Lake of Sorrows
Erin Hart
Hodder & Stoughton, 2004http://www.erinhart.com/
Ricki Lake of Sorrows
Ricki Lake: Welcome! Hey! I'm Ricki Lake, and I've got a really great show lined up for you! It's great to have you with us!
Audience: Go Rick-i! Go Rick-i!
Ricki Lake: Also great is American-born author, Erin Hart. She's with us today to talk about her current novel, Lake of Sorrows!
Erin Hart: Thank you Ricki, it's great to be here!
Ricki Lake: Musical guests are The Offspring!
(Cut shot to a colourful Punk Band, offstage. Audience claps along to raucous chorus from Pretty Fly (for A White Guy). Cut shot, to sexy crowds dancing along.)
Ricki Lake: Yes, as always, today's program will feature excitement, drama, conflict, character, important advice, diet tips from me- that fat chick in the film Hairspray, can you believe it!- and of course surprises.
Erin Hart: Oh my, I've never been on a daytime chat show before! Especially not a fictitious piss-take of one. It's an honor to be immortalized, Ricki!
Ricki Lake: Erin!
Erin Hart: Yes?
Ricki Lake: Don't flatter yourself. This isn't immorality. It's just another one of Critical Mick's offbeat reviews that no one will ever read.
Commercial Break #1. Begin Overview...
Audience: (laughs)(camera zooms around a full house, having a great time.)
Erin Hart: I'm still proud to be featured!
Ricki Lake: Well let's get down to it! Lake of Sorrows is your second novel? What's it about?
Erin Hart: Set in modern Ireland, Lake of Sorrows is a mystery that begins not with the discovery of the body of a missing person, but of one hundreds of years old! Unnervingly preserved by the bog waters, the body draws an archaeological team that includes American Nora Gavin and, uncomfortably, her estranged lover Cormac Maguire.
Ricki Lake: This sounds just like your first novel, Haunted Ground.
Erin Hart: Only on the surface! Haunted Ground started with the discovery of a body in the bog. In Lake of Sorrows- get this- there are TWO bodies in the bog!
Mystery French Voice Offstage: Body in le Bog II, you say? Le plug-in d'animation! Sounds no more enticing than City Slickers II: Le Legend d'Curley's Gold.
Erin Hart: Who was that?
Ricki Lake: Nevermind the teaser, let's continue shall we?
Erin Hart: Sorry Ricki, I don't know how these talk shows work. That unseen interruption mentioned something about gold? Why, yes, in Lake of Sorrows Nora encounters a mysterious young man ostracized by harsh local gossip that his father and uncle have stolen a trove of golden Celtic artefacts. Other interesting characters include the wrathful, sexually-frustrated foreman, a manipulative vixen of a rival archaeologist, a mute witness to horrible crimes, and an aging inspector, long haunted by his own personal tragedy.
Ricki Lake: Oh my! But wait. Haven't I heard something about a second body?
Erin Hart: Right at the end of Chapter Two! Lake of Sorrows moves right into the good bit. A second body discovered, victim to the same "triple death" suffered by the ancient corpse. But... this newer find is wearing a wristwatch! Whenever you go digging into the past's vast repository, you see, you never know what horrors will be uncovered.
Ricki Lake: A wristwatch-! So someone, within living memory, was murdered in this same ancient way... and Nora and Cormac have to figure out who and why?
Erin Hart: They aren't assigned the case in any far-fetched Miss Marple manner, but they do find themselves at the core of the mystery, with a hell of a good reason to unearth the truth.
Ricki Lake: Is there any sex?
Erin Hart: Oh yeah.
Ricki Lake: Order me a copy!
Mystery French Voice Offstage: Au contrer! Leur rôle dans la série!
(Cut to the Audience, gasps and exclamations)
Commercial Break #2. Begin Harsh Criticism...
Nicci French: (appearing stage right, speaking in the Mysterious French Offstage Voice and finding it hard to navigate under some weird garment that covers almost her entire body.) Pardon, you are sitting in my chair!
Ricki Lake: What we did not tell you, Erin, when you agreed to appear on this program, was that esteemed mystery author Nicci French would also appear. Intimidated?
Erin Hart: Not at all! Hello, Nicci! How are you?
Nicci French: (wanders into the first row of seats, then crashes into the backdrop. At last she lifts the deerstalker hat big enough to hide two people, spots her chair, and runs.) Non, I will not shake le hand of a pretender! Usurper! épisode et son contenu résumé! You believe you can take my place on le bestseller charts?
Erin Hart: Hey, no offence meant! I-
Nicci French: See this giant Sherlock Holmes hat? It belongs to MOI. How many hats are on your head? Ha! None!
Erin Hart: Ricki, she seems a bit upset! Can you get Nicci French a glass of water, maybe a small Jameson whiskey?
Ricki Lake: (stands off to one side, violently shaking a jar full of mixed ants in hopes that they'll fight)
Nicci French: Lake of Sorrows, j'ai crée le mien, had nothing to do with Phil Coulter's CD! If it is imitation or tribute that you wished to play, Miss Hart, you have failed!
Erin Hart: Sorry- I think you're confused. Coulter's 2000 album was called Lake of Shadows. My novel is called Lake of Sorrows. There's Irish music in my novel, though not as prominently featured as in Haunted Ground. I love those tunes, can't help but include them, but they are much more in proportion.
Nicci French: (turns red, mumbles Gallic curses) OK, then, what about body count? My Beneath the Skin had gore galore! Ha! And I killed off my main character not once but twice! Compare that?
Erin Hart: Hey, write the story that you wish to tell! Write from the heart. I myself love creating interesting characters and exploring their depths and motivations, not gimmicks like killing off main characters without warning. Sure, each figure that the readers needs to know is introduced in the first third of Lake of Sorrows. But every scene's new knowledge keeps those readers constantly re-evaluating, the screws getting ever tighter. Some hard judges have praised my approach.
Nicci French: Oh, you are proud of le fact that both Critical Mick and his wife enjoyed this novel?
Erin Hart: I've got a lot of time for all for my fans.
Nicci French: Well ITV makes dramas of my novels! Two-part dramas! With millions of viewers, I wouldn't have time to acknowledge each and every one!
Erin Hart: Yeah, but those dramas suck!
Audience: (gasps!)
Commercial Break #3. Climax...
Erin Hart: Not to sound all judgemental, but a suspect with an iron-bellied alibi cannot turn out to be the killer just because that would take people by surprise. Hell! The whole fun of a mystery is that an unexpected solution makes perfect sense, in retrospect!
Nicci French: (roars in anger) What about procedure, I put to you-! Yours is not a procedural! There are only six pages of autopsy scene in the whole novel!
Ricki Lake: If I can intrude here- a lot of research has gone into Erin Hart's mystery. The authentic details are there. They're simply played down, to allow the interaction of the various characters to take the fore.
Erin Hart: Thanks, Ricki. If anyone would like, I can recommend several great autopsy-heavy books. I love the mystery genre, and am always delighted to talk about it over a drink or two.
Nicci French: I hated Haunted Ground! Et agréable à visite! I spit on its creepy mansion!
Erin Hart: That's your decision. Thank you for giving it a read, anyway.
Ricki Lake: I've got to goad again, Nicci- Haunted Ground strikes me as a first novel. Lake of Sorrows is leaps ahead, true talent well polished. It's a fantastic story, on par with Minette Walters.
Audience: Go Rick-i! Go Rick-i!
Nicci French: (roars and throws down her awkward Sherlock Holmes hat) I AM THE ONE WHO IS COMPARED TO MINETTE WALTERS!
Erin Hart: I'm pleased that you liked my novel, Ricki.
Ricki Lake: The prompting in my earpiece praises Lake of Sorrows' excellent pacing. The pages really keep flying! The manner in which it's divided into small sections-
Nicci French: (pulls an bullwhip from within her hat, cracks for attention) Stop praising anyone else's work! You'll knock moi from le bestseller charts! De mon frère, très cool! Avec des superbes photos de Buffy!
Ricki Lake: Nicci French, you're British. Lose the fake accent. Your behaviour is as juvenile as this review.
Audience: Go Rick-i! Go Rick-i!
Nicci French: (loud enough to be two people) All you ever read was The Safe House! Go buy my other novels before making your decision! On second thought, I will just whip up some excitement about my writing, right here and now! Ha!
(Audience shrieks and panics, as Nicci French makes everyone dive behind chairs or face a brutal lashing. The Offspring jam out some punchy riffs, equally stirring. Ratings soar.)
Erin Hart: Nicci, maybe there is room for the both of us on the bestseller charts. Let's let quality do the talking for us.
Nicci French: On guard!
(Erin Hart feints low with her chair, then belts Nicci French across the teeth.)
Audience: Go Er-in! Go Er-in!
(Bits of wood splinter, Nicci French goes down. Bouncers circle in and muscle the pair to opposite end of the camera shot.)
Nicci French: (lisping, as with a dinged-up kisser) I never saw that coming! But oh, how deep it struck!
Ricki Lake: No greater praise, from one mystery author to another.
Commercial Break #4. Begin Summary...
Ricki Lake: (Lights dim, calm and sombre. Ricki looks stunning in an intimate spotlight.) Yes, we've come once again to Ricki's Take. What should we draw from the tableau that we have witnessed today? Well, I'll tell you.
Ricki Lake: Haunted Ground, not a bad debut.
Ricki Lake: Lake of Sorrows- damn, now there's a good read!
Ricki Lake: Erin Hart, welcome to prime time!
Ricki Lake: Nicci French, go crawl back into a hole like Gargamel nursing his foiled plot at the end of each Smurfs episode.... or like the villain from tomorrow's exciting program, featuring Bartholomew Gill and Critical Mick. Who will endure public scorn? Tune in and find out!
Ricki Lake: Just between me and you, though, it's Critical Mick. The bastard takes liberties that will get his ass sued.
Critical Mick is an Erin Hart fan. Lake of Sorrows is the best whodunnit yet, in 2005
Read or listen to Critical Mick's interview with Erin Hart!
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