Holiday Release!

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For those new to the Italian Kitchen Mysteries, I’m offering a holiday sampler. The best part? It’s only $0.99! Here’s the book description:

Meet Victoria Rienzi, mystery-author-turned-sleuth, as she returns to the Casa Lido restaurant to research her family history and learn her formidable nonna’s secret recipes. Get to know her quirky family—besides Nonna, there’s her sweet mom and dad, her brother Danny, a cop with a serious demeanor but a heart of gold, and her sassy sister-in-law, Sofia, who serves as her partner in crime solving. (And just for fun, there’s her hunky ex, Tim, sous chef at the restaurant, as well as the enigmatic Cal, a charming woodworker who may be more than he appears.) Make yourself at home in the beach setting of Oceanside Park—take a turn on the boardwalk, dip your toes in the ocean, and stop at the Casa Lido for a great Italian meal.


The sampler includes:
--Excerpts from Murder and Marinara, The Wedding Soup Murder, and Book 3 in the series, the upcoming A Dish Best Served Cold, as well as a special sneak teaser from Book 4, Minestrone Mischief
--A never-before-published short story, “Mystery Man.”
--A dozen recipes from the Casa Lido, the seaside restaurant featured in the books, including antipasto, salads, sauces and pasta dishes, and of course, dolci—desserts!



The Queen of Comfort Reads: Mary Stewart

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When the world gets you down (which seems to be fairly often these days) may I recommend a nice, warm helping of Mary Stewart? Stewart had a long and prolific career, stretching from the fifties through the nineties. Though she wrote a number of Arthurian fantasy novels, it is her body of romantic suspense novels for which she is best known, and probably best loved, starting with Madam, Will You Talk? in 1955 through Rose Cottage in 1997.

Stewart’s heroines are smart, adventurous, brave, and occasionally sassy. Reading these novels as a young girl, I found myself wishing to be one of these independent young women, finding adventures—and love—in the wilds of Scotland or on a sunny Greek isle. Several years ago, I searched out first editions of Stewart’s romantic suspense novels through the seventies, the same library editions I’d read and loved. And while they are not in perfection condition, this little collection is one of my most prized possessions.

I cannot say exactly what it is about these books that brings me such pleasure—the evocative settings, the sense of being transported to another time and place, the often tender and bittersweet love stories at their centers? I just know that on a rough day, I need a little of Mary’s “rough magic.”

What about you, friends? Which books get you through difficult times?

(For a deeper dive into all things Stewart, check out this wonderful blog, Mary Queen of Plots.)

Nancy Drew, I Love You

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I stole the title of this post from a poem by Maria Mazziotti Gillan, an Italian-American  poet from Paterson who has an uncanny knack of telling my life story in her work. In the poem, the speaker describes Nancy Drew as the best friend she didn't have, the adventurous girl she wanted to be but was too timid. Like Gillan's eleven year old speaker, I, too, was a fraidy cat--fearful of getting hurt and getting in trouble, so my adventures had to be vicarious.

And like so many of us who end up writers, I found those adventures in books. For that I will be forever grateful to Carolyn Keene, who allowed me to explore hidden staircases and haunted bungalows without ever leaving my house. And for giving me a smart, plucky heroine who had her own blue convertible (and who found solving mysteries more stimulating than her boyfriend Ned.) Nancy Drew was the kind of girl I could be some day, if I were lucky. As Gillan so eloquently puts it:

Nancy Drew, I still love you for taking me away with you,

carrying me away from the tight confines of my life,

to a place where everything is possible

and bravery is common and miraculous as stars.

Excerpt from Italian Women in Black Dresses, by Maria Mazziotti Gillan

Blog Tour: The Wedding Soup Murder

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I hope you’ll join me for fun giveaways, interviews, and the sharing of special recipes from the Italian Kitchen!

From October 11-16, I’ll be touring with the wonderful bloggers at Great Escapes Book Tours for the release of The Wedding Soup Murder. Here’s the schedule:

October 12 – Cozy Up With Kathy 

October 12 – Escape With Dollycas Into A Good Book 

October 13 – Brooke Blogs 

October 13 – Christa Reads and Writes 

October 13 – Sapphyria's Book Reviews –

October 14 – Literary Gold 

October 14 – Celticlady's Reviews 

October 15 – FUONLYKNEW 

October 15 – Maureen's Musings 

October 16 – I Read What You Write 

October 16 – Mystery Thrillers and Romantic Suspense Reviews 

Quick Glimpses: The Wedding Soup Murder

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Photo by Pat Whelen on Unsplash

Photo by Pat Whelen on Unsplash

In the second book of the Italian Kitchen Mysteries, The Wedding Soup Murder, Victoria is charged with helping cater a wedding at a fancy country club that overlooks the beach. When the club’s president is found dead the morning after the reception, our sleuth returns to the scene of the crime:

From where I stood, I could see that the walkway to the beach was lined with a mix of natural vegetation and flowers that grow in sandy soil. The path was a good distance from the club, and the beach grass was high enough to obscure anyone walking there, especially at night. I crept along the side of the path, my heart thrumming in my chest. Sneaking around in places I shouldn’t be was the part of detecting I hated (and Sofia thrived on). In the distance was the ocean; in front of me the platform and a steep drop to the beach below. I kept my eyes on the horizon as I approached the wooden structure, trying with little success to look as though I belonged on a crime scene. The railing around the platform would have been waist high for my sixty-five inches; Merriman was taller. But there was no gate across the stairway, and the steps looked narrow. She probably fell forward, straight over the stairs. . .

Why I Love Nora Ephron

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Nora Ephron was my biggest girl crush. My biggest influence and inspiration as a writer. You know that New York Times feature, “By the Book,” in which writers are asked who would be invited to their fantasy dinner parties? Well, Nora would definitely have a seat at my imaginary table. Like her, I started out as a journalist, and when I turned to fiction, I began by writing romantic comedies. I’ve been following Ephron’s career since I read Crazy Salad in college. Heartburn has a special place on my bookshelf, (and I still hate Carl Bernstein). This past Mother’s Day, my sons hit it out of the park with their gift: a signed first edition of Ephron’s essays. I keep it in my office, over my desk. Just looking at the cover makes me happy.

Ephron is the kind of writer who makes you feel as though you know her; it’s that unmistakable voice—smart and funny and loud, unafraid to be both feminist and feminine. As a writer for Esquire, she held her own with the big boys, but also understood the power of a good meal—or a good hair cut, for that matter.       

In so much of her work, she tells the often uncomfortable truths about what women think and feel—open up to any page of I Feel Bad About My Neck; watch the scene in Sleepless when Rosie O’Donnell tells Meg Ryan: “You don’t want love. You want movie love.” (Damn right, Nora.)

 But we also want our place in the world, a theme Ephron explored in Julie and Julia, in which a young writer, Julie Powell, realizes her dream through the inspiration of the more famous and successful woman, Julia Child. A bit like Nora and me. . .