The Story Behind the Story
American antiques dealer Kate Hamilton is back in Long Barston, helping her colleague Ivor Tweedy organize an auction in a seaside village on the Suffolk coast. An abandoned Victorian insane asylum is being converted into luxury townhouses, and Kate and Ivor have been asked to sell a fine collection of antiques, including a fifteenth-century painting attributed to the Dutch master Jan Van Eyck. But when a retired criminal inspector is found dead, Kate fears the halls of the sanatorium housed more than priceless art. The inspector turns out to be her friend Vivian Bunn’s first boyfriend. They met in 1963 at a seaside holiday camp when, along with three other teens, they explored an abandoned house where a local doctor and his wife had died under bizarre circumstances. When a second member of the childhood gang dies unexpectedly—and then a third—it becomes clear the teens discovered more in the house than they realized. What was the deadly truth they unwittingly found? When Kate makes a shocking connection between a sixty-year-old murder and the long-buried secrets of the sanatorium, she understands that time is running out for Vivian—and anyone connected to her.
Some novels are pure fiction. Others, like this one, are inspired by real-life events. The initial idea for The Shadow of Memory came from “House on Loon Lake,” a 2002 podcast on NPR’s This American Life about three boys who explored a mysterious, abandoned house one summer. The transformation of a Victorian insane asylum into an upscale gated community was inspired by a story in Bill Bryson’s hilarious Road to Little Dribbling as well as similar accounts of Edinburgh’s Craighouse, possibly the most luxurious mental hospital ever built in Great Britain. And the investigation into the provenance of a hitherto unknown painting by Jan Van Eyck was sparked by the revelation of a fake Frans Hals painting sold in 2011 for $11 million by Sotheby’s London auction house. My challenge was to weave these threads together to produce The Shadow of Memory, the fourth book in the Kate Hamilton Mystery series.
An Excerpt: The Shadow of Memory by Connie Berry (769 words)
Note: Kate and her elderly friends Lady Barbara Finchley-fforde and Vivian Bunn are attending a pre-wedding hen party.
“Kate, dear.” Lady Barbara approached me. “It’s rather late for the senior set. Time Vivian and I were tucked up in our beds.”
“Of course. Let me say goodbye to Angela and Hattie.”
“No, no—you stay and enjoy the fun. Vivian will see me home.”
“Actually, I’m ready for a good night’s sleep myself.” That wasn’t quite true, but with Lady Barbara’s failing eyesight and the slight unsteadiness I’d noticed in Vivian recently, no way would I allow them to trek through Finchley Park alone in the dark.
We gathered our belongings, thanked Hattie for the boxes of goodies she’d packed up for us, and said our goodbyes.
We followed the gravel path through St. Æthelric’s graveyard. Above us, the sky was a deep inky blue. The nearly full moon glowed like a giant baroque pearl, lighting our path.
I let the older women walk ahead of me so I could keep my eye on them. They were giggling like schoolgirls, which made me wonder how many Pimms they’d downed at the Arms.
Something purple caught my eye.
It was a sock. In a shoe. Attached to a leg.
A man sagged against a headstone. His chin rested against his chest.
“Stop,” I called out. “Someone’s ill.” Crouching, I placed my finger on his neck.
I was wrong. Someone was dead.
Laying just beyond the man’s outstretched fingers, partially hidden by a tuft of grass, was a piece of folded paper.
I picked it up and read Vivian Bunn, Rose Cottage, Long Barston.
“Who is he?” I asked Vivian.
“I’ve never seen him before in my life.”
“Nor I,” said Lady Barbara.
“What was he doing with my name and address?” Vivian was clearly upset.
“We don’t know the paper was his,” Lady Barbara said. “Someone else probably lost it.”
As none of us believed this, we let the comment drop and waited for the police to arrive.
The night was chilly. Normally, I’d have immediately escorted the two older women home, but when I called Tom, he’d asked us not to leave the body until the police arrived.
I found a place for Vivian and Lady Barbara to sit—one of the newer gravestones, a modern design with a flat rectangular top and an inscription that read To the Memory of Letitia Hubbard, Loving Wife and Mother.
Vivian screeched. “We can’t sit on Letitia.”
“She won’t mind.” Lady Barbara settled herself on the granite slab. “Letitia was always a very welcoming person.”
Vivian lowered her ample bottom. “Oo—like perching on a slab of ice.”
“Poor man. Should we cover him?” Lady Barbara began to unwind her soft woolen shawl.
“He doesn’t need it,” I said. “On the other hand, you do. Scoot together and both of you get under the shawl.”
Taking Vivian’s pocket torch, I went back to view the body.
The man had been somewhere in his seventies, I judged. I couldn’t see his face properly, but his white hair was short, still fairly dense, and neatly clipped. He was tall and well dressed, with wool trousers and a tweed sports jacket under a khaki raincoat—conservative except for the bright purple socks, which gave the corpse an almost jaunty appearance.
I saw no blood, no obvious signs of trauma, but a stain on the front of his crisp white shirt and a whiff of vomit told me he’d been sick. I was tempted to check his pockets for identification but curbed my curiosity. Tom would be there soon.
And then he was.
The emergency vehicle arrived first, lights flashing. Then Tom’s new black Range Rover, followed by a Vauxhall, one of the police cars. The Rover pulled up to the lych-gate.
As the EMTs converged on the body, Tom and his sergeant, DS Ryan Cliffe, strode toward us along the gravel path. Tom was in full-on policeman mode.
He gave me a quick nod and a pat on the arm. “Thank you, Kate. Cliffe will drive Vivian and Lady Barbara home. We can interview them in the morning. Would you mind going along? If you’re up to it, come back. I’d like to take your statement tonight while everything is fresh in your mind.”
“Of course. But the man is a complete stranger. He was dead when we got here.” I handed Tom the note. “I found this.”
Tom took a look at the note. He gave Vivian a curious look but said nothing.
“This way, ladies,” said Sergeant Cliffe.
Author Bio
Connie Berry is the author of the Kate Hamilton Mysteries, set in the UK and featuring an American antiques dealer with a gift for solving crimes. Like her protagonist, Connie was raised by antiques dealers who instilled in her a passion for history, fine art, and travel. In 2019 Connie won an IPPY Gold Medal and was a finalist for the Agatha Award’s Best Debut. She is a member of MWA, CWA, and SinC. Besides reading and writing mysteries, Connie loves history, foreign travel, cute animals, and all things British. She lives in Ohio with her husband and adorable Shih Tzu, Emmie.
Author’s Contact Links
Web site: https://www.connieberry.com
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/ConnieBerryAuthor
Twitter: https://twitter.com/conniecberry
Instagram: http://instagram.com/conniecampbellberry
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/authorconnieberry
