Author Archives: Murderati

How I do it

How do you do it?

The question snickers in my inbox. It’s the late-night topic of conversation in bars. Friends shake their heads in consternation. Acquaintances think I’m some kind of superwoman.

How do you do it?

The truth is, my life is a wonderful mess. It’s fractured and overscheduled, satisfying and frustrating, surprising and predictable.

In an effort to gain a bit of control, I try to organize myself, to make and reach goals. At the beginning of each week, I tell myself I’ll . . .

write at a consistent time every day
write a set amount every day
leave phones unanswered
ignore emails
get rid of clutter
clean my office and keep it clean
schedule my day for maximum efficiency
cut down on caffeine
increase sleep time
get up earlier
go to bed earlier
read more; read less
get more exercise
spend more time with the kids
write MORE
cook nutritious meals
make time to talk with my husband; let him have much-needed time alone
clean the fridge; eat all the produce in it before buying more
take better care of myself
take better care of the yard
clean the damn house
talk to the fig tree . . .

And that’s just what I can remember from last Sunday.

Here’s what I’ve done since 7 this morning:
Watered front and back yards. Fed kids. Cleaned kitchen. Took one kid to swim team. Helped other child with math. Wrote blog. Took one kid to swimming lessons and stayed to encourage/assess for need for next week. Rewrote blog. Answered emails. Managed new attendees-only Yahoo group for Left Coast Crime 2008 in Denver (sign up, people!). Wrote in Darnda series. Thought through a plot point for Sasha. Worked on redesign of website. Went to store. Composed letter and mailed manuscript to new PR person. Went to bookstore to buy present for tomorrow b-day party for kid’s friend; schmoozed with inventory manager. Got kids lunch. Did research for Sasha book. Planned more publicity for LCC 2008. Wrote another section for website. Visited MySpace and Crimespace to confirm friends. Helped daughter with her typing; read a story she wrote and talked with her about it . . .

I’m sure I’ve forgotten more than half of it.

Sometimes I wish I could go on an extended retreat — for a month or two — without distractions. That’ll have to wait for at least the next 10 years.

In the meantime, all I can do is try to insert a bit of order here and there.

Lately, I’ve been focusing on what I DO accomplish — stressing the positive — a page written, a chapter edited, a mailing sent . . . a smile earned, a child’s hug freely given, food eaten happily.

How do I do it?

I don’t.

But I keep trying.

How do you do it?

Writing Funny

by JT Ellison

It’s been a serious week. For me, at least. I’ve been fretting, something I’m not prone to do. My new book is kicking my butt. I realized that I have no outside life — that writing and reading have become my end all, be all. Not that this is such a bad thing, but exclusivity in any endeavor can sometimes lead to ruts. Ruts don’t equal fresh, exciting writing. Sometimes it hits me that I don’t have the life experience of so many other writers I admire, and I wonder if it reflects in my work. (Yes, I’m reading John Connolly. I always dive into massive introspection when I surrender to his art.)

And then, a beautiful thing happened. Thank the good Lord above, LAST COMIC STANDING showed up in my Tivo list. Hubby and I have been watching the preliminary rounds, the auditions from across the country. My goodness, there are some seriously funny people out there. And some who have absolutely no business trying. Watching this combination of entertainment and train wreck has drastically improved my mood, and led me to this post.

Open call to all you funny writers out there — how do you do it?

I read blog entries, stories and books that are wicked funny, have me bowling over laughing. Obviously, comedians write their material and the talented ones can turn it into true comic nirvana. But I can’t, for the life of me, write funny.

It’s more than just not being able to translate my sense of humor to the page. I’m certainly not a comedienne, but I’ve got a pretty good sense of humor. I do voices, can cut up with the best of them. I don’t get offended at dirty jokes. I love to laugh. It’s an RX that I prescribe for any happy relationship, actually. People ask how our marriage works so well, and I tell them we have at least one huge belly laugh together a day. Laughter really is the best medicine. (Oh no, I used the word "really." Ever since Eisler joined the crusades against "like" and "really" I assiduously avoid using the word in print, but it fits here. Sorry, Barry!)

See what I mean? That makes me laugh, but it doesn’t translate. I’m just not funny on paper.

I used to be good at telling long intricate jokes. Now, not so much. I only know one really good joke and it’s absolutely filthy, plus, to make it work well, you have to act it out. If I ever tell it in public, I warn you in advance I have been completely over-served and you should haul me off to bed (mine, not yours.) It’s THAT filthy.

So what’s a girl to do? I want to be suave and amusing in print. I want to make people grasp their sides and have tears roll down their faces. In person, I can be dry, and droll, and bitingly sarcastic, and do it in Donald Duck’s point of view. But the second my fingers touch a keyboard, the loquaciousness is gone. I want to be like my good friend Kristy Kiernan. That girl puts words to the page and I start rolling in the aisles. Jeff Cohen always makes me laugh. Randall Hicks slays DorothyL with good humor. Bill Cameron has the most brilliant way of using irony to self-deprecate and make me laugh. Toni Causey and our own Pari can make me giggle with their eyes closed and one hand tied behind their backs.

So I beseech you, funny writers. Share your wealth with a poor, misguided girl.

HOW DO YOU DO IT?????????

And for our readers, who makes you laugh, every time??????

I need amusement today, folks. Double, triple extra special bonus points for anyone who writes a short short about this poor cat.

Wine of the Week: Morellino di Scansano

————–

PS — I’m thrilled to have the opportunity to host debut author Michelle Gagnon here next Friday. Stop by and get to know this dynamic new talent.

Breaking News…

This just in to the Murderati grapevine…

Our very own Ken Bruen will be presented with the first ever David L. Goodis Award at NoirCon in Philadelphia, PA. The conference, slated for April 3-6, 2008, follows in the footsteps of last year’s GoodisCon, with plans for an annual celebration of the past, present and future of Noir in all its forms.

Congratulations, Ken! A well-deserved honor indeed!

Can Voice Save a Story?

by JT Ellison

I hate to pose questions in my blog titles, much prefering to find some fun tidbit to infer the topic, but this one is too important to play games with. Can voice save a story???

All the Sad Songs

ALL
THE
SAD
SONGS

By Ken Bruen

Everyone has a sad story

How the world goes round

I’m not claiming this is the saddest one but it is the one I just heard

Two days ago, when I was not at me most convivial

I love that word…………….convivial

And maybe one day, I’ll learn to spell it

I was sitting in me favorite café, looks out on the water and I was doing what I do best

…………………….yearn

For what…………….who knows

Since me marriage broke up, I’m more than ever inclined to the razor blade music, the

sadder the song, the happier I am

I was listening to me MP3……………sent to me by Craig Mc Donald (Art in the Blood,

Head games, Rogue Males)

And hit on Lorena Mc Kenna……………..Raglan Road…………..God, what a song

And worse, a great friend of mine, Gretchen Peters, lives in Nashville (not far from the gorgeous Tasha Alexander), has written the ultimate end of relationship

song………………BREAKFAST IN OUR HOUSE

Jesus wept, when you both know it’s over and yet………cos you like have history and

she sings, like every awful moment you’ve ever had when you tried like fook to save it

and couldn’t

Barry Walsh plays the most beautiful back up bass you’ve ever heard and best of all,

Gretchen has found real love again and I’m……………ok………….screw it, I’m jealous

I was telling a female friend about this and she was stunned, went

“Guys think like that?”

Shite, I dunno, I only know that’s what I felt and she goes

“But you’re that hard arse, the hardboiled guy”

I apologized, said…………I’d lost the run of meself but hey, not to worry, I’d be fooking

granite tomorrow

Thing is, I had lost the run of meself and had met someone……………..and horrors, she

dumped me, in like jig time, cos I hadn’t been the person she’d read about

Then I’m sipping me expresso……………yeah, dark, bitter and a guy comes up, goes

Talk to you a minute?

Sure

He goes

“You know Cathleen?"

“Sure.”

Known her most of me battered life

A good girl, in the Irish sense, she’d lend you a few quid if you were stuck and

never………….and I mean……………never………expect it back

She was the one who knew, she heard me little girl had Down Syndrome, said

“Life is a hoor.”

So, I regard her as …….family

He goes

“I left her, met me a 20 year old student.”

I’m thinking

“Where’s me fooking hurly when I need it?”

And he goes

“Cathleen didn’t turn me on any more.”

I’m fookin outraged, spittin iron

I look at him, forty-five, balding, a pot belly, a weak mouth and real bad eyes and

GOD FORBID……………….GOD FOOKIN FORBID…………..he isn’t turned on

I’m so angry, I could spit

He asks

“So, cara, what do you think?”

I take nine deep breaths, let it slow, like bad poetry and say

“I think……………..I think you should get a long rope……………”

And then I stop………..Jesus on a bike, what do I know………….I get up, brush past him and go and feed the swans, me blood biling

I think

“I have Steve Mosby’s book, Jerry Rodriguez’s book, and Nick Stone’s brilliant sequel

waiting at home for me, not to even mention emails from Sandra, Craig, Duane, Laura L.

The Rabbi, Jason………..and The Big O………..so, like, how am I hurting?

And Ruth Jordan sent me a lovely email yesterday…………..so, what’s the matter with me, as Charlie Stella would say

There’s a hooded guy sitting on a bench, maybe 18, coming off a glue or speed jag and

his radio is playing, Shane Mc Gowan and Moira Brennan, with

“You’re the one”

Killer song

Killing him and me…………..I’m kinda used to sad songs

I move away and a local from the Claddagh asks, rather shouts

“The fook happened to your hair?”

I want to say

“Life”

But jaysus, that’s a bit too deep, even for Galway

Sustainable Writing

by Pari Noskin Taichert

A recent joy in my life is writing features for a monthly magazine distributed throughout northern New Mexico. Most of Local Flavor‘s articles center on food. Other contributors offer restaurant reviews and culinary advice. My newfound specialty is sustainable agriculture and the preservation of community identity.

In the last few months, I’ve written about Wal-Mart’s entry into the organic produce business; the New Mexico apple industry; how the cultivation of lavender has saved a failing economy; and conservation easements in a village near my hometown.

Sustainable agriculture means finding suitable crops for a particular area that provide a living for local farmers and result in good products for consumers. The idea is to waste as few resources as possible for maximum gain — all the while respecting and replenishing the earth from which the crops grow. It’s "Think globally, act locally" in action.

When I look at the publishing industry monolith, I marvel at its contradictions. Mammoth corporations gobble up big houses while smaller publishers inch toward renown. Writers feel powerless as a group and display astounding individual optimism.

Where’s the center in all this flux — editors leaving, contracts dumped, writers abandoned, the pull of copycatting vs. the desire for originality?

Where’s the most accurate snapshot of our industry?
Where’s the truth in the paradoxical information we get and propagate?

In college, I read Small is Beautiful by E.M. Schumacher. In it, the learned economist questioned the most fundmental assumptions of his field and eschewed many well accepted concepts including: centralization makes industry more efficent and everything is about money.

I’d forgotten the book’s profound affect on my youthful idealism for almost thirty years. Then I started talking to micro-farmers and other growers, to government leaders struggling to maintain the souls of their communities in the face of development, to architects and urban planners.

We writers now live with tremendous conflict. We rush to promote, to find commercial recognition, to network and work meaningfully. We want to make a living at our craft. We fizzle and burn out. Our creativity is affected by all this frenzy.

Part of the beauty of focusing on sustainable agriculture is its emphasis on long-term and continued success. It considers the entire operation — nourishing the ground, planting, harvesting crops, collecting seeds for the future, getting products to market quickly and closeby.

It’s a quiet, but powerful, way to frame one’s approach to the world . . .

I’ve been chided for some of my posts that are critical about the current norms in the publishing industry. Yet, I remain hopeful that if enough of us respect ourselves — and enough of our readers do, too — we might change a few of the truly dehumanizing aspects of this business.

I believe we writers could learn from the concept of sustainability. At the very least, it might remind us to stop and breathe deeply,
to take the time to meet with — and support — the people who matter,
to nurture a creative space and the calm within it to work.

All of these small affirmations will feed our hearts as well as our careers . . . and will help us to find our own truths in the middle of the maelstrom.

Sopranos: Onion Rings and Loose Ends

by Mike MacLean

If you haven’t heard about the Soprano’s finale perhaps you should crawl out of that cave you’re living in for a little sunlight. For you, my pasty skinned friends, I respectfully offer this SPOILER ALERT.

The whole season, I’d anxiously waited to find out Tony’s fate. Would he end up in prison? The grave? Maybe he’d wind up in a white-bread suburb somewhere, a guest of the witness protection agency. Sunday night all my questions would be answered. I couldn’t wait.

As the final minutes ticked off, the tension was masterfully brought to slow boil—impending doom contrasted brilliantly with cheesy 70s arena rock. Then the music cut out and the screen went to black.

Instantly, I fell into the stages of grief. Shock. ANGER! Despair. I didn’t make it to acceptance. Perhaps I never will.

Love or hate it, you can’t deny the final episode was something to talk about. For me, it sparked questions about the nature of storytelling and the responsibilities of the storyteller.

I’m not someone who needs to be spoon-fed his fiction. Writers don’t need to provide all the answers. It’s far more gratifying to interpret and speculate. Why were there so many oranges in film version of The Godfather? Why does Hannibal Lecter really agree to help Clarice? What’s with Hemmingway and the bulls?

And the Sopranos finale surely created a buzz of speculation. It brought the audience into the creative process, allowing them fill in their own blanks and to create their own ending.

Was this a brilliant, thought-provoking move, or was it a cop out?

I’d like to don my artsy-fartsy, literary cap and vote brilliant. But the storyteller in me leans towards cop out.

David Chase is obviously a fantastic writer who has given us a groundbreaking show. After several remarkable seasons, he must have faced tremendous pressure to create a fitting ending. In the end, he didn’t do his job. He brought us to the edge of our seats, made us sweat, and then failed to finish the story.

You might say it was a bold, artistic move on Chase’s part, but I wonder if fear didn’t rear it’s ugly head. Tony’s final chapter couldn’t live up to expectations, so he put the burden on us, the viewers.

Of course, that’s just my opinion. And you know what they say about opinions. Whatever the case, I still thank Chase and HBO for a great show that raised the bar for TV storytelling.

So I ask you murder fans, what did you think of the ending? Would you have written it differently? And of course, what do you think was Tony’s fate?

Are you from a writing family?

It being Father’s Day tomorrow, I thought I’d ask a family-related question.

Someone posed this question on my screenwriter board: Do you come from a writing family?

His hypothesis was that most writers actually don’t. And the responses certainly bore him out – there was only one out of the dozens of screenwriters who answered him who had a writing pedigree.

I didn’t, either – my parents are scientists. They’re educated and literate but neither has much flair for writing, and even though my mother had us going to dance lessons and piano lessons and museums and galleries all the time, both of them – as most parents! – were dismayed when I went into theater after college, and are still a little stunned that I’ve made a living at writing all this time.

BUT – my parents also are huge readers. There were overflowing bookshelves in every room of the house when I was growing up. My father was a huge genre reader, specifically, and he had, randomly, collected just about every sci fi and horror classic out there. So his reading taste had just about everything to do with my writing education.

And Mom did make me and my siblings write something every single day for a long time, even before kindergarten. That enforced habit was a critical factor in my writing training. And not just for me- my sister and brother also are great writers – my artist sister has a true genius for it, and my brother is a songwriter and very good with prose as well.

There were other things my parents did that prepared me for a writing career, but I think that the most important one was about gender. They were both incredible role models for me as a woman. My mother was fearless. Definitely not the cookie-baking kind of mom. Very early on I saw her going head to head with city councilmen and the mayor over community political issues and the message I got was very clear – women can do anything.

I got the same message from my father – he never made me think that I couldn’t do as well, as much, and more than any boy in any class. He expected me to make a living with my brain – and I never had any doubt that I could. Other girls my age were definitely NOT getting that message from their parents.

And maybe even more important than that – they both were passionate about their work. It was very clear to me from their example that you’re supposed to do what you love for a living. And although they may sometimes have regretted sending that message – I think it was the greatest gift.

Because it’s not just writing training that makes you a writer, is it?

So how about you all? What lessons did you get from your parents (whether intended or not!) that made you the writer – or other profession – that you are? Let’s see what patterns might emerge.

And Happy Father’s Day to all our fathers!

Never Underestimate The Power Of A Face-To-Face

By JT Ellison

How many times have we heard the old adage writers are solitary creatures? And how many times, upon hearing this statement, have you nodded your head in agreement? That’s what I was worried about. This statement has begun to define our existence as writers. Yes, we work in our own heads the vast majority of the time. Yes, we’re so busy creating that in our real lives, jobs, family, kids, we don’t have time for anything else. Yes, it’s very easy to nod and agree when people say writing is a solitary venture.

Guess what. It’s not.

Stephen King’s glorious book ON WRITING tells of a somewhat supernatural contract between writer and reader, a kind of ESP that exists because the writer puts the words on paper and the reader ultimately, well, reads said words and a psychic connection is formed between the two entities. Cool, huh? He writes in one time and space, and the reader is able to read his mind regardless of their plane of existence, simply by reading the words.

But what happens in between the writer putting the words on the paper and the reader reading them? A LOT.

Outlines, synopses, rough drafts, final drafts, revisions galore, agent reads, editor reads, revisions galore again, copy edits, galleys. Then ARC’s, reviews, sales to bookstores, inside sales, book tours, marketing and promotion dollars, conferences… okay, you’re getting the idea. I don’t disagree for a moment that there’s a psychic connection between writer and reader. There’s just a butt load that goes on in between those steps to make it happen.

And your editor and agent are a vital part of everything that happens with your book.

I’ve always said how lucky I am to have actually laid eyes on both my editor and my agent. Now I’m starting to realize that this is a must. I know, I’ve heard the stories too, of authors who’ve never met their editors or agents even after a forty year relationship. They’ve talked on the phone, they’ve emailed, sure. But they’ve never met face to face.

I don’t know if this scenario is good for the writer. There are ample opportunities on the genre calendar to find a way to meet up with your editor and agent. They don’t go to conferences? They don’t travel to symposiums? Well, go to them.

I’m not kidding. I always said that if I got a deal, the first thing I was going to do was fly to New York to sign the contracts. (Of course, this was back in my silly naive days when I thought that contracts happened in an overnight kind of time frame — I didn’t realize just how long everything takes in the industry.) Instead, right after I got that fateful phone call I learned that my editor was going to be attending Thrillerfest. Well, that took care of that. I met Linda in Phoenix, we broke bread, laughed, found lots of things in common we’d already touched upon on the phone, and started what I believe will be a long and fruitful relationship. And blessings on top of blessings, the MIRA team was at Thrillerfest to promote THRILLER, ITW’s great anthology, so I got to meet the bosses too.

When deadlines got in the way of my plans to go to Bouchercon in Madison so I could meet my agent, I made different plans. I went to New York instead. Scott, Linda and I had lunch, I reaffirmed that he is, in fact, quite a great guy who doesn’t bite, and all three of us were able to sit down together and discuss some of the plans for the series. THAT is worth its weight in gold, my friends.

I know this isn’t the cheapest proposition in the world. It’s expensive to go to conferences. It’s worse to take a two day trip in the name of research, trust me. But I wouldn’t trade actually meeting both of them face to face for the world. It’s an investment in my career. And it should be the same for you.

Name one business that doesn’t have meetings between clients and principles. Industries and businesses in this country and abroad still rely on that face to face meeting. Think about how many historic deals were done with just a handshake? A man’s word was his bond, spit in the palm, clasp hands, and Bob’s your uncle. Even now, with technology allowing instant access between a corporations offices, clients, etc., they’ve perfected the video conference. I think there’s something about human nature that tells us if we can look into another person’s eyes, we can judge whether we’re being sold a bridge or not.

Why should writers be any different from any other business person? Short answer. We aren’t, and we shouldn’t.

Go forth and mingle, friends. Meet the people who are helping you make that psychic connection. If you don’t have a deal yet, get thee to a conference where you can pitch. Make a good impression. Try. We don’t have to be solitary little creatures. The industry as a whole will be better for our active involvement in OUR futures.

"A most moving and pulse-stirring honor–the heartfelt grope of the hand, and the welcome that does not descend from the pale, gray matter of the brain but rushes up with the red blood of the heart."

–Mark Twain – The Begum of Bengal speech, 1907

Wine of the Week: Marques de Caceres 2003 Rioja Crianza

Are You What You Write?

by Robert Gregory Browne

My wife is concerned.

"I think you should blog about it on Murderati, Rob. See what other people think."

She works in the office of a public high school. When it came time for my first book, KISS HER GOODBYE to be released, she was sure to let everyone at work know, and helped generate a huge gathering of well-wishers at my Barnes and Noble launch.

A lot of her colleagues came out and bought a signed copy of the book, and I was, to say the least, grateful. Grateful to all the people who showed up and, of course, grateful to my wife for getting them out there. No one could ask for a more exciting and successful launch (we sold every book in stock — close to sixty).

But, as I said, she’s concerned.

You see, there are parts of my book that aren’t exactly politically correct. Some of the characters, being bad guys, are vile, bigoted creeps. One in particular, a guy by the name of Bobby Nemo, treats women as sex objects, utters profanities, racist, sexist and homophobic slurs, and is generally not a very pleasant guy. The words that come out of his mouth, the things he thinks, are not pretty.

And this is what has my wife concerned. She worries that all those people who showed up to buy my book, all of those colleagues — people she sees day in and day out — will read the book with its slimy characters like Nemo and wonder what kind of man she married.

She’s afraid they’ll read the book and think that its characters and situations are a reflection of me, of the way I think and feel.

I remind her that I’m writing crime fiction, that the people who populate that world are not very nice, and that unless my characters think and speak the way criminals and cops think and speak, I won’t have much of a book.

I also try to point out that I’m just about the polar opposite of Bobby Nemo —

— yet she still worries. Her colleagues don’t really know me, she says. And what if they assume that I’m some sort of racist pervert. How embarrassing.

To complicate matters, she recently listened to my first podcast with Brett Battles — a podcast on creating characters (battlesandbrowne.com) — and I happened to utter the words, "all of my characters are me" as I explained my approach to writing.

And this is true. In a way, all of my characters ARE me. I’m like a method actor taking on a role, using details of my own life to flesh out each character I’m trying to portray. It’s something that can’t be helped. By using my own experiences, coupled with imagination, I’m able to create what I hope are very compelling, three-dimensional people.

That still doesn’t mean that Bobby Nemo ever, for even a moment, speaks for me.

I seem to recall the young Stephen King running into all kinds of trouble with his early books. Who is this guy? people wondered. He’s gotta be sick in the head.

But as we all now know — or at least assume, based on his appearances on various TV shows — Mr. King is a relatively mild-mannered guy who, like me, shares little, if anything, with the whacked out characters he creates.

Or does he?

All of this gives rise to a question: how much of ourselves do we
consciously or unconsciously put into the people we create to populate
our novels? Do our novels give us an excuse to allow our long suppressed emotions and beliefs to come out?

I can confidently so no, that isn’t the case for me. I just make stuff up.

But what about you? Are YOU what you write?