The secret of snow, p.1
The Secret of Snow, page 1
Praise for the novels of Viola Shipman
“Viola Shipman knows relationships. The Clover Girls will sometimes make you smile and other times cry, but like a true friendship, it is a novel you will forever savor and treasure.”
—Mary Alice Monroe, New York Times bestselling author
“Viola Shipman has written a love song to long-lost friends, an ode to the summers that define us and the people who make us who we are. The minute I finished The Clover Girls, I ordered copies for all my friends. It’s that good.”
—Kristy Woodson Harvey, New York Times bestselling author
“Reading Viola Shipman’s novels is like talking with your best friend and wanting never to hang up the phone. The Clover Girls is her most beautiful novel yet, and her most important.”
—Nancy Thayer, New York Times bestselling author
“Oh, the joy! The Clover Girls may be [Shipman’s] best yet, taking readers on a heartwarming trip down memory lane... Ideal for summer... A redemptive tale, celebrating the power of friendship while focusing on what matters most. Perfect for the beach!”
—New York Journal of Books
“Every now and then a new voice in fiction arrives to completely charm, entertain and remind us what matters. Viola Shipman is that voice and The Summer Cottage is that absolutely irresistible and necessary novel... [It] brings us the astounding importance of home and underscores the importance of a loving family and of having a generous heart. Grab a glass of sweet tea and enjoy!”
—Dorothea Benton Frank, New York Times bestselling author
“Shipman’s evocative novel is a love letter to Michigan summers, past and present, and to the value of lifelong friendships. A blissful summer read sure to please the author’s many fans, and fans of writers like Elin Hilderbrand or Kristin Hannah.”
—Library Journal on The Heirloom Garden
“The emotional scars left by war unite two women, generations apart, in Shipman’s sentimental family saga... The Heirloom Garden successfully captures these women’s resilience and their hopeful desire for new beginnings.”
—Publishers Weekly
Viola Shipman
The Secret of Snow
Table of Contents
The Secret of Snow
Christmas in Tinsel Tree Village
The Secret of Snow
VIOLA SHIPMAN is the pen name of Wade Rouse, a popular award-winning memoirist and internationally bestselling author of twelve books, which have been translated into twenty languages. Rouse chose his grandma’s name, Viola Shipman, to honor the woman whose heirlooms inspire his fiction. He lives in Michigan and California, and hosts Wine & Words with Wade, a Literary Happy Hour, every Thursday.
To my friends in Michigan who taught me to love and embrace winter all over again (and not to wear fancy shoes in the snow).
And to my brother, Todd, who loved winter and snow most of all.
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
A Personal Letter To Readers
Acknowledgments
Reader’s Guide
Discussion Questions
chapter 1
DECEMBER 2021
“And look at this! A storm system is making its way across the country, and it will bring heavy snow to the Upper Midwest and Great Lakes before wreaking havoc on the East Coast. This is an especially early and nasty start to winter for much of the country. In fact, early models indicate that parts of western and northern Michigan—the lake effect snowbelts, as we call them—will receive over 150 inches of snow this year. One hundred fifty inches!”
I turn away from the green screen in my red wrap dress and heels.
“But here in the desert...” I wait for the graphic to pop onscreen, which declares, Sonny Says It’s Sonny... Again!
When the camera refocuses on me, I toss an adhesive sunshine with my face on it toward the green screen behind me. It sticks directly on Palm Springs, California.
“...it’s wall-to-wall sunshine!”
I expand my arms like a raven in the mountains taking flight. The weekly forecast pops up. Every day features a smiling sunshine that resembles yours truly: golden, shining, beaming.
“And it will stay that way all week long, with temperatures in the midseventies and lows in the midfifties. Not bad for this time of year, huh? It’s chamber of commerce weather here in the desert, perfect for all those design lovers in town for Mid-Century Modernism Week.” I walk over to the news desk. The camera follows. I lean against the desk and turn to the news anchors, Eva Fernandez and Cliff Moore. “Or for someone who loves to play golf, right, Cliff?”
He laughs his faux laugh, the one that makes his mouth resemble those old windup chattering teeth from when I was a girl.
“You betcha, Sonny!”
“That’s why we live here, isn’t it?” I ask.
“I sure feel sorry for the rest of the country,” says Eva, her blinding white smile as bright as the camera lights. I’m convinced every one of Eva’s caps has a cap.
“Those poor Michigan folk won’t be golfing in shorts like I will be tomorrow, will they?” Cliff says with a laugh and his pantomime golf swing. He twitches his bushy brows and gives me a giant wink. “Thank you, Sonny Dunes.”
I nod, my hands on my hips as if I’m a Price Is Right model and not a meteorologist.
“Martinis on the mountain? Yes, please,” Eva says with her signature head tilt. “Next on the news: a look at some of the big events at this year’s Mid-Century Modernism Week. Back in a moment.”
I end the newscast with the same forecast—a row of smiling sunshine emojis that look just like my face—and then banter with the anchors about the perfect pool temperature before another graphic—THE DESERT’S #1 NIGHTLY NEWS TEAM!—pops onto the screen, and we fade to commercial.
“Anyone want to go get a drink?” Cliff asks within seconds of the end of the newscast. “It’s Friday night.”
“It’s always Friday night to you, Cliff,” Eva says.
She stands and pulls off her mic. The top half of Eva Fernandez is J.Lo perfection: luminescent locks, long lashes, glam gloss, a skintight top in emerald that matches her eyes, gold jewelry that sets off her glowing skin. But Eva’s bottom half is draped in sweats, her feet in house slippers. It’s the secret viewers never see.
“I’m half dressed for bed already anyway,” she says with a dramatic sigh. Eva is very dramatic. “And I’m hosting the Girls Clubs Christmas breakfast tomorrow and then Eisenhower Hospital’s Hope for the Holidays fundraiser tomorrow night. And Sonny and I are doing every local Christmas parade the next few weekends. You should think about giving back to the community, Cliff.”
“Oh, I do,” he says. “I keep small business alive in Palm Springs. Wouldn’t be a bar afloat without my support.”
Cliff roars, setting off his chattering teeth.
I call Cliff “The Unicorn” because he was actually born and raised in Palm Springs. He didn’t migrate here like the older snowbirds to escape the cold, he didn’t snap up midcentury houses with cash like the Silicon Valley techies who realized this was a real estate gold mine, and he didn’t suddenly “discover” how hip Palm Springs was like the millennials who flocked here for the Coachella Music Festival and to catch a glimpse of Drake, Beyoncé or the Kardashians.
No, Cliff is old school. He was Palm Springs when tumbleweed still blew right through downtown, when Bob Hope pumped gas next to you and when Frank Sinatra might take a seat beside you at the bar, order a martini and nobody acted like it was a big deal.
I admire Cliff because—
The set suddenly spins, and I have to grab the arm of a passing sound guy to steady myself. He looks at me, and I let go.
—he didn’t run away from where he grew up.
“How about you, sunshine?” Cliff asks me. “Wanna grab a drink?”
“I’m gonna pass tonight, Cliff. I’m wiped from this week. Rain check?”
“Never rains in the desert, sunshine,” Cliff jokes. “You oughta know that.”
He stops and looks at me. “What would Frank Sinatra do?”
I laugh. I adore Cliff’s corniness.
“You’re not Frank Sinatra,” Eva calls.
“My martini awaits with or without you.” Cliff salutes, as if he’s Bob Hope on a USO tour, and begins to walk out of the studio.
“Ratings come in this weekend!” a voice yells. “That’s when we party.”
We all turn. Our producer, Ronan, is standing in the middle of the studio. Ronan is all of thirty. He’s dressed in flip-flops, board shorts and a T-shirt that says, SUNS OUT, GUNS OUT! like he just returned from Coachella. Oh, and he’s wearing sunglasses. At night. In a studio that’s gone dim. Ronan is the grandson of the man who owns our network, DSRT. Jack Clark of ClarkStar pretty much owns every network across the US these days. He put his grandson in charge because Ro-Ro’s father bo
He showed up to our very first official news meeting wearing a tank top with an arrow pointing straight up that read, This Dude’s the CEO!
“You can call me Ro-Ro,” he’d announced upon introduction.
“No,” Cliff said. “I can’t.”
Ronan had turned his bleary gaze upon me and said, “Yo. Weather’s, like, not really my thing. You can just, like, look outside and see what’s going on. And it’s, like, on my phone. Just so we’re clear...get it? Like the weather.”
My heart nearly stopped. “People need to know how to plan their days, sir,” I protested. “Weather is a vital part of all our lives. It’s daily news. And, what I study and disseminate can save lives.”
“Ratings party if we’re still number one!” Ronan yells, knocking me from my thoughts.
I look at Eva, and she rolls her eyes. She sidles up next to me and whispers, “You know all the jokes about millennials? He’s the punchline for all of them.”
I stifle a laugh.
We walk each other to the parking lot.
“See you Monday,” I say.
“Are we still wearing our matching Santa hats for the parade next Saturday?”
I laugh and nod. “We’re his best elves,” I say.
“You mean his sexiest news elves,” she says. She winks and waves, and I watch her shiny SUV pull away. I look at my car and get inside with a smile. Palm Springs locals are fixated on their cars. Not the make or the color, but the cleanliness. Since there is so little rain in Palm Springs, locals keep their cars washed and polished constantly. It’s like a competition.
I pull onto Dinah Shore Drive and head toward home.
Palm Springs is dark. There is a light ordinance in the city that limits the number of streetlights. In a city this beautiful, it would be a crime to have tall posts obstructing the view of the mountains or bright light overpowering the brightness of the stars.
I decide to cut through downtown Palm Springs to check out the Friday night action. I drive along Palm Canyon Drive, the main strip in town. The restaurants are packed. People sit outside in shorts—in December!—enjoying a glass of wine. Music blasts from bars. Palm Springs is alive, the town teeming with life even near midnight.
I stop at a red light, and a bachelorette party in sashes and tiaras pulls up next to me peddling a party bike. It’s like a self-propelled trolley with seats and pedals, but you can drink—a lot—on it. I call these party trolleys “Woo-Hoo Bikes” because...
I honk and wave.
The bachelorette party shrieks, holds up their glasses and yells, “WOO-HOO!”
The light changes, and I take off, knowing these ladies will likely find themselves in a load of trouble in about an hour, probably at a tiki bar where the drinks are as deadly as the skulls on the glasses.
I continue north on Palm Canyon—heading past Copley’s Restaurant, which once was Cary Grant’s guesthouse in the 1940s, and a plethora of design and vintage home furnishings stores. I stop at another light and glance over as an absolutely filthy SUV, which looks like it just ended a mud run, pulls up next to me. The front window is caked in gray-white sludge and the doors are encrusted in crud. An older man is hunched over the steering wheel, wearing a winter coat, and I can see the woman seated next to him pointing at the navigation on the dashboard. I know immediately they are not only trying to find their Airbnb on one of the impossible-to-locate side streets in Palm Springs, but also that they are from somewhere wintry, somewhere cold, somewhere the sun doesn’t shine again until May.
Which state? I wonder, as the light changes, and the car pulls ahead of me.
“Bingo!” I yell in my car. “Michigan license plates!”
We all run from Michigan in the winter.
I look back at the road in front of me, and it’s suddenly blurry. A car honks, scaring the wits out of me, and I shake my head clear, wave an apology and head home.
My house is located in the Movie Colony neighborhood of Palm Springs, a quiet enclave of historic homes tucked behind the northern part of the city. It has wide streets lined with large homes hidden behind huge hedges. Many movie stars lived here, or in the vicinity, during their heyday—Bob Hope, Liberace, Ann Miller, Steve McQueen, Howard Hughes, Elvis, Marilyn Monroe, Truman Capote—hence the neighborhood’s name.
I live in a Hollywood B-list actress’s home. She was famous for being the first woman killed in all of the old murder mysteries, the best friend who’s mistaken for someone else, the only waitress at the late-night burger joint, the maid who wanders in on a crime, the nosy sister who knows the boyfriend is bad news. You would know her if you saw her in a movie; you just wouldn’t know her name. But she made a ton of money being killed.
Ironically, America’s fascination with celebrity never dies.
Especially in Palm Springs.
Endless streams of tourists amble through my neighborhood every single day, maps of stars’ homes in their hands, stopping in the middle of the street to snap selfies in front of where their idols once dwelled. During Modernism Week, double-decker buses will drive by every hour on the hour, the voice of the tour guide booming at a decibel level only slightly lower than an airport runway, sightseers able to peer over hedges into our homes and yards. I have a front-load pool, and I have on occasion—after a glass or two of wine—gone topless to get a little more sun. I looked up once to see an entire family peering at me: the teenage son and husband snapping photos, the wife trying to cover their eyes with her hands. I still credit her as the primary reason those photos never went public.
Though I am not a famous celebrity, I am a local celebrity, meaning the buses stop at the top of the hour, and the guide bellows, “This 1920s Spanish bungalow was once owned by Lexi LaMar, famed for being the damsel in distress who was murdered first in every Hitchcock movie. In her later years, she was the voice of Velma in Scooby-Doo. The home is now owned by local celebrity and Palm Springs’ number one meteorologist Sonny Dunes, who promised us chamber of commerce weather all week long. Everyone yell, ‘Sonny says it’s sunny...again!’”
I hit the remote to my gate, and it opens, my car sliding behind the ten-foot ficus hedge. We call it a Hollywood hedge out here, because it’s so insanely green and lush, it seems fake. I pull past the glimmering pool and into the garage. I park and walk into the house, turning on lights as I go.
My house is nothing like what people picture a Palm Springs home to be—minimal, modern, clean, white, angular. It’s actually original Palm Springs: a low-slung terra-cotta tiled home with thick white stucco walls, arched windows, dark-beamed ceilings, multiple Spanish revival fireplaces and bougainvillea-drenched courtyards. I head toward my bedroom and kick off my shoes. I toss my dress into the hamper and turn on the shower.
I step underneath the showerhead and let the hot water pour over me. At first, my hair doesn’t move. It’s frozen by so much hair spray that the water slides right off it, like it might an otter’s back. Finally, my hair softens, and I lather it with shampoo. I turn and lift my face to the water and then look at the drain, watching the rainbow of makeup swirl away, as if I’d dropped a still-wet watercolor in the shower. On your TV set, I may look like perfection, but up close and in person, I look like, well, what you might kindly call a clown. Even Cliff wears more makeup than a Lancôme counter girl at the mall. It feels good to shower, to—quite literally—wash away Sonny’s sunniness.
I am so not that person.
I slip into my favorite pair of sweats, pour a glass of a Sancerre and head into my garden. I sit, sip and inhale. The glorious scent of Natal Plum, which I call my Desert Star, fills the air. The deep green shrub, which I have planted as a low shrub on the far side of my pool, is as intensely fragrant as gardenia. The white star-shaped flowers dance against the dense green leaves, mimicking the stars in the sky. I love to cut the flowers and float them in a vintage turquoise Bauer tray so that my house—like the world right now—is filled with their heavenly perfume.
