Page 2 of The Little Porto Book Club

I’m rewarded with a disapproving click of the tongue. ‘Not Detective Amber Quill again! Yes, she might be loveably offbeat and fiercely intelligent, but she isn’t real, Viviane.’

‘How dare you.’

She waves my upset away. ‘If you won’t meet up with your many aunts, uncles, cousins, then I want you to slip out for an hour or two, join a book club or a chess group.’

It’s mind boggling when Mum has these ideas, ideas that I personally find abhorrent. I must handle this carefully, or else she will march me to a club of some sort herself, loudly introduce us as if we’re as important as visiting royalty, and demand everyone’s names, job description, which bairro they reside in and, incongruously, whether they’re a cat or dog person. For reasons I cannot fathom the woman enjoys the minutiae of idle chitchat. As for my Porto relatives, let’s just say decibels are all I hear when we have yet another prolonged catch-up. They’re loud. Obnoxiously so. Sure, I love them, but in small doses.

How to convince her that joining a club will be an exercise in futility? Ah, dredge up a recent trauma. Those witches from our tiny village of Marple Bridge in Greater Manchester, whose many microaggressions towards me did not go unnoticed.

‘Remember the last time you insisted I join a community club? Scrapbook Sundays, where those women of questionable crafting talent huddled together to stage whisper that I was a modern-day Boo Radley. I mean, it made no sense. Those imbeciles didn’t even realise that Boo Radley was the hero of the story!’

Not to mention I found scrapbooking intolerable, but once again mother insisted.

Mum shakes her head at the recollection. ‘Ah, yes, I remember it well. I still find it so strange the Scrapbook Sundays members used Loctite instead of crafting glue and somehow stuck all of their fingers together like they had mittens for hands!’ She guffaws. ‘Well, every member except you, that is.’

‘Yes, very strange. You’d think they’d have noticed the difference in texture. It goes to show how many people walk this earth and pay absolutely no attention to detail.’

‘Then there was that glitter mishap as I arrived …’ She shakes her head at the memory. ‘Arabella really did resemble a disco ball. Incredible that those types of accidents could happen in one tiny community group.’ Mum had arrived to find me, headphones on, ignoring the chaos unfolding as the witches tried to pry their sticky fingers apart.

Not long after, the Scrapbook Committee announced they were going to investigate the Curious Case of the Glue Switcheroo and launch a probe into who planted a glitter bomb that managed to explode above Arabella, the self-proclaimed Crafting Queen Bee. Accidents happen, I wasn’t curious in the slightest. And shortly thereafter this coincided with Mum deciding we’d return home to Porto.

While my mother is an interfering meddler, she’s also very protective and takes offence when people highlight my perceived shortcomings. That fateful day, when, predictably, the Crafting Queen Bee blamed me, Mum provided a concise and mostly coherent lecture about their cliquey behaviour and what makes a kind human, before ending the outburst with a string of Portuguese insults – very out of character for my sweet mother. Just the memory makes me smile. But not enough that I want to be a joiner again. Absolutely not.

‘Then we’re in agreeance that more community clubs are not the way to go?’

With a sigh, she slips the wrinkled tea towel over her shoulder and folds her arms. A sure sign she’s sticking to her objective. ‘No, no, that’s not what I’m saying. You, my extraordinarily clever, bright and brilliant girl, just haven’t found the right club.’

I roll my eyes, another battle lost. I have no tools left in my arsenal in which to fight this, because once Mum’s made her mind up about some new wearying challenge she won’t be swayed. Meanwhile, Detective Amber Quill waits patiently upstairs on my nightstand, ready to get on with her investigations. ‘Clubs are the work of the devil.’

‘OK, OK, I agree, some clubs are a bit too cliquey, their friendships already cemented.’

I let out a relieved breath. ‘Definitely.’

‘You’ll find a café or pastelaria and you’ll go there every Wednesday at precisely 4 p.m.’

‘Why every Wednesday?’

‘Because today is Tuesday. You wrap up your workday at 3 p.m. each day, giving you plenty of time to prepare. You’re a creature of habit, and here I am making it easy for you.’

The dastardly woman has calculated my every excuse, premeditated to the nth degree. A fine illustration of what I face in this daily battle of wills, where my mother is always one step ahead.

‘Fine, so all I have to do is go to a café every Wednesday at 4 p.m.?’ I can’t help but be suspicious. Going to a café isn’t such a hardship, as long as it’s not a hotspot of queues and crowds.

‘Go with the intention of making friends.’ And there it is. ‘You’re good with patterns. Soon enough you’ll work out who the regulars are – they’ll be the people you should strike up conversation with.’

I have zero intention of doing that. A café might be nice, though. I’ll enjoy some uninterrupted reading time with Detective Amber Quill. And as a bonus, there will be pastries, which I’m partial to. All I have to do is find a café tucked in a quiet corner of Porto.

‘Querida, I know the move has been … difficult. But I want you to know, we can talk about him, you know? It hurts but—’

‘I’d rather not rehash all that again if you don’t mind.’ There are so many mysteries afoot, but this one: The Peculiar Death of the Man with Two Families I have no desire to solve. And OK, his death wasn’t all that peculiar, but the aftermath certainly was. Who knew my beloved father was such an untrustworthy soul?

Chapter Two

After much deliberating, I find an unassuming pastelaria in the Ribeira district, close to the Dom Luis Bridge, that meets the requirements for my weekly reading sessions. Pastelaria História has a certain nostalgic charm with its concertinaed awnings like the half-lidded eyes of someone in love. Inside there are retro Seventies-style Formica tables and peeling vinyl chairs. I feel most at ease in a humbler space where they’re not so much moving with the times but cemented firmly in the past. It’s wholesome, the type of place you can rely on. I hope, anyway.

The fridge has a range of mouthwatering delicacies on display from bola de berlim, fat, fluffy doughnuts filled with creamy custard, to Estaladinho, sweet buns dusted with cinnamon, coconut and sugar. There’s folhado de chocolate, a flaky puff pastry with thick, gooey chocolate filling and, as always the ubiquitous pastel de nata, the blistered custard tart famous all over Portugal.

Better yet, this forgotten little pastelaria on a hilly cobblestoned side street is just the right amount of quiet for this introvert.