Best Date EVER

HANK: Hurray hurray, it's Catriona day.

She's one of the dearest friends of the reds ever, I mean, EVER. She's brilliant, and hilarious, and wonderful human beings, and knows a lot of stuff.  Look at that bio! I mean, do.

Her new book is out! Well, August 3, but you can--hint hint--pre-order.  It's called SCOT ON THE ROCKS And it's a Lexy book, and you KNOW you want that. Need that. MUST have that.

And as in all books, this one needed research. And though we all draw from our own lives, Catriona hit an obstacle with this one. Dating.

Reader, I dated him.

  by Catriona McPherson

In the third book about Lexy Campbell and her pals from the Last Ditch Motel, I’ve got my poor heroine – of all things – dating. The dates were a lot of fun to write but also quite a challenge, because the last time I actually went on a date was 1985. And that was only to get a baked potato.

     Remember that bit in Sleepless in Seattle when widowed Tom Hanks is thinking about going back out there? And Rob Reiner says “All you need to know is tiramisu”. And Tom says “Wait, what? How long have I been away? I’ve never even heard of tiramisu and now you tell me every woman I meet will expect me to do it to her?”

      That would be me trying to write about dating, if it weren’t for fiction. I love a fictional date! (Tan France voice.) When I was young I swooned over the romantic, successful date. As time has passed I’ve come to appreciate the bittersweet, doomed date and – best of all – the truly horrendous but very funny date.

     Here’s my top five.

 5. Maxim and the future Mrs de Winter in Daphne du Maurier’s Rebecca

They’re in Monte Carlo. Mrs Van Hopper is laid up in her suite. And so, day after day, Maxim drives the girl around the cliffs, sometimes smouldering wordlessly at her, sometimes snapping at her to stop biting her nails, sometimes staring bleakly out to sea with his jaw in a grim line, wracked by ghosts . . . What was wrong with us all back then? These were terrible dates! Maxim de Winter is a bad boyfriend. Of course, he wasn’t much cop as a husband either, what with one thing and another. Nice house, though.

4. Rob and Laura in Nick Hornby’s High Fidelity

I adore this pair of bumbling would-be lovers. On the best of all their hopeless dates (and one of the others was a funeral), Rob asked Laura to meet for lunch . . . and proposed! So romantic! Laura laughed in his face. He insisted he was serious, telling her he was tired of love and hopes and dreams and he just wanted to be done with it. She checked. Was he, she asked, saying that if he had a bit more energy they might be breaking up but, since he was so exhausted, how about getting married? Pretty much, he confirmed. “Well, that changes everything!” Laura said. “How can I resist it? I will! I do!” It’s a great scene (and I reckon he’s still a better bet than de Winter).

3. Mira and Johnny in Jess Lourey’s Knee High by the First of July*

At this stage of the game, three books in, Minnesota librarian and super-sleuth, Mira James, is in a love triangle with the toothsome Johnny, the annoying chief of police Gary Wohnt (I read a few entries in the series thinking “Gary Wohnt, but Mira might”), and the other chief, Chief Wenonga, an enormous fibre-glass statue of a fallen hero of the Ojibwe people, who sometimes seems like a better prospect than either of the other two. One night, Mira gathers all her courage, dresses up, makes a fancy meal and invites Johnny over for general . . . let’s call it tiramisu. Now, I don’t want to spoil the scene. It is laugh-out-loud funny. But maybe don’t read it while eating.

*We think. I emailed Jessie after much feverish thumbing of pages. She thinks it’s either this one or August Moon. But you can’t go wrong reading any of the twelve instalments.

2. Bobby and Michelle in John Vercher’s Three-Fifths

Yes, this counts! This is totally a date. Bobby is training up Michelle as a waitress at the restaurant where they both work and, when he goes upstairs to the closed section with his own plate of food one night before his shift, she’s there already. He sits down at the very next table. She doesn’t close her schoolbooks. At this point, they make Rob and Laura look all in. Slowly, though, the scene turns into one of the sweetest moments in the book. It’s a little oasis of kindness in what – I’ve got to tell you – is otherwise complete heartbreak. I’ve been recommending this debut all year since I came across it. It’s a bleak and beautiful story and all the more so for this single breath of hope.

1.Peter and Harriet in Dorothy L Sayers’ Gaudy Night

But to finish on actual romance: I still think this is pretty perfect, decades after I first read it. Peter has been pursuing Harriet for several books now and so far she’s having none of it. In this scene, they’re in a punt, on the Cam, reading over case notes:

“She studied his half-averted face. … The flat setting and fine scroll work of the ear . . . the gleam of golden down on the cheekbone …. The little hollow points above the collar bone …

He looked up and she was instantly scarlet, as though she had been dipped in boiling water. Through the confusion of her darkened eyes and drumming ears, some enormous bulk seemed to stoop over her. Then the mist cleared. His eyes were rivetted upon the manuscript again, but he breathed as though he had been running.

So, thought, Harriet, it has happened.”

Who needs tiramisu?

I’d love to hear about your favourite fictional dates. Or funny dates from real life. It’s safe to tell me now, because the book is finished and I can’t use them.

HANK: Oh, how about when Prime Minister  Hugh Grant and Natalie are in the back of the limo with the lobster? Or when Colin Firth comes to find Aurelia? And she learned English "Just in cases"? I guess those aren't dates. 

Or Katharine Hepburn and Humphrey Bogart on The African Queen? When she pours out the gin and refuses to talk. Again, not actual dates. And movies, not books. 

Okay. One of my own such dates was on 1965-ish summer night when I went to the Zionsville town fair with Dave somebody or Mike somebody, and when I called my mom from a pay phone to see if I could stay out past ten, I was told "No, you have to come home. The barn is on fire." It was. And the ladies auxiliary was on our front lawn serving lemonade. True story.

How about you, Reds and readers?  

SCOT ON THE ROCKS

A community is devastated when the bronze statue of local legend Mama Cuento is stolen on Valentine’s Day. When Lexy Campbell arrives on the scene, a big bronze toe is found along with a ransom note – “Listen to our demands or you will never see her again. There are nine more where this came from”.

Then, Lexy’s ex-husband Bran turns up begging for help to find his wife, Brandee, who has disappeared. Lexy agrees to pitch in, but when she shows up at Bran’s house he has just discovered one of Brandee’s false nails and another ransom note with the same grisly message.

Are the two cases linked or is a copycat on the loose? Who would want to kidnap a bronze statue or, come to that, Brandee? And can Lexy put aside her hatred for Bran long enough to find out?

CATRIONA M^cPHERSON

Catriona McPherson, multiple award-winner, multiple Mary Higgins Clark award loser, was born in Scotland and lived there until immigrating in 2010. She writes the Dandy Gilver series, set in the old country in the 1930s, as well as a strand of darker (not difficult) psychological thrillers including the latest STRANGERS AT THE GATE.

After eight years in the US, she kicked off the humorous Last Ditch series, which takes a wry look at her new home. The ebook of number three, SCOT ON THE ROCKS, is coming out early what with one thing and another. It will be available on 3 Aug.

Catriona lives on 20 scruffy acres in NorCal, with a black cat and a scientist.

“A hilarious romp that's dead serious when it comes to the tricky mystery and an unexpected denouement”
Kirkus Reviews on Scot and Soda


“McPherson stands apart in her ability to tell a hilarious tale while balancing the ramifications of crime”
Library Jounral on Scot and Soda


“Peppered with clever red herrings, the mystery gleefully revels in the absurd.”
 Publishers Weekly on Scot and Soda


“Jaunty pacing, a comically rendered Southern California setting, and quirky characters … A sure bet for fans of Janet Evanovich and Sarah Strohmeyer”
 Booklist on Scot Free