Writers I Love
These cool autumn days, I’m turning my attention to the harvest of new books by writers I love. A long-time fan of the Chief Inspector Armand Gamache series by Louise Penny, I have already read her latest thriller, The Madness of Crowds (September 17). Pulitzer Prize winning author Colson Whitehead’s Harlem Shuffle (September 14), has transported me to New York City where I’m savoring every beautifully crafted sentence of this family-saga-meets-classic-heist set in the 1960s. Next on my reading list is The Lincoln Highway (Oct. 5) by Amor Towles, author of A Gentleman in Moscow—a beloved novel that Kit and I have read…and reread. Last September, it was the community One Read book in Columbia, MO.
Another much anticipated book is Cloud Cuckoo Land (Sept. 28) by Pulitzer Prize winning author Anthony Doerr (All the Light We Cannot See). The characters and story appear across centuries, from Constantinople in 1453 to present day Idaho where Doerr lives and writes to a future spaceship named Argos—all united by a long-lost book from ancient Greece.
Since Kit and I began exploring Nevada City and the neighboring city of Grass Valley, we’ve been delighted to discover that there is a rich literary base here of writers, readers and independent bookstores. Shortly after arriving five months ago, I read a piece in The Union newspaper (founded in 1864) about Heart Wood: Four Women, for the Earth, for the Future (2020)—a novel by local author Shirley DicKard that is a National Indie Excellence Award winner and a finalist for the Montaigne Medal. Like Doerr’s novel Cloud Cuckoo Land, her novel is the story of characters connected across centuries by an old oak desk. With roots in the Heartland, the story and old oak desk migrate westward to a region of northern California not far from where the author lives and writes.
In the months that have followed our own move from the Heartland to the Sierra Foothills, Shirley and I have become friends and regularly meet for coffee at Three Forks Bakery and Brewery in Nevada City to talk about writing and all manner of life. And the fires this summer that have plagued Northern California. Writing at the age of 75. Getting one’s books and blogs out there. Bookstores we love and support. And Restaurants that serve delicious, locally sourced food. We also share recipes. (Visit The Common Ingredient food website/blog for some of mine as well as a family Pizza Night recipe that Shirley’s grandchildren wrote, photographed, and submitted.)
Recently, Shirley invited me to join her on a neighborhood walk in and around the edges of Grass Valley’s historic downtown. She suggested we meet at the Holbrooke Hotel on West Main and from there we’d walk to the home of a friend, also named Shirley—a retired librarian who is also a talented photographer/artist. I arrived early and had time to peruse the lobby of the recently restored 1853 hotel that is brother to the historic National Exchange Hotel in Nevada City. An old picture postcard at the front desk describes the Holbrooke’s history. “It’s seen gambling, gunfights, good times and bad. Fortunes made and pure gold lost. Haunted by rough cowboys and Victorian Madames, their secrets forever safe within the storied walls. Legend tells us even Prohibition didn’t stop the whiskey from being served in the Saloon.”
When Shirley arrived, we set off down a side street next to Tofanelli’s Gold Country Bistro and entered an ever-narrowing network of streets, small Victorian houses with lovely gardens, and finally little houses that were formally gold miners’ cottages with back rooms that served as brothels. Street names introduced us to that piece of the neighborhood’s early history—Jill and Helen, and Hazel Lane and Doris Drive that converge at a “Dead End” street sign. In this maze of cottages and gardens with deep roots, I found a giant redwood, pear trees, gorgeous pastel roses, hollyhocks, coneflowers, brilliant red and orange zinnias as tall as cornstalks, and layered rows of soft lambs’ ear, iris fronds and shrub firs.
Eventually we segued back to the downtown district after climbing a set of steep steps with a wrought iron railing, accompanied all the way to the top by a barking German Shepherd just inches away in a fenced-in backyard. Public sculptures made from old steel mining equipment marked a little vest-pocket park at a street corner across from South Pine Café serving breakfast, lunch, and beer. The local landmark is not to be missed according to the two Shirleys. Then it was back to West Main where I noted establishments that I will take Kit to soon. Williams Stationery Office Supplies Plus, est. 1949. A venerable barber shop with photos of classic men’s haircut styles—sideburns, crew cut, butch cut or astronaut (Boomer), JFK, flat top, Ivy league, executive and professional cut. One store front had a vintage 1951 Du Mont console TV in the storefront display widow. I was immediately reminded of a similar model bound for resale in a second-hand furniture store at the heart of Colson Whitehead’s Harlem Shuffle that I am currently reading.
Which takes me back to books and local bookshops where I began. After a refreshing stop at Brew Bakers Coffee & Tea House for a hot chai latte and apple doughnut, the three of us strolled a block or two to a pedestrian street off West Main to The Book Seller—one of the area’s terrific Indie bookstores. A display table inside featured all the newly released books I’ve just mentioned. In the fiction section, I located Heart Wood which is a hot item with local book clubs. Two shelves down the alphabet, I spotted my friend Alex George’s novel The Paris Hours. In Columbia, MO Alex carries copies of Heart Wood at his highly popular indie bookshop Skylark.
On the rare rainy Sunday morning that followed our walk, Shirley emailed Alex from her home in Camptonville, CA— “Cathy had told me so much about you, so when we found your book on the shelf near mine at The Book Seller, I just had to buy it. Here in California, we've lived far too long in the midst of a massive drought and ravenous wildfires. But last Saturday night, we were blessed with gentle, soothing rain. It was a perfect time for The Paris Hours. I cozied up in my favorite reading chair and as the rain pattered against the streets of Paris, I slipped into the lives of Soren, Guillaume, Jean-Paul, Camille. Thank you. It was one of those perfect moments.”
And so, dear readers, October is the perfect time for you to purchase one or all the wonderful books by I love. Curl up in your favorite reading chair and let your mind travel broadly and with abandon. Enjoy every minute of the literary journeys that lie ahead of you this fall.