Book Signing

Two weeks have past since surgery; recovery is officially over. It was time for an outing and I fulfilled a wish to drive north to see Jacqueline Winspear at Third Place Books. I was not disappointed. With charm and wit she talked about the spark that kindled the story for her latest "Leaving Everything Most Loved".

   She wondered her whole life why people left everything they loved to go to unknown places. Her aunt emigrated to Canada with young children and husband during the fifties when many left England, and other European countries to start over in a place of more opportunity. Asking her mother why they left, she was assured that it wasn't because they were unloved. She remembered receiving the airmail letters that sounded crinkly and thin. These would come from that far off place called Canada. At age four she started a fund to raise money to go visit. Eventually she went when she was nineteen. 
  I reflected on how my life was exactly the opposite. I was the little girl whose family left. We received the crinkly, thin airmail letters from grandparents and aunts. My dream was to go back to Silesia and see the homeland my father talked about.

    Another spark for her novel came from her childhood. There was an Indian woman who taught in her school who brought 30 saris and allowed each girl to wear one during class. Hers was peachy and the feeling of silk on her skin never left her memory.

   Someone asked her about her book cover illustrations. She is lucky to know the artist and collaborates with him on each book. When they both agree on the illustration, a woodcut is made and the prints come from his painted woodcut.
   The fact that Maisie is influenced by Eastern philosophy comes from the connection England has with India for the last hundred years. Yoga and meditation were not invented in California twenty years ago, according to Winspear.
  The mapping of each case came about because Jacqueline was recovering from a very dangerous fall off a horse during the writing of "Maisie Dobbs". She used over sized posted notes to map out her book and incorporated that concept.

 A phrase Winspear used to describe people who had time to come together to talk was the "chattering class". I looked around the bookstore and thought about the 200 plus people of the chattering class who were hanging out in a "third place" listening to an author. Some were playing chess on the floor, others eating in the food court. Most arriving by car and some by wheels, parking in the most ingenious bike rack.

 
  I am so glad  I went and am genuinely relieved to hear that number 10 is not her last "Maisie". She knows when they will end, but she is not telling. Next year she is releasing a book with a new subject, but the following year she will bring back the meditating, brave detective.