B.R. Stateham's Blog, page 15

A Ffolkes Tale

I have a character by the name of Geoffery Armitage Ffolkes.  Pirate extraordinaire.  Loud, obnoxious, a preening narcist, keenly observant.

To use a Edgar Allen Poe reference, a prodigious prognosticator.

The character resides in the 17th Century.  In a city that has been universally acknowledged as one of the most sinful city in the world.  Port Royal, Jamaica.

My pirate friend is a detective.  And a spy.  A totally unique, quite irritating, completely mesmerizing character rarely, if ever, found in the pages of detective genre.  Think, if you will, of a red headed, red bearded TALL Cyrano de Bergerac with a mind like Sherlock Holmes.

That would be Geoffery Armitage Ffolkes.

Yes, there is a book out featuring this creature entitled, Ffolkes Medicine: The Adventures of Geoffery Armitage Ffolkes Begin.  Off and on I have been toying with writing a second book of this lovable rascal.  I thought I'd share the first two chapters and see if you had any opinions.  Good or bad.
So here they are.

By the way, the second book is going to be called, A Ffolkes' Tale.

One

　
　
I was once a man of prodigious appetites. 

I valued the nectar of fine wines. Savored and cherished the exquisite aromas and textures of rare cuisine. With much verve and gusto I admired and appreciated the seductive curves of beautiful women. I could converse with artist or critic the fine points of any artistic endeavor in five languages. In my sartorial splendor I was a breathtaking specimen of manhood. I towered over men like the snow capped pinnacle Olympus does setting amidst the ever-present clouds. I strutted a ship’s deck or the halls of powerful potentates and princes with a blatant arrogance only a man as gifted with such genius– such savoir faire–as I divinely possessed. I was a god among mortals. A creature of heavenly beauty sat amidst a sea of puerile peasantry; a rose of exquisite delicacy and refinement glowing disdainfully in the midst of mundane colorless cauliflower.

I was, in my youth, a most handsome rogue.

Women swooned whenever my magnificent personage entered the room. Matrons would hide their daughters–bind them with rope and chain–in their efforts to protect them from my magnetic personality. Men openly admired my masculine physique and martial airs. I was a deadly swordsman, an unrivaled marksmen with pistol or musket, a bare-knuckled pugilist of powerful persuasion.

I was a man who valued freedom. Old World rules and rituals I shunned and abhorred as if they were the plague. As indeed, in my eyes, they were! I made my way to the New World where I became a pirate–merchant–agent provocateur–spy and assassin. In the New World I found freedom and new lands to conquer. In the New World I acquired and lost fortunes time and time again. I was a swordsman–a courtier–a diplomat–and politician. I’ve led pirate fleets into battle and fought the Spanish, the Dutch, and the French on countless occasions.

People have branded me a liar, a thief, a braggart, a fop, and a fool. And indeed I bow and sweep plumbed hat before me most regally at each declaration. I will not deny any. I was a man of great appetites! I vowed at an early age to live life at its fullest and to never confess sorry for being the man the Almighty decreed that I should be.

I have strolled on each and every continent–sailed the seven seas–explored vast reaches of jungles no other white man had ever witnessed before me. I have made love to queens and to charwomen with equal passion. I have stolen treasure from kings and prelates and never regretted for one moment any of these nefarious deeds. I have hunted men and women with the intent in ending their murderous lives because justice of some nature needed to be dealt.

I am, pilgrim, a brilliant orator–a splendid actor–and an audacious, yet quite convincing liar. My mind has the effervescent perspicacity only a genius of rare magnitude can possess. In brief, pilgrim–I am a man like no other you have ever met. Nor will ever meet again in the short and abysmally colorless lives you will live. So attend to my words, pilgrim. Read what amazing adventures I pen to these pages. Sit back in wonder at what I am about to tell you.

****
It was one of those Caribbean nights of enchanting allure. The soft breeze off the cool dark waters revived all from the oppressive heat of the day; the moon hung like a gigantic white orb just above the eastern horizon and bathed the vast plain of the glass-surfaced sea with glistening wonder. Standing on the balcony of my set of rooms high above the tiled roof tops of the city I stood admiring the night’s grandeur. In my hand was a glass of recently acquired French bourbon snatched from the burning hold of a sinking Spanish caravel just off the Azores a few weeks past.

Below me, in the private garden behind our inn, the aroma of bougainvillea and an assortment of other fragrances drifted into my nostrils. A soft breeze filled with sweet aromas and promised intrigues washed across my Grecian features. I felt my self relaxing . . . mellowing–home from the sea was I and in need of respite. A’pirating in these waters was always an endeavor filled with risk. But of late the Spanish crown had become disturbingly intent on finding ways in ending my illustrious career. It seems they objected to my taking of their ill-gotten riches through the use of either superior guile or blunt force over these last few years. So, in their minds, it was time to pluck from their fattened derrieres the thorn which irritated them the most. That thorn being, of course, my own humble self.

The Spaniard’s choice of instruments to extract the festering boil that I was, as some Spanish friends have described me from a safe distance, were two 80-gunned behemoths named the Sol de Magnifico and the La Madonna del Mahinero. Two of their newest and swiftest fast galleons of the Spanish king’s navy commanded by an old adversary of mine. Don Miguel Alverez Ochoa Rameriez and I had crossed paths on several occasions in the past. Some of these crossing were for our mutual gain. But most were in some adversarial fashion or another. Apparently Don Miguel held the ear of his monarch with some authority and it was my old friend himself who suggested he take on the assignment of removing me from the Caribbean.

Of course I was flattered, pilgrim! To be so honored–to be so entrenched in the craw of the Spanish king, and even more so with Alverz Ochoa Rameriez, it almost made me swoon with delight. And there was a reason why I so enjoyed being the nemesis I was to the Spanish crown. For a brief period of my life some years back I was a guest of the Spanish in one of their prisons. Captured and thrown into a vile pit of rotting flesh and foul smells I survived. Chained to the oars of a fat galley and flogged on a daily basis as I and my chained comrades pulled on our oars and propelled a galley laden with African riches back and forth across the blue waters of the Mediterranean I endured.

The time of my incarceration was brief. The suffering I endured harsh but bearable. Yet more than sufficient to seal into my ebullient personality an undying hatred for tyranny and cruelty monarchies of all nationalities seemed to inflict upon their subjects. Nay, not just the Spanish and their cruelties I despised, pilgrim. The cruelties of all who claimed some moral or noble right to hold others in chains of bondage did I swear vengeance to. I vowed I would hunt down these cruel masters and take from them their power and their wealth. Pirating, dear pilgrim–or more accurately, the acquisition of a Letter of Marque from the English Crown–provided me with the wherewithal to achieve this goal.

A Letter of Marque gave me a legal right to hunt the Spanish, or the French, or the Dutch, if they so became the enemies of England, while I lived in Port Royal. Suffice to say, in all humility, I became quite proficient in such endeavors. Soon after arriving in Port Royal with my partner, a one-eyed, pipe smoking withered old piece of leather named Tobias O’Rourke, I quickly make a reputation of being a quite successful pirate captain. So much so that now, on this very night, I found myself a hunted man.

And glowed like that of a bright lantern on a stormy night in delight on such a compliment.
But pilgrim, a cautionary note; one should not gloat too long on one’s accomplishments for Fate has a way of twisting one emotion into something far, far more sinister. As, in truth, happened soon after I stepped away from the moon lit balcony and thought about retiring for the night. From below I heard men shouting in surprise and anger. Voices I recognized as those of my crew. The thundering hooves of men in heavy boots rapidly ascending the stairs to my rooms came to me–soon following a hurried pounding on the heavy wooden door of my apartment.

"Come!" I shouted, reaching for a brace of flintlock pistols lying on a table beside my bed.
In through the door swept the tanned, wrinkled leprechaun form of Tobias, followed by the slightly taller form of my slant-eyed samurai comrade, Morikami Tademori, a veritable giant of an African moor by the name of Abdul, and several others as well. On their faces were visages of grim determination of plainly etched pain. Something evil had occurred. Something which required my immediate attention.

"Terrible news, you worshipfulness," the thick Irish brogue of Tobias ran musically to my ears. But on this night it was the music of a fugue–the opening notes of a funeral–which rang in my ears. "We’ve found Little Johnnie Boy just a few minutes ago. He’s dead, cap’n. A dirk shoved into his heart."

"Where?" I asked, gripping the pistols in my hand firmly and feeling the color drain from my face.

"On the beach just a quarter mile from here, darlin. I’ve left a few of Tademori’s men there to guard the body and not disturb the site, figuring your lordship would want to inspect the lay of the land fer yerself, as it were."

I nodded and swept past the gaggle of men who hurriedly made room for me to exit and descended the stairs as rapidly as I could. Behind me Tobias, Tademori, and the others followed. Into the warm tropical night we fled, pilgrim. Into the dark night and into an adventure that become both deadly and mysterious. Filled with intrigues and whispering the first dark murmurings of a possible war to erupt between the English and the Spanish if I and my comrades could not extinguish the burning fuse before it burnt its way to the waiting powder keg yet hidden from view.


Two With brightly burning torch in hand I knelt to one knee and looked at the body lying on the wet beach. Waves, crashing onto the moon lit sands, would slowly meander its way up to the dead man’s boots before receding. Less than five hundreds yard behind me the first building of the city could be spied, as could the cluttered harbor filled with a hundred or more ships, masts and furled sails filling the dark night like an artificial forest. A strong wind was coming in off the water. Strong in its salty flavor. Yet cool and soothing as it caressed gentle fingers through my long red curls.
Such a beautiful night in paradise. Seemingly too beautiful for anyone to greet the Grim Reaper in such scurrilous fashion.

Kneeling beside me was the leathery from of Tobias. One hand holding his long stemmed pipe, his one good eye intent on studying the corpse as it lay motionless at our feet. He was, this garrulous old Irishman, as good at reading a dead man’s life and death as I was. In silence the little man was using one hand to push and prod and examine the body. As for me, my eyes were trying to look at the signs in the sand, making an effort to separate the churned up sand from those who stood guard over the dead man from those that might be that of both Little Johnny himself and Little Johnny’s killer.

Behind us Tademori, Abdul, and a few others huddled over us like lurking vultures, each holding torches over our heads to give us more light. Standing up I half turned, my eyes falling onto the giant form of Abdul.

"Send two of your best men that way," I said, pointing at a set of tracks the seemed to separate themselves from the clutter surrounding the body and hurried off into the night away from the city. "See where they lead to. And hurry, we may yet find our killers near by."

The Numidian nodded and disappeared for a moment. Seconds later two of his black African kinsmen swept around us and disappeared into the night. Handing the burning torch to Tademori I knelt down beside Tobias and reached for the right hand of the dead man. The hand was twisted up into a fist, yet in the dim light of the torches, there appeared to be something in the man’s grip.

"Ah, Lil’Johnny," the Irishman beside me moaned. "Too close to the deadly flames you flew. Tis a sad world it is now that you’ve left us. I’ll raise a cup of two of real Irish Whiskey up in salute to you later tonight."

"Dead for several hours," I grunted as I strained to pry open the rock like fingers of the fist and retrieve from its grip whatever it was the dead man desperately held onto.

"Aye, cap’n. From the way his stomach is bloated and the color of his skin I’d venture to say at least six or seven hour hence. Sunset. That would be about the time of the dar’lin man’s demise."

My Irish friend was no physician. Just a plain seaman of vast experience. Yet a man of acute vision with his singular eye. And with a mind of infinite curiosity. Two qualities in a man I valued the most. Although . . . most assuredly, pilgrim . . . I would never admit this to my Irish rogue. The man’s sardonic wit and sharp edged tongue would never allow me to forget my sudden weakness in complimenting him.

"The blade of a dirk, cap’n. Just below the third rib underneath Lil’ Johnny’s left arm. That was the blow which brought such a beautiful man to his grave."

I nodded, having observed the blade’s entrance through the flimsy cloth of the dead man’s shirt and the amount of blood which it had absorbed. I also noticed the bruising on the man’s face around the jaw and the left temple. There was also deep cuts on fingers and palms of his one free hand. Obviously our friend fought for his left. Fought desperately.

"Tademori, hold the light closer to our friend’s hand, if you please."

"Hai!" the samurai grunted with interest and knelt down beside me to comply.

One by one I strained to stretch out the dead man’s fingers and retrieve the sliver of paper to tantalizing near to apprehending. Behind me I felt the presence of the men leaning closer, they too as curious about the ragged piece of paper the man clutched with a dead man’s grip. It took some time to complete the task but ultimately the paper was removed and I stood up holding the thick and coarse paper in hand as I turned toward my samurai friend.

One glance told me enough. It was the right hand corner of a map. There was a partial outline of the coastline of some land mass–possibly an island. In dark ink an arrow was drawn to a small X marked on the very tip of a piece of land which seemed to be the entrance to a small inlet. In Little Johnny’s handwriting were the words ‘heavy redoubt.’ Another roughly sketched line disappeared off into the ripped off portion of the missing map. But the words ‘Two league’s sail from De . . . .’ were visible.

Nothing else was visible.

Frowning, I tossed back long locks of my shoulder length mane and looked down at the dead form lying at our feet. The dead man had fought desperately for his life. With at least two or more assassins. They had pursued their query across the sands of the beach, killed their man, removed the map from his hands, and then hurried back from whence they came. Port Royal, only a few hundred yards away, lay on a spit of land which jutted out from the main portion of the island known as Jamaica. From the direction Lil’Johnny was running from was in direction toward the main island. But in that direction was nothing but jungle and wilderness. He was running for his life toward Port Royal. Running and clutching a map. A map he thought so important he fought his assailants with only the use of one hand. And paid for his foolish mistake dearly.

Why?

What was so important about a piece of paper it cost a good man’s life? A good man who happened to sometimes be in the employment of Tobias and I as a gunner on one of our ships. And who? Who were the assassins who were determined to bring him down before he entered the pit of infamy known as Port Royal?

Glancing at my Irish imp of a friend I saw the light in the man’s one clear eye. He too was very curious as to what set of circumstances brought a friend of ours to his grave. It would be a matter of honor. In a city renowned for its cutthroats and piratical heresies, it was a matter of honor on our part to track down the rogues who so brutally took the life of our comrade and bring them to justice. But more, pilgrim. Much more. The ragged piece of paper torn from a map had captured our attention. Our interests. Would a treasure map–the first obvious thought to flash through our minds–be worthy of a man’s demise? A treasure map like so many others to be had for a pittance in any pub in Port Royal. Why this one so steeply purchased in the blood of a good man’s death?

Yes, questions to be answered. A puzzle to be solved. And more importantly; justice to be exacted.

A couple of random thoughts today

All right,  This is it.  I'm finally going to get serious.  I am (gasp!!) going to do something my wife has said I should be doing for years . . .

I am going to get organized!!

I have dozen writing projects on tap.  Five are active.  Yet, like most writers I know (there are expects, of course, to what I am about to say)  I tarry somewhat . . .  if not outright balk at the idea of actually sitting down and writing!   Don't know why I'm this way.  Yes, Gertrude;  I acknowledge I might just be basically lazy.  Laziness has its advantages.  Lallygagging around and doing nothing all day gives you the opportunity to mentally scope out your novel scene by scene.  Fill in a character's personality maybe.  Or block out a particularly difficult scene.

But at some point in time you've got to sit down and write the damn thing.  Ah! Now THAT'S the problem.  The physical aspect of actually writing the novel.

So I'm going to commit myself to 3 On 3.  Three pages a day on the three currents works in progress.  And it should work.  Add it up!  Three pages a day per novel gives you, in 30 days,  90 pages a month.  Times five months you have a 450 page novel.  If you can sustain that load for three different works, you have three books complete at the end of five months.

Not bad, eh?

Now, pull out your wallet and lay a fiver on the table.  Whatcha want to bet this epiphany on my part is going to happen?  Come one, don't be shy.  Bet me!






Saw recently the move, The Bourne Legacy.  This is the rebirthing of the Bourne franchise featuring a different agent coming out of the Treadstone agency-within-the-agency spy ring the legendary Jason Bourne was a part of.  But this time the agency-within-the-agency is an offshoot, and far more secret, of Treadstone.

In this movie there is no Jason Bourne.  But there is an agent known as Aaron Cross.  And he's not just an agent with the moves of a Bourne.  This baby has been genetically enhanced.  Genetically souped up to be even better.  With a catch;  his intellect has been considerably souped up.  But on a temporary basis that has to be augmented with a dosage every few hours.  If he doesn't get the dosage he eventually recedes back to his original intellect.  Which isn't too much, by the way.

Jeremy Renner is Alex Cross.  He brings some interest twists to the character.  The plot for the movie is, or was for me, quite interesting to contemplate.  There's conspiracies within conspiracies playing around in this movie guaranteed to keep the franchise running for years.

Which is good.  Everyone like their conspiracies to be almost believable.

Go see the movie.  I'm sure you'll like it.

Beth Anderson. One accomplished Writer

A friend of mine, Beth Anderson, writes romantic mysteries.  And/or political puzzlers.  But more than that she's a writer who, like so many writers I know, kinda grew up writing the moment they learned their ABC's.  She wrote love stories for her friends, who paid her for them, while she was in school as a child.  She grew into adulthood writing . . . honing . . . her craft until finally, finally, she sold her first major piece to a publishing firm.

I like that.  First learning to read---and then getting bitten immediately by the urge to write.  What I like even more is seeing a writer becoming something else . . . that elusive dream of becoming a  published 'author' so many of us strive to become ourselves.

I had a hunch if I approached her politely she might agree to answer a few questions about writing, and her career, and share them with us.  Don't care who writes the questions----read about a writer and their creative process and you can always walk away with something to think about.    I think you'll find a jewel or two in this interview.

So let's get to it.


1. Beth . . . the writing bug;  when did it first bite you?  And when did its fury finally burst onto the scene and send you down this lovely torturous path?
Ha!  I’ll give you torturous for sure. Lovely I’ll have to think about, although now that I think about it, the writing biz has had many lovely moments. I think my first signal that I was going to be a writer really got my attention was when I was eight years old. I was lying on the floor with my eyes closed, listening to the radio and visualizing the scenes, when I heard an announcement that they were having a contest: Basically, whoever wrote the best radio show script was going to win a hundred dollars. The fact that the show was a medical drama didn’t faze me at all even though I knew nothing about being a doctor. Oh, and I also didn’t know how to write a script. But for some reason, I had the feeling that I could do that, I really could! It didn’t take me long to realize that first and foremost, my spelling was atrocious and when I wrote the script, even I couldn’t decipher it. But something in the back of my mind still said I could do it. I remember the utter strength of those words running through my head even though the evidence was right in front of me that I had a long, long way to go. I still knew I could do it.

Raven Talks Back 
 Life and logic intervened, of course. I went on to school, got horrible grades in English, tried to write romance stories about my junior high girlfriends and their boyfriends for a dollar apiece, got caught and almost expelled. Not a good start, although my friends liked the stories.  Eventually I grew up, sort of, got married, produced four children and somewhere along the line managed to win a magazine contest for a short story with my eight page opus about a widow with a head cold and a widower with two small sons he was taking out Trick or Treating. I think the prize was a bottle of perfume or something like that. Certainly not publication. I deduced from that episode two things. One, they must have been really desperate to have a winner but they weren’t going to spend any time editing it.  And two, I probably really should study up on how to actually put a publishable story together. I still wasn’t ready though, until many years later, when I met up with a group of women who were forming a romance writers’ group. I always knew I was never going to be a romance writer, I was thinking from the git-go of heavier stuff, but I figured good writing is good writing no matter what the genre. That went on for, I would say five years, with me writing manuscripts (on an electric typewriter) then re-writing them and sending them out and dealing with the rejections. Same thing most writers do unless they have some heavy duty help from someone who knows what they’re doing, but none of us knew what we were doing and most of the ladies fell by the wayside or decided writing was just too much trouble and they’d read someone else’s books instead.
Then one day as I received probably my fiftieth rejection and was about to quit, I walked into a friend’s bookstore and had what I can only describe as a Magic Moment. My eyes, for some reason, traveled all around all those shelves of books and for the first time really focused on the enormity of the effort that had been expended to have had All Those Books actually printed. At that moment it almost seemed as if those shelves lit up with some kind of glow and I thought, “If all the writers who wrote all those books got published, so can I.”  That was the moment that sealed my fate. I went home, hunkered down, and even though it took me three more years, every day I knew I was getting closer until finally, while I was at a Romance Writers of America Conference, I met the head of the Superromance section of Harlequin Romances, the closest romance subgenre to mainstream without being actually mainstream. We passed going through one of the doors, she glanced down and read my name tag and said, “Oh! Your book is sitting on my desk right now. We all like it, but we need some changes made.  Would you be willing to do them before we offer a contract?”
Would I?  YES I WOULD! Two, not one but two, grueling edits, during which I finally learned how to write a book, and I had my first contract. You can about imagine how I felt three years later (their normal lead time then) when I finally held that first book in my hands. I’d say it was a miracle, but the pragmatic part of me says, “Oh, no, it’s not a miracle. You worked your butt off for this.”
 2. The mystery genre seems to be your weapon of choice when it comes to writing.   Why?  And while answering that, you might throw in some thoughts about your willingness to infuse large portions of horror into your works.
I’ll answer the second part first. I’m probably never going to infuse large portions of horror into my works. Real horror keeps me awake nights. There are some authors I love, but I can’t read their books because there’s too much horror in them and they’re such good writers that the first sentences will set the hair on the back of my neck standing straight up, and I know right then that I have to close the book and leave it closed. The strange thing is, I can read a Steven King or a Dean Koontz straight through and be happy because I’m being hugely entertained. I admire both of them tremendously, but I’ve never actually been so frightened at one of their books that I had to stop reading. They’re just, to me, fun.  BUT then one day I picked up a book by Rick Reed, who writes gay mysteries. I read one and a half pages into it and I honest to God had to put the book down and I could not go back and read it, because in that one and a half pages he had managed to create so much real terror and tension that I knew something really, really horrible was going to happen and I couldn’t bear to read on. Just couldn’t do it.
I gave that a lot of thought afterward and I finally realized that what he had done, and superbly, was taken a perfectly normal scene, a guy walking around his apartment getting ready for a date with a guy he had never met. In that short space of time, I had already decided I liked this guy enough that I didn’t want him to die, but more and more I got the sinking feeling that very soon after his company walked through the door, this guy that I already liked was going to die a horrible death. Now that is some genius horror writing and I still shiver when I think of it but I have no idea what happened to the nice guy because it scared me so badly I had to stop reading. Probably not what Rick wanted to happen, but it did. The upshot was, I learned how to create real horror and I also learned I don’t want to do it.
 As for why I write mystery and jumped right into it after that first contract for a romance (although there was a mystery in that book too) I think a lot has to do with the personality of the writer and how he or she thinks. For one thing, I like the idea of creating all kinds of imaginary chaos, usually in one family, and then setting it all right again for them. Almost like playing dollies when you’re a kid. Give them a problem, then help them solve it.  Make the world right again, whether the end result is a Happy Ever After one or not. I think mysteries are true to life, at least the ones I like to read are. I don’t think people always live happily ever after, but I do think when you fall into a serious mess, it can usually be managed with common sense. That, to me, is actually how  mysteries are solved by the main protagonist. He or she has to be capable of solving huge problems by using common sense, not emotion or gimmicks.
Second Generation  3.  Do you find it easier, or more difficult, cracking into the genre being a woman?  Or has the issue of sexism ever come up?  While we're on this subject, what is your take on the idea of the mystery genre being so attractive for female writers?
Hmmm. Tough questions, but I’ll try. There has long been a watch on male-female ratios in crime writing sales at Sisters in Crime. More and more and more there’s not that much of a difference cracking into the genre, with minor exceptions.  Traditionally, it is a little harder for most woman writing serious, hard-hitting, shoot ‘em up mainstream thriller/mysteries because those more often than not feature serious, hard-hitting, shoot ‘em up men. It just seems to be easier for most traditional publishers to accept that a woman wrote a cozy, particularly a hobby cozy, and female writers do predominate in that genre. I know many will probably argue with this, but I can’t offhand recall the names of any male hobby cozy writers and I know I’ve never read one. By the same token, it’s harder in traditional publishing for some (I said some, not all) women to be published with edgier books whose protagonists are mostly very tough men, i.e. Jack Reacher heroes. I think the protagonist’s personality has to be understandable right down to the core to the writer to be realistic, and although I did write one book completely from a male point of view, and successfully, I really had to go some to get into his head first and then stay there. I think someone like Lee Child, for instance, could probably have done it better. 
But then today we have the self-publishing thing, and there, the sky’s the limit.  Nobody has to worry about what sex you are when you’re your own boss. There, there is no discrimination, no matter how minor because you, as publisher of your books, get to make all the decisions. Readers today don’t seem  concerned about the sex of the writer, or the name of the publisher, or anything else for that matter, as long as you give them a good, well edited book. I haven’t done any self publishing yet, but that doesn’t mean I won’t.
 4.  In your opinion what are the components for a good crime/mystery novel?  Rate, if you will, the importance of plot, characters, descriptive detailing, and believability in writing a genre novel.  Of the four items listed is there one which is more important than all the others?
In my opinion, believability is the most important component in any book.  If you don’t make sure you have believable dialogue and cohesive believable narrative, you’re lost because even regular readers can spot unbelievable dialogue even if it’s only that they get a disquieting feeling they can’t identify while they’re reading, but they know they’re having difficulty enjoying the book.  So many times it’s dialogue that doesn’t fit the character, and when that happens I do spot it immediately and I do know why that is and I do put the book down, unfinished. Life, in my opinion, is too short and too full of things we have to do for us to waste time struggling through a book with bad dialogue, which is always unbelievable dialogue.
Next in importance would be characters. You have to have characters, particularly your main characters, who readers can relate to; in other words, people your readers would welcome into their own homes. It has nothing to do with their station in life because money has nothing to do with character anyhow; we all are aware of that. Your characters must have multi-faceted characteristics because we all do. The worst criminal in the world will still have at least one or two endearing qualities even if it’s only that he stops to pet a dog on his way to commit whatever atrocity he’s bent on committing. There’s a lot to be learned about building characters, way too many to enumerate here.  ;-)
I would rate plot next after characters in importance. You can have a plot in mind and then build the characters, but in my case the lead has always popped into my mind first, and I spend some time with them getting to know them from the inside out before I start building a plot around them. It may work differently for you, but here’s why I put plot after characters. You can have a so-so plot, but if you have a lead character that’s a series character who you know your readers love, they will forgive you and many times won’t even notice when the plot’s not that strong, but get your characters wrong and you’ve got an angry reader on your tail.  I read most of the posts on DorothyL, a huge list full of librarians and booksellers and authors as well as ‘civilians’, and most of the time if a person tires of a series it’s not the latest plot that irritates the reader, it’s that the writer changed the lead character or he became boring over time or just about any reason, but it almost always falls on the lead character. As I said in the paragraph before this one, you have to get your lead characters right.
Last I would list descriptive detailing because to me, descriptive detailing is the least important part of any story and in fact, stops the action if there’s too much of it. One exception would be in reading a book by someone like James Michener, who was known, and not always favorably, for his descriptive detail, although I’ve noticed that on the flip side of all those pages and pages of detail are wonderfully drawn characters, some human, often animals, and he brought them all to life equally well in the middle of all that detail. But for the most part, I prefer books with not so much detail because too much of it slows the action. I’ve had editors add detail in my fast moving scenes when they never, ever should have done so. (Sigh…) Too much detail and you’re accused of padding the book-- in some cases to try and hide the fact that you don’t have enough plot. You might not even realizing you’re doing that, particularly in the case of brand new writers, but if you are, experienced editors will spot it.
  5.  What is the state of health these days for fiction in general and  the mystery/detective genre in particular?   What trends do you see growing stronger--and conversely—any trends fading away which might be soon forgotten.
The state of fiction is healthy enough. Historical fiction seems to be coming back. People are actually reading more now because of e-readers. The state of traditional publishing is dwindling because (see previous sentence). From what I’m seeing, the mystery/detective genre is increasing, in part because the whole traditional publishing world is shrinking and along with that trend, many, many former romance writers are turning to mysteries and liking them because they can combine them with romance, which is becoming more accepted nowadays.  Just a few years ago a lot of mystery readers would tear down the walls at the suggestion of adding romance to mysteries. Now, they’ve begun to accept them although there are limits even there. Most diehard mystery readers would much rather not be bombarded with romances that are too erotic, but there are plenty of opportunities for erotica writers even within the erotica genre. People know where to go to get what they want to read, and they do. There’s room enough today for all genres and all methods of presentation.
  6.  What's your next book going to be about?  Is there any novel of yours you are particularly fond of?   Are we to see any cinematic productions of any your novels?  Any television series in the works?
Ha!  I could tell you but I’d have to kill you, re the first question. ;-) I’m currently zapping in between three books that I really want to write. All are about murder of one kind or another.  It’s hard to pick a favorite of all my published novels. The most fun to write was Night Sounds, the one with the male protag who carried the whole book and somehow, he did it all almost effortlessly. It was just one of those fun books you start writing and giggle to yourself all the way through writing it, even though it is a serious murder mystery. And here’s a funny thing about that book, which takes us back to Question 5. There’s a lot of hot romantic scenes in it between Joe and Zoey. Those were almost universally the most talked about scenes in the book. It was always mentioned somewhere in almost all reviews. Conversely, the basic part of the mystery (whodunit?) was an element of a big money scheme which was tricky and I was so  proud of myself for dreaming it up. I spent tons of time researching exactly how to do this thing, and wrote it as simply as I could so everyone would understand it (and hopefully admire the mind that thought it up). Catch this: Not one reviewer OR person who spoke to me about the book ever mentioned the money caper part of the mystery. Not one. Nope. They were all interested in the romantic angle. The success or failure of how they felt about that book was based on Joe and Zoey, who grabbed all the attention. So like I said earlier, you gotta have characters your readers will love.  
I think I still have to say, I don’t have one book I can point to that’s the best, because they’re all different. I don’t do series, which I wish I could say I do because I’d be making a lot more money than I am, but I put my people through so much misery that once I pull them out of it, I just want to leave them alone to enjoy the rest of their lives because they’re all very much alive to me. So all of my books are mainstream standalones. I don’t ever anticipate writing a series. I thought for a time maybe I would for my last book, Raven Talks Back, but even there, at this point I just want to leave them alone.  Besides, I’ve got those three new novels jockeying for position in my head right now.
Movies and Television shows? There’s always hope. Raven Talks Back has been mentioned by reviewers as movie material and I have to tell you, that’s how I saw it, and God, what a beautiful, exciting movie it would be.0 But there’s a lot of difference between a book and a movie script. It could be done, but will it?  Time will tell. And there’s always that one out of the three running around in my head, the one with one character who has multiple personalities…   I do make life hard for myself, don’t I? 
Stay tuned! Come by and check out my newly updated website, which actually isn’t quite finished but you can grab a look and see how it hits you. Had to change it and I’ve neglected the blog lately because I moved from Chicago to Washington State.  http://www.bethanderson-hotclue.com .  There’s lots there besides chapters of all my books. Lecture pages on different writing subjects. One especially famous one that I’ve had thousands of emails from new writers who loved what I had to say about a new way of Writing a Tight Synopsis. I’m on Facebook, you can find me there. And you can find my last four books up at Amazon and Barnes & Noble online, just go to their sites and type in my name, it’ll take you to my author page on both sites.  Come see me, we’ll have a cup or a glass of something and talk.  B.R., thanks for allowing me to run on  and on about one of our favorite subjects-Writing!  Ciao for now!

From out of the past

A novel long forgotten.  Written, and forgotten, for over thirty years.  Discovered recently down in the basement and pulled out of a dust covered plastic storage bin.Wow!
It was an experiment I played with.  Combining two separate novels into one volume--one novel complimenting the other until, in the end, the two merge into one.  One a kind of whodunit.  The other an adventure/horror novel.
After finding it the other day I reread  a few of the chapters and made a startling discovery.  Sumbitch!  With a little tweaking, a little pruning, this 'script has honest-to-god potential!  The only problem is---back in '81 there was no such thing as a personal computer (or, at least, not for me).  So I wrote it on an old electric typewriter.  But worse than that, back then I was so poor I didn't use ordinary typing paper.  I used discarded paper my wife would bring home from school.  Over the years the paper has faded and the ink has dimmed.
'Course, I'm not rolling in dough even now (few writers I know are).  The novel has to be transferred over into a computer file.  And it appears I'll be the one doing the re-typing.  But that's okay.  Re-typing means rewriting.  Modernizing.  Tweaking the plot a little.  But it's going to be a slow slugfest getting it done.  It's not as if it is the only project peculating along at the moment.
But I did get the opening chapter done today.  Thought I might share it with you and get maybe some feedback from you.  I've had to retitle the novel.  Now it's called , The Dead.
What do you think?
One June 6: 0823 hrs.              Angrily he reached for the phone, threw it up to his ear, and tried to sort out the mess Bill Francis left last night's log book in.  He could sense it.  Feel it in his bones.  It was not going to be a good day.  That feeling of cynical frustration began building the moment he walked into the sheriff's office and headed for his desk.  One look at last night's log book confirmed it.             A shitty day.  Destined to become a nightmare.             "Sheriff's office.  Sergeant Ulrey speaking."             "Nick, this is Fred.  We're over at the Mallory place.  We need you, or someone, and an ambulance, over here as fast as possible."             Nicholas Ulrey heard the urgency in Fred Berkley's voice.  Tossing the ink pen onto the logbook in front of him he sat back in the squeaky old office chair, half turned to stare at the large wall clock on the far wall, and frowned.  He knew fear when he heard it.  And Fred sounded very afraid.  Keeping his voice measured and calm he wanted to make the old farmer relax and tell him a little more before reacting.             "What's up, Fred?   Harold or Darlene hurt?"             He heard someone definitely sobbing in the background.  He also heard men's voices---Fred's oldest sons---speaking softly in the background.  Turning his head he gazed out of the big plate glass window beside his desk as he waited for Fred to collect his thoughts and waved to Sandy Duncan, the town's last remaining barber, as he walked by heading to the large Methodist church down at the end of the block.             "Nick . . . uh . . . Harold's dead.  And Darlene . . . well  . . . she's in a bad way herself.  We need the ambulance for Darlene.  There ain't a thing you can do for Harold now except cut him down and cover him up."             "Cut him down?  Okay wait a minute, Fred.   What do you mean cut him down?"             "We found him, Nick.  Found him in the main barn.  Rope around his neck and swinging from a rafter.  God!  What an awful sight, Nick!  Just . . . just . . . awful!             "Fred! Listen to me Fred.  It's very important.  Leave every thing alone.  I mean everything.  Don't touch a thing!  I'll be right out.  The ambulance is on its way.  You got that?"             "Right, Nick.  We'll touch nothing.  And thanks."             "Who else is there with you?"             "Me, Frank and Bobby.  And Louise.  We came over to help Harold cut his wheat."             Frank and Bobby were Fred's sons.  Big, strong kids.  On a farm as large as the Berkley's, the kids were going to be as big as plow horses.  Both on football scholarships.  Fred Berkley's farm was just south of Harold and Darlene's big spread.  Neighbors.  Old friends.  It must be, Nick thought, tearing Fred up to stare at Harold swinging from a rope.  He heard the emotional strain in the old man's voice.  Knew exactly how the old man was feeling.  Finding a body like that was always a shock to one's psyche.             He closed his eyes and tried not to think about it.  Harold Mallory was close to eighty years old.  A small, wiry man.  Amazingly young and healthy for his age.  He had known him ever since he took the job as deputy sheriff six years ago.  Harold and Darlene were good people.  Good people.  Church people.  Friendly people.  Harold's death would be a severe loss to the community.             "I'll be there in a half hour, Fred."             He hung up, leapt out of the chair and reached for the gray trooper's wide brimmed hat all in one motion.  He had to leave the office empty.  But he had no choice.  Walking out he unlocked the car door of the brand new Dodge Charger hemi the county just purchased for patrol cars, climbed in and hit the idiot lights and siren as he backed the car away from the curb and then accelerated rapidly down the semi-deserted main street.             He knew what he would find along with the body.  As well-intentioned as Fred and his sons would be he was positive he would find Harold's body lying on the floor of the barn with some kind of tarp or blanket covering it.  The old man and his boys wouldn't allow their friend's body to ride the wind currents flowing through the giant barn as it dangled at the end of a rope.  The crime scene would be contaminated with all kinds of footprints and fingerprints from the Barkleys and god knew what else.   He wouldn't say anything to them about it.  He'd moved out to this rural community six years ago to take this job.  To get married.  Have kids.  Live in relative peace in the country away from the madness of the big city.             Yet, thinking about it as he made a hard right turn off the highway which sent him hurtling down an arrow-straight country road of white dust and past miles upon miles of freshly cut golden wheat fields, tragedy struck everywhere.  Even in a peaceful little haven like Glennville.             "Car Ten to dispatch," he said after reaching for the mike.             "Go ahead, Car Ten."             "I'm heading out to the Mallory place.  We need an ambulance and Doc Foster there as fast as possible."             "Affirmative Car Ten.  Dispatching ambulance now.  Will contact Doc Foster at his clinic."             Doc Foster was the contracted county medical examiner.  And an old friend of the Mallorys.  It was going to be another hard blow to take.  Watching an old friend of the deceased examining the body. But that was something the doc faced every day in this county.  It was a farming community.  Everyone knew everyone.             And people died all the time.


            HE WOKE SCREAMING.  THE PAIN IN HIS HEAD . . .THE NOISE . . .WAS DEFEANING.  EYES ROLLING IN SHEER AGONY HE TRHEW THE SLEEPING BAG OFF AND STUMBLED OUT OF THE COT INTO THE NIGHT.             EVEN THROUGH THE PAIN HE HEARD IT.  THE SILENCE.  THE GODAWFUL SILENCE OF THE JUNGLE.  ONLY HOURS BEFORE IT HAD BEEN ALIVE WITH THE GROWLS OF CATS , THE EXOTIC CALLS OF PARROTS, THE CHATTERING OF MONKEYS; THE CRASHING OF ANIMALS FORAGING NEAR BY DOWN BY THE RIVER.             BUT NOT NOW .  NOT NOW .              SILENCE GREETED HIM AS HE STUMBLED AROUND, STARING AT THE CAMPSITE LIKE A MADMAN.  HIS BODY DRENCHED IN SWEAT HE TURNED SLOWLY TO STARE IN HORROR AT THE DARKNESS OF THE PRIMEVAL JUNGLE SURROUNDING HIM LIKE SOME LIVING, SENTIENT, MALEVOLENT GREEN WALL.              THE JUNGLE.             IT WAS LIKE SOME SUFFOCATING HAND CLOSING AROUND HIS THROAT TRYING TO TEAR AWAY HIS LAST BREATH!  IT WAS A MASSIVE WEIGHT PRESSING DOWN ON HIS CHEST.  AN INCREDIBLE HEAVY WEIGHT THAT WAS CRUSHING HIS RIB CAGE.  HE COULDN'T BREATHE!  HE COULDN'T THINK!  HE WANTED TO ESCAPE!  TO RUN !  RUN AS FAR AWAY FROM THIS TERRIBLE PLACE AS HE COULD!             BUT THE JUNGLE . . . THE JUNGLE SURROUNDED HIM!  EVERYWHERE.  OPPRESSIVELY HOT .  SILENT AND DARK.   AND EXTREMELY DEADLY!             HE HEARD A TWIG SNAP BEHIND HIM.  SCREAMING HE WHIRLED, PULLING FROM ITS HOLSTER THE BIG FRAME OF A .45 CALIBER SINGLE-SHOT REVOLVER AND BEGAN FIRING.  FIRING INTO THE DARKNESS.  FIRING BLINDLY . .             AND THEN . . . DARKNESS.             OBLIVION.             THEY FOUND HIM, HOURS LATER, LYING IN THE DIRT BESIDE THE COLD REMAINS OF A CAMPFIRE UNCONSCIOUS AND MUMBLING ABOUT A JAGUAR.  A BLACK JAGUAR.             THEY DRUG HIM BACK TO HIS COT, UNBUTTONED HIS SWEAT-STAINED SHIRT, AND FORCED WATER BETWEEN HIS PARCHED LIPS . . . AND WHISPERED IN LOW VOICES, LIKE LOVERS,  ABOUT VARIOUS WAY IN KILLING HIM.            

Let's talk about story telling

Let's talk about story telling today.  Especially about how to tell a story properly.  Oh sure, sure . . . there are hundreds, if not thousands, of MFA programs out there that will pontificate beautifully on how to write (tell) a story properly.  And all you have to do is spend thousands of dollars to go, earn that degree, and (of course) write and become an instant success.Right.  That's the ticket.  Let's all run off and enroll right now!
Or (since we're friends and we know how to bullshit with each other over just about everything) let's just sit down over a cup of coffee, a glass of beer, a pint of ale, a jug of wine, a two-liter bottle of Coke, or a quart of Pepto Bizmol (choose one or any combination, I'm not picky) and let's just talk about good, old fashion story telling.
I'll start.
My example of excellent story telling?  Go see Pixar's newest movie, Brave.
Perfect!
If doesn't matter if we're talking about story telling in a novel, short story, or movie.  Story telling is story telling.  There's a certain structure---a certain flow---that needs to happen which, by definition, makes a story.  A balance, if you will, between action and emotion.  A balance between grief, anger, joy and laughter.  A balance between  the descriptive (visual) arts used to push the plot along and not using enough,  making the whole thing feel like a card board cut out.
In its succinct form; balance.
Great story telling is the art of balancing everything in its appropriate form.  Too much action in story writing (or a motion picture) and all you have is noise.  Too much heart felt emotion with no possible chance of relief and all you have is a fit of depression.   Too much talking without a little action to stir up the Destroyer in all of us and you have sheer boredom.
But oddly enough---there may be no such thing as too much comedy.  Laughter . . . honest laughter . . . is a commodity few people ever get enough of.  That, my friends, is something a lot of writers have forgotten.  Laughter.
Don't care how grim the story is or how action-filled it is.  Sprinkle in a little laughter.  In fact I would suggest that some of the best action movies ever filmed, or books ever written, became the best because somewhere in the depths of the story line people took time to laugh--even if only briefly--at something.  That juxtaposition of imminent death and amusement seems to be so part of us as human beings.  We need both.
One of the best directors of action (Western) movies ever to craft a film was a guy by the name of John Ford.  His movies always contained humor.  Lots of action, to be sure.  But humor as well.  Soft, gentle humor that made the characters humane.  A vivid contrast emotionally.
Pixar's Brave has it all.  Action, color, grandeur, story line, humor.  You will laugh and you will shed a tear (or you ain't human, fella!)  If you haven't seen it on the big screen then you've missed something special.
Go see it.

A friend of mine; Cody Toye

Oh, my gosh!  I do so need to profusely apologize to a friend of mine, Cody Toye.  I promised weeks ago I would throw up on this page a blog he wanted to share with his friends and I have been damnably remiss in not carrying out my promise.I offer no excuses, my friend, for being so thoughtless.  Yes---I agree whole-heartily---I am a fracking idiot and one lazy bastard.  I do humble apologize. 
But let me present to you now, friends and soon-to-be-friends, one quirky, interesting writer.   Cody Toye.  He is a writer who leans heavily toward the twisted humorous side of life.  That's why I used the word quirky.   Rare is it to find someone who intentionally wants to write the funny side of any known,  stodgy old genre.  But Cody tries to do just that the genres of horror and mysteries.  And if you've ever tried to write humorously you know how hard it can be.
So without further ado, here's both a small blog and an excerpt from one of his stories to share with you.  Enjoy.
Zorza First off, thank you for the guest spot on your blog it is a real honor. Our love for the art of writing started soon after graduation. Though we never got serious until later in life, we always attempted to land a piece or two in popular magazines. We tried various outlets and found our few big fish, but usually ended up sobbing over the infamous rejection letters. After some time, we did land a contract with a small indie publisher. Our writing careers seemed to be going places. After a bit, I started jumping from genre to genre trying to find my niche. Luckily, my wife, author H.R. Toye already knew her place. She pumped out horror and mysteries left and right while I tried to find the path less taken. The demand for more stories from our publishers kept us on our toes, making more and more words magically appear on the white screen flashing in front of our eyes.  The more we thought we were moving forward, the further back we seemed to be going. Our short stories we once lived for set whispering to us from the far reaches of our laptops memory. A year later, we lost our contract and felt the freedom once more. With more wiggle room, we decided to put together the best of worlds, our published short stories and our never seen magazine stories into one collection. This collection is a journey into the words that have plagued our minds for some time now.  Almost completed, The Blood Moon Chronicles is expected to hit stores in late July.
Excerpt Merchant of Death The needle tore deep into the plastic wrapper leaving the slightest pinhole lingering for evidence. Cecil Smiled devilishly and stared at his remaining product. The ten o’clock news ran another special on the heinous crimes plaguing Northwest Arkansas, this time labeling him the “Merchant of Death.” I’m the Merchant of Death? This thought amused the tiny man. A hellish cackle escaped his lips and continued to illuminate his madness. As he finished injecting the last of tomorrow’s product, he heard the announcement that ten more were found dead today, bringing the death toll to eighty-two. This set him off once again. Through the spray of spittle and the booming laugh, he was able to correct the old tube television set and inform it that the death toll was actually one hundred and three. ***** The sun beat down on the old Ford van, reflecting the bright yellow paint. The multitude of colored dots offset the décor nicely. Sprinkle Ice Cream was open for business once more and what a day it would be!  The heat index called for a record high and was predicting a scorching one hundred and eight, a perfect day for his ice cream truck. Cecil cringed at the sound of the rusty hinges of the back doors creaking open. As he loaded the last of his freight into the Nelson freezer, he placed his “special product” to the far left making it easy to dispense at will. With one more walk around, he was ready to start his day. The lyrical hum of “Colonel Bogey’s March” filled the summer air. With perked interest, dozens of kids rounded the corner and jumped over the hedge. The younger group simply dropped what they were doing and started bouncing up and down. The “Ice cream dance” as he came to refer to it over the years, brought streams of adults with fistfuls of money out into the heat.  One by one, Cecil handed out cones, sandwiches, and fruity colorful ice pops. A devilish grin never left his face as he pulled from the special inventory and randomly handed them out. He knew he was nothing more than a social disease, a killer of children tall and small, yet he somehow felt at ease ridding the world of the overfed spoiled American children. Visions of his childhood plagued him. Little Cecil, only eight years old, watched from the steps of the orphanage as spoiled brats bought gobs of ice cream from the Good Humor truck and mockingly ate it in front of him. Some of the even meaner children went as far as throwing the half- eaten ice cream at him, hoping to see it splatter moments before he could catch it. Poor Cecil! Who’s laughing now? A stifled giggle caught in his throat, creating a nasty gurgling sound to splash out.

Here we go again---rules for a writer!

Been missing in action lately, blog wise.  There's a reason.  Had to finish writing the last few chapters of the newest Turner Hahn/Frank Morales novel, Guilt of Innocence.   I don't know if it's occurred to you, but for many writers the end of a novel is the roughest stretch of the sea to navigate through.  Especially so if you're writing a complex police-procedural novels involving Turner and Frank.  Even the short stories I write featuring these two are the hardest of the lot to write  The thing about a complex whodunit is tying up all the loose ends.  Or putting it another way, snipping off and cauterizing all the subplots that naturally drift into these kinds of novels.  Everything has to fit.  Has to come to some plausible conclusion.  Maybe a conclusion that promises some interesting ramifications in a later novel.   But still, some kind of conclusion.  So a lot of thought, and rewriting, goes into the end of a novel.
Which brings me to the main point for this little meandering trip into the mind of a writer . . .
Rules.
No, not the 'grand' rules of what to do as a writer.  Not the old tags about 'Finding your on voice,'  or 'Read everything you can get your hands on,' or 'The truth of a writer is rewriting, rewriting, rewriting!'
Not that bullshit.  Long ago I decided if you're going to go flat fucking crazy and be a writer anyway, you're going to write your own way--so forget about other peoples' grand rules and just hack it out on your own until you get it right. Nope . . . the rules I have in mine are the nuts-and-bolts kind of mechanics every writer should do while in the middle of writing a novel.  The rules that helps the writing process move along more efficiently.  Nothing grand or karmic in nature here.  Just the everyday rules of the trade one plumber would give to another in order to help him out of a jam.  So here goes:
1.  Character names and personality traits:  Create a character and load them up with some kind of descriptive set of personality traits--make sure you jot them down on a paper and keep them handy.  Just five or six words.  No more.  It is absolutely amazing how you can butcher that name throughout the book if you don't do this.
2.  Key incidents in the novel:  Shit happens in a chapter and fifteen chapters later you need to mention it again and explain it in a different light.  Especially true when writing a whodunit.  But you forgot where the hell this occurred.  So you spend half a fracken day trying to find it.  Good way to really make you pissed off for the rest of the week.  So on that list-of-names-paper---mention chapter and incident where things happen.  You're wife/husband will thank you for it.
3. Chapter rereads/rewrites:  Write a chapter at a time and then STOP!  Go back and reread the chapter.  Take out the commas, the adjectival/adverbial clauses.  Make your sentences short and snappy. Do this and the story flows so smoothly you'll think you've almost became a great writer.  Don't let the feeling go to your head.  That's a trap as well (and eventually another blog).
4.  Imagery:  Paint a picture in words.  Vividly.  Throw the painting somewhere in the chapter--for me usually in the first two paragraphs.  Don't over do it.  But paint just enough to give the reader a vivid image in their head. ONE VIVID IMAGE!  Don't over describe every scene.  A reader likes both;  likes to see a vivid image described in such a way as to make it crystal clear in his mind.  But then he also likes to allow his imagination to create their own images as well.  Yes, Tonto; this is a dichotomy.  A problem.  One only resolved after lots and lots and lots of practice!  So . . Good Luck!
5. Be Very Careful!:  MFA profs ( and a lot of writers) all over the country will tell you the first draft of a novel is shit and you are REQUIRED to rewrite the novel two, three, four times.  Bullshit.  You're going to find out that, occasionally, you got it right the first time.  Especially of you're writing a story you're passionate about.  Another one of those problematical/contentious/debatable conundrums you'll have to wrestle with for yourself.  So all I'm telling you is read your stuff with a critical eye and decide for yourself.  Let others read it if you want (as long as they will give you a blunt, honest assessment).  but refrain from drastically rewriting the original work.  You may find out that magic you put into words will evaporate and never come back if you drastically alter the first draft.

So there they are.  Five rules.  Now I know there are more out there one plumber could offer to another.  So do so!!  What rules do YOU use while writing a novel?

By the way, the artwork at the beginning of the blog.  Done by Javier Carmona .  The Carmona Brothers and I are working on a graphic novel entitled Decadence.  The image above is one of the characters found in the story. Guandi is his name.  The Chinese Taoist god of war.   When finished it should be a visual banquet for graphic novel fans.
At least we hope so.

Old stuff made new

Old stuff written before the birth of dirt and stuffed into a back drawer and promptly forgotten.  And then re-discovery . . . .

What the hell!?

You realize the stuff you wrote a long time ago isn't bad.  In fact, it might be just the thing in today's market!  Science fiction mixed in with a little historical adventure.  But how do you know?

How do you know the stuff long discarded should see the light of day again?

Years ago I wrote a novel called Pirates of E'outh.  About a ship from the 16th Century being hurled hundreds of centuries through Time to an alternate-earth.  One filled with all kinds of strange aliens and wild adventures.

And I started the novel (potential series?) with an interesting set-up.  A prologue of a descendant of the main character writing back to his kinsmen from the future.  I dunno . . . rereading the intro and then the book again I find myself itching at the thought this could see a publishing house specializing in this kind of speculative fiction giving its nod of approval to it.

But before I sent it off . . or to a lit agent . . I thought I'd share the prologue with you and see if it generates any commentary.  I hope it does.  A little feedback would be nice.  So here it is. 

What do you think?


PROLOGUE

            It all began with my grandfather.  Jeffery Arnold Clarke, my grandfather, died in 1989.  At the time of his death he was 99 years old.   He had been in his lifetime a cowboy, a police officer, a soldier of fortune and a private detective.  He fought both alongside, and later against, Poncho Villa in Mexico.  He smuggled guns for Chinese resistance fighters who were fighting Japanese occupation of their homeland prior to World War II.  Before that he fought all of World War I flying extremely fragile fighter planes made of nothing but canvas, wire, and wood.  And  survived.  When he died, he died old and proud and much loved by all those who knew him. 

            I was his favorite of all his grandchildren.  He often said to me, as I grew to manhood, he had a special gift which he wanted me to have upon his death.  I thought nothing of it for most of my life.  That 'special gift' had already been given to me over and over again by this old gentleman I loved so much.   But when he died, to my surprise, I did receive a special gift.
            Among his possessions had been an old steamer trunk in which I remember playing on as a kid while it sat in the dark, dust-filled attic of grandfather's house.  No one in the family took particular interest in this steamer trunk.  Grandfather had told us often that nothing was in it except his old World War I uniforms and a few old photo albums.  Nevertheless it was that old steamer trunk which he promised me.  It was that steamer trunk that I wanted most from him.
            I was pleased to hear that the old steamer trunk had been bequeathed to me in his will.  It arrived at my house one cold and wet November day by special courier and I took possession of something which eventually came to own my soul with an all-consuming power.
            One day in December, not long after the trunk was delivered, I decided to open it and rummage through my family's past.  True enough, upon opening the trunk I found my grandfather's World War I uniform.  He served in the Royal Flying Corps, which eventually became the Royal Air Force, in the Great War.  He was one of the few survivors who joined in 1914 and lived to tell about it at war's end.  He was an ace with fourteen confirmed kills and had, among other things, the distinction of being shot down twice by none other than Baron Manfred von Richthofen.
            But the manuscripts underneath grandfather's uniform were the articles which consumed me.  There, tied in neat bundles of six manuscripts apiece, were dusty pages of history which can only be described as being too incredible to believe.
            Did I say history?  Well—yes and no.  Not history as you or I know it.  But history, and revelations, only a prophet or a insane man might write.  I cannot accurately describe accurately what these manuscripts say.  One must read them in their entirety to truly understand both the fascination and the dread I feel whenever I think of them.  But let me generalize, if I can, what these ancient and crumbling papers purport to say.
            On one bright morning in 1920 my grandfather was walking on an empty stretch of Florida coastline just south of St Petersburg, Florida.  He had been discharged from the RAF only a few weeks before and had taken up residence in the small Florida community he was to call home for the rest of his life. The doctors suggested recuperation in the Florida clime might be the best prescription for a return to health.  Grandfather's health had been severely compromised while serving in the RAF in some official capacity while in Russia in 1919.  It was a time in his life he would never talk about whenever I asked him about it.  I got the impression it was still, after so many years had passed by, a source of intense emotion for him.  Respecting his wishes I never approached the subject again.
            But on this sunny, but somewhat lonely, Sunday morning was taking his usual stroll down the beach watching the ocean waves roll lazily onto the sands and enjoying the many sea gulls which seemed to equally enjoy strolling with him in the early morning light. 
            As he walked he discovered this old steamer trunk. The trunk I now possess.  It was half buried in the sand.  To say the least, my grandfather was quite perplexed at finding this artifact on this particular beach at this particular time of the day.  It was, as grandfather's own handwriting says in the many diaries he left for me to read, both an exciting and fearful discovery.  At first he thought he might have come across some old pirate's treasure chest filled with Spanish doubloons and stolen Aztec gold.  But then it occurred to him that it was possibly only flotsam left from a recent ship's sinking in the gulf.  Kneeling, grandfather became curious as he observed the blackened and scorched markings he found on the exterior of the trunk.  He pried open the trunk's lid and lifted it to see what was inside.  What he found was enough gold and jewels to instantly make himself a multi-millionaire!  But more than that, he found the bundles of manuscripts and the long, rambling letter from a long-forgotten ancestor by the name of Geoffery Clarke.  The letter was addressed to Geoffery Armstrong Clarke. 
            The letter was addressed to me, a distant cousin to this Geoffery Clarke.  Incredibly a letter addressed to me almost 400 years prior to my birth!
            My name is Geoffery Armstrong Clarke.  Geoffery Clarke is my great-grandfather, ten generations removed.  This distant relative, who was born in 1588,  communicated through Time using my grandfather as the intermediary!  I was born in 1968.  But this Geoffery Clarke had written to me, and mistaken my grandfather as me, back in 1920!
            To be confronted by the ramifications of this experience is devastating to one's sense of reality.  It was with a disorienting sense of deja vu I had when I read my grandfather's diary, and later, the manuscripts.
            At first my grandfather believed someone was playing on him a massive and cruel joke.  But the gold and jewels were genuine and priceless and no one came to claim them.  Grandfather hauled the heavy trunk back to his house and over the years quietly began to exchange gold for currency.  Our family fortunes were made with his serendipitous finding.  However, it was the other pieces of evidence included in the trunk which finally made grandfather realize a relative of ours had mistakenly believed he was communicating with Geoffery Armstrong Clarke—me—by sending the trunk through Time by some incredulous means.
            Confusing to comprehend?  Not as confusing as the full impact of what waited for me in that dusty steamer trunk.  As I read both my grandfather's diaries and the manuscripts themselves, a  sense of vertigo gripped my soul.  For weeks after making the initial discovery I moped around the house trying to comprehend what was taking place.  I admit there were times I thought I would go insane. For the more I read my ancestor’s adventures, the more I became confused.
            Geoffery Clarke was not communicating with me from the past. They came from the future.  The distant future, and more amazingly, from a distant planet.  Amidst the hundreds of pages of handwritten manuscripts were pieces of evidence which irrefutably proved this relative was indeed in the distant future.  He knew what fortunes, and misfortunes, lay ahead for Earth.  Fortunes and misfortunes grandfather would have had no way of knowing would take place in 1920.
            In the trunk were photographs.  Not photographs of whatever place and in whatever time Geoffery Clarke was in. But photographs of Earth. Three dimensional photographs!  A photographic technique only now in experimental stages of development in my time! Earth orbit photographs.  Lunar photographs showing the back side of the moon. Photographs of what seemed to be a thriving metropolis on Mars!  And there are photographs of objects; objects like automobiles.  Automobiles built in the 1980s. Automobiles built in 2050.  Photographs grandfather held in this trunk, in the attic of his house, since 1920!
            How did this trunk get to Florida?  How could a distant ancestor of mine find himself whisked away from Earth, in his own time period, and unceremoniously dumped onto a distant world in a distant future?  How could this distant relative send this trunk, and the evidence to prove this was no hoax, back through Time?
            Of course, perhaps, part of the answer lies in the Bermuda Triangle.  It is only a few hundred miles to the southeast of where my grandfather lived in 1920.  Oddly enough, in 1610 it is the place where my distant namesake apparently was whisked away from his home world by a strange power.  But how?  Who?  And the most intriguing question of all—Why? Why was this strange power trying to communicate to me in 1920?  Even my father had not been born in 1920. So how did Geoffery Clarke know he would eventually communicate with me over this vast distance?
            There are far more questions than there are answers.  I have no answers other than what Geoffery Clarke offers in his many manuscripts.  But the questions are so enticing, and the adventures my distant relative had so wondrous,  I felt compelled to have them published.
            I leave to the reader whatever judgments they wish to take.  All I do is faithfully record what my distant relative put down in his own handwriting.  There are a dozen or so manuscripts in the trunk and my plans are to have them published one at a time.  Perhaps in time an answer will be found.  Answers which will explain the whys and hows of this perplexing phenomenon.  But for now, all one can do is read . And believe.


                                                                                    Geoffery Clarke/2008.
                                                                                   

The Next Literary Giant?

It could be that Stuart Ayris might become one of those literary writers students thirty years from now will have to read in literature classes as required reading.No, I'm not kidding. 
Listening and reading comments from those who have read Stuart's works basically have said the same thing.  They all have been impressed with the way the words flowing across the page evokes powerful emotion.  That, Pilgrim, is the mark of a talented writer.
Stuart is into writing true literature;  that is, he paints the human heart in words.  The frailties.  The irony.  The hopes.  The dreams.  The failures.  All the deep emotions that make up the human heart.  An Englishman who pulls from his life's experiences stories and snapshots of real life and sets them to words.  Literature, in its most classical definition.
So I thought about asking him some questions.  To be honest, his style, his choice of story telling, are not my gig.  I do not say that in any judgemental fashion and, in fact, admire his grace and style of word slinging.   But because we do differ in our choices I thought it'd be a kick to dig into his mind and see how he ticks.
Do genre writers (me) and writers of emotive literature (Stuart) have any similarities in the way we approach story telling?  Hmmm . . .
Let's find out.  1. Stuart everyone who has reviewed your works that you're lyrical in your writing.  That you have a way with words that is almost poetic. Tell me, did this style of writing come natural or did you cultivate it in some mysterious fashion?
My first love, way before writing, was music – most particularly the songs of Bob Dylan. When you think of songs like Subterranean Homesick Blues, Desolation Row and Stuck Inside of Mobile With The Memphis Blues Again you could read the words aloud and hear the music. There is a rhythm when certain words are put together that, when read aloud, gives you so much more than mere words can. And from there I read Jack Kerouac with his mad prose and his made up words and his absolute love of Jazz. When you read his stuff at his best it’s like listening to Duke Ellington or Charlie Parker – he riffs with words, he improvises and it is magnificent. With my first novel, A Cleansing of Souls, I just didn't have the confidence to do anything other than put one word after another. With Tollesbury Time Forever, well, I guess I was at a stage of my life where I had nothing to lose. So I wrote a book that I would love, that riffed and moved up and down and in and out like music does. There's made-up words a-plenty and there are musical references that make me smile, even if no-one else discovers them. And within the novel there is a two-act play, several poems, a song and a two hundred year old recipe for boiled rabbit.
When I type I like to think I'm playing piano in a band – sometimes that's a blues band, sometimes a rock and roll band, and sometimes I'm an old jazz man covered in cocaine. Depends where the mood takes me I guess.
So getting back to the question – did my style of writing come naturally? I suppose it is the product of the wayward, disorganised, ever-hopeful, life I have led. And that's ok.

 2.  The other striking feature of your writing is how close the professional life other than the writing of novels has seriously impressed upon your memory emotions, events, and stories.  For someone who prefers to write a more literary novel,  this must be a prerequisite.  Yes or no? 
I seriously believe I know no more about how people behave or how people should be treated having been a psychiatric nurse for almost fifteen years than I did as a 21 year old road sweeper. I know more about medication and mental health legislation but that's about it. I've spent six years managing an acute admission ward and three years managing a community mental health team – that doesn't mean I know more about people. It's just I perhaps have been exposed to experiences that otherwise may have passed me by.
In terms of the more literary novel, that is not what I have ever set out to write. I have an absolute belief that creativity is a process of remembering and recording, whether that be novels, music, paintings or any other art. When I get in a certain frame of mind I'm able to remember sequences of words that I write down and when I really get moving and grooving and the wine is flowing and the whisky flourishes I'm able to remember whole chapters that somehow form a novel. That's just how it is.

 3.  What is it about the written word, and the kind of stories you like to tell, which is so important to you?  The desire to be a writer, has this always been with you or did it come  into being in a surprising manner?
English was about the only thing I liked about school – other than football and cricket. My ultimate desire is for people to live in peace, with themselves and others. My first novel was me trying to work out how that is even possible, my second about how I personally was going to do that and the one I'm writing at the moment is about how others might do it. Changing the world is not such a grand ambition. Keeps me out of the pub once in a while anyway!


4. Tollesbury Times Forever is about an alcoholic who is mentally ill.  How did this story come about, and more interestingly, what compelled you to write it?  Is it a tale of hope and possibilities?  Or is it quiet ride into psychotic oblivion?
It is most definitely a novel about hope and possibilities. Working in psychiatry for so long I have come to a fundamental understanding that I do not believe there is such a thing as mental illness. I do not believe in medication or hospital or anything at all about the system. Tollesbury Time Forever is just about life and trying to get through it. The quiet rides are the psychotic oblivion – the handy dandy wonders are where life is really at. And if that includes seeing things nobody else can see or hearing things that nobody else can hear, then fantastic – if it helps you feel better about yourself – fantastic! If not, then it is love and friendship that you need – not medication and being locked up.
Why did I write Tollesbury Time Forever? It was just a natural progression from the thoughts and rememberings in my mind. Partly it was to make sense to myself about the conclusions I had come to and partly to give myself hope.

5.  It seems from my studies in college many great 'literary' novels ultimately turned out to be great novels which left the lasting impressions of tragedy and hopelessness.  For readers who might pick up your works, are these two emotions which will greet them and carry on after the book is read?  Or, in the end, will there also be some hope and optimism expressed as well?
I don't believe you need to have something terrible happen to you to experience an enlightenment and I don't believe hopelessness is ever positive. I agree with your point about great books bringing forth emotions but those emotions must, absolutely must, lead you to put down the book you have just finished and leave you tingling, leave you knowing with great certainty that you can make the life of a total stranger better. The Grapes of Wrath, A Prayer For Owen Meany and The Dharma Bums are three books that did that for me. There are reasons that books have been around for thousands of years. The human experience is dependant upon them just as it is beholden upon all of us to make this world a finer place. So yes – HOPE. And yes – OPTIMISM. But the major thing for those two wonderful paradigms to sustain is FORGIVENESS. And I guess that is what Tollesbury Time Forever is all about.
6.  You have a brother, Ian Ayris, who is a writer as well.  Tell us, any rivalries there between you and your brother when dealing with your literary efforts?  I know Ian writes in a different genre but his work too seems to leave a lasting impression of  quite sadness and hopelessness  (I know I said this and it sounds judgmental--but I'm not indicating that in any way--just wanted you both to know);  so this question is this--what forces in your youths helped to mold your worldly visions in this way?
No rivalry at all! I think it is wonderful what he has achieved. We have, from a fairly early age, led very different lives – and as I alluded to earlier your experiences will undoubtedly have an impact on your rememberings and your writings and your stories. I think the main thing that has led us to having writing in common is the fact that our mum and dad are wonderful. Simple as that really!

 7.  How do you define literary success?  Money?  Fame?  A fan base?  What do you hope your novels and stories will eventually accomplish?  Or are you, after the story has been written, interested in what happens next?
Ultimately I want to write full time. It is the only non-destructive thing that comes naturally to me. Success? That's one person reading one of my books and maybe thinking that in some way life has a bit more to it than they first imagined. As a psychiatric nurse I have spent years being paid to give people hope. Nobody should get paid for that, me included – that's why I want to get out of the whole nursing things as soon as I can afford to.

8.  Tell us what's coming up next for you.  What are you writing?  How many stories are waiting in queue?   What would you like to write?  And have you ever thought about trying a different genre to write in?
I'm almost 60,000 words into the first draft of my next novel – The Bird That Nobody Sees and I'm loving it. It's about friendship and angels and midgets and paintballing and pool competitions and, of course, a bird that nobody sees. When I wrote Tollesbury Time Forever I had no idea that anyone would read it. There are now 54 five star reviews on Amazon UK. That fact though doesn't change anything. I write what comes into my head – although I do now have the confidence and belief that those words have merit.
I'm almost 60,000 words into the first draft of my next novel – The Bird That Nobody Sees and I'm loving it. It's about friendship and angels and midgets and paintballing and pool competitions and, of course, a bird that nobody sees. When I wrote Tollesbury Time Forever I had no idea that anyone would read it. There are now 54 five star reviews on Amazon UK. That fact though doesn't change anything. I write what comes into my head – although I do now have the confidence and belief that those words have merit.

Today we're interviewing Mark Gilroy. Author, publi...

Today we're interviewing Mark Gilroy.  Author, publisher, and interesting.  Interesting in the fact Mark knows about the publishing world now than any of the rest of us will come to understand in the next one hundred years.

There's a reason for this.

Before Mark became an accomplished author he sat on the OTHER side of the desk.  He was a vice-president in a couple of the largest traditional print houses in the the country.  He was the guy who SIGNED fledgling authors on the dotted line. He ran the company.  He created promotional campaigns.  He was The Man In Charge.

What's fascinating to consider is that Mark started out in the business working in the stockroom and wound up sitting at the head of the table in the boardroom.

Huh, apparently it is true.  Hard work, determination, and a will to succeed DOES pay off.

Now he stands on the other side of the parking lot.  He's an author of a new detective/mystery series featuring his female police detective, Kristen Connors.  The first book is called Cuts Like A Knife.  And I'm going to read it pretty damn soon.

But there's something else about Mark I find intriguing.  His idea of putting a mystical/spirituality into the basic personality weave of a character.  I like that.  He got the idea from one of my most cherished authors; a guy by the name of Tony Hillerman.  Hillerman's Jim Chee novels featuring Navajo police officer Jim Chee are fascinating.  Navajo mysticism flows through these books with a quiet fascination.   I understand, therefore, Mark's interest in this idea.

An interesting man with some interesting comments and ideas.  I know you're going to like this interview.


 Cuts Like A Knife o                                                        1. Mark, you've been in the publishing business for decades. Starting in the garage loading trucks to becoming vice-presidents of well known publishing houses. Tell me, how does a kid going to divinity school wind up in a place like this? And a follow up question; what keeps you in this business?

Growing up I was an avid reader—my mom even said I was smart—but I was not always a good student. The second semester of my sophomore year of college I decided to add a second major—Speech Communications with a Journalism emphasis. The next fall I began internship as a sports stringer at a small community newspaper. I would sit at the editor’s desk on Friday nights and take calls from high school football coaches. I would write 10 to 15 short stories that made it sound like I had been at each game. That began my official paid career in publishing. They liked my work enough that I had my own byline before I left college. I think it was a personal turning point for me as. Writing about something I loved—in this case football and then the other sports throughout the year—seemed to open up my ability to think and express myself more clearly in all my course work. I began freelancing while in grad school and I woke up one day working in the proof room of a publishing house—with packing some boxes on heavy order days. From there I moved into editorial, then marketing, then management of publishing divisions.

2. Compare and contrast question: you've been on both sides of the desk. For years as a book publisher, editor, acquisitions manager--and now as a successful author. Of the two sides mentioned, which do you prefer? The one finding the talent and marketing it? Or the talent needing to be marketed?

That’s a great question. One thing I’ve never been able to figure out is if my role in publishing was to help talented people put their best work into the marketplace—or to try and be a talent. Obviously my work as a publisher for three companies indicate that I have thoroughly enjoyed the former, helping others—and it has paid the bills. But throughout my career I have compiled and written enough books that I knew I wanted to do more to express what was on my mind. So to answer your question, the answer is yes and both! I like both sides of the table very much. Right now, having written my debut novel, I’m probably having more fun as a writer at the moment.

3. I'm very curious about this. You are a religious man. A man of faith. So how does a man of faith find himself attracted to what others might describe as the 'dark side' of detective/mystery literature? What is it about this genre you find unable to resist?

I have always enjoyed murder and suspense thrillers, I’m sure in part just as pure escapist entertainment. The first time I ever really connected the dots between faith and this genre was when I started reading Tony Hillerman’s wonderful Jim Chee novels. His hero was a detective on the Navajo Reservation and a man of introspection and simple faith. When I started writing Cuts Like a Knife I had no thought about writing a religious fiction novel—and I would argue that it isn’t. I wanted to do a great general market novel that would wow readers who like suspense. But my hero, Detective Kristen Conner, is a person of introspection and simple faith. That does connect to my background and life—but you can also say that was inspired by the incredible work of Hillerman. I loved the review that USA TODAY gave of the novel. In the last sentence the reviewer called it: “An intense, eerie, funny, and suspenseful thriller with a very subtle faith thread that enriches rather than suffocates it.” I’ll take that as a compliment.

4. While we're on the discussion about the genre we both dearly love, tell me; what makes, for you, a great mystery/detective yarn? What kind of main character do you find compelling? Do they have to be male or female? Same question as the last, but this time aimed toward the villain. A real nasty one? An intellectual one?

You’ve got Smiddy and can answer this question better than I can I bet! I’ve been asked several times if I outlined Cuts Like a Knife. My answer has been no. I came up with a lead character I really like—and a villain who is very bad in an understated way. Those two wrote the rest for me! I have favorite literary characters that are both male and female, but I do like self-reflection and some emotional depth. Ditto with the villains. I don’t like cartoonish characters. So I guess on both sides of good and evil I like some psychological depth and tension. One of the responses I’ve had from readers is that my killer—a true psychopath—is so calm, cool, and collected—even logical in his own way—that they have found him to be scarier than a ranting and raving lunatic. Like the opening scene, this guy really could be sitting next to you at a ball game.

5. What is your opinion on what makes for a successful writer of genre fiction? How much talent is needed versus how much luck comes in to play. Can talent alone eventually bring you success? Or is luck the more dominate factor in finding success.

I’ve been on the business side of publishing so long that I recognize exceptional cases happen, but realize you can’t plan and manage based on exceptions. By definition exceptions don’t happen very often. So, luck is always possible. Talent without promotion sometimes hits too. But generally speaking in world where there is more supply than demand, it takes all of the above: writing talent, a great marketing plan with execution, and more often than not, a couple strokes of luck.

6. As a traditional publisher what is your take on the rise of epublishing? Will one destroy the other or will a day come along which sees both publishing methods find a mutually satisfactory equilibrium? And which of the two do you think will be the most lucrative for the author?

This is a tough question that can be answered a lot of ways. First, I’d state I am platform neutral and don’t care if people like ink and paper or an electronic device to consume books. In terms of what is best for the author … A traditional publishing model pays you royalties. A self-published e-book model pays you profits. The former has a marketing and sales team to support you, in the latter it is all up to you—but access to sales channels is available for all. But to state the obvious, neither pays much if the work doesn’t sell! I obviously elected to sell my novel to a publisher under traditional publishing terms so it might seem I favor that model. But I watch the self-publish e-book model with keen interest as well. For fiction, the common denominator for success in either model goes back to the issues of talent and marketing you mentioned earlier. Neither model works without the author highly involved in both. I have been amazed at the quality of fiction from self-published authors, but something I’ve noticed—and others have noticed as well—because of the success of some trailblazers, there are other writers throwing some inferior work at the wall. By inferior I would stress they have not submitted to the disciplines of peer review, rewrites, and basic editorial process like proofing! They might be even better at marketing so when readers sample the indie world and discover the quality to not be there, it hurts the ones doing it right.

7. In writing a continuing series with an on going character how hard is it in keeping the series fresh and exciting? Is there, in your opinion, a natural life span a series exists and when do you know when it must come to an end?

I just finished the manuscript for the second Detective Kristen Conner novel—Every Breath You Take. So it wasn’t hard at all to keep fresh. You need to ask me that same question when I am working on number four or five—I think I’ve got a real good idea to pursue for number three! In my opening novel Kristen turns 30. I’ve wondered if 10 books and her turning 40 would be a good number for the series—I think and hope I could keep 10 books fresh. But keep in mind Robert Parker has written close to 40 Spenser novels—he’s still with Susan, he still scarfs donuts without putting on weight, we still don’t know his first name, and he still catches the bad guys. So maybe 10 isn’t ambitious enough?

8. Tell us about your character, Kristen Connors. How did she come into existence? Why a female protagonist? How many books are you planning on writing with her? And what are you writing on now?

As the father of six kids—three sons and three daughters—I think I’ve experienced enough drama to write a male or female lead character. If my wife and daughters read this I could be in trouble, but there has been more drama from the females than the males—so when I wrote a family-centered character that loves her family but fights with them constantly, it was easy to go with a female lead. My publisher asked how I could write female interaction and dialog so well. I just said look at the gray in my beard and you’ll know. Seriously, the family interaction has been one of the fun ways to intersperse humor into a storyline with a serial killer. Kristen is strong, independent with a bit of a temper problem—so she is a graceful mess. She studies krav maga and other hand-to-hand combat disciplines but is pissed she can’t shoot a handgun straight. She’s beautiful and doesn’t know it. She coaches her niece’s soccer team—she played at Northern Illinois University—but with her temper even that gets her into hot water. She loves God but fights with Him too. And I won’t even mention she isn’t getting along with the head of detectives. So she’s a very delightful young lady with plenty of flaws. I am just beginning to sketch ideas for novel three and will start rolling on it soon! How many books? I’ll let the audience tell me!