Retreat!

by Alexandra Sokoloff

So it’s October, and for me that has come to mean not just Halloween, but a semi-annual retreat with my awesome writing posse: Margaret Maron, Sarah Shaber, Diane Chamberlain, Katy Munger, Mary Kay Andrews and Brynn Bonner. At first once a year, then twice, now sometimes three, we go on retreat to the beach or the mountains or some generally fantastic place. We work all day long by ourselves and then convene at night to drink wine and brainstorm on any problem that any one of us is having (and of course, compare page counts!). Murderati’s own Dusty Rhoades now regularly joins us for at least some of the fun.

Our favorite retreat is the Artist in Residence program at the Weymouth Center in Southern Pines, NC.

I’ve written about Weymouth here before: the mansion I used for my haunted house in The Unseen, a 9000 sq. foot mansion on 1200 acres that was what they called a “Yankee Playtime Plantation” in the last quarter of the nineteenth century, the fox hunting lodge of coal magnate James Boyd. James Boyd’s grandson James rebelled against the family business to become – what else? – a novelist. Boyd wrote historical novels, and his editor was the great Maxwell Perkins (“Editor of Genius”), and in the 1920’s and 30’s Weymouth became a Southern party venue for the likes of F. Scott Fitzgerald, Sherwood Anderson, and Thomas Wolfe. That literary aura pervades the house, especially the library, with all its photos and portraits of the writers who have stayed at the house.

And yes, it is haunted, ask anyone who’s been here.

When I started plotting The Unseen, I needed a haunted mansion that I could know and convey intimately – the house in a haunted house story is every bit as much a character as the living ones. So of course the Weymouth mansion, with its rich and strange history, convoluted architecture, isolation, vast grounds, and haunted reputation, was a no-brainer. I truly believe that when you commit to a story, the Universe opens all kinds of opportunities to you.

And that’s what a retreat means to me. It’s a commitment to do as much work – and as much magic – as you can possibly do in a weekend, or a week, or if you’re really lucky, two, or in the case of NaNoWriMo – a whole freaking month.

Last time we were at Weymouth I came committed to figuring out the sequel to Huntress Moon. I left a week later with a full thirty-page outline. This week my task was to take my rough draft of Blood Moon and bash through a second draft. I finished yesterday, and today am bashing through the update of my website (a much more daunting task than a book, let me tell you!)

Writers among you know this Goethe quote I’m sure (which doesn’t apply just to writing…)

Until one is committed, there is hesitancy, the chance to draw back, always ineffectiveness concerning all acts of initiative and creation. There is one elementary truth, the ignorance of which kills countless ideas and splendid plans; that the moment one definitely commits oneself, then Providence moves too. All sorts of things occur to help one that would never otherwise have occurred. A whole stream of events issues from the decision raising in one’s favor all manner of unforeseen events, meetings and material assistance which no one could have dreamed would have come their way. Whatever you can do or dream you can, begin it. Boldness has genius, power and magic in it. Begin it now!

Well, I’d like to add that it really, really helps to have a whole group of pro writers committed to the same thing along with you.

But you know what makes it exponentially productive? This place is imprinted.

One of the most prevalent theories of a haunting is that a violent or tragic event leaves a lingering residue on a place, like an echo or a recording. Well, Weymouth has had its share of tragedy and weirdness, but it’s also got an imprint of pure creativity. (Come on, reread that list of authors above!) It’s been a writers’ retreat for decades now, centuries, and you can feel it in the marrow of the house.

Layer on to that the sexual energy, just another facet of creativity – oh yes, think about it. Writer parties in the Roaring Twenties? What was going on in every other room, in the gardens, in the horse stables…? Did I mention that Weymouth regularly hosts weddings? We arrived to find a massive wedding marquis in the back gardens, the most elaborate I’ve ever seen, (and I’ve been part of a wedding or two) with the detritus of what was clearly a fantastic and opulent party.

As I write this, well-built men are putting up another party tent in one of the front gardens while another bride is being photographed in the gazebo in back.

It resonates, I’m telling you.

All of this beauty and, um, stimulation, it really makes the pages fly. Also the dreams I’ve been having… well, never mind that. But one of the most fantastic things about the writing life is that our work brings us into these incredible, layered situations, dreamlike, sometimes, with hazy boundaries between eras and dimensions, between the real and our imaginations. When we’re in the zone, synchronicities spark and breakthroughs become the norm instead of a longed-for rarity.

Writing is a draining thing. You can never really turn it off. So I’ve found that retreats, and the dedicated companionship of other writers, keeps me working deeper, faster, further than I could possibly go on my own.

And I am grateful to whatever providence brought me to my writing group and to Weymouth.

So what about you all? (You all. Yes, I must be back in the South….) Do you have retreats, writing groups, places that supercharge your writing? Let’s hear about them!

– Alex

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Lots of extras today.

— First, for the Cumberbitches out there (you know who you are) I was interviewed by Newsweek/The Daily Beast as a Cumberbatch authority and managed remarkable restraint, if I do say so myself. Read here.

— HALLOWEEN GIVEAWAY

It’s October, my favorite month, and you-know-what is coming, so I’m giving away 31 signed hardcover copies of my spooky thrillers Book of Shadows, and the book that stars the Weymouth manor I speak of in this post: The Unseen.

Enter here to win!

Book of Shadows.

An ambitious Boston homicide detective must join forces with a beautiful, mysterious witch from Salem in a race to solve a series of satanic killings.

Amazon Bestseller in Horror and Police Procedurals

The Unseen

A team of research psychologists and two psychically gifted students move into an abandoned Southern mansion to duplicate a controversial poltergeist experiment, unaware that the entire original research team ended up insane… or dead.

Inspired by the real-life paranormal studies conducted by the world-famous Rhine parapsychology lab at Duke University.

— And finally, I’m doing my usual NaNoWriMo prep series on my Screenwriting Tricks blog. Commit!!!

Lost in translation

By PD Martin

About a year ago I came up with an idea for a new novel. It was the kind of idea that kept eating at me, kept calling to me “Write me”. I knew it was an idea I’d get to sooner rather than later, that it would ‘jump the queue’ in terms of the projects I had planned. This is the order I’m supposed to be doing things in:

Books 2 & 3 in my Guardian and Wanderer series (Pippa Dee)
Book 2 in my new “RB and The Committee series” (as a follow-on to Hell’s Fury)
Another mainstream drama project (I was hoping to have an agent and a sale by now for my first mainstream drama novel, but alas it hasn’t happened yet).

Then, and only then, would I move onto this ‘new’ idea, something that’s completely different again to what I’ve been writing. It’s a post-apocalyptic YA thriller/action adventure. I know…I’m all over the shop.

However, when I was in bed at night, I’d literally think about scenes from this book. I’d see and hear them in my head, compose the sentences and dialogue. I had the character down — a tough 18 year old who’d been imprisoned since she was 10 because she was a ‘danger to society’. But I didn’t write any of these scenes down. I trusted my subconscious and conscious to let the idea brew, to fully form. But now, I’m not so sure…

I’ve finally answered the call of this book and put all of my 1-3 points above on hold. After a little bit of initial but essential research, I started writing last Thursday. In fact, it’s the first thing I’ve written since we collected Liam in Korea a few weeks ago. And I am also aware that my writing stints are going to be an hour here, an hour there, and then one full day (Thursdays).

Now here’s the problem. The book isn’t coming out at all like it’s been in my head for the past year or so. The main character, instead of being a kick-ass bad-ass chick with a major attitude problem, is turning out to be a young woman who wants redemption for ‘her kind’, who wants to prove she can do more than only destroy society. But I just don’t know. Is the book lost in translation or is this how it is meant to be, how it always would have turned out even if I’d answered its call twelve months ago, or even six months ago? It’s not that I’m not happy with what I’ve written so far and I am only 5,000 words in so it’s hard to tell. But still, why is it so different to what I’d envisaged?

So, Murderati…for those of you who write, has this ever happened to you? Found a book comes out incredibly different on the page to what it was in your head? And for the readers, do you ever get the feeling a book is different to what perhaps the author first thought?

And finally, any thoughts on whether I should go with the flow, what’s coming out on the page, or ditch my 5,000 words and start again trying to be true to the original vision.

IT’S (NOT) ALL IN THE BOX

by Gar Anthony Haywood

Three weeks ago, the family and I moved into a new home. We’d been renting a place in Alhambra until we could find a house both within our budget and big enough to accommodate our ever-expanding need for space, and we finally lucked into a four-bedroom, single-story mid-century number in Glassell Park that fits the bill. It was a great blessing. The new joint needs a lot of work, God knows, and most of the heavy lifting has already been done, but there’s still a hell of a lot of sweat equity left to invest to make it our “home” — starting with unpacking all these @!*#%!*@ boxes we’ve vacuum-packed our lives into. Boxes just like this one:

If you’ve ever made a similar move yourself, you know what I’m talking about. First you spend weeks stuffing and taping everything you own into cartons three sizes too small, and then you spend weeks yanking it all out again in a different place, always thinking along the way:

“What the hell is this?“

“So that’s where that damn thing went!”

“Why in the world do I own one of these?“

“I’ve got absolutely no use for this, and I probably never will — but as soon as I toss it, I’ll find a use for it, so I’d better hold onto it.”

You learn a lot about yourself as you take this item-by-item inventory of your earthly existence, and one of the most fascinating is all the things you’ve accumulated not with the intent of using it in this life — the one you’re actually living — but in the life you hope to have someday. Clothes you plan to fit into; brochures for exotic cars you intend to own; toys you’re going to play with just as soon as you’re making enough money to slow down a little. Some of this stuff is as new as the day you acquired it; it comes in packages that have never been opened, inside plastic bags that are still sealed air-tight.

These possessions are pieces of a dream you can’t let go of. Giving them away or selling them off at your next yard sale would be a form of surrender, an admission that time has run out on the future you’ve always thought would be yours.

So when the time comes to change addresses, you stick these things in a box, rather than leave them behind, and then you find a place for them in your new home — the closet, the garage, the attic — when the box gets opened again. If it gets opened again.

Some things go into boxes that stay sealed forever.

Of course, as I’m a writer, most of my moving boxes are filled with ideas. Fragments of stories yet to be written, dogeared notebooks brimming with single-line plot synopses and half-formed character profiles. Throw this stuff away? Are you nuts? There’s a bestseller in there somewhere, I know there is, and one day I’m going to find it.

Ultimately, for all our mindless attachment to them, it’s not the things inside the boxes that really count. It’s the things we can’t box up: the people we love, the memories of good times past, the hope that tomorrow will only bring more of the same.

As I write this, late at night in my new office upstairs, I see boxes all around me; numbered and labeled, every one filled with odd bits and pieces of this poor man’s treasure. But what I value most isn’t in any of these boxes, nor anywhere here in this room. They’re downstairs, occupying three different beds in three different bedrooms.

And that’s what makes this home.

Nanowrimo Prep: Campbell, Vogler, The Hero’s Journey, and a Narrative Structure Cheat Sheet

by Alexandra Sokoloff

Eight days and counting. Yes, I know, Halloween is seven days. I’m actually talking about NaNoWriMo, National Novel Writing Month.

I said that I’d do some prep here, but that’s not really feasible when I only blog twice a month (some of you have been prepping over at my blog, of course!). Still, I wanted to post SOMETHING useful for NaNo.

(If you have been living in a cave for the last ten years and have not heard of NaNo, you can read all about it here.)

I’m always encouraging you guys to read EVERYTHING you can about writing processes and structure, and I feel like this is a good time to nudge you all again to do a little reading about Joseph Campbell and the monomyth he details in his classic Hero With a Thousand Faces, and Christopher Vogler’s Hollywood Cliffs’ Notes version of the same: The Writer’s Journey.

Wikipedia is a perfectly fine overview, and has all the info and links for you to explore further if you are so moved, and I hope you do.

Campbell

Vogler

It’s easy to get lost in Campbell (such a GOOD lost!) so Vogler’s is a more streamlined version, but as useful as it is, and it is – I think it falls short in one major way.

Here are the twelve steps of the journey that Vogler details:

The hero/ine is introduced in the ORDINARY WORLD
they receive the CALL TO ADVENTURE
They are RELUCTANT at first or REFUSE THE CALL, but
are encouraged by a MENTOR to
CROSS THE THRESHOLD and enter the Special World, where
they encounter TESTS, ALLIES, AND ENEMIES.
They APPROACH THE IN-MOST CAVE, cross a second threshold
where they endure the ORDEAL
They take possession of their REWARD and
are pursued on THE ROAD BACK to the Ordinary World.
They cross the third threshold, experience a RESURRECTION, and are transformed by the experience.
They RETURN WITH THE ELIXIR, a boon or treasure to benefit the ORDINARY WORLD.

Absolutely! But let’s break that down into where those steps fall in the three-act structure:

Act One:

Heroes are introduced in the ORDINARY WORLD
they receive the CALL TO ADVENTURE
They are RELUCTANT at first or REFUSE THE CALL, but
are encouraged by a MENTOR to
CROSS THE THRESHOLD and enter the Special World, where

Act Two:

they encounter TESTS, ALLIES, AND ENEMIES.
They APPROACH THE IN-MOST CAVE, cross a second threshold

Act Three:

where they endure the ORDEAL
They take possession of their REWARD and
are pursued on THE ROAD BACK to the Ordinary World.
They cross the third threshold, experience a RESURRECTION, and are transformed by the experience.
They RETURN WITH THE ELIXIR, a boon or treasure to benefit the ORDINARY WORLD.

Do you see the problem with this template? All good for Acts I and III… but there are only two steps to guide you through that vast, interminable, suicide-inducing second act. And the second act is a full HALF of the story.

That’s not a whole hell of a lot of help when you’re in the middle of the damn thing.

I have another problem with Vogler, in that THE ROAD BACK step. I have far too often seen fairly new writers struggling with that concept, when the fact is that not all stories even have this step. It’s a great element for a pure Mythic Journey story, like Lord of the Rings (the first), Star Wars, and The Wizard of Oz. But NOT ALL STORIES FALL INTO THIS PATTERN.

So I’ve composed an alternate version of this journey that gives a little more detail to help you through that treacherous middle.

————————————————————————–

NARRATIVE STRUCTURE CHEAT SHEET, from Screenwriting Tricks for Authors

Act I:

We meet the Hero/ine in the Ordinary World.

S/he has:

— a Ghost or Wound

— a strong Desire

— Special Skills

And an Opponent, or several, which is standing in the way of her getting what s/he wants, and possibly wants exactly the same thing that s/he wants.

She gets a Call to Adventure: a phone call, an invitation, a look from a stranger, that invites her to change her life and crystallizes her desire.

That impulse may be blocked by a

— Threshold Guardian

— And/or the Opponent

— And/or she is herself reluctant to take the journey.

But she overcomes whatever opposition,

— Gathers Allies and the advice of a Mentor

— Formulates a specific PLAN to get what s/he wants

And Crosses the Threshold Into the Special World.

Act II:1

The hero/ine goes after what s/he wants, following the PLAN

The opponent blocks and attacks, following his or her own PLAN to get what s/he wants

The hero/ine may now:

— Gather a Team

— Train for battle (in a love story this can be shopping or dating)

— Investigate the situation.

— Pass numerous Tests

All following the Plan, to achieve the Desire.

No matter what genre, we experience scenes that deliver on the Promise of the Premise – magic, flying, sex, mystery, horror, thrills, action.

We also enjoy the hero/ine’s Bonding with Allies or Falling in Love

And usually in this Act the hero/ine is Winning.

Then at the Midpoint, there is a big Reversal, Revelation, Loss or Win that is a Game-Changer.

Act II:2

The hero/ine must Recover and Recalibrate from the game-changer of the Midpoint.

And formulate a New Plan

Neither the Hero/ine nor the Antagonist has gotten what they want, and everyone is tired and pissed.

Therefore they Make Mistakes

And often Cross a Moral Line

And Lose Allies

And the hero/ine, or if not the hero/ine, at least we, are getting the idea (if we didn’t have it before) that s/he might be WRONG about what s/he wants.

Things begin to Spiral Out of Control

And get Darker and Darker (even if it’s funny)

Until everything crashes in a Black Moment, or All is Lost Moment, or Visit to Death.

And then, out of that compete despair comes a New Revelation for the hero/ine, including understanding what s/he has been wrong about from the beginning

That leads to a New Plan for the Final Battle.

Act III

The Heroine Makes that last New Plan

Possibly Gathers the Team (Allies) again

Possibly briefly Trains again

Then Storms the Opponent’s Castle (or basement)

The Team (if there is one) Attacks the Opponent on his or her own turf, and all their

— Skills are tested.

— Subplots are resolved,

— and secondary Opponents are defeated in a satisfying way.

Then the Hero/ine goes in alone for the final battle with the Antagonist. Her Character Arc, everything s/he’s learned in the story, helps her win it.

The Hero/ine has come Full Circle

And we see the New Way of Life that s/he will live.

————————————————–

If this works to make the process a little easier for you, great! It may be more useful to look at it later, during your rewrites.

And if not, no problem – forget it! I’m just always looking to try to explain things in different ways, because I know for myself, sometimes it just doesn’t sink in until I hear it for the tenth or ten thousandth time.

So are you doing Nano? Do you use Campbell and/or Vogler in plotting or revising your stories? Tell us about it!

– Alex

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Screenwriting Tricks for Authors and Writing Love, Screenwriting Tricks for Authors, II, are now available in a e formats and as pdf files. Either book, any format, just $2.99.

– Kindle

– Amazon UK

– Amaxon DE (Eur. 2.40)

– Smashwords (includes online viewing and pdf file)

– Amazon/Kindle

– Barnes & Noble/Nook

– Amazon UK

– Amazon DE

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HALLOWEEN GIVEAWAY

It’s October, my favorite month, and you-know-what is coming, so I’m giving away 31 signed hardcover copies of my spooky thrillers Book of Shadows. and The Unseen.

Enter here to win!

Book of Shadows.

An ambitious Boston homicide detective must join forces with a beautiful, mysterious witch from Salem in a race to solve a series of satanic killings.

Amazon Bestseller in Horror and Police Procedurals

The Unseen

Inspired by the real-life paranormal studies conducted by the world-famous Rhine parapsychology lab at Duke University.

You Don’t Have To Be Mad To Work Here . . .

By Tania Carver

You know that phrase, ‘You don’t have to be mad to work here but it helps’? Course you do. It’s long been the province of dull office cubicle dwellers in dead end jobs desperately trying to create a personality for themselves. Well guess what? If you’re a writer apparently it’s true. And not only that, but there’s some science to back it up.

It was fellow Murderati-ist Zoe Sharp who put me on to it. She posted a link on Twitter to this report here. I read it and instantly agreed with it. It wasn’t a shock. Far from it. In fact, it came as something of a relief.

This directly from the article: ‘Writers had a higher risk of anxiety and bipolar disorders, schizophrenia, unipolar depression, and substance abuse, the Swedish researchers at the Karolinska Institute found.’ The article then goes on to mention a few writers who famously suffered from mental illnesses. Virginia Woolf drowned herself as the result of depression. Hemingway shot himself after suffering from depression. Hans Christian Andersen suffered from it too. Graham Greene, my favourite writer, was bipolar. None of this came as a surprise. Especially substance abuse – just take a look round the bar at Bouchercon or Harrogate on a Saturday night. (In fact, the bar at Harrogate on a Saturday night takes more from crime writers in one hour than a wedding takes in a whole night. I’m sure Bouchercon’s take is something similar.)

A lot of writers I know have all suffered from some kind of mental disturbance at some time. I’m not going to name anyone because it’s not my place to, but some have openly talked about it. I know that in the last decade I’ve suffered (at least) two quite severe bouts of depression lasting up to a year at a time. It was very, very bad. Hard for me but I think it was even harder for the people I live with. I don’t like to make a big thing of it because not only am I British but I’m Northern; it’s in our culture to ignore things and get on with them. I’m also quite private and reserved. So much so, in fact, that I feel quite uneasy talking about it now. So why do it? I don’t know. The article sparked something in me that I recognised and I needed to say it.

However, looking back in hindsight and at a certain degree of remove, I see that those two episodes weren’t necessarily negative. I lost a lot of weight, which I needed to. And at least I tried to get something positive out of it from a work point of view. This is also something that the researchers discovered. From the article again: ‘Lead researcher Dr Simon Kyaga said the findings suggested disorders should be viewed in a new light and that certain traits might be beneficial or desirable. For example, the restrictive and intense interests of someone with autism and the manic drive of a person with bipolar disorder might provide the necessary focus and determination for genius and creativity.’

Now while I would never make any claims to genius, I would say that my creativity increased. I wrote three books while this was going on. Working through it seemed like the best thing to do at the time. One of the books (The White Room) turned out incredibly dark. I couldn’t help it. The subject matter was dark to begin with – a novel based on the real life story of eleven year old child killer Mary Bell – but it seemed that my depression made it even darker still. I was totally in the mind of my child killer and it was harrowing. It was like falling into train lines and not being able to get off them until I reached my destination. And the trip was very, very dark. Consequently I was in even more of a state at the end of it. Interestingly, the book that resulted is probably the one from my backlist that most people want to talk to me about. It was also a book of the year in the Guardian newspaper. (Shameless plug: You can still buy it here.) The Surrogate, the first Tania Carver novel, also emerged from a bout of depression. So the answer is simple. If I want to write something good I need to have a crippling bout of depression.

Obviously, it’s not something to make light of or to romanticise. Writers should never willingly wish themselves to suffer mental imbalances in order to make them more creative and especially not to access what they believe is their untapped genius. (That way lies madness of a different kind – the self-delusionary kind.)

If it does happen, treatment can be given. But there is a danger – and I certainly felt this in my own case – that accepting what it was and seeking help – and probably medication – might make my situation worse. As Tom Waits said, ‘If I exorcise my demons, maybe my angels will leave as well’. This also opens up an interesting area for study – are people in creative industries such as writing more prone to bipolar disorders or are people with bipolar disorders more drawn towards the creative professions where they are more temperamentally suited and can use their creative skills? I don’t know the answer to that one.

Depression (if that’s what it was and not some undiagnosed bipolar disorder) is not something I’m in a hurry to revisit. It was like living in hell (and worse for those around me, I know). Every morning I would wake up feeling fine. A mental blank slate. But then my consciousness would kick in and it was like a wall falling on me and crushing me. Huge, heavy stones on my chest and head, pushing me down, stopping me from breathing, thinking. Stopping me from climbing out. And my heart felt like the heaviest stone of the lot.

But it went eventually. Gradually lifted all on its own. I was able to move away from it, put distance between myself and what had happened and try to keep away from whatever had caused it. And that’s the thing – I don’t know what caused it. As the article says, writers are prone to anxiety, to depression. I’d go so far as to say it’s our default setting. We constantly think everyone else is doing better than us – more successful, bigger advances, higher sales, better marketing profile. We constantly live in fear of rejection, of handing in our new book and being told it’s no good, that they’re returning the advance, they can’t publish it, it’s unreadable rubbish. Every time we get praise we think we’ve dodged a bullet, breath a sigh of relief, and prepare to start the whole thing again. And we can’t stop it or change it. Is it any wonder writers are more prone to this than many other professions?

Maybe it’s just me. I don’t know. Maybe other writers can successfully negotiate these mental pitfalls better. All I know is I haven’t had a bad bout for a few years now. And I’m in no hurry to go through it again.

I am in a hurry to finish the new book, though. With as little anguish as possible.

I LIKE

by Stephen Jay Schwartz

I like that the guy who works at Trader Joe’s sees us and says, “Hello, family.”

I like that people stop us at the beach and comment on how the kids have grown.

I like that, at the West Hollywood Book Fair, Jerry Stahl leaned over and said it’s nice that my family is so supportive.

People in the book community have watched my children grow for a number of years now. My wife and boys have attended just about every book event I’ve had since Boulevard, my first book, was published.

I like it. It’s a good feeling. Especially since, for the first eight or so years of my children’s lives, I was almost never around. I was working a national sales job that kept me crossing the country every other week. One week in, one week out. For years my youngest son said he didn’t like me. He actually used the word “hate,” which I knew was much stronger than what he meant. When I asked him why he “hated” me, he couldn’t think of a reason other than, “You have too much hair on your arms and face.” At the same time, he loved the daylights out of his mother. I realized that Noah felt this way because I was hardly ever there. I was the one who LEFT. His mommy was the one who STAYED. She is an at-home mom and has been by his side his entire life. I got the picture – why would a parent leave his family every other week unless he really didn’t care? And then, when he was home, why would he spend most his time hiding away, writing a book? Noah was too young to understand the sacrifice of working a day job to support a family. He thought I wanted to go. He was too young to understand the commitment and sacrifice necessary to excel at an art, despite the challenges of raising a family and working a nine-to-five job.

I couldn’t get this point across and soon I had to accept the fact that this was how it was going to be. Although this saddened me, I didn’t blame him for not liking me. I told him I thought he would change his mind someday, and I would patiently look forward to that moment.

Since I traveled so much I figured I’d better put something in writing, in case I met with a terrible accident along the way. I wrote a letter to each of my boys, sealed the letters and placed them in a drawer. In the letters I told my boys how much they meant to me, how special they are, singling out the special qualities that makes each boy unique. In Noah’s letter I said I knew he loved me and he should never, ever think that I didn’t get that message. Just because he didn’t say the words didn’t mean he hadn’t shown me, in everything he did, how much he cared.

I wanted to put him at ease. I know from experience that there’s nothing worse than wishing you had said something to someone before they died. Nothing worse than wondering if that person thought you didn’t care.

One day, just a few years ago, Noah turned to me and said he had something important to say. I brightened, guessing what was up. He was a bit shy about it, so I prompted him.

“Is it that you don’t hate me anymore?” I asked.

He smiled.

“So, you like me now.” I deduced.

I could sense there was something more. My chest started tingling.

“I love you, daddy.”

Damn. That was the best feeling in the world. I’d been waiting nine years for that and, frankly, I’d been wondering if I was ever going to hear him speak those words.

Since then we’ve been peas in a pod. The best of buds. He’s twelve now and we often walk around in public holding hands. I relish it, knowing he’ll soon cross that line where holding his daddy’s hand isn’t cool anymore. But that’s the funny thing about Noah – he doesn’t care what is and isn’t cool. He goes against the grain in everything he does. And, to me, that makes him all the more cool.

His older brother, Ben, surprised me with some critical family support the day Boulevard launched at Book Soup in L.A. There was a group of about fifty people and when I asked if anyone had questions, Ben, ten years old at the time, raised his hand.

“You have a question, Ben?”

“No,” he said, “I have a statement.”

“Okay,” I said, warily. He came up to the podium and I put the microphone to his lips.

Ben studied the crowd confidently and said, “I watched my daddy writing all the time, for years. He was always writing and saying he was going to make a book. I really didn’t think it would be that good because, well, it was his first book, so how could it be that good? And then he finished it and it got all these great blurbs (yes, he knew what blurbs were!) and everyone is saying all these nice things. And I’m really proud of him.”

Another touch-my-heart moment. If you saw the pictures from that day and saw my face you’d see the look of a content, grateful father.

You see the same look in my author photo right now.

I’m the kind of guy who just can’t smile for the camera. I try, but I usually end up looking like an insincere dork. Anyone who spends a little time studying body language knows that a sincere smile is seen in the eyes. The eyes have to smile, and that’s a response that can’t be faked.

One day Noah took a photo of me at the Festival of Books, standing next to Lisa Lutz. He was just getting into photography at the time and I thought he looked absolutely adorable behind that camera. As I posed for him, my face lit up with a pure, proud, authentic smile. And that’s what he captured, something real, with eyes that smiled with my lips. I carefully photo-shopped Lisa Lutz from the frame (sorry, Lisa!) and submitted the photograph to my agent. When my novel, Beat, was published I showed Noah the author photo in the back, and his name in print as the photographer. His face lit up with pride. I think that was the moment he decided to take a more series interest in photography.

(Movie Magic brings Lisa Lutz back into the picture! Hello, Lisa!)

After that he took pictures of me and other authors at every panel I did. His passion came to the attention of Diana James, the literary publicist married to author Darrell James. She asked him to take some photos of Darrell at one of the book festivals and, after we sent them to her, she sent Noah a $20 check for his services. It was his first paying gig. Diana was such a sweetheart – she included a letter to Noah saying how wonderful his work is and that he should continue pursuing his dreams. Diana passed away not long ago – a terrible, tragic loss to her husband, friends, and the literary community at large. A terrible loss to a little boy whose life she touched.

(Diana James, photographed by Noah)

I’m aware I’m a lucky guy. The time I spent working and writing could have driven my family away. There was in fact a critical moment when my marriage almost ended and everything had to be rebuilt, from the bottom up. We worked through it, we got past it, we made it to the other side.

Things could be better. I could be supporting myself as an author. I could be working a day job that means as much to me as my writing. I could be out of debt. I could have a car that runs. I could be living in a house instead of an apartment. The list goes on.

But this thing I’ve got is better than everything else combined. The love and support of a loving and supportive family.

I like it.

Well, no, it’s more than like.

It’s love.

Escaping to another place

Zoë Sharp

Most of us read to be transported to another place. As a child it was a place of excitement and welcome. I think most children go through a phase of feeling that we don’t quite fit in with our families, and that we might even be some kind of cuckoo, deposited in another nest to be raised, and that sooner or later our ‘real’ family will arrive to claim us.

No? Ah, just me then …

In times of stress or unhappiness, the world presented by a good book can be a place to step into, to be enveloped and even comforted. It offers some kind of order out of chaos. You open a crime thriller in particular knowing there will be satisfying resolution. That the murder will be solved, the mystery unravelled, the disaster averted, and the bad guys will get their just desserts. However horrific the crime, the hero will prevail and there will be justice done.

It’s hardly surprising then, that crime thrillers are popular reading among people faced with senseless violence on a daily basis. It is their safe haven and their escape.

This is why I am devoting today’s blog to an appeal for books for our service men and women in the front line. Last Christmas, the Historical Writers’ Association launched their Books For Heroes appeal in the UK, but there’s a similar one going in the States.

Last year’s donations when down extremely well, although apparently the helicopter making the delivery to service personnel in Afghanistan came under fire and had to jettison boxes to make an emergency exit, then go back for them later with mine sweepers.

And you thought you were a serious book lover …

I know it seems very early to be talking about Christmas, but don’t forget that we’re not talking about getting them to people in the least hospitable places where even UPS won’t deliver. And they need to be as-new books. The kind of thing you wouldn’t mind giving or receiving as a Christmas present rather than something that’s about to be donated to the nearest charity store.

Paperbacks only are appreciated, rather than hardcovers, because when you’re airlifting cargo, weight is a serious consideration. I hope you’ll seek out the appeal in your area, or your country, and make the time to donate a book or two. Those that don’t go overseas to service personnel on the front line are likely to end up in the hospitals or rehab centres for the returning injured.

Whether you agree with the war or not, the people who are out there serving their country and the rest of us deserve some small sign of our appreciation and consideration, especially as Christmas approaches. What better way than to give them the freedom of a book?

So, fellow ‘Rati, do you have a favourite book that’s seen you through a difficult time? Care to share?

This week’s Word of the Week is monger, usually used in combination with another word, meaning a dealer and—except in a few instances, such as ironmonger— a person who trafficks in a petty or discreditable way, or in unpleasant subjects, such as warmonger, or gossipmonger. From the Latin mango -onis, a furbisher or slave-dealer, from the Greek manganeuein, to use trickery.

PS More news on the new Charlie Fox book very soon, I promise!

The Pleasures of Re-reading Mystic River

By David Corbett

When I was trying to learn how to write, I took a course from Tom Jenks, formerly with Scribner’s (where he was responsible for editing Hemingway’s The Garden of Eden for posthumous publication) and currently the main force behind Narrative magazine.

One of the most important things I learned from Tom was that it was better to go back and re-read books that had a profound effect on you, or which you considered particularly excellent, instructive, or inspiring, than to be broadly read. It’s advice I’ve taken to heart, particularly since my writing career has so profoundly curtailed my time to read for pleasure.

It’s good to know that when I do read for the sheer enjoyment of it, I’m going to read something I know will scratch that particular itch.

One such book I picked up again recently was Dennis Lehane’s Mystic River. This was my first re-reading, and I was amazed at how much more I enjoyed it the second time through. I wasn’t reading for story, I was reading to see how Lehane did certain things, and how many he did well.

His pacing is both leisurely and taut, not easy to do. You never feel rushed but you never feel like you’re meandering, either.

His prose evokes a profound emotional connection and also provides a vivid pictorial image without being showy.

His command of setting is as deft as Richard Price’s—high praise. I was awestruck by how intimately he knew these neighborhoods, and captured them for the reader. I know, he grew up near there, but familiarity isn’t enough. You’ve got to know what to include, what to leave out, and in both cases why.

His female characters are fascinating and rendered beautifully on the page.

His understanding of cops and how they work—more importantly, how they think and talk—is unparalleled.

And these last two points are part of a larger one: I don’t know a writer who captures the inner life of his characters as vividly, intimately, and movingly as Lehane does here. This skill isn’t prized the way it used to be. Screenwriting, an affliction a great many of us now suffer from, has taught us to emphasize what can be seen and heard, not thought or felt—or worse, explained.

There’s a lot to be said for that approach. Dramatic writing, relying on what characters do and say, benefits from the power it brings to the depiction of conflict.

But there are moments in Mystic River when a character is alone with his or her own mind and heart that are simply some of the most moving I’ve come across on the page in quite some time.

They’re the kind of moments that are all but impossible to capture on film, which is one of the reasons I’ve always found the film version of Mystic River wanting. Don’t get me wrong, I liked the movie. But I didn’t love it the way I loved the book.

So much of the pleasure of the book resides inside the character’s skulls, which is invisible to the camera. In particular, I thought the women characters were robbed of the subtle interiority that made them so compelling on the page.

That also contributes to another problem I have with the film, one that the story mage John Truby discussed in an online essay discussing story structure in which he used Mystic River, Intolerable Cruelty, and Runaway Jury as his examples.

His chief complaint about Mystic River’s screenplay goes as follows:

Mystic River uses the classic technique of showing the three lead characters as boys, when one of them is molested. The rest of the story therefore has to turn on how one boy’s ghost haunts all the boys as adults. But this central connection is never made. Yes, the molested boy, Dave, is a broken man. But the other two, Sean and Jimmy, seem to be no different than they were as kids. And Dave’s horror has no real effect on them as adults.

In the book, we see more clearly how Dave’s molestation has affected both Sean and Jimmy.

One of the most moving scenes in the first part of the book—a scene I’d largely forgotten until I re-read it—portrays Jimmy’s profound isolation and his yearning for female affection, not just from his fragile, troubled mother, but from his teacher who lavishes attention on Dave when he reappears after his abduction.

Jimmy’s the toughest of the three friends, which is what makes his longing so interesting. His desire for this kind of attention is so profound he fantasizes that it was him, not Dave, who got into the strangers’ car that day. That need for female validation defines Jimmy’s capacity for staying straight as an adult, and it explains why his daughter’s murder so deeply unhinges him. More importantly, it provides the connection of shame and perverse envy that links Jimmy’s youthful longing with the vengeful hatred he feels toward Dave as an adult.

As for Sean, he was the one who got out. His dad was a foreman at the Coleman candy plant, responsible for firing Jimmy’s dad, and Sean has never looked back after leaving East Buckingham. But that superiority was built on circumstance, not character. And the issue of luck plays out to tragic consequences when he’s unable to solve the murder of Jimmy’s daughter in time. It was luck that kept him out of that car as a boy, luck that got him out of East Bucky—and now, thirty years later, luck that draws him back in and, this time, turns against him.

It’s an old complaint, a great book ill served by its film adaptation. But I didn’t appreciation exactly why I so preferred the book until I went back and read through those pages again.

But then, I forget a lot of things these days.

* * * * *

So, Murderateros—what book(s) do you re-read, for inspiration, education, or just the sheer pleasure of it?

* * * * *

Also, a little publicity for a new 4-week online course I’ll be teaching next month through LitReactor, called:

The Spine of Crime: Setting, Suspense and Structure in Crime, Mystery, and Thriller Stories

I’m expanding from the Who of crime to the What, Where, and How, with detailed lectures and manuscript review of student projects.

If you or someone you know might be interested, find out more here.

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Jukebox Hero of the Week: The inmates (male and female) of the Cebu Provincial Detention and Rehabilitation Center, the Philippines, doing their astonishing dance routine to Psy’s Gangam Style:

Who, me?

By PD Martin

Well, looks like today is/was my Wildcard Tuesday and I’ve completely missed it. It’s 7.25am here in Oz, and all hell is about to break loose in my house as I try to get Grace to school and Liam ready for his second ever swimming lesson.

So, huge apologies from me. I’ve got nothing….nadda.

And my only excuse is that I’m still not quite moving away from the chaos side of the equation…yet!

Hope you’ll forgive me!

What’chu laughing at?

by Pari

Years ago when I worked in health care marketing, our corporation considered opening an incontinence clinic. The job of writing the mock promo brochure fell to me. I dutifully delineated all the advantages a customer (patient) would find if he or she wanted to pay our organization for the privilege of looking into the wonders of urethras, kidneys etc etc. But then — I guess because writing the rest of the brochure bored me — I came up with this title: You’re in Control.

Great, huh?

They didn’t use it.

That’s when I found out that there are certain subjects a person just shouldn’t mess with. And when it comes to health care, believe me, most of it isn’t allowed to be funny.

Now I work in a university department of psychiatry and mental illness isn’t a joke either . . . or is it?

Enter David Granirer and Stand Up for Mental Health. Here’s a guy who suffers from Depression — notice the capital D? — who is also a counselor and comic. He has created a way for people with mental illness to do stand-up comedy around a subject that often is so taboo, so dripping with stigma, families — and individuals — will do anything in their power to avoid even skirting the topic.

Last Tuesday night NAMI-ABQ brought in Granirer to perform. What’s special about this is that six locals with mental illnesses ranging from bipolar disorder to outright schizophrenia had gone through weeks of training too. They stood up one-by-one and gave us a show. Just as in an ordinary line up of comedians, some were great and some were closer to okay. But what astounded me was how incredibly interesting their material was. We in the audience got a glimpse into “madness” and it was fascinating. The comics joked about their delusions, OCD and mania and we went along for the ride. Our willingness to go on that journey may have started with curiosity, but we stayed because it was entertaining and fun.

For me it was a glimpse into a very different way of seeing the world. I feel richer for it, grateful for the opportunity. And since the show, I’ve thought a lot about how difficult subjects can be turned into good, funny and authentic material.

So today, my questions are:

Is there anything that should be off limits when it comes to comedy?
And does that change depending on who delivers the punch line?
Are there things we should joke about that no one is tackling?

(I’m home today, so I hope to be able to finally post some responses!)