Author Archives: Murderati

Shall We Play a Game?

by J.D. Rhoades

Okay, the weather’s getting warmer,
the first buds are appearing here on flowering trees and shrubs, my wife’s
recovering nicely from the scare we had a couple weeks ago, and it’s Daylight
Saving time again.

Yes, I’m one of the few people I
know who likes DST, and wishes it could be all year round. I like having some
sunlight left when I leave the office. Having
the clocks change means there’s more time in the evenings to take a walk or a
bike ride, sit out on the deck with a guitar and a cold drink, or whatever. I’m
willing to put up with a day or two of time change lag for that.

On the whole, things are looking
decidedly more cheerful here inside my head, and I’m feeling frisky, and not at all in the mood for a serious post about craft and such.

So let’s have some fun and play a
game. This is one I like to call “iPod Roulette,” and it’s a great way for us
to all get to know each other better (and maybe discover some new music). You don’t necessarily need an Apple iPod
to play it…any Mp3 player or computer music player will do, so long as it has a
“Shuffle” feature that allows you to play random songs from your library. It
goes like this: (1) Hit Shuffle. (2) In the comments, post the first twenty songs
that come up. (You can forward through if you don’t want to listen to all of
them before posting). (3) Be honest.

This last part is crucial. C’mon,
we’re all friends here, and if you secretly have Tom Jones singing What’s New
Pussycat in your music library, no one will laugh at you. Much. Well, okay,
we’ll probably laugh. A lot. But it’ll be warm, friendly laughter, not like
that time when I read my love poem out loud in English class and everyone knew
it was about…never mind.

Ready? Okay, I’ll start:

Van Morrison, Moonshine Whiskey

Todd Rundgren, It Wouldn’t Have Made Any Difference

Clannad, Siuil A Run

Richard Thompson, Nearly In Love

Jimmy Buffett, Tampico Trauma

Adam and the Ants, Goody Two Shoes

Steely Dan, Throw Back the Little Ones

The Wallflowers, 6^th
Avenue Heartache

Little Richard, Ooh! My Soul

Elton John, Take Me to the Pilot

Enya, Wild Child

Jethro Tull, Wond’ring Aloud

George Thorogood, Move It On Over

Buddy Guy, Damn Right I’ve Got the Blues

Muddy Waters, Rollin’ and Tumblin’

Electric Light Orchestra, Telephone Line

Talking Heads, Life During Wartime

Grateful Dead, Black Peter

Randy Newman, Bad News From Home

The Beatles, Hey Bulldog

For those
of you without iPods or other computerized musical players, feel free to weigh
in on how they’re destroying human interaction as we know it. Or gripe about
Daylight Saving Time. Or tell us about your favorite new-to-you music. It’s spring, and I’m in too good a mood to argue.

In A Late Style Of Fire

By Ken Bruen

This sounds like an Irish joke and a very sad one.

170,000 Irish blood donors had their details stored on a laptop and on February 7th, the laptop was stolen in New York.

"Not to worry,” say the blood bank.“It’s encrypted.”

Thus throwing down the gauntlet to every would be hacker out there.

And … all of the donors will be informed by email.

That is a lot of email.

There will certainly be Irish blood circulating for St Patrick’s Day.

Mostly they say, the important thing is not to panic?

My postman who tells me all of the above, says

“Blood will out.”

Is there a response to this, I mean one that bears any semblance of sanity?

The title of today’s blog is from a poem by Larry Levis. If ever there was a poet of connection and separation, he’s it.

He termed “souvenirs," the symbols objects and places by which people interact during their lives.

If you had to name one vital one, what would it be?

For me, it’s always the same, books.

As I prepare to move home again, I gaze with dismay at the mountains of books that cover my study and I can’t take them all with me.

I’m listening to my MP 3, sent to me by Craig and just now, Leonard Cohen is doing “Who by fire."

Pure coincidence, I think, as I finish reading the Levis poem, a line resounding

It is so American, fire. So like us.
It’s desolation. And it’s eventual , brief triumph.

The very essence of the Irish mentality is also in those lines.

I remember at college, a lecturer describing what makes a writer and after a long winded harangue, he finally said
“Fire in the gut.”
Without that, he said,
“Go work in a bank.”

Tony Black, in an email, working on his 2nd book, wrote
“It’s cooking, I’m on fire.”
No sweeter words or better feeling.
God, when it’s hot, when it sings, you think you’ll always have the flame.
Would it were so.

Most mornings, if you can rise to a damp squib, you’re lucky. I don’t think the flame is ever fully extinguished but it sure does dim.

Alex recently wrote an amazing blog about The Price, not only the title of her 2nd stunning book, but the deal we do to get published/reviewed/known.
The price we pay as Bruce sang, and how much you’re willing to give for your craft.

Charles Willeford was asked what was the hardest thing for a writer to do?
“Stay in print," he said.

There was a time I’d thought it would be bliss to be a painter and I actually went to Art college for a year, completed the course and my tutor on graduation asked me
“So, are you any good?”

He was genuinely interested in what I thought.
I told him the truth, I said
“I have a certain technique but talent, no."

He smiled, said
“You’re right.”

I’d done a few paintings and gave them to friends who were gracious enough to say thanks and nothing further.

A month ago, one of them turned up on e-bay and I’d love to say it was going for a small fortune. The only word that really applies is small.

My grumpy priest was round the other evening, one of those bitter cold nights, your breath making clouds of, if not unknowing, certainly of desperation.

Flattering me is not one of his traits but he did manage
“You make a great fire.”

It’s true, turf and the tiniest hint of peat, it lights up the whole room, you could almost aspire to contentment. Throws odd shadows along the bookcases and you’re glad you don’t have any real reason to head downtown.

He said
“I’m perished.”

Which not only tells me he’s freezing but is a heavy hint to get the Jay out.
I make it with cloves and sugar, brown sugar, not of the Rolling Stones type I hasten to add, and the real trick is ensure you have heavy tumblers. Literally add weight to the enterprise.

He gets on the other side of that then picks up my notebook, looks at some lines I’ve scribbled down

… the slightest comprehend If slight-indeed
As such
The comprehension.

He has no compunction about reading whatever is to hand and I’m putting it down to long friendship as well as sheer nosiness. I wait and then

“What does that mean?"

I’m not sure yet and tell him so

He is holding out the tumbler for another and says
“I suppose we’ll find it in the next book when you have another lash at the clergy.”

He is standing in front of the fire, so close that I’m half afraid his pants will burn. Burning a priest will do wonders for my rep but not much for my friendships.

He spots the Louisville slugger in the corner, goes over and takes a swing of it, says

“Now that’s a handy yoke.”

He reads the inscription on it and asks
“Who do you know in Ohio?”
Before I can answer, he says

“Tis nearly as good as a hurly."

No higher praise

And dare I say, he knows I have a hurly because he gave it to me
In lieu of communion perhaps.

Then, as is Irish habitual, he veers off in another direction, asks

“How’s the young wan?"

My daughter
I say she’s doing good and almost like him more till he adds

“I haven’t seen her at mass?"

I go and get him a refill

He nods when I hand it to him and comments

“You’re not having one?"

I say I’ve work and he laughs

“Sure that writing isn’t work.”

I give him my best smile as that usually makes him nervous.

Alex comes into my head and I ask him

“What do you think of the devil?"

I can see by his expression he thinks I mean the government then realizing what I really mean, he tosses off his drink, gets his coat and at the door, leaves me with

“As long as he isn’t thinking about me, I’m leaving him to his own tricks."

I’d meant to tell him about Rabbi David and his latest email where he wrote
‘Shrouds have no pockets.’
But it will keep
I’ll let it … simmer.

My daughter was going out with friends last Friday and for the first time — she is fifteen — she had eyeshadow, lip gloss and it shrieved me heart.
I know the whole gig about father’s not wanting their little girls to grow up and go out into the world and Jesus, maybe run into the likes of me.

I could see by her serious face how essential my answer would be when she asked

‘What do you think Dad?"

I lied
I lied big
I said
“You’re gorgeous."

After she’d gone, I stood in the hall and if I wasn’t such a hard ass, I’d have wept

I kept telling me own self
"This is like a cliché, father’s always react so."
Damn cliché didn’t ease one bit the agony in me soul.

I finally moved and said aloud what I’d promised my friend Lou I would, I say
"The very meaning of the word Grace, is, a free gift."

My surrogate sister, Kathy in New York, is having a real tough time and I resolve to get to the church and light her candle

The email brings Lisa from Delaware agreeing that "The Blessing” by James Wright is her favorite poem by him.

I try to count me blessings and would love to have just one that isn’t in disguise!

Mainly I wish, and I know how selfish it sounds but fookit, I wish my daughter was five years old all over again.

Me home looks like a battlefield in the process of selling it and the killer is the books. I give a ton away but there are obviously signed copies from friends that mean more than money.

To make me smile on all of these shenanigans, C.J. emails to say … you want to make the sale go smooth, bury a statue of St. Joseph in the garden!

Of course I have St Joseph, and I do have a shovel, one that the troops use in Iraq, sent to me by Craig, I have a garden but do I have the … suspension of disbelief, vital to burying a saint?

I just know I’ll get caught

See the headline

"OBSCURE MYSTERY WRITER ARRESTED FOR BURYING SAINT IN GARDEN!"

As I pass through the sitting room, where St. Joseph is perched, I can’t look at him, I’m thinking, “I’m on the verge of burying you buddy."

I head for the garden and sure am going to miss the basketball mini court I’d built for Grace.

There is a nice plot (sic) under me one oak tree and as I survey it, I mutter
"C.J. … hell of a woman."

Of Fairy Tales and Folk Tales

by Naomi Hirahara

My mother she butchered me,
My father he ate me,
My sister, little Ann Marie,
She gathered up the bones of me
And tied them in a silken cloth
To lay under the juniper,
Tweet twee, what a pretty bird am I!

–"The Juniper Tree" by the Grimm brothers

My mother doesn’t like the cover of the Japanese version of my second mystery, GASA-GASA GIRL. The publisher doesn’t understand my book, she wrote in an e-mail. Looks like something for teenagers.

But when I first saw it, I loved it. Immediately. It’s in manga style, with cartoon characters. My amateur sleuth, a seventysomething Japanese American gardener, is grappling with some young man while his tomboyish daughter stands holding a smoking gun.

The cover alerts readers that the book inside may be a fairy tale. No, I silently respond to my mother’s electronic comment, this publisher totally got the book.

************************

Inevitably at some writers conference, book event, or blog, there will be an author who explains that it’s best to write what you know. I always cringe when I hear that remark and double cringe when another writer counters that writing what you know is the most boring thing ever.

You see, readers will look at me and firmly place me in the "writing what you know" camp. After all, my main character in my series is inspired by my father and all the men I wrote about while I was a reporter and then editor for a Japanese American newspaper for more than 10 years. It’s a very quaint and precious behind-the-scenes story but is nowhere close to evoking the oohs and aahs of let’s say, a white guy writing about a geisha in the mid-twentieth century. Because certainly he did the hard lifting, while I must have sat there and documented what was right in front of me, like a teenager with a Super 8 camera (I know, I’m dating myself.)

But writing any kind of fiction is just that — writing lies for entertainment and illumination. Doesn’t matter if the subject matter is close and all around you, or back in the distant past or future or in another country or world. When you sit down at that computer or desk, what you’re doing is creating a new universe — it can be one that is very similar to the one you live in, but it cannot be the exact same reproduction. Characters that are based or inspired by real people cannot be tied down to reality — there will come a time in your manuscript that they will loosen their rope ties or break their metal shackles and go on their own way. It just has to be.

Anyway, what do we really know? Do we totally understand our friends, parents, children, spouse/partner and even ourselves? (If we did, there would be a lot less substance abuse, divorce, child neglect, and family discord, I’d imagine.) Can we imagine what loved ones are feeling, thinking at all times? Have we shocked ourselves at how we’ve reacted during a time of crisis? Those of us who write about familiar characters, settings and locales may be recreating what we THINK we know. But it’s indeed just one interpretation.

For those in the mystery genre, plot also forces us to be universe creators. Whether we write traditional mysteries, thrillers, police procedurals, noir stories, or PI novels, we are actually treading in to the arena of folk tales and fairy tales. Because how in the world can our amateur sleuth — a common baker, p.r. professional, or gardener — keep tripping over those dead bodies? We know your average FBI agent doesn’t have that kind of non-stop exciting life (I’m sure there’s a lot of paperwork that needs to be filled out on antiquated computers). We’ve heard how most crime labs are destitute and to process one DNA test might take the length of a whole season of CSI. And private investigators — talk about mundane work!

Yet in our hands, these people become something else on the page. I’m convinced their stories are our society’s contemporary folk and fairy tales. Just check out Grimm’s fairy tales; they are definitely more noir than fanciful. Some impart lessons; others are just gruesome. Some are light and humorous. All present an alternate reality, where a common villager can transform into something quite extraordinary.

***********************************

As I’ve mentioned on blogs and speaking engagements, my father, up to this time, hasn’t read any of my books in the series — and now there are three of them. Even though he was born in California and has lived here for most of his life, he feels more comfortable reading Japanese.

I say "up to this time," because things have changed with the Japanese translation.

Instead of waiting for my author’s copies from the Japanese publisher, I run to the local Kinokuniya Bookstore in Los Angeles’ Little Tokyo as soon as I hear that Shogakukan’s version of GASA-GASA GIRL has come in.

My first stop afterwards is to my parents’ house. My father grabs the book out of my hand before I’m barely inside. He rushes to the light and examines the front and back covers and goes straight to the end of the book, where there’s a five page essay on me and the series.

"The person writes that she’s hoping for more books on Mas Arai," he reports.

There will be, I say, as I’ve just forged a deal with a new publisher. (This time hardcover, yay!)

He then asks me what’s going to be the heart of the fourth book.

"Drugs," I say in Japanese.

"Drugs?" My father frowns and considers this topic. "This guy’s a gangster," he then proclaims.

I wonder if I’ve insulted my father — perhaps guilt through literary association — but when I look more closely at his bespectacled face, I believe that his eyes are glimmering.

The next time I see him, he has finished the book. "Kora," he says. Hey! "You wrote my story."

But you’ve never been in New York, the setting of the translated book, I tell him.

He doesn’t seem to hear my words. When I leave, he walks onto our cement porch. "Our friends are waiting for the next installment," he says. "They are wondering what will happen next."

_______________________________________________________________________

WANT TO LEARN MORE ABOUT CHARACTER AND UNIVERSE BUILDING?
S.J. Rozan and I will be leading a workshop, "Credible Characters, Credible Worlds," at MWA’s inaugural two-day Crime Fiction University during Edgar Week. Our session will be on Tuesday, April 29, at 2 p.m. at Lighthouse International in New York City.

Where do stories come from (part three zillion)

by Alex

I’m at LCC in Denver this weekend, along with what seems like a staggering number of ‘Rati, really fun, although I’m shocked and bummed that Rae isn’t here – your name is being tossed around all over the place.

This afternoon I’m on a panel on "Where do stories come from?" with the interestingly diverse group of Donna Andrews, Jane Cleland, Penny Warner and Mike Sherer. I never get tired of this question (and apparently neither do conferencers) so I’m thrilled to be able to indulge in this conversation with some of my favorite authors.

The thing is,there are so many answers to the question, and I suspect we all have different answers to the question depending on who’s asking, and on how much sleep we have had, or, you know, other variables. And call me humorless, but I don’t really find it funny when authors answer glibly, "At Walmart" or something similar, although it’s true that you can always pick up a character or two for the storage bin cheap in line at one of those places.

I think, in no particular order, that sometimes there’s a particular aspect of ourselves that we want to explore, or a fantasy we want to work out (possibly instead of destroying our lives and everyone around us by doing it for real. And don’t ask me why I would want to live out fantasies as dark as what I write.

Sometimes a character will work itself into my consciousness first and start nagging to be written about, but for me that’s usually after I start with an overall story idea or thematic thread, like "I want to do a story that’s an erotic triangle between a woman with a troubled past, a cop who thinks she’s an indulgent prima donna, and a very, very bad man… and then the characters will start to grow out of the situation.

I have said before that I think authors are generally working just a handful, maybe as few as a half dozen, personal themes – over and over and over again (as I wrote about a few weeks ago, THE PRICE is only one of my deal with the devil stories.). I also keep working out themes of violence and gender and how men and women react differently to violence, or force the pairing of an unlikely man and woman in a crime-solving situation and have them have to use specifically gender-related skills to the solving of the case. The soul-crime of sexual abuse and sexual violence is another big theme for me, and so is the more supernaturla theme of opening doors that shouldn’t be opened and having to deal with the consequences of that opening.

Sometimes an idea presents that is just obviously a story, like my third book, which is actually such a great idea that I’m reluctant to talk about it on the Internet – public domain and all. But at the time that story seed presented itself to me, I had already done years of research on the overall subject, so maybe (or apparently) I was more ripe to recognize the idea as a terrific story than someone just casually reading about it for the first time.

But I’m not entirely sure that when people ask authors – "Where do you get your ideas?" that they’re not really asking THAT so much as "How the hell do you ever put a story together?"

Because yeah, you can sometimes identify a seed idea that acts like the grain of sand that irritates an oyster enough that it starts the process of adding layers that become a pearl. That’s one metaphor for it all. But I also think that writers keep vast warehouses of story ideas, snippets of character, dialogue, themes, locations, professions, character quirks, sexual dyanmics – that are not just sitting passively on these warehouse shelves, but that are actually constantly shifting and turning and rubbing against each other and sometimes they stick and magnetize and suddenly you have a premise or subplot. At any given moment I’ll have half a dozen to a dozen story ideas in various stages, and occasionally I can feel ideas collide in that warehouse and become a greater magnetizing force that will attract other elements and eventually snowball (to now hopelessly mix about seven metaphors, but that’s what the process feels like.)

But no matter how much I talk about story being my first motivator, writing is ultimately ALL = about the people for me – the characters. At a certain point I get invested in the people I am idly fantasizing about and that’s when a story shifts into high gear. Because from then on, no matter how hard writing can be, you need to bring those people into the world – the sense of responsibility is enormous, some shadow of what parents must feel. You’re solely responsible for their existence and that’s what keeps you going, keeps you writing to the end and through all the subsequent revisions, that responsibility.

Or that’s just me.

I’m looking forward to hearing what everyone else has to say.

What’s it for you?-

The Upper-Bottoms Wedding

by J.T. Ellison

I’m a true Taurus, which means in addition to being exceptionally bullheaded, I find slapsticky humor hilarious. But I also appreciate the subtle, cerebral stuff. It boils down to this, highbrow, lowbrow, subtle, crude, sexy, sexist… make me laugh, and I’ll love you forever. I love to laugh.

One of my favorite sure bets is on Monday nights, when Jay Leno does his headlines. I know this is the second time I’ve mentioned Leno lately, and don’t worry, I also love Letterman, and Conan, and we all know how I feel about Mr. Yummy (Yes, it’s the Scottish accent coupled with the humor. Sue me.)

ON Leno, though, there is something about the typos in headlines, the deadpan delivery, even the in-your-face innuendo of the wedding announcements that just cracks me up. I swear, the Upper-Bottoms wedding just slayed me. WHO doesn’t read these things aloud when they’re putting them together? I know, it’s protocol to have the bride’s name first, but my goodness, save everyone the trouble and switch the names already. Of course, on that one, it would just end up as Bottoms-Upp.

And I wouldn’t get my juvenile jollies if people actually paid attention.

I’m a huge fan of bloopers, too, and gag reels, people getting tongue-tied and embarrassed. I’m just one of those easily amused people, I guess.

So why don’t I find reported instances of my own typos at all amusing???

And not just not amusing, but a personal affront on my soul???

Part of it comes from the fact that the reported instances of typos in ALL THE PRETTY GIRLS are my fault. The second issue is the notifications come with such breathless glee. And the third insult to injury is that they’ve come from my family. Yes, you read that right. The very people who are supposed to turn a blind eye to my shortcomings have been the first to point the proverbial finger. I haven’t had any strangers write to me with problems. It’s all come from within. Makes me feel like I’m still in junior high.

In all seriousness, this is a real issue. Many lists get into discussions about all the editorial errors in books these days. The complaints are numerous, the blame widely spread. I thought I’d take a moment and talk about how those errors come into being.

I just finished my "Author Alterations", otherwise known and galleys or page proofs, for my second book. I know the manuscript was relatively clean. I’d been through it at least three times, my independent readers caught errors, my editor caught a few. Then it went to copyediting. The copyeditor makes all the changes she or he thinks are appropriate, and the author is left picking up the pieces. My first go-round with copyedits was brilliant. The second wasn’t as simple. Writing books set in the South can be difficult, simply because we use phrases and vernacular that’s grammatically incorrect. Modern usage of language has changed. Writing has become less formal in many ways. So if you score a CE who is a stickler for proper grammar and usage, and who doesn’t know your style, it can be a nightmare.

So I undid a lot of the changes she made (STET is a girl’s best friend) and sent the manuscript back. A note here for the newbies. One — when you get your first set of copyedits, you don’t make the changes to your electronic manuscript, you make them directly onto the paper. Yes, it’s a bit archaic, but that’s the way things are. A sweet friend saved me from that very mistake my first go-round, so take it as free advice. Two — and this is a BIGGIE — make a photocopy of your copyedits. That way, when your proofs come back, you can check to make sure your CEs and STETs made it into the final product.

And herein lies the rub. Between copyedits and page proofs, the manuscript is typeset. Which means it’s reentered into a document in full. Which means there will be errors that weren’t in the copyedits. It’s just one of those crazy things. I know a few houses have moved to an electronic CEs and PPs, but mine hasn’t. Which means my author alterations not only include reading through for errors, I need to make sure all my CEs made it into the final product. It’s time consuming, but I care about making sure there are as few mistakes as possible.

After all of that, the manuscript is finished, sent off to proofreaders for a final read-through. And mistakes still make it through. After I was informed of the two errors in ATPG, I went back and looked. One was a typo, an extra A, the other was an action. Baldwin turned off the television twice in two pages. And I’m not making excuses, I should have seen them. The proofreaders should have seen them. The copyeditor should have seen them. But they didn’t. And that, unfortunately, is life. I hate that my book is out there with a couple of typos. Drives my OCD butt mad. But what can you do?

I did my absolute best to make sure 14 is clean, but it’s out of my hands now. I don’t get to see it again. I can’t take one last pass through to make sure everything is perfect. And to be perfectly honest, I probably wouldn’t catch anything more. I’ve read that book at least five times now, and the mind plays tricks on you. You reach a point with these novels that you can recite passages by heart. You know what you mean, so your mind tells you it’s correct. I have high hopes for my proofreaders. And I’ll live with the consequences.

But it won’t stop me from enjoying other people’s mistakes. All hail the typo!

So as a readers, how much is too much? Will you abandon a book that has too many typos? And the writers, what tricks do you use to eliminate these problems?

Wine of the Week: 2006 Deltetto Langhe Arneis, a Geerlings & Wade special.

P.S. I’m here in Denver at Left Coast Crime. A great time is being had by all. I’ll check in as much as I can!

Must Try Harder …

by Zoë Sharp

Coincidences happen every day. They’re a fact of life. And while there are a few of us who still firmly believe that instances of déjà vu are nothing more than a glitch in the matrix, they happen, too, often in a way that’s really quite corny. I’m rapidly coming to the conclusion that real life is a lot more badly written than an average novel.

Can you imagine sitting down with your agent or editor, and explaining to them the idea for your next book. A courtroom drama that unfolds after a beautiful eighteen-year-old model is found murdered just yards from her front door after a night out with friends. She’s been stabbed seven times and brutally raped. The police question her boyfriend, but his DNA doesn’t match that found on the body and the case goes cold. Then, nine months later, a man is arrested after a scuffle in a pub. His DNA is taken as a matter of routine and fed into the system. Twelve days later the police arrest him for the young model’s death and he goes to trial. In court, his defence is that he found the teenager lying on the ground and assumed she was passed out drunk so he, "took advantage of the situation", not realising she was dead until afterwards. Yes, you tell your agent, this is going to be his defence, under oath, in a court of law.

Or, what about a serial killer? There are a lot of them in fiction, it seems – far more than in real life. So, you decide to write a serial killer book. Your killer is going to murder five prostitutes in a single mid-sized English town over a forty day period. One other woman is going to have a lucky escape when the killer is interrupted. But rather than have him totally baffling police with the total lack of clues, forensic scientists are going to lift a full DNA profile from three of the bodies, which he carelessly dumps on dry land rather than in water. Not only that, but they’re also going to match 177 clothing or textile fibres from the killer’s home to his victims.

The killer’s car is going to be seen kerb crawling the local red light districts, and blood is found in the back of it. Oh, and by the way, the police will already have his DNA on file after a minor robbery he committed five years previously. His defence in court? Our old friend coincidence. Yes, he did indeed frequent the red light districts, and by amazing chance did indeed have sex with all the girls in question, on the very day they disappeared, but everything else was one big fat coincidence. Or fifty of them, I believe it was, during one period of cross-examination by the prosecution.

So, no criminal masterminds at work here, then.

Tragically, both these cases are real life. Mark Dixie has just been sentenced to life for the rape and murder of Sally Anne Bowman in Croydon, South London. Steve Wright has just had a similar sentence passed for the murders of Tania Nicol, Gemma Adams, Anneli Alderton, Annette Nicholls, and Paula Clennell, all working in Ipswich, Suffolk. Both these men may well be very sad, twisted – even downright evil – individuals, but what makes them all the more pathetic is that it almost seems like they couldn’t be bothered to put any effort into planning their crimes.

In books, serial killers connect with their victim in some way – even if it’s only inside their sick little minds. They stalk their victims, photograph them, create little shrines to them for the detective to uncover – usually illuminated by a single swinging lightbulb. As writers we simply can’t rely on the same level of random chance, coincidence and happenstance that seems to occur time and again in real life. We have to make our villains more – I hate to say it – larger than life.

More human, even.

Some writers complain that occasionally they’ve taken an aspect of real life and inserted it into a novel, only for that to be the part that readers pick out as being the most unbelievable bit. I know if I presented either of those two scenarios to my agent, she’d point out the plot-holes and bat them right back at me. Must try harder.

So, my question is this. Are there times when you experience something, or see it on the news and say to yourself, "If I’d written that in a book, nobody would believe it …", and how much coincidence and happenstance will or won’t you accept – both as a reader and a writer – in fiction?

This week’s Word of the Week really ought to be mesmoronic, as mentioned in my comment to Louise’s blog, but we made that one up so it doesn’t really count. Instead, it’s actually outfangthief, which is the right of judging and fining thieves pursued and brought back from outside one’s own jurisdiction.

For those of you who live in the US and can pick up XM 155 satellite radio, you might be interested to know that I’m on over the course of this weekend. I was interviewed by Kim Alexander, host of Fiction Nation. The times you can listen in on Take Five XM 155 are:

Friday 3/7 11:30pm

Saturday 3/8 6pm

Sunday 3/9 10am

Sunday 3/10 8pm

Monday 3/11 midnight

And on Sonic Theater XM 163

Thursday 3/13 3:30 pm

All times are EAST

The Great Beyond

by Robert Gregory Browne

When I was fifteen years old, my uncle had a heart attack and died.

A few minutes later, a stubborn doctor brought him back to life.

When he was asked about those few minutes, my uncle refused to talk
about them. I sensed that whatever happened to him “out there” must
have scared the hell out of him.

This was the beginning of my fascination with the near-death experience.

NDE is not uncommon. Millions of people around the world claim to
have experienced it, most of them reporting the usual trappings we’ve
all heard about:

Out of body travel. Tunnel. Bright light. The presence of long-departed loved ones.

Many tie this to a religious experience, but these elements cross
all cultural and spiritual boundaries. Scientists have suggested that
what NDE survivors go through is merely a kind of death dream caused by
chemicals in the brain, but it seems odd to me that most survivors
dream pretty much the same thing.

It also seems odd that many of the survivors are able to report what
doctors and loved ones have said in the room – after they were
clinically dead.

Based on my uncle’s refusal to talk about his trip to the great
beyond, however, I’ve long had the feeling that the experience as
described is not universal. For some of us, there is a darker version
of the journey. A scarier version.

And that idea, of course, attracted me as a writer.

When I think of my book, KISS HER GOODBYE, which comes out in paperback next month, I look at it as
essentially a crime thriller. It’s the story of an ATF agent whose
daughter is kidnapped and buried alive, and the unusual lengths a
desperate father has to go to in order to save her.

All the elements of a crime thriller are there, but I also wanted to
give the reader a slightly different experience, one that allowed me to
explore some of the questions about near-death and the afterlife.

These are questions we all think about from time to time. What’s out
there? How will it affect me? Will it be painful? Exhilarating? Scary?

Most people are frightened by it. Call me weird, but I think of
Death as simply another step in the adventure, wherever it may lead.
And while I don’t look forward to any pain associated with dying, I do
think Death itself will be an amazing journey.

But that’s me.

I’m curious to know what you think. What’s waiting out there for you?

Music First, Words Second

By Louise Ure

I had a chance to visit my husband’s family on a recent trip to Seattle. Always a dicey proposition. “Psst,” someone hissed as I passed the front bedroom. A hand snaked out the scant two inches of open doorway. “I thought you’d get a kick out of this.”

I took the offering with a thumb and forefinger. Bruce’s brother does all his shopping at flea markets and garage sales, and you never know what he’ll come home with. This time it was a gem.

A CD called Miss Calypso, performed by a woman I knew for other talents: Maya Angelou.

Who knew? It started me thinking about other writers – both mystery and general fiction — who started off in life as musicians. First came the tune. Later they added words.

It seems natural that songwriters would later turn to novels.

Leonard Cohen. Jimmy Buffett. Kinky Friedman. I guess three verses and a chorus were no longer enough for them.

But there were lots of other musicians as well. Ralph Ellison (Invisible Man) was a trumpet player and pianist, with a love of jazz.

Mystery writer and presidential daughter Margaret Truman had a singing career before a writing one. The critics were kinder to her books than they were to her vocal talent.

Ed McBain was a pianist, too, but I’m sure glad he later turned his attention to fiction. The world would not have been as fine without his 87th precinct stories.

How about thriller writer Greg Iles? Guitarist, vocalist and founder of the band Frankly Scarlet, Greg only turned to writing when he realized that the life of a traveling musician wasn’t right for a family man.

James McBride (The Color of Water)
is musical theater composer, songwriter and sax player. He’s still making music today, although I’m delighted to see that he describes himself first as an author and second as a musician in his publicity material.

Bill Moody’s still doing gigs in San Francisco’s North Beach.

Ridley Pearson is an orchestral composer and folk song writer.

Hal Glatzer uses his vocal and guitar skills on the page as well as out loud.

John Lescroart has got a new CD out (Whiskey and Roses) as well as a new book (Betrayal).

It’s an international phenomenon, too. The 2006 Australian Idol winner, Damien Leith published his first novel, One More Time, last October. And Norwegian writer, Jo Nesbo, who created a detective with the unfortunate name of Harry Hole, is both an economist and a musician.

Best-selling Japanese author, Haruki Murakami (After Dark) owned jazz clubs in Tokyo and performed for years.
A recent New York Times interview with him provides perhaps the best reason there’s such a dramatic link between musicians and writers.

“Practically everything I know about writing … I learned from music. It may sound paradoxical to say so, but if I had not been so obsessed with music, I might not have become a novelist. Even now, almost 30 years later, I continue to learn a great deal about writing from good music. My style is as deeply influenced by Charlie Parker’s repeated freewheeling riffs, say, as by F. Scott Fitzgerald’s elegantly flowing prose.

Once, when someone asked Thelonious Monk how he managed to get a certain special sound out of the piano, Monk pointed to the keyboard and said: ‘It can’t be any new note. When you look at the keyboard, all the notes are there already. But if you mean a note enough, it will sound different. You got to pick the notes you really mean.’

I often recall these words when I am writing, and I think to myself, ‘It’s true. There aren’t any new words. Our job is to give new meanings and special overtones to absolutely ordinary words.’”

In a recent blog post over at Hey, There’s a Dead Guy in the Living Room , Sharon Wheeler talked about hearing a soundtrack for books she reads. So that’s my musical question for you today: Do you hear a song or a singer when you read certain works? Is there such a thing as a soundtrack to a book?

And is there any logical link between musicianship and writing?

liars and cheaters and con men, oh my

by Toni

She made the dumb mistake of trying to steal it all right before Christmas. Three weeks before, to be exact, and if she’d picked any other month, I probably wouldn’t have caught on quite as quickly.

She didn’t come in a villain package. She was 26, married with two kids, and when you met her, there were a few things you noticed right away: she had some sort of defect with one eye (it didn’t track with the other) and then inside of a couple of seconds, you quit noticing because of her smile and warmth and vivaciousness. She was pretty. Not gorgeous, not beautiful, but pretty, and she made you comfortable.

I needed someone capable in the office, someone versatile, so I could finally have time to write.

I interviewed a lot of people for that position–accounting / clerical –and there were several very good candidates, so if the top two choices had fallen through, there were others. She had a personality that caught my attention and there was an easy-going charm about her that I knew would give her an edge on the phone. Still, had it not been for her stellar references, there might have been a toss-up between her and the next candidate, a young man who probably had a little more experience, but who interviewed with the personality of a stick of wood.

His references barely remembered him, so they couldn’t really vouch for him. Her references raved. The references were from very large corporations; I’d looked up the numbers myself instead of relying on the ones on her resumé, called directly, went through the phone system and the secretaries, so I knew the people I spoke to were legitimately employed at the companies in question.

They could not say enough good things about her.

So why wasn’t she still working for them? I’d ask, and was told that it was an unfortunate matter of their company having completed a big project and then laying off extra employees, last one hired, first one fired. She had the unlucky misfortune to be late to the game. This was typical in the area–there had been a lot of construction surges and downturns in the previous five years, so I understood how that could happen. I understood how a young mom could be trying to build a career only to have it sidetracked, and with the economy the way it was, have a hard time finding a stable place. Each reference stated they’d hire her back if given a choice.

I would find out later that those references were relatives or, in one case, a friend of hers.

It’s hard to prove fraud for a telephone reference, especially when it didn’t occur to you to record it.

The insurance background check was the last hurdle, and she was clear. She went to work for us some time in October. We had a new accounting software package, but since it was new to us, we also did one other thing: we made her manually track what she did for the day. We were a small company–tiny, actually, so this wasn’t abnormally difficult.

This was pre-online banking. This was get-a-statement-once-a-month times, and if you wanted your bank balance, you had to call and talk to an officer of the bank because the tellers wouldn’t tell you over the phone.

She made me laugh. Daily. I enjoyed her company, and really liked her. We had a lot in common. She was one of those rare people I didn’t mind being around every day, and I’m fairly grouchy and introverted and would just as soon be a hermit most of the time, so this was a major feat. Three weeks before Christmas, she came into the office in tears. She’d just discovered she was pregnant for her third child. She couldn’t afford to lose her job, and didn’t want us to think she’d misled us. We told her not to worry–she had already won over some of our crustiest clients and she worked hard, was very efficient, and we figured we’d find a way to work something out. We couldn’t offer her maternity leave, but when it was time for the baby, I could hold down the fort for a while ’til she could come back. She was elated.

I think she cashed the first forged check that day.

She came in for the rest of that week and everything seemed perfectly normal. We talked about what we were going to get for our kids for Christmas. Our Christmas was going to be relatively small that year because we were climbing out of a construction slump and we were just that month starting to have a real turn-around. We didn’t want to over-do it or be too optimistic, and there were a lot of reasons not to be. We hadn’t even done the first bit of Christmas shopping yet, but that was okay because that year was going to be the first in a couple of years that we were going to be able to shop a little ahead of time instead of just a day or two before. I didn’t explain that to her–almost everyone here in this state had been through some tough times. Just being able to afford to hire her had been a victory; we’d seen companies two or three times our size go belly up the previous few years and we’d managed to survive.

She told me the things she’d been able to buy her kids. It was going to be one of their best Christmases, she said, because she finally had a good job.

We’d not only survived, we’d managed to grow, and now, here was a young family, benefiting.

She’d cashed several more forged checks by that Friday.

She started missing work the first couple of days the next week. Morning sickness. I understood that, and she was great about calling in.

I went to make a bank transfer, and there was no money in the accounts. None.

I double-checked the accounting program, and there was money according to the balance showing on the computer, but somewhere, there had been a mistake. Thousands of dollars of a mistake, and my honest first assumption was that we’d written a check we’d forgotten about and hadn’t remembered to tell her, or else we’d input a deposit twice. I then compared the computer register against the manual one, and the balances were the same.

But some of the entries were vastly different.

Which didn’t make sense. The room grew icy cold, my hands felt numb and there was a chill up my spine. It was a surreal out-of-body moment where I could not believe what I was seeing. I was almost certain I was making a mistake, that there was a logical explanation for this, and it had to be somewhere in that data. Because it could not have been purposeful. The numbers on the ledger grew large and bold as the world around it grew fuzzy and I thought you’re making it up. You’re just making it up because somewhere you screwed up and you’re just wishing for a better excuse. Right? I couldn’t possibly have been that naïve.

I went to the bank the next day and had a copy of all of the checks pulled. The bank was quick to help, and by that afternoon, I had copies of everything that had cleared to that date. I normally wouldn’t have seen these checks for another two weeks, when the bank statement came in.

Multiple checks had been made out either to cash or to her or to people we didn’t know. The signatures had been forged; she’d endorsed the back. When I compared these to the checks on the computer, I discovered a flaw in that program (which ended up being the demise of that program, nationally). A check could be written, printed and then voided and never show up as having ever been written.

By going through the blank checks in the office, I realized there was one more check out. It would turn out to be a very large one, which coincidentally matched the amount of the very large check we were expecting. I put a hold on the account.

Two days before Christmas.

The police issued a warrant for her arrest. She called in sick again that day. Then she said she didn’t think she’d be able to come back to work for us because the morning sickness had gotten so bad, and she knew it wasn’t fair to us to not work for another month. She’d understand that we would need to replace her. We confronted her over the phone with the facts; explained that there was a warrant for her arrest. Explained that she had one shot at not being arrested for Christmas, and that was to turn herself in. We’d work with her through a first-offenders program, and this was strictly because she had kids. She’d have to plead guilty, but she’d get to stay out of jail and repay while she was on probation and, once she’d paid everything and if she stayed clean for a year, her record would be expunged. She agreed.

She failed to show up the next day.

The police don’t care if someone’s having Christmas, by the way, if they’ve stolen thousands of dollars. In fact, it often makes the criminal a wee bit easier to find.

There were witnesses, handwriting proofs, and evidence galore. When the police arrested her, her car was packed with luggage–she was moving to Arizona, to live with a sister.

Later, I would see a photo of evidence of all sorts of new toys and electronics they’d found at her house.

We really didn’t have much of a Christmas that year; wouldn’t have had any, had it not been for family who stepped in and helped. My kids were 8 and 4.

I was 28.

Crime wasn’t new to me. I’d had enough of it in my life at that point, and was aware enough of the world to realize it was common. But it was the first time I’d experienced a targeted, systematic con aimed directly at me. It was the first time my judgment had completely failed. Everyone who’d met her was stunned, but that didn’t help assuage the fear that if I could so completely misperceive something of that magnitude, how the hell could I trust what I believed about anyone else?

The financial damage she did lasted a very long time. The economy here was about to take another downturn and we’d struggle. But what she took from me was more valuable than money: faith. Faith in my own judgment, a willingness to trust. Eventually, I’d realize I didn’t want to let the actions of one person poison my perceptions of everyone else I met, and I’d find a balance, but it would take a long time. It would take even longer to forget.

This past Christmas was the first Christmas day I didn’t think about her. Not even once. And I didn’t realize it until a month later.

17 years.

What she gave me, though, turned out to be more valuable than what she took.

She didn’t come in a villain package.

~*~

I write about crime and try to find the absurd and a way to deal with it while showing its repercussions. I think reading about an interesting villain failing to succeed will always hold a certain lure. So what draws you to crime fiction?

~*~

If you’re anywhere near Denver from Thursday through Sunday, come on out to Left Coast Crime. A ton of us will be there and we’d love to see you.

How do you teach writing? (Part 2)

by Alex

To start off my PRICE tour I did the Southern California Writers’ Conference in San Diego last week. The conference is run by a WGA friend of mine, the irrepressible writer/director, Michael Steven Gregory, and his perfect straight man, Wes Albers, a writer/cop and the best of both professions. I love this conference because it feels like home, of course, but especially because of the unique dynamic between the instructors and attendees. The conference is made up primarily of workshops rather than panels and so attending authors end up doing a lot of teaching and also one-on-one sessions, and the whole atmosphere of the conference is so casual and friendly that I think students can get a lot of in-depth attention just by asking for it.

In prepping for my workshops and doing the actual teaching I realized that I have no idea how to teach people HOW to write. That is, if someone can’t put together a descriptive sentence, or a dramatic paragraph, I am not the person who is going to be able to help them with that. I can tell you how to make an existing sentence more effective and I can tell you what paragraphs you need to expand on to bring out the full potential of the situation, but I can’t tell you how to start from scratch. Honestly I think that skill starts extremely early – like, with third grade journaling. Storytellers are writing down stories from practically the time they can write (but that’s my theory – would love to hear what people have to say about late starters.).

I also have to admit that I hate with a singular passion the kinds of writing exercises in which an instructor gives you a situation, or a set of characters and you have to put together a story from those elements. I’m perfectly capable of coming up with my own elements, thanks very much.

But I am finding I am useful in explaining to people how to tell a story.

The classes I taught were “Creating Unbearable Suspense” and two sessions of “Screenwriting Tips and Tricks for Novelists (and Screenwriters)”. I’ve picked up a lot of structure tricks over the years and I’ve managed to distill them into a form that was translating amazingly well to the three classes of students I had last week. And one thing I found that worked really well was that I asked the students to give me examples of books and movies in their particular genres, so we were dealing with a set of examples that I knew would resonate with the classes. It’s a fun way to teach because you end up expanding your own repertoire and learning something (imagine that!)

Another huge perk of teaching is that in going over al these classic examples of great storytelling you remember why you wanted to write in the first place, which I admit I sometimes forget. Someone paid me the supreme compliment – he’d been ready to move on from his first novel and just send it around as is because he thought he’d taken it as far as he could go – and then after my class he said he was excited about diving in to the rewrite and taking it to a deeper level. That was especially nice for me to hear because I need to do exactly the same thing with my own book and all the back and forth with the classes jazzed me about doing it.

I like using examples of both films and books because the entire class is more likely to have seen the same movies and actually remember them than books. And the examples I find myself using over and over again are SILENCE OF THE LAMBS (which should surprise to no one), JAWS, STAR WARS, THE WIZARD OF OZ, HAMLET, THE SHINING and PET SEMATERY. I love these stories because they are pretty much perfect examples of construction, and some other techniques that I love to teach. OZ and STAR WARS are particularly good for demonstrating how the hero’s journey plot works; JAWS is a great example to kick start a discussion of high concept premises and obligatory scenes, SILENCE OF THE LAMBS is a stunning example of using fairy tale archetypes and motifs to make your story resonate (RED DRAGON is great for this as well); THE SHINING and PET SEMATERY are wonderful for demonstrating the power of fate, inevitability and the hero’s ghost; HAMLET and OZ and SILENCE and STAR WARS are fantastic for subplots and supporting characters.

I picked up some great new examples from my classes, too – BLACK FRIDAY for a knockout premise (terrorists plan an attack on the Superbowl – genius), and WITNESS for a brilliant exploration of theme, especially in the climax.

So since I’m in the mode, what I’m wondering today is – for those of us who teach, what do you think you teach well, and not so well? For example, I know RGB teaches a great seminar on character, which I’m not sure I would know how to do – would love to see him break it down for us on Murderati sometime.

And when you teach, or even just when you go off on a rant about great books and films – which are the examples that come up over and over for you, and why?

I’m really interested in hearing what stories are touchstones for our Rati readers and writers.