Elena Hartwell's Blog, page 71

A Priest, a News Photographer, and an Air Marshall Walk into a Blog…

Thrilled to showcase three more Debut Authors from the International Thriller Writers. Please help me welcome John Vanek, Sue Hinkin, and Joe Reid!

The Authors

John Vanek …

… is a physician by training, but a writer by passion. Medicine is his wife, writing his mistress, and mysteries his drug of choice.  Now he lives happily as an ink-stained wretch.

To learn more about John, click on any of the following links to visit him on his website,  TWITTER, FACEBOOK, and GOODREADS.

The Interview

What is one of your favorite elements of your debut?

Without a doubt, the CHARACTERS! My novel, Deros, which is the first book in the Father Jake Austin mystery series, is heavily plot driven, but I take great care in crafting interesting characters. As the fine Irish author, Ann O’Farrell said about Deros, “A riveting tale of mystery and murder. A fast read, but the characters linger in your memory.” And as NY Times bestselling author Laura Lippman put it: “Interesting, nuanced characters in a finely wrought setting.”

What led you to write your debut novel?

I detest stereotypes, including those concerning Roman Catholic priests. Placing most priests on a pedestal is as wrong as lumping them all in with degenerates and pedophiles. The truth is that they are simply human beings, warts and all. My protagonist, Father Jake Austin, is roughly based on two priests who were my friends. As a bonus, my mystery is set at St. Joseph’s Hospital (where I practiced medicine for twenty years) and in Oberlin, Ohio, a fascinating small college town, which itself serves as a character in the story. As the gifted novelist Sterling Watson said about  Deros , “John Vanek guides the reader through the seldom-seen worlds of both medicine and the priesthood.”

What are you working on now?

I’m currently putting the final touches on Miracles, the second book in the Father Jake Austin mystery series. It will be in my editor’s hands soon. All I’ll say is:  A dying sister, a bleeding statue, and a comatose infant in the intensive care unit. Coming to a bookstore and bedside stand near you.

Thank you. Wishing you happy writing. John Vanek.
Thank you, John! Happy writing to you too!


Sue Hinkin…

… was raised in Chicagoland. She majored in Art at St. Olaf College in Minnesota, where her heroine Lucy’s Norwegian father wanted her to attend, but she wasn’t up for the winters. She did her graduate work in Ann Arbor, Michigan, before hightailing it to  warmer climes.

Sue was a Cinematography Fellow at the American Film Institute in Los Angeles, and was one of the first camerawomen in the news business. She also spent a number of years working in the NBC TV Art Department.

To learn more about Sue, you can visit her on her website, and find her on FACEBOOK.

The Interview

What is one of your favorite elements in your debut novel (Deadly Focus)?

Rizzoli & Isles, Cagney & Lacey, and now for me, Vega & Middleton. I’ve always been drawn to stories about strong female friendships. With disparate personalities and experiences, drawn together by passionate commitment to a common goal, Luca Vega and Bea Middleton take on the toughest adversaries. Family, in whatever form that may take, is a major backdrop. Bea is a twice-divorced single mother of two contentious teenagers, and Lucy is an orphan with a sometimes-suicidal case of survivor’s guilt.

What led you to writing your first novel?

I’ve been writing forever but the idea for this first thriller, of which there have been many iterations over several decades, came about from a story covered during my first job as a TV news camerawoman in the Midwest. With two major FCC sex discrimination suits against the station in the late 1970s, they hired me, the first woman to be out in the field with a 16mm film camera. Yep, pre-video. There was one black woman on the reporting staff, one woman tech person (me) and the two of us were often sent out together. From that inspiration came my two leading characters.

What are you working on now?

Book #2 in the Vega & Middleton series is entitled Low Country Blood. It features Bea Middleton and is her story as she returns home to evocative Savannah, Georgia to deal with an aging mother, family intrigue, and a brutally murdered fifteen-year-old nephew. Pub date January 2019

Book # 3, The Burn Patient, has Bea and Lucy together again in Los Angeles facing a war for control of the black tar heroin trade and the return of Lucy’s nemesis, Gary Mercer, back from the presumed dead. Burned beyond recognition, he’s hellbent on Lucy’s fiery destruction. Pub date late 2019

This entire series has a diverse, multi-cultural cast which has been both fun and intimidating to write in this time of fractious identity politics. Diversity, however, is reality– particularly in an urban setting like L.A. Respect, research and a strong sense of empathy has helped me dive in and write my cast of characters.

Joe Reid… 

… is the son of a Navy helicopter pilot. After graduating from Notre Dame Law School, he became a patent litigator, and since then he has represented clients ranging from individual inventors to Fortune 50 companies in lawsuits valued in the millions—sometimes billions—of dollars.

He’s also spent an awful lot of time on airplanes and in airports.These travel experiences spawn the backdrops for his novels, which he writes each morning before dawn breaks and the real world intrudes.

To learn more about Joe, you can visit him on his website, or find him on INSTAGRAM, FACEBOOK, and TWITTER.

The Interview
What is one of your favorite elements in your debut novel?

Takeoff obviously holds a special place in my heart for many reasons.

One of the things I’m most proud of is that the book starts with a bang—literally—as the opening scene includes a gun battle outside baggage claim at LAX.  When I first started writing, I was definitely one of those people who started the narration too early in the plot, or too early in the scene, so I’m glad I could demonstrate that I’m over that hump.

Another of my favorite elements is that Takeoff culminates in Austin, Texas.  I don’t live in Austin—one of the few places I think I haven’t lived at some point—but I have spent a lot of time there in my work as an intellectual property attorney, and it is one of my favorite places and a city I’m glad I could spotlight.  I hope I’ve done it justice for all of my dear friends and colleagues who do live there.


What led you to writing your debut novel?

I ended up writing Takeoff in a slightly roundabout way: when I originally decided to try my hand at writing, I had an idea for an epic spy novel set in various places around the world, but I found that I had a really, really hard time writing it.  After reading a bunch of books on craft, I decided I wasn’t ready for something that “big,” so I decided to write a “practice novel.”  I spent a lot of time thinking about interesting characters and settings, one of which was an air marshal solving crimes in the sky.  When I eventually finished the spy novel, I was intrigued enough by the air marshal idea that I went back to it, and Takeoff was the result.

What are you working on now?

In terms of writing, I’m currently working on the sequel to Takeoff .  I actually finished the draft of the novel a couple of weeks ago, and now comes the process of working through it with my agent and publisher.  Because Takeoff debuts on July 1, I’m also heavily engaged right now in trying to get the word out about the book. I have some signings lined up and some more in process, I’m headed to ThrillerFest , and that’s why I appreciate opportunities like this one.

You are very welcome! Glad to have you here. I know you’ll have a fantastic time at ThrillerFest!

Thanks for hanging out with me and the debuts.

Don’t forget to check back over my past interviews to meet other authors and read about my thoughts on writing!

The post A Priest, a News Photographer, and an Air Marshall Walk into a Blog… appeared first on Elena Hartwell.

Memorial Day: Find a Moment of Beauty in Honor of the Dead

Memorial Day celebrates and honors those who have died while serving in the US Armed Forces. People often confuse it with Veterans Day, November 11, but Veterans Day honors all those who have served. A small, but important, distinction.

A lot of politics are played with the lives of the men and women who serve in our Armed Forces. But Memorial Day gives us an opportunity to value not the political possibilities, but the actual reality of the individuals who gave their lives for their country. Leaving politics aside, here are some of the numbers of our dead.

American Revolutionary War: 25,000 Dead
War of 1812: 15,000 Dead
Mexican American War: 13,283
Civil War: 665,000
World War One: 116,516
World War Two: 405, 399
Korean War: 36,516
Vietnam War: 58,209
Afghanistan: 2,411
Iraq: 4,424

If we total up all our wars, including the “small” ones, approximately 1,354,664 Americans have died as a result of armed conflict. These are the men and women we honor on Memorial Day. These are the men and women upon whose graves we place the flowers.

A lot of stories have been told about the fallen. The movies, the books, and the poetry. They have been glorified and vilified. They have been immortalized and forgotten. They have been held up on pedestals as heroes and pushed down into the mud as fiends. I believe those labels are too simple. They were flawed and brave and foolish and achingly young. They were fodder and leaders and pawns. But above all, they were us.

And like us, even in the darkest times, they found moments of beauty. Moments of joy. Moments of compassion and thoughtfulness.

Whether or not our wars were “just” – whether in fact that’s even possible, set that aside, and think instead of the loss. Of the lives, which remain unlived. Of those who once stood upon the earth and found beauty there. Let’s set politics aside for a day and join together instead to mourn the sacrifice. Take the hand of the person next to you and ask them not who they voted for, but where they find beauty. And accept that even those whose hearts we cannot understand, find those moments too.

High Flight
by World War II fighter pilot John Gillespie Magee Jr.
A few months before he died in 1941.

“Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds of Earth

And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;

Sunward I’ve climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth

of sun-split clouds, — and done a hundred things

You have not dreamed of — wheeled and soared and swung

High in the sunlit silence. Hov’ring there,

I’ve chased the shouting wind along, and flung

My eager craft through footless halls of air….

Up, up the long, delirious, burning blue

I’ve topped the wind-swept heights with easy grace.

Where never lark, or even eagle flew —

And, while with silent, lifting mind I’ve trod

The high untrespassed sanctity of space,

– Put out my hand, and touched the face of God.”

 

The post Memorial Day: Find a Moment of Beauty in Honor of the Dead appeared first on Elena Hartwell.

Writing and Publishing with Crime Writer Matt Coyle

The author… 

Thrilled to have crime writer Matt Coyle join me today. Matt grew up in La Jolla, California. He earned a degree in English (he says he smuggled it out) from the University of California, Santa Barbara.

Matt sold golf clubs and worked in restaurants and the sports collectible business. He lives in San Diego with his yellow lab, Angus, where he writes the Rick Cahill crime novels. To learn more about Matt, visit his website by clicking here.

You can also follow him on TWITTER,  FACEBOOK, and GOODREADS

Welcome, Matt!

The Interview…

Your voice is unique and yet reminiscent of classic noir – how did you develop your style? 

Thanks. I think voice comes a little from influences and a lot from craft. I read Chandler and Macdonald when I was a teenager and in college. They are certainly a big part of my foundation as a writer. The other part of voice is putting the time in. It took eleven years from first words on a floppy disk to publication. Along the way there were four or five revisions. In those revisions was the genesis of my “voice.”

As you get ready to launch the fifth book in the Rick Cahill Series, how has your writing life changed since the launch of book one?

I’d like to say I’ve gotten more organized and the writing has gotten easier, but neither are true. When I start a book, I jot down a few ideas on paper, but I don’t outline. My writing is process is, ah, let’s call it, organic. (My term exactly, Matt!) I start with an inciting incident that will emotionally pull my protagonist, Rick Cahill, into the story. Generally, I’ve had a good idea what the ending is going to be and I just need to find interesting and logical ways to get there. However, in writing the last two books, Wrong Light, and number six which I’m writing now, the endings have been a bit nebulous at the beginning of the writing process.

I think it worked out fine with Wrong Light. We’ll see with number six.Despite my growing disorganization and lack of a clear path, I have this stupid confidence that I can make it all work out in the end because I’ve done it before. I test that confidence daily, but just roll with it and accept that this is my process.

One thing that I think makes writing each book a tad easier is that my first drafts seem to improve with each book. That’s comforting when you’re staring down a deadline.

Your first book did extremely well both critically and commercially, including an Anthony Award and making Amazon’s Weekly Bestseller List. Did these accolades give you confidence for the next book? Or did it set the bar high for your own expectations?

Good questions. I don’t think the Anthony gave me any extra confidence as I was writing Night Tremors. The Amazon Bestseller list came a couple years later on a Kindle sale. However, the Anthony did probably help raise expectations. I’ll always have my own set of expectations for each book. If not better than the last, I want it to be worthy of the series. I think the Anthony Award made me more cognizant of not letting my publisher and readers down.

The Anthony definitely gave me a boost in visibility, which has helped with getting other accolades. I have plenty of shortcomings, but I’m not going to throw out false modesty regarding my books. I’m proud of every one of them and think they deserve whatever notoriety they’ve received. However, I realize I was lucky to be noticed right off the bat and that’s given me a boost in building a career. There are a lot of talented writers who haven’t been as lucky as I have.

Tell us about your path to publishing your first novel.

I don’t think we have enough space to cover my path to publishing. It would take about three blogs. However, here’s the Reader’s Digest version: I knew I wanted to be a writer ever since my father gave me The Simple Art of Murder, by Raymond Chandler when I was thirteen or fourteen. It took me thirty years to realize that you actually had to write to become a writer. I started writing the book that would become Yesterday’s Echo when I was forty-three.

It took me six years of putting together a manuscript that was submittable and five years of rejections and four or five revisions before I got an agent. Five months later, I had a book deal. I would have liked to have been published earlier, but am thankful that an earlier version of the book wasn’t published. If it had, it wouldn’t have been as good as the book that was eventually published and I don’t think my career would be at whatever level it is today.

What are the best and the worst decisions you have made in your writing career?

I hope I haven’t made the former and have already made the latter. Maybe the best decision to date was to revise my first book one more time after yet another rejection and after I’d already started writing book two. The worst decision was probably waiting so long to actually decide to start writing and be serious about it.

What are you working on now?

The fifth Rick Cahill Crime novel, Wrong Light, comes out this December. Right now, I’m sitting in a motel room in Santa Barbara where I’m researching and writing book six in the Cahill series.

“Join writers’ organizations and go to writers’ conferences where you’ll meet other people at various stages of the career you’ve chosen and all understand its unique journey.”

Final words of wisdom:

Write. Write when it’s easy (is it ever?) and write when it’s difficult. Write when you can find so many other things to do instead of write. Join a writers group. You need other people to tell you if your writing the book you think you’re writing.

Join writers’ organizations and go to writers’ conferences where you’ll meet other people at various stages of the career you’ve chosen and all understand its unique journey.

And agree to do blogs with nice people who are giving you an opportunity to reach a greater audience.

Thanks, Elena!

Thank you, Matt! Great to have you join us here today!

The post Writing and Publishing with Crime Writer Matt Coyle appeared first on Elena Hartwell.

A Navy Seal, a Journalist, and a Film Producer on Their Debut Novels

This week I’m introducing three more International Thriller Writers from the Debut Author Program: Jack Carr, Paddy Hirsch, and Nick Clark Windo.

These three guys definitely put the “International” into ITW. Two thrillers and a historical mystery, written by three fascinating individuals. Thanks for joining me!

The Authors



Jack Carr…
…is a former Navy SEAL who led special operations teams on four continents as a Team Leader, Platoon Commander, Troop Commander and Task Unit Commander.


Over his 20 years in Naval Special Warfare he transitioned from an enlisted SEAL sniper specializing in communications and intelligence, to a junior officer leading assault and sniper teams in Iraq and Afghanistan, to a platoon commander practicing counterinsurgency in the southern Philippines, to commanding a Special Operations Task Unit in the most Iranian influenced section of southern Iraq throughout the tumultuous drawdown of U.S. Forces.  Jack retired from active duty in 2016.



Connect with Jack on social media: INSTAGRAM, TWITTER, and FACEBOOK







The Interview

What is one of your favorite elements in your debut novel? I was drawn to the theme of revenge because books with that theme always resonated with me.  I wanted to explore what could happen when someone with the training and experience born of the last 16 years at war abandons everything he believes in and essentially becomes the insurgent he’s been fighting.  To really have nothing to lose he would have to believe he was dying which is one of the conspiratorial elements of the narrative.

I got that idea from the ancient Japanese code of honor known as Bushido.  I remember reading that Samurai would go into battle thinking they were already dead which made them more effective and efficient warriors.  I wanted to apply that mentality to a modern day warrior, hence the pharmaceutical tie in to the story which I got from studying the Church Committee hearings in the 1970s.  Combining these two elements put the protagonist, James Reece, in the mindset of an ancient Samurai as he applies his skillset to a list of conspirators that killed his team and his family.

What led you to writing your first novel? Writing is something I have wanted to do since I was very young.  My mom was a librarian so we grew up surrounded by books and she instilled a love of reading in us at a very early age.  I was also naturally drawn toward military service.  I always knew I would do those two things in life: serve my country in uniform and write.

While in the military I was solely focused on the task at hand as that is what I felt I owed the operators under my leadership, their families, the mission and the country.  As my time in the SEAL Teams was coming to an end it was time to give my other passion a shot.  The Terminal List is the result.

What are you working on now? The second novel is close to completion and I could not be more excited about it!  I don’t want to give too much away for those that have read or are about to read The Terminal List, but I will say that some characters from the first book find their way into the second – which ones and in what capacity, that’s the secret.

Paddy Hirsch…
… is a journalist, broadcaster, online host and now a fiction writer. He was schooled in Ireland and the UK, and spent ten years in the British Royal Marines before moving to Hong Kong to start a career in news. He has worked in every journalistic medium in a variety of countries, in Asia, Europe and the Americas. He is a specialist in business, financial and economic news, and his work appears regularly on National Public Radio in the US.

He attended Stanford University as a Knight Fellow in 2011 and has won several awards for his video work explaining financial terminology. In 2012, Harper Business published his book Man vs Markets, a tongue-in-cheek guide to the financial system. The Devil’s Half Mile (Tor/Forge) is his first novel.

You can find Paddy on TWITTER, INSTAGRAM, and FACEBOOK

The Interview

What is one of your favorite elements in your debut novel? My favorite character is Kerry O’Toole. She’s the mixed-race daughter of an Irish gangster and a former slave who escaped from a plantation. Her mother died in childbirth, and her father failed to educate her, so she has limited options. So she chooses her own path. I love Kerry because she’s the character who developed most during my writing process. She’s also become a way for me to develop all sorts of themes that I might have not touched on otherwise, many of which are particularly relevant today. In fact I’d say she is the character who most effectively connects the narrative to current events.

What led you to writing your first novel? I’m business and financial journalist. I wrote a book called Man vs Markets a few years ago, explaining the financial markets. I wanted to write a follow-up, a history of the New York Stock Exchange, to show how markets are developed and formalised. But it was SO BORING! Plus, I wasn’t getting any actual writing done, as there was so much research to do. So I wrote a murder into the narrative, just to keep my hand in, you understand. And the murder kind of … took over. Like a succubus!

What are you working on now? Right now I’m editing the follow-up to The Devil’s Half Mile . The working title is Hudson’s Kill. And I recently started a third book, which has the working title Half Moon Point. Meanwhile I’m doing a lot of work editing podcasts that are focused on business and finance, which is giving me all sorts of inspiration!







Nick Clark Windo…

… was a student in the Faber Academy “Writing a Novel” course. He studied English literature at Cambridge and acting at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, and he now works as a film producer and communications coach.

The Feed, his first thriller, was inspired by his realization that people are becoming increasingly disconnected from one another, as well as by philosophical questions about identity and memory. He lives in London with his wife.

You can follow Nick on TWITTER

The Interview

What is one of your favorite elements in your debut novel? Well there is a plot point that, in these technologically advanced days, I wish I could install a hidden camera into every book and watch people’s reactions to. But obviously I can’t say what it is!

There’s a character who I grew to love, which surprised me a lot, because he’s horrible. He’s called the Pharmacist and he’s a vindictive and dangerous person. But I realised while writing him how damaged he had been in the past. I thought a lot about why he behaves in the way he does and what’s poisoned him; how pre-emptive attack is his best form of defence.

That’s in no way to forgive him – he’s a delightfully wrong’un, for sure – but I found it very interesting to begin to understand his motives and sympathise with his situation. The Feed, I hope, has a few such characters and situations. It’s far from being a morally cut-and-dried world.

What led you to writing your first novel? I have a few other novels that I wrote first but haven’t been published. I doubt they will ever see the light of day, but all of them were needed for practice. The ideas for The Feed were cooking in my brain for quite a while before I started writing. I knew themes, and I knew some plot points (the one I mentioned above, for example), but for some reason the story wasn’t cohering.

Then I had insomnia for a while. I’d never had it before. And after a couple of weeks, I realised it was because I was checking Twitter until just before I went to sleep every night. The technology was directly affecting the rapidity of my dreams. When I woke up that morning, I had the title for the novel and also the thing that made all my ideas coalesce: what will happen to us as human beings when technology becomes fused with us…and then fails?

What are you working on now? Well there’s a TV adaptation of The Feed which is about to go into production, which is very exciting. So there’s more from the Feed world coming soon. That aside, I’m playing with a couple of ideas. One is very different in that it’s set in the here-and-now (but not so different as it’s a story about obsession and how it affects family). The other is similar in that it’s a thriller with an apocalypse at its heart…though I’m more interested in the pre-apocalypse world for this one, rather than The Feed’s post-apocalyptic one!

 

It’s always exciting to find new authors. Don’t miss some of my past interviews with debuts, including Demetra Brodsky, Cari Davis, and Matt Goldman and James Tucker, L.A. Chandlar, and Dianne Freeman.

The post A Navy Seal, a Journalist, and a Film Producer on Their Debut Novels appeared first on Elena Hartwell.

Jenny Milchman on Writing her Fourth Novel

Something Wicked This Way Comes

 

Jenny Milchman is the author of COVER OF SNOW, which won the Mary Higgins Clark Award, RUIN FALLS, an Indie Next Pick and a Top Ten of 2014 by Suspense Magazine and AS NIGHT FALLS, the recipient of the 2015 Silver Falchion award for best novel. Her latest novel, Wicked River, was published by Sourcebooks in May 2018.

She is Vice President of Author Programming for International Thriller Writers, a member of the Sisters in Crime speakers bureau, and is the founder and organizer of Take Your Child to a Bookstore Day, which is celebrated annually in all fifty states. Jenny lives in the Hudson River Valley with her family.

So happy to have Jenny join me today to talk about her writing journey.

THE INTERVIEW

Wicked River came out of your own aborted honeymoon in 1994 (though yours ended on a much better note!). Why did this particular story stick with you all these years? Do you think some stories need time to marinate before an author can do them justice?

My husband and I were young when we got married, and decided to go on a backwoods honeymoon to save money. The only problem was, we didn’t know a whole lot about the back country. Including the fact that June was black fly season in the Adirondacks where our trip was set.

We got chased out in a much more ignominious way than my heroine and hero do, but the question always stuck with me: What if we hadn’t left when we did? How bad could things have gotten? That question propels Wicked River. As for why it took twenty-three years before I wrote it, it’s less that the story needed to marinate—though I do think that happens, all the time—and more that there was a bad guy living in my head, and he needed a story. You meet him in Wicked River.

Now that your fourth book is hitting the shelves, what is the most important lesson you have learned as a professional writer?

That it’s not about book one—or book four. This whole professional writing thing, that is. Instead it’s about the words we put on the page every day, building them into the next book, and the next. That’s the way we grow our readers, make them happy, and one day maybe break out.

You are very active with International Thriller Writers, an organization that supports writers at all levels, from pre-published to best seller. How has that organization and those relationships sustained you through the difficult challenges in your career?

In a very tangible way, ITW helped me through a recent difficult period—when I lost my first publisher after my editor was let go. Some of the organization’s biggest blockbuster authors read the novel my agent was shopping and sent it out on submission with words of endorsement and support. Nearly two years later, these are the blurbs I’m still waving as proudly as a flag.

One of these authors even helped me re-craft my ending when I knew it was in trouble. ITW has a decade-plus history of supporting its members—of walking the walk that when one of us rises, everyone else does too. The way they showcase debut authors is unparalleled in the writing world. I recommend joining ITW, volunteering in whatever way suits you best—like you have done, twice now, Elena—and letting the community be there for you in good times and bad.

“ITW has a decade-plus history of supporting its members—of walking the walk that when one of us rises, everyone else does too.” —Jenny Milchman

Tell us about your writing process.

I’m going to bullet this one—Jenny’s Top Three Tips (keeping in mind that they probably won’t work for anyone besides me):

Instead of outlining, sink into the story as if you were living it
Write on a machine with no email, social media, or even internet
Keep a squeakily clean, borderline-obsessive room to yourself

I can handle the first two tips Jenny, but the third one is going to be a challenge!

Your first three books were published with Ballantine Books. Wicked River is published through Sourcebooks, one of the hottest independent publishers in the country. How has your experience differed between the two houses?

It was a case of the door I never would’ve known to open being the exact right one. I loved my time with Ballantine and all the people I worked with there, but Sourcebooks fits me in a way I never knew existed in publishing. If you took Jenny-as-a-writer, or even Jenny-as-a-person, and made her a publishing house, that would be Sourcebooks. How is that for a confusing sentence? (Luckily my editors at Sourcebooks rock).

The emphasis SB places on relationships, bookstores, on the face-to-face combined with the virtual world, are elements I was always looking for in a publisher, and just didn’t know it. The publicity cycle for Wicked River began ten months before it came out, with me being sent to book festivals and Winter Institute, and it’s continuing through the summer with first a five week tour, and then a second tour for four SB authors together. Which sounds like it could be a novel in of itself! I guess I am trying to say that SB is hot for a reason. They are innovative, inventive, and doing things right.

“This is going to be harder than you would ever believe, and better than you can even imagine.”

What are you working on now?

My current work-in-progress is very different from Wicked River, which is a multi-POV thriller in which the reader knows exactly where danger is coming from—just not how or when it will hit. Whereas my new book, Mercy Island, is a stranger-comes-to-town story, told from just the heroine’s perspective, in which the reader has no idea what will turn out to be bad, scary, harmful. It’s the most Gothic novel I’ve ever written, with this paranoia seeping in from all sides (hopefully). I have to put it down to go on tour, and I’m going to miss my heroine terribly.

Final Words of Wisdom:

This is going to be harder than you would ever believe, and better than you can even imagine.

Great final words! Thanks for hanging out with us today!

The post Jenny Milchman on Writing her Fourth Novel appeared first on Elena Hartwell.

Two Independent Bookstores, A Greyhound Bus, and Flying First Class

Authors often do live events at bookstores, libraries, and conferences. Travel is part of the package in this career. Travel is both exciting and exhausting. From the crowds at conventions to the anxiety about whether or not anyone will show up for a book event, it’s a challenge, but one I love to undertake.

My most recent travel plans were to support Three Strikes, You’re Dead, the third in the Eddie Shoes Mystery Series. I had a marvelous time in California at two bookstores, Gatsby Books in Long Beach on April 14 and Mysterious Galaxy in San Diego on April 15.

Independent Bookstores Rock.

One of the things I enjoy most about being a writer is doing events with other authors.

For Gatsby Books, I got to join Christina Hoag. We’re a great match for an author event, she comes from a Journalist background, I come from a Theatre background. We’re both a couple years into our “novelist” careers, she has Skin of Tattoos and her YA novel, Girl on the Brink. We also have similar struggles. We know what the other has gone through to get to this point and where we strive to go. Having another person who understands this journey helps with the isolation aspect of writing alone most of the time in one’s room.

“Having another person who understands this journey helps with the isolation aspect of writing alone most of the time in one’s room.”

Gatsby Books is a small, but excellent bookstore in Long Beach California, just off the 405 Freeway. Our audience was lovely.  Christina and I “interviewed” each other—with help from our audience, who asked great questions. The folks at Gatsby Books were friendly and helpful and clearly love books and the people who write them.

Plus, they have a cat. Who doesn’t love a bookstore with a cat?

Mysterious Galaxy is one of my favorite bookstores. The store specializes in mystery, thriller, and sci-fi. Even better, it’s about ten minutes from where my parents live.

For the Mysterious Galaxy event, Christina and I were joined by San Diego author, Corey Lynn Fayman. Corey was the perfect addition to our duo. He also has three books out in his Rolly Waters series. The turnout was excellent—San Diego is my hometown and Mysterious Galaxy is well-known for their author events.

Like the Gatsby event, we asked each other questions and the audience participated as well. Both events ran about an hour and we signed books afterward. That’s always a wonderful feeling. To know that a reader wants your work and that having you sign it makes it an even better experience. It’s like the curtain call at the end of the play. A way to engage with the reader and say thank you for buying my book, thank you for reading, thank you for supporting an independent bookstore.

Amazon plays a huge role in most writer’s careers, but Independent Bookstores are fundamental as well. They are places where people can come together to find new authors, get the latest book from their favorite writers, and hear professionals talk about their work. If you’d like to learn about Independent Bookstore Day (The last Saturday in April), click the link here.

I’d flown from Seattle to Los Angeles for the Gatsby Books’ event, so I had to get from Long Beach to San Diego. My plan was to rent a car, but the drop off fee for a one-way rental was ridiculously expensive. I checked out Amtrak, TesLoop, and Uber. What I landed on was the good ol’ Greyhound Bus.

“It’s low budget travel at its best.”

It was perfect. There’s something nostalgic for me about heading out into the dark on a bus. I’ve ridden Greyhound before. It feels like the ultimate American ride. Anonymous driver. A lot of empty seats. The new buses have WIFI and outlets for your gadgets. It’s low budget travel at its best. It is not glamorous, but it was peaceful. I wasn’t groped by a TSA agent. I didn’t stand in line to go through security. I didn’t have to arrive an hour and a half before my trip. It cost me $18.

Arriving in San Diego, Mom and Dad were there to pick me up at the station. Priceless.

After a week in San Diego with family and friends, I headed back up to SeaTac on United. I’m a 1K member, and they treat me very well. I got the free upgrades for both flights and flew first class.

In some ways, the two trips are the perfect metaphor for a writing career. Sometimes, you travel by bus. Sometimes you fly first class. But no matter what, you reach your destination. And then you plan your next trip.

I’ll see you all in Deadwood, South Dakota for Wild Deadwood Reads. Travel by car. Another adventure.

 

 

 

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One Teen Thriller, One Historical Mystery, and One TV Comedy Writer Who Kills….

I’m thrilled to introduce this week’s ITW Debut authors: Demetra Brodsky, Cari Davis, and Matt Goldman. These authors all bring something unique to their craft. A little something for every reader!

The Authors

Demetra Brodsky…

…is an award-winning graphic designer & art director turned writer. She has a B.F.A. from The Massachusetts College of Art and Design and lives in Southern California with her family of four and two lovable rescue dogs where she is always trying to make more time for the beach.

Dive Smack is dedicated to Pumpkin, the monarch butterfly she once saved from the brink of death. Once you read the book, you’ll understand why.

You can connect with Demetra through the following links:  TWITTER, FACEBOOK, INSTAGRAM, and  TUMBLR

The Interview

What is one of your favorite elements in your debut novel? One of my favorite elements in Dive Smack is the springboard diving I used as both his skill and a metaphor to illustrate the main character’s life spiraling out of control. I have a friend [Karen LaFace] who was a U.S.A. springboard diver in the 1992 Summer Olympics in Barcelona, who was kind enough to proofread all the diving in my book. When she blurbed my debut novel and called it “…a perfect 10” I was ecstatic. When an olympic springboard diver says you nailed it, you kind of have a moment of stomach swooping pride.

What led you to writing your first novel? I lost my job as an Artist Manager during the recession in 2009. At the same time, my youngest daughter was devouring the Percy Jackson novels. Being a first generation Greek American, I thought about how much I’ve always wanted to be an author, even though I was pushed by family as a teenager to do something they deemed more practical. I took the opportunity I had, for better or worse, to freelance and dive (pun acknowledge, not intended) into writing. I knew virtually nothing about writing a book. I had written poetry for years, though, so I set off for my local library and read as many books on the craft as I could carry, dedicated to changing my career and learning everything I could.

Once I had an outline and was drafting, I joined online groups and began attending conferences. I had started a now defunct blog and interviewed other authors to build my network, which branched into designing swag. That first novel got wonderful and constructive feedback from agents when I finally decided to query, but the timing for Greek Mythology had passed. I still intend to resurrect that book, which is the first in a planned goddess trilogy.

What are you working on now? At the moment, my projects are slightly under wraps, but I can say I have a YA thriller about alien abduction out on submission at the moment, and I’m also working with my editor at Tor Teen on a thriller proposal about siblings, and maybe the end of the world as we know it. I’d tell you more, but . . . you know how that saying goes. We’re thriller writers, after all. But please, stay tuned for things to come.

Cari Davis …

… is the author of historical romantic suspense, creating tales of love, crime, and adventure in 19th century America.  As a child, Cari’s idea of fun Saturdays involved spending hours at the local library, researching historical tidbits and escaping into the endless worlds of fiction. She especially enjoys the suspense of thrillers/crime fiction, but is a sucker for being swept away by historical romance and the promise of true love. When she began writing, it became her goal to bring both genres together as one.

Originally from Southern California, Cari now resides with her husband in the beautiful state of Washington. She’s a member of International Thriller Writers and Romance Writers of America.

You can visit her website or follow her on TWITTER, FACEBOOK, GOODREADS, Google+, and PINTEREST. She loves to hear from readers!

The Interview

What is one of your favorite elements in your debut novel? I definitely have some favorite characters and favorite plot twists, but if I had to pick one favorite element it would be the various locations where the story is set. The reader is taken on an adventure with the characters from Gold Rush era San Francisco, through the jungles of the Isthmus of Panama, to antebellum New Orleans, with a brief stop in Acapulco along the way.

What led you to writing your first novel? I have had a lifelong love affair with mysteries, thrillers, and suspense novels, starting with Nancy Drew. As much as I enjoy reading them, though, my muse always wants to throw in a romantic element in the plots playing through my mind. When I decided to sit down and write my first novel, I thought it would be a romantic suspense in the same vein as Allison Brennan or Karen Rose. Yet, everything that I came up with seemed trite or woefully unoriginal. While struggling with the whole process, I took a break and read a historical romance (another genre I love). While reading the novel, I had an epiphany, realizing what I truly wanted to write. I set aside the horrible attempts at contemporary romantic suspense and wrote Fool’s Gold, a historical romantic suspense.

What are you working on now? I am working on rewrites for my second novel, TARNISHED COPPER.

Matt Goldman…

… is also a television writer, he’s been nominated for a Writers Guild Award and has won an Emmy Award. His credits include Seinfeld, Ellen, The New Adventures of Old Christine, and Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency.

Matt Goldman’s novel, Gone to Dust, introduces private detective, Nils Shaprio. It will be be followed by Broken Ice, his second Nils Shapiro mystery in 2018.

Connect with Matt on TWITTER.

The Interview

What is one of your favorite elements in your debut novel? My favorite element in my debut novel, Gone to Dust , is my P.I., Nils Shapiro. He’s a modern man—complex, sensitive, and no tough guy. I have extensive experience in series creation from my TV work, and I’ve created a person who can live and grow for dozens of books.

What led you to writing your first novel? I’ve written television comedy for decades. I wanted to move into drama, so I started reading crime fiction for the first time. (I was a literary fiction snob before that.) I fell in love with the genre, and after a few years of reading it, decided to give it a try.

What are you working on now? When Forge acquired Gone to Dust , they asked for a second book in the series, which comes out June 12, 2018. When they read that, they asked for two more. I’m currently writing the fourth book in the series, and a stand-alone mystery set in 1922, and developing a television pitch.

Don’t forget – you can support your favorite authors by posting positive reviews

on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Goodreads.

You can also request new books from your local library. Happy Reading!

The post One Teen Thriller, One Historical Mystery, and One TV Comedy Writer Who Kills…. appeared first on Elena Hartwell.

Elaine Viets: Thirty-Two Novels and Counting

I’m thrilled to have the prolific Elaine Viets visit with me today. Her wildly popular Dead-End Job series are being re-released as e-books. Hi Elaine! Thanks for visiting!

The Author

The versatile Elaine Viets has written 32 mysteries in four series. Her bestselling Dead-End Job series features PI Helen Hawthorne, the queen of the Dead-End Jobs. Helen works a different low-paying job in each novel. In Shop till You Drop, which launched the successful series, Helen sold bustier to bimbos. In Murder Between the Covers, she worked at a bookstore. Helen has been everything from a telemarketer (Dying to Call You) to a cat groomer in Catnapped! The New York Times calls this South Florida series “clever.”

Elaine’s cozy Josie Marcus Mystery Shopper mysteries is set in her hometown of St. Louis. That’s also where she sets her darker Francesca Vierling newspaper mysteries. For readers who prefer forensic mysteries, Elaine has the Angela Richman Death Investigator series, the critically acclaimed: Brain Storm and Fire and Ashes. Elaine passed the Medicolegal Death Investigators Training Course at St. Louis University. She served on the national boards of Mystery Writers of America and Sisters in Crime. She’s a frequent contributor to Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine. Elaine won the Anthony, Agatha and Lefty Awards.

Follow Elaine on social media: TWITTER and FACEBOOK

The Interview

The Dead End Job series is being re-released as e-books. I understand you actually did all of these jobs, can you talk about how that series came together? What made you decide to focus on crappy jobs you’ve experienced?

I worked most of the crummy jobs in the Dead-End Job series. I didn’t actually wash cats for Catnapped! the way my PI Helen Hawthorne did, though I did have the help of Judge Tracy Petty. She not only judges pedigreed cats, but showed them, too. My worst Dead-End job was telemarketer for Dying to Call You. If I go to hell, I’ll be a telemarketer. The best – and I don’t consider it a real dead-end job – was bookseller for Murder Between the Covers. For my first Dead-End Job novel, Shop till You Drop, I sold bustiers to bimbos. For Murder with Reservations, I worked as a hotel maid and made 38 beds and cleaned 17 toilets a day, plus the Jacuzzi in the honeymoon suite. I actually scrubbed Hershey’s syrup out of the Jacuzzi.

The Dead-End Job series started after Don and I’d had a bad year: he had Stage 3 cancer, my Francesca Vierling mystery series was canceled due to a publishing merger, and we were being audited by the IRS. To pay the mortgage, I worked in a bookstore, and that’s when I got the idea for the DEJ series. Each book featured a different low-paying job. I worked everything from customer service at a country club whose motto was “Do you know who I am?” – that was Clubbed to Death – to selling expensive bridal gowns in Just Murdered. For Checked Out, set at a library, I shelved books. The librarians loved me – I’m six feet tall and I could reach the top shelves.

This was a mostly pink collar world – low paying jobs for women. I was fascinated by how customers behaved. Often they indulged in what I called “clerk abuse.” They’d had a bad day with their boss or their spouse, and they took out their frustration on the bookseller or the customer care person. Clerk abuse was no fun – but I killed them in my novels.

“Death Investigators are the paralegals of the forensic world.”

Your multiple series run from traditional mystery to cozy – what makes you choose to write in different sub-genres? Does the process differ for you?

I started writing hard-boiled mysteries with my Francesca Vierling newspaper series. When a publishing merger wiped out Dell books and ended the series, I was heartbroken. It took me two years to come up with another idea, the Dead-End Job mysteries. Penguin editor Genny Ostertag bought that series and it lasted for 15 books.

Penguin had great success with cozies and asked me to try a mystery shopper series. My mother was a mystery shopper and so I wrote the first Josie Marcus, Mystery Shopper mystery, Dying in Style. That book tied with Stephen King for first place on the independent mystery booksellers list. Josie was supposed to be a two to three book series, but Penguin kept renewing the contracts until I’d written 10 mystery shopper novels. The cozy genre has many restrictions – no graphic sex or violence, no cussing. After 10 books, I figured I’d taken the series as far as I could, and discontinued it.

I wanted to write darker forensic mysteries. I took the Medicolegal Death Investigators Training Course for forensic professionals at St. Louis University to learn about death investigators. Death Investigators are the paralegals of the forensic world. They work for the medical examiner. At a crime scene, the DI is in charge of the body and the police handle the rest of the scene. I started my Angela Richman death investigator series with Brain Storm.

“Eleven years ago, I had six strokes…”

You have survived six strokes and brain surgery – how did that experience impact your writing?

Eleven years ago, I had six strokes, including a hemorrhagic stroke, and a coma. I was in the hospital three months and my nearly complete recovery took four years. Three days before the strokes, I’d gone to the ER with blinding migraines and other symptoms, and the neurologist on call told me I was too young and fit to have a stroke and sent me home. That was terrible advice – for anyone. Three days later, my husband found me unconscious and I wound up in the hospital for real.

When the strokes hit, I’d been about to leave on tour for Murder with Reservations, my DEJ mystery set in a hotel. While I was in a coma, the mystery community held a tour by proxy and sold my novels coast to coast. They saved my career. My husband saved my life. I recovered, thanks to the help and good wishes of my family and friends.

I used that experience in Brain Storm and killed (on paper) the doctor who misdiagnosed me for my DI, Angela Richman. The brain surgeon who saved her life is accused of killing the incompetent doctor. DI Angela Richman is the ultimate unreliable narrator – she’s drugged and brain damaged but has to save the man who saved her.

With thirty-two novels under your belt – what advice do you have for writers debuting their first novel?

Writing is a business. Know your business. Join professional organizations for networking and to meet other writers. I belong to the Mystery Writers of America, ITW and Sisters in Crime. Attend conferences and writing workshops, especially ones that are suited to your sub-genre. Get to know your local bookstores.

Take us through writing a novel – what’s your process like?

I’m working on an outline for my next Angela Richman novel now. I do a detailed chapter by chapter outline while I research what forensic information I’ll need for the story. I also consult police and death investigator experts. Once that’s finished, I’m ready to start writing. I try to finish 1,500 words a day. In the morning, I reread what I wrote the day before. I may throw it out because I don’t think it’s working, but the novel seems to progress with this system. The actual writing taken four to six months. Once it’s finished, I revise, then turn it in to my agent, Joshua Bilmes at JABberwocky. Joshua does a line edit of my work and sometimes demands a complete rewrite. It doesn’t go to the editor until Joshua approves it.

What are you working on now?

I’ve just finished Ice Blonde, my Angela Richman, Death Investigator novella, which will be published this June. Deal with the Devil and 13 Short Stories, a collection of short stories published by Crippen & Landru, will be published April 28. It debuts at the Malice Domestic mystery conference in Bethesda.

Final words of wisdom:

A writer writes. It’s fun to talk about writing, take classes and tell yourself, “I need to learn more about writing short stories, or outlining my novel, or plotting a thriller.” All that may be true. But if you’re a real writer, you’ll take the difficult step of sitting alone at your computer and actually writing. You’ll write novels and they may be so terrible you’ll bury them in a desk drawer. But that’s how you learn how to write. Keep on writing.

Great advice, thanks Elaine!

 

 

 

 

 

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One Thriller and Two Historical Mysteries Debut

I love meeting and finding new authors! This week I’m hosting three fantastic new debut authors, all members of the International Thriller Writers’ Debut Author Program. It gives me great pleasure to introduce to you: James Tucker, L.A. Chandlar, and Dianne Freeman.

The Authors

James Tucker…

…has worked as an attorney at an international law firm and is currently an executive, managing real estate strategy at a Fortune 50 company, where his work includes frequent travel throughout the United States. Fascinated by the crimes of those in power, he draws on these cases for his writing.

He has a law degree from the University of Minnesota Law School and was one of four fiction writers awarded a position at a past Mentor Series at the Loft Literary Center in Minneapolis. He has attended the Community of Writers at Squaw Valley and the Tin House Writers’ Workshop in Portland, where he was mentored by author Walter Kirn. He lives near Minneapolis with his wife, the painter Megan Rye, and their family. Next of Kin is his first novel.

Follow James on TWITTER and FACEBOOK

The Interview

What is one of your favorite elements in your debut novel? The connection to crimes from nearly a century ago, and the reverberations today of those crimes. A thriller that’s only a puzzle doesn’t interest me. There must be something more to make the mystery resonate.

What led you to writing your first novel? I’ve always been fascinated by stories, and how to tell them. This initial idea for Next of Kin was an image of a remote camp in the Adirondacks where a young boy was trapped in a house with a killer. I wanted to know if he escaped, and who would help him to survive.

What are you working on now? I’m working with my publisher, Thomas & Mercer, through the editing process for Book 2 of the Buddy Lock Thrillers series. Book 2 will be published in October 2018. I’m also halfway through Book 3 in the series.

L.A. Chandlar…

… is an author and motivational speaker. Her 1930s New York City Art Deco Mystery series is available through Kensington Publishing.

Her Fight To Keep Creativity Alive series focuses on creativity and how it helps us work, play and live more fully. Her novel, The Christmas Journalist, weaves together human interest stories of Christmas traditions into a modern tale. Laurie lives in New York City with her family.

Ms. Chandlar is represented by Jill Grosjean Literary Agency.

The Silver Gun is her first novel.

To sign up for L.A.’s newsletter, click HERE

To find L.A’s social media, click HERE

The Interview
What is one of your favorite elements in your debut novel? My favorite two elements are featuring Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia as a main character and then having a piece of art as the backdrop of each story. LaGuardia was a five-foot-two firecracker and I think his spirit has a lot for us today. He came in when NYC was corrupt and broken, he was utterly fearless and brought a lot of life. Plus, he was a minority on both sides: half-Jewish and half-Italian, had a heart that fought for the little guy, was hilarious and king of sensational photo-ops, and he knew that art and music would bring the soul back to the city. Which brings me the art backdrop. We named the series for the Art Deco era because of art’s powerful impact on such a short time period that was bookended by two world wars with the Depression in the middle. Yet in the midst of tremendous adversity, so much beauty and richness came out of it all. I wanted to highlight that potency, so a different form of art comes alongside a character in each book and helps them navigate the lively mystery.

What led you to writing your first novel? I was extremely inspired by New York when we moved there just two weeks after 9/11. The city was barely beginning their recovery and I saw first hand how a city responds to that kind of tragedy. The city was full of camaraderie, sacrifice, art, and of course cocktails. I picked up a biography about LaGuardia at that time, and realized I’d pigeonholed the 1930s into being JUST about the Depression. But in the big cities there was so much more going on. From women’s roles coming to prominence in the workforce and civil rights, to art, music and architecture, to gritty humor and definitely exciting cocktails. I wanted to write that side of the story.


What are you working on now? I am currently working on book three of the Art Deco Mystery Series, The Pearl Dagger. (Book Two, The Gold Pawn, releases September 25th and The Pearl Dagger releases fall of 2019). I am also writing a YA novel featuring a teen who is introduced at the end of The Silver Gun, where her story weaves in and out of the Art Deco Mysteries. I thought it would be a lot of fun to have two genres intermingle, where you learn new little tidbits in each that bring a greater story to the whole.




Dianne Freeman…

… is a life-long book lover who left the world of corporate finance to pursue her passion for writing. After co-authoring the non-fiction book, Haunted Highway, The Spirits of Route 66, she realized her true love was fiction, historical mystery in particular. She also realized she didn’t like winter very much so now she and her husband pursue the endless summer by splitting their time between Michigan and Arizona.

Her debut novel, A Lady’s Guide to Etiquette and Murder is scheduled for release with Kensington June 26, 2018. To pre-order, click HERE

Find Dianne on FACEBOOK and TWITTER

The Interview

What is one of your favorite elements in your debut novel? My favorite element in A Lady’s Guide to Etiquette and Murder is the era itself—the late Victorian period. My sleuth is a peeress who knows someone close to her is a killer, but to identify him she has to work around the rules of society that restrict her behavior and limit her access to information. She can’t just canvass the neighborhood, she has to insinuate herself into the investigation, be very creative and cunning, and always watchful of her reputation.

What led you to writing your first novel? Everything led me to writing this novel. Writing has always been a hobby for me and once I retired, I decided to try my hand at a novel. From a trip to London, I knew that I wanted it to involve a house in Belgravia. My love of mysteries dictated that it had to be a whodunit. I was heavily influenced by the novels of Edith Wharton in my teens so a setting in that time period was too good to resist. Finally, a long-ago class called The Mystery Novel as a Social Commentary had a big impact on me, so I knew the story had to focus on the social structure of the time. After that, all that was left was to write the story.

What are you working on now? My debut is the first in a mystery series so now I’m just finishing up with book 2, A Lady’s Guide to Gossip and Murder.

Congratulations to all the Debut Authors! Such a marvelous accomplishment!



Happy Writing!

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LCC: Writers and Readers Converge

Lovely to be back at Left Coast Crime. There are a lot of different writers conferences around the country, but Left Coast Crime is one of my favorites. It’s also specifically a Mystery Writers conference, so it’s filled with my people.

Part of what’s fun about LCC, is that it’s in a different city every year. Last year was Honolulu, Hawaii, definitely tough to beat. This year it was in Reno, Nevada. Snow on the ground, but just as fun as last year, if a little less tropical.

Some writers conferences are geared toward learning the craft, some toward finding agents/editors, some are for the big names in the biz, and some are more focused on readers. LCC is a Mystery reader’s conference, with lots of opportunities to meet with, learn from, and listen to, favorite authors.

Here are some of the activities that make them so popular for readers and writers alike.

Panels: The heart and soul of a conference. They usually start early in the morning and go through to happy hour. Panels can range from writing tips to the business of writing to how to use social media to create a platform and everything in between. Typically there is one moderator and three to five writers. The moderator generally familiarizes themself with the authors and generates questions. The moderator keep the panelists focused, (not so easy to do with several smart, funny experts up on a dais in front of a crowd) fields questions from the audience, and handles giveaways. For Left Coast Crime this year I moderated a panel on Research in Fiction. It was very informative and we had a full meeting room – almost a hundred people turned out!

Author/Reader connections: These are wonderful extras that I’ve only ever seen at LCC. A writer or group of writers comes up with a fun event for a set number of readers. Readers sign up through the LCC website. These can range from lessons in something to sharing a meal to cocktails or anything else the writers can think up. For this year’s conference, I teamed up with Catherine Bruns to do a cake and chat event. We had a blast and the cake was delicious!

The second event I did was coffee, books, and chatting with fellow Pacific Northwest author Bharti Kirchner. We gave away books and discussed writing over coffee at the Starbucks. So much fun to discover our readers were working on first novels! Lots to talk about.

The Bookstore: Full of books from all the attending authors, the bookroom is sometimes also the location for author signings. Typically authors sign their books following a panel, though at some conferences there are additional times scheduled. I love the book room! So great to see all the books out (usually up to three titles for any given author). It’s a great way to discover new and new-to-you authors. (Yes! My books are on this table – can you find them?)

Banquet: Most conferences have a banquet the final evening of the event. LCC is no exception. The Nugget Casino did a fabulous job – the food was quite good and the service was excellent. The awards ceremony was short and sweet and all the speakers did a lovely job. Catherine Bruns and I teamed up again and hosted a table. We decorated it with crime scene tape and swag and books. You can read more about Catherine from my interview with her back in January. Click here to read.

Additional events: The Debut Author Breakfast. A popular event at various conferences, attendees join several debut authors for breakfast and listen as they stand up and give a quick (LCC gives roughly 2 minutes) description of their debut novel. I was a debut at last year’s conference. This year was much less stressful as I got to be in the audience to support the debuts. I had several writer friends up at the microphone, so that made it even more exciting. I sat at Debut Author Kathleen Valenti’s table. She did a great job with her talk. It’s not easy having to go last!

Speed Dating: Though I didn’t do speed dating this year, I have done it in the past. It’s a terrific way to meet a room full of readers. Readers sit at tables of roughly 8-10 people. Two writers team up and have two minutes each to “pitch” their books. Then a bell rings, the writers move to the next table and two other writers take their place. A reader might hear forty authors in an hour and a half! It’s quite thrilling as the writer – though it’s easy to start thinking … didn’t I say this already? right around table twelve.

Probably my favorite aspect of attending writers conferences is spending time with fellow writers. Whether it’s a writer I’ve known for years or someone I’ve just met, it’s always a delight to hang out, chat about the business, get to know each other in person (we often interact in the virtual world) and just spend time with other people who understand the difficulties of being a professional writer. I had an amazing crew to hang with at LCC this year – and I look forward to many more years of chatting about writing. Hope to see everyone next year when LCC goes across the border! Vancouver, BC, Canada … here we come!

Authors: J.R. Ripley, Sheila Sobel, (Me!) Cheryl L. Reed and Christina Hoag. Look for me and Christina Hoag in LA at Gatsby’s Books in Long Beach on April 14 and in San Diego on April 15 at Mysterious Galaxy! Click here for more information.

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