My Weblog

Getting Away From It All

In Texan, 'fixin' to' is the equivalent of preparing to do something. This can either be a psychological preparing: "I'm fixin' to get up the nerve to call Carol and tell her I can't make it tonight," or an actual activity: "I'm fixin' to go to the grocery store."

I'm doing the latter. Fixin' to pack my bags and head out of the hot and humid state of affairs that is Houston in August.

I heard a report on the radio the other day that recommended no reading, no watching, and no conversation to establish the fact that you are well and truly on vacation. Heaven help him, but that man sure got it all wrong. I'm going to read several good books, watch the sun set (and sleep through sunrise) and talk with my family. Can't imagine a good vacation without any of those.

Not that writers never really go on vacation.

No, we drag our work with us, even if we manage to leave our computer and files behind. That's because writers are always working. Listening. Letting the cadence of that dialect settle into our subconscious for when someone surprisingly unplanned but necessary walks onto the page and needs grounding for their place in the story. Observing. Both actual physical scenes embedded in our brains like a photo album, and emotional wear and tear to give our character's lives the depth they so richly deserve.

This tendency came home to me when I was finishing up the third book in my series. After I turned Shady Acres in to my editor, I rewarded myself with a class in Memoir Writing. One in-class writing assignment provided a sweet revelation.

Twenty years before I'd met a homeless man while out with girlfriends for lunch. "I was an engineer," he began as I turned away from his outstretched beggar's hand. His eyes, which at first had seemed as dead as those of the fish laid out on ice in the display case behind him, burned with an old remembered pride. I sat with him for an hour while my girlfriends grew increasingly worried about me and my choice to sit with this raggedy old man rather than shake him off and giggle with them. I didn't know then why I was so drawn to this man, or why I felt compelled to take the time to listen to his story.

Now I know. When I got the edits back for my book and reread what I'd written, I discovered something. The man I'd met way back when in the Lexington Market in Baltimore lent the anguish of his life to fuel my character Cal's anger. It made Cal real for me. I wonder if that man will even know what a gift he gave me that day by saying, "I was an engineer."

So when I'm on vacation this time, I'm  not just fixin' to relax. I'm also going to pay attention. To read. To watch. And especially to listen.

Julie

Keeping It Real

Let me just start out by saying, "I love my children." I have three, and I had them late in life, and I love every hair on their heads and every conversation we share. I've never been one of these moms who reminds her kids how many hours of labor I went through to birth them (Oldest 7 1/2, Middle 10, Youngest 8 -- unless you include the C-section).

Oldest is job-hunting and won't be home much longer. At least, that's what we think and hope, for his sake. My Middle is in the Army now, and stationed in the great state of Alaska, guarding . . . something; and that something's in Alaska for . . . some reason. That part kind of escapes me. But he'll only be home from time to time, as far as we now know. So I'm in the process of losing two-third of my reality check.

But there's Youngest. She's going to be here for three more years; and then she, too, will fly away into the world, just as she ought. All we'll get will be the bills in the mail, and the phone calls. (She has the only cell phone in the world that died of exhaustion. She has 250 numbers on speed dial.)

How will I keep humble when they're all gone? For years, people told me that my late-in-life children would keep me young. I've pretty much disproved that. It would have kicked in by now, I figure. But barring youth, I would still like to aspire to "humble" and "sweet." As in, "She's just as humble and sweet as she was before she won the Oscar," or "the Pulitzer committee just thought she was so real and fresh, so humble."

Without my kids' constant commentary, I don't have a hope of maintaining modesty. Those sweeties clue me in all the time as to my shortcomings. According to my children, I am (1) deaf, (2) too loud on the telephone, (3) impossibly inept at the important tasks of programming my cell phone and other electronic devices, (4) a very old fogey who simply Does Not Understand, and (5) totally off in my clothing judgements and even my color identification.

There's a kernel of truth in all of these assessments, I'm afraid, and I just have to live with those crucial shortcomings. Hopefully, none of these horrors will show up in Oldest, Middle, and Youngest as they grow older (trying hard to suppress a snort of anticipatory laughter, here).

To balance all these aforementioned horrible debits, I have three measly assets. I keep The Bottomless Wallet, which has twenties in it -- miraculous! And I can Cook. and I can Do Laundry. I accomplished these amazing feats through the magic of Momdom, bestowed upon me when the doctor said, "Push!" But strangers aren't likely to pat me on the back because I can sort darks from lights, or make the critical decision that tonight is beef stroganoff night. So no one else will know that I do have a few amazing talents to balance out all my shortcomings. Plus, my kids wisely know that if they praise me for my little corner of competence, I might take them for granted. So they concentrate on my weak points.

When I set out on tour, which I refer to as Ego Restoration Time, the first couple of days are spent re-orienting myself. I'm not the clothes idiot, I'm the well-dressed woman. I'm not the deaf mom, I'm serene and regal. I'm not the dense woman who couldn't remember which Rachel or Josh my daughter was talking about, I'm wise and subtle. I'm not the woman who forgot that my son needed his favorite shirt for his job interview, I'm the New York Times bestselling author. Just when I'm beginning to feel reasonably good about myself, it's time to go home.

And there are my little love muffins, just waiting to bring me down to earth . . . God bless 'em.

Charlaine Harris

When I Could Fly

by Kris

I'm always fascinated by how readers dissect our books, by which elements they secretly believe to be real, and which they consider products of our imaginations. Nobody ever regards as psychopathic killers just because we write about murders. Or if they do make that assumption, they obviously aren't troubled by it. I'm amused by which parts they consider pure fiction, and which they're convinced must be autobiographical.

Readers of my Tracy Eaton mysteries never seem to view me as reality-challenged as Tracy, or as eccentric in my approach to problem solving. Instead, the most common assumption they make is that my parents, like Tracy's, are major motion picture stars. They're so sure of it, most don't ask, "Are you parents really movie stars?" but "Who are you parents? Anyone I'd recognize?"

Sorry, no. That assumption couldn't be farther from the truth. Tracy's mom and dad are a compilation of the whack jobs I happened to observe on the occasional acting job I scored when I was younger, my lifelong love of screwball comedies, and a fertile imagination. Still, it's good to know I've made it feel that real.

The questions my standalone suspense novel, Never Say Die, raise aren't as much fun for me to field. They invariably pinch at an area that can be tender to the touch, even after a long time. Since the protagonist of Never Say Die, Zoey Morgan, makes her living as a professional triathlete, readers always ask whether I compete in triathlons, too.

I usually make light of it in my answer, reminding them that Zoey is younger, thinner, blonder and in way better shape than me. And then I admit the truth, that my husband, Joe, used to compete in tri's, which gave me access to professional female competitors who provided all the research I needed.

But there's another truth that I don't usually share. While I was never a triathlete, since I've never really been into swimming and cycling, I was at one time a dedicated long distance runner. Few things in life have given me as much pleasure as running did. When a runner really hits her stride, I'm convinced that's as close as a human being can come to flying.

I'm sure I'd still be pounding the pavement today — only once while I was stopped at a light, a truck plowed into the back of my car. My running life ended in the moment of impact, I just didn't know it then. Even now it's hard to figure how injuries to my shoulder, hip and back could possibly result in nerve damage to my foot and ankle. Or why, if the other injuries eventually healed, why the ankle didn't. But the body is a magnificent whole, and the over-compensation it performs ripples out in unexpected ways.

I mourned for the loss of running in my life after that, and I tasted all the stages of grief…denial, which meant I ran anyway, only to limp home in pain; anger, which caused me to rail on and on to anyone who would listen, and many who doubtless wished they hadn't, about the injustice of it all; deal-making — that meant I visited every doctor of every sort who promised to help, and had too many costly sets of unless orthodics made; and eventually, acceptance, when I learned to tolerate walking, even if it's nothing like flying.

These days I do accept it, although I still miss it, and occasionally the loss can still smart. But time does heal if we let it. I've needed the distance the years away from the accident has given me. I doubt I could have written Never Say Die any earlier; it would just have hurt too much.

Now I was able to welcome the chance to give to Zoey the feelings and the sense of joy in the movement of her body that I once experienced, and she shared with me a chance to fly along with her. Observant readers will note that while Zoey swims and cycles as all triathletes must, and I do describe those activities — the fullest, most heartfelt description in Never Say Die are of Zoey's running.

So…that's the real answer to the "which parts are autobiographical" question. When people comment on how real those running passages read and ask whether I run along with Zoey, naturally, I always say, "No."

Except for the little voice that I alone can hear in my mind, which answers, "Yes, but only in my heart."

The Point is the Put Down or The Triumph of Spirit over Reality or Not

by Marlys Millhiser

I’m just back from a high school class reunion in Iowa and not telling which–but everybody else was really old. Some of them were dead even. The whole trip was so full of ideas for a mystery I had to stick my tongue between my upper and lower front teeth, which makes for an odd smile and not the impression you want to leave at a class reunion. I suffer from TMJ and am not allowed to clench or grind. Now stop that! My teeth! (Comes from writing mysteries and not being sure who the murderer is until the end of the book. I once had an agent suggest something called plotting–but I never got the hang of it. If I know what’s going to happen I lose interest.)

There was tragedy and disaster and loss–triumph, contentment, coming to terms, acceptance at my class reunion. And classmates from all over the country, one from Canada. Iowa’s a solid, sensible place where education has always been supported by tax payers. Problem is, it doesn’t have work enough for the scientists, educators, engineers, etc. it trains. So, many of us took that advantage with us to jobs in other states and that’s still happening. I met my husband at the University of Iowa. He lived ten miles from me and my classmates at the reunion but we met over three hundred miles away. Go figure, as they used to say.

I changed schools, states, and towns often as an only child in a working-class family until I joined this class in fifth grade and the only praise I ever got was when I wrote something. So I figured I must be a writer. Later, I lost baby-sitting jobs because of my story-telling prowess. I was much in demand by the children but the parents noticed the kids wide-eyed awake when they returned home–and the sitter asleep.

Anyway, I will remember this reunion for the triumph of spirit over reality. Which I suppose I’ve always celebrated. Classmates had lost mates and children, parents and siblings. And still they thrive on that which they’ve gained. The class social stars a bit subdued by life and us nerds a little less in awe of them. But, I thought, life does make sense in a way after all and we all serve a purpose.

And then I come home to blog again and pick up the cat at the kennel which reminds me of a remark-in-passing by a fellow classmate, "You write mysteries? I bet you have cats, huh? Women writers usually do." There are more than a few male hard-boiled writers with cat tracks across their computer key boards. But that’s not the point. The point is the put down. And our vulnerability to it. Not just writers and not just women and not just nerds.

I’ve had my share of dogs too–they adore you. But a cat is a needed touch of reality. They squint from the desk, window sill, bookshelf with that hooded, sometimes cross-eyed shock and disbelief (like my classmates when I came to a highschool dance with a girl–who couldn’t dance either.) But with a cat you’re not sure just what the offense is. Makes you go back and check your wonderful prose yet again.

So, have I made sense of or connection between putting down women mystery writers and class reunions? And is the point the put down or the triumph of spirit over reality? Oh crap–the cat’s eyes are crossing! Sorry, gotta go.

We Have Wireless! (Kinda Sorta)

By Elaine Viets

"High-speed Internet Access!"

"We have wireless!"

Whenever I see those banners on a hotel, I want to ask, "Where?"

I’m just back from a tour for my new Dead-End Job mystery, "Murder Unleashed." Every hotel I stayed at bragged it had "Wireless!" in bold banners on the building.

The hotel didn’t say where it had the wireless.

At a charming hotel in St. Louis, I spent nearly an hour fiddling with my computer before I called the front desk for help.

"I can’t get the wireless to work," I said.

"Oh, sorry. You’ll have to come down to the diningroom," the clerk said.

It turned out the wireless only worked at two tables in the restaurant. If I wanted to check my e-mail, I had to drag my laptop downstairs and set it up in the diningroom behind the breakfast buffet.

"I thought you had wireless in every room," I said.

"Only on the south side of the building," the desk clerk said.

I guess that would have looked strange on a banner.

"Free Wireless in Every Room!" a hotel in Bowling Green, Ohio, declared on its welcome sign.

"Except today," should have been the rest of the slogan.

The wireless only worked in the "executive center" – a desk in the lobby. A tech spent most of his time with his head in the hotel’s ceiling, promising the wireless would work everywhere, real soon.

Dark-suited business types circled the one working wireless port like buzzards, waiting for their chance to check in at the office. Traveling across the country and across time zones, cell phones died and phone messages were lost. We needed e-mail to keep in touch with our homes and offices.

At least I had a desk at that hotel. In Columbus, Ohio, the wireless only worked if I perched on a chair arm in the lobby, with my laptop on, well, my lap.

It took sixty minutes of struggling with the password and reconfiguring my computer before the desk clerk finally confessed: "We only have wireless in one corner of the lobby. You have to sit on the edge of that gray chair."

"That’s not what it says on your sign," I said.

"We’re getting it fixed," the clerk said.

I wasn’t sure if he meant the sign or the wireless.

And so it went, across the nation. Hotels that should have said: "We have wireless – maybe!" or "We have wireless unless it’s raining!" Or "We have wireless every Tuesday!" lured in travelers with false promises of high-speed access.

Worse, none of the hotels would admit up-front there was a problem with their wonderful wireless.

They blamed the weather. "It was worked fine until we got this rain."

They blamed me. "Are you sure you have the right settings on your computer?"

"Did you check your user access password?"

"Is the green light on your wireless card working?"

It usually took an hour before the hotel would break down and admit its wireless was whacked, except for one weird place in the building. I wasted many long, slow hours trying to get high-speed access.

Finally, in Ann Arbor, I dragged my suitcase into a bed-and-breakfast.

"Do you have wireless access?" I asked.

"No," the owner said. "We don’t have any computer connection."

"Thanks," I said. "You’ve saved me so much time."

Women in literature, thirty years later

Fellow Femme Fatale Dana Cameron was down for the weekend, to do some research and attend a signing with Laura Durham, Noreen Wald, and me at Riversdale, an historic house in Prince George's County, Maryland.  And while we were driving around, trading tall tales and biographical snippets, I told her the story of my day of infamy in Women in Literature class.

I have no idea how accurate my memories of the class are--after all, it was thirty years ago, during my time as an undergraduate at the University of Virginia. I can't recall everything we read in the class.  Since Dr. Suzette Henke, then an assistant professor of English at UVa, was teaching, I'm pretty sure we covered Virginia Woolf.  Kate Chopin, and Charlotte Perkins Gilman, certainly.  Who else, I'm not sure.  But I remember the classes as a time of heady excitement.  We were discussing, with the same attention and gravity we gave to Shakespeare and Chaucer, the work of women whose writing had been overlooked in its time and women whose writing helped shape twentieth-century literature.  Implicit in our discussions was the assumption that we were on the threshold of an era in which we, as women, would play our own part in shaping not just the literature of our century but the world in which we lived.  It helped that the class was mostly women--I recall that it was about twenty students, only three of them men.

At some point that semester I read an article that I found fascinating.  I suspect it was something Dr. Henke recommended, though I can't be sure.  At any rate, the article talked about how differently men and women behaved in classes and other group discussions--because men were accustomed to argument and debate, while women were more used to conversation and polite discussion.  Men were, according to the article, much more apt to interrupt others, and much more apt to resist interruption by continuing to talk though the interruption.  Women were much less comfortable interrupting, and rarely tried to resist an interruption.  And even when women tried to hold their own in debate, they all too often found their voices drowned out by the louder, deeper, more insistent voices of the men.

It rang true.  Especially true for someone in the second class of women to attend UVa.  The triumph of attending a school that would have closed the door in my face two years earlier was tempered with the knowledge that many of the men thought we didn't belong there and would rejoice at a reversal of the court decision that opened the door for us.

Even in Ms. Henke's Women in Literature class, with only three men in the class, the men seemed to do the lion's share of the talking. 

So I braced myself for an experiment.   One afternoon I came to class determined to behave like a man. 

I jumped in to state my opinion on every question discussed, even if it meant interrupting one of the men who had usually jumped in first.  Even if I didn't have anything to say, I jumped in and made something up.  If anyone tried to interrupt me, I just kept talking--louder--shouting if necessary.  I was assertive.  I was dogmatic.  I was bloody obnoxious. 

Most of the class--including at least one of the men--retreated into silence with shocked expressions.  I could almost hear them muttering "what a bitch!"  One woman classmate berated me for interrupting one of the men--never mind that he'd been interrupting me, her, and every other woman in the class for weeks.  One man, clearly resenting the sudden rebellion in the ranks, fought back so vehemently that if we hadn't been in the relatively safe and controlled atmosphere of the classroom, I might have retreated in physical fear.  But we were in the classroom, and I think Ms. Henke recognized what I was doing, and revealed my tactic to the class toward the end of the hour.

At least that's how I remember it.  Of course, it was thirty years ago.  Memory may be making the incident more dramatic than it was at the time.  Or I may be embellishing that day with bits of memories from other times.  Because there have been plenty of other times over the years when I've run into the same thing. 

It still happens.  We let it happen.  We even do it to ourselves. 

I wish I could look back on that day in Charlottesville as a quaint memory of a bygone era.  More like a preview of things to come.  Because even on paper, we haven't made as much progress as we think we have, and the gap between what is and what should be is even wider than before.  At least in the seventies, we were trying to look, not just for flaws in our society but also within ourselves, for self-defeating prejudices and blind spots.  Now, when we call for needed change, we're told that women already have equality--what more do we want?

I don't see much self-reflection happening today, and I think we need a lot more of it.  All of us.  Me included.

I'm tired of having to decide whether to sit down and make nice or stand up and be called a bitch.  And I'm starting to think I've spent too much time sitting down.

Big Guys Don't Cry

by Mary

We've had an exciting few weeks in the mystery world. The International Thriller Writers organization announced its first award nominees, to a bit of ribbing from the outside. Why? None of its nominees were women. To me, that's not so surprising in a male-dominated genre. What does continue to surprise me is the number of crybaby he-men who can't take what they've been dishing out to cozy lovers for years. When Elaine Viets took ITW to task with a humorous blog on The Lipstick Chronicles site, many couldn't handle the fact that she used their own methods of attack against them.

We cozy people are generally good-natured. We've laughed along with jokes made about our relatively non-violent books. We've taken it on the chin when criticized, allowing different strokes for different folks. In contrast, when Elaine gave thriller writers a dose of their own brand of humor, suddenly it was a mortal sin to dare question another genre's actions with snarky observations. Some ITW supporters responded to her blog with such vehemence I could practically see foam coming out of their mouths and onto the screen. Others were more moderate. I didn't agree with everything in Elaine's post, but its sly way of throwing up clay targets to draw fire, then sneaking in important side issues through the reactions she knew would come, was nothing short of brilliant.

When ITW formed, readers and writers in other mystery genres thought it was a great idea. We've known ITW members for a long time and have supported them by attending their signings, buying their books and recommending them to other readers. So, it shocked me when the ITW website first went up, and it featured an article by cozy writers' arch-nemesis Otto Penzler, a well-known figure in the mystery world. Mainly, his article served as a letter of introduction for ITW, its members and its goals.

That wasn't the only thing it did. Its first paragraphs trashed cozies, their writers and their readers. A year earlier, Mr Penzler wrote another cruel article berating cozies. He twisted the knife by ridiculing each of the Agatha award nominees. This was done in typical alpha male fashion, with sarcasm and a disregard of others' feelings. It broke new ground in bad manners and unprofessional conduct in the mystery community.

The sight of Mr Penzler attacking cozies through the ITW article (or was ITW attacking cozies while hiding behind Mr Penzler?) was one I'll never forget. The ITW writers were our friends. The founders had appeared to have put much thought into setting guidelines for an honorable organization. How, then, was Mr Penzler with his divisive, holier-than-thou attitude chosen as the group's spokesman, and his article posted to the website?

Some have suggested it was simply an oversight, due to the rush to get the website up and running. I don't think that's possible. Think about it. Candidates for writing an intro article would've been discussed among decision-makers. Someone suggested Mr Penzler, others agreed. Maybe they didn't think he'd blast cozies again. Maybe they thought he would write only about ITW and its members. When his article was submitted, it would've been read and approved by someone or several people. There may have even been discussion over whether the offensive passages should remain. Whatever the case, it passed the first round of approval.

Once on the website, every single member of ITW at the time would've read it, don't you think? Wouldn't you be anxious to check out your new exciting group's website? That means every board member and every writer member saw it, read it, and didn't care that they were hurting us.

Nobody cared that this precedent was a giant stride in the wrong direction. It was an arrogant, disrespectful way to begin relationships within the mystery community. And yet, cozy writers and readers took the hit with grace. ITW lobbed a grenade into a camp of cat-loving, gardening, pacifist grannies, most of whom were ITW's supporters, in an unwarranted attack. How honorable is that? Don't pout and cry to me when, a year later, one rock is tossed back at ITW and its members. It's hilarious to me that the self-appointed tough guys and gals don't have a clue about how to be tough, yet the grannies they dismiss as weaker, lesser beings are the ones who have repeatedly sustained hits from them with barely a whimper.

What disturbs me most is the increasing arrogance of non-cozy writers that, would you believe, coincides with ITW's formation. The level of bad manners is a new phenomenon around here, and it appalls me. I've been to several book signings by ITW members who either talk about their own superiority to traditional mystery writers, or how their books are superior to cozies. Don't they think their audience might read across genres and be offended by that? And then, after criticizing us as writers and readers, they want us to pay thirty bucks for their hardbacks? It has become common practice for hardboiled and thriller writers to disparage cozies on convention panels. Wouldn't it be better to gain respect by showing respect for other writers, rather than cut them down? A fellow panelist once dismissed my remarks and experience to the audience as meaningless in light of his higher intelligence. What, is there a manual? Is this new behavior taught in the exalted realm of ITW membership? I believe it is, if not directly through power promotion me-me-me courses, then indirectly. The proof is in the arrogance of new authors, who are so green they can only be echoing the attitudes their mentors feed them.

I'd like to address a couple of specific points in Elaine's article that brought cries of outrage from ITW supporters. One was that she questioned the judges' judgement. She pointed out she agreed with some of their choices, not with others. She was much less harsh about it than Otto. Elaine criticized about twenty judges. Mr Penzler criticized over 800 Malice Domestic reader judges for their nominee choices. Not exactly equal force in retaliation there, thriller guys.

Another outcry was that Elaine must have made the ITW nominees feel terrible. Mr Penzler brutally criticized the Agatha nominees by name, skewering them individually, in a New York newspaper the year prior to the ITW article. Nothing near that force was used against ITW nominees in Elaine's article. Two of the Agatha nominees that year were two of the nicest, most devoted advocates of writers in all mystery genres, Carolyn Hart and Margaret Maron. I can forgive a lot of things, but that I cannot forgive. For that blatant disrespect and for the alliance of ITW with its perpetrator, I expect any and all future potshots in ITW's direction, justified or not, to be taken like a man without so much as a peep, just the way those fine ladies did. Don't tell me it's not fair to criticize ITW members who had no part in what Otto did. If rude and unreasonable judgements against cozy writers were ITW policy from the start, and there were not only no objections from members but the policy continues today, then don't cry if a thriller writer gets a slap on the wrist once every few years.

I will say that when a few cozy people complained about Otto's article to ITW, David Morrell was a complete gentleman. He was kind and took immediate action to notify others of our concerns. He got the offending cozy-bashing sentences deleted from the ITW website. I just wish they had been seen for what they were, a bad miscalculation in direction and in policy, much earlier.

I commend the ITW supporters who put up an admirable defense of ITW's nominees and judges after reading Elaine's blog. I believe in defending my friends, too. For my part, I only want a more professional attitude to be present in ITW members' speech in public forums. They can dismiss me, what I write and my choice in reading if they want in private. The dismissal of cozy readers who attend thriller panels or book signings is plain foolish.

I realize I'm a nobody who can't help anyone up the social ladder of the thriller world. But I'm a well-mannered nobody. And I love to buy books and promote good mystery writers. I may be nothing but a yapping little lap dog compared to the lowest-ranking ITW writer. Nevertheless, I would advise all mean cozy-haters to wear thick socks when in my vicinity. I may not be big enough to go for the jugular, but I will not hesitate to take a flying leap at those legs, teeth-first, like a teacup ankle-biter on PCP.

Hear me. Fear me. I AM the Alpha Chihuahua. ;)