This time around, we’re talking to Brunonia Barry about her first novel, The Lace Reader. The novel has generated enormous buzz in the publishing world, because Barry decided on a grassroots approach to the business, and self-published. Word got out, the book took off like a rocket, and a bidding war ensued. It’s no wonder everybody wanted a piece of this literary property. The Lace Reader is a supernatural thriller about Towner Whitney, a self-described “crazy woman”, who returns to Salem to find out what happened to her Great Aunt Eva. She’s the family’s eccentric matriarch, who has mysteriously vanished. Once home, Towner finds herself in the midst of a series of possible murders, a dangerous cult leader, and the horrors of a past she’s spent her life desperately trying to bury. I spoke to Brunonia from her home in Salem, Mass.