How Visiting Ireland Changed My Life — Welcome Daphne Silver!

by Posted on

Welcome Daphne! She is here to celebrate the release of her first novel — Crime and Parchment! I first met Daphne through her husband Matt who was a librarian at my local library. (Matt has since moved on to bigger and better things in our library system.) And I’ve been delighted to watch her journey to published fiction author! If you like your mysteries to have a dash of history, you will love Crime and Punishment!

Daphne: Has your life ever been changed by a trip?

In 2013, I visited Ireland with my husband Matt. I knew going would be an incredible experience, but I had no idea how it would plant the seed for my first cozy mystery CRIME AND PARCHMENT (Level Best Books and Blackstone Audio, 2023). Matt and I had met working in museums, so art and history are important to both of us. While I was still working in the museum world at the time, he’d migrated over to become a librarian. At the top of our list was seeing the Book of Kells at Trinity College in Dublin, Ireland.

If you’re not familiar with the Book of Kells, it’s a truly spectacular illustrated Gospel created around the 9th century. The Book contains 680 pages of gorgeous artwork: interlacing decorations, curvilinear forms, abstract patterns, and intertwined animals. It’s a masterpiece. Although I’m Jewish like my main character, the rare books librarian Juniper Blume, I agree with her that while “Kells might not have been my sacred text, but it was still sacred to me.”

No one is sure where in the British Isles it was created, but the fact that it has survived is a miracle. Kells Abbey was pillaged by the Vikings multiple times. In 1007, a reference to the Book of Kells in the Annals of Ulster describes “how the great Gospel of Columkille [a reference to Saint Columbia]” had been “wickedly stolen during the night from the western sacristy of the great stone church at Cenannas on account of its wrought shrine.” The wrought shrine is a reference to its bejeweled cover. The manuscript inside the book was amazingly discovered several months later “under a sod” but missing its ornate cover, which was never seen again.

That story stuck with me. I always wondered what happened to the book’s ornate cover. Over the years, a seed of an idea began growing slowly in my brain. For many years, I worked at various history museums like the Jewish Museum of Maryland and Historic London Town and Gardens, just outside Annapolis. I also wrote history books under my legal name, Lauren R. Silberman, including Wicked Baltimore: Charm City Sin and Scandal (History Press, 2011) and Wild Women of Maryland: Grit and Gumption in the Free State (History Press, 2015). During those times, I learned a lot about Maryland history. I started wondering… what would have happened if those ornate covers somehow came here?

I know it sounds ridiculous, especially given that the covers have been missing for a thousand years – long before Maryland started, but I couldn’t let go of the idea. I mean, Maryland was started as a Catholic safehaven. What if the covers had been found, held in secrecy, and then brought here for safety reasons in the 17th century? I also pictured a tenacious librarian who is driven by her insatiable curiosity to discover the truth behind a literary mystery – and who won’t give up even when a not-so-historic body is found. Soon Juniper Blume was born.

Life got in the way of writing. I changed jobs, had my son, and couldn’t focus on my story. However, the seed kept sprouting. When my son was a few years old, I came back to my idea, and suddenly, it poured out of me. Not Juniper and the Book of Kells, but a whole new world: Juniper’s sister Azalea, their late grandmother Nana Z and her historic home on the Chesapeake Bay, and the charming town of Rose Mallow. Maybe it’s because of my museum background, but I wanted to know more about all of them. Writing Crime and Parchment allowed me to explore history’s mysteries in my own backyard, but it was all inspired by that trip to Ireland.

So, readers, I return to my original question – has your life ever been changed by a trip?

About Crime and Parchment

Rare books librarian Juniper Blume knows this much… an ancient Celtic manuscript shouldn’t be in a Maryland cemetery. But that’s exactly what her brother-in-law claims.

Last year, Juniper saw the 1,200-year-old Book of Kells in Ireland. She learned how their bejeweled covers were stolen centuries ago, never to be seen again. So how could they have ended up in Rose Mallow, a small Chesapeake Bay town? Being Jewish, the Book of Kells might not be her sacred text, but as a rare books librarian, the ancient book is still sacred to her, making it important to Juniper to find out the truth.

Rose Mallow is the same place where Juniper used to summer with her sister Azalea and their grandmother Zinnia, known as Nana Z. Ever since Nana Z passed away, Juniper’s avoided returning, but her curiosity is greater than her grief, so she heads down in her vintage convertible with her rescue dog Clover.

Juniper discovers that her sister Azalea has transformed their grandmother’s Queen Anne style mansion into the Wildflower Inn, backing up to the Chesapeake Bay. Although Juniper isn’t much of a cook, Azalea has kept their grandmother’s legacy alive, filling the house with the smells of East European Jewish treats, like sweet kugels and tzimmes cake. Will coming back here feel like returning home or fill Juniper with a deeper sorrow? Can she apologize to her sister for not being there when she was needed most?

About Daphne Silver

Daphne Silver is the author of the Rare Books Cozy Mystery series. She’s worked more than twenty years in museums and has the great fortune of being married to a librarian. When she’s not writing, she’s drawing and painting. She lives in Maryland with her family. Although she’s not much of a baker, she won’t ever turn down a sweet lokshen kugel.

Sign up for her newsletter and get the free short story “A Midsummer’s Night Scheme” at www.daphnesilver.com.

Visit her at www.facebook.com/daphnesilverbooks and www.instagram.com/daphnesilverbooks. Purchase Crime and Parchment in print, ebook, or audiobook at https://www.amazon.com/stores/author/B0CKWHQZ66

Unknown's avatar

Published by Sherry Harris

Sherry Harris is the author of the Agatha Award nominated Sarah Winston Garage Sale Mystery series and the Chloe Jackson Sea Glass Mystery series.

35 Thoughts

  2. Welcome to the blog, Daphne! Your book and the story of how you got there is fascinating.

    I went at barely 17 to Southern Brazil for a year as an exchange student. I learned Portuguese by immersion, and the trip widened my view of the world immensely. It truly changed my life and started me on a new path of traveling and learning.

    Like

  4. Daphne, congratulations on Crime and Parchment. I love the idea of this particular story because while I’ve never been on a trip that I feel has changed my life, Ireland is at the top of my bucket list if I ever did go wandering far afield.

    So a book centered on the Book of Kells (which I read a little about in the Ireland of the Welcomes tourist magazine I subscribed to for a few years) does hold quite an interest for me.

    Definitely putting this on my buy list!

    Like

  5. Congratulations, Daphne. I’ve never seen the Book of Kells, but I’ve seen pictures and it’s gorgeous.

    I don’t think a trip has changed my life…yet.

    Like

  6. “Crime and Parchment” sounds fabulous and I’ve added it to my “gotta” read list.

    The only trip that changed my life that I can think of was when we went again to a place we loved for a few days of relaxing and to refocus from our busy lives. It was on the way home, actually not many miles out of town, that I said “Boy, wouldn’t it be nice to live here.” Startled hubby so much that he actually pulled off the road and stopped. He looked at me and asked if I was serious (because I’m not the best person in the world for change). I took just a few seconds to answer with a yes. We talked all the way home about what it would entail, what we would lose and what we would gain. By the time we arrived home, the decision had been made. Of course it took time (like a year and a half) to make it all come to all come together, but it was the best decision ever made and most definitely has led out lives onto much different paths changing our lives for the better.
    2clowns at arkansas dot net

    Like

  7. Welcome Daphne! A trip to a writers’ retreat changed my life because I got to know Edith, Barbara, Liz, and my dear friend Christine among many others! It was a two and a half day event, but the friendships that I formed that weekend have made a huge impact on my life.

    Like

  8. DAPHNE: Congratulations on your debut mystery novel! So interesting to learn how travelling to Ireland changed your life.

    My first solo trip to Europe for 2 months when I was 20 greatly opened my eyes to many different cultures, history, food and landscapes. I loved staying in youth hostels & B&Bs and travelling by Eurail/Britrail and many small buses across the continent.

    Like

  9. Thank you, Daphne for such an interesting blog! In my case, my life was changed 100% when I cam to the US from Chile as an exchange student. I love my life🕺❣️Happy Holidays to you and yours. Luis at ole dot travel

    Like

  10. Has my life been changed by a trip? Well, I traveled across the country to Las Vegas to get married!

    Like

  11. Congrats on your debut!

    Not sure my life has been changed by a trip, but I’ve had lots of trips I’ve really enjoyed.

    Like

  13. My trip by myself to Peru and the Amazon and Machu Picchu for two weeks taught me that I could expand my horizons, meet new people and all of this by myself. I cried when my husband took me to the airport because it was a lot to handle at my age then. But I persevered and survived and became stronger. Trips to the Florida Keys taught me that I loved fishing. Trips to New Orleans taught about fabulous food.

    Like

  14. The trip that really changed my life and showed me that I could do anything was going by myself to the Amazon and Machu Picchu in Peru for two weeks. I met many wonderful people there and visited so many great sights that furthered my art degree. Then going to the Florida Keys for 13 years showed me that I loved fishing. Visiting New Orleans six years in a row made me a fabulous food connoisseur. I have surely grown in my life. Now I typed out a message and it disappeared, so if they both show up sorry. But I love these posts.

    Like

  15. Yes. We moved up our wedding after going on a vacation together. We had thought about moving to Virginia, but decided to stay in Ohio closer to our families. Thank you for sharing. God bless you.

    Like

  17. Like madspangler, a trip to Peru changed my life. I learned to be open to so many new ideas and it showed me that I was a much stronger person that I would have ever imagined. I returned every year for the next 27 years, each year challenging myself more and more. I became very spiritual (not religious) and have such a positive attitude toward life.

    Like

Comments are closed.