Trace Your Writer DNA

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: Have you tried any of the genealogy sites? DNA is one way to figure out where you came from.

But there's another way. A writer DNA test. And the amazing Vanessa Lillie is tracing hers today.

But wait wait wait. Before we do that: Vanessa's new book, her debut LITTLE VOICES, is a spectacular (and chillingly disturbing) study of family, and parental love, and how far someone will go to get what they, and have they life they dreamed of.

DO NOT read this book--unless you are up for a non-stop fabulous page turning experience.

Anyway. The terrific Vanessa Lillie--here we are with Daniela Petrova, who I am also trying to lure here to the Reds page--has been tracing her author roots.

(And read on for a giveaway!)

Rhode Island; Small state, big stories
              by Vanessa Lillie

Rhode Island may be the smallest state, but many big stories have been created here. As a Rhode Island author (as of October 1st when my debut was published), I wanted to share a few highlights from our author card catalog.

Let’s begin in the summer of 1845 with a tragic romance starring Providence Poet Sarah Helen Whitman. Imagine her wearing her beloved coffin shaped necklace and tending her rose garden under a midnight moon.

Along stumbles Edgar Allan Poe, who notices her, a moment passes between them, but he doesn’t stop. Then over six months: she writes a poem about him; and he repurposes an old poem and puts her name on it; letters are exchanged; he boards a train after a nearly deadly dose of laudanum to see her, and recuperates in Providence. A whirlwind engagement includes graveyard walks and meetings at Providence’s Athenaeum Library (pictured).



Poe promises sobriety, and fidelity, and both are (likely) broken leaving Whitman to end the engagement. A few months later Poe is dead, and Whitman continues publishing poems throughout her lifetime. She also writes a biography in defense of Poe who believed had been harshly criticized and mischaracterized by his biographer. (Read more here: https://edgarallanpoeri.com )



Next we go forward about 40 years to a man Stephen King called "the twentieth century's greatest practitioner of the classic horror tale." He’s the creator of the tentacled Cthulhu, Mr. “I AM PROVIDENCE” H.P. Lovecraft. Born in Providence, he lived most of his life here. From an early age, Lovecraft was reading and writing, typically darker stories that reflected a childhood he characterized as difficult (his family home is pictured). His father passed away in a mental institution, and Lovecraft likely suffered from depression most of his life.




He was relatively unknown during his life, but when he wasn’t writing for pulp magazines, he was writing letters to more famous author-friends, called the “Lovecraft Circle,” who borrowed his ideas (with permission) and worked them into their stories. It’s estimated Lovecraft wrote over 100,000 letters in his four decades of life. These friends carried on his name after his death and his prominence rose among horror and weird fiction readers.



While his influence and stories created legions of fans and followers and even an annual convention in Rhode Island, it’s important to note some of Lovecraft’s earliest writings are xenophobic and racist. He was heavily influenced by Poe, and a marker in Swan Point Cemetery for him reads: I AM PROVIDENCE.

Jumping ahead another few decades, we head to the coastal town of Kingstown, Rhode Island where Jhumpa Lahiri came to America from London at the age of three, remaining there until she graduate high school and went onto college.

In an interview with the University of Rhode Island where her father worked as a librarian, she said of growing up in the Ocean State: “From childhood, I always loved the ocean. I felt that being close to the sea is a basic human need. … There’s something so powerful about the element of it, the distinction between the land and the water, the force of the water and what it represents in contrast to the land.”



Rhode Island has made many appearances in Lahiri’s fiction, including the Pulitzer Prize and the PEN/Hemingway Award winner, Interpreter of Maladies. Themes of identity, informed by her feeling out-of-place as an Indian-American in a predominately white town, also influenced her best-selling book, The Namesake. Most recently her best-selling book, Lowlands, also takes place partly in Rhode Island.



Returning to thrillers, Edgar and Macavity award winning author Bruce DiSilva set his mystery series in Rhode Island featuring Providence reporter Liam Mulligan. DiSilva was himself a journalist for the Providence Journal and Hartford Courant during his forty year career. In DiSilva’s debut, Rogue Island, Mulligan is investigating a series of arsons in his old working-class neighborhood of Mount Hope in Providence (pictured).



Next is Lisa Gardner, bestselling author of over twenty novels, that include New York Times best-sellers and five adapted for movies. She lived in Rhode Island for several years, and the smallest state had in impact on her writing. For example, her fifth novel, The Survivors Club, focused on a Rhode Island State Police Officer. She did extensive research with local officials on a well-known case where an entire family disappeared from their home in wealthy Barrington, RI.


Gardner was also the keynote speaker at the Rhode Island Authors Expo last year, and I was so pleased to get an opportunity to hear her speak and get a signed copy of her latest book. She also gave me great advice for my debut-day: “Treat yourself. I prefer bling, myself.”

We’ll end with my debut thriller, Little Voices, also set in Rhode Island. The story centers on a new mother who is struggling postpartum, but also determined to solve the murder of a friend.

That terrible crime is in Swan Point Cemetery, near the Seekonk River, where Poe and Whitman often walked on their ill-fated courtship, and likely were engaged there as well (based on her poem about the moment). Not far away is the marker honoring H.P. Lovecraft.

I often walked through Swan Point myself with my newborn son, imaging a story about a new mother solving a crime. And, now that my debut has arrived, I’m honored to join these incredible authors inspired by the smallest state.


HANK: And whoa. Little Voices is truly chilling!

So, reds and readers, who is in YOUR reading or author DNA? In my veins, I'm connected to Sue Grafton, and Edith Wharton, and Shakespeare (a very old connection), Scott Turow, and Mary Willis Walker, and my writing-imaginary-sister Lisa Scottoline. Geographically? Hmm. Boston is: Dennis Lehane. Peter Swanson. Lisa Gardner. Tess Gerritsen. And yeah, gotta say, Robert B. Parker.

How about you?


And a signed copy of LITTLE VOICES to one lucky commenter!

LITTLE VOICES


The voice in her head says he's guilty. She knows he's innocent.

Devon Burges is in the throes of a high-risk birth when she learns of her dear friend's murder. The police quickly name another friend as the chief suspect, but Devon doesn't buy it--and despite her difficult recovery, she decides to investigate.

Haunted by postpartum problems that manifest as a cruel voice in her head, Devon is barely getting by. Yet her instincts are still sharp, and she's bent on proving her friend's innocence.



But as Devon digs into the evidence, the voice in her head grows more insistent, the danger more intense. Each layer is darker, more disturbing, and she's not sure she--or her baby--can survive what lies at the truth.

Vanessa Lillie is originally from Oklahoma, but now lives in Providence, Rhode Island with her husband and dinosaur aficionado four-year-old son. She's smitten with the smallest state, and enjoys organizing book events and literary happenings in the city's robust creative community.


www.vanesslille.com


www.facebook.com/vanessalillieauthor


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www.twitter.com/vanessalillie