Vincent Zandri's Blog - Posts Tagged "murder-by-moonlght"
A Process of Discovery: Mixing Genres in 'Murder by Moonlight'
The following blog is now appearing in slightly different form at The Vincent Zandri Voyager: http://vincentzandrinoirauthor.blogsp...
I'm not known as an experimental writer.
In fact, I'm often accused of being a throwback to the very old days of Dash Hammett or even the more recent old days of the now, sadly late, Robert B. Parker and Jim Crumley. Not that I write as well as the aforementioned hard-boiled masters, but I am still trying to improve my skills on a daily basis, and that entails going out on a limb at times. In a word, it entails experimentation.
I think it was Jim Harrison who said, 'Life should be a process of discovery or else it's not life at all.' Or maybe it was Hemingway. In any case, in my newest release, Murder by Moonlight which is based on the true story of Bethlehem, New York axe murderer/attempted axe murderer, Chris Porco, I might have chosen to write a true crime novel. All the information on the case has already been published in the papers so it would have been a matter of putting it all together and telling the story, like it happened or supposedly happened.
But that's not me.
While conducting my research, I found a lot of discrepancies in the case, not the least of which is that, in my mind, it's impossible for one skinny young man to take a heavy fireman's axe to both his parents in the middle of the night, and not get at least some amount of blood spatter on his skin and clothing. I get spatter on my clothes just cooking a steak. It's because of inconsistencies in evidence like this that I decided to write a fictional truth about about the Porco murder in which I am able to dramatize what might have happened on that cold moonlight night back not too long ago.
I did something else too.
I normally write in a sparse, hard-boiled, noir style. But in this novel, because of the axe element, I added in a bit of horror as well. It's not a horror novel say in the vein of JA Konrath or Blake Crouch, nor would I attempt to even think about walking onto their territory with my limited skill set, but I can say this: "Murder" was a fun book to write simply because as an artist, I was presented the perfect canvass for mixing styles, and I think I pulled it off. That is, judging by the many great reviews received thus far, not to mention the very good sales.
How about you? Do you mix your genres? Have you ever attempted re-writing a true story in order to get at more possible truths?
WWW.VINCENTZANDRI.COM
Murder By MoonlightVincent Zandri
I'm not known as an experimental writer.
In fact, I'm often accused of being a throwback to the very old days of Dash Hammett or even the more recent old days of the now, sadly late, Robert B. Parker and Jim Crumley. Not that I write as well as the aforementioned hard-boiled masters, but I am still trying to improve my skills on a daily basis, and that entails going out on a limb at times. In a word, it entails experimentation.
I think it was Jim Harrison who said, 'Life should be a process of discovery or else it's not life at all.' Or maybe it was Hemingway. In any case, in my newest release, Murder by Moonlight which is based on the true story of Bethlehem, New York axe murderer/attempted axe murderer, Chris Porco, I might have chosen to write a true crime novel. All the information on the case has already been published in the papers so it would have been a matter of putting it all together and telling the story, like it happened or supposedly happened.
But that's not me.
While conducting my research, I found a lot of discrepancies in the case, not the least of which is that, in my mind, it's impossible for one skinny young man to take a heavy fireman's axe to both his parents in the middle of the night, and not get at least some amount of blood spatter on his skin and clothing. I get spatter on my clothes just cooking a steak. It's because of inconsistencies in evidence like this that I decided to write a fictional truth about about the Porco murder in which I am able to dramatize what might have happened on that cold moonlight night back not too long ago.
I did something else too.
I normally write in a sparse, hard-boiled, noir style. But in this novel, because of the axe element, I added in a bit of horror as well. It's not a horror novel say in the vein of JA Konrath or Blake Crouch, nor would I attempt to even think about walking onto their territory with my limited skill set, but I can say this: "Murder" was a fun book to write simply because as an artist, I was presented the perfect canvass for mixing styles, and I think I pulled it off. That is, judging by the many great reviews received thus far, not to mention the very good sales.
How about you? Do you mix your genres? Have you ever attempted re-writing a true story in order to get at more possible truths?
WWW.VINCENTZANDRI.COM
Murder By MoonlightVincent Zandri
ITW Interviews Vincent Zandri
The following article is now appearing in slightly different form at ITW's "The Big Thrill": http://www.thebigthrill.org/2012/12/m...
Murder by Moonlight Author, Vincent Zandri Talks Writing
By Milton C. Toby
The idea of “humorous noir” is so rife with contradictionthat it’s difficult to know what to make of an author who attaches that label to some of his work. But after talking with Vincent Zandri, author of MURDER BY MOONLIGHT, his latest release in the Dick Moonlight series, “humorous noir” starts to make sense.
Moonlight is a cop-turned-private detective who spends an inordinate amount of time making bad decisions in his personal and professional lives and getting into all sorts of trouble. That happens to a lot of us, but Moonlight’s got a pretty good excuse for his shortcomings, a fragment of a .22 caliber hollow point bullet lodged against the cerebral cortex in his brain. The injury affects his memory and compromises his ability to make rational decisions, and, for good measure, keeps him at death’s door.
A near-fatal brain injury that almost guarantees one disaster after another for the detective accounts for the “noir” part of the equation.
The humor? That comes with Zandri’s ability to make certain doom for his protagonist funny.
“Dick Moonlight really started in the gym,” Zandri explained. “There was this crazy dude who was working out all the time. He decided to become a masseur because he thought it was a great way to pick up women. It was the craziest thing I’d ever heard of. I was working on the character at the time, and I realized that because of the brain injury Moonlight could be as crazy as I want in the books. They’re are serious, but really meant to be fun.”
In MURDER BY MOONLIGHT, the detective faces his toughest case yet, an apparently open-and-shut murder investigation that proves to be far more complicated than a first look at the clues suggests. Moonlight’s new client, socialite Joan Parker, barely survived a brutal ax attack that killed her husband. Questioned by the police at the scene, she identified her son, Christopher, as the killer. The problem that Moonlight must unravel is that Joan now admits that she has no recollection of the attack and, despite her accusation, she is convinced that Christopher actually is innocent. Moonlight is familiar with near-death experiences, uncooperative memory, and false accusations, and he takes the case.
The result for Moonlight, the author says, is “something more sinister than anything he’s ever come up against.”
Zandri was a journalist first, a novelist later. He took a time-tested path, one that worked for him at the time, but one that now may be out of style thanks to the digital revolution.
“I started out covering sports for the local newspaper, and worked my way up from there” he said. “Working as a journalist taught me to write and it honed my skills. Then writing school in Vermont. I expected to teach and write literary fiction, a novel every two or three years. But I always wanted to be a freelancer.”
Would he do things differently now?
“That’s just what you did at that point in time,” Zandri said. “But things have changed. My son wants to start with a novel, talking to readers through social media, without going through the traditional route of agents and publishers. There are more opportunities for authors today than there were when I started writing.”
Easier doesn’t necessarily mean better, though, he added.
“Maybe it’s too easy to get published now. There is a lot of garbage out there, but the gems seem to rise to the top. Talent, hard work, and perseverance always will pay off in the end.”
Along the way, Zandri began taking photographs.
“I took some photography courses at my liberal arts college, this was in the 1980s, but I wasn’t thinking about photojournalism at the time. One day, by chance, I had my camera equipment with me when I witnessed a serious automobile accident. I started snapping away. The local paper wanted to buy the photographs, and so did the lawyers. This is great, I thought. You take photographs and you get paid for it.”
Journalist-to-novelist is a relatively common career sequence, the transfer of similar skill sets from one occupation to the other a logical one. Photographer-to-novelist, on the other hand, doesn’t happen as often, even though a good photographer has an aptitude that translates well to writing. The ability to compose the elements of a scene into an effective photograph is a skill similar to creating an effective scene with words.
“A photographer sees the scene first, the same way a writer tries to picture a scene happening on the page,” Zandri said. Writers are taught to “show, don’t tell.” For photographers, showing and telling are one and the same.
Zandri’s writing and photography took him to exotic locales around the world. Now he’s cutting back on that part of his life, spending more time on writing fiction.
“I want to keep my hand in, though,” Zandri said of his journalistic pursuits. “It’s like getting paid to exercise. But I want a mixed bag of publishing opportunities and genres. The business could change tomorrow, and you have to be ready.”
Zandri can turn out a Dick Moonlight book in about six weeks—the next one is due for release in Spring 2013—but his traditional noir novels take a little longer to write. When we talked in mid-December, he was putting the finishing touches on THE GUILTY, the third novel in a well-received series featuring private detective Jack Marconi. There has been a 10-year break between this one and the earlier Marconi books, THE INNOCENT and GODCHILD.
“It was good to get back to Jack Marconi,” Zandri said, “good to get back to his voice.”
Zandri works in a variety of genres—journalist, photographer, writing school graduate, noir novelist—and media—print and digital. He’s a traditionalist who has embraced cutting edge technology. Considering the variety, I asked if there was a common theme running through all of his work.
“I want readers to finish one of my books and think it was money well spent,” he explained. “I really appreciate the people who have stayed with me, and I always keep them in mind. I’m going to work hard for my readers.”
Murder By Moonlight
WWW.VINCENTZANDRI.COM
Murder by Moonlight Author, Vincent Zandri Talks Writing
By Milton C. Toby
The idea of “humorous noir” is so rife with contradictionthat it’s difficult to know what to make of an author who attaches that label to some of his work. But after talking with Vincent Zandri, author of MURDER BY MOONLIGHT, his latest release in the Dick Moonlight series, “humorous noir” starts to make sense.
Moonlight is a cop-turned-private detective who spends an inordinate amount of time making bad decisions in his personal and professional lives and getting into all sorts of trouble. That happens to a lot of us, but Moonlight’s got a pretty good excuse for his shortcomings, a fragment of a .22 caliber hollow point bullet lodged against the cerebral cortex in his brain. The injury affects his memory and compromises his ability to make rational decisions, and, for good measure, keeps him at death’s door.
A near-fatal brain injury that almost guarantees one disaster after another for the detective accounts for the “noir” part of the equation.
The humor? That comes with Zandri’s ability to make certain doom for his protagonist funny.
“Dick Moonlight really started in the gym,” Zandri explained. “There was this crazy dude who was working out all the time. He decided to become a masseur because he thought it was a great way to pick up women. It was the craziest thing I’d ever heard of. I was working on the character at the time, and I realized that because of the brain injury Moonlight could be as crazy as I want in the books. They’re are serious, but really meant to be fun.”
In MURDER BY MOONLIGHT, the detective faces his toughest case yet, an apparently open-and-shut murder investigation that proves to be far more complicated than a first look at the clues suggests. Moonlight’s new client, socialite Joan Parker, barely survived a brutal ax attack that killed her husband. Questioned by the police at the scene, she identified her son, Christopher, as the killer. The problem that Moonlight must unravel is that Joan now admits that she has no recollection of the attack and, despite her accusation, she is convinced that Christopher actually is innocent. Moonlight is familiar with near-death experiences, uncooperative memory, and false accusations, and he takes the case.
The result for Moonlight, the author says, is “something more sinister than anything he’s ever come up against.”
Zandri was a journalist first, a novelist later. He took a time-tested path, one that worked for him at the time, but one that now may be out of style thanks to the digital revolution.
“I started out covering sports for the local newspaper, and worked my way up from there” he said. “Working as a journalist taught me to write and it honed my skills. Then writing school in Vermont. I expected to teach and write literary fiction, a novel every two or three years. But I always wanted to be a freelancer.”
Would he do things differently now?
“That’s just what you did at that point in time,” Zandri said. “But things have changed. My son wants to start with a novel, talking to readers through social media, without going through the traditional route of agents and publishers. There are more opportunities for authors today than there were when I started writing.”
Easier doesn’t necessarily mean better, though, he added.
“Maybe it’s too easy to get published now. There is a lot of garbage out there, but the gems seem to rise to the top. Talent, hard work, and perseverance always will pay off in the end.”
Along the way, Zandri began taking photographs.
“I took some photography courses at my liberal arts college, this was in the 1980s, but I wasn’t thinking about photojournalism at the time. One day, by chance, I had my camera equipment with me when I witnessed a serious automobile accident. I started snapping away. The local paper wanted to buy the photographs, and so did the lawyers. This is great, I thought. You take photographs and you get paid for it.”
Journalist-to-novelist is a relatively common career sequence, the transfer of similar skill sets from one occupation to the other a logical one. Photographer-to-novelist, on the other hand, doesn’t happen as often, even though a good photographer has an aptitude that translates well to writing. The ability to compose the elements of a scene into an effective photograph is a skill similar to creating an effective scene with words.
“A photographer sees the scene first, the same way a writer tries to picture a scene happening on the page,” Zandri said. Writers are taught to “show, don’t tell.” For photographers, showing and telling are one and the same.
Zandri’s writing and photography took him to exotic locales around the world. Now he’s cutting back on that part of his life, spending more time on writing fiction.
“I want to keep my hand in, though,” Zandri said of his journalistic pursuits. “It’s like getting paid to exercise. But I want a mixed bag of publishing opportunities and genres. The business could change tomorrow, and you have to be ready.”
Zandri can turn out a Dick Moonlight book in about six weeks—the next one is due for release in Spring 2013—but his traditional noir novels take a little longer to write. When we talked in mid-December, he was putting the finishing touches on THE GUILTY, the third novel in a well-received series featuring private detective Jack Marconi. There has been a 10-year break between this one and the earlier Marconi books, THE INNOCENT and GODCHILD.
“It was good to get back to Jack Marconi,” Zandri said, “good to get back to his voice.”
Zandri works in a variety of genres—journalist, photographer, writing school graduate, noir novelist—and media—print and digital. He’s a traditionalist who has embraced cutting edge technology. Considering the variety, I asked if there was a common theme running through all of his work.
“I want readers to finish one of my books and think it was money well spent,” he explained. “I really appreciate the people who have stayed with me, and I always keep them in mind. I’m going to work hard for my readers.”
Murder By Moonlight
WWW.VINCENTZANDRI.COM
The Art of Loneliness
The following blog is now appearing at The Vincent Zandri Voyager:
I spent more than three months overseas in 2012 trying to purge whatever demons or persistent memories that had lodged themselves inside my skull over the past couple of years. I went from a month in Italy, to a couple of weeks in Paris and Normandy, directly to California, back to New York, then to Egypt and back to Italy. In between were trips to other places, mostly for conferences and even a beach-side vacation in the Cape.
I recall flying back to the states a few months ago. The pilot flew directly over Cape Cod like a ship captain or pirate of yesteryear desperately seeking the Provincetown lighthouse. A much welcome beacon in the the heart of darkness.
I guess I'm always looking for that beacon in my heart of darkness. Memories are part of our business as writers. Even if some of them are somehow pleasant but unpleasant at the same time, we tend to romanticize them, and even do our best to conjur them up in our work. What were the sensations, feelings, emotions that went into something that sticks in our brain like silly putty on the wall? How can I tap the typewriter keys to recreate it so that it's more real than when it actually happened? How do we paint the canvas so that we walk away from it for the night convincing ourselves with absolute confidence: "There, I feel better now."
Regrets are easy to cling to because we are always asking ourselves, What if I had done something different? But then, what the fuck is the point of that? You can't change your senior page in your high school yearbook. It's still there gathering dust in the attic to send chills up your spine. Pimples and all.
Every evening in Florence, Italy, following work, I walk to a small bar located in the Santa Maria Novella. On the way I pass by a boutique shop that sells women's precious underthings. There's a woman who works the shop. She's an attractive brown-eyed, brunette and she always smiles at me as I walk by. On occasion we share a "Buono sera," or "Buono nochte" but always I keep walking and she keeps working. I sometimes wonder what would happen if I stopped to talk, but I never do. Maybe that's the beauty of it all. The art of loneliness.
Why, as writers and artists, do we crave it?
I will travel thousands of miles to be alone and hate being alone. Perhaps there's a lesson to be learned here. Or maybe, I'm just doomed to always be searching for that beacon. But God help me if I ever find it.
WWW.VINCENTZANDRI.COM
Murder By Moonlight
Vincent Zandri
I spent more than three months overseas in 2012 trying to purge whatever demons or persistent memories that had lodged themselves inside my skull over the past couple of years. I went from a month in Italy, to a couple of weeks in Paris and Normandy, directly to California, back to New York, then to Egypt and back to Italy. In between were trips to other places, mostly for conferences and even a beach-side vacation in the Cape.
I recall flying back to the states a few months ago. The pilot flew directly over Cape Cod like a ship captain or pirate of yesteryear desperately seeking the Provincetown lighthouse. A much welcome beacon in the the heart of darkness.
I guess I'm always looking for that beacon in my heart of darkness. Memories are part of our business as writers. Even if some of them are somehow pleasant but unpleasant at the same time, we tend to romanticize them, and even do our best to conjur them up in our work. What were the sensations, feelings, emotions that went into something that sticks in our brain like silly putty on the wall? How can I tap the typewriter keys to recreate it so that it's more real than when it actually happened? How do we paint the canvas so that we walk away from it for the night convincing ourselves with absolute confidence: "There, I feel better now."
Regrets are easy to cling to because we are always asking ourselves, What if I had done something different? But then, what the fuck is the point of that? You can't change your senior page in your high school yearbook. It's still there gathering dust in the attic to send chills up your spine. Pimples and all.
Every evening in Florence, Italy, following work, I walk to a small bar located in the Santa Maria Novella. On the way I pass by a boutique shop that sells women's precious underthings. There's a woman who works the shop. She's an attractive brown-eyed, brunette and she always smiles at me as I walk by. On occasion we share a "Buono sera," or "Buono nochte" but always I keep walking and she keeps working. I sometimes wonder what would happen if I stopped to talk, but I never do. Maybe that's the beauty of it all. The art of loneliness.
Why, as writers and artists, do we crave it?
I will travel thousands of miles to be alone and hate being alone. Perhaps there's a lesson to be learned here. Or maybe, I'm just doomed to always be searching for that beacon. But God help me if I ever find it.
WWW.VINCENTZANDRI.COM
Murder By Moonlight
Vincent Zandri
Murder By Moonlight Book Trailer Contest Winner - YouTube
The following blog is now appearing at The Vincent Zandri Voyager:http://vincentzandrinoirauthor.blogsp...
Here's the winning entry for the Murder by Moonlight trailer contest sponsored by Amazon Studios!
Murder By Moonlight Book Trailer Contest Winner - YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vi8LX4...
Methinks this entry truly brings out the cinematic possibilities of the Dick Moonlight series.
What are your thoughts?
WWW.VINCENTZANDRI.COM
Murder By Moonlight
Vincent Zandri
Here's the winning entry for the Murder by Moonlight trailer contest sponsored by Amazon Studios!
Murder By Moonlight Book Trailer Contest Winner - YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vi8LX4...
Methinks this entry truly brings out the cinematic possibilities of the Dick Moonlight series.
What are your thoughts?
WWW.VINCENTZANDRI.COM
Murder By Moonlight
Vincent Zandri
Screen Shots
The following blog is now appearing at THE VINCENT ZANDRI VOX in slightly different form: http://vincentzandri.wordpress.com/20...
As writers in the digital age, there is more opportunity to obsess than ever before. Writing has always been a game of obsessions and emotional turmoils. Years ago, the obsessions were more about the writing. If the words came too hard (or, ugh, not at all!), we obsessed over the well running dry forever. If they came too easily we obsessed over our built-in-shit detectors being on the fritz. No one likes to be thought of as a hack. Hemingway once said he not only wanted to be thought of as a writer, but he wanted to do it better than anyone ever had before. He admitted to being obsessed with this notion of being the best. It led to an early grave for the master.
Now we have other things that make us obsessive. We have Amazon rankings for instance. Take my newest novel, MURDER BY MOONLIGHTImageSince its publication on January 1, it’s been in the UK Top 200 for overall books and in its Top 10 for Mysteries, and is still enjoying a respectable run there. Just this past week it went to the Number 1 spot in Germany for Mysteries and reached the No. 6 for Overall Bestselling Kindlebooks. It’s still the number 1 Mystery as I write this. In France it also hit the Overall Top 10 and the Number 1 Mystery spot. It’s presently the No. 2 Mystery.
So what’s to obsess about?
Once you hit a number 1 spot and the Overall Top Ten, there’s only one direction to go. You guessed it…I guess it’s fair to say that Amazon rankings not only offer up a real-time glimpse of where our work stands in the retail marketplace, they also serve as a kind of distorted, up-to-the-second, “fun-house” mirror reflection of ourselves and our self worth, not only as writers, but as worthy human beings. They give instant gratification, or the lack thereof, a new and often times, dangerous meaning. And they can be the source of severe obsession. Best to unplug and walk away from them for a while.
When things go well on the retail end of things, I suppose the point is to enjoy the moment, which I most certainly am. I am also mighty grateful to the people all over the world who are giving MBM, which is based on the real life Chris Porco axe murder case, a chance (look for a movie based on the case coming soon on Lifetime).
To commemorate our brief and ever so humble moments at the top of the Amazon lists, we take screenshots. So that every now and then, when the books aren’t moving as well as we want them to, we can look at them and remind ourselves that we are not only writers, but writers who have enjoyed some degree of success. Screenshots are more than glimpses at our past, they are our security blankets when all we’d rather do is obsess and depress.
WWW.VINCENTZANDRI.COM
Murder By Moonlight
Vincent Zandri
As writers in the digital age, there is more opportunity to obsess than ever before. Writing has always been a game of obsessions and emotional turmoils. Years ago, the obsessions were more about the writing. If the words came too hard (or, ugh, not at all!), we obsessed over the well running dry forever. If they came too easily we obsessed over our built-in-shit detectors being on the fritz. No one likes to be thought of as a hack. Hemingway once said he not only wanted to be thought of as a writer, but he wanted to do it better than anyone ever had before. He admitted to being obsessed with this notion of being the best. It led to an early grave for the master.
Now we have other things that make us obsessive. We have Amazon rankings for instance. Take my newest novel, MURDER BY MOONLIGHTImageSince its publication on January 1, it’s been in the UK Top 200 for overall books and in its Top 10 for Mysteries, and is still enjoying a respectable run there. Just this past week it went to the Number 1 spot in Germany for Mysteries and reached the No. 6 for Overall Bestselling Kindlebooks. It’s still the number 1 Mystery as I write this. In France it also hit the Overall Top 10 and the Number 1 Mystery spot. It’s presently the No. 2 Mystery.
So what’s to obsess about?
Once you hit a number 1 spot and the Overall Top Ten, there’s only one direction to go. You guessed it…I guess it’s fair to say that Amazon rankings not only offer up a real-time glimpse of where our work stands in the retail marketplace, they also serve as a kind of distorted, up-to-the-second, “fun-house” mirror reflection of ourselves and our self worth, not only as writers, but as worthy human beings. They give instant gratification, or the lack thereof, a new and often times, dangerous meaning. And they can be the source of severe obsession. Best to unplug and walk away from them for a while.
When things go well on the retail end of things, I suppose the point is to enjoy the moment, which I most certainly am. I am also mighty grateful to the people all over the world who are giving MBM, which is based on the real life Chris Porco axe murder case, a chance (look for a movie based on the case coming soon on Lifetime).
To commemorate our brief and ever so humble moments at the top of the Amazon lists, we take screenshots. So that every now and then, when the books aren’t moving as well as we want them to, we can look at them and remind ourselves that we are not only writers, but writers who have enjoyed some degree of success. Screenshots are more than glimpses at our past, they are our security blankets when all we’d rather do is obsess and depress.
WWW.VINCENTZANDRI.COM
Murder By Moonlight
Vincent Zandri
Should I Go to Writing School?
The following blog is now appearing at The Vincent Zandri Vox: http://vincentzandri.wordpress.com/20...
I get asked this question a lot for obvious reasons. I went to writing school and I’m not afraid to advertise that fact. I’m proud of what I accomplished there back in the mid to late 1990s. The work was hard, but enjoyable since writing and reading were also a hobby at the time, and the students, for the most part, were good, decent people.
Of course, there were some assholes who couldn’t wait to shit on your work as soon as walked through the workshop door. But many of these same people are history now, not having published a word once they were given their diplomas. Most likely they now sell insurance or have drunk themselves to death. One can only hope.
But at the time, writing school was a necessary evil for me. I had no idea I would actually write for a living. I thought I would live the cush life of the writing professor. You know, write a novel every five years or so, publish it with a small publisher, bang the crap out of my pretty young adoring female students. Seemed like a nice life to me. But in order to live that life, I first needed my MFA.
These days, for the most part, MFA programs are a scam and a sham. They have sprung up all over the place simply because of the demand. People feel like writers when they are enrolled in a writing program. Problem is, after dropping 30 or 40K it’s more than likely they will never see their work published commercially. They might venture to self-publish, now that DIYing it is hot shit. But the work will probably be mediocre and not attract an audience the way a work published by a major publisher could (or a hotshot indie publisher/small press).
But writing school was a good time. I drank like crazy, spent days and nights on speed, fucked like a rabbit, and yeah, got some writing done too. It was an escape, but not entirely. I was there to work hard and work hard I did. I was determined to be a success one day. Image
Was the experience worth the cost in the end? For me it was. My creative thesis turned into my first full-length power novel: The Innocent (or, As Catch Can). Mind you, the version I worked on at school was very different. The writing teacher who advised me during my last semester suggested all sorts of cuts and revisions, which I did to please him. But as soon as I got back to New York, I put the cuts back in and reversed the revisions. The book was originally bought by Delacorte Press only a year after graduation in a mid-six figure deal, and went on to sell hundreds of thousands of copies. It still sells at bestseller levels today now that it’s on its third publisher in 13 years. So much for writing school advice.
So, do you need to go to writing school?
The choice is entirely yours. You will meet some like-minded people who will be your friends for life, and you meet some of the most crappy souled assholes in the world who want nothing more than to crush you and your talent. They are the jealous type. You will meet professors who are old and washed up and who will hit on you. But you will also meet some genuinely great teachers who embrace the fact that teaching writing is as much a spiritual calling as the writing itself.
I’ll say it again. The choice is yours. Do you want to be a serious writer who makes his or her living from words? If that’s the case, writing school can teach you a lot. It’s what you make of it. But if you just want a place to escape to in which you can play pretend writer, save your money and sell insurance.
WWW.VINCENTZANDRI.COM
Murder By Moonlight
I get asked this question a lot for obvious reasons. I went to writing school and I’m not afraid to advertise that fact. I’m proud of what I accomplished there back in the mid to late 1990s. The work was hard, but enjoyable since writing and reading were also a hobby at the time, and the students, for the most part, were good, decent people.
Of course, there were some assholes who couldn’t wait to shit on your work as soon as walked through the workshop door. But many of these same people are history now, not having published a word once they were given their diplomas. Most likely they now sell insurance or have drunk themselves to death. One can only hope.
But at the time, writing school was a necessary evil for me. I had no idea I would actually write for a living. I thought I would live the cush life of the writing professor. You know, write a novel every five years or so, publish it with a small publisher, bang the crap out of my pretty young adoring female students. Seemed like a nice life to me. But in order to live that life, I first needed my MFA.
These days, for the most part, MFA programs are a scam and a sham. They have sprung up all over the place simply because of the demand. People feel like writers when they are enrolled in a writing program. Problem is, after dropping 30 or 40K it’s more than likely they will never see their work published commercially. They might venture to self-publish, now that DIYing it is hot shit. But the work will probably be mediocre and not attract an audience the way a work published by a major publisher could (or a hotshot indie publisher/small press).
But writing school was a good time. I drank like crazy, spent days and nights on speed, fucked like a rabbit, and yeah, got some writing done too. It was an escape, but not entirely. I was there to work hard and work hard I did. I was determined to be a success one day. Image
Was the experience worth the cost in the end? For me it was. My creative thesis turned into my first full-length power novel: The Innocent (or, As Catch Can). Mind you, the version I worked on at school was very different. The writing teacher who advised me during my last semester suggested all sorts of cuts and revisions, which I did to please him. But as soon as I got back to New York, I put the cuts back in and reversed the revisions. The book was originally bought by Delacorte Press only a year after graduation in a mid-six figure deal, and went on to sell hundreds of thousands of copies. It still sells at bestseller levels today now that it’s on its third publisher in 13 years. So much for writing school advice.
So, do you need to go to writing school?
The choice is entirely yours. You will meet some like-minded people who will be your friends for life, and you meet some of the most crappy souled assholes in the world who want nothing more than to crush you and your talent. They are the jealous type. You will meet professors who are old and washed up and who will hit on you. But you will also meet some genuinely great teachers who embrace the fact that teaching writing is as much a spiritual calling as the writing itself.
I’ll say it again. The choice is yours. Do you want to be a serious writer who makes his or her living from words? If that’s the case, writing school can teach you a lot. It’s what you make of it. But if you just want a place to escape to in which you can play pretend writer, save your money and sell insurance.
WWW.VINCENTZANDRI.COM
Murder By Moonlight
MOONLIGHT FALLS Comes Full Circle
The following blog is now appearing at The Vincent Zandri Vox: http://vincentzandri.blogspot.com/201...
Six years ago I was surviving as a freelance journalist and sometimes foreign correspondent. I hadn't published a full-length novel since 2001 when Dell published, Godchild, the second in the Jack Marconi series. I was beginning to think I would never enter back into the game again. Even then, I still had no idea about the power of e-books and digital publication, so I was still schlepping manuscripts the old fashioned way: via snail mail and via an agent who schlepped via snail mail. In the end, a small traditionally based press took the book on. I signed a traditional deal for traditional percentages. Hey, what did I know?
Now I have the rights to my first Dick Marconi novel back. And now, for the first time, the novel that started it all is available from a digital-heavy indie press that knows how to publish, market, and distribute e-books--StoneHouse/StoneGate Ink. I should know, Over the past two years, I've sold literally hundreds of thousands of copies of my novels with them. So many that it led to a seven book deal with Thomas & Mercer of Amazon Publishing.
Introducing for the first time, again, MOONLIGHT FALLS
Moonlight Falls
Six years ago I was surviving as a freelance journalist and sometimes foreign correspondent. I hadn't published a full-length novel since 2001 when Dell published, Godchild, the second in the Jack Marconi series. I was beginning to think I would never enter back into the game again. Even then, I still had no idea about the power of e-books and digital publication, so I was still schlepping manuscripts the old fashioned way: via snail mail and via an agent who schlepped via snail mail. In the end, a small traditionally based press took the book on. I signed a traditional deal for traditional percentages. Hey, what did I know?
Now I have the rights to my first Dick Marconi novel back. And now, for the first time, the novel that started it all is available from a digital-heavy indie press that knows how to publish, market, and distribute e-books--StoneHouse/StoneGate Ink. I should know, Over the past two years, I've sold literally hundreds of thousands of copies of my novels with them. So many that it led to a seven book deal with Thomas & Mercer of Amazon Publishing.
Introducing for the first time, again, MOONLIGHT FALLS
Moonlight Falls
What Will Happen If There Are No More Books?
The following blog is now appearing in slightly different form at The Vincent Zandri Vox:
By now you've probably heard about the big advertisement book-idea mogul James Patterson ran in the New York Times last week. I'm not going to tear it apart sentence for sentence because other writers like JA Konrath and JE Fishman have already done a far more intelligent job of it than I can ever hope to. But one sentence in Patterson's curious rant struck home with me. He asks, "What will happen if there are no more books like these..." and then he goes on to list a whole bunch of novels that have, in part, helped shaped the 20th century as we remember it, and in a few cases, the 21st as we are presently living it.
I can only assume that when Patterson says "no more books" he means no more "paper books." Which in itself is kind of ridiculous because in my mind anyway, a book is a book is a book (Thanks Miss Stein!), whether it's published in paper or on Kindle or Nook or papyrus or on the interior lenses of those new Do-It-All wonder glasses Google is currently perfecting--You know, the eyeglasses that will one day replace the E-Reader.
Okay, so let's, for shits and giggles, pretend that as of today, there are no more paper books. They're all gone, disappeared, library and bookstore shelves emptied of their contents. So let's take this little fantasy a step further and just for the sake of argument, let's say that Papa Hemingway is still alive and kicking at 113 years old (Not an impossible stretch considering today's abundance of centenarians and beyond...). Picture the scene: Papa comes lumbering into his writing room in the Keys (He will by now have moved back to Key West for practical and professional reasons). He's a little drunk from having downed a one too many Papa Doubles at Sloppy Joes after spending most of the day on the Gulf not fishing, but assisting with the new efforts to monitor fish populations in the wake of the 2010 BP Oil Spill.
Already he's getting hungry and smelling the wonderful dish his 7th wife Maria is cooking up in the kitchen. He wants to eat early tonight and get to bed at a decent hour so he can get up at dawn and bite the nail on his new novel which will be released not next year, but within three months of its completion as an e-book. Man, what he wouldn't give to have Max Perkins around right now, editing his work as he produces it. He recalls the days when a writer could get away with putting out one novel every five or ten years. Now he's got to put one out every six months. That's how much the reading public is devouring books these days.
Papa runs his thick hands over his beloved Remington portable, but then switches on his lap top, and waits for it to boot up. When it does he clicks onto the Amazon Sales Rank website like he always does automatically. He does this now not because he's wondering how he's performing for his publishers, but because, in this day in age, he's wondering how his publishers are performing for him. He still works with publishers, both big and small, but five or so years ago, he decided his audience was large enough that he would start his own indie label which would publish Papa books and stories exclusively. Why give the corporate bastards all the money and the rights? was his logic.
He stares at the screen, focuses on The Sun Also Rises, and feels his smile growing under his white bearded, suntanned face."Sun" is selling in the 2,000 range for Paid Kindles in the Amazon store.
"None male," he whispers in Italian to himself. "Not bad."
In fact, he goes down the list of the many novels he's published since his first book, Three Stories and Ten Poems was self-published in Paris in the early 1920s on a genuine old fashioned 19th century era printing press. All the books are ranking in the 2000 or below range, netting him a nice profit not on a semi-annual basis, but a daily basis.
He sits back in his wood and leather Cuban cigar makers chair and reflects on how much things have changed since he first started writing with pencil and paper. How the world has gone from the Carrier Pigeon in the trenches of World War I where he nearly lost his right leg, to smartphones and texts. How he used to spin ceramic disks on his phonograph but these days tunes into his own personalized Pandora digital radio now that the record stores have become more historical fact than his old neurotic buddy Scott Fitzgerald. He remembers crossing the Atlantic with his beloved Hadley on the Normandie but how he recently visited Paris via the business class of an Air France Airbus. He recalls horse drawn wagons delivering milk to his doorstep on the Left Bank and how now he can't bear milk unless it's Lactose free and bears the Whole Foods logo. He certainly recalls the days when the US Army issued cigarettes in the daily ration kits. But he was smart enough to quit that deadly habit a long time ago.
The only thing he truly misses about the past is bookstores like Shakespeare and Company. Now there was a bookstore. But then, he was never much for book signings, and he was never fond of chain bookstores especially when they wouldn't let go of the antiquated 1930s era policy of "returns" on books that didn't move within a few weeks. Then there were the bookstores, many of them independent, high school and university, who wouldn't carry his books at all because they weren't considered "politically correct." Screw 'em, he said then, and Screw 'em, he says now.
He certainly isn't crying for the major publishers who were the first to blame him when his books weren't moving and then the first praise themselves when they did move. Now, he entertains many forms of publishing and as a result, he's got more control of his work than ever before, and having lived his life as a rugged individualist, he couldn't be happier. Sure he misses paper books, but then he loves his new Kindle Fire. He doesn't have to travel with a trunk load of heavy books anymore, and he even gets to watch The Killers on it, the one movie based on his work which he actually likes.
He gets up from his chair, takes a glance at the book shelf that now contains photos of his family. His many wives, good and bad. His sons, his grandchildren, his great grandchildren and even a great great grandchild. He smiles wryly but proudly and he misses those who have passed before him. The curse of old age. He turns to the window, and from there he can see the sea. The eternal sea. He knows that tomorrow, the sun will also rise upon it and he will bite the nail as he has always done. That is something that never changes and he is as resolute in his calling than ever before.
"Papa!" calls the voice of Maria from below. "Before it gets cold!"
He feels a start in his heart. He knows he'd better get himself to the table before she tosses the meal out the window. But at the same time, he's thinking about a certain young woman he recently met at Sloppy Joes bar. A strawberry blond, with a figure to die for and legs that go all the way up past her shoulders. What did she call herself? A professional blogger? Not a reporter, but a blogger. Oh well, time to commit that new word to memory. For Papa, words have always held a special fascination, no matter where or how they are printed or spoken. But he's made plans with this special new strawberry blond. They are about to visit the border country where Turkey meets Syria in order to write about the civil war going on there. For Papa it will be yet another war and another book, but for the blonde, it will be her first experience in Indian country. It will be a romantic time for them both. Just like it was for he and Marty Gellhorn during the Spanish Civil War. What's old will be new again and all's fair in love and war.
"But how will I break the news to Maria?" he asks himself, feeling the pangs of worry fill his considerable stomach.
Poor old Papa. Some things just never change.
WWW.VINCENTZANDRI.COM
Murder By MoonlightVincent Zandri
By now you've probably heard about the big advertisement book-idea mogul James Patterson ran in the New York Times last week. I'm not going to tear it apart sentence for sentence because other writers like JA Konrath and JE Fishman have already done a far more intelligent job of it than I can ever hope to. But one sentence in Patterson's curious rant struck home with me. He asks, "What will happen if there are no more books like these..." and then he goes on to list a whole bunch of novels that have, in part, helped shaped the 20th century as we remember it, and in a few cases, the 21st as we are presently living it.
I can only assume that when Patterson says "no more books" he means no more "paper books." Which in itself is kind of ridiculous because in my mind anyway, a book is a book is a book (Thanks Miss Stein!), whether it's published in paper or on Kindle or Nook or papyrus or on the interior lenses of those new Do-It-All wonder glasses Google is currently perfecting--You know, the eyeglasses that will one day replace the E-Reader.
Okay, so let's, for shits and giggles, pretend that as of today, there are no more paper books. They're all gone, disappeared, library and bookstore shelves emptied of their contents. So let's take this little fantasy a step further and just for the sake of argument, let's say that Papa Hemingway is still alive and kicking at 113 years old (Not an impossible stretch considering today's abundance of centenarians and beyond...). Picture the scene: Papa comes lumbering into his writing room in the Keys (He will by now have moved back to Key West for practical and professional reasons). He's a little drunk from having downed a one too many Papa Doubles at Sloppy Joes after spending most of the day on the Gulf not fishing, but assisting with the new efforts to monitor fish populations in the wake of the 2010 BP Oil Spill.
Already he's getting hungry and smelling the wonderful dish his 7th wife Maria is cooking up in the kitchen. He wants to eat early tonight and get to bed at a decent hour so he can get up at dawn and bite the nail on his new novel which will be released not next year, but within three months of its completion as an e-book. Man, what he wouldn't give to have Max Perkins around right now, editing his work as he produces it. He recalls the days when a writer could get away with putting out one novel every five or ten years. Now he's got to put one out every six months. That's how much the reading public is devouring books these days.
Papa runs his thick hands over his beloved Remington portable, but then switches on his lap top, and waits for it to boot up. When it does he clicks onto the Amazon Sales Rank website like he always does automatically. He does this now not because he's wondering how he's performing for his publishers, but because, in this day in age, he's wondering how his publishers are performing for him. He still works with publishers, both big and small, but five or so years ago, he decided his audience was large enough that he would start his own indie label which would publish Papa books and stories exclusively. Why give the corporate bastards all the money and the rights? was his logic.
He stares at the screen, focuses on The Sun Also Rises, and feels his smile growing under his white bearded, suntanned face."Sun" is selling in the 2,000 range for Paid Kindles in the Amazon store.
"None male," he whispers in Italian to himself. "Not bad."
In fact, he goes down the list of the many novels he's published since his first book, Three Stories and Ten Poems was self-published in Paris in the early 1920s on a genuine old fashioned 19th century era printing press. All the books are ranking in the 2000 or below range, netting him a nice profit not on a semi-annual basis, but a daily basis.
He sits back in his wood and leather Cuban cigar makers chair and reflects on how much things have changed since he first started writing with pencil and paper. How the world has gone from the Carrier Pigeon in the trenches of World War I where he nearly lost his right leg, to smartphones and texts. How he used to spin ceramic disks on his phonograph but these days tunes into his own personalized Pandora digital radio now that the record stores have become more historical fact than his old neurotic buddy Scott Fitzgerald. He remembers crossing the Atlantic with his beloved Hadley on the Normandie but how he recently visited Paris via the business class of an Air France Airbus. He recalls horse drawn wagons delivering milk to his doorstep on the Left Bank and how now he can't bear milk unless it's Lactose free and bears the Whole Foods logo. He certainly recalls the days when the US Army issued cigarettes in the daily ration kits. But he was smart enough to quit that deadly habit a long time ago.
The only thing he truly misses about the past is bookstores like Shakespeare and Company. Now there was a bookstore. But then, he was never much for book signings, and he was never fond of chain bookstores especially when they wouldn't let go of the antiquated 1930s era policy of "returns" on books that didn't move within a few weeks. Then there were the bookstores, many of them independent, high school and university, who wouldn't carry his books at all because they weren't considered "politically correct." Screw 'em, he said then, and Screw 'em, he says now.
He certainly isn't crying for the major publishers who were the first to blame him when his books weren't moving and then the first praise themselves when they did move. Now, he entertains many forms of publishing and as a result, he's got more control of his work than ever before, and having lived his life as a rugged individualist, he couldn't be happier. Sure he misses paper books, but then he loves his new Kindle Fire. He doesn't have to travel with a trunk load of heavy books anymore, and he even gets to watch The Killers on it, the one movie based on his work which he actually likes.
He gets up from his chair, takes a glance at the book shelf that now contains photos of his family. His many wives, good and bad. His sons, his grandchildren, his great grandchildren and even a great great grandchild. He smiles wryly but proudly and he misses those who have passed before him. The curse of old age. He turns to the window, and from there he can see the sea. The eternal sea. He knows that tomorrow, the sun will also rise upon it and he will bite the nail as he has always done. That is something that never changes and he is as resolute in his calling than ever before.
"Papa!" calls the voice of Maria from below. "Before it gets cold!"
He feels a start in his heart. He knows he'd better get himself to the table before she tosses the meal out the window. But at the same time, he's thinking about a certain young woman he recently met at Sloppy Joes bar. A strawberry blond, with a figure to die for and legs that go all the way up past her shoulders. What did she call herself? A professional blogger? Not a reporter, but a blogger. Oh well, time to commit that new word to memory. For Papa, words have always held a special fascination, no matter where or how they are printed or spoken. But he's made plans with this special new strawberry blond. They are about to visit the border country where Turkey meets Syria in order to write about the civil war going on there. For Papa it will be yet another war and another book, but for the blonde, it will be her first experience in Indian country. It will be a romantic time for them both. Just like it was for he and Marty Gellhorn during the Spanish Civil War. What's old will be new again and all's fair in love and war.
"But how will I break the news to Maria?" he asks himself, feeling the pangs of worry fill his considerable stomach.
Poor old Papa. Some things just never change.
WWW.VINCENTZANDRI.COM
Murder By MoonlightVincent Zandri
I'm a Passenger
The following blog is now appearing at The Vincent Zandri Vox in slightly different form: http://vincentzandri.blogspot.com/201...
What hasn't been written about Peru's great wonder of the world, Machu Picchu that hasn't already been written? The answer is obvious, which is why I'm not about to even remotely attempt to describe the things you can perhaps, already imagine, even if you've never before stepped foot on the 2,430 m high mountain. You see the massive terraces and try to picture what it must have been like for the ancient Incas to carve them out of thick jungle vegetation-covered granite. You picture men literally falling off the mountain while trying to tame it. You see the giant granite boulders on the mountain-top "quarry," some weighing dozens of tons, and you can't help but imagine a man being crushed under its weight during the process of transporting the stones to their final position. Then, you can't help but feel pain for these people who were forced to flee from their sacred home in the night while the Spanish closed in on them, with the promise of death, destruction, and the hording of their precious metals.
I'm not going to describe standing on the mountain as the the sun brakes through the clouds, revealing the massive peaks that surround me, their presence looking almost fake. Like a brilliant projection flashed up onto a gigantic screen. You must fight the urge to reach out and touch these peaks, as if that were possible, only to feel yourself losing your balance. Should that happen, and you go over the side, the only thing that awaits you is a one way ticket to the Gods.
I'm a passenger these days. An observer. A mover. I don't rest. I don't sit down. I stand. I walk. I run. I'm never still, even at home. The itch to explore is sometimes so great, I think it will never be scratched. The itch is located in a spot along my spine that is impossible to reach. Or perhaps it's located in my brain. So the only cure is to keep on moving. I'm coming down from Machu Picchu after one of the most breathtaking hikes I've ever experienced. My body and clothing are soaked in sweat that's mixed with the mist from the clouds that move in and out of these Andes Mountains like foamy waves constantly and never-endingly lapping a seashore. Soon I'm seated on a bus that transports forty passengers too rapidly for the narrow mountain roads that hug cliff-sides thousands of feet high. One false move on this rain-soaked gravel road and we're done for.
You can't take in a life-experience like this one all at once. It has to upload, like a computer program. One day you can be doing the most mundane thing, like the laundry for instance. And it will hit you. I've hiked Machu Picchu...I've entered into the Third Pyramid in Giza all alone...I've jogged Tienanmen Square just a few years after a young man defied bullets and held back a tank with his frail body...I've visited a healer in the Austrian Alps and seen the sun come up on the basin in Venice...I've ridden a Ferris wheel with the one woman I truly loved in Paris...I've been stranded in the African bush and been accused of killing many men by a voodoo Beniois...I've ridden the metro in Moscow and somehow found my way around...I've touched the Parthenon and walked over the Mammar Bridge in Turkey...I've touched the English Channel with my bare toes on the sandy beaches of D-Day's Normandy...I've four-wheeled in the Tuscan mountains with a best friend who's always yelling at me to learn the Italian language...And on and on and on...But that's not enough.
I'm a passenger on a journey that is not only never ending, it's speeding up. In my mind, I'm planning the next stop. India. I haven't yet been to India. I need to see India. So many of you have been there and I am as envious as I am curious.
On the way back into Cusco, the driver of my van tries to negotiate the relentless traffic. After a day on a magic mountain, we're stuck in traffic. Then comes the near deafening and horribly heart wrenching squeal of a dog as a tourist bus runs over one its legs, crushing it. I don't want to look but I have to look. When I see the small brown, furry dog limping away on three legs, my heart sinks into my stomach. Tears cloud my eyes. No one in the van speaks a word about it. Not the driver. Not my guide. No one. But you feel the pain like the mist that still soaks your clothing.
I'm a passenger.
WWW.VINCENTZANDRI.COM
Murder By Moonlight
Murder By Moonlight
What hasn't been written about Peru's great wonder of the world, Machu Picchu that hasn't already been written? The answer is obvious, which is why I'm not about to even remotely attempt to describe the things you can perhaps, already imagine, even if you've never before stepped foot on the 2,430 m high mountain. You see the massive terraces and try to picture what it must have been like for the ancient Incas to carve them out of thick jungle vegetation-covered granite. You picture men literally falling off the mountain while trying to tame it. You see the giant granite boulders on the mountain-top "quarry," some weighing dozens of tons, and you can't help but imagine a man being crushed under its weight during the process of transporting the stones to their final position. Then, you can't help but feel pain for these people who were forced to flee from their sacred home in the night while the Spanish closed in on them, with the promise of death, destruction, and the hording of their precious metals.
I'm not going to describe standing on the mountain as the the sun brakes through the clouds, revealing the massive peaks that surround me, their presence looking almost fake. Like a brilliant projection flashed up onto a gigantic screen. You must fight the urge to reach out and touch these peaks, as if that were possible, only to feel yourself losing your balance. Should that happen, and you go over the side, the only thing that awaits you is a one way ticket to the Gods.
I'm a passenger these days. An observer. A mover. I don't rest. I don't sit down. I stand. I walk. I run. I'm never still, even at home. The itch to explore is sometimes so great, I think it will never be scratched. The itch is located in a spot along my spine that is impossible to reach. Or perhaps it's located in my brain. So the only cure is to keep on moving. I'm coming down from Machu Picchu after one of the most breathtaking hikes I've ever experienced. My body and clothing are soaked in sweat that's mixed with the mist from the clouds that move in and out of these Andes Mountains like foamy waves constantly and never-endingly lapping a seashore. Soon I'm seated on a bus that transports forty passengers too rapidly for the narrow mountain roads that hug cliff-sides thousands of feet high. One false move on this rain-soaked gravel road and we're done for.
You can't take in a life-experience like this one all at once. It has to upload, like a computer program. One day you can be doing the most mundane thing, like the laundry for instance. And it will hit you. I've hiked Machu Picchu...I've entered into the Third Pyramid in Giza all alone...I've jogged Tienanmen Square just a few years after a young man defied bullets and held back a tank with his frail body...I've visited a healer in the Austrian Alps and seen the sun come up on the basin in Venice...I've ridden a Ferris wheel with the one woman I truly loved in Paris...I've been stranded in the African bush and been accused of killing many men by a voodoo Beniois...I've ridden the metro in Moscow and somehow found my way around...I've touched the Parthenon and walked over the Mammar Bridge in Turkey...I've touched the English Channel with my bare toes on the sandy beaches of D-Day's Normandy...I've four-wheeled in the Tuscan mountains with a best friend who's always yelling at me to learn the Italian language...And on and on and on...But that's not enough.
I'm a passenger on a journey that is not only never ending, it's speeding up. In my mind, I'm planning the next stop. India. I haven't yet been to India. I need to see India. So many of you have been there and I am as envious as I am curious.
On the way back into Cusco, the driver of my van tries to negotiate the relentless traffic. After a day on a magic mountain, we're stuck in traffic. Then comes the near deafening and horribly heart wrenching squeal of a dog as a tourist bus runs over one its legs, crushing it. I don't want to look but I have to look. When I see the small brown, furry dog limping away on three legs, my heart sinks into my stomach. Tears cloud my eyes. No one in the van speaks a word about it. Not the driver. Not my guide. No one. But you feel the pain like the mist that still soaks your clothing.
I'm a passenger.
WWW.VINCENTZANDRI.COM
Murder By Moonlight
Murder By Moonlight
From the Jungle to the Frying Pan
The following blog is now appearing in slightly different form at The Vincent Zandri Vox: http://vincentzandri.blogspot.com/201...
The plane ride home is a time to reflect. You've spent the better part of 48 hours, hiking, canooing, driving, over some of the most difficult jungle terrain you ever imagined on your way to an airport that's nothing more than a shack with some ceiling fans, and you look forward to going home. You stare out the porthole window of the 757 and watch the snow-capped peaks of the Andes pass you by as the plane rocks and rolls from up-drafts. The turbulence sends chills up and down your spine, but it also makes you feel somehow alive. You feel good because you've accomplished something unusual.
In the Amazon Jungle you were taunted by spider monkeys who swiftly moved in packs of 200 or more, swinging from branches only inches above your head. A family of howling monkeys growled at you while protecting their new baby. A tarantula blocked your path on a narrow trail as you and your guide tried to get back to the lodge in the dark of night. A piranha bit your finger as you pulled it in with fishing line and hook. The bite stung and drew blood. It also caused the guides to laugh out loud while shaking their heads. "Who's the silly gringo in the Indiana Jones hat?"
Now you're home to the daily grind (yes, writers live the grind too!). You went straight to the ortho surgeon from the airport only to learn that you snapped a tendon in your right foot during the many hikes through Peru's mountainous jungle and that now you need an operation that will lay you up for two months. "You didn't hear something go POP?" asked the inquisitive doctor. Not an easy thing to accept for someone who jogs and trains with weights on a daily basis. Not to mention hiking, flyfishing, drumming for my new band, etc. I can't bear the through of sitting for more than a five minutes. But like a Russian travel friend of mine likes to say, "Hey, what can you do?"
Here's what I do: I have an email into my fixer. I'm already setting up the next adventure. Until that time, I have the galley proof of The Guilty (the third book in the Jack Marconi series) to get through, plus the first draft of a new Dick Moonlight novel, Moonlight Weeps. There's an article or two I will be writing, and one being published next week about my adventures in Africa from Living Ready Magazine. I'll suppose also be taking time to heal from my surgery. I'll be healing all summer long. Which also means I can't drive. Oh no, how am I going to get around?
Oh well, welcome to Vincent Zandri's real world...From the jungle to the frying pan.
Murder By Moonlight
The plane ride home is a time to reflect. You've spent the better part of 48 hours, hiking, canooing, driving, over some of the most difficult jungle terrain you ever imagined on your way to an airport that's nothing more than a shack with some ceiling fans, and you look forward to going home. You stare out the porthole window of the 757 and watch the snow-capped peaks of the Andes pass you by as the plane rocks and rolls from up-drafts. The turbulence sends chills up and down your spine, but it also makes you feel somehow alive. You feel good because you've accomplished something unusual.
In the Amazon Jungle you were taunted by spider monkeys who swiftly moved in packs of 200 or more, swinging from branches only inches above your head. A family of howling monkeys growled at you while protecting their new baby. A tarantula blocked your path on a narrow trail as you and your guide tried to get back to the lodge in the dark of night. A piranha bit your finger as you pulled it in with fishing line and hook. The bite stung and drew blood. It also caused the guides to laugh out loud while shaking their heads. "Who's the silly gringo in the Indiana Jones hat?"
Now you're home to the daily grind (yes, writers live the grind too!). You went straight to the ortho surgeon from the airport only to learn that you snapped a tendon in your right foot during the many hikes through Peru's mountainous jungle and that now you need an operation that will lay you up for two months. "You didn't hear something go POP?" asked the inquisitive doctor. Not an easy thing to accept for someone who jogs and trains with weights on a daily basis. Not to mention hiking, flyfishing, drumming for my new band, etc. I can't bear the through of sitting for more than a five minutes. But like a Russian travel friend of mine likes to say, "Hey, what can you do?"
Here's what I do: I have an email into my fixer. I'm already setting up the next adventure. Until that time, I have the galley proof of The Guilty (the third book in the Jack Marconi series) to get through, plus the first draft of a new Dick Moonlight novel, Moonlight Weeps. There's an article or two I will be writing, and one being published next week about my adventures in Africa from Living Ready Magazine. I'll suppose also be taking time to heal from my surgery. I'll be healing all summer long. Which also means I can't drive. Oh no, how am I going to get around?
Oh well, welcome to Vincent Zandri's real world...From the jungle to the frying pan.
Murder By Moonlight
