Brophy, Grace 1941-

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Brophy, Grace 1941-

PERSONAL:

Born February 8, 1941, in NJ; married Miguel Peraza (a painter). Education: Studied tapestry design under Carlos Delclaux in Geronia, Spain, 1982, 1986.

ADDRESSES:

Home—New York, NY; Umbria, Italy. E-mail—[email protected].

CAREER:

Former faculty member at Hunter College and Queens College of the City University of New York; has worked as a systems engineer for telecommunications firms, including Bell Labs, AT&T, and Verizon, over a twenty-year period.

AWARDS, HONORS:

Crime book of the month award, BookPage Web site, and named one of the twelve best crime novels, the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) Radio 4, both 2007, both for The Last Enemy.

WRITINGS:

The Last Enemy (mystery novel), Soho Press (New York, NY), 2007.

A Deadly Paradise (mystery novel), Soho Press (New York, NY), 2008.

Coauthor of textbooks Writing Proficiency and Minimum Competencies, both McGraw- Hill.

SIDELIGHTS:

Grace Brophy began her writing career in 2001, when she spent considerable time living in Venice and Assisi, Italy, with her husband, Uruguayan painter Miguel Peraza. The country provided the inspiration for the setting of her mystery novels, which feature Commissario Alessandro Cenni, who is a member of the state police in Umbria. Brophy's first novel, The Last Enemy, tells the story of Rita, a young woman born of an Italian mother and an American G.I. Rita grows up in Brooklyn, but after her mother's death she decides to travel to Italy and live with her Italian relatives. She quits her job and sets off to Assisi, where she stays with the Count and Countess Casati. Despite their titles, they are impoverished and not prepared for their American relative to move in with them. Rita's visit ends up far briefer than she had intended. She goes missing during Holy Week, and her body is eventually discovered in the family's crypt. Alessandro Cenni sets out to solve the case, though it requires him to investigate the aristocratic Casati family and their friends. A Kirkus Reviews critic commented that "Brophy's leisurely debut has an old-fashioned feel and charm aplenty." A reviewer for Publishers Weekly predicted that "rich dialogue and a finely depicted setting will please lovers of old-style deductive detective fiction." Harriet Klauser, reviewing the mystery for the Midwest Book Review Web site, declared: "The story line is fast-paced and never slows down even after the audience knows the identity of the killer for there remains a case to prove."

Brophy's Commissario Cenni returns in her next effort, A Deadly Paradise. In this book the small town of Assisi is rocked by the unlikely and gruesome mutilation and murder of an older German woman. Cenni investigates the woman's background and discovers she was hardly the unassuming old lady and retired diplomat she appeared to be. The victim was actually a bisexual swinger with an African lover who visited her recently, and both her current life and distant past contain a wealth of secrets. Cenni's boss wants him to charge the German woman's lesbian lover. Cenni, however, believes there is far more to the case and insists on digging deeper, discovering clues by investigating a scandal that took place thirty years earlier.

Brophy told CA: "A Deadly Paradise is my favorite of my books, probably because it was so much easier to write than my first novel.

"In terms of writing crime novels, particularly ones set in Italy, I was most influenced by author Michael Dibdin. But my great favorite is John le Carré. I recently reread [his spy novel] Smiley's People just to see how it's done. I have also been influenced by the classics, particularly the nineteenth-century English novels of Jane Austen, Charles Dickens, George Eliot, and the Brontë sisters.

"The most surprising thing I have learned as a writer is how important the mechanics are in writing novels, and in particular crime novels. How do you maintain the suspense between chapters without using obvious cliff hangers? I've been writing all my life and making a very good living at it, but not fiction, and not crime fiction. There are so many things one learns in the process. When writing The Last Enemy, I had to struggle to make sure it was clear which character was talking at any particular time, without constantly repeating, ‘Alex said,’ or ‘Alex asked.’ I kept a stack of paperbacks by my side while writing my first book and would pick one up, and then another, just to see how it was done. (And this from someone who had studied the novel for years in graduate school, but no one teaches that stuff.) The second novel came so easily because I had already resolved the mechanics.

"I prefer character development to plot development, but in crime novels, one can't skimp on one for the other, so I needed to develop discipline as well. How much after all does the reader really need to know about the murder victim? In The Last Enemy, I wanted to tell Rita's full story but I couldn't. And by the time I got to know Rita, I was feeling rather sad that I had killed her before she had her first child. I actually thought for one brief moment of resurrecting her. The lesson there is don't get too involved with your characters.

"I want to accomplish two things in writing fiction. First, to ensure that the reader enjoys the book enough to buy the next. But what I hope for, especially, is that someone who has read one of my books might be without a new novel to read on a rainy evening, and will see my book on the shelf and decide, I can read that one again. I judge books, even crime novels, by how re-readable they are. If it's only a plot-driven mystery, there is no reason for a reader to ever pick it up again. I don't believe I've realized my goal yet, but perhaps in my next book."