The Publick House Historic Inn, Sturbridge, MA was the setting for The Friends of the Joshua Hyde Library 9th annual “Stewing Over Mysteries” dinner, Wednesday January 23, 2019. Good cheer and good fare were in abundance. The evening was an outstanding success as folks exchanged lively conversation with each other and a master storyteller. A sellout crowd of 80 people packed the Tap Room celebrating William “Bill” Martin and the release of his latest novel, “Bound for Glory.”
Friends President, Donna Englander, introduced the guest of honor as “king of the historical thriller.” Martin is a successful historical fiction writer with eleven published books. The principal protagonist, Harvard educated antiquarian, Peter Fallon, appears in six novels. The characters premier was in, “Back Bay”, a New York Times bestseller in 1979. Martin specializes in bringing American history to life with such novels as “Citizen Washington”, “The Lincoln Letter” and “The Lost Constitution”.
The newest, “Bound for Glory”, takes place in 1848 during the California gold rush. Readers join a group of Bostonian’s as they set sail for the Pacific coast, navigating around Cape Horn in South America to the goldfields of California. Martin said the novel is adapted from a screenplay he penned in 1974 titled “ The Mother Lode”. The screenplay won him a Hal Wallace Screen Writers Fellowship at the famed University of Southern California Film School. Martin, a Harvard graduate, completed his M.F.A. in 1976.
Martin entertained the audience in the hearth room for an hour with tales of his days in Hollywood. He is passionate about the research required for historical fiction and shared with wannabe writers the discipline required for success. Martin said, “everyday you write a sentence and nail it down, you write a paragraph, and nail it down, then you have a page and that’s the process, you just keep doing it until it’s done.”
“Bound for Glory”, illustrates his love of connecting a moment in history in the present, to the past through his characters adventures. Peter Fallon finds himself standing on the street corner in San Francisco reading a brass plaque. Martin said, “The same plaque represents the spot where the ship of Bostonian’s anchored in 1849 and suddenly, you’ll be back on the ship with them in a totally different world.”
The credentials from his webpage are impressive. “He was the 2005 recipient of the prestigious New England Book Award, given to an author “whose body of work stands as a significant contribution to the culture of the region.” In 2015, the USS Constitution Museum gave him the Samuel Eliot Morison Award, for “patriotic pride, artful scholarship, and an eclectic interest in the sea and things maritime.” And in 2018, the Mystery Writers of America (New England Chapter) gave him the Robert B. Parker Award.”
The Friends of the Joshua Hyde Library and the Old Sturbridge Inn & Reeder Family Lodges made this an affordable and entertaining evening. Tickets cost $15 per person. Hats off to the Publick House chefs in serving a delicious dinner of beef stew, with select desserts, tea and coffee. The stew was well prepared being tender with generous chunks of beef, yellow potatoes, carrots and peas. The broth was scrumptious, rich with the subtle flavors of bay leaf, hint of lovage and a dash of white pepper. The dessert trays offered brownies, cookies, mini pecan rolls, tortes and petite cupcakes. Not a crumb was left.
Martin enjoyed being in the Publick House Inn built-in 1781. His writer’s mind was already conjuring up who could have been sitting in the same room so many years ago. Martin said, “ we are the products of the world that we create and the world’s we envision. World’s that give us a fantastic sense of tradition just be sitting in this very room.”
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