M.A. McLaughlin is the award-winning author of a historical mystery trilogy:
Claire's Last Secret,
A Shadowed Fate, and
Forever Past, all set around the
Byron/Shelley circle in nineteenth-century Italy. Her novels have been published by Severn House (U.K. and U.S.) and Thomas Schluck (Germany), earning starred reviews in
Publishers Weekly, as well as a gold medal for historical fiction in the Florida Writers Association's Literary Palm Award. Her work has been featured internationally in blogs, journals, and websites. Her new novel,
The Lost Dresses of Italy, will be published by Alcove Press in February, 2024.
Recently I asked McLaughlin about what she was reading. The author's reply:
Smile Please, by Jean Rhys
I have been drawn to Rhys’ work for years, from her early novels in the
1920s to her last, brilliant novella, Wide Sargasso Sea, published in
1966. She is a writer’s writer. In every novel, she achieves the
perfect balance of lush descriptive imagery with sharp, precise prose—a
very difficult thing to achieve. Of all the novelists who have
influenced my writing, none have been as significant as Rhys, and I go
back to her work time and time again for inspiration. Right now, I’m
re-reading her autobiography, Smile Please, begun when she was
eighty-five and left unfinished at her death three years later. I
always pick it up in January when I’m looking back at the previous year
and anticipating what is to come. Similarly, Rhys’ self-revealing
narrative is told from the perspective of an older woman reflecting back
in a series of vignettes on her childhood in Dominica and her later
years in Paris and London—but always through the magic lens of her
imagination. Phrases and images seem to float through the personal
recollections with her typical delicate touch. One of my favorite
passages is when she describes her home as a teenager in Roseau,
Switzerland: “The steps down to the lawn. The iron railings covered
with jasmine and stephanotis. In the sunniest part of the garden grew
the roses ... But in the shadow the Sensitive Plant which shut its
leaves and pretended to die when you touched it, only opening again when
you were well away.” In this short metaphorical excerpt, Rhys says more
than a dozen pages of biographical facts ever could: she loves beauty,
she is tentative around other people, and she accepts the ebb and flow
of life. Her autobiography is just a gem of a work, worthy of many,
many readings.
Visit
M. A. McLaughlin / Marty Ambrose's website.
My Book, The Movie: Forever Past.
The Page 69 Test: Forever Past.
Q&A with Marty Ambrose.
--Marshal Zeringue
Byron/Shelley circle in nineteenth-century Italy. Her novels have been published by Severn House (U.K. and U.S.) and Thomas Schluck (Germany), earning starred reviews in Publishers Weekly, as well as a gold medal for historical fiction in the Florida Writers Association's Literary Palm Award. Her work has been featured internationally in blogs, journals, and websites. Her new novel, The Lost Dresses of Italy, will be published by Alcove Press in February, 2024.
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