BillLindau

From The Moore County Independent, December 2006
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BILL LINDAU
SPECIAL TO THE INDEPENDENT
It was about 20 years before Lynne Hinton found a publisher for the first book she wrote, but she finally achieved that goal -- after publishing several more novels. Now, having published the "The Arms of God" last year, the Durham native and longtime Baptist minister has come out with another book, under another name.
Writing under the name "Jackie Lynn", Hinton published a murder mystery titled "Down by the Riverside," her first attempt at that kind of genre. Hinton, a frequent visitor to The Country Bookshop, was on hand Thursday, Nov. 30, for a book signing for both "The Arms of God" and "Down by the Riverside." "Down by the Riverside," a story inspired by the death of a member of one of her congregations, was published in June by St. Martin's Press. "The Arms of God" was published in paperback in November 2005.
The audience at last week's book signing included Hinton's old high-school guidance counselor, Gwen Simmons. Hinton was raised in Fayetteville and graduated from Douglas Byrd High. "She made me the woman I am," Hinton said.
Simmons has published novels since 2000. Other works include "Hope Springs", "The Last Odd Day" and "Friendship Cake". "Down by the Riverside" is intended to be the first novel in the Shady Grove Mystery Series, Hinton said.
Hinton said she wrote "Down by the Riverside" during a trip back to Santa Fe, N.M., where she had loved before. This novel deals with somebody who finds the body of a well-respected man. The death appears to be a suicide, but the woman who discovered the body finds out more and more things, from interacting with local people, that lead her to believe otherwise.
The critics liked the book, she said. "I've decided that critics are nicer to first-time writers," Hinton quipped. This is the first book she has written under a pseudonym.
She has another mystery in the works, titled "Memphis Tea Parties". She hopes the book will be published in 2008, the 40th anniversary of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s death. She said the title is based on a phrase from the 1960s. "Tea party" was a term to describe liaisons between traveling businessmen and the women who met them at the Memphis airport.
This book takes a "Pelican Brief"-like angle to the crime the book is about, Hinton said.
"It started me thinking about the Martin Luther King shooting," she said. "Do we really know who did it?"
"Down by the Riverside" was prompted by the drowning death of a developmentally disabled adult named Larry, a member of the First Congregational United Church of Christ in Asheboro, where Hinton last served as pastor.
One day Larry disappeared, and he was discovered drowned after he had wandered off.
"It was the hardest funeral I ever preached," Hinton said.
Following Larry's death, Hinton said she came up with a story based on Enoch, a character in The Bible who did not die, but ended up walking with God, she said.
"The Arms of God" is about a woman whose mother left her at a daycare center when she was 4. The mother did not return until that girl, Alice, was an adult. Alice's mother suddenly dies, and Alice tried to piece together the woman's life.
"The Arms of God" is not a religious book, HInton said. She said publishers rejected it for so long because they considered it too gloomy.
Hinton lives in North Carolina with her husband, Bob Branard. She received her bachelor's degree from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro, and a master of divinity degree from the Pacific School of Religion in Berkeley, Calif.
At the Pacific School, Hinton focused on theology through the arts, she said. One of her instructors was a native North Carolinian named Katie Cannon. Through her, Hinton studied African-American literature, and also Third World Literature.
That was when she started working on "The Arms of God", Hinton said.
When she was in the ministry, after becoming an ordained Baptist minister in 1990, Hinton went to film school. She said she did not like filmmaking, but film school turned her on to the arts.
After pastoring her second church, she learned the first novel she had published, "Friendship Cake", was a commercial success. It was published in 2000.
Then she moved to Santa Fe. Her husband retired and she wrote two more books. "The Arms of God" had yet to find a publisher, however.
In 2004, Hinton and her husband moved back to the South. Her first books were published by Harper Collins, and she landed a deal with St. Martin's Press, she said.