Writer with Local Following, Mardi Link, Scores Big with Memoir at Knopf
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Gardener, and notable Michigan author Mardi Link in Traverse City.
"Mother of sons, writer in search of good sentences, garden gal."
That's how author Mardi Link describes herself, with a website picture in front of a profusion of tulips. Bucolic, yes; reality, no.
How about something more sinister like an abiding interest in cold cases, unsolved mysteries, obscure murders that continue to intrigue after decades? Her "good sentences" often drip with angst from their venomous settings.
The kind of stories that have excited readers since the days of Edgar Allen Poe have vaulted this Michigan writer to the heights of literary success.
After reading the latest news on Mardi, whose works are highly popular with local readers and book clubs, all we can say is she's living the police reporter's ultimate dream.
Here's what the Bear River Writers' Conference of the University of Michigan has posted under its "success stories":
"Mardi Link's memoir, due out next year, was picked up by Knopf for a six figure advance after seven publishers bid for it at auction. She is represented by Dystel & Goderich Literary Management, New York. She has two earlier published books, When Evil Came to Good Hart and Isadore's Secret."
Working title of the book is "Bootstrappers," about which Link says: "The book chronicles the two years immediately following the end of my twenty-year marriage and the repercussions of my decision to try to hang on to our old, drafty, heavily mortgaged farmhouse -- the only home my three young sons had ever known. But here's the good news: it has a happy ending!"
She added: "Being a single mom, making a living as a writer, up in the wilds of northern Michigan, is not for the weak of heart, the squeamish, the polished nail set, I can tell you that!"
Mardi is one of the writers for the Bear River Review, a hip quarterly journal arising out of the annual conferences of the Bear River Writers Conference at Walloon Lake, near Traverse City. Walloon, you reading folk may recall, was one of Ernest Hemingway's haunts.
U-M profiles her: "Mardi Link is a journalist and the 2007 Betty Crumrine Scholar from the Antioch Writers' Workshop. She is the co-founder and former editor of ForeWord magazine and the former editor of Small Press magazine. Mardi lives with her husband and three sons on a hobby farm near Traverse City, Michigan.
"Mardi Link was born in Detroit and grew up in the state's southeastern suburbs, spending summers up north on Lake Michigan. She formerly lived in Bay City and is a 1980 graduate of T.L. Handy High School. The only daughter of educators, she attended Michigan State University's school of journalism, and has worked as a police and general assignment reporter, magazine editor, and freelance writer."
As a teenager, Link drew inspiration after reading the 1976 Edward Keyes book "The Michigan Murders" about the serial murders of several University of Michigan and Eastern Michigan University female college students in the late 1960s. Despite clues left at the scenes, six police agencies were baffled. Then, a break exposed a suspect: John Norman Collins, a a quiet young seemingly all-American boy.
After a trial, Collins on August 19, 1970, was found guilty and sentenced to life imprisonment without parole. Now in his sixties, he is serving out his time at the maximum security state prison facility in Marquette, Michigan.
"Collins was one of the first serial killers exposed in the region, and his crimes had many in the area locking their doors for the first time. Edward Keyes's harrowing The Michigan Murders, covers every step of the case. It fell out of print for more than a decade before being revived for this special edition," states a promotional piece.
Ironically, the onetime teen literary wannabe, Link, wrote the prologue for the newest edition.
Unlike the Robison murders, the coed case was closed. However, convicted killer John Norman Collins still maintains his innocence, Link said.
Her first book, "When Evil Came to Good Hart," was published in 2008 by the University of Michigan Press and was on the Heartland Independent Bestsellers List of the Midwest Booksellers Association for four months.
Her second book, "Isadore's Secret," was published in 2009 also by the University of Michigan Press, and chronicles the mysterious disappearance of a Felician nun from her convent in 1907. It was named a 2010 Michigan Notable Book, a Great Lakes Great Read, and also spent several months on the Heartland Bestseller List.
This true story was the basis for an earlier book, "The Errant Nun," by Harry Milostan, under the pen name Notsolim, and the Broadway play The Runner Stumbles and the film of the same name. For more than four decades the Robison family homicide has gone unsolved. Why?
When Evil Came to Good Hart looks at the anatomy of this infamous cold case, detailing the history, legend and lore surrounding the historic resort coastline where the crime took place and naming the alleged killer.
The publisher describes the book:
"In this page-turning true-life whodunit, author Mardi Link details all the evidence to date. She crafts her book around police and court documents and historical and present-day statements and interviews, in addition to exploring the impact of the case on the community of Good Hart and the stigma that surrounds the popular summer getaway. Adding to both the sense of tragic history and the suspense, Link laces her tale with fascinating bits of local and Indian lore, while dozens of colorful characters enter and leave the story, spicing the narrative."
During the years of investigation of the murders, officials considered hundreds of tips and leads as well as dozens of sources, among them former secretaries who worked for murder victim Dick Robison; Robison's business associates; John Norman Collins, perpetrator of the "Co-Ed Murders" that took place in Washtenaw County between 1967 and 1969; and an inmate in federal prison in Leavenworth, Kansas, who said he knew who killed the Robison family.
Despite the exhaustive investigative efforts of numerous individuals, decades later the case lies tantalizingly out of reach. It is still an unsolved cold case, yielding, in Link's words, forty years worth of "dead-end leads, anonymous tips, a few hard facts, and countless cockamamie theories."
"The murder mystery that has confounded and fascinated people for over forty years has been given a whole new life. When Evil Came to Good Hart is a well-researched and well-written piece of nonfiction that holds the reader in its spell, just as it has the many writers, reporters, and law officers who have puzzled over it. My highest praise for Mardi Link's book is to say that it reads like a good novel, a real page-turner." --Judith Guest, author of Ordinary People and The Tarnished Eye
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kjbeachbum Says:
On October 10, 2011
at 10:55 AM
The best thing I like about Mardi Link is her down-home practicality. She is a phenomenal writer. And, I wish her continued success. Tried to send this article over to FB. Didn't work. Thanks, Dave.
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Dave Rogers |
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