• Home
  • Lane Winslow
    • A Killer in King's Cove (#1)
    • Death in a Darkening Mist (#2)
    • An Old, Cold Grave (#3)
    • It Begins in Betrayal (#4)
    • A Sorrowful Sanctuary (#5)
    • A Deceptive Devotion (#6)
    • A Match Made for Murder (#7)
  • Reviews
  • Events
  • About
  • Contact
  • Blog
  Iona Whishaw

Inspiration for Lane Winslow

4/24/2015

2 Comments

 
Picture
If you wondered what my main character, Lane Winslow might look like, this is how I see her.  This picture was taken in 1935 of my mother as a very young woman, and I don't mind admitting she has been a huge inspiration.  In a world where apparently women were taught as a matter of course to subsume their inclinations to the important lives of men, she cut a swath through life that was completely independent.  It was she who put my father through university, and bought our first houses.  When we were children she hitchhiked to Alaska with interstate truckers because she was tired of waiting around for my father to come back from geology field trips, and in the same devil-may-care spirit drove me and our German shepherd all the way to Nicaragua to find him, long before the highway through Central America was even complete. She wrote books and spoke 6 languages, and went off to university to get 4 Master's degrees after I grew up and left for university. And of course, there was that brief episode of spying during the war in South Africa where my father was a pilot for the RAF.

 In a classic 'do as I say, not as I do' gambit, she used to say that I should make sure to attend to the needs of any husband I had before my own, but I never believed her, not for a minute.  She always did what she wanted, and never let me forget that we came from upper class stock. Once as I teenager I argued over something with her and she pronounced: "I'm right whether I'm right or not!"  She was a fabulous conversationalist with a lively interest in the world right up until she died.  I think Lane has that kind of spirit, and I believe many women of the period were equally powerful. All my female relatives were!

2 Comments
Linda Kelly
10/18/2018 10:11:11 pm

Love the bio of your mother, and I'm happy getting some history this way... thanks, you're a great writer. Shows what having a good mama can do!

Reply
marilyn marilyn
12/28/2018 02:58:38 pm

iona, i would be so intimidated by your mother!! my mother was a katie the riveter in a shipyard during ww2 & she was good looking. i was a cute kid but taken away from her & when i was given back she hated me. by the way are you named after iona, scotland ?

Reply

Your comment will be posted after it is approved.


Leave a Reply.

    Meet Lane Winslow!

    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture

    Archives

    October 2020
    March 2020
    November 2019
    August 2019
    March 2019
    January 2019
    November 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    November 2016
    July 2016
    April 2016
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015

    RSS Feed

Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.
  • Home
  • Lane Winslow
    • A Killer in King's Cove (#1)
    • Death in a Darkening Mist (#2)
    • An Old, Cold Grave (#3)
    • It Begins in Betrayal (#4)
    • A Sorrowful Sanctuary (#5)
    • A Deceptive Devotion (#6)
    • A Match Made for Murder (#7)
  • Reviews
  • Events
  • About
  • Contact
  • Blog