Art Taylor's Blog, page 61

The Liars Club Oddcast

I first met Jon McGoran when we were both reading at a Noir at the Bar one snowy night in Baltimore. He’s a fine writer and has become a fine friend as well, and I was so pleased when he invited me to be a guest on the Liars Club Oddcast that he helps run—and then grateful for his patience as we worked out a time to record the podcast around my class times and the bus stop schedule!

Jon and his co-hosts—Gregory Frost, Merry Jones, and Keith Strunk—were so gracious and generous with their questions about my work and the places the conversations went from there, about short stories, about experimental structures in fiction, about teaching creative writing, about reviewing, and much more.

I hope you’ll give it a listen, hope you’ll enjoy sitting in on the conversation as much as I enjoyed being part of it! You can find the episode with me as a guest here.

The First Two Pages: Designed for Haunting by Sybil Johnson

In April 2015, B.K. Stevens debuted the blog series “The First Two Pages,” hosting craft essays by short story writers and novelists analyzing the openings of their own work. The series continued until just after her death in August 2017, and the full archive of those essays can be found at Bonnie’s website. In November 2017, the blog series relocated to my website, and the archive of this second stage of the series can be found here.

Sybil Johnson writes the Aurora Anderson mystery series for Henery Press, and I’ve been so pleased that sharing a publisher brought us together, giving me the opportunity to get to know both a fine writer and a generous and thoughtful person.

Sybil’s latest novel, Designed for Haunting, releases today—just in time for Halloween shenanigans ahead, as she explains in her First Two Pages essay below. The previous books in the series include Fatal Brushstroke, Paint the Town Dead, and A Palette for Murder. And beyond her fiction, you can also catch Sybil blogging every other Wednesday at Type M For Murder.

Please use the arrows and controls at the bottom of the embedded PDF to navigate through the essay. You can also download the essay to read off-line.

Johnson Designed

Fall for the Book: October 10-13

This year’s Fall for the Book festival at George Mason University boasts an array of headliners, including Elizabeth Kostva, Tayari Jones, Rep. John Lewis, and Elizabeth Strout—like the entire festival covering a wide range of styles and subject matters.

I’m excited about some of the crime-fiction programming ahead, of course, and particularly pleased to have helped pull together a panel of writers from the Mid-Atlantic Chapter of Mystery Writers of America to discuss crime writing as social commentary. Here’s a list of the mystery-related events, all on Mason’s Fairfax, VA campus

Thursday, October 11, 3 p.m.: “Laugh Out Loud Reads” with Jill Orr • Sandy Springs Bank Tent, near the Johnson Center


Saturday, October 13:
11:30 a.m. — “Solving the Riddle: Historical Female Detectives” with Greer Macallister and Deanna Raybourn • Merten Tent, near Merten Hall


1:30 p.m. — “Crime Fiction as Social Commentary” with E.A. Aymar, John Copenhaver, Aimee Hix, Alan Orloff, and LynDee Walker • Merten Hall, Room 1203

I’ll be in the audience, not on stage, for all of this. But still hope to see many friends and fellow writers there!

Find the full festival schedule here.

The Throne Didn’t Come With The Award

I’m so very thrilled that the English Department at George Mason University has chosen me as its distinguished alum of 2018. Here’s the announcement on the department’s website, and the awards ceremony will be hosted by Mason’s College of Humanities and Social Sciences on Wednesday, October 10 in Fairfax, VA (by invitation only).

It was one of the best decisions of my life to come to Mason to earn my MFA—life-changing really in terms of both my career and my personal life, since I also met my wife, Tara Laskowski, in those grad school workshops. I’m grateful to be recognized now for the ways I’ve hopefully given back to the program, the department, and the university as well.

“Precision” and the NY Public Library

I’m thrilled that my story “Precision” has been selected by the New York Public Library for its SimplyE app, in conjunction with its ongoing Subway Library program. The program makes short ebooks available for easy reading on iPhones, iPads, and Android devices—perfect for a commute! And I love both the new graphic they designed for the story and the blurb they came up with too:

In a house in the woods, in the middle of the night, a technician reminds himself of the rules of his trade while his client looks on, steeling herself to follow through with the rules of justice.

“Precision” was originally published in Gargoyle 61 in 2014 and was later named among “Other Distinguished Mystery Stories of 2014” in Best American Mystery Stories 2015, edited by James Patterson and Otto Penzler. So pleased with the attention this story has received!

 

The First Two Pages: Dark Network by James McCrone

In April 2015, B.K. Stevens debuted the blog series “The First Two Pages,” hosting craft essays by short story writers and novelists analyzing the openings of their own work. The series continued until just after her death in August 2017, and the full archive of those essays can be found at Bonnie’s website. In November 2017, the blog series relocated to my website, and the archive of this second stage of the series can be found here.

I’m pleased to welcome today another of the authors I first met at the Deadly Ink Mystery Conference back in August. Carol Gyzander kicked off this mini-series, writing about her story “Stars the Color of Hope,” and Teel James Glenn and Chris Ryan will be discussing their work down the road. This week, James McCrone shares some insights into Dark Network, the second book in his Imogen Trager series of thrillers.

Faithless Elector, the first book in the series, was praised by Publishers Weekly as a “fast-moving topical thriller” focused on the country’s first female president-elect and on conspiracy theories, allegations of voter fraud, and subsequent investigations of the FBI.

(Should I have italicized that word topical for emphasis?)

Dark Network—picking up three days after the ending of Faithless Elector—continues the saga about a “stolen presidency,” and a third novel, Who Governs, is forthcoming before the end of 2018. You can get a glimpse at Dark Network in the essay below, and find out more about James McCrone and his work at his website here.

Please use the arrows and controls at the bottom of the embedded PDF to navigate through the essay. You can also download the essay to read off-line.

McCrone Dark Network

The First Two Pages: Liar Liar by Nancy Boyarsky

In April 2015, B.K. Stevens debuted the blog series “The First Two Pages,” hosting craft essays by short story writers and novelists analyzing the openings of their own work. The series continued until just after her death in August 2017, and the full archive of those essays can be found at Bonnie’s website. In November 2017, the blog series relocated to my website, and the archive of this second stage of the series can be found here.

Bonnie Stevens hosted Nancy Boyarsky in 2017 for a First Two Pages essay on her novel The Swap, part of her Nicole Graves mystery series. (You can find that essay here.) Today, Nancy returns for an essay on her latest book in the series, Liar Liar—just released today!

Liar Liar has a topical theme—far too topical, it seems: a young woman accusing her university’s star quarterback of rape and suddenly finding herself assaulted by the media and in need of protection. Enter Nicole Graves, who works for a private investigation company and is tasked with babysitting the woman throughout the trial. Needless to say, things take a couple of unexpected turns.

In addition to The Swap and Liar Liar, the series includes The Bequest. Nancy has also written several textbooks on the justice system, and she is the co-author, with her husband Bill Boyarsky, of Backroom Politics, a New York Times notable book. You can find more about her work at her website: nancyboyarsky.com.

Please use the arrows and controls at the bottom of the embedded PDF to navigate through the essay. You can also download the essay to read off-line.

Boyarsky Liar Liar

September Newsletter

When I started writing my September newsletter, I thought I didn’t really have any news to share… and then realized how busy I’ve been and how much I’ve got going on: projects in progress, publications and events ahead, and lots of fun reads to recommend, both classic and contemporary.

Find the full newsletter here—and hope you enjoy!

The First Two Pages: “Stars the Color of Hope” by Carol Gyzander

In April 2015, B.K. Stevens debuted the blog series “The First Two Pages,” hosting craft essays by short story writers and novelists analyzing the openings of their own work. The series continued until just after her death in August 2017, and the full archive of those essays can be found at Bonnie’s website. In November 2017, the blog series relocated to my website, and the archive of this second stage of the series can be found here.

Back in August I attended my first Deadly Ink Mystery Conference, thanks to the invitation of Debby Buchanan and Nikki Bonanni—such a fun time! I was asked to lead a workshop on pacing and plotting and to participate in a couple of panels, and along the way I met some fine writers whose work I hadn’t known before, writers including Christine Bush, Jack Getze, Teel James Glenn,  Carol Gyzander, James McCrone, Chris Ryan, and Rich Zahradnik—in addition to many writers I’d met at other conferences over the years and was certainly pleased to see again.

Several of those new-to-me writers have agreed to contribute First Two Pages essays here, and I’m glad to host the first of them this week, Carol Gyzander, whom I was also thrilled to see again at Bouchercon as well.

Carol talks today about her Lovecraft-inspired story “Stars the Color of Hope,” published in Hideous Progeny: Classic Horror Goes Punk by Writerpunk Press, a writers’ collective Carol works closely with. This new collection, published back in May, is the group’s fifth anthology of cyberpunk stories inspired by the classics, and Carol herself has written cyberpunk versions of Shakespeare, Poe, and Twain—a wide range!

Carol is doing fascinating work, and you can get a glimpse of her writing here—both her fiction and her thoughtful commentary on that fiction.

Please use the arrows and controls at the bottom of the embedded PDF to navigate through the essay. You can also download the essay to read off-line.

Gyzander Stars the Color of Hope

 

The First Two Pages: River of Secrets by Roger Johns

In April 2015, B.K. Stevens debuted the blog series “The First Two Pages,” hosting craft essays by short story writers and novelists analyzing the openings of their own work. The series continued until just after her death in August 2017, and the full archive of those essays can be found at Bonnie’s website. In November 2017, the blog series relocated to my website, and the archive of this second stage of the series can be found here.

I first got to know Roger Johns at the Suffolk Mystery Authors Festival last month in Suffolk, VA. We ended up sitting together at lunch before the festivities began and then picked up our conversation again at dinner afterward and bonded both as writers and as college professors (former college professor in his case). Roger is as fun and engaging in person as he is on the page—and you’ll get a sample of his prose here as well as a glimpse into his careful process as he dissects the first two pages of his latest Wallace Hartman mystery, River of Secrets, released at the end of August.

Roger’s debut novel, Dark River Rising, was a finalist for the Silver Falchion Award and the Readers’ Choice Award at Killer Nashville, and he was named the 2018 Georgia Author of the Year this year in the mystery category. Check out more about his work—his novels, his blogs, and more—at his website here. And enjoy this preview of his latest novel below.

Please use the arrows and controls at the bottom of the embedded PDF to navigate through the essay. You can also download the essay to read off-line.

Johns River of Secrets