Looking For Garbo: My Debut Novel Finally Has Its Release Day!

I’m happy to share that my debut novel, LOOKING FOR GARBO is being released today by Amphorae Publishing Group. It’s been a long time in coming and I have to thank my agent, Jill Marr at Sandra Dijkstra Literary for sticking by me the last 8+ years.

The idea for a story based on Garbo’s famous quote first came to me back in 1995. I saw something in her earnest desire to save the world by sacrificing her own life – something that could have been a typical Garbo vehicle that MGM Studios might have put out at the height of her power and fame, circa 1939:

“If the war didn’t start when it did,” Garbo said, “I would have gone and I would have taken a gun out of my purse and shot him, because I would not have been searched.”

Garbo was talking about her biggest fan at the time – Adolf Hitler. Hitler was obsessed with Garbo, and watched his own private print of her CAMILLE every night. Hitler sent Garbo numerous fan letters, inviting her to come to Nazi Germany. The novel takes Garbo’s quote at face value, and follows her on her journey via ocean liner to assassinate Hitler, and preempt WWII. Of course, war erupts while she is en route – and like any thriller the real action begins with her stuck on the open seas surrounded by Nazis.

My agent Jill found several buyers over the years for the novel. One went out of business, another was a bad fit to say the least: I actually bought the rights back to my work in 2014 and had to wait another 5 years for my novel to see bookshelves. But all said and done it was totally worth the wait. I just hope everyone enjoys the final product as much as I did writing it.

Looking For Garbo is available May 7th at all major bookstores, and online at Barnes & Noble, Amazon, Bokus and IndieBound,

CINEMUSES: INGRID BERGMAN – PARADISE IN PARIS

I’m a student of film and grew up loving the stars of Pre-Code, through to the 40’s and 50’s. Especially the leading ladies. And no other leading lady captured my young imagination and set my adolescent heart afire more than Ingrid Bergman.

I first met Ingrid, the beautiful Swede, as many did in Casablanca. It’s hard to argue Casablanca isn’t the finest American film ever made, largely because of the performances by Bergman and her leading man, Humphrey Bogart. Bergman embodied the role of Ilsa, a young woman with a secret who falls head over heels in love with Rick when they meet in Paris right before the German occupation of the City of Lights during World War II. This we find out in flashbacks, framed in the knowledge that Ilsa betrayed Rick and ever since has been the disillusioned, bitter owner of the most popular watering hole in the desert location on the North African continent.

Any film lover will tell you that Casablanca is meticulously constructed. Film students like me pour over every frame of film, literally, in books such as (Warning: Film Geek!) “Casablanca:The Film Classics Library.” But what I only realized just recently, after having watched the movie repeatedly for over twenty years, is the theme of closure. Never having gotten over losing Ilsa, Bogart’s Rick walks around like an open wound, the not-knowing what happened to his lost love gnawing at his guts all these years later. This betrayal is central to the narrative and everything hinges upon what Rick will do once he finds out why Ilsa betrayed him. And maybe even more to the point – whether she ever really loved him in the first place.

My favorite scene when I was a kid, was the moment at the airport near the end when Rick lets Ilsa go. But after having loved and lost myself, my new favorite is when Ilsa comes to Rick’s the night before and ends up pointing a gun at his heart to try and get the letters of transit. Rick tells her to shoot – she’d be doing him a favor by putting him out of his misery. At this very moment, Ilsa’s resolve melts and she falls into her true love’s arms. At that moment Rick’s faith in love and humanity is restored by the only person on earth with the power to do so – Ingrid Bergman.

Bergman is at her most beautiful in Casablanca. Her face radiates youth and beauty. She exudes a wholesome sensuality that makes everyone in the film fall immediately in love with her and want to help her. We can all relate to Rick, having once been so lucky to have been loved by such a woman, then left standing in the rain at a train station with a cryptic dear john letter melting in his hand, his heart broken in a million pieces. Only an insanely beautiful woman could do so much carnage, made all the worse by depriving her loved one with the reason why; with closure. It doesn’t really matter what the reason is, just the not knowing. That’s when the mind will turn on itself. Fueled by liquor, cigarettes and rage, Rick represents everyone who’s ever had their “guts kicked out” by a beautiful woman. And Ilsa is the only one who can put us out of our misery.

I have a feeling that Casablanca will continue to fascinate me for decades to come. No doubt, there are more surprises to come as I live and dare to love again. And having been deprived closure by a lover like Rick, I still would love to know why I had my guts kicked out. But I also know I’ll never get Paris back, because that only happens in the movies. That’s why I’ll never stop being fascinated by Ingrid Bergman in Casablanca. Because she taught me that even though someone says they don’t love you anymore, a part of them always will. The part worth remembering. Paris.