Goldman, Mary Elizabeth

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Goldman, Mary Elizabeth

PERSONAL:

Born in Dallas, TX; married. Hobbies and other interests: Horse riding, travel.

ADDRESSES:

Home—Bandera County, TX. E-mail—[email protected].

CAREER:

Author. Republic of Texas Press, former managing editor; Forever Texas, former coeditor.

WRITINGS:

A Trail Rider's Guide to Texas, illustrated by Jennifer Remy Renfrow, Republic of Texas Press (Plano, TX), 1993.

(Editor, with Mike Blakely) Forever Texas: Texas History, the Way Those Who Lived It Wrote It, Forge (New York, NY), 2000.

To Love and Die in Dallas (novel), Forge (New York, NY), 2007.

SIDELIGHTS:

Mary Elizabeth Goldman's novel To Love and Die in Dallas is both a tale of high-society drama and a depiction of teenage life in the maverick Texas city during the late 1950s and early 1960s. Goldman is able to write with authority about Dallas's social life. According to her home page, she worked for a Texas oilman and his son when oil controlled politics in the state, and she herself is both a seventh-generation Texan and a Dallas native.

The plot of To Love and Die in Dallas, which reviewers have compared to the television programs Desperate Housewives and Dallas, revolves around a diary belonging to Annie Williams that makes its way into the hands of a friend, attorney David Matthews. "Back in Gaston Junior High in the years before JFK's assassination forever stained the city's name," explained a Kirkus Reviews contributor, "the alphabetical seating chart in their classroom made Lindsey Wilson and Annie Williams best friends." The diary is a revelation about Lindsey's life, as well as her death. Married to a prominent U.S. senator, Lindsey was also the secret lover of still another high school classmate, Greek restaurant magnate Frances Zacchoias. Lindsey was always the center of attention, and her death is no different," declared Detra Fitch in her Huntress Reviews assessment. "Lindsey's funeral reunites the three other friends." Further complicating matters is the fact that the diary has arrived in Matthews's office accompanied by the freshly murdered body of a third friend, Roberta "Butter" Duplissey; David's new wife, Taylor, is the prime suspect. "Life in Dallas both past and present," stated a My Shelf reviewer, "is woven into the intriguing history of these friends."

It is up to police detective Jake Malone to untangle the complex web of relationships and determine the truth of the matter. "There are some great red herrings, some wild, unexpected turns," reported Stephanie Padilla in her review for the New Mystery Reader, "and one bang up of an ending." "All the major players in this tautly plotted thriller must cope with life-changing discoveries," declared a reviewer in Publishers Weekly. "A clever ‘uh-oh’ ending promises a sequel."