Our guest
guest this week is Gigi Pandian, the child of cultural anthropologists
from New Mexico and the southern tip of India. After being dragged around the
world during her childhood, she tried to escape her fate when she left a PhD
program in favor of art school. But adventurous academic characters wouldn’t
stay out of her head. Thus was born the Jaya Jones Treasure Hunt mystery
series. Gigi
was awarded a Malice Domestic Grant for her debut mystery novel, Artifact,
which was released August 28, 2012. Connect with Gigi online at http://gigipandian.com/.
One of
my favorite things about traveling is learning the history of a place. There
are some settings that are so evocative of their pasts that it’s impossible to
visit them without feeling that pull to the past.
Dunnottar
Castle in Scotland is one such place. The first time I visited the ruins, I
knew the cliffs where they stood would be a fantastic place to set a mystery—especially
a mystery involving history.
Those
cliffs along the eastern coast of the Scottish Highlands inspired more than
dramatic fiction. They were the perfect place to build the strategic fortress
of Dunnottar. Not only is it a remote location at the edge of the sea, but the
land mass is actually removed from the mainland. You have to climb down steep
cliffs and climb back up again to reach the castle.
In the
seventeenth century, the treasure of the Scottish Crown Jewels was hidden at
Dunnottar Castle. Going back even further in history, fortifications have
existed on the site since Pictish times. The name “Dun” is Pictish for fort.
I first
visited Dunnottar castle as a teenager, traveling with my mom on one of her
research trips to Scotland. The sweeping landscape made an immediate impression
on me, and I knew I’d be back for another adventure. Being there felt like traveling
to another century, so it didn’t take much to imagine national treasures being
smuggled into the castle as it once existed.
I love
archaeological mysteries, so when I began writing a mystery novel, I started
with the idea of a Pictish archaeological dig on the cliffs near the castle
ruins. As I wrote more, the idea behind the mystery became more complex. I
found myself weaving in history that I’d learned from my father, who’s from
India, about Scotland’s historical connection to India via the British Empire’s
occupation of India.
In Artifact,
historian Jaya Jones travels from San Francisco to the British Library in
London and on to a Pictish archaeological dig in the Highlands of Scotland,
piecing together the secrets of a lost Indian treasure hidden in a Scottish
legend from the days of the British Raj.
The
next book in the mystery series will take Jaya and friends on a journey from
San Francisco to south India on another treasure hunt. The most fun part of
writing this series is that it gives me yet another excuse to travel!
