MAKE MINE MYSTERY - http://makeminemystery.blogspot.com

Last week the Borders chain announced the closing of 200 Waldenbooks and Borders Express stores before the end of January. That was a loss for those of us who need places to sell our books, but since the big chains rarely embrace unknown authors, it didn't feel like a tragedy.
On the other hand, not long ago we mourned the loss of Creatures ‘N’ Crooks, an independent mystery and sci-fi bookstore in Richmond, VA. As a writer, it hurt so much because there is now no mystery bookstore within a 2 hours drive of me. These people did embrace new voices and helped fans find them.
Even as a fan I see the loss of independent bookstores as a cultural tragedy. Sadly, there’s not a lot we can do about it. The economics are hard to fight. But we CAN actively support the specialty stores that keep their doors open. The best way to do that is to buy your books there if you’re anywhere near one. But how do you find these wonderful places?
The easiest way is to become familiar with the Independent Mystery Booksellers Association (IMBA).
http://www.mysterybooksellers.com/ . Through their website they can help you find just the books you want – by theme, by author, or by detective. But, more important to me is their comprehensive list of mystery book stores. They’re all there, from Aliens and Alibis in Columbia SC to Wrigley Cross Books in Gresham OR. You can easily search using their interactive map feature to locate the stores nearest you or whatever city you may be planning to bury that body in.
The IMBA has recently started up a new blog for authors
http://knock-em-dead.blogspot.com/_ to make it easier for us to communicate with booksellers and each other. I suspect that many serious fans would enjoy those posts too.
I’ve met many IMBA members at mystery conferences and conventions and I can tell you these people are as devoted to the books as any fan. They also order my books, even in parts of the country where no one has heard of me… yet. So this short blurb is my pitch to you the reader and you the writer. Support independent mystery booksellers and their association all you can. These are the folks who will take care of you and show you the gems hidden in the stacks when the big chains are only interested in the best sellers.
From the Sunday morning mind of Earl Staggs
Some people, be they readers, editors, or writers, object to flashbacks. I rather like them when they’re done right and use them frequently myself.
A flashback is one method we have of inserting backstory. When we feel something that happened before the current story began is relevant, we can stop the forward motion of the story and include the past event or information as a flashback. A flashback may be as short as a few sentences of narrative or may run for several pages and may contain dialogue, action, setting and description.
I have two problems with some flashbacks, however. The first one is length. If we detour from the current story too long, readers may get wrapped up in the flashback and forget important points from the current story. If there’s a lot of information needing to be told in flashback mode, I think it’s better to break it up into smaller portions and space them out within the current story.
My other problem is when writers overuse past perfect verb helpers (“had” and “had been,” for instance) in a flashback so readers will know they’re reading something from the past.
Here’s a brief example:
***She had divorced her husband years ago and her lawyer had been successful in negotiating a large cash settlement. Before long, she had settled into a life of lavish indulgence, which included traveling with and supporting younger men. I know because I had been one of them. Within two years, she had gone through the money and the men drifted away. Now she had been reduced to waiting tables at a diner in the seediest part of town.***
The use of so many “had’s” is considered passive writing, and can be avoided if a distinct transition is used to introduce the flashback. A good transition takes the reader into the past without a need for past perfect tense. Here’s the same example with “Ten years ago” as the transition, the passive verb helpers eliminated, and some additional tightening:
***Ten years ago, she divorced her husband and her lawyer negotiated a large cash settlement. She then settled into a life of lavish indulgence, which included traveling with and supporting younger men. I was one of them. The money and the men are gone now and she waits tables at a diner in the seediest part of town.***
But a clear transition is also needed to bring the reader out of the flashback and back to the present story.
Here’s one way:
***I remembered all that about her as I settled into a booth and she trudged over to take my order. I also wondered if she remembered me.
While some people object to flashbacks, there are times when they can be used effectively if they are brief and you have a clear transition into and out of them so readers don’t get confused.
Anyway, that’s my opinion. Any other takes on it?
By Jean Henry Mead
Not so long ago, if someone said you were creative, they meant you were different, or what author Nancy Slonim Aronie called “tapped by the goddess of artistic sensibilities.”
We’re all born with innate talents that are creative in their own way. Florists are creative in their arrangements as are plumbers who create unusual designs that hopefully don’t leak. And I’ve always admired the creative talents of wedding cake designers and chefs who garnish their gourmet dishes with sprigs of parsley and mounds of berries and whipped cream.
Aronie says, “Creativity is your soul expressing itself. Creativity is a continuing process. And process and souls expressing themselves have nothing do with selling or reviews or results or commercial success. They have everything to do with taking chances, being honest, letting us experiment with what feels right, letting ourselves make—as Annie Lamott puts it in
Bird by Bird—'[lousy] first drafts.' This brainstorming of the gut will nourish your innards.”
Aronie’s creativity exercise is an interesting one. She basically says to allow yourself 30 minutes to decide which ordinary thing you’ll turn into something extraordinary. Then write about it. “What was the experience like for you? How will you remember it? How will you change the channel from ‘what a drag’ to ‘what a joy?’”
Some of the exercises she suggests are:
~Clean the hydrator in the refrigerator.
~Match all the socks in the sock drawer.
~Throw out all the stretched–out underwear that you never wear.
~Organize your videotapes.
~Rip pages from a magazine and make a collage that says ‘I’m creative’.
~Add a plant to your work area.
~Make an exotic mushroom sandwich on toasted country French bread. Serve it on your nicest plate with yellow and orange nasturtium.
~Put a love note under someone’s pillow.
Most of these things fall under the dreaded category of “housework,” and I can think of better things to do with the little time I have to be creative, although I have to admit that her suggestions are challenging.
Aronie has taught a workshop, telling students that “creativity is maintaining the balance between the heart and the mind, the dedication to the moment and the ability to stand by and surrender and let the stuff flow through.”
Not a bad idea.
I haven’t indulged in any scientific study of the subject, but it seems to me that in crime fiction the most popular motive for murder is greed. I say that using the dictionary definition of greed: “An excessive desire to acquire or possess more than what one needs or deserves.” Most often it involves money in some form or another, but it could be almost anything, including somebody else’s wife.
One of the classic Bible murders occurred when David got his henchmen to arrange the death of Uriah. That left him free to marry Uriah’s widow, Bathsheba. James M. Cain used a similar plot (sans henchmen) in The Postman Always Rings Twice.
Dashiell Hammett’s The Maltese Falcon is a classic tale of greed. All the killing is done in an attempt to acquire the supposedly ancient black bird.
Another popular fictional murder motive is revenge or retribution. This has spawned the good guy killer fad seen most notably in Lee Child’s Jack Reacher novels. The hero doesn’t consider them murders but retribution for injustices to himself or other friendly characters.
Interestingly enough, this type of rationalization is similar to that of the schoolyard killers. At Columbine and Virginia Tech, the students rationalized that they were punishing other kids who had bullied them, ostracized them, made fun of them, or generally made them feel unwanted. In the fictional world, authors make sure their targets are painted black enough that there’s no doubt “they deserve it.”
Actually, rationalization is the balm that most murderers use to justify what they’re doing in their own minds, even when they know it is against the will of the law and society. They become determined to do it anyway.
I say most murderers, because there are always the psychopaths—serial killers. These guys (and a few gals) are so egocentric and socially disconnected that they know what they’re doing is right. Nobody else matters, so what’s to rationalize? Psychologists say there are plenty of them around. Fortunately, only a few drift into the murderous category. Except in fiction.
So why do they murder? If you’re writing a novel, they can do it for any good (or bad) reason you can dream up. Just try to keep it believable.
Chester CampbellMystery ManiaMurderous Musings
As authors and/or publishers, we often struggle to get reviews for books—especially positive, glowing reviews. Each author that gets a positive review basks in its warmth for a while, and we usually share them with others like pictures of a new baby… or perhaps a new boat or motorcycle.
As readers, we seek out reviewers whose judgement we trust, whose taste runs at least roughly parallel to our own, so we can be guided by their opinions.
A few months ago, I started a review site strictly dedicated to genre fiction, The GenReView. Thus far, I have published quite a few reviews of books in a variety of genres: fantasy, sci-fi, romantic suspense, mystery, suspense, GLBT. It’s been fun, although finding reviewers I can rely upon to turn out at least one review each month has been a bit of a trial.
But, as I read some of the online discussion group postings and listservs to which I belong, I’m wondering about the importance of reviews. (Yeah, yeah, I know—why am I stabbing myself in the back?) Seriously, folks. An uncommonly large number of people say that reviews mean little to nothing to them. I was really surprised at this, especially given the amount of time and money publishers and authors devote to gaining reviews.
Personally, I like to read reviews of books before I commit to buying and/or checking them out at the library. My time is valuable, and I don’t like to waste any of it. I figure, once I find a couple of reviewers whose views and taste are close enough to my own, I can use them as bellwethers for at least some of my reading forays.
Reviews in print are highly prized, yet are the hardest to obtain for most authors and publishers. Many newspapers have cut back on “frills” and reviews are often viewed as that sort of luxury. Plus, the sheer number of books being published each year makes getting the few review slots a very competitive process. Online review venues are becoming more and more important to those who want reviews, as fewer and fewer print reviews are available.
Here are some things other than reviews that people said influenced what they pick up to read, in no particular order:
- Friends’ recommendations. If a friend whose reading tastes are similar to your own says, “Hey, you gotta read this book! It’s awesome!” then chances are you will be influenced to at least give the book a shot.
- Recommendations from other readers on [insert name of appropriate listerv] list. Whether you regard someone as a particular friend or not, if they read the same sort of fiction you read, and you’ve heard them say other positive things about books where you shared the same opinion, you are often likely to trust their opinion.
- Advertisements in “target” magazines. If you read Ladies Home Journal, and trust it, and see an ad for a new romance novel there, you may be influenced to see what it’s all about.
- Past satisfaction. The fact that you have read past titles by the author and enjoyed those books, is usually an indicator that you will like the newest title. But as authors get long in the tooth, or perhaps long in the pen, there is a general consensus that often authors begin to run out of new ideas, or become too predictable. (Just how many times can notorious ex-IRA-enforcer Sean Dillon tell someone that he attended the Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts, and performed Ibsen there?)
- The amount of advertising about the new book that they saw on television or heard on the radio… or now, on the Internet. Radio, TV and Internet ads for books are popping up more and more often. As with most ads, some people view these as intrusive and annoying, but they still get the name of the new book in front of potential readers… and that often works.
Surprisingly, back-cover blurbs seem to have the least influence of all. Well… maybe not so surprisingly. I know that I have been too often disappointed by what the blurb on the back said, compared to the reality of the book inside the covers, and I think many people have had that same experience.
What do you think, as reader, publisher or author? Are “formal” reviews of books losing their importance to you? If you are an author or publisher, is it worth the trouble it now seems to be, to get those elusive reviews? Do you trust online review sites, or do you only rely upon NYT Bestseller lists? What’s important to you when considering whether or not to read a new title?
I’d like to know what you think!
When people find out I write mysteries, they sometimes ask if I'm fascinated with criminals and killers. I am, of course, but I'm also fascinated by heroes. Thanks to Bill Crider, I've been alerted to a
story about two groups of real heroes reuniting more than sicty-five years after the event that brought them together. The heroes were the men of the 1st Battalion, 141st Regiment, 36th Infantry Division, a Texas group that found themselves surrounded by German forces in the Vosges mountains of France in 1944. They were reuniting with the men of the 442nd Regimental Combat Team who broke through and saved them.
The 442nd were Nisei, Japanese Americans from Hawaii and the west coast, the sons of Japanese immigrants. Many of the men had parents, brothers and sisters in concentration camps where they were guarded by other American soldiers. Shortly after the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, Japanese Americans living in the western states were rounded up, denied due process, and sent to camps. For their own protection, they were told, but the soldiers guarding the camps had their guns pointing in not out.
When Roosevelt offered able-bodied men in the camps the opportunity to prove their loyalty, many enlisted. They were formed into a unit that was merged with the 100th infantry from Hawaii and became 442nd. Their motto was "Go for broke." They fought in Italy and France where they became known as the Purple Heart Brigade for all the casualties they sustained. The 442nd was the most decorated unit in U.S. military history. Their rescue of the 1st Battalion of Texans, the lost battalion, was perhaps the greatest of their many accomplishments. After the unit was cut off, two attempts were made to rescue them. Both failed. Then the assignment was given to the 442nd. After five days of fierce fighting, they managed to bring out 217 of the original 228 Texans, while sustaining 814 casualties, themselves. I Company went in with 185 men and 8 walked out.
What made the 442nd such fierce fighters? They lived in a time when people of color, especially people of Japanese ancestry were considered inferior and disloyal, so they felt they had to prove their loyalty.
One of the characters in my work in progress is a veteran of the 442nd. He fought in North Africa, Italy and France before being wounded in the Vosges. His friends and family spent the war in detention because of the color of their skin. The story isn't far enough along to share with you yet, but I will share a resource about Japanese Americans during that period. At the
Densho Archives, you will find oral interviews with both combat veterans and concentration camp residents. Their stories, in their words, will move you like nothing else.
Mark Troy
http://www.marktroy.nethttp://hawaiian-eye.blogspot.com
Since Perry Mason is a fictional character, I didn't really have a love affair with him. But I read plenty of Erle Stanley Gardner's books featuring Perry Mason and I never missed a Perry Mason TV show.
In fact, when I was in labor with my third child, despite my husband's urgings, I wouldn't leave for the hospital until the Perry Mason show was over. Pretty exciting since my pains were three minutes apart. Fortunately, we weren't too far from the hospital.
At the time we lived in Oxnard CA. I learned that at one time Perry Mason had his law office in Ventura and many of his mysteries were located in Oxnard.
I'm sure my fascination with Erle Stanley Gardner and Perry Mason had an influence on my own mystery writing. After I had several books published I wondered if anyone celebrated Erle Stanley Gardner in Ventura. I attended one such event and then it disappeared.
Soon after, I discovered that Temecula actually had an Erle Stanley Gardner mystery weekend. Gardner owned a ranch in Temecula where he continued writing mysteries with the help of four secretaries. Temecula's museum has many interesting artifacts concerning Gardner.
Of course I volunteered to give a writing presentation at the mystery weekend. I was accepted and have done so every year since. My next one will be on Novel Writing, this Saturday, November 7th 10 a.m. behind the museum in Old Town, behind the senior
center.
So my love affair with Perry Mason paid off for me.
Has anyone had a similar experience with a fictional mystery character?
Marilyn
http://fictionforyou.com
Hoodoo Sea took me away says Rolf Hitzer ...
In my day job I am responsible for ninety people, not including the people in their lives affected by the decisions I make. If each person needed five minutes of my time on any given day, I am not able to return any incoming phone calls, emails, text messages, or tackle any file on my two foot high stack that never shortens. Sound stressful?
When I had decided to write, Hoodoo Sea, I dedicated two hours each night after my day job had completed. Penning a fiction novel allowed me to go on a psychological journey to the vast world of make believe. I became the Mayor of Pretendville, and I loved being there.
I was the architect of my protagonist and antagonist. They would do whatever I would decide in my novel and this process helped me escape from my reality. Talk about personal therapy?
As humans, I believe we all need an outlet regardless of what it is we do to help keep a roof over our heads. I happened to discover writing was a mental release for me. What I wonder, though, if I were a full-time writer, where would be my place to go and hide from reality? Hmmm, maybe one day I will have the answer to that question.
Link for Amazon:
http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_ss_2_4?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=rolf+hitzer&sprefix=rolfWebsite:
http://www.hoodoosea.com/About the Author:Rolf Hitzer was born in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada in 1959 and raised by his parents, Erna and Julius Hitzer. Rolf attended Princess Margaret Elementary School, John Pritchard Junior High and Graduated from Kildonan East Regional Secondary School where he had majored in Culinary Arts.
Rolf is married to his wife Irma since 1997. Together they have a wonderful blended family with Rita and Clark Bodoano and Grand children, Alexandria, Patrick and Braeden. Jason and Leah Tutlies, and Grandson Easton. Mandel Hitzer, and the youngest Jessica Hitzer. Clearly the growth of his family is still a work in progress.
Rolf Hitzer has several passions besides writing, they include being at the log cabin on weekends. Spending time on the water with a fishing pole in hand. Wildlife viewing and especially Moose calling during the fall rut. Playing a range of Poker card games and a variety of board games.
Rolf is a Member of the Winnipeg Real Estate Board, The Manitoba Real Estate Association and the Canadian Real Estate Association. He is currently working on his second novel.
For more information on his book visit:
http://www.hoodoosea.com/ .
About the Book:The government of the United States of America is on the verge of startling the world.
Billions of dollars had been invested in its space program.
And now, the moment of truth has arrived…
Scott Reed is the man for the historic mission. He is the Wing Commander chosen by the elite brass at NASA. The assignment to test flight the first speed of light craft, held top secret, was about to shock the world. The risk? Utter and complete failure. The reward? Being a part of the greatest human accomplishment ever known to mankind.
Major James Harrow, second in command of the four person crew, despised his Wing Commander. Harrow was a proud and patriotic American. What was NASA thinking when they selected a Canadian to pilot the voyage? There was no comparison as to who was the better skilled aviator. This was his time, his moment. Major James Harrow was about to prove to everybody they were wrong to bypass him as Commander.
The weather conditions were perfect and lift-off for the test flight was text book. The triumphant cheers from Mission Control in Houston were echoed all the way to Cape Canaveral. The silent fear of the first hurdle of the flight had been succumbed. All systems were go! That is, until the crew and SOLT-X1 entered the Bermuda Triangle…
It seems to me that there are a lot more sub-genres than there used to be. More hybrids. Erotic romance. Paranormal romance. Paranormal mysteries. Historical mysteries,supernatural mysteries... well, the list goes on.
I have become a lot more aware of all of these mixed genres since a: searching for favorite authors in bookstores and finding them in unlikely places and b: writing for Ravenous Romance, which just upped the ante for mixed genres with their anthology HUNGRY FOR YOUR LOVE.
Yes, romance and zombies.
Zombies are relatively new in terms of mainstream popularity, but they've already shambled their way into the horror market, the paranormal market as bit players, YA, and now...romance. For those that say it's just wrong, St. Martin's Press bought the print rights to HUNGRY FOR YOUR LOVE. This pleases me as I have a story in the anthology. :-)
I wrote a story several (okay, lots of several) years ago that I called 'zombie noir.' It was originally published in DANGER CITY , a noir anthology published by Contemporary Press. I was the only female author in the the book. The story, A MAN'S GOTTA EAT WHAT A MAN'S GOTTA EAT, prompted my father to say I wrote like a misogynistic drunken man. His observation probably explains why, when I showed up at the book launch party in Greenwich Village (yes, I wore black!), the publishers were surprised to see a dame.
In the spirit of Halloween, I am posting the opening paragraphs of this story as an example of mixed genre, specifically zombie noir. I hope you enjoy the excerpt.
Oh. Profanity warning. Not much, but a little.
The name’s T-Bone. Chuck T-Bone. I’m a private detective. You know, a P.I., a dick, a gumshoe. To be specific, I find missing people. It’s always been my specialty, even before the big change. After I died I changed my name to fit my new life - though ‘life’ might not be the right word under the circumstances.
Back in the old days, I was Charles Tyrone of Tyrone’s Investigative Services. But I bought it while doing a job for a prominent family - an Italian family with connections in all the wrong places. They paid me well and I’ve never had enough money to be choosy about who I work for. I’ve always tried to stay on the clean side of the law but it ain’t easy, even these days.
Yeah, I’m a zombie. Undead, living dead, ghoul, take your pick. I say we’re just ordinary guys and dolls trying to earn an honest day’s wages and put food on the table, same way we did before this zombie crap really started to hit the fan. You know, back a year or so when the dead starting refusing to stay buried. Having corpses walking around in various states of decay was bad enough, but then it became obvious that the deads’ favorite past-time was chowing down on the living. You’d step outside of your house and bam! Instant corpse kibble.
It was Wednesday morning, the middle of a hot July week. Smog lay over the San Fernando Valley in a thick haze and it was hotter than the Sahara outside. I was kicking back in my office, air conditioner cranked to the max as I waited for a new case to keep me in grub and pay the bills. Used to be that J.D. took up most of my pay but now I only drink it out of habit.
These days it was more important to pay the bills, especially the electricity so you could keep your home and your workspace nice and frosty. Dead meat rots if you don’t keep it cold. I was still in pretty good shape after six months. A little green around the gills, maybe, but nothing major. One of these days I was gonna go down to one of the local mortuary joints and get myself embalmed. But that took more do-re-mi than I had to spare, so in the meantime I’d make due with my J.D. I figure my insides must be fairly pickled as is.
It had started out to be a slow week and so far there were no signs of things getting on the speed track. My bank account was flatter than a ten year old in a training bra and if something didn’t break soon, I was gonna join the lines at the unemployment office.
I was just starting to sink into a depression darker than an African night when the door opened and she walked in. She didn’t knock, but then trouble rarely waits to be invited. Tall and still lusciously curved, she swayed towards me. This could’ve been on account of the fact that her dainty feet were encased in black stiletto heels, the kind that said “fuck me but don’t ask me to walk.” Nice gams, kind of slender, so slender that in a couple of places I could see bone showing beneath the seamed stockings.
Her hair, where it still clung to her scalp, was blond and luxuriant. Heavy make-up gave her once porcelain, now bluish complexion an almost natural skin tone, marred only by a gash across one cheek that no expensive mortician’s putty could hide. Her nails were painted red to match her lipstick and her low-necked, curve-clinging satin dress. A black silk scarf draped around her throat and shoulders didn’t quite conceal the gaping wound where someone had given her the King Kong of hickeys right above the collar bone. Her peepers were still an icy blue, but Brother, all the Visine in the world couldn’t get the red out.
All in all, I wouldn’t kick her out of my bed.
I would love to know all of your favorite or least favorite examples of mixed genres! What works for you and what doesn't? Inquiring Danas wanna know!
Dana Fredsti
MURDER FOR HIRE: The Peruvian Pigeon (James A. Rock Inc, Yellowback Mysteries Imprint)
RIPPING THE BODICE (Ravenous Romance, as Inara LaVey)
http://www.danafredsti.com/Member, Sisters in Crime (National & NorCal Chapters)
Events Coordinator, SinC NorCal
TECHNICAL DIFFICULTIES HAPPENED, So I posted Dana's entry again, but I'm saving part of the original because she did have a comment we don't want overlooked.