by Ciji Ware
One of the best books giving a full account of Hurricane Katrina and its aftermath is Dr. Ivor van Heerden’s The Storm (written with Mike Bryan). This is a harrowing read and one that every American should take the trouble to absorb. Former deputy director of the now shuttered LSU Hurricane Center, Dr. van Heerden subsequently had a “set-to” with the administration at Louisiana State University as a result of his unflinching reports about the U.S. Army Corps of Engineering’s responsibility for the levee and canal wall failures. LSU’s “questionable behavior” involved alleged retaliation, including van Heerden’s firing for fear his remarks would jeopardize the school’s federal funding. Subsequently, a judge found van Heerdan’s assertions of wrongful termination were “undisputed” in the documents related to the professor’s suit that was finally settled in his favor in 2013. Dr. van Heerden now resides in the Chesapeake Bay area but maintains his ties with New Orleans through www.levees.org where he and his fellow crusaders fight for safer protection for this water-ringed city.
Orphans of Katrina by Karen O’Toole about the massive effort to rescue the animals abandoned or stranded in the storm is a book that breaks your heart and a story that suggested the fictional character of Marielle Durand Claiborne. If you’re an animal lover, you can learn more at www.orphansofkatrina.com
Much of the foundation of the New Orleans sections of That Winter in Venice was laid pre-Katrina during my research for Midnight on Julia Street (first published in 1999; revised edition, 2011), and so I extend repeated thank yous to New Orleanians Jeannette Bell, Bill Borah, Patricia Gay, Paul Neveski, William D and Sally K. Reeves, Britton Tice and the gang at Garden District Bookshop, along with the authors of the books listed below.
From my base in California, I must thank my “Ciji’s Beta Readers” who are brave enough to scan early drafts of my work: Diane Barr, Ellie Cabot, Carol Kavalaris, Diane Natt, Joy Ware, Marilee Zdenek, and most especially New Orleans native, public relations expert and dear friend, Gaynell Rogers. Betas, too, in a sense were certain pals who heard me yak about this novel often enough to feel as if they’d read one draft or another: Jola Anderson, Linda Bucklin, Pat Boddy, Chris Butler, Janet Chapman, Phoebe Fielding, EV Gilbreath, Alison Harris, Bonnie MacLaird, Cindy Mason, Deb and Larry Mindel, Linda Ojeda, Dean Stolber, Susan Wintersteen, Millie Zinman, and my dear friend of longstanding, author Cynthia Wright.
I am also deeply indebted to Kim Ostrom-Cates (pen name: Ella Marsh Chase) who is not only a sublimely talented novelist but also a very skilled editor. I am so grateful for her candid editorial wisdom, copyediting, friendship, and for worshipping that special breed of dog as much as I do: our beloved Cavalier King Charles Spaniels.
The novel is dedicated to two friends who are both consummate professionals in their fields: the aforementioned Cheryl Popp, and Carol Kavalaris, my dog walking pal, the perfect neighbor, and a woman who runs a global enterprise called ArcusStone™. This limestone product, with the proper sealant applied underneath, can make an historic building look “antique” but still be watertight. What are the chances of living across the street from the one person I’ve ever met that knows how to fix a leaky palazzo? (“Serendipity One Million!”) Carol’s guidance and practical advice provided a crucial “plot point” just when I needed it and I will be forever grateful to her for helping me figure out how to deal with stemming the acqua alta that threatened to cancel my fictional Il Ballo di Carnevale! And without the help of my cousins, Eve Forester Rossi and her husband Marino who live in Florence, my university-vintage Italian employed in the novel might be completely comical. Let us hope I instituted their “suggested changes” in decent form. If not, it’s my fault and le mie scuse più profonde!
As with every book I write, I am deeply grateful for the love and support of my husband of nearly four decades, Tony Cook, who has always encouraged my “gallivanting around the world.” We’ve got one more to go in the Four Season Quartet project—That Spring in Paris—a work-in-progress that is likely to provide a few more interesting adventures. My much-loved son and daughter-in-law, Jamie Ware Billett and Dr. Teal Eich—New Yorkers, now—provided welcome respites to and from several trips to Venice and will probably do the same on the next one as we head for France!
And, finally, a posthumous thank-you and bon voyage to Ensign Aubrey, my dear, sweet fourteen-year-old Cavalier King Charles Spaniel who loyally laid under my desk until I wrote “The End” on this one. As for Venice and New Orleans, let us pray measures are taken in time to prevent a similar epitaph...
For anyone wishing to explore more about this “tale of two cities,” here follows a partial bibliography culled from the many books I consulted for this effort:
VENICE:
Venice: A New History by Thomas F. Madden
Venice: The Biography of a City by Christopher Hibbert
The City of Falling Angels by John Berendt
Carnival Masks of Venice: A Photographic Essay by J.C. Brown
Save Venice, Inc: Four Decades of Restoration in Venice edited by Melissa Conn, et al
The Costume Designer’s Handbook by Rosemary Ingham and Liz Covey
I read nearly a dozen photography and large format books on Carnival in Venice, including one I purchased and dreamed over some twenty-five years ago:
Carnival in Venice by Shirley and David Rowen, published by Harry N. Abrams, Inc.
NEW ORLEANS:
The Storm by Ivor van Heerden and Mike Bryan
1 Dead in Attic by Chris Rose
Rising Tide: The Great Mississippi Flood of 1927 and How It Changed America by John M. Barry
New Orleans: Elegance and Decadence by Richard Sexton and Randolph Delehanty;
New Orleans Interiors by Mary Louise Christovich, photography by N. Jane Iseley
The Free People of Color of New Orleans by Mary Gehman;
The Second Battle of New Orleans: A History of the Vieux Carrè Riverfront Expressway Controversy by William E. Borah and Richard O. Baumback Jr.
The French Quarter by Herbert Asbury.
Treating Trauma - Survivors with PTSD by Rachel Yehuda, Ph.D
“The Big One,” Times-Picayune archive, by Mark Schleifstein and John McQuaid.
Numerous accounts about Hurricane Katrina and its aftermath are available online from the archives of the Times-Picayune; the U.S. Geologic Survey; the U.S. Army Corps of Engineering; The New York Times, and a number of ad hoc blogs and newsletters from various interest groups that sprang up in the wake of the storm. All make for compelling reading.
CIJI’s “WOO-WOO” LIBRARY:
The Biology of Belief by Dr. Bruce Lipton
Epigenetics by Lyle Armstrong
Ancestral Clearing — 5 audio tapes by John Newton
If intrigued to explore this field further, simply type “Epigenetics” into a search engine and see what turns up.
Ciji Ware
Sausalito, California
Visit Ciji at:
http://www.cijiware.com
Facebook:
http://www.facebook.com/CijiWareNovelist
Images of the author’s researches can be seen at:
http://www.pinterest.com/cijiware/that-winter-in-venice/
The Four Seasons Quartet — Book 1
That Summer in Cornwall
Meredith Champlin, the newly appointed guardian of an unruly “Beverly Hills brat,” decamps from her settled existence in Wyoming with her charge and her Welsh Corgi to spend the summer with her English relatives at Barton Hall, a shabby-chic castle perched on the remote cliffs of UK’s West Country.
Meredith’s summer escape gets even more complicated when former British Army Lieutenant Sebastian Pryce, veteran of a bomb-sniffing K9 squad in Afghanistan, proposes they join forces to found the Barton Hall Canine Obedience Academy, along with signing her up for his volunteer rough-and-ready Cornwall Search and Rescue Team.
Even with an assist from a novice search dog named T-Rex, the odds seem long that a mere three months in the
land of Meredith’s Cornish ancestors can transform her troubled ward into a happier child, heal the wounds suffered by her soldier-turned-significant-other, and save the Barton-Teague estate from pending disaster.
“Ware again proves she can intertwine fact and fiction to create an entertaining and harmonious whole.” — Publishers weekly
“Ciji Ware’s award-winning storytelling should come with a warning—Do not start unless you want to be up all night!” — Romantic Times
Available at all online retailers or cijiware.com.
The Four Seasons Quartet — Book 2:
That Autumn in Edinburgh
Can memories of a tragic, eighteenth century love triangle be passed down through a descendant’s DNA?
When Fiona Fraser’s mercurial boss dispatches the American designer to Edinburgh to create a Scottish Home Furnishings Collection, the chemistry deepens instantly when she and tartan manufacturer Alex Maxwell discover their ancestral bonds to the star-crossed lovers Thomas Fraser—the “Lost Lieutenant”—and Jane Maxwell, the flamboyant 4th Duchess of Gordon who died in 1812.
From the cobbled streets of Edinburgh’s Royal Mile to the tartan and cashmere mills of the Scottish border country, the modern lovers grapple with the imminent threat of financial ruin to their respective firms, along with ancient wounds echoing down through time... and a heartbreaking mystery, hidden for more than two centuries, that will dictate Alex and Fiona’s own destinies...
“A deep, complex novel exploring love, betrayal, healing, and renewal in the human heart.” — Affaire de Coeur
“Vibrant and exciting...” — Literary Times
Available at all online retailers or cijiware.com.
Midnight on Julia Street — the prequel to
That Winter in Venice
If you enjoyed meeting Kingsbury Duvallon and Corlis McCullough in That Winter in Venice, you will love reading their own story in Midnight on Julia Street, a novel of scandal that transcends time in the Big Easy.
The sultry streets of pre-Katrina New Orleans, the glamorous Garden District, derelict riverfront cotton warehouses, and gritty back alleys come alive in this time-slip novel of a feisty reporter who inexplicably glides between the nineteenth century and the modern world. A long-forgotten drama of blackmail, swindles, and a love affair that is still changing lives leaves Corlis and King wondering if their burgeoning, unholy attraction will render them pawns in a matrix of mystery and deceit.
“Vibrant and exciting... an intriguing plot full of rich characters that I couldn’t wait to see what happened.” — Literary Times
“Wonderful storyteller, Ciji Ware is in rare form with this intriguing and terrific novel.” — RT Book Reviews
Available at all online retailers or cijiware.com.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Ciji Ware is the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of nine novels, a novella, and two nonfiction works. She is the daughter, niece, and descendant of writers, so writing fiction is just part of the “family business.” She has been honored with the Dorothy Parker Award of Excellence and a Romantic Times Award for Best Fictionalized Biography for Island of the Swans, and in 2012, was shortlisted in the prestigious WILLA (Cather) Literary Award for A Race to Splendor.
An Emmy-award winning television producer, former radio and TV on-air broadcaster for ABC in Los Angeles, as well as print and online journalist, Ware received a BA in History from Harvard University and has the distinction of being the first woman graduate of Harvard College to serve as the President of the Harvard Alumni Association, Worldwide. As a result of Ware’s first novel, Island of the Swans, she was made a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland (FSA Scot), and in 2015 was named to the “Martha’s Vineyard Writers-in-Residence” program—both honors she treasures. The author lives in the San Francisco Bay Area and can be contacted through her agent, Celeste Fine at Sterling Lord Literistic, or at:
http://www.cijiware.com
Any notes of grammatical or formatting errors are most appreciated. If you spot any of these pesky devils, please send them to Ciji at [email protected]. We will gather them together and make the corrections, enrolling you among our honored “Ciji Beta Readers!”