Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: MONDAY, April 30, 1990                   TAG: 9004280233
SECTION: EXTRA                    PAGE: E1   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: CHRIS GLADDEN STAFF WRITER
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Long

MURDER, HE WROTE/TEACHER SATISFIES PASSION FOR WRITING WITH HIS FIRST

Buffered from the rest of the world by forests and well-kept grounds, Montpelier normally generates a tranquility common to institutions that strive to instill knowledge, character and a regard for tradition.

But Montpelier finds its peaceful routine shattered when students and adults connected to the school begin to turn up dead.

Montpelier is very much like Woodberry Forest School in Madison County - except there are no murders at Woodberry, except those in the imagination of W. Edward Blain, chairman of the English department.

Blain, a Roanoke native, has written a mystery set at Woodberry Forest's fictional look-alike. "Passion Play," published in hardback by Putnam, arrived in bookstores in late April. The official publication date was April 26, the anniversary of Shakespeare's christening. The coincidence pleases Blain because a major plot element involves a student production of "Othello."

"Passion Play" is the third novel Blain has written but the first to be published. Pre-publication reviews have been favorable.

Publisher's Weekly called it "an outstanding first novel" and "a mystery superior to most, endowing teachers, teachers' wives, sports coaches, the boys and their girlfriends with an unforgettable reality." Library Journal judged it "thorough, believable and engaging." And Booklist praised it as a "gripping first novel - an exciting and thought-provoking debut."

Blain frankly admits that his first efforts gave him little indication that he would have such an auspicious start as a published writer.

"The first novel I did to see if I could get to the end of something," says the 38-year-old author. "It's not something I would want to show. The second I thought was brilliant."

Blain proudly had 20 copies of this second work bound like a term paper and handed them out among friends.

"Then I sat back to watch the reaction," he says, amused today at his miscalculations.

"It was devastating. They never said it was boring. They just said they had to make a phone call and would leave. One of my former students read it and was the first to say, `It didn't grab me.' "

An editor that Blain approached said he would consider the book for publication if Blain would rewrite it. But the editor added that he read 150 pages before he realized it was a mystery.

Ted Blain, as he's known among his friends, learned a valuable lesson - one that he applied to "Passion Play."

"I decided to defy people to put it down," Blain says. "The scariest thing at a boarding school is people you trust killing people."

Into the action, Blain wanted to weave the universal literary conflict between the head and the heart. He was teaching "Othello" to his English class and realized that this Shakespearean tragedy about a man whose reason is corrupted by his passion would fit perfectly into the book he was writing. He began the mystery in the fall of '87 and finished in the fall of '88.

Blain is a 1970 graduate of Patrick Henry High School. His soft Southern accent, khakis and blazer reflect his years in pursuit of undergraduate and graduate degrees at Washington and Lee University and the University of Virginia. His father owned Blain Supply Co., but Ted had decided early on to be a writer.

"I've always written things," Blain says. "I remember watching Red Skelton when I was a child and writing rip-offs of the shows."

Not everyone who wants to be a writer, however, gets published. Blain calls the process that put his work on bookstore shelves relatively miraculous. Previously, he had published 6 1 MYSTERY Mystery only one piece, a short story in a literary magazine. He did it with an eye toward selling his book; it gave him an opening with literary agents.

"I could say, `My recent short story has been published, and here are the first three chapters of my novel.' " Blain included that spiel in 22 letters he sent to agents.

Two wrote back and said they were interested. Blain went with an agent in New York, who sent the manuscript to four publishers. Putnam editors said they would publish the book but suggested changing the time-frame from 1976 to the present, which Blain did.

Like many writers, Blain draws on his own experience to achieve a sense of authenticity in his book. Though he plays around with some names of friends and relatives, bestowing them on buildings and characters, Blain decided that the school is too small a community from which to draw recognizable characters. However, all 200 copies that came to the school quickly sold out.

"I thought the students would have seen enough of me: A prophet is not without honor except in his own country," Blain says. "But they seem to get a charge out of seeing their environment fictionalized."

Already at work on another book set against the background of summer theater, Blain is again following the whodunit format.

In academia's world, English teachers who write mysteries are very much like the untouchable caste in the Hindu religion, Blain jokes. But he's content with the genre.

"I've always liked mysteries. The first full-length book I ever read was a Hardy Boys mystery.

"I could spend my life frustrated because I'm not William Faulkner or decide I could just have fun."

Those who find themselves hunkered over "Passion Play," unable to put it down as the clock ticks into the wee hours, know that Blain opted for fun.

"It was so liberating," he says.

W. Edward Blain will sign copies of "Passion Play" at Books Strings and Things on the Roanoke City Market May 5 from 2 to 4 p.m.