Sara Paretsky and me

 

Seems cheeky of me to even put myself in the same breath as the doyenne of today’s female crime fiction authors, doesn’t it? (She was also one of the founders and the first president of Sisters in Crime.) But let me explain. I watched an absorbing Zoom interview with Paretsky today and learned a lot—something that people have told me all my life. Other people have the same insecurities that I do. It’s not just me!

I was not maliciously happy to learn that this famous author harbors some of my doubts. Indeed, I’m sorry—I thought maybe when you reach a pinnacle of success, you get beyond that. But she confessed today that there is little disconnect between what’s on her mind and what comes out in her writing. Reminded me of the man who once scornfully asked me, “Can’t you write about something besides what you know?” I guess the answer is “No, I can’t.” Though I can’t remember exactly how she stated it, Paretsky confessed to a tendency toward verbosity. Sometimes she wants to tell herself, “Close it down and get out of here.” She also admitted that the novel she’s working on now is about to bury her—but don’t most all of us feel like that, especially in the murky middle?

That she is a Chicago author and was speaking for the Hyde Park Historical Society further endeared here to me. Hyde Park is, in case you somehow missed it as I shouted it everywhere, the neighborhood where I grew up and the setting of my latest novel, Saving Irene. Paretsky talked knowledgeably about the neighborhood and the opportunities it offers, at least one of them she implied a safe place to grow old and cherish your idiosyncrasies (none of this is a direct quote).

Paretsky, who holds a degree in history from the University of Chicago, has a strong grasp of the history of both her city and the country. She talked knowledgeably about the optimism of the eighties, reflected in her early novels, and the sadness of the later ones when she sees that our government is pretty much run by men of wealth, though she applauded the emerging voices of both women and young people these days. Still, most leaders in our Senate count their personal wealth as at least ten million dollars, and the top leaders approach half a billion.

I am about the same age as Paretsky, and yet I felt I was way behind her understanding of the sweep of history in our lifetime. She became active in the sixties, first published in the eighties. I may have been a bit before her, but I couldn’t speak as knowingly about the protests of the sixties as compared to those of today. Then it occurred to me if the subject was the American West of the nineteenth century, particularly the history of women, I could probably hold my own. All reassuring.

I’m realistic enough to understand that I am not and never will be the writer that Sara Paretsky is. She crafts more complicated, more realistic novels than I ever will—and more popular and, surely, more profitable. But it reassures me to know that, after years of writing and at our age, we share some insecurities.

I learned something else today. The Zoom program was to begin at noon, but I was involved in something and a bit slow in tuning in. When I did, I got a message that the meeting had reached capacity of participants. If someone dropped out, I might be admitted. Disappointed, I kept trying and finally did get in. Much later I learned from an email that there was no limit but a Zoom glitch. Guess, though, it will taste me to be a bit more prompt.

I’m still in the phase of thinking I look like an old and not very attractive on Zoom—today I was terribly aware of the stretched-out sweater that keeps me warm, my lack of makeup (I really could remedy that), and the unflattering angle of the camera. I looked furtively at the other participants and decided that they all looked better than I did. But I bravely left the camera on.

Yay for me!