Attack of the Parsley Eaters

My parsley plant is being devoured before my eyes and I am excited!  The defoliaters are the caterpillar and larvae of Swallowtail Butterflies.  They are gorgeous in the garden but even the caterpillars are beautiful.  The larva--not so much.  They look like odd, fuzzy pieces of black lint--a lot like ladybug larvae.

Two years ago, I saw a Black Swallowtail unfold his wings and take his first flight.  That year he and his siblings wiped out a dill plant but it was well worth it.  I saw them last year, too, but did not catch a cocoon emergence.  I've got my fingers crossed for this year.

Meanwhile, elsewhere in the garden, the hibiscus--yellow, red, orange and pink continue to bloom nearly every day and volunteer sunflowers are turning their heads to the sun all over my backyard.

Happy Father's Day--Sigh...

Although I send my fondest wishes for a Happy Father's Day to all of you Dads out there, this year is very tough.  My email box overflowed with gift ideas and special tributes to Fathers.  Every one of them made my throat tighten and my eyes moisten.

It's not the first year that my husband and I had no male parent.  But last year, when my father-in-law left us on June 13 last year, we were pretty much oblivious to everything else including that year's Father's Day.

As a result this year feels like the first year.

We miss our Dads all the time but today is more poignant than others.

We think they were both pretty special guys with big hearts, generous spirits and love that never ended.  My dad, Leon Butcher (left), passed away on the same day that Katrina hit New Orleans in 2005.  He was just weeks away from his 78th birthday.

My father-in-law, Bill Fanning (right), departed just a month before his 85th birthday.

They certainly didn't die young but still it feels as if they died way too soon.

Happy Father's Day, Dads!

Raindrops Kept Falling on Our Heads

It came in the middle of the night--twelve inches of torrential rain. 

The pounding of the June ninth downpour at times sounded louder than the rumbles of thunder and cracks of lightening.

In the darkness, I could not see that the pipe that routed water under my house had clogged with cedar needles until it was too late.  Our family room was slightly flooded but we were lucky.  We only lost a room of carpet and a few books.  I was sick and tired of looking at that fourteen-year-old floor covering so it was a blessing in disguise.  But the books broke my heart.

Around town, matters were a lot worse.  All day we heard helicopters overhead rushing to rescue people from roofs and treetops.  Local radio station KNBT 92.1 FM spent the morning taking one call after another with listener reports of conditions. 

We heard stories of vain attempts to outrun the water of this flash flood.  And one man died, swept away by the unstoppable force of the water.

Some of the damage is a quick fix.  We piled our carpet by the curb where a City of New Braunfels truck will pick it up and haul it away.  Others stacked up sodden furniture.  Trash can lids awaited pick up with bulging lids and distended sides.

But for others, clean-up is a long process.  The city crews are busy in the parks with no clear idea of when they'll be open again,  River outfitters who looked to a summer filled with the prospect of an excellent year now see their season ended.  Some residents lost their homes and all the contents and now need to jump start their lives anew.

And in my garden, flowers bloom in glorious profusion--grateful for the rain and oblivious to our pain.

Writing and Motherhood

Welcome my special guest to the blog today.  Phyllis Schieber, like me, is an author and mother and derives great joy and fulfillment from both roles in her life.  


by Phyllis Schieber

 As I was considering topics for this post, it occurred to me that one of the subjects I have neglected to address is how motherhood figures into the subtext of The Sinner’s Guide to Confession, as well as to my earlier work, Willing Spirits. As a preface to that discussion, I must first address how motherhood has shaped my life. I am the mother of a soon-to-be twenty-six-year-old son. One of my dear friends, the mother of five daughters, once told me that, “It doesn’t matter how many children you have. Once you’re a mother, you’re a mother.” I believe that is true. Motherhood has empowered and defined me as nothing else in my life ever has, not even writing.



Many years ago I read “One Child of One’s Own,” an essay by Alice Walker. In the essay, Walker discusses her decision to have a child, but “only one” because more would make it difficult for her to move about with ease. She also points out that it is unlikely that the question of whether or not to have children is even asked of men who are artists, but that is a whole other discussion. Nevertheless, when I was pregnant, I worried about how I would balance my need to write with my responsibilities for my child.


Needless to say, I was not prepared for the emotional impact of motherhood. I don’t know how anyone can be. Nothing can prepare someone for the intensity of such love. In truth, I did not feel that immediately, and I worried that perhaps something was wrong with me. When the nurse handed me my baby boy, he looked rather perplexed and not at all certain that he liked me. But that first night alone with him in the hospital room, I was enraptured. I pulled the curtain around my bed and peered down into the bassinet He stared at me as I unwrapped his blanket and removed his diaper. I smiled at his naked little body and ran my hands all over him. He relaxed under my touch and wriggled about a bit. As I changed his diaper, I introduced myself and presented my plans for our future. He listened with interest before he began to wail. He was hungry. After a rocky start and the help of another new mother in the bed next to mine (by some miracle, she also happened to be a maternity nurse), I nursed him. I was in love. I knew by then that from henceforth, he would tell me what my plans would be. I acquiesced without complaint. Once we were home and eventually settled into a routine, my life was defined by his needs. His father left early and came home late most every day, and I spent long, mostly happy days with my baby. I learned how to strap him to my chest and write. He slept to the sound of me banging away at the typewriter keys. If I stopped, he opened one eye and looked up at me, questioningly, but with understanding. I often rested my chin on his downy head, inhaled his unique scent, and rubbed my cheek against his soft hair. I had never been as in love with anyone as I was with him, and that love persists.

It is true that I am not a real baby-person. Some women just adore infants. I am not one of them. Give me a two-year-old, and I am there for the duration. The emergence of language thrills me. I am intrigued by the surfacing of thought processes; I am captivated by their play, and by their creativity. I invented games to play with my son that involved little more than our imaginations. I grew as a writer because he challenged my vision and my originality as nothing else ever had. As he got older, I enjoyed the time I had with him even more because I knew it was short-lived. I welcomed school holidays and snow days because it gave us more time to be together. I stashed away little art kits that we could do on these days. We baked and cooked. We painted. I introduced him to the game of “mishmash.” From time to time, I would allow him to empty the kitchen cabinets and pour a little of everything into a huge bowl. He delighted in this game as only a child could. With his sleeves rolled up and a big wooden spoon clutched in his hand, he stirred the ingredients as he explained what he was making. Each time, it was something else. Years later, when he told that he had chosen to write about mishmash as one of the topics for his memory piece during his six-week Language and Thinking orientation at Bard College, I was moved to tears. He remembered. My time with him had been well spent.


When I write about motherhood, as I often do, it comes from a place that is still a source of wonder to me. How is it possible to love someone so much? In The Sinner’s Guide to Confession, each of the main characters is a mother. Barbara, the mother of three grown children, recognizes the strengths and weaknesses of each of her children. She deftly navigates those relationships, trying not to play favorites and working hard to be what each of her children needs while still retaining her independence and her privacy. When she eventually decides to reveal her secret, she is most worried about how it will affect her children. Kaye has two children and though they are adults, she is unable to disregard how her decision to leave their father might affect them. Even Kaye’s relationship with her own mother, Gertie, explores the push and pull of mother and child. However, Ellen’s loss of her infant daughter and the inability to conceive again play the most significant role in the novel. Ellen’s need is so profound and so palpable that I cried as I wrote the section where she imagines what it would have been like to raise her daughter. Ellen’s situation is heartbreakingly sad. Her loss defines her forever. I loved writing the scene where Ellen and Joy meet for the first time. They are each so full of expectations. Joy, already a mother herself, can really understand what Ellen must have felt and continues to feel. Both women have suffered unimaginable losses, and this brings them closer.

My role as a mother has enriched me as a writer. I can go to a place inside myself that understands what it means to split yourself between your own needs and dreams and your role as a mother. Of course, after so many years, I have a better grip on how to balance the two. Clearly, I have written consistently throughout these last twenty-five years. Still, when my son is home, I turn my days over to him whenever he wants me because now there are weeks and months that go by without seeing him. Although I cherish the time I now have to myself, I often miss those endless days of being wrapped in a cocoon with my baby. And like the women in my novels, I continue to create a life for myself that is separate from my child’s life because that is natural and best. Sometimes, however, I long for just one more chance to experience another day of the chaos and fatigue that defined those early months. I want just one more day of the newness and the thrill of such never-ending love.

Join Phyllis on the Sinners Guide to Confession and Willing Spirits virtual tour.  If you would like to be a host on this tour, contact margie@nikkileigh.com

Catch Me When You Can

Today, Sunday, you'll find me at the meeting of the Heart of Texas Chapter of Sisters in Crime at 2pm at Barnes & Noble Westlake in Austin.  I'll talk about  "My Double Life of a Genre-Crosser: Writing Mystery and True Crime." Like actors who are typecast, authors are pigeon-holed into a slot where they are supposed to devote their writing life. If following your bliss means breaking out of that mold and entering unchartered territory, don’t hesitate to go where your passion leads.


Tonight at 9:25pm Eastern I'll be talking with Dana Pretzer about the Angel Downs murder and the politican charged with her murder, Stephen Nodine on Scared Monkeys Radio.

Tomorrow on Women in Crime Ink, I'm writing about Joran van der Sloot and his latest victim, Stephany Flores Ramirez.

Radio People are Cool

I worked in radio for 15 years and often grow rather nostalgic for those radio days. 

My fondness for radio has continued to grow now that I have done interviews about my books on dozens of radio stations across the country.

Because of these both these experiences I really appreciated the praises of radio I read last night in a novel.  I simply had to share this book excerpt and dedicated it to all the strange characters and good friends I've met in Radio land.

From Relentless

by Dean Koontz

"Radio hosts, both talk-jocks and traditional tune-spinners, do better interviews than TV types. Rare is the TV interviewer who has read your book, but eight of ten radio hosts will have read it.

"Radio folks are brighter and funnier, too--and often quite humble.  I don't know why this last should be true, except perhpas the greater fame of facial recognition, which comes from regular television exposure, encourages pridefulness that ripens into arrogance."

Thank you, Dean!