Dog Days

Even without Covid, there has always been something about early August. My mother called this time of year Dog Days. Eastern Kansas, where I grew up, was impossibly hot during Dog Days.

Before air conditioning, life stopped. Not dead still.--there were still chores and rituals. Chickens to water, cows to milk, and that ever-blooming garden! Air didn't move during sleepless summer nights. Only fans provided some relief.

An overwhelming lethargy hung over life. My sister and I weren't allowed to go swimming. Not just due to the heat, but as nearly as I can recall, Mom believed there was an increased chance of contracting polio during Dog Days.

According to the Old Farmer's Almanac, "in ancient Greece and Rome, the Dog Days were believed to be a time of drought, bad luck, and unrest, when dogs and men alike would be driven mad by the extreme heat."

Other sites mention a time of increased infections, strokes, and sudden thunderstorms.

The Almanac again: "This period of sweltering weather coincides with the year’s heliacal (meaning “at sunrise”) rising of Sirius, the Dog Star. Sirius is part of the constellation Canis Majoris—the “Greater Dog”—which is where Sirius gets its canine nickname, as well as its official name, Alpha Canis Majoris. Not including our own Sun, Sirius is the brightest star in the sky."

There was light at the end of the tunnel. My sister and I knew that if we made it through Dog Days, it would cool off. And there was the ultimate prize at the end; we got to start school. Schools had a distinctive odor. Floors were re-waxed during the summer and chalk dust was as alluring as perfume. There were brand new pencils and Big Chief tablets and erasers and our very own desks in which to store everything.

I was in Walmarts a couple of days ago and teared up over the aisles of school supplies. Who would buy them now? What would they do with the excess merchandise? I was suddenly overwhelmed with the awareness of all the bewildered, disappointed children who no longer will have a positive end to Dog Days. What about all the families with 3, 4, or more kids faced with on-line learning? Do they have to buy extra computers?

I have been patiently waiting out Covid and all it's implications. Then it dawned on me this week that this plague might be around forever. Like the flu. Like the common cold. Vaccinations didn't make the flu go away.

Soon people will start coming up with better ways to jump start our lives. Educators are really smart. They will figure out some way to preserve our educational system.

Our lives will change again. But's important to remember that when Pandora opened the box that let out all miseries of the world, hope remained inside.

Soon it will be freed too.

Summer Reading List

It’s been quite a week! I made the 11-hour drive (each way) from western Massachusetts to Ohio to drop Audrey off at Denison University, where the cross country team is having preseason for a non-existent season. (They are a dedicated tribe, those distance runners.)

And, like I assume Frankie is and other are, I'm gearing up to teach in my virtual classroom starting next week. But I’ve managed to do some reading of late as well -- always a good thing for a writer!

My reading list this summer has been diverse and influences me on many levels.

The Mistress’s Daughter: A Memoir, by A.M. Homes

Dark Rooms, by Lili Anolik

On the Come Up, by Angie Thomas

This Tender Land, by William Kent Krueger

White Fragility, by Robin DiAngelo

The Thief, by Fuminori Nakamura

The Things They Carried, by Tim O’Brien

Three of these books I consider mysteries: This Tender Land, The Thief, and Dark Rooms. A.M. Homes' memoir was a book I wanted to read because she's a friend. DiAngelo's book I read because I should. The crime books I read because that's just what I do and have done since I was a kid.

I’m not going to rate them. That’s not what this platform is for. But I enjoyed them all and am pleased with how much I was able to read this summer. Admittedly, about half of these were consumed via audio (and listened to twice).

If anyone has read any of these, I’d love to hear what you think of them.

Going Down The Punctuation Rabbit Hole

 

Exclamation marks, periods, semicolons, etc. We use them every day and don’t think anything about it. They’ve always been there for us. We think of them as being necessary for the written word. But they didn’t always exist. Even spaces between words or divisions into paragraphs wasn’t there when written language came about.

I’ve seen this myself from the years I’ve spent studying Ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs and Coptic. Nary a space in sight. It’s amazing how fast you can get used to figuring out where words and sentences begin and end. Or, in the case of AE, what direction the text is written in. 

But I didn’t really know anything about when punctuation marks came into being. I still know only a little, but I’m finding it a fascinating topic.

This whole foray into the history of punctuation started when I read a post by author Kathleen Valenti on Chicks on the Case about exclamation points. I, myself, am a heavy user of exclamation points in emails and letters. I’ve learned to rarely, if ever, use them in stories I write.

Her post got me thinking about the several semesters I took of Swedish (don’t ask me to translate anything, ‘cause I’ve pretty much forgotten it all). I had this vague memory that the use of ! in Swedish differs from how we use it in English. So I did a little googling and found an article on the top 5 mistakes Swedes make when writing English. Number 1(!) was in the use of the exclamation mark. In Swedish it’s used to indicate a positive friendly tone while in English we tend to think of someone shouting or being overly excited about something.

This got me thinking about how punctuation marks came about in general. So I did more googling and came across an article by Keith Houston on “The Mysterious Origins of Punctuation.”

That led me to his book, Shady Characters: The Secret Life of Punctuation, Symbols and Other Typographical Marks where I’ve learned a bit about the pilcrow (paragraph mark), the interrobang (combination of question mark and exclamation mark) and other symbols like the at sign and hyphen. I’m still in the process of reading the book, but it’s great so far.

I also found the book Making a Point: The Persnickety Story of English Punctuation by David Crystal. This one gives a history of punctuation in English as well as advice on how to use it.

From what I’ve read so far, written texts were seen as an aid to reading aloud. Reading silently was a tad suspicious. So letters were all caps, squished together with no punctuation. Aristophanes in 200 B.C.ish came up with the first forms of punctuation to help with reading aloud. That didn’t stick. But punctuation started gradually being added until, in the 7th century A.D., spaces in English became common practice and reading silently was no longer suspect. Basically, our current punctuation has its roots in the middle ages and was pretty much set when the printing press was invented.

There’s so much more to learn and it’s much more complicated than I’m making out. You’ll just have to pick up one of those books and see for yourself.

The interrobang is an interesting little twist. It’s a cross between an exclamation mark and a question mark and was invented in the 1960s. You can put it in your Word documents by using the Wingdings 2 font. You can read a short history of it here.

Yes, you’re right, I’ve seriously gone down the rabbit hole on punctuation and I’m enjoying every single minute of it.

Something for more for writers to think about

by Rick Blechta

As if the writer’s life isn’t already such a struggle given the state of the publishing industry let alone the state of the world, I ran across an article last week that every novelist should read: Alan Dershowitz claims a fictional lawyer defamed him. The implications for novelists are very real. Please click HERE to read the article I saw in the Washington Post.

Okay, after reading the article you might be saying, “This isn’t something I would write about. I don’t put real people in my novels.”

True, but I know several novelists who inject the occasional real person (usually a public figure) into their plot. This person may not actually appear on the page, but the author might comment on this real person in a negative way — maybe they have an ax to grind — and the next thing they know, a very unwelcome lawsuit arrives on their doorstep. Whether the suit is successful or not, you know it’s going to cost you a lot of money in lawyer fees to defend yourself.

Here’s an example. When W.P. Kinsella wrote Shoeless Joe, he included a large number of real people in his plot, starting with “Shoeless” Joe Jackson. Another real person used was J.D. Salinger — or should I say the famously litigious J.D. Salinger who was not happy that he’d been co-opted into Kinsella’s novel and “intimated he would sue should the character ‘J.D. Salinger’ appear in any other medium, should Shoeless Joe be adapted.” (Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shoeless_Joe_(novel))

In short while Kinsella avoided a lawsuit in the case of his novel, when the book was adapted for the big screen, the producers, leery of being sued, changed the name of the character to Terence Mann, casting James Earl Jones in the part.

Is it worth it to use real people in one’s plots? I’m thinking that in these litigious times it’s not. Or should I say that a writer has to seriously contemplate if there is not another way to accomplish the same thing? In the suit brought by Alan Dershowitz, he doesn’t appear in the TV show, but the fictional lawyer certainly makes some inflammatory remarks about the real lawyer.

How will this all play out in the courtroom is anyone’s guess, but I for one will be following this story.

I’ve never used real people in my stories, but I have been tempted to have characters make possibly inflammatory observations about real people I don’t like. I know other authors who have done that. No lawsuits on those yet, but who knows? I don’t think it’s worth the indulgence. I make little enough money writing as it is. No sense having to hand it (and more) over to a lawyer.

_____________________

There’s even more litigation involving Field of Dreams, if you care to read about it (it is interesting): https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2014/04/field-of-schemes/358624/

A Healthy Respect for Teachers

As some of you know, I’ve been teaching a Creative Writing Class at our community college for the last six weeks.  Tonight will be our last class.  As a writing prompt, I’ve asked them to write the first few pages of their book as well as the last few pages.  No, I wasn't specific as to what that book might be.

I look forward to hearing what they’ve written.

Teaching this class in-person has given me a new perspective on what heroes our schoolteachers, school administrators, bus drivers, and janitorial staff really are.  I teach seven adults, neatly spaced apart in a fairly large classroom, where masks are required.  It’s a pretty safe environment.

There are going to be times and circumstances where in kindergarten up to college classrooms where that will not possible.  I’m hoping that all the students and teachers stay safe and healthy.

In my classroom we discussed heroes and how they might be written.  how they need to be relatable but flawed in some way. And heroes are always up to the task at hand, no matter the consequences or the danger.

We have them in real life. We always have, but it’s much more obvious now. The doctors, nurses, and health care workers risking their own lives to treat those sick with Covid-19.

As always, our heroes are also the law officers, firemen and EMTs that continue to work even though they’re putting themselves in danger of contracting the disease. And many of them have.

Less obvious are the people who are working in our grocery stores, pharmacies, gas stations, and (thank heavens) the liquor stores. We also need to thank the truck drivers, the mail carriers, and sanitation workers.

Our teachers are also heroes.  They always have been, but now more than ever they’re putting themselves on the front lines.

One of the many reasons we enjoy reading mysteries, especially in uncertain times, is that we’re pretty certain that by the last page, justice will be served and the heroes will be victorious.

But this isn’t fiction.

It’s real life. And it's scary as hell. So, when you interact with our real-life heroes, thank them and tell them how much they are appreciated.

Real life heroes, good on you! Thank you, thank you, thank you!

Inhabiting Characters' Minds

I realized something a couple of nights ago when I was reading before lights out. By the time I get to bed these days, I really need to escape from all of the depressing and scary thoughts that would otherwise follow me into sleep. I've found that any book works, as long as it holds my attention for that half hour.

For the past week, I've been reading Naomi Hirahara's Mas Arai novel, Hiroshima Boy. If you haven't encountered him, Mas is in his 80's, a member of the Japanese American community in Los Angeles, and a retired gardener. In this book, he travels back to Hiroshima to bring half of  his dead friend's ashes to the man's sister. On the ferry to Ino, where the woman lives in an assisted living facility, he notices a teenage boy in a red San Francisco T-shirt. Later, he finds the boy's body. Then the ashes he has brought with him disappear, apparently taken by the woman who wandered into his room.

What I realized about this book is that my brain shifts gears when I'm reading it. I am seeing the world through Mas's eyes. I am inhabiting his mind, and the way he thinks is almost like meditation. I'm not good at meditation. It makes me impatient. I want to get it over with and check it off my list and move on. I almost put this book back on my TBR pile. But then I clicked on a news website (in my endless surfing from one website to another looking for good news). There was an article about the 75th anniversary of the US bombing of Hiroshima. Obviously, this was the right time to read this book. So I went back to it -- back into Mas's head. I'm slowing down and letting him take me along at his pace. Having surrendered, I really love this character. Bonus: the plot is intriguing and I'm getting a history lesson from the perspective of a survivor. 

Oddly enough, this has reminded me of Goodfellas. I have watched this movie multiple times. Several times recently because it's among the films I'm discussing in a book about gangster movies. If you haven't seen the movie, it's based on the life of real-life mobster, Henry Hill, who became a government informer. I thought of this movie while reading Hiroshima Boy because watching Goodfellas requires being in Henry Hill's head. Hill is played by Ray Liotta, who provides the exuberant voiceover. We follow Henry from boyhood, when he becomes fascinated with the mobsters who hang out across the street, through his life as an adult criminal, and then his downfall when he is forced to go into the federal witness protection program. What stands out about Henry is his enjoyment of what he does. He "normalizes" the world in which he lives. But the sudden, explosive acts of violence that he and his colleagues engage in are an aspect of this world. These men are criminals and killers. And in the scene that leads up to his arrest, being in Henry Hill's head is like being deranged. He (Liotta) tells us about his crazy day, as he is preparing an elaborate meal, picking up his brother, getting the woman who is transporting his drugs ready for her trip, and worrying about the plane overhead that seems to have him under surveillance. He is high on his own drugs and so tightly wound that a doctor insists on examining him. Being in Henry's head toward the end of the movie is knowing you're in a bad place and -- if you didn't know how his story ends -- you would wonder if he (you) are going to make it out alive.

As a reader/viewer I appreciate the depth of these characters. As a writer, I'm analyzing how I'm brought  so fully into their worlds. I'm also thinking about why I find it impossible to do more than skim American Psycho, and why I still haven't been able to make it through the much less graphic movie. I suspect it's because there is nothing about the protagonist that I can comprehend. There is too much darkness there.

At any rate, it's something to consider as I work on my historical thriller. Do I want to have readers enter my villain's head and understand how he sees the world? Do I want to give him that opportunity to reveal himself? The thing is it could completely change my book. For the reader to go there, I have to go there first. The last time I did that with a character in another book I was working on, I saw the world through his eyes and realized he was not capable of what I wanted him to do. If that happened with my thriller, it would completely screw up my book.

Thinking. . .

Depressed

I (Donis) am feeling low today.* I'm tired and headachy and just plain tired. I've been fighting with depression a bit over the past couple of weeks, like so many people. I'm bothered by the news. I'm bothered by the fact that it's been over 110ºF for three weeks and not only can I not go out to eat because of the pandemic, I can't even sit outside on my porch. I want to work on my new book but I'm uninspired.

I typed a lot of words on my work-in-progress today, most of which I’ll either have to take out later or totally rework. But I did it, by damn, and I’m hoping I dug out a lot of slag that has a piece or two of gold in it that I can use later.

When I’m on a roll, I can produce several usable pages in a day, but today there were only one or two paragraphs that I feel confident about.

Some days I can slog along quite handily, but there are days like today when everything I write feels like pure schlock. When that happens, it causes me great agony and despair that I can’t whip up the will to do what needs to be done. I have a bad attitude.

On such days I sit at my desk for an hour staring at a pad of paper, or at the computer with my fingers poised over the keyboard, and … nothing. It’s not even that I can’t think of anything to write. I am always writing in my head, and have done for as far back as I can remember.

All I wanted to do today is clean something, or garden or dust or cook. Brawny tasks which take only muscle and no brilliant turns of phrase. But I have to persevere. So much of writing is just grunt work. Sit and type it out, choose the best way to say this or that, watch the repetition, find the right word, the right sentence.

Even when the world is not as messed up as it is these days, I never know why one day is better than another when it comes to writing. Why are some days so unsatisfactory? 

I can always blame a bad writing day on my sensitive nature. Earlier this evening I spent half an hour reading the news online and now I want to lie upon the couch and press the back of my hand to my forehead until my soul is soothed. People are capable of such awful things, and there is no sense to be made of it. Just the titles of the articles gave me the vapors.

Yes, that must be why I had such am unsuccessful day — the news, or the weather, or the stars. It certainly can't be my fault, because I did everything required of me, and yet I couldn't produce anything brilliant, or excellent, or particularly adequate.

But I can see that there is something good going on here. There's a story here that I want to tell, so what else is to be done but try and tell it? Tomorrow morning I’ll get up, invoke the gods and pray for intervention, sit myself down at the computer, and try, try again.

______

*On top of everything, I feel guilty for feeling low. So many people have it so much worse than I do.

Letting it rest

Barbara here. For the last two weeks I have been on a family holiday at my cottage and have not done a lick of work on my WIP. But I have found the perfect excuse; I am letting it rest.

Two weeks ago, I proudly wrote THE END on the last page of the first draft of my new Inspector Green novel, titled THE DEVIL TO PAY, and printed all 352 pages off in order to start the first rewrites. This first rewrite is "big picture" stuff. Since I invent the story as I go along, the plot takes many unexpected turns, and the characters change, grow, or disappear, leaving loose ends, plot holes, ghosts, and non-sequiturs - in short, a ragged mess. By the end of the first draft, it's a story but a very rough one. While I'm writing the first draft, I keep a separate file of notes about things to change, add, delete, or enhance, and I use this to help me focus my edits. I also spend time simply daydreaming about the story to tease out the plot tangles, develop crucial subplots, and deepen characters and relationships. This often random mental meandering frees my imagination to take wild flights that hopefully will enrich the story.

One time-honoured way to free the imagination is to get some distance from the story so that you can see it through somewhat "fresh eyes". By the time I get to THE END of the first draft, I've lived with the story and its characters for over half a year. They are very familiar to me, which makes it difficult to think about them in new ways or to see the flaws and contradictions right in front of me. Working with a deadline, it's difficult to get enough time away from the manuscript to really see it through fresh eyes, but even a few weeks away from it and trying not to even think about it can help. Hence my holiday in the cottage sun. 

I'm letting it rest. And as this photo shows, the cottage is the perfect place to do that. At least that's my story.

Star turns

by Rick Blechta

I couldn’t sleep the other night so I took my laptop to the living room and watched “an old friend” on YouTube. I’ve written previously about my enjoyment of Rex Stout’s Nero Wolfe. The old friend was an episode of the fantastic TV series from the early 2000s starring Timothy Hutton and Maury Chaykin.

The interesting thing about this production was it used an ensemble cast. Generally, the same actors would appear in every episode as different characters. Some shows even had actors doubling up on roles. It was an interesting way to work and something quite out of the ordinary for a TV show. But best of all, the troupe of actors were really excellent. It was a fun show to watch. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Nero_Wolfe_Mystery)

The episode I watched the other night was “Death of a Doxy”. Appearing early in it was Kari Matchett as Archie Goodwin’s girlfriend, Lily Rowan. However, later on she appears as a showgirl, Julie Jaquette, and it’s this role that I’d like to discuss. Best of all, it’s one of Stout’s best Nero Wolfe stories.

Whenever she’s on screen, Ms Matchett just kills it. Her performance is note perfect and breathtaking. In short, she eclipses everyone and it’s just magical how she brings this quirky character to technicolor life. If you wish to see it, visit YouTube and search for “Death of a Doxy + Kari Matchett”. The complete episode is three down.

If you enjoy good theatre, you will enjoy this production!

Actors have the opportunity to make more of their part than was intentioned by the playwright and craft a performance that is more memorable than what is written. They don’t have to be in a leading role.

And that got me thinking: Could writers do more with minor characters than we generally do? Some writers do this well — I’m thinking Elmore Leonard here — other not so much.

It would be wrong to make every character so quirky and interesting that it overwhelms the story’s arc and slows the plot down to a plod, but might we, well breathe a little more life into minor characters in some cases?

I’ve got to put a lot more thought into this. I may be missing some good opportunities in my WIP.

Breaking Out

We are just about to set off on a research trip. It will be the most adventurous thing we've done since lockdown, apart from having applied a very slightly generous interpretation to the 'three households' allowance and having a forbidden hug or two last weekend.  But you can't take a risk, of the sort you take every time you set out on the motorway,  to celebrate fifty happy years, when can you take it?  And so far at least, we've all survived.

But now we're going to be brave, break out and go to a hotel for a couple of nights.  Neither of us has health issues apart from our age and since the place we're going to has had no new cases for some considerable time we decided it was safe enough to go ahead.  That was admittedly before Covid 19 like a hydra reared its head all over again in Europe and despite the best efforts of government it is affecting us here too.

But my new book - Old Sins, provisionally - is set in the beautiful northwest Highlands of Scotland, and though I know and love it well from many holidays, there is no substitute for checking it out on the ground once you've decided more or less where the action will take place. Memories are famously untrustworthy and from previous research experience there will be something that crops up like a gift to give me a slant I hadn't thought of before - like the lighthouse that simply begged to have a body washed up at its foot. 

My long-suffering husband is my chauffeur and uncomplainingly drives for miles and miles while I look for ... well, whatever it is I need to see.  I can't give him precise directions because I'm looking for a feeling, an atmosphere, that I just can't find on Google Earth, however closely they focus in: the smell of sea air, the colour of the sunset over the mountains, the sound of the waves, the touch of the rain which, since it is the West Highlands, will almost inevitably be falling. (Forecast for Monday/Tuesday/Wednesday next week: rain. Though since it's so unreliable, who knows?)

His reward is a break (tax-deductible, of course) in a hotel with a fine line in seafood  fresh from the water and, of course, the sheer joy of being amid the moors and those extraordinary mountains, dramatic volcanic plugs that rear up from sea-level in a flat, almost lunar landscape.  And even if there's rain about, the natives will tell you, 'If you don't like the weather, wait a minute.'

And I must admit that I'm haunted by the fear that the liberty we have at the moment to do something like this may at any time be taken away and at least we'll have it to look back on when the doors are locked again.

Sweating Reviews

No, I'm not worrying about the reviews my books receive, although I should. I worry about the reviews I give other writer's books. 

Right now I'm reviewing a very difficult academic book, When Sunflowers Bloomed Red: Kansas and the Rise of Socialism in America. The book is not difficult because the writing is poor. But it's hard to capsulize because each chapter is self-contained. It's an excellent, very distinctive book, based on unique research that delves into a little known subject. Heroic research, in fact. 

I can happily recommend this stellar contribution to Kansas history. 

Oh to be able to give good reviews to all of the books I read. Nevertheless, I have a formula. I do not lie, but I do not give negative reviews. It takes a lot of work to write a book. Even a very bad book. It's much easier to find what's wrong with a book than what's right. 

So here's what I do:

1. If  a book is well-written--my review will mention traits that make it special. Perhaps that is characterization, or an intriguing plot. Sometimes I will love a well-developed theme or an author's unique voice. My enthusiasm will show. 

2. If the book is mediocre, I will find some one thing that an author does well. After all, someone did select it for publication. I try to avoid reviewing genres that I normally don't read. Because I don't know what I doing. 

3. If a book is rather poor, I summarize the plot without commenting on the book's merits and suggest an audience for the writing. 

4. If a book is terrible and I think the writer should quit. Period. Never write anything again, I refuse to review the book. I ask the editor to find someone else.

Although I don't lie in a review, I certainly am capable of misrepresenting my reasons for refusal to said editor. I have used such ploys as "I don't have the time." "Something has come up." I hedge. 

But most of the time I simply tell the truth, which is "I don't believe I am the right person to review this book. It's too far removed from my personal tastes for me to be objective."

The truth is I have no idea why someone loves a particular genre and another hates it. For that matter, no one really knows why a book clicks with the reading public. 

The best writing advice I ever received was "write what you really want to write. There's so little money in the business that it's stupid to do it for any other reason."

Appropriation or Appreciation?

This week, I was told by an industry insider that a novel I recently finished was problematic because the multiple points of view I use to tell the story include a Korean female.

I use, I think, seven characters’ third-person limited POVs, including an African American teenage boy, a white teenage girl, a white woman in her 40s, a black man in his 20s, a white male in his 40s, another white male in his 50s (the co-protagonist), and the character in question, his Korean wife (the other co-protagonist).

I had a really great exchange with this insider, who is knowledgeable and thoughtful. It was eye-opening for a guy who just four years ago published the third Peyton Cote novel, a series told through Peyton’s eyes.

I’m a 50-year-old, white, male, who grew up upper-middle-class. Privileged beyond belief, admittedly. Only three years ago, an agent told me I needed a strong female character. I thought it would be a fun challenge: Could I write from a female POV convincingly? an opportunity, which, in itself, illustrates my privilege.

I’m 100% behind social-justice causes, including #OwnvoicesBooks. I’m also certain it’s easier for me to write a character who thinks, acts, speaks –– and is very much like –– me. I attempted to show the trials and tribulations I assume a female Asian woman might face in a male-dominated profession. And I see the problematic portion of the previous sentence –– “I assume” –– because, as a white male, I have the option of walking a mile in another’s shoes, when others do not. The problem for me is that I see no other way to write the book. The plot can’t be told from one POV (or I’m not smart enough to figure out how to do it). Five people who always read my work as I write indicated they knew the male lead (the American), at least in part, by his interactions with his Korean wife. It was a part of the book they all enjoyed.

I toss this conversation forward because it’s an important one, and I look forward to hearing from others.

Coincidently, I just read Angie Thomas’s fantastic On the Come Up and Robin DiAngelo’s White Fragility. I recommend them both highly.

My Christmas In July

All this month I’ve been celebrating Christmas in July by watching Christmas movies (some Hallmark, some not), reading Christmas books (mostly cozies, but some others as well) and painting Christmas ornaments.

The month started off with my helping Christina Freeburn celebrate the release of her latest book, Dash Away All, on Facebook. It was a fun 2-hour event. We did posts every 10 minutes, alternating them between the two of us. I think that worked out quite well. Her book takes place in July on the set of a Christmas movie. A fun read. Her main character has been hired as the onset crafter for the movie. Things did not turn out as she planned!

Here are a couple of the ornaments I painted this month. I’m working on some others as well. These two I gave away at the Facebook event I mentioned above along with a copy of my own Christmas book, Ghosts of Painting Past.

Other good Christmas books I read are Death of a Neighborhood Scrooge by Laura Levine and Premeditated Peppermint by Amanda Flower, both cozy mysteries.

The other book of note that I’m currently still reading is “The History of a Nutcracker” by Alexandre Dumas. I picked this little gem up at a Barnes & Noble a couple years ago. I’ve never seen the Nutcracker ballet, but I’ve listened to the music and sort of, kind of know the basic story. What I didn’t realize is that it has its origins in a story by Ernst Theodor Amadeus Hoffman, first published in 1816, called “The Nutcracker and the Mouse King”. Fast forward to 1845 when Alexandre Dumas adapted a version of the story in “The History of a Nutcracker”.

In terms of short stories, I’ve been enjoying Steve Hockensmith’s “Naughty: Nine Tales of Christmas Crime”. These all appeared originally in EQMM or AHMM. You can hear him read some of the stories on the EQMM podcast. There’s a list of all of the ones that have been on the podcast at https://www.stevehockensmith.com/steves-stories

I haven’t only been reading or viewing Christmas stuff this month, but my occasional dipping into it has kept me sane.

We Are What We Read

I’m nearly at the end of teaching my Creative Writing class and it’s been as much of a learning experience for me as it has for them.   We started out as eight strangers and by the end, we know a lot about each other.

In each class, I assign a writing prompt such as create a character and put that character in an action scene. This week’s writing prompt is to write a scene of romance primarily using dialogue. Next week’s assignment, and our final one, will be to write the first few pages of your book and the last few pages of your book.

All of the members of this class are good writers.  Some are outstanding.

One of the classmates uses the writing prompts to add to his folksy short story about a boy losing his bike.  One of the writers is extraordinary at humor.  One has a remarkable ability to describe scenes.  One is a thriller addict and it comes out in his writing.

Three of the students are millennials and I hesitate to pigeonhole any demographic, but I’ve noticed that when they read their work aloud, they do it from their phones using Google-Docs. And all three of them write about medieval fantasy worlds of assassins, magic, and fierce warriors.

When asked about the subject matter, I discovered that Dungeons & Dragons has made an impressive comeback.  I’d thought that the game had died out in the eighties.  I was wrong.

I was impressed when one of the other students asked them if they’d read The Lord of the Rings or The Hobbit and they replied that they had.

It wasn’t the first time I’d gotten an inkling that younger folks interested in writing enjoyed that genre.  I spoke to a middle school class about writing and asked them what kind of interests they had.  It was the medieval fantasy genre but also, and not surprising, science fiction and superheroes.

I thought back to what genres interested me when I was much younger.  Back in the seventies, pulp science fiction and horror magazines filled with strange and wonderful short stories held my fascination.  I began writing my own and submitting them.

Not one of them sold.

However, I did get a really positive personal letter from Ben Bova, the publisher of Omni.

I kept writing short stories and finally got one published in a glossy men’s magazine called Cavalier. A tawdry publication, but the one that first published Stephen King’s short stories.

Mine was called Fast Dancing Detroit Style and it was about a killer who picks up a hitchhiker in the Nevada desert who turns out to be a ghost.

It wasn’t much later that I picked up my first Travis McGee mystery.  I was hooked.  I discovered that I love mysteries.  But that's not what I started writing, not yet.

As a fledgling writer I took a few detours, trying my hand at a historical novel (awful), a horror novel (even worse), and a flat out thriller (my own wife wouldn’t read it).

No, I was exclusively reading mysteries:  Sue Grafton, Raymond Chandler, Walter Mosely, Ed McBain, Lawrence Block, and Mickey Spillane, as well as many, many others.  Mysteries are my niche.  I enjoy reading them and I enjoy writing them.

The point of this rambling blog?  We are what we read.  Or perhaps what movies we watch and games we play.

Stay safe.  Stay healthy.

www.thomaskiesauthor.com

Not Being There

As Barbara noted in her post on Wednesday, one of the challenges of writing during a pandemic is not being able to do field research. Even thought my books are set in the past or in a near-future alternate universe, I do rely on going to real places and walking through them. Last fall, I had planned to go down to Flushing Meadows in Queens, NY to tour the site of the 1939 World's Fair. Not much is left from that famous "World of Tomorrow." The 1964 World's Fair was held on the same site. But I wanted to walk the lanes and streets of the park and see the two structures that remain. I also wanted to go to the Queens Museum.

But last fall, I was busy and I couldn't decide whether to drive or to take the train down to New York City and go from there. I reserved my tour ticket after hearing a delightful podcast, and then I dithered about logistics. I decided with all of the videos available on YouTube and elsewhere on the Internet, with all the photos and descriptions I had found, there was no urgency about actually going to Flushing Meadows. I could wait until spring. Then came COVID-19. And by spring break, it was obvious it would be awhile before I could go anywhere.Hardly tragic in the larger scheme of things. But I keep thinking about the mist on a street in Chicago.

It was years ago, and I went to Chicago for a week because the first quarter of You Should Have Died on Monday (soon to be reissued) was set there. I wanted to walk through what Lizzie Stuart, my crime historian, would do if she were in Chicago looking for information about the time her mother had spent there in 1968. I had been to Chicago several times before, but this time I needed to pay attention to details. A fellow author and lawyer who lived there had offered to take me out to Cook County Jail and give me a tour of some other places that might work for my locations.

That first day, I arrived at my hotel, and then decided to go for a walk. I was walking along, when suddenly there was a refreshing mist in the air. I looked around, puzzled for a moment, until  I realized the buildings were blocking the view of the river.

On the next corner, a woman asked me to buy a small press newspaper. I bought one and dropped it in my tote bag. Then I came to the kiosk offering tickets for a river tour. Of course, Lizzie would take a river tour. She had nothing to do until she met with the private detective who was looking for her mother the next day. I bought a ticket and decided to walk some more while I was waiting for the next boat. On the next block, across the street, I saw a sports uniform display -- the store Lizzie where Lizzie would buy something for John Quinn, her baseball-loving almost fiance. I went in, bought a White Sox baseball cap because that's what Lizzie, the historian, would buy. Then I walked on until I came to the little burger place where Lizzie would have a late lunch and I noted the architecture and the open door in back. Then I walked back to the harbor for the boat tour -- where Lizzie would notice the passengers and I make notes about what the tour guide was saying about the buildings and the huge Ferris wheel.

Now, here's the thing. I was looking back to see if I had a photo of the Ferris wheel that I could post here because on that tour I had a chance to see exactly how it gleamed in the hazy afternoon sun. I mentioned that in the book. But when I was checking the Chicago Architecture Center site, I saw immediately that the gondolas that I remembered as red and had described that way are blue in the photos. It turns out this is a new Ferris wheel, installed in 2016 to replace the 1995 wheel with the red gondolas that I remembered. But if I hadn't seen the red gondolas and I were writing that novel (set in 2004) right now, I might well have gotten that detail wrong. In fact, that boat tour that was really useful in the book because of what happened on board, might have gotten only passing mention and details taken from a brochure.

From Chicago, Lizzie went to Wilmington, North Carolina. I had been there several times before. This time I went to the library and did the research Lizzie would have done -- and when I asked the questions she would have asked, a helpful patron in the local history room offered a suggestion about the neighborhood I wanted to go to. There I parked, walked over to the fish market and order lunch, then walked along the adjacent street -- where I saw a broken place in the sidewalk and the house where I knew Lizzie would find another lead. In my mind, when the door opened, the person there would be a child. I didn't know what he was going to say, but I knew it would affect the outcome of her search. That conversation sent her -- and me -- to New Orleans. I had been there several times before, but now I was in Lizzie's skin. This time, I needed to find the right hotel for Lizzie and walk her through finding Becca -- a trolley tour of the Garden District, a early morning walk on Bourbon Street with the smell of stale beer, the location of Becca's restaurant.

I'm getting nostalgic writing this. I love field research. It's like going on-location in a movie. I can only be grateful that although I wasn't ready to begin my sixth Lizzie book, I did take the opportunity I had almost two years ago to go to Santa Fe.

A friend came along and we walked through my locations -- driving from the airport to Santa Fe, walking around downtown, stopping in art galleries so that I could get details for the gallery that Quinn's sister owns. I collected maps and menus and newspapers. I have all of that in a banker's box along with my notes. I have photos. I'm ready to start writing. I plan to have that book finished by the end of the year.

I am so glad I have seen and felt Santa Fe for myself. I know even though Lizzie is going to be distracted while she is there, she will want to go back.

The Tale of the Printer

So much good news from my blogmates lately! (well, except for Rick, who has to go back to the drawing board on his WIP. I sympathize. I've been there.) Congratulations to Barbara for finishing the first draft of her new novel, to Aline on the occasion of her Fiftieth Wedding Anniversary, and to Charlotte, whose historical novel, The Healer's Daughter, won a Kansas Notable Book Award, is a finalist for the Will Rogers Medallion, and a finalist for the High Plains Books Award!

As for me, I'm slogging through, like so many writers. I've started a new novel and am trying to muster up the discipline to write a certain number of pages every day, when in reality I'm so distracted by the disturbing state of the world that it's a wonder I manage to get out of bed in the mornings. Added to the fact that I live in the festering germ swamp that is Arizona, things keep going oddly wrong in my little world, which doesn't help my state of mind. I had all kinds of trouble with my internet connection in May and June. We had repair people out twice in a matter of weeks. But as it turns out it wasn't us – in the alley behind out house, someone had run into the provider's tower with his car and caused some kind of short. That's what they told us, anyway. Whatever it was, we seem to be doing all right now, connection-wise. I have read, however, that since the pandemic began and the number of people working from home has skyrocketed, home internet connections have been problematic for everyone.

Then yesterday my printer gave up the ghost. I did everything I could think of, but the message on the printer screen says “Your printer needs repair. Please unplug.” I hunted through the online jungle to find out who is selling the same Canon PIXMA printer that I could buy online and perhaps pick up curbside. No luck at any venue. That type of printer is no longer made. Figures. I bought $75 worth of ink cartridges for it last week. So today we put on our hazmat suits and went to Best Buy to actually look at printers, and guess what? The local Best Buy stores are basically sold out of printers since, as the salesman told me, everyone is working at home and they can't keep them in stock. (aside – the young man, though properly masked, kept unconsciously stepping closer to me, invading my 6-foot safety space, and I kept backing up like he was coming at me with a knife.)

So here are my printer choices: I can order a new printer of unknown quality (plus ink) online, or I can haul my old printer in for repair, which might be faster, but will probably cost more than buying a new printer. I could also go to more electronics stores, but I think I've had as much human contact as I care to for a while. My husband and I talked it over, and decided to drop the old printer off with the Geek Squad and pay the price to get it fixed. In the meantime, there will be no printing here at the Casey household for the foreseeable future.

Reaching the end

This is the height of the summer, and up here in Eastern Canada, we've been enduring an unprecedented, prolonged heat wave. What is it with 2020 anyway? Being an arctic species, we Canadians fall into a stupor once the temperature soars above 30 degrees C. Usually this is accompanied by enough humidity that you can wring out your hair after a five-minute walk.

I've been writing the first draft of my next Inspector Green novel in fits and starts for months. Humming along nicely in February and slammed to a halt in March by the pandemic. Spent two months obsessively reading news, checking numbers, sewing masks, and listening to our PM's daily briefings. Picked the novel up again in May when I found I could concentrate enough to write a coherent paragraph. And then in June to July, turned to a sloth by the heat. BUT... Drumroll...

This afternoon I finally wrote THE END on the final page of the first draft of Green #11. It weighs in at 89,050 words and 352 pages. That will no doubt change, with the paring down of blubbery prose and the fleshing out of characters and subplots I didn't know I needed. There is much work to be done yet, but at least I now know it's a book, which is a tremendous relief. It is a story with a beginning, middle, and end. There are characters who can be tweaked but who know what their job is. And it now has a title that may stick around! THE DEVIL TO PAY.

One of the challenges I face in the rewrites is that because of the pandemic, I wasn't able to do much of the research I planned to do or discovered I needed as the book went along. So I had to rely on Mr. Google or make stuff up. I made a lot of stuff up, like the procedures the Ontario Provincial Police uses when investigating a homicide, or the protocols followed for bail hearing in the Ottawa courthouse. I want to avoid being contacted by an astute lawyer reader who says "That's not how it's done at all." I'd like to talk to the OPP, I want to visit the courthouse, but neither are feasible right now. I also don't know how protocols will have changed by the fall of 2021 when this book hits the shelves. Will there still be masks and physical distancing, or will we all be rejoicing in our post-vaccine freedom?

So for now I will research what I can, contact my police friends and other experts to answer the questions that have cropped up, and make a note of what will have to wait until the book is in the final editorial phase with the publisher (like the vaccine info). I may also have to live with some of the stuff I made up. It is fiction, after all.

So I have printed the draft out, and as of tomorrow, I turn from THE END of Draft One to Chapter One, Draft Two. And begin to tear the whole thing apart, with the file of notes and questions compiled during first draft at my elbow. But for now, I'm going to pour a glass of wine. And do a little jig. (Photo not provided).

Coming to a VERY painful conclusion

by Rick Blechta

Two nights ago I woke up at 3:00 a.m. because I smelled a skunk, but that’s another story…

As I tossed and turned trying to clear my mind and get back to dreamland, something flitted through my consciousness that was exceptionally disturbing: my WIP is telling the wrong story. That certainly woke me up completely! Allow me to explain.

The basis of my plot is about skullduggery within high the US government and my protagonists are trying to discover exactly what’s going on and then how to make it public — without getting themselves murdered. And that turns out to be a very difficult thing to accomplish.

All perfectly normal stuff for a thriller, right?

I believe it was Barbara who first brought up on Type M the problems the pandemic is causing writers who are trying to write novels that are relevant. Do we acknowledge how societies’ are coping with the new reality of our lives or do we carry on as if nothing has changed? To my mind, that won’t work unless we set our plots in 2019 or before.

And that’s my problem. I was trying to tell my story ignoring the pandemic, and two nights ago it suddenly became apparent that this would flat out, not work.

I didn’t sleep the rest of the night as I wrestled with what I could do. First off, would anybody right now — and in the foreseeable future — actually care about an illegal operation within the US government to make off with huge amounts of cash? Should I scrap the entire novel and come up with something else? Could I adapt the plot somehow and move it in another direction?

Now I usually don’t dish out much information about things I’m writing, but in this case I feel it’s necessary to make my conundrum clear.

As I puzzled through the issue over the course of several hours I began to see a possible way through the mess, to possibly improve my story by working in the pandemic.

I’ve gotten to a place where I believe much of what I’ve written can be saved, but there’s a lot that will need to be cast aside. Also disheartening is that a fair bit of research is heading right down the drain. 

Sad as the whole thing is, this is what writing is all about. It could have just as easily happen when the novel got to a publisher or editor, “We really like the story you’re telling but could you change it to…?

So it’s once again Back To The Drawing Board for moi. Sigh…

But perhaps in the long run, I’ll be saving myself even more work.

Excuses, excuses!

On Saturday, we will have been married for fifty years.   Our family is arriving this week and things are a bit hectic here. I  hope you'll forgive me if my post this week is just a cartoon that made me laugh.

Facing Reality (Virtually)

I've had a very exciting month. Last week I learned that my historical novel, The Healer's Daughter,  had won a Kansas Notable Book Award. I cannot find the words to tell you how thrilled I was. Was then, and still am.

A week earlier I was informed that this book is a finalist for the Will Rogers Medallion. And the week before that I received another call--I was a finalist for the High Plains Books Award. So many, many good things happening all at once. It was almost too much to take in. I'm simply stunned.

Then yesterday my local Sisters In Crime chapter told me The Healer's Daughter was also historical suspense. For that reason, I'm asking Rick Blechta, our blogmaster, to post that more current cover photo in place of Fractured Families. 

Everything I write is set in Kansas or about Kansas. Even my mysteries (The Lottie Albright Series) are set in Western Kansas. It doesn't exactly make an agent or editor's heart go pitty-pat. Even worse, at the heart of everything is agriculture. Kansas is all about land. Never mind about following the money. In Kansas, follow the land. There has always been murderous tensions surrounding the land.

When the Kansas Notable Book people asked about my home town, I asked that they list it as Hoxie, Kansas, even though I now live in Fort Collins, Colorado. I moved here after my husband died because I wanted to live closer to my three daughters. Even then, I could only bear to do so because Colorado was once part of Kansas Territory. I could still say I was a Kansan.

But now, two exciting award ceremonies will be conducted virtually: The Kansas Notable Book Award and the High Plains Book Award. Right now, it appears that the Will Rogers Award ceremony will be live. If that happens, I will consider driving to Fort Worth, Texas. Some of my friends are planning a wine and cheese party the night of the High Plains Award ceremony. It will be fun to hear "the winner is...." surrounded by this giddy crew.

I believe that authors should support their publisher. I've always been traditionally published and in the past, I've done the best I could with promotion. But the old ways won't work any more. I've had to rethink everything. I've decided to jump right into mastering Zoom technology.

I'm going to contact the organizations that asked me to speak before COVID hit and ask if they would consider a video presentation. I can't personally sell books that way, but I can sustain interest in my novels. If attendees buy a book through Amazon, Barnes and Noble, or their local book store, and email me, I will send them an autographed bookplate.

The problem is that "virtual" might be the new reality.