MAYHEM ON MONDAY

Mayhem on Monday has been the story of my life. Although in recent years, Mondays still mean mayhem but not in the same hideous way they used be. Nope. Gone are the days when mid-afternoon on Sunday I’d start to obsess about the next morning in all its nightmarish qualities. As a child the worry was undone homework or impending math tests or the need to sit quietly muzzled among the long rows of other kids, wishing to be almost anywhere else — with the exception of the Principal’s Office. Flash forward and school has become work. On Sunday afternoon, the specter loomed of perma-meetings starting at the crack of dawn and grinding inexorably through the day, while the mile high inbox teetered. And of course, there was the unrelenting pressure of locating two shoes from the same pair in the dim early morning. This didn’t always happen successfully, but that’s a story for another day. I haven’t even mentioned the traffic, often compounded by snow!

No matter how much I liked my jobs — the work was very interesting and I had excellent colleagues many of whom are still friends — I could never manage being a morning person. And as for being a Monday morning person: are you kidding? Mayhem doesn’t come close.

Now, if there’s any mayhem on my Mondays, it happens in a good way: cheerful, empowering, fun. The fictional game of creating murder mysteries has many lovely advantages, quite aside from the ongoing game of wits with readers, the fun of playing with characters’ lives and the joy of dreaming up bizarre and dangerous scary experiences for them, not to mention bumping off people.

Here are my top ten reasons to love Mondays now:

· Working in my pajamas
· Drinking endless cups of coffee, made the way I like it
· Having the right – no, make that the obligation – to nap
· Enjoying the advantage of having my dogs cuddled up
· Getting paid for telling lies (oh the thrill!)
· The commute to my kitchen is less than a minute. No snow. Bare feet!
· Being able to bump off anyone who has annoyed me in even the smallest way (Hear that Mr. Big Shot in the Cadillac Escalade? You are toast)
· Reading two papers in the morning and having that count as research (yes, that includes comics and horoscopes because I make the rules)
· Talking out loud to myself and knowing it’s definitely in the job description
· Meeting the nicest people without leaving the house! You know who you are – friends, readers, former colleagues, cozy mystery lovers
· What’s not to love? Hey, my whole week is like that!

And as for you, gentle Monday reader: what’s the best or the worst about your Mondays? Are they filled with mayhem? Or are they marvelous? Don’t hold back.


Mary Jane Maffini is a lapsed librarian, a former mystery bookstore owner and a lifelong lover of mysteries. In addition to the four Charlotte Adams books from Berkley Prime Crime, she is the author of the Camilla MacPhee series, the Fiona Silk adventures and nearly two dozen short stories. She served two terms as President of Crime Writers of Canada. She loves mysteries of all kinds and is enjoying the surge in Canadian crime (writing).

Her latest Charlotte Adams book, The Busy Woman's Guide to Murder, will be published in April, 2011. She says she’s grateful for all the tips she gets from Charlotte and for the opportunity to write the series. She lives and plots in Ottawa, Ontario, along with her long-suffering husband and two princessy dachshunds. Visit her at www.maryjanemaffini.com