My father had been home from World War II for a decade before I came into the world in 1951. He served in Europe, where he followed Patton’s army and taught and demonstrated bomb disposal, actually publishing a manual on the topic. Somewhere in this world there is a picture of my father, the major, sitting on a live bomb, a huge thing of probably ten or more feet in length with fins on one end. He’s smoking a cigar and laughing. Figures.
As a child, I loved newspapers (the funnies, especially) and I loved books. So did my dad. I can remember every night when he came home from work, he would eat supper and then he would read the Charleston Evening Post, now the Post and Courier. When he was sufficiently caught up on the world, sometimes we would take a drive down to Mr. Louie Burmester’s place of business, just a few blocks away on Sullivan’s Island. It was just the two of us. He would shoot the breeze with Mr. Louie and I’d enjoy a small vanilla ice cream cone on the house. Then I was allowed to choose a Golden Book, which he would read to me later that evening at bedtime. I think they were twenty-five cents. Anyway, this little excursion didn’t happen every night, but we made the trip together often enough for me to amass a small mountain of children’s books. By chance, the night before he died, he read me every single one. He was just forty-two and I was only six months past my fourth birthday. My mother was devastated and never got over losing him. Well, to be honest, she recovered well enough to marry and sadly bury two more husbands. They were lovely men.
By the time I was seven, my older siblings were all out of the house. My sister married, and my brothers either joined the Coast Guard, went to boarding school in Texas, or moved to California seeking fame and fortune in the music business. I became sort of an only child. Basically, I had a childhood with enough drama that could turn anyone into a writer.
Stella Maris Grammar School in Mount Pleasant, South Carolina, was where I would receive my primary school education. We spent our days under the firm hand of the Sisters of Charity and the stalwart nuns of Our Lady of Mercy. They were dedicated to expanding our minds and saving our heathen souls while imbuing us with a love of God and a fear of the Devil. We were taught to understand our faith through the Baltimore Catechism. We learned that our purpose on this earth was to know God, to love God, and to serve Him in this world. We gave up candy for Lent, we said rosaries and other prayers called, believe it or not, “ejaculations” to work off time in Purgatory, and we did penance for sins yet to be committed. We won holy cards in spelling bees and threw overripe persimmons at each other during recess.
It was roughly 1959. I was a young girl of around eight years when I realized we didn’t have a school newspaper. Working as a school journalist seemed to me to be a perfect extracurricular activity. We had one big campus that consisted of a kindergarten and grades one through eight. I thought, surely there must be enough going on to produce some kind of a newspaper. A monthly seemed appropriate. I pointed this out to Sister Miriam, our principal, and told her I had a plan.
She listened and smiled at me and said, “Well then, let’s go start us a newspaper.”
I was thrilled. It was my first publishing experience. My plan was to ask each class to submit one page of news and if they wanted to, they could include a cartoon. My secret was that I would write a Dear Abby–type column called Ask Stella. There was a box—probably an empty tissue box—where students could discreetly write out a question anonymously, drop it in, and Stella would answer. What made me think I could offer valuable advice to eighth graders is anyone’s guess. I think we published three or four issues before the whole venture fizzled. Maybe the novelty had worn off. I remember being a little disappointed. But here’s what I remember most—the smell of mimeograph ink. And what it felt like to organize a team and to put writing out there for others to read. There was criticism. There were kudos. It was worth it. It was also the beginning of coming to understand myself and of some deep-seated desire to be understood by others. To have a voice and have it heard seemed very important, even then.
The fifties and Catholic school did not really go hand in hand with self-expression. In fact, we were unquestioning, well-behaved, polite little lambs for the most part. We did our jobs by doing massive amounts of homework and projects, but we kept our opinions to ourselves.
Time marched on and soon the civil rights movement began. There was the Orangeburg Massacre, the bombing in Birmingham, and the marches on Selma and Washington, DC. Then came the Vietnam War and the women’s rights movement. My teenage years were fueled by heated debates and massive change all around and in my world. And guess what? Suddenly, I had opinions. I wasn’t afraid to voice them because if I hadn’t learned anything up until then, I sure knew the difference between what was right and what was so terribly wrong.
Later, a job in Charleston took me to a job in San Francisco and then in 1973 to a job in New York. I became an importer of women’s apparel and traveled all over Europe looking for inspiration and then all over Asia looking for production. I had a brief marriage of arrogance and then when that firestorm ended, I met Peter Frank. What a romance we had! Anyway, we married and three years later our daughter was born. Knowing I couldn’t be much of a parent if I was out of the country or on the road somewhere domestically for almost half of the year, I retired. We left the city for the suburbs of New Jersey and our son was born. I was so bored I thought I would die, so I began to volunteer. I was class mom a number of times and still say that if I could get back the amount of time I spent in the car line waiting for one of my offspring to appear I’d be ten years younger. But life was good, almost idyllic.
Then the unthinkable happened. My mother was diagnosed with stage IV melanoma and she passed away quickly. Burying our parents is the natural order of life, but that doesn’t mean it’s easy. I was completely heartbroken. And then my siblings wanted to sell her house on Sullivan’s Island to settle her estate. Now I was deeply depressed because I had lost my mother and was about to lose my sense of place in the world. How would I bring my children home to know their aunts and uncles and cousins if I didn’t have a house? And I had given up my career and therefore my own income. Peter wasn’t interested in stepping up for a second house, so I began scratching my head. What to do?
Well, given the fact that my children were in school, it had to be part-time work. But what could I do to earn enough money to cover a modest mortgage, taxes, and maintenance on that house?
Still an avid reader, I stumbled across a bestseller in paperback that I had not read. It was written by a wildly popular author at the time. After I finished I thought, You know what? I can do this. I can write books! It seemed like the perfect solution to my situation. I was so naïve I didn’t know the odds were stacked against me of ever getting published. I didn’t have an MFA, or even a BA. I just sat down and did it.
But how did I decide what to write about? Well, I already knew I wanted to write about the Lowcountry because I missed it so desperately. But something was bothering me and after a lot of thought I figured it out. My children were being raised in a bubble of peace and prosperity. I grew up with history happening all around me. They had no clue what my childhood had been. So I decided to tell a story that would show them the difference between the childhood they knew and mine. It took a while to get a manuscript together, but I finally did.
I used to believe that much of life was serendipitous. But now I suspect certain things are almost preordained. Call it fate, luck, or the hand of God, selling Sullivan’s Island was just about the fastest thing that has ever happened in my entire professional life. It was published in January of 2000 and when I saw the first copy I was so overwhelmed, I wept. Sullivan’s Island debuted on the New York Times list at number nine, which was pretty unheard of back in the day. The rest is history, thanks to a smart sales team, a talented marketing team, a great editor, and booksellers everywhere.
I’m always writing these days, or thinking about writing. How is my day structured? We rise early, have breakfast, read the newspapers
, and dress for work. Then my husband drives to his office and I go to my office upstairs. I check my email, maybe make a phone call or two, and then settle down to write until noon. I have a small lunch, watch the news and the weather, and then I go back to my office, writing until three or four. It’s not very glamorous but it sure is a lot of fun.
By Invitation Only is my nineteenth novel. It’s a story of two families who are the Haves and the Have Nots. A wedding’s being planned, things go haywire, and the proverbial tables are turned. One thing’s certain: one side has terrible manners and could use a dose of Sister Miriam. I think it’s surely one of my favorites and I hope it will be yours, too!
Wishing you all every good thing,
Dorothea Frank
Shrimp and Grits
Serves 2 to 4
For all those years when I was desperately missing the Lowcountry, one sure way to make myself feel a little better was to cook up a batch of shrimp and grits. For decades, before it became a trendy appetizer and dinner menu item in restaurants across the South and beyond, this simple, comforting dish was a Lowcountry breakfast staple. The truth is that no matter what time of day you serve them, shrimp and grits are always deeply satisfying. For best results, use coarse whole-grain grits or, even better, Anson Mills quick grits (www.ansonmills.com).
FOR THE SHRIMP
1 pound large shell-on shrimp
6 ounces thick-sliced applewood-smoked bacon (about 4 slices), chopped into ¼-inch pieces
¼ sweet onion, finely chopped
½ teaspoon sea salt
½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
¼ cup all-purpose flour
2 garlic cloves, minced
Juice of 1 lemon
2 green onions (white and light green parts), thinly sliced
FOR THE GRITS
2 cups milk
1 cup stone-ground grits
4 tablespoons unsalted butter
1 teaspoon sea salt
½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
To prepare the shrimp, peel and devein them, reserving the shells. Rinse the shrimp, drain thoroughly, and set aside.
Place the reserved shells in a medium saucepan and add 2 cups water. Bring to a gentle boil over medium heat (be careful not to let the liquid foam up and boil over). Reduce the heat and simmer, uncovered, until the liquid is reduced to 1 cup, about 30 minutes. Strain the shrimp stock into a glass measuring cup and set aside; discard the shells.
To make the grits, in a medium, heavy-bottomed saucepan, bring the milk and 2 cups water to a boil. Stir in the grits. Reduce the heat and simmer until cooked, about 30 minutes, stirring occasionally. Stir in the butter, salt, and pepper and keep warm on the side.
Meanwhile, to finish the shrimp, line a plate with paper towels. Place the chopped bacon in a large sauté pan and cook over medium heat, stirring occasionally, until the bacon is browned, about 10 minutes. Use a slotted spoon to transfer the bacon to the paper towels and set aside.
Pour off all but 2 tablespoons of the bacon fat and place the sauté pan over medium heat. Add the onion, salt, and pepper and sauté until lightly browned, 4 to 5 minutes.
Meanwhile, spread the flour in a shallow dish and dredge the reserved shrimp in it to coat thoroughly. Add the shrimp to the pan and sauté just until pink, about 4 minutes.
Stir in the garlic and cook until fragrant, about 30 seconds. Stir in the reserved shrimp stock and lemon juice and bring to a simmer, gently scraping up the browned bits from the bottom of the pan. Simmer until the gravy is heated through and slightly thickened, about 2 minutes.
Stir in the green onions and reserved bacon. Serve the shrimp over the hot grits.
Dorothea Benton Frank’s Favorite Cocktails: Throwing Persimmons
When the trees burst with bright orange fruit, the kids might have their fun throwing persimmons during recess—but adults can make their own sort of fun. The mellow, distinctive flavor of the fruit is a beautiful pairing for bourbon. Infusing the spirit is simple—just cut up a persimmon, add a few black peppercorns for depth and a very faint spice, and let sit. From there, it’s simple as can be to make a quick, refreshing drink with lemon and ginger ale. A light, refreshing pairing for any classic Southern dish; shrimp and grits, perhaps?
1½ ounces persimmon–black pepper bourbon (recipe below)
½ ounce fresh lemon juice
¼ ounce simple syrup
Ginger ale
Combine all ingredients except ginger ale in cocktail shaker with ice. Shake vigorously, then strain into a tall glass with fresh ice. Top with 2 ounces of ginger ale. Garnish with a thin slice of persimmon.
FOR THE PERSIMMON–BLACK PEPPER BOURBON
8 ounces bourbon
1 whole, ripe persimmon, top removed, cut into slices
¼ teaspoon whole black peppercorns
Combine bourbon, persimmon, and black peppercorns in a sealable container. Let steep for 24 hours. Strain, discarding solids, before using.
By Carey Jones and John D. McCarthy, authors of Be Your Own Bartender: A Sure-Fire Guide to Finding (and Making) the Perfect Drink for You, published November 2018; johnandcarey.com
Dorothea Benton Frank’s Letter to Her Readers III
Dear Readers,
I wanted to reach out to you all for a couple of reasons. One, to thank you for buying my books, for which I am seriously and eternally grateful, and two, to try and get to know y’all a little better. I’d love to hear from you to talk about By Invitation Only and others and I’d love to hear how you identify with the situations found in these pages.
Unlike the characters in By Invitation Only, my family does not now and never did own a farm, except my brother-in-law who grew cotton and soybeans and slaughtered the occasional hog. When I was about eight, visiting my oldest sibling, Lynn, and her husband, Scott, in Manning, South Carolina, during Thanksgiving week he would go out into the country to the farm with a whole host of men. They’d dig a pit, build a fire, put the hog on a spit, and commence drinking bourbon and basting the beast for the next twenty-four hours. On Wednesday or Thursday morning they’d reappear smelling like wood smoke and booze, looking like who did it and ran. We say when it comes to pig we eat everything but the oink. We did. They had pounds and pounds of pulled pork, but there was a small mountain of sausage and hash, too. I think we had turkey on Christmas but Thanksgiving was the other white meat. To this very day, I can still taste the pork, silky and smoky and melt-in-your-mouth tender.
There was always a football game on the television as Scott’s brother-in-law was Alex Hawkins who played for the Baltimore Colts and who, by the way, helped me catch my first fish. A couple of years ago Alex turned up in Columbia, South Carolina, at a talk I was giving at the university. We marveled over how many years had passed and who knew then I’d be living a writer’s life now?
If there was time to walk you through my childhood and later years, you’d probably say that I was destined to do something like this, given my history of 1950s and ’60s classic Southern women’s oppression. We knew it! Sooner or later she was gonna blow! But I think that maybe talking about the here and now is more interesting as it relates to this particular book.
In the last three years, both of my children have married. Our most recent wedding in October 2017 for our son, William, was a breeze. The groom’s family gets off very easy. My husband and I threw a Lowcountry barbecue, including an oyster roast for the rehearsal dinner. The bride’s family had never had the pleasure of wild, fresh-caught shrimp and grits with andouille sausage prepared by Lowcountry chefs or wild roasted oysters that came from the May River around Beaufort. We were blessed with a balmy night in October, so we decided to have it in our front yard, which looks at Charleston Harbor. It would have been more picturesque if it hadn’t been pitch-black dark. Nonetheless, we hired a jazz trio to set the mood, put up a small tent, strung lights, and rented farm tables and chairs. There were lanterns and bales of hay topped with pumpkins and gourds everywhere.
Our bride, Maddie Clark, is about the best thing to happen to our family in eons, so pretty and so smart. Except for my son-in-law, Carmine Peluso, who is handsome and wildly talented. And except for the child he and our daughter, Victoria, brought into this world last June. Ted. Ted is the true love of my life.
I had an occasion to serve on a panel with Lesley Stahl of 60 Minutes in April last year, right before Ted was born. We were at the Post and Courier Book and Author Luncheon in Charleston along with several other authors, talking to eight hundred people, chatting them up and signing books. My daughter was there and she was heavy with child. Lesley took one look at her and then back to me and said that we were in for the greatest thrill of our lives. Lesley was there to promote her book Becoming Grandma. She began to tell us the story of her daughter’s delivery of her grandchild and how we were going to love this child so much it would astound us. She was right.
I remember thinking, I have to be excited for my daughter’s sake, that I was sure to love this child, but I’d keep my wits about me. I swore I’d never be one of those pathetic grandmothers with a thousand pictures on my phone, making everyone suffer them and stories about Little Johnny’s tiny precious teeth.
So Ted came into the world last June and I lost my mind. I did. I have at least six hundred pictures of him on my phone and should we meet at a book signing or somewhere, please save a little time for Ted. And wait until you see the videos! And his precious tiny teeth. No, really! They’re two little perfect pearls! Just yesterday he broke the skin of a clementine with them and sat there sucking the juice. At eight months! Einstein!
Lesley was right. I didn’t even know there was this kind of happiness to be found on earth.
So many of the things I have just described to you can be found in this book but written in another way. Irma the sow of Diane’s barbecue is reminiscent of the pork I ate on Thanksgiving and how it came to be on my plate. The decorations from Diane’s barbecue look an awful lot like the decorations we had for Will and Maddie’s rehearsal dinner, as do the tent, strung lights, and pumpkins. But praise the Lord, I don’t have all of Diane’s drama in my life. Otherwise, I’d go off the grid and live in a cave. On the page, it’s hilarious. But in real life? Not so much. With the possible exception of Ramsey Lewis playing at a party. I’m such a fan of his!
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