Guest post by Judy Penz Sheluk

I am happy to welcome to Type M our guest this weekend, Judy Penz Sheluk. A former journalist and magazine editor, Judy is the author of two mystery series: the Glass Dolphin Mysteries and the Marketville Mysteries. Her short crime fiction appears in several collections, including The Best Laid Plans and Heartbreaks & Half-truths, which she also edited.

Judy is a member of Sisters in Crime, International Thriller Writers, the Short Mystery Fiction Society, and Crime Writers of Canada, where she serves as Chair on the Board of Directors. Find her at www.judypenzsheluk.com.

Take it away, Judy!

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Someday, maybe

It was a cold, wintry day in February 2002. I was training for my first full marathon (Ottawa) and our program called for a 21k (13 mile) run. A saner person would have stayed in bed, put off the run for another day. Instead I covered my face with Vaseline, donned triple layers top and bottom, and ventured down to the Running Room, only to learn that all of my running mates had bailed. Disheartened, but determined, I was just about to head out on my own when a guy named Dan stopped me. “I’ll run with you,” he said.

Now, I didn’t really know Dan, beyond the fact that he did something in construction and ran with the blistering fast group (I ran with the slow plodders group), but he seemed like a nice guy, and the thought of running all those miles alone didn’t hold a lot of appeal. So off we went, and while Dan must have felt as if he were running in chains, he never once made me feel as if my snail-like pace was holding him back. And somewhere along those miles he told me he’d always wanted to be a lawyer, and I said I’d always wanted to write murder mysteries, and we both laughed and said, “someday, maybe.”

Fast forward to 2019. I’m at Chapters Bookstore in Newmarket with a table full of my books and a stack of bookmarks. It’s early, the store is quiet, and I’m preparing myself for a very long day, when who should appear before me but Dan. “I saw your notice on Facebook,” he said. “I’m so proud of you for following your dream.”

It turned out that Dan had also followed his dream, graduating from the prestigious Osgoode Hall School of Law in 2012, and now with a successful practice specializing in estate law. 

“Estate law,” I said, my author brain kicking into high gear. “I might need legal advice for my work-in-progress…” I let the words dangle, hoping he’d say, “Call me.” He did.

And that brings us to the point of this post (whew, you’re saying, that’s a long way to get to the finish line). Anyway, when it came to Where There’s A Will, book three in my Glass Dolphin cozy mystery series, not only did Dan help me with the finer points of estate law, he also shared a story about the will of Cecil George Harris, who, in June 1948, was pinned under his tractor on a farm near Rosetown, Saskatchewan. Fearing he may not survive, Harris used his pocketknife to scratch sixteen words onto the tractor’s fender. “In case I die in this mess I leave all to the wife. Cecil Geo Harris.”

“It would be ten hours before help arrived to take Harris to the hospital,” Dan told me. “He died the next day from his injuries, never mentioning the will, which was later discovered by neighbors. The fender was removed from the tractor and determined by the courts to be a valid holograph will. The fender was kept as evidence until 1996, when it was turned over to the University of Saskatchewan College of Law. It’s still there, on public display.”

Did Cecil’s saga make it into Where There’s A Will? Of course it did. It’s simply too good of a tidbit not to include. But even so, it’s just a tidbit, a fun fact blended into the fiction. What truly changed the course of the story, far beyond anything I could have planned or plotted, was something Dan wrote in response to one of my many questions.

“The dead can’t reach out from the grave.”

Or can they? I leave it for you to read the book to find out.

About the book: Emily Garland is getting married and looking for the perfect forever home. When the old, and some say haunted, Hadley house comes up for sale, she’s convinced it’s “the one.” The house is also perfect for reality TV star Miles Pemberton and his new series, House Haunters. Emily will fight for her dream home, but Pemberton’s pockets are deeper than Emily’s, and he’ll stretch the rules to get what he wants.

While Pemberton racks up enemies all around Lount’s Landing, Arabella Carpenter, Emily’s partner at the Glass Dolphin antiques shop, has been hired to appraise the contents of the estate, along with her ex-husband, Levon. Could the feuding beneficiaries decide there’s a conflict of interest? Could Pemberton?

Things get even more complicated when Arabella and Levon discover another will hidden inside the house, and with it, a decades-old secret. Can the property stay on the market? And if so, who will make the winning offer: Emily or Miles Pemberton?

Purchase Links:

• Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B08KFLQ6KH 
• B&N: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/where-theres-a-will-judy-penz-sheluk/1137780682?ean=2940162992455 
• Kobo: https://www.kobo.com/ca/en/ebook/where-there-s-a-will-87 
• Apple: https://books.apple.com/us/book/where-theres-a-will/id1533844283?ls=1
  

Improve!

Kathleen O'Neal Gear and W. Michael Gear were keynote speakers at the recent Women Writing the West conference. The Gears have over 17 millions copies of their books in print worldwide and translations into 29 languages.

 If that weren't enough to turn you green with envy, Kathleen has a super academic record. She has published over 200 articles in the fields of archaeology, history, and bison conservation. The United States Department of the Interior has twice awarded her a "Special Achievement Award" and she received a "Certificate of Special Congressional Recognition" from the United States Congress in 2015. 

I met the Gears when they first attended a Western Writers Conference in Fort Worth. At that time they were living in a cabin in Colorado. I recall Michael saying they just had a mattress thrown on the floor. It was all they could afford. 

In the late Richard Wheeler's autobiography, An Accidental Novelist,  he reported on meeting the Gears (yet unpublished) at that same convention. He was interviewing wannabes for Walker Publishing and agree to read their stories. After the convention, a UPS truck delivered an enormous box. "I discovered a cache of manuscripts, five hundred pagers, one thousand pagers, one after the other." Wheeler was looking for books of about 60,000 words and could not publish these monsters. 

When they did finally begin selling, Michael told Richard they were down to their last 75 bucks and about to return to contract archeology. Richard points out that they were both willing to integrate editorial suggestions and made swift progress toward becoming best-selling novelists. 

In Michael's talk at WWW he stressed the important of improving one's writing. He emphasized that writing has changed over the years and we must read today's best-selling authors to understand how styles have evolved. 

I read a lot and some of my favorite novels were written during the 60s. It was the era of great social novels which were mini history lessons that captured the spirit of America. I learned more about the Civil Rights movement in a novel, Five Smooth Stones, that I have in any of my African American textbooks. And I own a bunch!

Yet, in re-reading these books, I find that language is stilted, and exposition and explanations are too drawn out. A lot of books that were best sellers during the years they were published would be rejected today. 

People are in a hurry. They don't put up with much. They like short chapters with whiffs of a backstory. I heard someone say that Americans like a lot of white space. Michael encouraged the listeners to read broadly. Read all the genres on the best-sellers list. Think about techniques that might improve our own writing. 

This is not a license for degrading our writing. Think of how much is conveyed in poetic images. It can be a new art form. 

Now don't yell! Once I asked writing students to notice how James Patterson changed a whole plot with a chapter ending with a one word paragraph. I know how disheartening it is to walk into a library and see seventeen copies of Patterson's latest book on the shelf. But there's a reason why he sells. 

It's a challenge to cultivate our own style and voice while keeping all the new rules in mind. When you feel frustrated, remember the Gears and their astonishing determination. They wrote a lot before they discovered the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.  

A week in slow motion

I greatly appreciated Rick’s Tuesday post. Tuesday, for me, dragged on and on and on. I’m usually pretty good at keeping myself busy. As I mentioned in my last post, my mother has read four or five books a week since COVID isolation began. (Be nice to my mother. We need readers like her.) I haven’t been that voracious, but I’ve read a few –– I’m enjoying Megan Abbott’s YOU WILL KNOW ME and Adam O’Fallon Price’s HOTEL NEVERSINK –– and I’ve lost 40 pounds since COVID began.

But Tuesday didn’t feel like a productive day. Taught two classes over ZOOM. Met with students. Lots of pacing.

And the more I thought about it, the more I thought that is what most writers do, isn’t it? Pace?

In actuality, the waiting keeps us going.

Wait for the next idea or story to emerge. Wait for the rejection. No, the acceptance. But still waiting. Waiting is part of this game we all long ago decided to enter and to which we have dedicated blood, sweat, bourbon, and tears. And what to do while we wait? Write the one that shows up, even if it’s not the one you hoped for. There really is no other answer.

And for that reason, a frustration I’ve always had about this business is that so much of what happens is out of my hands. An agent pitches your book. A publisher decides whether or not to read it based on the agent’s pitch. It’s a product-based business that only tangentially revolves around the product.

“Your previous sales numbers aren’t good.”
“Okay, but do you like the new book?”
“Your previous sales numbers aren’t good.”

You can’t wait for sales numbers to change. You write the one that shows up. So Tuesday, if nothing else, I wrote a few pages –– and paced long into the night, waiting.

Social Distancing? Quarantini? Faceism?

 

Hard to believe it’s almost the end of the year. Pretty soon it’ll be January and time for various organizations to decide on the word/phrase of the year. The words they choose don’t have to be new words, but ones that reflect what happened during that year.

In a post awhile back, I talked about how the American Dialect Society selects its word. It’s done at their annual conference in January. Sadly, the 2021 conference has been cancelled due to Covid, but they’re looking into remote meetings. We’ll have to see what they come up with.

These are the words that various organizations chose for 2019:

American Dialect Society – “(my) pronouns”. Their Word of the Decade is “they”.

Merriam-Webster – “they”

Oxford – “climate emergency”

Dictionary.com – “existential”

Here are some possibilities I came up with for 2020:

social distancing/physical distancing – I don’t remember hearing either of these phrases before 2020 so I think either/both of them are good candidates.

self-quarantining – Lots of people have been doing this.

quarantini – A drink you drink during lockdown. I’ve also heard it used as a description of a get-together with friends via video-conferencing instead of at a bar.

Covid-19 – One strain of the coronavirus. Yeah, it describes this year all right, but let’s come up with something better.

faceism – When we make quick, unfair judgments about people we don’t even know based on seeing their face. I’ve been hearing this a lot recently.

Covid fatigue/pandemic fatigue – Tired of being cooped up. Tired of being careful. Tired of being scared.

safer at home – At the beginning of all this, we were told we’re not “sheltering in place”, we’re just “safer at home”.

quarrulent logorrhea – I added this one after reading Thomas’ post on Monday.

There’s still a couple months left in the year so who knows what new words/phrases will pop up. Perhaps we’ll have another “pregnant chad” situation and some new election phrase will come into vogue.

You may have noticed that I haven’t mentioned the election until now. I wrote this before the polls closed in the U.S., before the results were known. Heck, maybe we don’t even know the results yet given the large number of mail-in ballots.

When the various organizations select their words, we’ll have to see if they chose one of these or selected something else. I rather like “social distancing” myself.

What about you? Any other words/phrases that describe 2020? What has your vote?

Today is a special day

by Rick Blechta

I won’t bore you with why it’s so special. If you don’t know, then I won’t ruin your day by reminding you why.

However, I’m finding it rather to focus on much, so I thought I would do something fun.

We all know 2020 has not been kind to everyone. Back on December 31st, I remember being with some dear friends and as we toasted the new year, someone said (probably moi), “Here’s to a brand new year! It’s going to be so much better than 2019. No way it could be worse.” I’m still doing a face plant when I think about how wrong the statement turned out to be.

So let’s laugh about it. Here are some memes I’ve been collecting over the past few weeks. Hope they make you at least smile!

IF 2020 WAS A MATH PROBLEM: If you’re walking on the ice cream at 5 ounces per toaster, and your bicycle loses a sock, how much gravy will you need to repaint your hamster?

ONE DAY 2020 WILL BE THE ONE-WORD CATCHPHRASE FOR EVERYTHING MESSED UP AND BAD; “How’s your day going?” “A total 2020.” “Say no more…”

IN 20 YEARS WHEN KIDS ASK ABOUT THE 2020 TOILET PAPER SHORTAGE, I’m telling them we had to drag our butts across the lawn — in the snow — uphill. Both ways.

Hope I get what I’m wishing for tomorrow morning!

On Elections and Quarrulent Logorrhea

 Seriously.  

Is anyone thinking about writing today, the day before election day?  I know I’m not. 

Since everyone else is talking about the election, let’s jump in ourselves, shall we?

In 1758, a young George Washington was running as a candidate in Virginia for a seat in the House of Burgesses.  Washington spent his entire campaign budget, 50 pounds, on 160 gallons of liquor to 391 voters.  Already a custom in England, it had become a tradition in Virginia to roll barrels of booze into polling places as encouragement to voters. 

While he was president, Andrew Jackson said that he had only two regrets. “That I have not shot Henry Clay or hanged John C. Calhoun.”  Here’s a recap on Jackson’s backstory.  Before he became president in 1829, he’d fought in three wars and is said to have participate in up to 100 duels, including one in which he killed his opponent.  Once president, he passed the Indian Removal Act and was responsible for 4,000 Cherokee deaths on the Trail of Tears. 

In 1844, James Polk ran against Henry Clay and won the presidency.  That was in spite of the fact that Clay, in trying to appeal to the massive Irish population in New York City at the time, claimed that he was an immigrant, and his real name was “Patrick O’Clay.”

In 1876, in an attempt to beat Rutherford B. Hayes, the opposing party spread a malicious rumor.  They claimed that Hayes shot his own mother “in a fit of insanity” after a long night of drinking in Ohio.  His mother was, in fact, already dead so she wasn’t around to help debunk the rumor.  Hayes lost the popular vote to Samuel J. Tilden but won in a wildly disputed electoral college vote.

In 1896, the New York Times endorsed William McKinley for president.  They also ran an article about his opponent, William Jennings Bryan, with the headline, “Is Mr. Bryan Crazy?”  So-called experts were interviewed and concluded that Bryan suffered from megalomania, delusions of grandeur, and quarrulent logorrhea, which means he complained too much.  One of the psychiatric “experts” said, “I should like to examine him as a degenerate.”

Quarrulent logorrhea…oh yeah, I’m using that. 

In 1952, Dwight Eisenhower was expected to have an easy win over Adlai Stevenson.  Making it worse, Stevenson wasn’t helped when a flyer was distributed throughout the American heartland that claimed Stevenson had once killed a young girl “in a jealous rage.”

Also, in 1952, President Harry S. Truman said about General Dwight D. Eisenhower, “The General doesn’t know any more about politics than a pig knows about Sunday.”  Eight years later, when Eisenhower’s vice president, Richard Nixon, ran for president, Truman said that Nixon was a “no-good lying bastard,” and he told a crowd that anyone who votes for him “ought to go to hell.”

President Lyndon B. Johnson was well known for his crude put-downs.  He also wanted people to know where he was superior to President John F. Kennedy, under whom Johnson had served and then succeeded.  Presidential historian Robert Dallek wrote, “When people mentioned Kennedy’s many affairs, Johnson would bang on the table and declare that he had more women by accident than Kennedy had ever had on purpose.”

So, on that classy note, please go out and vote.

Guest Blogger Judith Starkston

Type M is honored to welcome our weekend guest blogger, the inimitable Judith Starkston. Judy has two degrees in Classics from the University of California, Santa Cruz and Cornell. She loves myths and telling stories. This has gradually gotten more and more out of hand. Her solution: to write fantasy set in the exotic worlds of the past. Her first novel, Hand of Fire, set during the Trojan War, was a semi-finalist for the M.M. Bennett’s Award for Historical Fiction. Priestess of Ishana, featuring Bronze Age Hittite priestess Tesha, won the San Diego State University Conference Choice Award. Her latest Tesha novel, Of Kings and Griffins, about a vicious king, vengeful griffins, and a scheming goddess, is available now on Amazon. As Judith says so succinctly, we all need a good escape these days!

Many thanks to Donis Casey for inviting me to visit on Type M for Murder today and tell you about my latest book, Of Kings and Griffins.

Of Kings and Griffins starts with a corpse—adorned with a gold sun disk and lying on an ebony bier—but it isn’t a murder mystery. The question is not who done it, but what happens next. The stakes quickly turn to life and death. Set in a Bronze Age empire that suffers from sometimes modern-feeling crises, the book is about a world upended when the king dies and his heir isn’t really up to the job, no matter what he thinks. The new ruler has insecurities and arrogance that make him unpredictable, but there are few limits on his power, and he’s chafing even at those.

Within this dangerous context, the main character, Tesha, a young woman who is both a priestess and a lesser queen, tries to forge a safe path for her husband, daughter, and sister, as well as her small, fractious kingdom that is part of the great empire this new king reigns over. Her tools to accomplish this goal of safety and happiness are intriguing and sometimes frustrating. Her husband is the most successful military leader of the time, but that draws the new king’s jealousy. She uses her strategic mind along with her diplomatic skills, but those processes are slow and the results ambiguous. She’s always counted on the active support of the goddess of love and war, but Tesha also has her own magic. The old king created a loophole for her to exercise her powers to benefit his empire, but sorcery is forbidden. Now his son views her abilities with intense suspicion and that loophole is turning into a snare. Even her goddess may be laying traps. When her sister disappears into the land of griffins, mythical beasts whom Tesha’s sister has warned her to fear, Tesha believes she has to take extreme action. But the temptation to seize control through her magical powers—justified to keep her family and country safe—may be the biggest danger of all. 

My historical fantasy is based on the life of a Hittite queen who was all but forgotten by history. The rites she practiced as a priestess, which have come down to us on clay tablets, offer tantalizing windows into their religious magic. I have melded this Hittite predilection for psychologically fascinating magic with events from Hittite history, and created a potent mix of politics, fantasy, romance, and intrigue. The griffins, who take a major role in this book, are depicted throughout Hittite artwork, even on the walls of throne rooms. As far as history can tell, they never actually entered into the plots and schemes of men and women, but I can vouch that they are way more fun than dragons.

And we all need a really good escape these days.

Of Kings and Griffins is book 3 in the Tesha series but is easily read as a standalone. Jump right in with this book.

If you would like to learn more about Judith Starkston, this series, or its historical background, go to her website. Sign up for her newsletter to receive book news and giveaways, a short story and Bronze Age cookbook.

When the Veil Between the Worlds Thins...

Appropriately enough, November 2, the day before Election Day in the U.S., is the Day of the Dead, a Spanish/Aztec celebration much beloved down here in southern Arizona. Día de los Muertos is a day for remembering your loved ones who have passed on. It’s like a family reunion, with your dead ancestors as the guests of honor. Day of the Dead is a usually a joyful time, with parades, music, costumes, lots of food, and a candlelit altar to help the dead find their way home for the two days of the year (Nov. 1 and 2), when the living and the dead can commune. I intend to do quite a lot of remembering and communing this year, finding some peace and happy memories in a time of chaos that I'll be happy to put behind me.

On the Day of the Dead, Families Have a Picnic on the Graves of their Deceased Loved Ones

Throughout the 1990s, I ran a little shop and sold imports from  Scotland, Ireland, and Wales. For a decade I was totally immersed in the Celtic culture. Oct. 31 and Nov. 1 are very important days in the Celtic calendar, for at midnight, the veil between the world of the living and the world of the dead thins, and we may actually be able to see one another.

All those Celtic peoples who came to the New World early on and settled on the frontiers and the back woods, from whom many, many of us descend, myself included, had a view of existence that is very different from the modern way of looking at things. We wonder how such realistic and practical people could have so readily believed in ghosts and haints and contact with the dead.  It had to be because they were ignorant and uneducated, we think, and obviously not as smart as we are.

But I say, au contraire, my friends. As I travel through this life, I begin to have an intimation that things are not necessarily what they seem. We perceive the world as we have been taught to do. We see what we are looking for.

My great-grandmother, whom I was privileged to know when I was a girl, knew there were spirits abroad just as firmly as she knew the sky was blue. She had seen them, and she believed the evidence of her own eyes. Did she really see them, or was she deluded? I’ve never seen a ghost. Am I realistic, or am I blind? How does a sighted person convince someone who has never seen that there is a color blue?

My husband remembers that every Halloween, his father would dig a pit in back of the house, line it with bricks, fill it with wood, and light what they called a "bonfire", though it was more like a good sized campfire. The family would sit around it and roast wieners and marshmallows on sticks and stretched-out hangars. He has no idea where the family tradition came from, but I'm guessing it was passed down through the family from the misty past, for such traditions are remarkably enduring. So, if you live in the country or don't worry about being fined for building an open fire in your back yard, stretch out those hangars and get yourself a bag of marshmallows, and take a trip into the past with some campfire s’mores. Put a slab of Hershey bar on top of a Graham cracker, put a melty-hot roasted marshmallow on the chocolate, top with another Graham cracker, and enjoy. 

And while you’re at it, be sure to light a candle to guide your loved ones home.

Neither a plotter nor a pantser be

I am fascinated by the many approaches writers use to writing a novel, and the attempts they make to conceptualize and pigeonhole their approach. Plotters and pantsers have been around for a while, and now my fellow Type Mers have introduced me to another – the plantser, aptly described by Sybil as a hybrid version. This 'neither here nor there' approach recognizes that writing is a spectrum, not a dichotomy. In fact, although writers may predominantly favour one style, they may use another if the mood or the task requires it. I am much more likely to be a plantser when writing a short story, mostly because short stories don't allow much room for stumbling around wondering where I'm going.

I also used the plotter style for some of my earlier Rapid Reads novellas because the publisher required a thorough outline before offering a contract. With these novellas, like short stories, there is no room for wandering, and the plots are straightforward, linear, and devoid of subplots. It's easy to write an outline in a straight line. 'This happens, which leads to that, and then that...' Even so, when I actually sat down to write the novella, the outline proved inadequate and both characters and storyline became richer. Luckily, few publishers complain when the end result is better than the plan.

Rapid Reads novella

Sybil also described another intersecting spectrum  -- lawful to neutral to chaotic - which I had not heard before, possibly because I avoid reading "how to" books. I don't like to analyze how I write, where my ideas come from and how my characters emerge. For me, there is a certain magic to the writing experience. Ideas come to me from somewhere in the jumbled cauldron of my subconscious, and I'm afraid if I look too closely, they will disappear. I also don't want to follow someone's plan for how to create the perfect novel, complete with heroes' journeys and three thrill points. These guides can be useful at the self-editing stage when you're trying to figure out why on earth the story isn't working, but as a creative aid, they are killers. Too close to paint by number. 

I read Sybil's link on lawful to chaotic styles with great interest. It breaks the process into more elements, like how you create character, what order you write scenes, how you use outlines. I still don't fit into any box, although there are some I never enter, but I generally jump around between pantser and plantser, and between lawful and neutral. 

Note the change of direction at the end 

I was interested to discover that I am rarely chaotic, even though in my mind my process feels quite chaotic. Chaotic as used in this matrix seems to refer to the order in which you move through a story. Do you write scenes out of order, copy and paste or shuffle them around, and end up with a "Frankendraft"? This is the one approach that would never work for me, because each scene grows out of the scene before, and the character's later actions and thoughts evolve out of what they went through before. I will insert scenes or move a scene around during rewrites once I can see the whole story.

It's a useful look at the writing process and entertaining to see how other writers approach it. I actually met a highly successful chaotic plotter (a combination I would not have thought possible). The important point is that there is no right or wrong way to write, just your way, and that depends on your personality, your experience, and the way that magic muse comes to you. What do other writers think? Where do you fit in?

Sorry I'm so late!

by Rick Blechta

I unexpectedly had to go out of town this morning to pick up something in the nearby city of Hamilton. I only realized after I’d said I could go that today was Tuesday — meaning Type M for Murder.

Anyway, here I my thoughts and observations for this 27th of October, 2020.

The original title of this post was going to be: Book Promotion in this time of COVID, so let’s start from there!

Several months back I was approached by Tampa-Hillsborough County Public Library in Florida, to take part in an online authors event. To say the least, I was very honoured to be asked. It’s part of a program called Written By. (I was even more thrilled when I saw how many of my novels and novellas they had in their collection.

Thing is, I’ve never done anything like this online. We had to do a tech check to make sure that I could connect when the rubber hit the road — good thing too because I skidded right off the information highway a couple of times!

The odd thing about the set-up is that I will be speaking to a faceless audience. They will be able to see me and the moderator, but we won’t be able to see them. We can’t speak directly, either, and all questions at the end of my talk will be read by the moderator.

Have things changed over the last several months. Speaking online is something very new to me.

I’m hoping I will be an effective speaker, but not being able to look out over the audience is going to mean I have to just trust that I’m doing a good job. Normally I look at an audience and tailor what I’m saying and the direction in which I’m taking my talk judging by how engaged the audience looks. Having been a school teacher for a good part of my working life, I know how to spot glazed eyeballs! Too bad that ain’t gonna work this time.

That’s all out the window with this assignment, and I have to say I am a bit concerned. Maybe it might be a good idea to take a break in the middle of my talk (the difficulty of writing fiction when the format has to be kept very simple for low-skill readers) and take a few questions from the audience to better gauge where their interests lie. I just don’t know. I’m pretty good at thinking on the fly, but that doesn’t mean I enjoy doing it.

The talk is open to anyone, anywhere, so if you wish to drop by, please do so. I need all the moral support I can muster! Thanks in advance to any of you who can make it.

Here are the deets you need to know:

Wednesday, November 4th at 6:30 PM Eastern Standard Time

It finishes around 7:00

And it’s absolutely free!

Here is the link to sign up: https://attendee.gotowebinar.com/register/4279599831956390155 

Support your local Type M for Murder author — and do it from the comfort of your own home. Such convenience!

I thank you. 

Cruising the block

I made mention of the guilt writers can feel when not writing last time I was here. Was that really two weeks ago? Time flies when you're having fun. Or when you're dealing with edits from the seventh circle of hell.

The fact is, I can very easily not write. In fact, I am something of an expert. I will seize any excuse not to throw words at the screen and sometimes it's as if there are traps all around my desk preventing me from even reaching it, like Indiana Jones trying to get to the golden figurine at the start of 'Raiders of the Lost Ark.' 

And I don't even have a bullwhip.

What is also a fact is that when I don't write - if, say, I abandon all hope of getting anything cogent down and I retire to the couch to watch a movie (for instance, Raiders) - the guilt kicks in.

You see, writing is a job and I know I should be doing it. I can make all the excuses I want but in the end I see them for the imposters they are.

The thing is, there are days when I just cannot string words together. That does not mean I have the dreaded writer's block.

I don't believe in writers' block. The Late Terry Pratchett once said, "There is no such thing as writer's block. That was invented by people in California who couldn't write." My apologies to anyone in the Golden State who is reading this. I'm sure Mr Pratchett was wrong.

Philip Pullman said, "Do plumbers get plumber’s block? What would you think of a plumber who used that as an excuse not to do any work that day?"

Whenever I feel my little hand fluttering to my forehead and I sink onto a chaise longue bewailing the fact that my muse has deserted me, I remind myself that I'm a writer and writers write. Right?

By the way, I have never actually done anything like the above. I'm from Glasgow, the toughest city in Scotland, and such behaviour would be viewed with contempt and quite possibly an admonishment to pull oneself together. Swearing and perhaps physical encouragement may also be employed.

So, no writers block but that doesn't mean I don't find myself stuck. There can be many reasons for this, principally the fact that I am not a plotter. I am not even a plantster, as I read here on Type M last week. I am very much a pantster and as such I hit many patches where, frankly, I don't know what the hell is happening.

I wrote around 30,000 to 40,000 words of my book The Dead Don't Boogie before I had to force myself stop and decide what it was actually about. I had all kinds of mayhem going on in Glasgow (it really is a relatively peaceful city despite being the toughest) but with no clear notion as to why. 

So I took myself and my dog off onto the moors to let the Scottish elements blow away the cobwebs. And sometimes just about everything else. The next day, I had a germ of an idea and I was able to complete the draft, then retro fit what I'd already written. 

When you hit a block in the road you either drive round it or, if you are Indiana Jones, drive through it. Sometimes you have to go back and find a different route.

I have come to a shuddering halt with at least two books and could not power through, go round or go back. I began filled with enthusiasm and I knew where I wanted to go but had reached a point where I was questioning why I was actually writing this damn thing. They were examples of an author writing the wrong book. I didn't know it when I began but I sure knew it by the time I found my words, ideas and interest dried up. I wasn't blocked. I just didn't care anymore.

That wouldn't happen to a plotter, I'm sure, but try as I might I don't have the discipline or the patience to go that route.

Here's the thing though - I still feel guilty that I didn't complete those stories. Maybe I will one day, when the time is right.

The Robots Have Won

Pardon my erratic posting. You'd think with the pandemic lockdown I would've settled into a definite routine but things can get very uncertain with interruptions coming at the last moment. 

The title for this post was inspired by a comment made by Scott Adams, of Dilbert fame, and I'll get to that in a bit. Not too long ago, a couple of years maybe but seems like eons in our current conceptual thinking, the big scare was the Robot-apocalypse. Machines would take over and start to push us humans around. Eventually we'd end up in a Terminator world or The Matrix. Now a biological virus has temporarily shelved those fears. 

Back to Scott Adams. He claimed that AI--Artificial Intelligence--is now in charge of human decisions, in other words, the machines have won. His reasoning is that much of what goes online is decided by algorithms administered by AI that can reach across platforms. These algorithms exist for one reason, to maximize profit for the owners of the AI. How this happens is that the AI culls through reactions to what's posted on media--click bait is the most common example. The AI compares what generated the most clicks and delivers reports accordingly to the programmers. AI can now write new algorithms for itself (no need for meat-bag programmers), the measure being what generates the most traffic, not just on social media posts but across the spectrum of electronic content from phones, smart speakers, license plate readers, cash registers, you name it. Powerful computers with enormous banks of memory have you under the microscope. Keep in mind that everything about you is being cataloged--what you wrote, where you go, when were you there, what did you look at, what did you listen to, what did you buy, who was with you? Health monitors and smart watches add your physical vitals. It's possible for AI to track your physiological response to what you look at on Facebook. If you had an intense emotional reaction to a news article, for example, AI knows that, and more importantly, what did you do afterwards? Who did you contact? What did you share? AI has amassed about each of us an extensive glossary of personal trigger words and incorporates them to nudge us toward a desired response. Positive scenario: if we're shopping for a winter coat, the machine knows what styles and colors we prefer and displays the appropriate selections. Negative scenario: if AI, rather its big tech owner, wants us to vote a certain way, then dark trigger words can be used to steer us from the "wrong" decision. 

We've already known people who've been in Facebook jail or demonetized on YouTube because an algorithm decided what they posted was against "community standards." What AI did was read or listen to the content and decide based on certain words that it was inappropriate, regardless of the context. Twitter banned links to the Babylon Bee because the AI didn't understand satire. Sadly, rather than admit the shortcomings of the algorithms, big tech prefers to side with them because in the long term, the gains in massive data harvesting outweigh the occasional stumble.

We've created a symbiotic relationship with AI, which has morphed into a ruthlessly effective parasite because it gives us what we want. We in turn, let it grow and expand and take more and more control. We could unplug from AI but we've become emotionally dependent on its power to provide instant gratification. And every solution we have to the perils of this dependency seem to involve yet a deeper co-dependence. Spending too much time online? Then try this app that monitors your usage and decides when you've had enough.

All this time George Orwell thought we'd have Big Brother forced upon us when instead we willingly climbed into his lap. Little did we suspect that Big Brother would be a robot.

Our Poor State

This picture was taken in the front of my house. The actual fire is miles away. Nevertheless this is what the sky looked like in Fort Collins on Wednesday. 

So many homes have been destroyed, so much acreage and trees. It's heartbreaking. The biggest fire in Colorado history is now competing with the second largest fire in Colorado history. 

I'm sorry to be so late posting this. I'm a little under the weather today. It's difficult to tell at this point what is causing a health problem. Covid, allergies, the flu, and an ordinary cold all have the same systems. Now smoke irritation has been added to the mix. I tend to error on the side of caution and self-isolate rather than risk infecting my friends or my family. 

I intended to report on a terrific talk given by Michael Gear and Kathleen Gear. They were the keynote speakers at the Women Writing the West conference. I'll save it for next time. 

Thanks!

"Thank God for Books"

 “Thank God for books.”

The remark made me smile when she said it and makes me smile again as I write it here. I’d asked my mother, a woman with type 1 diabetes, missing half of one lung after a victorious fight with lung cancer, and 19 heart stents, how her week was.

“Just like every other week since March,” she said, stubbornly. “Thank God for books.”

My mother isn’t one to sit still, and she sure as hell isn’t one to be told what to do by her son. How has she survived her litany of health issues? “Positive outlook,” she says. She likes to “go.” So being told by me (and her granddaughters, her husband, even Dr. Fauci on CNN) that shopping, book club, restaurants, travel –– all of it –– is off the table brings out her stubborn side.

“I’m reading three or four books a week,” she said. We got her a Kindle Fire for Christmas two years back. She reports having 500 books on the thing.

COVID changed lots of things.

I’m teaching over Zoom and wearing a mask in the classroom when I don’t. (My wife says I “have a Fozzie Bear voice,” so the mask only makes it worse.)

The publishing industry has changed, too, and not in a good way. An editor at a small independent house known for eclectic crime titles told me his house had been hurt badly by COVID. The email exchange saddens me because we need those independent publishers (and inde booksellers) if we aren’t going to only read what “the big 5” puts out –– high-concept thrillers.

Our local mystery bookstore recently closed. It was more or less a one-man operation. It was also a place where I could walk in, say, “Give me something I can’t get on Amazon,” and the owner, there day and night, would smile and lead me to a book. His recommendation was a homerun every time.

It’ll be interesting to see how things look from the other side of COVID. A look at the Edgar Award nominees tells us just how important the independent presses are. As we help local businesses stay open, I hope readers also remember their small presses and independent booksellers because my mother’s book-buying habit can’t save everyone. 

Are you a plantser?

 

I, Sybil Johnson, being of sound mind (not sure about the body) fully admit to being a plantser. Not a plotter or a pantser, but a plantser.

When I first started writing, I put myself squarely in the plotter category even though it didn’t seem quite right. I don’t do the extensive outlining that seems to be common to plotters. But I sure as heck wasn’t a pantser. I could never fly by the seat of my pants. Honestly, I don’t know how anyone can work that way even though I know a lot of people who do.

Then I started saying I was a hybrid, which more accurately describes the way I work. I know the crime, the killer, the victim, suspects and most of their secrets (sometimes new ones are revealed during the writing process). I also know how the story starts as well as what happens at key points along the way. I do occasionally change what happens at those key points, but I’ve never yet changed the victim or killer or reason for the crime. I’m open to doing that, however, if it makes a better story. And, finally, I know what the 3 subplots that form the basis of my novel are. But I don’t know as many details as a typical plotter does.

Then I heard the term plantser. A little googling tells me that this term has been around for several years, but I’ve only come across it in the last few months. Basically, the writer who is a plantser takes a little bit from the plotter and a little from the pantser, a hybrid, which I already thought of myself as. Plantser is a much better term and more fun to say.

I don’t know why it makes me feel better about the way I write to have a term for what I am. Doesn’t really change my process. But somehow I feel better knowing that there are enough people out there who work in a similar manner that there’s actually a term for us.

While I was googling, I found this blog post on different Writing Alignment styles: Lawful, Neutral and Chaotic Plotter; Lawful, True and Chaotic Plantser, and Lawful, Neutral and Chaotic Pantsers. Looking at these definitions I’m a mix of Lawful and Chaotic Plantser since I know the ending and write towards it and do some character bios, but I also write out of order and assemble scenes into a “frankendraft”.

I don’t think it matters what your writing style is, but I think it helps to understand a little about the way you write.

Any other plantsers out there?

The art of the interview

By Rick Blechta

      

I’m currently involved in a non-fiction book project. No, I’m not writing the book, although I’m on tap to either do an introduction or a closing. The project is the biography of a little-known but highly influential guitarist who sadly died far too young. I won’t go into details here since it’s not cogent for this post, but it’s a story I’ve wanted to tell for a long time. Somehow I never found the time/energy needed to get the job done myself. Now out of the blue, a publisher in Florida has taken on the task. I got involved because I have a number of hours of interviews with those who knew the guitarist best: the people who played with him.

So I’ve dug out my cassette tapes of those interviews. They are somewhat disappointing because I didn't know then what I do now. I’d made a very fundamental mistake: I interjected myself too much. What I was doing was not a conversation. I should have given these people as much opportunity to speak as possible. My comments didn’t help the interviews along much at all. Yes, I did make some good observations, but I could have done that by myself afterwards. Too often I cut off my interviewees with my own thoughts.

Wrong, wrong, WRONG!

Now why am I bringing this up here?

It’s pretty hard to get through a crime fiction novel without needing some expert help. For instance, unless you’re actually involved in law enforcement, it’s impossible to know everything you’d need to make a police procedural real and believable.

I’m sure everyone who has written fiction has needed questions answered at one time or another. And that leads us to interviews. What I've learned along the way is that you want to get the experts you’re consulting to open up. They may go far beyond the answers to the specific questions you have. They may also give you insights you don’t expect but that can make your novel even better.

In order to do that, you need to ask your questions and then get out of the way.

I learned this key technique in Vienna during the mid-’90s doing research for a novel that became Cemetery of the Nameless. I put it that way because when I first arrived in Vienna, the novel had a very different, dare I say bland title.

During the course of my research I needed specific information on how Viennese law enforcement operated. I knew it was very different than what I was used to.

We were staying a pension west of the main part of town. Our host knew the local policemen, so off we went to the local police shop. First thing I learned is that local police work out of shops. This one had a store selling security items, locks, alarms, etc. in the front with the police offices in the back (a good detail to have in my pocket).

My biggest question was about the ranks of the various officers and how murders would be investigated. I had my trusty cassette player and recorded the whole interview. Problem was they spoke German, so our host translated my questions for the two police officers. It was impossible for me to do much talking since the language barrier added a whole layer of difficulty.

So I’d ask my questions and they’d talk. Sometimes what their answers went on for a long time when I had been expecting a sentence or two. It was obvious they were going off on tangents all over the place. I didn’t find how far until later when the conversation was translated for me. What I got a ton of extra information that could add much to the plot of my novel.

I also unexpectedly got a new title for it.

The story began with a body floating in the Danube River. Who would investigate something like that? My two police officers began talking excitedly about a backwater where floating bodies sometimes washed up. When these poor souls can't be identified, they're buried in a small cemetery nearby called the Friedhof Der Namenlosen (Cemetery of the Nameless).

Later, when I was told what they'd said, I realized my story had a new title. I could never have come up with that good — better yet, it was a real place!

I learned my lesson about interviews that day.

I wish I could go back now and redo those interviews with the musicians. Ask them questions and then get the hell out of their way. I’m sure I would have learned a lot more. Sad thing is, several of them are now no longer with us.

Next time you’re requesting inside information from someone for your books, don’t be like Blechta — well, the old Blechta — by all means ask the questions for which you need answers, but give your experts as much latitude as possible in their answers. I expect you’ll be very surprised with all the extra things you learn.
__________________________
Note: The above cover of my novel is a (highly doctored) photo I took at the Friedhof Der Namenlosen (minus the overlay of Beethoven). Pretty evocative place, isn't it?

Dirty Words

On Friday, Donis wrote an excellent blog about curse words in her writing and in real life. It made me think about the creative writing class that I’ve been teaching. It’s winding up tonight (six weeks goes by in a flash). One of my students is a retired Marine who has served in Afghanistan. He’s a natural storyteller but at the start of our course he was pretty rough around the edges. Nearly every sentence had at least one f-bomb in it.

That shouldn’t come as any surprise. That’s how Marines talk. In the first story he wrote for us, a little girl is shot and killed by accident in a terrifying incident that kept escalating. If those Marines want to swear up a storm, so be it!

Back when I was in the newspaper business, that’s how we talked as well…men and women. That’s just real life.

But that’s not necessarily how we write. One exception to writing comes to mind and that was the HBO television series Deadwood. Nearly everyone in the show dropped multiple f-bombs on a regular basis.

When used that often, it loses its ability to shock.

So how much swearing in a novel is too much? The old cliché offered by people who are offended by cursing is the usage of expletives arises from a lack of imagination.

I don’t agree. The judicious usage of curse words can do a number of things. For one, it can give a sense of realism.

For example, if I was writing a book from a soldier’s point of view, not swearing just wouldn’t be realistic. If I was writing a novel about nuns, I’d most likely rule it out. But I’m writing crime novels. Criminals use some pretty salty language, and so do most journalists I have worked with, and my protagonist is a crime reporter.

Curse words can show powerful moments of anger or despair. If your protagonist has refrained from cursing through most of the book, but at the moment of crisis, she shouts the f-bomb, then you know that this is serious.

On the flip side of all of this, I listened to a podcast a few weeks ago by Laura Steward who was interviewing the author, Brad Parks. He just released a thriller by the name of Interference that is now on my reading list. She asked him an interesting question. Do you use any curse words?

His response was that his agent had given him some advice early in his writing career. Ten percent of readers who encounter expletives will close the book and never pick it up again. Most likely the same thing happens with the author. They’re done with you.

Brad Parks said that he makes his living by writing thrillers. It’s how he pays the bills. He doesn’t want to alienate ten percent of his customer base.

I get it. But I simply can’t make my characters less real to me. I fear that would make them less real to my readers.

So, dammit, I’m going to get off my ass now and go in and finish writing my next mystery. I might even swear a little to get warmed up.

Stay safe and stay healthy.

Hidden Motives

As my colleagues and I have said these are strange, surreal times. Working at home, I sometimes forget what day it is. Friday felt like the weekend. It was my day to post, but I completely forgot because I was trying to get my cat to eat (stomach upset) while grading midterm exams and watching the clock because at 2 pm EDT (11 am PDT), I was going to be on a virtual Bouchercon panel. 

Today, Harry, my cat, finally got hungry enough to eat some of the chicken breast I had cooked for him and then some of his wet food. I made progress on the midterms I've been grading. I watched the Bouchercon Anthony awards, and then I decided to do a quick post here before getting a little more work done. 

I had a breakthrough today as I was listening to a Bouchercon panel on the "villain" in crime fiction. The authors were discussing the importance of making the villain a complex character. This is something I have thought about and have been trying to do as I plod along with my historical thriller. It is the most difficult book I've ever tried to write. I'm sure I'll be able to finish the first draft of my sixth Lizzie Stuart mystery before I get through the first draft of the thriller. 

I've thought about it. I've made multiple starts. Tried first-person narration by multiple characters. Tried third-person POVs and a mix of the two. Began in February and gone forward through 1939. Began in the middle and tried flashbacks. 

If I didn't want to tell this story so much I would have given up long ago. 

But today, while listening to the Bouchercon panel and working on something else, I had a thought. The problem is my "hero" not my villain. I have make my hero too upright, too pure of heart. He is angry. That is what is motivating him, not his belief in truth, justice, and the American way. He wants revenge against the villain for an old wrong. He wants to bring him down. He is lying to himself when he tells himself he is only interested in learning what the villain is up to and stopping him from carrying out his dastardly plot. He wants to bring him down, to pay him back. That's what I should be plotting toward -- that moment when he confronts his rage and has a choice.

Like real people, complex characters have layers, parts of themselves they try to bury because they are afraid of what would happen if they didn't. That's what I need to focus on. I need to push each of my main characters to the limit until they are confronting not only each other but their own demons. 

With the realization, I'm feeling more hopeful that I can pull this off. I even know who has to die. 

And I know where I should begin.

Fingers crossed, but I think it will work.

 

 

Curses

Donis here. I sometimes wish I didn't live in such interesting times. I often find myself scared and depressed, so much so that I'll purposely avoid news and social media for days at a time. My husband doesn't do this. He stays informed and takes it upon himself to inform me, as well.  I can always tell when something alarming has happened by the plethora of salty terms emanating from the den. Don't get me wrong. I don't disapprove of Don's uncivil language. He has no intention of running for Pope.

(Incidentally, when he was in his thirties, my husband informed me that forevermore he was going to be perfect in all things, but after a week he realized that he couldn't stop getting smelly feet after a run, so he gave up his quest for sainthood. But that's another story.)  

I've been known to use less than pristine epithets myself and find them extremely useful in times of stress.   In fact, this brings to mind a dear friend of mine whom I have known since my salad days at the University of Oklahoma. At the time, he was an extraordinarily innocent boy who on frequent occasions would curl your ears with the most astoundingly filthy curses. Because of his sweet face and gentle nature, the effect of this language was not nearly a shocking as it was hilarious, and ever since, for good or ill, I've had quite an affection for dirty words.

I grew up among people whose goal was to curse in the most imaginative language possible, which can really increase your vocabulary if you apply yourself. My mother was particularly good at coming up with ways to express disapproval using only G-rated words. One of her scariest curses was "I heap coals of fire upon him." The words themselves weren't as frightening as her throaty growl and the curl of her lip over her eyetooth. My father had been a Marine, and knew words that I don't understand to this day, but he had a house full of little daughters and controlled his language heroically. He often had the pee-waddin' scared out of him and wondered what in the cat-hair was going on.

When I was writing my Alafair Tucker mysteries, which take place in Oklahoma in the 1910s in a family setting, I was very careful about the language I used, since my characters wouldn't normally use profanity. The series I'm writing now is set in 1920s Hollywood, which is another story altogether. If my characters didn't curse it wouldn't be realistic. Yet I know my audience and try not to be too shocking, which means I try to find creative ways around using f-bombs and hideous racial/sexist epithets.

When I grew up and became an English major, I came to realize that this fashion of cursing is quite Shakespearian. Shakespeare manipulated the English language in such a joyously profane way in order to scorn his fellow man. There are actually several web sites devoted to Shakespearean curses. One of my favorites is http://www.pangloss.com/seidel/shake_rule.html The author, Chris Seidel, has created a page on which he has taken nouns and adjectives from Shakespearian curses and divided them into three columns. You take one from column A, one from column B, and one from column C, and "curse with the the best of Shakespeare." Examples follow:

Fie, you bawdy, dog-hearted malignancy!

             you rank, onion-eyed rudesby!

             you whoreson, fat-kidneyed pantaloon!

             you knarling, rump-fed moldwarp!

Have a nice day just doesn't have the same ring.

Spies among us

Rick's Monday post was sobering. Not only because of the many ways we can be monitored and tracked and spied on, but also because this technology changes and evolves all the time. So even if we writers do include the most up-to-date gadgetry in our latest opus, by the time it has wended its way through the glacial publishing process and arrived on bookstore shelves, the technology will be out of date. And some astute reader will call us out.

But we can but try. Technology has facilitated the job for our characters in many ways. How many times has one of our characters looked up needed information in the middle of a case, or Googled someone to find out background? How many times have they used alerts, GPS, and whatnot to guide them through their day. But technology has also made plot twists more challenging. We can no longer make our characters lost in the wilderness (either urban or rural), when a reader would just say, Turn on your map app, idiot! We can no longer place our characters in peril without a reader yelling Why don't you call 911? Or your mother? We writers have to go to great lengths to get around this instant world-at-our-fingertips. Batteries have to die or the phone has to be dropped in water, both of which make the character look inept, or the character has to be in a dead zone, of which there fewer and fewer. At least in Canada in the dead of winter, batteries seem to have a life of about five minutes, so it's still possible for a character to be caught out unexpectedly.

Back in the mists of time, when my eldest was a newborn and neither cellphones nor personal computers were around, we bought a marvellous new-fangled gadget called a baby monitor. (Aside: look this up on Google and you'll find the first baby monitors were developed in 1937 in response to the Lindbergh baby kidnapping). We placed the recorder by the crib and took the receiver downstairs with us. It had two channels, A and B. We selected one at random and were delighted to be able to monitor our daughter's every breath. One day, being daring, I switched to the other channel, and suddenly, out of the blue, we were listening to a ferocious argument of our neighbours down the street! Ummm, talk about too much information. As a crime writer, however, I immediately saw the potential of this device for a crime story.

Since then, technology has intruded further and further into our lives, with some of us preferring to hide under our bed to stay out of the digital spotlight, and others embracing each new invasion. Today, that same daughter lives in a "smart home" where everything is wirelessly connected. She can sit in Ottawa and watch the Uber Eats driver delivering her family's food to their house in Toronto. She can play with the temperature in their house and add items to their grocery list. Clearly, most of us don't mind being ruled by that little round gadget on the counter that seems to know every aspect of our lives. No chance for sneaking around behind your spouse's or parents' backs with this home!

This summer we were up at my cottage, where life is still pretty simple. We bring our smart phones and laptops with us to stay connected on the mobile network, but there is no wifi and we waste very little time online. One day we were all sitting in the living room, glumly watching the rain pour down the window panes, and I wistfully remarked, "What's the weather going to be tomorrow, does anyone know?" And my two year-old granddaughter, sitting on the sofa beside me, pipes up "Why don't you ask Google?"

In a flash I remembered that baby monitor that watched over her mother all those years ago, and I thought, what a change in one generation. Could anyone have imagined it? And can we imagine what the next generation will bring?

That, of course, is the landscape of science fiction writers, not crime.