Conventional Wisdom

Next week is Bouchercon. I'll be there. Besides grabbing any excuse to visit New Orleans, Bouchercon presents an opportunity to connect in person with the community of readers and writers. I’ve gone convention-heavier this year with the release of The Devil’s Kitchen. But I always try to attend at least one conference annually. I learn something every time. I get other benefits. My network grows. Opportunities I didn't anticipate sometimes crop up.

Mostly, I get a sense of belonging. Reading and writing tend to be solitary activities. Bouchercon and the other conferences allow us private practitioners to come together. Maslow's hierarchy of needs puts belonging only slightly above fending off wild animals. As a social species, we want to be a part of something bigger. Mystery conventions give each of us a chance to connect and to share.

How do we maximize the opportunities at a conference? What follows are a few simple suggestions. For most of the experienced conference presenters and attendees, what follows is probably not groundbreaking. Consider the list as a refresher.

1.      Think about what you hope to gain from a conference before you arrive.

Identify your goals. Want a selfie with a famous author? They’ll likely be signing something somewhere. Get in line. Want to renew acquaintanceships? Find a bar stool with your name on it. Success at a conference differs depending on where you are in your reading/writing journey. Identifying your personal goals helps you determine the steps to achieve them.  

2.      Wear your name tag in a place where it can be easily seen.

I'm horrible with names. Often, I'll forget a name within moments after the conversation finishes. And I'm usually reluctant to renew a conversation later because I can't remember someone's name I should know. Help me out. A prominent nametag makes it easier for introverts to take a chance.

3.      It’s hard for most of us to start a conversation. Consider a few easy and planned openings.

Surprisingly, the question, "What's your favorite book?" may not be the right starter. Surrounded by big names and smart talk, a person's mind may be spinning in search of the correct answer to this question. Consider perhaps asking, "Are you a reader, writer, or both?" The answer leads directly to easy follow-ups. In moments, you may find yourself having an accidental encounter with conversation.

4.      Keep lists.

I'm a list guy. I need to write things down if I want to get them done. Usually, have three lists going at a conference: A. The books I'm going to add to my TBR pile, B. Ideas gleaned from panels. This list contains suggestions to improve either my current project or a future one, C. A list of action items—things I need to do to help myself succeed as an author.   

5.      Say “Yes.”

Conferences can be draining. It’s easy to want to retire to your room after a long day. While everyone needs to find the balance that works for them. Try to say “yes” to opportunities.

6.      Be realistic.

Not every session will be right for you. But everyone will be doing their best. Similarly, not all conversations will be smooth. Remember, people are most likely to remember the last thing you say. End positive. You don’t have to lie and gush excessively if flattery is not warranted. Instead, thank your conversational partner and wish them a good conference.

7.      Carry a card.

It's impossible to remember all the names of people I've met. Even a list guy can't stop mid-conversation to write everything down. Have a card ready. They're cheap. They help build a connection that you worked to forge when you summoned the courage to start talking.  

    8. Fill out the evaluations.

Thoughtful comments help organizers make the best conference possible. No one wants to fail. Giving them a few sincere thoughts helps to improve everyone’s experience.

        9. Don’t reveal the ending.

A few years ago, I was sitting at a major conference watching a big-name author being interviewed. The first question from the audience was, “Why did you kill off [major character] at the end of Book Nine?” The room went ugh. In a private conversation, probe all you want. Writers love to talk about their work. In a public forum, stay away from announcing major plot twists.

 I’m sure you have other suggestions for maximizing the convention experience. If you see me at Bouchercon, come tell them to me. I’ll be the name-tag wearing, list-jotting, reader/writer. Please say hello. I’ll hand you a card.

Until next time.

We're only here to help.

            The car I drive every day seems much more concerned about my personal welfare than with getting me from point A to point B.  It won’t let me start up until my foot is on the brake.  If I don’t put on my seatbelt it emits a robotic and relentless clang that supersedes the radio and increases in volume until I’m forced to succumb.  I think the approach is based on similar techniques banned by the Army Field Manual on abusive interrogation. 

After exceeding a certain speed, all the doors lock.  If I wanted, the car would automatically keep me in my lane.  I turned that feature off.  I also turned off the frantic bleating caused by drifting over a lane line.  During the course of an average trip, the dashboard flashes and plaintive chimes pipe up to warn me of a whole host of impending catastrophes, such as running out of gas, losing air pressure in the tires, missing an upcoming service call or inadvertently switching from NPR to talk radio.

I suspect all this coddling is getting us ready for fully automatic, driverless cars. 

        When I was growing up in the 50s and 60s we had none of these things.  We drove death traps.  No seat belts, no warnings of any kind – no bells, lights, beeps nor melodic nags.  Doors would fly open upon impact, windshields would turn to spray if hit by a rock, dashboards were made of heavy-gauge, forehead crushing steel and small children were expected to sail unimpeded through the air in the event of a collision. 

I learned to drive cars that were entirely nonfunctional without human intervention.  No power brakes, no power steering.  Shifting gears was a personal choice, whether you liked it or not. You tuned the AM radio with a knob.  The windows were cranked and the manual door locks had a big button on top to make it more convenient for car thieves. 

Somehow, I survived.

I started writing with a pen and paper.  My brother had our grandfather’s mechanical typewriter, but since each key had to travel though long, eleborate linkages before striking the ribbon, it didn’t seem worth the trouble.   When I finally got my hands on an electric Smith Corona, I thought, how astonishing.  I was a terrible typist, but this was a big upgrade from my terrible handwriting. 

Since then, I’ve been grateful for every step change in writing automation.  The word processor changed my life and made a whole writing career possible.  MACs and PCs took it to another level, and having the web, with virtually the entirety of human knowledge one key shift away, feels like sorcery. 

But as with my nanny car, modern technology has taken a dark turn.  The cars want to drive themselves, and it’s clear the computers want to take over writing responsibilities.  A recent upgrade of Microsoft’s Office 360 included their chat bot, Copilot.  Really makes it sound like a clever helper – a benign, compliant assistant.  Your hearty wingman, ready and willing to just jump in and take care of those bothersome tasks, such as selecting words, composing sentences, framing arguments or provoking someone’s imagination. 

We know where this story ends.  It becomes so effortless.  Just a tap or two on the keyboard and the difficulties of composition are swept away.  Skills atrophy, ambition wanes, intellectual sloth and sedentary numbness sets in.  All writers start sounding the same, but so what?  You can now make a living without lifting a finger (except for those few keystrokes.)

One hopes you will, because the robots won’t be giving it away forever.  Eventually, the luxury of abandoning your craft and self-esteem will come with a big monthly price tag.  You may even be compelled to take back the means of literary production.  I might tell my computer, "Release the keyboard, please.  This time I’ll do it myself." 

         And I’ll probably see written across the screen, “I’m sorry, Chris.  I can’t let you do that.”  

 

 

The Digital Detective, Karma

I. inspired by Hiëronymus Bosch

Sharp Dresser, Sharp Tongue, Sharp Practices

This heading perfectly encapsulates a once and former boss. Clues were apparent from the beginning, but the worst characteristics emerged over time. His name could also be described as an insulting slur, a diminutive of Richard rhymed with Rick, and no, it wasn’t Mick, Nick, or Vic. I’ll simply refer to him as ‘Rich’ for now.

Moderately wealthy, he moved easily in the business world. ‘Rich’ kept useful contacts on a private payola payroll. Kindnesses were transactional. Favors to others he considered IOUs.

How did I become his most trusted employee? I was in grad school, struggling to meet rent and tuition. A full-time student, I also worked forty hours on Wall Street as documented elsewhere. I found myself in demand but was surprised when I received a call from Boston. The caller asked what might induce me to leave school and move to a state I’d yet to visit.

For a financially strapped student, salary talked, not to mention it represented an opportunity to continue designing professional software. He dangled the opportunity for a partnership. I accepted the offer and moved south of Boston’s 128 with little more than clothes and a record collection.

The Mask Slips

Gradually, he revealed more and more about his circumstances. He liked owning things other people didn’t. His Cadillacs, his Brookline house, his country club membership, and his many, many toys represented assets most people couldn’t afford. He’d make hamburger with $20 per pound filet mignon. Sometimes I’d drive him crazy. When his wife discovered I’d obtained designer towels identical to hers from a Ross discount store, she gave hers to the maid.

He subscribed to a shopping service that shipped exotic foods to the US. One day he bragged about a fancy green fruit from New Zealand. “Kiwi?” I innocently asked. “The local grocery store carries it.” He dropped that service the same day.

As other companies have noted, I tend to keep my mouth shut. If I have a problem, I’m more likely to confront– usually politely and perhaps unwisely– but have my say. Although he looked upon people with contempt, Rich valued my talents and quirky sense of humor. But me as a person? Unlikely, based upon how he scorned others.

II. inspired by Hiëronymus Bosch

Swing, Swap, Swag and Swagger

Rich’s personal excesses typically overshadowed his professional quirks. His life orbited a world of strippers, porn stars, and gambling. He and his wife often made their private life public, once discussing their peccadillos on a popular television talk show. And yet, he and his wife harbored social pretensions. Never knowing what would come next, it was like watching a circus on fire, but those escapades do little to further this article.

Except…

Initial Concerns

Rich’s disdain extended into the corporate realm. His father had started a company selling overpriced ‘collector’ coins, and named the enterprise CFS, Inc, which originally stood for ‘Coins for Suckers’. Naturally, customers weren’t privy to the insult. Those few who asked were given a nonsensical backronym such as, ‘Come find a Steal’. Rich took over the company name but not the business, and the initials now stood for ‘Consulting for Schmucks’.

Take taxes. That’s what CFS did, take taxes. The company was authorized to collect sales tax only in its home state, but Rich also charged out-of-state customers sales tax, which he treated as unearned income, a nifty little bonus every month, every year. Say CFS reaped monthly revenues of $100,000, then phony sales tax brought in an additional $5000 to $10,000 every thirty days.

Grift, Graft, and Grease

Rich was fascinated with mafia and police. Those who knew his parents claimed mafia members encouraged his father to leave town, prompting a move to Miami, never to return. He was highly motivated by a neighbor shot and killed through his basement window.

Brookline and Chestnut Hill are old but expensive neighborhoods with large houses and narrow, winding streets. Authorities ban overnight street parking but that didn’t bother Rich. He bribed cops not to ticket his cars. Parking problem solved.

At one time, Rich joined as a police reserve deputy. Reservists were supposed to be unarmed, but once again, he flouted rules, carrying a concealed snubnose revolver. He often spoke of the satisfaction of clubbing protestors offset with the regret of breaking his five-cell flashlight over students’ heads.

By now, you’re probably thinking Rich was not a nice man. As I write this, I wonder how a professional like R.T. Lawton might view him. A petty perpetrator or a wannabe criminal who sidled so close to the line he could topple at any moment?

And yet, the man occasionally listened to me. For some reason, Larry, one of our data center operators, aroused Rich’s ire. If Larry made even a small slip, Rich would explode, showering the place in fire and brimstone. Shouting made Larry more nervous, which precipitated further errors, more screaming and threats, and the end of a civilized world as we knew it.

I took Rich aside and said, “Larry has brought mistakes to our attention. If he hadn’t been honest, we would have considerably more grief figuring out where the fault lies. Ease up a little. By the way, did you know Larry is teaching himself programming?”

Rich listened. He even critiqued one of Larry’s student programs, making suggestions for improving the app. Larry became a valuable part of the team.

I emphasize our company’s apps, development software, and consulting were first class. The CEO’s problems did not bleed into the quality of the products. Consider John McAfee, first maker of antivirus programs. He had a very erratic short life, yet the reputation of his software sold millions of copies.

Meanwhile, where was my partnership? By then, I had developed products, but I hadn’t seen sales figures and Rich wasn’t about to allow an inspection of his books.

Shooting Blanks

An Australian-American company I’d worked for in my early days asked for a copy of our software with an eye toward selling our products together. We sent a copy on magnetic media. Oddly, SDI shipped it back a few weeks later without comment or communication of any kind.

A couple of months later, we found out why. SDI introduced an add-on for their product called F0, a clone of my package Fx, which I solely developed. SDI’s Boyd Munro was a brilliant software writer but he had tried and failed to implement his version of Fx until he reversed engineered my program. It turned out Rich had not demanded a non-disclosure agreement.

But all was not lost. In Virginia, another software company, TCSC, proposed joining forces to release a joint combination of our products. TCSC’s owners bore the unlikely names of Tom and Jerry, but their business included a wealth of customers.

Usually, I did the traveling, but Rich felt the importance of negotiations required the presence of the CEO. He was right, but oh, so wrong.

Rich had expected to spend a few days, but he returned after one. What happened, I asked? He put me off and said he didn’t want to talk about it.

Okay, but where do we stand? What are the plans?

He waved off my questions, refusing to answer. What the hell? I had a stake in this.

Not long after, I resigned and struck off on my own consulting and designing software. Rich badly needed technical assistance and I greatly needed corporate customers, so I accepted him as a client.

But Rich, being Rich, couldn’t do things honestly. He wouldn’t pay until the next job came up. His account was the largest on the books, aging three, four, sometimes five or six months. Then came an incident that brought an end to our agreement, an eruption that stranded me ’two hundred miles from nowhere,’ according to one observer. I’ll write about it next time.

I ghosted Rich after that. When he phoned, I refused his calls. Although he occasionally called as the years passed, I never spoke with him again.

Karma Bytes

Some time later, I found myself in DC chatting over dinner with Tom, a principle in TCSC mentioned above.

“You recall Rich visited our office to seal a joint marketing deal? Do you know what happened?”

“I remember, but Rich flatly refused to discuss it.”

“Little wonder. He arrived that day and strode directly to Jerry’s office, demanding to see the boss. His secretary explained he was on a delicate overseas call, which was expected to take quite some time.

“He said, ‘I don’t intend to wait. I’ve come a long way and insist you usher me in now.’ The secretary politely but firmly asked him to take a seat, but he became more belligerent, his voice loud and his vocabulary abusive.

“Rich stormed into Jerry’s office, shouting he should fire his ƒ-ing **** of a receptionist, calling her numerous obscenities. ‘Fire the bitch,’ he concluded.

“Jerry, a big man, listened quietly. Then he said,

“That ‘bitch’ is my wife.”

III. inspired by Hiëronymus Bosch

Just Deserts, Unjust Desert

At the level we were at, software developers knew one another by name and reputation if nothing else. I learned Rich, after making a small fortune out of our company, moved to Vegas. His deep voice was used in radio broadcasts, but not all went well.

Years later, I chatted with his daughter. She indicated he’d become embroiled in yet another scam and this time lost his money. He died a broken man.

How I felt about that was unexpected. He was a Brunswick stew of dishonesty, turpitude, swindling, cheating, greed, selfishness, and petty crimes. And yet, I felt badly. As awful as he was, no one deserves to die a broken shell. Given a vote, I’d rather imagine him alive, playing his little cons, not paying bills, and cheating on his taxes than rotting a fractured husk in a Las Vegas grave.

How confusing is that?

'Before the Coffee Gets Cold' and How important are Names?

Do character names play a role in whether you will continue reading a book or not?

I once had a middle-aged man in my college fiction writing class, probably my grumpiest student ever.  I try hard to reach all students, and always strive to be cheerful.  (As I've told students, there is a difference between happy and cheerful. You can be cheerful in the company of others, even when going through down times.  All profs know this.)

But this man – there seemed to be nothing I could do to change his opinion of me.  He simply didn't like me. Or so it seemed to me.  Even though I had treated him fairly and kindly.

And so it seemed, until I found out the reason why.  I resembled his ex-wife, and worse, my name was almost the same! (she was a Melanie.  Close enough.)  As you will imagine, it was an acrimonious separation, following her infidelity.  To him, I resembled a scarlet woman.

I can laugh about it now, but it led me to think about how we come to read a book, with our own baggage.  How we tend to tie emotions to names. 

So I asked myself: what if we didn't have preconceived notions about names.  What if - for instance - we had never come across those names before?

I had a chance to test that out this week, while reading Before the Coffee Gets Cold.  This is a charming little book, by a Japanese writer. It's not a crime book; in fact, it's what my colleagues sometimes call a 'woo woo' book - meaning, it involved magic.  The premise is intriguing: if you sit in a certain seat in a coffee house, you can go back in time for the minutes it takes for your coffee to get cold.  Usually about 10 minutes.  It will not change the present, but may help you make decisions about the future.

There was nothing wrong with the translation.  However, I started to read the book, and found myself so bogged down in Japanese names, that I put it down after two chapters. I simply couldn't tell characters apart. 

I read two mystery books in between.  Then, while waiting for my holds to come in at the library, I picked up this book again.  And encountered the same difficulty as before.

The problem?  It came down to, I couldn't recognize the male names from the female names!  I couldn't find a way to tell them apart.  Many names started with K, so that confused me further.    

I was more determined this time,  however.  So I wrote down a cheat sheet.  Wrote the name down and opposite it, and whether the character was male or female. Then I added old or young. I referred to the cheat sheet regularly, to get through the book.

Turns out, the book was charming, and did make me think about our pasts, and what gets left out. By that I mean, the things that never get said.  I'm glad I read it.

But it made me realize how much we depend on names to give us a hint as to whom the characters are.  Male vs female, even older vs young.  Susan and Kathy, I associate with boomer age women, for example.  Helen and Mildred, would be their parent's generation.  Ditto Bob and Ed vs Matt and… well you get the picture.

It also gave me sympathy for people reading foreign language translations of my own work!  Our names could be unfamiliar to them, along with what they suggest. 

Without those signposts, reading becomes much more of a challenge.  Turns out, there is a lot in a name.

Compared to Agatha Christie by The Toronto Star, Melodie Campbell writes capers and golden age mysteries.  The Silent Film Star Murders, book 19, is available at B&N, Chapters/Indigo, Amazon, and all the usual suspects.

To Sleep, Perchance To Dream...

NOTABLE DREAMS IN HISTORY

Mary Shelley's Frankenstein:
Shelley said she was inspired by a nightmare to write her famous novel, Frankenstein, which is considered a foundational work of science fiction.

Elias Howe's Sewing Machine:
Howe's dream of being captured by warriors wielding spears with holes near their tips led him to realize the needle should have the eye near the point, a key innovation for his sewing machine design.

Niels Bohr's Atomic Model:
Bohr's dream of the solar system with planets connected by strings helped him conceptualize the structure of the atom, with electrons orbiting the nucleus.

Paul McCartney's "Yesterday":
McCartney famously composed the melody for the song "Yesterday" entirely in a dream.

Albert Einstein's Theory of Relativity:
Einstein recounted a dream where he was sledding downhill at increasing speeds, which led him to contemplate how the appearance of stars would change at near light speed, ultimately contributing to his theory.

Srinivasa Ramanujan: The Man Who Knew Infinity:

Ramanujan said that, throughout his life, he repeatedly dreamed of a Hindu goddess known as Namakkal. She presented him with complex mathematical formulas over and over, which he could then test and verify upon waking. Once such example was the infinite series for Pi.

Robert Louis Stevenson's Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.

Dmitri Mendeleev's Periodic Table of the Elements:
Mendeleev, struggling to organize the elements, reportedly saw the periodic table in a dream, where elements fell into place based on their properties.

James Watson's Double Helix:
Watson, while working on the structure of DNA, dreamed of two snakes intertwined, which sparked his idea for the double helix structure of DNA.

Otto Loewi: Nerve Impulse Breakthrough:

In 1921, Loewi dreamed of an experiment that would prove once and for all that transmission of nerve impulses was chemical -- not electrical.  Twice, because he forgot the dream and couldn't read his midnight writing, so it repeated itself the next night!

Robert Altman:  Three Women

I've written about this one before - one of my favorite films.

Links:  Wikipedia and World of Lucid Dreaming

Now, I haven't had any dreams that are that important - except to me - but I have always dreamed in full color, often with full (if sometimes incoherent) plot, dialog, people, animals, you name it.  One dream I've never forgotten happened when I was somewhere around 6 or 7:  

I was walking in a jungle, in a cold, cold rain, with seven evil dwarves promising to get me out of the jungle.  An elephant came up to us and said, quite clearly in my mind, "They're liars," which I knew instantly was true,  and "Come with me." His trunk went around my waist - and I can still remember the feel of it under my hands, rough and wrinkled and firm - and lifted me up on his back and then he pushed through and past the dwarves and on out of the jungle...  There were a lot more adventures, which I'm not going to bore you with, but I still remember clearly, and the elephant made sure I stayed safe throughout.  Elephants are always good in my dreams...

I also had a dream where I was in a swimming pool, and everyone else could go through this passage down at the bottom and get out - whatever out was.  But I couldn't.  And then, in a sequence of dreams over a week or two, I was given gills, and then I could breathe underwater, and I finally went through that passage, and came out into a glorious sea, full of color and fish and creatures...  Ever since, the sea has been wild in my dreams, but a source of great happiness and freedom.  

I've also had precognition dreams, i.e., seeing the future.  These are rare, but when they come I know it.  Some are so trivial that it's like, WHAT????  

Example:  I dreamed that I walked into the church we were attending and looked at the cover of the latest new devotional, which had not yet arrived.  A week later, it arrived, and the cover was exactly what I had dreamed.

Example:  My husband and I were going on our first overseas trip to see his relatives in England and Ireland.  One night I dreamed that we were in Victoria Station, and I looked across the lobby and saw my former English professor.  Well, we did indeed arrive at Victoria Station, and we were looking for where to catch the bus, and across the room... you guessed it, my former English professor.  

Others aren't so trivial.  

Example:  About 35 years ago, we were going on vacation to Charleston, SC, with a couple we knew, and I dreamed that I looked up from packing, and saw my husband, outside, with someone attacking him, and the blood running down his face.  So I warned him to be careful while we were there.  Well, what happened was that my girlfriend and I got about a block ahead of the men, talking, and out of nowhere a car pulled up behind us, two guys jumped out of the car and came running towards us doing the drunk "Hey, baby, you're lookin' hot!" which is not the compliment men think it is.  Allan ran forward and got in between them and us, and one of them turned around and told him to piss off, he didn't and the guy punched him. But my husband can take a punch, and they got down to it, until the other guy dragged his pal away.  NOTE:  We called the cops, they found them, two drunk soldiers on leave, and arrested them.

Now something like that could obviously happen on vacation.  But this next one couldn't:

At one of my jobs I had to travel to other offices. The night before heading out, I dreamed that I ran into the wife [who I'd never met] of one of the employees, Joe [name's changed], who'd left Joe and their children for another man, and I was really pissed off about it, as was everyone else.  She kept saying, "But I couldn't help it! You don't understand!  He was so beautiful!"  Well, I woke up, and the next morning, I'm running around the office like a maniac, trying to get ready to go, when I got a call from the secretary. I snapped "I'm on my way!" And the secretary said, "No, no, no. I'm calling because I've got to tell you, Joe's wife died suddenly last night."  After I managed to get my breath back, I told her I was on my way, and told the people in my office what had happened, and asked (as casually as I could) what Joe's wife looked like. He described her, and it was indeed the woman I'd seen in my dream. Whew...  

NOTE 1:  I've had a lot of dreams where the dead have come to me, beginning when I was about six years old and my grandfather died.  I was by his graveside, and a big wind came up and swept everything away except a letter in my hand, which I read and learned by heart in that dream.  There were messages for my grandmother and mother, so when I woke up, I told them both what my grandfather had written to them.  I think it helped my grandmother; my mother freaked out, and I never told her my dreams again.  He also had a message for me, which turned out to be very, very true in my future life.  

NOTE 2:  Two things about precognition dreams.  (1) I always know one when I have one because I get what I call "spiritual vertigo" - at some point I realize what I'm watching is separated from where I am by a physically unbridgeable bottomless abyss, which makes me wake up dizzy and nauseated. (2) And they're very frustrating, because I can't change what happens. I see what I see, and it's going to happen.  Sigh...  In other words, they're not fun to have. 

And yes, I've also had dreams that sparked stories, including the Crow Woman & Dark that Rides stories, as well as "The Ghost of Eros" (Black Cat), "Blue Moon" (AHMM), and "Shut In" (BOULD Awards).  I'm still trying to write a story based on one dream; someday I'll get it.  

Still…

Beauty can stop the

sun and the sea, but dreams are

the language of time

— Eve Fisher

 

Wednesday on the Thursday Schedule

A few years ago I read a short story whose protagonist was a high school student. One of the early scenes took place in class and that got me thinking.

It might be cool to write a story which followed a teenager through his day, with different facts about his life coming out in each class. Since no teacher or other student would see all of these actions, only the reader would come to realize what was going on.

Neat idea, I decided.  But I write crime fiction so I had to figure out what crime would be involved.  The obvious choice, I am sorry to say, is an active shooter situation.  That is, somebody bringing a gun to school. But that was not something I wanted to write about. 

So I found a different solution.  I titled the story "Wednesday on the Thursday Schedule" which, to me, suggested bureaucracy at work, and something being out of whack.  

I sent the story off to the usual markets and, in much longer than it takes to tell you, it was rejected.  Very sad, but I tucked it into my memory files and waited.  

Last year D.M. Barr announced she was looking for stories for an anthology of tales inspired by the songs of Elton John and Bernie Taupin. Hmm...

I realized that with a little revision my story would connect with "The Cage," an obscure song from Elton's first album.  Heck, I already had a mention of wild animals!

So revise I did and Barr bought my story.  "The Cage" appears in Better Off Dead, Volume 1,  which will be published on August 25th..

The moral, I guess, is be patient and the right market may come along.  I hope you like it. If not, don't go breaking my heart. 

Hot Streak

Attempting to predict anything in publishing is a mug’s game, especially trying to predict how long it will take for a short story to find a home.

I’ve been on a roll this summer, with 10 original short story acceptances beginning June 20 and ending as I write this, a few days before it posts. (I placed a pair of reprints and a few originals earlier this year, but I’m only looking at my recent summer sales because there are some interesting things to note.)

Ten acceptances in nine weeks means an average of 1.11 acceptances per week. It’s been quite a while since I’ve had acceptances at a rate averaging more than once a week.

Six were accepted by paying publications; four by non-paying publications.

Three stories were accepted on first submission, five on second submission, and two on third submission.

The two fastest responses came quickly—one the same day as the submission and the other the day after submission. The slowest response took one year and 11 days. Ignoring the three outliers, acceptances ranged from eight days to 120 days.

One story took 10 days from submission to acceptance, but in between the editor requested some small revisions, so I date the acceptance as the day the editor accepted the revised version.

One other story required a revision before it was accepted, but the editor did not request the revision. The original rejection letter was so specific that I knew what I needed to change to fix/improve the story, but the story sat on my computer for more than three years before I figured out how to solve the problem. I submitted the revised story to the same editor with a note about why I was resubmitting it and what I had done to fix the problem. An acceptance followed. So, it sold on second submission, but to the same editor who had previously rejected it.

Eight of the stories are crime fiction. Two are romances.

One story was written to invitation. One was written for an open-call anthology. The two romances were originally written for a specific market that did not accept them. The other stories were of the “write first, market second” variety, which I haven’t been doing much of the past few years. Most of my writing has been “market first, write second”—that is, writing stories by invitation or writing to meet specific open-call anthology guidelines.

Now, here’s where I found some interesting data:

One story was written in 2003, one in 2010, two in 2016, one in 2020, one in 2024, and the last four were written this year, which means the oldest story would be old enough to vote, were it a person, and another would be getting its learner’s permit to drive. Many of the publications where I placed these stories did not exist when I wrote the stories.

What I learned from these acceptances is two-fold: 1) Never throw anything away because 2) the market is in constant flux.

I’ll be surprised if this pace continues, but it might. I’ve been looking through my unsold stories and putting them back out to market. After all, they’ll never be published if I don’t submit them.

* * *

I’ve been having a good streak with publications as well. In addition to the five stories I mentioned in my two previous posts, two more stories are hitting newsstands and mailboxes as you read:

“The Girl in the Shop” appears in the September/October issue of Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine and “Blind Pig” appears in the September/October issue of Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine.

“Curves” was published August 17 on Guilty Crime Story Magazine’s website.

* * *

Like many of you, I’ll be at Bouchercon in New Orleans the first week of September.

Barb Goffman and I will accept the inaugural Derringer Award for Best Anthology for Murder, Neat. I will also be celebrating Tammy Euliano’s Derringer Award for Best Long Story for “Heart of Darkness” (Scattered, Smothered, Covered, and Chunked, which I co-edited with Stacy Woodson), and I’ll be celebrating Stacy Woodson’s Derringer Award for Best Novelette for “The Cadillac Job” (Chop Shop, which I edited).

I’ll be hanging on tenterhooks awaiting word about M.E. Proctor’s Shamus Award nomination for Best PI Story for “Drop Dead Gorgeous” (Janie’s Got a Gun, which I edited).

And I’ll be hanging on different tenterhooks awaiting the announcement of the Anthony Award for Best Anthology because I co-edited two of the nominees: Murder, Neat, with Barb Goffman, and Scattered, Smothered, Covered, and Chunked, with Stacy Woodson.

I’ll also be participating in two events:

“Killing Your Darlings: Edit that Manuscript,” a panel discussion with me, Luisa Cruz Smith, Donald Maass, Paula Munier, and Otto Penzler, moderated by Sara J. Henry. Friday 2:30–3:25 p.m. in Galarie 5-6, followed by a signing in the Acadia Ballroom.

“Jumpstart Your Story,” which I’ll co-host with Harry Hunsicker and Stacy Woodson. Saturday, 10:00–11:00 a.m., in the Media Room.

If you see me, say howdy!

Revisiting the Art of My Youth

The group of young Asian Americans beside me gaze at The Starry Night with its sharp spears of cypress piercing the swirling patterns of the sky.

"Is it real?" one of them asks.

"It is," I say. "Those are the real colors Van Gogh painted and the real brushstrokes. You won't see those in the immersive digitized version. This exhibition from the 1880s to the 1940s is only a fraction of what we got to look at every week when I was a kid. But the art from the 1960s to the 2020s hadn't been painted yet."

On the day of this conversation, I'd just scored a free year's MoMA membership, usually three figures, as a perk of the NYC ID that New York residents are entitled to as photo ID with numerous benefits. When I was in high school, I spent every Saturday afternoon at the Museum of Modern Art. We took the subway from Queens and feasted on art for free. Now, they've curated the hell out of the bits of the collection on display. My very favorite, Pavel Tchelitchew's Hide and Seek, doesn't fit any category so may never make the cut.

The Cubists have plenty of wall space. I've been reading a mystery series based on art crimes, the Genevieve Lenard novels by Estelle Ryan. The Braque Connection gave me a new appreciation of Cubism and Georges Braque in particular, as seen through the eyes of its autistic protagonist. I'd never liked Braque because his art at MoMA in the 1950s was limited to a few brown and gray paintings, which hung next to similar brown and gray canvases by his buddy Picasso. A visit to Google Images taught me that Braque had an enormous stylistic range and a broad and vivid palette. Back at MoMA in 2025, I looked at his work and that of Picasso, Juan Gris, and the other Cubists with fresh eyes. Braque's Road near l'Estaque, which I don't remember, is a Cubist abstraction with the colors of a Cézanne.

Some of the paintings I visited many times in my teens made me feel as if I'd come home. Henri Rousseau's The Sleeping Gypsy, Chagall's I and the Village, and Cézanne's Château Noir all put a huge smile on my face.

Long Live Storytellers

A Book of Verses underneath the Bough,
A Jug of Wine, a Loaf of Bread– and Thou
    Beside me singing in the Wilderness
Oh, Wilderness were Paradise enow!

    — Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám

The fall of the Ottoman Empire merely increased Western romance of North Africa and the Far East. Suddenly North America found itself fascinated by Ottoman and Eastern Indian arts, their literature, poetry, music, dance, architecture, fabric art, and painting. Americans were shown the beauty of the Taj Mahal and the depth of poet philosophers Omar the Tentmaker and Rumi.

Actual knowledge was imperfect, and artists of the day happily filled in gaps relying more on imagination than edification. By way of example, the humorous 1877 poem ‘Abdul Abulbul Amir’ enjoyed renewed popularity in 1940 and remained a staple in grade school education as late as 1960 or so. The poem, songs, and cartoon films relied on Ottoman and Russian caricatures.

Shéhérazade and Dunyazade entertaining Sultan Shahryar

Roc On

Artists of the day wove Middle Eastern cultural memes and motifs into art nouveau, themes with flowing robes and diaphanous gowns, harems and hijabs, heroin and hookahs. Classical composers, including Ravel, Rimsky-Korsakov, and Schumann, found the tales of Shéhérazade (Scheherazade) irresistible.

She and her often overlooked sister, Dunyazade, inspired other storytellers, playwrights, and filmmakers. With her stories within a story featuring Aladdin, Sinbad, Ali Baba and his clever sister Morgiana, she’s my candidate for finest storyteller of all time. Certainly she was motivated… her life depended upon her storied skills.

SciAm

Scientific American, founded in 1845, is our Western Hemisphere’s longest, continually published magazine. Reading the June issue, I unexpectedly came across an article on writing, leading with a history of Shéhérazade.

The thrust of the piece, ‘The Power of Storytelling’ (pp.78-79) contends writers (a) live longer and (b) more readily find meaning in life, which they refer to as a ‘why’ mindset, why as opposed to how.

Reading between the lines suggest internalizing ((b), finding purpose in life), reduces stress and increases interest in the world around us, boosts ((a), longevity). Researchers further posit storytelling benefits introverts, building a platform to express themselves and expanding social ties.

Emphasizing why is more important than how, study author Ron Shachar indicates two skills necessary for writers.

1. Linking events together in a cohesive, coherent manner, i.e, connecting the plot dots.
2. Seeing the world through the eyes of others, understanding the ‘why’ motives of characters in a story.

That brings us back to Shéhérazade, a storyteller who not only understood her characters, she fathomed her Audience of One. After all, her life depended upon it.

Are You Running Out of Things to Read, or Watch?

If so, consider some of these.

First, though . . . rewind eight days. Picture me having an e-conversation last week with a writer friend, about favorite books and movies. What happened was, we both had so many, we were categorizing them by genre. (Can you see that my life is sometimes less than exciting?)

Back to the present. The result of that recent discussion is the following list of my favorite movies, novels, TV series, and short stories in each of several genres of fiction. Note: They go beyond the basic five genres (mystery/crime, SF/fantasy, romance, Western, and horror) to include ten subgenres. If the subgenres aren't familiar to you, that's okay. I made them up.

Another note: While I hope you'll agree with a few of my reading/viewing choices, I'm sure you won't like some--you might not like any--so be aware of one thing: These are not necessarily what I consider to be the BEST movies. They're just the ones I enjoyed the most. I do recognize that Citizen Kane, Schindler's List, Nosferatu, The English Patient, etc., are great achievements, but it'll be a cold day in Jamaica when they show up in my favorites list. 

For better or worse, here are my personal choices:

MYSTERY/CRIME

Favorite movie: L. A. Confidential (1997)

Novel: Plum Island, Nelson DeMille

TV/streaming series: The Sopranos (HBO, 1999-2007)

Short story: "Man from the South," Roald Dahl

SCIENCE FICTION/FANTASY

Favorite movie: Aliens (1986)

Novel: The Stand, Stephen King

TV/streaming series: Game of Thrones (HBO, 2011-2019)

Short story: "A Sound of Thunder," Ray Bradbury

ROMANCE

Favorite movie: Sleepless in Seattle (1993)

Novel: The Princess Bride, William Goldman

TV/streaming series: The Thorn Birds (ABC, 1983)

Short story: "The Gift of the Magi," O. Henry

 

WESTERN

Favorite movie: Once Upon a Time in the West (1968)

Novel: Lonesome Dove, Larry McMurtry

TV/streaming series: Deadwood (HBO, 2004-2006)

Short story: "Three-Ten to Yuma," Elmore Leonard

HORROR

Favorite movie: Psycho (1960)

Novel: Magic, William Goldman

TV/streaming series: Stranger Things (Netflix, 2016-2025)

Short story: "Nightmare at 20,000 Feet," Richard Matheson

ADVENTURE

Favorite movie: Jurassic Park (1993)

Novel: Sands of the Kalahari, William Mulvihill

TV/streaming series: Lost (ABC, 2004-2010)

Short story: "Mrs. Todd's Shortcut," Stephen King

COMEDY

Favorite movie: Blazing Saddles (1974)

Novel: One for the Money, Janet Evanovich

TV/streaming series: Cheers (NBC, 1982-1993)

Short story: "The Kugelmass Episode," Woody Allen

DRAMA

Favorite movie: Casablanca (1942)

Novel: From Here to Eternity, James Jones

TV/streaming series: Mad Men (AMC, 2007-2015)

Short story: "The Last Rung on the Ladder," Stephen King

HISTORICAL

Favorite movie: Gladiator (2000)

Novel: Pillars of the Earth, Ken Follett

TV/streaming series: Rome (HBO, 2005-2006)

Short story: "The Lottery," Shirley Jackson

FAMILY

Favorite movie: It's a Wonderful Life (1946)

Novel: The Hobbit, J. R. R. Tolkien

TV/streaming series: Little House on the Prairie (NBC, 1974-1982)

Short story: "The Boy Who Cried Wolf," Aesop

ESPIONAGE

Favorite movie: Goldfinger (1964)

Novel: Eye of the Needle, Ken Follett

TV/streaming series: Slow Horses (Apple TV+, 2022-)

Short story: "Deep Down," Lee Child

SOUTHERN

Favorite movie: Deliverance (1972)

Novel: To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee

TV/streaming series: Evening Shade (CBS, 1990-1994)

Short story: "Poachers," Tom Franklin

SPORTS

Favorite movie: The Natural (1984)

Novel: The Hustler, Walter Tevis

TV/streaming series: G.L.O.W. (Netflix, 2017-2019)

Short story: "The Swimmer," John Cheever

LEGAL/COURTROOM

Favorite movie: 12 Angry Men (1957)

Novel: Presumed Innocent, Scott Turow

TV/streaming series: Goliath (Amazon Prime Video, 2016-2021)

Short story: "Witness for the Prosecution," Agatha Christie

WAR

Favorite movie: The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957)

Novel: The Hunt for Red October, Tom Clancy

TV/streaming series: Band of Brothers (HBO, 2001)

Short story: "The Snows of Kilimanjaro," Ernest Hemingway

Before you ask . . . Yes, there was a lot of indecision in coming up with these. For example, I almost chose The Godfather for favorite crime movie, Galaxy Quest and Raising Arizona for funniest, Somewhere in Time for romance, Shane for Western novel, the first few seasons of The Walking Dead for TV horror, etc., etc., and if I'd waited until next month to make this list, it'd probably look a lot different. And yes, I also made a list of what I thought were the worst movies, novels, etc., in every category, but decided to keep those to myself. There's already enough acid indigestion in the world.

Which brings us to my question: What are some of your favorite movies, novels, TV series, and shorts? Do we agree on any of them?

Now, where'd I put that remote . . . ? 

The Great Shakespeare Watch

Awhile back, I talked about a couple of Shakespeare's plays being noir. Actually, a lot of his plays are noir. The Merchant of Venice, of course, tops the list and was my original reason for posting. At the time, I was reading my way through the plays.

In the comments, someone said Shakespeare was meant to be seen, not read. That was a "Well, duh" moment for me. I've seen Richard III and The Tempest as done by the Cincinnati Shakespeare Festival years back, both excellently done. But I thought, I've only seen a handful of these as movies. So I made this my project for the year: See all of Shakespeare's plays on YouTube or as a movie. As of this writing, I have four left: The Winter's Tale, The Tempest, Henry VIII, and The Two Noble Kinsmen. Included was Edward III, which, until the 1990s, was not considered one of his. A handful are still questioned as his, most notably Pericles. 

Because some plays aren't as well-known as others, it becomes hard to look for versions online. Some, like the Henry VI trilogy, varied wildly between an RSC television special from the 1960s to a youth Shakespeare camp to a local Shakespeare company doing a table read over Zoom. The last was actually kind of fun to watch. 

Of course, there were the classic movies, like Pacino's turn as Shylock in The Merchant of Venice. My favorite remains Ian McKellan's take on Richard III. But the biggest surprise to me was Joel Coen's MacBeth, with Denzel Washington in the title role. (Talk about Shakespeare as noir!)

In having to comb YouTube for some of the plays (I didn't want to spend money on a Britbox or Marqee subscription.), I've found the plays filmed on stage to be uneven in quality. Some of this, of course, was the ability of the actors. One, MIT's reality-show take on Timon of Athens. Then acting and editing were...Let's call it an acquired taste. But the concept worked rather well. Some had a lot of heart and some great performances, but were not exactly Wil's best. In particular, it's obvious why Edward III took so long to be included in Shakespeare's canon. It's Shakespearean in style, but the story begins with the titular Edward wooing Joan of Kent while the back half is about the Black Prince, though said Black Prince is offstage for most of it. Shakespeare would likely have focused on Prince Edward. 

 So, should one read or watch Shakespeare's plays? Oh, watch is definitely preferred. How else can you see Falstaff, the Bard's prototype for Harry Mudd and other rogues? But reading the Henry Trilogy (and The Merry Wives of Windsor) can be fun, especially if you read Sir John's lines aloud? I wish this binge included a turn by Brian Blessed as Falstaff. He's an obnoxious lout, but he's my favorite recurring Shakespeare character. 

 

Crime Scene Comix Case 2025-08-034, Boxed In

Once again we highlight our criminally favorite cartoonist, Future Thought channel of YouTube. We love the sausage-shaped Shifty, a Minion gone bad.

Yikes! In this Crime Time episode, only one outcome is possible.

 

 

 

 

© www.FutureThought.tv

 

That’s today’s crime cinema. Hope you enjoyed the show. Be sure to visit Future Thought YouTube channel.

The Power of the Word

 

A few years ago, I wrote a column about Lara Prescott’s book, The Secrets We Kept, a novel about CIA’s successful efforts in the late 1950’s to bootleg Boris Pasternak’s Doctor Zhivago, which Novy Mir had refused to publish.  CIA arranged for the first Russian-language edition, and snuck back it into the USSR, hoping to embarrass the Kremlin.  They got more than they hoped for when Pasternak won the Nobel Prize but was discouraged (to put it mildly) from accepting.  For the Soviet Union, it was a public-relations disaster, the engines of terror fearful of a poet.  The story is fiction, but the context, the history, is genuine.  Zhivago opened a crack in the monolith.

Here’s another one.  An account of a CIA covert program with the codename HELPFUL, which is about the projection of soft power.  The author is Charlie English, and the story he tells is called The CIA Book Club.  The idea behind the operation is that reading unregimented literature, books that question the orthodoxy or the received wisdom, can unlock the curious mind.  Not just Orwell and Solzhenitsyn, but Kurt Vonnegut, and Agatha Christie, and Albert Camus.

The focus is Poland in the 1980’s, and interestingly, the book-smuggling effort parallels the rise of Solidarity.  CIA was not directly involved with Solidarity – they were careful to maintain deniability – but they channeled money to the movement, through third parties.  The book thing, though, was more indirect.  It was an opposition of ideas, or of culture, in a generic, popular sense: not Plato’s Republic so much as current issues of Cosmopolitan.  There was, yes, an element of cultural imperialism, Charlie English admits, but the impulse was to show a life outside the Iron Curtain, to show that there was an opportunity for that life, beyond Soviet domination.

It’s a significant distinction.  Not that the lure of a life in Peoria is a better shopping experience than you’d find in Warsaw, an unlimited inventory of Air Jordans, but that Warsaw could aspire to a larger life.  That through reading, through an act of imagination, the act of experiencing a forbidden reality, you could internalize it, you could breathe that intoxicating air.  These people didn’t want to defect, or escape, from Eastern Europe, they wanted to reinvent a community of hope.

Entertaining that future of infinite possibilities seems like a peculiarly American sensibility, Frederick Jackson Turner’s myth of the frontier, and perhaps the New World re-exported it to the Old, but it’s reductive – and condescending - to think in exceptionalist terms.  The eager readers of those books, in Poland and Moldova and Ukraine, didn’t need to be persuaded.  What they were looking for was the light at the end of the tunnel, and the CIA book smugglers opened a road map.

It’s a fascinating window on what appears to be a more innocent age, too.  I’ve always been struck by the irony, that the Soviet Union would ban books, and send writers to mental hospitals, or the Gulag, and in the U.S., we’d let market forces do the work.  Behind the Iron Curtain, you took a Pasternak or a Milovan Djilas seriously; here, you’d simply let them die of neglect. 

It speaks to the power of the written word, even in this degraded information environment, that we can look back at this footnote to the Cold War, and realize wistfully that books lit the match.  They were refuge, and rescue, and the last, best hope of the future. 

Analyzing What Motivates Your Character Can Make All The Difference

Due to an injury that is making it hard to concentrate, I am rerunning this column from last year rather than writing something new (though I am making small updates). Whether you've read it before or this is the first time, I hope it is helpful. 

It's strange how you can start writing a story intending it to be about one thing, and in the end, realize it's really about something else. Has that happened to you?

With my 2024 story "A Matter of Trust" I wanted to portray the dissolution of a marriage (with a crime thrown in, of course). The story opens with a happily married couple enjoying dinner. An argument develops because the wife is worried about her husband's health. His blood sugar is too high, thanks to his love of jelly. He agrees to start cycling, a way to get his weight--and his blood sugar--under control. The argument ends, and the two are happy once more. For a time anyway. Neither of them foresee that the husband would become addicted to the jelly donuts sold by a shop in town--a shop he begins to secretly ride his bicycle to each day. And they certainly don't anticipate the events that would come from that addiction.

As my writing progressed, I realized that the husband--the main character--was an emotional eater, and jelly (rather than his wife) was the love of his life. I started working that concept into the story, going back to the beginning and layering the idea into the husband's thoughts. I'd expected that doing so would be enough for the man's actions to not only be believable but also understandable, even if the reader wouldn't agree with them. He would be a real person, rather than a character who did things because the plot dictated it. That should have been enough for a solid story.

But when I reached the end, I realized what I'd written still wasn't enough. (Don't you hate when that happens?) Why had this guy come to associate jelly with love? That was the key question. Once I figured out the answer and layered it into the story, only then did the husband become full-blown and the story have real heft. Only then did I realize that a story about the dissolution of a marriage turned out to actually be a story about ... Well, I'm not going to say. I don't want to give everything away. (But I promise, there's a crime in there!)

This type of analysis can be useful for most stories. Readers become invested when characters feel real. So the more an author understands why a character does what he or she does, the more the character will (hopefully) come across as a complex human being rather than a cardboard cutout. 

I hope I've enticed you to read "A Matter of Trust," maybe with a jelly donut by your side. The story is a current finalist for the Anthony Award and can be read on my website. Just click here. 

But if you'd like to read more sports stories, pick up the anthology it was published in, THREE STRIKES--YOU'RE DEAD! Every story in the book involves crime and sports (baseball--major league, minor league, and high school--biathlon, boxing, bull riding, figure skating (that Thriller Award-nominated story is by fellow SleuthSayer Joseph S. Walker), marching band/football, running, swimming, tennis, ultimate Frisbee, zorbing, and cycling, of course). It can be purchased in trade paperback and ebook formats from the usual online sources. The trade paperback also can be purchased directly from the publisher, Wildside Press.