Lea Wait's Blog, page 265

Mind, Body, and Words

Lea Wait, here.

Mystery writers work to perfect the first line of their book or story. Is that sentence intriguing? Does it hint at challenges to come? Is it perhaps … scary?

Well, today I’m writing a very scary first line.

One week ago my husband, artist Bob Thomas, had a stroke.

Lea’s husband, artist
Bob Thomas

A roast chicken was in the oven, we were talking and getting dinner, and he dropped the dishes he was taking out of a cabinet. As they shattered on the floor, he turned to me. His mouth was distorted, and he drooled as he said, in amazement and anger, pointing at the broken dishes, “My hand doesn’t work.”

He spent five or six hours at our local emergency room having tests, and then was admitted to an intensive care room where he could be monitored. Fifteen hours later his speech was better, although, normally left-handed, he couldn’t hold anything with his left hand, and he couldn’t eat, because he couldn’t swallow.

Thirty hours after the stroke he had another episode. His speech slurred again. He had another CAT scan.

And we both started to be educated.

His (thankfully, small) stroke had destroyed connections between his brain and both his left hand and the muscles in his mouth and throat. Speech and occupational/hand therapists immediately started to work with him to re-learn those skills; skills that had been automatic hours before. He could hold a spoon as long as he focused on holding the spoon. As soon as someone spoke, or came into the room, or he thought of something else … the spoon fell. He choked when he tried to swallow.

His major worry was that he wouldn’t be able to paint again. How could he hold a paint brush?

Bob & two of his paintings at gallery

Seven days after his stroke, Bob’s now home. He’s determined to regain the functions he lost, and he’s making major strides. Despite dropping his brush several times, he’s even completed a painting he’d been working on before his stroke — completed it well. He’s eating, small bites, in a quiet room, as he focuses on the process of swallowing. His voice is normal.

He’ll be seeing therapists and doctors for a while. But he’ll recover. It may take some time, but, with continuing work, his body will come back to close to what it was before his stroke. We are thankful and hopeful.

Bob and I have both learned a lot in the past week. We’ve learned that we’re ready to tough out what will come. We’ve learned not to take our bodies (or our lives) for granted. And we’ve learned the power of focus.

When Bob didn’t focus on chewing and swallowing he choked. When he didn’t focus on his hand, he dropped things. When he did focus, his body worked – and each time it worked he retrained it to work better the next time.

A Few of Bob’s Paintings

Which brings me to the third part of the title of this blog — “words.” Because, like our bodies, our words can also be taken for granted. We speak sloppily, using whichever words come first, whether or not they reflect exactly what we want to say. We don’t worry about this because, we assure ourselves, “people know what we mean.”

But the truth is, often they don’t. They don’t hear the nuances behind our thoughts. And those nuances can lead to major misunderstandings. (Think: voters who believe grandiose political promises without specific, credible, plans to turn those promises into realities.)

Those of us who write are guilty of the same thing: we write hurriedly, casually. We excuse incorrect grammar as “too formal.” We use the same words over and over because they’re the easiest, the most common. Not because they best reflect our thoughts.

Editing does for writing what focus is doing for Bob’s body: it retrains us to recognize when our writing is imperfect; when it doesn’t reflect exactly what our brain intended it to do. (It may mean realizing that our thinking is also sloppy.)

This kind of focus takes time. It means not assuming “people will understand.” It means writing precisely what we mean; choosing the perfect word and sentence construction, and, ultimately, putting together tightly written paragraphs, chapters and plots.

If we don’t take the time to convey our thoughts in the best possible way, we are letting our readers, and ourselves, down. We are leaving our brains in the “idle” position.

Focusing is exhausting. But it’s also strengthening. It keeps our minds and skills in peak condition.

Because we need to do our best today. We can’t take for granted that we can put it off until tomorrow.

Weekend Update: January 30-31, 2016

Next week at Maine Crime Writers there will be posts by Lea Wait (Monday), Barb Ross (Tuesday), Kaitlyn Dunnett/Kathy Lynn Emerson (Wednesday), Maureen Milliken (Thursday), and Vaughn Hardacker (Friday).

In the news department, here’s what’s happening with some of us who blog regularly at Maine Crime Writers:

Maureen Milliken is excited to announce that the audio version of her novel Cold Hard News, the debut in the Bernie O’Dea mystery series, is now available on Audible, iTunes and Amazon. She got the boost to pursue audio from Dale Phillips, who’s posted about it on Maine Crime Writers.

Checked out Audible.com and look what I saw! Cold Hard News leading the new releases.

Maureen is also scheduled to appear as part of a panel with the Sisters in Crime NE Speakers bureau at the Sandwich Public Library, “It’s a Mystery to Me,” in Sandwich, Mass., Saturday, Feb. 6. She’ll be joined by fellow Maine Crime Writer Kate Flora and Arlene Kay, as well as moderator Leslie Wheeler. It’s sponsored by Titcomb’s Bookshop. Details were also firmed up last week for two upcoming events: The SINCNE speakers bureau is planning an event for Thursday, April 14, at Maureen’s childhood library, Lithgow Public Library, in Augusta. Stay tuned for details. And finally, April being the coolest month, Maureen will appear on a panel of debut writers at Maine Crime Wave, along with fellow Maine Crime Writer Brenda Buchanan, and Dick Cass and Brendan Reilly, moderated by Kate Flora. That’s April 9 — save the date!

Working on a short story? Don’t miss the submissions deadlines for Level Best Books and the Al Blanchard Award: http://levelbestbooks.com/submissions

Haven’t read Beat, Slay, Love? Love free stuff? Well, it is now available as an audio book, and one of this week’s lucky commenters will win a free download. All we ask is that, if you like it, you consider leaving a positive review.

An invitation to readers of this blog: Do you have news relating to Maine, Crime, or Writing? We’d love to hear from you. Just comment below to share.

And a reminder: If your library, school, or organization is looking for a speaker, we are often available to talk about the writing process, research, where we get our ideas, and other mysteries of the business. Contact Kate Flora: mailto: kateflora@gmail.com

You Might Be Next

Kate Flora: We’ve been visiting the big city—San Francisco—and leaving my desk and exploring new territory always reminds me how important it is to get out now and then to go “character shopping.” Once, years ago, when I spoke to a high school class, I told them that while they thought they were there to watch me, actually I was there to watch them. Then I took them through some observation exercises. What does a classroom sound like? What behaviors can I observe? What are the details that might help to bring a character to life?

Now I have a whole city to provide me with characters. Shortly after we arrived, we took BART (the Bay area subway system) over to Berkeley to see our friends’ newly purchased house. As I gazed around the subway car, I realized that my husband and I were the only people there who weren’t plugged into our phones. Nearly everyone had earphones on, and everyone was staring intently at screens.

There was something almost ritualistic about it, like people entering the Church of the Cell Phone. The car would stop. People would get on. They would find seats and immediately bow over their phones. And never lift their eyes to see the people around them. Perhaps it was kind of them—no one could see me stare.

The forty-something blonde with the lank hair and phenomenal gum chewing skills is a definite candidate for one of Joe Burgess’s reluctant witnesses. She’ll absolutely have to blow one of those defiant bubbles in his face.

For Thea Kozak, who consults to private schools, there was the gaggle of high school kids.

I can’t photograph people, so this is what else I’ve been seeing

The large, perhaps Samoan dandy with his burgundy suede boots, and his entourage of girls—his beautiful African-American girlfriend and her plain and pudgy girlfriends. When he wasn’t taking selfies of himself (most of the time), there was some actual conversation going on. When he finally stood, anticipating his stop, he planted one of those burgundy wonders on the seat and wiggled it around to admire it. My imagination stuck an older lady with a cane into the scene so she could whack him and tell him to get his dirty foot off the seat.

At the next stop, the door opened and three young black teens got on. Two dashed for the back, the third threw himself down on the seat in front of us. Yes, mama said it was rude to stare, but there was some kind of amazing physics going on. The waistband of his jeans only reached the top of his thighs. Between that and his actual waist was an 8-9 inch expanse of shiny red boxers. A sweet-faced lad with honey brown skin and an amiable grin. But how, oh how, did he keep those pants on when he walked? Perhaps gravity was the reason he reclined rather than sat? Eventually he got up and ambled down the car to join his friends and I waited with ‘baited breath for the descent of the pants. It must have been magic because despite the narrowness of his hips and the absurdity of their position, they never fell off. Imagine my cynical cop watching that performance? I have seen such pants fall down, though. In airports. On the street. On the stairs leaving the subway.

It was followed by one his cohort spilling a Coke, which rolled in a suspicious brown stream up and down the car as we made our herky/jerky way to the other side of the bay. Repellant in real life; amusing in a book.

Not a blue-haired boy but a fascinating pair of shrubs

And speaking of fashion, the only other set of people interacting with each other instead of with their phones were the tall, awkward, skinny blue-haired boy and his teeny girlfriend. He had to bend like a stork to reach her face, but he couldn’t stop kissing her. Ah. Young love. Or young lust? What a springboard for a character’s imagination.

There is a young Middle Eastern couple with a small baby. She looks far too young to be a mother. He is dressed like a dandy. The baby is in colorful fleece. After a signal passes between them, they get up and walk to the end of the car, and return, he carrying a sign begging for money, she, eyes down, trailing in his wake, holding the sleeping baby. How can they even get anyone’s attention, when all the eyes are on their phones. Only one person gives them money, a geeky young man who digs in his backpack. They move on to the next car.

On the escalator to the street, there is a man wearing a luscious, soft-looking brown cashmere dress.

Then on into Berkeley, approaching the campus via a city street where in clear defiance of

A rogue vine

the “No Drug Area” signs, gaggles of odd, shabby-looking people were gathered in a miasmic fog of marijuana. Gone are the used bookstores, in their place food joints and stores selling vinyl. Past a row of booths alternating activism with recruitment for campus fraternities and organizations. Pre-business. Pre-law. Pre-medicine. Environmental awareness. Come to a lecture on socialism. I’m remembering my college days. We had a dress code. They have an undress code—often the largest pieces of clothing worn are piratical, over-the-knee boots.

I am tucking my mental notebook away when we pass a lovely young woman with russet curls and a sprinkle of freckles who appears to be scrutinizing something botanical. How academic. How pleasing to see her taking an interest in her environment. But alas. No. She is just looking for the right backdrop and lighting for her selfie.

For 2016, I have vowed to concentrate on “otheries.” Taking note of the world around me. It’s a writer’s job. And how richly I am being rewarded.

the Death of an Old Family Friend

John Clark reprising a piece I wrote for Wolf Moon Journal back in 2005 in the hope it brightens your day as we creep into February.

On the Death of An Old Family Friend

Great grandfather Horatio Clark who was one of many in the family who loved to garden and fish

When you marry, you gain more than a partner. You acquire new relatives, different ways of thinking, new customs and family celebrations. All of these are more or less expected parts of a new blended life. If you are lucky, you gain some unexpected things as well. I gained new realms to explore, and I did; hunting and fishing through parts of Maine that had previously been odd names on a topographic map.

I got in the habit of sitting on the front steps with my father-in-law. He would talk about catching trout in a spot a couple miles in from a particular tote road or trolling for salmon just before dusk with a Rangely spinner below a certain dam. As we watched the setting sun creep across the hill on the other side of the road, I would share my own memories of fly fishing the Carabasset River with my father before it was lined with ski chalets, and trout were still plentiful enough to be fooled by eight year old boys. I=d reminisce about the gold nugget my grandfather found while fishing the North branch of the Dead River and how my father would hike nine miles into Spencer Stream to catch monster trout. These were companionable moments interspersed with the cry of hawks and the beckoning sounds of float planes on their way to Moosehead Lake.

I began to explore some of these inherited realms, sometimes alone, sometimes with my wife or friends. There was something magic about wading down the middle of a stream, chest deep in cool water, automatically casting streamer flies while lost in thought. Sometimes those moments would be pleasantly interrupted by the sharp tug of a hungry trout or the wary gaze of a deer caught in the act of drinking. By the end of the day, my body would be tired and my soul recharged.

Fixing the Wire bridge over the Carrabasssett River not far from my grandparents’ house in New Portland

Certain spots began to acquire their own lore; The overgrown blueberry field where a bear was surprised while eating grubs from an anthill, the streamside trail where a mother hawk maintained her uneasy vigil until satisfied that we were uninterested in her hatchlings, the remote pond where moose and deer ambled through the shallows together, completely indifferent to our presence, the springhole where I suddenly found myself chest deep in frigid water while ice fishing. Each became a part of a blended heritage to be shared with my children while sitting on front steps and listening to the sounds of summer.

One August, while fishing one of my inherited streams, I dangled a fly in a small pool below the remnants of a long destroyed mill. The spot had often rewarded me with dinner. To my astonishment a huge brook trout swam out of the jumble of old millwork to eye my offering. After looking it over with the contemptuous experience of trout-like wisdom, he turned gracefully and swam back into the rocky den from whence he had come. I was stunned! In years of fishing this brook, nothing of this size had ever shown itself, not had there ever been a hint a fish this big existed. Numerous attempts with different flies resulted in a couple curtain calls, but nary a nibble. I returned home to share my adventure. Over the rest of the season, I returned several times. Each time my mammoth friend would emerge, eye my offering and grandly swim back to his rocky hideaway. His pool was so small and his length so long that he had to use the entire pool to turn around. One evening just before the season closed, I brought Beth with me and she was treated to a command performance complete with a tentative nibble on the evening‘s offering.

Even when the boat wasn’t ready, I was thinking about fishing as a kid.

Summer slipped into fall, fishing was replaced by duck hunting and then by deer hunting. Winter brought holiday gatherings where I shared the story of my mammoth friend with those from >away=. Ice fishing became the prime weekend activity, with slow periods filled by meals cooked over outdoor fires and everyone remembering fishing tales from past seasons. More than once I shared the story of my friend and we all wondered how such a large fish had come to live in such a small pool.

As winter faded into spring, Maine experienced what was to become known as the 500 Year Flood. Heavy rains rapidly ate away the snow cover, creating torrents where small rivulets had been just the day before. River towns were evacuated and it seemed like entire forests were rushing madly under bridges. The events surrounding the flooding and the safety of loved ones erased all thoughts of my friend.

When spring once more passed its mantle of green to summer, I returned to the stream. As I approached the old mill site, I was saddened at the changes wrought by the flood. Pools I had fished for years were unrecognizable, with rocks pushed far downstream. The remains of the old mill were gone. After an hour of fishing in every possible spot, I realized my friend was gone. Smaller fish still lurked among the nearby rocks, but the big trout was just a memory to be shared with friends and family on summer afternoons when the siren song of float planes headed for remote ponds fill the skies.

If you’d rather be here right now, raise your hand.

Finding Faces

Kaitlyn Dunnett/Kathy Lynn Emerson here. It’s confession time—I’m not very good at finding fresh ways to describe the physical appearance of my characters. What do they look like? Sometimes I have no idea.

I do make character sheets on which I record height, weight, build, hair and eye color and so on, but when it comes to finding a way to make each one stand out for the reader I am always left fumbling for the right words.

Over the years I’ve worked up a “cheat sheet” listing details that describe a character’s attributes. It’s broken down into the following categories: attitude, build, complexion, ears, eyes, face and facial hair, fingers, gait, hair, hands, laugh, nervous habits, nose, smell, and voice. Yes, those are alphabetical. No, they don’t have a particular rationale behind them, other than being areas where I’ve managed to accumulate a variety of descriptive words and phrases that I can mix and match when creating a new character. Under gait, for example, the list includes awkward, slight limp, rolling, slow-moving, hobbling, scuttling, shambling, light on his feet, shuffling movement, and flat-footed. Hair omits the standard colors and includes straw-colored, mud-colored, rich blue-black that reflects the sunlight, sand-colored, ginger, and also lank, bald, thinning, and receding hairline.

Such word lists are great as far as they go, but sometimes I have the feeling I should be doing more. When I was working on The Scottie Barked at Midnight, which has an unusually large cast of new characters, I decided to try something I know some writers have used successfully—clipping photos from magazine ads to help visualize what their characters look like. The problem, of course, is that most of the people in those are too good looking. News stories provide more variety. In fact, years ago, I had a certain small-time Maine politician in mind when I was creating a particularly smarmy villain.

Other than that, though, the only time I’ve matched a character with a real person’s picture was after the fact. Rosamond Jaffrey’s late, unlamented father, Sir Robert Appleton, from my Face Down mysteries and, now, the Mistress Jaffrey mystery series I write as Kathy Lynn Emerson, found his perfect embodiment in Colin Firth, as seen as the not-so-nice Lord Wessex in Shakespeare in Love. Other attempts to find faces that match my imaginary people usually end up with me saying “he’s a cross between x and y.”

One caveat—it’s almost always a bad idea to come right out and describe someone as looking like a celebrity. For one thing, it dates the book. And, of course, this doesn’t work at all well in an historical unless you’re sure your readers will know what a character means when he says someone is a dead ringer for Lord Byron or King Henry or Bram Stoker (who, incidentally, was quite a good-looking man).

But to get back to the Liss MacCrimmon series—the plot of The Scottie Barked at Midnight centers around a television talent competition called Variety, Live. Making up the rules and deciding on each character’s talent was the easy part. I still had to describe each contestant in a way that would make them separate and distinct in the reader’s mind. Second confession—I don’t much care for The Voice or American Idol or any others of that ilk. The only competition I do watch is Dancing with the Stars . . . and that gave me an idea.

Why not, I asked myself, use former competitors on Dancing with the Stars as the inspiration for my characters? There are certainly plenty of different physical characteristics on display in any given season. So I gave it a try. You’ll have noticed that I’ve sprinkled photos of celebrities throughout this post. The characters they inspired are, in the order they appear in the post, M.C. Roy Eastmont and contestants Willetta Farwell, Mo Heedles, Elise Isley, Iris Jansen, Hal Quarles, and “The Great Umberto” aka Oscar Yates. Keep in mind that I only borrowed physical features, not the real person’s personality or talent.

So, what do you think? If you’ve read the book, do these photos fit your idea of the character? If you haven’t read it, does the physical appearance of the person in the picture seem to go well with the character’s name? All bets are off, by the way, for Mo Heedles. She is a real person who won character-naming rights at a Malice Domestic auction after the book was already written. Before that, “Mo” was named Carla Uvedale.

There’s no question that using this technique gave me the variety I was after for this book, but I found that I had no particular urge to do it again when I was writing this year’s Liss MacCrimmon mystery, Kilt at the Highland Games (July). That said, I’d be very curious to hear about other writers’ experiences in taking the inspiration for their characters’ appearance from pictures of real people. Did it work for you? Have you done it more than once? Chime in, please, and share.

Kaitlyn Dunnett/Kathy Lynn Emerson is the author of over fifty books written under several names. She won the Agatha Award in 2008 for best mystery nonfiction for How to Write Killer Historical Mysteries and was an Agatha Award finalist in 2014 in the best mystery short story category for “The Blessing Witch.” Currently she writes the contemporary Liss MacCrimmon Mysteries (The Scottie Barked at Midnight) as Kaitlyn and the historical Mistress Jaffrey Mysteries (Murder in the Merchant’s Hall) as Kathy. The latter series is a spin-off from her earlier “Face Down” series and is set in Elizabethan England. Her websites are www.KaitlynDunnett.com and www.KathyLynnEmerson.com

On Books

Bruce Robert Coffin here. Wishing each of you the best 2016 has to offer.

The other day I was busy editing the manuscript to my second novel — far from finished but editing is something writers do when the writing isn’t going so well — when a random thought popped into my head. What is the big deal about books? No really. They are only paper and ink after all. Only words printed on pages, bound together by a spine, sandwiched between two cloth-covered pieces of cardboard, then wrapped in a shiny dust jacket. Nothing too extraordinary, right?

But if books really are no big deal, if they don’t rise beyond the sum of their parts, why then do we love them so? Why do we erect buildings dedicated to them? Why are we compelled to purchase shelves to hold them, and boxes in which to store them? Why do we display our books on coffee tables and night stands as if they were endearing photos of loved ones? Or race to the store to buy the latest in a series? Or stand in line to have one autographed by a total stranger?

I pondered the question for a while. Pondering is also something writers do, especially when the writing isn’t going so well. Suddenly, the answer came to me, like a bolt of lightning from a clear blue sky (hey, I’m allowed one cliché). Maybe the answer to the question is….that they aren’t really books at all. They are more like portals, capable of whisking us away to strange new places, and new dimensions. To boldly go where no man, or women, has gone before… Sorry, I get carried away.

Books can transport us back to a time when we were different people, younger versions of ourselves. Don’t believe me? Try picking up a copy of Clifford the Big Red Dog or Where the Wild Things Are, then tell me you can’t see images from your childhood dancing before your very eyes. Or Charlie and the Chocolate Factory by Ronald Dahl. I still recall sitting at my desk in third grade while our homeroom teacher read to us. Still remember trying to imagine what an everlasting gobstopper or a snozzberry would taste like.

 

One summer, when I was but a wee lad, I pedaled my bike to a local flea market every week so I could gaze upon their vast collection of antique children’s books. Displayed proudly upon painted shelves was a treasure trove of all things mystery. There were Nancy Drew Mysteries, The Hardy Boys, and Spin and Marty, titles that pre-dated me but intrigued me all the same. I can still remember their musty smell and little white price stickers. Oh, what a quarter would buy. So very captivating were their covers and illustrations. I deliberated over them like an indecisive teen perusing the latest record album bin at the local LaVerdiere’s. Even the book titles were brilliant: The Secret of the Caves, The Ghost at Skeleton Rock, The Whispering Statue, and The Mystery of the Dragon Fire. I had no idea what dragon fire was, but I knew I couldn’t wait to get that book home and delve into its mystery.

 

When I turned twelve, I read my first Stephen King novel, Salem’s Lot. I can still recall the smell of those new pages, the same magical scent as the pop quiz sheets straight from the school office mimeograph. I also remember King’s book scared the hell out of me, as have many of his subsequent works. I read King’s book mostly at night, alone, in my room, frequently unnerved by the feeling that someone was watching me from outside the window. Maybe Danny Glick?

As I aged, my tastes changed, along with my books: One Police Plaza, Tuesdays with Morrie, Of Mice and Men, and A Walk in the Woods. I imagined myself hiking up and down mountains along the Appalachian Trail while chatting with Bryson, or maybe sharing a cream soda with Katz. Each book represented a new chapter in my life, new memories.

More than just paper and ink, books are endless streams of thought and consciousness, knowledge and ideas. Each possessing the power to entertain, to enrich, and to teach us to grow. Books allow us safe passage, an escape from this world to another, if only for a short while. Evoking an infinite number of emotions, the best books are like an amusement park thrill ride, lifting our spirits one moment and then rocketing us downward toward some imaginary horror the next.

What is the big deal about books, you ask? Why not open one and find out?

Waiting for the Punchline

Jessie: In northern New England, wondering if it is too early, or just plain wrong to gloat about missing out on the snow covering the mid-Atlantic. 

I’ve been thinking about weather a lot lately. Winter has been slow in coming to my part of the world and much bemused merriment shines from my neighbors’ faces. The scraping grind of snowplows is usually the background noise of winter here but instead, all has been eerily quiet. Ice races have been canceled on the lake. The ground has just recently consented to freeze into solid, irregular lumps. Frost heaves and potholes are only now beginning to make nuisances of themselves.

All of this had got me to thinking about how I am not spending the winter this year. I’m not using my slow cooker ever single night. I’m not wearing my bathrobe over a fleece track suit, over thrermals, all day. I’m not considering ordering all our food from Amazon so I don’t have to go out into the cold to the grocer. I’m not thinking about adopting dogs from the local shelter just so they will sit on my lap even though I am horribly allergic. I’m not even typing this post while wearing fingerless gloves.

Sure, the temperatures plummeted to below freezing for a few days last week but they’ve bounced back up and any forecasts for precipitation are calling for snow showers rather than drifts. The days have noticeably lengthened before I’ve lost the will to leave my bed. I haven’t even had to make a desperate run to the pharmacy for tissues and cough syrup for one of my kids.

I ought to be happy but instead I feel uneasy, like I’m waiting for the punchline. Like a tsunami will roll up over my barely snow-dusted lawn or an earthquake will crack my ice-free driveway. Maybe killer bees will arrive come spring or rattlesnakes will start basking on my  flagstone patio by summer.

The worry almost makes me envy those people who are digging out their mailboxes. Almost.

Readers, are you having an unusual winter? If so, what are you or aren’t you doing lately?

 

Weekend Update: January 23-24, 2016

Next week at Maine Crime Writers there will be posts by Jessie Crockett (Monday), Bruce Coffin (Tuesday), Kaitlyn Dunnett/Kathy Lynn Emerson (Wednesday), John Clark (Thursday), and Kate Flora (Friday).

In the news department, here’s what’s happening with some of us who blog regularly at Maine Crime Writers:

Chris Holm is a finalist for the Lefty, given at Left Coast Crime.

See THE HOUND OF THE BASKERVILLES and then join Crime Writers Kate Flora, Gayle Lynds, Lea Wait, Chris Holm, Paul Doiron for a discussion immediately following the Sunday, January 31st 2pm Matinee at the Portland Stage, 25 Forest Avenue! Complementary wine and cheese reception to follow discussion. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s most celebrated Sherlock Holmes story gets a gloriously funny makeover in this cheeky spoof adapted by Stephen Canny and John Nicholson of the hit comedy team Peepolykus. This rollicking good show has Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson unraveling the mystery of Sir Charles’ death and the curse of the hound! Packed full of the verbal and visual ingenuity that Peepolykus is known for, this fast-paced comedy offers a slapstick adaptation of this classic tale featuring three actors in various roles. http://www.portlandstage.org/show/the...

SAVE THE DATES:

Friday, April 8th for Two Minutes in the Slammer–a crime community event as part of the Maine Crime Wave. Portland Public Library in the evening.

Saturday, April 9th: Maine Crime Wave. Our own mystery conference with crime, cops, manuscript workshops and craft sessions. Portland Public Library.

An invitation to readers of this blog: Do you have news relating to Maine, Crime, or Writing? We’d love to hear from you. Just comment below to share.

And a reminder: If your library, school, or organization is looking for a speaker, we are often available to talk about the writing process, research, where we get our ideas, and other mysteries of the business. Contact Kate Flora: mailto: kateflora@gmail.com

The ‘truth’ is never a sure thing: ‘Making a Murderer’ and more

Hi from Maine Crime Writers. Maureen here tonight.

I haven’t had a chance to start watching “Making a Murderer” yet, but I plan to soon. Probably this weekend. The documentary series on Netflix examines the conviction of a man and his teenage nephew for murdering a woman, and apparently (I’ve been trying to avoid spoilers) makes a case for their innocence. While I’ve been trying to avoid spoilers, I did read an article the other day that pointed out prosecutors say important information was left out of the mini-series that shows Steve Avery, the subject of the documentary, is not innocent.

On the other hand, if he was set up for the murder the way he was set up and went to prison for 18 years for a rape he didn’t commit, then, yeah, they’re going to say stuff like that.

I’ll hold off judgment until I’ve watched it. Though even then, I know I won’t know for sure.

It reminds me of a multi-part documentary I watched several years ago, “The Staircase,” which apparently just re-aired on Sundance. The Academy Award-winning mini-series by filmmaker Jean-Xavier de Lestrade was incredibly sympathetic to the subject of it, author Michael Peterson, who had been convicted after his wife, Kathleen, was found battered and dead at the bottom of a blood-spattered staircase in their family home in North Carolina.

After I watched it, I read “A Perfect Husband,” by Aphrodite Jones about the same case. And it was a whole different story. I was convinced after reading that, despite the hours of documentary footage that would convince some viewers otherwise, that Peterson is guilty.

It’s a big reminder that we don’t become experts on a topic from watching a TV series or reading a book. The information we’re given is not only shaped by who’s telling the story, but also our own perceptions and comfort zones.

A case here in Maine, that of Dennis Dechaine, is another example. Dechaine was convicted of killing 12-year-old Sarah Cherry in 1988. A tenacious group of supporters believe he’s innocent and are pushing for the case to get another look. A filmmaker who also believes in Dechaine’s innocence is making a documentary.

The general consensus in Maine seems to be that Dechaine is guilty and his supporters are a little nuts. I won’t get into all the details of the case here, but I’ve done a lot of reading on it – more than “The Staircase” case and certainly more than “Making of a Murderer” – and I think there’s a compelling argument for his innocence, including a fairly obvious more likely suspect.

But again, it’s all conjecture.

Even if we sit through every minute of a court case and listen to every word of testimony, we don’t get the full story.

I just finished reading Jon Krakauer’s “Missoula: Rape and the Justice System in a College Town,” which is an in-depth look at college campus sexual assault. It’s a depressing reminder that our attitudes about rape and its victims never seems to change. Just as depressing is the farce many of those in the justice system make of “justice.” Particularly when money, power and public image are involved.

I understand that defense lawyers need to defend. In fact, I’m a big supporter of lawyers who defend unsavory defendants. I fully believe in people’s constitutional right to representation and that the justice system only works when those accused of crimes are represented well. Anyone who believes in our Constitution should feel the same. Let’s hear it for our Sixth Amendment rights!

But that can all end up falling apart fast.

The book quotes notorious defense attorney Alan Dershowitz, who says, basically, that defense lawyers will lie like dogs to get an acquittal. It’s all about winning, not about the truth. I don’t know if all lawyers feel that way, but the ones in “Missoula” certainly do. And they get a lot of help from the prosecution and law enforcement.

One of the disturbing things about the book is that most people would rather have their assumptions and general conclusions validated than be forced to look at things a different way. “Making a Murderer” and “The Staircase” lets us believe we’re looking at things from a different angle and shaking up our comfortable perceptions. We get all giddy with the possibilities, that this guy who everyone believe murdered someone maybe didn’t. In the end, though, for us it’s really just fiction and the stakes are low. Most of us are lucky enough that we’ll never have to go through someone in our family or a close friend being murdered. Or see a family member or friend accused, rightly or wrongly, of murder.

“Missoula,” on the other hand, reinforces an all-too-familiar scenario.

We’d rather believe the nice-guy football star really is a nice guy, not a rapist. No matter what the evidence, we will not believe a “friend” or acquaintance, or anyone but the scary stranger in the bushes, would rape a woman. Even if that woman is a friend, too.

We don’t want our world and perceptions shaken up that much. It’s why the huge majority of rape victims never report it or tell a soul. Just about everyone reading this post knows someone who has been raped who has never told. Or is a victim herself. Or himself. There are many more silent rape victims out there than people wrongly convicted of murder.

The documentaries about the possible wrongful convictions, as well as “Missoula,” are studies of how the justice system can go wrong.

They’re also studies of how easily manipulated we can be as observers, not only by the information that’s presented to us that we don’t question, but our own perceptions and comfort zones.

Maureen Milliken is the author of Cold Hard News, the first in the Bernie O’Dea mystery series. Follow her on Twitter at @mmilliken47, like her Facebook page, Maureen Milliken mysteries, sign up for weekly email updates at her website, maureenmilliken.com.

 

Horrid Murder!

Jen Blood on the Maine Crime scene today… I’ve been racking my brain for about a week now, looking for something extraordinary and entertaining for this month’s post with Maine Crime Writers. After Chris’s eloquent article on Monday, I thought I’d take a much less timely or studied approach while nonetheless continuing on the theme of Maine Crime… The crime this time, however, took place over two hundred years ago. I first began researching the grisly tale for a short story I wrote and then produced as a radio drama with WRFR, our local public broadcasting station in Rockland:

IT WASN’T THE GHOSTS THAT DREW ME TO THE STONE HOUSE. It wasn’t even the history, really. Not the mystery, nor the murder. Or murders, actually—eight of them over two hundred years before, when a supposedly upright former Harvard professor named Isaiah Burch took an axe to six of his seven children and his wife one night, then used his finest straight razor to slit his own throat.

But it wasn’t the murders that brought me to the house, either. No. Erin Solomon brought me there that day. The history and the mystery and the murder were just a convenient excuse. Solomon brought me there…

The ghosts just made me stay.

You can listen to the full audio here. It is based, albeit loosely, on the Purrington mass murder of 1806.

I first heard about the Purrington (there is much confusion as to the correct spelling of the name; I’m going with this one, but it’s also referred to as Purington and Purrinton) murders while doing a story on the Maine Greyhound Placement Service for Downeast Dog News a few years ago, because MGPS is actually built either on or near the site where the Purrington house once stood. While interviewing one of the volunteers there, he brought up the story. I promptly went home and researched, and stored it away as something I wanted to draw on at some undefined point in the future.

In 1805, Captain James Purrington moved with his family from Bowdoinham, Maine, to a farm on Old Belgrade Road in Augusta. From everything I’ve read thus far, he was a moody, dark sort of fellow, and my guess based on the highs and lows and what was called “hereditary madness” when people spoke about him after the fact, is that he probably suffered from bipolar or schizophrenia or some other illness that, in another time, might have been treated before things got out of hand. Unfortunately, that’s not the way things happened for the Purrington family.

Here’s an account from a hand-printed bill that detailed the night of the crime, on July 9, 1806:

“Between the hours of 2 and 3, a near neighbor, Mr. Dean Wyman, was awakened by the lad who escaped, with an incoherent account of the horrid scene from which he had just fled; he, with a Mr. Ballard, another neighbor, instantly repaired to the fatal spot, and here, after having lighted a candle, a scene was presented which beggars all description.–In the outer room lay prostrate on his face, and weltering in his gore, the perpetrator of the dreadful deed–his throat cut in the most shocking manner, and the bloody razor lying on a table by his side–In an adjoining bed-room lay Mrs. Purrinton in her bed, her head almost severed from her body; and near her on the floor, a little daughter about ten years old, who probably hearing the cries of her mother, ran to her relief from the apartment in which she slept, and was murdered by her side…”

What always gets me about these sorts of things is the graphic nature of the text. And, beyond that, you’ll note the depiction of the eight caskets on the bill (pictured above) — two large, the others lined up from largest to smallest. Eeks. According to the story, James Purrington was buried apart from the rest of the family, the axe and straight razor in the coffin with him. Though technically pre-Victorian, the account already shows that lurid fascination with the macabre the Victorian era is renowned for. The mid- to late- 1800s saw the return of so-called “mourning jewelry” – first made popular in the 1600s, jewelry made from a loved ones’ clothing, hair, or even bones – as well as the by-now-familiar memento mori death portraits. The Purrington murders pre-date those portraits by decades, but I took some liberties with my short story and included one such portrait – the image was just too chilling to resist.

The full story was that Purrington took an axe and murdered his wife, six of his eight children, and then killed himself with a straight razor. A seventeen-year-old son – the “lad” mentioned in the article – escaped with only minor injuries, while fifteen-year-old daughter Martha survived for another three weeks before she finally succumbed to her injuries.

The Pulitzer Prize-winning novel A Midwife’s Tale tells the story of Martha Ballard, a midwife with the incredible reputation of having never lost a mother in over one thousand births. Ballard was the midwife for the younger of the Purrington children, and the night of the murder it was Ballard’s home that the surviving son, seventeen-year-old James Purrington, fled to. The midwife detailed the night of the murder in her journal, and part of that story is told in Midwife’s Tale (which was later made into an award-winning PBS documentary).

I’ve altered other details of the crime to make everything fit within the fabric of my short story, including changing James Purrington from a captain with a history of ups and downs to a former Harvard professor who had been the picture of health. There is no greyhound farm in the story, but rather an old ice house and Freeport’s Stone House – a rambling estate I came to love while attending the University of Southern Maine’s Creative Writing MFA, as most of the MFA’s conferences and workshops were held there. But the spirit of the crime, that chilling knowledge that something dark and inexplicable happened in this place, remains.

The final line that captured my imagination and always makes me pause, is toward the end of the hand-printed bill, and was italicized by the original author.

“The ways of Providence are dark and mysterious! yet God is just! and man, weak man, must tremble and adore!”

You can read the full text from the hand-printed bill here.