Ariel Lawhon Blog

My mother read to me by the light of a kerosene lantern. Most people don’t believe me when I tell them this but it’s true. I grew up in a small hippie town in northern New Mexico, in a home with no running water or electricity. My parents, descendants in a long line of cattle ranchers and cotton farmers chose to abandon the great state of Texas and forge their own path in the turbulent 70′s. We’re nostalgic about it now, my siblings and I; the wood burning stove and the cistern, the chickens and the outhouse. The way light hits the mesa at four o’clock in the afternoon. Running barefoot through the sagebrush. Picking Indian Paintbrush. Monsoons in summer. Blizzards in winter. We once found a cannon ball buried in the front yard–a relic from the old stagecoach road that passed in front of our house–and lost it again within a fortnight. It’s quaint and fascinating but it’s the sort of childhood you remember fondly because it’s in the distant past. Because it makes an interesting conversation starter. Because the hard, hard moments stack up evenly with the magical ones. Most people don’t know how to respond when they learn that I was raised so far off the grid that I actually fell off. So poor that the “dirt floor” analogy actually applied. And that’s OK. Because in life (as in fiction) the best stories are found on the outskirts, those bare, ragged edges of society. Or in my case, down a six-mile dirt road on the other side of the Rio Grande Gorge Bridge.

In the absence of a television I discovered C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien. L.M. Montgomery and Agatha Christie. I cried myself to sleep after reading WHERE THE RED FERN GROWS. It’s the first book I ever threw against a wall. Later I had a brief but passionate literary love affair with Piers Anthony and his magical Xanth. I believed for years that these authors and their stories were mine, and I felt an irrational rage when I learned that other children loved them as well. I wanted to yank those books out of their hands and stomp away screaming, “Mine, mine, mine!”

I’ve become more generous in the years since I left the mesa. Instead of hoarding beautiful stories to myself, I now try to share them any chance I get. My mother no longer reads to me by the light of a kerosene lantern, though I’d jump at the chance if she offered. And I’m ever on the lookout for a novel that makes me feel the way I did as a child, curled up in a patch of sunlight, lost in the magic of story.

Here’s the truth: I wouldn’t change a moment of it even if I could. Those little bits, the flotsam and jetsam of my life, made me who I am today. My off-kilter childhood made me a relentless reader. It made me a storyteller. It made me a writer.

Monday was my thirteenth wedding anniversary. Since January 27th, 2001, Ash and I have had four boys, moved seven times, and had more adventures (we will NEVER go snorkeling or snow boarding again) than many couples share in a lifetime. He is still my best friend. And he’s still the best thing that ever happened to me. Even when he resembles The Grinch:

Tuesday was the day that THE WIFE, THE MAID, AND THE MISTRESS became a real book. Granted, it’s been real to me for quite some time. But still, there’s nothing quite like seeing the story you wrote on the front table at Barnes and Noble:

Wednesday brought a deep breath. Coffee with a friend. Laundry–good Lord there was so much laundry. It’s what happens around here when you miss a day (or three–ahem). Loads of laundry. Four to be exact. Which reminds me, whoever said that little girls go through more clothes than little boys is a LIAR. During all that washing and drying and folding and putting away was no small amount of hand wringing over the book launch party the following day. Which is how I ended up in the basement with my husband and sister Abby taking shots of whiskey. It was for a legitimate reason. I swear. But more on that in a bit.

Thursday was oddly terrifying. In a wonderful sort of way. But I was very keyed up anticipating the event at Parnassus Books in Nashville. I wanted people to come (they did). I wanted them to have fun (they did). And I wanted them to join me in a toast to the still-missing Judge Crater. I shouldn’t have worried about that last bit, apparently. As it turns out people are ALWAYS willing to knock back a shot of Crown Royal and holler, “Good luck, Joe, wherever you are!” It’s a good thing I’d practiced the toast a few times the night before with my husband and sister (pictured below, top left). I’d never actually taken shots before and it’s a bit of a shock to the ole’ middle aged system. But, in case you’re wondering, a book launch becomes a par-tay when you pass around the commemorative shot glasses:

Friday I swapped a case of nerves for a full-blown sinus infection and didn’t make it out of my pajamas. At 3:00 I began to contemplate the merits of a shower when my sister told me that her husband was headed to the hospital for an emergency appendectomy (two hours after getting a major promotion). Abby has three children, four and under. I have four children, ages five to ten. My husband and I kept all seven of them for the night. Fun times. No sleep. We ain’t afraid.

Saturday I was reminded how much work is required when caring for babies and toddlers. They wake up a lot. They pee on themselves. They need lots of things, namely bottles and diaper changes and food that must first be mashed or strained or cut into tiny pieces. It’s not like I didn’t know these things. I lived it for YEARS. But now that mine are older and in charge of their own bodily fluids and able to make their own lunch I’ve forgotten how much is involved in caring for little ones. My brother-in-law made it through surgery just fine and came home to find his kiddos healthy and happy and not a little bit sticky. He says he feels lighter.

Sunday was the kind of day you can’t believe is happening even though the proof is right there in front of you in black and white. Newsprint to be exact. This gorgeous ad ran in the New York Times. And because life is weird and technology miraculous, my sister-in-law in Texas sent this picture to me as proof:

As far as weeks go, this one was epic. And exhausting. And absolutely perfect. I wouldn’t trade a moment of it for anything.

In a grassy patch behind my mother’s home is a large pile of rusting wire. Bedsprings. Fencing. Tomato trellises. Coat hangers. While such a sight might be considered random or wasteful on other properties, it is in fact quite purposeful on hers. My mother is an artist who specializes in sculptures and wall hangings. Rusted wire is one of the most important elements in her work. She calls this decomposing collection her “Rust Garden.”

I recently photographed her oxidized garden for a an upcoming blog series on her website but the process got me thinking about my own work. My latest novel in particular. The idea came to me two weeks after my second son was born. I emerged from the postpartum fog one morning to read the news. On a long-forgotten news site was a link to a story claiming that the disappearance of one New York State Supreme Court Justice, Joseph Crater, might have finally been solved. I clicked. Of course. And the story, along with it’s accompanying theories, was interesting. But what bolted me to the chair and sent a knowing shiver across the nape of my neck was the final paragraph. I read how the judge’s wife, Stella Crater, went to a bar in Greenwich Village every year on the anniversary of her husband’s disappearance, where she would sit in a corner booth and order two shots of whiskey. Stella would raise one glass and toast her missing husband, “Good luck, Joe, wherever you are!” She would slowly drain her glass, and then rise from her seat and leave the bar, leaving the other drink untouched on the table. She did this until her death in 1969. For thirty-eight years. In all that time Stella never once missed her bizarre ritual.

That single image cemented itself in my mind, along with a thousand questions.

And there it sat for five years, rusting.

I didn’t begin writing the book in earnest until three years ago. But my first few attempts were stilted. I had the wrong angle. The wrong narrator. The wrong story. I was so curious about the judge and his whereabouts that I missed the real story on my first few passes. It took some time before I realized that the key to understanding the mystery lay with Stella and the other women Judge Crater left behind: his maid and his mistress. My early drafts were film noir pot boilers. They were the obvious choices, the who-dunnits. They were bright, shiny rolls of wire that needed to be seasoned.

The truth is that without time, I would have never really known what the story was about. But now, after three years of outlining, writing, revising, editing, revising again, editing again, line editing, and copy editing, Stella’s story has personality. It has patina. It will be published by Doubleday on January 28th, 2014.

These days, when I find myself dazzled by a bright, shiny new idea, I toss it into the rust garden of my mind and wait until things get interesting.

“…in the end we will only just remember how it feels…”

–      Rob Thomas, Little Wonders

There is a bookcase at one end of my living room. I refer to as my “keeper shelf” and were you to visit me (I hope you do!) you would find a motley assortment of novels. I keep my Harry Potter collection beside The Chronicles of Narnia. They’re not so different after all, full of magic and wonder and whimsy. I have Ann Patchett and L.M. Montgomery and Neil Gaiman. Kate DiCamillo. Marilyn Robinson. Leif Enger. Somehow The Book Thief and The Glass Castle ended up on the same shelf as a five-book collection by P.G. Wodehouse (bought, I might add, at a rambling bookstore owned by Larry McMurtry). A dusty and tattered edition of The Princess and the Goblin is held together by a rubber band and sits on the shelf farthest away from my curious toddler. It’s the copy my mother read to me as a child and I’d sooner give birth to a hippo than part with it. The Thirteenth Tale. Water for Elephants. The Night Circus. The Kite Runner. The Hunger Games. The Help. Watership Down. I own almost every novel written by Dick Francis and George MacDonald.

*sigh*

This collection of stories evokes something in me that I find difficult to express. It’s not uncommon for me to pass my bookshelf, run my fingers along the spines, and close my eyes. I summon the emotions I felt the first time I read them. Sometimes I even pull one from its spot and read a passage. I did this yesterday with The Time Travelers Wife:

 “The curve of her shoulders, the stiffness in her posture say here is someone who is very tired, and I am very tired, myself. I shift my weight from one foot to the other and the floor creaks; the woman turns and sees me and her face is remade into joy; I am suddenly amazed; this is Clare, Clare old! And she is coming to me, so slowly, and I take her into my arms.”

Three years later and I don’t remember much of the plot, but I do remember how I wept my way through the last 50 pages. Audrey Niffenegger broke my heart and then patched it together with that last scene. My devotion for her novel is irrational.

For me, redemption is synonymous with The Kite Runner. I was quiet when I finished Khaled Hosseini’s stunning debut. I sat, book laid open in my lap, and felt something akin to worship—not for the author, but for the pure joy of seeing that kite lift into the air, and for what it meant:

“It was only a smile, nothing more. It didn’t make everything all right. It didn’t make anything all right. Only a smile. A tiny thing. A leaf in the woods, shaking in the wake of a startled bird’s flight. But I’ll take it. With open arms. Because when spring comes, it melts snow one flake at a time, and maybe I just witnessed the first flake melting.”

Every book on that shelf moved me. Sometimes to laughter. Sometimes to tears. I have felt rage and empathy and grief. I’ve even fallen in love a time or two. Yet I’d be hard pressed to synopsize any of my favorite novels. Character and Plot and Setting and Theme slip away with time. But I can pull any book from that shelf, dust off the cover, flip to a favorite passage and tell you exactly how it made me feel. And really, that’s all that matters in the end.