Peg Herring's Blog, page 8

Picky, Picky, Picky!

As a kid I was known as a picky eater. Basically, if my mother didn't make it, I was suspicious, and my aunts learned to keep a jar of peanut butter around. That I'd always eat.
Today, I'm less picky about food, but as a consumer of entertainment, I'm still picky. I know that sometimes that comes off as sour grapes or the I-could-do-it-better attitude. That might be true.

I need some sort of logic in my comedy. Anything billed as "zany" or "madcap" is liable to go unread/watched. There are ways to do zany well--Mel Brooks comes to mind--but most of the time I get tired of silliness portrayed as comedic genius. I don't like those people. They need to grow up.

I need plot authenticity in my dramas too. A few nights ago we watched a movie (It was too hot to do anything else!) and though I kept my comments to myself, here are a few logical flaws I noticed.
*The millionaire bad guy had dozens of minions willing to obey his every command. So...he calls in a retired crook who doesn't want the job.
*In order to make the retired crook (let's call him RC) cooperate, MBG arranges his financial ruin if he doesn't take the job. Again, thousands of people in the world who'd gladly help him out, but...
*RC then goes out and gets a bunch of other retired crooks to help him, though it turned out the job only required two guys. None of them wanted the job either, but there's money.
*During the job one of the gang, a complete nut case who shouldn't have been trusted to cross the street by himself, goes berserk and kills the guy they were supposed to "warn" to leave a certain woman alone. The other guy, who should have known better, kills the woman, sorta by mistake.
Remember, these are the good guys in this film. We're supposed to feel sorry for them.

*This leads BRG to put out contracts on all of them. RC tells RBG he should only kill him, not the others, but of course they die horribly, one by one.
*In the meantime there's a girl RC really, really likes, so naturally he tells the RBG, "Please don't hurt her." Yeah, that's gonna work.
*There's also a hooker who doesn't seem to have a purpose except that RC goes to bat for her when a john beats her up and beats the crap out of him...by trespassing onto a corporate property and in front of a dozen expensively-clad witnesses. I guess that shows us how honorable he is...?
At that point I went to another room and read a book.
Now I know this was a testosterone flick, concocted to make a certain type of man happy with lots of  blood and the F word sprinkled like salt on French fries. But is it too much to ask that there be a cogent reason for the way anybody in the film acted at any point in time?

So yes, I'm picky. When I watch, when I read, I need to feel that the characters are acting from some point of logic, no matter how screwed up it might be. Others can dismiss bad writing as "just for entertainment." I want better entertainment than that.

And More in the Free Category

NOT DEAD YET...is a book that's hard to categorize. If I tell you it's a mystery I won't be lying, but what kind of mystery is it?
Well, a different kind.
There's no detective who drinks more than he/she should and struggles against the system.
There's no recently-divorced woman who just opened a business and has a crazy best friend who forces her to investigate local crime.
There's no serial killer whose methods make you want to hurl.

What is it then? A mystery within a mystery, for one thing. Four curiously talented yet oddly shy squatters must solve a murder, but they have their own secret to hide.
And when you get it, you'll be gobsmacked.

NOT DEAD YET...is free this week for Kindle readers, so there's no risk. If you like it, I'd appreciate a review (as I always do!)
It's also available in print (Amazon, bookstores) and audio (Amazon Audible). In mid-July it will be released on other e-book distributors as well (B&N, Kobo, etc.). If you read library e-books, ask your library to order it then. 

Free! Free! Free!

Research shows that the word free is one of the most compelling in the English language. Everyone wants something for free, even if they don't need it.
And we know that nothing is really free, right?
Still, if you're a mystery reader, you can get a free e-book right now using the link below. I joined with a group of mystery writers who offer their book free for a very limited time in order to get attention and interest. The "free" books will usually  require you to submit your email address, which means you'll get a newsletter from the author at some point. I don't think that's a huge price to pay, because you can always unsubscribe if you don't want more of them.
I chose KIDNAP(.)org as my giveaway, and I put up 500 copies. They're already half gone, so I think it's going well. I'm at work on the second book of the series (of at least 3), so if you enjoy the free book, it won't be long before you can read further adventures of this "gang" of kidnappers.
NOTE: The second book will probably never be offered for free. That's how we get you!

The Point Where a Book Takes Off

As a reader, you feel a point where you're inside the story, at least if you and the story are sympatico. When you get a good book that happens almost immediately. I recently read MERCY DOGS by Tyler Dilts, which was recommended by a friend, and I fell into the story right away. I liked the protagonist. I empathized with his situation and his father's. I was interested in the mysterious disappearance of his renter. I wanted to know how they were all going to end up.
I love it when that happens.
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For me, writing a book has that same moment. Intellectually I know I'm going to write a story that comes floating into my head, but emotionally, it often doesn't click until I'm in the middle of actually writing it down.
I'm at work on the sequel to KIDNAP.org, which got nice attention from people in the book industry as well as readers. I knew I wanted it to be a three-story arc, and with my editor's suggestion, I figured out what the 2nd and 3rd books would deal with. I started writing, and it went well. Robin and the gang face two threats, a very powerful target and a sneaky man from her past. I got through a rough draft and one edit, and as I went, things got clearer and better.
https://www.amazon.com/KIDNAP-org-Peg...
And then I started the second edit. All sorts of things happened in my head, and suddenly the story came alive. I can hear Robin talking. I can see Cam's pained expression when they tell him he has to wear dress shoes for a whole evening. I can feel Tom's panic when he realizes his friends are locked inside a murderer's estate.
It isn't finished--not even close. But that moment has come where I fall into the story headfirst, and I won't be able to rest until it's done...even though I already know how they're all going to end up.

It's Not What You Think, It's How You Present It

I was a debater back in the day. Our high school team was very successful, thanks in large part to a coach who knew argumentation and demanded we learn to do it correctly. I went on to college debate and more coaches who taught me how logical argument must go. In its most basic form a point of debate should:
1. State your position clearly
2. Explain your position
3. Support your position with evidence
4. Restate your position in a brief, easily remembered form

That's why Facebook makes me crazy.

Today's social media allows for arguments so weak they'd be laughable if our society weren't in peril because of them. These arguments are tossed into the public forum from the highest levels of our government down to the lowest levels of education, people who can't even spell the word argue.
Not only are pathetically weak arguments presented, but when someone responds, that weak argument usually descends into name calling and insults. Here are a few examples of bad technique.

Generalization: When someone says "You liberals" or "All Republicans," they're assuming the groups are completely in agreement. If you're paying the slightest attention to what people say, that obviously isn't true. Every group has a range of opinions within its membership. Still, it's convenient to dismiss a whole group at once. Wrong, but convenient.

Simplification: Taking an argument down to This or That is almost always wrong. The abortion issue, for example, has lots of facets, different ways we could go about solving the problem of unwanted pregnancies, but it almost always gets down to "Baby Killers" vs "Abusers of Women's Rights." Though we don't like to admit it, most problems aren't black and white. They're complicated, and the answers don't come from screaming at each other across picket lines or media posts.

Whataboutism: Arguments about current behavior of a public figure often go off the rails when someone says, "Well, what about when X did Y?" That's the technique you used as a kid to deflect Mom's anger when you broke her vase. "Well, Bobby kicked the dog yesterday." I'm guessing it didn't work then either, but we love to point the finger at someone else when we're wrong.

Iknewsomebodyism: Everyone who argues for or against welfare cites examples to "prove" that welfare recipients are either saved by or abuse the system. Now there are real figures that show precisely what welfare does and doesn't do, and how it affects the nation. We'd rather look at the two families we know personally who live off the government or that one little old lady who'd have died without Meals on Wheels. Similarly, whenever a new shooter kills a bunch of people, arguers (including news media) rush to "prove" he demonstrates their favorite theory: Muslims are violent, white men are all repressed nuts, etc. On any topic, one example doesn't prove anything.

Namecalling: When all else fails, you win the argument by attacking your opponent, right? Wrong. You might see respondents fall away from your posts (except the bots who get paid to keep things going) but it's because they, unlike you, recognize that the last defense of a defeated debater is personal attack, and BTW, the more obscene your terminology, the weaker your argument was in the first place. No matter how much you despise a person or group, your feelings don't make their evidence incorrect, and no matter how much you admire someone, he or she can be wrong.

There are more bad ways to argue, and I'm aware that I won't convince people to stop using these techniques. Please recognize that the arguments above are amateurish and ineffective with those of us who think. In an actual debate, an opponent would smash them to bits, no matter what the topic was.

Then again, I'm reminded of what the secretly taped guy from Cambridge Analytica said: Truthfulness doesn't matter. You should go for people's feelings, not logic. In that case, today's online arguments are all exactly where those who hate America want them to be.

...and Then the Monsters Showed Up

I'm not a big reader of science fiction, but I love it when it's well done. (Michael Crichton comes to mind.) Good sci-fi writers explore interesting social questions while constructing cool plots about things that haven't happened...yet.
My complaint with SF is that all too often the story ends with "and now we must kill the aliens before they kill us." The last few chapters are the all out battle for the survival of our species, with lots of things blowing up and gallons of green blood spilt.
That's not my thing. In the most recent example I read, the story began well, with questions about how time travel would actually work and what the resulting physical and mental problems might be, but it ended up with monsters pouring out of the portal and lots of shooting. We started with questions and ended with an arcade game.

SF isn't the only predictable genre, which is why genre fiction has a bad name with literary folks. Who hasn't started a romance novel and known from the first chapter what was going to happen and who was going to end up living happily ever after together? (Sometimes it's a tossup between two men, but if you go with the less socially acceptable one, you'll probably get it right.)

Mysteries are often predictable too, and after reading them all my life, I really enjoy finding one that escapes the rules a little. An interesting (but not mean) sleuth is great, a unique setting is nice, and if at all possible, a solution that's clever and even obvious...after I read it. Too often these days I know the "who" early on, and I tend to skip chapters to get to the end and find exactly the same thing that happened in the last five books I read: The protag is bloody but alive, the cop that doubted him/her becomes a friend/lover, etc. etc. etc.

Even "literary fiction" novels, those books that are supposed to "transcend genre," are often the same old same old, and lately they seem to come in streaks. I'm tired of books about bookstore owners who are delightfully fey, tired of titles with "Girl," and tired of lead characters with no redeeming qualities who wallow in their own misery for 400 pages and end up exactly where they began.

If you're nodding your head as you read this, I know what's wrong with you. You have read TOO MUCH. YOU NEED TO STOP READING BOOKS. (YOU NEED TO STOP WATCHING TV AND MOVIES TOO.) YOU NEED TO GET A HOBBY, LIKE COLLECTING SPOONS OR WEAVING YOGA MATS OUT OF OLD GROCERY BAGS.

Or you can keep doing what you're doing, looking for the one book in ten that occupies your mind and satisfies your heart. That's what I intend to do!

Authors in Strange Situations

Nobody tells you that promoting the books you write requires you to be adaptable and have a sense of humor. We picture authors jetting all over the country, sipping champagne and telling adoring fans about their latest novel, but that's not reality for the vast majority of us. I loved the story one author told about arriving at a bookstore where he had an audience of one. The fan told him he'd really liked the book, though he admitted he might not have chosen to read it except, "It was the only one they had in solitary confinement."

I haven't met any ex-cons who are fans (that I know of), but I have ended up in strange situations. I want to state here for the record that I am EXTREMELY grateful to libraries and bookstores who allow me to come for a Sit & Sign or, even better, a talk. However, it doesn't always go the way one might imagine.

*** There was the library where they'd booked two events at the same time in the same room. The other event was a League of Women Voters meeting (in a Presidential election year), so I ended up in the children's room, with those cute little 2-foot high tables and miniature chairs.
***I spoke once in the Library Annex, a building so old I worried about the roof collapsing. And if any of my audience had allergies to mold...








 ***Scheduled for a Meet the Author Sit & Sign, I arrived to find the librarian who'd contacted me had retired, and no one on the job seemed much interested in her program. They'd scheduled another author to give a talk at the same time, so I got to sit and watch people file into the conference room to hear him. (They didn't even have to pass by my table to get there.) I heard every word of his speech from my table in the hallway behind the door. It was very entertaining, and when he was finished I watched people leave with his book, not even aware I was there.

***I once sat in a bookstore promoting my historicals and heard a customer ask at the front desk if they had any historical mysteries. Asked what era, the woman said she liked medieval and Tudor. The clerk led the woman RIGHT PAST ME to a section where she introduced her to a few of her favorites. Ummm, chopped liver here?

***At one library my audience was very small--three people. When I started chatting with them I realized it was the librarian's mother and her two sisters. She'd called them when it became clear no one else was going to show up!
***Recently I stopped at a library where I'm scheduled to speak and found that nobody there knew about it. The librarian had been reassigned, and yes, they'd love to have me come, but could it be Saturday, not Thursday, and in the morning, not evening.* (It's a good thing I don't have a day job!)

Ask any author who's done a book tour and they'll tell you about being asked where the bathroom is, if "you" carry the New York Times, and what books you can recommend for a fourteen-year-old who really doesn't like to read. They'll tell of events where none of the employees knew an author was coming, and a table had to be cleared really quickly for her use. Of librarians who schedule a talk mostly so they can pick the author's brain about how they might get published. And about the homeless people who attend because there are refreshments afterward. And sometimes there's absolutely no one. Time doesn't fly in those cases.
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Still, it's fun. I enjoy the exchange with readers and with the people who serve as guides for reading: librarians and book store clerks. It's just that authors, like the rest of the world, have to adjust their expectations once in a while. The world doesn't revolve around us; in fact, the world doesn't ever intend to.

* The event is at the Port Tampa City Library, March 10, 2018, at 11:00 a.m. I'll be speaking on mystery writers who are very good but don't have the big name recognition.

Another Oldie Reborn

I wrote recently about re-releasing my historicals now that I have the rights from the publisher who originally launched them (2 down, 2 to go!) I explained that they have to have different covers because the original ones aren't mine.

There's another book I'd like to tell you about, but we have to talk about some additional things.
First, sometimes a book title just doesn't work. You might have seen FORMER TITLE on some of your favorite authors' novels (Did you know that Fitzgerald almost called his book Among Ash-Heaps and Millionaires? I think THE GREAT GATSBY is a better title!) Titles aren't etched in stone, and if one doesn't work, the smart thing to do is change it. The book I once called A Lethal time and Place is a good example. I realized over time that it sounds scary and dark, while the story is whimsical and fun. Hence a new title, NOT DEAD YET...
The same is true with covers. The cover artist listened to my ideas and did as I asked, but from the first I knew the cover below was (again) scarier/darker than the story.











After a while of feeling that wasn't right, I tried for a lighter tone here:










But honestly, this one's boring.



So we're going with a new title and a new cover. If you already bought the book with the above title/cover, don't do it again!

If you haven't and you're looking for something fun, try Not Dead Yet...
You are sure to love Leo, Libby, Memnet, and Roy, and you will probably want to read this one twice so you can pick up on the hints to the big plot twist you missed the first time through!

Available now on Amazon and many other e-book sites. Print will be available as soon as I do the "real book" proof, maybe two weeks, and I've started the audio, which always takes much longer.

Everything Old Is New Again

My first published books were with Five Star Publishing, which went out of the mystery business a while back. They were very good to me, but my Simon & Elizabeth Mystery series is now mine again.
When an author gets her rights back, it means she can do what she likes with books that were once under someone else's control. It also means that she has to re-do everything: covers, formatting, setup, and publishing. Amazon and Draft2Digital make this less painless, but that doesn't mean it's easy. Still, there are advantages for me and for my readers.
First, I get more of the profits. That might not matter to you, but the man in my life approves!
Second, I can release the books in paperback. Over the years people mentioned that hardcovers, though nice, are expensive, and I agree. I just didn't have any say in the matter.
Third, prices are better. Because I'm doing this as an indie, I set the price for both paperback and e-books. (Haven't looked into audio yet. So much to do, so little time!)

NOTE TO LOYAL FANS: Don't buy these again just because they have new covers! They're the same stories you probably read in 2010-2011! (I mean, you can spend the money again if you want to... :)

So here are the first two books. I will work to get the others out ASAP, probably by the end of 2018.
Links: Her Highness' First Murder (Book #1)
Amazon Paperback:
Amazon Kindle:
Everybody Else E-books (B&N, Kobo, etc.): https://www.books2read.com/u/38gN8a

 Poison, Your Grace (Book #2)
Amazon Paperback:
Amazon Kindle: https://www.amazon.com/Poison-Grace-S...
Everybody Else E-books: https://www.books2read.com/u/mYg5zP

What Are You Working On?

I've been a little scattered for the last few months, so my workday jumps from book to book. I was stalled on the sequel to KIDNAP.org, but I think the breakthrough is close. I got the audio files (Authors have to listen to the whole thing and okay it before it's released.) and as I listened, I got inspired to continue the story of Robin and her gang of non-hoods. The narrator, Megan Scharlau, is excellent, and that's what I needed to get busy and finish the half-done manuscript from last summer.
Audio will be available by the end of JanuaryMaggie has another Sleuth Sisters going (release date is March 23 if I recall correctly and it's up for pre-order on Amazon). It's been sent out to beta readers who'll tell her what needs tweaking. A fan wrote to say that Maggie missed a book when she published to the non-Amazon sites, which meant only Amazon had Sleuthing at Sweet Springs. A day was spent last week getting that fixed.
I did a boxed set of The Dead Detective Mysteries this past week. The series finished a few years back, but people still mention it fondly, so I thought I'd give readers a price break on the whole set. Everyone said it was easy to do that, but...no. Of course I couldn't use the same covers, so I had to get a new one, and apparently I wasn't as tech-savvy back then as I am now (still not much) so the files were different from each other and not "clean." I now know how to find and delete hidden TAB entries, but it took a dozen tries to get to that point. It's like this: Upload, pray, wait for processing, look, say bad words, go back to the original file. Repeat, repeat, repeat. FINALLY!

After all that I was very ready for some good news, and it came in the form of a review of KIDNAP.org that not only praised that one but also included ALL my books. The review, which appeared on DorothyL but came originally from Buried Under Books, says the reviewer has yet to find something I wrote that she doesn't like. Yay!
This One Is Done and ReleasedLast but not least, I'm working on putting the Simon and Elizabeth series out in paperback. For those who don't know the process, a writer gets a contract that gives a publisher rights to publish her books for a set number of years, 5 in my case. Five Star put the books out in hardcover, and they were beautiful, but a lot of people don't want to pay $25.95 for a book, especially from a writer they've never heard of. As I get the rights back when the contracts run out, I can publish them myself. Right now the first two books are back in my name, so I'm working on paperback and e-books. They'll be much cheaper and still available from most e-book sellers. Print will be Amazon only.
Should Be Ready by the End of JanuaryHave I been busy? Yes. Some days it seems like I don't know which way to go, but I think things are working out well. Sometimes, however, I feel like I need to do a roll-call: Simon? Are you all right? "All right!" Seamus? "All right!" Robin? "So far!" Maggie? "Almost!" It's hard having a head full of other people!