Author to speak at Cd'A Resort

COEUR d'ALENE - Sara Paretsky once told a magazine editor that if she were elected president, the first thing she would do is "set up a Department of Restoring the Bill of Rights. I would have 10,000 people working there."

Although the best-selling crime fiction writer is not planning a run for the oval office, political liberties will be part of the conversation when Paretsky speaks Friday at The Coeur d'Alene Resort. She is the featured speaker at the Idaho Humanities Council's Northern Idaho Humanities Lecture and Dinner.

Paretsky will explore the theme of her best-selling 2007 collection of essays, "Writing in An Age of Silence," and discuss the challenges of being a writer in America, particularly in the years following 9-11.

"At the time, there was a tremendous amount of pressure on writers to not write anything perceived as anti-American," Paretsky told The Press in a telephone interview from her home on Chicago's south side.

Paretsky felt that pressure herself in 2003, the day before the U.S. invaded Iraq. She was scheduled to speak at the public library in Toledo, Ohio, and was asked to change the topic of her planned speech, to refrain from discussing the Patriot Act and its effect on writers because it was "too political" as the nation was preparing to go to war.

With trepidation, Paretsky gave the talk she had planned, discussing censorship and silence, and received a standing ovation.

"If I let my voice be muffled, could I ever speak in public again?" Paretsky writes.

Some of the panic fueled by anti-terrorist fervor has died down in the past few years, Paretsky said, but the effects of 9-11 remain in the nation's psyche and in the powers given to the government through the Patriot Act.

Paretsky is best known for creating V.I. Warshawski, the female private investigator that first appeared on the literary scene in 1982. Paretsky's first detective novel and is featured in 13 crime novels Paretsky has since penned. With both brains and beauty, Warshawski defied the then-common characterization of women in crime fiction. She was neither powerless nor evil.

Growing up in rural Kansas, female heroes like Joan of Arc captured Paretsky's attention more than the common literary heroines of the day.

"There just wasn't much happening for Nancy Drew," Paretsky said.

Like Paretsky, V.I. Warshawski has a passion for social justice. Her crime-busting scenarios usually intertwine with real-life issues and concerns facing U.S. citizens - political, corporate and governmental corruption, racism, the effects post-traumatic stress disorder on veterans. In one book, the private eye probes the memories of a Holocaust survivor.

Following the 2003 publication of "Black List" - a novel in which Paretsky's female detective gets caught up in the governmental powers sanctioned by the Patriot Act, and follows an investigative trail that leads back to the days of McCarthyism - Paretsky received scores of e-mails and messages from readers accusing her of being un-American and supportive of terrorists.

Paretsky said she receives less of that kind of mail these days, although she remains concerned about the issues of silence and censorship. She finds the Patriot Act's effect on U.S. citizens' Fourth Amendment rights regarding searches and seizures particularly troubling.

In "Writing in an Age of Silence," Paretsky shares her concerns, but the essay collection also provides a message of hope, a call to all U.S. citizens to stand up and be heard at any cost.

Tickets are still available for Friday's dinner and lecture.

The event begins at 6 p.m. with a no-host bar at The Coeur d'Alene Resort. Dinner is at 7 p.m. followed by Paretsky's talk.

Paretsky's books will be available for purchase and signing following the lecture.

General tickets are $45. Benefactor tickets are $100 and include a pre-dinner private reception with Paretsky and preferential seating during the dinner and lecture.

Tickets can be purchased by calling the Idaho Humanities Council, (888) 345-5346.