Kathy Lynn Emerson's Blog

Message to Readers

Dear readers. At some point, this site changed the automatic posting of the Maine Crime Writer’s blog, to which I contribute twice a month, to look as if it was my personal blog and listed my website instead of www.MaineCrimeWriters.com as the source. To avoid future confusion, I have stopped the feed. I will post occasional blogs I’ve written here in the future, but not on a regular basis. Sorry for the confusion.

Weekend Update: October 6-7, 2018

[image error]Next week at Maine Crime Writers, there will posts by John Clark (Monday), Bruce Coffin (Tuesday), Kate Flora (Wednesday), William Andrews (Thursday), and on Friday a group post on Fall in Maine.

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

 

 

 

An invitation to readers of this blog: Do you have news relating to Maine, Crime, or Writing? We’d love to hear from you. Just comment below to share.

And a reminder: If your library, school, or organization is looking for a speaker, we are often available to talk about the writing process, research, where we get our ideas, and other mysteries of the business. Contact Kate Flora

It’s Too Soon to Tell

by Barb, writing away in Portland, Maine

I love writing to prompts. There are many kinds of prompts: a word or phrase, a physical object, a photo or other image, or even a piece of music. Typically, when you write to prompts in a group setting with other writers, you get a limited amount of time, say 10 or 15 minutes, to write.

Over the years, my production in these situations has been equal parts memoir, essay, and fiction. I’ve completed a couple of pieces I started writing to prompts, but mostly it’s a limbering up exercise and an opportunity for collegiality that keeps me fresh. I have a tendency to think too much and the focus provided by the prompt, along with the time limit, gets me out of my own way.

Here is a piece that I wrote in 2007 in response to the prompt, “Finish the phrase, ‘It’s too soon to tell.'” It may have special meaning for me today as I await the birth of my second grandchild.

It’s Too Soon To Tell

It’s too soon to tell

Will he have his mother’s fine skin,

His father’s auburn hair,

His Uncle Charlie’s protuberant ears?

It’s too soon to tell

Will he have his grandmother’s gift for music

His grandfather’s way with words,

Cousin Violet’s wonderful laugh?

Will he run races like his Uncle Pearce?

Build great cities like his Cousin Neville?

Or write software like Rita’s daughter Lil?

It’s too soon to tell

Will he have Aunt Clea’s love of the bottle,

Uncle Henry’s black depressions,

Cousin Mortimer’s passion for unsuitable women

Or Cousin Jasper’s for unsuitable men?

Will he know great love?

Will he go to war?

Will he know want, or will his pockets always be full?

This much we do know

He smells like heaven

His smile lights up the sky

His cry breaks your heart

And he holds each of us in the palm of his hand

Because we can’t wait to discover

The oh, so many things

It’s too soon to tell

Life – Extended?

Last June 17 — about fourteen weeks ago — I was dizzy, and visited the emergency room of a local hospital here in Maine. Twenty-four hours later I was diagnosed with stage four pancreatic cancer, metastasized The doctor who gave me the news said I might have a year to live, if I was lucky.

I had no idea I was ill. I’d spent the past several years caring for my husband, who’d died April 9. Since his death I’d updated my legal documents and taken care of my husband’s estate. I’d planned to spend the rest of 2018 catching up with writing deadlines and settling into a new normal.

Now everything had changed.

During the next three weeks I had three biopsies, many blood tests, two MRIs, and my first chemo treatment. When all those results were in, my oncologist told me that my condition was worse than he’d first thought. The lesions on my liver were close to blocking bile ducts; when that happened (which would be in either hours or days) I’d develop a serious infection which would kill me. I didn’t have “maybe a year”. I had, at best, “two-three months.”

I wrote about my situation on Facebook and on this blog and was overwhelmed with notes, calls, flowers, angels, prayers and thoughts. (Thank you, all!)

[image error]My priorities changed. I decided to self-publish two historical novels that hadn’t sold, but that I wanted to be out in the world. I contacted libraries and schools where I’d agreed to speak, and warned them I might not be able to be there as I’d promised. I met with the man who had agreed to be my literary and personal executor, and went over what I’d want him to do after I died. My four daughters all visited Maine to be with me. On August 9, with just the immediate family present, my youngest daughter, who’d been engaged for more than fifteen years, got married on the front lawn of our home. still felt well — and went for regular chemo treatments and took heavy doses of antibiotics. Every week I had blood tests to see how my [image error]body was reacting.

A week later my blood tests came back with “atypical” results. The lesions on my liver had shrunk dramatically, and my white blood count was way down.

My oncologist shook his head. “This doesn’t happen,” he explained. “You might have months to live instead of weeks.”

Again, my priorities changed. The two historical novels I wanted to publish are now on Amazon. In the past six weeks I’ve bought a wig and spoken at two libraries and one school. My agent is encouraging me to get back to writing, and is looking at an historical mystery I’ve finished.

Yes — I still have stage four cancer. I’m tired a lot of the time. One or more of my daughters are with me, and take me to chemo treatments, run errands, bring me juice to [image error]drink and nag me when they don’t think I’m eating enough.

I’m trying to get back to writing, but it is hard. How much time do I have?

I don’t know. But, then, do any of us?

In the meantime, I’m still here. I still thank you for all your thoughts and prayers. And, on good days, I can write a little.

No, this isn’t fun. I’m frustrated by being unable to plan very far ahead. I’m so glad I was able to take care of my husband when he needed me, and that my daughters are trying to take care of me now.

But death is a part of life  — and I’m still here, planning for the release of my next mystery October 30 (THREAD HERRINGS). And thanking all of you for supporting me and understanding in this difficult year.

Waking October

Shameless Commerce Department: The third book in the Elder Darrow jazz mystery series, Burton’s Solo, drops, as we say in the biz, on 1/1/18. You can preorder (and keep your money out of Jeff Bezos’s grimy paws) here. [image error]Stay tuned for info on a launch party and various events through the fall and early winter.

I thought I was going run out of things to talk about this month, but then I took the harrowing trip going out of of New Harbor to Monhegan on the Hardy Days cruise, eight or nine foot seas all the way. It would have been considerably less nervous-making if the woman in front of me wasn’t fingering her rosary the whole. [image error]There was a certain amount of gulping and swallowing during the trip, though nothing more untoward than that. And by the time I’d wrapped myself around a Blackheart Imperial Stout at the Monhegan Brewing Company (10.1%!), I was all set for the ride home.

[image error]Have I mentioned yet how pleasant it is to drive out through Brunswick and Bath and barely pause at the Wiscasset Bridge, driving the length of Route 1 in a gear higher than first?

Then this week, the political theater got me so goddamned mad I couldn’t see straight—for several consecutive days. I grew up in Boston, the self-named Hub of the Universe (Legend has it that if there’s ever a nuclear holocaust that takes out large parts of the world, the headline in the Globe will read Hub Man Killed in Blast.) The city was well-known for dirty politics and general backroom skullduggery—c.f. Billy Bulger, James Curley, et al—but the sheer sleaze and overt self-interest displayed by the so-called servants of the people in Washington (looking at you, Senator Collins) was and is enough to gag a sword-swallower. I wanted nothing so much as to go down the line of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Ds and Rs alike, and dope-slap every one of them. It’s as if our entire Federal government relocated to a planet without enough oxygen to support brain life.

[image error]Tinker, my meditation expert, tells me all this is why I wake up every morning at three, but I prefer to believe it’s because my brain is dreaming up new ways to murder people (in my books! In my books!) and also to appreciate the unmatchable glory of a New England fall. I’m sorry to be predictable with that sentiment, but there is no finer weather than a bluebird day in October, dry and bright and full of oxygen (at least until CMP figures out a way to pipe our good air to Massachusetts too. Maybe we could trade some electricity for decent broadband?)

But the antidote to too much bitching is to remind myself to be thankful: for surviving another summer in a resort town and what’s rapidly becoming a theme-park city, for still eating well out of the garden, for having both my parents alive and well and sharp at 91, for being able to do the work I love, and for my readers.

Yes, I’m soft as a fucking grape, but I hear the ripe ones make the best wine. Take a break, take a walk in the woods, and thank whatever lucky stars are yours. I’ll be back to killing people tomorrow.

Is the Cassandra Curse Still Operative? You Decide…

Sandra Neily here. Thinking about curses, modern and ancient.

It turned out to be a motivating week to return to the Cassandra Curse as I worked on my next novel, returning to the narrator who lives that curse. Named Cassandra Patton Conover, she avoids her first name, calling herself Patton. It doesn’t really work to avoid her first name because she has a job where no one seems to listen anyway.

This passage from Deadly Trespass (my previous novel) explains the curse.

 

Millie hugged me. “Shannon’s party’s tomorrow night. Don’t bother cooking; I’ve got your apples and I’ll put your name on the applesauce.” Plump, chapped lips pressed together with disapproval. “What name do you want? The Cassandra name or the Patton name? I like the girl name. Wasn’t she a goddess? I survived seventh-grade mythology but that was before the last ice age.”

She tugged her apron over her squat frame.

“Cassandra was human,” I said, “just considered crazy because she was a seer.”

“We all have eyes, honey.” Millie said.

“No. She was a see-er, but maybe not a very successful one. Cassandra saw truth—saw the future. She rejected Apollo’s advances so he put a curse on her, made it so no one believed her prophecies.” I felt dry face lines crack into a smile. Across the ages, what did we have in common? “She warned the city of Troy not to bring a gigantic wooden horse inside its fortified walls,” I said. “No one believed her. After dark, Greek soldiers jumped out of the horse, opened the gates to the attacking army, and Troy was destroyed.”

“There you have it,” cried Millie as she reached up to tweak my cheek. “That’s you. Cassandra. Sees what’s going to happen, warns people, and they don’t listen. Mayhem and dismantling the world continues. Sounds like your old job. Good you ditched it,” she said.

I put two cookies in my mouth and chewed so my face would be busy. No one knew how much the Cassandra curse haunted my lobbying life, but I was pretty sure there wasn’t any way to talk about being ignored without sounding like a whiner. (excerpt, Deadly Trespass)

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This week, despite the promise of an FBI investigation, it seems possible that Dr. Ford’s testimony about assault will be ignored in the race to fill a Supreme Court seat. It also seems possible that the pleas of hundreds of thousands of women who by now, have contacted their elected representative or gone public with their own traumas, will also be ignored.[image error]

People in power may bend their heads to simulate listening, but too often the women will not be heard.

Their warnings about where they might take their anger are also not heard. And they are sending out warnings. They are sending them with their hands, and bodies, and gatherings, and their open mouths.

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I love this grim but energized painting of Cassandra by Anthony Frederick Augustus Sandys. The painting is silent but Cassandra is not. The energy of her hair and the wind and clearly her mouth are all about a grim but energized rage. Yes, there’s some crazy there. Well, why not?[image error]

I’ve added Damon Winter’s photographs from his New York Times photo essay, “Women Have a Message for Washington” because I think they capture a very modern Cassandra moment.

I especially like the first one because it is clearly a Cassandra moment: wide open mouth.

You decide. Is this a moment when we will defeat the Cassandra curse or will it follow us like some enduring Greek tragedy?

Cassandra painted by Anthony Frederick Augustus Sandys. Credit: University of Toronto and Internet Archive. http://www.victorianweb.org/painting/sandys/drawings/18.html

https://www.greekmyths-greekmythology.com/the-myth-of-cassandra/

NY Times Sept. 28, 2018 https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/28/opinion/sunday/women-brett-kavanaugh-protests.html?action=click&module=Opinion&pgtype=Homepage

Sandy’s novel, “Deadly Trespass, A Mystery in Maine,” won a Mystery Writers of America award and was a finalist in the Women’s Fiction Writers Association “Rising Star” contest. This year, she’s been nominated for a Maine Literary Award. Find her novel at all Shermans Books and on Amazon. Find more info on the video trailer and Sandy’s website.  The second Mystery in Maine, “Deadly Turn,” will be published in 2018.

 

 

 

 

The Paperback Reprint Dilemma

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the portrait Liss buys at auction (actually a copy of a famous one)

Kaitlyn Dunnett/Kathy Lynn Emerson here to talk about one of those problems that’s nice to have . . . but which is still a problem. I’m talking about what happens when the paperback reprint of a book that originally came out in hardcover is published.

This is a good thing. Many readers are reluctant to plunk down $25 or more for a hardcover book just so they can read it when it first comes out. Even the e-book edition is more expensive at this stage, although the price does come down by the time the paperback is published. Audiobooks are great, but they aren’t cheap. That leaves two choices—borrow the book from the library or wait for the paperback reprint, which is less expensive. If it’s a mass market paperback, it usually sells for around $7.99. If it is reprinted in the larger “trade” size, the price averages about $15.

For writers with series published as paperback originals, there is one print version of each title. They focus their publicity efforts on that publication date and then move on to writing and publicizing the next book in the series. For those of us published in hardcover first, we’ve already done the publicity thing once. Now we have a new edition, but not a new book. And there is a new book due out in a month or so. Reinvent the wheel? Or focus on the real new book?

[image error]As you may have guessed, the paperback reprint of the eleventh Liss MacCrimmon mystery, X Marks the Scot, just came out. I’m delighted it’s available, but the places where I might write guest blogs, and the ads my publisher is putting out, are all focused on the twelfth book in the series, Overkilt, which will be in stores in hardcover at the end of this month. You know those “buy three Kensington paperbacks and get one free” offers? They all focus on paperback originals. I’m happy for those authors, but not so thrilled for my poor forgotten babies.

Aside from blogs like this one, and promotions on Facebook, I’m not sure what else I could or should be doing to let people know about the paperback. To make it more difficult from my point of view, most of my energy these days is actually focused on writing the thirteenth book in the series, A View to a Kilt, which is due on my editor’s desk on the first of December.

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Bala checks out my box of author copies

I’d be interested to hear how other writers handle the appearance of the paperback reprint. And what readers think of the nearly year-long wait for a less expensive edition of books they want to read. And whether readers think a trade-sized paperback is enough of a bargain to be worth the wait. I’m particularly interested in the answer to that last question. The Mistress Jaffrey mysteries I wrote as Kathy Lynn Emerson only came out in hardcover, e-book, large print, and trade paperback. Now the Deadly Edits series, although it’s also from Kensington and also written as Kaitlyn Dunnett, will also be reprinted in trade paperback rather than mass market size. That edition of Crime & Punctuation will be available at the end of May 2019 with Clause & Effect to follow shortly thereafter in hardcover.

Comment, please. Inquiring minds want to know. And there is a paperback copy of X Marks the Scot in it for one lucky commenter.

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Kathy Lynn Emerson/Kaitlyn Dunnett is the author of nearly sixty traditionally published books written under several names. She won the Agatha Award and was an Anthony and Macavity finalist for best mystery nonfiction of 2008 for How to Write Killer Historical Mysteries and was an Agatha Award finalist in 2015 in the best mystery short story category. She was the Malice Domestic Guest of Honor in 2014. Currently she writes the contemporary Liss MacCrimmon Mysteries (Overkilt—November 2018) and the “Deadly Edits” series (Crime & Punctuation) as Kaitlyn and the historical Mistress Jaffrey Mysteries (Murder in a Cornish Alehouse) as Kathy. The latter series is a spin-off from her earlier “Face Down” mysteries and is set in Elizabethan England. Her most recent collection of short stories is Different Times, Different Crimes. Her websites are www.KaitlynDunnett.com and www.KathyLynnEmerson.com and she maintains a website about women who lived in England between 1485 and 1603 at www.TudorWomen.com

Weekend Update: September 29-30, 2018

[image error]Next week at Maine Crime Writers, there will posts by Kaitlyn Dunnett/Kathy Lynn Emerson (Monday), Sandra Neilly (Tuesday), Dick Cass (Wednesday), Lea Wait (Thursday), and Barb Ross (Friday).

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

from Kaitlyn Dunnett: the paperback reprint of last year’s hardcover, X MARKS THE SCOT is now in stores. This is the eleventh Liss MacCrimmon mystery and involves a treasure hunt that takes Liss from Maine to the Canadian Maritimes and back again.

 

An invitation to readers of this blog: Do you have news relating to Maine, Crime, or Writing? We’d love to hear from you. Just comment below to share.

And a reminder: If your library, school, or organization is looking for a speaker, we are often available to talk about the writing process, research, where we get our ideas, and other mysteries of the business. Contact Kate Flora

Let’s Have a Blemish or Two

Dorothy Cannell: Many years ago I went on a fund raising house tour in my home town [image error]in Illinois because of one home in particular.  I had been charmed by its creamy stone exterior and slate roof every time I passed it when in the area.  The images sprang of a delightful, heartwarming life within where the past was preserved and the present embraced. On stepping into the hall my hopes were fulfilled.  Behold the handsome staircase, the richly polished floor boards, a door ajar to a book lined library.  I continued to be delighted throughout our prowling of the ground floor and the one above; all was proportion, harmony, and excellent taste.  But as we proceeded upward and on I found it all rather monotonous; regretting that there wasn’t a single eyesore of the lumpy soap dish made by a six-year-old sort, or a garish picture gifted by a dear friend that required being put on display in case of a visit.  I rethought the library with its matching leather bound books and decided a few tattered paperbacks would have suggested that someone in the house occasionally read something other than the house beautiful or yachting magazines.  Suddenly the thought was there: ‘Perfection can be boring.’

I was reminded of this personal viewpoint last week when reading a mystery acquired in a secondhand bookstore that had been published a couple of decades ago.  My interest in the main character waned on discovering she had no foibles or problems worth more than transient angst.

She was a successful career woman.

Age not specified, but young.  My guess late twenties or early thirties.

Attractive.  Policeman boyfriend refers to her gorgeous legs and how even when her hair is windblown she had never looked lovelier.

Organized and energetic.

Marvelous clothes sense.

A loyal friend.  Her arrival on the scene is due to a phone call from another friend who is worried that a murder has occurred and that an ex-boyfriend may be involved.

A good sport.  She camps out in derelict surrounding without complaint.

Patient listener, never putting in a – ‘Yes, but …”

Kind to an eccentric character who is ridiculed by others.

Policeman boyfriend is handsome, admired by and respected by his superiors, and revered by his subordinates.

Speaks of herself as being nosy, but it would be more appropriate to use the word ‘concerned’.

No idiosyncrasies.  No foibles that make people endlessly compelling and dear in real life.

[image error]This is coming from me as a reader, not a writer.  In connecting this read to that visit to the house that palled, I realized that I see a main character as the structure on which the traditional mystery, setting, and plot is built.  This is the person who opens the door for us, invites us in, takes us through the rooms, and enlivens the visit.  We need him or her to be someone with relatability, not someone who will make us feel we should rush back out and get a better haircut, a change of clothes, or keep our mouths shut about personal problems of which they could have no understanding.

Just a thought before I whip up a batch of homemade bread, finish up a piece of sculpture, and read the dictionary from cover to cover.

Happy reading

Dorothy

PLOTTING ON MONHEGAN ISLAND

Wanting take advantage of Maine’s glorious Septmber weather, my husband and I spent a day on Monhegan Island. This small island, only about one square mile, is one of our favorite places to get away and hike. Camera mandatory. We booked the ferry Elizabeth Ann ahead and were lucky with the weather. The twelve-mile ride from the village of Port Clyde took us past the Marshall Point Lighthouse, another favorite haunt.

[image error]I thought I might set a story on Monhegan, so as we rode the ferry away from the mainland, I started plotting. The island has a small year-round population but boasts a thriving fishing community. In summer tourists and artists fill the island’s cottages, hotels, and galleries. And maybe my fictional murderer or his victim, I told my husband. He just rolls his eyes when I suggest these worst-case scenarios.

The ferry left us at the village dock and we hiked up past the Island Inn, where we’d stayed overnight on a previous visit. The inn is quaint and cozy, and our room had a balcony overlooking the harbor. A good vantage point from which a criminal hiding out could watch the comings and goings of ferry passengers. Hmm, my plot began to cook.

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Monhegan’s trails are extensive, about twelve miles. For our few hours before the ferry returned, we chose the cliff side trails. We hiked through the village, and in the schoolhouse yard, found the Tercentenary Tablet that commemorates John Smith’s voyage to the island in 1614. We entered the cool shade of the woods, fragrant with pine and balsam, and climbed through a fairy glen, where children had built stick houses for the wee ones. We emerged from the woods onto White Head, among the highest ocean cliffs [image error]on the Maine coastline.

A man standing nearby aloud from his guidebook that the undertow there was dangerous and the waves unpredictable. On that clear day, we could see the islands of Isle au Haut and Matinicus, and beyond to the broad Atlantic. Anyone who fell in—or was pushed—would be swept away to Spain. Aha, I’d found my murder site. Steep, with giant waves crashing on the rocks below. Isolated—except for the crush of people taking pictures and looking through binoculars. Oh well, I’d set the story during another season. During a storm.

Before I ruined the scenic interlude for my husband, he dragged me away back to the trail. this next photo is of the village, taken from Lighthouse Hill. We had lunch in the village and bought pottery as a souvenir before boarding the ferry to return to Port Clyde.

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If you go to Monhegan, put my plotting out of your head and enjoy the island. If anyone has experiences on other Maine islands to share, I’d love your comments.