Life Happening

 I'm really, really late today but I want to post because I missed my last Friday. I was busy with my day job (teaching at university) and lost track of the schedule. Today I wanted to get a post up. Except last night, I felt a small jab of pain in my eye. It was gone in a second, but it was in the same eye that I saw an ophthalmologist about back in spring. My GP referred me when I called her about the bloodshot eye had seen when I happened to glance in the mirror I was passing. He determined that I had a fairly common broken vein in my eye. It looked and sounded scary, but it wasn't painful and would probably resolve itself. 

He could see my eyes were dry and asked if I had ever been told that. I said I but I hadn't used artificial tears since the wave of recalls of contaminated eye drops.  Even though my artificial tears had not been among the brand or type of drop in the several recalls, I had been spooked enough to stop using them. We agreed it might be safe to start again. But this morning I woke up with both eyes itching and I forgot about my post because I was busy getting my dog to daycare and then calling for an appointment to see what's happening. After I'd gotten in for Monday, I turned to emails I needed to respond to and then picking up dog and feeding pets and self and responding to more emails and I'm finally here now.

I had intended to write a longer post about the topic my Type M colleagues were discussing recently -- muddled middles. I've been dealing with that, too. It isn't usually a problem that paralyzes me for long periods as I'm writing because I'm a plotter. But this time I'm writing a historical thriller and trying to plunge in and see where it gone. With that in mind, I have focused on the characters and their goals and motivations rather than extensive outlining. That worked until I got to the middle and realized I wasn't sure where to insert my parallel murder investigation by my Albany police detectives happening in the months leading up to the presidential election in their present. Their "present" because my two Albany books were set in the alternate near-future when I wrote them, but now are in the recent past. In their present a presidential election is approaching and in the first book I had Howard Miller, a character who turned out to bear a striking resemblance to one of the real-world candidates that we all now know too well. In Book 2, people connected to him had McCabe and her family under surveillance because her father is a retired journalist and had been doing some research on the candidate's activities. In my third book --when I get to it -- I intend to deal with that, but meanwhile I want to use the characters as the investigators of the murder in my historical thriller.

I think I may have mentioned this complex structure before. But I didn't realize last time I mentioned how difficult it would be to deal with the "muddled middle" when I can literally flip a coin to decide when a scene should appear. Knowing that has slowed me down to a crawl. I have gone back to my preferred method of outlining and that has taken me down a path that didn't occur to me when I was attempting to write faster. 

I'm just hoping that whatever is happening with my eyes is no more serious than an allergy or something I've been using on my face. I want to get my pile of term papers read and grades submitted and then settle into summer writing. By then I should have outlined enough to find my way out of my maze.

Have a good weekend, everyone.

I'm Back

 Better late than next time. I've missed my last two Friday posts. With the last, I was returning from South Burlington, Vermont. Luck was on my side. The GPS worked, the ferry from Vermont to Essex, NY was on time, and the traffic was not as heavy coming toward Albany as it was headed north into the Adirondacks. But by the time I got settled and ready to write, it was after midnight and no longer my day to post.

I went to South Burlington because I really need a break. School was out and I needed to get my grades in. I also needed some sleep. Thanks to the staff in the Registrar's Office I was able to get my grades in. Thanks to the hotel I stayed at in South Burlington I was able to get two nights in a lovely king-sized bed in a junior suite. I was supposed to have had four nights there, but my recently discovered carpal tunnel syndrome slowed me down when it came to grading the papers in my two classes. I'm looking forward to my doctor visit to learn about the treatment so that I can focus on the manuscripts I'm working on. 

While I was in Vermont I had a chance to scout out the settings for the 1939 historical I'm working on.   was rainy, but much like New York. When the sun came out, it was warmer than when I arrived. The friend who I had joined for her trip to Vermont left a little before I did. We spent Thursday enjoying the food Vermont hat to offer -- including delicious maple ice cream. I had a few stops I wanted to make to do research for the Vermont portion of my book. With map and guide book in hand, I looked for buildings that were there in 1939. 

I enjoy doing that kind of research. I enjoy walking in my characters' shoes. I enjoy imaging how my characters with various backgrounds and experiences would respond to the same setting -- the food, the music, the people -- to something they have never experienced first hand. I try not to make that off the cuff. If my protagonist loves Southern accents and blues music, I want to know when she experienced both. Maybe her mother sent her to live with her grandparents and that was the first time she also experienced being cared for and living in a stable environment. Or, if another protagonist hates the South and wants to get on a train or plane and never come back, maybe that character has experienced something traumatic in that time and place. Maybe my protagonist is someone who has fled a small Southern town one step ahead of a lynch mob. Maybe when he arrives in New York City, he is like the young African American man in one of Rudolph Fisher's stories who looks around him in astonished delight when he finds his way to Harlem -- just as my Southern-born schoolteacher will. But she will not be delighted. As I tried to imagine Vermont in 1939, I knew it was only an exercise. But as I gave some thought to how my white Southern plantation owner felt about the snow and the ski lodge and the laughing, happy young men and women with jobs in the city, The ones who had been on the train that the senator's daughter who he was courting had taken. She had invited to come along. He might well have wondered if she had wanted him to be uncomfortable. But he had accepted the invitation and was  having the rare experience of being ill at ease, 

 His insight was mine. Or, rather, his lack of insight was a clue to the mystery of his childhood and his pride. That was important and it made the time I had put in doing general and not very focused research about America in 1939, both the South and the North, worthwhile. I've been thinking about what I could use for other characters. I always take my characters to the settings where they might get a clue -- and if I pay attention, I will get more than a clue about who they really are and how they see the world.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                

Living with Writer's Block

 I've been trying for months to finish a 4,000-5,000 word essay for a special journal issue on Edgar Allan Poe and his impact on mystery writers. I have done my research.  But somehow every time I sit down to finish, something else comes up. Something I have to take care of right now. 

The essay is due. The co-editors are waiting for the draft so that they can provide feedback. I finally know what I want to say. I intend to finish today. But for some reason I decided -- after pausing to listen to a discussion about CDC's current recommendations -- that I should schedule my second Covid booster for this afternoon. Then I'm having dinner with a friend (because it would take time to cook and we need to catch up). After that I will come home and finish my essay and send it along. Tonight. . . or tomorrow morning.

Writng this essay should have taken no more than a day or two. But it has been like pushing a boulder up a mountain. 

I've had this experience occasionally in the past -- sometimes when I'm trying to start a book. It is hard to explain unless one believes there is such a thing as "writer's block." 

My own experience is that it is related to either uncertainty about what I am about to do and/or the direction that I intend to take. This is the difference between being a pantser or a plotter. Unlike the pantser, who can jump in and enjoy the process, I plod. In my moments of existential self-doubt when I begin a new project, I wonder if I can even do what I have said I will do. So, I am show I can write another Lizzie Stuart novel in a couple of months. But I have struggled to finish the Poe essay until I finally found the quote that brought it all together. 

In the case of the historical thriller I am trying to write, I can imagine what it will be. But I can't get there. I am so concerned with getting it right, that I can't get it down at all. I think I am on the verge of breaking out of my box, but maybe not.

At least with the essay, having editors who are waiting for me to stop holding them up has forced me to move on. As for the historical thriller. I have the first 50 pages for my agent and the synopsis in progress. I've got to finish this weekend and send it to him. 

The psychology of my "writer's block" requires that I be completely fed up with myself for not getting the work done. Then I need to either have a deadline or be able to apply my own pressure to finish the first draft. 

And -- this is the payoff -- once the draft is done, I am ready to revise. I love revisioning. That is the best part of writing. I have never had writer's block when I am revising. I wish I coulc say that about the first draft. 

Maybe a hot fudge sundae would help. 

About Titles

 Frankie here. Sorry to have missed my last Friday post. 2022 started before I got around to setting up the calendar that I intended to do to keep myself on schedule. 

Now I'm trying to finish the craft essay I was invited to write about setting in crime fiction. Classes begin on Monday, so I want to get it out the door today.

I do want to comment on the title discussion. I find it almost impossible to focus on what I'm writing  until I have a title. Some titles come easier than others. The title of my first Lizzie Stuart book is Death's Favorite Child. That came from associating a line about death in a poem with Lizzie's sleuthing and the presence of a child in the book. It took me all of the five years of drafts and revisions to come up with that title. In contrast, as I began to outline the sixth book in the series after a long hiatus, I knew exactly what that title should be -- A Rainy Night in Gallagher. The story begins on a rainy night. And the title is a reference to "A Rainy Night in Georgia" (one of my favorite songs and the TV series theme song for In the Heat of the Night).

The title of my 1939 historical thriller came after months of trying different titles. I was inspired by another TV show. On an old episode of The Andy Griffith Show, little Ronnie Howard (now director Ron Howard) asked his father for a penny to put outside during a storm. A friend claimed that a penny struck by lightning would multiple. Since one of the exhibits at the 1939 New York World's Fair was about electricity and the World of Tomorrow, I suddenly thought A Penny Struck by Lightning. That was it. The contrast between past and future. 

But I'm still struggling to find a title for my nonfiction book about dress, appearance, and impression management in crime and justice. The book is for a general audience rather than academic. I want a title that will be intriguing enough to delight both an editor and the marketing department in a publishing house and to stop bookstore browsers in their tracks (not too ambitious, right?). My agent says a one or two word title would work well in the current market. I can use a subtitle to provide more information about the contents. I've been looking for a word that describes clothing in disarray -- frayed, shabby, stained, bedraggled, hemmed? A reference to Justice's robes and to four hundred plus years of American crime and justice history from colonial era to present. I've considered "Clothing Justice" or "Naked Justice."  I thought of "Strip Search" and "Dressed to Kill" (already used). I'm still looking for a title that captures the biases, stereotypes, and conflicts in the criminal justice system involving victims, offenders, police officers, courts, and prisons. The title should also suggest that the book draws on popular culture and mass media. 

I really need a title that I can stick up on the wall in front of my computer as I revise my introduction and the sample chapters of my proposal, then write the final chapters. Any suggestions appreciated.

Back to work on my essay. Have a great  weekend.

If Only It Would All Fit Together

 I'm late today because I had some day job tasks to do. Then I got distracted. I realized I couldn't remember all the details of a short story that I contributed to an anthology (Monkey Business: Crime Fiction Inspired by the Films of the Marx Brothers, edited by Josh Pachter). I went back to read it, and I was pleasantly surprised that I managed some low-key humor. I'm not known for being funny.

When I was searching my documents for the manuscript of the story, I came across some notes -- notes I'd made over the last two or three years about my historical thriller. I was delighted when I logged on intending to write about something else and saw that yesterday Donis had shared some notes from her writer's journal. 

My notes are on my computer and in the journal I keep on the bookshelf beside my bed and on scraps of papers and the backs of envelope. The notes on the computer are the most complete and I can understand what I intended. For example, these biographical notes about one of my main characters. The book is set in 1939:

Cullen Talbot

1. Where lives?

               A Southerner. Between Atlanta and Savannah on family plantation, mortgaged. Lives alone except for a servant or two. Has three families of white sharecroppers. Wants to bring place back to glory of his grandfather’s days before the Civil War.

2. Family background?

               Grandfather was colonel in Civil War. Lost an arm. Father was a doctor, married daughter of a neighbor. She died of influenza in 1918. Father shot by black man -- intervened in argument between man and his pregnant wife. Had a black nurse, then tutor, then sent to military academy, attended  University of Georgia – majored in agronomy and business.

3. How old is character?

               33 years old – born in June 1906. Twelve when mother died. Just back from college – 1929 – when father killed. The man who shot him was shot by sheriff.

4.  Origin of name?

               Cullen Talbot – British and German on his mother’s side. Her grandfather was a German immigrant.

               Cullen – puppy, young dog (Gaelic)

               Talbot – messenger of destruction (German/French)

5. What look like?

               5’10” – 175 lbs – blond hair, pale blue eyes – scar on chin from fall during teenage fight-- comment of boy about girl he liked – thinks of himself as chivalrous toward women – “gentle gentleman from Georgia”

6. What kind of childhood?

               Parents kind toward each other, considerate not passionate.

7. What does for living?

               Business – farming and mill

               Concerned about prices of crops – dealing with sharecroppers

8.  How deal with conflict?

               Touchy and quick to anger – just as quickly cools down

               Would prefer to use his wits rather than fists – take proactive verbal strike

9. Who else in life?

               Fraternity brothers, senator (mentor) and his daughter, her cousin 

________________________________________________________________________________

This is all well and good -- except I still don't know if Cullen is an antagonist of Jacob Baldwin, my sleeping car porter protagonist, or a true villain. That's why I have four different versions of his backstory and much more on his motivation. The same is true for the other main characters, who include two women. 

My notes to myself vary -- depending on whether the story is set completely in 1939, or with a prologue in 1968, or with a parallel story set in 2020 during a murder investigation. That 2020 murder investigation would be conducted by the detectives from the two police procedural novels I have set in Albany, New York (alternate history). 

The note about 2020 was scrawled in my beside journal when I woke up in the middle of the night. It's either a brilliant idea and the solution to my problem with the pacing of a thriller that needs to stretch over an entire year -- or, it's a really bad idea.

It would be nice if I could work it all out in an outline - or even in the notes I keep writing to myself. But it seems I'm going to have to write the book and then strip away the 2020 plot if it doesn't do what I'm hoping. At best, it will at least break me out of my log-jam and allow me to keep moving. 

 Like Donis, I wish all the notes I keep writing to myself would come together as a solid plot with all the pieces falling into place. Alas, it isn't that easy.

 Happy weekend, everyone.

 

Settling Into A Routine

Like everyone else, I've been trying to adjust to being home-bound. Yesterday, I tried my hand at making a mask so that I could go out. I needed to drop off my tax documents. The office I've been going to for two decades was about to close as it usually does on April 15 (even though this year the deadline is in July). If I had missed the person I've worked with for years I would have had to the branch office that was remaining open and work with someone there by email or phone. Since my person knows all about my writing deductions I opted to make a quick trip to give her what she needed.

What surprised me was how anxious I felt when I ventured out of the house after being on shutdown (here in New York) for four weeks. I have been having everything delivered -- and, yes, that really is a time-consuming process. Way too much time involved in trying to think about what you might want to eat two weeks from now because it takes five days to get a delivery slot. Also a problem to have to order veggies that quickly go bad if you don't cook with them first.

But going out yesterday reminded me that I need to get some fresh air. I need to step out the door and go for a walk at least every other day. I also need to get a routine in place. This afternoon, I ordered the supplies I need -- printer paper, files, storage boxes, and a larger shredder -- so that I can bring some order to my home office.

 I'm alternating organizing with working. I have a proposal to get in, and I need to finish my book about gangster films. At the same time, I am teaching two classes online. That's a learning curve that I and a lot of other teachers are experiencing right now. I normally do hybrid courses, but now I need to do  Power Point slides. I rarely do a complete Power Point presentations for my in-class lectures. So Monday and Tuesday I focus on classes. The rest of the week, I'm doing research and writing. I'm also attending Zoom meetings.

Of necessity, I've becoming more skillful in navigating virtual meetings. I'm learning how far to sit from the camera and to pay attention to what's on my desk. Or behind me. I realized in the middle of one meeting that my cat's litter box was visible on the screen. I use a litter deodorizer, and it's okay there (the only convenient place to have it out of the way). But anyone looking must have wondered. Anyone who saw this little dragon must have wondered about him, too.

 I always wonder about what I can see of other people's rooms.

There is also the question of what to wear for a virtual meeting. With celebrities dressing down and showing us their unmade-up faces and just out of shower hair, everyone else seems to have followed the trend. But I still feel as if I should at least tidy up enough not scare people when my face pops up on the screen. I do have this hair thing going on. Like some other ill-advised people, a few days ago I decided to trim my own hair. Now, the gray is really showing. I can't decide how I feel about it. I've been seeing gray hairs since I was in my 20s, and I'm really tired of doing touch-ups every two or three weeks. Now that I'm house-bound I could see what I look like if I don't. Except for those Zoom meetings where other people are seeing my experiment.

I think I need a hat. Maybe I'll knit one with that beginner's knitting kit that I bought a couple of years ago and never time to use. Knit while I learning about French culture from a Kanopy course or taking a Master Class (now that I have a year's subscription). I could knit my hat while I'm learning how to make something really interesting for dinner.

Except I need to stay focused. I want to get back to my 1939 historical thriller. The delay has given me a few ideas. Although Sleuthfest was cancelled, I had a character-naming opportunity in the auction. The winner offered me two names to use. I decided to use both, pairing them with another couple whose names I had already offered to include. As soon as I thought of that, I could see the four of them chatting together on a train bound for New York City. They are discussing the World's Fair that both couples plan to attend. The sleeping car porter, my protagonist, is moving about in the background -- an echo of the scene in Alfred Hitchcock's Shadow of a Doubt. But instead of telling the two couples about the man who hasn't been seen since he boarded the train, my porter will be worrying about his own problems. The perfect set-up for a flashback. . .

So that's the news from here on my sofa. It's late and I should go to bed. Stay well, everyone.

About the Villain

I intended writing about something else today, but what Donis wrote about villains yesterday got me thinking.

I'm dealing with that issue of the villain right now as I work on my historical thriller. In my five Lizzie Stuart mysteries, only two of the villains die. On the other hand, in my two Hannah McCabe police procedurals, the villains both die. I didn't plan it that way, but that is what happened.

In the standalone I'm working on now, the villain is -- I hope -- a three-dimensional character with what he perceives as good reasons for his dastardly acts. That part works because I always try to understand my villain and give him/her a chance to make the case for what he or she does. But it is disconcerting in this thriller to have the reader know early on who the villain is and something about "why." This requires me to spend so much more time than I usually do inside my villain's head. He is not a serial killer. He is not insane. So I am dealing with someone who can rationalize what he does.  I don't agree with his logic, but I don't want to stack the deck against him by inserting my author's perspective.

I have to admit that I sometimes have empathy for villains. That could have something to do with the fact that I began to really think about villains when I was reading Shakespeare -- three quarters of Shakespeare in college. I found Iago fascinating. I thought Macbeth and his wife deserved what they got -- but they also had some great lines. Richard III had me from his first monologue.

I think the thing about villains is that they have so much energy. In one of my Lizzie Stuart books, the people who were behaving badly threatened to steal the show. Luckily, Lizzie is a first-person narrator. Even so, I had so much fun writing one of the characters that I'm already planning a return appearance.

One of the questions -- one that also comes up in other genres -- is whether the villain can redeem him/herself. If the villain feels justified and then later changes his or her mind and does the right thing, was he or she only a misguided protagonist? I'm playing with this idea. Maybe I will find it easier to stay in the head of the bad guy in my historical thriller if I think of him as both protagonist (from his POV) and antagonist (from my hero's POV).

Although it would certainly be time consuming since I have at least four viewpoint characters in this big book -- I'm thinking of writing the book with each of the main characters as the narrator. That would be four or five novellas. Then I could go back in and put them all together, with alternating narrators. I'm thinking of this because it would make it much easier to keep track of what my characters -- including my "villain" -- are each doing over the course of eight months. I would also be able to settle in and write from one POV from beginning to end.

It seems like a lot of work to take this approach, but I think it will save me time (less revising) and allow me to create characters who are more fully developed than they are when I'm simply shifting viewpoints as I write. For example, I will know what each character has been up to and how character arcs overlap and intertwine. My villain has a life. He doesn't spend 24 hours a day hatching ways to make my hero's life miserable. If I tell the entire story from his point of view, I hope I'll be able to really understand him.

Has anyone else taken this long way around when dealing with multiple viewpoints, including both hero and villain.

The Default Setting

Sorry I'm late today. I'm getting a slow start because I was up late last night and slept in. Because I'm on intersession schedule and working at home rather than the office, I haven't been setting my alarm. Left to my own devices -- i.e., doing what I do naturally -- I become nocturnal and have to watch the clock to remind myself to go to bed. Last night, my cat went to bed before I did.

But I was already thinking about my 1939 characters and their default settings -- how they go about their lives unless compelled or making an effort to do something else. I've been thinking about that because I've been considering how I might weave that into the plot. I have multiple characters, and I want to give them lives. Real people go about their lives negotiating with the world and making adjustments -- or not. They have to cope with their natural inclinations. 

So I've been pondering each character's default setting. This is more of a challenge than I usually have with a book. I'm accustomed to writing series protagonists. I know by now how they navigate life. I even know a lot about my recurring secondary characters. I spent a lot of time learning about Jo Radcliffe, my most recent protagonist, a former Army nurse in the late 1940s who debuted in an EQMM short story.  But now I'm writing a standalone. I have a cast of characters in a much larger book than I've tried before -- not so much in word count but in the size of the canvas and the problems they encounter. It's 1939. First, they were dealing with the Great Depression. Now, they are living in a world on the brink of war.

I have to keep reminding myself that I have knowledge that they don't have yet. In April 1939, they don't know what is going to happen in September. They don't know that Pearl Harbor will be bombed and the United States will no longer have the option of staying out of the war. I need to get into their mindsets as people who are even less able to see into the future than we are in 2018. How are they going about their lives in an era of uncertainty, but one in which they are not dealing with a 24-hour news cycle and social media? What are their default settings? What makes each of them make adjustments -- work schedules, promises to friends, an evening out or church on Sunday?

I need to ponder how each deals with day-to-day life before getting themselves into the difficulties of the plot. I keep coming back to their bios and asking myself questions about them. That is my default setting as a writer. Even when I want to plunge into my thriller and see where I end up, my tendency is to keep circling back to read my characters' bios.

Last night, when I was up browsing on my computer, I had my characters on my mind. This morning when I woke up, I was wondering who among them would understand why I didn't go to bed last night and woke up late and sluggish. My Pullman porter is a night worker by necessity. But I think he would be tucked into bed before midnight if he had a choice. How does lack of sleep affect what he does? My villain on the other hand, likes to roam about outside at night. He lives in Georgia, on the plantation that once belonged to his grandfather. He is a businessman now, travels back and forth to Washington and New York City. But wherever he is, his default setting is to be up and restless. Does he leave his hotel room and go for a walk? If he does, what happens?

By the way, I have been thinking about who would play these characters in a movie. I, too, am having a problem with the ages of the actors who come to mind. So, I'm still pondering.

Happy New Year!  See you in 2019.

Distracted Characters

The discussion about endings got me thinking about my series arcs and my subplots that sometimes extend beyond the current book. The romances. The deceptions.  The murder that is solved, but the relationships that aren't resolved. I was going to write about that, but then my life intruded.

I've been juggling balls -- symposium in April, classes to teach, SinC chapter, non-profit board, books to write, short story for an anthology -- and my mail has been piling up on my foyer desk. I noticed but didn't feel any urgency about the pink envelope I received. I knew that if my car insurance payment had been credited on the next day, then I would automatically get a notice. I was sure I had made my customary payment by phone because the bill wasn't there in my in-box. And then I got around to paying bills and realized there was no entry for the insurance. And called to make sure I had actually paid. And was told by the customer service person that no, I hadn't and I had missed the grace period. Luckily, I've been with the company for most of my driving life, and he reinstated me in a few minutes. And I -- horrified by the accident I might have had -- signed up for automatic bank withdrawals of my payments.

After I'd hung up, I started thinking about distractions in my characters' lives. I've been thinking about subplots in my historical thriller. But over the course of the eight-month span required in this book (because of real life events), any number of things might distract or obstruct my characters.

Over the course of eight months, they will need to go on with their lives, attending to the ordinary tasks that we are all required to do to avoid having bad things happen. Even when we are organized, sometimes we are required to work late or deal with a difficult person or go to another store to find something. Sometimes we have a dripping faucet or are spattered by a passing car before an important appointment and have to stop to make repairs. 

Thinking about this over a soothing cup of tea, it occurred to me that I should think about my  characters' ordinary days.  What will fall by the wayside when they find themselves immersed in this extraordinary situation?  How will little things left undone create problems? How will things beyond their control distract them from bigger problems.

This is sending me back to my 1939 timelines and notes with each character in mind.  I don't think I'm wasting time thinking this through. As I've mentioned I cannot write a non-stop thriller -- even if I wanted to do that -- but I do need to make sure my characters struggle to get to the finish line.

Of course, I've done this in my series, particularly the first-person Lizzie Stuart books. But I think that here it might be even more important. I can work in setting and a sense of ordinary life without  paragraphs of description.

What about your characters? Distractions as they are sleuthing or plotting mayhem?

And Then It Clicked

Summer brings out my inner Adrian Monk – not the obsessive compulsive Monk. The Monk who worries about "the jungle out there". I worry about ticks when I walk across my lawn. I would never take off my shoes and walk in the grass – who knows what kind of bacteria I might pick up. I've been doing research on the public health movement and the effort to eradicate diseases. So, of course, I'm worrying more this year about those potentially malaria-carrying mosquitoes that torture me even when I wearing bug spray. I worry about the snake that might be stretched out on the path if I go for a hike in the woods. I did once encounter a large black snake when I was a teenager in Virginia walking along a country road. And then there are the things lurking in the ocean that I love. Blame that one on Jaws (this year celebrating its 40th anniversary and being screened two days in June in theaters).

The photo below is of Assateague Island, the island in Virginia where the wild horses live. I've been there twice. Once in autumn (when this photo of the beach facing onto the Atlantic was taken). But the first time I went to the Eastern Shore of Virginia, it was summer. I had a wonderful time. But summer is not my happy season.

Did I mention the early morning light? But this morning when I woke up at dawn, I had a possibly life-changing thought. It could have been prompted by those Little Debbie commercials that I've been seeing on television for the past few weeks. The one where the child version of the adult appears and reminds the adult how much he or she loved Little Debbie snacks when he or she was a child. That could be what reminded me of my forgotten child.

I don't remember liking summer even when I was a child. The only good part about summer was three months of no school when I could read and dream and do what I wanted. But I do remember liking ice cream cones and corn on the cob and hamburgers on the grill (well, I have always liked food, whatever the season). And I remember going to movie matinees. I remember going to my bookcase and finding books that I loved and reading them again during long summer days. I remember laying on a blanket on the grass (after checking for ant hills) and looking up at cloud shapes. So this summer – which isn't officially here yet – I am going to make my list. That list will include planting tomatoes and cucumbers (my father who "truck farmed" in summer in addition to his day job, used to let me have my own garden patch). I am going on nature walks. In fact, I'm going to get back into my walking program that fell by the wayside when I moved from the suburbs to the city. (There is some irony there because I was sure I would walk more when I had ready access to sidewalks). And, I am going to begin the mornings with breakfast on my little enclosed sun porch.

This morning, however, I began the day with a moan when I realized how early it was. I tried to fall asleep again. Instead, I fell into that twilight stage between sleep and wakefulness. And that was when I solved several problems. First, I had a half-dream about taking my laptop computer – that is now over five years old and that no longer has sufficient space to do regular backups -- to my computer guy. My laptop crashed last night and after trying to fix its own problem finally informed me that some systems could not be recovered. I had to unplug it to turn it off. So, this time -- I realized in my half-dream about my conversation with my computer guy – I must admit defeat. I must hand him my old computer and tell him I'm ready to buy a new one.

Problem number one solved – and then something else clicked into place. I was awake again and thinking how much I hated never being able to get a good night's sleep when the weather begins to warm up. And then I must have drifted off because suddenly I was seeing a man who was standing at the edge of a field. He had dirt cupped in his hands and he seemed to be taking great pleasure in the smell and the feel of the soil. I woke up and realized the man in my dream – who had looked like Kevin Spacey – was the villain in my 1939 historical thriller.

If you read my last post, you may remember that I was struggling to connect with my villain and make him a three-dimensional character. Somewhere in my dream, he came to life. My villain owns a large farm – a plantation – in 1939 Georgia. He is a successful businessman, but he has a strong sense of heritage. He would feel a love of his land. He would love the summer and the heat. He would go for walks in the woods with his hound dogs. To get into in his skin, I need to try to "do summer" – and maybe that's what I had realized before I fell asleep again and dreamed about him. Or maybe deciding to embrace (well, at least, try to occasionally enjoy) summer allowed me to find the link that was missing between my character and me.

Cullen (that's his name) would stand outside during a thunderstorm enjoying the lightning display and the rain soaking him to the skin. Ain't going that far! But I'm beginning to understand the pleasure that he takes in nature and his senses.

And that leaves me with my sweet, gentle protagonist. My hero, who is still as much of a mystery to me as my villain (sorry, make that my anti-hero, or hero to himself) was. But if I've find the core of one of them, I'm sure the other will come. I just hope my hero isn't a winter guy. I can't wait until January.

Okay… I was typing that when I realized maybe he is. He grew up in the South, too, but maybe he wasn't a boy who took to nature. Picked cotton and hated getting sweaty and sticky. But never liked jumping into the creek, looked first. Used to be teased about being a "sissy" by his friends. But a good-natured boy who took the teasing in stride. Read books and went to small Southern college. Now, a Pullman porter, who takes pride in his appearance in his uniform. Saving his money to go to law school, imagines himself in a courtroom. Never thought of himself as particularly strong or adventurous…

This could work. Maybe I should try writing the whole book when I'm sleep deprived and have stumbled to the computer. Or maybe I write better on my desk top than the laptop. Shucks! Does I need to replace my old desk top, too. It still works (I'm writing on it now) but it may not be up to a book.

All right, have breakfast out on my sun porch and think about this. And remember summer dreams can be good for my writing process…