Who Killed the PinUp Queen?

HANK: It's really difficult to go to a group appearance with Toni Kelner. She is SO FUNNY--and so droll and so soft-spokenly southernly hilarious, she has the audience in stitches (whatever that means) and they mob her afterwards, thronging for books. Her husband is a motivational genius, and her daughters are marvelous and hip and smart.

Bless their hearts. (Little southern humor I learned from Toni.)

Anyway--Toni is everywhere! Writing her own books, editing anthologies with someone named Charlaine Harris (heard of her?) and winning awards. She also is the absolute QUEEN of TV trivia! (We should try to stump her. Anyone? It's kind of impossible..)

But today, she's talking about another queen. A pin up queen.

The Mystery of Bettie Page

There were lots of pinup queens during the fifties, but only one Queen of the Pinups: Bettie Page. Her photos range from outdoorsy bikini shots that wouldn't even raise an eyebrow to seriously kinky bondage and domination pictures, and everything in between. But whether she was posed as a dream girl next door, a sultry vixen, a bound beauty, or a stern dominatrix, the camera loved her. Her photos were ubiquitous from 1951 to 1957--the best estimate is that she posed for half a million pictures and worked with almost all of the amateur and professional photographers in New York City. Then, at the height of her popularity, she left the modeling business.


That could have been the end of the story, but in the 1980s and 1990s, Bettie's photos started re-emerging, and artists based a multitude of drawings and comic books on her. As interest grew, the search for her began in earnest, and there were endless theories about her "disappearance." Had she been murdered by a mobster? Been abducted by a sheik for his harem? Gone into a convent? What could have happened to the so-called Dark Angel?


In 1993, Bettie finally came forward after having heard about the frenzied search. She was amazed that anybody even knew who she was, let alone cared. She'd been living in obscurity for most of her life, and was nearly broke at that point. For a few years, she would only give interviews by phone and if her likeness wasn't shown, saying that she wanted her fans to remember her as she had been, not as an old woman, but in 2003, she did allow her picture to be taken for Playboy, in which she'd last appeared as a Playmate of the Month for January 1955.


So what was the mystery of her disappearance? It was no mystery at all, really. She stopped modeling for a combination of reasons: she was getting older, the laws surrounding pinups--particularly where bondage was involved--were getting more strict, her acting career had never taken off, and she got religion. So she left New York and went on to live her life. She had some good times and sadly many bad times before fame found her again. Bettie died just over a year ago, but still continues to inspire artists, models, film makers, and even musicians (including Bob Dylan, who included an image of Bettie on the back page of the album booklet of his brand-new album, Christmas in the Heart).


More importantly to me, Bettie inspired this mystery writer to write Who Killed the Pinup Queen?, the second in my "Where are they now?" series. My protagonist Tilda Harper is a freelance entertainment reporter who specializes in tracking down the formerly famous to write about them, so Bettie Page's story is right up her alley. Tilda interviews the once buxom Sandy Sea Chest, who has discovered late in life that there's still plenty of interest in her, and who has gone public with her story. When the former model is bludgeoned to death, Tilda sets out after the killer.


When I decided to use pinup queens for a backdrop for a mystery, I knew I wanted to draw on Bettie's story. But which story should I use? The story of the disappearance, and the fans' search for her years later? The real story of her life? Or the legends about what could have happened to her? I decided to use all three.


Sandy, the murder victim, takes pleasure in her pinup past and capitalizes on it with a web site from which she sells autographed photos and t-shirts. But another former pinup Tilda encounters is desperate that her past--which she considers sordid--stay deeply hidden. And a third has disappeared completely, even more thoroughly than Bettie did, creating a special challenge for Tilda.


Of course, none of these stories are exactly what happened to Bettie Page and none of these characters are exactly like Bettie herself. Despite all that's been written about her, and all the pictures, and the movies of her, and the movies about her, she's still a bit of an enigma. I suppose the irony is that even though Bettie bared all for the camera, she still kept her secrets.
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Of course you can't wait to read the book--comment for a chance to win an autographed copy! And if you have a TV trivia question for Toni--let's see if she can answer..

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Toni L.P. Kelner multitasks. In mysteries, Who Killed the Pinup Queen?, the second in her "Where are they now?" series, is just hitting the shelves. In urban fantasy, she edits anthologies with Charlaine Harris. Death's Excellent Vacation is due out in August. In short stories, she has her first noir story coming out in March in Carolyn Haine's anthology Delta Blues. Kelner has won the Agatha Award and a Romantic Times Career Achievement Award, and has been nominated for two other Agathas, four Anthonys, and two Macavitys. She lives north of Boston with author/husband Stephen Kelner, two daughters, and two guinea pigs.

The Inspirational Surround

HALLIE: For Christmas, one of my daughters gave me fingerless gloves. My other daughter gave me flannel slippers with buckwheat/beanbag soles that can be heated in the microwave. My husband gave me a lovely soft, pale gray wool shawl. As I type this, I'm wearing all of them (the things, not the family) and sipping a cup of hot tea in my office, a little room that hangs off the side of our house. In realtor speak: a solarium. Actually it's a winterized sun porch, barely eight by fourteen, with 7 windows all around. I love this light-filled space, and it has the great virtue of smallness,\ so I can't indulge my inner packrat. But when the temperature outside is seven degrees, which it was the other morning, it's COLD in here, and it feels even colder because I like my computer right up agains the window so I can watch the sparrows shivering the bushes as they peer longingly at the frozen birdbath.

Very glamorous, my writing life. So, how glamorous is yours--because it's one of the truths of life that misery loves company.

JAN: How glamorous is my office? Think painted paneling and bulletin boards. Not one bulletin board, mind you, but two because I'm the kind of person who needs visual stimuli pinned up in front of her so not to lose or forget anything. There's also an enormous office-sized printer with mental issues (its paranoid that its paper drawer is open -- sort of like that bad dream that you've gone to work without your shirt on). Lots of wires and storage drives I don't quite understand (my husband comes home with computer periferal extras) a guitar stand with the guitar missing, and a dog bed with my dog, Amber, currently snoring -- or maybe its more like doggie groaning.

The color scheme is beige and brown. Need I say more?

RO: It's a room we added on top of the house so there's a rather skinny set of steps to get up there. High ceilings, skylights, floor to ceiling windows and a slider to a small deck with a platform and pergola. Right now I'm watching a woodpecker nibble on a branch outside my window and I have to stop whatever I'm doing if I hear one of the owls.

My desk is a long slab of wood on top of two iron sewing machine bases. I have a bunch of mix-matched vintage furniture including a china cabinet filled with shells, a rattan sofa covered in barkcloth and a birds eye maple chest. There are books everywhere, a tree in the corner with a pink wrought iron flamingo stuck in the pot, and a telescope for when I need to check out the nighttime sky. One wall is floor to ceiling bookcases - just mysteries and gardening books. Like Jan I have two bulletin boards, filled with everything from my agent's first wonderful email to me (I Love It!) to pix of Bettie Page, Edith Wharton, the Virgin of Guadalupe..the list goes on.

It's a wonder I ever get any work done.

ROBERTA: I have a small nook off the bedroom with an astonishing view. But the part I like best is the slanted wall over my computer and printer--slathered with photos, poems, cartoons, an NYT bestseller list to give me inspiration. Here are a few samples:

1. a cartoon from Byline, one guy is handing another guy a book
and saying "We've started with a small print run. Here's your copy
and I'll keep the other one."
2. a photo of my stepson Andrew with our old dog Poco. The dog
has a sign around his neck saying "Andy is my valentine."
My son has a sign around his neck saying "Poco is my valentine."
I think he was a freshman in high school and we'd gone out to
dinner leaving him home without a date!
3. a list my husband passed on:
free your heart from hatred, free your mind from worries, live
simply, give more, expect less...

HANK: Sometimes my study is so sunny I have to wear my Evita baseball cap (Where the heck did I get that? Don't remember) to be able to see the computer screen. I'm sure I'm quite a sight: ponytail sticking out of the cap, no makeup, a big sweatshirt from the Gap that says Ti(RED) on the back. Sweatpants and those cozy clogs that I can't remember the name of that have tyrolean braid around the edges. Very very glam. Very.

I can see trees and sky out the bay window in front of me, squirrels fighting with the blue jays. A whole wall of books. A wonderful photo on an easel beside--but I can't see the photo anymore because I've covered it with so many signing posters and memorabilia(me at B and N, Borders, other bookstores. The best seller list with my books on it. My special fave is a cash register receipt from the Borders cafe that has "come meet Hank Phillippi Ryan" printed on the bottom).

I'm surrounded by books I might need. Hallie's in case I get stumped. Stephen King On Writing. Strunk and White. Baskets of file folders with notes in them. Again, via Hallie, my "compost" file of newspaper stories. I dig into them when my brian needs fuel, maybe for just a word. My word count chart. My scene and character and timing notebook. A sign that says: Hook. Stakes. Beautiful Writing.

On my desk, behind the monitor,the glittering beribboned bags that people used when they gave me book-deal champagne. In front of the monitor, two engraved little rocks. One says: Patience. The other says: Imagine.

HALLIE: I wonder if that's a universal among writers--that we surround ourselves with words. Our talismans. One of mine is a quote from an all-time favorite children's story from Carl Sandburg's Rootabaga Stories:

And a secret ambition is a little creeper that creeps and creeps
in your heart
night and day, singing a little song, "Come and find me, come and
find me."

Read the story of "Three Boys With Jugs of Molasses and Secret Ambitions" and have a lovely, inspired day with your very own freckles and secret ambitions.

So, with what talismans do you surround yourself?