by Gail Barrett

I’ve always wanted to write a book set in Spain, an ancient land steeped in intriguing contrasts — poetry and passion, flamenco music and bagpipes, Roman bridges and Celtic ruins.

I first went to Spain decades ago as a student. I intended to spend a year there, but ended up staying for four. And what an experience that was! Even now I can close my eyes and instantly transport myself back in time to those long, hot days in a sun-drenched land, to those ancient pueblos baking in the dusty plains. I can hear the deep, graveled voices of the Spanish men, the buzzing of Vespa motorbikes over cobblestone roads, the clinking of glasses in smoke-filled bars. And I can smell the fried calamares permeating the air, feel those pulsing summer nights.

So of course, I knew I had to set a book there. And who better to write about in Spain than the Gypsies? For most people Gypsies and Spain are synonymous, although when I lived there, I never saw them much. They’d ride into Madrid in their horse-drawn carts, then slip quietly away in the night — mysterious, stealthy, alone. Of course things have changed now, and most Gypsies are as integrated into mainstream society as anyone else. But some still live on the fringes, self-contained, speaking their own language, vastly misunderstood.

So I decided to play with the stereotypes, challenge them. And when I discovered Luke Moreno prowling through a medieval palace, I knew I’d found the perfect hero for my book. Luke’s as complex as the land he lives in, an honorable man with a shady past, a man who has spent his life fighting injustice — only to find himself framed for a theft.

And I set Luke up with an equally tortured heroine — his ex-lover Sofia Mikhelson, the same woman who betrayed him in the past. Sparks fly from the moment Luke sees her. And Sofia is just as convinced that Luke once deceived her. Talk about conflict!

The story kicks off when an ancient Roma (Gypsy) necklace — former Nazi war loot — surfaces in a Spanish bank vault. The Nazi-Swiss bank-Spain connection is real, of course, and so are other facts in the book, such as the Roma’s eleventh century migration out of India. Still, I admit I played loose with history. There isn’t really a legend or three ancient artifacts, although you never know…

In any case, the Spanish government, anxious to appease the Gypsies, decides to donate the necklace to the royal family of Romanistan. Luke is in charge of security at the event, which takes place at a palace outside Madrid. The necklace is stolen, Luke is set up to take the blame, and so begins his action-packed chase through Spain to retrieve the necklace and prove his innocence.

Luke and Sofia go first to Madrid, a place that I know well. (Four years of bar hopping paid off!) But even though I knew the city, I still ran into problems when I was writing the book. At one point, for example, Luke and Sofia are searching an apartment in the oldest part of Madrid. Now I remember those old apartments with their creaking caged elevators and sagging wooden stairs. The problem is that those buildings don’t have fire escapes or back doors. So when the police trapped Luke and Sofia in the apartment, I had no way to get them out.

Fortunately, I remembered those little dormer windows that dot the roofs throughout Spain. Luke and Sofia end up escaping through one of those windows and climbing over the roof, which made for a pretty exciting scene, especially since they were six stories up.

From Madrid, they head to Ávila, a wonderful medieval city, best known as the birthplace of St. Teresa, a pillar of the Catholic Church. (You can see her finger in a museum there if you’re interested in the relics of saints.)

Ávila is also famous for hosting one of the most notorious trials of the Spanish Inquisition, conducted by none other than Tomás de Torquemada, the Gran Inquisitador who murdered thousands of people during his horrific reign. A beautiful plaza covers the site of the trial now. You can sit there on a summer night and watch swallows dip past while you contemplate the innocent people who were burned beneath your feet.

The trial, known as La Guardia, began in 1490 with the arrest of Benito Garcia, a Jewish converso. Poor old Garcia was returning from a pilgrimage in the north when a communion wafer supposedly fell out of his knapsack — “proof” that he was ritually murdering children. After a year and a half of torture, Garcia and seven supposed accomplices “confessed” to the crime. It didn’t matter that there was no body, no grave, no report of a missing child or even the trace of a crime. The inquisitors continued torturing the men, determined to prove their guilt. The ones who didn’t repent were torn apart with hot pincers, then burned to death in the small plaza. Those who did repent their “crimes” were mercifully strangled before they were burned.

In any case, despite its grim history, Ávila today is a beautiful little city with the best preserved medieval wall in Europe. You can stroll along the top and gaze out at the landscape, watch the storks nesting, see the slots in the wall where soldiers poured burning oil on attacking enemies. Of course, in HEART OF A THIEF, my characters use the wall for more nefarious purposes when they need to break into the villain’s estate.

From Ávila, Luke and Sofia head to Salamanca, famous mostly for its university, and another place I love. Salamanca has one of the most beautiful plazas I’ve ever seen, and that’s another place I got stuck. Luke and Sofia got trapped inside the plaza by the police, and I couldn’t get them out. I wracked my brain for a solution — but there were no back doors, no dormer windows to climb out of… there was simply no way out!

Fortunately, I was taking a trip to Spain around that time, and as soon as I got to the plaza I found the solution — one of the side balconies above the arched doorways. I also found a waiter who was willing to chat while I sipped my wine, and he told me all about the night delivery trucks that supply the bars. Problem solved. My characters leap off a side balcony onto a truck.

The climax of the book takes place at don Fernando’s country home, or pazo, which I modeled after Pambre Castle in Galicia in the northwest corner of Spain. Built in the 14th century, Pambre Castle has the perfect ambiance for a suspense novel — moss-covered stones and crumbling towers set against a perpetually dreary sky. Unfortunately, I couldn’t get inside the castle, so I had to imagine that. But the castle itself is real.

So there you have it. I thoroughly enjoyed writing HEART OF A THIEF and loved traveling to the places my characters go. In fact, just thinking about Spain makes me yearn to take another trip back… Maybe it’s time to drag out the suitcase. ¡Adiós!