ENTRAINMENT

Entrainment refers to an individual's chronobiological,

physical, and behavioral relationship with their environment

I. The People Next Door

I’d recently been through a rather hellish few months on the day they arrived. In fact, I was feeling particularly downtrodden (both professionally and personally) on that early Sunday morning when the sound of a screaming baby made me throw off my covers and rush over to the bedroom window.

When I saw the U-Haul parked in front of the duplex next door, I panicked. “No, no, no, no,” I muttered, frantically pulling on a pair of sweatpants and a T-shirt. “There is no way. No way!”  

I flew down the stairs and out the front door, skidding to a stop when I reached the house. Slowly, cautiously, I stepped up onto the landing and peered in. There, arranged around a scatter of unopened moving boxes, were a small girl, a smaller boy, a man, and a woman who was clutching a howling baby.

“Are you fucking kidding me?!” I shouted.

I know.

Do I wish, in my heart of hearts that I’d kept that question to myself? That I’d simply asked, “Are you, um, really moving in here?”

Yes. I do. But I didn’t. I actually bellowed, “ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME?!” into the faces of that family of five, who stared at me, stunned.   

Now, before you conclude that I am the monstrous harridan that I truly was at that moment, let me provide some context…

I live in an old craftsman house on a tiny corner lot in the middle of Burlington, the largest city in the state of Vermont. Burlington’s 44,670 inhabitants are squeezed into an area of 15.5 square miles. By “squeezed” I mean that the average property lot in the city is 0.4 acres, or 17,424 square feet. The lot on which our house was built in 1925 is 3,485 square feet.

That’s tiny.

So tiny in fact, that if I wanted to sail a paper airplane from my office window down through the dining room window of the apartment next door, I wouldn’t have to try very hard.

We’re lucky in that the north, west, and east sides of our house are open to the street. It’s only on the south side that the neighboring structure looms so closely, I cannot help but be aware of the comings and goings of the people who live there.

And, given that it’s a rental property, new people have moved in every year or two since we arrived here fifteen years ago.

Normally, the moment I see a moving van show up, I make it a point to go over and cordially introduce myself. I want to make sure the new tenants know that a writer lives next door. A writer who very much appreciates and needs quiet.

As it’s a very small (800sf) two-bedroom unit, there had never been more than two people renting the place. They were usually young professionals—the sort of mature or close-to-mature type of folk who were amenable to my appeal for noiselessness.

A family of five, including a kindergartener, a toddler and an infant would, I knew, not a quiet neighbor make.

Before they replied to my outburst…before the angry flush of blood in my indignant face receded, I ran back into my house, crawled into my bed, and wept. It wasn’t enough that my mother was dying of dementia or that I was having the damnedest time finishing my latest novel. How would I be able to write while living next door to a proverbial daycare?

II. Morbid Curiosity

I am guessing that I am not the only person on the planet who obsessively reads any and every story involving plane crashes. I mean, not just the BIG commercial ones, but also the small ones, where a couple of people die when their single engine plane falls out of the sky and lands in a burst of flames on a freeway or out in a field somewhere. I have no idea why I’m fascinated by such things, but I always wonder: was it the plane’s fault or the pilot’s?

Back when I was living in a small town in northern California I got wind of a story about three members of a wealthy local family who perished in their private plane on their way to a funeral, of all things. There’d been two sons in the family—and the one who died had been a local sports hero. The other brother had not been living in the area. From what I could ascertain at the time, he and his new wife inherited the family’s huge house in the hills, as well as a whole lot of money.

III. Will and Grace 

After I’d cried through an entire box of tissues and could no longer remember why I felt so sorry for myself, I went next door again. By now the U-Haul had been emptied. A few of the boxes slit open. The kids were jumping around for no other reason than because they were children. The baby was sleeping.

I knocked softly. When the lot of them turned to look at me, I could see the fear in their eyes. Did they wonder if this time I’d do more than yell? Maybe I’m misremembering, but I think the mama bear scooted the kids behind her.

“I’m sorry,” I said.

“Thank you,” the woman replied with a cautious smile. “Your husband came over to explain why you freaked out. You should know we’re pretty respectful. We’ll do our best not to get in your way.”

I softened. Although I didn’t for a minute believe that this troop of humans wasn’t going to get in my way, or in my head, or end up bothering the shit out of me with the noise of life in the days to come, I realized that it shouldn’t matter. Not in the grand scheme of things. Not in life. Not in being a writer who craves silence. I was the one who had to adapt to my surroundings. I was the one who needed to learn how to go with the flow.

“Would you like to come for dinner tonight?” I asked.

“We’d love to,” they said in unison.

Over the many months that followed, the family next door became, for all intents and purposes, an extension of our own family. They’d come from down south and had pretty accents when they talked. Will, the father, was here in Vermont on a fellowship in high-risk obstetrics. His wife wore her hair in dreadlocks and made a mean vegan stew. Their blond-haired daughter was named after a musical instrument and was as sweet-natured as the sound it emitted when played. Their son was a flippy floppy bag of boy who never met a clump of mud he didn’t like. Our cat would often be found sleeping on their couch. They all worshipped our daughter Loy. She was their favorite babysitter.

IV. Long Way Down

Even with the cacophony streaming over from the raucous clan next door, I finished writing my novel. Soon after the release of The Widow on Dwyer Court, my agent asked me about my next book. I mentioned something about working on RASH, Part 2, or maybe a bio about my father’s scandalous life, but she quickly interrupted my literary riffing and suggested I pen another thriller, since my novel was getting such good feedback.

Stroking my ego was not an unsmart move on her part and I immediately agreed that writing about fictional crime and death and murder and deceit felt way more attractive than writing about the same stuff involving my own family. 

That’s when I remembered that plane crash. That family. The inheritance. The two brothers.

I slung my imagination around that seed of a story, pulled it up from its embryonic roots and planted it. Over the next few months I let it bask in the sun, watered it and waited while the characters and climaxes, scenes and schemes sprouted up out of the dark damp earth until I had a fully-formed plot.

A year later I sent the finished novel to my agent. She loved it. As did an acquisitions editor at Crooked Lane Books.

Long Way Down comes out October 21, 2025. If you’re guessing there’s a plane crash in the story, you’d be correct. I can’t wait for you to read it.

V. What Goes Around 

It’s always a good idea for thriller authors to attend thriller conferences and festivals. At the end of May I will be appearing alongside a slew of A-list writers at The Montreal Mystery Festival. And then…in September I will be attending the Bouchercon World Mystery Convention. It’s being held in New Orleans this year. And wouldn’t you know it, but after Will finished his residency here, the family next door moved back to New Orleans. They rent out their basement as an Airbnb. When I wrote to ask them if it’s available during that weekend, they were quick to reply:

“It’s yours for the duration, Lisa," they wrote. "We can’t wait to see you again!”

END

PS. Because I have a new book being published soon and because WordPress is really expensive I decided I needed a new website. I hired the fabulous Kira Kornecki to build me this shiny new WIX site. Thanks, Kira. x