Chestnut Time at the Armory
One of my favorite memories growing up in Buffalo was the annual trip my brothers and I would take each fall to collect chestnuts at the Connecticut Street Armory. At least, we thought they were chestnuts.
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Nonni and the Loaves and Fishes
Don’t let the name Gardiner fool you—I had a Sicilian grandmother. She and my grandfather lived on the West Side of Buffalo in an upstairs flat with three small bedrooms and one bath. They had eight children (and adopted two more) who were likewise highly accomplished in producing offspring, so I shared my grandparents with […]
So You Think You’d Like to Write a Book…
Four years ago, when I decided to write a novel set in Buffalo, I did the worst thing I could possibly do. I looked up “what it takes to write a novel” on the Internet. I did not find loads of encouragement.
Chlorine, Hot Tar, and Baby Oil
What is more evocative than the heady smells of summer—a freshly mowed lawn, meats on the grill, fat little funnel cakes frying at the fair? For me, however, the smells of summer will be tied forever to the summers of my youth, and the pungent aromas of the Massachusetts Swimming Pool.
The Buffalo I Have Lost and Found
I went back to my hometown this summer to visit family and friends, and to do research for my nearly completed novel, set in Buffalo during the late 1960s. As is so often the case when I write stories, I learn things about myself in the process that surprise me. I discovered, for example, that […]
What I Learned About Writing from a Tomato
I am a gardener. And I’m a writer. So naturally, every day from 9 to 5, I am wracked with guilt and mild self-loathing. When I am outside in the garden, I feel guilty that I am not at my desk, butt-in-chair, working on my next blog or novel. When I’m at my desk, I […]