Month: April 2025

A Tangled Web of Nuclear Secrets- Kay Smith-Blum

I always think Historical Fiction is best when it tells me something I don’t know. Some subjects (the Regency Period, The US Civil War 1.0) have been mined to death, and that’s why I seldom read about them.

Kay Smith-Blum, a fellow Black Rose author, has written a terrific book about the events- and their afterlife (pun intended) at the Hanford Nuclear site in Washington State during and immediately after WW2.

Okay, Kay. What should we know about you?

I refer to myself as a recovering retailer, because I spent decades in the high-end fashion biz, first at Neiman Marcus and then, co-owned a specialty store in downtown Seattle with my husband, Butch Blum (store of the same name opened in the 70s).  When we sold our business in 2016 – miraculous timing – it freed me up to write full time. I’d been threatening to write my birthmother’s wild and woolly story that followed her giving me up for adoption (she went to work for the mob in one of their first “legitimate” clubs in Dallas and led a high life only to lose everything in the end). But I couldn’t get that story right, and it is “still in the drawer.”  During the course of researching that first tale, I came across a particularly interesting Texas woman attorney – and began to craft a 2nd manuscript. But I met with some resistance about writing a Civil Rights movement story without the “lived experience” – but color me persistent – and during that time I had the odd dream which inspired TANGLES, and the rest is history, pun intended. But, there was a lot of weeding pulling – my Zen activity in my three son’s gardens (which I designed) – to clear away the writer’s block during all three manuscripts. If weeding doesn’t do it – swimming laps almost always does.

I’ve spent some time in the Tri-Cities and heard whisperings about some of the events you talk about, but tell us what Tangles is about?

TANGLES is a Cold War love story wrapped inside a mystery, centered on the Hanford Nuclear Reservation, the little-known third site of the Manhattan Project – and currently the largest environmental disaster in the Western Hemisphere. That said, this is a deeply human story about the men and women who risked their lives during WWII and during the nuclear arms race that followed – but due to the cloak of government secrecy around all nuclear projects, including the plutonium production at Hanford, they had no idea they were doing so.

That’s not the typical Histfic topic. Where did the story come from?

I was knee-deep into querying my 2nd manuscript and receiving rejections left and right when I had an odd dream. A mass of red hair floating on a body of water and the sensation of peering down at it and realizing the hair wasn’t wet. When the dream recurred a second night, I wrote it down in my journal. Within days, I ran into two long-time acquaintances who both had grown up in Eastern Washington near the Hanford Nuclear Plant. They referred to it as “The Area” and down the rabbit hole of research I went. But the idea of the tangled mass of hair begat the title  – a play on both the dream and the intricate web of government and corporate deception in the name of both war and long beyond the Cold War is the through-thread of the tale.

Totally unfair question: What’s your favorite scene in the book?

The opening scene in chapter one is based on a real scientific peer-reviewed paper I found in Nature Magazine from 1963, and I’m really proud of it. But my favorite scene might be the interchanged between Luke (my male protagonist) and Walker (an indigenous biologist for the state of WA and buddy of Luke’s) when they are hiking in the Goat Rocks Mountain wilderness in search of a missing person. The dialogue between them is snappy – because they are both so smart and challenge each other – and poignant – because Luke is having a bit of a melt down about his first love –  but funny, too. The scene cover a wide range of emotions and brings the reader in close to both of these characters. A particularly great line is where Luke recognizes Walker’s water bag as originally crafted and used by Spanish explorers who carried wine, not water, in the bags, and Walker quips, “Probably why they lost the Americas.” No better way to show a character’s qualities than through dialogue.

Where can we learn more about you and your work?

Please – sign up for my newsletter – I’m bound to send one out eventually – at

https://www.kaysmith-blum.com

Readers can Follow me pretty much everywhere  – here are the links:

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Whether your tastes run to historical fiction or award-winning urban fantasy, check out all my work on my Amazon Author Page, and don’t forget to sign up for my newsletter.

Do All Authors Dream-cast or Just Me?

I am neck-deep in the sort-of-final draft of my new historical novel, The Deserter. As I spend more and more time with Gil, who is a pain in the ass, and not the most charming character I’ve ever written, I find myself writing the action scenes like a movie. Since every movie needs a star, I often imagine a certain actor as that character. Here are some of the actors who have inspired my work (and if any of them want to actually make the movies, operators are standing by!)

First, of course, was The Count of the Sahara. Byron de Prorok was a real person, so I had to choose the right person for the job. Here’s the real Byron, looking very, well, Byronic.

So who do I get who has that early 20-th Century, mid-Atlanic look?

How’s Benedict Cumberbatch sound?

Then there is the Lucca Le Peu stories, Acre’s Bastard and Acre’s Orphans. Kids are tough because they age quickly, and Lucca is of mixed Syrian/French heritage. But the one character I was obsessed with was the leprous spy master and member of the Knights of St Lazar, Brother Marco. Nobody says tortured, doomed and brooding like Clive Owen. Then there’s the equally tragic Sister Pilar. Rachel Weisz is perfect, although to mar that visage with Leprosy would be a horrible crime, but maybe an Emmy nomination would be reward enough?

Then there’s Johnny Lycan, the Werewolf PI. A normal Chicago suburban white boy with a monstrous secret. He’s physically big but vulnerable… “Reacher with Claws.” I bounced around a lot on this one, but if you’ve seen The Night Agent, Gabriel Basso rocks it. Plus my wife thinks he’s adorable. Not for nothing, the script for this movie exists if anyone with money wants to see it.

Finally, there’s the tragic Gil Hawkins, whose anonymat is Gil Vincente. Once he was the Lion of Marseille’s underground and now a Legionnaire with a deep secret. One face kept popping up. Charlie Hunnam is physically perfect, if a bit old for the job but that’s what make-up’s for, right? And he’d rock a kepi.

Hey, a guy can dream. Who do you imagine when you read books? Do you picture actors or are you normal? Let’s see your comments.