The Great Crossroads--What Would YOU Do?

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: Is your main character YOU? How many times have you heard that, Reds and readers? And I say: every character is some little part of us, because they come from our experience or curiosity or fears or hopes or dreams or imaginings.  Our characters take shape from us, and learn from us.

But whoa.  The wonderful Wendy Tyson has realized she’s learned from her character? How does that work? 

Well, here's a hint. This is where Wendy lives now. 

Why?  Wendy can explain it best.

When A Character Lends You Courage

By Wendy Tyson

Sometimes real life takes its cues from fiction.

 The heroine of my Greenhouse Mystery Series, Megan Sawyer, had been at a crossroads—although she didn’t know it at the time. Early thirties, newly widowed, she’d poured what energy she had into her job as an environmental attorney at a large Chicago law firm. She spent her days defending large corporations against environmental claims and her nights mourning Mick, her late soldier-husband. 

Her grandmother, Bonnie “Bibi” Birch, a widow herself, had been her lifeline during the darkest days, calling her every morning to make sure she’d pried herself out of bed, and ringing again every evening to remind her she’d get through the long stretch of nighttime loneliness ahead. Eventually the two tethers to the real world—Megan’s job and Bibi—pulled her through, and Megan found that the sheer effort of breathing wouldn’t break her.

           

The days and months rolled on.

And then the call came. It was Megan’s father, Eddie Birch, asking her to come home, back to Winsome, Pennsylvania, the small Bucks County town where Megan first fell in love with Mick. Eddie had met someone, and they were planning to elope in her native Italy. Would Megan consider returning east? Bibi needed her. The old, historic farm, Washington Acres, where Megan had grown up, needed her. Mostly he needed her.

Megan, a rational woman by nature, weighed her options. Her license and career and paycheck were in Illinois. Her memories of marriage to Mick, truncated as they were, lived in Illinois. Her friends were there, her house was there. Yet somehow the decision was an easy one. Something was missing from her life. It wasn’t just Mick. It wasn’t just worry about Bibi or concerns about the old house or the farm with no one at the helm. She’d gone into environmental law to protect the environment, and yet day after day she found herself on the other side, arguing why chemicals weren’t linked to incidences of autism or cancer or lung disease, why workers weren’t impacted by the poisons they spread on fields. This wasn’t what she’d signed up for all those years ago.

Somewhere, somehow, she’d lost her way.

And so Megan left her life behind. She took up organic farming, remaking the farm into what it once was. She started a café and organic food shop. Her Chicago friends were aghast; why leave a comfortable life and a steady paycheck for something she hadn’t done since childhood? Many questioned her sanity, blaming her choices on grief. Megan knew in her deepest gut that this was right.

After A Muddied Murder was released, readers asked me how much of the book was autobiographical. Not much, I’d say. After all, I had a family. A satisfying legal career with a worthwhile mission. Roots in the Philadelphia suburb where I lived. Megan was bruised, young, unfettered. While her move, especially the career switch from lawyer to farmer, required courage, at the end of the day Megan needed to rebuild her life. She’d become comfortably numb, and Eddie’s call was the catalyst for change.

Megan and I were nothing alike. Or so I thought.

The idea for the Greenhouse Series was born in 2014. The first book released in 2016. Fast forward to 2017. My husband and I realized something wasn’t quite right. We loved the outdoors and the quiet and solitude of nature, yet we lived just miles from the city limit, in one of the most densely populated parts of the country.  

As a family we enjoyed hiking, biking, swimming, kayaking, and skiing, but we had to drive a considerable distance to enjoy any of these activities. My kids didn’t love their school, and we found ourselves spending more and more time in our cabin in Vermont. Sundays were rough; no one wanted to go back to the city. We’d sit on Interstate 87 in sullen silence, bracing for the traffic and congestion ahead.

But that’s life, right?

As I was writing the fourth Greenhouse mystery, exploring Megan’s choices and those of her family members, I started to do some real soul searching. The truth was, most of our vacations were taken in off the beaten path locations, and nearly every time we traveled we fantasized about what it would be like to live somewhere greener, more scenic, where the emphasis was on the environment rather than efficiency.

 It wasn’t that we didn’t love Philly; it was that we had landed there for law school and simply stayed. We never really considered if it was where we wanted to be. We acted dutifully, maintaining the house and lifestyle that were expected of us. But as Megan learned, doing what’s expected and doing what’s right are not always the same thing.

I grew more and more convinced that we could make some lifestyle changes and live where we wanted to live. It would take creativity and consensus—and courage, but I had a role model already: Megan. Hadn’t she paved the way? Didn’t I owe myself (and my family) the same chance to create an intentional life that I’d given my character?

We moved to Vermont last year. Our home is smaller, more modest. We have to drive an hour or more for big box stores. We share our garden’s bounty with deer and moose. 

My mailing address and my street address don’t match, and last winter the final patch of snow melted in May. But on Sunday nights, we linger outside under a canopy of stars—grateful that we’re not stuck on Interstate 87. And our dog Driggs can go swimming.

I have Megan to thank for that.

HANK: That is fascinating! When you say “Didn’t I owe myself (and my family) the same chance to create an intentional life that I’d given my character?” –that is truly profound. And I am now thinking about whether I have learned from Mercer—well, yes, I have. That is so interesting! (And I didn’t write the Donna Parker books-remember those—but I certainly learned from her!)

How about you, Reds and Readers? What have you learned from a fictional character?

ABOUT WENDY TYSON

Wendy Tyson is an author, lawyer, and former therapist who writes the bestselling Greenhouse Mystery Series and the Allison Campbell Mystery Series. Her short fiction has appeared in literary journals and in the short story anthology Betrayed: Powerful Stories of Kick-Ass Crime Survivors, and her novel A Dark Homage was recently accepted for publication in January 2020. Wendy is a contributing editor and columnist for The Big Thrill and The Thrill Begins. She and her husband recently moved their micro-farm from Pennsylvania to the Green Mountains of Vermont. For more information about Wendy, visit her at www.watyson.com

 Twitter, Facebook,Instagram and website--and her book buy links on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Indiebound.

 

ROOTED IN DECEIT

It’s summertime in Winsome. Washington Acres is abloom, Megan is preparing for the grand opening of their wood-fired pizza farm, and things with Megan’s beau, handsome Dr. Finn, are getting as hot as the August temperatures. 

But when Megan’s ne’er-do-well father arrives in Pennsylvania with his high-maintenance Italian wife, Sylvia, and announces they’re staying at the new yoga retreat center a town away, a sweet occasion sours.

Eager to secure pieces for her Milan boutique, Sylvia finagles a meeting with up-and-coming artist Thana Moore, whose work is showing at the retreat center. After their explosive encounter, Thana is murdered and Sylvia becomes the prime suspect. 

Only Sylvia isn’t the only one with ties to the artist—once upon a time, Thana Moore had been Megan’s best friend. 

As Megan delves into Thana’s past, piecing together the years since their falling out, she realizes that something sinister is afoot in Bucks County. Unless Megan can find the killer, this idyllic summer will turn nightmarish. Innocent people may be imprisoned—and even more could die.