Say this for author and columnist Susan Reinhardt: She rarely holds much back on the printed page.
After four nonfiction books that are much like her Citizen-Times columns, Reinhardt is taking a stab at humorous fiction with her new novel, “Chimes from a Cracked Southern Belle.”
The story’s main character — Dee Millings — was married to a psycho. Now she’s living in Spartanburg (where her beloved mama believes her daughter remains a virgin) and where her Aunt Weepie loves to crash funerals and dive into into a reception casserole.
“It’s all fiction — I made the stories up,” said Reinhardt. Well, there is a bit of truth in there. “It’s based on this woman from Black Mountain years ago in Asheville who was married to a minister who went crazy and mowed her down at the Bi-Lo with a church van. And she survived!” With the release of the book, Reinhardt recently reconnected with her.
Reinhardt has been working on “Chimes” for about 10 years, all while raising a family and writing her Citizen-Times columns.
“I have always wanted to write fiction, so if anyone got mad at me, I could say ‘It’s fiction! I made it all up,’” she said. “There are a lot of surprises, a little mystery, some romance and not too much erotica. I’ve tried to write sex scenes, but it’s difficult knowing that my poor Mama would read it. Daddy would have a bourbon or two and laugh. But not Mama. Once her blood pressure started soaring, so did her religion.”
In the story, Dee Millings is looking to recover from her near brush with death and an ex-husband who is sending threatening letters from behind bars. She settles in Spartanburg (where Reinhardt’s parents still live) and looks for ways to fill her life. Among her pursuits are work in a nursing home where she looks after a 104-year-old patient.
And here, Reinhardt’s reality collides again with fiction. In her younger days, Reinhardt once wanted to be a nurse. And she once wrote a column about a 104-year-old woman who was looking to renew her driver’s license (but failed the eye exam). “She drove me to the DMV — that was a heck of a ride,” she said.
In the book, the fictionalized 104-year-old Annie Sue then takes to drinking.
Reinhardt worked on the book “a little bit at time, and in 10 years, you have it done. I don’t have time to sit down and write for eight hours,” she said.
The book was with a New York publisher twice, but the Great Recession derailed the project, she said. Her previous four books —“Not Tonight Honey,” “Don’t Sleep with a Bubba,” “Confessions of a Kitchen Virgin” and “Fifty Shades of Funny” — were all published in New York.
For “Chimes,” she worked with the Asheville publisher Grateful Steps. “I was involved with everything, even the cover,” she said.
While her columns often take a funny turn, Reinhardt said she figures her readers might be surprised by her life off the printed page.
“They would probably be surprised that I’m a a strict mother,” she said. “I’m more traditional in the family role than they might expect.” But Betty Crocker she’s not. “I can’t cook,” she said.
