My Weblog

Convention Time!

by Toni L.P. Kelner

 

I have conventions on the brain this week, conventions past, present, and future. In January I attended Arisia, last weekend it was Boskone, and I'm preparing for next weekend's trip to Sleuthfest. Later on this year, I'll be at Malice Domestic and Bouchercon, and I'm considering attending others as well.

Now every convention requires a fair amount of preparation: travel, hotel, panel preparation, packing, shopping, school wrangling, guinea pig care, and so on. So why do I keep doing these things?

Of course, my excuse is that it's for business. At Arisia and Boskone, which are science fiction conventions, I'm promoting the anthologies I co-edit with Femme Charlaine. At Malice and Bouchercon, I'm pushing my mysteries. And at Sleuthfest, I'll be talking to other writers, so the promotion will be at a minimum. (Theoretically...) But the fact is, I really enjoy conventions. And here's why.

• I get to hang with friends from all over the country in one place. At Boskone, I spent time with Femme Charlaine from Arkansas, Joshua and Ginjer from NYC, and even locals like Sarah who I don't get to see all that often. As long as I've been in mysteries, Malice and Bouchercon are like old home week!
• I make new friends. At Arisia, I met Jan and Byron and then renewed the acquaintance at Boskone. I met Kate at Crime Bake in the fall, then say her again at Arisia and Boskone. I'd exchanged e-mails with Seanan, but only got to see her in person at Arisia.
• I visit places I might not have ever gone to on my own. I don't think I'd ever have picked Indianapolis or Anchorage without Bouchercon being held there in different years, but I was charmed by both cities. I don't always see much of the city other than the convention, but in Anchorage I snuck away for a flight over a glacier and I took a cable car tour of San Francisco. And when I can, I take an extra day or two to see some sites. I've been to the Smithsonian several times during trips to Malice, and when I went to Madison for Bouchercon, I snuck out for a day to see the Circus World Museum at Baraboo, a place I'd always wanted to go.
• I make some good business connections. I've met with editors at almost every convention I've attended, many of whom I've eventually done business with. And if I haven't, I might do so in the future.
• I get books. There are freebies galore and there are book rooms filled with dealers who have books I can't find elsewhere or might not have ever known exist. Heaven!
• I attend the convention panels myself--I like hearing other writers talk about their work, and I always learn something. (Even if it's only how not to act on a panel...)
• I get to party! I am not, at home, much of a party animal. But at conventions, I feel comfortable hanging at the bar or dancing at the late night parties and listening to bands. Sometimes, very rarely, I even wear a costume.

So even though this Wednesday, I'll be packing like a maniac and fussing about it the whole time--"Where are my black slacks?" and "Why did I say I'd do this convention?"-- and on Thursday, I'll be dealing with the casual indignities of airplane travel, by Friday, I'll be happily ensconced at Sleuthfest and having a terrific time. Femmes Dana and Elaine will be there, too.

I hope to see some of y'all there!

Killer Bears

By Elaine Viets        

 

The detective solved a "grizzly murder" -– at least that’s what the jacket flap said.

Gotta watch those killer bears. Gotta watch those jacket copy writers, too. It should have been a "grisly murder."

This grizzly sighting happened on a book by a bestselling author – Patricia Cornwell, I believe. Even the greats have to bear with these common errors.

I’ve read about people in "desperate straights," which must be somewhere south of the Strait of Gibralter. Or maybe they are unhappy heterosexuals.

And America is plagued with expatriots. What a shame they no longer love their country. Thanks to four years of Latin, I understood that expatriates had left their "patria" – that is, their native country. They could still love it.

 Excitement has "peeked" during sports events. I imagine it would if a  mountain suddenly appeared in the middle of a cheering stadium. At the very least, curiosity would be "peaked." Er, piqued.

I’ve waded through accounts of people who "wet their appetites" – which sounds rather nasty. Actors have been real "troopers" – even when they play sweet maiden aunts, not burly state troopers.

Opportunities to misspell (or is that miss spell?) lurk everywhere. When I write my Josie Marcus Mystery Shopper books, I have to keep asking: Is Miss Apple the principle or principal of Amelia Marcus’s school?

Fortunately, my teachers gave me a little saying to answer that question: "A school principal is the prince of pals." Not necessarily true if you knew my high school principal, but the sentence helps me.

My teachers also helped clarify the dreaded "it’s" and "its" that confound so many. Sister Grace Edmund taught us to mentally change "it’s" to "it is" when we read the sentence. If it’s correct – if "it is" correct – we can apply that apostrophe. Otherwise, "its" is a possessive pronoun that will not possess an apostrophe. Sister was a gentle nun who would never hit students with a ruler. Instead, she hit that apostrophe on her blackboard with a wooden, rubber-tipped pointer until she beat it into our heads.

Alas, nothing could be done to help me spell "separate." I still get it wrong.

The wily "recommend" looks right with two C’s as well as two M’s.

Despite my teachers’ best efforts, I’ve made some very public spelling mistakes. Newspaper readers rightly laughed at me when I said a man wore German liederhosen. "Really?" a reader asked. "His pants were singing? That is newsworthy." He politely told me the German gent wore lederhosen.

I had a cyclist peddling all over town – selling from a bike, no doubt. I’ve also had one ride a stationery bike. A paper bike is lightweight, but not as fast as a paper airplane.

Spellcheck adds its own perils. It once changed my businessman’s Dunhill briefcase to Dunghill. That name lacks snob appeal, even if you’re at the top of the heap.

I’ve tried to defend the language, as well as offend it. A copyeditor – a very good one who obviously didn’t spend time contemplating whiskey bottles – tried to change Jack Daniel’s to Jack Daniels in one of my mysteries.

The correct name of that liquor is Jack Daniel’s Tennessee Sour Mash Whiskey – as in, belonging to Mr. Jack Daniel.

I fought for that apostrophe like a mother grizzly.

 

It's Not the Years, Honey...

“Spencer-Fleming explores a serious societal issue - the reentry problems of soldiers home from combat… while concocting an an absolutely irresistible combination of crime fiction and romance… this is a surefire winner. This series, as intelligent as it is enthralling, just keeps getting better.”

                                                                       —Booklist on "One Was A Soldier"

HANK:  Talk about intelligent and enthralling. That's exactly how I would describe Julia Spencer-Fleming. Wouldn't you? Given half a chance, I'd just take this moment to gush. But hey, Julia has stuff she wants to talk about. And a moment ago, I knew what it was. Now, ::scratching head::, if I could just have a moment to think, I know I could..why did I come into this room,anyway?

Oh. To let the fabulous Julia talk.

 It's Not the Years, Honey...

             

 by Julia Spencer-Fleming

 I remember the moment I realized my main characters were somewhat out of the fictional zeitgeist. I was at the Edgars dinner, I believe, and the presenter of the prestigious Mary Higgins Clark award was explaining the parameters of the contest. The books had the feature a heroine under 35, in a good relationship with her family, who got into trouble through no fault of her own. And no real bad language, either. (Footnote 1)

  My heroine, whom I had felt was as a cool young priest, didn't qualify.(Footnote 2) She was already 35, and getting older with each succeeding book. My hero, the rugged and ready for action chief of police, wore vision correcting glasses to read and couldn't kneel properly because it hurt his knee.

Why are we so enamored of young protagonists?

 I'll grant you, the mystery community has a rich tradition of well-seasoned detectives, but for the most part, popular contemporary fiction features one 30-something store owner/reporter/cop/lawyer/bail bondsman after another. These characters wade into action scenes without having to think about their lower backs going out. They jump into bed with nary a concern for stretch marks and sagging bits. The heroine never misses a clue because she had menopause brain while walking into the crime scene. (Footnote 3) The hero never falls asleep in the cop car on a stake out because it's after nine.

What makes this preference more of a mystery (4) is the trending age of the readers and writers of crime fiction. The primary consumers of mysteries—indeed, of most fiction—are women over the age of forty. And if you belly up to the bar at a mystery convention (5) you will see we may be raucous and lively, but there's no way you'll mistake us for a gathering of recent college grads. Or even recent doctoral dissertation grads.

 

As I get older, I want to read about people like myself. I take my daily omeprezole (6) for my ulcer, I have traumatic arthritis in one knee, and last year I bit the bullet and let my hair grow out

to its now-natural silver. (7)

Now, it's true that I want the people I read about to be able to solve crimes, chase down bad guys, and even do the horizontal hokey pokey (8) if it's that kind of book. But is it too much to ask that they think about bifocals as well as blood spatters? College tuition as well as cadavers? Gums as well as guns?(9)

 What do you think? Do you want your detectives fresh, young and Ben-Gay free? Or is it time for the crime fiction world to stage a gray revolution?

Footnotes:

 (1) My table had an impromptu unacceptable-Mary Higgins Clark opening line contest. The winner was: “F@#$ you, mother!” Deidre shouted as she stormed out of her 40th birthday party, looking for trouble.

(2) Episcopalians average age: 53.(See a)

         (a) I just made that up. But we are kind of gray.

(3) My children imitate me standing in the middle of the kitchen, saying, “What did I come in here for?”

(4) Ha! Get it?

(5) Not that I am suggesting you do this.

(6) My husband calls them my Oprah pills.

(7) God knows what I'll be like 10 years from now, when I'm 58. Dead, probably.

(8) My daughter says I must NEVER use this phrase. EVER.

(9) Too much?

Julia Spencer-Fleming is the Agatha and Anthony-award-winning author of the upcoming One Was A Soldier, the seventh Clare Fergusson/Russ Van Alstyne mystery. You can find her at Facebook, on Twitter, and at her Reader Space. One Was A Soldier is available for preorder at: Amazon Barnes & Noble Books-A-Million Borders Powell's Books and your locally owned independent bookstore.

My Fictional LIfe

There are advantages to my age, and one of them is that people no longer expect me to be like one of my characters. When I was younger, that was an issue. When I would meet readers, they were invariably a bit disappointed because they expected me to be . . . more. They expected me to have a long mane of hair like Aurora Teagarden, or to be grim and physical like Lily Bard.

When I started writing the Sookie Stackhouse novels over ten years ago, expectations grew. I don't know what readers thought they'd see when I did a personal appearance, but it wasn't me. I think they thought I'd look like the heroine of a romance novel. They certainly wanted me to speak and act more frankly than I do. Not that I'm prim and proper, but they were expecting some kind of Candace Bushnell or Erica de Jong, and what they got was me!

My friendly acquaintance Laurell Hamilton writes novels that are not only about physical adventure, but sexual adventure as well. She told me that readers were spreading a rumor that she had men chained in her basement for the enjoyment of Laurell and her husband. She was rightly appalled.

I don't know if these readers are projecting their own wish list onto the nearest living person, or if they simply believe you are what you write. If that were true, then most of my friends would be murderers. (I've been asked that, too.)

The key element of writing is imagination, and that imagination is what people latch onto. I can only assume people without it are inclined to believe that whatever you write must come from real-life experience. Far from it!

For every exciting edge-of-your-seat scene you read, there are hours of the writer sitting staring at his/her computer. That's the reality. And it's plenty exciting for me.

#Valentine Fail

by Dana

In which our Heroine learns that a common Language and similar Customs do not ensure perfect Expression and Understanding...

A long time ago (let's say the mid-1980s), in a galaxy far, far away (London), I was studying abroad, broke and bored out of my mind one weekend.  That midwinter didn't have feet of snow piled up like this year; it was gray and drizzly, the no-man's-land between New Years and the first crocuses.   Valentine's Day was a week or so off, so I figured I'd amuse myself by making Valentines for a bunch of friends.  A glossy magazine, a glue stick, some scissors and paper, and I was in the card-making business.  Cheap and creative and distracting, it kept me off the streets (at least, out of the pubs) for a few hours.

Quite pleased with myself, I went down to get the mail on Valentine's Day.  My landlady looked very excited:  I had a package and two cards.  “Only one of those is from your young man,” she said, indicating something I couldn't quite work out. 

“Right,” I said, glancing at the addresses.  “He sent chocolates.  One card's from my mother, and the other is from my grandmother.”

At which point, she and her daughter burst out laughing.  At home, we'd exchanged cards among family and friends, as well as sweethearts.  Remember when you had to get one for everyone in the class in grade school?  I do.  In London, at least according to my landlady, you didn't give someone a Valentine unless you meant it.  Meant it seriously.  Romantically. 

So, having first assumed that I was receiving protestations of affection from men other than my then-fiance-now-husband, they then thought it was pretty darned funny my grandmother would be sending out any Valentines at all, much less sending one to me. 

I didn't know:  in England, at least back then, you didn't exchange Valentines casually.  It's like how on “Buffy The Vampire Slayer,” you avoid speaking Latin near the spell books, because you don't know what kind of trouble you'll summon.

I might have been a little nervous heading into the common room after class that day, but I was determined I was going to give the cards out.  I figured, my friends will understand.  I'm just being nice. Friendly.  We all did something like this in my mixed-sex dorm at home last year, just for fun.  Look at me, being creative.

Nope.  It was as bad as you imagine:  the guys all blushed and stammered while I tried to explain—I'm just being nice!  It's only friendly!  The girls all gave me sideways glances, wondering what, exactly, I was suggesting.  I kept trying to explain.  “We did this in my dorm last year!  I was being creative!  It's friendly—honestly, it's not what you think!” 

A lecturer saw one of the cards, and, while I was dying a thousand deaths of mortification, said something nice about all my efforts.  Which was very sweet of him.

“How many did you make?” he asked, after a pause.

“Mmm, six—eight.  Maybe ten, tops,” I said.

“Ah.  A lot of work,” he said, hastily grabbing a cup of tea and fleeing.

What he didn't say, but what I now understood, was that I'd just propositioned a significant percentage of my class, male and female.  A lot of work, indeed.

Be careful out there my friends.  It's Valentine's Day tomorrow.  And don't speak Latin in front of the books, either.

Got a #Valentine Fail?  A #Valentine Triumph?  Please share--I'd love to hear it.

The Call of the Snowbird

By Elaine Viets

On a recent trip to Key Largo, Florida, I watched the winter birds – pelicans, egrets and snowbirds.

Showbirds are a northern breed that flock to south Florida every winter and roost around the pools and beaches. This February, we’re teeming with snowbirds. I observed this species from my perch by the hotel pool.

South Floridians welcome snowbirds, at least at the beginning of the season. They are harbingers of prosperity. We try to pluck them as gently as possible, so that they will keep returning every year.

Snowbirds are easy to distinguish. As soon as they arrive at the airport they began molting. Snowbirds shed pounds of heavy coats, hats, scarves and boots. After the final molt, they are extremely white, but soon turn bright red after exposure to the sun.

Once at their hotels, they don colorful plumage and head for the water. The younger snowbirds wear bikinis and two-piece suits. The males wear board shorts and Speedos. More mature female snowbirds prefer one-piece plumage, though some with poor eyesight wear skimpy suits. Mature male snowbirds often display bellies of impressive girth, but prefer their females to be big-breasted and slender.

Snowbirds sun themselves around beaches and pools. They are a hardy breed. When temperatures dip into the low seventies and the locals turn blue, the snowbirds will flock together.

Snowbirds recognize one another on sight and begin an elaborate greeting ritual.

"Where are you from?" one will call from a hammock, and the others will answer:

"Michigan!" "Upstate New York!" "New Jersey!" "North Carolina!"

After the ritual greeting, one snowbird will ask, "How much snow?" Then they try to outdo one another with the depth of the snow they left back home. Snowbirds who have fled two or three feet of snow outrank those who had a measly eight to ten inches.

Next, the female snowbirds will squawk about the damage the snow has inflicted. "The pipes burst in our downstairs and ruined two thousand dollars worth of carpet and baseboards," said gray-crested snowbird.

"We lost six thousand dollars," said a blonde-streaked snowbird.

The poolside winner at our resort was a saline-breasted snowbird who claimed that burst pipes put four inches of water in her home during the two hours she was out grocery shopping. "Did twelve thousand dollars worth of damage," she said. "We had to replace everything. It took eight weeks to fix the damage."

This snowbird was rewarded with respectful silence. None of the flock could top her story.

Even young snowbirds are affected by this brutal winter. Two boys aged about five were playing with their trucks in the wet sand on the beach. "Okay," said the boy with brown curls, "that’s your driveway and I’ll plow it." They dutifully made truck noises while plowing the snow-sand.

After the ritual raucous greeting, mature snowbirds settle in quietly, roosting by the water, sipping dangerous-sounding drinks decorated little paper umbrellas.

Some snowbirds bring their computers, but don’t really seem to use them. This may be part of an outmoded nesting urge. Others sleep under fat paperback novels.

About five o’clock as the sun sets, the snowbirds begin their calls. They open their cell phones and shout, "Hi, how are you? Another seventeen inches? Amazing. No, no, we’re fine. It’s nice and sunny down here. Eighty degrees. We’re having a terrific time. Oops. Here comes the cabana boy with another drink. Gotta go."

These calls sound like the snowbirds are concerned for the folks back home. Experienced watchers recognize the sound of crowing. 

 

  

The Story of Story

by Kris Neri

Not long ago, I made notes for a talk I gave in January in conjunction with a series of writing workshops sponsored by the Los Angeles chapter of Sisters in Crime and the Burbank (CA) Public Library. I offered a comprehensive workshop, with writing exercises and feedback, that I called, “How to go from a mere fragment of an idea to a fully plotted novel that’s ready to write,” to show attendees how I actually plan my own novels, and take them through my suggested method of organization, so they’d have more control over their material, and might better build on each stage of the process.

Though I came up with a general topic, I knew that since this workshop series is partially sponsored by Sisters in Crime, I expected to encounter lots of mystery writers there, as I did, and geared it accordingly. But since it was also partially sponsored by a library, I wanted to be prepared for writers of other categories and genres of fiction as well, and tweaked the exercises for those potential students as well, jotting notes with a selection of examples that I could switch to on the spot.

It occurred to me, not for the first time, that when you strip away genre conventions and trappings, the essence of story is always the same. Some consuming problem arises in a character’s life, and though she feels compelled to solve it, obstacles rise up to prevent it. Characters and conditions continue to change, or maybe she just sees them in new ways. Old alliances crumble and new relationships are forged. Yet the journey gets harder, and at times she doubts that she’ll manage to solve the problem after all. She grows, yet the force or forces she does battle with grow, too. Until she finally finds a way to confront whatever resistance she faces, and solves that problem, changing her life in the process, at least to some extent.

 Though we’ve expanded them greatly since then, in essence, this is the way we’ve been telling stories since we wore loincloths and lived in caves. We know that because our earliest storytellers sometimes left pictorial records of their tales drawn on the walls of those caves. For those early people, the tasks of survival must have consumed most of their energy. Yet at night, by the campfire, we can imagine the communal storytellers thrilling our earliest ancestors with struggles and victories reflective of those they actually faced each day.

The need for stories must surely be coded in our DNA.

And yet the variations on the basic theme seem infinite, and the number of possibilities grow with each   generation removed from our earliest ancestors, and reflect the struggles that matter to those living at that time in history. Sure, when you immerse your life in story, whether as a writer or a reader, some patterns will emerge for you in your readings, and you often see how they will play out. Yet loads of writers continue to surprise us with their storytelling inventiveness.

Back when I was in college, in a theatrical history class, my professor remarked that there are no new  stories today. He maintained the last documented new plot was created in the 11^th century. I don’t know how he came up with that, or who might document such things. But while I’m sure he’s wrong — the detective form, for instance, came later — the essence of many storylines is often similar, and many plot variations have been told too many times to count.

Maybe we find comfort from that sameness, just as the surprises and new wrinkles thrill us, and the reflections of our unique periods in history resonate so deeply within us. Stories provide us with escape from our own struggles. They make us think. They make us feel. And sometimes, they actually show us how to change our lives.

Storytelling…it’s a proud tradition. Even the word sounds magical. Thanks for joining us around the campfire.

Like Mother, LIke Daughter

by Hank Phillippi Ryan

HANK: One of the true joys of being a writer--and you all know this--is the serendiptious way a new friendships can begin. How, by chance, you meet a fellow author--and feel as if you've known her forever. That's what happened with me and Laura DiSilverio. We were roomies on a road trip...and instant friends. In this blog, you can see what I think she's such a special person.

LAURA DISILVERIO

Like many of you, I am a mother; Lily is a teen (13) and Ellen is a tween (11).  A forty-eight, I am on the cusp of menopause, just beginning to experience the “brain fog,” night sweats, and mood swings that coincide with the expiration date on my eggs.  Need I spell out what this means in terms of hormonal fluctuations disrupting our household?

Yet.  Yet, even though the incidence of daughter eye rolling has increased exponentially, along with the number of hours spent plugged into iPods or on-line, and even though the girls display a marked preference for friends’ company rather than family time, I can’t help but notice that my daughters occasionally act in a selfless way that gives me hope Tom and I haven’t completely failed as parents.  I’m sure we all find it hard, in one way or another, to watch as our kids move farther away from us emotionally, discover values of their own that might clash with ours, and indulge in behaviors that make us wonder if they completely missed out on the “survival” gene.  Focusing on my daughters’ moments of kindness, generosity, responsibility and accountability makes it possible for our family to live together sans homicide.  (If you have a low sappiness threshold, quit reading now.)

Lily does the dishes every night.  This, by itself, is not awe-inspiring.  However, she NEVER complains about it or needs reminders.  When Tom puts a plate in the dishwasher, she stops him:  “That’s my job.”  Just this past weekend she spent many hours generously helping her six-year-old cousin learn how to draw with Gimp on the computer.  Listening to the way she encouraged him and praised him almost brought me to tears. 

When I’m out of sorts (see comment about menopause in first paragraph), she comes over, wraps her arms around me, and says, “Mommy needs a hug.”  (What Mommy really needs is a week at a spa or for one of her books to crack the bestseller list, but a hug is a marvelous substitute.)  She hand-made ornaments for every aunt, uncle, grandparent and cousin this past Christmas, and cheerfully wrote thank-you notes for every gift she received—without prompting.

Ellen is an altogether different kid—feisty, strong-willed, fiercely independent.  I foresee fireworks in our future as she becomes a teen and discovers that her parents, despite their many successes, have combined IQs that add up to about twenty-seven.  She responds to virtually every parental comment, dictum, or question with an argument or negotiation.  I could tell her the sun rises in the east and she’d say, “Well, it’s really more the southeast.”  If I ask her to pick up a towel from the bathroom floor, she responds with, “That’s Lily’s.”  When asked to log off the computer, she’ll come back with “Five more minutes?”  Gaaagh!  We have had many talks about this (expletives deleted) habit.

Recently, though, Ellen has occasionally paused, on the verge of answering me, and said, “Caught myself!”  And then responds appropriately.  She insists on rescuing every stray dog we see and raises money via lemonade stands and the like to contribute to the humane society.  She’s donated more than five hundred dollars over the past couple of years.  One of her friends recently told her mother, “Ellen’s my only friend who has never lied to me.”  (Maybe this says more about her other friends than it does about Ellen, but it still warmed my heart.)

I realize these are not earth-shattering moments and don’t mean my children will grow up to be little Albert Schweitzers or Mother Theresas.  I also realize there is still much landmine-filled territory to negotiate during the teen years.  (Please don’t give me examples; ignorance is temporary bliss.)  But as I mourn the passing of childhood milestones—Will this be the last time they want a bedtime story?  Will this be the last day they want me to walk home from school with them?  Is tomorrow the day they’ll want to wear make-up, shave their legs, borrow the car and get a tattoo?—I take comfort from these small portents of maturity to come.

 

Laura DiSilverio is the author of Swift Justice, a finalist for the Lefty award for best humorous mystery of 2010.  She also writes the Southern Beauty Shop mystery series as Lila Dare;  the second in that series, Polished Off was released yesterday.  You can find Laura and Lila on Facebook or at www.lauradisilverio.com and www.liladare.com .