Why Windy City?
Why Chicago - the Windy City?
Windy City Romances
There's a lot to like about Chicago, a lot that makes it a great backdrop for any series. Carl Sandburg knew that when he referred to Chicago as "the city of the big shoulders” in his poetry. Sarah Paretsky set her thriller series in Chicago, giving heroine V. I. Warshawski plenty of problems to solve. The city's grown tremendously, but at its heart, still muscle and power. The phrase "political machine" was probably coined here.
Chicago is a huge melting pot. Simone Elkeles, a young adult writer, often captures the diversity of this lively, vibrant town in her work. Always on the move. Downtown, people brush past you on the street, plugged into their head phones. You get in step and rush with the rest. Chicago actually have a street called Rush Street that has a lot of clubs.
Setting Windy City Romances series in Chicago seemed like a natural for me. After all, I went to school there. After college, I stayed in Chicago for a while. The rattling of the L train taking me down to the loop, the Magnificent Mile glittering with tiny lights, the breath-taking two-story Christmas tree in Marshall Field’s—always a lot to see and do.
Oak Park snugs close on the western edge of the city, before the sprawling network of towns that have become suburbs. Ernest Hemingway grew up in Oak Park. The suburb houses some striking Frank Lloyd Wright homes because he also lived there. Framed by busy streets like Division and Harlem, Oak Park still offers a family setting where kids get a good education in leafy neighborhoods only twenty minutes from downtown.
In the Windy City Romances, Oak Park produces women like Vanessa, Amy and McKenna. The three of them could have gone to Trinity High School, named Immaculate Heart of Mary High School in the books. They share traditional values and the feisty attitude of sassy women who aim high and then deal with it. They gathered at Petersen's Ice Cream Parlor, which still exists today, to hoot and howl and wonder about men in all their mystery.
But enough is enough. Sometimes you have to get out of town, especially in the summer heat. Generations of Chicago people have fled the city for the shores of Lake Michigan every summer. Michigan is a stone’s throw away, especially now that I 94 takes you there in less than an hour. Small towns like New Buffalo, Lakeside and Harbert serve up gift shops galore and eateries that trend from ethnic to just plain down home cooking. Casual and kicked back, “cottages” today are larger, more impressive.
Alex Compton, the Internet mogul in Her Favorite Mistake, does what every well-heeled Chicago businessman would do. He gets a beach house. After all, he grew up in Massachusetts. The shore holds a certain fascination for him. Before long, so does Vanessa Randall. The novel opens during summer and wraps up in the fall. The beach provides a perfect setting for summer romancing that complicates their lives...and leaves them wanting more.
Hope you enjoy Windy City Romances. Stay tuned for more Chicago lore and sign up for my newsletter using my email on the front page if you’d like more information on release dates, and more tidbits about Vanessa, Amy, McKenna and Harper.
Windy City Romances
There's a lot to like about Chicago, a lot that makes it a great backdrop for any series. Carl Sandburg knew that when he referred to Chicago as "the city of the big shoulders” in his poetry. Sarah Paretsky set her thriller series in Chicago, giving heroine V. I. Warshawski plenty of problems to solve. The city's grown tremendously, but at its heart, still muscle and power. The phrase "political machine" was probably coined here.
Chicago is a huge melting pot. Simone Elkeles, a young adult writer, often captures the diversity of this lively, vibrant town in her work. Always on the move. Downtown, people brush past you on the street, plugged into their head phones. You get in step and rush with the rest. Chicago actually have a street called Rush Street that has a lot of clubs.
Setting Windy City Romances series in Chicago seemed like a natural for me. After all, I went to school there. After college, I stayed in Chicago for a while. The rattling of the L train taking me down to the loop, the Magnificent Mile glittering with tiny lights, the breath-taking two-story Christmas tree in Marshall Field’s—always a lot to see and do.
Oak Park snugs close on the western edge of the city, before the sprawling network of towns that have become suburbs. Ernest Hemingway grew up in Oak Park. The suburb houses some striking Frank Lloyd Wright homes because he also lived there. Framed by busy streets like Division and Harlem, Oak Park still offers a family setting where kids get a good education in leafy neighborhoods only twenty minutes from downtown.
In the Windy City Romances, Oak Park produces women like Vanessa, Amy and McKenna. The three of them could have gone to Trinity High School, named Immaculate Heart of Mary High School in the books. They share traditional values and the feisty attitude of sassy women who aim high and then deal with it. They gathered at Petersen's Ice Cream Parlor, which still exists today, to hoot and howl and wonder about men in all their mystery.
But enough is enough. Sometimes you have to get out of town, especially in the summer heat. Generations of Chicago people have fled the city for the shores of Lake Michigan every summer. Michigan is a stone’s throw away, especially now that I 94 takes you there in less than an hour. Small towns like New Buffalo, Lakeside and Harbert serve up gift shops galore and eateries that trend from ethnic to just plain down home cooking. Casual and kicked back, “cottages” today are larger, more impressive.
Alex Compton, the Internet mogul in Her Favorite Mistake, does what every well-heeled Chicago businessman would do. He gets a beach house. After all, he grew up in Massachusetts. The shore holds a certain fascination for him. Before long, so does Vanessa Randall. The novel opens during summer and wraps up in the fall. The beach provides a perfect setting for summer romancing that complicates their lives...and leaves them wanting more.
Hope you enjoy Windy City Romances. Stay tuned for more Chicago lore and sign up for my newsletter using my email on the front page if you’d like more information on release dates, and more tidbits about Vanessa, Amy, McKenna and Harper.