Tempa Pagel was born in Pontiac, Michigan. She received a BA in history from Oakland University in Michigan, and a MEd from Fitchburg State College in Massachusetts. Since moving to Massachusetts in 1976 she has worked as a publicist, a free lance writer, a church school administrator, and middle school special education teacher. She and her husband reside in Newburyport with their son and daughter.
Here’s the Church, Here’s the Steeple, a cozy mystery published in March, 2006, came out of an interest in local history, an intrigue with the workings of small New England towns, and an appreciation of the humor in raising children. Tempa is at work on her second Andy Gammon mystery in which Andy and her sidekick, mother-in-law Mayta, again stumble across a dead body connected to the past, this time a girl who vanished from a grand hotel at the turn of the century. |
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I am a book lover, but I wasn’t born that way. Sometime around fourth grade a neighbor loaned me
one of her Nancy Drew books. I finished it in a couple of days. It was pretty good so I read another one, finishing it
in a few hours. My mother, pleased with the fact that I was reading, started buying me my own. Soon I was devouring Nancy
Drews as fast as I could get my hands on them. When none were to be had, I reread the old ones, some as many as four
times each.
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Plum Island beach where Tempa's character, Mayta, the
mother-in-law and sidekick, lives.
This location will
continue to figure in Tempa's upcoming books. |
Doing research in a cemetery for
a future mystery |
My favorite childhood memory is not
going to the swimming hole down the street, or to Girl Scout camp, or tramping through fields and woods at the other end of the
neighborhood--all of which I enjoyed immensely--but of lying in the hammock in a part of the yard secluded by evergreens, with a
delicious hour or two of free time ahead of me, and cracking open a new glossy covered Nancy Drew mystery. While my mother took
pride in the fact that my reading ability jumped three grade levels in one summer, I took pride in my expanding shelf of book
spines sporting that famous silhouette with a spy glass (my collection would eventually grow to forty-two--the entire series at
the time). |
I moved on to Trixie Belden, and the Dana Girls, then authors Mary Stewart, Phyllis A. Whitney,
and Helen MacInnes, among many others. Eventually, I developed a love for all fiction, and later, for nonfiction also,
but it was mystery that hooked me into reading, and which remains my mainstay. For an intriguing plot, interesting
characters, and a lot of information about some aspect of life you never knew about before, you can’t beat a good
who-done-it. And if you meet a character you want to spend more time with, or find an era or locale you want to revisit,
there’s often a whole series to follow up with.
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The mighty Atlantic Ocean crashing onto
Plum Island during a storm. |
Tempa and husband Tom on rocky New England coast. |
I’ve immersed myself for far more hours than I care to admit in worlds created by the likes of
P.D. James, Martha Grimes, Dick Francis, Tony Hillerman, William Tapply, Robert Parker, and Linda Barnes. I’ve learned
about espionage on every continent during every era in history. I’ve learned about archaeology, anthropology, mixology,
and the inner workings of airports, English pubs, and the Big Dig. I’ve learned how to autopsy a body and how to bake
world class brownies.
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Mysteries have taught me about horse racing in England, catching blue fish on Martha’s Vineyard,
driving taxis in Boston,
and repossessing cars in New Jersey. I’ve experienced secondhand the devastation of post World War I London, the yellow fever
epidemic in 1830’s New Orleans, San Francisco’s 1906 earthquake, and rum running across the Detroit River in the 1930’s. I’ve
been introduced to the cultures of the Navajo in New Mexico, the Ojibwa in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, the British upper class,
and Boston literary scholars in the 1860’s.
So, what am I reading now? Besides many mystery authors--add Jacqueline Winspear, Laurie R. King, Anne Perry, Susan Oleksiw, and Kate Flora, to those listed above-- I enjoy a variety of fiction and nonfiction. I’ve listed some my favorite books, which, because of a strong sense of place or time, magical feeling, or revelations about life and history, have stayed with me.
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