Cyd Redondo sits down for a question-and-answer session with dru’s book musings so that we, the readers, can get to know her better. Here’s Cyd!

What is your full name?
Cyd Elizabeth Madonna Redondo.

How old are you?
32-ish.

What is your profession?
Third generation travel agent. Redondo Travel, partly out of necessity, specializes in booking travel for senior citizens. I love my work and my clients: I started running errands and filing when I was thirteen and was booking actual trips by the time I was sixteen. I now run the agency, am the social director and corresponding secretary of the Third Avenue Businessperson’s Association and a proud member of the American Association of Travel Agents, Cruise Lines International Association, The Professional Association of Travel Hosts, and of course, AAA.

Do you have a significant other?
I’m in love, but it’s impossible.

What is their name and profession?
Roger Seymour Claymore, III. He passes himself off as a vegan chiropractor.

Do you have any children?
No. See above.

Do you have any siblings?
I’m an only child, but I grew up with ten older male cousins who over-protected me like brothers. My “brousins” have pretty much had me under surveillance since I could crawl.

Are your parents nearby?
My dad passed away when I was four, but my mother is usually downstairs.

Who is your best friend?
Debbie Pinkowski. Since kindergarten.

Do you have any pets?
I had a chameleon, briefly, but now Barry resides in the Brooklyn Zoo. Otherwise, two of my aunts are allergic to cats and dogs and my mother has an issue with rodents, so no pets in the house. We do have a stuffed bison head—Gary— in the den. My Uncle Leon was a taxidermist for the Museum of Natural History, and they gave it to him as a retirement present.

What town do you live in?
Bay Ridge, Brooklyn.

Do you live in a small town or a big city?
Couldn’t be smaller, even though it’s part of Greater Manhattan.

Type of dwelling and do you own or rent?
I moved back to my three-story family home on 77th St. after my annulment from Barry Manzoni. Right now, I live with my mother, my Aunt Helen and my Uncle Leon. The house is paid for, so technically I don’t pay rent, I just pay for everything else.

What is your favorite spot in your home?
The rocking chair in my attic bedroom. It has a view of the river and the Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge.

Favorite meal and dessert?
Eggplant parmesan and cheesecake.

Do you have any hobbies?
I’m a travel nerd—I collect vintage travel posters, Fodor’s Guides, and globes. I also kickbox as a way to relieve stress and hold my own with my brousins. It’s especially effective in stilettos.

What is your favorite vacation spot?
Theoretically, too many to count. As a travel agent, I have a list of places I want to go that’s pages long. But until last year, the only place my family allowed me to travel was Atlantic City, and that’s where I met Roger, so it has a special place in my heart.

What music do you listen to?
60s and 70s music by default. When I was in elementary school, I found a stack of records without covers in the trash: Carly Simon’s “No Secrets,” Linda Ronstadt’s “Hasten Down the Wind,” Joni Mitchell’s “For the Roses,” and “Buckingham Nicks.” It turns out my pervert brousin Jimmy bought them for what my mother called the “suggestive” covers, not the music. They were the first records that were truly mine and started my love affair with those singers and that era. Of course, my Uncle Leon, who lived in London in the 60s, taught me all about the Beatles and the Rolling Stones.

Do you have a favorite book?
David Copperfield. Like me, he grew up without a Dad and went to the Victorian equivalent of Catholic school.

What is your idea of a really fun time?
I love seeing anything at Lincoln Center and riding the Coney Island Cyclone with my friend Debbie after a few shots of Jack Daniels. Otherwise, going anywhere my family doesn’t know about.

If you were to write a memoir, what would you call it?
Ten to One: My Brousins and Me or Cyd Redondo: Domestic Woman of Mystery.

Amateur or professional sleuth and whom do you work with?
Amateur. So far I’ve worked with U.S. Fish and Wildlife, Scotland Yard, and Interpol.

In a few sentences, what is a typical day in your life like?
My clients don’t sleep much, so I grab coffee and a bialy on my walk to our Third Avenue office and am open for business at 8. Kickboxing practice on the punching bag in the supply room pretty much depends on my frustration level. I spend most of my day booking Golden Retirement Getaways that always include full travel and repatriation insurance, and networking with other travel professionals. After work, I usually go home for dinner with my family, unless I’m lucky enough to sneak away to my favorite restaurant, Chadwick’s, for crab cakes.

What is a typical day when you are on a case?
As I’ve only had two cases and one took place in the African jungle and other on an Australian cruise ship, there really isn’t anything typical yet. The only thing that seems consistent is that I have to be careful of the endangered animal in my purse when I grab the items I need to get myself out of trouble.

Fogged Off, A Cyd Redondo Mystery #3
Genre: Traditional with cozy elements
Release: November 2021
Purchase Link

When travel agent Cyd Redondo’s client and Jack the Ripper expert Shep Helnikov is found dead in London, she navigates the cutthroat worlds of research librarians, unemployed actors, rodent smugglers and more to find his killer and bring his body back home . . .

When her client and Jack the Ripper expert Shep Helnikov is found dead in London, travel agent Cyd Redondo is on the hook for thirty thousand dollars to return his body home. So when his university offers to cover the costs if she’ll go in person to collect him—and his Ripper research—she jumps at the chance, even if it means bringing her wily uncle along. But no sooner does Cyd arrive in London than her client’s death by natural causes starts to look most unnatural.

Cyd’s only hope for recovering the body and vamoosing back to Brooklyn is to find the killer herself—but she’s thwarted at every turn by Scotland Yard, Shep’s former girlfriends, a sinister mortuary service, an old nemesis, and her taxidermist uncle himself. And when Shep’s apartment is ransacked and a second Ripper expert is found murdered, Cyd knows she’ll have to solve the crimes fast, before someone books her on a one-way trip to the morgue . . .

About the author
Wendall Thomas teaches in the Graduate Film School at UCLA, lectures internationally on screenwriting, and has worked as a film and television writer. Her first Cyd Redondo mystery, Lost Luggage, garnered Lefty and Macavity nominations for Best Debut, and Drowned Under was nominated for a Lefty for Best Humorous and an Anthony for Best Paperback Original. Her short fiction appears in LAdies Night, Last Resort, and Murder A-Go-Go’s.

All comments are welcomed.