the old Washoe House, and the turn at the tin movie theater, and the curve in the road that takes you past the house that I’m just going to have to use in a story.

And then there’s the food...Cause this supposed to be about food, right? 

If its the weekend we might stop at the Farmer’s Market in Sebastapol. Or there’s the apple pie place a few miles outside of town. And somehow we just always find ourselves driving past the Korbel Champagne Cellars and nothing, but nothing, in this world is more inspirational than a glass of Blanc de Noir. 

But those are all appetizers to when we turn down the Bohemian Highway (not kidding, thats the name of the road) and cruise into Occidental, a tiny town hidden away from the rest of the world. There you’ll find Negri’s, my favorite plotting spot.

You can’t miss it. There’s a giant neon sign with a martini glass on it and the handles on the entryway doors are a giant fork and spoon, just in case you needed reminding why you were there. The tables are covered in those plastic-coated red and white checked tablecloths that are great for easy clean up and serve as a warning to how messy you or, more likely, your kids might get.

And just as soon as our butts hit the seats, I slide out my notebook. By that time I’ve got two or three hours worth of ideas rattling around in my brain.

I  don’t have to worry about the kids. They’re happy as can be. Negri’s is a family place...a real family place. The kind of place that knows sometimes the two year old is going to put spaghetti in his hair. I order another glass of champagne or a cocktail and a plate of raviolis and get to work.

I’ll admit half the fun is that my favorite plotting partner is across from me. Tom doesn’t write books, but what he lacks in experience he makes up for in enthusiasm. And his ego isn’t bruised when I shake my head at some...most of his ideas. This is the man who thought Wayne Scotting would make a great character name, after all. 

The courses come out on rolling carts. Soup. Salad. Antipasta. And we eat it all, even the stuff I wouldn’t normally touch. Like the pickled peppers. I don’t like pickled food and I hate peppers. Yet at Negri’s I pop those bad boys into my mouth..and then gulp down the whole glass of water. 

The raviolis are wicked good. Everything is good. But I would be lying if I said we were only there for the food. Nope. It’s the place. The whole experience--the drive, the flavors and the feeling you get in a place where you can really relax and talk and laugh. And let the barn door of your imagination fly open.

Juliet's Appetite for Living

I have an astonishing ability to eat just about anything. I'm not sure that's a good thing -- and recent pictures of me demonstrate that it's really NOT-- but it did make me a successful anthropologist. Nothing like giving chili-sprinkled fried grasshoppers a go to ingratiate yourself with the local population in a small village in Mexico. Or gnawing on gelatinous chicken feet in a dim sum restaurant in San Francisco's Chinatown. Or actually asking to try seal meat while in a Yup'ik village.

After all, how can you understand the flavor of a culture without trying its food?

The other day I was in bar with a bunch of other mystery writers (why are we so often found in bars?) and a young man was talking about his stay in Sweden, where he was offered a fish dish that is considered a great delicacy. He knew he was in trouble when the family's young daughter ran outside to throw up the moment they broke the seal on the jar. It seems that they prepare the fish with a variety of spices, then let it putrefy in the ground for a year or so until it reaches its prime.
(About the picture at left: I'm sure they weren't eating clownfish, but isn't it cute?)

When Bouchercon (the big mystery conference) was up in Anchorage a couple of years ago, I took part in the Authors in the Bush program, which sends authors out to remote areas of the state. I flew on a bush plane out to a Yu'pik village right on the Bering Strait. Hooper Bay is still almost entirely native, and its people survive primarily by using traditional means of hunting and gathering. I was speaking at the school and asked the children about their family hunting trips, and one girl told me her favorite thing to eat was "mouse food."

At first I thought she was referring to "moss food" or some such, but I was wrong: she was talking about the stash of food mice build up all summer, carrying home grains and roots and berries in their mouths and tucking them away for the winter. Apparently it makes for quite a delicacy (though it seems cruel to steal the mouse's stash, they leave half for the mouse to eat). I was just as glad there wasn't any available for me to try -- the seal meat was about as far as I could take this whole adventurous gourmand thing.


(For more info on the trip, and pictures, check out my artloversmysteries blog here.)

I wrote my first mystery series with my sister, who doesn't like to cook, so our protagonist Annie Kincaid does great take-out -- which is pretty easy to do in the Bay Area: Mexican, Thai, Vietnamese, Ethiopian, German...you name it, it's available. The possibilities are endless.

But now that I'm writing a new series on my own, my protagonist --who happens to be a witch-- loves to cook. Like me, she observes that cooking is a kind of everyday magic. You can infuse your cooking with love and caring...there's a reason that the first thing you do when someone visits your home is to offer them food and drink. It's a way to show your affection and respect...or is that my food-loving parents speaking?

I grew up in a family that adored food, and cooking. Life revolved around the kitchen, where my mother whipped up her own mother's southern dishes --gumbo and cornbread were my favorites-- and my father honed dishes he invented during years of cooking at resorts in the Adirondacks and Santa Fe--including the unforgettable "Lawes steak" and "Lawes spaghetti".

These are indelible parts of my childhood memories now, as much --or more-- food for the soul as for the body.

Rachael Starves Her Characters

No one eats in my novels.

I forget to make them hungry. I'm the opposite of the food writers in that way. There are no recipes, no drool-worthy descriptions of [cream/spice/sugar/fill in the blank].

I think what it comes down to is that I'm really not that great a cook. I've learned that simple is the best way to go. If I get any fancier than a meat and a green, it's bound to get a little funny, and my characters have the same problem.

In the novel I'm working on now, my main character Lucy gets so flustered that she cracks two eggs into cold water and then tries to convince the hero that she's going to poach them. I had to go into my own kitchen and try it myself to see if she could get away with it (it's not pretty and raises lots of white foam, but it's doable). That and a dessicated Hershey bar that ends up getting thrown into the rafters of a de-sanctified church is the extent of the food in the current work in progress. Poor characters.

Maybe if I fed 'em better they'd act right. I know I act better after a good meal. I might try it.

Channeling Cass, Who Eats to Live

By Sophie

I'm a terrible terrible junk food addict, as the Pens know (especially those who roomed with me in D.C. and got dragged along for McDonalds runs). My taste in, well, taste is lowbrow and well-larded with lard.

I'm not into the sugar so much, but sprinkle salt on just about anything and deep-fry it and we're good. Potato chips are my core food, in particular those sturdy kettle-style salt-and-pepper deals. But I also adore hush puppies, clam fritters, onion rings, catfish, anything at all from the Frito-Lay folks....

(It turns out that both LGC's people - the English - and my people - the Poles - make a version of stale bread fried in bacon fat. Global delicious!)

This has worked out okay for me, surprisingly. I force myself to eat a decent diet, packing away the required fruits and veggies and so forth before prowling the larder late at night for sodium-rich foodstuffs composed of polyunsaturated fats. I don't even have to compete with the kids, because in a freakish departure from the family genes, they don't like junk food. (A shameful memory of mine is yelling at my then-eight-year-old, "You better eat that whole damn cupcake or no apple for you!")

However, change has come to Sophietown.

Starting last week, my diet underwent a dramatic overhaul. I'm eating for sustenance. Food as fuel - consumed indifferently, on the run, chosen for dietary efficacy and without a thought to palate appeal. Cereal and yogurt and fruit for breakfast, a simple sandwich or salad for lunch and dinner.

This isn't a diet and I don't care if I lose weight. Any improvement in my cholesterol or blood pressure or BMI will be unintended.

Because it's all about becoming Cass.

Cass Dollar is the heroine of my next book. I'm not sayin' much about her, because that will jinx the project, but Cass is a haunted young woman who views her body variously as a vehicle and an encumbrance and a ticking bomb. Cass is hardly a sensualist - her world is a lean and daunting place, and she neither seeks nor indulges pleasure of any kind, and certainly not when it comes to food.

I've never tried "method" writing before - the idea of being the character, at least during writing hours. But this project seems right for it. I feel a real affinity for poor Cass (don't worry, she has a redemptive arc and by the end of the book she'll probably be downing jelly donuts and champagne and dancing through sprinklers or something) and I want to understand who she is as clearly as I can, at least in the early days of the draft.

(Note that I just gave myself an out there. "Early days of the draft," I said, which is code for "if I really need a Dorito then all bets are off.")

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Barbara Freethy on Movies

UPDATED TO ADD: Leave a comment to enter a chance to win a free copy of Barbara's new book, Suddenly One Summer! She'll draw one winner...

USA Today Bestselling Author, Barbara Freethy, just released her 25th book, SUDDENLY ONE SUMMER, which is the beginning of her Angel's Bay Series for Pocket Books. She's written category romance, single title contemporary, romantic suspense and women's fiction, and her books have received numerous awards, including four RITA nominations and one RITA win for her novel DANIEL'S GIFT. Barbara is thrilled to be starting an ongoing series set in the fictional California coastal town of Angel's Bay, a community rich with interesting characters, historical legends, quilting, and a little bit of magic. You can read an excerpt from her new book at http://www.barbarafreethy.com/.

Hi everyone – thanks to the Pens Fatales for inviting me to guest blog. I’ve been reading through all the great movie lines and laughing out loud. I thought I’d talk about memorable movie themes.

Forbidden love is one of my favorites and I think The Thornbirds plays out this theme in a wonderful way. The love of Meggie Cleary for the handsome Ralph de Bricassart, the ambitious priest, is filled with rich conflict and tormented love. She loves him, but he loves God more. How can she compete? He tries to let her go, but he fails and in a moment of weakness makes love to her. In the end, he still goes back to the church. It’s the ultimate romantic conflict.

Another interesting theme is the “stranger in a strange land” as portrayed in the movie, Witness, with Harrison Ford. A young Amish boy witnesses a murder and the cop, John Book, goes into hiding with them in order to protect them. Their way of life is completely different from his, and through their eyes, he finds a new side in himself.

And then there are the community based movies, often about female friendships, The Ya-Ya Sisterhood, Steel Magnolias, How to Make An American Quilt. All of these movies are about family, relationships, life, death, rebirth. They make you laugh and they make you cry, and I like to do both!

I also love romantic comedies and crime capers. I enjoyed How To Lose A Guy in 10 Days which explores the ways women destroy their relationships with men. I didn’t find He’s Not That Into You quite as good, but I did like the theme that sometimes you have to accept the fact that no matter what you do, it’s not always right.

As a writer, I love to have a theme in each of my books. Sometimes I don’t know what it is until I’m done. In SUDDENLY ONE SUMMER, the first of my Angel’s Bay books, the theme of identity, and hiding from who you are, plays out in almost every thread. The heroine, Jenna, is on the run with her daughter, Lexie. The hero is a burned out reporter who doesn’t think he’ll ever be impressed or awed by anyone in life again, until he meets Jenna, who jumps into the bay to rescue a stranger. Reid knows that Jenna is hiding something. So is he. And telling the truth might be the greatest risk of all.

In my second book, ON SHADOW BEACH, which comes out next April, the theme is about memories and reunions. The heroine, Lauren, goes home to take of her father who is suffering from Alzheimer’s. She’s reluctant to make the trip because her sister was murdered there, and she’s never been back. Her father is clinging to each memory as his mind begins to fail. She’s choosing to forget the very things he wants to remember. And then there’s Shane, her first love. If she dares to go back there, she’s afraid she’ll lose her heart all over again.

In the book I’m current writing, IN SHELTER COVE, out next May, I’m playing around with the question of what’s real and what’s not, and how can you tell the difference?

So in books and in writing, I’m drawn to themes that challenge what we think about ourselves and each other. I love a good time of course – and pure entertainment is fine, too – Knocked Up for example! But I think the movies that stick with me the most resonate on some thematic level.

What are your favorite movie themes?

Memory is a Strange Thing

by Gigi

I've been known to declare that if a character or scene in a book is well crafted, when I think back on it, it'll take me a moment to remember whether I saw it in a movie rather than having read it.

I can almost swear I have seen actor Djmon Hounsou look out over the barren, blistering desert--after the last camel has died, the last drop of water has evaporated, and the dying members of the caravan have realized civilization is a three day walk away--and say stoically: "Only half a day for a running man."

I would swear I had watched this scene on the screen except for the fact that I know I read it in The Last Camed Died at Noon. (It's a dramatic scene. Trust me. You just had to be there.)

That book hasn't actually been made into a movie. Any directors out there reading this? It's a GREAT book.

One of my favorite movies (one that's a real movie outside of my imagination) is a romantic comedy mystery that wonderfully melds the worlds of real and fictional characters.

American Dreamer is the story of an American housewife who loves reading romantic thrillers. She enters a contest to write the best opening chapter for the "Rebecca Ryan" series of novels--and she wins. She's flown to Paris, and an attempted purse snatching leaves her with a bump on the head that makes her think she's the character Rebecca Ryan.

One of the main characters is a writer who writes the Rebecca Ryan novels, so the "real life" mystery of the movie gets mixed up with the plots and characters of the novels.

"I will not be outwitted by a two dimensional character from a cheap romantic thriller!" one of the characters exclaims at one point.

Right before he's proven wrong.

Now THIS is a movie I can also imagine being a damn good book.

Martha At The Movies

Movies are my life.

I mean that literally.

My packed, color-coded planner features movie premieres up to nine months in advance. If possible, I attend the midnight premiere because if you care about a movie, you'll love sleep over it and put your paying-job performance in jeopardy.

My personal life philosophies are peppered with movie lessons. Don't be a pushover. Marty McFly from Back to the Future will vouch for this. Sometimes, you just gotta dance it out. Kevin Bacon had it right in Footloose. Always trust the elderly, wise Asian guy. Thanks, Karate Kid.
My daily life dialogue is ripped from famous movies. Probably my most overused phrase is "No Shame." I say it 24 x 7. If a friend freaks out about gaining five pounds, taking too much vacation or being an obsessive Ren Faire fan, I tell her - hey - No Shame. It's gotten to the point where I've heard my friends echo the sentiment. I bet they have no idea where it's from - Rambo. Lieutenant Colonel Podovsky tells the titular character, "You may scream. There is no shame" while torturing the hell out of him.

I may be more obsessive than the average person. I may enjoy watching the same movies 5, 6, 7, okay, over 100 times (sit on that Sophie and Juliet, ya amateur Die Hard fans). The truth is - I value movies.
I value the way they connect people. The effect they have on social consciousness. Even sub-par piece o' crap train wreck movies. I guess I feel the same way about movies as I do about pizza - even bad ones aren't so bad. Every movie (read: every person, every idea, every book, everything and anything) offers something to someone.

Yeah, yeah, I know - that's probably from a movie, too.

Movie Lines

by Lisa Hughey

“Sarcasm is the refuge of losers.”

“Albuquerque. Snorkel. See I can do it too.”

“I hope you have Hobo stab insurance.”

“Buyers and sellers. Pimps and whores, pimps and whores.”

Out of context, many of these lines don’t have meaning. But give the line the right inflection and rhythm and suddenly it re-images an entire scene and feeling from a movie.

Movies are family time at my house. Movie night equals popcorn and Dots (you eat the Dot in the same mouthful as a big scoop of over-buttered popcorn and that taste of salty/sweet is out of this world) and all five of us snuggled together on the sectional sofa.

Our collective taste is eclectic. We watch everything from sci-fi (Serenity) to R-action adventure (The Movie That Shall Not Be Named–since I promised Martha) to PG-action adventure (National Treasure) to fantasy (Harry Potter) to quirky (Little Miss Sunshine) to sophomoric humor (Accepted) to animated (Titan A.E.). And if we all like a movie it becomes something we watch regularly. My favorites switch. For awhile, National Treasure was my go-to movie if nothing else appealed. All of the above are perennial favorites.

After watching a film over and over, some of those special lines, the zingers that amuse you every time, wiggle their way into your speech patterns like worms into your dirt. The quote is usually appropriate to the conversation but there is a moment where we connect on a deeper more intimate level.

Last week I asked son’s friend if the girl hanging around his house was his girlfriend.

My son was suitably embarrassed. “Mom.” As in, it’s none of your business.

To which I replied, “Fuck you, I’m old I can do what I want.”

Alan Arkin couldn’t have said it better. Friend’s eyes got round and big, thinking we were on the verge of a fight, then son and I started laughing.

So, sure the images are great, but it's the words that I remember and the emotions they evoked that stick with me.



Finally, (I couldn't resist) when you’re in the mood for a Bruce Willis fix....

“Come out to the coast, we’ll have a few laughs.” I promise there will be no guns blazing, but look out for lines flying. “Yippee Cay-Yay Mother Fucker.”


Lisa

ps–Just in case you aren’t sure where these quotes come from:

“Sarcasm....” Greg Kinnear’s character, Little Miss Sunshine
“Snorkel....” Riley, National Treasure
“Hobo stab....” Jonah Hill’s character, Accepted
“Pimps and whores....” Lewis Black’s character, Accepted
“F-U, I’m old....” Alan Arkin’s character, Little Miss Sunshine
Last one is from the movie that shall not be named....