Sometimes the best way to know a person is by asking questions, where you can learn more about what makes them tick.

Let’s meet Ellie.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *   
What is your name?
– – Eleonora “Ellie” Stone

How old are you?
– – Twenty-six. I was born in 1936. (It’s 1962, in case you didn’t realize.)

What is your profession?
– – I’m a newspaper reporter for a small upstate daily in New Holland, NY. I’m known around town as the “girl reporter.”

Do you have a significant other?
– – No. After each affair, I always seem to want to be alone.

Any children?
– – None.

Do you have any sibling(s)?
– – Now you’re breaking my heart. No. Not anymore. My older brother, Elijah, died in a motorcycle accident in 1957.

Cats, dogs or other pets?
– – No. My intrusive landlady, Mrs. Giannetti, won’t allow it.

What town do you live in?
– – New Holland, NY, population 31,583. I’m from Manhattan, though. I still keep my late parents’ apartment on lower Fifth Avenue.

House or building complex?
– – Top half of a duplex.

Do you rent or own?
– – Rent.

What is your favorite spot in your house?
– – The parlor. That’s where I listen to the hi-fi and keep my Dewar’s in a hutch. I don’t keep it for long.

Who is your best friend?
– – His name is Ron “Fadge” Fiorello. Six-two and three hundred plus pounds of great guy. He the proprietor of Fiorello’s, the ice cream shop across the street from my apartment. But his real profession is gambler. He plays the ponies. Hard.

Amateur sleuth or professional?
– – Professional. I’m paid by the New Holland Republic newspaper to investigate everything from PTA meetings to murder.

Whom do you work with when sleuthing?
– – Usually alone, but Fadge lends his considerable heft from time to time. He’s my muscle. And I have an assistant at the paper, Norma Geary. She’s a widow with a little boy with disabilities. Despite her talents and persistence, she’s always overlooked because, as a woman of a certain age, she’s invisible.

Favorite meal?
– – If it’s with Fadge and after midnight, I’d say pizza. If I’m on my own, either baked beans and cheese on toast or maybe pitted olives soaked in gin.

Favorite dessert?
– – I’m not much on sweets. Probably a glass of Dewar’s Scotch whiskey.

Favorite hobby?
– – Crossword puzzles.

Favorite vacation spot?
– – Prospector Lake in the Adirondack Mountains. I spent many summers there as a girl. And one memorable week in 1961 when two men plunged to their deaths from a dangerous diving spot.

Favorite color?
– – Blue. So many different flavors.

Favorite author?
– – Dorothy Parker. “That woman speaks eighteen languages, and can’t say ‘No’ in any of them.”

Favorite sports team?
– – New York Yankees. A passion of my girlhood. Not so much now that I’m grown.

Movies or Broadway?
– – Broadway.

Are you a morning or a night person?
– – I hardly sleep. No more than four or five hours a night.

In a few sentences, what is a typical day in your life like?
– – For breakfast, a hard roll and butter and coffee with Fadge at Fiorello’s across the street. Then to the office where most days I put a thumbtack on Georgie Porgie (George Walsh)’s chair, or some other suitable prank. (He deserves that and more, believe me.) Then I’ll interview someone for an article I’m writing. If I’m lucky, it’s not the nine-year-old spelling bee champion who wowed the audience by managing to spell “poodle.”

At the end of the day, after tapping out three or four stories on city council meetings or pot holes or murder, I head home and curl up on my sofa with a glass of whiskey and some music on the hi-fi. Maybe Brahms, Stravinsky, Debussy, or Bruch. Anything without vocals, really. Drop the needle, and I’ll name the composer.

Giveaway: Tell us, have you ever wanted to work as a newspaper reporter? Leave a comment below for your chance to win a print copy of A Stone’s Throw. U.S. entries only, please. The giveaway ends June 9, 2018. Good luck everyone!

You can read about Ellie in A Stone’s Throw, the sixth book in the “Ellie Stone” mystery series. The first book in the series is Styx & Stone.

Ellie Stone, a young newspaper reporter in 1960s’ upstate New York, investigates a double murder at an abandoned stud farm near glamorous Saratoga Springs.

August 1962. A suspicious fire claims a tumbledown foaling barn on the grounds of the once-proud Tempesta Stud Farm, halfway between New Holland and Saratoga Springs, NY. The blaze, one of several in recent years at the abandoned farm, barely prompts a shrug from the local sheriff. That is until “girl reporter” Ellie Stone, first on the scene, uncovers a singed length of racing silk in the rubble of the barn. And it’s wrapped around the neck of one of two charred bodies buried in the ashes. A bullet between the eyes of one of the victims confirms it’s murder, and the police suspect gamblers. Ellie digs deeper.

The double murder, committed on a ghostly stud farm in the dead of night, leads Ellie down a haunted path, just a stone’s throw from the glamour of Saratoga Springs, to a place where dangerous men don’t like to lose. Unraveling secrets from the past–crushing failure and heartless betrayal–she’s learning that arson can be cold revenge.

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About the author
James Ziskin is the author of the Anthony® and Macavity Award-winning Ellie Stone Mysteries. His books have also been finalists for the Edgar®, Barry, and Lefty awards. A linguist by training, he studied Romance Languages and Literature at the University of Pennsylvania. After completing his graduate degree, he worked in New York as a photo-news producer and writer, and then as Director of NYU’s Casa Italiana. He spent fifteen years in the Hollywood post production industry, running large international operations in the subtitling/localization and visual effects fields. His international experience includes two years working and studying in France, extensive time in Italy, and more than three years in India. He speaks Italian and French.

Visit James at jameswziskin.com.

All comments are welcomed.