Category Archives: A Simple Murder

The Haskell Free Library and Opera House

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A corner of the opera house with black tape down the center and the two flags on either side.

During a reunion with my Rowell cousins, we went on an outing to the Haskell Free Library and Opera House. Yes, my friends, the top floor is an opera house, although it is used for many types of events.

The most interesting thing about this Library, however, is not that it has an opera house, but that it straddles the US – Canadian border. It has two addresses, one in Derby Line, Vermont and one in Stanstead, Quebec. Black tape runs through the children’s room and throughout the library to mark the line.

As a librarian, I had to ask about the inner workings of the library. Everyone receives the same card and is treated the same. They receive funds from both towns, as well as from donations and the sale of a variety of souvenirs. Their circulation system comes from Quebec, which must make Interlibrary Loan interesting. (Most of New York State is broken up into systems like Westchester Library System of the Ramapo Catskill Library System and usually, although not always, cover multiple counties. The libraries in each system share a card and books fly from one library to another. Interlibrary loan is used for books from the other systems. ) Haskell has a large French section and many of their flyers are in both languages. And they owned my first book: A Simple Murder, which I signed for them.

This past year they had to construct a special entrance and exit for the Canadians.

Outside is the line, marked with granite blocks and cameras and signs threatening all kinds of punishment for crossing it.

Thanks to my cousin Barbara for arranging this. Truly a highlight.

Shaker music

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Music has always been an essential part of Shakers’ experience. Right from the beginning, music was an important part of Shaker worship. At first, the music was chanting and were transmitted by word of mouth. But, as some of the members experienced a ‘spiritual gift’, the hymns were written down.

Since most of them had no formal musical training, their hymns were not written in musical notation but in a form using letters. The Shakers felt that these hymns were inspired by God.

The Shakers’ first hymnal, Millennial Praises, contained 140 songs and was published in 1812.

Most people are familiar with the song, Simple Gifts. Simple Gifts was composed in 1848 by Elder Joseph Brackett, on or about the time he moved to the Shaker community at Alfred, Maine, otherwise known as Sabbathday Lake. This community is the model for Zion, the community I include in my Will Rees mysteries.

Here is a link to a version done by Allison Krauss and Yo Yo Ma. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=baNueuDCue0&list=RDbaNueuDCue0&start_radio=1

Will Rees

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When we first meet Will Rees in A Simple Murder, he is pursuing his son to a nearby Shaker community. 

David has run away from his aunt’s rough treatment. When the boy was eight, his mother died. Rees drops his son on his sister and leaves, ostensibly to pick up weaving jobs. The truth is, though, that Rees, besides grieving the devastating loss of his wife, is also dealing with a huge amount of guilt. He is running away. And David views that as abandonment and it takes many years, and a lot of work, before the estrangement is resolved.

Through the series, we see Rees evolve from an indifferent father, at best, to an engaged and caring father. In Cradle to Grave, he and Lydia adopt several orphaned children, increasing the number of children to six.

By the Long Shadow of Murder, Rees and Lydia have a little girl of their own and she is pregnant with another child.

And Jerusha, the eldest of the adopted kids, is now in her late teens and hoping to attend The Litchfield Female Academy to become a teacher. Although Rees would never crush her dream, he hopes Jerusha will stay home. He wants to keep his children close.

In my head, I imagined Rees’s evolving – growing up if you will – from a fairly self-centered man to a husband and father whose core is his family.

Quite a journey.

Partners in Crime Podcast

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I had a wonderful time talking to Gina Hott about both my Bronze Age Crete series and the Will Rees/Shaker series. We discussed, not only the stories, but also my research and some of what I discovered.

One example of a funny story: during President Washington’s first term, John Jay was dispatched to Great Britain to work out a treaty. (Great Britain still did not recognize the new United States as its own country and continued to lay claim to forts and to impress American sailors.) The Jay Treaty was very unpopular. The newspapers of the time pilloried Jay (God damn John Jay and God damn all the people who won’t damn John Jay.) Jay was burned in effigy all through New York and Pennsylvania.

Here is the link if you missed it.  https://youtube.com/live/BAlVQsAe3FM 

Also, keep an eye out for a new Fresh Fiction giveaway. In August I am giving away the first novels in each of my series plus an Amazon gift card.

Albany Book Festival and More

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Last Saturday I attended the Albany Book Festival at the Albany University Upper Campus. This is always one of my favorite events as it gives me a chance to talk to both other writers and of course many readers.

Jacqueline Boulden, Carol Pouliot, Chris Keefer, Amy Patricia Meade, Syr Lazlo, Catherine Bruns, Eleanor Kuhns – some of the Mavens of Mayhem.

My contest on Fresh Fiction has been extended through October. Follow this link: https://gleam.io/Jghrh/eleanor-kuhns-september to join and possibly win a copy of my new book, In the Shadow of the Bull, as well as A Simple Murder and a $10.00 Amazon gift card.

Very excited to announce I will be speaking at Newburgh Free Library next Wednesday, October 4 at 6:30. The event is free.

Communes – and Shakers

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The communal style of living which is now so much a part of our picture of the Shakers was actually not a part of their beliefs. When they moved to the Colonies, however, relocating around Albany, financial stresses compelled them to live in a communal setting

If you have begun thinking of tie-dye, put it out of your mind.

The equality between the sexes was a direct outgrowth of the Shakers’ belief in the dual nature of God; a masculine half and a feminine half. It did not hurt that the spiritual leader of the order was a woman, Mother Ann Lee. Her experiences during childbirth, and the death of her young children, persuaded her that all sin came from sex and that only by overcoming fleshly desires could true salvation be attained. Unlike many of the new faiths that sprang up at that time, the Shakers were celibate.

The sexes lived together in the Dwelling Houses, but were separated and lived on separate sides of the Dwelling House. Personal property was abolished as well, all the property being held communally. New converts brought with them and gave to the order all of their worldly possessions, including land. Even though the order accepted anybody, including those who were penniless, the order became quite wealthy from the property deeded to them.

By living communally, the Shakers also had a work force, necessary on the large farms they owned.

Their agrarian methods ceased to be competitive with the United States economy when it shifted from farming and handcrafts to factories. The Shakers couldn’t compete and their numbers began to dwindle. Celibacy was part of the problem. Since they had no children of their own, they relied on converts, both adults and children. Once there were governmental agencies that cared for the poor and for the abandoned children, formerly a conduit of people to ‘make’ a Shaker, and the number of converts declined, the number of Shakers diminished rapidly.,

Tthey remain once of the most successful ‘communes’ ever established. Currently, there are still two surviving members.

Families

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As I looked around the table at Christmas dinner, and saw people who had not spoken to one another for years, I thought of how complicated families could be.

In Murder, Sweet Murder, I set the mystery against Lydia’s family, but Will Rees’s is no less difficult.

Lydia, estranged from her father and step-mother, left her family years ago. Her father is a wealthy Boston merchant engaged in the Triangle Trade. He owns a distillery that distills molasses into rum as well a fleet of ships that run slaves from Africa.

Lydia cannot accept her father’s profession and after some problems in her personal live, runs away. She lands at Zion, a Shaker community in Maine. In Murder, Sweet Murder I bring her back to Boston, and her family. She is no more tolerant of her father’s profession now than she was then.

Rees’s father was an abusive alcoholic who died by falling off a wagon in a drunken stupor. Rees is not an alcoholic but he makes other mistakes with his children. Before the action begins in A Simple Murder, David, Rees’s oldest son runs away from home, and takes refuge in Zion with the Shakers. Rees had left David (he would say his father abandoned him) with Caroline and her husband. When Rees returns home and recovers the farm, sending Caroline’s family packing, she never forgives him.

In A Devil’s Cold Dish, Caroline does her very best to destroy her brother and his family.

As the stories go on, and Rees’s history unfolds, his family expands. But it also changes. By the time of Murder, Sweet Murder, Jerusha, Rees’s oldest daughter, wants to leave home for school. David and Simon have already left for a farm in a distant town.

Families are complicated, even in fiction.

Albany Book Fair

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I had a great experience on Saturday at the Albany Book Fair. This is one of my favorite venues. It is not far away from my home. And the Fair allows you a full day, not an hour or so. I always enjoy talking to the other authors as well as the people passing through.

Besides that, this was my very first in-person activity, which made it even more special. Usually I sell my books to the parents that are wandering through. This time, I sold several to the students wandering through. (Am I aging myself when I say some of them look like grade schoolers?)

This time, I sold two of my first book: A Simple Murder. That makes sense since a lot of us mystery readers want to read a series from the very beginning.

I also sold four of Death in the Great Dismal. Not too surprising since the swamp is such an amazing place. I took the opportunity to recommend the Great Dismal as a destination.

Goodreads Giveaway

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A Circle of Dead Girls was just formally released on March 3rd. (I say formally because Amazon had it in mid-February.)

Death in the Great Dismal will come out October 7.

These titles are eight and nine, respectively.

Since it has been many years since the publication of the first three in the Will Rees saga, (and also because with people kept at home because of the corona virus – COVID-19, they have more time to read) I am offering a Goodreads giveaway of A Simple Murder:

Yes, I will be giving away three books to three lucky winners. Go to Goodreads to sign on.

Dame Schools

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In several of my books, Rees’s children attend dame schools. I mention them almost without a description. (Of course I mention the schooling received at the hands of the Shakers. Boys and girls were segregated: boys were taught by the men during the winter and girls by the women during the summer.)

Well, what are dame schools?

The New England Puritans believed that Satan would try to keep people from understanding the scriptures so it was decided that all children be taught to read. In fact, the first American schools arose in New England. The Boston Latin School was founded in 1635 and the Mather School in 1639 in Dorchester.In 1642 the Massachusetts Bay Colony made town schools compulsory and other New England colonies soon followed. These were for white boys only. Common schools were established in the 1700s but a tuition was charged.

If parents could not homeschool their children they went to dame schools. Considering how busy most women were I wondered how that worked out. With that said, however, there were enough educated women in the North who could function as teachers. Usually they were widows who taught in their own home. They were paid in money but also in kind – baked goods, produce, alcohol and the like. (I imagine the abilities of these untrained teachers varied widely – from essentially a day care to a real school. But I digress.)

In the beginning education focused on reading and ‘rithmetic but soon it was the four R’s; ‘riting and religion as well. Some of the dame schools offered girls embroidery, sewing and other such graces. Dame schools went up to eight grade and most girls went no farther. Boys, however, might move to a grammar school where they were taught advanced arithmetic, Latin and Greek by a male teacher.

There was also a huge divergence between the North and the South. Planters educated their children with tutors and son were frequently sent to England or Scotland for schooling. During the early part of the 1800s, it was against the law to teach slaves but schools for white children were opened in Georgia and South Carolina (1811). Segregated schools for children of all races began opening during Reconstruction and continued until 1954 when the Supreme Court declared state laws establishing segregated schools unconstitutional.

A final note: These schools went only to the eighth grade just like the dame schools. For many rural areas of the country eighth grade school was the norm until 1945.