Abigail’s Necklace was my first attempt at writing a historical fiction short story. Crafting a great short story is more difficult than writing a novel. You must build your setting, develop characters, give them a full story arc, make the reader care, add twists and turns, bring the story to a satisfying conclusion, and throw in a moral lesson for good measure, all within 2-3 chapters of a typical novel. This challenge helped me grow as an author.

I followed the characters of Abigail’s Song, Abigail and Moishe, who went on a music tour around Europe. Abigail’s story had a “small thing” — a necklace that belonged to Abigail’s deceased mother, Nelly. The characters could’ve gone to many grand cities, but my imagination kept sending them to St. Petersburg, Russia. My story originated from a question: what if Nelly visited this city and left a secret Abigail could discover?

Movies set in splendid St. Petersburg and songs about Nevsky Prospect shaped my imagination. My memory of the City on Neva, however, came from a dirty window of the hotel room where my family stayed for three days, waiting for the border control to clear us for the flight to New York in February 1991. St. Petersburg (Leningrad) was the city of my dreams: the Hermitage, the Mariinsky Ballet (Kirov), the Bronze Horseman. I was a bus ride away from the grandeur but didn’t get to see it. There were protests, high crime, and many other reasons to focus on getting out of the city, not exploring it. Noticing my pout, my parents and grandparents promised, “You will visit one day, when it’s safe.” More than thirty years later, the trip is still in my dreams.

The inspiration for the story came when I searched for a song Abigail would sing. The Beggarwoman fit the story perfectly. Penned in the early 1800s, the poem La Pauvre Femme by Pierre-Jean de Béranger later became a popular song (romance) in Russian. The lyrics depict a poor blind beggar, showing that she once a celebrated actress, who lost her appearance, voice, and sight. This musical tale intertwined with the stories of Nelly, who died in poverty, and Abigail, whose appearance and eyesight were damaged by smallpox.

Abigail’s Necklace is one of nine stories in the Echoes of Small Things anthology by Paper Lantern Writers launching November 1. Find out how a tiny detail can change lives and history.