I'm reposting Dee Stewart's April 2008 review of Zora and Nicky below:
A Review Inspired
by Dee Stewart
I love to read, but lately all I've been doing is reviewing and editing books. These tasks somehow drain my love for reading until this month. My friend, Claudia Mair Burney, who write the hot pants off me sent me three of her latest novels, all divine, but this one--Zora and Nicky: A Novel in Black and White--it did something I rarely get, something that justifies my reasoning for writing inspired fiction...illumination.Zora & Nicky in short is an interracial/interdenominational love story. How do people of different races build a world together? How do people of different ideas of sound doctrine live a life together? How do people love through Christ? A not so simple love story written with simple, elegant, honest, passionate prose. Best book of the year so far.
My favorite passage: Because I have broken into a million pieces. Click here to read more.
I have to agree with Dee. It's a masterpiece. I recommend it for the older teens. 17 and up I'd say.
Today, I welcome one of my favorite authors; truly, one of my favorites in craft and spirit. If you've been following this blog for more than a month, I've said something about Claudia's work. Zora and Nicky and The Exorsistah were two of my top pics for 2008 and Claudia was my author of the year. I'm a fan.
Welcome Claudia. Introduce yourself to my readers. I’m Claudia Mair Burney, friends call me Mair, which rhymes with fire, no matter how it looks. I’m a Catholic Jesus freak, wife, mom, rabbit owner, artist, and word lover, and I wrote a series of mysteries that are funny, and sexy, and still have Jesus in it.
Your latest releases is the third book in the Amanda Bell Brown series. Tell us about it. I named the heroine after my own great-grand mother. She came from share croppers, and wasn’t able to live her dreams, so I shared some of mine with her. Amanda, Bell to the people who love her, is a psychologist with a troubled past who spends a lot of time helping other people, but she has no idea how deep her own post traumatic stress syndrome runs. She meets Jazz Brown, a fine man, with his own emotional wounds, and they fall in love. But they’re a train wreck together. Half the fun of reading the books is finding out if they ever get it right. Solving a murder is just icing on the cake.
Click to orderLove this cover. Tell us about Deadly Charm. It’s the last in the series, unless Howard Books decide to publish an optional fourth book. Buy the others and they may! In this one, we see if Bell gets everything she’s dreamed of: her man, her baby, and yes, another murderer going down, this one her most cunning nemesis yet.
Bell's gotta get the man, Claudia. I just ordered my copy and I can hardly wait to see where they're going. How have Bell and Jazz evolved over this series? It’s easy to focus on Bell’s dysfunction, but we see in subsequent books that the fine man has a few chinks in his armor. Bell and Jazz don’t get better initially, they get worse, like most of us, until grace, the amazing kind, saves us. And salvation isn’t a one time event. We are being saved all the time. Loving each other is a big part of Bell and Jazz’s, as is trusting in love. So, it’s all good in the end, but what a ride getting there. I think Deadly Charm is the funniest of the three.
I know readers will interpret this as the Holy Spirit guides them, but from your perspective, what’s the spiritual takeaway forDeadly Charm? That God loves you, even if you’re broken, and crazy, and make horrible decisions out of love, because you really want to help people. And I want people to know you can love Jesus, too. Boldly go to the throne of grace, battered and bloody if you have to. And love one another. That’s my big message. Seriously.
Claudia, in addition to mystery, you write in other genres – young adult, woman’s fiction, even romance. How is the writing different from genre to genre? It’s just story, Rhonda. Some books are a little harder to manage, because they characters are not as much like me as Bell is. In the end, I try to tell a good tale, beautifully, or at least do so giving the readers a good time. But I try not to sacrifice story for… anything, including the “rules” about one can and cannot do in a genre or with a structure, and I strive to give readers characters they can love enough to walk 200 to 400 pages with. I do that with all the genres, as best as I can. Sometime I fail, other times, not so much.
What has been the most rewarding experience since being published? Meeting so many people. When I begged Jesus to let messy ol’ me write for Him, I told Him I’d tell people as broken as I am that He loves them. I’ve been able to do that through these books, and the relationships I’m building because of my work. It rawks! Hard, girl.
Any disappointments or things you would have done differently? Publishing is unbelievably brutal, from vicious reviewers, to the crazy things that go on for the sake of business. Only the strong survive. Unfortunately, I’m not as strong as I thought I was.
Are we going to see Bell and Jazz again? I hope so. If people buy the books it can happen.
What’s next for you? I’m writing The Exorsistah 3, for Pocket Books, and Let Nothing Upset You, a non-fiction, playful journey with Teresa of Avila. I also write galleries on occasion for Beliefnet, and just dusted off an urban tale I’d like to try my hand at again. It’s called Restoration.
Claudia's books can be found where ever books are sold and certainly on Amazon.com. She has quite a few of them. If you try one new author, make it Ms. Mair Burney, I promise, promise, promise...you'll thank me.
There's good writing, and then there's, well... really good writing. When I read Claudia Mair Burney's debut novel, Murder Mayhem and a Fine Man, I thought, where did this woman come from and how did she learn to write like this?
Claudia Mair Burney did the dogone thing. Amanda Bell Brown is a sassy and clever heroine. Sizzling dialogue, authentic description, and ever mounting conflict make it top notch reading. I couldn't stop laughing at the humor, was moved by the underlying spiritual message and was simply delighted to find a really well written novel. Book two, Death, Deceit, and Smooth Jazz stares at me from my night table. If it weren't for previous writing commitments, like this blog, writer's workshops I have to prepare for, and promises made to the people I'm critiquing, I'd be in a hot bath with a tall glass of ginger ale, grinning and laughing about what Bell and Jazz get into next. For those of you that haven't read it, here's the synopsis:
For Amanda Bell Brown, just living her life is murder! How's a woman supposed to grapple with faith, a fine man, and turning thirty-five when she keeps tripping in her high heels over mysteries -- and not just the God kind?
Amanda Bell Brown knows that life as a forensic psychologist isn't quite as cool as it looks on prime-time TV. But when she turns thirty-five with no husband or baby on the horizon, she decides she's gotta get out and paint the town -- in her drop-dead red birthday dress. Instead, she finds herself at the scene of a crime -- and she just may know who the killer is. She needs to spill her guts, but not on the handsome lead detective's alligator shoes -- especially if she wants him to ask her out. A complicated murder investigation unearths not just a killer but a closet full of skeletons Amanda thought were long gone. Murder, mayhem, and a fine man are wreaking havoc on her birthday, but will her sleuthing leave her alive to see past thirty-five?
View the book video here:
Hurry and get a copy. I promise, you won't be able to put it down!
