Mary-Ann Tirone Smith's Amazon Blog

This month and next I'll be visiting several libraries, bookstores and conferences, either with Jere if we're dicussing DIRTY WATER:  A RED SOX MYSTERY, or just me if the subject is my memoir, GIRLS OF TENDER AGE.  So when you're in the following neighorhoods and want to say hello, please come by.  I'm looking forward to all this because I just finished a really solid draft of my Civil War novel and I need to come down from my crow's nest and mingle with book lovers!

I have to start this post describing a taping Jere and I did on the WNBC Connecticut affiliate, Channel 30.  Got to meet the Sports Director, the always-charming and knowledgeable Kevin Nathan.  He asked some especially provocative questions as to the plot of DIRTY WATER.  We should be on tomorrow, Monday, May 11, at the five o'clock newscast and then again at 11.  (Unless there's a breaking sports story which seems to happen every five minutes.)  We had a good time.  Thanks, Kevin.

I will be with fellow Sister in Crime, Kate Flora, at the Conant Public Library in Sterling, Mass, at 3:30 on Saturday, May 16.  Our topic is "We're Not Making This Up"-- writing true crime.  I'm often asked to discuss the crime that centers my memoir:  GIRLS OF TENDER AGE.  Kate will be talking about her own true crime book--maybe you've seen the TV version, FINDING AMY.

On Tuesday, May 19th, it's Jere and me hanging with the Bates College Book Club, Boston chapter, at six after which we'll catch the game with #1 Toronto.  (Hopefully, they won't still be #1, they'll have been replaced by the Red Sox.) Two days later, Thursday, May 21, we'll be at the Simsbury Library at noon, having some lunch and talking the latest DIRTY WATER talk.  Borders Books will be handling book sales for the library--keeping it simple.

One week later, Thrusday, May 28th at six PM, we'll be at the Goodwin Branch of the Hartford Library.  This little library was my childhood refuge and I can't wait to get back.  And I can't wait to show Jere where I used to sneak over to the adult section and put a grown-up book between two children's books. I always got caught.

The last weekend in May brings Jere and me to Book Expo at the Javitts Center in NYC.  We'll be signing books at the author's autographing area on both Saturday and Sunday.  A lot of the time, we'll be hanging at the Hall of Fame Press Booth right alongside DIRTY WATER'S distributor, Midpoint Trade Books.  If you're going, come find us!  Our autographing session times are in the program.

Come JUNE, Jere and I kick off at the Bookworm in West Hartford, Saturday, June 6 at noon.  We'll be signing all those Fathers' Day presents for Red Sox fan dads and grandpas who also love to read a good mystery.

The Ocean State Writers Conference will be Friday and Saturday, June 19 and 20, at the University of Rhode Island.  I have a Saturday panel at 9AM discussing writing with New Engand settings (among other things).

Finally, on Friday, June 26, at 5:30, there's a really neat event at the East Haddam Library called "Fridays at Five-Thirty."  Cocktails and goodies, and then I segue into my role as guest writer reading from GIRLS OF TENDER AGE.

Then it's officially summer and time to read, read, read.  Yea!!!

Will be joining my fellow Sisters in Crime for a panel on writing true crime called, "We're Not Making This Up," at the Roslindale Library, Roslindale being either a neighborhood or suburb of Boston--I can't figure out which is which when it comes to Beantown.  Hope you'll be there:  Wednesday, April 6, at 6:30 PM.

Village Books will have all the authors' books available including my memoir:  GIRLS OF TENDER AGE.  (Support your local bookstore!)  In addition, they will also have DIRTY WATER:  A RED SOX MYSTERY there--first five purchasers receive a bar of "Big Poppy" soap (Dominican mango with poppy seed exfoliant) compliments of Stella Marie Soap. My Sox collaborator, Jere Smith, will have signed the books earlier; he can't be at the event because he'll be at Fenway enjoying the game and taking notes and pictures for his blog:  "A Red Sox Fan from Pinstripe Territory," www.letsgosox.blogspot.com

I will join him after the library panel, missing just a couple of innings.

Hope to see you at the library or the game, or both!

      All you mystery/true crime fans can still get in on "Mystery 203," a two-day festival on Saturday, April 18, at the Easton Library, followed by a move on Sunday, April 19, to the Westport Library.  (In case you're wondering, 203 is the area code.)  Just think--48 hours of mingling with fellow enthusiasts plus panel discussions, book signings, writing tips from the pros to those who will be pros; raffle and auction; and a big party--"Cocktails and Crime"--Saturday night.  Check it out at www.murder203.com

      I'll be on two of those panels:  Saturday at 11:15, Easton Library, the topic, "Do Crime Writers Have to Be Forensic Specialists?" with me and three tough guys--D.H. Dublin, Chris Grabenstein and Larry Goldstone.  (Sparks will fly, I promise.)  I'll be zeroing in on  my latest mystery, DIRTY WATER:  A RED SOX MYSTERY.  (My collaborator, Jere Smith, can't come--he'll be at Fenway enjoying and covering Sox games for his blog:  A Red Sox Fan from Pinstripe Territory, www.letsgosox.blogspot.com )

      Next day, Sunday at 2, Westport Library, the topic, "We're Not Making This Up" with yours truly, again, along with the equally brilliant and good lookin' Kate Flora and Mathew Phelps.  We three write true crime, my contribution, GIRLS OF TENDER AGE:  A MEMOIR, which centers on a tragic crime that turned my childhood, my family and my community upside down.

      Final note:  This is especially wonderful for writers as we get to emerge from our caves and interact with the very people we seek to entertain and maybe enlighten.

      And did I say the keynote speaker is LINDA FAIRSTEIN?!?!?!  Hope to see you there.  Go to www.murder203.com and sign up!

 

On Saturday, February 28th, I'll be part of Quinnipiac University's fifteenth annual "Celebrating Women's Creativity" conference in Hamden, CT, a day of workshops and panels.  The grand range of topics include "Painting and Other Fooling Around," "Sustainability:  Creative Solutions for Promoting Environmental, Societal and Human Health," and "Memoir:  A Writer's Ultimate Intimacy" (this last compliments of Yours Truly--I'll use my own memoir, GIRLS OF TENDER AGE, as a touchstone).  Please go to www.quinnipiac.edu or call 203 582-8954 for more information.  They'll be happy to send you a brochure.

And then on Sunday, March 1st, Jere and I will be at the Yale University Bookstore at 2PM, where we'll have a book talk/reading/discussion as we bring our mother-son collaboration, DIRTY WATER:  A RED SOX MYSTERY, into the new season.  I get all warm and energized just thinking about it.  Hearing "Play Ball!" can't come soon enough.

Hope to see all you memoir, mystery and baseball fans soon. 

Jere and I will have a book talk/reading/signing at the most wonderful Front Steet Bookshop, 165 Front Street, Scituate, MA, on Friday, February 6 from 6-8PM, courtesy of Sisters in Crime and store owner, Peg Patten.  Check out the store at www.frontstreetbookshop.com

Looking forward to meeting and chatting with Scituate mystery fans, Red Sox fans and book fans in general.  After you've checked out the store, check out the DIRTY WATER:  A RED SOX MYSTERY blog at:

Jere and I loved meeting the great gang of people at Kate's Mystery Books Friday night in Cambridge, Mass.  Everyone who approached us couldn't wait to talk Red Sox.  (Course, we were practically in spitting distance of Fenway.)  It may be December, but pitchers and catchers will be here before we know it.

Then today, Saturday, though a lone wolf, I had a good time participating on the memoir panel at the Fairfield (CT) Writers' Conference.  Four strong-willed, opinionated women giving our take on the memoir.  Terrific moderater who had to do a heck of a lot of moderating.  Great stuff.  Packed classroom, standing room only.  (Thank you, standees.)  I was a moderator once--someone said to me:  "Why'd they pick you?  You're not moderate about anything."

The most wonderful Craig of Borders Books in Fairfield was our bookseller and thought it was brilliant that I stuck Red Sox baseball cards in all the copies of DIRTY WATER which he said were flying off the shelf.  This is in pinstripe territory, folks, though one fellow had me sign a book for his Mets fan father.  Naturally, I wrote in the book, How about those Mets?  "Naturally," because I'm no good thinking on my feet after 24 hours of travel between Boston and Providence and Fairfield and then back home, plus all those people!  I'm a writer.  I live in a cave.

So like the message title says:  NEXT UP--THE BOOKWORM, WEST HARTFORD, CONNECTICUT.  The store invited us to drop in and sign books after the great turn-out at the West Hartford library last month.  Jere and I will be at the store on December 20th, at eleven AM.  We'll probably hang in till one o'clock so we can take the time to chat with everyone.

See you then.

Jere and I will be chit-chatting with customers along with 25 other writers at Kate's renowned holiday party this Friday, December 5th, from 6-8PM.  Our slot to actually sign DIRTY WATER: A RED SOX MYSTERY is from 6:30-7:15.  If you can't make it, you can email the bookstore and order a book which we will sign for you before it's shipped. 

Jere and I hope to see you, especially any local bloggers who have been so supportive of our book, the first novel to have a running blog throughout.

(And the next morning, Saturday, December 6th, I will be at the Fairfield, CT Library, one of three panelist discussing the memoir at 11:30 AM--part of an all-day writers' conference--and signing GIRLS OF TENDER AGE:  A MEMOIR.)

Finally, this blog is appearing on the Dirty Water page. Nice.

Meanwhile, I hope you enjoy our separate book blog:

and Jere's blog:

A Red Sox Fan from Pinstripe Territory:

letsgosox.blogspot.com

  Dirty Water: A Red Sox Mystery