Interview with Sydney Riley
The Provincetown mystery series centers around Sydney Riley, the wedding/events planner at the Race Point Inn. Ptown, as it’s often called, is a former fishing village that’s become a major tourist destination, so in the summer Sydney stays busy! The off-season is slower, so we were able to catch up with her at The Canteen—one of her favorite eateries—and find out a little more about her.
Why did you choose to live in Provincetown?
I happened to come here one winter, right after a nasty breakup, and I fell in love with the town. I stopped by the inn for a warm beverage and Barry, the owner, hired me on the spot. So I guess in a way it felt like Provincetown chose me, not the other way around.
What do you like about living there?
I feel like I live in two different places—without ever moving! Summers are insane: the tourists really descend on us around Memorial Day, about 50,000 of them, and it’s nonstop parties, shows, theatre, concerts… the restaurants are all open and do a booming business, the beaches are all full, the whale watches going out… and just when you realize you cannot stand being stuck behind another car with out-of-state license plates, it’s September and they start leaving. Winters are quiet; we all pretty much know everyone in town at least by sight, and we do trivia nights, “Winter Wednesday” classes, that sort of thing. Only about five restaurants stay open; most of the retail shops close down. And then, just when the gray skies and howling winds start getting to you, it’s April and time to start thinking about The Season again.
You seem to have a problematic relationship with your mother. Would you like to comment on that?
Absolutely not. I need to have at least three glasses of wine in me before I can talk about my mother. Maybe not even then.
I hear there’s a story about your name.
My father’s a great history buff. He never studied it or anything like that—he was in sales his whole career—but he reads history books pretty much nonstop. When I was born, he’d just finished reading something about Sydney Reilly. Sydney Reilly was a spy, pretty dashing—Ian Fleming based his James Bond character on him. I think my dad would have preferred to give the name to a boy, but I was all they had in the kid department, so I got it. I shudder to think what I’d have been called if our last name were Churchill.
So it’s been said that if there’s a dead body anywhere in Provincetown, you’ll be the one to find it. What’s your connection to murder?
Honestly, I wish I knew! It started with my boss’ death—Barry, the one who hired me when I first came down here? I really loved Barry, and I still miss him. But yeah, I did find him after he was killed, and that made it so much more personal. I had huge motivation to find out who did that to him, probably so I could kill them myself. And it’s become very odd, because since then there’ve been murders here that I’ve helped solve, and everyone thinks I’m this younger Miss Marple or something, but really I just know a lot of people and get very lucky. I kind of stumble into the solutions.
It was around the time Barry was killed that you met your boyfriend, right?
Ali had actually come to Provincetown to arrest Barry, if you can believe that. It’s amazing he stuck with me, because I was initially really snarky to him. He was wrong, by the way, Barry wasn’t doing anything illegal.
Ali works for Immigration and Customs Enforcement?
ICE. Yeah. Though he’s not going after people who are cheating on their green cards anymore. Right now he’s working in the human trafficking department. It’s a growth industry, apparently. And obviously we don’t live together, he works out of the Boston office. I go spend time with him in the winter when it’s slower here, or he comes down to Ptown when he has time off… that works for both of us.
What do you do when you’re not organizing weddings or solving crimes?
Collapse? Okay, no, seriously, let me think, what do I do? I drink wine, I watch a lot of theatre, I go to see films. I used to travel more when I wasn’t pinned down to such a long tourist season for work, and I’d like to do more of that. My best friend Mirela is teaching me to paint in the off-season—she’s a fantastic artist—and that’s been fun. And even though it seems the great white sharks are here to stay, I do still swim in the ocean. I’m not giving that up for anything!
What would we find in your refrigerator right now?
Oh, please don’t go look. Really, you’d regret it. Um, okay, there’s some cheese and yogurt and part of a salad that really needs to go in the trash. Dumplings—no, never mind, they’re in the freezer. Stuff like soy sauce and pickles and mustard.
Do you have any bad habits?
Do you have about an hour? I can’t even begin to list them. Okay, I’ll try… mostly it’s my reliance on sarcasm to get me through awkward situations. The more stressed I am, the more I’m snarky. Oddly enough, people around me find that off-putting.
I can’t imagine why. Sydney Riley, thank you for taking the time to chat!