Bookpleasures.com welcomes as our guest Helaine Mario. 

Helaine is the author of four novels of suspense, Firebird, the award-winning bestsellers, The Lost Concerto and Dark Rhapsody, and Shadow Music, #3 in the Classical Music Suspense Series.

The Lost Concerto won the Ben Franklin Silver Medal for Suspense, a Library Journal Star, First Place Royal Palm Award, and was a Finalist for: USA Best Books, International Book Awards, National Indie Excellence, and Next Generation Indie Books. 

Dark Rhapsody won the 2018 Best Book Award for Mystery/Suspense from American Book Fest, was chosen by The Reading Frenzy for their 2018 Top 20, and was listed under ‘Page Turners to Devour’ in Hollywood Weekly.

Helaine graduated from Boston University and has been married fifty plus years, with two children and five beautiful grandchildren. She lives in Arlington, VA and is grateful to be a two-time cancer survivor.

Helaine was a White House volunteer for Tipper and Al Gore and continues to be a passionate advocate for women & children’s issues. Because she believes in “giving back,” she founded The SunDial Foundation, Inc. in 1998. 

Now the ‘Helaine and Ronald Mario Fund’ continues this work.  All net royalties from Helaine’s books support children’s reading programs and programs that benefit our most vulnerable women, children and families.

Good day Helaine and thanks for taking part in our interview.

Norm: How did you get started in writing? What keeps you going?

Helaine: Hi, Norm, thank you so much for your interest in my books.  I always loved to read but never ever expected to write fiction. 

Then one day I was sitting by the water, reading a newspaper, when I saw a photo that reminded me of my first, long ago love, and I found myself wondering…what if? 

I wrote the prologue to The Lost Concerto that day. 

Now, 4 books later, what keeps me going is loving what I do.  I write the books I want to read.  I cannot NOT write.  ☺

Norm: Are you a plot or character writer and what helps you focus when you write?  

Helaine: I am all about character.  I believe that flawed, deeply-layered characters whom readers will care about make a story so much richer - and my characters frequently tell me what will happen next. 

Plot is much harder for me, but research and strong characters open many new paths to follow and inspire new story.

I don’t have too much trouble focusing – I just turn on the classical music and watch the next scene unfold like a film before my eyes.  Then I just fall into it.  I am there.

Norm: What did you find most useful in learning to write? What was least useful or most destructive?  

Helaine: I never took a writing class.  My inspiration and writing lessons came from 3 women authors from the 50s – Helen MacInnes, Mary Stewart and Evelyn Anthony. 

Reading their books, I learned how to write strong women characters and create complex plots with international settings. 

Their stories taught me how to write believable dialogue, mystery, heart-racing suspense, swooning romance, and history.  I read every one of their books, and miss these authors still.

One interesting note to add.  My publisher advised me early on to deepen my characters. 

My Colonel originally was hard as granite.  Adding a rescue Golden Retriever gave the Colonel humor and humanity and made the story so much better.  

As for bad advice, my first agent wanted me to change my style to a domestic thriller.  I chose to be true to myself, and I’ve never been sorry. 

Norm: What served as the primary inspiration for Shadow Music? As a follow up, how did you decide you were ready to write the book?  

Helaine: I signed my first contract for The Lost Concerto, my classical music suspense novel, at age 68.  Needless to say, I thought it would be my only book. 

But readers began asking what happened next for my main character, pianist Maggie O’Shea.  And I realized that I wanted to know as well. 

But I was terrified to write another book because I had poured my whole heart and soul into The Lost Concerto and did not think I could write a book as good… and I could not bare to disappoint my readers. 

But my publisher, Pat Gussin, gave me excellent advice.  She said, “Readers want to re-visit the character they have come to love, but in a series that character needs new challenges to change and grow.” 

Excellent advice.  I found the new challenges by adding new characters to the familiar ones – strong supporting characters who added new emotions, story, plot, and depth.  And so Maggie O’Shea’s book #2, Dark Rhapsody, was born. 

But the end surprised me, and I realized that Maggie’s story was not done.  Shadow Music was the result.

The power of classical music is at the heart of each of my books. 

Norm:  Did you write the book more by logic or intuition, or some combination of the two? Please summarize your writing process. 

Helaine: Interesting question.  I think readers are very smart, and they expect a story to be realistic, honest, and as truthful as possible.  So, the answer for me is both. 

Logic, in terms of what makes sense, what should happen next organically, what consequence follows the choice? 

But intuition, too, based on the characters’ choices, emotions and personalities.  Not always what should they do, but what WILL they do?  Frankly, my characters often surprise me.

As for the writing process, I would love to write every day but with travel and grandchildren that is not always an option.  I write when I can, hopefully for at least 3 hours at a time. 

Then the next day I edit yesterday’s work, and that leads into the next scenes.  I begin with a vague outline, but honestly, the story takes over and I end up re-writing the outline to follow my scenes. 

Finally, I try to stay open to new inspiration and be willing to change course.  You never know what will fall out of the sky.  

Norm: What was the time-line between the time you decided to write your book and publication? What were the major events along the way?  

Helaine: I am a very slow writer.  It takes me two years to write a book, and then once the contract is signed, another year to work with my publishers to edit, market and finally see it on the shelves. 

Not sure what you mean by major events…. In the publishing world, there are hours of editing, jacket and cover choices, interviews, newsletters, social media – months of reaching out to new and established readers. 

The highlight, of course, is that emotional moment when that first box of books arrives.  

Personally, for me, health issues and choosing family time and travel also have slowed down my writing process.  But I have found a balance and would not change my choices.  I am doing what I love. 

Norm: How did you create the character of Maggie O'Shea? Is she based on someone you know? Is there much of you in her?

Helaine: The inspiration for my pianist Maggie O’Shea comes from my son, Sean, who asked for piano lessons at age 6.  Within a few years, we went from a ‘no-piano home’ to a ‘grand-piano home.’ 

Sean studied classical piano for 15 years, and as I listened to him practice, I fell in love with the great composers and their music.  So when I began to write, there was no question that my main character would be a pianist.

Maggie is flawed, complex, and layered with depth, a woman who must find a way to move on after tragedy with grace and dignity.   

Maggie is not based on anyone I know.  But she is strong, compassionate, talented, kind, beautiful, very smart, loving, and very courageous – she is the person I want to be.  

Norm: How much research did you do before writing Shadow Music?

Helaine: Hours and hours, months and months!  The truth is, many writers include only 10% of their research in their books.  Otherwise, your story resembles a college text. 

The trick is to share your info in interesting ways, through dialogue or backstory or special scenes. 

For me, the most important thing about research, besides needing to be accurate, is that one piece of research leads to another, and often you find yourself going down an unexpected but rewarding path. 

Research on WWII led me to missing music, which became the plot of The Lost Concerto.

More recently, research on missing art led to a vanished Van Gogh, and that led me into Maggie’s search in Shadow Music. 

Also, as I researched Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No. 2, I realized that the music, with its emotional beginning, middle and end, could mirror Maggie’s journey.  Rachmaninoff’s Concerto became the heart of Shadow Music.  As Maggie’s father Finn says, “Music tells our stories.”

Norm: Did you know the end of your book at the beginning?  

Helaine: Nope, no idea.  I hold my breath and keep banging forward through each scene and hope hope hope that inspiration will strike. 

Several writers say that not knowing the ending to a story is good, because if the writer doesn’t know how the book ends then their readers won’t know either.  ☺ 

Also, as I’ve said, my characters often drive the action. 

In Dark Rhapsody, when it came time to write the climax, my characters took over and surprised the heck out of me. 

In Shadow Music, Maggie has to make a life-changing choice, as does the Colonel she has come to love.  I feel as if they made the choices, not I.

I’ve also been surprised to realize that each of my books involves a search for something lost.  Not just art, or a person, but on a deeper level, finding what is lost within ourselves.  

Norm: What do you want your book to do? Amuse people? Provoke thinking? 

Helaine: My books are suspenseful, yes.  But on a deeper level, I want my stories to sweep readers into another world, to strike a deep chord within them. 

I hope to make my readers laugh, cry, swoon, think, feel real concern and fear, and… want to listen to classical music.  I want my readers to stay up all night reading, and I want my characters to resonate long after the last page.  

I believe story-lovers respond to the healing and transformative power of music and art in my books.  I also explore loss and grief, aging, doing the right thing, the consequences of the choices we make over decades, finding the courage to move on.  I hope my readers will find themselves asking, What would I have done? 

Norm:  Where can our readers find out more about you and Shadow Music?

Helaine: I hope readers will check out my beautiful WESBSITE

The site has my bio, info on all my books, and lists all the children’s charities I support with my Royalties.

Readers can also sign up for my Newsletter – For the Love of Books – on my website.

Finally, there is always good info on Amazon and Goodreads.

And I always love it when readers reach out to me with their questions and reactions to my stories. 

Norm: What is next for Helaine Mario?

Helaine: I want to keep living in the moment, enjoying the gift of time with my sweetheart, my children and grands, and my friends. 

As for books, I am half-way through writing my fourth Maggie O’Shea novel, Echoes on the Wind.  I still want to give book lovers that magical feeling of expectancy and “falling into a good story.” 

Norm: As this interview comes to an end, if you could invite three writers, dead or alive into your living room, who would they be and why?

Helaine: For non-fiction, Bob Woodward, who has written extensively about our modern day political world.

Helen MacInnes, the first Queen of Espionage, who inspired my books.

Kate Quinn, who has inspired me with her beautifully written historical books about World Wars I and II.

And finally, to add a #4 to the list, Kristen Hannah, because for me she is the ultimate, sweeping storyteller.

Norm: Thanks again, and good luck with all of your endeavors.

Helaine:  Thank you!

Follow Here To Read Norm's Review of Shadow Music