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Katrina, Isaac, and the Long-Range Weather Forecast

by Donna Andrews

I remember where I was seven years ago this week.  Bouchercon was unusually early that year--September 1-4 in Chicago, Illinois.  And normally when Bouchercon is happening, the eyes of the mystery community are on the convention, with everybody either there or wishing they were.

Except in 2005, as we were all converging on Chicago, Hurricane Katrina was heading for New Orleans.  It was a curiously schizophrenic weekend. We all paneled and networked and promoted, making new friends and catching up with old ones--and then drifted back to the television to watch in stunned disbelief what was happening in the Big Easy. And worrying about our friends there.

I knew my life was going to change when I got published.  One of the best changes--and perhaps the one I least expected--was how my social circle would expand.  Yes, writing is a solitary business, but for that reason we writers appreciate all the more those occasions when our tribe can gather. It's really cool the first time you look around the audience at a convention and recognize all the faces that correspond to the books on your shelves.  And even cooler when many of them become your friends.

But having so many friends spread across the country--for that matter, across the world--has a downside.  Whenever any crisis or natural disaster happens, I find myself thinking of the friends who may be affected by it. I first realized this on 9/11 when, like everyone else in the writing community, I knew a lot of people in New York and worried for days before some of them checked in.  I have friends who have survived earthquakes and mudslides in California.  Wildfires in Colorado and New Mexico.  Tornadoes in Nebraska.  I've worried through them all.   And been worried about, of course, most recently when the derecho ripped through the Washington area. I've become familiar with that curious mixture of relief, when you hear that a friend is safe, and guilt because others weren't so fortunate.

I knew a few people in New Orleans back in 2005, but as it happened, immediately after Bouchercon--and while the horrible aftermath of Katrina was playing out--I was traveling around for a short signing tour with fellow Femme Dana Cameron and two of our writer friends, Jessica Speart and Eileen Dreyer.  Eileen had a new book out for Bouchercon: Sinners and Saints, released September 1, 2005.  It doesn't just take place in New Orleans--it takes place in a New Orleans in which a category 5 hurricane is heading for the city.

Eileen spent months in New Orleans, researching her book.  Researching the kind of worst-case scenarios that make for taut, gripping suspense in fiction--and disaster in real life. More than any of us, Eileen knew exactly what could happen in New Orleans and why.  I'll never forget how white-faced Eileen was when she heard of yet another real-life event that paralleled the events in her book--or how elated she was when she finally heard from one of her friends, an ER room nurse who had been her guide to New Orleans and particularly the Charity Hospital ER.   (For more about Karen Chabert, aka Kareena Boudreaux, check, out Eileen's blog.  And read the book, for heaven's sake.  Sinners and Saints. There will be a quiz later. Okay, there won't but it's fabulous.)

Thank goodness Isaac has been less catastrophic.  Although I feel guilty saying that, because obviously for some people it has been catastrophic.  I find it particularly heart-wrenching when I see a news story about someone who was still rebuilding from Katrina and is now looking at starting all over again.

Why, yes, I am watching the news.  Mostly the Weather Channel, because it comes the closest to satisfying my craving to know what's happening on the gulf coast. It's the new ritual for dealing with disasters. You turn on the TV.  You monitor Facebook and your email for signs that your friends and family are okay.  Maybe you make a donation to someplace or other.

I'm trying to add another thing to my own ritual.  Next time I find myself staring at the screen watching someone else's hurricane, tornado, blizzard, police emergency, or whatever, I'm going to make a point of doing something toward making myself a little more prepared for the next emergency to come my way.

There are a lot of good checklists out there--for example:
http://www.ready.gov/hurricanes

I'm going to work those lists.  Some of it I already have done.  But after my own experiences in the derecho, I'm also making my own, somewhat eccentric list.  The things I've got on it so far:
•    Get all my important phone numbers, addresses, and passwords down on paper, not just in the computer and the iPhone.
•    Make it a part of each day's routine to back up the WIP not just to the cloud but also to a flash drive, so I can work from wherever I can find power.
•    Find a battery powered fan. It won't make up for missing AC, but it sure will help.
•    Get a new manual can opener.  The current one is better at provoking primal screams than opening cans.
•    Make sure there's a working flashlight or LED headlamp in every room. And that I know where the spare batteries are.  And that the nephews haven't used up all the batteries on their Wii controllers.

And maybe I'll get started on some of that stuff tonight.  It's high hurricane season here, and they're predicting a snowier than usual winter for my part of the county. Anyone else obsessively watching the Isaac coverage and thinking emergency preparedness?

Femmes of the Past, Part 2

By Dean (aka Miranda) James

For the second in my series of glances backwards at notable Femmes Fatales of times past, I settled on the American detective story writer Elizabeth Daly (1878-1967). Born in New York City and educated at Bryn Mawr and Columbia University, she was said to have had a lifelong interest in puzzles and detective stories. Her series of sixteen detective stories, beginning in 1940 with Unexpected Night, all feature bibliophile and amateur sleuth Henry Gamadge.

Gamadge is an urbane and well-educated man who grew up in the East Sixties of New York City. Always interested in books, he works as a rare book and manuscript expert, and indeed some of his cases are connected with obscure volumes. During the course of the series he meets an attractive young damsel-in-distress, Clara Dawson, who becomes Mrs. Gamadge. They have a son, a cat named Martin (who is not a pet, merely a cat who came and stayed), and an assistant.

In her sixties when she began her career as a mystery writer, Daly quickly became a favorite of readers for her clear prose and superbly plotted and crafted novels. No less a writer than Agatha Christie was said to have named Daly as her favorite American detective story writer. Daly is a big favorite of mine as well. I love the atmosphere of New York in the 1940s in her books, and Gamadge is a most attractive sleuth. Felony & Mayhem Press is reprinting many of the series, and for the true detective story fan, these books are a must read.

I'm Not Feeling Funny

by Toni L.P. Kelner

 

This summer I've been working on the first in a new mystery series, the Family Skeleton series. The protagonist is Georgia, a single mother and  adjunct English instructor who moves back home and has to deal with the family skeleton. A skeleton named Sid. He walks, he talks, and he makes bad bone jokes, and he wants Georgia to help him solve his murder. The first one is The Skeleton in the Armoire and it'll be out next August from Berkley Prime Crime.

We don't have a cover yet, but here's an artist's rendering of Sid celebrating. (The artist is my daughter Maggie, by the way.)

 

 

I confess that I love this idea. It's wacky, and provides some unusual situations for a mystery. I picture it as kind of like Bewitched or The Ghost and Mrs. Muir. But without the romance--I'm not going there with a skeleton!Obviously it's going to be light-hearted--after all, somebody has to supply Sid with all those bone jokes. So I couldn't wait to get started. But here's the thing. The book hasn't been going as quickly as I wanted or expected it to. I've been having a hard time being light-hearted. 

What's up with that? I'm a pretty cheerful person. I make jokes all the time, admittedly not all good ones, but I laugh at them anyway. My family and I laugh a lot at the dinner table, and in the car, and when just hanging around. Our humor may not be sophisticated, but there's a whole lot of it. And I've always had a fair amount of humor in my books--some of it was even intentional. So what was slowing me down?

I started to think the issue was the world right now. Or at least my world right now. Excuse me for whinging, but I've got a lot of stresses right now. Work-related issues, family illness, some family discord, the rapidly approaching time when my daughter goes to college. (Okay, that last one isn't for another year, but I'm whinging about it preemptively.) Then there are world issues like divisive politics, natural disasters that seem to keep coming, shootings at movie theaters, and so forth.

All that has combined to make it harder for me to take an ambulatory skeleton seriously. Or maybe itmade it harder for me to take myself seriously. When there are so many bad things happening, what right to I have to write a silly novel about a skeleton? Shouldn't I be doing something more meaningful? Or even Significant?

Today this seemed more true than ever. I got some bad news about the health of my big sister Brenda, and I just wanted to go cry. Then I heard that Jerry Nelson, the man who created the Count on Sesame Street had passed away. You might think that it would have been the straw that broke the camel's back, but oddly, it make me feel better.

No, I'm not glad the world has lost a talented performer. It's just that when I saw people posting their memories of watching Sesame Street, and found YouTube clips of the Count singing with Kermit and the others, I remembered laughing at the Muppets myself. A lot. It ralso eminded me of our visit to Sesame Place in 2003, when Steve got to meet the Count in person. (So to speak.)

 

 

Then I thought about a recent visit to the Center for Puppetry Arts in Atlanta, GA, and the wonderful exhibit they had of Jim Henson's muppets. They even had a muppet of Henson himself.

 

Here were two beloved creators who'd added tremendously to the world, so much so that when they died, people mourned them as if they were friends. Was their work meaningful or Significant? Not hardly. The muppets make us smile and laugh and sing along and feel better--if they manage to teach us something along the way the way the Count does, that's okay, too.

I remembered that making people laugh so they can forget a little of the yuckiness in the world is a worthy goal to aspire to. That's worth a little hard work, even when I'm feeling bad.

Sometimes you just have to put your red nose on and be funny!

 

 

Improving Perfection

by Kris Neri

As of this writing, I’ve just gone through the editorial process for my next Tracy Eaton mystery, REVENGE ON ROUTE 66, in which Tracy and the gang fight mayhem through various real and made-up places along the Mother Road, Route 66. For the benefit of the writers among you, who hope to be published someday, I thought I’d share my experience with you. I didn't know when I wrote this that Femme Elaine was also going to share her editorial process, but I think this piece dovetails well with hers. 

Editors work in a variety of ways. Some use Post-its stuck at various points they question in the manuscript others write in margins, and some use digital comment tags. My editor for this series, Lisa, is happy to work in different ways, and since I prefer comment tags, that’s the method I request.

What does it matter? I always think at the start. I’m convinced the manuscript was perfect when I sent it off to her. How much could she find to comment on?

Turns out, quit a bit. When it comes back, I’m usually initially convinced she must have mixed my manuscript up with someone else’s more prone to making mistakes than I am. Surely, there can’t be that many tags – that many questions – in a document so flawless, it should be carved in stone like the statue of David.

It’s not just a matter of lots of comment tags, either. There’s also the editorial letter, which deals with what works well – and mostly, with works less well – in a larger, more conceptual sense. The letter contains suggested changes that demand more of a rewrite than mere tweaks and a polish.

Though the clock is already ticking down on a too-short deadline, when I read that letter and the tags, I set it aside initially for some serious thinking. Of course, I’m convinced it’s all wrong.

But a curious thing happens in short order. Within a couple of days, I begin to see that maybe it’s not totally wrong, after all, In fact, I start to see how some of those suggestions can actually make this book move from what I considered perfect to even better.

The comment tags that seemed so excessive start to make sense, and I come to see how a line or two tucked here and there not only speak to some potential questions the reader might have, but by judiciously noting small points and adding clues, I make it a stronger mystery. One that will make the reader look back from the end and say, "Aw, those clues were all there. I should have known."

That little voice inside that we all have, the one that always tells us the truth –- which I'll admit I’ve done my best to silence, unsuccessfully it seems –- starts confirming some of the points in my editor’s letter, insisting that if I apply those ideas, it absolutely will strengthen the book.

It’s not a matter of just making this adjustment here, and that change there, though. At that point in the process, my creativity gets sparked. I see how neither my editor nor I have nailed some points exactly right. How eliminating a questionable scene isn’t the answer, but moving it to a different place not only improves the flow, it allows me to more logically address some of the issues in those comment tags.

Of course, that little voice works both ways. It doesn’t only shout out when I’m wrong, it also tells me when I’m right. Story choices that came more from my unconscious, and which didn't get much conscious scrutiny during the course of writing the book can become forged in fire as a result of my editor’s questioning and my own. I not only know that they have to remain, I also know why. And I know how to make that argument when I send the final manuscript back.

It may not take a whole village to make a good book even better, but it does take another set of eyes.

With the ease of self-publication today, too many writers, who have by-passed the traditional publication route, are rushing into print, without availing themselves of the benefit of another perspective. They skip the editorial process, rather than have their presumed-perfection questioned. Since I'm a bookseller as well, I see those products every day, with the mistakes often jumping out at me from the first page. If the first one is problematic, how many pages do you think I read?

Oh, sure, some writers do have editing horror stories to tell, and maybe some of you will share them. But you're better off risking that because none of us can see our own work with the fresh eyes our readers will bring to them. We can get so locked into our own conceptions, we don’t notice the tiny plot holes and the odd contradictions.

Fortunately for those of us who are traditionally published, there's no question of skipping the editorial process. I'm grateful for that. A good editor who does spot those problems, and better still, grasps your vision and helps you to better achieve it is one of the best resources you can have.

Writers, if you’re dreading the editorial process –- don’t. Authors, care to share your editorial stories?

My First Time

by Hank Phillippi Ryan 

 

Nope.  Nope.  Nope.  I don't have one. No "trunk novel." Unless, um, you count one that never got past six chapters and an incredibly elaborate outline. 

 You do count it?

 Okay, then, the story. And it's a tale of innocence and experience, of great expectations, of hilarity and naiveté and big-time reality checks. And, finally, of education and knowledge and lessons learned for a lifetime.

 All from 6 chapters and an outline?

 Yup.

 I've always wanted to write mysteries, ever since I was a little girl, but I just never had a good idea. Which, as you know. is a big problem.

  One day, in 19....94? or even before that....I got one. A good idea. I would write a mystery about GOLF, featuring the first female golf pro at an exclusive local golf course, and she would solve a sort of eco-murder-mystery on the golf course having to do with herbicides and miscarriages. (As a TV reporter, I had covered the trial that turned out to be "A Civil Action" so I was full of research knowledge and lots of cool jargon.)

 

 We will not discuss the fact that I do not know how to play golf, don't know how a golf course works, and actually, don't even like golf because my depth perception is so bad I can never figure out where the ball is.  But I thought GREENSKEEPER  (good title, huh?)  would be commercial, and I'm a reporter, had been for almost 20 years back then, so I thought--I write true stories every day. How hard can it be to make stuff up?

  So I started. And whoa, I decided I was a natural. It as fun, the story was flowing, it all made sense. To me.

 What I didn't know:   I had clearly never heard the phrase "point of view." I mean, I'd heard it, but had no concept that in a good book, the POV has to be consistent. So when I tell you I head-hopped paragraph to paragraph, that is only in retrospect, because back then I didn't know that's what I was doing.

 

 I finished six pretty great (if I did say so myself) chapters. and decided it was time to submit this baby to some agents and get this new career underway. I was TV reporter. Who wouldn't want me?

 But no--wait. I read somewhere you were supposed to have an outline. NO problem, I thought. I can do that. So I wrote an incredibly specific chapter by chapter description of what was going to happen, and that only served to make me  even more certain that I would soon be a wildly successful author. I thought--who wouldn't love this?

  I sent the chapters and the outline to two agents. And waited for the good news. This was--1994, remember. Maybe--before that. Actually, come to think of it, it might have been 1989. Hmm. I wrote it on a typewriter, I remember.

 Meanwhile, I sent the manuscript to my father, who is retired from the foreign service now, but used to be the music critic for the Chicago Daily News, and has written two well-published non-fiction books on American music.

 He's the nicest person in the world, and infinitely loving.  He called, and said--"Honey? I read your stuff. And, uh--" And I am quoting precisely now: "There's this thing called 'voice,'" he said. "And you don't have it." 

 Which was--a bummer. But I figured, what does he know? He doesn't read this kind of book.  

A few weeks later, I got my replies from the agents.

  One's letter said, paraphrasing: Wow, this is a great plot, and we love the idea of the female golf pro. But we are sorry to say your writing is just not up to par. (Oh, they didn’t actually say "up to par," I'm sure. But how could I resist? And that's what they meant.) And they rejected it.

 The other agent said: "Wow, you are a terrific writer! But this plot just doesn't cut it."

 I was so flummoxed and disappointed, I just--stopped.

 Years later, more than ten years later, when I started writing again, I knew enough to know that I didn't know anything. I was still a complete novice, writing PRIME TIME, but I worked and learned and got advice and read books about writing, took  classes  and went to conferences and joined Sisters in Crime and MWA. And revised, revised, revised.

 

  And it all worked beautifully. And now my fifth Novel, THE OTHER WOMAN is the lead hardcover title for Forge's fall catalog, and is getting amazing amazing blurbs--Lee Child, Karin Slaughter, Lisa Gardner, Lisa Scottoline, Joe Finder, Louise Penny, Carolyn Hart, Lisa Unger. (And I am on the national board of MWA, and about to be president of national Sisters in Crime.)

 I pulled out GREENSKEEPER, recently, wondering if there was anything I could steal for my next book. Or anything I could learn.  And there was.  I learned exactly what NOT to do!

 And what could be more valuable than that?

 What did you learn from your mistakes?

 

 ***Breaking news: You can win a Kindle, a Nook or $100 gift certificate to the bookstore of your choice! Click here for details!

 

http://hankphillippiryan.com/newsletter-7-12.html

 

A Novel Diary

 

Chapter 2: Title Hell
By Elaine Viets

NOTE: This is a continuing series about my May 2013 Dead-End Job Mystery, from conception to publication.

 I’d rather write a whole novel than name it. Choosing a title is the hardest part of writing a mystery. I have to capture a 75,000 word novel in a few words.

Because I write funny mysteries, the task is even harder. Funny mysteries often have punny titles. Make the title too punny, and my novel will be dismissed as fluff by readers and reviewers. Too serious, and I’ll mislead them.

My editor, Sandy, and I had a theme for my new Dead-End Job mystery: It would be set in the cutthroat world of South Florida beach concessions, where there’s killer competition for the money spent on kayaking, paddleboarding, parasailing, and other beach sports.

Now we needed to name our baby. I had to produce a synopsis and lists of titles that would be shot down until we found a good one. I’d entered Title Hell.

Luckily, my editor is not like the red demon in "The Fall of the Damned" by the 14^th century Flemish painter Dieric Bouts. She’s tough but fair. But I’d go through a hell of a lot of titles before we chose one.

I started with this synopsis for my nameless DEJ mystery:

It's set on the beach in South Florida. A company gives lessons for standup paddleboarding and parasailing. The company owner says a competitor is sabotaging his business, but most people think the guy is a crank. The PI team of Phil and Helen try to find out if anyone is ruining the man's business. Helen works at the rental stand while Phil poses as a beer-drinking tourist to catch the saboteur. A woman is killed parasailing and the company may have to close, unless Helen and Phil can prove her death was murder -- and find the killer.

"I suppose we can’t call it Son of a Beach?" I emailed Sandy. Once I had that terrible title out of my system, my mystery-loving friends sent lists of titles, including Stiff on a Board, Murder Is a Shore Thing, Beached, Death on the Line, Murder on the Wings, Murder in the Wind, Death of A Beach Babe, Stand Up and Die, Paddles and Perils, A Stand-up Death, Peril Sailing, and A Perfectly Safe Death. I liked the last title. It had a sophisticated Alfred Hitchcock touch. I was sure my editor would choose it.

She didn’t. Sandy ran the titles past many publishing pros at Penguin. They liked Murder Is a Shore Thing.

That was my last choice. I thought it was too fluffy.

"I'm concerned that title will be hard to remember and hard to find in the bookstores’ online catalogues," I wrote Sandy. "Barnes & Noble’s system is especially unforgiving. If someone calls my mystery  Murder Is a Sure  Thing instead of Shore Thing, the B&N computer may say it’s not in stock."

I tried bargaining.  "They really didn't like A Perfectly Safe Death? That's what everyone says when you try a dangerous sport. How about A Perfectly Safe Murder?  If you really don't want that, can I try to find another title?"

Sandy gently reminded me that I’d suggested Murder Is a Shore Thing first, it was easy to remember and it tied into the subject. My favorite, A Perfectly Safe Death, didn’t do any of that.

Many editors wouldn’t bother humoring a writer. They’d choose a title and I’d have to live with it.

Sandy said she’d try to think of new titles, but she needed a title that day. She also wanted Helen to have a bigger role in this novel.

Now I was deep in Title Hell – rejected with a deadline looming.

Sandy sent more titles, including Murder at High Tide, Death Goes to the Beach, Death Catches a Wave, and Death Makes a Splash. She also agreed to reconsider Beached, A Coastal Killing, Death of a Beach Babe, and Seaside Sabotage.

Meanwhile I phoned some friends on their sailboat. (Cell phones are wonderful inventions.) They were on a boozy cruise and primed to brainstorm.

The boaters said I made a landlubber's mistake: A shore is where the water meets the land but there may or may not be a beach at the shore. They also suggested I write about a paddleboard murder, since a parasailing title might confuse readers with "Final Sail," my Dead-End Job mystery about yachting. I rewrote the synopsis so a paddleboarder was murdered. The boaters gave me these titles: Board Stiff, Board to Death, The Board Game Murder. 

I sent them to Sandy and sweated. Would I be released from Title Hell?

At last, I got the verdict. The new book would be called – Board Stiff.

Hallelujah!

 

Where does a book start for you?

The title of this blog is a question I have often asked other writers in interview situations. The obvious answer is, "It starts on page one, doofus. Next question?" What I'm talking about, however, is the genesis of the book -- another way, I suppose, of asking the question that so many writers dread, "Where do you get your ideas?

I can refine the question further by asking: Does it start with a character? a setting? a few words of dialogue? What I'm really getting at is, what inspires an author to write a particular book? I can offer some examples of how books started for me.

Eight years ago I wrote several sample chapters and a synopsis for a new mystery series set in Houston, featuring an older, wealthy socialite as the sleuth -- the "Murder, She Wrote" of the monied set, more or less. My agent read it, thought it was okay, but that it didn't have that spark of originality. Then she asked me why mysteries so often focused on rich people. Why hadn't someone written a trailer park detective?

After I stopped thinking about being rejected and started evaluating her question, I had a character (Wanda Nell Culpepper) and a scenario (murder of an ex-husband by lawn flamingo) in my head, and I wrote the first chapter in what would become Flamingo Fatale in about two hours. The book was published in 2005 under the name Jimmie Ruth Evans.

Rejection prompted me another time with an idea for a book. An editor turned down an academic mystery I wrote, saying that the character didn't stand out enough in the crowded market. What could I come up with, I asked myself, that would stand out? At the time (1998) I was reading some of the early paranormal mysteries out there, namely Laurell K. Hamilton, P.N. Elrod, and Tanya Huff. Their books were all fairly hard-edged, and I realized that I hadn't read any cozy paranormal mysteries. What if I wrote a cozy vampire mystery?

Within minutes of articulating that thought, I heard two sentences in my head: "The vicar doesn't know I'm a vampire. Nor does he know I'm gay." Those are the first two lines of Posted to Death, the first of four books about an American vampire, Simon Kirby-Jones, who resides in an English village. I had to write the book to figure out who was talking in my head. The first book was published in 2002, and I think the Simon books might be the first paranormal cozy mystery series, or close to it.

So there you have it, a couple of examples of where writers get their ideas. In my case, from rejection. Hmm... maybe I should think more about that... In any case, for those of you who also write, where does a book start for you?

"But I emailed you about that!"

by Donna Andrews

I showed my friend Angel one of my cool new toys yesterday--a set of lenses for the iPhone camera.  My photographer/writer friend, Robin Templeton, told me about them --from PhotoJojo, if anyone else is interested. And I thought a fellow iPhone/techie like Angel would appreciate these.  And she did.

"I want those!" Angel exclaimed. "Where did you get them?"

I picked up my phone.

"I can email you the link," I said.  I was actually starting a new email on my phone when--

"Text it to me," she said.  "I never read my email."

Never reads her email?

This actually explains a lot. 

And no, I don't mean that as a criticism.  Confession time: I don't always check my phone messages every day.  And I don't always handle emails well. I check for email obsessively, but I don't always close the loop by reading the whole email right away, responding appropriately, taking any action needed or adding that action to my project list, and filing or deleting the email.  This is my goal--this is how I know I should handle email--but the reality?  Arg. As a result, whenever I get busy, my email box has a frightening tendency to become bloated with emails in every stage of handling.  A tendency I have to fight by reminding myself, daily, that it's easier to keep up than catch up.  That mantra applies to housekeeping, too.  And since I have recently been in the throes of finishing a first draft (of The Hen of the Baskervilles, which will come out next year), I'm not inviting anyone over to dinner just now, and my apologies to anyone who's waiting for an email response from me.

No, Angel's comment drove home something that I've been thinking about lately--the fact that in our modern world, one of the most important and yet really basic responsibilities of friendship has become exponentially harder: that we at least make an effort to communicate with our friends in the way that is most comfortable and convenient to them.

Used to be, when you wanted to get in touch with your friends, you called them.  You picked an appropriate time, and you called. Either they were there or they weren't.  If they weren't, you tried again.  Answering machines improved on this because when your friends weren't there, you could still get in touch with them.  And if the people you were calling had different ideas about appropriate times--if they slept late, went to bed early, or devoted their evenings to family time or novel writing--the answering machine no doubt saved many friendships.

Cell phones came along, and made life easier and more complicated at the same time.  If I have my friend's home phone, cell phone, and office phone, which does she prefer I use? Keeping track of that could be tough, especially since the answer wasn't static. This friend, formerly a landline person, now has a cell phone she loves and prefers.  That cell phone loving friend just moved to a remote area with bad coverage and has reluctantly become a landline user.  This friend now works at a secure government facility and cannot access her phone during the day, so if I need to reach her right away--like to prevent her from making a long drive directly from work to a meeting that has been cancelled--I need to call the work number that is under all other circumstances off limits.  Complicated.

Then email came along, and at first it seemed to make communications so much easier, at least for those of us who are comfortable with the written word.  You can think of something you want to tell someone at 3 in the morning and just send it.  If you need to tell the same thing to ten friends, you can do it in a single email.  You can attach documents, include links. Can you tell I'm a big fan of email?

But I know everyone isn't.  And email brought complications.  People began acquiring multiple emails--which is primary?  Are the others even still working? Spam happened, and the resulting spam filters.  Did the recipient get my email or is it stuck in her spam filter? Is she not answering because she has been on vacation or because she doesn't want to answer me? Or did she, perhaps, answer and get stuck in my spam filter? Or did she change email addresses suddenly, without enough time to notify everyone, as sometimes happens when an email is hacked. Or is this one of those people who signed up for an email only because it seems you can't get by without one in our modern world.  One of those people who only checks her email once a week or so?

I began trying to keep track of my friends' preferences.  This one responds more quickly to email.  That one clearly prefers to hear from me by phone.  But about the time I figured out the need to do this, along came text messaging, and Facebook messages, and I have no idea how to get in touch with anyone anymore.

And now I realize that there was a time when I was foolish enough to complain to or about people who just didn't "get" my communications preferences.  I remember whining about certain people who always called me on my cell phone when I preferred to talk on my land line, because the sound quality was better.  Or who called in the middle of my writing time. Or who left me voice mails on my land line when I was traveling and checking it even less often than usual. Or who use an email other than my primary email and then complain when I don't respond immediately.  I realize now that I was being unreasonable.

 Unless I'm one of your close friends, you probably have no idea how I prefer to be contacted this week. So what right do I have to complain if you don't guess correctly about how best to contact me?

Some of the old rules still apply.   Like unless I know the person well enough that I'm sure it's okay, I wait till after nine a.m. and don't call after 9 a.m.  And a few new commonsense ones, like not sharing anything through Facebook, even in a private message, that I would blush to see on the front page of the Washington Post someday.

I wish more people would follow the commonsense practice of not cluttering up listservs with "me, too!" and "congratulations!" messages.   Someone posts that she's gotten a good review.  That's nice.  But if forty-seven people then chime in on the list with congratulations . . . well, the odds that I will continue reading that list diligently diminish significantly.  Maybe I should be more proactive, on lists I'm a moderator or at least an established member, at stepping in with messages like "Let's have a collective round of applause for so-and-so; and please, those of you who want to add your personal congratulations, do so privately."

Netiquette (Internet etiquette) gets more complicated every day.  Anyone else have any helpful hints or pet peeves?

Recommending Books

One of the perks of being a writer is that people often ask me what I'm reading. Nothing pleases me more than to recommend a book I've enjoyed. (This is far easier than answering another frequently asked question: "What's your favorite book of all time?" I've learned to answer that with, "It changes every week," because that's the truth.)

I have a Book & Blog column on my website, and I regularly list the books I've read. My goal is to write a column every week, but that hasn't happened with much regularity in the past few months. However, I tell readers what I've read lately and what I thought about it -- if I enjoyed it. There's no point in trashing other writers' work, especially  not in public. We get enough of that as it is.

Recently, I was asked to contribute to a project I could really sink my metaphorical teeth into. John Connolly and Declan Burke assembled a massive work called "Books to Die For." Each writer contacted was asked to write a short piece about a mystery he/she thought was important to the development of the genre. After some soul-searching, I decided to write about Geoffrey Household's Rogue Male (1939), and I'm glad I did. Household is not much read now, but he wrote some amazing novels, and I was glad to reread Rogue Male.

I'm not writing to celebrate my own short piece in this book, published by the UK's Hodder and Stoughton, but to say that now that I've received my author copy, I've become fascinated by the selections of other writers. (I'm going to count how many of the recommended books I've read myself.) There are about 200 listings, one or more for every year between 1841 and 2008.

Now, there's a challenging reading list.

Charlaine  Harris

 

Confessions of a Shopping Daddy

 

By Elaine Viets

 

St. Louisan Alan Portman makes sure his daughters  Yael and Merav are well dressed. Alan buys only the best brand names for his girls, but he doesn’t pay the highest prices to clothe his princesses.  Alan crowned himself the king of the resale shops to have those best-dressed daughters. He also decks himself in designer labels. Merav is 7 and Yael is 11. As you can see, they’re model children.

Alan reveals some of his secrets in time for back-to-school buying.

 

(1) ELAINE: When did you start combing the resale shops for children’s clothes?

 

ALAN: We have always shopped the resale shops for the girls’ clothes. The rule in our house was the girls could not wear anything to daycare that could not be burned at the end of the day. A $2 shirt and a $3 skort? Perfect.

As you walk the racks at the resale shop, you quickly realize that you can start the college fund with the money you save by letting someone else’s grandmother pay full retail for Polo and Guess.

 

(2) ELAINE: Do children’s resale shops have "grandma dresses" – beautifully made clothes for the holidays?

 

ALAN: If you go to Macy’s or Nordstrom’s, you can buy $500 Christmas dresses for a 2 year old. Bet that child won’t wear it more than three times. Same thing for the Easter dress, though those tend to run a little cheaper. You’ll see the same dresses in the resale shop for $20 tops. It’s a little sad to see handsewn dresses made with some grandmother's love in the resale shop. Grandmas do not follow garment label regulations, so you have to wing it when you wash the dresses.

 (3) ELAINE: When are the best times to get deals?

  ALAN: You need to plan a little further ahead. The best deals on Christmas dresses are in February. Halloween costumes are on the rack in August for $5. Spring dresses are not as cheap, but still good deals. Always look at the winter coats. Yael wears a Columbia three-season jacket that was easily $100 new. I paid $12 in early November.

 (4) ELAINE: Name some of your favorite resale shops for yourself and your girls.

ALAN: For the girls, I like the Olive location of Once Upon A Child (http://www.onceuponachild.com/),  a national children’s resale chain.  For myself, I like the National Council of Jewish Women’s resale shop (http://www.facebook.com/pages/The-NCJW-Resale-Shop-St-Louis/145992922085248).

Sign up for emails and on Facebook with shops near you. What’s better than $5 Levis? Twenty-five percent off a bag of $5 Levis.

(5) ELAINE: Give us an example of your bargain-hunting prowess for the girls.

ALAN: The most expensive items I bought recently were two pair of $8.50  jeans from the Children’s Place. I found an $8.50 royal blue Chaps tennis dress that looked great on Yael but she didn’t like it. Ralph Lauren, Gap and Apple Bottom can all be found for less than $10. ALAN: I bought a pair of khaki pants without much wear for $5. I’d never heard of the brand. I figured if they  lasted a month, fine. I Googled the brand at home. Bill’s Khakis list for $75 a pair. I have two pair now. I bought the second pair on a half-off sale day $2.50.

 

Better still, since we spent over $50, we got a coupon for $25 off on our next $50 purchase. The store also has a punch card system. Purchases and sales go on the same card. So I filled a card that had credit for several boxes of clothes the girls have outgrown. With a little luck, I could spend well under $10 cash and walk out with a dozen items next month.

(6) ELAINE: Which children’s brands are the best deals?

ALAN: Disney, Sesame Street, Gap, Children’s Place, Polo and Nike. I may not look it, but I know clothing brands.

(7) ELAINE: Which are the worst deals?

ALAN: Stay away from Old Navy, Target and WalMart brands. Why pay $10 for something you can buy for $15 new? You need to know the full price to shop second hand or outlet. Outlet malls can be rip offs: "Ohhh, I can save a whole dollar over the regular store! So glad I drove to the outlet mall and spent $20 on gas."

(8) ELAINE: Kids grow like weeds. What happens when your girls outgrow those designer duds?

 ALAN: They go back to the shop to be resold. Those that can’t be resold get donated to the National Council of Jewish Women’s resale shop.

(9) ELAINE: You’ve lost more than 85 pounds. What did you learn when you were losing all this weight?

ALAN: I needed new pants. A year ago, I was wearing size 44 pants. Today I wear size 38. At first I wore my own pants that I had put away because they were too tight. Then I made the mistake of buying new pants. I kept losing weight and I was changing pants sizes once a month. There was no way I could afford $100 in pants every month.

I started looking for pants at the National Council of Jewish Women’s resale shop. BARGAIN CITY! Ten dollars will cover almost any pair of pants, $5 buys most shirts. If you are the right size, you can have logoed shirts from every country club and insurance company in St. Louis. Nike, Adidas, and all of the sports teams. I have Blues, Cardinals, and Budweiser shirts for less than 20% of what they were new.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

(10) ELAINE:  What are some of your good finds?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I picked up a plain black T-shirt with a strange logo. It fit and was $2. I gave it a shot. It was a Three Dots brand. It looks like it was worn twice, maybe. It is soft! Cashmere soft. Maybe there is something to $50 plain T-shirts.

(11) ELAINE: What did you learn – sometimes the hard way?

ALAN: There are no returns, so make sure it fits before you buy. Check for wear, especially with work clothes. Check shirts for stains, twice. Belts don't fare well. By the time the resale shop gets them they are shot.

If you make a mistake, donate it back and take the tax deduction. The IRS is pretty liberal with the value of clothes. Google "IRS value of donated clothing " for a chart.