Tuesday, March 27, 2007

Welcome to the LLL!

The Literary Ladies Luncheon got its start in Charlottesville, VA, in 1996, when Susan Tyler Hitchcock asked Bella Stander, who had just moved from Maine, to lunch. Susan brought along Deborah Sussman Susser, who years previously had lived two doors down from Bella in New York's Little Italy--though neither had ever seen each other. (Their tenements even shared a boiler. Small world, huh?) The three started meeting for lunch more or less monthly. Susan and Deborah started asking other women writers to come.

There were some hiccups: Deborah moved to Arizona, and the lunches stopped for nearly a year because so few people showed up. But Susan and Bella rallied, and the LLL became bigger and better than ever. Under Bella's benevolent dictatorship as Social Secretary (she was the only one willing to organize the lunches and the mailing list), the LLL grew to more than 40.

Bella moved to Denver at the end of 2005 and Janis Jaquith took over as Social Secretary. Now Bella is organizing an LLL chapter in Denver.

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hey Ladies!
Wow! What a great idea.
After our last luncheon, where the LLLers gave me enough Mrs. Rowe Cookbook ideas to last a lifetime, I am almost afraid to write this...But maybe, sometime in the future, we can do a LLL cookbook? ;-)
Cheers,
Mollie

Mrs. Rowe's Restaurant Cookbook: A Lifetime of Recipes from the Shenandoah Valley

Bella Stander said...

An LLL cookbook?!?! The only thing LLLers make is reservations.

Anonymous said...

"The only thing LLLers make is reservations." Speak for yourself! And what about those great potlucks we used to have? I remember a few good dishes--and I'm not talking about the attendees.

This blog is a great idea, Bella. I really like the good ol' girls network we are developing. I have gotten and posted editing and writing jobs within our LLL community--hurray.

We be woman!

Mollie Cox Bryan said...

Okay. Enough cookbook talk, already. ;-) Is anybody going to the ASJA conference in April ?

Jenny Gardiner said...

Cookbook sounds good to me! Mollie--you're in charge of organizing ;-)

Susan Tyler Hitchcock said...

Maybe we should make an LLL cookbook of recipes from all the restaurants we have ever lunched at. There were -- Monsoon (where it all began), Sylvia's Pizza (from which Bella absented herself during a period of wheat self-deprivation), Blue Bird Cafe for a long long time, Milan, and surely many others.

Bella Stander said...

I have no recollection of the LLL at Sylvia's. Here are the restaurants I do remember:
1) Monsoon, when it was on the Mall.
2) The Tea Room, also defunct
3) Sakura (the last time I ate cross-legged on the floor, hopefully never to be repeated)
4) Northern Exposure (Given up due to my & another LLLer's wheat intolerance. There wasn't a single thing on the menu--including soup--that didn't contain wheat)
5) Michael's on the Corner
6) a little dark place downstairs on Elliewood with a brick oven grill
7) another place at the end of Elliewood
8) Rococo's (or am I imagining this?)
9) The Blue Bird
10) Milan Indian Restaurant

I stand by my reservations comment!