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Before we all depart for the holiday and indulge in festive pursuits (i.e. eating, drinking, and celebrating) I have to let you know about Eliza Graham’s debut novel, Playing with the Moon.

The Cover:

 

About the Book:

Shattered by a recent bereavement, Minna and her husband Tom retreat to an isolated village on the Dorset coast, seeking the solitude that will allow them to cope with their loss and rebuild their foundering marriage. Walking on the beach one day, they unearth a human skeleton. It is a discovery which will plunge Minna into a mystery which will consume her for months to come.

The remains are soon identified as those of Private Lew Campbell, a black American GI who, it seems, drowned during a wartime exercise in the area half a century before. Growing increasingly preoccupied with the dead soldier's fate, Minna befriends a melancholy elderly woman, Felix, who lived in the village during the war. As Minna coaxes Felix's story from her, it becomes clear that the old woman knows more about the dead GI than she initially let on.

About the Author:

Eliza Graham worked in marketing and PR before taking up writing nearly six years ago. She lives near Oxford, England, with her husband, two children and small menagerie.

Here’s Eliza’s take on the RosettWrites Q & A:

Dream vacation destination?

A luxury catered chalet in the Swiss Alps.

You've just won the lottery. What's the first thing you do/buy?

A new bathroom.

Favorite mystery/thriller movie?

Can I choose a TV series? The le Carre 'Tinker,Tailor, Soldier, Spy' series from the BBC back in the late seventies (or early eighties--I can't remember exactly when it first came out but I know I was away from home studying and missed it). I love the characters and plotting and the sense of moral and political confusion and decay.

Favorite junk food?

Chocolate.

What's one food you absolutely can't stand?

Liver.

Paper or plastic?

Paper.

What's one talent you wish you had?

Hand-eye coordination. I am useless at ball games.

M&Ms or Godiva?

Godiva.

Favorite time of Day?

Breakfast. Any mealtime, in fact.

Tell us a little about your book. Did an event or idea inspire the book?

Some years back I visited a deserted village on the south coast of England that had been evacuated for pre-D-Day exercises during WW2. I was completely overwhelmed by the poignancy of the place and couldn't help thinking about the people who might have lived there and who had never been able to go home again.  PLAYING WITH THE MOON is about people who do finally return 'home' after sixty years and confront the past, which is both comforting and disturbing. The book starts with a young couple finding a body on the beach.

What's your writing style? Outline or no outline?

At the very most I scribble ideas for the next chapter. My first draft is really an expanded outline, which becomes a final draft following four or five rewrites. Then I rekey (every single word) for a final version. The rekeying helps iron out clunky phrases.

I wish I were a neater writer. I scribble on shopping lists and receipts, despite possessing some very smart notebooks for writing down ideas. I just never seem to have them on me in shopping queues or in the bath.

What do you wish you'd known about either the craft of writing or the business of publishing when you first started writing?

I wish I'd realized you  have to have the soul of a child and the hide of a rhino, or whatever the exact expression is. It's so true that you have to able to 'feel' and yet be thick-skinned enough to recover from criticism.

What's up next for you? What are you working on now?

I've switched into a new mode for me--a YA novel called BLITZ KID. I had some material left over from earlier novels and it was lively stuff: looters and spies and bombed-out buildings and lots of air-raid sirens. I couldn't bear not to use it in a novel!

Sounds terrific! Thanks, Eliza. 

RosettWrites will be on hiatus until Jan.

Merry Christmas!