An Interview with Alicia Beckman (Leslie Budewitz) By E. B. Davis

 

He was not here to impose judgment, but to bring a man before society’s

judgment. Render unto Caesar and all that. If he crossed into God’s

territory in the process, tough luck for the Big Guy.

Alicia Beckman, Blind Faith, Kindle Loc. 1367

 

Long-buried secrets come back with a vengeance in a cold case gone red-hot in Agatha Award-winning author Alicia Beckman’s second novel, perfect for fans of Laura Lippman and Greer Hendricks.

For decades, the unsolved murder of Father Michael Leary has haunted Billings, Montana, the community he served. Who summoned the priest late one autumn night, then left his body in a sandstone gully for the ravens and other wild scavengers?
 
And it’s haunted no one more than Lindsay Keller, who admired and confided in him as a teenager. Compelled by his example to work for justice, she became a prosecutor. But after a devastating case left her shattered, she fled the rough-and-tumble for the safety of a desk, handling real estate deals and historic preservation projects. Good work, but not what she’d dreamed of. 
 
Now Lindsay finds herself in possession of the priest’s wallet, the photo of a young girl tucked inside. She’s sure she knows the girl, and that it’s tied to his death. But how?
 
Detective Brian Donovan, a hot-shot Boston transplant, would like nothing more than to solve the county’s coldest case. Probing the life and death of Father Leary takes Lindsay and Donovan deep into long-simmering tensions in this seemingly-peaceful place.
 
Then another woman far away digs up unexpected clues about her own family’s past—a history rooted in a shocking truth—and her questions bring her to Lindsay and the detective. But the dangerous answers could rock the community to its very core.

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This was one of the hardest interviews I’ve ever written. Why? Alicia Beckman presents a long, dark tale involving three families. The story starts in 1972 (actually before that) and ends in 2016. The story is shown through five characters throughout those years. It’s hard to say who is the main character. I enjoyed getting to know all of them, but particularly Lindsay Keller, Brian Donovan, and Michael Leary. There are two murders. The first in 1972, which was solved, but without a known motive—a key to the second murder—one yet to be solved—the 1995 murder of Father Michael Leary. The perpetrator of the first killing isn’t talking and couldn’t have killed the second victim because he was in prison.

 

I’ve focused on characters and all things Montana in the interview because I don’t want to spoil the plot. I hope the interview will spark your interest to read this page turner. Please welcome Alicia Beckman aka Leslie Budewitz to WWK.           E. B. Davis

What’s a Green River?

 

It’s a lemon-lime soft drink that was hand-mixed at diners and soda fountains when I was a kid in the 1960s, in Billings, Montana. I fondly remember a man in my parents’ bowling league stepping behind the counter at the bowling alley café to mix them for the kids and his happiness in seeing our joy. No doubt the color and name came from a colored syrup.

 

Why is Billings, Montana called the Magic City?

 

City boosters promoted the nickname in the 1950s and ‘60s, claiming the town “grew like magic.” Now Billings is called Montana’s Trailhead.

 

What’s a sensei?

 

A martial arts teacher. The term carries a sense of wisdom and trust.

 

When Lindsay gets the wallet of Father Leary, whom she knew and liked when he taught at her high school, she ends up withholding evidence by keeping a photo of a young girl out of the wallet before turning it into Detective Donovan. Why did she do that when she knew it could get her into disciplinary trouble with the state bar?

 

This is a tough moment for Lindsay. She prizes honesty and prides herself on her own, but something about that photograph tugs at her. She knows she should recognize the face, that it’s the key to unlocking a memory she’s more than half forgotten, and keeps the photo to study it. She also fears that the girl’s connection to Father Leary—whatever it is—will be a problem and tarnish his memory. She isn’t thinking about her career; that worry comes later. It’s one of those stupid things we do instinctively, and then have to hope don’t have major consequences. But of course, for Lindsay, it does.

 

In high school, Lindsay stood up to a nun who belittled an American Native girl. Although Lindsay never got in trouble because of the incident, she ended up telling her parents. Why did she do that?

 

Lindsay was a good kid who wasn’t going to lie to her parents, especially when she expected she’d get in trouble at school and they’d find out anyway, making them even angrier that she hadn’t told them. While her parents tussle over how to respond, they are actually proud of her for standing up to injustice. And yes, this incident does foreshadow the adult Lindsay’s conflict with her boss and her conflict with her own daughter, Haley.

 

The day of that high school incident, Lindsay befriended a new girl, Carrie, whose grandmother was the housekeeper for Father Leary. While visiting Carrie at her house nearby the church, Lindsay waits and watches as Carrie drags her little sister out of the church where she was playing, followed by Father Leary, who was clearly upset. Why did the scene stay in Lindsay’s mind all those years later? Are there significant times that we somehow know are important, but we don’t know why?

 

Lindsay and Carrie, seventeen at the time, each saw and heard bits and pieces of a confrontation that stuck in their minds for different reasons. Lindsay had never seen the priest she admired so rattled and wondered how it was connected to Carrie and her sister. Carrie thought they were in Billings to stay, after a lifetime of being continually uprooted; instead, they left the next day, and no one would tell her why.

 

And you’re absolutely right: We often sense that an event is a turning point, without knowing why or how it will play out. We may get necessary perspective over time, or learn the rest of the story later. For Lindsay, the tragedy that occurred that evening shoved the incident at the church out of her mind. Carrie, on the other hand, resented Leary and her grandmother making a decision that deeply affected her without including her or telling her what was really going on. The adults felt compelled to act as they did to protect the girls. As a storyteller, I’m intrigued by the consequences of attempting to protect the people we care about by withholding uncomfortable truths.

 

Lindsay turned state’s evidence when she turned in her prosecutor boss for knowingly providing unreliable evidence in a murder trial. Again, she stood up to authority. But she also undermined her own career, which she very much loved. Why can’t doing the right thing be a win-win situation, but it never seems like it is?

 

Ah, humans. We’re blinded by our own desires sometimes, aren’t we, especially when other people’s goals become our obstacles.

 

In Blind Faith, it seems that Lindsay should be understanding about her daughter’s choices, but I could understand how Lindsay felt. Her daughter hides that she dropped out of college during her sophomore year to pursue a career in the culinary arts. The girl wasted a lot of money, didn’t get a degree (even if it was one she didn’t want to use), and then lied to Lindsay and her husband. Why shouldn’t Lindsay be mad? I think she had every right.

 

Parenting is complicated, isn’t it? Lindsay is more upset by Haley’s deception than by her change in direction, and she wanted to see herself as the parent a kid could talk to about difficult choices. But Haley—who doesn’t know about the difficult choices Lindsay made in her own career—fears her smart, successful mother will judge her as a failure. It’s a trust issue, on both sides, and they work through it, coming to understand each other and themselves a little better as a result.

 

After Lindsay turns in the wallet, Detective Donovan must reopen the cold-case murder from 1995. His first thought is to wonder if Father Leary was a pedophile. Does this correspond to the time when stories broke of sexual scandals within the Catholic Church?

 

Absolutely, though it took years for the scope of both the sexual abuse and the coverups to become clear. I do want readers to know that this is not a book about pedophilia or sexual abuse; that’s simply one theory the police investigate when dealing with the murder of a priest.

 

Although his wife is after him to clean up his diet, Detective Donovan refuses to drink coffee without cream. As soon as he opens the cold case, he downs two Cokes. Why the stress when twenty-one years have gone by without the case being solved? Or is this his excuse?

 

Ah, the paradox of caffeine: It can both calm and energize us. What Donovan’s really dealing with is the emotions triggered by the conjunction of the cold case and another case he’s investigating, that of the PGA—Parking Garage Asshole—who attacked a woman that morning with a knife. The attack brings back an incident earlier in his career, when he was forced to shoot and kill a man. He too had a Catholic upbringing, and as a bit of a hotshot, wants to be the guy who solves the Father Leary’s murder. Together, the two cases remind him of his own uncomfortable truth: the hunter and the prey aren’t always very different.

 

Carrie’s mother and grandmother kept secrets and covered up Carrie and her little sister’s real identities as Carrie discovers when trying to trace a genetic disorder that threatens her grandson’s life. Did neither the mother nor the grandmother have any idea that their genetic heritage was fraught in health issues? Would it have made a difference even if it did? Why do people tell lies in the name of protection?

 

No, neither of them knew about the genetic disorder, first identified in the late 1930s. Neither actually lies; they simply let the girls believe what appears to be true and close the door on the past. It’s common, and driven by a huge range of motives. Rich ground for fiction.

 

I was surprised at the discretion Carrie and her little sister used after knowing the truth. Is lying by omission better than lying to protect?

 

Carrie and Ginger decide not to publicly disclose the conclusions they’ve reached but can’t prove. Those directly involved are long gone; disclosure would do no good, and privacy will do no harm, unless they kept the truth from Carrie’s daughters. I am certain, though, that they will tell the girls everything, because it is part of their story. And that’s what both Carrie and Ginger have always wanted: to know their own story.

 

Does everyone have secrets, even real-life everyday people?

 

Of course we do, whether it’s a secret resentment or what really happened when the car bumper got dented. Some deeply affect our relationships or our view of ourselves; others are trivial at best. More story potential!

 

What is burning sweetgrass?

 

Sweetgrass is a wild grass that is sometimes braided and burned like sage, to clear or sanctify a space. Lindsay’s high school classmate, Charlene, mentions her family, who are members of the Crow tribe, burning it in the hospital as a blessing. It’s got a lovely, slightly sweet fragrance, much like the palm fronds burned in the Easter season. Sweetgrass can also be woven into baskets.

 

A couple of questions about the topography. What are:

 

The Rims: The Rims or Rimrocks are a long sandstone cliff formation that runs along the north side of the Yellowstone River Valley. Billings sits at the junction where the Rims meet the river, and the Rims are a defining feature of the area. 

 

Butte: A butte is a hill or rock cropping, usually standing alone, with a flat top. Lindsay and her high school pals, Jana and Mary Ellen, used to drive north of town to the base of a big butte and park the car, to get away and do things they weren’t supposed to do, like smoke and drink.

 

I’d expected this book to be a follow up on what evidently was a stand-alone, Bitterroot Lake. What are you writing now? 

As Leslie Budewitz, my real name, I’m continuing to write cozy mysteries and just turned in the seventh Spice Shop mystery, set for publication in July 2023. As Alicia Beckman, a name that honors my mother and grandmother, I’m writing moodier suspense – so far, all standalones. The WIP is tentatively titled The Birdwatcher’s Daughter and follows a young reporter, a teenage girl, and the girl’s father as they uncover a hidden past that connects them. It’s set in Seattle and in the Flathead Valley in Northwest Montana, where I live.

 

Thanks for a great conversation!