Two weeks ago I wrote about Bouchercon in New Orleans last month. Here are some words of wisdom I gathered there:
"Historical fiction is very liberating because you don't have to explain why the cell phone doesn't work." - Laura Joh Rowland
"Writing is a hobby that I don't have to buy golf clubs for, or worms for fishing." - Josh Pachter
"What if I write about that but not at all about that?" - Brandi Bradley
"I have killed my ex-husband about twelve times." - Pamela Ebel
"I love editing. I love publishing. I love bookselling. I hate writing." - Otto Penzler
"Research is a deep dark rabbit hole that I just love." -Wendy Gee
"We fistfight a lot in the South because everything's so far apart we can't wait for the police to show up." - S.A. Cosby
"I've never seen a writers' block problem that couldn't be solved by conversation with other writers." - Jonathan Maberry
"What's romance without a good murder?" - Meredith Anthony
'If you find my stuff funny it says more about what's wrong with you than what's wrong with me." - Jeff Markowitz
"I was tired of the Civil War before I was born." - Henry Wise
"A great opening line is a cheap magic trick." - Ivy Pochoda
"I've built a career on sarcasm." - Gini Koch
"You're writing a story to entertain people, not put them to sleep. We have Ulysses for that." - Charles Todd
"What are you saving your time for?" - Polly Stewart
"How can you write about crime fiction if you don't do crime?" - William Boyle
"In school I read 'The Lottery' and it broke me. I don't think you should read it at the age I read it." - Jason Powell
"That which we call a dead body smells the same in all time periods." - Laura Joh Rowland
"All of America has become the South." - Ace Atkins
"My editor always calls my books cozies on crack." - Rachel Howzell Hall
"Deadlines are the writer's friend." - Thekla Madsen
"My agent and I had a difficult divorce." - Bonnar Spring
"Only Elmore Leonard was born Elmore Leonard, but we can all get closer." - Mysti Berry
"The pillars of the South are religion, class, sex, and race." - S.A. Cosby
"Can her friendship survive being a serial killer?" - Emma C. Wells
"What do you kids call dancing these days? Just dancing? You're letting us down on the slang." - Gini Koch
"If I'm stuck in the doldrums I give my characters a side quest." - Brandi Bradley
"Sometimes the tipping point doesn't tip for many years after the pre-tipping." - Laura Joh Rowland
"I go to the library because that's where the cool kids are hanging out." - Jonathan Maberry
"The adage that it's a privilege just to be nominated is bullshit." - Don Bruns
"Write about characters, not caricatures. We're not all Boo Radley. We have shoes now." - S.A. Cosby
"I don't think you can have a story without character development." - Steve Steinbock
"I'm very much a Joseph Campbell meets Save the Cat kind of writer." - Rachel Howzell Hall
"A crime novel without a bar is like a day without sunshine." - Eric Beetner
"I have a lottery ticket. It proves that math education in public schools is a failure." -Wendy Gee
"Humor comes from a place of trauma. You figure if I make the guys laugh, maybe they'll stop hitting me." - Libby Klein
"Scanty-cladness is a futuristic trope." - Laura Joh Rowland
"My grandmother made the best sweet potato pie in Virginia and I will fight you about that." - S. A. Cosby
"I was going to say something unflattering about myself but I'm vain." - James Lincoln Warren
"Everything you cede to a machine is something you are not learning to do. You are the passenger, not the driver." - Jonathan Maberry
"My Victorian series you can blame on PBS." - Laura Joh Rowland
"I was born in the 1960s, so how is that a historical period?" - Nancy Herriman
"Books that have no humor in them I find unrealistic." - Matt Goldman
"Hopefully this novel that I'm working on right now will be out before we're all dead." - Rob Byrnes
"Someone said I like your books but I don't like your main character at all. I said, you know that's me, right?" - Libby Klein
"Aristotle also wore a Snoopy hat." - Tim Maleeny
"If you're trying to be timeless, good luck. "We've already got Pride and Prejudice." - Elizabeth Rose Quinn
"It's like la la la, oh shit." - Rachel Howzell Hall
"Research is a deep dark rabbit hole that I just love." -Wendy Gee
ReplyDeleteThat is me, me, me, and more me.
"We fistfight a lot in the South because everything's so far apart we can't wait for the police to show up." - S.A. Cosby
Been there, watched that...
Great lines!
As a retired librarian I can sink into research and never come out.
Deletefun post, Robert! Melodie
ReplyDeleteI always love these posts, Rob. Thanks.
ReplyDeleteThese are fabulous, Rob. I forgot all about Laura Joh Rowland. When we went to dinner with the gang at Sisters in Crime NY years ago, she was always hilarious in a deadpan way. Smart woman. I think I'll send her an email about my new poetry book. And maybe read one of her Victorian books. I've heard worse things blamed on PBS.
ReplyDeleteFortunately Trump is trying to protect us from PBS.
Delete"You're writing a story to entertain people, not put them to sleep. We have Ulysses for that." - Charles Todd
ReplyDeleteOh, he's so right. Molly's soliloquy almost made up for for the rest of the novel.
Rob, it's good to see Steve and James again.