An Apple Today

by Leigh Lundin

By now you and the rest of the world have heard the news that Steve Jobs died. Once a guy who returned soda bottles to buy food with nickel deposits, this is a man whose Apple salary was $1 a year, or as he put it, he earned 50¢ for showing up at work and 50¢ based on performance. This is the brother of author Mona Simpson. This is a guy whose customers (synonymous with fans) left mounds of apples at his home, each with a single bite out of them.

The World of Apple

One of the cleverest headlines, The Guardian, I think, read 'Steve Jobs, Computer Icon'. Syria, homeland of Jobs' father, is in rebellion but students took note of their fatherland's favorite son. They were hardly alone; from Asia to Europe, people reacted to Jobs' death as they might a superstar's.

An amazing aspect of the Mac was that I was able to sit down in France or Germany or Iceland and use one of their Macintoshes. I might not be able to read a Norse menu, but if I let my hands go by feel, I could use the machine.

My long-time friend and computer teacher Geri choked up on the phone. I couldn't blame her– she'd vested her career and reputation first in computerizing her school and then convincing them Macs were the wave of the future. She's purchased nearly every Apple product except the iPad. (And in October, she remedied that situation!)

MITS Altair

Europe became important to Steve Jobs only partly because of the tremendous support of NeXT from developers like Jean-François Groff, but also from the early Web development that came out of Cern. Minutes before my article was due, my wonderful friend Lela sent me this Jobs history documented by a French writer.

IBM 370 computer room

Why Mac

Through the mid 1970s, my personal computers were the size of SUVs and used more air conditioning than the average Italian village. In 1975, MITS introduced the Altair, arguably the first personal computer. Shortly thereafter, I soldered together an IMSAI 8080 and later bought a Sol-20, both painted 'IBM blue'. The Sol had walnut side panels, supposedly obtained from the leavings of a gunstock manufacturer.

PTC Sol-20

'Complete' systems meant you didn't need to solder the boards but often implied you still had to separately buy floppy drives, keyboards, and monitors. Aficionados pored over issues of Popular Electronics, Dr. Dobb's Journal, and Byte. College students tinkered including Paul Allen and Bill Gates, Steve Wozniak and Steve Jobs. They weren't executives then, they were amateur engineers you could chat up at trade shows.

IMSAI 8080

iWant

In 1977, I paid scant attention to the affordable, expandable, and easy to use Apple ][, but two years later a demonstration of Apple's Lisa caught my imagination. $10,000 proved too steep for most companies let alone personal users, but when the Macintosh rolled out in 1984, I plunked down money to buy a 'fat Mac', a computer I still have.

In an office running two IBM mainframes, several DEC and other computers, the little Macintosh worked away, cranking out great-looking documentation with graphics and reference cards that were a pastiche of IBM's own.

original Macintosh

Since then I've bought few computers other than Macintosh. A Mac is not, as some claim, a Rolls-Royce or Lear Jet. To me, it's more like John Deere or DeWalt. It's a silicon workhorse and when I constantly use a tool, accuracy, reliability, and ease of use become desirable features.

Best Tool for the Job

MacBook Air

When my colleagues Dixon Hill and RT Lawton's lives depend upon a sidearm, price takes a distant second to reliability. The women who cut my hair use scissors priced between $200-300. Sure they could cut hair with a $20 or even a $2 pair of scissors, but precision and comfort are important to them. If they sell their well-kept scissors thirty years from now, they can still demand nearly what they paid for them.

The same is true of the Mac and its famed aesthetics are a bonus. Even counting the Sculley era, Macs somehow manage not to look dated. Style enhanced function and we haven't touched upon Apple's innovation, like the current barely-there MacBook Air, one of the most beautifully designed machines ever.

Innovation

Duo with DuoDock

The PowerBook Duo was one of the cleverest subcompact notebooks ever, what today might be called a netbook: Return from a trip, close the Duo's cover, and slide it into the VCR-like slot of the DuoDock, which suddenly became a full-fledged desktop computer with monitor, keyboard, hard drives, math co-processor, ethernet, and everything else you expect on your desk.

When Apple discontinued the Duo, the outcry was considerable. That was the first time I heard the term 'cult-like following' applied to people who wanted sensible computer products.

These days, I spend inordinate hours pecking away at my keyboard, answering eMail, editing, writing and rewriting stories and articles like this one. The Mac helps me get the job done.

tribute by Jonathan Mak Long

iSad, no

Many admirers and fans expressed sadness, but I won't. My mother once exhorted me to dissuade my 86-year-old grandmother from taking a 'round-the-country bus tour. My mother argued a woman her age shouldn't attempt such a trip, that waiting rooms were cold, awful places, and that grandmother could die on such a trip. "But why not?" I said. "If she died, she'd die doing exactly what she wants to do." Like the crew of the Challenger, how many of us die living our dream?

While people tweet 'iSad' around the world, I'm simply glad one man found a positive way to change the world.

What really happened when Columbus discovered America

by Elizabeth Zelvin

We’re coming up on Columbus Day, and having researched and written two short stories and a Young Adult novel about the events this holiday celebrates, I have quite a different perspective on the matter than most Americans.

The Santa Maria, 1492

For starters, it has nothing to do with Italians. Yes, Columbus was born in Genoa. But the three ships’ crews on the historic first voyage were Spanish. The names of 87 out of 90 have survived. The roster included one Genoese sailor, one Calabrian, one Portuguese, and several Basques. On the second voyage, when the fleet of 17 ships carried more than 1,200 men, the only Genoese, a childhood friend of Columbus, was a rapist and a boor to whose ugly tale I tried to do justice in my novel. Apart from a cabal of Catalans, who at one point mutinied, stole three caravels, and headed back to Spain, these first conquistadores were Spanish, their policies dictated by the needs and desires of King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella in their drive to unify Spain, fill its coffers, expand its dominion in land and trade, and purge it of any taint of dissension from its Christian faith.

The crime connection in this true story is the genocide of the Taino, the indigenous people of the Caribbean islands where Columbus landed, and especially in Hispaniola (Quisqueya to the Taino, Haiti and the Dominican Republic today) where the first settlements were built. It followed the conquest of Granada, the last Moorish (ie Muslim) stronghold in Spain, the expulsion of the Jews on the exact date, August 3, 1492, that Columbus sailed, and the similar extinction of the Guanche, the natives of the Canary Islands, which Spain was in the process of conquering, island by island, at the same time.

The people who greeted Columbus and his crew were peaceable and friendly. They had never seen horses or metal weapons. Columbus described them as “robust and comely.” In a letter to the king and queen, he said: “They are so ingenuous and free with all they have, that no one would believe it who has not seen it; of anything that they possess, if it be asked of them, they never say no; on the contrary, they invite you to share it and show as much love as if their hearts went with it.” He was already considering what good servants they would make. When he failed to find enough gold to impress the sovereigns, the Taino morphed in his mind from potential Christian brethren who must be converted to that valuable commodity, slaves.

The Spaniards were convinced that the Taino had no religion, good news in that no former beliefs would form obstacles to their conversion to Christianity. One of the priests who accompanied the second expedition collected what he called folk tales and published them on his return to Europe. How ironic! In fact, the Taino were describing their religion to Fray Pane, and he didn’t get it. These were a people who settled disputes not by war or litigation, but through a ball game, batey, a team sport similar to soccer. Games also had a ceremonial function, and sometimes they were played for fun.

There is a good explanation for the Taino’s generosity. It was the keystone of their ethical belief system. Matu’um, generosity, was a virtue. But the Spaniards didn’t get it, and neither did Columbus. They took all they were offered—water, food, labor, goods, and especially gold, from nuggets to elaborately worked masks—and took whatever they wanted, including sexual favors, with or without Taino consent. But when two Taino took a couple of European shirts, not even keeping them but bestowing them on their cacique (chief), Spanish justice was immediate and cruel: their noses were slit in the presence of their families, and they narrowly escaped execution.

It’s sometimes said that what really killed off the entire Taino people was illness: European diseases to which they were not immune. This is a copout. Within three years of Columbus’s first landing on October 12, 1492, one-third of the Taino population was already dead. Many committed suicide, using cyanide extracted from cassava, their staple food, rather than endure the penalty for failing to pay the monthly “tribute” of gold that they did not have. In February 1495, the point at which my novel ends, the Spaniards rounded up 1,500 Taino and herded the 500 most likely prospects for slavery into ships’ holds no better than those of African slavers in later centuries. More than 200 were dead and dumped overboard before the ships landed in Europe.

Eurocentric culture has long declared the Taino extinct, although some Caribbean Americans who carry Taino DNA identify themselves as Taino, making efforts to reconstruct the language and their cultural heritage.

Happy Columbus Day.

The Smoking Gun -- Sort of . . .

First: A Little Confession . . .

I suppose there's something I ought to get off my chest -- before you find out from somebody else, and feel I betrayed your trust by not disclosing it up-front.

You see: I smoke cigars.

Five to ten a day, actually.

And, if you happen to be one of those very kind souls who thinks: "Well, maybe he only smokes little ones, with that flavored tobacco that doesn't smell so bad," I'm afraid I have to disabuse you of that notion.

The cigars I smoke aren't small at all; they're usually six to eight inches long, by a fifty-four to sixty ring gauge. Sometimes larger. (Maybe this is a good time to ask Rob if congress can confirm that Freud really said, "Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.") Additionally, my cigars are never made from sweet smelling flavored tobacco; they're malodorous and strong. Very strong. Fidel Castro Cigar strong (which means they're rough--and absolutely evil-smelling ... if you don't like cigars, that is.)

I acquired this "classy" habit for the same reason most Special Forces Engineer Sergeants do. You see, an SF Engineer is the "Demo Man," or explosives expert on an A-Team. We're taught to construct field-expedient demolitions and/or incendiary devices out of common household products, so that we can fabricate and employ explosives even when working in a denied environment (a place ruled by the other side during war time) when we haven't received a resupply in a while.

And, like every other SF Engineer who's served time on Smoke Bomb Hill back at Ft. Bragg, I was taught that a cigar can be used as a "punk" to light military time-fuse during high wind conditions. (You can't do this with a pipe or cigarette, because they don't burn hot enough to ignite the powder train inside the fuse.) Consequently, I taught myself to smoke cigars. And, if you ever wind up meeting a dozen men who work on an A-Team for some reason, it's a good bet that the two guys smoking cigars are the Team's Engineers.

Naturally, over time I came to learn a few tricks of the trade concerning how to light time-fuse this way. First: it helps to tap the ash off the end of your cigar before you hold it to the fuse. Otherwise the ash can act as an insulator, and you might wind up melting the plastic casing around the fuse without igniting the powder train within. This means you have to hack off a length of melted fuse, and try all over again. Likewise, it helps if you give the cigar a few strong puffs, to stoke the heat, just before touching it to the fuse. And, finally: Try not to draw (inhale) through the cigar, once you've touched it to a fuse, because some of the plastic usually melts into the end of the cigar -- and dragging those noxious fumes into your oral cavity is a rather unfortunate experience.

I picked up that last tip, as a very new engineer, when lighting a series of four charges my A-Team had emplaced during a training raid. The charges were roughly fifty meters apart, and I had to sprint between them in order to minimize our time on target. By the time I was finished puffing the fuse on the fourth charge to life, my head was spinning. When we pulled off the target, I was doing my impression of "Julie" in the opening credits of that old television show The Mod Squad -- my feet barely touching the ground as two guys ran alongside, carrying me between them.

What does all this have to do with sleuthing, you ask?

Well, since I enjoy cigars, I sometimes have my story characters stop by my favorite cigar store here in Scottsdale. I thought this was an original idea of mine -- until Leigh pointed out that this idea was so old, it had been used in Martin Kane, Private Eye, which is billed as the very first television detective show. Martin Kane (played by William Gargan --seen in the photo, left. Gargan was the first of three actors to play the roll).

In the show, Kane smoked a pipe, and each episode featured a trip to the detective's tobacconist, where Kane would review the case -- and discuss tobacco with the store's proprietor -- because the show was sponsored by the U.S. Tobacco company. These tobacco shop trips were actually an early form of product-placement advertisement.

I'm disappointed to add another entry to my "nothing new under the sun" file, but wasn't really too surprised. I've noticed that (particularly in the past) an inordinate number of fictional detectives seem to smoke.

I suspect part of the reason is that smoking makes what actors call "good stage business." In other words, it gives characters something to do with their hands. Additionally, a writer can use details concerning someone's smoking to highlight character traits. What is the difference, for instance, between a man who uses a set of gold snippers to clip the end off his cigar, then lights it with a solid gold lighter -- compared with -- a man who bites the end off his cigar, spits it out, then lights up with a battered Zippo. What if he lights it with a match that he strikes on his thumbnail? Or, on the heel of his work boot?

Would a woman's character change, in your mind, if instead of smoking a cigarette, she smoked a cigar? What if she were the one biting the end off, and striking the match on her work boot?

I suspect that the nature of the characters described above shifts subtly as you go through the two paragraphs. Did you wonder, for instance, if the cigar smoking woman in work boots was a contemporary feminist, or did you perhaps jump to the idea that she inhabits a WWII setting and works as a "Rosie the Riveter?"

It may interest you to know, incidentally, that in my part-time occupation as a fill-in body at the cigar store near my house, I've become acquainted with several women who smoke cigars, and one or two who smoke pipes.

I freely admit that:
(A) Other props used by characters can reveal the same or similar character traits.
(B) Smoking is bad for you.

On the other hand, when someone smokes in a novel or film, particularly a contemporary one, I think that reveals an aspect of his/her character.

Smoking and detectives have traveled around in the same circles since long before the old pulp days. In fact, if you think about it,: Sherlock Holmes smoked pipes -- and cigars, if I recall correctly.

Can you imagine Marlowe without at least an occasional smoke in his hand? Would it change how you perceived his character, or even subtly alter the tone of the enttire work? I think it would, but you're free to disagree with me. In fact, that's what we've got the comments section below for. So -- feel free to blast away! (Assuming we've worked out the bugs.) You won't hurt my feelings; I've been called reams of unprintable names by army sergeants screaming at the tops of their lungs, and learned to let it roll off my back a long time ago.

What about Peter Falk's character in the TV show Columbo? Can you envision Lt. Columbo without his trademark cigar stump (it seemed almost never to be lit)? Admittedly, he would still have that car and trench coat, the ruffled hair, and sometimes that basset hound. But, can you see him holding up a gnarled hand to say, "Just one more question, sir," without a cigar stump parked between two of his fingers?

And, as long as we're covering television detectives, we might as well cover the other side of the balance sheet too.


Telly Savalas smoked cigarettes through much of the first season of Kojak. But, the writers changed that -- supposedly in response to non-smoking pressure from the public -- by creating a scene in which a meter maid chewed him out for smoking all the time. She handed him a Tootsie Pop to chew on, instead. And, the rest (as they say) is TV history.

The trend of connecting tobacco to fictional detectives has been changing for a long time, and continues to be in flux today. I'm not the kind of guy who advocates that anyone take up smoking anything (unless we're talking about somebody who walks into the cigar store while I'm working). But, it seems to me that smoking has its uses, when it comes to detective fiction -- if for no other reason than to demonstrate who the bad guy is.

What do you think?

Inspirational Smiles

by Deborah Elliott-Upton

This photo was taken by my daughter when I needed a new head shot for my press kit to accompany an essay I wrote for the 2009 Bylines Writers Desk Calendar. If you're not familar with the calendar, you can check out their web site at www.bylinescalendar.com I must have one every year.

The story behind the photo is my own Mona Lisa smile moment.

My daughter is pretty clever at constructing the setups for photo shoots. She had this great hat and I already owned the Trench coat. After more than several attempts, both of us admitted we weren't happy with the way the photos were turning out. I'm not the most photogenic person, so it's always difficult, but this one was frustrating. If I described the photo we both wanted, it would be fabulous. In reality, I appeared stiff, the props dead on the page. I just wasn't "feeling it."

When I wanted to quit, my daughter suggested I think of something very serious. Just when I had something in mind, she said something that made me laugh. This picture is the result. The Byline editor loved it and told me I should use it for all my publicity. Nice people say it captures my personality. Truthful people say it shows my decidedly wicked personality. What's the secret words behind the smile? Only my daughter and I know the truth causing this particular smile and neither of us are talking.

Following is the article inspiring the photo shoot. I hope you enjoy it.

Evergreens packed the landscape around Lake Tahoe like sardines in a tin. My brother-in-law, Charlie, drove along the lake's perimeter with one hand on the wheel, the other directing our attention to points of interest. My sister, Connie, had invited my husband and me along on their Reno vacation. I wanted to see the Ponderosa where Pa Cartwright raised those three strapping, good-looking sons. My sister wanted to visit the casinos. Our guys just wanted to relax in the skit resort cabin. Now driving around the lake, my mind wandered.

Connie turned halfway in her seat to face me. "What do you think?" she asked.

Studying the steep drop to the lake, I answered, "How easy it'd be to roll a dead body at midnight down the slope, watch it bounce among the trees like a pinball machine and finally plop into the lake."

When I glanced up, three sets of raised eyebrows and stone-cold silence reminded me I was a mystery writer and these three were not.

Writers imagine tragic stories about the new school teacher's background and give the librarian a secret, lurid past. The letter carrier may be a spy. Our dog's grromer sends secret codes via implants in our household pets.

Being a writer is fun using a wickedly delicious sense of imagination for ideas. All we have to do is look beyond the ordinary for inspiration.

In Context

by Robert Lopresti

Follow up to my lament below. I have found a way to put the hotlinks in bold.
Beloved readers;

You may have figured out that Blogger is giving us some problems. This is mortifying for me because I was the one who suggested using it as a platform. Here's the latest kink: I put a number of hotlinks in this article and they are there and working but they aren't underlined as is usually the case. You have to run a cursor over them to find the damned things. THEN the underline appears. I have no idea why. So think of it as a fun game! Or don't. Grumble.

Back at our Old Location I may have mentioned three or four hundred times in passing that I am a reference librarian, and on occasion I have pointed out a favorite reference book or two.  Today's volume is a special treat for me because it is a government document. That's right, it was compiled with your tax dollars, so thanks very much.

Respectfully Quoted was edited by Suzy Platt and published by the Library of Congress in 1989. And this is cool, you can search it full-text online. (Sorry about the annoying ad that pops up.)

Briefly, RQ is a book of quotations compiled by a branch of the Library of Congress called the Congressional Research Service. So what makes it different from all the other dictionaries of smart-babble?

Pithy party

Well, let's think for a moment about how such books are compiled. There are two main methods. Either some expert reads a whole lot of books and finds a line he likes, says "Ooh! That's pithy!" and writes it down, or some expert reads a whole lot of books and finds quotations that other people have used, and writes them down.

But this book was compiled differently. You see, the CRS works exclusively for congresspersons and their staffs. So each of the lines in this book was asked about by a representative or a senator.

Well, what lazy devils. Why did they bother a bunch of librarians? Why didn't they just look it up in Bartlett's like everybody else?

You see, this is what makes the book unique. Let's say you are a senator preparing a speech. You find the perfect quotation, witty, to the point, perfectly making your case while devastating your opponents. You make your speech to wild applause.

The next day a reporter calls to ask why you had chosen to quote a statement that had originally been made in defense of Stalin's purges. At that point you know this is not going to be a good day.

If you are a politician you want to know the context in which something was said before you quote it. You don't want to use a term like final solution, modest proposal, or even crusade without knowing what they mean to some people. (Of course, you may also use quotes to pass a message to some of your listeners, which is sometimes called a dog whistle. Some people claim Michelle Bachmann is a master of this technique.) It would also be nice to know that the quote is genuine, and not something made up entirely or attributed to someone who didn't say it. And that's what makes Respectfully Quoted unusual. Each quotation has been checked back to its source and often provided with a context.

Who said?

All of these fall into the category of "attributed to but we can't find them among their works."

"Elect us and we shall restore law and order." Often attributed to Adolf Hitler.

"We must all hang together, or most assuredly we shall all hang separately." Attributed to Ben Franklin.

"You may fool all the people some of the time; you can even fool some of the people all the time; but you can’t fool all of the people all the time." Attributed to Abraham Lincoln.

"England and America are two countries separated by the same language" Attributed to George Bernard Shaw.

“The finest Congress money can buy.” Mark Twain did not say it. He did write the following: "I think I can say, and say with pride, that we have some legislatures that bring higher prices than any in the world." He intended to say this at a Fourth of July gathering in England but the US ambassador, General Schenck, decided that after his own wonderful speech no more were needed and cancelled Twain's. What a peach Schenck must have been to work for, huh?

Surprising sources

"Fifth Column." General:Emilio Mola used the term in the Spanish Civil War to describe those inside Madrid who would help the four columns of attackers outside.

"Founding Fathers." Apparently comes from that great speaker Warren Gamaliel Harding.


Odd but true

"These are stayed neither by snow nor rain nor heat nor darkness from accomplishing their appointed course with all speed." Who originated the famous motto of the mailman? Would you believe Herodotus? He was describing the messenger service of the Persian King Xerxes.

"You see things; and you say 'Why?' But I dream things that never were; and I say 'Why not?' I remember Ted Kennedy at his brother Bobby's funeral quoting Bobby quoting JFK with very similar words. But they come from George Bernard Shaw, who put them in the forked mouth of none other than Satan.

"I wept because I had no shoes until I met a man who had no feet." A boiled-down version of a a parable by medieval Arabic poet Sadi.

"There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics." Attributed to Mark Twain, but Twain attributed it to Benjamin Disraeli.

"Winning isn't everything, it's the only thing." Vince Lombardi says he didn't say it. Some people say he did. Others says Red Sanders did.

"If an army of monkeys were strumming on typewriters they might write all the books in the British Museum." - Sir Arthur S. Eddington.

It's a fun book to browse. But don't quote me.

The Class of Writing, Part I

Undetered (or perhaps (shudder) drawn) by Leigh's communiqués covering the weirdness of Florida, Susan Slater recently moved from the Southwestern US (New Mexico, Arizona) to Palm Coast, between St. Augustine and Daytona. First she was beset with internet problems, then Sunday she telephoned SleuthSayers International Headquarters. horrified that her computer had died. Fortunately, she'd sent in her intended article, which appears today. Unfortunately, she will have to introduce herself personally when she gets her new machine. (She's considering using this opportunity to switch from PCs to a Mac, possibly an iMac, a Macbook air– or both! Me, I stick with my Underwood.)

Susan is the author of several Southwest mystery novels including single title and series, including the Ben Pecos series. She's also the author of the breakout 'henlit' novel, 0 to 60.

— Velma

The Class of Writing, Part I

by Susan Slater

Most readers today– certainly those thirty-five and younger grew up with computers! They expect their information demands to be met quickly–they IM, email, download, text, twitter, speed-dial– anything that saves them time. And information is always at their fingertips– iPods, Blackberries, cell phones, laptops– the pace of life seems frantic and the amount of information staggering!

It's certainly no longer necessary to describe the elephant! The gorgeous prose of yesteryear is almost non-existent! We are exposed to so much more today. Poor Miss Marple is no longer gory enough– not when the reader has just seen a murder/suicide on the six o'clock news.

Taking It Home

How different from when I grew up. I wrote in a journal, posted notes to friends, sent honest-to-goodness thank-you notes on real paper in real envelopes (no Jacquie Larson here). As a child I read books written a hundred years before my time–and loved them. The richness of back-story, the lushness of description– I wanted to be another Bronte or Austen or at the very least an Agatha. I wanted to "live" with those characters–grow with them. A chat with Hercule Piorot? Too perfect.

I always chose the 'fattest' book on the library shelf to take on vacation–it had to last a week! No beach read, commuter scan, or summer light-weight for me. I personally think it's a shame we have very few epics being written today. I know I was meant to write The Thornbirds!

But in our bottom-line driven society, terms like having punch and to-the-point take precedence. There's very little patience for carefully crafted, in-depth stories with memorable characters. We have formula romance and formula mysteries. Readers demand (and get) fast-paced stories that mirror their lives. There are not a lot of characters in fiction today that I'd want to take home!

Attracting That Audience

So what does this mean for writers? If we want to attract a reading audience, we MUST take heed or not be published! This modern-day pacing has changed the way we write.
We no longer have the luxury of wallowing in lengthy back-story or page after page of description– hey, our readers have been there, done that. And they can always Google a topic they're not familiar with.

All this ranting brings me to some advice. Having taught writing for many years, I tried to come up with what might be the most helpful to writers. Comments on plot, characterization, scenes, POV? All are great topics but I decided to start (and aptly so) with beginnings. Those opening paragraphs that will make or break you. And I'm not just talking about "hooks"– but maybe more the nuances. See what you think.

• Question: What do readers need to know right up front??

First paragraph, first 5 pages, first 10?

• Answer: Whatever will keep them reading!

1. It could a foreshadowing. Consider Connie Shelton's opening to Memories Can Be Murder:

   We come to certain crossroads in our lives. It is inevitable. Some are planned–marriage, career changes, cross-country moves. At other times we come to these crossroads quite suddenly, with no warning. I was orphaned in such a way over fifteen years ago and managed to get on with my life anyway. But within the past few days the discovery of some boxes of old papers dumped my preconceived ideas about my own life suddenly and completely upside down.

2. If you don't want to "bait" your reader, snag him with a description (setting the stage or establishing tone) of something so unusual that he's propelled to continue. For example, Tony Hillerman in A Thief of Time:

"The Moon had risen just above the cliff behind her. Out on the packed sand of the wash bottom the shadow of the walker made a strange elongated shape. Sometimes it suggested a heron, sometimes one of those stick-figure forms of an Anasazi pictograph. An animated pictograph, its arms moving rhythmically as the moon shadow drifted across the sand. Sometimes, when the goat trail bent and put the walker's profile against the moon, the shadow became Kokopelli himself. The back pack formed the spirit's grotesque hump, the walking stick Kokopelli's crooked flute. Seen from above, the shadow would have made a Navajo believe that the great yei northern clans called Watersprinkler had taken visible form. If an Anasazi had risen from his thousand-year grave in the trash heap under the cliff ruins here, he would have seen the Humpbacked Flute Player, the rowdy god of fertility of his lost people. But the shadow was only the shape of Dr. Eleanor Friedman-Bernal blocking out the light of an October moon."

3. Or pull the reader directly into the action–often done through dialogue. Let the reader experience (or discover) what is happening along with the main character. Consider Susan Slater's opening to 0 to 60:
   

   "I have a love child."
   
   "Ed, I don't have time for games. Ok, Ok, give me a hint. Movie? Novel?"
   
   She continued to slip his tux from its protective covering, twist the hanger handle perpendicular, and stretch to secure it over the closet door. She smiled. They hadn't played a version of What's That Line? for years. But back when things were simple– before children, a demanding job with a six-figure salary– they'd open a bottle of wine and just be together. Would it be like that again now that he was retiring?

   Here the reader is 'with' Shelly when she learns that her marriage is a sham. By experiencing the event, the reader buys into the story (perhaps, identifies with it) and wants to find out how Shelly will handle the crisis.
   
   Consider also, Erica Holtzer's Eye for an Eye, where a mother is on the phone with her daughter on Halloween and hears what happens when the daughter opens the door to what she thinks is more trick-or-treaters. The reader is right there experiencing it with her.


4. If I'm writing a short story–where I do not have the luxury of space–I have to make every sentence count especially in the first paragraph. I call it the "10 in 10" rule– 10 facts in the opening paragraph of 10 lines! Look at the following opening paragraph from An Eye for an Eye, my contribution to the anthology of short stories commemorating the 50^th anniversary of Rod Serling's Twilight Zone. Can you find all the facts? ONLY count those that further the story–those that are necessary to the plot:
   

   Sliding behind the steering wheel, Edie started the rental and quickly turned the heater to three before pulling a New Mexico map from the glove box. At least she couldn't get lost. Ha! Her friends would laugh at that. She had been known to screw up going from point A to B in a straight line. But not this time. She shook out the map and traced the route with her index finger: highway 64 from Taos, west across the Gorge, cross 285 at Tres Piedras, continue on 64 and follow the signs to Durango. Piece of cake. Yeah, right. What the map didn't say was beware of wildlife. Was she taking a chance starting out well after dark? Probably. But as usual she was running late. Just another stressor. One she'd promised her shrink to work on.

Did you find these?

• Her name is Edie
• She's driving a rental
• She's in New Mexico
• She's going from Taos to Durango
• It's cold out
• She's sometimes inept–gets lost easily
• Wildlife on the road could pose a danger
• It's well after dark
• She's running late
• Being late is a stressor that she's promised her shrink to work on

Obviously, if your opening paragraph only has 5 lines or 8, the facts would match.

• Question: How do you know where (within your story) to start?

My response might surprise you.

• Answer: Next week!

Fran's Article

Folks, please bear with us. We suffered a glitch that knocked Fran's article off-line. Fran's writing must have been too HOT for Blogger

We'll return at midnight with tomorrow's article by Susan Slater.

The Crime of Capital Punishment

by Leigh Lundin

In mystery stories, the crime story typically ends with the detective's dénouement explaining how he arrived at his conclusions. In some of the 1940s radio plays, the protagonist might even chortle: "Old Sparky will electrify you, Eli!" or "It's the gallows for you, Gusman!"

In real life, this can be the point when the plot intensifies if it's believed detectives or the prosecutor got it wrong. And, in a surprising number of cases, they do. Common wisdom argues a tiny fraction are mistaken, but common wisdom is wrong. Looking only at DNA cases, the State of Illinois discovered one in sixteen condemned men were innocent, but cases of actual innocence could be double that. Experts extrapolate that as many as one in eight men sent to their deaths may be innocent. If they're right, three hundred currently on death row might not be guilty.

That number may be extremely conservative because the Innocence Project exonerated 250 men by February of last year. The pace is slowing… in many cases there is no DNA to connect the crime with the accused but, according to Innocence Project statistics, eyewitness identification erred in an astonishing 70% of their cases. Even in up-close-and-personal rape, identification is often wrong.

The Court of Lost Appeal

Another reason the pace is slowing is that prosecutors and courts throw up impediments to testing. Prosecutors sometimes 'lose' evidence or launch legal arguments to prevent testing.

In Kafkaesque rulings two years ago, the Supreme Court slapped down the Innocence Project. They held that prisoners have no right to post-conviction DNA testing. The Supreme Court expressed deep disdain when DNA was used to exonerate. In dismissing exculpatory DNA evidence, one of the justices wrote that forensic science has "serious deficiencies". Chief Justice Roberts expressed a fear that post-conviction DNA testing risks "unnecessarily overthrowing the established system of criminal justice."

Finality

In middle school, we're taught the accused are considered innocent until adjudged guilty. This remains true even though the prosecution comes to court with several advantages and the defense is often, well, defensive.

To this Court, 'finality'– the court's term for closure– is more important than accuracy. As law professor General Beishline said, "If you've come to the law seeking justice, you've come to the wrong church."

The AEDPA, Gingrinch legislation signed into law by President Clinton, prohibits federal courts from remedying miscarriages of justice. The AEDPA rendered federal courts powerless to correct state courts' misinterpretations of U.S. constitutional and federal law. Judges may try to step outside legalities to set matters to right, but few judges are willing to risk their careers. They are, after all, subject to elections and reappointments.

Execution of 'Anarchists', Chicago, 1887     (credit: ChicagoHistory.org)

Savvy and Savaging Politics

Arkansas: Capital punishment makes good politics. During his first presidential campaign, Governor Bill Clinton returned to Little Rock to sign the death warrant of a mentally deficient man (who was saving his pecan pie until after his execution). Clinton may have had in mind the lessons of another governor, Michael Dukakis who'd cleared the way for Willie Horton to be freed.

Florida: Our Florida governor Bob Martinez started signing death warrants his first full day in office as quickly as they were slapped on his desk. When it appeared he would lose re-election, he ramped up executions against international protests. Several legal experts are convinced he wittingly executed innocent men. As the Innocent Project demonstrated significant numbers of the condemned were truly innocent, Florida (like North Carolina's Inquiry Commission) recently established a commission to review doubtful cases.

Texas: The last two governors of Texas who campaigned for president set records in numbers of executions. Both Governor Bush and Governor Perry asserted Texas never wrongfully executed anyone, ever. Governor Perry was so convinced, he shut down a state investigation by the somewhat gutless Texas Forensic Science Commission that was looking into doubtful convictions. As writer J.D. Bell said, "If Perry was certain of Texas' infallibility in assuring the guilt of all 235 men sent to death during his gubernatorial reign, then there surely would be no reason to block a thorough investigation into Willingham's execution."

Illinois: Governor George Ryan has had his woes, but his legacy may have helped reshape capital punishment in the land of Lincoln. Once freed from political constraints, he turned his attention to the nearly 300 men on death row. In a matter of months, 18 were exonerated, not merely judged not guilty but proved not guilty.

Two Wrongs

Almost as bad as executing the wrong man, the real perpetrator likely goes free. In the recent Troy Davis case, after seven witnesses recanted their stories, the remaining chief accuser against Davis was the most likely suspect. Calls for relief from conservatives and liberals, from religious and political leaders went unheeded. Psychologists contend his repeated trips to the execution chamber were a form of torture.

When witnesses recant, appeals courts and parole boards almost invariably take the position witnesses lie the second time. Though convenient for the prosecution, that psychology seems backwards to me. Transcripts coming out of parole hearings show boards strongly influenced by prosecution bias and seldom by the notion that a jury erred. Indeed, the last judge who looked over Troy Davis' new evidence and witness recantations agreed there was some little mitigation, but in the end wrote Davis failed to prove his absolute innocence and that repudiations were "smoke and mirrors."

Make a Write

The English teacher in my tiny high school formed debate teams. I'm grateful to Miss Arthur's debates for a couple of reasons. First, I'm still amazed how often the fallacies taught in debate show up unchallenged on talk radio. Secondly, the exigencies of preparation forced me to thoroughly research the death penalty. For a multitude of reasons– ethical, technical, financial, and moral– I came away convinced capital punishment was wrong.

But mine isn't the final opinion— it is only mine. Yours may differ and feel welcome to talk about it here.

(We're still hearing some are having trouble posting comments even after following the guidelines above right. Try other 'profile' options to get that comment to us.)

Some Like It Hot

One of my favorite sub-genres is film noir. That term usually brings to mind titles out of the past like The Maltese Falcon and Double Indemnity (and Out of the Past), but I like the neo-noirs as well: Blood Simple, The Grifters, L.A. Confidential, etc. And yes, I realize I'm talking about screen fiction rather than our usual page fiction. But I can't help myself. I'm a certified, card-carrying movie maniac.

Balmy and Palmy

One of the best of these newer noirs, I think, is a film called Body Heat. I enjoyed it when I first saw it, years ago, and I've probably watched it half a dozen times since, on cable and tape and DVD. It always makes me long for more novels and stories and movies about conniving women, lovesick men, Chandleresque dialogue, and dark, steamy plots in which the guys always think they're in control but they're not. One of the female lead's more memorable quotes to the male lead in BH was, "You're not too smart, are you? I like that, in a man."

In my opinion, Body Heat had everything: a storyline with twists and turns throughout, unforgettable characters, a surprise ending, smart dialogue, and a sweltering Florida setting (the fictional Miranda Beach, just north of Miami) that made you think This couldn't have happened anywhere else. And the late John Barry's score was one of his best. Most of this soundtrack was different arrangements of the same tune, but it was still outstanding, and the saxophone theme in the opening scene set the mood for the whole film. Barry was one of those masters whose music could make an already good movie (Goldfinger, Somewhere in Time, Dances With Wolves) far better.

Mrs. Walker, You're Trying to Seduce Me

Like many successful films, this one featured no superstars. Before they exchanged body heat, William Hurt and Kathleen Turner weren't familiar to movie audiences -- I think he had two previous film credits and she had none. Anytime I see them now, it's hard not to picture them as Ned Racine and Matty Walker. Racine was a lazy, incompetent lawyer suffering from subtropical depression and Matty was a sexy and mysterious married woman whose temperature, she told him in that throaty voice of hers, always ran a couple of degrees high. I also picture them sweaty. And I'm not talking about just the love scenes. Everybody in Body Heat was sweating, all the time. Even at the office, or in court, or at concerts, or during meetings, or at lunch. (The same kind of thing happened in A Time to Kill. One would think nobody south of the Mason-Dixon had ever heard of air conditioning.)

A piece of trivia: BH supposedly takes place during a Florida heat wave. In reality, it was filmed during one of the coldest winters in the state's history. Constant perspiration was supplied by crew members in warm coats and gloves who hurried around with spritz bottles and sprayed water onto the already shivering, sometimes barely-dressed actors. Turner once mentioned in an interview that she often crunched and held ice cubes in her mouth until just before she had to say her lines, so her breath wouldn't make clouds in the freezing air when she spoke.

Aides and Abettors

This was also one of those movies where even the supporting cast does a great job. Mickey Rourke had a punky, street-smart role that seemed to have been written especially for him; Ted Danson was surprisingly good as Hurt's tapdancing fellow lawyer, and had some of the best lines; reluctant cop J.A. Preston reminded us that at least one person in this story knew right from wrong; and Richard Crenna, best known to audiences back then as farmer Luke McCoy, was somehow believable as the rich and obnoxious (and doomed) husband of the femme fatale. By the way, one of the incriminating clues -- the fact that a pair of eyeglasses the murder victim always wore were missing from the scene of the crime -- was so clever I wound up using it myself years later, in a short mystery I sold to Woman's World. And one of the things I remember most about the film was the delicious buildup of tension in the ten minutes or so before the final action scene, which -- believe me -- ended with a BANG.

More trivia: I've heard that one of the producers -- Alan Ladd, Jr., I think -- demanded that director Lawrence Kasdan have William Hurt shave off his mustache before filming began. Ladd thought it made him look "too sleazy." Kasdan refused, and the mustache stayed put. Sleazy was exactly the look he wanted.

Is It Hot in Here, or Is It Just Me?

It's often been said that Body Heat was a remake of 1944's Double Indemnity. Maybe it was. I liked DI a lot too -- but I think BH is actually a better movie. If you enjoy crime/mystery/suspense (and I assume you do, if you're reading this blog), here's a piece of Miami advice: buy or rent Body Heat. And if you've seen it I'd like to hear your opinion.

There's one more thing I always remember anytime I think of this movie. Back in the mid-80s I made a practice of taping uncut and commercial-free movies off Showtime and Cinemax, to watch later. Since my dad, who passed away years ago, loved westerns, and since he and my mother lived too far out in the country to get cable back then, I got into the habit of occasionally taking him a six-hour videocassette of (on the same tape) two or three movies with John Wayne, Clint Eastwood, etc. Well, one day I left him a tape that contained, I think, High Noon first, Rio Bravo next, and (although I'd forgotten it was on there) the uncensored version of Body Heat. I later realized what I'd done, and even though I figured that BH would be way too risque for him or Mom, I also figured that if he found it on the tape he'd see right away that it wasn't a horse opera and wouldn't bother to watch it at all. As things turned out, a couple weeks later I was on the phone with my mother, and asked her if Dad had liked the movies on that latest tape I'd given him. She said, "He must have. I think he watched that third one five times."

Way to go, Pop.

In the Shadows

C'mon in. Pull up a Bacardi and Coke, throw in a slice of lime, make yourself comfortable and let's talk. Some of you already know me and that's fine. Some of you may have heard a little about me amd that's fine too. And, some of you may be asking yourself, "Who the heck is this guy?" And, that's really okay. I don't mind at all.

See, I spent twenty-five years in the shadows using several different aliases on the street, trying to avoid publicity. In my prior business, if you became known then you'd best be working in a very large population area, else move on to other territory. There's nothing like walking into a house or a bar undercover and suddenly realizing there's somebody in the place who knows you and what you do. Yeah, it's happened, ...more times than I would have liked.

Oh sure, I had a gun tucked inside my belt and concealed back underneath my shirt, but I only carried one. The other side often had their own weapons, and there was usually more than one of those guys at our little get-togethers. Yes, I did have a surveillance team as close as they could get and still stay out of sight, but most of the time they were several minutes away when seconds might count. And no, I didn't like to wear a wire transmitting our conversation to the outside just in case the opposition decided to shake me down. Guns they didn't mind. After all, they had their own and half expected you to do the same, but wires tended to bother them. Plus, some of the more sophisticated organizations had electronic equipment to detect transmitting frequencies that weren't theirs.

Let's just say they were a very untrusting lot, so when I pretended to be someone else, I had to have my story straight. There were times in the old Kansas City days when I taped a piece of paper on the wall by the phone. The left hand column listed the aliases I was using and the right hand column had the names of potential defendants who'd be calling for that particular name. business was good. No doubt there're a few psychiatrists out there who have written dissertations on multiple personalities and therefore have strong opinions on the subject. As for me, to this day I'll still answer to a lot of different names if I think someone is talking to me. It's a different life, but you get used to it.

Don't get the wrong idea, the job wasn't all excitement. Our Rule of Thumb said it was ninety percent boredom: doing paperwork, or waiting for the snitch to call, or the potential defendant to show up at a pre-arranged meeting site. Seems a lot of them boys couldn't tell time very well even if some did wear a Rolex. Only about ten percent of the job was adrenaline: stepping into the criminal world with a made up story as to who you were this time, or kicking doors with an arrest warrant when the case was done and the object of your intentions might have made up his mind he wasn't going back behind the walls for another stint, or taking the wheel in a high speed surveillance breaking red lights and hoping nothing went wrong.

Anonymity was my friend back then. In any case, I think you can see why it's kinda difficult for me sometimes to step out into the bright lights where most authors go when they're seeking publicity in order to advance their writing career.

Turns out, even my first three short stories got published in an undercover fashion. In those days, the federal agency I worked for didn't allow its Special Agents to have any outside employment. Somehow, they even construed this policy to to prohibit the writing and publishing of short stories. However, since the agency also taught us how to construct an alias with appropriate documents, and how to work undercover, I merely put their training to use. The byline on those first three stories was a nickname I used on the street, the payment checks came to a Post Office box in the name of an undercover alias, and the checks... well, let's just say it was easier in those days to cash them under a name that wasn't yours. Obviously, the agency had an excellent training program because none of this came to their attention.

Now I'm retired, so I write short mystery fiction for fun and profit. Roughly a third of my stories have been sold to Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine where I have four different series going. Where do I get my story characters? Most of them walk right in off the street from the old days and sit down for a little chat from the past. Them people haven't aged a bit, they're frozen in time. Plots and story lines? These guys are all scam artists and they want their stories told, even if it is the fictionalized version. Call it a form of immortality through the printed word.

Okay, here's my first installment on this blog, so if you got any questions or topics you'd like brought up, just shoot 'em in. Who knows, they could end up in one of our future talks.

Well, it's getting late, my glass is empty and I got to go. Be looking for you in a couple of weeks. Seems I signed up for this gig on the Fortnight Plan. Guess you could say that way I can still keep one foot in the shadows where I find life more comfortable. See ya around.

Desperately Seeking Detectives

Consider the flood of detective novels, mysteries, and thrillers. Consider that, unlike the Victorians and the Edwardians, a jewel robbery or two is not enough to elevate the reader's heartbeat. Consider that, except maybe in the hands of Karin Fossum, a single victim is currently small potatoes. And consider that with only two sexes, the permutations of she killed him, he killed her, he killed him, etc don't go very far.

What's a writer to do for variety? There are the save the world thrillers of great ambition and small plausibility, and the serial killers that have just about displaced Nazis as an all-purpose menace. But the sovereign source of originality remains The Detective.

Here the profession has shown almost unlimited ingenuity. We've had all manner of police from every age and every nation. Monks and priests likewise, to be joined by Chinese scholars and Japanese potters. Little old ladies who haunt prize gardens and country houses share the shelves with little old men (and some not so old) who pontificate from their armchairs.

There are gumshoes of every type, ditto journalists, those other licensed snoops. Railroad engineers fussed about malfeasance along the rails and titled lords who find unpleasantness at their clubs rub elbows with Greek scholars navigating the shoals of the ancient world and their Roman counterparts loose in the Empire, not to mention swaggering Renaissance gentlemen abroad in low company.

Even species is no bar, either, especially for the feline tribe with cats as assistants, cats as narrators and witnesses. The mind boggles.

Of course, every detective needs a weakness and here, again, the profession has been creative. The old broken heart (Lord Peter Wimsey) and alcohol problems (Philip Marlowe) have been greatly expanded. One of Dick Francis's protagonists had a hand crippled from a racing accident. Jeffrey Deaver went several steps better with Lincoln Rhyme, his quadriplegic detective, while Jonathan Lethem gave his Lionel Essrog Tourette's syndrome, which certainly added an original flavor to the narrative.

But to the best of my knowledge no one before Alice LaPlante has attempted a mystery narrated by an Alzheimer's patient, although Faulkner had the profoundly retarded Benjy narrate part of the mysterious The Sound and the Fury.

The main character of Turn of Mind keeps a sign in her kitchen, informing whoever maybe concerned that she is Dr. Jennifer White, 64, suffering from dementia. A former top hand surgeon and a widow with two grown children, she is initially still able to read and capable of writing down the events of the day as Magdalena, her caregiver urges her to do.

But there are gaps and nowhere are those moments in the mental abyss more noticeable than when the murder of her long time friend and neighbor, Amanda O'Toole, is at issue. Dr. White forgets that her friend is dead; Dr. White grieves and is lonely, and then Dr. White forgets again. Not uncommon with a dementia patient, but this one is different. This one is not only a grieving survivor but also a 'person of interest' in the death.

Who knocked the formidable Amanda on the head, and then removed four of the fingers of her right hand? Surgically removed, that is. Does Dr. White not know? Or does Dr. White not remember? Or does Dr. White not want to remember?

These are the chief mysteries of Turn of Mind, although other questions emerge in the course of the novel, and LaPlante's skillful plotting creates a good amount of suspense. Almost everything is filtered through Dr. White's increasingly fragmented mind, and it is fair enough to call her both suspect and detective. Despite a capable investigating officer, the case is ultimately resolved through the doctor's almost dissolved memories. By the end, although she barely registers it, the doctor presents the reader with the truth.

The portraits of both women, and also of Dr. White's two problematic children, Mark and Fiona, are sharp and complex. The doctor's memories of her husband, James, and of her children when young and of her friendship with Amanda and her husband Peter are all imaginatively handled. Though broken up by plausible gaps in Dr. White's consciousness, we eventually get a good picture of a complex woman in complicated relationships.

If the good doctor occasionally seems to have retained too much - she gets loose in her old clinic and gives perfectly good medical advice for a half hour or so - the sense the novel gives of a good mind crumbling is more genuinely scary than any number of terrorist plots or serial killers. In Turn of Mind, LaPlante has scored a rare double, finding not only a unique 'detective' but a uniquely terrifying antagonist in Alzheimer's disease. The result is an imaginative and provocative volume.

Missed Connections

Missed Connection 1, a photo by ChildOfAtom on Flickr.

You’ve probably seen the ads in weekly newspapers or certain websites. They generally go something like this:

Where: Joe’s Grill. When: Last Tuesday night. You: The beautiful woman in a red dress. Me: The guy being punched by his girlfriend for looking at beautiful women. I was bleeding too hard to give you my phone number. Want to meet?

This is a story about a missed connection. (But I swear I was nowhere near Joe’s Grill that night.) Bear with me. We will get to crime fiction eventually.

They want your blood

A few years ago my siblings and I were asked to participate in a national medical survey. The object was to determine whether certain conditions had a genetic link.

And we were happy to do so. It was no biggy: just a blood draw. In fact, the longest part of the procedure was reading the list of cautions and warnings that the researchers provided in the name of fully informing their human subjects. Mostly they wanted to tell us not to expect instant cures to come out of the study.

But one paragraph fascinated me. I don’t recall the exact language bu it amounted to this: If it turns out you aren’t related to the people you think are your family, we aren’t going to tell you.

I was most amused that they found it necessary to plan for this circumstance. Very logical, really.

So how does this relate to missed connections? Or crime fiction?

What’s bred in the blood comes out in the bone

Doug Allyn has a story in the November issue of Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine, and a fine story it is. “Bloodline” is about a fourth generation banker who participates in a study much like the one I was involved in, but the doctor in charge did not follow the rule above. In fact, he took gleeful pleasure in telling the protagonist that he was not the biological son of his wealthy (legal) father.

(By the way, this is the premise of the story, so I am not revealing salient plot points.)

I had mixed feelings as I read the story. Yes, it was a very enjoyable read, but I had the maddening sense of – you guessed it – Missed Connections. Why hadn’t I seen that paragraph of legalese as a story idea?

Not that I would have come up with the same story as Allyn. Maybe I wouldn’t have thought of any story at all. What bugged me was that it never even occurred to me to LOOK for a story idea there.

Go fish

When people ask where I get my ideas I usually reply with a parable:

Once a traveler was walking along the riverbank. He saw a man standing by the river with a pole in his hand, a baited hook on a line and the line in the water. The traveler noticed a creel full of trout.

“Gosh,” he said, “where do you get your fish?”

We all live by that river. Some of us have developed our equipment and some of us haven’t. I think mine is in pretty good condition.

But dagnabit, that was a big juicy fish that swam by and I never even knew it was there. Makes me wonder if the next Harry Potter idea was right in front of me today while I was trying to decide between a chocolate chip cookie or a snickerdoodle.

If it was and someone else grabbed it I hope they don’t tell me where they got their idea.

Re-writes?

Francis Nevins, courtesy of St. Louis University

      This past Saturday I drove up to Baltimore, Maryland in a pouring rain in order to enjoy a lunch with one of my favorite authors, Professor Francis (“Mike”) Nevins who had travelled to the east coast for a nostalgia convention.   Mike, as all fans know, is the author of six novels, two collections of short stories and several books of non-fiction. He has edited more than 15 mystery anthologies and collections.  Mike was a close friend to Frederic Dannay, one half of the Ellery Queen collaboration.  (Mike refers to Dannay as the “closest thing to a grandfather that I ever had.")  Mike also wrote one of the definitive Ellery Queen pastiches – “Open Letter to Survivors.”

       I know, I know.  At this stage you roll your eyes and think to yourself, “here goes Dale off on another Ellery Queen tangent.”  So, like any other mystery writer, let me attempt to pull the rug out from under your feet.  What caught my interest, among other things, was Mike’s ruminations on another favorite author of mine, John D. MacDonald.

John D. MacDonald

       Mike was one of the editors who oversaw the collection of MacDonald’s early stories that comprise the anthology The Good Old Stuff.  (Actually, as reported in a review by Bill Pronzini there were too many stories for one volume, and the rest were collected in More Good Old Stuff.)   What was particularly interesting about Mike’s recollections of working with MacDonald was the fact that the author was adamant that the stories needed to be updated in order to be re-published.  For example, references to radio shows became references to television shows.  “This is always,” Mike admonished from across our salads as we chatted, “a bad idea.” 

       I suppose that there are legitimate contrasting views on that point, although I side generally with Mike.   Reflections of the world as it existed at the time a story was written can become anachronistic, rendering a story “dated” in the eyes of some readers and therefore contributing to its demise from published literature.  As an example, it has become increasingly difficult to find John D. MacDonald titles in bookstores (and you might as well forget about finding any newly published volumes by Ellery Queen).   But Mike’s observation is certainly correct from a purist perspective – short stories and novels help us to understand the times during which they were written.  We cannot (as the philosopher Heraclitus observed) step into the same river twice, but historical context in the writings of a time get us as close as we can get to that river. 

        All of this is perhaps a minor issue when we are talking about John D. MacDonald’s insistence that a story should be rewritten substituting a television for a radio.  But the significance grows when we begin to slide on down the slippery slope. 

        Last January it was announced that a new edition of Huckleberry Finn, updated by Twain scholar Alan Gribben of Auburn University, would eliminate a now totally unacceptable noun that was used 219 times by Mark Twain to describe Huck’s companion Jim during the course of the narrative.  In the new edition that word would be replaced with “slave.”  I can certainly understand the problem and sympathize with the solution.   I would never use the deleted word, even in quotations, even in an “historical” novel that hearkens back to a time when the word was lamentably acceptable in everyday speech.  But Twain’s use of the descriptive noun nevertheless  shapes the novel because it reflects the time in which Twain wrote it.  Commenting on this, USAToday on January 4, 2011 quoted Jonathan Turley, a legal blogger, who calls the editorial decision an "offense against the original work." 

The editing of a classic raises very troubling questions from the right of an author to have his works remain unchanged to the integrity of literary and historical works. Like all great works, the book must be read with an understanding of the mores and lexicon of its time.

Aside from the fact that MacDonald was editing his own work, the MacDonald example and the Mark Twain example delineate what might well be opposite ends of a spectrum.  MacDonald’s updates seek to remove anachronistic references in the hope of making a story more modern.  The Twain example, however, seeks to supplant the admittedly unacceptable racial views of Twain’s present with the (hopefully) more correct approach of ours.  Is it right to do this, to take a book that was ultimately instrumental in fighting racial prejudice and revise it in a manner that suggests that some of the manifestations of that prejudice did not historically exist?  Is it right to apply present standards in a way that pretends to alter the past?

      Well, there is another recent median point on that same spectrum, an example more socially tinged than MacDonald’s re-write of his stories but less so than Twain’s.   The Washington Post reported last week that the Albemarle Virginia public school system has removed from the required sixth grade reading list at one middle school a Sherlock Holmes novel because a Mormon parent complained about the way it portrayed Mormons.  The book at issue is A Study in Scarlet, which first introduces Holmes and Watson.  And the “offending” paragraph reads as follows:

 [John Ferrier] had always determined, deep down in his resolute heart, that nothing would ever induce him to allow his daughter to wed a Mormon. Such marriage he regarded as no marriage at all, but as a shame and a disgrace. Whatever he might think of the Mormon doctrines, upon that one point he was inflexible. He had to seal his mouth on the subject, however, for to express an unorthodox opinion was a dangerous matter in those days in the Land of the Saints

 I mean, really.  Is this a reason to remove A Study in Scarlet from a reading list?

Colin Cotterill

        And what awaits us at the bottom of the slippery slope if we follow and apply the approach of the Albemarle Virginia public school system?   When I attended the Bouchercon mystery writers’ convention in St. Louis 10 days ago one of the panels I listened to featured Colin Cotterill. Cotterill, for those of you unfamiliar with his works, lives in Thailand and has written a series of mysteries featuring Dr. Sin and the Peoples’ Republic of Laos.  Cotterill explained at Bouchercon that while there is complete freedom of the press in Thailand, such is hardly the case in Laos.  In order to maximize his chance to have one of his books actually published in Laos, where it is set, he and a friend went through the mystery eliminating all pages that might conceivably be deemed objectionable by the Laotian government.  When they were done they were aghast to find that they were left with only 10 pages.  On a lark they sent these off to whatever Laotian governmental office oversees such things.  That office responded with a formal letter concluding that regrettably only 3 of the 10 pages could be published. 

     That, I think, is a good recent example of the bottom of the slippery slope.

A note to readers -- Next week my Tuesday partner in crime Susan Slater, well known author of Southwestern Mysteries, will be signing on to SleuthSayers with a multi-part article.  After Susan takes a few weeks in this spot I will be back, so see you in October!

From 375 SQ Feet in 180 Days or Less

I’ll admit I was reasonably happy living in my 30 ft. 5th wheel RV with my two 14 year old cats, Nick and Nora, when my daughter, Karla, said she wanted to buy me a house. “Buy me a house?” said I. “I barely have energy enough to clean this trailer, how the heck will I be able to keep a house clean?”

“But, Mom. Just think how awesome it will be to live in a nice house, decorated with plants and nice pictures and nice furniture. You can have a real bathroom without dealing with emptying the black water tank. You won’t have to worry if your propane tank is going to run empty in the middle of the week-end and a Blue Norther is swooping down from Amarillo. You can have a washer and dryer and not have to use the laundromat at the RV park."

“Hmm.” She did make it sound enticing. Except all I could think of was vacuuming, mopping and dusting all that knick-knack sh** that I knew she wanted to decorate with to make the house look awesome. “But a house, a whole house. I’m just not sure.”

“Okay,” she said, “but you think about it and I’m flying down there next week and we’ll look around.”

My daughter came down from Nashville, where she lives, to Central Texas where I was happy as a lark in my RV and guess what? We found a great house, she and her hubby bought it and I moved in the last week in August. And I love it. Three bedrooms, two baths, a fire place, a bay window and a kitchen island. It’s decorated with plants, super pictures, positive sayings, and all that knick-knack stuff that make a place warm and awesome.

My late husband, Elmer and I had semi-retired in 1990, then decided to open a mystery bookstore. Mysteries and More was a wonderful store, and we featured our local Austin and Texas area mystery writers. Mysteries, because that was my first love and I was also writing mysteries.

In 1999, Elmer and I decided to retire and follow our dream of traveling the west and southwest so we sold-out the bookstore, bought a 5th wheel and took off for New Mexico and points west. We spent three summers traveling and coming back to Austin to our house, then decided to give up the house and live in the RV full time. We enjoyed every minute of it and so did Nick and Nora, who you might suspect were named after The Thin Man’s Nick and Nora Charles.

I’d penned a Private Eye novel in the mid-eighties but it wasn’t good enough to be published although I did get close a couple of times. In the late-eighties I published a couple of short stories in a small subscription magazine that paid in copies. I was writing a column for Mystery Scene magazine, did interviews and wrote book reviews. Soon I began selling stories to Ed Gorman, Marty Greenberg and Bob Randisi for anthologies. The ones for Ed and Marty were for theme anthologies; the Cat Crime Series, holidays like Christmas and Mother’s Day, White House Pets, etc. For Bob Randisi who founded Private Eye Writer’s of America: stories for Deadly Allies and Lethal Ladies. In 1998, I won an Anthony for Best Short Story, “A Front Row Seat,” in the Vengeance is Hers anthology, which was also nominated for a Shamus award.

Dean James and I co-edited Deadly Women which had articles, interviews and stories by and about women mystery authors. We were nominated for an Edgar, an Agatha and a macavity. We won the macavity, given by Mystery Reader’s International.

I sold my first mystery novel in 2000, titled Austin City Blue, featuring Zoe Barrow an Austin policewoman. It was nominated for an Anthony for Best First Novel. The second Zoe Barrow, Dark Blue Death came out in 2005, and in 2002, Five Star, my publisher, released a collection of my short stories titled, Found Dead In Texas.

Last September, my third mystery, What Doesn’t Kill You, a non-series book was published by Five Star.

In 2009, R. Barri Flowers and I co-edited, ACWL Presents: Murder Past, Murder Present, an anthology of stories written by members of the American Crime Writer’s League, published by Twilight Times. In April, 2012 our second anthology, Murder Here, Murder There will be released by Twilight Times. I have a short story in both.

“What does this all have to do with my moving?” you ask. For one thing, I now have a room that is going to be a real office. With “Going To Be” being the operative phrase here. After living in an RV for over nine years, I had accumulated more books, tablets, pens, reams of paper, etc., than you could imagine and now I’m slowly, very slowly trying to get the “office” set up.

This entailed getting internet access, which isn’t always easy or affordable in the TX Hill Country, getting my old computers set up and operational. It’s just NOT that easy for a person who has the cyber-technology skills of a horned toad to do.

However, having said, all that I’m delighted to be joining my fellow writers in this great new blogging adventure and look forward to seeing each of you readers every other Monday. My writing partner is Fran Rizer and I certainly expect her to keep me in line, online and on time. So y’all come back now, you hear?