Showing posts with label O'Neil De Noux. Show all posts
Showing posts with label O'Neil De Noux. Show all posts

24 December 2021

Movies at a Theater


Eve Fisher's SleuthSayers posting on December 16th – My Brain on Old Movies – triggered my mind to remember the first movies I saw at a theater. As a kid, my first love was movies over books and stories and I remember so many.

The first movie I remember seeing in a theater was 1959's Journey to the Center of the Earth with James Mason, Arlene Dahl and Pat Boone. Saw it at the Saenger Theater on Canal Street, New Orleans. My Aunt Lucy and her boyfriend, later to be my Uncle Milton, took me on the streetcar where they deposited me at the Saenger while they went across the street to the Orpheum to watch Ben Hur, which they thought an eight year old like me would find boring. Journey was shorter than Ben Hur so I watched the movie twice. Loved it. Still do.


The next movie I remember seeing at a theater was 1960's The Lost World with Claude Rains, David Hedison, Jill St. John, Michael Rennie and Fernando Lamas. Followed by the re-release of 1953's The War of the Worlds with Gene Barry and Ann Robinson.

Somewhere along in there, I saw some Disney movies at the theater – Sleeping Beauty, Dumbo, Song of the South (Lord help me).

I also mentioned in a previous post how as an army brat, I lived in Italy (my father was stationed in Verona) and saw most of the movies released between 1961 and 1963 at the post theater.

Later, in high school my taste changed and I went to theaters to see Michelangelo Antonioni's Blow-UpDr. Zhivago, The Graduate. As a young adult, I moved on to Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, Romeo and Juliet (1968 Franco Zeffirelli version with Olivia Hussey and Leonard Whiting).

When I became a writer, those early movies inspired me to write science-fiction stories and I wrote terrible SF stories until I learned how to write. Have to point to Journey to the Center of the Earth and The Lost World as inspirations for many of my SF adventure stories set on a fictional planet inhabited by dinosaur-like creatures. Some of those stories ended up in Asimov's, Tomorrow Science Fiction Magazine, Gorezone, Infinity Plus,  Oceans of the Mind, the premier issue of Plasma Frequency, Cricket children's magazine, and anthologies like Adventure and Star Noir. Many of stories are available in my collection Backwash of the Milky Way.

Other movies spurred me to write mysteries, western stories, historical fiction, children's fiction, mainstream fiction, suspense, fantasy, horror, romance, erotica, humor, and even a religious story. Always proud of my story which appeared in Messenger of the Sacred Heart as well as my stories which appeared in Cavalier, Juggs, Hustler's Busty Beauties, Playgirl and about a dozen Mammoth Books of New Erotica.

A Walk on the Wild Side with Capucine, Laurence Harvey and a 25-year old Jane Fonda and the scandalous Brititte Bardot movie And God Created Woman as well as other Bardot movies inspired my erotica.

from And God Created Woman (1956)
directed by Roger Vadim
starring Brigitte Bardot

Don't know about y'all but today's movies are so bad, it's hard to be inspired by any of them, except for the occasional movie without explosions, karate, guns, excessive violence, gore, insipid dialogue, cliched characters, excessive CGI and more explosions.

That's all for now.

www.oneildenoux.com 

03 December 2021

Ellison's Titles


 Came across a Harlan Ellison short story I'd read before and stopped to look at the title again – "Pretty Maggie Moneyeyes" and marveled at another of his great titles. I went through my Ellison books and thought I'd share some of his titles:

"I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream"


"Come to Me Not in Winter’s White"


"Shattered Like a Glass Goblin"


"Adrift Just Off the Islets of Langerhans: Latitude 38° 54’N, Longitude 77° 00’ 13” W”


"Mefisto in Onyx"


"City on the Edge of Forever"


"Soft Monkey"


"Pennies, Off a Dead Man's Eyes"


"Love Ain’t Nothing But Sex Misspelled"


"The Beast that Shouted Love at the Heart of the World"


"Shatterday"


"Angry Candy"


"The Deathbird"



"Again, Whoredome at a Penny a Word"


"Prowler in the City at the Edge of the World"


"Someone is Hungrier"


"All The Sounds of Fear"


"I See A Man Sitting On A Chair, and The Chair is Biting His Leg"


"Gnomeboy"


"The Very Last Day of a Good Woman"


"Nothing for My Noon Meal"


"Deeper Than The Darkness"


"Wanted in Surgery"


"One Life, Furnished in Early Poverty"


"Delusion for a Dragon Slayer"


"White Trash Don’t Exist"


"Croatoan"


"The Wine Has Been Left Open Too Long and the Memory Has Gone Flat"


"Lonely Women are the Vessels of Time"


"The Diagnosis of Dr. D’arqueAngel"


"All the Lies That Are my Life"


"Escape Goat"


"Paladin of the Lost Hour"


"Prince Myskhin, and Hold the Relish"


"The Function of Dream Sleep"


"Count the Clock That Tells the Time"


"The Executioner of Malformed Children"



"Twilight in the Cupboard"


"With Virgil Oddum at the East Pole" 


"The Man Who Rowed Christopher Columbus Ashore"


"Anywhere But Here, With Anybody But You"


"Darkness on the Face of the Deep"


"How Interesting: A Tin Man"


"Demon with a Glass Hand"


"The Lingering Scent of Woodsmoke"


"Where Shall I Dwell in the Next World"


"Chatting with Anubis"


"Djinn, no Chaser"


"She’s a Young Thing and Cannot Leave Her Mother"



"Never Send to Know for Whom the Lettuce Wilts"


"Objects in the Mirror are Closer than They Appear"


"The Toad Prince; or, Sex Queen of the Martian Pleasure-Dome"


"Loose Cannon; or, Rubber Ducks from Space"


"Jeffty is Five"


"A Boy and His Dog"


"Pretty Maggie Moneyeyes"


“Repent Harlequin!” Said the Ticktockman

and my favorite – "The Whimper or Whipped Dogs"


No, they are not all speculative fiction. Two won the Edgar Award – "Soft Monkey" in 1988 and "The Whimper or Whipped Dogs" in 1974. Four were awarded a Writers Guild of America Award.

I've said it before. Titles are critically important, not just with books, but short stories as well. How many times have you thought about a good movie you've seen, then asked yourself – what was the title. Was it Blood something or Fatal something or a one of those instantly forgettable one-word titles like Contagion, Inception, Deception, Conception, Affliction?

I've quoted Walker Percy before – “A good title should intrigue, without being too baffling or too obvious.”

I would add a good title should be memorable.

12 November 2021

Random Thoughts


In a brief sojourn on social media, I spotted a post where a reader sat crying as she said, "Why did you write this book? It's hard."

The book was A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara, a name I'm not familiar with. The woman's sadness at reading the book reminded me how one of the lessons in writing fiction is to elicit emotion in the reader. Looks like Hanya Yanagihara nailed it.

I have felt that way before many times. Not driven to tears but choked up. I got choked up when I finished reading Lonesome Dove the first time because I wanted 700 more pages. Felt that way when I read Adriana Trigiani's Lucia, Lucia and especially when I read Kristin Hannah's The Nightingale.

Got a little choked up when I finished writing Battle Kiss and USS Relentless because I was no longer going to be with those characters. I saddens me when I finish a Lucien Caye private eye novel because I'll miss him and Alizée and Jeannie.

Weird.

Found a quote from Thomas Harris about characters and thought I'd share it –

"Sometimes you really have to shove and grunt and sweat. Some days you go to your office and you're the only one who shows up, none of the characters show up, and you sit by yourself, felling like an idiot. And some days everybody shows up ready to work. You have to show up at your office every day. If an idea comes by, you want to be there to get it in."

Thomas Harris and cat
Thomas Harris and friend

Random thought about using active voice. I see a lot of passive voice in stories. It works but it bothers me, almost as much as a short story which begins with telling and goes on and on before the writer gets around to a scene. I know, there are many excellent stories which do this but many do not.

Active – Jimmy shot Eddie three times.

Passive –  Eddie was shot three times by Jimmy.

In a biography on PBS, I saw how J. D. Salinger followed Hemingway (and others) in saying a writer should write what he/she knows, has observed, has felt, otherwise there is no passion in the writing. "There is no fire between the words."

A friend saw this online and wondered if I wrote it because it was about me. No. I did not write it, but it's me all right.


cat

        I'm not anti-social, although I don't socialize
        Most people annoy me
        I don't like what many find as fun
        I'm happy with inexpensive things
        I like affection on my terms
        I enjoy solitude
        That's right
        I'm a cat


www.oneildenoux.com

22 October 2021

Show, Don't Tell


Show a story. Don’t tell a story.

I searched through my SleuthSayers posts and did not find that I put this up, so I'm putting up the small lesson I was taught about showing a story and not telling a story. I was asked about this twice over the last few weeks so I thought I'd put it up on SleuthSayers.

Over the years, this has been the most difficult element of fiction writing for beginning writers to learn. Showing a story is dramatizing the events in scenes. Telling a story is a summary of the story, flat without enough details to stimulate a reader’s imagination. You may summarize events between scenes but you should present the action of your story in scenes. It is immediate and much more dramatic.

In showing a story, the writer gives the reader more clearly defined action, characters, point of view and setting.

Describe the little things. Give specific details. Don’t just write – They had dinner. Put in what they ate. Don’t just write – They got in the car. It sounds better and gives a visual image if you put it as – They climbed into the red Corvette.


 

Writing and Reading a story is a collaboration between the writer and reader.

It should be something like this:

WRITER ---------- STORY ---------- READER

 

If a writer does not show enough in the story, the reader has to re-create the story in his or her mind and it will look like this:

WRITER --- STORY ----------------- READER

 

The reader has to fill in a lot of space with guessing and could guess wrong. That is why we give them specific details and setting.

If a writer gives too much information, too much explanation, and does not let the reader participate, it will look like this:

WRITER ----------------- STORY --- READER

 

The reader may be bored and stop reading. You want to hit the right balance, the half-way point.

 

Like the old saying about plays and movies. Plays tell a story. Movies show a story.


www.oneildenoux.com

01 October 2021

What is a Yogiism?


A Yogiism is something said by Yogi Berra, something less profound than something written by Shakespeare but memorable.

I am old enough to remember Yogi Berra playing catcher for the New York Yankees. Lawrencec Peter 'Yogi' Berra was a great catcher and an even better clutch hitter, excelling at hitting pitches out of the strike zone. Berra had more home runs than strikeouts in five seasons. Hard to imagine.


His achievements and honors are many, including 18 times an American League All-Star, 13 times a World Series Champion, 3 times AL MVP. Awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom.


Yogi and his World Series Rings

There are many Yogiisms. Here are a few examples of his unintentional or intentional wit:

"It's deja vu all over again."

"Ninety percent of the game is half-mental."

"One thing we know for sure: If you can't imitate him, don't copy him."

"If the world was perfect, it wouldn't be."

"Never answer an anonymous letter."

"Baseball is 90% mental and the other half is physical."

"We made too many wrong mistakes."

"You can observe a lot by watching."

"When you come to a fork in the road, take it."

"I always thought the record would stand until it was broken."

"Nobody goes there anymore. It's too crowded.

"Take it with a grin of salt."

"Always go to other people's funerals; otherwise they won't go to yours."

"You've got to be very careful if you don't know where you are going, because you might not get there."

"If people don't want to come to the ballpark, how the hell are you gonna stop them?"

"A nickel ain't worth a dime anymore."

"We have deep depth."

"Pair up in threes."

"Even Napoleon had his Watergate."

"You better cut the pizza into four pieces because I'm not hungry enough to eat six."

"You wouldn't have won if we'd beaten you."

"He hits from both sides of the plate. He's amphibious."

"It gets late early out here."

"I'm not going to buy my kids an encyclopedia. Let them walk to school like I did."

"Slump? I ain't in no slump. I just ain't hitting."

"It ain't the heat. It's the humility."

"So I'm ugly. I never saw anyone hit with his face."

"Little League is a very good thing. It keeps parents off the streets."

"The future ain't what it used to be."

"I usually take a two hour nap from 1 to 4."

"Love is the most important thing in the world, but baseball is pretty good, too."

"In theory there is no difference between theory and practice. In practice there is."

Probably his most famous Yogiism:

"It ain't over 'til it's over."

Yogi was incorrectly credited with coining the phrase, "It ain't over 'till the fat lady sings," which was first attributed to Ralph Carpenter, Texas Tech University sport information director. When Yogi was asked about that particular quote, he told a New York Times reporter, "That's one of the things that I said that I never said."

Sources for the quotes come from:

  • https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yogi_Berra#Playing_style
  • https://ftw.usatoday.com/2019/03/the-50-greatest-yogi-berra-quotes
  • https://www.authenticmanhood.com/blog/20-great-yogi-berra-quotes

That's all for now.

www.oneildenoux.com

20 August 2021

Photography


My father, a police detective and photographer bought me a camera when I was fifteen and taught me how to use it, as well as how to develop the film and print the pictures. Black and white, of course. We had to send color film to labs back then.

He bought me a Yashica twin-lens reflex camera which took 120 mm negatives (four times the size of the standard 35mm negatives). It opened a new world to me and I've been taking pictures ever since.

Yashica was the inexpensive version of the wonderful Rolleiflex German camera

Snapshot turned into still life photos and candids pictures of family and friends moved to portraits. My MOS in the army was Photographer: Still (opposed to Photographer: Film. There were no video cameras in 1971). I gave up the little Yashica for another twin-lens camera, one with interchangeable lenses and the ability to use 120 mm film with 24 exposures (rather than 12 as in the Yashica). I moved to the Mamiya C330.


Japanese Mamiya cameras were well-made, durable with excellent lenses

In the army I perfected my lab work, developing and printing and thought I would be a professional photographer when I got out only there were no jobs, so I went back into law enforcement and later discovered my calling to be a writer.

But photography was always there. Eventually, I moved to the Mamiya RB 6x7 single-lens camera. A real gem, only large and bulky. Along the way I bought a Nikon 35mm, which was more portable and produced sharp images.

RB 6x7, similar to the greatest camera in the world, the Hasselblad


Taken with Yashica



Taken with Mamiya C330


Taken with RB 6x7

Taking photos in St. Louis Cemetery #1 with RB 6x7 in 1975

Digital photography is much easier but I miss the craft of focusing the camera and setting the f-stop and speed and the smell of the developer and glacial acidic acid and fixer. I miss washing the negative and hanging them up, making sure no dust got to them while they dried. I miss printing the pictures, seeing the images come to life in the developing tray in the dim, yellow light of the darkroom.

I still have my C330 but rarely use it. I don't like having others develop the film and print the photos. Digital photography is much easier and I'm a writer now.

www.oneildenoux.com

30 July 2021

Pulphouse: A FIction Magazine


Pulphouse: A Fiction Magazine published my first private eye short story, "Women Are Like Streetcars" in July 1992. The story has been reprinted five times (in the U.S., Denmark, and France/UK), and is included in the newly released volume. Stories from the Original Pulphouse: A Fiction Magazine (July 2021).

With this volume, editor Dean Wesley Smith has selected some of his favorite twisted stories from the first incarnation of Pulphouse's fiction magazine, stories he describes as "Sort of half-beat off kilter, yet still high-quality fiction and great stories." So happy to see my story including with cool stories by Jerry Oltion, Kent Patterson, Kristine Kathryn Rusch, Ray Vukcevich, and J. Steven York.

The story of Pulphouse Publishing is too big to be condensed in this blog but Dean Wesley Smith and Kristine Kathryn Rusch and the others at the publishing house created a specialty house of limited, signed editions and moved into paperbacks. 

Worked there in 1992 as an assistant editor, which is where I met my wife Debra Gray De Noux who was art director and associate publisher at Pulphouse. I learned so much about writing and editing and publishing in my time there.

The small, specialty Pulphouse Publishing was founded in 1988 by Dean Wesley Smith and Kristine Kathryn Rusch and was active until 1996, publishing 244 different titles. Beginning with Pulphouse: The Hardback Magazine, it also published ground-breaking print runs of Author's Choice Monthly Collections, Axolotyl Press novels, Short Story Paperbacks, and Mystery Scene Press. Books came out in limited edition leather bound and hardback, each numbered and autographed by the author, as well as trade paperbacks.

Partial list of famous authors published by Pulphouse Publishing includes
List of authors published by Pulphouse includes well known mystery writers

Kevin J. Anderson
Michael Bishop
Alan Brennert
Ed Bryant
Mark Budz
Adam-Troy Castro
Charles de Lint
O'Neil De Noux
George Alec Effinger
Harlan Ellison
Marina Fitch
Ester Friesner
Ron Goulart
David H. Hendrickson
Nina Kiriki Hoffman
Damon Knight
Joe Lansdale
George R.R. Martin
Judith Moffet
Andre Norton
Jerry Oltion
Mike Resnick
Spider & Jeanne Robinson
Kristine Kathryn Rusch
Robert Sheckley
Robert Silverberg
Dean Wesley Smith
Michael Swanwick
Jeff VanderMeer
Karl Edward Wagner
Lawrence Watt-Evans
Kate Wilhelm
Jack Williamson
F. Paul Wilson
Roger Zelazny


Max Allen Collins

Bill Crider

O'Neil De Noux

Lauren Estleman

Brian Garfield

Joe Gores

Ed Gorman

Edward D. Hoch

Stuart M. Kaminsky

John Lutz

Margaret Maron

Marcia Muller

Bill Pronzini

Kristine Kathryn Rusch

Teri White

The new incarnation of Pulphouse Fiction Magazine continues through WMG Publishing, Inc. Issue 13 was just released. Available as magazines and eBooks. Can't talk up Pulphouse/WMG Publishing enough.

Their covers are the coolest.


That's all for now.

www.oneildenoux.com

09 July 2021

A little More About Rejections


We've talked about rejections over the years here at SleuthSayers, especially about rejections of well-known works by famous writers. I left out some of the famous rejections already discussed here (F. Scott Fitzgerald, Alex Haley, Stephen King, Louis L'Amour, George Orwell, J. K. Rowling, John Kennedy Toole, and others).

J. D. Salinger's desire to be published in The New Yorker brought many rejections until they finally accepted "A Perfect Day for Bananafish."  After publishing a number of other stories there, Salinger asked if they would publish The Catcher in the Rye in segments and received a big NO from fiction editor William Maxwell.

Salinger submitted the novel to Harcourt Brace and editor Robert Giroux loved it only his boss, Eugene Reynal did not. Giroux called Salinger in to tell him the book needed to be re-written as Holden Caulfield was crazy. Re-write The Catcher in the Rye? It was too ingenious, too ingrown.

Salinger took it to Little Brown who published it without changing a word and the rest is history.


As for these other rejection stories, I don't know if all these are true. The come from multiple sources online but some probably are true:

Kon-Tiki was rejected by a number of publishers, so was Jonathan Livingston Seagull. Who wants to read a book about a seagull?

A rejection of John le Carre's The Spy Who Came In From the Cold came with the notation how Le Carre "hasn't got a future."

James Joyce's Ulysses was judged obscene by a number of publishers. Some of Jack Kerouac's work was rejected for being pornographic.

Lolita was rejected by publishers fearful of being prosecuted for obscenity.

Dune was rejected 20 times.


Usula K. Le Guin's The Left Hand of Darkness was rejected as being "endlessly complicated."

Pearl S. Buck's first novel East Wind: West Wind was rejected a number of times before publication.

Tony Hillerman was told to "get rid of the Indian stuff."

After a number of rejections, Zane Grey self-published is first book.

Marcel Proust also received so many rejections, he too self-published. So did Beatrix Potter with The Tale of Peter Rabbit.

James Baldwin's second novel, received a rejection describing the book as "hopelessly bad."

Lord of the Flies was rejected 20 times. That's right. Nobel Laurate William Golding's classic study of morality and immorality and human nature had a struggle getting into print.


William Faulkner's first novel was initially rejected as "unpublishable."

Chicken Soup for the Soul received 134 rejections.

Gone with the Wind was rejected 38 times.

The list goes on and on. Richard Adams, Rudyard Kipling, Irving Stone, Judy Blume, Sylvia Plath, D. H. Lawrence. Even Anne Frank whose diary was rejected by 15 publisher.

NOTE: Much of the above came from bio articles of some of the writers mentions as well as Writers Write and Writers Business and the PBS American Masters Documentary Salinger, a film by Shane Salerno (2013).

So, ya'll don't give up.

www.ONeilDeNoux.com

18 June 2021

Still Writing in the Dark


In my April 2019 SleuthSayers’ posting, I mentioned how writers evolve. Most of this posting is a repeat of what was posted before.

When I began writing novels, I made detailed outlines and after completing the books, I saw I always deviated from the outline to make the story work. No problem. I also wrote a detailed synopsis of each book to satisfy agent/editor/publisher.

That was then. Now, I begin with a character with a problem. Add setting, time and a couple conflicts listed in sketchy notes so I don't forget. Sometimes the character walks off in another direction and the sketchy notes are ignored. I follow the character and write what he/she says and does.

Writing in the dark. I'm not alone in this. Better writers have been doing this for a while. Me, only recently. When it is time to get back to Lucien Caye, to rejoin his world, go back to 1951, I put him in motion and tag along. I miss him and that world so it is great to be back. Same with my other series characters.

I follow in the footsteps of James Sallis and Dean Wesley Smith and many other good writers.
James Sallis – DRIVE (made into a movie with Ryan Gosling and Carey Mulligan out of this novel), the Lew Griffin New Orleans novels – THE LONG-LEGGED FLY, BLACK HORNET, MOTH, BLUE BOTTLE, EYE OF THE CRICKET, GHOST OF A FLEA – and many other novels, books of poetry, non-fiction books, and essays.

Sallis explains "After years of writing the well-made story," he became disaffected and bored and if he was bored, possible his readers would be bored. He sometimes goes back to Raymond Chandler's – when in doubt have a man come through the door with a gun in his hand. He decided to challenge himself and improvise.

Sallis says, "I would start with a scene. I would start with a bit of conversation, with a plot point and would see where it took me. And I would try to surprise myself." He goes to to explain writers go every way with their writing, some have to have it all clocked out and some can't do that. There is a danger to all creative work. Sallis adds how writing this way can be like throwing yourself off a cliff.

LINK to Sallis interview: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PuXCz2gv3pc

Dean Wesley Smith has over a hundred published novels and more than 17 million copies of his books in print. Dean wrote a book about this: WRITING INTO THE DARK: HOW TO WRITE A NOVEL WITHOUT AN OUTLINE.

LINK: https://www.amazon.com/Writing-into-Dark-without-Outline-ebook/dp/B00XIPANX8/

Dean says it will start with a scene or conversation and he sees where it takes him looking for a surprise. When addressing writing into the dark, he explains, "To be vital you have to change." He goes on to remind us, "You are the God of your book."

Here is a great interview of Dean Wesley Smith:
LINK: https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=1&v=zjl66ZnrC7g/

I still like starting with the story running and catching up with the characters. Endings can be a surprise and when it works, it is like the satisfaction a homicide detective gets when the killer looks you in the eye and confesses.

That's all for now.

www.ONeilDeNoux.com

28 May 2021

Stuff about Louisiana


On December 20, 1803, The formal transfer of the Louisiana Purchase was held in the Cabildo building in New Orleans. The oldest city in the land purchased from France was Natchitoches, Louisiana, founded in 1714.

The tallest state capitol building in the U.S. is in Baton Rouge. It stands 450 feet.

State Capitol Building, Baton Rouge, Louisiana

The largest enclosed stadium in the world is the Louisiana Superdome in New Orleans.

The Port of New Orleans has historically imported and exported much of the world's food, coffee and oil.

The term "Uncle Sam" was coined along the New Orleans wharves before Louisiana was a U.S. territory as goods labeled U.S. were said to be from "Uncle Sam."

The dice game of Craps was created in the early 1800s (some say 1805, some say 1813) by New Orleanian Bernard Xavier Philippe de Marigny de Mandeville. A simplification of the European game of Hazard, which dated back to the Crusades. Craps caught on quickly and thrived along the New Orleans riverfront and spread worldwide.

Louisiana is the No. 1 producer of crawfish, shallots and alligators in the U.S.

Do I have to tell you what this is?

Oldest rice mill in the U.S. is Konriko Co. in New Iberia.

24% of the nation's salt is produced in Louisiana.

Two American Revolution battles fought outside the original 13 colonies were fought in Louisiana in 1779. At Baton Rouge, Spanish Colonial Governor Bernardo de Galvez (Spain was allied with the Americans), captured the British fort and forced the British to surrender a second fort at modern Natchez, Mississippi. In a second battle, American and Spanish privateers captured British supply ships and two armed sloops. Galvez cleared the British from the Mississippi River and the sea lakes around New Orleans (Lake Pontchartrain, Lake Borgne and Lake Saint Catherine). Galvez later took Pensacola from the British in 1781.

Louisiana has over 6.5 million acres of wetlands, the most in the U.S.

The staircase in GONE WITH THE WIND was copied from the antebellum plantation house Chretien Point in Sunset, Louisiana, located 14 miles north of Lafayette.

Chretien Point Plantation House, Sunset, Louisiana

Louisiana's Tabasco holds the second oldest food trademark in the U.S. Patent Office.

The largest sugar cane syrup mill is Steen's in Abbeville, Louisiana. (My grandfather Calixte De Noux worked in sugar mills up and down the Mississippi in the early 20th Century).

An early bottler of Coca-Cola (some say the first bottler) Joseph Biedenham of Monroe, Louisiana, was one of the founders of Delta Airlines, initially called Delta Air Service. Also involved in the creation of the Airline was Monroe's C. E. Woolman whose use of an airplane to crop dust for boll weevils became the first crop dusting service in the world.

The Lake Pontchartrain Causeway is the longest over-water bridge in the world at 23.87 miles.

Lake Pontchartrain Causeway Bridge between Metairie and Mandeville, Louisiana

While the International Joke Telling Contest is held annually in Opelousas, Louisiana, the biggest joke in Louisiana has been its legislature since – forever.

After the U.S. military academies, Louisiana State University (LSU, aka: The Ole War Skule) contributed the most officers to the U.S. armed forces in World War II.

The Louisiana Hayride radio show helped Elvis Presley, Hank Williams and Johnny Cash rise to stardom. It was broadcast from KWKH Radio, Shreveport, Louisiana from 1948 into 1960. I was a kid in the 50s and a teenager in the 60s. Never listened to the Hayride. I was (still am) a rock and roller, although I do like Elvis, Hank and Mr. Cash.

The oldest pharmacy in America was claimed to have been located at 514 Chartres Street in the New Orleans French Quarter. Early medicinal mixtures were known as cocktails (good for what ails ya).


New Orleans Pharmacy Museum, 514 Chartres Street

New Orleans is birthplace of Jazz, which gave way to the Blues and Rock and Roll. Some call Jazz the only true American Art form.

Information from a number of books and online source, especially The Real Cajun Deal who copied information from Cajun Works.

That's all for now, folks.

www.oneildenoux.com

07 May 2021

Lost for 43 Years


The Death Mask of Napoleon, presented to the city of New Orleans by Napoleon's personal physician Dr. Francois Antommarchi in 1834, and put on display in the Cabildo on Jackson Square, went missing for 43 years.

I've viewed the death mask many times in the Cabildo. It is one of three bronze effigies cast from a plaster mold made by Antonmmarchi forty hours after Napoleon's death. The mask in the Cabildo was the first cast from the original mold, the other two are in Paris at the Musée Carnavalet (Musée Historique de la Ville de Paris) and in the Musée de l'Armée (Hotel des Invalides which houses the tomb of Napoleon).

The effigy does not resemble the Napoleon we see in paintings and sculptures. The cheeks are sunken showing high cheekbones, the nose has a distinct curve, its end drooping slightly. The lips are further apart on the left than the right as if the emperor is giving us a slight smile. With the head shaved in order to create the plaster mold, the forehead seems narrow and only part of the ears are shown. The lay of the head reveals a prominent Adam's apple. Such was the first Emperor of France at death at the age of 51. (Napoleon referred to himself as Emperor of the French rather than Emperor of France). The face looks more like Julius Caesar than Napoleon.

Napoleon death mask

When I first saw it as a kid, I was amazed. First death mask I'd ever seen. More amazing was the story how we almost lost the mask.

Dr. Antommarchi arrived in New Orleans in November, 1834, to great fanfare. He set up a practice as Napoleon's doctor and prospered until leaving in 1838. He joined a wealthy cousin in Cuba and became adept at removing cataracts. He died in Cuba in 1838, a yellow fever victim.

The celebrated death mask was put on immediate display and moved to the new City Hall on Lafayette Square (now called Gallier Hall after its architect James Gallier, Sr.) in 1852. During the Civil War, the New Orleans City Hall was often in upheaval with Confederates occupying it for a year and US forces for the remainder of the war after the Yankees took the city in 1862.

In 1866, former City Treasurer Dr. Adam Giffen, walking along Canal Street, saw Napoleon's Desk Mask in a junk wagon. He was astonished and followed the wagon and bought the mask from the junk dealer. The mask had been thrown out with other trash when City Hall was going through one of many clean-ups after the war. Giffen took the mask home and put it on the table in his library, showing it to family and friends.

When Dr. Giffen died in 1890, the mask was given to the widow of the doctor's son, Robert Giffen. The widow put the mask on display in her home. No one in city government missed the mask and the widow eventually sold it to Captain William G. Raoul, President of the Mexican National Railroad, who took the mask to his home in Altanta, Georgia. When Raoul learned the city of New Orleans was seraching for the mask, he contacted the city and agreed to return the mask for the price he had paid for it plus interest and an inscription about him placed next to the mask when it went back on display. New Orleans Mayor Martin Behrman eagerly agreed to the arrangement and the mask was returned in 1909 and placed in the custody of the Louisiana State Museum, to which the Cabildo is a part.

On August 13, 1902, an out-of-work traveling salesman from Chicago attempted to steal the mask. The theft was prevented by the quick intervention of E. L. Carrol, a Tulane University medical student working as a night watchman at the Cabildo.

On May 11, 1988, the Cabildo was set ablaze by men working on the roof. I happened to drive past it along Decatur Street, saw the Cabildo on fire and felt certain we'd lost the historic building – seat of the Spanish colonial government and site of the Louisiana Purchase ceremony in 1803. The New Orleans Fire Department saved the old building.


Television crews filmed heroic firefighters battling the blaze and dousing Saint Louis Cathedral next door to keep the oldest cathedral in continuous use in the United States from burning. They also filmed firefighters carrying out art and historical treasures from the Cabildo, including the death mask. As you can see, the fire engulfed the entire roof.

The Cabildo was restored to its original state and the death mask is there on display. Note the three floors. The first floor is of French design, the second Spanish architecture, the third floor and cupola of American architecture.


Much of the information in this posting is from the pamphlet DEATH MASK OF NAPOLEON, a publication of the Louisiana State Museum, New Orleans, issued January 15, 1936. Price 25¢. No copyright listed. No author listed.

That's all for now.

www.oneildenoux.com

16 April 2021

More About Setting


Still trying to come up with something new to say about writing that I haven't put up here on SleuthSayers.

When I read Jim Winter's post "A Sense of Setting" (April 9, 2021), I went back and saw I had posted about setting back in January 2018. Figured we have some new followers, so I want to say it again because setting is so important in fiction. Here's what I previously posted –

I was fortunate to learn early from a panel of editors:

Setting is the fictional element which most quickly distinguishes the professional writer from the beginner.

Setting is not just the name of a place or time period, it is the feeling of the place and time period. It includes all conditions – region, geography, neighborhood, buildings, interiors, climate, time of day, season of year.

Setting should appear near the beginning of a novel or story and remain throughout by answering the questions WHERE and WHEN. By using sensory details, the writer can flesh out a setting: the visual, smells, sounds, taste, feeling of atmosphere. All five sense sould be used in describing the little things – what a character sees, hears, feels, tastes and smells.

Every story takes place somewhere. Setting is more than a backdrop, it creates mood, tone and can help establish the theme of a work of fiction. Like charaters, it plays an important role in a story. Writers should not neglect setting.

When establishing a setting, get the details correct. You can't have azaleas blooming in Louisiana in December. In New Orleans, the weather is an important part of setting. We have only two seasons – STEAMY HOT (spring, summer and autumn). WET COLD (winter). There are only two mild days at the beginning of spring and two mild days at the end of autumn. Tennessee Williams said these were the only good days to be outside in New Orleans.

Go to the place you set your story (or a place like it if your setting is fictional place). Go and watch, listen, take notes. It's helped me before.

Azalea bush
Azalea bush in Louisiana, March 2021

NOTE: Do not put too much setting description in your fiction. It should not read like a travelogue.

www.oneildenoux.com

26 March 2021

The Zone can be elusive


In October 2017, I put up a post here entitled In The Zone, where I spoke about The Zone, a sort of Twilight Zone, a separate existence, a Zone where I wrote stories and novels with such focus the story flowed like a swollen river.

My wife bought me a T-shirt which read: Poor Listener. It had taken her a white to realize I wasn't listening to her because she talked too much, I wasn't listening because I was somewhere else. I was in The Zone.

The pandemic changed so many things, including making The Zone elusive to me for the first time. The scenes still play out. I still watch and listen to the characters but the distraction of living in fear keeps intruding. I still daydream but they are shorter and grow unfocused. At least I know it and can bear down and still write but I miss The Zone.

When I wrote my epic historical novel BATTLE KISS (320,000 words) and the follow-up USS RELENTLESS (234,000 words) I could step in and out of The Zone at will and everything was there.

The deaths (relatives, former co-workers, old friends) take a toll.

OK, the vaccines are here but every time I go out so many people, too many people, are unmasked and not following distancing protocols. It's frustrating.

So I rarely leave the house, which should help me to enter The Zone. And I do, but not as easily. The election took a lot out of me, the great anxiety fearing we were slipping into a fascist state.

But there is a light at the end of the tunnel. I don't see it yet, but it has to be there.

The lessons I learned when I started writing have taught me how to narrow my focus and to keep writing, no matter what. I hope beginners listen to the lessons we sometimes give here on SleuthSayers. I learn something new here all the time.

Y'all take care. Gotta go Zoning.

www.oneildenoux.com

05 March 2021

Lawrence Ferlinghetti, a personal inspiration


Freshman year at Loyola University in 1969, I took Photography 101 from a prof who was into Beat Generation writers (Kerouac, Ginsberg, Burroughs, Carr, Lawrence Ferlinghetti and others). For our final grade he asked us to do a photo essay of a poem. Any poem. He pointed to the books in his office and told us to look through them. As other students picked up Ginsberg and Patchen and Para and Rexworth, I found the collection A CONEY ISLAND OF THE MIND by Lawrence Ferlinghetti, thumbed through it and the title of poem #22 on page 37 stopped me – Johnny Nolan has a patch on his ass.


I was juiced and put together a dynamite photo essay, illustrating Ferlinghetti's images:

  • "kids chase him" – easy, I went to City Park and photographed kids running after each other.
  • "screendoor summers" – a photo of an open screen door with the sun in the sky above.
  • "through the back streets" – illustrated by a photo of Antoine Alley at night (Antoine Alley runs along the downtown side of Saint Louis Cathedral).
  • "a man laments upon a violin" – visited several jazz halls until I found a man playing a violin.
  • "a doorstep baby cries" – wasn't hard, we had a few babies in the family.
  • "a ball bounced down stairs" – I used a tennis ball and a tall staircase at Loyola's Marquette Hall.

The hardest step was how to illustrate Johnny Nolan with a patch on his ass. Never found Johnny Nolan or a lookalike but I found pair of blue jeans with a patch on the butt at a thrift store and hung them from an old clothes line.

Man, I was proud of my essay. Nice, sharp black-and-white images.

Bought a copy of A CONEY ISLAND OF THE MIND and other books by Ferlinghetti and have read them so many times over the years. His poems inspired me, still do. The economy of words, the precise images.

When Hurricane Katrina ravaged our city, I lost most of my photos and negatives, including my photo essay of Johnny Nolan has a patch on his ass.

Recently, I read the poem to someone who have never read it and got teary eyed. Comes from being an old man. Comes from realizing how many things you loose in life.

"Johnn Nolan has a patch on his ass

kids chase him

thru screendoor summers ..."

Lawrence Ferlinghetti died on February, 22, 2021. He was 101 years old.

www.oneildenoux.com