Mystic murder mystery solved in Ann Hallum’s new novel

July 26, 2015 12:01 am • Last Updated: July 26, 2015 12:05 am

By AMY J. BARRY, Special to The Day

Mystic author Ann Hallum (Photo submitted)

The names may have been changed to protect the innocent but the places are real, and local readers will have fun identifying all the familiar spots in Mystic, New London and surrounding towns in Ann Hallum’s new romantic murder mystery, “Mystic Secrets: Death Visits the Mystic Drawbridge.”

This is Hallum’s first published novel, although she’s been writing for years. Once she took the novel out of the box that had been on a shelf in her art studio for close to a decade and finished it, she went the self-publishing route. She was anxious to get the book out there.

Hallum has a lot in common with her protagonist, Leslie Leonard, who meets Dr. Gerard Martinson at a writer’s conference — the start of a romance that heats up even more when Leslie moves to Mystic, where Gerard lives. A creepy murder occurs at the drawbridge downtown.

The suspenseful mystery builds as the new lovers realize they both have connections to the victim. Dark secrets and suspicions start to threaten their relationship. Leslie is robbed of valuable Korean celadon antiquities and brutal attacks occur. Luckily for Leslie, a Mystic journalist and Manhattan police detective come to her aid.

Hallum says her writing is inspired by her own career in fashion, textiles, interior design and education. Leslie is an interior designer who attended Parsons School of Design in New York. Hallum also took classes and taught at Parsons. Both Leslie and Hallum went to the Iowa Writer’s Workshop — although Hallum went with her husband, who was interested in writing poetry. And both traveled a lot between Mystic — Hallum’s home for the past 15 years — and Manhattan.

“A first novel is always a little bit autobiographical,” Hallum says. “Leslie is a conglomerate of different experiences I had. And Gerard has many of the characteristics of my late husband, who was a research scientist.”

Although, she points out, unlike her characters, “I have no connection with Korea and I’m not a Buddhist, but I’ve always been interested in Far Eastern countries and their beauty.”

So why did Hallum wait so long to publish her first novel?

“I’ve written all my life, starting in second grade when I won a prize for the best written essay on a field trip we took on a train,” she recalls. “I was asked to read it on a local radio station — it was so exciting. I never looked back. All my work and traveling and jobs have always included writing.

“I carried around synopses of novels in my bag,” she continues. “This book began when my husband and I moved to Mystic. While we were waiting for the Mystic drawbridge to close to cross it, he said, ‘What if something was under the bridge when the bridge went up?’

“I started fiddling around with the idea,” Hallum says. “It was a couple years after 9-11 and still very much on our minds.”

And, as she says in the book’s Author’s Note, “The threat of more attacks loomed very real. A story echoing the feeling of that period took hold in my imagination, and I began to write it.

“And now, with the whole resurgence of terror, ISIS, the book is good because it pushes us to think about those things,” she adds.

Creative journey

Hallum grew up in Western Pennsylvania. She worked in the Bahamas after college, where she had studied math and sciences. It was the islands that got her on her career path.

“The creativity and colors of the Caribbean blew my mind,” she says. “It was the end of the 1950s and I knew I wanted to do something creative. I got a wonderful job with (fashion designer) Diana Vreeland, as her assistant. It was like a post-graduate course in living. The Beatles were coming on, feminism — it was a great time.”

She describes herself as a romantic person and notes that her other novels on the shelf have more romantic themes — “but not kitschy,” she stresses. She hadn’t planned on writing a murder mystery, but that’s how “Mystic Secrets” evolved.

“Writing a mystery was challenging but exciting,” she says. “I really got into the mood of it. The ideas just fell out. I really enjoyed it. I had a wall with Post-its all over it and I’d put them up and take them down. You have to be very efficient and orderly and have a good mind for thinking things out to write a mystery.”

Now that the novel is published, Hallum thinks she’ll take a month or so to do some painting. She mostly paints in watercolors and has worked with internationally trained artist Guido Garaycochea, curator of Expressiones in New London. Hallum painted the watercolor of the Mystic drawbridge on the cover of her book.

“I think I’ll just relax and paint and see what comes out of the hopper,” she says.

Hallum is amazed by how positively people are responding to her novel, and how happy they are that the story takes place in Mystic.

“It’s a wonderful world,” she says. “I love big cities, but I’m quite content here. It’s beautiful and I’ve always loved the ocean, and the people are nice.”

“Mystic Secrets: Death Visits the Mystic Drawbridge” is $14.95 softcover and is available as an e-book.