Authors at Home: Gabrielle St. George, “How to Murder a Marriage”
We’re thrilled to feature Gabrielle St. George at The Reading Lists today. Her debut novel, How to Murder a Marriage (Level Best Books, November 9) is a suspenseful, fast-paced and fun story about a relationship advice expert who’s got a stalker (or two or three!). What’s especially fascinating about Gabrielle’s fiction is that she drew from her own real-life relationships ups and downs to create her characters and craft her story. For Gabrielle, this saying is absolutely true: “Be careful or you’ll end up in my novel!” Read on to find out more about Gabrielle and How to Murder a Marriage.
What are you currently reading, watching, listening to? Anything you wholly recommend as being inspiring, uplifting or just really fun?
Currently listening to Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants by writer and botanist Robin Wall Kimmerer. This work of art is blowing my mind and feeding my spirit and strengthening my already deep connection with nature. I am an animist and this book is everything. Uplifting!
Just finished watching the Netflix movie The Devil All the Time, a psychological thriller by Antonio Campos, based on the novel by Donald Ray Pollock and I’ve got to say, this movie was brilliantly written. It was sooooooo good and intense. Just really fun!
About to dive into book #4 in the Owens Sisters saga, The Book of Magic by Alice Hoffman. Hoffman is my favorite writer ever and Practical Magic is one of my top 5 books of all time. I love everything witchy. Inspiring!
Can you take us through the day in the life of Gabrielle St. George? What’s your day-to-day routine like — when you’re writing a book, and when you’re not?
I’m a coffee addict and an early riser. I relish my alone time and raising four kids meant I had to get up way before sunrise to steal those moments for myself. I adore sitting in the dark and quiet, nursing a steaming cup of java, dreaming up my stories and conversing with my characters, while watching the sky wake up. I swing wildly between being so busy that I often forget to eat for whole days, while allowing myself very little sleep, and losing entire afternoons cloud watching. Moderation is a virtue I do not possess. ADHD on the other hand, I have in spades. When I’m writing I put in long hours, mostly because I am a master procrastinator, so when I have a deadline looming, I’ve usually created a situation that’s basically like having a gun cocked to my head. I do my best work under that kind of extreme pressure, but it’s never fun and I’ve been trying to change my ways for as long as I can remember.
I live on beautiful, forested farmland that a river runs through, and on both writing and non-writing days, I walk my dogs in the woods or along the beach for a good hour then sit by the water’s edge to meditate. I’m addicted to nature and am capable of losing ridiculously large swaths of time relishing in it. When I’m not writing I love to paint. I’m a professional artist and am very lucky to have a fabulous studio to paint in. I also adore making pottery. I have an amazing vegetable garden with a pretty potting shed that one of these days I may just move into. I practice yoga and I’m a vegetarian and love to cook vegan food, especially for my four grown-up babies, when they come home from their globe-trotting adventures to visit with their hippy mom.
What is your favorite food? Your go-to drink?
As I said I’m a coffee addict. Sitting in a fabulous café with an amazing latte and a sweet treat is one of my favorite things to do. Cookies are my comfort food. I grew up with a bipolar mother who never received treatment and most of the time it was just the two of us, so that was pretty rough going. There were times when she just wasn’t able to care for me, so there were no meals. When I was too young to reach the stove or make myself anything to eat, there were always cookies in the cupboard, and that’s what I would have. The cheap, boxed ones kept my tummy full and I love them to this day. In fact, I’m loathed to admit that barely a day goes by where I don’t have a cookie (or three).
Are you working on any projects that we should look out for in the future?
I’m currently working on the first draft of Book 2 in the Ex-Whisperer Files series titled, How to Kill a Kingpin, and as per usual the deadline gun is at my temple, and I’m sweating it out. On the heels of that I’ll be writing the fourth book in the non-fiction Gal Guides series, which doesn’t have a title yet but I’m thinking will be something along the lines of The Gal Guide to Aging Powerfully. Personally, I am loving growing older and am obsessed with the beauty and power of middle-aged and elder gals, so I think I’m going to indulge that passion and have some fun with the topic.
If you weren’t writing books right now, what would you be doing?
I would be a full-time artist. I paint very large, abstract paintings when I’m not writing and I sell my work in galleries in Canada and the US. If I wasn’t an author I would probably focus solely on my art. I love both forms of creative expression so I would hate to have to choose between painting and writing. If I wasn’t doing either of those things, I’d love to read fortunes and cast spells for a living. (Not joking!)
What is one big message you want readers to take away from How to Murder a Marriage?
More than one — That it’s never too late to start over. That middle-age is a whole new fabulous beginning. That no matter how dire situations seem, we can always overcome obstacles if we enlist the help we need. I’m someone who does mostly everything on my own, and it’s difficult for me to ask for help, but I’m working on that because it’s the wrong way to go about things. Women need each other and we are so willing to support one another which is profoundly beautiful. Girlfriends are lifelines and we have to learn to reach out and lean on shoulders. It’s okay to make our needs a priority — This is a revolutionary concept for many females including me.
How has your personal experience shaped your approach to writing this novel?
My personal experience upon which the seeds of this novel are based nearly buried me so many times in so many ways. Somehow, I dug myself out of the dirt, found a way to press on, and in time, thrived. The biggest surprise for me is that now, years later, I truly can laugh at so much of the trauma and drama that plagued me. I didn’t expect that, but that healing has been divine. Laughter is my medicine and finding the humor in my past pain helped me write this book and writing this book helped me heal the pain.
Has writing this novel helped you process your experiences?
I draw upon many of my real-life experiences and relationships for inspiration, fodder, and straight-up material in my writing. I’ve worked through a range of emotions by modeling characters after people who have hurt or harmed me. It’s extremely therapeutic because I’m in complete control, and these characters don’t get to defend themselves or clap back. The villains of my life get their comeuppance in my literary world, and I experience a satisfying sense of closure. As a bonus, it’s cheaper than therapy.
You write about stalkers; you share that you’ve personally had stalkers. What is the craziest or scariest thing that has ever happened to you?
One morning, home alone, I went to my car on my secluded country property to find that absolutely everything that had been inside my glove compartment and console had been pulled out and strewn about — loads of tissues, papers, receipts, all thrown across the front and back seats. There was a long screwdriver and a sharp, jagged tool jammed into the driver’s seat cushion, sticking out menacingly poised to impale. There was a serrated knife with a ten-inch blade positioned against the gas pedal. The screwdriver pointed purposely toward a one-dollar coin that had been placed on the center of the driver’s seat cushion. The coin marked a large, white, sticky splotch of fluid — it was semen. In my potting shed every sharp garden tool had been carefully placed in a pattern along the bench and floor all pointing toward my house. Knives and shears, scissors and saws, all laid out in a threatening map. The creep clearly spent hours in my potting shed watching my home in the dark of night. He’d left a pile of cigarette butts on the floor which forensics were able to collect DNA from. They ran it through the system and found our guy — a random stranger — a violent offender who had done time for rape and assault and was out on parole. The police installed cameras all over my heavily wooded property because they were certain that this rando would return, as they said these types always did, and their behavior always escalated. The detectives didn’t think the perp would make the leap from creeping around my home, defiling my possessions, and staging threatening displays of sharp objects, to entering my house with the intent of inflicting physical violence. They figured the guy would have to work up to that. Might take an extra visit or two. I moved.
What advice would you give to someone who is in a dangerous or toxic relationship?
GET OUT. There is no other option. It’s not easy and oftentimes we can’t do it on our own and it’s okay and usually necessary to ask for help. The steps below are a condensed excerpt from my non-fiction book The Gal Guide to Navigating Narcissism, but the points apply to extricating ourselves from any toxic relationship —
1. You need to find a support system to help you through the extremely difficult times you are guaranteed to face. If you cannot rely on your friends and family then seek out counselors, therapists, support groups, helplines, and domestic violence shelters.
2. You need to make a serious game plan and stick with it.
3. You need to get your exit strategy down on paper. Seriously, writing out your game plan makes it concrete and serves as a valuable reminder when you feel yourself beginning to waver or you become so exhausted that you are considering throwing in the towel just to put an end to the stress and pain. Keep this list where you can read it whenever necessary — On your nightstand, in your car glovebox, taped to your bathroom mirror, on your phone, and laptop — As long as it’s not in a place where the person you intend to leave could see it.
4. You need to erect virtual unscalable walls of stone all around you that will keep him from climbing back inside your barriers and keep you safe and protected.
5. You need to reclaim and preserve your sense of self. No one deserves to be bullied, threatened, or verbally and emotionally abused in a relationship. There are ways to escape and begin the process of healing.
6. You need to remember that you deserve to be healthy and happy.
Book Summary:
GIVE A MAN ENOUGH ROPE AND HE’LL HANG HIMSELF — BUT BE CAREFUL, THE GALLOWS LOVE A CROWD
Gina Malone, a bestselling relationships advice author and expert on exes, meddles in other people’s affairs for a living. It makes for enemies. One of them is scaring her to death.
A modern-day Miss Lonelyhearts, Gina’s smart, she’s sassy, she’s got a potty mouth, and she’s determined to live life on her own terms. She’s also divorced, an empty nester, and turning fifty. In the true spirit of mid-life crises, Gina dyes her hair, pierces her nose, and moves to a tiny tourist town on the Canadian shores of Lake Huron.
Just as she’s settling into her new life and deciding whether to fall into bed with her hot contractor, Gina advises a reader to leave her husband, right before the woman goes missing. And Gina’s got a stalker. Is it her vengeful ex-husband, the abusive ex of the missing woman, or her new crush’s crazy ex? All three would love to get her alone in some dark and deserted place, which isn’t tough to do since her new residence is an old family cottage she’s renovating on an empty stretch of beach.
Can Gina outsmart her stalker and find the missing woman before the noose around her own neck gets any tighter?
About Gabrielle St. George:
Gabrielle St. George is a Canadian screenwriter and story-editor with credits on over 100 produced television shows, both in the USA and Canada. Her feature film scripts have been optioned in Hollywood. She is a member of the Writer’s Guild of Canada, Crime Writers of Canada, Sisters in Crime, Mystery Writers of America, and International Thriller Writers. Ms. St. George writes humorous mysteries and domestic noir about subjects of which she is an expert — mostly failed relationships, hence her debut soft-boiled series, The Ex-Whisperer Files, which launches with HOW TO MURDER A MARRIAGE. She is also the author of the non-fiction GAL GUIDE SERIES: How to Say So Long to Mr. Wrong, How to Know if He’s Having an Affair, and How to Survive the Love You Hate to Love.
Gabrielle lives a wildly magical life on a fairy-tale farm along the Saugeen River and spends weekends at her 1930s cabin on the shores of Lake Huron with her partner (current coupling still alive and kicking) and their extremely disobedient dogs. When she’s not writing, painting, gardening, stargazing, moondancing, and daydreaming, she travels the world to visit her four fabulous children who live abroad.
Connect with Gabrielle:
Website: www.gabriellestgeorge.com
Instagram: @gabrielle.st.george
Facebook: @gabriellestgeorgeauthor
Twitter: @GStGeorgeWriter
