Dear Reader Column -- April 13, 2021

Dear Reader,

If you work at a library, today's the last day to enter my Chocolate Chip Cookie Giveaway. If you're one of the three lucky winners, a batch of my homemade chocolate chip cookies will be delivered right to your front door. To see photos of past librarians and book club readers dunking and munching, and to enter, click here.

Please take a minute and email this week's guest author Marcia Talley. She has written Done Gone, and seventeen previous novels featuring Maryland sleuth, Hannah Ives. A winner of the Malice Domestic grant and an Agatha Award nominee for Best First Novel, Marcia won an Agatha and an Anthony Award for her short story Too Many Cooks and an Agatha for her short story Driven to Distraction. She is author/editor of two star-studded mystery collaborations, Naked Came the Phoenix and I'd Kill For That, and her short stories appear in more than a dozen magazines and anthologies. Marcia divides her time between Annapolis, Maryland and restoring a quaint Loyalist cottage in the Bahamas which was devastated by hurricane Dorian.

In Marcia's latest novel, Done Gone, Hannah Ives is worried when her long-time neighbors, Peter and Trish Young, are a surprising no-show at her Italian night. As she struggles to make sense of the Youngs' inexplicable disappearance, Hannah gets a call from Trish. But when she meets up with her heavily disguised friend, their reunion takes a devastating twist.

Marcia has two copies of "Done Gone" for two lucky book club winners. Say "Hello" and when you do, you'll be entered in the book giveaway. Email: marcia.talley@gmail.com

The Family Vault

It started simply, as addictions usually do. I spit into a test tube and sent it off for DNA testing. While awaiting results, I began constructing my family tree on a popular genealogy website and found myself sucked, head-first, down a rabbit hole as I began visiting my relatives...the dead ones, that is.

Fortunately, there's a lot I already knew. A great-great-uncle on my father's side was deep into genealogy and wrote a book about it. Then there's my Mormon cousin who provided a family tree that takes our family back--seriously--to Ragnhild "Hilda" Hrolfsdatter, born in 0836 in Maer, Norway.

Confession: their deaths fascinate me.

Sometimes tombstones tell the tale. In November 1910, baby Robert Culver, my second cousin once removed, lived only six hours. His mother, Helen, died a day later.

Or obituaries in local newspapers. "Papa Hise," a relative on my mother-in-law's side, fetched the shotgun from the attic, killed the family dog before the horrified eyes of his daughter, Odie Grace, then shot himself in the head. Then there was the Brelsford great-uncle who went West to seek his fortune. When prospecting didn't pan out, he shot his car before turning the gun on himself. Better the car than the dog, I say.

But the real treasure are the death certificates you discover online. My second great-grandmother Helen Drew lost four children, ages 15, 17, 20 and 25, in a single year during a typhoid epidemic. I. Can't. Even. My husband's step-grandfather, drop-dead handsome James, was caught between train cars and decapitated.

One relative was stabbed to death at age 21. What's that all about, I wonder? Another, a Rebel, died of smallpox in a Yankee prisoner of war camp. My great-grandmother, Marcia Jane Drew, for whom I was named, died at age 42 in Lowell, Massachusetts during dental surgery, or so my grandfather firmly believed. And yet there's her death certificate, staring me in the face: ovarian tumor. As a cancer survivor who confidently stated "no history of cancer in my family" that would have been good to know. My third great-grandmother, Sarah Drew, died of "suicide by hanging." Really? At age 84? I feel a novel coming on.

Genealogy is now a passion. After building my own family tree, I happily help friends research theirs. If the contents of friend and family closets ever peter out, what with the popularity of Scandinavian Noir these days, maybe I'll start writing under a family-inspired pseudonym--Hilda Hrolfsdatter has a nice ring to it, don't you agree?

-- Marcia Talley

Email: marcia.talley@gmail.com and when you do you'll be entered to win one of two copies of her new book, Done Gone.

Thanks for reading with me. It's so good to read with friends.

Suzanne Beecher
Suzanne@DearReader.com

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Comments

[MAUREEN CHADWICK]

Hilda Hrolfsdatter is a definite game changer. Who could possibly resist buying her book to find out where she got her name!
Loved your article.

[Suzanne Dana]

What a fascinating book it would be if this is just a taste of the stories! I’ll have to keep my eye out for Hilda Hrolfstatter on bookshelves!