Not Again!

I was amused by the flurry of true confessions by my fellow Type M'ers. Donis Casey's contribution really struck home. She mentioned grammatical errors that were a source of deep embarrassment because she was an English teacher and dithering over lay, lie, laid, and lain. For some reason, I can't send a letter ending with "yours truly" without checking on line to see if truly needs an "e."

For the life of me I can't understand how proofing errors can slip by when I've read a manuscript a jillion times. My most frequent manuscript error is leaving out words. I could swear little articles (a, an, the, etc.) are there. Until someone points out they are not.

My most embarrassing error of that nature was a FB post lauding one of my dearest friends and explaining why I was unable to attend her birthday party. As luck would have it, FB turned on me that day and the post didn't go through. I hastily rewrote the darn thing and wouldn't you know, it flew right through this time. As "my dead friend" not "my dear friend." I had a lot of explaining to do. Especially to those who were alarmed by her demise so close to the party.

For some reason historical errors really bother me even though in a novel I'm supposed to be able to invent stuff. I make a heroic effort to keep everything in historical novels and mysteries accurate. But with my first mystery, Deadly Descent, I mentioned that people had stolen Matt Dillon's papers from the Dodge City court house. It's true that some of Wyatt Earp's documents went missing. But a former chairman of the Department of History at Fort Hays State University emailed to ask that I surely knew Matt Dillon was a fictional character?

Actually, I didn't. I was mortified! Gunsmoke was one of my favorite series. Naturally that meant Miss Kitty was also fictitious. I was grief-stricken.

Another error was in Hidden Heritage. I thought Laura Ingalls Wilder's father was John J. Ingalls and he wasn't. It didn't take long for fans to correct me.

I got my first taste of the perils of historical reference when I wrote my first historical novel, Come Spring. I mentioned the legal description of a land location. Made it up, of course. A man wrote to tell me that was his property and he didn't appreciate my using it. Who would have thought?

Historical and grammatical errors don't weigh on my soul forever. I'm over them, painful though they were at the time. But how about it, my darling Type M'ers? What was your most embarrassing moment as a writer?

I have to go down the list a ways. I'm willing to share my fourth most embarrassing moment.

 

Annie Hogsett, Guest Blogger

Type M is thrilled to welcome Annie Hogsett as our guest blogger this weekend. Annie has a master’s degree in English literature and spent her first career writing advertising copy—a combination which, in Annie’s opinion, qualifies her for making a bunch of stuff up. Her first published novel, the incredibly clever and entertaining Too Lucky to Live, #1 of her “Somebody’s Bound to Wind Up Dead Mysteries,” was released by Poisoned Pen Press in May 2017. Second in her series, Murder to the Metal, launched in June 2017. Third, The Devil’s Own Game, is set for this October. Annie lives ten yards from Lake Erie in the City of Cleveland with her husband, Bill, and their delinquent cat, Cujo. Unlike her protagonists, Allie Harper and Tom Bennington, she has never won a 550-million-dollar lottery jackpot.

My Partner Reader

My first mystery was published in June of 2017—Tom Kies and I share a “book birthday—and unless I misremember**—Donis Casey was present at the launch of both of our baby books at The Poisoned Pen. It’s all a blur. In spite of my longing for “real readers”—and although I was given to shouting out with no warning, “Hey! Somebody, somewhere, could be reading my book right now!”—I didn’t have a clue about the role readers were about to play in my writing life. I didn’t understand—until time passed and there was evidence actual human beings were reading my mysteries—my writing process had been incomplete.

In my first career, as an advertising copywriter, I thought of readers—or listeners or watchers—as the people I was addressing—a demographic based on age, gender, race, marital status, and so on, unto forever. I considered them to be people with needs or problems a product or service might fulfill or solve. I needed to understand them in order to sell them something. I thought, very tenderly sometimes, about what they wanted and needed, even their hopes and dreams, but at the end of the day it wasn’t a relationship. They were a target. I was writing “at them.”

When I wrote my first novel, a fantasy for young adults, those unfathomable alien beings were “my audience.” I was writing “for them.” I thought a good bit about what would woo and entertain them, but mostly I was in a warm, fuzzy relationship with my characters. One of whom was, in fact, warm and fuzzy. I followed my guys around, eavesdropped on them, admired how brave and funny they were. Their adventures unfolded in front of me and I wrote them down. Pantser? Yeah. Big time. No regrets. In truth, I was my reader then. I was writing for me. And she adored my story.

When Too Lucky To Live was published, I’d still had very little experience of what it means for a writer to be in partnership with a body of readers. To be sure, I’d been revising my story to meet the standards of an agent, a publisher, an editor. Master readers. Learning from them how to listen to seasoned advice and smart suggestions, I began to understand the meaning and the value of collaboration. To see weak spots, fix them, feel the work getting better.

The door was open to a new way for me to experience the process, but my Partner Reader didn’t really show up until I started the second book in my series. I’m guessing she was always there, but at last I could hear her, and, now into the third book, I hear her better every day. She’s there as I write. As I reread what I write. As I slash, burn, and fine tune. Her presence is unconscious a lot of the time, but she’s plenty conscious enough to be Sacagawea for my expedition and save me from at least some of the bears.

American essayist, Rebecca Solnit, in her book The Faraway Nearby says, “A book is a heart that only beats in the chest of another.” I get that now. I got it, like a lightning bolt, from an article, the much revered and honored author, George Saunders wrote for The Guardian.*

He pictures the writer as an optometrist, constantly asking his reader, “Is it better like this? Or like this?” He insists that you imagine your reader as being “as humane, bright, witty, experienced and well intentioned as you.” And says that “ to communicate intimately with her, you have to maintain the state, through revision, of generously imagining her.” The result is, he says, “in revising your reader up, you revise yourself up too.” I can bear witness to the soundness of this advice.

I can tell you, too, that the more I write, the louder and more insistent my Partner Reader is. She’s sitting next to me right here, now, as I write this for you. She’s bright and kind. She doesn’t want me to make a fool of myself. And regardless of whatever personal pronoun you choose, she is you.

*P.S. The most valuable part of this post is the link. You can thank me later.
 https://www.theguardian.com/books/2017/mar/04/what-writers-really-do-when-they-write

________
**You do not misremember, Annie. I was indeed present at the Phoenix launch of both yours and Tom's books -- Donis

Our Fascination with Bad Guys and Evil

I enjoyed reading the latest blogs from Donis Casey and Frankie Y. Bailey about their take on their literary villains. When blocking out a story, I often fixate on the villain and then I wonder why. Why do we have such a fascination with bad guys and evil?

I reached out and asked a number of writer friends who their favorite villains are. Some of the answers were quite interesting: Randall Flag (from Stephen King’s The Stand), Tony Soprano, Jack the Ripper, Long John Silver, The Joker, Draco Malfoy, Maleficent, the Pied Piper of Hamelin (well, when he wasn’t paid for eradicating the plague ridden rats from town, he reciprocated by stealing all the town’s children), Hannibal Lecter, Nurse Ratched, and of course, Darth Vader.

Some answers drew more than a one word answer. “Patricia Highsmith’s Tom Ripley. He could seem so normal as to be a sociopath. She really placed a light into that dark world. A villain…anti-villain.”

“Jack in Lord of the Flies. He is proof we are all base when stripped of rules, that hunger is what drives us all.”

“John Wilkes Booth…even though he killed Lincoln, he was a somewhat sympathetic character, a lost soul, pathetically delusional.”

When she mentioned John Wilkes Booth, it stopped me in my tracks for a moment. Booth thought what he was doing was the right thing. Don’t most villains rationalize their crimes as ‘doing what’s right’? Don’t they view their actions as beneficial for the greater good…even though their ‘greater good’ is criminal, repugnant, and destructive?

And the statement about Tom Ripley seeming so normal? The philosopher Hannah Arendt, while watching the Nazi engineer of genocide, Adolf Eichmann, stand trial in Jerusalem, realized that the most striking thing about evil was its banality. Eichmann looked like a bank clerk not a textbook villain. He was a bureaucrat who murdered millions of innocent people.

Ted Bundy, boyish, handsome, and charismatic, was a sadistic sociopath who confessed to thirty murders. But he looked so normal.

John Wayne Gacy tortured and murdered at least thirty-three teenage boys and young men. Before he was caught, he attended parades, children’s parties, and charitable fundraisers dressed as a clown. A CLOWN!!!! Okay, that’s pretty scary.

How many times have we heard the television interview with the neighbor of a serial killer who had been arrested say, “He seemed so normal”?

So back to why we’re so fascinated with evil.

Carl Jung believed we need to confront and understand our own hidden nature to grow as human beings. Healthy confrontation with our shadow selves can unearth new strengths, while unhealthy attempts at confrontation may involve dwelling on or unleashing the worst parts of ourselves.

Sigmund Freud viewed human nature as inherently antisocial, biologically driven by the undisciplined id’s pleasure principle to get what we want when we want it. We’re born to be bad but held back by society.

In the early 1970s, Stanford psychologist, Philip Zimbardo carried out his infamous Prison Experiment. The mock jail he created in Stanford’s psychology building where “guards” abused “prisoners”, revealed the speed with which ordinary people can begin to carry out depraved acts in a toxic environment.

I’m certainly no expert, but is it possible the reason why we’re fascinated with bad guys is that the line that we need to cross to get to the Dark Side is incredibly narrow?

Or is it that being good is boring and being bad is wicked fun?

The Rise of the Foodies

The Type M'ers have gone temporarily nuts. Suddenly instead of discussing really cool ways to murder people some sort of fatal attraction to favorite recipes seem to have infected the faithful.

I've especially enjoyed Donis Casey's old recipes. In her latest book, Forty Dead Men, she includes a recipe for Red Eye Gravy. I've heard of it, but never tasted it.

In my own Lottie Albright series, Lottie as undersheriff doesn't spend much time in the kitchen so I really can't contribute recipes used by my characters. However, my family had a few that were really dillies when I was growing up. One of our favorites was Wacky cake. I've heard this cake called by a variety of names: Poor Man's cake, depression cake, hobo cake, war cake. The reason it was so popular was that it didn't depend on expensive ingredients. It's delicious. Here's the recipe:

1-1/2 cups flour (sifted)
1 cup sugar
3 Tablespoons Cocoa
1 Tablespoon vinegar
1 teaspoon baking soda
pinch of salt
Mix all together, then punch three holes in the mixture. Add the following ingredients (only one per hole)
1/4 cup vegetable oil
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 cup warm water

Mix by hand. Don't use an electric mixer. Bake in a 9 x 9 pan at 350 degrees for 25 minutes.

And for Christmas I have the world's easier popcorn ball recipe. If you are ambitious, you can shape the popcorn into a miniature Christmas tree and add colored gum drops for ornaments.

I use one recipe per popper of corn:

1 cup light corn syrup and one 3-oz package of Jello. Bring to a boil over medium heat and pour over about 11 cups of popped corn. Mix very quickly and use butter on your hands (or gloves) to shape the mixture into balls. Be very careful. This concoction is really, really hot.

In a Writing State of Mind

I’ll admit, I’m a pantser. I don't plan ahead when I'm writing.  It's a discovery process.   I know what the first scene of my books look like and what I want my ending to feel like. Most times, I’m not even sure who the bad guy is.

That being said, I began this blog by typing it in my hotel room in Phoenix. My wife Cindy was still asleep, I had a cup of a coffee and a breakfast sandwich from the café downstairs, and the lights were dim. Later that day, I’d sit on two panels at the Poisoned Pen Mystery Conference. While in Arizona, I had a great time mingling with other novelists, and talking with readers and aspiring writers. And of course the highlight was spending some time with Ian Rankin and Hank Phillippi Ryan who are delightful individuals, as well as my Poisoned Pen family of wonderful writers. What was extra special was meeting fellow Type M for Murder contributor Donis Casey. It was so nice to meet you in person, Donis!

Even though I was in Phoenix, I did my best to work on my third Geneva Chase mystery. A couple of months ago, Annette (my editor) and Barbara (my publisher) signed off on the first hundred pages of Graveyard Bay. In the first chapter, two bodies are found chained to the forks of a mammoth forklift used in boatyard marinas. The tines of the giant machine are under the dark, gray surface of the icy bay leading to Long Island Sound.

Brrrrrr.

I’m thirty chapters into Graveyard Bay but in the back of my mind, I’d envisioned the ending and it was really messy. I was not satisfied, I hate messy. I’d wrestled with the ending for weeks and just hadn’t been able to envision an ending that both makes me happy and scares the bejesus out of me.

But it came at four o’clock that Phoenix morning. I got up out of bed, went into the hotel bathroom and wrote it all down in my notebook so that I wouldn’t forget it once the sun had come up over the Arizona landscape.

And guess what? It was the ending I’d been looking for.

What precipitated my epiphany? One, I was at a conference filled with mystery writers and readers. I was surrounded by creativity and those who appreciate it. That has an incredibly positive effect on the writing process.

In addition to that, however, my wife, who has a PhD in Psychology, and after she had her first cup of coffee, explained that it might have had something to do with time of night when the ideas came to me, that nether world between dream and reality. She says it’s called hypnagogia.

What?

When I Googled it, this is what I found: Hypnagogia is a well described neurological phenomenon that can occur when one is waking up (hypnapompic) or going to sleep (hypnagogic). It is an in-between state where one is neither fully awake nor fully asleep.

The term hypnagogia comes from the Greek words for “sleep” and “guide,” suggesting the period of being led into slumber. In this state, which lasts a few minutes at most, you’re essentially in limbo between two states of consciousness.

According to Carlolyn Gregnoire in an article for Huffington Post, surrealist artist Salvador Dali called hypnagogia “the slumber with a key,” and he used it as creative inspiration for many of his imaginative paintings.

“You must resolve the problem of ‘sleeping without sleeping,’ which is the essence of the dialectics of the dream, since it is a repose which walks in equilibrium on the taut and invisible wire which separates sleeping from waking,” Dali wrote in the book 50 Secrets of Magic Craftsmanship.

Mary Shelley, too, said she got the inspiration for Frankenstein from a “waking dream” in the wee hours of the morning, “I saw with eyes shut, but acute mental vision.”

To what extent, then I wonder, are we in a waking dream state while we’re writing, even in the cold light of day? At some point, don’t we find ourselves immersed in the scene we’re writing? When we’re driving to the grocery store, aren’t we listening to dialogue between characters in our head? During a particularly stressful point in our story, don’t we feel what our protagonist is feeling?

Stephen King once described his writing process in this way:
“There are certain things I do if I sit down to write…I have a glass of water or a cup of tea. There’s a certain time I sit down, from 8:00 to 8:30, somewhere within that half hour every morning…I have my vitamin pill and my music, sit in the same seat, and the papers are all arranged in the same places. The cumulative purpose of doing these things the same way every day seems to be a way of saying to the mind, you’re going to be dreaming soon.”

I guess ultimately, it’s difficult to be creative if you’re trying too hard. Sometimes you just have to let it flow, and, once every so often, it comes to you when you’re half awake.

Happy writing, happy dreaming.

Summer Reading and What's Hot Right Now

Vicki Writing (not exactly as shown)

Vicki Reading (not exactly as shown)

Vicki Reading (not exactly as shown)

Vicki Writing (not exactly as shown)

By Vicki Delany

I read far more in the summer than the winter. I like to sit outside in the sun by the pool with my book whereas inside over the winter I seem to be doing things.  This year I have a brand new deck and the weather has been fabulous (hot and sunny) and so I’ve been plowing through books.

This week I've read The Death of Mrs. Westaway by Ruth Ware (loved it) and Forty Dead Men by our own Donis Casey (totally different than Westaway but also great).  As an aside, let me say that I think Donis is one of the best writers working today who can really (and I mean really!) capture the times and the people she’s writing about, which is a farm family in 1910s Oklahoma.

As a reader my favourite type of book is the ‘modern gothic’ or standalone psychological suspense, and right now there’s an overwhelming number of them out there.  If we can get away from the “Girl Who” or “The Woman in” titles these are basically domestic thrillers in which women, mostly, are faced with a sudden, unexpected threat that turns their world upside down.  The threat often comes from the past, as long buried secrets are revealed.  Writers like Ruth Ware, Paula Hawkins, Kate Morton, Tana French, Cate Holahan.  Prince Edward County’s own Linwood Barclay has been writing this sort of book for a long time. It was with Linwood’s work that I first came across the phrase “domestic thriller” although being about men dealing with family life, his books don’t quite hit the group I am talking about.   But they’re always good and no one does twists quite like Linwood.

As always when a particular type of book suddenly becomes popular the market is flooded and some are a lot better than others. I didn’t get very far with The Woman in the Window by A.J. Finn because I found it so very derivative.

As a writer, I seem to have been ahead of the curve. I’m very happy these days writing cozy mysteries and I love the characters and worlds I’ve created, but I can’t help but think I might have been too early for the boat.

My first two novels were exactly what’s so popular right now: standalone domestic thrillers with dual storylines (i.e. something that happened in the past affecting events of today). Scare the Light Away and Burden of Memory were published by Poisoned Pen Press in 2005 and 2006. After that I switched to the Constable Molly Smith series, because everyone said you have to have a series. I tried my hand once again with a modern gothic in More than Sorrow, which sorta sunk without a trace.

I might not be writing that type of book anymore but I’m glad so many people are. I’m looking forward to some great reading this summer. Tell me, readers, any books or authors you can recommend along the lines of what I’m looking for?

Putting Yourself Out There

Staying connected

Very interesting posts this week on the joys of being a writer. John wondered about the effectiveness of social media, Sybil pondered the usefulness of going to conferences. When it comes to promotion, what one writer is willing and able to do may be quite different from another. I enjoy conferences and think they're very useful for making connections. But I don't go to many, one or two a year if family health and finances permit. I'm not a particularly shy person, and I'm not at all bothered about speaking before a group. But I'm slow to warm up in a social situation, at least until I feel I have a handle on whomever I'm talking to. I told a friend once that I think I was born to be an observer in this life. This is a great quality to have if you're a writer, but not as useful if you need to work the room. I actually do make the rounds at every conference I attend and talk to as many people as I can, but I'll never be as effective at it as someone as outgoing and naturally talented as, say, Louise Penny. However, I'm guessing I'm a much better schmoozer than J.D. Salinger, who could buy and sell me. So as effective as that technique is, it must not be the end-all and be-all.

I've been doing this author thing for years, and I keep trying a little of this and a little of that, and attempting to judge what promotional activity works best for me. Other writers have been extraordinarily helpful to me, but I can't afford to go to as many conferences as I'd like in order to make those connections. I'm much less promiscuous with bookstore signings than I was when I started out. After sitting in lonely solitude behind a table a few times, I now choose my bookstores and signing times with great care, and do everything I can to publicize the event beforehand. For every other bookstore I come across, I find it much more effective to talk to the booksellers.

I'm very lucky to live within driving distance of Poisoned Pen Bookstore, which is owned by my editor (whose husband happens to be my publisher). Whether I can travel or not, most mystery authors eventually find their way to Poisoned Pen for an event. This a a wonderful way for me to keep in touch with the many author friends I've made over the years. Witness the above photo of Yours Truly, Ann Parker, and our own Vicki Delany, having lunch after their event in Scottsdale this month. Then we did a library panel together, below, looking much more proper, and as we know, looks can be deceiving.

Ann Parker, Vicki Delany, Donis Casey

I find that the more I speak to groups, the more I'm asked to speak. I get a lot of library business. I was a librarian for 20 years, so I know a lot of library types all over the country. Book clubs are good. If you can find a non-book group to talk to that has some sort of connection to what you write about, that can be fabulous for your sales. History groups are good for me. I know another writer who used to sell her books at an annual zoo event and cleans up. (Makes money. Though I think she does actually volunteer to muck out cages.)

My husband, however, would rather stand on his head in a mud puddle while poking himself in the eye than speak in front of a group. I understand that most people are terrified of public speaking, so my publicity plan, such as it is would be torture for them.

The internet is a godsend, if you know how to work it, though less so for us Luddites. I try to do something on Facebook, author page or personal page, every day. I don't tweet. This may be a big mistake, but the very idea makes me tired. It would be hard for me to host an internet radio program, because I simply don't have the technical skills--or the interest. My webmaster, who is also my brother, told me that my website should be "all Donis, all the time", and not concentrate solely on my books. This gives you leeway to change your focus, if you decide to do something other than what you have been doing. Change genres, for instance, or become a playwright, or an actor. Do working actively on blogs and Facebook and Goodreads and BookBub increase my readership? I don't know, to tell the truth. But I'm a writer, damn it, and more writing is always better than less. On my own site, I've more or less kept a public diary of my experiences as a novelist, and whether it's instructive to others or not, after a dozen years I have written enough material for a book.

This writing game is tough. And when it comes to selling yourself, you just have to put your head down and go. What works for one may not work for you, so you try everything you can manage and do the best you can. The really important thing, though, is to do the best you can without making yourself miserable. Life is too short.

p.s. and aside: This has nothing to do with the price of tea in China, but I tend to write short. Or, more accurately, I write long manuscripts and end up whittling them down to the nub. I want to get to the point.

Endings

Well, this is embarrassing. I thought I had written my Type M entry and scheduled it to post this morning, but apparently that was somebody else posting at some other venue. Since I only manage to write about one book a year, every book launch is a big circus for me and I have to be very careful not to forget where I am and what I'm supposed to be doing for whom. Therefore I apologize for my tardiness, but better late than never. That's what I'm telling myself, anyway.

My official book launch party on February 24 at the Poisoned Pen bookstore in Scottsdale Arizona went off very nicely, thanks for asking. In fact, the bookstore recorded the whole thing and posted it on their Facebook site. You can check it out by going here and scrolling down to Feb. 24. To tide you over, here is a photo of the evening.

Dennis Palumbo, Priscilla Royal, Donis Casey, Barbara Peters

In more writerly news, a couple of weeks ago my Type M blogmates were discussing a thread on endings, which is a topic near to my heart. I am speaking about the end of a novel, but a few years ago I was thinking about the end of life, and in that vein I read a wonderful book called Being Mortal, Medicine and 
What Matters in the End, by Atul Gawande. If you’re interested in managing your own demise, I would recommend it.

But even when planning my own induction into the choir invisible, I can’t help but think like a writer. Toward the end of Dr. Gawande’s book, he quotes a study done by Daniel Kahneman, who says something to the effect that it doesn’t matter too much how much pleasure or pain we endure, it’s the ending of the experience we remember. As an example he cites the experience of watching an exciting sports match, when your team, “having performed beautifully for nearly the entire game, blows in the end. We feel that the ending ruins the whole experience…The experiencing self had whole hours of pleasure and just a moment of displeasure, but the remembering self sees no pleasure at all.”

What does that tell you, Mr. or Ms. Writer?

We are told that we must have a gripping beginning to our novel in order to engage the prospective reader as soon as possible. Then we have to keep drawing the reader on, keep him interested as we work our way through the long middle of the story. All excellent advice.

But, by God, the ending better deliver. Because as we all know, a great beginning makes a reader want to read your current book, but a great ending makes her want to read your next book.

Little Venues

 

 

This week my very good friend Donis Casey wrote about preparing for the launch of her new book Forty Dead Men. This book was released in February and won a rare starred review from Publisher's Weekly.

 

This very prestigious magazine is read by bookstores and libraries across the county to determine which books to purchase for sale to customers or shelve for library patrons. PW had this to say about Forty Dead Men:

 

"In Casey's excellent 10th Alafair Tucker mystery (after 2017's The Return of the Raven Mocker), 22-year-old George W. "Gee Dub" Tucker, a WWI vet scarred by his war experiences, returns to the family farm in Boynton, Okla., run by his parents, Alafair and Shaw, with the aid of their large brood of children....Casey expertly nails the extended Tucker family - some 20 people - and combines these convincing characters, a superb sense of time and place, and a solid plot in this marvelously atmospheric historical." (starred review) (Publishers Weekly)

 



For those of you who are not familiar with this terrific series, it begins with The Old Buzzard Had It Coming in the Oklahoma Farm Country in 1912.

 

Donis's launch was held at the Poisoned Pen Bookstore in Scottsdale Arizona and she was joined by two other Poisoned Pen authors, Dennis Palumbo (Head Wounds) and Priscilla Royal (Wild Justice). It was combined with a tribute to the late Frederick Ramsay.

 

I participated in a couple of co-interviews with Fred and he was a great writer, a wonderful person, and I felt greatly honored just to set next to him. 

 

Being interviewed by the famous Barbara Peters (owner of The Poisoned Pen Bookstore and Editor-in Chief at Poisoned Pen Press) is one the most sought after experiences for authors. I was so in awe of her that I could barely remember my own name during my first visit to the store.

 

If I could have, I would have gone to AZ to applaud Donis's launch. But last year, I went to five libraries in Kansas and four major conferences. 

 

Looking back, I honestly have to say my favorite experience, the one that was a truly joyful event was speaking at the tiny library in Blue Mound Kansas. Thirty-seven persons attended. Later my nephew argued that there weren't thirty-seven persons in Blue Mound. But there were! And they were glad to see me. Happy that I came bearing books. Happy to buy them. Happy to listen to whatever I had to say.

 

With my next book, Silent Sacrifices, I'm going to spend more energy seeking out these rewarding little venues.   

 

Another Year, Another Book, a Whole New World of Self-Promotion

Donis here,  kicking off my new year. My tenth Alafair Tucker Mystery, Forty Dead Men, will hit the streets on February 6, 2018. You can pre-order here. I am particularly proud of this book, which deals with the psychological effects of warfare on a veteran of the First World War. They called it shell shock back then. Now we call it PTSD. The early reviews have been stellar. Publishers’ Weekly starred review of Forty Dead Men says “Casey expertly nails the extended Tucker family—some 20 people—and combines these convincing characters, a superb sense of time and place, and a solid plot in this marvelously atmospheric historical.”

The official launch party for Forty Dead Men will be at Poisoned Pen Bookstore in Scottsdale, Arizona, on February 24 at 2:00 p.m., when Poisoned Pen Press hosts Yours Truly, Dennis Palumbo (signing Head Wounds, A Daniel Rinaldi Mystery) and Priscilla Royal (signing Wild Justice, A Medieval Mystery) for a three author signing party! We will also be remembering another wonderful Poisoned Pen author, Fred Ramsay, who passed away late last year.

Trying to publicize a new book is a new adventure for me every time. Forty Dead Men is my tenth book in almost thirteen years, and just in that short time things have changed so much that I have to re-learn how to do it with each release.

Do you remember, Dear Reader, when authors had hard-copy press kits that they used to give to prospective agents and editors and to bookstore managers? That is a photo of mine, above. This is a left-over from the press kit batch I used to publicize of my third book, The Drop Edge of Yonder, a mere 10 years ago. NOBODY that I am aware of uses a physical booklet like this anymore. No, now it's either promote yourself on line or in person, and in person is becoming harder and harder to arrange. I have a website and a blog. I don't know how much either helps, but it can't hurt, right? This time I’m doing something most authors these days do automatically, and that is set up an author page on Facebook. It’s hard to believe, but Facebook was less than a year old when my first book was published in 2005, and nobody had an author page. I was finally convinced to create one because I can use it to push promotions and announcements. We shall see how this turns out. In the meantime, Dear Reader, if you would be so kind as to visit my Facebook author page, here, and give it a “Like”, I would be most appreciative.

Also, please remember that especially if you like a book, it is very helpful to the author if you write a nice review for it in Goodreads or on Amazon.

This writing game is tough. And when it comes to publicity, you just have to put your head down and go. What works for one may not work for you, so you try everything you can manage and do the best you can. The really important thing, though, is to do the best you can without making yourself miserable. Life is too short.

Traveling and Talking Books

Carolyn Hart and Hannah Dennison

I've just returned from Huntington Beach, California, where I participated in the third annual Ladies of Intrigue event, which is sponsored by MysteryInk bookstore. It was a day-long conference featuring more than 15 women mystery writers. including Carolyn Hart and Robin Burcell. This was, according to her, Carolyn's career event finale, and since she has no plans to travel out to this part of the country again, she particularly asked me and former Type M-er Hannah Dennison if we would participate in the conference this year. Of course we said yes. Carolyn has been a mentor and a friend from the beginning of both of our mystery writing careers, and we would both do anything she asked. So off we flew for one day in California, where we mingled and served on panels along with eleven other fun and fabulous authors*. Then Carolyn, Hannah and I schlepped back to Phoenix for an appearance at the Poisoned Pen Bookstore last night.

Carolyn, Hannah, Donis at Poisoned Pen
photo by Judith Starkston

I wonder sometimes how cost-effective it is for an author to spend her time and money traveling around the country appearing at bookstores and events and conferences. I know that every appearance gains at least a couple of new readers, who will spread the word, we hope. But as Rick said in his post about book launches (below) doing events with other authors is always a celebration. The mystery community is nothing but kind and supportive, and it's always nice to know that even authors who are infinitely more well-known than I have the same problems with their writing.

The view of the Pacific from my hotel balcony was worth the trip

I was interested in Aline's post (below) about audiobooks. I've met many a "reader" who prefers the audio version of a book to the print version, and I've been lucky that my publisher has sold the audio rights to all my books--but one! The audio version of my latest, All Men Fear Me, has not come out yet. According to Blackstone, the publisher who does the audio books for Poisoned Pen Press, the audio version of my previous Alafair book, Hell With the Lid Blown Off, did not sell well enough. This surprises me, since the paper version of Hell did very well. Also, I loved the audio version of that book. Hell is the only book in the Alafair Tucker series that has some first person narration, and when I first heard the character of Trent Calder (who had been a secondary presence in all the previous books) speak for the first time, I was bowled over. It was as though Trent, who had only lived in my head, was suddenly a real person.

Perhaps it was more expensive to make because Blackstone had to pay two narrators for Hell instead of one. I have been told that Blackstone is waiting until the audio of Hell makes a profit (Hmm. Hell Makes a Profit. Sounds like a book title to me.) Therefore, Dear Readers, next time you’re at your local library, please do me a favor and check to see if they own a copy or two of Hell With the Lid Blown Off in audio. If they do not, I would be grateful if you would request that the system buy one. Most public libraries have a mechanism for users to request titles. If you'd like your own download, check it out here. Once Blackstone makes money off of Hell, they’ll do an audio of All Men. I hope they do one eventually, since the ninth Alafair book, The Return of the Raven Mocker, will be out in January, and I don’t want to get several titles behind when it comes to audio books.

*Attending authors at Ladies of Intrigue this year were Carolyn Hart, Robin Burcell, Rhys Bowen, Kathy Aarons, Lisa Brackmann, Ellen Byron, Donis Casey, Hannah Dennison, Kate Dyer-Seeley, Earlene Fowler, Daryl Wood Gerber, Naomi Hirahara, Linda O. Johnston, Carlene O’Neil, Laurie Stevens and Pamela Samuels Young.

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.

Happy Happy Anniversary

This week our blogmaster, Rick Blechta reminded the Type M'ers that our blog is ten years. I'm a fairly recent member and came in through the good graces of our beloved Donis Casey. I'm feel humbled and honored to be included with this collection of talented, generous people.

I tried to look up my first blog before I started this post, but I'm going to have to settle for completing this scant offering without including the date.

I'm getting a new roof and guttering on my house. We have a great homeowner's association and this is only going to cost me $40.00. So I'm quite cheerful about all the banging and shower of debris. But nevertheless I can't work with this sort of noise. I jump when there's a bang. Could be gunshots you know. One pays a price for possessing a murderous mind.

My deadline for the new mystery is August 16th so I'm leaving daily for a more peaceful place. Through the roofing process my internet is temporarily very erratic. So I'm going to publish this post before it all goes away again.

A sincere thank you to everyone who has followed this blog. And we can't thank Rick Blechta and Vicki Delany enough for starting it in the first place.

Writer's Conferences I Have Known And Loved

I (Donis) am not actually here today, Dear Reader. I am attending the Left Coast Crime conference in Phoenix. I thought it would be interesting to post photos from the conference, but I am new to my phone/camera and don't yet know how to post pictures without being in physical contact with my computer. Perhaps if someone will lend me their ten-year-old to teach me, I'll learn how before my next picture-taking event.

So, in the interim, I am posting for your enjoyment photos from some of the many writer's/fan conferences I have attended over the past ten years. There are too many to cover every one, so I just picked out some highlights, especially if they are photos in which I look pretty good. Join me on my virtual trip down conference memory lane.

With Larry Karp, Bouchercon, Anchorage, AK

Women Writing the West, Colorado Springs, CO

Hmm. I'm wearing the same wrap, though these photos were taken some years apart. I like that durn wrap. I still wear it a lot.

Tucson, AZ

I like the red sunglasses. I do the Tucson Festival of Books every year. It is huge. Hundreds of authors and tens of thousands of readers attend.

Tucson, AZ

Of course the one thing an author almost always does at a conference is sign books. This signing is at Tucson with Elizabeth Gunn and Hilary Davidson

Malice Domestic, Bethesda, MD

My first Malice Domestic, With Charlotte Hinger and Clea Simon

OWFI Annual Conference, Oklahoma City, OK

Oklahoma Writer's Federation International. I'm standing on a mezzanine landing in the conference hotel. I taught three workshops here that year.

Murder Mysteries and the West, Tempe, AZ

That's me in the blue talking to a reader after the panel discussion. Barbara Peters, my editor and owner of Poisoned Pen Bookstore, is in the white, and the cowboy-hatted Reavis Wortham is next to her. Susan Slater is trying to hide behind the pillar.

Cozy Con, Phoenix, AZ

This event had so many well-known writers that I don't have room to list them all. (Besides the fact that this was a few years ago and I don't remember who a couple of these people are) How many can you name?

Cozy Con, Phoenix, AZ

Though I do have to mention these three, sitting on the left side, next to me on the end, because they are three of my favorite people: left to right, Carolyn Hart, Hannah Dennison, and Earlene Fowler.










(All photos taken by Donis Casey, Donald Koozer, or an obliging waiter.)

Dream a little dream

by Rick Blechta

Dickens Dream by Robert William Buss, 1875

What we see in our “mental movie theaters” nightly is one of the strongest forces shaping our lives. A particularly vivid dream can stick with someone for a lifetime. One I had many years ago while still in my teens remains as vivid to me as the day I had it. In the dream I was flying over the playing field at my old grammar school. In writing this, I did a quick cataloging of those sorts of dreams and I have six of them.

I’m sure I’m not alone in this (our own Donis Casey wrote about this a short while back), but I occasionally experience what I like to call “novel dreams”, highly detailed, linear “stories” from which I wake and tell myself, “You should write this down. It would make a hell of a book.”

Of course, I never do. I might wake up enough to think this. I might even wake up enough to think about the dream in order to memorize the salient points of the story. Then I roll over, go back to sleep, and have most of those salient story points disappear into the great beyond by the time I wake up the next morning.

As a side comment, I’ve also taught myself to dream lucidly — a bit. For those not familiar with the term, it simply means that you are aware of the fact you’re dreaming as you’re in the middle of the dream. People who are adept at this technique can actually impose their conscious mind on their unconscious mind and somewhat direct the course of their dreams. I’ve only managed this a handful of times over the years, but I have taught myself to regularly wake up from frustration-type dreams whenever I have them.

About a month ago, I made a vow that the next time I have one of my “novel dreams”, I would wake myself up at the end, and this time I would get it all down, even if that meant completely disturbing my night’s sleep.

So, last Friday, it happened, and everything worked like a charm. The dream was just winding down, I realized from inside the dream that this was happening, woke myself up and grabbed my little digital dictation machine.

Rather than go downstairs, I snuck into our en suite bathroom and spent just over 6 minutes dictating the high points of the dream’s plot. Satisfied, I went back to bed, and even managed to drift off again after a half hour.

Only one problem: when I got up the next morning and switched on the dictation machine, what greeted me was a complete string of gobbledegook. It sounded as if I was talking in my sleep. Much of it was unintelligible, little of it made any sense, and what did sort of make sense was absolutely ridiculous.

My guess is that I never woke up enough. If I didn’t have the hard evidence of the recording, I would likely swear that I dreamed getting up and going to the bathroom to dictate my story.

Little flashes of the original dream are still floating around in my noggin, but nothing like the complete story. Even so, those bits and pieces are intriguing and might have been something worthwhile.

Undaunted, I’m going to try again. Next time, though, I will get out of bed, go downstairs and write it all on the computer, fully awake. Unless I can somehow manage to “sleep type”, I should get a proper read on whether these dreams are anything worth mining for story ideas, or some half-baked thing that’s created by my unconscious mind to taunt me.

There are accounts of authors who have dreamed their books first (Robert Louis Stevenson with The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, for instance), so I have to believe it’s possible. Has anyone else accomplished this or tried to do it?

I’ll let you know how my noble experiment is progressing.

As Sick as a Parrot

Sybil here. I’ve been working through the comments from my editor for my next book, Paint the Town Dead. As usual, she has many useful things to say. And, as usual, some cliches have managed to slip through. To keep the flow of writing going, I don’t worry about cliches in the first draft, but I do try to excise them from the one I send to my editor.

This exercise got me thinking about cliches and how to get rid of them so I consulted my trusty(?) internet and came up with a few websites that I thought you all might find interesting.

The first one that popped up was from the Oxford Dictionary, which had a procedure to help get rid of cliches in your writing. (‘Cause as a former programmer, I can relate to algorithms and procedures.) What struck me as funny about this one was the first “cliche” noted on the site: as sick as a parrot. Well, as a United Statesian*, I had never heard of this one. Had to look it up on the internet to find out it means “to be very disappointed”. I’ve never read or heard this anywhere here in the U.S. I assume, given this is an Oxford Dictionary site, this is a British thing. Is it common in Canada as well? Has anyone heard it in the U.S.?

The next site I visited was tips from Grammar Girl on avoiding cliches. This one has some interesting historical tidbits on where some cliches come from as well as suggestions on how to get rid of them. Plus there are some links at the bottom of the article that I found interesting.

One in particular was the Phrase Finder where you can type in a word like “cat” and it’ll tell you phrases that include that word. Raining cats and dogs, no room to swing a cat,... For each phrase there’s a discussion on its origins. Great fun if you want to avoid doing real work.

And the last site I found before I gave up on searching was http://writing2.richmond.edu/writing/wweb/cliche.html

I’m sure there are a lot more sites out there with tips but I must get back to my edits since they’re due in a week.

*United Statesian – see Donis Casey’s post awhile back on Thanksgiving where she mentions the phrase in a footnote: http://typem4murder.blogspot.com/2014/11/thanksgiving-already.html

Computer translation to the rescue!

by Rick Blechta

For today’s post, we’re going to have fun, courtesy of Vicki. She found or was sent a link to a reprint of the Arthur Ellis Awards shortlist announcement made last Thursday.

That’s a good thing, right? The word is being spread around the world. The shortlisted books will garner increased sales due to their notoriety. Everyone, publishers and authors will win.

Except there’s a catch with this particular version of the Arthur shortlist.

We believe what you’re about to see was translated into another language and then translated back into English by one of those online, automated translation sites. The results are often unintentionally hilarious.

Vicki alerted me to what was done to the novella category in which we’re both nominated (an honour to be nominated, especially alongside my old pal, Vicki). And congrats to Barbara, as well!

First here’s the original announcement:

Best Novella
Rick Blechta, The Boom Room, Orca Book Publishers
Vicki Delany, Juba Good, Orca Book Publishers
Ian Hamilton, The Dragon Head of Hong Kong, House of Anansi
Jas. R. Petrin, A Knock on the Door, Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine

and now the translated site’s version:

Greatest Novella
Rick Blechta, The Improve Room, Orca E book Publishers
Vicki Delany, Juba Simply Proper, Orca E-book Publishers
Ian Hamilton, The Dragon Head of Hong Kong, Area of Anansi
Jas. R. Petrin, A Knock on the Door, Alfred Hitchcock’s Thriller Magazine

I love The Improve Room and Juba Simply Proper. What great titles. Vicki and I should have used them. From now on I’m going to use the services of Google Translator, run my titles through several languages and then back to English. I’m sure it will make my publications far more memorable.

You’ll also notice that our category went from “Best Novella” to “Greatest Novella”. That’s a huge improvement. However it’s not as good as the change in the category in which Barbara is nominated. “Best Novel” changed to “Absolute Greatest Novel”. That means if she wins, she will have written the most important crime novel ever. Holy Mackinaw! What an honour!!

Here are the links to both lists (the official one and the one we’re talking about). There are several more translational gems:

• http://crimewriterscanada.com/
• http://worldnewss.net/the-2015-arthur-ellis-awards-shortlists-for-crime-writing/

Not to leave out the rest of the Type M crowd, here are examples of everyone’s book titles (from the left-hand column of this page) run through Google Translator. I think we’ll try English to Spanish to German to English:

• From book and breaking by Vicki Delany (Not quite what she had in mind, I’m sure.)
• What the Sawfly by Frankie Bailey (A mystery about insects. A first!)
• None So Blind by Barbara Fradkin (She came through with flying colours!)
• Roses for a Diva by Rick Blechta (So did I!)
• Fatal Stroke by Sybil Johnson (Forget the artist crap and go for the gusto!)
• Ill Feeling by Aline Templeton (A bit wishy-washy for the title of a mystery I’d say.)
• Crossing Bitter by D.A. Keeley (Close, but no cigar, John)
• Hidden Heritage by Charlotte Hinger (Obviously, Charlotte picked wisely.)
• Wrong Hill to Die by Donis Casey (Must be a geographical mystery. Another first!)
• Werewolf Smackdown by Mario Acevedo (The magic in this title defied translation!)

And finally, just to show you how much computer translations have helped understanding in our complicated world, I present the second paragraph in today’s post translated into Spanish, then German, and back to English:

That's a good thing, right? Spread the word throughout the world. Should come Garner preselection books increased sales due to its notoriety. Each winning publishers and authors.

See? Exactly the same! Err…

Home again, home again

By Vicki Delany

Here I am relaxing at home. (Not actually relaxing, mind because I have three books still to be released in 2015 and more to write for 2016, but you get the point). Over the months of February and March I visited Arizona, North Carolina, Florida, Oregon, Michigan, and Pennsylvania.  Oh, and my home province of Ontario also.

All in the service of promoting my newest book, By Book or By Crook, the first in the Lighthouse Library series, written under the pen name of Eva Gates.

Its been an exhausting schedule, but as has been said many times before, the best part of being a writer is the friends you make.  I travelled and did appearances with Kate Carlisle, Jenn McKinley, Donis Casey, Erika Chase, and Barbara Fradkin. I talked books with Molly Weston and Barbara Peters. At Left Coast Crime in Portland, I hung around with the great Canadian contingent of Robin Harlick, Cathy Ace, Sam Wiebe, Linda Wiken, Barbara Fradkin, Eric Brown and Madeleine Harris-Callway (some of whom are pictured below).
















And there I met readers galore. Below is the table that Linda Wiken and I hosted at the LCC banquet. 

I am often asked if I find this sort of tour worthwhile, and I say yes.  With some reservations. It`s always difficult to tell what lasting effect (if any) your appearance will have.  I didn’t sell anywhere near enough books to pay for the flights and hotels, nor did I expect to, but I hope it will pay back over time.  I signed at Mystery on the Beach in Del Ray Beach Florida and By Book or By Crook was the number five bestselling paperback (trade and mass market) in the store for February. 

Booksellers who might not have read my new book otherwise, read it because I was coming, and loved it and so they promoted it to their customers. Certainly being on a panel with bestselling cozy authors like Jenn McKinlay and Kate Carlisle is invaluable for introducing Eva Gates as a new cozy author.

Cave Creek AZ with Kate Carlisle and Jenn McKinlay

Wherever I was I managed to find the time to drop into Barnes and Nobel to sign copies of the store stock of By Book or By Crook and slip my bookmarks into them.  Hopefully, browsing readers will come across them.

Next up: Malice Domestic in Bethesda, May 1 – 3, and the Mechanicsburg Mystery bookstore in Mechanicsburg PA on May 3rd. And, best of all, ROAD TRIP! with Mary Jane Maffini and Linda Wiken.

Until then, I had better get some writing done. 

An Eating Tour

By Vicki Delany

Last week I went to Raleigh, North Carolina on an extensive book tour. I travelled with my friend Linda Wiken (aka Erika Chase) and Type M’s own Donis Casey. Our escort and superb organizer was the indomitable Molly Weston.

Did I say, book tour? I fear it turned into more of an eating tour with a few book signings thrown in. North Carolina cooking, I have discovered, is FABULOUS!

And that's just great for me (if not for the waistline) because my new cozy series, the Lighthouse Library Series, is set in the Outer Banks of North Carolina. So all this eating was, of course, necessary research if I'm going to have veracity in the series.

I think I like hush puppies the best, followed closely by fried green tomatoes. I am not terribly fond of collards nor of okra (in the pic above to the left cooked with tomatoes).

 

But nothing, but nothing, beats shrimp and grits done well, as they were in the dish below. The cabbage was kinda an odd side though.

 

Oh, right, book tour...

Here are some pics of that:

A Visit to North Carolina and Head Meeting Desk

By Vicki Delany

First, before my rant of the week:

Are you in the Raleigh/Durham area of North Carolina?  If so, why not come out to one of my many events there this week and next.  I’ll be with fellow-TypeM-er Donis Casey, and Canada’s Mystery Maven, Linda Wiken (Erika Chase).  It will be sort of a meeting of the mavens as North Carolina Mystery Maven Molly Weston will be our guide. 

I understand the weather in North Carolina is not looking promising, so I will probably be packing this hat.

The full schedule of events can be found at http://vickidelany.blogspot.comhttp://vickidelany.blogspot.com

How much is one of my books worth to you? How much do you think my time is worth to me?

I’m hoping you’ve answered, more than 0.

But not everyone seems to think so.

I was approached this week by a profit-making corporation that promotes it’s product by doing public events.  And they charge a healthy sum for an evening of… participating in their promotion (food and drink is involved).  They invited me to a book-club type evening and the participants would be discussing one of my books.

Naturally, I said yes. Sounds like a great opportunity.

They replied and said they couldn’t afford to pay me. (Not good, but I will do book clubs without charging a fee. Off topic, but I do not do workshops for free, other than schools).  And, then they said I would be expected to GIVE each participant the book in plenty of time for them to read it before the meeting.

Uh, no. I was being asked to not only give up an evening of my time, appear in public to entertain people who have paid to attend the event, but donate a substantial number of my own books to boot. I would in short, counting my time, be out several hundred dollars.

So I said no. I suggested they contact my publisher to perhaps come up with a deal or a discount, but I am not giving them all the books so they can charge people to come to their event.

I said that as a writer I make my living by SELLING books. 

And what do you suppose the reply was to that? Oh, we didn’t realize you were self-published.

Huh? In case anyone out there doesn’t know, a standard publishing contact gives the author a small number of books to use for promotion, send to reviewers, etc. After that the author pays a slightly discounted rate for each book. So each book they wanted me to give to their participants would have cost me 50-60% of the cover price.

Frankly, I don’t know what we can do to about this sort of thing. Musicians say the same thing: The value of their time and of their product is seen as nothing.

It’s not helped by the number of books that are given away on Amazon etc. for free or for .99c.  A whole lot of people out there now believe that the value of a book is $0.00, certainly no more than $0.99. 

If you come to meet Donis, Linda, and me in North Carolina I can guarantee you will get a lot more than $0.00 worth of entertainment.