Author Archives: Murderati Members

Entertainment

I had a blog half-written about e-book royalties, but it’s going to have to wait because I’m too tired to be analytical this late Saturday night (early Sunday morning.) Why? Because I just returned from my first rock concert in ages.

Before I had kids, I went to a lot of concerts. I’m sure this is standard fare for most of us. For me, I love rock. LOVE it. But I’m still pretty traditional in my rock taste. In the 80s, I was a throwback to Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd, The Who and a touch of harder rock like AC/DC and The Scorpions. In the 90s, I still liked the same bands, but add in U2 and The Eagles and The Steve Miller Band and Kansas. A little less hard. But current bands? Ugh. I couldn’t find anything new I really liked.

After kids? Getting out to concerts is difficult, to say the least. I think we’ve been to 2 or 3. I know Steve Miller was one, a long time ago.

The 2000s have seen a resurgence in real rock bands. When I said “real” I mean rockers who can actually play an instrument AND entertain. Saturday night I saw Nickelback with Three Days Grace.

To say the concert was fabulous is an understatement. And even though I’m over 40 and brought my two teenage daughters and my eldest’s boyfriend, I still enjoyed myself. One thing I noted immediately is that these bands drew in a wide range of ages. There were a lot of older teens, but just as many 30 and 40 somethings–so I felt right at home. (Unlike “Jingle Ball” a couple years ago which was all pre teens and teenagers and other than Katie Perry who can actually play the guitar and belt out a song, none of the performers were anything more than mediocre.)

Both bands have real talent for music, songwriting, and singing. But as we all know, talent is only one component of a successful artist. These bands both know how to entertain. They put on shows–Nickelback complete with pyrotechnics. But it wasn’t just the bells and whistles. Nickelback came out to a stage in the middle, away from the lights and gimmicks, and just sat on stools playing guitar and singing. That shows confidence. That they don’t need all the other stuff to play good music.

Some of the fun stuff was playing riffs from popular and timeless songs –such as Pink Floyd’s THE WALL and Journey and Bon Jovi, among others. It not only showed the bands roots and influences, but showed an appreciation of those who came before them.

Needless to say, I was impressed. I loved the entire concert (perhaps even more than my teenagers!) and would go again in a heartbeat.

A talented band is certainly necessary to enjoy a concert, though there are some musicians who are more performers than artists (such as so many of the popular “pop” bands of today.) These type of performers couldn’t put the gimmicks aside and sit on a stool and play guitar and give the audience an amazing show. Because they are nothing outside of the bells and whistles; their talent is only in the performance itself.

One highlight was Daniel Adair, Nickelback’s drummer. Not only is he talented, but he is reminiscent of the best drummers of my favorite bands. While no one compares (IMO) to Jon Bonham, Adair was amazing to listen to, and his solo was truly remarkable. The drummer often is overlooked in bands, but a bad drummer is noticeable, and a good drummer makes every song better. Drummers are the backbone of rock.

Writers are different in that we don’t “perform”, but we do need to entertain. No one is going to pay to listen to us read from our books (at least not most of us!) but they do buy books because they want to have a few hours of enjoyment. Whether they take their pleasure from the thrill of a suspense, the puzzle of a mystery, or the heart of a romance, they want to close the book and think, “That was a good story.”

There are a few other bands I would love to see in concert, and maybe I’ll have to track them down. The Howling Diablos are one, but I haven’t heard them playing outside of Michigan yet. They’re more bluesy, maybe I could see them in a club. And then there’s The Dropkick Murphys from Boston who my friend Carla Neggers saw before attending the 2009 Thrillerfest (and yes, I was jealous.) And maybe Eagles of Death Metal because they have such fun songs. But if Nickelback or Three Days Grace came back? I’ll be there.

What current band would you like to see? What band would you have loved to see? (For me? Hands down, Pink Floyd’s THE WALL. Though The Who would be a close second.)

For your enjoyment:

Nickelback performing Burn it to the Ground in 2009

Nickelback performing Animals in 2006

Daniel Adair’s drum solo in London last year:

Three Days Grace performing Riot in Detroit

Three Days Grace “Break” music video

HUNKERING DOWN

By Stephen Jay Schwartz

It happens too easily, doesn’t it? This loss of time.

Where did it go? I look back, month to month, and identify the actions that kept me from writing.

It must have been a year ago that I turned in my final draft of BEAT. The first thing I did next was work on the proposal for my next book. I spent about two months on an idea set in the Los Angeles Harbor. Did a ton of research, digging into the lives and cultures of the people living in San Pedro. I took a four-hour tour of a container ship, led by the ship’s captain. I did tours of the harbor on a fireboat. I studied and prepared and learned what I could about my characters’ lives.

I wrote the proposal and I sent it to my agent and he nixed it. Didn’t feel it would sell. I began again.

I put my head into a cool idea about grifters. Ensemble crime piece with twisted characters and a fresh story. I wrote the proposal and sent it to my agent and…he nixed it. He suggested that I write an international thriller—possibly for Hayden Glass. I came up with another idea and wrote two proposals using the same storyline: one was a standalone and one was a Glass book. I wrote two twenty-page proposals and sent the Hayden one to my editor.

While I was waiting on his answer, my editor suggested I write a “Hayden” short story – something we could give away for free on Kindle and other e-book venues. Something to introduce new readers to the world of Hayden Glass.

It took two months to write “Crossing the Line,” a short story prequel to Boulevard. It documents the moment a younger Hayden Glass, just one year into the LAPD (two weeks into the Vice unit), picks up a prostitute, fully intending to arrest her, and instead “crosses the line.” It’s the first time his addiction appears on the scene. The story should show up any day now, and I intend to post a pdf file of it for download from my website.

After finishing the short story I waited for word on my book proposal, busying myself by marketing Boulevard, prepping and attending conferences like Thrillerfest, doing library gigs, working the day job, spending time with my family, dealing with the impending short sale of my house. There were plenty of things to keep me from writing a novel.

Ultimately, my editor suggested that I write a standalone, and my agent agreed. But a book deal didn’t emerge and I was instructed to write the standalone without a contract.

Once I determined what I was going to write, once I had my agent on board (after all, he’s the one charged with selling the thing, it’s a whole lot easier if he’s passionate about the story from the start) I settled in to do the research.

I spent a couple months interviewing professionals and reading books about the FBI. I somehow managed to finagle a trip to Europe for a little “boots on the ground” action. I set a hard-and-fast deadline to begin writing the novel, a date that should have given me plenty of time to prepare.

That date is November 1.

I haven’t finished my research. I haven’t even finished typing my handwritten notes from Europe into my computer.

Meanwhile, the launch of BEAT has required that I spend weeks doing interviews and writing blogs. I’ve thrown myself into the marketing, doing everything possible to give BEAT a chance. And then came Bouchercon and my SF launch and all the signings and touring leading up to the conference. And there are signings and touring still to come.

That elusive “start” date feels like it’s slipping away. My wife and I have to move the crap that has accumulated in our house over the past five years and move it to a small apartment in less than three weeks. We have yet to define what is garbage, Goodwill, recycle, storage or apartment-stuff. This could take all of my time, further derailing my plans to have a book out quickly. As it is it’ll take eight months to write the book, using weeknights after work and full weekend days, and then I’ve got to sell it, execute an editor’s notes, then wait ten months to see it released.

Tonight my wife told me not to let anything get in the way of my writing. She said that she would somehow deal with everything else. I’m responsible for keeping my day job and writing the next book and that is all.

I think I’ve done enough marketing. I’m not sure how much it helps anyway. And I think I’ve done enough waiting for others to tell me what to do next.

You know, Brett Battles told me this would happen. He said it would sneak up on me, that I should write the next book without waiting for permission.

And Bob Crais told me not to get lost in the machine, but to “write the next book, always write the next book.”

I know how I get when I write. Everything else falls to the wayside. Writing is all-consuming. That means I’ll have no time for anything else. I’ve been afraid to jump in, afraid that the house will fall apart, that I won’t spend time with my family, that the world around me will crash and burn. I’m going to have to trust that my wife can do what needs to be done. Homeschool the kids, manage the bills, pack up the house and move a family of four and a dog and a fish.

November 1^st. Chapter One. First sentence. Time to write.

OBSTACLES

By Brett Battles

We’re all perpetrators. We find reasons not to do the things we really should be doing…going out with friends, cleaning out the garage, learning to cook that meal we always told ourselves we wanted to learn.

It’s amazing the things we can talk ourselves out of. “I’ll do it tomorrow.” “I’m just not in the mood.” “There’s that other ‘thing’ I want to do first.”

We can be especially good at this when it comes to writing. “I need to mental be in the right frame of mind.” “I only have an hour or two to write, so it’s not even worth it.” “I’ve got writer’s block.”

I’m here to tell you, if you want to write books, those are all just excuse. Sure, there are going to be days you just can’t write because life gets in the way. But if you’re making excuses, it’s not life getting in your way, it’s you.

I knew when I was in fifth grade that I wanted to be a novelist. I didn’t know all the parameters of being one at the time – the work I would have to put in, the amount of time it would actually take to write a full book – but I knew I wanted to write stories. The dream obviously stayed with me, and I wrote a lot over the following years. What might be surprising is that I didn’t complete a full novel until just after I was thirty-two. Why? Because there were years I didn’t really put the effort in. I was busy living (something all novelists need to do in some way or another), and was not serious about being a novelist. Even when I finished that book, I wasn’t ready.

For seven years after that, I wrote very little. Then, when I turned thirty-nine I told myself if I really wanted to fulfill the dream of that ten year old me, I needed to buckle down and do it.

The biggest obstacle was finding time to write. I had a fulltime job, after all, and that pretty much ate up most of the day. But if I just gave up because of that, it would be because I was making excuses again, something I had done for years. So I had to find a way to work writing into my day, or just admit I was giving up.

My solution? I adjusted my habits and got up early, allocating two hours every morning to write before I went work. I also decided any time I had free time in the evenings or the weekends, I’d write. That’s how I wrote two novels that I haven’t published, and also three that I have. THE CLEANER was written this way.

I could have easily said it’s not worth it after one of the unpublished novels failed to sell, and given up. But I kept going. A) because I was still holding tight to the dream, and B) well…because I’m a writer, and writers write.

Sleeping would have been great. I could have stayed up later, done things with friends, had a life. But I was (and still am) a writer. And that meant, as I’ve already said, I had to write. Still, just because I did didn’t guarantee I’d achieve the goal of being published, but I definitely wouldn’t achieve it if I didn’t write anything.

If I may repeat myself, if I was going to be a writer, I had to write. This could apply to anything. If I was going to be a ball player, I would have to practice. If I was going to be a scientist, I would have to study. If I was going to be a professional photographer, I would have to take photographs…a whole hell of a lot of them.

Now maybe you might not be able to get up early, or even carve out a couple hours somewhere else in your day, but you can find an hour, or a half-hour or even fifteen-minutes…somewhere in your life is a block of time you can set aside. But setting aside the time is just the start. You need to use it, too. No excuses.

Excuses will get you a free afternoon. Working on what you love could get you a lifetime of satisfaction.

Here’s something you should check out. An example of improvising, and not letting obstacles get in your way. I love this!

So what excuses do you give yourself? How do you move beyond them?

Fun Is Good, Part II: The Audacity Factor (or Oh, No, He Did NOT Just Do That!)

by J.D. Rhoades

L’audace, l’audace, encore l’audace, et toujours l’audace!

-George S. Patton, supposedly quoting Frederick the Great

This is the second in my series of posts on what gives books that all-important yet elusive element of fun. As we remember from my last post on the Bad-ass Factor, any moment that makes you want to leap up, pump your fist in the air and holler ‘Hell YEAH!” increases the fun factor exponentially. But so can moments that make you say to yourself “Oh, no. She’s not really going to do that”, or moments in which the reader goes, “No WAY is he going to pull this off.” Sometimes the Audacity Factor–the sheer outrageousness of the topic or of the way it’s carried out–can add fun to a book.

Take for example, one I’m reading right now, EMPIRE OF IVORY by Naomi Novik. It’s one of her Temeraire series of fantasy novels. They’re basically Patrick O’Brian-esque Napoleonic Era naval adventures–but with flying, talking dragons taking on the French hordes instead of sailing ships. If that made you involuntarily laugh out loud in disbelief at the imaginativeness of the concept, you’re not the only one.

Another example is Victor Gischler’s GO-GO GIRLS OF THE APOCALYPSE. Hell, the title alone makes you think “we are in for one wild ride.” And you’re right. How can you not love a book in which a post-apocalyptic American civilization rises from the ashes, based around a chain of strip clubs owned by a guy named Joey Armageddon? After all, once the inevitable destruction of society and the following Dark Age is over, a fellow could really use a cold beer and a lap dance.

On a more literary note, Michael Chabon’s THE YIDDISH POLICEMAN’S UNION sets us down in an alternate world where the post-Holocaust Jewish state was established, not in the Middle East, but in the Sitka peninsula of Alaska. Say what?

In Neal Stephenson’s SNOW CRASH, not only is the hero/protagonist named Hiro Protagonist, he starts the book as a pizza delivery guy–for the Mafia:

If the thirty-minute deadline expires, news of the disaster is flashed to CosaNostra Pizza Headquarters and relayed from there to Uncle Enzo himself–the Sicilian Colonel Sanders, the Andy Griffith of Bensonhurst, the straight razor-swinging figment of many a Deliverator’s nightmares, the Capo and prime figurehead of CosaNostra Pizza, Incorporated–who will be on the phone to the customer within five minutes, apologizing profusely. The next day, Uncle Enzo will land on the customer’s yard in a jet helicopter and apologize some more and give him a free trip to Italy–all he has to do is sign a bunch of releases that make him a public figure and spokesperson for CosaNostra Pizza and basically end his private life as he knows it. He will come away from the whole thing feeling that, somehow, he owes the Mafia a favor.

The Deliverator does not know for sure what happens to the driver in such cases, but he has heard some rumors.

After that, things start to get weird.

There’s a lot of overlap, you’ll note, between this factor and the idea of High Concept that Our Alex talks about here. Outrageous High Concept can often equal serious fun.

All of the above books are gripping, page-turning, and thought provoking. They’re also a hell of a lot of fun to read. Why?

One thing that makes audacious concepts fun is the same thing that makes watching an acrobat or a high wire artist fun: you wonder if they’re going to pull it off or if they’re going to crash to the floor before your very eyes.

So how do you pull it off? Well, there are a few things you need to do:

First, be matter-of-fact. Your readers may find the world you build outrageous or strange, but to your characters, it’s their everyday life (unless you’re doing a Wizard of Oz type tale, where your protagonist is dropped into another world). They’re not going to spend a lot of time examining or thinking about their surroundings, so neither should you by lapsing into long passages of description or having them think about “how wonderful it is that we have flying dragons.”

Which leads to our second point: move fast. Get right into the story, and don’t give the reader a lot of time tho think “Flying Dragons? How the hell does THAT work?”

This leads to something akin to the high wire act mentioned above: you’ve got to be able to put in enough backstory to let the reader know what’s going on, without stopping the narrative dead in its tracks with the dreaded “As you know…” Chabon, for example, doesn’t have a character say, “As you know, Meyer, the State of Israel was founded in 1948, but was destroyed after only three months, so we ended up here…” He gets to the story, and you have to figure out what’s going on. In some unimportant respects, you never do; in THE YIDDISH POLICEMAN’S UNION, casual mentions of things like “the Cuban War” and “The Third Russian Republic” are never explained; they’e part of the background noise every real society has.

But most importantly, you have to have a story to tell. YIDDISH POLICEMAN’S UNION is more than just an audacious concept, it’s an engrossing neo-noir murder mystery. GO-GO GIRLS OF THE APOCALYPSE is more than just laugh-out-loud outrageous, it’s a cracking good adventure tale. In order for a story to be outrageous and fun, it has to first be a story. If you don’t have that, you have something like John Boorman’s movie ZARDOZ, which has outragous concept to spare, as well as Sean Connery running around in a red leather jockstrap and a ponytail talking to a flying stone head, but it ends up being nearly incomprehensible, unless you’re really really stoned.

Don’t let this happen to you….

So tell us, readers and writers…what are some of your favorite fun, audacious concepts? Which ones does the author manage to pull off, and if you dare, which ones veer into ZARDOZ territory?

Why are readers so angry these days?

Yes, this is right on the heels of my last Murderati blog post, about whether I should pull the plug on the internet, followed by the post by Alafair Burke of being stalked online by an obnoxious woman. But I can’t help blogging again on the problems that come with being so accessible to readers online. The reason I can’t get off the subject is this situation, which I mention over on my own blog.

It turns out that some of my readers are angry (again), and they have no qualms about letting me have it with both barrels. This time, it’s nurses who are up in arms about my book, The Bone Garden, because it focuses squarely on the contributions of Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes. The story takes place in 1830, when Holmes is a medical student, and in the tale, he gets the first inkling that doctors’ dirty hands are linked to childbed fever. “What about Florence Nightingale’s contributions?” say the annoyed nurses. “By ignoring her, you’ve revealed that you don’t value nurses’ contributions to medicine. Don’t you know that Nightingale’s observations during the Crimean War changed hospitals forever? Why is your book only about doctors?”

I try to patiently answer the emails, pointing out that the Crimean War was in the 1850s, a good twenty-four years after my story takes place, so for my characters to mention Nightingale would make them, oh, psychic. I also point out that Holmes was in America and Nightingale was an English nurse, so the two of them probably wouldn’t have known each other anyway. I point out that Holmes presented his groundbreaking paper on infectiousness in 1843, before anyone in America had heard of Nightingale. But while I’m trying to be reasonable and patient with these charges, I’m also aware that my blood pressure has shot up, and another writing session has been torpedoed.

All because a few readers are irritated and aren’t shy about letting me know it.

I’ve blogged about other examples of angry readers. There was the reader who told me I was showing my ignorance when I referred to Aphrodite as the goddess of love, because any educated person knew the goddess of love was Venus. There were the pit bull and Doberman owners who took me to task for using their beloved breeds as scary dogs in my stories. There are readers who tell me I clearly hate men (because the men are so mean in my stories) and that I hate women (because my female victims are so viciously attacked). And on and on. The question is, why do these readers get so worked up about stories that are merely fiction?

I’ve tried to analyze the reasons readers get angry. Most of the time, it seems to result from the fact readers are quick to personalize some element in the story. They think the author is insulting them in particular. They see it as a specific attack on their worth or their profession or their philosophy. And if an author makes a factual error (as we all do), the reader feels empowered by his own superior knowledge and feels compelled to let the author know it.

As a reader, I’ve read plenty of novels where I spotted factual mistakes, but I’ve never felt the need to tell the author he’s an idiot. I’ve read a number of novels that I felt were poorly written, but I’d just shrug and move on. I can’t remember any instance where a novel made me angry at the author. Where does this anger come from, and is it endemic to today’s society? If people are getting this riled up about something as trivial as a novel, what are their lives like at home? Are they insulting their spouses and kids? Are they screaming at their bosses?

I suspect that the nasty letters we writers receive are just a reflection of generalized anger about everything these days. It’s not hard to find angry people. Just check out any online election news article or political forum, and take a look at the comments. There are people engaged in name-calling and insults. There are people demanding guillotines or firing squads for the opposition. On both sides of the aisle, you’ll see calls to either “eat the rich” or “eat the poor.” You can’t find much moderation, because it’s not newsworthy. And when you turn on the news, you’ll find flushed, bug-eyed commentators yelling at the camera, spittle flying.

I guess I should be relieved that all we writers have to deal with are emails from a few pissed-off readers.

Have people always been this angry, or is this something recent? Is it a result of our wired culture, where all it takes is a mouse click on “send” and the object of your derision instantaneously hears your unvarnished rage? Please, can we go back to old-fashioned letter writing, when people got a chance to calm down before they actually sealed the envelope and licked the stamp?

I’m traveling today, so can’t respond to comments. But I’d love to hear from other writers what sorts of things have made your readers angry enough to let you know about it.

“Because Kait is worth the truth . . .”

by Pari

I remember when I heard about Kaitlyn Arquette’s murder. It was 1989 and I worked in PR at St. Joseph Healthcare Corporation. My office was just a few blocks from the gas station where Kaitlyn was shot in the back of the head. Hell, I’d gotten gas there, had parked on the same stretch of crappy real estate where her car came to rest after being run off the road.

The murder was too close somehow. Too unthinkable. How could this 18-year-old, beautiful, bright girl be killed like that? It also sat horridly in my heart because one of my good friends still lived with the unresolved questions surrounding her sister’s murder more than a decade before.

Two young women, alone on a dark night, each murdered in cold blood. And no one could explain why.

In Kait’s case, after a few months the police claimed the murder was a random drive-by. But for some reason, the questions surrounding Kait’s murder didn’t go away. People I knew and respected whispered about police cover-ups, insurance scams, Vietnamese gangs, witness intimidation. In the newspapers and on television, Kait’s mother, Lois Duncan, talked about uncovering forensic evidence that refuted the idea that the murder could possibly have been random . . . or a drive-by.

A prolific and award-winning YA author, Duncan wrote a book in 1992 that cast serious doubt on the investigation and its conclusions. She did the national media circuit, verbally sparring with reps from the Albuquerque Police Department and the DA’s office. (Robert Schwartz was the DA at the time.) Those appearances on Good Morning America, Unsolved Mysteries, Sally Jessy Raphael and Larry King breathed new life into the investigation . . . for a little while.

Kaitlyn Arquette isn’t front-page news anymore. The corner on the busy street near Albuquerque’s downtown looks as innocuous as ever.

And more than 20 years later, Kait’s family remains convinced the shooting was absolutely NOT a random drive-by. Is this irrational grief? Are they deluding themselves?

The police still stand by their investigation and conclusions. Are they right? Or was there malfeasance that should be looked at anew?

I don’t know. But I think that there are too many valid unanswered questions. I also know that the Arquettes didn’t start out as conspiracy nuts. They were just a regular family not angry at or suspicious of the police. Through the years, with reason, they became disillusioned.

Lois and I have known each other tangentially for years – one-to-two degrees of separation. We reconnected more recently on Facebook. Two weeks ago she told me that someone had set up a Kaitlyn Arquette channel on Youtube. You can watch some of the media clips there and judge for yourself.

As a parent, my heart aches for the Lois Duncan’s continued pain at the loss of her daughter. As a mystery writer who basically has tremendous faith and respect for law enforcement, I can’t ignore the questions Lois, her family, and credible private investigators have raised.

Decades ago when Larry King asked Lois what she possibly hoped to accomplish by keeping the investigation alive, she answered simply that her Kait deserved the truth.

She does.
My friend’s family does.
Everyone does.

So, look at the website and media clips. If by some strange coincidence, you have information on this case, please contact Lois here. Who knows? Maybe you know more than you think.

And for discussion today . . .

Do you have good examples of police investigations? Detectives that deserve a shout-out for the work they’ve done?
Do you have examples in your own life of investigations that ended with only more questions? Or that were abandoned before they should have been?

Bouchercon Blues

Zoë Sharp

Bouchercon By The Bay starts today in San Francisco, and I’m not there, dammit.

Sometimes, you have to weigh up want against need, and right now I need to be concentrating on the book I’m in the midst of, and the copyedits for the next book have just landed, and the outline for the next one is still only a vague murky idea. In short, there are a hundred and one jobs that made a transatlantic trip just not feasible at the moment.

Dammit again.

I made the mistake of looking at the list of attendees, and see the names of so many people I would love to have hung out with, not least of which are my ‘Rati colleagues. Another thing I noticed is there are very few people I’d leave the bar to avoid. And it reminds me, if I needed reminding, what a great community this is to be a part of.

So, because I’m a masochist at heart, I started thinking about all the aspects of a convention that I enjoy so much, and what I was really going to miss.

There’s a lot I’m going to miss.

Obviously, meeting with people we know. The crime writing crowd are overwhelmingly smart and funny, and I genuinely enjoy their company.

Meeting with people we don’t know – yet. Finding a new mind in tune with your own is always a joy.

Meeting ‘the man behind the curtain’ (as per Louise’s blog from Tuesday) and NOT being disappointed. I first met some of the biggest names in the business at conventions or festivals, both here and in the States and found that in the majority they’re delightful.

I love to meet readers. First and foremost, I’m a reader. I got into this because I loved books, loved to read books, and went that step further and then wanted to write stories that other people might want to read. But the reading came first, and without satisfied readers, we’re talking to ourselves.

What else? Fascinating panels, the undiscovered gems that often come out of the book bag, the charity auction.

That last one might sound odd, but I have been lucky enough to be able to auction off four character names either at Bouchercon or at Mayhem in the Midlands in Omaha Nebraska. One of the four turned into five, as I included both the winning bidder and her late mother. I just happened to have a slot in the next Charlie Fox book for mother and daughter characters. And, again, looking at the list of attendees for San Francisco, I see that three of those generous bidders – Frances L Neagley, Terry O’Loughlin, and BG Ritts, are all going to be there.

And I’m not, dammit.

Of course, although the whole point of going to a convention is to BE at the convention, not off sight-seeing, there is usually the opportunity for a side trip to a gun range while we’re there. Watching people who’ve never handled a gun before having their first shot at it (pardon the pun) is always entertaining. And then there’s the occasion when I put a trip to the gun range up as an auction prize, and the lady who made the winning bid had been blind since birth.

But that, as they say, is another story…

Here’s a group of us taken after our foray in search of firearms in Baltimore. I don’t know quite what just happened to Stuart MacBride, but I’m open to suggestions.

OK, so now I’m completely grumpy and naffed off that I’m not at Bouchercon, and in order to prevent bottom-lip-out overload, I have to think about the things I DON’T like about conventions.

Watching badly moderated panels. I’ve seen a few in my time. Like the one where the moderator asked questions of the panelists in the same order ever time, so the poor woman at the far end was left with nothing to add to every question. Or the one where the moderator did not-very-funny stand-up for the entire duration, and one panelist didn’t actually get to speak at all.

Rude panelists. I’m fortunate to have moderated only one of these, but her name will stick in my mind forever. For entirely the wrong reasons.

Being landed with the bill for everyone else’s cocktails at a group meal. OK, OK, as a teetotaller, I’m aware that I’m always going to end up paying extra at a group meal – it’s the price you pay for going out in company, and if you don’t like it, you should eat alone. But do these people never stop to wonder at how little it seems to cost them to eat and drink at a convention? The indomitable Sally Fellows had this nailed at Mayhem. Every time we sat down in a restaurant, her first words to the wait staff were, “Separate checks, please.” If nothing else, it makes my accountant’s life easier.

Air con red-eye. Maybe I should be blaming all the late nights in the bar, but I always seem to end up with dreadful bloodshot eyes at conventions, which I put down to the fact that Brits are not used to being in air-conditioned buildings. If it wasn’t for eye drops, I’d permanently be walking round with eyes like this:

Bad manners. And this is another one where I appear to contradict myself. I DO love talking with people, but that’s different to being talked AT by people. And I’ve lost count of the number of times you can be in mid-sentence and someone else just comes up and jumps into the middle of the conversation. They don’t want to join in – they don’t even want to let you finish what you were saying before they take the plunge. It’s like being ambushed.

OK, so your turn. What do you love or hate about conventions? What’s the best question you’ve heard on a panel? Or the worst?

This week’s Word of the Week is epitome. The most common modern use of epitome is to mean excellence, the best example, as in ‘she is the epitome of elegance’- a person or thing that is typical of or possesses to a high degree the features of a whole class. But its fundamental meaning is a condensed account, a summary, especially of a written work. Its root is the Greek epitome, to cut short, abridge. In theory, a précis encapsulates the best of the original work, although (as most authors are aware) this is not necessarily the case…

Paying Attention to the Man Behind the Curtain

By Louise Ure

This feels a little creepy to write, just after Alafair’s post yesterday about cyber-bullying an author. But it’s a look from the other side … from the reader who thought she knew a writer’s heart and didn’t.

I found myself in an unfamiliar situation a couple of weeks ago: choosing to not read a man’s fiction because I found his personal character and politics unsavory.

I’ll leave him nameless in this blog, but you would surely know his name. He has written more than a dozen books and his work has been lauded for decades. He is revered as one of America’s preeminent crime fiction writers.

So you can imagine my anticipation when I was invited to a small private luncheon with this icon –this man whose work I have admired for longer than I’ve been writing.

And that’s where my “I know him because I know his work” rationalization crashed headlong into the reality that an author’s real voice is not always consistent with his voice on the page.

This man’s words on the page are powerful, and so deeply emotional that you would think he placed his own feet inside his characters’ shoes. In person, not so much.

While still glib in real life, he came across as untrustworthy and inauthentic; someone who doesn’t reach out for new experiences. He said, for example, that he will only travel through affluent neighborhoods because he doesn’t like to see billboards in Spanish or HIV prevention ads on bus stops. They would sully his world.

In his work, his characters care deeply about things. They are driven to find the killer, to stop the pain, to make things right in a world gone mad. In person, the less information the better.

He has no television, no radio and no computer. He reads no newspapers or any other author’s work, either in fiction or non-fiction. He prefers to sit quietly, by himself, in a dark room.

The cops in his books are not cartoonish; he creates real people with their own obsessions and weaknesses and self-doubt. His writing sings with clarity and precision.

But in real life this author thinks the cops can do no wrong and believes that torture, whether done by the police or soldiers, is justified to get a confession. “Better to torture an innocent man than to chance that one bad guy gets away,” he said at the lunch.

He called me un-American when I expressed a different point of view.

So there I was, with Famous Author’s Latest Oeuvre in hand, and I walked out without getting an autograph. I didn’t want his signature on any book in my house. And I’m considering removing his earlier works from my shelves as well, as I no longer think I can appreciate them without identifying the writing with the real life man.

This seems like such an odd fit of pique for me. While I’m perfectly comfortable not going to see a Mel Gibson movie, or finding a new favorite country singer after spotting Leann Rimes at the Republican National Convention, this is the first time that I have purposely spurned a writer of fiction because I didn’t like him personally.

(Wait a minute, come to think of it, there is one other guy, who years ago at one Bouchercon or another, invited himself to the lunch I was hosting, ordered lots of food “for the table,” then got up and left when the bill arrived. I still haven’t bought any of his books.)

But it brings me to my central question today: Do we expect the real life man to live up to the author’s voice on the page? And if you can’t stand the man behind the curtain, can you still admire the magic he conjures up?

I don’t mean that an author has to resemble their characters, or even have their same world view. There are too many good examples of the shy author who writes thrillers with daring, adventurous protagonists. Or the senior citizen whose protagonist is a hip and humorous 20-something.

I also don’t mean that every writer has to echo my own values and life experience. I guess I mean something closer to … heart. If an author’s work has depth and emotional resonance that rocks you, should you expect that to be reflected when you meet him in person? Would it be okay if he were shallow or rude or purposefully mean?

Should it even matter that I don’t like the man behind the words?

In some ways, I wish authors weren’t so “available” to us readers. In an ideal world, I’d remove both the author photo and the short bio from every book jacket. There would be no Meet the Author signings or conventions. Blogs and websites and Twitter and Facebook would be outlawed, unless they dealt strictly with a discussion of the work.

That’s why we buy books anyway, right? To get lost in a fantasy world created by someone we’ve never met. Why do we have to taint that magic by bringing the real life author — warts and all– into the equation?

Maybe I shouldn’t have gone to that lunch. Maybe I would still revere his books.

How about you ‘Rati? Do you pay any attention to the man behind the curtain?

I Was Cyber-bullied by a Naked Woman

by Alafair Burke

We’ve all seen the tragic stories of teenagers driven into depression, out of schools, or even to suicide by the online taunts of peers. The media have dubbed the phenomenon cyber-bullying and almost always describe it as harm committed by and against children.

But I’m starting to wonder whether horrible stories like this, this, and this are tragic extensions of the everyday nastiness to be found on the internet, among both children and adults who feel emboldened online to hurl criticism, taunts, and veiled threats they would never speak aloud to a person’s face.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not going Unabomber or anything. I still the <3 the World Wide Webs. Although I understand why Tess is thinking about pulling the plug, I get energy from the supportive relationships I’ve formed with readers online. And yet there’s something about the Internet that encourages people to let their guard down and say impulsive things. Is it really surprising that some people’s inner thoughts are better left unsaid?

A couple of weeks ago on my Facebook page, I finally got around to posting some photos from book tour, including one from my joint event with Harlan Coben at Barbara Peters’ Poisoned Pen.

Within a few minutes, the reader comments numbered into the double digits. Love him! Two of my favorite writers! Waiting for you to come back to Scottsdale!

Pretty loving stuff, right? Well, almost all of it. Whoa. Who gained all that weight? Too much touring. Needless to say, I wasn’t feeling the love from that one. I tried to convince myself the woman was talking about Harlan (yeah right). My response: Harsh. Guess I won’t be wearing that outfit anymore.

I sort of expected the woman to delete her post, or perhaps back pedal, or at least say nothing. But a minute later: Alafair, maybe you should start riding your bicycle when you go to East Hampton. But you’re still my favorite chubb* writer. Love you. LOL.

Love you? LOL. No, I don’t think so. Block User.

But blocking her wasn’t enough. A few minutes later, I had this nagging loose thread tickling my brain. Something about the woman’s name had sounded familiar. She’d come to my attention before. I googled her name with mine. I got some hits on Facebook. She had posted other comments to my page, and they were also odd: One asked whether I employed some of the cyber-sleuthing technology referenced in one of my books; another made strange mention of the race of a character.

And here’s what’s even stranger: Googling her name with mine pulled up that old My Space profile I’d forgotten about, and hers as well, because she had friended me there. Her profile was very…public. And personal. And naked.

My inner mean-girl was seconds away from unblocking her on Facebook, slapping up a link to her naked pictures, and saying, “If I looked like this, I wouldn’t be calling anyone chubb.”

And, you see, that’s how it starts. With the press of a button, I could have sent thousands of people to gawk at the naked photographs this woman had posted, but only her handful of friends had actually seen. At least some of them would have taken a cue from me and piled on their own insults. They would have forwarded the link to their friends. And who knows how this obviously unhealthy woman might have responded.

Needless to say, I suppressed my inner mean-girl. At forty years of age, it’s no longer hard to do. At least, not for me.

But obviously some adults are still hitting that send key. Although a naked lady’s comments about my weight fall into a category of their own, I am amazed at the number of people who contact writers online to tell them how hard they suck. Granted, the positive, supportive comments outweigh the meanies by 999 to 1, but, man, that .1 percent can irritate. Just a few of my favorites:

Why did the book have to be so long?

Why do you set your books in New York and Oregon? I prefer reading about New Iberia.

The sun does not rise in Portland that time of year until seven a.m.

I’m enjoying your books but feel they are too similar to each other. Not sure I’ll stick with them.

This week I received a nasty-gram based on a blurb I had written. Apparently I wouldn’t know “credible writing if it hit me in the face.” I’m not sure I want writing to hit me in the face.

At least I know I’m not alone. One writer swears to me that someone used his book as toilet paper and mailed the soiled pages to his publisher. (Okay, that one’s got nothing to do with the Internet, but it’s frickin’ creepy.)

A certain two-time Edgar winner and Grandmaster I know receives emails all the time telling him his words are too big, his sentences too long, and his characters too old. A recent gem: “I just finished [name of novel]. It was a tedious reading, I do not know why it was written. I have read all your previous books with relish.”

What a fan! Give that man some relish.

And it’s not just in my writing life that I open myself up to online criticism. Thanks to RateMyProfessors.com, students can post anonymous, unmoderated comments online about their professors. Professor Burke generally fares well in the forum, and I even have a chili pepper (signifying my “hotness”) despite the obvious chubb factor, but it’s not fun when someone calls you “boring as hell.” (Is hell …boring?)

Some of my colleagues have been less fortunate. Comments about weight, body odor, flatulence, attire, supposed senility, and their marriages and other personal details abound. And these are comments by adults, about adults.

To be clear, the jibes I’m complaining about aren’t nearly as bad as the psychological torment that has made headlines, or the growing phenomenon of nasty online comments about obituaries. Obviously most healthy adults (and I’ll include myself in that group) can handle this stuff. You ignore it. Or, if you’re me, you let it hurt your feelings for half a minute, then laugh about it, then ignore it. This stuff’s minor, and it’s rare.

But this morning I felt like exposing the bullies to sunlight. No retalitation. No mean-girl revenge. Just an acknowledgement that as much as I love comments from readers, I could do without the rare nasty aside.

So, are you willing to share your cyber-bully stories? What’s the nastiest thing anyone has ever said to you online?

(*Chubb? I have no idea if this is slang for fat, because lord knows we don’t have enough words for obese, or if she just omitted the y, but for reasons I can’t explain, being someone’s favorite chubb writer seems much worse than being someone’s favorite chubby writer. Either way, I am not aware of an award in either category. If there is one, please do not send it to me.)

If you enjoyed this post, please follow me on Facebook and/or Twitter, but please don’t talk smack about me, all right?

Moonlight & Magnolia’s Keynote Speech: Master Your Voice

By Allison Brennan

Below is the speech I actually gave (mostly) to the George Romance Writers last Saturday night. I did go off on a couple or four tangents telling stories that popped into my head, but I did actually give the whole speech with some minor changes I’d written on my hard copy. I was definitely surprised I stuck to it!

First, can I just say that if you write in any genre of romance and live within a couple hundred miles of Atlanta, that this conference is one of the best? The chapter is amazing, gracious, and full of Southern hospitality. While I presented my own workshop on Friday afternoon, as well as the keynote speech, I also sat in on an incredible workshop put on by Michael Hauge, a screenwriter and story consultant. And while everything he said I knew, either from Vogler or our own Alex, the way he said it and the examples he gave had me looking at my stories from a slightly different angle.

For example, Michael talked about the tools for creating a subconscious connection to our hero. I’m not going to go into his workshop in detail, because no one would understand my notes, but when he said we must create empathy with our hero–we have to know where they start–so that when something bad happens the reader is already emotional invested in the hero.

I had a problem in my current WIP because while I had Lucy Kincaid prove she was competent and smart and yada yada, I hadn’t created empathy for her character for new readers. This is book two, and I just made the assumption that everyone would have already read book one. So the key emotional turning point happened far later in the book than it should have, and I gave no reason for the reader to be invested until that point.

Ironically, in my very first draft that I showed no one, I had the big emotional turning point in chapter one, but felt that it was a poor place to start the story because I couldn’t assume that readers would understand that the news Lucy receives is truly devastating for her.

So, when Michael talked about empathy, then talked about showing your hero as powerful (one of the “subconscious connections”), he used the example of a surgeon saving a child’s life . We’re introduced to someone we know can get the job done, and therefore are willing to follow her on her journey, already invested in her because of her skill and dedication.

Suddenly, I knew exactly what was wrong with Act One. In my first draft, I’d subconsciously known that I had to give Lucy the bad news early. But I convinced myself Chapter One was too early (and it was) and kept pushing it back and back until my semi-final draft had it at Chapter Sixteen. By that point, it slowed the plot and didn’t really create the empathy that it should have.

I emailed my editor from the workshop and told her what I wanted to do–and she completely agreed. Now, this pivotal emotional turning point is in Chapter Three–after Lucy proves she’s skilled and capable, she gets devastating news. Sure, this means a little more of revisions that I had hoped, but it’s working so much better.

While nothing Michael Hauge said was a huge revelation, looking at something familiar from a different angle will completely change your perception and understanding. For me, it was about Act One–which is always the hardest part of my book to write.

This whole experience reminded me to trust my instincts and stop second guessing myself. I should get it tattooed to the back of my hand.

Speech to the Georgia Romance Writers

Moonlight & Magnolias Conference

October 2, 2010

I have a confession to make.

Okay, it’s not much of a confession—it’s not like I’ve kept it a big secret. I don’t plot. I don’t outline. I barely write a synopsis. In fact, I only write the bare minimum required for only two reasons: when it results in a check (some contracts pay part on proposal) or when I have to get something to the copy department so they can, you know, write the back cover copy.

Plotting is like speaking. I don’t plot, I don’t write speeches. Because writing the speech is like planning what I’m going to say days—or weeks—before I say it. What’s the fun in that? And it’s written—the written word doesn’t always translate well to the spoken word. If you doubt me, go buy my audiobooks. I listened to one chapter of SUDDEN DEATH and scared myself—and realized maybe the audio book deal wasn’t the best idea on the planet.

As Stephen King said, “I don’t think my books would’ve been as successful as they are if the readers didn’t think they were in the hands of a true crazy person. When I start a story, I don’t know where it’s going.”

I get that.

When I was first asked to give a keynote, I didn’t think twice about saying yes. I love giving workshops and I like talking (after all, I was voted “Most Likely to Succeed” and “Most Talkative” in school.) I didn’t think about writing the damn speech. But other people—people I adore and love and who mean well—thought I was insane.

“What do you mean you’re going to wing it? You can’t wing it,” said my friend Roxanne St. Claire. “You have to write the speech. Edit the speech. Rehearse the speech. Give the speech six hundred times to your dog until you know it by heart, but still print it out in twenty-four point font double spaced and put it in front of you in case you forget.”

I laughed. But she was serious.

Then Margie Lawson—you all know Margie Lawson, the woman who helped make the guy who invented highlighters a billionaire?—told me that not only did I have to write the speech, I needed a theme.

Theme? What theme? I don’t do themes.

Of course you do, she informed me.

No I don’t, I insisted.

She then told me that all my books had themes and I stared at her like she’d grown horns and she laughed at me (again) and wouldn’t tell me what the themes of my books were after I informed her I had no themes.

Bitch.

I didn’t need to write a speech—I’d simply jot down some bullet points and all would be good.

But between two little demons–Rocki on one shoulder and Margie on the other (where was my angel, dammit?) I began to panic. On the plane, I wrote a speech on my laptop.

I hated it. I can’t even remember what I wrote, but I revised the so-called speech all weekend until Sunday morning when I had to give it and realized it sounded like crap, and it wasn’t in a conversational order, and I didn’t put down half the stuff I wanted to talk about and it was, ahem, kind of short I realized after beginning, so I winged it, but kept referring to his miserable excuse for a written speech and kept losing my train of thought.

After that dismal failure, I said never again. I would never agree to speak to another group EVER.

The second time I agreed to give a keynote, I wrote a speech much like this one—in fact, the opening is pretty much the same. But at one point about three or four pages in, I went off on a tangent . . . and never did give that speech.

(In hindsight, I could have recycled it, because I didn’t really give it, right? Damn. Why didn’t I think of that earlier before I stressed about writing this speech?)

See, I have a speech! I figured, writing a speech wasn’t really plotting, because it’s not fiction. It’s like having a conversation with a couple hundred friends, right?

But I still needed a theme. Margie told me I needed a theme. What is a damn theme, anyway? I write to entertain people, not to educate them.

Well, I have one! And I didn’t even have to come up with it. The fabulous and gracious organizers of this conference did it for me. It’s your theme. Master Your Story, Master Your Destiny.

Of course, I then had to ponder what that actually means. Going backwards, isn’t destiny something like fate? Are we talking about controlling fate? Or sort of an H.G. Wells kind of time travel where if we didn’t do something right five years ago we can travel back in time and fix it?

I wish. I’d go back twenty-five years and not quit soccer because if I didn’t quit soccer, I’d still be in good shape.

I can pretend, anyway.

Or I’d go back fifteen years and start seriously writing earlier. Or five years ago tell myself that no matter how much I know about the business, I don’t know ten times as much and never will.

Ignorance is sometimes bliss.

On December 28^th, my fifteenth book will be released on the five-year anniversary of my debut novel. When I realized this, I was stunned, because I still feel like a debut author. I still feel like I know nothing about this business, until I talk to someone who knows less. J

There is one certain truth that you can take to the bank. Well, you might not get any money for it, but it’s the one constant truth in publishing.

You control nothing—nothing—in this business except for your book. Your story. What you put on the page. That is yours. Even if you accept editor revisions or critique partner advice or your husband’s insistence that you name every hero after him (ahem), it is your book with your name and your blood, sweat, and tears on each and every page.

Think about that. Your Story.

It’s all you control.

You don’t control marketing, advertising, reviews, or covers. You can’t substantively affect whether Walmart orders a hundred thousand copies or ten thousand copies or no copies of your book. You have no say if your publisher fires your editor or your editor changes houses.

Sometimes, you have some control over some parts of some books. But you’ll never know when or why or how much.

You control one thing. The story.

The theme “Master Your Story” might on the surface seem like a positive affirmation you chant at night to keep you motivated, but there is a deeper truth to it that few writers really understand.

You can’t be anyone but YOU.

If you imitate, you’ll be a pale imitation. If you innovate, you’ll rise to the top. (Someone other than me said something like this, but I honestly can’t remember who.)

Oh, but what about the market? I hear your worried minds ponder. What about Facebook? Twitter? Publicists? The high concept? The logline? The pitch?

Forget the market.

The market is constantly changing. Yes, you need to consider the market but only after you write the damn book. Because what’s hot now may not be hot two years from now. Or it might be hotter. Or publishers will be so over-inventoried that they buy your trending up vampire-werewolf historical time travel, but it won’t be out for three years and in three years just where will the market be?

If you don’t have a book, you have nothing to market.

Write your book with passion. Be bold. Be unique. Write in your voice, and make it the strongest voice you can.

When you’re done, when you have mastered your story, then you can look at the market. The question you should ask is:

How can I position this story to fit into the market the day I pitch it?

Sure, you might need to revise the book a bit, but it’s still your book.

Good stories can find a home. Sometimes it takes awhile. But one thing writers sometimes forget is that once you sell, you now have Expectations. With a capital E.

You have Expectations from your editor and publisher and agent. You have reader Expectations. You have your own Expectations. If you sell a story you’re not passionate about just to sell a book (though I would argue that it will be a harder sell if you haven’t put your heart into it,) you may be wed to that genre for years. It is hard to write something completely different without getting a pen name, and then that means building two careers.

It can be done. It has been done. But it makes your life difficult and even more complicated.

Soooooo much easier to love what you write.

Be the best YOU. No one has your voice. No one has your stories. If I gave everyone in this room the same one-line premise and told you to write a story, we would have as many different stories—unique in voice and tone and genre and execution—as there are people.

I call this discovering your voice. Your voice is unique and amazing. When you write with YOUR voice you have passion and heart in the story, no matter what you’re writing. Don’t be like everyone else. Don’t try to be the next Nora Roberts or the next Stephen King. Be the first you.

At my last sit down meeting with my publisher over the summer, someone asked me where did I see my writing going? This was a valid question, as I had just changed agents and that in and of itself was making a statement. I had to think about it, and then was prompted, do you want to be like X author or Y author? And I said no, I want to be Allison Brennan. I know that sounds cheesy, but it’s true. But if I’m going to be pigeon-holed, I want to write the types of stories like Tess Gerritsen’s THE APPRENTICE and Lisa Gardner’s THE PERFECT HUSBAND and THE THIRD VICTIM and Tami Hoag’s A THIN, RED LINE but . . . not exactly. They wanted an answer because they need it for marketing and planning and covers and all that stuff. I get that. Genre is about marketing and reader expectations. They need to know where I fit; or, rather, because this is genre fiction, if I fit the suit.

But I don’t want to be the next Tess Gerritsen or the next Lisa Gardner because I will never be as good a Tess or Lisa as they are.

That is what I mean about voice. It’s all yours. You need to develop and nurture and grow and protect it with all your heart and soul.

When you do that, mastering your story isn’t far behind.

Some people say that you need three things to get published: talent, perseverance, and luck. You only control two of them. Talent—some writers are naturally talented, some have to learn more about the craft and practice, practice, practice.

Stephen King said, “While it is impossible to make a great writer out of a good one, it is possible, with lots of hard work, dedication, and timely help, to make a good writer out of a merely competent one.”

Perseverance—the hard work and dedication that King speaks of–that’s all you. Whether you have the inner strength to write and learn and submit and be rejected—over and over and over for years–that’s on you. You have to want it bad enough to make sacrifices, to learn from critiques, to not be destroyed by rejection.

Then there’s luck. Well, you have no control over that. But you can help luck find you. Go to conferences. Meet people. Enter contests. Submit your manuscripts. But more than anything, keeping writing and keep persevering. The longer you write, the greater the chances your book be on the right desk at the right time.

If I can impart any advice, it would be this:

Write. And write some more. No one is so good that they can’t learn. I still take classes, I still edit and revise, I still take editor input, and I hope that I always will. And even now, though I know my voice, I’m comfortable with my voice, I can do better.

Write for yourself first. As Stephen King says, write with the doors closed and edit with the windows open. Or something like that . . . essentially, don’t listen to everyone when you’re writing your rough draft. It needs to be you, all you, warts and all. Then you edit and revise and send it out to your trusted critique partners, you trusted editor or agent or ideal reader. Someone or several someone’s who will give you quality advice based on your voice and not theirs, your vision and not their dreams.

Don’t write to the market. Write with passion in your voice, with your vision, and only then, when it’s done, when it’s you, then look to the market and see where it fits or how you can position it to fit. The market isn’t evil—it’s there because of readers. But it’s changing all the time. And honestly? Good books that transcend the market sell all the time. The passion that comes through when you discover and hone your voice will make your work shine, whether you’re writing what’s currently popular or not.

Anne Lamott said, “We are a species that needs and wants to understand who we are. Sheep lice do not seem to share this longer which is one reason why they write so little.”

Don’t be sheep lice. Go forth and write!