Lea Wait's Blog, page 8

Memorial Day

Today is Memorial Day. A day to remember those who made the ultimate sacrifice in the service of our country. My uncle and my brother were two of those. My Uncle Karl died in 1942 on the USS Quincy in the Battle for Savo Straits. My brother, his namesake, died in 2021. His death resulted from Parkinson’s disease and was attributed to his service in Viet Nam. That’s the thing about giving your all in the service of your country. Some wounds don’t show. That doesn’t make them less devastating or less worthy of honor. Freedom isn’t free.

 

 

Weekend Update: May 24-25, 2025

Next week at Maine Crime Writers there will be posts by Kait Carson (Monday) and Dick Cass (Tuesday).

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

Kate Flora: A three-book set of my Thea Kozak mysteries is on sale right now:

Matt Cost will be doing a COST TALK at the Albert Church Brown Memorial Library in China Village, Maine, today, at 2 p.m. The focus of the talk will be on the recent release of The Not So Merry Adventures of Max Creed with a nod to the November publication of Mainely Mayhem. Idea, backstory, research, reading, writing–come hear about the books and the process.

On Thursday, May 29th, Matt Cost will be giving his COST TALK at the Isaac F. Umberhine Public Library in Richmond, Maine at 6:30 p.m. If you attended the talk in China Village, you can skip this one, because it will be very similar.

There will be no talking, but Matt Cost will be signing books along with Maureen Milliken and Dale Phillips, at the Barnes & Noble in South Portland, Maine, on Saturday, May 31, from 1-3 p.m. Come check out the fun without having to listen to Cost blab along about his books. The Not So Merry Adventures of Max Creed will be Matt’s featured book.

Kate Flora: Book Nine in the Joe Burgess series, Those Who Choose Evil, out in June, is available for preorder:

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, along with the very popular “Making a Mystery” with audience participation, and “Casting Call: How We Staff Our Mysteries.” We also do programs on Zoom. Contact Kate Flora

Writing Is a Solitary Gig. Yes! Road Show! Maybe Give It A Bit More ‘Gas’

 

Sandra Neily here:

About Library Presentations …

I am busy getting ready to do a library presentation. I haven’t done one in a while and need to get reactivated after pandemic sloth. Writing is a solitary gig and being out with people who ask questions about the writing but also about subjects that crop up in it …is renewing.

Michael at work, doing what he loves

I am experimenting with using a non-fiction partner, someone who won’t compete with my book sales, but one that will add interest and richness to the presentation as well as offer her or him good exposure. Michael Good is with me because I asked him to proof my draft of “Deadly Turn.” A bird naturalist with a guiding business, he’s also testified at wind power hearings about the core conservation issues I have in the mystery.

Here’s how I go about prepping for the day

Light pollution map shows clearly (with darkness) that Maine has the last chunk of forest in the east.

I send out a press release blurb that is convenient for a library to use. I send it out in Word and encourage them to edit in any way that works for them. It should have something “sexy” (a sit up a take notice thing) that will spark interest. This time I included the map of light pollution that shows Maine as the only eastern place that’s not overrun with civilization. (That means there’s habitat for wild creatures there.)

I also send along a headline that might be helpful. We crafted a title for the talk that might lure in guests: Live Birds and Deadly Forces. Check out Camden’s release to see how they used it  (They used most of what I sent.)

(The more we give overworked librarians material to use, the more we might add to the success of the event.)

I ask the librarian to announce a raffle for a free book. I draw up forms that include the person’s name and email. (I keep the emails for my newsletter mailing list but ask for permission before folks leave.)

If I have any slides that I’d like to use, I send the library my slides via Google Drive or a flash drive if the library is set up for that. Find it here. (More on that below.)

I add the presentation date and a shorter press release to any social media outreach I have going on and my website. And I include a link to the library’s announcement.

I gather up all my stuff: raffle slips and pens, a brochure rack for my flyer, signed books that include a business card of my contact info with a short book review, plenty of cash for change … (still not using my phone for payment; gotta get on that).

  If I have a work in progress, I put together some first chapter pages to hand out as a teaser and headline it with a short synopsis. I do juice it up a bit with pics or clip art.  I’ve included just the first paragraphs of a teaser here.

DEADLY HARVEST, A Mystery in Maine # III       

Can salamanders solve a murder mystery? Good question ….

     The Plot … the Murder … the Threat: Cassandra Patton Conover, weak from months long cancer treatment, arrives at her woods cabin only to fall through melting spring ice with her dog Pock. Life gets complicated when her snowshoes snag a body under the water and she finds her backyard woods littered with No Trespassing signs and cameras. Patton is intimate with this threat: an out-of-control assault aimed at the health of what it attacks. With her wayward dog, wild creatures of all sizes, and a game warden who cannot turn away from Patton or the looming loss of his tribal lands, she (once again) steps outside the law to solve a murder caused by relentless forces aimed at the Maine woods and its wildlife.

Chapter One

Up to my waist in broken ice, snowshoes scrambling for good footing in the melting marsh and lake bottom muck, I struggled for breath. Even though the water was chest high, I couldn’t seem to get air into lungs that had seized up. Ice-water saturated my clothing and found skin.  

I saw Pock sinking into a happy crouch. My dog is a Lab. Water—any water— is heaven-sent.

“Nooooooo,” I yelled. “No, don’t jump! Not fun in here. Not FUN!” …

“Deadly Turn” is about wind power where, perhaps, it may not belong. I’m doing some field research here.

Drawing Readers to the Heart of What Matters: Michael and I are using a short PowerPoint that I send to librarians (via Google Drive….it’s really easy and one creative effort is useful for a long time). Depending on the subject matter in the novel (and most of our novels deal with social or geographic issues in some way), I find readers do like us to touch on core issues or locations we explore. It doesn’t have to be topical. A mystery that takes place on a Maine island could have a few slides about the Maine Island Trail. Or if one takes place in a seamy, dangerous alley, a few slides on the old Commerical St. (where we were NOT allowed to go as teens) and what it has turned into now. That kind of thing.

Now that I’m all geared up for this week’s presentation, I will be ready to arrange fall and winter dates and get back on the road. (After the total knee replacement coming my way.)

Sandy’s debut novel, “Deadly Trespass, A Mystery in Maine” won a national Mystery Writers of America award, was a finalist in the Women’s Fiction Writers Association “Rising Star” contest, and was a finalist for a Maine Literary Award. The second Mystery in Maine, “Deadly Turn,” was published in 2021. Her third “Deadly” is due out in 2025. Find her novels at all Shermans Books (Maine) and on Amazon. Find more info on Sandy’s website.

It’s (almost) summer, so find a Maine Crime Writer near you

Underwood Library in Fayette, where I had a great author talk with a wonderful group of people April 5. I love it!

Along with the lilac buds, the ticks and the visitors from away, one thing is sure about the warmer months in Maine — a Maine Crime Writer will have an event somewhere near you.

It’s a reality of the 21st century that people don’t go to things the way they used to. Yes, there is so much vying for your attention nowadays. It’s not like the old days, when we only had three TV channels, no smart phones and parents went out and did grownup things instead of hovering around their kids every waking moment until the child turns 18. Going to the local library to hear an writer talk just seems so… 20th century.

But you know what? You might enjoy it. Whether it’s someone whose books you’ve read or someone you’ve never heard of, you’ll be entertained, learn something new, and maybe be introduced to a writer or books that will enrich your life. At the very least, you’ll be supporting a local product.

Don’t feel like you’ll be pressured to buy books — you won’t. But you can if you want to. No one will force you to ask questions or talk, either. You can just do you, whatever works.

From the writer side of things, I never say no to a library. If it weren’t for libraries, particularly my childhood one, Lithgow, in Augusta, I probably wouldn’t be a mystery writer, or any kind of fiction writer. I’m always astounded at how hard librarians work, how committed they are to bringing good programing and events to their town. In many cases, the library events are the only show in town. I’m happy to get up there and talk whether two people show up or 30 do. It’s the least I can do.

On top of it, I love talking about writing and my books. It’s even more fun when people have read one or more of them, and have questions and discussion points. But if you haven’t read any of them and have never heard of me, don’t worry. I don’t expect everyone there to have. I roll with it.

Maine Crime Writer Kate Flora at our shared table at the Brunswick Second Friday art walk in August last year. We’ll be there on second Fridays this year, too!

It’s even more fun when a group of us writers get together for a Making a Mystery event. The audience gets to participate, and they have fun too.

No matter what I’m doing, I always get a little buzz of excitement seeing my name on the sign out front, or on a library’s social media post. That’s me! I’m a writer!

Are you more of a shopper? We’ll also be at craft fairs, art walks, bookstore signings, book festivals, and more. Stop by and say hi. Even at these you don’t have to buy anything (though, of course, you can if you want to!). We love to talk to you. Even when it’s about how you don’t have time to read, don’t like to read, hate mysteries, or want to discuss (in depth) some other writer that you like or the book you want to write someday. Just as long as you take a bookmark before you go.

Wondering how to find us? We often list our events in the weekend update on this blog. You can also check out your library’s website, the website of your favorite writer, or even Google “author event near me.”

If you want to find me to argue about all this and tell me why it’s just not possible to seek out a local author (or two or three) between now and when the snow flies again, I’m happy to do it. Check out my website, maureenmilliken.com, where I have an events list. Come and find me. I’ll be there.

 

It’s Never Too Late Revisited

Kate Flora: Today, as I’m at the Massachusetts Library Conference pitching Sisters in Crime programs to librarians, I’m revisiting a post I did several years ago. It is still relevant to the many who dream of writing but have put it off and now feel like it is too late. I’m still hearing from sorrowful writers who’ve given up the dream. The bottom line: If you dream of writing, don’t give up. Give it a try.

Many times, when I speak about the writer’s life at libraries, people come up to me after my talk and say, often mournfully, that they’ve always wanted to write, but they’ve put it off for so long that now it’s too late. I respond that if writing is part of their dream, it’s never too late. Then I tell them that my mom sold her first mystery in her eighties and published it at 83. They are often astonished, but I like to think that mom’s story gives people hope.

Here’s an interview I did with her for our local Sisters in Crime newsletter in 2000, shortly before her first Amy Creighton mystery, The Maine Mulch Murder, was published. Amy Creighton is a sixty-something freelance book editor living in a small Maine town.

It’s Never Too Late: An Interview with 83-year-old mystery newcomer A. Carman Clark

One of the hardest things for the aspiring author to deal with is rejection and the feelings of inadequacy and worthlessness that a long series of rejections can cause. Frequently, authors meet writers who, though they love the craft, have grown discouraged by the process of trying to become published and given up. This month, as an inspiration to all of us, we talk with an 83-year-old author, A. Carman Clark.

Q. How long have you been writing?

I can’t remember when I wasn’t writing once I discovered that words on paper held thoughts and could be used and reused. I wrote down what my mother said I could do and held it as evidence when she changed her mind. Creative writing? A very romantic story, written when I was ten and illustrated by a classmate, showed me the joy of making words into scenes from my imagination. I never recovered from this creative attack.

Q. How long have you been writing mysteries?

In 1990, I outlined ideas for a series of mysteries set in a fictitious town I’d created years before. Playing with plots through 1991 led to noticing places where a body might be found from public rest rooms to behind hedges and woodpiles. I settled down to daily writing of the book in 1992, having cleared away a non-fiction project so I could give my full attention to the characters and dialogue in this village murder.

Q. How long were you trying to get the book published before you finally sold it?

My mystery began traveling out to an agent and to publishers in March, 1994. When editors made suggestions, I did rewrites to improve what they considered weaknesses when their suggestions made sense to me. The manuscript finally sold in April, 2000, after my daughter suggested that I send the book proposal to The Larcom Press.

Q. How long did it take you to write the book and how many revisions did it go through before it was accepted for publication?

I wrote MM in about nine months and did five rewrites. Didn’t change the plot but worked to make characters more fully rounded and dialogue more suited to individuals.

Q. What made you decide to write a mystery? What’s it about?

MM originated from my frustration with reading too many mysteries in which I was turned off by drugs, violence and gore, and characters I couldn’t identify with because they had more money than I could imagine. I wanted to read about ordinary folks living in a small town where everyone knew everyone else, and about the question of whether they truly knew what happened behind closed doors. When I complained to the local librarian that I couldn’t find any mysteries I liked, she challenged me to write one. So I did. My protagonist was a divorced woman in her sixties, self-employed as a copy editor, who enjoyed rural living. One day, while gathering sawdust to mulch her strawberries, she finds a body. The subsequent investigation explores family secrets and the lengths people will go to to protect them. And the story reunites Amy with her old school friend, Town Constable Dort Adams, and ignites a romance.

Q. How did it feel when you learned that a publisher wanted to buy your book?

My first thought was to cheer and celebrate the fact that my obituary wouldn’t read, “Mrs. Clark once wrote a book.” (Clark, a regular newspaper columnist, is the author of From the Orange Mailbox, a collection of her columns.) Now there would be two books and then more. I went out and ran around the house squealing in glee. My house is isolated. This didn’t disturb my neighbors. Then I went back to the computer with a new sense of confidence, whipped out my weekly column with no hesitation and went on to my next assignment as though I’d had an injection of adrenaline.

Q. Drawing on your many years of experience as a working writer, what advice would you give other writers about dealing with discouragement and rejection?

As a writer and as head of Maine Media Women’s Communications Contest for five years, I’ve counseled and advised writers to consider that rejections are often the opinion of one person. But take time to reread the book or article, and now, distanced by time, see what you’d like to change or improve. When a writer feels her story is good, it’s important to keep sending it out. Somewhere there will be an editor who will respond. Let rejections be challenges.

Q. What else would you like to say to your sister writers, besides hooray?

I used to hate rewriting. But since my second complete revision of MM, I’ve come to enjoy the process. I live in the village of Granton (the fictitious setting of the book) and move through it, seeing new aspects of small town life which can be incorporated into The Corpse in the Compost, my next Amy Creighton mystery. When I’m really into writing a book, I forget to eat. Writing every day from November to April is a great help in avoiding cold weather nibbling, which adds pounds. Although by statistics or publishing records, I’m a later life author, I’ve been a writer since I first discovered the magic of words, when I learned to make the right marks with pencils. On days when I’m not writing a book, I feel something missing, so I use journaling to keep me alert and to catch ideas that flit across my mind. Questioning myself lets me push away unrecognized mental limits and then move ahead in my writing.

________________________
Sadly, Mrs. Clark died while she was doing a last rewrite of The Corpse in the Compost. It was subsequently finalized and published by her daughter. As a mentor, advisor, and supporter of many Maine writers, she left behind a generation of writers inspired by her faith, talent, wisdom, and tenacity. So if you dream of writing and haven’t gotten around to it yet—it’s not too late. Get going. Photos: An intrepid young woman tries to cross a busy stream.  Mrs. Clark on her wedding day. Mrs. C .

If you’d like to read The Maine Mulch Murder, or get a copy for your local library, her daughter Kate has a few hoarded hardcover copies for sale. Both Mulch and Compost are  available for your kindle or nook. An avid gardener, Mrs. Clark sometimes got annoyed by people who didn’t know the difference between compost and mulch.

p.s. a three book set of my Thea Kozak mysteries is on sale this week. Here’s the link:

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B095BS2B8H?_bbid=270743169&tag=bbmkt26-20

Decoration Day

Kaitlyn Dunnett/Kathy Lynn Emerson here, thinking about Memorial Day, which is just a week away. Actually, I’m thinking about Decoration Day, which was the old name for Memorial Day, still in use in some places as late as 1967. To be even more specific, I’ve been remembering stories my mother told me about Decoration Day when she was growing up, and the preparations her family made to take in boarders for that weekend.

In New York’s Sullivan County in the 1920s there were over two hundred hotels. That area, in the foothills of the Catskill Mountains, was a popular summer vacation spot for people who lived in New York City and Decoration Day weekend was the time when the first wave of guests arrived. The local communities held coaching days—parades featuring coaches, wagons, and floats—but Mom was always too busy at home to attend. Her family owned a farm. In the summer, like families in the neighborhood, they turned their home into a boardinghouse.

farmhouse with the “addition”

To accommodate more guests, they built an addition onto the original farmhouse. It had six bedrooms upstairs and was connected to the main house, where there were several more bedrooms. There was one indoor bathroom (for baths). For other needs, everyone used the outhouse or the chamber pots supplied to each room. Boarders cleaned their own or left a tip for family members to do it for them. Family members also cleaned the rooms and made the beds. Most rooms had two beds and some also had a cot so that an entire family could sleep in one room. Often the same people took the same room year after year.

my mom, one of her aunts, and some of the boarders

So they could take in even more boarders, the family gave up their own bedrooms and slept in the attic. There there was a big bed on one side and mattresses on the floor on the other. My great-grandfather slept on a featherbed on top of the grand piano in the dining room while his two sons moved into a room in the barn. At times there were as many as forty people sleeping in the house.

the other side of the “addition”

Downstairs, the addition contained a large dining room and a kitchen. Food was passed through a hole in the wall to waitresses—the older children in the family. The younger ones washed dishes. Most years my great-grandmother was the cook, but occasionally the family hired someone. My mother recalled one older New York woman, an Irishwoman, who didn’t stay long because it was “too damn lonely in the country.”

boating on the pond

Meals were served at a long table, family style. Breakfast consisted of cereal, juice, eggs, bacon, toast, and sometimes pancakes. A typical mid-day meal was chicken, served with biscuits, a vegetable and a salad, soup, pickles, and a choice of pies, cakes, and homemade ice cream for desert. The evening meal was lighter, typically salmon, cold cucumbers, and potato salad. Much of the food was home grown and the farm also supplied milk and eggs. My great-grandmother and her daughters made their own bread. The family also made their own wine. Yes, it was during Prohibition, but for the most part people ignored that particular law.

Mom and her father, with the outhouse in the background

Mom’s uncles dug a large, spring-fed pond so they could start an ice business. The ice kept food fresh for the guests and the pond did double-duty as a place they could boat, fish, and swim. For summer use only, her uncles built a water tower and the house also had electricity and a crank telephone—all the luxuries, 1920s-style.

guests fishing off the dock

So, that was what accommodations were like for folks who went to the mountains for Decoration Day a hundred years ago. After the weekend, they went back to the city until the real summer season started on the Fourth of July.

Kathy Lynn Emerson/Kaitlyn Dunnett has had sixty-four books traditionally published and has self published others. She won the Agatha Award and was an Anthony and Macavity finalist for best mystery nonfiction of 2008 for How to Write Killer Historical Mysteries and was an Agatha Award finalist in 2015 in the best mystery short story category. In 2023 she won the Lea Wait Award for “excellence and achievement” from the Maine Writers and Publishers Alliance. She was the Malice Domestic Guest of Honor in 2014. She is currently working on creating new editions of her backlist titles. Her website is www.KathyLynnEmerson.com.

 

Weekend Update: May 17-18, 2025

Next week at Maine Crime Writers there will be posts by Kaitlyn Dunnett/Kathy Lynn Emerson (Monday), Kate Flora (Tuesday), Maureen Milliken (Thursday) and Sandra Neily (Friday).

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

Matt Cost, along with fellow Maine Crime Writer, Maureen Milliken,, will be at the Bigelow Free Public Library in Clinton, Massachusetts today, May 17th, from 10:30 to 12:30 for the May is for Murder Book & Author Festival.

On Tuesday, May 20th, at 4:30 p.m., Matt Cost will be on the Bookish Moment with Sarah Burr talking about his recent release, The Not So Merry Adventures of Max Creed.

On Wednesday, May 21st, at 6 p.m., Matt Cost will be doing a COST TALK at the Baxter Memorial Library in Gorham, Maine. The focus of the talk will be the recent release, The Not So Merry Adventures of Max Creed, and how the book came into existence. There will also be a nod to the November ’24 release of Mainely Mayhem.

Next Saturday, May 24th, at 2 p.m., Matt Cost will be doing a COST TALK at the Albert Church Brown Memorial Library in China Village, Maine. The focus of the talk will be the recent release, The Not So Merry Adventures of Max Creed, and how the book came into existence. There will also be a nod to the November ’24 release of Mainely Mayhem.

Jule Selbo will be the guest on the SISTERS IN CRIME podcast with Julie Hennrikus on May 21, 2025, they’ll be talking about writing craft and Jule’s Dee Rommel Mystery Series.

Never too early to put this on your calendar –  Juliana (Jules) O’Brien will be interviewing Jule Selbo at South Portland Library on May 29, 2025 at 6 PM – about writing mysteries, ‘why write?’ and the Dee Rommel Mystery series. (The fourth of the series is just out, 7 DAYS, A Dee Rommel Mystery –  it follows 10 DAYS, 9 DAYS and 8 DAYS.)

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, along with the very popular “Making a Mystery” with audience participation, and “Casting Call: How We Staff Our Mysteries.” We also do programs on Zoom. Contact Kate Flora

Genres Within Crime Books and the Introduction of Rom-Mystery by Matt Cost

Choosing a book has never been easier or harder than right now. First you decide if you want fiction or nonfiction. Let’s say you go with fiction. Then your choices are still astounding in number of genres. So, you whittle it down to crime. This still leaves some work to do as you have mystery, thriller, and suspense to consider. And the sub-genres are still like the grains of sand on a beach. You’ve got Amateur Detective, Cozy, Noir, Private Investigator, Police Procedural, Historical, Thriller, Phycological, Domestic, Medical, Legal, Paranormal, and Rom-Mystery.

Okay, I think I made up the Rom-Mystery thing, but not sure, it seems like it should be a thing. Simple and difficult, right?

If you are searching for a book, you might find yourself traversing down a path looks like this:

Fiction>Crime>Mystery>Historical>Noir>Private Investigator>Rom-Mystery

This could lead you to The Brooklyn 8 Ballo series. A work of fiction that is a mystery, historical, a sliver of noir, 8 Ballo is a PI, and there is a slow burn romance involved. Rom-Mystery.

If you wanted something a bit lighter, you might find yourself following Alice down this particular rabbit hole:

Fiction>Crime>Mystery>Private Investigator>Amateur Detective>Rom-Mystery.

To find yourself at The Mainely Mystery series in which our hero, Goff Langdon, has a blistering romance with Chabal. Rom-Mystery.

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Looking for a more professional private investigator series with a former Boston homicide detective hanging out his own shingle in his hometown to help care for his elderly grandpops? Try this:

Fiction>Crime>Mystery>Private Investigator>Professional>Rom-Mystery.

The Clay Wolfe Trap series will fit the bill! Set in the fictional town of Port Essex, the mysteries are twisted, the thrills are shocking, and the romance is hot! Meet Baylee Baker. Rom-Mystery.

Branching to the edges of mystery and into thriller is not a far step to take and can be a nice way to recharge the system. There are a ton of distinctions within the thriller genre. Give this a go:

Fiction>Crime>Thriller>Psychological>International>Action>Political>Conspiracy>Rom-Mystery.

Max Creed is a modern-day Robin Hood looking to bring justice to those wronged by the ultra-wealthy in any way necessary. The romance in these is a slow burn that begins to heat up in book two of The Chronicles of Max Creed. Rom-Mystery.

Need more historical? Let’s give it another go and see if we can find another Rom-Mystery.

Fiction>Crime>Mystery>Historical>Noir>Private Investigator>Rom-Mystery

This time the search just might lead you to a new series debuting in 2026. The first book is 1955 and contains a simmering relationship between the two main characters of The Jazz Jones and January Queen Mysteries. Rom-Mystery. 

No cover yet but it might look something like this: 1955

Or perhaps you like your crime with a blast of humor? Try following this journey of genres:

Fiction>Crime>Mystery>Private Investigator>Amateur Detective> Humorous>Rom-Mystery.

This will not lead you to one of my books for some time as Bob Chicago Investigates is still in the initial editing stage, but at some point, in the not-too-distant future, you will get a chance at some chuckles as Bob Chicago fumbles and bumbles his way through the pages. And then he meets Junko! Rom-Mystery.

I currently have six different mystery/thriller series in various phases of the writing and publishing pipeline and every single one of them has romance. Rom-Mystery. Because romance makes the writing world go around. But they can’t be pegged as that and that alone. All of them have their nuances of mystery, thrills, suspense, humor, history, and so much more.

What do you think? Will Rom-Mystery catch on?

About the Author

Matt Cost was a history major at Trinity College. He owned a mystery bookstore, a video store, and a gym, before serving a ten-year sentence as a junior high school teacher. In 2014 he was released and began writing. And that’s what he does. He writes histories and mysteries.

Cost has published six books in the Mainely Mystery series, starting with Mainely Power. He has also published five books in the Clay Wolfe Trap series, starting with Wolfe Trap. And finally, there are two books in the Brooklyn 8 Ballo series, starting with Velma Gone Awry. For historical novels, Cost has published At Every Hazard and its sequel, Love in a Time of Hate, as well as I am Cuba. The Not So Merry Adventures of Max Creed is his 17th published book.

Cost now lives in Brunswick, Maine, with his wife, Harper. There are four grown children: Brittany, Pearson, Miranda, and Ryan. They have been replaced in the home with four dogs. Cost now spends his days at the computer, writing.

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Here’s to Getting Unstuck

Rob Kelley here, following Vaughn’s and Gabi’s posts this week and thinking about getting unstuck. I was stuck for the last several days on a book that continues to fight me. But I have a strategy, or at least a realization, that seems to reflect my writing reality more than my writing fantasy.

I’ve written before on the disconnect I have with how I thought this whole writing journey would all go and how it’s actually going. It’s not better, or worse, just different. In On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft, Stephen King says that he likes to get 2000 words in a day. That’s the classic “butt in chair” advice that often serves me well. Except on the days it doesn’t.

My partner, Margot Anne Kelley, writes both her nonfiction and (forthcoming!) fiction extremely deliberately. After months and months of research, she pours out words in a steady stream, not fast, but sure. That is so not me.

After a day in which I stare at the screen, or write then delete sentence after sentence, or just freak out and refuse to sit at the computer at all because my head is about to explode, Margot gently reminds me that I do not write like she does or like Stephen King does (though, wouldn’t that be nice?).

I’ve come to think of the way I write as “burst mode.” I have a GoPro camera that I take along when we go on adventuresome travel. It’s hard while snorkeling to line up the perfect shot of a colorful fish below you, so I use the camera’s burst mode feature. It fires off a succession of multiple exposures. So, nothing, then a lot. That also seems to be the way I’ve come to write.

I never go very long without a productive day. Sometimes a few days, sometimes a couple of weeks, before my writing anxiety is overwhelmed by my not-writing anxiety and things start to move.

Today I’m thinking about this because I’ve just been in several days of not writing. Events in the world and things in my own life have been distracting me, and I’m trying to gather up some of that grace that Margot shares with me, and give myself a break.

I’ve dreamed of writing and publishing a novel most of my life, since I was a kid sitting on my bed reading science fiction. Then life kind of got in the way and the creative energy needed to write a book got poured into building a company. But once I’d moved on to other things and my brain opened up some bandwidth for writing, I was raring to go.

But, like many writers, my writer’s self-image was this crazily outsized, overblown, fantastically inaccurate portrayal of what I’d experience. We all have read countless books on writing by writers we respect, looking for tips on how to make it all work better. Some work, some don’t.

The tip that matters for me today? Giving myself the grace to know that the focus will return, the words will come, the broken plotline will get fixed, the problematic character  will be resolved.

In other words, today I am writing (and not just a blog entry!).

What works for you when you’re stuck?

On Being Stuck

I am stuck.

There.

I said it.

I am stuck. Stuck. Stuck.

It isn’t for wanting ideas. I absolutely drowning in some (possibly) brilliant ideas right now.

For example: a dystopian situation where a young girl is taken to an orphanage by a stranger, it’s unclear where all the other people are. It’s just her and this man. Her sister and parents have disappeared. At the orphanage two men let her in but then kill the stranger and take is body somewhere else. The next day, a family arrives. The father is dying. The two men let the boy in but turn away the father and mother, who is fine and very sad to let her son go. That’s the build up. But then what happens? Not sure. When I close my eyes, it’s like a twisted Wes Anderson movie.

Or this: A woman gets a call from her younger sister, who is living somewhere in the New Mexican desert with a deadbeat boyfriend. “I need help,” the younger sister says. So the older sister goes out to the desert very reluctantly and man oh man do readers know they are in for something. She finds out her sister’s boyfriend, who is still a dirtbag, has stolen a tremendous amount of money from a dangerous man. There are dead bodies and various shoot-outs and, oh yeah, the sisters share a secret about some past criminal activity that might destroy both their lives.

Or this: A man and a woman go on vacation in Rome to try to save their marriage. Things aren’t great and when they go for a walk the Palatine Hill, the husband disappears. Poof. Gone. With the backpack that had the wife’s wallet and phone. She makes it back to the hotel and is met with either piteous or smug looks by the hotel staff. When they let her into her room. Her phone, wallet, and passport are on the bed. Her husband and his things are gone. Poof. As she retraces the moments, days, months, years leading to his disappearance, she begins to think that she never knew him. Not really.

So I’m stuck. But not really.

All of these projects are started, scrawled out on a notebook that is a hot mess of brilliance (“Two sisters at a laundromat in El Paso with a stolen Mustang and a six pack of beer watching their laundry spin and praying the blood comes out.”) or something else entirely (“Nobody is good. That pointy spoon nobody wants. Maybe that’s the point?!?”)

I’m doing all the things that usually work. Walking. Thinking. Staring at the wall. Talking to literally anybody who will listen. Including Jack, who is my dog. Or my sons, who on good days half-listen to some of what I say.

I have entirely randomly decided that the trouble is thus: I can hold the plot of a short story in my head. From beginning to end. But longer projects? I hold the threads and it’s a little like being a kid and making a friendship bracelet and missing a step. Or holding the string of a kite and then a big wind kicks up and the kite is gone and the thread is snapped.

Do I start over? Do I keep going? Do I rework the bits that I wake up in the middle of the night hating? By the way, is it just me or is this thing that I’m working on the worst thing ever to be written or thought or half-thought? It’s not even good enough to be a full thought.

I do have some strategies. I’ve retreated to poetry. I’m listening to James Lee Burke’s audio books, which are pretty lovely, and watching a lot of little league. I’m working my way through Lori Rader-Day’s complete backlist in preparation for Crime Bake.  And I do sit my butt in that chair everyday and get something out. (Though I make no promises as to the quality.)

I just read Vaughn’s post about rabbit holes and the pomodori approach.  Maybe I’ll try tomorrow?

I’m wondering, if you write – what helps you get unstuck? Is this a normal phase you’ve experienced? Any tricks? For those of you who write novels and short stories – is there some sort of mental gymnastics that helps gear you up for longer pieces?