The Cassandra Reilly Mysteries by Barbara Wilson

Author:Barbara Wilson
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Open Road Media
Published: 2017-07-27T00:00:00+00:00

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FROM KALAMAZOO TO TIMBUKTU

CASSANDRA REILLY: PORTRAIT OF AN EXPATRIATE

by Archie Snapp

She’s a woman who makes her words count—and those words come in many languages. Spanish translator Cassandra Reilly, 46, who has seen more of the world than most people, says travel is a way of life for her. “I couldn’t stop now even if I tried,” she admits.

I met Cassandra on our recent trip to the Transylvanian part of Romania. Most of our readers know that while Dr. Lynn was busy with her research in Munich, Eldest Daughter Cathy and I took our little adopted daughter Emma (or as we now call her, Emoke) back to her homeland for a visit. As I mentioned in last week’s story about Emoke’s grandparents, who have come to stay with us for an extended visit, we had a marvelous time and met numerous warm and fascinating people in the small town of Arcata and its spa.

Cassandra Reilly was one.

I asked her about her background. “I started out in Kalamazoo, Michigan,” she explained. “My grandparents were born in Ireland, which is how I got an Irish passport.”

Reilly uses the Irish passport to venture into territories most Americans wouldn’t dream of going to. I often heard her reminiscing over past harrowing adventures with her good friend, Jacqueline Opal, 42, from Australia. The two met in South America in the late seventies, and found themselves traveling companions for almost a year, a period that ended when Reilly missed the boat to the Galápagos Islands.

Jacqueline, or “Jack” as the Australian is nicknamed, has established herself in Budapest where she helps run a secretarial agency. But Cassandra Reilly says it’s unlikely she’ll settle down anytime in the near future, in spite of advancing age.

“I’m on my way to China,” she says, with a faraway look in her hazel eyes. “I don’t know how long I’ll be there or where I’ll go next.”

For all her wanderlust, Reilly still has to make a living. She chose translation as the occupation most conducive to her way of life. Well known as the translator of Venezuelan author Gloria de los Angeles’s magic realism novels, Reilly has also played a role in bringing the destruction of the rainforest to the notice of the British public.

Adept in many languages, including Romanian, she nevertheless is reticent about her personal life. A large family meant little time for Reilly, though her father, Michael Reilly, whom she is said to resemble, was a bon vivant and a storyteller. Spanish was an early interest, encouraged by a favorite high-school teacher, whose example spurred Reilly into a traveling and translating career.

The fact that Reilly was recently widowed may have something to do with her sometimes melancholy air of detachment. Her strong Catholic upbringing has stood her in good stead, however, and given her a concern for the welfare of others and a desire to see justice done. A refreshing sense of humor is also part of Reilly’s traveling portmanteau.

I asked Reilly if she had been born with the name Cassandra and she smilingly admitted that she’d chosen it.

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