Mary Higgins Clark was always a writer,
right?
Actually, no. Mary Higgins Clark
had many jobs before she became a writer. Some other jobs she had were an advertising
assistant, a stewardess for Pan American Airlines, a radio scriptwriter and
producer, and many jobs related to radio programming.
When Clark was widowed, she started
working as a radio scriptwriter and producer, and submitted short stories to
woman's magazines. Radio writing taught her how to "write tightly." After the
great success of her first book, Where are the Children?, Clark wrote
more and more, and received many awards for her phenomenal books.
Clark is a very talented author,
and has delighted many over the years with her suspenseful, gripping mystery
novels. There is a lot the public doesn't know about her. She was born on December
24, 1929 in New York City. Her parents were Luke Joseph and Nora C. Higgins.
Her father was a restaurant owner, and her mother was a buyer. She married her
first husband, Warren F. Clark in 1949. Warren and Mary had five children, Marilyn,
Warren, David, Carol and Patricia. Mary Higgins Clark married her second husband,
Raymond Charles Ploetz in 1978. (Hile, 10: 43)
She received her education at the
Villa Maria Academy, Ward Secretarial School, New York University and Fordham
University. She graduated in 1979 with a Bachelor of Arts. (Chapman, 51: 109)
Clark received many awards in her lifetime. She received the New Jersey Author
award in 1969 for Aspire to the Heavens: A Biography of George Washington,
in 1977 for Where are the Children?, and in 1978 for A Stranger is
Watching, She got the Grand Prix de Literature Policiere (France) in 1980
and an honorary doctorate at Villanova University in 1983. (Chapman, 51: 110)
Clark has written many, many books
such as: Where are the Children?; A Stranger is Watching; The Cradle Will
Fall; A Cry in the Night; Weep No More My Lady; While My Pretty One Sleeps;
Loves Music, Loves to Dance; All Around the Town; I'll Be Seeing You; Remember
Me; Let Me Call You Sweetheart; Silent Night; and Moonlight Becomes You.
She wants her readers to get a very
specific message from her work. In Clark's own words, "I feel a good suspense
novel can and should hold a mirror up to society and make a social comment".
She also said, "I would like to get across a sense of values. I like nice, strong
people confronting the faces of evil and vanquishing them." (Junior Discovering
Artists) Clark does one thing every time she is preparing a book. She creates
biographies of every character and does research to make sure each and every
one of the characters acts normal. She especially likes to make sure that her
criminals behave the way they normally would. She goes to many trials as research
for her novels. "I see psychopathic killers on trial. They look so normal."
(Hile, 10: 47) Having two children in the legal profession also helps her with
writing her books.
Memories from childhood of the kidnapping
of aviator Charles Lindburgh's baby son gave her the idea for the book Where
are the Children? (Hile, 10: 45-46) Writing for the radio helped Clark learn
to "write tightly." In her own words, "In that time (four minutes) you had to
tell a story and leave room for two messages from the sponsor. It taught me
to write tightly." (Hile, 10: 45)
MY CRITICAL COMMENTS ON HER BOOKS
The book Where are the Children?
was about when two children, Michael and Missy, who were kidnapped by Carl Harmon,
Nancy's ex-husband. Mike and Missy were taken when they were playing outside,
as Nancy was doing housework. They lived in Cape Cod, and it was late fall.
Carl put them to sleep by sedating them with needles. He kidnapped them for
a few reasons. One was that he was sort of insane, so no one really knew why
in the first place. Another reason was because he sexually assaulted children.
Thankfully though, he never got to Michael or Missy.
The story had another twist. Seven
years, to the day, before Michael and Missy were kidnapped, two other children
of Nancy's, Peter and Lisa, were kidnapped and killed. Nancy was married to
Carl at that time, and Peter and Lisa were his children too. Nancy was accused
of the crime of killing Peter and Lisa, but she got acquitted when the key witness
disappeared. She moved as far away from California (where the trial took place)
as she could, dyed her hair, and changed her whole identity. Needless to say,
the police were very suspicious of Nancy when the second set of her children
were found missing. It turned out that Carl did it the first and second time.
He didn't finish the job the second time though, they caught him before he could
hurt Mike and Missy. The book was very good. It was suspenseful and gripping.
On a scale from 1-10, I would give it a 9.
While My Pretty One Sleeps
is about the murder of Ethel Lambston. Neeve Kearny is the only one who seems
to really care or notice she's gone. Ethel was a frivolous writer who was known
to disappear for awhile to hole up somewhere to write a book. Neeve owns a very
high class, expensive Madison Avenue boutique in New York City. Ethel buys all
of her clothes from "Neeve's Place". Ethel had ordered some clothing from Neeve,
and after calling and calling Ethel to come pick up her clothes, Neeve decides
to go to Ethel's herself and just put the various clothes items right in Ethel's
closet.
Ethel is quite a scatterbrain, so
Neeve makes up clothes lists for her, what goes with what, what accessories
go with what, etc. When Neeve goes to Ethel's she realizes that the items missing
from the closet don't go with each other. She also notices that there are no
winter coats missing. Neeve thought to herself, "Now why in the world would
Ethel leave with mismatching clothes and no winter coats?" After that, she really
started to worry.
Neeve told her father, the ex-Police
Commissioner, and he just made her feel silly for worrying. Then, Ethel's body
was found in a local park, and all the evidence points to . . . three different
people! One is her nephew, a slimy character who Ethel has left her life savings
to, a great sum of money. Another suspect is her ex-husband, a spineless near
bankrupt man who had been trying to get out of alimony for years. The third
suspect is Gordon Steuber, a fashion designer who Ethel verbally bashed in a
recent article.
In the end, it is none of these suspects.
The killer is a good friend of Neeve's dad, Anthony della Salva or "Uncle Sal"
as Neeve called him. He was another famous fashion designer. There were a few
things that tipped Neeve off. One was that the slit in Ethel's throat was exactly
the same cut as when Neeve's mother, Renata, was murdered. Neeve knew that none
of the suspects would have anything against her mother, so it couldn't be any
of them. The other thing that made her point the finger at Uncle Sal was that
she saw sketchings in her mother's cookbook. The clothes on the people in the
sketchings were exactly the same as the style that made Sal so rich and famous.
Sal stole the design from Renata, then killed her so she wouldn't uncover the
scandal. Ethel had recovered this fact when researching for her article on the
fashion world. So he killed her too. I loved this book. On a scale from 1-10,
I would give it an 11. This book is good for sixth to eighth graders. Read it!
After reading a few books of Mary
Higgins Clark, one tends to notice similar styles in this author's writing.
The two books, Where Are the Children?, and While My Pretty One Sleeps
have many similar styles of writing in them. The three conventions this piece
will reflect on are point of view, the cliffhanger, and realistic
dialogue. The following section will explain these conventions.
First, Mary Higgins Clark uses the
convention of the cliffhanger. A cliffhanger is usually at the end of
a chapter. It keeps the reader interested and makes them want to know more.
Mary Higgins Clark uses this technique very well.
At the end of this chapter, which
happens to be the first, the reader is not sure what the "ghastly" mistake was,
who Neeve Kearny was, and why she would detect it. It grabs the readers interest.
I know it grabbed mine!
Also, Mary Higgins Clark also uses
this technique in Where Are the Children?
This is a cliffhanger for obvious
reasons. Why is she lying on the sand? Why is she shivering uncontrollably?
Why is she wet? What is the mitten's significance? All of these are very good
questions, and they all are answered before the end of the book.
She uses realistic dialogue.
She tries to make the characters as realistic as possible through excessive
description and a great amount of dialogue.
I know this seems like an odd quote
to use, but I think it shows the realism in Neeve. She hates yogurt, and she
orders in from a nearby deli, as do all New Yorkers. You would never guess that
Neeve would solve the mystery to Ethel Lambston's death, or that Denny (the
delivery man) was hired as a hit man to kill Neeve.
Also, this convention is used in
other of Clark's books. I think this is a good example from Where Are the
Children?
This is just so realistic. I think
Clark wanted to give the reader a sense of hominess. It reminds me of a morning
at my house, and at many others too, I would suppose.
The third convention that is very
important to Mary Higgins Clark's novels is all the points of view that
she employs. She always uses third person. In While My Pretty One Sleeps,
a chapter might be in the view of Neeve, Myles, the killer, Denny, Gordon Steuber,
Jack, Seamus, Ruth, or Uncle Sal. And many more. This gives the reader a chance
of cracking the case before the author lets us know who did it. If the book
was only from one point of view, or in first person, the book would be very
one-sided. If this book was just in the point
of view of the main character, Neeve, then the reader would never get all the
facts and little clues about the other characters. It is almost the same situation in
both of the quotes that I employed. Both are through the killer's eyes, and
in both books you're not sure yet who the killer is. Likewise, she uses it in
Where Are the Children?
She is a wonderful author. As I have
read her books and researched her life, I have learned so much about her writing
and her as a person. I hope you will too from reading this report. I think Mary
Higgins Clark should be remembered for her outstanding writings and her interesting
and intriguing life. I think she has definitely fulfilled her dream to show
how "good, regular people confront the forces of evil and vanquish them." I
personally loved both of the books I read by Clark, While My Pretty One Sleeps
and Where Are The Children? I plan to read many more in the future. I
would recommend her books to anyone in sixth, seventh, eighth or ninth grade.
Chapman, Jeff, ed.
Contemporary Authors. Vol. 51. Detroit, MI: Gale, 1996.
Clark, Mary Higgins. Where Are
The Children? New York: Simon and Schuster, 1975.
Clark, Mary Higgins. While My
Pretty One Sleeps. New York: Pocket Books, 1989.
Hile, Kevin S. ed. Authors and
Artists for Young Adults. Vol. 10. Detroit, MI: Gale, 1993.
Junior Discovering Authors.
CD-ROM. Detroit, MI: Gale Research, 1994.
AUTHOR'S STYLE AND CONVENTIONS
It was all right now, he
told himself. He was safe! It was just as he was draining the last warming sip
of bourbon that he realized the one ghastly mistake he had made, and knew exactly
who would almost inevitably detect it. Neeve Kearny (Clark, While My Pretty
One Sleeps.16).
It was there that Ray and
Dorothy found her. Shivering uncontrollably, lying on the sand, hair and clothes
plastered to her head and body, her eyes blank and uncomprehending, angry blisters
raised on her hand that clutched a small red mitten to her cheek (Clark, Where
Are the Children? 35).
'I have some yogurt in
the fridge,' she offered. Neeve had just finished helping one of her personal
clients select a four-thousand-dollar mother-of-the-bride gown.
She smiled quickly. 'You know I hate yogurt. Send for a tuna-salad sandwich
and a diet Coke, okay?' Ten minutes later the order was delivered to her office,
she realized she was starving. 'The best tuna salad in New York, Denny,' she
told the delivery man. (Clark, While My Pretty One Sleeps.) Ray came down the stairs
pulling the knot closed on his tie. Nancy was sitting at the table with a still-sleepy
Missy on her lap. Michael was eating his breakfast in his poised, reflective
way (Clark, Where Are the Children? 11).
The job was finished. The
blowing snow had already covered up his footsteps. Ten minutes after he got
out of here, all trace of him and the presence of the car would be obliterated.
(Clark, While My Pretty One Sleeps.12)
He could feel the chill
coming in through the cracks in the windowpanes. Clumsily he got up and lumbered
over to the window.(Clark. Where Are the Children?)
CONCLUSION
WORKS CITED
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Created March 31, 1997, Last Updated April 7, 1997 and is continuously revised.