When Deanna R. Adams of Mentor wrote her first historical novel, the story she told took on a life of its own.
During the four years Adams worked on “A Place We Belong,” she also juggled jobs as a freelance writer, hairdresser, restaurant hostess/waitress and caregiver for her daughter who was battling cancer. Her daughter and three grandchildren’s home was an hour’s drive away.
Anyone who knows Adams will not be surprised that her four novels feature strong women as the main characters. One of these women is Lydia, the protagonist of her latest novel.
In “A Place We Belong,” set in 1940s Cleveland when lawman Eliot Ness was director of security, burlesque queen Lydia turns to him for help in finding her sister Tess. The sisters were separated as girls when their mother died, and by 17, Lydia was making a living as a fan dancer for Cleveland’s Roxy Theater, one of the top burlesque theaters.
Ness accepts the challenge, but his growing friendship with Lydia causes tension in her personal and professional life. To make things even more complicated, her search for her sister takes her to Tennessee and a ring that traffics stolen children who have then been sold.
The book’s main characters often meet for walks and picnics at Lake View Cemetery in Cleveland, and Adams’ description of the monuments and sites there shows her affection for the place where Eliot Ness’s ashes were scattered after his death.
“Although I enjoyed creating the story and its characters, you can’t manipulate history,” she said. “The research I did led to the twists and turns of the story.”
During this investigation, Adams – and later Lydia and Ness – came across Georgia Tann and her children’s home in Tennessee, which served as a cover for a corrupt adoption ring well into the 1950s.
Perhaps best known as the author of “Rock ‘n’ Roll and the Cleveland Connection,” Adams is a lifelong writer who has worked many other jobs to make a living. After the success of her book about Clevelanders involved in rock music, she learned that most readers thought she had become rich by writing that book.
“I can’t tell you how many people have asked me if I’m buying things like a bigger house,” she said.
Author Deanna R. Adams “Cleveland’s Rock and Roll Venues” celebrates concert hotspots
She lives and works in the modest home in the Mentor Headlands neighborhood that she has shared with her husband Jeff since 1983.
Adams, who turns 70 this year, didn’t live through the 1940s but has long been fascinated by the era when Cleveland was the fifth-largest city in the country and Ness was brought here to fight organized crime. The book’s carefully crafted details about the then-famous Roxy Theater and the nearby Theatrical Grill, where Mafia leaders met, are based on Adams’s long-term observations as a restaurant hostess and waitress.
She is a familiar face to visitors to local restaurants such as the Mean Mugs Pub, Noosa Bistro and the now-closed Willoughby Brewing Co. She also continues to enjoy following local rock bands and dancing to their music.
Writing has always been an important part of her life, she says. During her high school years at what was then the Andrews School for Girls in Willoughby, she wrote poems about teenage anxieties. Since Andrews had a career goal at the time, she studied cosmetology and became a trained hairdresser. At Lakeland Community College in Kirtland, she took journalism courses and became a staff writer for the student newspaper, the Lakelander, where Professor Gene Dent, the faculty adviser, helped arrange a summer internship for Adams at the News-Herald.
Dent was her first mentor in writing. Another important influence was Lea Oldham, who ran the Western Reserve Writers Conference, which Adams attended to hone her writing craft. When Oldham died, Adams took over. Under her leadership, the conference continues twice a year at the South Euclid-Lyndhurst Branch of the Cuyahoga County Public Library, where she met librarian Rebecca McFarland, an Eliot Ness expert. McFarland arranged for the ashes of Ness and his family to be interred at Cleveland’s Lake View Cemetery in 1997.
Working on A Place We Belong gave Adams strength and allowed her to escape to a simpler time during her daughter Danielle’s long battle with cancer, which took her life earlier this year. Adams is now primarily focused on helping herself, her three grandchildren, her father, her husband and her daughter Tiffany cope with that loss, and is also working on another book.
Photographer Janet Macoska commissioned Adams to write captions and text for a book about Cleveland rock star Michael Stanley, who died in 2021. Like Adams, Macoska was fascinated by rock ‘n’ roll from a young age and has made photographing rock stars her career.
“We expect the book to be released in time for the Christmas holidays,” Adams said.
In the meantime, she is promoting A Place We Belong with speaking engagements and appearances throughout the region. Her next meeting is Sept. 9 from 7 to 8 p.m. at the Willowick Public Library, 263 E. 305th St. Details: 440-943-4151.
Deanna Adams’ Books
Many books by Deanna R. Adams are available online and at local bookstores, including Barnes & Noble.
Non-fiction books: “Rock ‘n’ Roll and the Cleveland Connection” (2002); “Confessions of a Not-So-Good Catholic Girl” (2008); “Cleveland’s Rock and Roll Roots” (2010); and “Cleveland’s Rock and Roll Venues.”
Novels: “Peggy Sue Got Pregnant” (2013); “Scoundrels & Dreamers” (2014); and “The Truth about Justyce” (2020), which was number one on Amazon’s new releases list in May 2020.
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