On the Street Where You Live [Paperback]

Mary Higgins Clark (Author)

Product Details

• Paperback: 320 pages
• Publisher: POcket Books; Largeprint edition (2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0743261321
• ISBN-13: 978-0743261326
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (188 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #10,310,818 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

If I were to define myself in one sentence, I would say, "I'm a nice Irish Catholic girl from the Bronx."

I was a Christmas Eve baby all those years ago, the second of the three children of Nora and Luke Higgins. Mother was pushing forty when they married and my father was forty-two. My older brother was named Joseph. Nineteen months later I, Mary, was born. Three and a half years later, my little brother, John, came along.

We lived in a very nice section of the Bronx on a street off Pelham Parkway. I loved our house. I still love it. After my father died, when I was eleven, my mother had to sell it.

I went to Saint Francis Xavier Grammar School. Two years ago I went back and was Principal for a Day. Escorted by two of the tiniest children, I was led into the auditorium while the whole student body sang "Hello Mary. You're back where you belong." I still tear up thinking about it.

I was awarded a scholarship to Villa Maria Academy which is in the Pelham Bay section of the Bronx, otherwise I couldn't have afforded to set foot in it.

I went to Woods Secretarial School and at eighteen had my first full-time job as Secretary to the creative director of Remington Rand's in-house advertising agency. If I were making that choice now I would have gone to college even though God knows we needed the income. On the other hand the three years I spent in Remington Rand was a tutorial in advertising which served me well when I was widowed with five small children. Another plus was that I left Remington to be a flight stewardess with Pan American Airways and when my contemporaries were seniors in college, I was flying to Europe, Africa and Asia.

Warren Clark and I were married on December 26, 1949 and had five children in the next eight years; Marilyn, Warren, David, Carol and Patricia. Warren died of a heart attack in 1964. The highest compliment I can pay my kids are that they are like him.

I sold my first short story when I was twenty-eight. It was alled 'Stowaway'. It had been rejected forty times before a magazine in Chicago bought it for one hundred dollars.

My first book was about George Washington. It was published in 1969 and disappeared without a trace. Three years ago Simon and Schuster co-published it with the Mount Vernon Historical Society and retitled 'Mount Vernon Love Story', it became a bestseller.

My first suspense novel 'Where Are the Children' was bought in 1974 for three thousand dollars by Simon and Schuster. Thirty-three books later, I'm still with S&S.

Time to wind up - at least for the present. As soon as I sold 'Children' I enrolled in Fordham College. Went there for five years at night and earned a B.A. in Philosophy. Summa cum laude, if you please.

I never thought I'd marry again but ten years ago I threw a cocktail party on St. Patrick's day. My daughter, Pat, urged me to invite John Conheeney. Her opening words about him were, "Have I got a hunk for you!" He came to the party and we were married eight months later.

I'm Honorary Chairman of FraXa Research. My grandson, David, has the Fragile X syndrome, which is the second leading cause of retardation after Downs Syndrome. Basically the brain of the people who have it can't send out the proper signals because there's a kind of short circuit in the synapses that carry the signals. We raise money for research with the goal of finding a medication that will work around that short circuit. I go all over the country to the fund-raisers as new chapters of FraXa are opened.

I'm always asked to name my favorite book. They're ALL my favorites. If there is one book that is very special to me, it is my memoir 'Kitchen Privileges' because writing it made me relive my early life including those first struggles to become a writer. I think 'Kitchen Privileges' is both tender and funny and it's me.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

33 of 34 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Mary Higgins Clark Does it Again..., April 23, 2001

By 

Roz Levine - See all my reviews

This review is from: On the Street Where You Live: A Novel (Hardcover)

Talented criminal defense attorney, Emily Graham, is starting over. She's had to deal with a messy divorce from her greedy and adulterous husband and has been terrorized by a stalker for over a year. But now, all that is finally behind her and she's leaving Albany, New York for a great job with a presitigious law firm in Manhanttan and has bought her ancestral home in the beautiful seaside community of Spring Lake. On the day she moves in, a contractor, excavating her new backyard for a pool, finds the skeleton of Martha Lawrence, a young woman who went missing over four years ago. In her hand is a finger, complete with sapphire ring, of Emily's great great grandaunt, Madeline Shapley, who disappeared without a trace, from Spring Lake over 100 years ago. Now as Emily begins to investigate this double crime, that's landed literally in her backyard, she finds out that two other young women also disappeared in the early 1890s. She is even more shocked to discover that over the last five years the 1890's crimes seem to be repeating themselves as two young women have disappeared again, without a trace and the anniversary of the third is less than a week away. Is it a coincidence or is there a serial killer loose in Spring Lake, with a link to the past.....? Mary Higgins Clark has written a fast paced, intricately plotted page turner that's about to keep you up reading, all night. Her crisp, suspenseful writing is full of clever twists, turns and vivid, riveting scenes that will keep you off balance and guessing to the end. The only weakness to this book is its over-abundance of characters that become distracting and take away from the compelling story line and you'll need a score card, at times, to keep them all straight. Perfect for the beach or a long plane ride, On the Street Where You Live is a very satisfying read with a surprise ending that will knock your socks off. Mary Higgins Clark is one of the best in the mystery/suspense business and you really can't go wrong with this book.

26 of 28 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Spell-Binding Plot, Nail-Biting Ending Make This Classic MHC, May 8, 2001

By 

Antoinette Klein (Hoover, Alabama USA) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: On the Street Where You Live: A Novel (Hardcover)

Having read all the novels of Mary Higgins Clark, I feel this one may be her very best yet. She returns to the classic "young woman in jeopardy" theme she is famous for and surrounds heroine Emily Graham with a cast of well-defined characters, each with motive and opportunity to be a serial killer.

In a recent television interview, MHC mentioned she had just purchased a home in Spring Lake, NJ, the setting of this novel. The previous owner had been a Mrs. Eleanor Higgins and the fact that her own complete name is Mary Theresa Eleanor Higgins was not lost on the intrepid queen of suspense. The idea for this novel was conceived and the heroine of the novel purchases a home that had been in her family 110 years ago when a serial killer took the lives of three young Spring Lake girls. Is history repeating itself when a new string of killings occurs or is there such a thing as reincarnation of an obsessed killer?

Perhaps the most intriguing aspect of this novel is that MHC takes us into the mind of the killer. Without knowing his identity, the reader knows his moves, his plans, his mindset. But the looming question is who is this obsessed man? Is it Gary White, the greedy ex-husband? Will Stafford, the handsome real estate agent and Emily's frequent dinner partner? Ned Koehler, a man convicted of stalking Emily at her previous residence in Albany? Eric Bailey, the meek but intelligent owner of a dot-com company? Clayton Wilcox, the retired college professor who is being blackmailed? Nick Todd, the defense lawyer tired of getting guilty clients off? Or Bob Frieze, the restaurant owner prone to blackouts when he can't remember his actions for hours at a stretch?

Into this rich blend of characters, Mrs. Higgins adds a look at life in this upscale resort community and a touch of budding romance.

The suspects are many, but the ending is classic and chilling in the Mary Higgins Clark tradition. Definitely one to keep you up all night finishing.

16 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars "Reflections Of A Girlhood?", September 1, 2007

By 

SUPPORT THE ASPCA. "PILUM THROWER!" (?????) - See all my reviews

This review is from: On the Street Where You Live (Mass Market Paperback)

This is the first Mary Higgins Clark novel I have read, but it won't be the last. This is a very worthy page turner, with many secrets, subplots, richly described characters, & numerous murder suspects. There is a realistic, & highly detailed quality to the authors writing that is very refreshing. Feisty defense attorney Emily Graham's new home in Spring Lake, New Jersey was once owned by her family one hundred years earlier. Soon after moving in a dead body of a girl who had gone missing four years earlier is found in her back yard while she was having a pool put in. The body is found with the finger of an even earlier murder victim complete with a Sapphire ring. As if that was not ominous enough, she also finds that she is being stalked again. Could it be some one from her past, or a new menace? The dead start to pile up, as Emily is hell bent on solving the link between the present murders with those committed a century earlier. Some of the locals even think a reincarnated serial killer is on the prowl?

The most fascinating aspect of this novel is that the author takes us DEEP into the mind of the killer, without revealing his/her identity. The overarching question that slowly grows to a crescendo is who is this obsessed psychopath? Is it Will Stafford, the real estate agent, Gary White, her greedy ex-husband, Eric bailey, the timid but shrewd owner of a dot-com company whose stock helped Emily amass a fortune? could it be Ned Koehler, a man convicted of stalking Emily when she lived in Albany, or Bob Frieze, the cranky restaurant owner prone to unexplainable blackouts when he can't remember anything? Perhaps, it is Nick Todd, the defense attorney fed up with getting guilty clients off? Maybe, it is a woman? Could it be the elderly & supremely bitter Rachel lashing out at young girls for her husbands indescretions decades earlier, or a jealous secretary of an eccentric College professor? I won't tell you the shocking ending, read it for yourself. You won't be disappointed.