This weekend's guest blogger: Cathy Ace

My use of plots (garden ones)
for plotting (writing ones) 

One of the questions I receive from readers which I particularly enjoy answering is “What do you do when you’re not writing?” Of course, the same as everyone, I live a life filled with “MUST DO” lists, but I am also an avid gardener, and – I admit it – that’s my passion-filled, all-consuming hobby. This time of year, from June through to September, is when most of us who garden would love to be able to sit back and enjoy the fruits of our labors; but we all know it’s the time when we really have to apply ourselves because it’s peak growing season…and that, unfortunately, includes weeds!

Cathy’s garden in the spring.

I have come to terms with the fact that dandelions are just yellow flowers in the grass which the bees enjoy, and that I should therefore allow to flourish until they reach the seed-head stage, when I can happily mow the living daylights out of them. I have also accepted that buttercups in flower beds must be viewed the same way – as a natural phenomenon feeding the insects and they can look exceptionally good when the wind makes them sway, their yellow heads fluttering attractively. Then I rip them up. Roots and all.

When I’m mowing I find myself in a sort of Zen state; my mind is focused on doing a good job with the creation of stripes on our acre or so of grass, whilst it’s also able to play with plotlines, come up with devilish methods of murder, and offer me the chance to consider the intricate patterns of behavior my characters might display to allow readers to spot a real clue, or be taken in by a red herring or two. Ripping up weeds is a similar occupation – needing just a certain ruthless part of my brain to work in concert with my hands to ensure weeds come up and plants I want to protect remain undisturbed…all while figuring out how the suspects will be challenged by my protagonist, and finally brought to face justice at the denouement.

Cathy's garden in the fall – with Cathy on the mower!

So I would suggest that – for anyone struggling with plotting – a day or two working in the garden might help; I certainly find it allows me the mental freedom I need to be able to plot more fluidly. And then there’s the garden you get to enjoy as a result…not to be sneezed at (unless you, like me, suffer from allergies, so that a daily dose of antihistamine is required).

Happy gardening, and happy plotting!


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Cathy Ace is the author of The Cait Morgan Mysteries and The WISE Enquiries Agency Mysteries. You can find out more about Cathy, her characters, and her work at her website: www.cathyace.com.

Getting Dressed to Kill

 by Cathy Ace

  

Thanks to the TYPE M team for inviting me along today – this is a super blog with some great insights for those who enjoy taking, or reading about, the creative voyage. Looking at the list of regular bloggers I’m keenly aware I’m a relative neophyte, so it’s not surprising if my name is new to you. My first novel was published in March 2012, and I’m still discovering something new about the creative process and the crime-writing business every day. Discovering new authors and readers is a part of that joy, so if we’re new to each other – hello, nice to meet you!

A lot has changed in my life over the past four years, as one would imagine when a person embarks upon a third career in their fifties. But I have realized that something has come full circle – and it involves a dressing gown. Let me explain…

When I wrote the first Cait Morgan Mystery, The Corpse with the Silver Tongue, in the winter of 2010, I was still teaching at university and squishing my creative writing into “stolen time”. For that first novel I would plant myself at my desk as soon as I got out of bed (and had thrown the ball around for the dogs, and made coffee…you know) and wouldn’t move until I’d done what I needed to do that day in terms of word count. It meant I, essentially, wrote that book in my dressing gown and slippers.

Since then I have written ten more books across two series and each has brought different challenges, but there’s been one constant, and ever more keenly-felt reality; I’ve discovered that with each extra title published, the promotional effort required of me seems to increase exponentially. This means that, although I no longer teach at university, I am still squishing my creative writing into “stolen time”. It’s weird. I wouldn’t have believed it if someone had told me this was how it would be. It seems that being a “full-time author” means I’m still a “part-time writer”.

When I mention this to those who have much more experience than me, their response tends to involve the rolling of eyes and a world-weary smile conveying “now you know how it feels”. So, this is the norm, it seems. The new norm. I admit I struggle with it. It seems it’s more difficult for me to compartmentalize “work” and “creativity” when the work is promoting the output of my creative effort. And there’s the problem you see – without the creative output, there’s nothing to promote; without the promotional effort, there aren’t the sort of sales figures a publisher wants to support. It’s both, or nothing, so I’m trying to reach the right type of balance for me. As any author does, for them.

Thus, over the past few months, I’ve gone back to the basics; I wrote my first novel wearing a green silk dressing gown, and I am currently writing my eleventh wearing another green silk dressing gown. I don’t write first thing in the morning anymore; being on the west coast I find my email inbox is already quite busy when I get up, and my brain tells me I have to deal with “work” before I can feel fully “creative”, so now I work all day, then write at night. I pull on my dressing gown and slippers, and sit at my desk from about 9.30pm until maybe 1am or 2am to write. The house is dark and quiet, my husband and the dogs are asleep, any emails I receive can reasonably wait until the next day to be answered…so it’s just me and my characters. And my dressing gown.

And about that dressing gown…I love old movies, the black and white ones you see on TCM where so many of the glamorous 1930’s stars sported a fluid, embroidered, kimono-style dressing gown. I admit I coveted those flowing garments, so determined to find one for myself. And I did. In a tiny store specializing in Asian artefacts in British Columbia’s New Westminster, just half a block away from the Raymond Burr Theatre, I found an entire rail of silk kimonos. Black on one side, a variety of solid colors on the other, the fact they were embroidered with dragons (being Welsh means I have a soft spot for our national emblematic creature) and reversible meant I went a bit mad and bought three! I’ve worn the two green ones so far – I’m saving up the blue one for future use. One dressing gown per series of books; one dressing gown for each set of characters. It might sound a bit odd, but I find that getting dressed to kill really helps my creative process – the slippers don’t seem to matter so much, but the dressing gown plays a big part.

Maybe you could help me out here – is it just me who does this? Do you have other “rituals” that help you get into the creative frame of mind? I know some authors have a favorite writing spot, some have a preferred time of day – but clothes?

Cathy Ace is the author of two series: the Bony Blithe Award-winning Cait Morgan Mysteries (book #7 The Corpse with the Garnet Face is published in April 2016) feature a Welsh Canadian professor of criminal psychology who sleuths her way around the world tackling traditional, closed-circle mysteries; the WISE Enquiries Agency Mysteries (book #2 The Case of the Missing Morris Dancer was published in February 2016) feature four softly-boiled female PIs who operate their business out of a converted barn on a ducal estate in Wales. Cathy is National Vice President of Crime Writers of Canada, and also belongs to Mystery Writers of America, Sisters in Crime and the UK’s Crime Writers’ Association. Her website is here: http://cathyace.com.