Sherlock Holmes Stories

 

Sherlock Holmes. Most people probably know he’s a fictional detective. I’m not a Sherlock aficionado, but I did read all of the Conan Doyle stories when I was in high school and re-read some of them fairly recently. I’ve watched most of the Sherlock based TV and films. There are so many of them.

 Recently, I’ve been getting into the new stories written by other authors that feature Holmes and Watson. Here are the ones I’ve enjoyed the most: 

John Gaspard, author of the Eli Marks Mysteries which I thoroughly enjoy, also did Greyhound of the Baskervilles. He took the original story by Conan Doyle and inserted Sherlock’s dog into it. The story is told through the eyes of his greyhound, Septimus. It’s a thoroughly enjoyable read. I listened to the audio version narrated by Steve Hendrickson.

I’m also enjoying the Sherlock stories written by Bonnie MacBird. Honestly, I was first attracted to them because of the covers. Turns out, I enjoy the stories as well. The fifth one, What Child Is This?, is set to be released in October.

Then I became aware of the Sherlock in Minnesota series by Larry Millett. I first saw the title of the third book in the series: Sherlock Holmes and the Rune Stone Mystery, which features the Kensington Runestone found in Minnesota in the late 1800s. I’ve read a lot about it and even been to the museum dedicated to it in Alexandria, MN. It’s a nice museum and the Discovery channel series about the it was interesting as well.

Back to Sherlock. I decided this looked like a fun series so I picked up the first book: Sherlock Holmes and the Red Demon. Okay, I listened to the audiobook also, interestingly enough, narrated by Steve Hendrickson. I have to say I’ve become a fan of his narration. Loved the story so I’ll be moving onto the next one.

Those are the Sherlock stories I’ve been reading recently. Do you have any favorite Sherlock or Sherlock adjacent stories or TV or films?

Resolving to Write Every Single Day!

Since the beginning of December, I haven’t been on a deadline and have fallen into a very bad habit.  I’m not sitting down and writing every day.

Whenever I offer a workshop or give a talk to a group of readers and aspiring writers, I’m asked for my advice.  I always tell them, no matter what- write something every day.  Even if it’s a single sentence.

Write something every single day.

But how much should you write?

There’s no good answer to that, but let’s break it down in a quasi-scientific manner.  Most novels are between 70,000 and 100,000 words.  If we average that out to 85,000 words and we write 1000 words a day, you could write a novel in 85 days.  That’s under three months.


But that’s not counting revisions, false starts, or tossing your first, second, and third draft into the fireplace.

Michael Crichton, who passed away in 2008, wrote 28 novels, some under his own name and some under a pen name.  Author of books like Jurassic Park, The Andromeda Strain, and The Great Train Robbery, Crichton was extremely prolific, writing up to 10,000 words a day.  He said, “Books aren’t written, they’re rewritten.  It is one of the hardest things to accept, especially after the seventh rewrite hasn’t quite done it.”

Anne Rice is the author of an eclectic mix of gothic horror, Christian literature, and erotica. Best known for her book Interview with a Vampire, she knocks out about 3,000 words a day.  In her words, “I have to get all the distractions out of the way. I plunge into the work and write an episode; I can’t just clock in at 3,000 words.  I have to have time free to resolve things.  I write in episodic ways.  But when I’m ready to plunge in, I write from late morning through all afternoon, all evening.”

Arthur Conan Doyle, the grand master of mysteries and the author of the iconic Sherlock Holmes stories, wrote 3,000 words a day.  He said, “Anything is better than stagnation.”

Lee Child who pens the Jack Reacher novels writes about 1,800 words a day.  “I write in the afternoon, from about 12 until about 6 or 7,” he said.  “I use an upstairs room as my office.  Once I get going, I keep at it, and it usually takes about six months from the first blank screen until the end.”

Here are a few of my suggestions for reaching a word goal.

1) Work in a location in which you are comfortable.  Much like Lee Child, I have an office in a small room over the garage.  I’m near enough to a window that I can see if it’s raining but it’s not a distraction.  I have access to the internet in case I need to do some research, but I try not to overdo it. When I’m writing, I usually have some low ambient music in the background.

2) Limit internet usage.  It is a killer of time.  Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, news websites, and kitty videos are addicting and rob you of your productivity.

3) Find the time of day that you are the most productive.  Most writers find that they can get into a writing rhythm during a certain time of day.  Whenever it is, make sure it’s devoid of distractions.  For me it’s about 1 in the afternoon until about 5.

4) Don’t write boring stuff. If you can’t stay excited about your work, readers won’t either.

5) Don’t be afraid.  A bad first draft is better than no draft at all.  Keep in mind, that unlike in real life, you can go back and change a scene, or make dialogue sharper and wittier.

Shifting gears for just a moment, let’s talk about New Year’s resolutions.  Mine are the same as last year, with one important addition!

1) A healthier diet…more salads, less carbs, less sugar…which means less wine. Well, we all know how that resolution is going to end up.

2) Exercise more often. Carve out time for a long walk or the stationary bike.

3) Don’t be afraid of my first draft. I have to remember that a bad first draft is better than no draft at all.  Wait a minute, didn’t I already say that?

4) Read more. I’m a voracious news junkie, but I find when I’m writing, I can’t seem to find time to read books.  That should be every bit as important as time for writing.

5) Cut back…way back…on the internet. That is a time KILLER.

6) Learn to relax, take a deep breath, look around and appreciate life.

The addition?  Write. Every. Single.  Day.

Happy New Year!

Playing Fair

I did enjoy Charlotte's post about her dislike of 'fuzzy endings' – where the author hasn't really told you what happened and you have to make up your own mind – as well as the comments about it afterwards.

They seemed to echo something I'd been thinking of writing today – the question of what a detective story ought to be. Perhaps Oscar Wilde's Miss Prism summed it up in her defense of the three-volume novel: 'The good ended happily, the bad unhappily. That is what fiction means.'

It was Monsignor Ronald Knox who made the first attempt in his tongue-in-cheek '10 Commandments for Detective Fiction.' They included prohibitions like, 'Not more than one secret room or passage is allowable,' 'No undiscovered poisons may be used, nor any appliance which will need a long scientific explanation at the end,' and 'No Chinaman must figure in the story,' – possibly a dig at the Chinese opium dens that featured in Sherlock Holmes' cases and then became a feature much imitated in the 'penny-dreadful.'

The great thing about having rules is the effect when someone breaks them. When Agatha Christie, in The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, transgressed by breaking the first commandment, 'The criminal must be someone mentioned in the first part of the story but must not be anyone whose thoughts the reader has been allowed to share,' the shock propelled the book to the top of the best-seller list.

Now, of course, rules have been long superseded. As Butch Cassidy was told, 'There are no rules in a knife fight' and in crime fiction today anything goes. In some of the very best crime novels we know right at the start 'whodunit,' and the suspense is about the why or how.

But I still have an affection for the classic type, and I was wondering how other writers and readers today feel about Knox's commandment no 8: 'The detective must not light on any clues which are not instantly produced for the inspection of the reader.'

I've always felt when I was writing a book that I have the intelligent reader at my shoulder. I want to conceal the villain from them so that they don't guess who it is too early and I will do my very best to mislead them, but I like to think that the clues to the answer are there if they want to follow them. I try to play fair but I can go to elaborate lengths with red herrings - I remember rewriting one scene half-a-dozen times so that the clue I ought to give them remained unnoticed. But I couldn't get any satisfaction from the reader who says, 'I didn't guess' if I had actually cheated.

Is this an idea whose time has passed? What do you think?