My take on book launches

by Rick Blechta

Since a few Type M bloggers have mentioned their book launches/signings and made some interesting comments, and finding myself faced with the same situation, I thought I’d throw my thoughts out there and see what folks think.

To me, book launches have always revolved around two things: promotion of the new publication, but even mores as a celebration of a huge milestone in my writing life.

Think about it — I’ve just worked very hard and spent a lot of effort, not to mention hours of my life, all towards the end of producing a new work. In the background of this — and not having all that much to do with the actual creation of what is now enclosed between the covers — is the work of writing a proposal, coming up with a sample chapter or two, perhaps a detailed plot synopsis, etc. These are about as much fun to do as the math homework your high school teachers assigned every bloody day. We’re not even talking about the struggle of finding an author in the first place!

And now you’re actually able to hold a tome in your hands — which in my current situation is a very “generous” word to use. Still, I’ve produced something tangible. That’s a pretty incredible thing on its own.

Doesn’t something like this deserve a big celebration? And that’s how I personally view the launch of a book. This is exciting stuff (especially for me) and I want to have a big party!

In the past, some of my books have enjoyed really huge parties. For The Fallen One, I booked Toronto’s Arts & Letters Club, arranged for food and drink, invited to opera singing friends to perform (and I am still very grateful to Anna Bateman and Emilio Fina for their extreme generosity) and 100 people showed up! Anna and Emilio sang beautifully to orchestral recording of some iconic opera arias, and to wrap it up, they sang the Brindisi from the first act of La Traviata and opera which had a large place in the novel’s plot) with the audience “helping out” on the choral parts. Now that was a book launch.

This time out, I can’t afford something quite that extravagant, but my latest, Rundown, will get its due and be unleashed on an unsuspecting public on November 5th, from 2:00 until 4:00 at Toronto’s iconic mystery bookstore, Sleuth of Baker Street.

Type M’s founder (and my dear friend), Vicki Delany, is partnering with me to launch the second in her Year Round Christmas series, We Wish You a Murderous Christmas — and that’s a pretty cool thing in itself. Vicki and I have shared the stage at many a book signing, but never for a launch (and it was all her idea).

There will be food (including some seasonal goodies — considering Vicki’s book’s subject matter) and drink (bubbly, perhaps, since any good launch deserves a broadside from a Champagne bottle.

Sure, our party will help generate awareness and hopefully translate into increased sales, but for me, it will be an afternoon to celebrate a great accomplishment with friends: my eleventh book. For Vicki, it is her 23rd book. Think about that one for a minute, folks.

If you’re around, please drop by and help share in our joy at accomplishing something that’s pretty great!

Do You Like What You Hear?

Are you happy with your audio book? Does the reader give the right voices to the characters you have so lovingly created and lived with for months and months until you know them as well as your own family? Are you consulted about the actor/actress who will be reading? Do you listen to it with pleasure, even surprise as the reader sees an angle on your story that you hadn't realised was there? Or do you wince as the characters who emerge from the speaker are monsters you simply don't recognise as yours?

I've had both experiences. There was one who so perfectly had my Marjory Fleming's voice that I asked the producer if she could always be used in future, but as is the way of these things the actress was tied up with another production at the time when the company wanted to make the tape – I hadn't thought of that. The actress who read another book was so bad that I couldn't listen to it right through. I did manage to put a veto on ever using her again, but of course I realise that I'm not familiar enough with the talent available to make suggestions.

It must be an even bigger problem when a book is to be filmed, though I'd be prepared to live with it – chance would be a fine thing! But if you have a clear idea of your own character in appearance it could be very hard to have to accept a portrayal that just didn't conform to that. On the other hand, Ruth Rendell admitted that she was so pleased with George Baker as Wexford that as the series went on, she wrote the books with him in mind. Colin Dexter was another satisfied customer, with John Thaw as Morse.

But PD James, though she was as always diplomatic, never found 'her' Dalgleish – though personally I thought Roy Marsden came close. And when I asked her what she thought of the film of Death at Pemberly, she just said, 'Well, dear, my agent said to me "When it's sold, it's sold." 'The only way to take it!

I had a young friend who was blind and I thought she would have found the discs a great boon, but she said she greatly preferred reading the books in Braille: 'I don't want someone else to tell me what the people in the book are like.I want to decide for myself.' I liked that: it's sad to think that people who listen to, rather than read the books, will only have someone else's impression of what I've written.

It is, I suppose, rather like writing a play and being dependent on the actors and producer to deliver it, inevitably with their own interpretation.I've never felt tempted to try – I suspect that reveals control-freak tendencies. I'd love to know how other people feel about this.

Blowing My Own Trumpet

Aline here. I'm delighted to introduce you today to Marianne Wheelaghan. She's another Scottish writer, but having spent some time in the South Seas (the background for some of her books) she seems to have picked up some of the sunshine to bring back with her to grey Edinburgh. She's always warm, funny and very engaging and I know you'll enjoy meeting her here.

Marianne:

When I was growing up there was no greater crime than blowing your own trumpet. It was considered attention seeking and self obsessed, deceitful and shallow. Imagine then my dilemma when I discovered that for us writers to succeed it is not enough to write a good story, we must also be good self promoters.

 Regardless of whether we are speaking at an author event or being interviewed on social media, or writing an article for a magazine or blog, the book marketeers tell us we must “big” ourselves up. If we don't put the best possible spin on what we say, we run the risk of appearing uninteresting, dull even, and by default suggest our books are also dull.

But while I fully understand that in a world where everyone is clamouring to be centre stage we writers cannot afford to be shrinking violets, “bigging” myself up smacks of deceit and blatant self promotion. It seems to directly contradict my integrity as a writer.

Then, not so long ago, I discovered that some of the very best writers were shameless self promoters. I changed my mind – if it was okay for the great and the good to blow their own trumpet, it was okay for me.

Who were these charlatans? Let me tell you about just a few. In 1927 Georges Simenon, author of the Maigret novels, agreed to write a novel while suspended in a cage outside the Moulin Rouge nightclub for 72 hours – all for the handsome amount of 100,000 francs. While George wrote, the public could shout out themes and names for characters. They could even offer suggestions for a title for the novel. It was promoted as a “record novel: record speed, record endurance and record talent”. It didn’t happen in the end but that didn’t stop people from talking about it as if it had.

Who else? Nobel Prize winning Ernest Hemingway appeared in adverts for Ballantine Ale, as did John Steinbeck and CS Forester (of African Queen fame). Mark Twain advertised Campbell’s tinned tomato soup (I kid you not!) and Perry Mason author Erle Stanley Gardner promoted headache powders.

Virginia Woolf, despite stating she wasn’t interested in her appearance, went on a “Beautiful Woman” style shopping expedition with London Vogue’s fashion editor in order to help improve her image. As she became more famous she took more care over her appearance and developed the term “frock-consciousness”. Furthermore, when one Logan C Pearsall Smith criticised Woolf for writing for a low brow magazine like Vogue for money, she defended her actions in a letter to a friend saying, “Ladies’ clothes and aristocrats playing golf don’t affect my style; What Logan wants is prestige: what I want is money …Money dignifies what is frivolous if unpaid for.”

One of the oldest records of self-promotion dates as far back as 440 BC when the writer Herodotus paid for one of his own book tours around the Aegean. In the 12th century a certain Gerald of Wales invited people to his house for a meal and forced them to listen to him read from his latest work for three days!  Even the wonderful, great American poet Walt Whitman felt the need to write anonymous reviews about himself: “An American bard at last! Large, proud, affectionate, eating, drinking and breeding, his costume manly and free, his face sunburnt and bearded."

Walt, however, was an amateur compared to our very own John Creasey, who, when starting out, wrote hundreds of his own reviews under different names. The best self-promoter, however, has to be 18th century writer Grimod de la Reyniere, who invited his friends to a ‘funeral supper’ that he held to promote his new book Reflections On Pleasure. When the friends got to his house, he locked them in a room and hurled abuse at them while others watched from a balcony above. When the visitors were finally released they ran around telling everyone that La Reyniere was mad and everyone promptly bought his book.

So, regardless of what you call it, self-promotion, building an author platform, branding, bigging ourselves up, making waves or ripples, when push comes to shove all is fair in love and war and writing. As author Stendhal said in his biography Memoirs of an Egotist: “Great success is not possible without a certain amount of shamelessness, and even of out-and-out charlatanism.”

And while I’m not looking for great success let me shamelessly tell you that the ebook of my latest crime novel, The Shoeshine Killer, is available on Amazon.com. A snip at $2.99, it is the only book you'll read this year which features line-dancing policemen in Fiji!

The Fine Art of Pacing

I finished a really, really fast-paced novel a couple of days ago. The characters were interesting and well-developed, the plot hung together and made sense. The action was explosive and intense.

The book was boring. The author didn't understand the importance of pacing.

Imagine a movie where they cut to the chase immediately and it never lets up for two hours. One hair-raising desperate move after another. Bang. Bang. Bang. Close call after close call. Near collisions and real side swipes with parts falling off.

I'll guarantee you the patrons will be checking their iPhones in very short order.

Readers and movie goers need to rest between scenes. The 'tween time is a perfect place for back stories and to build up motivation for the next confrontation. It's also an ideal time to introduce any necessary historical material and comments on the setting.

Flashbacks used to provide an ideal venue. This technique lost popularity, but I've noticed flashbacks are returning. Whether flashbacks or back stories are used, insertions of this nature can provide a springboard into the next crucial scene where all hell breaks loose again.

An example of the use of a breather between a scene that propels the protagonist into the next scene: Tom and Jerry have just had a vicious verbal confrontation. Tom, our hero, loses big time. Jerry, his big brother, taunts him and feeds his fury. Tom slams out of the room.

During the time he's licking his wounds he recalls (in back story, not a full flashback) other times that Jerry made him feel this way. He broods on all kinds of unfair incidents from the past. The girl friend Jerry moved in on, the time Jerry blamed him for wrecking the car.

Tom can be walking down the street while he's thinking about all the past unfairness. It's a chance to describe surroundings, the neighborhood, etc. and give the reader a rest. Then motivation for the next scene begins to sneak in. Tom is not going to let it happen again. The stakes are too high this time. It's now or nothing. He stops at a pay phone and makes the crucial call. Which leads us into....

The next scene.

What’s in a book signing for a mid-lister?

Book signings are tough and getting tougher, according to most bookstore owners I meet. Attendance is down, people are ordering online more and more, and the entire proposition is risky for the store (especially the independent stores) who face returning unsold books at the conclusion of the event.

This summer and fall, I did several signings/readings/book talks at various locations in New England. Some at chains, some at independent stores. I continue to be amazed by the spirit of the inde booksellers. Here is Western Massachusetts, I have several indes, including World Eye Bookshop, in Greenfield, Mass., which has been around for 40-plus years, and Mystery on Main Street in Brattleboro, Vt., a place I go to ask for “a mystery I can’t find anywhere else.” The recommendations are always excellent.

My 7-year-old, the real Keeley

This weekend, I signed at World Eye. A handful of people walked through the front door, and it got me thinking about what’s in a signing for the mid-lister?

At a slow event, most sales are what I call “hard-earned, hand sales.” This means I’ve chatted up anyone walking through the front door (standard pick-up line, “Hi, you like mysteries? I’ve written a trilogy featuring a single-mother and border patrol agent.”) or walked the aisles handing out bookmarks. This past weekend, at a 90-minute event, on a sunny Saturday afternoon, I had to scrape for every sale.

Until Lynda Mayo arrived.

Lynda is why people like me (a mid-lister) do signings. Yes, I know I do them to meet store owners and, more importantly, readers, and to spread the gospel of my protagonist Peyton Cote. But when you’re hand-selling each and every book to people who thought they came in to buy a New York Times bestseller, a loyal reader like Lynda makes your day.

She arrived with a huge smile on her face, told her husband, “This was the book I spent all day reading.” We talked about Peyton Cote, each book in the series, secondary characters, and as she continued to rave two other people overheard her, approached, and bought books (who needs plants, when you have Lynda?). Our conversation was so great I forgot to get a picture with her.

It’s not about book sales, not for the mid-lister. It’s about enjoying the process -- of writing, of editing, even of fighting with the blank page; and it's about enjoying the promotional process, including the challenge of the “hard-earned hand sale.”

And readers like Lynda make your day once in awhile.

Random Thoughts on Libraries and Books

We’re having a September heat wave here at the beach, not conducive to thinking. So today you get random thoughts on libraries and books, things I’ve heard about recently.

The fairly new Manhattan Beach Library

Earlier this month, I read an article about a new imaging technology that can read closed books. MIT is developing a terahertz wave camera that will eventually be able to read the text on a book without it being opened. There are books in libraries and research institutions that people are afraid to open because they’re so fragile. Once this technology is perfected, they’ll be able to find out what’s in these books without worrying about destroying them. So far it’s in the prototype phase. For more details, including a short video:  http://news.mit.edu/2016/computational-imaging-method-reads-closed-books-0909

Then there’s X-ray microtomography, similar to a CT scan, which scientists have used to read text in scrolls that are too fragile to unwrap. They discovered that the Ein Gedi scroll, discovered in a synagogue that was destroyed in AD 600 and looks like a lump of coal, contains the beginning of the book of Leviticus. This technique was also used on papyrus scrolls from Herculaneum, a city that was destroyed during the eruption of Mt. Vesuvius. http://www.newsy.com/amp/videos/how-scientists-read-ancient-scrolls-that-can-t-be-opened/

Pretty interesting and exciting developments.

Then there’s Benjamin Franklin. I had heard that he was instrumental in the development of the lending library here in the U.S., but didn’t know many details. Apparently, he helped found the Library Company of Philadelphia in 1731, America’s first lending library and the predecessor of our free libraries. Franklin served as the librarian for the Library Company from 1733-1734. So, Ben Franklin was a librarian, however briefly!

While looking into Ben’s activities, I discovered this site, The Library History Buff. http://www.libraryhistorybuff.com/index.htm It’s full of all kinds of info on libraries and, yes, their history, including vintage postcards of libraries, and all kinds of links involving libraries.

And there’s National Hug a Librarian Day, which is August 25th. And International Hug a Librarian Day is March 1st, though there seems to be some confusion there. Anyway, I’m not sure I’d actually hug a librarian unless I knew them well, but we can show our appreciation by saying nice things to one. Then there’s Library Lovers Day on Feb 14th.

Those are my random thoughts for today. Hope you found some of them interesting.And if you happen to be in Manhattan Beach, CA on Monday, October 17th, I'll be on a panel there with Lida Sideris, Sarah M.Chen and Jennifer Chow at 7pm.

I know this is late…

by Rick Blechta

I’m well behind my time once again this week, but it has been an extraordinary day in a number of most excellent ways.

I go to Toronto’s world famous St. Lawrence Market every Saturday, usually in the company of one of my adult sons. We’ve done it for many years like clockwork and it’s a very important and enjoyable part of our week. So enjoyable, in fact, that I’ve used the market in several scenes in my most recent full-length novels.

However, this past Saturday, I was playing the music teacher role once again in helping a friend and former student get a French horn class started down the road to their music careers, and so I didn’t get to the market.

My son had the day off today so we went down this morning. It’s a completely different experience going there on a weekday. The stalls are less full of wares and the place has maybe 10% the business as a Saturday. We got a chance to chat with many of our shopkeeper friends.

We came home, dropped off our goodies and then I headed back downtown to stand in line for tickets to an open rehearsal of Norma by the Canadian Opera Company this evening.

While waiting (I scored a bench seat because I was there early!), as is my want, I was scribbling notes and writing a bit of dialogue for a scene I’m working on in my current novel-on-the-go, and as usual, I was writing with my favourite fountain pen. A woman of a certain age sat down next to me and noticed my pen.

“I noticed your beautiful pen. Are you a fountain pen lover, too?”

I didn’t get much more work in as we compared our pens (she had a lovely vintage Waterman; mine is a special edition Pelikan my darling wife gave me a number of years ago) and discussed different brands of ink. Someone else in line overheard us and said he, too, loves fountain pens.

Now, I love discussing fountain pens with anyone – but the day was about to get even better.

The question of my journal soon came up. I told them I was working on a novel.

“Oh, it’s nice you’re writing a novel. I’ve always thought I’d like to try. Are you hoping to get it published one day?”

I explained that I’ve already published ten and an eleventh is on the way in less than a month.

That sort of set the two people back on their heels. They asked my name.

“How come I’ve never heard of you?”

Good question and one I’ve answered many times — as have most authors I know.

The end result was — after I revealed that my two most recent novels have an opera singer as the main character — these two new “friends” were going to head over to the nearby Eaton Centre to look for the two novels in question (The Fallen One and Roses for a Diva).

Another person in line: “Excuse me for eavesdropping, but did I hear correctly? You wrote The Fallen One?”

“Yes.”

She said loudly, “I really enjoyed that book! And there’s another one out with Marta in it? I’ve got to get it.”

I’m sitting here writing this post — far different from the topic I had originally planned for today — and I’m still on cloud nine.

This has turned out to be the best day ever!*
_________________________

*Well, as far as my writing career goes…

What do do with All Those Tomatoes

by Vicki Delany

Looks like I’m out of step again.  We’re talking about libraries on the blog, but I’m giving you a recipe for tomato soup. Perhaps I’ll tell you another time why I have been called the Margaret Atwood of Prince Edward County (and yes, it has to do with libraries) but I know that right now you’ve got countertops covered with tomatoes and you’re wondering what do to with them.  

The thing about tomato season, is that when it’s over, it’s over. Sure you can buy tomatoes all year round – hard, firm, tasteless things that have turned red by an injection of gas, not the warmth of the sun.

Last time I talked about my love of tomato season and I’ve since had requests on my Facebook page (https://www.facebook.com/evagatesauthor/) for my soup recipe.  So here it is. Enjoy.

Vicki Delany’s Tomato and Red Pepper Soup

5 LBS FRESH TOMATOES  

3 MEDIUM RED BELL PEPPERS

2 TBSP EXTRA-VIRGIN OLIVE OIL

1 TABLESPOON CHOPPED FRESH SEEDED RED CHILI

SALT AND FRESHLY GROUND BLACK PEPPER

1 CLOVE OF GARLIC, FINELY CHOPPED

1 TABLESPOONS BALSAMIC VINEGAR

 2 1/2 CUPS VEGETABLE OR CHICKEN STOCK

Place tomatoes in a large pot of boiling water for about 60 seconds. Transfer them immediately to a large bowl of water. Cool, then peel off the skins and remove seeds.

Broil peppers (turning regularly) until the skins are charred. Place them in a covered bowl until they’re cool enough to handle. Then peel and finely chop.

Heat olive oil in a large, heavy-bottomed saucepan over medium heat.

Add the chilli peppers, chopped red peppers and a pinch of salt. Cook for 5 minutes.

Add garlic, and cook for 2 minutes.

Add chopped tomatoes, another pinch of salt, and vinegar. Cook for another 10 minutes.

Add the stock, bring to boil and simmer for 15 minutes.

Cool slightly.

Using an immersion blender, tabletop blender or food processor, blend the soup to a smooth consistency.  Can be served immediately or frozen.

Enjoy! This soup goes very well with a good book.

Winding down summer 2016 with a new book

Last month I was in Albuquerque for Bubonicon 48. The event was originally known as the New Mexico Science-Fiction/Fantasy Convention. The name Buboncicon came from novelist Robert E Vardeman noticing that Egypt was not letting anyone from New Mexico into that country because the Land of Enchantment does have a problem with bubonic plague. As if Egypt is such a pristine environment? So the con was renamed Bubonicon and a rat was chosen as the mascot.

In other news, a book I co-authored has been released, Forgotten Letters. Although I'm known for tales about sketchy detective-vampires, I've always wanted to write a novel about World War Two. So in collaboration with Kirk Raeber, a physician and Navy vet from San Diego, we penned what I think is an awesome story about love, loss, and redemption set against the backdrop of the biggest violent clash in history. The estranged lovers are American and Japanese, but what makes our story different is that the romance is not about the internment camps in the US. Rather the American finds himself reuniting with his lost love in wartime Japan. And there's Shiba Inus.

Here's the back cover copy:

A trove of forgotten letters reveals a love that defied a world war.

 In 1924, eight-year old Robert Campbell accompanies his missionary parents to Japan where he befriends a young Makiko Asakawa. Robert enjoys his life there, but the dark tides of war are rising, and it won't be long before foreigners are forced to leave Japan.

Torn from the people Robert has come to think of as family, he stays in contact by exchanging letters with Makiko, letters that soon show their relationship is blossoming into something much more than friendship.

The outbreak of total war sweeps all before it, and when correspondence ends with no explanation, Robert fears the worst. He will do anything to find Makiko, even launch himself headfirst into a conflict that is consuming the world. Turmoil and tragedy threaten his every step, but no risk is too great to prove that love conquers all.

 

Wish us luck.

Libraries and the World

I'm been reading the wonderful stories my colleagues shared about the libraries that played such important roles in their childhoods and development as writers. I've been debating whether I would share my early library memories. But I think they're worth sharing.

I loved the public library in my hometown, Danville, Virginia. When I was a child and teenager, the library was housed in the Sutherlin Mansion on Main Street. That section of the street was known as "Millionaires' Row" and is now in the Historic Register. The Sutherlin Mansion was unique in the role it had played in American Civil War history. During his retreat from Richmond, Jefferson Davis stayed there. Danville is known as "the last capitol of the Confederacy." Today, the Sutherlin Mansion is the home of the Danville Museum of Fine Arts and History.The public library moved to a modern building up the hill from the courthouse.

I don't remember the first time I went to the old library in the Sutherlin Mansion. This is rather odd because during the Civil Rights movement, integration of the library became an issue. But I was young enough during that era not to be able to drive myself into town. We lived about five miles outside the city limits, in what was then called "country" (before the city expanded outward when the mall was built). There was no way for children to get into town unless adults took them. So I missed much of the discussion about the public library. I got my books from the school library.

I don't remember when I went to the public library and got my card. I do remember being a teenager and browsing through all of the books in the adult section. I remember discovering books that I loved. I checked The Day Must Dawn by Agnes Sligh Turnbull out every few months. And then there was Mary Stewart's My Brother Michael. And all the books with titles that intrigued about subjects that seemed fascinating. I love nonfiction as much as fiction.

What I remember about visiting the library was that the librarians sometimes looked at what I was checking out and offered smiling observations. What I remember is that they seemed pleased that I was leaving with my arms full of books.

What I remember is that a library that was of the time and place in which it existed became one of my "good places" where I could go and discover other worlds. 

Louise Penny and Michael Whitehead

I was very sorry to hear that Michael Whitehead, husband of the wonderful Louise Penny, has passed away after a long decline.

I had the extreme pleasure of meeting the Louise  and Michael at my local public library several years ago. I sat next to Michael and we had a lovely and funny conversation about what it's like to be a writer’s spouse. He had on his usual bow tie and treated me as though he'd known me for ages.

If you don’t know Louise’s work (and if you are a regular mystery reader, I can’t imagine that you don’t), please go forth and familiarize yourself tout suite. I had read them all, and loved them all, so I went to see her, just as I’ve gone to see many many authors.

Now, I’ve been very impressed by how a number of authors handle themselves at events, but I must say that Louise blew me away. She is a true human being in the best sense. Even if I had never read one of her books, after listening to her, I would have given myself whiplash in my rush to buy them all. I’ve done many events myself, and do not consider myself an amateur at the game. However, I learned quite a bit from Ms. Penny on how to make a crowd love you.

Allow me to share :The moment she walked in the door, she went around the room, big smile on her face, shaking hands with and speaking to every attendee.

When she shook my hand, I said, “I’m Donis Casey…” intending to introduce myself since we have mutual acquaintances, but lo and behold, she knew my name! “Oh!” she exclaimed, “Let me give you a hug” Her pleasure appeared so genuine that I would now take a bullet for her.

When she spoke, her joy in her craft and love of her characters and setting washed over the audience. To tell the truth, when she was finished, I felt a desperate desire to regain that feeling, which is easy to lose in the everyday struggle of life. I vowed to rediscover the pleasure of storytelling, and to remember why I chose to become a writer in the first place.

However appealing and lovable a person Louise is, the bottom line is that she writes great books, full of heart and warmth, and true human frailty as well as strength, ugliness as well as beauty.

If you want to be a successful author, you have to write wonderful books. Its quite a bonus to be a wonderful person as well.

And so I offer her my dearest sympathy for her loss, and my gratitude for all the joy she has brought me and all her readers.

Launch parties

Barbara here. This blog is all about promotion, including blatant self-promotion, which is shortened to BSP in social media parlance and which can be a tricky line to tread. Inundate Facebook with too much "My book is out! Buy my book! See review of my book!" and you risk people either hiding your posts, unfriending you, or perhaps more kindly, simply scrolling on by. Hit Twitter with too many tweets and retweets and likes about your newly released darling, and people will roll their eyes and label you another desperate, "in-your-face" writer.

All of this hype can backfire, turning off the very readers you are hoping to reach, and yet without social media promotion, many a book sails off the publisher's production line, hits a few bookstore shelves, and sinks like a stone, because no one has heard of it. Professional review sites, publishers' promotion budgets, newspaper book pages, and radio appearances – all these promotional tools are shrinking at a time when the number of published books is exploding. Unless you are an international best selling author, who ironically doesn’t really need the media attention he or she receives, much of the effort to get the word out will fall to you.

With social media and other promotion, the key is moderation. Sometimes less is more, with as much give as take. Connect with people, listen and comment, encourage others, form relationships.

For me, that's where the launch party comes in. A lot has changed since I published my first Inspector Green novel in 2000. Social media like Facebook and Twitter were non-existent. Many of my friends and potential readers didn't even have email (except possibly a work email account). At that time I was so excited to celebrate my first book that I wanted to invite almost everyone I had ever known to my launch. I painstakingly printed out cards and address labels using Word software, licked envelopes and stamps, and mailed out hundreds of invitations. Quite a few people came to the launch, but many more were alerted to the book's existence and went out to buy it.

With subsequent books over the years, I have gradually phased out the printed invitations and I now rely exclusively on email and on social media event invitations. I know other authors have become much more media savvy, using newsletter sign-ups from their website to broadcast their news and using Mail Chimp or other email services to organize their mailings. I love to write, but I don't have a twelve year-old handy to keep me up to date with the latest tech advances.

But I do love a good party. I think it's one of the most enjoyable ways to get the word out and to share my excitement with others. Whether they come or not, they learn about the book. But I am not one of those writers who invites friends from California to my launch in Ottawa. If you do that, the whole thing loses its personal touch. So in addition to social media announcements, I keep track of emails from readers and friends, and individually invite those who live within a reasonable distance to the launch. To others who I know are interested, I send a personal note announcing the book. It's time consuming, but as I said, I love a party.

Which brings me to the crux of this post. My launch parties! FIRE IN THE STARS, the first in my brand new Amanda Doucette series, has been on the shelves a couple of weeks now, and I have lined up two launches. The first is in Ottawa, September 28 at 7 pm, at Mother McGinty's Stage in the Heart and Crown Pub, 67 Clarence Street in the Byward Market. Parking is not as horrendous as you might think; there's a parking garage across the street.

The second is in Toronto, October 13 at 5:30 - 7:30 pm, where else but at Sleuth of Baker Street, 907 Millwood Drive. Because it's way more fun, I am sharing both these launches with my good friend Linda Wiken, who is launching her first brand new Dinner Club mystery, TOASTING UP TROUBLE. At both launches there will be nibblies, drinks, book talk, and readings. A great opportunity to stock up for those long winter nights, or for early holiday gifts.

For those of you who live within a reasonable drive of Toronto or Ottawa, please come on down and help us celebrate the joy of seeing a book launched on its way. It's all free, and you get to share the night with other book and mystery lovers. Which is one of the unexpected delights of the book launch experience.

My library reminiscences

by Rick Blechta

I hope you’ve enjoyed Sybil’s and now Aline’s memories about libraries as much as I have. Judging by the number of people who’ve read them, it seems there’s a real interest — so here goes mine!

I grew up in a small(ish) town in Westchester County, which is just north of the Bronx in New York City. Mamaroneck is right on the Long Island Sound and has a very large pleasure boat harbour. In days past, it was locally nicknamed Clam Town because of the large tidal mud flats. As the 20th Century went on, that mud became more polluted, and when I was growing up, a put-down we often used was, “You smell like low tide.” But I digress…

The Mamaroneck Library adult reading room as it is today.

Mamaroneck has a lovely library, carefully added on to over the years, but it retains its original reading room which has large murals depicting local history all around it. The children’s library was in the basement, and I spent a lot of time there, not just selecting adventure books to sign out, but doing research for school.

It was run by a short, slender, but very imposing woman named Miss Bauman. All us kids were terrified of her because she ruled the room with (as we viewed it) an iron fist. If you took a book off the shelf, you’d better darn well sign it out or put it back in the correct spot. No leaving of books on her tables! Near silence was the word of the day, too. Only low whispering was allowed.

When I had the temerity of a ten-year-old to question why the adults left books on their tables upstairs, she snapped, “I don’t care what they do upstairs. You children need to be taught how to be tidy!” (Or words to that effect.)

What we didn’t realize at the time is that she was teaching us any number of useful things: how to use a card catalogue, how the Dewey Decimal System worked, why it was important to put things back where they belong so that they can be found easily again because they’re where they’re supposed to be. I could go on. I only realized later that she was patience personified when she was showing us “library things” and only became short when we didn’t follow her (sensible) rules.

Miss Bauman in 1971.

I’ve talked to a number of other friends who I remember from those library days. Our memories are the same: a velvet hand in an iron glove. But Miss Bauman is remembered fondly by us all  — especially me.

You see, a dozen years later, she became my brother’s de facto mother-in-law. Miriam (as I now knew her, although I couldn’t always break the “Miss Bauman” habit) brought up two of her nieces, one of whom my brother wed. She and I would often laugh about things that had happened in that basement room. Her memory of me was as “someone I always had to shush.”

I still love libraries. When I was on the road as a musician in my 20s, I would search out the library in whatever town we were playing in for the week and spend my days there, either reading books I found or something I’d brought from home. It was a lot more pleasant than sitting in a hotel room watching TV or sitting in the hotel bar drinking all day (or worse).

We have a beautiful and grand law library here in Toronto (in Osgoode Hall) and it’s generally empty. It’s also open to the public (when it’s not filled with lawyers studying for bar exams), something that’s not generally known. I wrote a large portion of my about-to-be-released novella, Rundown, there. In fact, Osgoode Hall is even in the book.

So thank you, Miss Bauman, for showing me the ropes and making me a life-long library aficionado.

________________

Completely off topic but still very interesting: Miriam Bauman started off in the ’30s as a teacher/librarian in one of the local grade schools. She often told the story of taking her class out onto the field to watch the Hindenburg float majestically overhead on May 6, 1937, only a few hours before her fateful crash in New Jersey.

Interesting sidebar #2: My very good childhood friend (also my brother’s best man), Len Tallevi is now the president of the Mamaroneck Library’s Board of Trustees.

Acknowledgement: Thanks to lawyer Henry Gluch for introducing me to the Osgoode Hall Law Library.

Happy Library Memories

I read Sybil's affectionate post about the library she had gone to as a child murmuring 'Yes! Yes!' to myself. Libraries played a hugely important part in my young life and have gone on doing so ever since.

My parents were great readers and the house was full of books, so my parents hadn't really bothered to take me to the library. I only discovered it when I was walking home with a friend who was carrying some books and she explained what she was doing.

I was frankly incredulous. 'You mean – you just go and they give you books? You don't have to pay or anything? I went in with her and met dear Mr Doig, the librarian. He explained you had to have a card signed by your mum to get permission but then yes, indeed, you could just take them.

I almost snatched the card from him, ran all the way home, extracted the signature from my amused mother, and ran all the way back. His eyes twinkled when he saw this hot and breathless child and he was a good friend to me afterwards. For instance, you were only allowed to take out three books a day but if it was a Saturday, or the holidays, he let me take out another three if I'd finished the first ones by lunchtime.

Indeed, so much did I appreciate it that I decided I might like to be a librarian. I think I had the idea that this just meant you got to read all the best books first and I hadn't understood the sheer sweat of organising the ticket system in those days before electronic registration. Then there were the wretched readers who would keep putting books back in the wrong place... No, I decided after work experience, being a librarian was not for me.

I did get a liberal education, though. In those days there was censorship and what were termed 'blue' books were not put on the open shelves. (Here I'm not talking about Fifty Shades stuff, you understand; I remember Peyton Place was one of them). They were, however, kept in the office where we had our coffee breaks, and sometimes some of us returned quite late...

Then the day came when someone actually asked to see the 'blue' books. A frisson went around the library desk and the Chief Librarian was summoned - a snippety little lady with steel-rimmed spectacles. She gave the man a look of disgust, said, 'Follow me,' led him to the room, and gestured to the shelf without looking at it. 'There you are.'

There was a puzzled silence before the man said, 'I don't see them. You know, the Blue Books – the government reports.' Somewhat red-faced, she made a quick recovery. 'Oh! I'm so sorry, they must have been moved. We'll look in the reference library.' She was awfully nice to him after that.

So even though the job wasn't for me, I still love libraries and visit a lot of them to give talks. They're absolutely the nicest audiences – not surprising, really, because they are the real book-lovers.

Guest Post: Ellen Byron

Please welcome Ellen Byron, fellow member of Sisters in Crime/LA, to Type M. Her first book, Plantation Shudders, was nominated for gobs of awards. Her second book, Body on the Bayou, just came out. Here she tells us what led her down a murderous path. Take it away, Ellen...

WANTING TO MURDER SOMEONE LEADS TO WRITING 

ABOUT MURDERING SOMEONE

by Ellen Byron

I’ve worked with a lot of strong personalities in my television writing career. Actors, directors, executives, other writers. Most have been hilarious and wonderful. Three drove me to fantasies of murder.

The first was a fellow writer on a popular sitcom that will remain nameless. He was arrogant, yet threatened by other writers’ talent – especially women writers, because he also happened to be sexist. He talked about his co-workers behind their backs, and in a business where perception is everything, his badmouthing cost people jobs. I wanted to KILL him. Being a relatively sane person, that was out of the question. So instead, I took a mystery writing class so I could kill him off on paper.

I signed up for a UCLA Writers’ Extension class taught by the inimitable Jerrilyn Farmer, and decided to write a mystery that took place during a sitcom production season. (Hmm, wonder where I got that idea?) The victim was the writer I despised, of course. I wrote a chapter, read it in class, and awaited acclaim. Instead, I got a tepid response. Then the other students shared their work. I was the only professional writer in the class – and my work was the least interesting. I wanted to hear a second chapter of everyone’s book but my own.

I didn’t try writing a mystery again for twelve years.

And that’s where the other two awful co-workers come in.

I returned to TV and worked on a variety of sitcoms with great writing staffs. Then I landed on a show where two of the guys at the top were, in different ways, the unpleasant equal of Despised Writer #1. Both were dismissive, cold, superior, and judgmental. If I told you my fantasies of their demise, you’d consider having me committed. There was only one way to rid myself of the vitriol I felt toward them…try writing another mystery.

This time I created a completely different world from television. My protagonist was a school psychologist at L.A.’s ritziest private school. And I didn’t make my bosses the murder victims. I made them repugnant suspects. That manuscript didn’t sell, but it did win a William F. Deeck-Malice Domestic Grant for unpublished authors and eventually landed me a book agent.

My third mystery, Plantation Shudders, is a one-eighty from both previous mystery attempts. It’s a cozy set in a charming fictional Louisiana village, and even comes with recipes. But vestiges of the Hollywood writers I wanted to kill can be found in the quirky Southern characters who inhabit my Cajun Country Mystery series. Despised Writers #1, 2, and 3 would never recognize themselves, but I got great pleasure from poisoning them with my pen.

I’ve expanded my murderous literary reach to rid friends of people who’ve wronged them. Need a personal enemy killed or arrested? Let me fire up my computer. While many of my life experiences have found their way into my plays and screenplays, writing mysteries fulfills me in a different and devious way. It’s reassuring to know that if I ever experience a horrible co-worker or boss again, or if anyone I care about has someone evil in the life, I am quite capable of murder. At least on the page.

Ellen's debut novel, Plantation Shudders, made the USA Today Bestsellers list, and was nominated for Agatha, Lefty, and Daphne awards. The second book in her Cajun Country Mystery Series, Body on the Bayou, offers “everything a cozy reader could want,” according to Publishers Weekly.

Ellen’s TV credits include Wings, Just Shoot Me, and many network pilots; she’s written over 200 national magazine articles; her published plays include the award-winning Graceland. http://www.ellenbyron.com/

A Cold Start

Fractured Families will be published in March and now I'm thinking about my next book. I have not decided on a title.

My mysteries begin with an image. Getting back to Kansas to do the research will be difficult to arrange because it's a long drive. The trip must be arranged before the snow flies. I want to visit one of the "Eight Wonders of Kansas"--the salt museum in Hutchinson. The tour takes vistors 650 feet underground.

There are only two other underground salt museums in the world and they are in Poland and Austria. The underground storage vaults in the Kansas Salt Museum contain millions of priceless documents from all over the world. The original negatives for Gone With the Wind and Ben Hur are stored there along with a vast number of other films.

A great deal of valuable art was stored there during World War II. It's one of the largest bedded salt deposits in the world and is still mined today. Over 500,000 ton of rock salt is removed this year.

Last week I gave a presentation to the Graham County historical society and wanted to continue to Eastern Kansas but had other obligations back here in Colorado. I can find out a lot about the Salt Mine from internet research, but it's no substitute for descending into the shaft and experiencing the icy terror of being hundreds of feet under the ground. Imagine being one of the early miners.

Today it houses an active business that offers impeccable security for data and treasures. Needless to say it offers a level of protection most of us do not need.

I'm going to start my book anyway. After all, it's the story not the background that should be center front. Whatever I write requires rewriting, but the urge to go East is becoming stronger each week. Maybe my Muse is trying to tell me something.

Three Starts

I'm writing something new, something I hope will launch a series. I've spent a lot of time pre-writing. I have an outline I like (you know me and outlines: it's a starting point and a safety net). I have characters I would enjoy growing over years, a husband-wife team.

What I'm toying with is the point of view, usually something I never second-guess. I've written a present-tense, first-person opening, and I've written a third-person, multiple-POV opening — each running close to 40 pages — and now I want to try a first-person, past-tense voice.

I grew up reading Robert B. Parker, Ross Macdonald, John D. MacDonald, Sue Grafton, Sara Paretsky, and others writing in that vein. As a reader, I enjoy the walk-behind-the-character-and-view-the-world-through-the-speaker's-eyes vantagepoint. It offers an intimate relationship with the speaker and just maybe with the writer. I'm reading Philip Roth's Exit Ghost right now and pause every few pages to reread a passage. The plot isn't pulling me along; however, the narrator's voice and Roth's turn-of-phrase is providing any and all narrative tension.

Also, it's difficult to separate plot from character when we're dealing with first-person protagonists. The plot is limited by the knowledge and capabilities of your speaker, and when you feature the first-person voice, you must allow readers an in-depth knowledge of your character's limitations; you must play fair with readers, far more so than when writing in the third-person voice.

You've got to show your hand often. I enjoy this type of writing — exploring the depths (and shallows) of my characters. I like that it's akin to acting — stepping into voice and playing the part for a few hours a day. Third-person doesn't provide me the same type of experience.

So I have two partials sitting on my desk and will write the same book from a third vantage point now, the first-person past-tense. It's all a unique and fresh writing experience.

Libraries And Events

I’ve loved libraries ever since I was a little kid. I couldn’t wait for my parents to drive me there so I could look through the stacks of books and pick out the next ones to read. That’s one thing I missed when we lived on a farm in Oregon for a year. That was most of 2nd and part of 3rd grade. There were no public libraries in a reasonable distance and it didn’t take me long to get through all the books in the small “library” of the two-room schoolhouse I attended.

I still love libraries. So it's quite a kick for me to do an event at one. I recently visited the Wiseburn Library in Hawthorne, CA where fellow SinC/LA member Sarah M. Chen and I had a great time discussing the differences between writing light and dark mysteries with a great group of attendees who asked all kinds of interesting questions. You may remember I wrote a post on briefly visiting the “dark side” awhile back in preparation for this event.

Here I am at my table before the event.

Me and Sarah M. Chen

Here we are discussing light and dark mysteries

The more I learn about the modern library, the more I realize they’re great places to connect with readers. The Orange County Library system here in Southern California not only features branch events but also puts together a literary event every year called Literary Orange. This day long celebration usually features 2 keynote speakers and around 15 author panels with 35-40 authors. And every June the city of El Segundo holds an author fair at the city’s library featuring Southern California authors. I’m sure there’s a lot more going on around here and probably a lot in your area too.

So, Type M readers, do you have favorite events that your local library puts on?

The value of learning as much as you can about your occupation (in this case, writing)

by Rick Blechta

Like all published authors, I have been buttonholed many times at parties, meetings, book signings and even once at a funeral (!) by people who’ve written a novel (or a book of some sort) and want to know what to do next. The inevitable question is: How do I find a publisher? Sometimes they ask if I have an agent, and if so, would I help them get their manuscript in to him?

Now, I don’t mind helping people, but after the fiftieth such request, it gets a little old.

First of all, I’m not going to contact my publisher or agent and recommend your work unless I’ve read it and found it good enough. By recommending someone, I’m putting my reputation on the line, too. Second, doing that takes a lot of time and I have little enough of that to spare. Look, I just met you and now you want me to grant you a very large favour just because you asked and are a nice person?

But besides the effrontery of such a request, there is something else that bothers me even more. These people want to become a published author but they don’t know anything about the business and haven’t bothered to educate themselves? If I were blunt enough to say that, my guess is they would get quite angry — but that doesn’t make it any less true.

I’ve been around for quite awhile now, and I’ve worked hard to learn a lot of things about the book publishing game, and it’s a good assumption by the neophyte that I could supply them with a lot of useful information. But what they don’t realize is that their request that I help them shows me that they aren’t really prepared to be an author. What I’m going to tell them from what I’ve worked hard to find out is also easily found on many websites, blogs and in numerous books.

The really shocking thing, though, is that these people are also telling me that they’re going into a very complicated business with zero knowledge of what’s involved, and what’s expected of them (a lot) besides good writing. It’s much akin to someone who’s received a compass as a present. That person then decides they’re going to become a great explorer and immediately leaves for the Amazon jungle, packing only their new compass (with little idea how to use it). How successful do you think they’re going to be?

Becoming a published author and then attaining enough success to keep going is a very tough accomplishment. The first order of things on the path to authorial success is to learn as much as you can about the job description. That requires hours of research and reading. Even if I were to pass you on to my agent, you need to know how things work and what the expectations are. Until you know that, you’re just a babe in the jungle.

Don’t get me wrong. Someone who has produced a novel — no matter how good or bad it is — has achieved a major accomplishment. When I tell them that they’re barely halfway there, I am greeted by blank expressions or downright unhappiness. (“What? I’m not even close to my goal?”) It’s sad to disillusion nice people, but I would be doing them no favours by telling them what they want to hear. A writer who doesn’t know the ropes is a writer who is going to risk falling on their face at best, and at worst, they’re going to be taken advantage of — sometimes in a huge way. I know of more than one author who signed away the rights to their series character in order to get their book published. How stupid is that? The publisher said, “No deal unless we get this.” Any sane person would have walked.

Most authors, me included, are more than willing to point the budding author in the right direction (First on my list is How to Get Happily Published* by Judith Applebaum), but please don’t expect us to grab your hand and take you where you want to go — especially if you’re just meeting us for the first time!

*And I purposely didn’t give a link for finding this book online.

Growing as a Writer

I've been thinking about the question my colleagues have been discussing about what is required to become a competent writer -- innate talent, hard work, acquiring craft-related skills? As I was thinking about that I read Donis's post yesterday about the challenges of a long-running series.

My Lizzie Stuart series is only up to the fifth book. In fact, after the fifth book was published back in 2011, I wrote two Hannah McCabe books. In July 2014, a Lizzie Stuart short story (inspired by some research I was doing) was published in Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine. But the short story did not move the characters forward. They have been in limbo for five years.

And now it's a few months later in series times, and I'm at work on Lizzie Stuart mystery Number 6. I'm writing this book because I have a story that I really want to tell. I'm also writing it because I hear from readers who they love the series and when am I going to do another book? Was that the last? What writer can resist when readers care about her or his characters and are waiting to find out what's happening in their lives?

Donis raised the issue of the character-arc. If the characters' lives are changing over the course of the series, how does one make each book in a series a stand-alone? I have always struggled with that. I can truthfully tell a potential reader that she can pick up any book in my Lizzie Stuart series and read a murder mystery that is complete in itself. No, one need not read the first Hannah McCabe novel before reading the second. But if a reader says that she likes to read a series in order because of the evolving relationships, I don't try to talk her out of that approach. As a reader, I have often picked up a book mid-series and then gone back to "catch-up" before moving on. I like relationships and back stories. That's one of the reasons I read any book, including a mystery.

But even though I struggle with the character arc dilemma, I have gotten better at dealing with it. I can now slip in back story here and there, without having Lizzie stop to say, "Two years ago when I was in Cornwall, I was involved in a murder case and that's when . . ." I'm a bit more subtle these days.

That brings me to the discussion we've been having about innate talent vs. hard work to acquire craft. I know I started out with imagination. From the time I was a small child, I told myself bedtime stories with recurring characters. When I was older, I started to write those stories down. But the process of becoming a functioning writer required that I discipline my imagination and hone any innate talent I may have possessed.

Aside from the basics of grammar and story structure, I had to learn the discipline of getting out of my comfortable chair (where I was thinking about my book) and going to my desk to get it down on paper. I had to learn the discipline of revising and revising and revising. I had to learn the discipline -- and develop a thick enough skin -- to sit quietly and listen and then ask lots of questions when someone I had asked to critique what I had written gave me an honest opinion. I had to learn the discipline not to rush the story, to let it evolve, and take wrong turns, to wait for all the pieces to fall into place.

I think that may be the difference between talented amateurs and professional writers. Having talent and imagination means nothing until one learns discipline. It's hard and frustrating, especially when working hard doesn't mean that one rises to the top of the New York Times bestseller list. But, on the other hand, discipline is good for the soul. And writing may be the one area in my life where I manage to consistently do what I should do.