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Erin Palmisano is the author of The Secrets of Madien’s Cove, which is available now.
Erin Palmisano is a dual NZ and US citizen. She grew up reading books and has always wanted to write stories of food, wine and travel which come together with a hint of magic. Erin and her chef partner live in New Zealand, where they own and operate three restaurants.
The Secrets of Madien’s Cove is a moving novel filled with friendship, summer, and legends of mermaids.
Let’s get to know Erin as she talks favorite novels, inspiration behind The Secrets of Maiden’s Cove, favorite part to write and more!
What are some of your favorite novels?
I have incredibly eclectic tastes in novels! Flowers in the Attic, which I read at the age of twelve in my formative years, was less of a book and more of an obsession when I was younger. I still consider it one of my most influential books. Gone with the Wind is not only my favourite historical fiction, but possibly my all time favourite novel. Anne of Green Gables was a childhood friend and I still keep that in my collection of greats.
Other books that sit on my “favourites” shelf on my bookcase, in no particular order are:
The Cave by Jose Saramago
Never Let me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro
100 Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
Wild by Cheryl Strayed
A Brief History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson
You and Me on Vacation by Emily Henry
Garden Spells by Sarah Addison Allen
The Housemaid by Frieda McFadden
Malibu Rising by Taylor Jenkins Read
And the next shelf are all my Harry Potter’s, which I read every other year.
When did you know you wanted to become an author?
I’ve wanted to be, and have been, a WRITER from the time I was able to read a book. Books were my my friends, my guides, my inspiration, my escape. As soon as I discovered the world of reading books I wanted to write stories as well, so I’ve been a writer of many sorts since I was about four years old.
Writing has always been my way of expressing the way I experience the world, from journals as a child, essays of angst and love in my teenage years, to travelogues when I was in my twenties and exploring the world. I’ve always loved writing fiction and it was always a dream to write books that made people feel delighted and charmed, especially once I discovered magical realism, but it wasn’t something I quite honed as a writer until recently.
I knew I wanted to be an AUTHOR about five years ago. I use the words writer and author differently because of the way I approached the two. Writing was a personal thing, a thing I did to express and share views. To be an author was to decide to make it my WORK. My partner Dan was always super supportive and enthusiastic when I told him I thought I was ready to give authorship a true go. He said, ‘treat it like a job.’
It didn’t mean I could give up any of my other jobs of course! But I created the time despite those other jobs (I own three restaurants still!), carved out hours per day to dedicate to writing, and found my voice during lockdown. By the time I got signed, I had two books ready to edit and two more books in the works.
What inspired you to write The Secrets of Maiden’s Cove?
I first came up with the idea when I was about 25 years old, after reminiscing with my cousin about mer-swimming as children. I grew up in Maryland around the Chesapeake Bay, and the water and summers were life. The idea was simple – a girl named Isla, with a tumble of red hair, arrives to a small seaside village in the middle of the night quite mysteriously, and she may or may not be a mermaid.
This was just when I was reading a lot of magical realism and this mermaid story resonated with me in a deep way. As a writer who always knew one day she’d try to be an author, I truly believed this was the story that was going to enable me to find my voice, my story, my first novel.
But it wasn’t. That book – my first book – instead turned out to be a happy accident written during the first lockdown. It allowed me to discover my voice, to intertwine my love of food, friendship, and magical realism, and it was called The Secrets of Little Greek Taverna. When I typed ‘The End’ for the first time, I had three thoughts simultaneously: ‘I wrote a book!’ ‘I found my voice!’ ‘Now I can finally write the mermaid story!
And yet, there is still a long journey between typing ‘The End’ for the first time and the last time, which anyone who has ever written a first draft and a final draft knows! I spent the rest of 2020 and into 2021 editing The Secrets of the Little Greek Taverna, first on my own, and then with the help of an old friend, who is also a brilliant writer and English professor who corrects bad grammar and stories for a living
To call Andrea my childhood best friend feels like slander – we were soul sisters. Andrea and I met when we were 12 years old, a time in life where you are leaving childhood behind, along with the magic and eager beliefs, and growing up. From the ages of 12 to 17, we were inseparable.
Over the next six months of working on Greek Taverna, it was with Andrea (she in the United States and me in New Zealand). Even on the days she wasn’t editing, we were texting. And suddenly my days were filled with texts reminiscing about our youth, about our friendship, about our summers.
This time reconnecting both comforted and saddened me, building a longing for home in the years of Covid and uncertainty.
When I finally finished typing ‘The End’ on Taverna for the last time, I smiled, opened my laptop to the folder of my mermaid story, and wrote the following words.
One from the land, one from the sea, summer soul sisters, forever shall we be.
And I suddenly knew exactly why my red-haired, may-or-may-not-be mermaid Isla was showing up on the shores of the Chesapeake Bay in the middle of the night – to reconnect with her estranged childhood best friend.
The story came together very organically from there, with the bond of childhood friendship a core theme, the surrounding Chesapeake Bay and its coves. Our youthful mermaid myths wove their way into the tale, along with the sultry magic only the summer can bring.
Devastatingly, I lost my dad to Covid during this time. It was very unexpected and fast, and in the middle of the pandemic, so I could not go home. I used my writing as a way to navigate my grief and longing to be home, and in turn, my dad found his way into my writing. Cleary’s Crab Shack and the glorious food of the Bay are a tribute to my dad.
Nearly 20 years and many edits later, the final edition is a book with a sense of place in the Chesapeake Bay, with the bond of friendship at the heart of the themes. Quirky villagers in an even quirkier fictional village, an unexpected romance, the food of the Bay, dusted with bioluminescence and mermaid magic.
But what I hadn’t expected to find was thatThe Secrets of Maidens Covehad, in its rawest, purest form, become a love letter to home.
What are some aspects that you enjoy the most when incorporating magical realism into a story?
What I love about magical realism is its subtlety. The way that little moments or lines weave their way into what is, otherwise, a completely normal storyline. It almost catches you unawares.
When we are young we are eager to believe in anything, whether it be Santa Clause, magic, or mermaids. But as we grow up, we are constantly learning that those things that you grew up loving and believing weren’t real. We learn to disbelieve everything we grew up thinking was true. Or that could be true, even if we knew it wasn’t.
What I love about magical realism is when you open a book, and suddenly, for one moment, one line, one chapter….you just wonder….what if I was wrong? What if it IS possible?
And that niggle of doubt stays with you – and that is what I want. To make you question your truth. To make you wonder, late at night, when the impossible feels possible again, if just maybe, magic still exists in the world.
What was your favorite part or chapter to write?
My favourite chapter to write was Chapter Eleven where they celebrate the Fourth of July. My books generally tend to have an ensemble cast of characters and to have them all in the same scene together is a dream scene for a writer like me, especially because I often visualise my scenes quite cinematically.
The best parts of writing are those organic moments where you’re suddenly in another place, another time, and you are experiencing the scene from within.
When writing the Fourth of July scene, I could see the Chesapeake Bay and smell the salt in the air, feel the humidity. My characters were all there, and it was as though I was typing their conversation and experience as fast as I could. It felt like those characters existed right then, and came through me, not from me.
I also wanted the experience of seeing the fireworks, something I’ve always loved, to convey that sense of grandeur, of magnificence, of feeling tiny and awed and yet connected to everything somehow.
What are you currently reading and what’s on your TBR (to be read) list?
There are very few aspects of being a writer and author that I don’t love, but the one thing is that when you’re actively writing or editing, you can’t be a reader anymore! And right now I am (very excitedly) on the first edits of book three!
But the last books I read pre-editing were the Fourth Wing Series, which I’d never read before – what a ride!!!!
And on my shortlist of up and coming TBR (or TTDOTR – that’s my new phrase – taking the day off to read!) are Great Big Beautiful Life by Emily Henry, and Atmosphere by Taylor Jenkins Reid.
