Apples and Autobiography

Cortland apples.

This is a classic "writer's autumn" for me: bringing out a novel in print at last, while also working on a book version of the Vermont memoir I began after Dave's death. (Segments piled up on Medium; if you're curious, read them here.)

In writing the memoir as segments that I placed online, I excavated a heck of a lot of trauma. That turned out to be healthy for me -- but only, I think, because I grew through it, and now I'm in a stage of life that I loosely label "getting off the trauma merry-go-round." Life is good, and I want to pull the pieces together and show how that happened.

So the working title for the book is LOOKING FOR THE LIGHT, and today in chapter 2, I'm writing about apples and related recipes and reasons.  Here's a scrap:

Today I still rely on a shelf of traditional cookbooks, but it’s leavened (that’s a baking powder term!) with vegetarian ones, a paleo gem, international and ethnic compendiums, and, most important for this region, the Bentley Farm Cookbook.

This astonishing volume, eight and a half by twelve inches across the front and more than an inch thick, contains the hand-lettered recipes of one of the region’s beloved home cooks, Virginia Bentley. When I complimented a slice of pie at a community dinner last year and (as we do here) asked for the recipe, the baker said, “Oh, it’s Virginia’s, from the book. You have the book, of course.” She wasn’t asking me whether I had it—she knew I must.

Here's the cookbook, with a bit of the apple portion of the index, and a recipe to show you how different Virginia Bentley could be in how she talked about cooking.

 

The Winds of Freedom: How Vermont's Northeast Kingdom Approached Abolition

In this presidential election season, I think it's been clear that the effects of the American Civil War continue to affect beliefs around the country. President Lincoln's long approach to the abolition of human enslavement in America gave us a fundamental piece of today's view of human citizenship in our nation. At the same time, the long delay in getting there, with some 250 or more years of enslavement behind that, contributes to an awareness that we are not always as "good" or principled as we ought to be. And now we have a nation divided on what goodness and principle mean.

In the 1990s, when I began writing my historic novels, I came face to face with prevailing myths in Vermont history that dismayed me. Many of them revolved around the Underground Railroad, one of the heroic efforts in America in the early to mid 1800s. What we know today, historically, is that the Underground Railroad in Vermont might as well have been called the Aboveground Railroad -- because in the theme noted now at Rokeby in North Ferrisburgh, Vermont, if you were Black and reached Vermont in the 1850s (or had lived here for many years already, like the Mero family of Coventry), you were "Free and Safe." No need for hiding places.

But many people couldn't process that idea when I talked about it. So, based on my personal connection with historic fiction, I opted to write about the 1850s here through the voices and experiences of local people, hoping that readers could internalize that experience and reshape their own vision of what happened.

That led to THE LONG SHADOW, book 1 in the Winds of Freedom series, set in North Upton (aka North Danville) in 1850, from the points of view of teenagers enmeshed in adventures there. At the moment, the printed version is out of stock, but you can get the ebook here. Also ask Kim at Green Mountain Books to watch for a gently used copy for you!

More about that story later this week ... and then about books 2 and 3.

If you'd like to hear how the abolitionists of St. Johnsbury, Vermont, and the surrounding towns saw their world in the 1850s and how they entered the movement toward abolition, here's my talk recorded at the St. Johnsbury Athenaeum. I hope you find some fascinating discoveries when you listen/watch it.

Billy Boyle World War II Mystery #19: THE PHANTOM PATROL, James R. Benn

Sure, autumn is great for crisp air, colorful leafs, and seasonal sports. But when cold rain or darkness (or needing a break) sends you back indoors, one of the big treats of the season is a new Billy Boyle mystery from James R. Benn. And number 19 in the series, THE PHANTOM PATROL, comes out this month. 

Apparently the publisher suffers from mild autumn flu or something, and has pushed back the release date to September 24. Definitely a nuisance for the author, as well as for bookstores hosting release events! But it will all work out. And I've got an advance copy, so I can fill you in and you can place a pre-order now, for delight in three weeks.

Yes, the new Billy Boyle is a keeper! This series has moved slowly through World War II, digging up extraordinary pockets of history that this young Irish cop turned wartime detective (working for "uncle Ike," General Eisenhower) discovers in assignments, official or not. His powerful friendship with Kaz, a Polish baron also working in his corps, his alliance with his boss Colonel Harding, and his romance with the very British Diana, who has even engaged in espionage behind German lines, have all lit up the books and given them emotional resonance.

In that way, THE PHANTOM PATROL cuts new ground for Benn. Although Kaz and a few others are with him as the book opens in the darkness of a Paris night, December 13, 1944, in the enormous Père Lachaise cemetery, much of the action depends instead on how Billy interprets what's going on a round him. We get to track his experience, his questions, and his choices, smart or not, as he sorts things out.

"I fired at the afterimage of the muzzle flash, then ducked as another burst slammed into the mausoleum. Kaz let off two more shots and I backed up, taking cover behind a tree as a gunman fired into the position I'd just vacated. I didn't have a clear shot at him, but as I scrambled between the graves, I realized these guys must be soldiers." 

Most of these enemies escape—leaving only one behind, neatly executed so he won't talk. "Excellent planning and ruthless approach," comments Billy's friend Kaz. ""Who are we dealing with here?" 

"And what the hell was in that grave?" I asked.

A quick bit of perspective: At this point in the war, the German occupying forces in France knew they'd been licked, and most officers invested in personal aspects of retreating. That included carrying away the spoils of war, which notoriously included priceless artwork. But others may have a stake in the profits. Soon it's clear that the gang activity Billy's hunting down must be engaged with masterful paintings. The obvious questions are, how are they being moved and how can the American team cut the supply lines?

Lightening up the action are cameo appearances from some of the American noncombatants embracing Paris and sometimes reporting for newspapers or enlarging their careers. Watch for J.D. Salinger and Ernest Hemingway, as well as British actor David Niven, drawing on his own military expertise from between the two wars. (I found myself pausing often to look up some of the surprises, and Niven's career was one of the really remarkable ones.)

David Niven (Wikipedia).

Benn is fully trustworthy as a historian and researcher, and deftly braids his details into Billy Boyle's investigations and personal stakes. It's hard to guess how long this series will run, as Benn's been adept at mining the war, month by month—but readers know the war will end, maybe not as soon as Billy and Kaz and Diana would like, but as even the Nazis know, the tide has turned and can't be resisted. Ramping up the suspense of this period is Benn's subtle threat to the relationship between Billy and the love of his (young) life: Will a Boston cop and an English aristocrat find a way to sustain their love and purposes when peace finally arrives?

Billy's own comment near the end of the book sums up what's at stake, and I can quote it without spoiling the plot: "When this is over, it damn well better have been worth it. We deserved a world worthy of both the sacrifice of the dead and those exquisite paintings. We deserved a world of love and beauty."

Don't miss this episode; it's the footing for the remaining Billy Boyle volumes, a rich platform of meaning and suspense garbed in the significant history of our time.