Ireland, horses, and a senseless fire fuel Connie Johnson Hambley's thrillers

HALLIE EPHRON: Talk about a circuitous path. Connie Johnson Hambley grew up on a dairy farm. She went on to have a successful career in law and banking. Now she’s about to release her second thriller featuring Jessica Wyeth, a New England horse trainer forced to come to terms with her own experiences in the war for reunification of Northern Ireland. Connie’s first book, The Charity, explores the impact of the business of terrorism on Jessica’s life in the States and its sequel, The Troubles, due out at the end of this year, picks up the story in Ireland.

Connie, were you drawing on dairy farming or law and banking when you wrote these books?

CONNIE HAMBLEY: Every family has its stories, and some of the best fiction begins with the nuggets of lore and truth picked up along the way. I grew up in New York State on a sprawling, picture-perfect farm filled with cows and horses. My grandparents were Irish immigrants who lived the American dream by starting a dairy delivering milk in a horse drawn wagon and growing it big enough to employ many men who worked hard to support their own families.

That bubble burst when the barn was burned down by one of those men. You can imagine the tizzy my parents went through trying to make sense of that! It was my first real glimpse of the darker side of life.

The arsonist who threw the lit matches into our hayloft didn’t look like he could do such a thing. As I played with my Chatty Cathy doll in the middle of the kitchen floor, I listened to men in uniforms and suits ask my parents a lot of questions.

There was so much more going on than I could comprehend at the time, and it all has become fodder for different themes I incorporate into my books.

I learned he confessed, but was set free at trial because of procedural issues. Years later, he showed up on our back porch and knocked on our door. My mom didn’t recognize him at first, if she had she might have reached for a shotgun, but he introduced himself as the guy who burned down her daddy’s barn!

I think the injustice of that drew me into becoming a lawyer, and the incongruities of a bucolic life tinged with arson jarred the mental wheels into motion. The stories didn’t stop when I went into banking. The same type of gall that prompts someone to torch a cow barn ripples through all sorts of money laundering schemes. I really don’t have to dig that far to find a lot of great stuff for stories!

I’ve witnessed some incomprehensible things in real life, so why not have some fun with it by tweaking them in fiction?

HALLIE: Have you trained horses? Jumped? Competed? Or watched it mostly from the stands?

CONNIE: I’ve trained and competed on both hunters and jumpers, so I know the grit needed to get a half ton animal to respond to a pipsqueak kid on its back.

Don’t let their big brown eyes fool you. There’s a big, independent brain clicking away that’s trying to figure out a way around that obstacle, not over it. It’s an incredible feeling to sail over a fence astride a horse. I bring that essence of strength and awe into my character and it’s something my readers respond to.

I’ve been lucky enough to have owned six horses, but I’m currently a horse lover without a horse. I get my equine fix by volunteering to help folks with special needs learn how to ride at Windush Farms in North Andover, MA.

HALLIE: What’s your Irish connection?

CONNIE: Growing up, I was surrounded by brogues, pale skin and clergy. My ancestors hail from County Cork in the south and Drumshanbo in northwest Ireland, about twenty miles from the border of Northern Ireland.

HALLIE: I hope you had to travel to Ireland to research this book.

CONNIE: I traveled there a few years ago and can’t wait to go back. Everything you hear about the natural beauty and wonderful people in Ireland is true.

The most amazing experience I had was traveling down a narrow road near Kinsale on the southwestern coast and coming across a stone circle, like Stonehenge, but this one was only about thirty feet in diameter. It was too small to be noted on any tourist map, and the locals didn’t want to talk about it.

Whoo, boy! That got me thinking! The boulders were lichen covered and mossy, just the way you’d want them to be! Maybe it was my writer’s imagination gone wild, but I could feel the difference in energy there.

The delicious tingling feeling of that discovery has stayed with me and is something I hope to impart to my readers.

HALLIE: We were in Ireland this summer and I felt that magic visiting a stone circle, too. 

Tell us what you’re working on next, and where our readers can meet you in person.

CONNIE: After The Troubles is launched, I’ll be able to focus on a memoir exploring the impact of the barn fire on my family. Then it’s back to work on the third book of the series.

September 26 will find me roaming the halls of my law school alma mater and Barrister’s Book Shop at Vermont Law School. October 19 – 21 I’ll be at the New England Library Association Conference in Boxborough, Massachusetts and on October 25 I’ll be at the Boston Book Festival. At BBF, for one special reader of this blog who mentions this post to me and the secret passphrase “Jungle Red Writers Rock,” I’ll have a signed copy of my book as a gift for him or her!

HALLIE: Connie will be checking in today and answering questions and comments. My question: How does travel fuel your imagination?

Coming Soon! The Troubles

    Jessica Wyeth is no longer a fugitive hiding under assumed identities. Through sheer grit, she has reclaimed her life only to find out that what she fought for was an illusion. She is not the child of a picture-perfect New England family, but an unwanted castaway.
    Broken, she tries to move forward by traveling to a remote town in northwest Ireland to train horses for a harrowing private jump race. Michael Conant, the rightful successor to his father’s dubious empire and the man she owes her life to, has set her up with everything she needs–world class horses, connections, and bodyguards.

    Michael and Jessica struggle with their pasts and wonder if they are collateral damage in the war for the reunification of Northern Ireland or an integral part of its troubles. Jessica immerses herself in learning about her mother, only to find betrayal in her mother’s truths. Michael rejects the legacy of his father and is tested on how far he will go to keep her.

    When attempts are made on her life, Jessica questions if it is her past that is catching up with her, or Michael's. Leaving the past buried could expose her to becoming another casualty of war.

   “The Troubles,” sequel to “The Charity” and second in a series, continues the story of Jessica Wyeth.