Make Note of Marlie Parker Wasserman
Greetings, Noters!
I am so happy to announce that I have completed the first draft of my next manuscript 🎉🎉🎉
Book Three in the Trending Topic Mysteries has been a challenging but rewarding journey, and I couldn't be prouder of Coco Cline’s next story. If you’ve been following along on social media, you’ll know that the beginning of this book started a bit rough. So much so that I tossed the entire plot and began anew. I even changed the title yesterday, if you can believe it. The perfect name finally came to me as I wrote the final chapter.
Also, this mystery is WILD. Truly one only Coco and her friends could solve. They have so much fun, too, despite the fact they’re on the hunt for a killer. What’s more, I think Coco has found her stride as an amateur sleuth, and I can’t wait to see where this leads her.
While there is still SO much work to be done in the editing process, reaching this milestone is a major accomplishment. I can't wait for readers to return to Central Shores in Spring 2024!
My featured author this week knows the joy that comes from finishing a draft.
Without further ado…
A Bit About the Author: Marlie Parker Wasserman writes historical crime fiction, after a career on the other side of the desk in publishing. In addition to Path of Peril, she is the author of The Murderess Must Die (2021) and the forthcoming Inferno on Fifth (2023). Marlie lives with her husband in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. She is a member of the Historical Novel Society and the Triangle Chapter of Sisters in Crime.
Marlie, thank you so much for sharing your time with my readers here at Noteworthy. What book made you first fall in love with reading?
When I attended first grade, the teacher placed me in the middle reading group—not with the best readers, not with the worst. How unfair! I’d show her, and I did. I clawed my way out of the middle, to the top group, though it didn’t happen instantly.
How did your love of reading evolve into a love of writing? How did you begin your writing journey?
For most of my adult life, I worked as a scholarly book editor, reading social science manuscripts. In other words, I suffered through a lot of passive voice sentences. As soon as I left scholarly publishing, I decided to find out if I could write any better than those alleged experts I had read. I also decided that I’d had enough nonfiction over the years. I signed up for every free or inexpensive fiction writing course I could find, in effect taking myself back to school. I found I enjoyed learning and enjoyed writing.
Your latest book, Path of Peril, reimagines the events that took place during Theodore Roosevelt’s trip to the Panama Canal. How did this idea to blend history and fiction come to you?
I learned about Teddy Roosevelt’s 1906 trip to Panama from a History Channel show I watched while suffering on my treadmill. When the narrator said that TR’s trip was the first time a sitting president traveled outside the United States, I was hooked. As a newshound who followed the Kennedy and Reagan trips to Berlin, and other presidents’ more recent trips abroad, I wondered how TR’s trip could be the first. What led him to set that record? I became fascinated not only with the details of the trip, but also with the characters who populated Panama at the time. People—rich and poor, engineers and laborers—came from all over the world to build the Panama Canal, known then as the greatest engineering feat ever. These people interacted, not always peacefully. I learned a lot about Roosevelt and the officials who accompanied him on the trip, but the historical record offered little on the poorer workers and the women who had come to Panama for jobs. Historical crime fiction writers begin with an era and events, and then imagine uncovered stories. Knowing that assassins killed three presidents in the years between Lincoln’s death and TR’s trip, and that pundits pointed to anarchists as a continuing threat, I thought fears about TR’s safety seemed logical. At the same time, I wanted to write the stories of people forgotten by history. I needed to invent not only potential assassins but also men and women who labored behind the scenes.
What a fascinating origin story. It’s wild to think that presidents traveling internationally is a relatively new concept. So, we now know how Teddy Roosevelt grabbed your attention. Tell us about Maurice Latta. How did he step out of history and onto the page?
Maurice Latta is a real historical figure who served as secretary to presidents from McKinley to Truman—a huge span of years. I did not want to write my novel from TR’s point of view—we’ve had enough of powerful men—so I looked for someone in his entourage who could act as a protagonist. In my research, I learned Maurice Latta had accompanied TR. But I ignored Latta at first because he seemed like a meek, uninspiring staffer. Then I realized those very qualities could propel the story. I tried to put myself in Latta’s position. He felt intimidated by others in TR’s entourage—others who were more worldly, wealthier. (Can’t we all relate to such anxieties?) But in his own way, Latta was open-minded. Ahhh, I thought, here is a character who has a chance to grow, to become more confident, and maybe to teach others a thing or two about accepting differences. So, readers, cozy up with Maurice Latta for a wild ride through Panama. Will he rise to the occasion?
Crafting a relatable character is always a win for a writer. Let’s talk more about your writing technique. You finish the first draft of a new manuscript. What does your revision/editing process look like?
I have three beta readers who all read for different issues: one for pacing and structure, one for readability, and one for the logic of the plot. Once I have their comments, I spend months revising. For a final revision, I press the Read Aloud button on Microsoft Word, to catch double and missing words. But as all writers know, we could revise for decades and still not catch every mistake.
It sounds like you have a great team to support you in this endeavor. What does your writing space look like? Is there anything you need for a successful day of writing?
I write on a laptop, on a glass-topped desk, in front of a window. My only ritual is that I start writing very early, immediately after breakfast and coffee, when I can rely on caffeine for help. In the afternoons, I catch up with my reading, especially with the newest crop of superb historical crime novels.
What is your favorite, can’t-live-without writing tool?
I don’t think I could write without WordHippo.com, my favorite thesaurus. I also use etymonline.com to learn if a particular word was in use in the era of each of my novels.
Ooh, I’ll have to look that up! A thesaurus is one of my favorite tools, as well. Sometimes the right word is on the tip of my tongue, and this helps push me over the edge. And for our final question, it’s vacation time. What literary hero do you enlist to be your travel companion? Why?
I travel a great deal and just returned from a wonderful trip to Athens, Crete, and Santorini. I would have liked Maisie Dobbs, Jacqueline Winspear’s protagonist, to accompany me. She picks up on scenes, people, and actions, and would have noticed everything around me. Fortunately, I encountered no crimes she would have needed to solve, unless you count a weak Aperol spritz as a crime.
A crime indeed! Marlie, thank you so much for sharing insight into your writing, your life, and your book, Path of Peril. Noters, learn more about Maurice and President Roosevelt’s adventure below!
Path of Peril: Would the assassins plotting to kill Theodore Roosevelt on his visit to the Panama Canal succeed? Until this trip, no president while in office had ever traveled abroad. White House secretary Maurice Latta, thrilled to accompany the President, could never have anticipated the adventures and dangers ahead. Latta befriends watchful secret service agents, ambitious journalists, and anxious First Lady Edith Roosevelt on their hot and humid trip, where he observes a country teeming with inequalities and abounding in opportunities. Along the way he learns about his own strengths—what he never imagined he could do, and what he discovers he can’t do.
Theodore Roosevelt did visit Panama in 1906, accompanied by White House staffer Maurice Latta. Path of Peril imagines what the newspapers feared to report and what historians never discovered about Roosevelt’s risky trip.