SCHMOOZING WITH MELODIE CAMPBELL

1. Who has influenced you the most in your writing career?

Believe it or not, a producer from HBO. In 1993, he saw my play “Burglar for Coffee” in Toronto and offered me a job writing pilots (which I turned down. This has to be the worst mistake every made by a person not legally insane. But who had ever heard of HBO in 1993?) This man called me “completely nuts” and assured me that my standup/humour column comedy translated well to plays and fiction. I needed a professional to tell me that, and I always remember him gratefully, when I need a boost.

2. What are you working on now?

Book 4 in The Goddaughter series, A BODY FOR THE GODDAUGHTER. More mob comedy, only this time Gina Gallo is the sleuth, not the perpetrator. Okay, well not totally. After all, this is her inept mob family we are talking about .

3. In what ways is your main protagonist like you? If at all?

Oh YEAH. Similar (but not exact) family backgrounds. Gina Gallo is the reluctant goddaughter of the mob king in Hamilton. I come from a Sicilian background. Gina reacts as I would to a lot of these situations. She has a rep as a smart-ass. She shares my background angst. And she is…how do I put this…more interested in justice, than the law.

4. Are you character driven or plot driven?

Chicken and egg. Yes, I start with character. A character with a problem or goal, and obstacles to that goal, which are resolved by the end. My books have a lot of plot in them. But the plot is driven by the protagonist and what she wants.

5. Are you a pantser or a plotter?

Plotter. I teach ‘Crafting a Novel’ at Sheridan College, so I am immersed in ‘craft.’ I don’t start writing until I know the ending and at least two crisis points. And usually I follow a 3-act structure, to avoid ‘saggy middle syndrome.’

6. What do you hope readers will most take away from your writing?

A few hours of smiles and laughter! I write to entertain and to lighten a readers’ day.

7. Where do you see yourself as a writer in 10 years?

Oh wow. Hopefully, with another humorous crime book series, and perhaps double the fans. Okay, make that quadruple the fans! And money. More money would be nice ;)

8. What is one thing your readers would be most surprised to know about you?

I trained for Opera. I used to sing ‘torch’ when I was younger. My dad was in a big band, so you can guess why I was called ‘Melodie.’ Oh. And I am lamentably addicted to fast cars. I blew my advances and royalties this year on a 2006 sapphire blue Corvette. One day I may regret this, but not today.

9. What do you like to read for pleasure?

Books like mine. Wish I could find more. I like Andrea Camilleri from Sicily, Lisa Lutz, and yes, Janet Evanovich, who Library Digest compared me to. Other favourite books include The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (you may be noticing a humour trend at this point…)

10. Give us a summary of your latest book in a Tweet

The Artful Goddaughter (Orca Books, just released)
Mob Goddaughter Gina Gallo stands to inherit two million bucks! All she has to do is plan a heist...but when the wrong painting is taken, hilarity ensues.


Billed as Canada’s “Queen of Comedy" by the Toronto Sun (Jan. 5, 2014,) Melodie Campbell has had a decidedly checkered past. Don’t dig too deep. You might find cement shoes.
Her crime series, The Goddaughter, is about a wacky mob family in Hamilton aka The Hammer. This has no resemblance whatsoever to the wacky Sicilian family she grew up in. Okay, that’s a lie. She had to wait for certain members of the family to die before writing The Goddaughter.
Her other series is racy rollicking time travel, totally scandalous, hardly mentionable in mixed company. But we’ll mention it anyway. Rowena Through the Wall. Hold on to your knickers. Or don’t, and have more fun.
The Goddaughter’s Revenge won the 2014 Derringer (US) and the 2014 Arthur Ellis Award in Canada. She has won seven more awards for noir stories which have appeared in Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine, Over My Dead Body, Flash Fiction Online, and more. Publications total over 200 and include 7 novels. By day, she is the Executive Director of Crime Writers of Canada.

SCHMOOZING WITH JANET BOLIN

1. Who has influenced you the most in your writing career? \

JB- My parents. They both loved to read and they read aloud to us. They were also very creative—if they wanted something, they made it. So if I wanted new stories, I made them.

2. What are you working on now?

JB-I’m finishing the fifth manuscript in the Threadville Mystery series. It’s due June 1.

3. In what ways is your main protagonist like you? If at all?

JB-Willow and I share a love of sewing, machine embroidery, and textile arts, but that’s about where the likeness ends. Willow is much better at handcrafts than I am. And she’s more impulsive and also braver about wandering around late at night, investigating. She’s younger, thinner, taller... And she’s not interested in writing books. But if I owned a store full of the newest sewing and embroidery machines, I might not write as much, either.

4. Are you character driven or plot driven?

JB-Character, within the framework of a murder and the resulting investigation. I throw my characters into a situation, and they take it from there.

5. Are you a pantser or a plotter?

JB-I used to be a pantser, but I ended up rewriting and rearranging scenes about a million times, so now, I plot first. I start with a very brief outline, because the fun is in the writing, not in the plotting. By the end of each writing day, I like to know what comes next, so I create a more detailed outline as I go along.

6. What do you hope readers will most take away from your writing?

JB-Entertainment. I want them to laugh, understand Willow’s emotions, and feel like they’re actually in Threadville while they’re reading the books and for awhile after they finish them.

7. Where do you see yourself as a writer in 10 years?

JB-As long as people want to read cozy mysteries, I’ll be happy writing them.

8. What is one thing your readers would be most surprised to know about you?

JB-I once had to be lifted down from a ski lift. Then again, they might not be surprised at all.


9. What do you like to read for pleasure?

JB-Fiction, especially mysteries and suspense.


10. Give us a summary of your latest book in a Tweet

JB-NIGHT OF THE LIVING THREAD - Something stitched this way comes...



Discouraged by the lack of sewing, and yarn shops near her rural home, Janet Bolin invented Threadville, a village of textile arts shops. Three Threadville Mysteries have been published so far—DIRE THREADS, THREADED FOR TROUBLE, and THREAD AND BURIED. The fourth Threadville mystery, NIGHT OF THE LIVING THREAD comes out on June 3, and features, among other things, a wedding, a craft fair, ancient Egyptian curses, an undulating trail of glow-in-the-dark thread, and people dressed up like zombies. And there’s a murder...

In addition to reading, writing, and walking dogs, Janet’s hobbies include sewing, knitting, and machine embroidery, including using software and killer (!) sewing machines to create original embroidery designs. http://www.ThreadvilleMysteries.com

SCHMOOZING WITH HILARY MACLEOD

1. Who has influenced you the most in your writing career?

For writing mysteries, M.C. Beaton has had the greatest influence on me. Her amusing mysteries about Hamish MacBeth, the irreverent copper in the remote highland village of Lochdubh, inspired me to find my own charmed setting (I call it The Shores) right outside my cottage door on Prince Edward Island. Beaton’s books also encouraged the idea of blending tragedy (murder) with comedy (the doings of eccentric locals.) Before I wrote my first mystery, Revenge of the Lobster Lover, I had read all of Beaton’s MacBeth stories, and remember closing the cover on the final one with the clear thought: “I could do that here.” So I did.


2. What are you working on now?

I’m close to finishing Bodies and Sole, the fifth book in The Shores Mystery Series.
It follows Revenge of the Lobster Lover, Mind Over Mussels, All is Clam and Something Fishy.

3. In what ways is your main protagonist like you? If at all?

I deliberately set out to make my protagonist, Hy McAllister, not like me at all. I gave her my younger sister’s red curly hair. She’s tall, which I am not. But, she is a writer and the house she lives in at The Shores is a replica of my cottage in Sea View, PEI. She’s clumsy. She doesn’t like to cook. Guilty as charged. There is also the perhaps subconscious fact that her name, Hy, begins and ends with the same letters as mine. Readers tell me they think I am Hy. I’m not, but I do think there is something of ourselves in all of the characters we create.

4. Are you character driven or plot driven?

Definitely character-driven. The story is there to provide my characters – good and bad – a place to play in and act out. I delight in creating appealing and appalling characters for each new book. My local characters, meanwhile, develop and grow. The Mountie, Jane Jamieson, has gone through the most dramatic changes from the first book to the fourth. My characters are definitely the focus of the stories, more so than the plot.

5. Are you a pantser or a plotter?

I am an organic writer. I prefer that to “pantser,” because although I don’t have a perfectly worked plot in advance of sitting down to write, or an outline, I do have a general sense of what’s going to happen. I’m not always right, because the characters do take over, and I enjoy the fun of writing myself into a corner, then figuring out how to write my way out. I’m sure it happens as well to writers who’ve plotted in advance. I admire writers with outlines. I just can’t do them myself. I wish I could. It’s very time-consuming going by the seat of your pants. There’s a lot of rejigging, weaving, moving scenes around that the more well-organized don’t have to struggle with. More room for error too.

6. What do you hope readers will most take away from your writing?

I hope they will have been entertained, had a few good laughs and some food for thought. I call my sub-genre “village noir satire.” I hope the village and the locals will entertain, the noir give food for thought, and the satire a few laughs.

7. Where do you see yourself as a writer in 10 years?

Resting on my laurels! I’d like to see The Shores mystery series on TV or film. I hope to have completed a historical romance that I now have in the works, and possibly a historical trilogy.

8. What is one thing your readers would be most surprised to know about you?

My readers might be surprised to know that I have never been a reader of mysteries or a watcher of cop and detective TV shows. The first mysteries I read – and certainly the first series—were those Hamish MacBeth stories that inspired me to create The Shores series. I read mysteries now, those of my colleagues, but I have always been mostly a fan of historical novels and 19th century novels.

9. What do you like to read for pleasure?

I read mystery books by my colleagues, writers like the Mystery Mavens, authors I meet in the course of conferences, library readings, etc. I like to know what the people I meet in the mystery community are writing. It’s part pleasure, part business. My pleasure reading at the moment is non-fiction. I read Malcolm Gladwell, sociological journalist, author of The Tipping Point and Blink among others; and Mary Roach, dubbed America’s funniest science writer. Among her books: Stiff, Bonk, and Gulp.

10. Give us a summary of your latest book in a Tweet

Fish fall from the sky, twin kills twin in the womb, a woman dies laughing and a wind turbine whips evil across the cape. Something Fishy.

Hilary MacLeod is the author of The Shores mysteries, a village noir satire series, winner of a CBC Bookie award for Revenge of the Lobster Lover. Her latest in the series is Something Fishy, and work-in-progress is Bodies and Soul.

SCHMOOZING WITH LINDA HALL

Who has influenced you the most in your writing career?

I’ve had so very many influences through the years that it’s hard to come up with just one. If you had asked me this when I was a teenager I had one name- Edgar Allan Poe. Later on it was Ruth Rendell. I especially adored her Barbara Vine books. I read Sue Grafton devoured her books and loved the idea of the series character.

What are you working on now?

I have a number of projects in the works. As we speak, my full length mystery, Night Watch is in with my agent. It features my new series character, Captain Emmeline Ridge, a female boat delivery captain who, of course, ends up being right in the middle of all sorts of murders and mystery and mayhem.

A second thing I’m working on is a short story collection. I’ve written a number through the years and I’m currently planning on self-publishing an ebook collection. I love short stories, love reading them and love writing them, but for a long time the publishing industry decided that “they didn't sell”. Well, no body asked me! This collection of mine will include a few stories reprinted from anthologies and some new ones. Currently I don’t even have a title for the collection - so stay tuned - writerhall.com or Facebook.com/writerhall

The final thing I’m doing is re-editing some of my out-of print works and getting them up as eBooks. That has been rewarding and great fun.

In what ways is your main protagonist like you? If at all?

Writing a series featuring a sailor has long been something I’ve wanted to do. I love the water and boats and happily am married to someone who shares this passion. My husband and I have a sailboat, aptly named ‘Mystery’ that we move aboard once summer comes. We consider it our summer cottage. Em Ridge is sort of my alter ego, the braver version of me. She’s the kind of sailor I want to be, not the kind I really am - the one who cowers down below in the cabin during storms while my husband mans the sails. She is strong and brave and takes control. I’m not that way so much on boats during storms.

Are you character driven or plot driven?

I like to say character driven, and probably for the most part that’s true, but sometimes stories come to me by a snippet of plot or a bit of a setting. Setting is a big one for me. Recently I watched a documentary about groups of young dumpster divers. They are very regimented - as in they have certain dumpsters they go to on certain nights of the week. But oh, the stashes they come up with - full loaves of bread, tons of barely bad produce, boxes of cereal and more. I kept thinking about these kids, and kept thinking about them, until an idea came to me. It’s the short story I’m currently working on. So, is that character or plot? Yes. And no.

Are you a pantser or a plotter?

Again, I would like to say Pantzer, but recently I’ve begun using Scrivener and LOVE it for writing and organizing my mystery clues and ideas. So, maybe that makes me a plotter? Don’t know.

What do you hope readers will most take away from your writing?

Entertainment, and entertainment alone. I hope I can provide a moment away from my reader’s real life. I want them to finish my book and quickly ask, “Where’s Linda’s next book?”


Where do you see yourself as a writer in 10 years?

I am chuckling as I read this question. This is the sort of question you ask someone in their 30s and 40s, maybe even someone in their early 50s. People in these age categories spend a lot of time at the beginning of every year writing down goals. They come up with 5-year plans and 10-year plans, carefully kept in notebooks which they check from time to time to make sure they’re on track.

But where do I want to be in ten years? I want to be ten years older, but still writing and still healthy and enjoying my grandchildren who will be ten years older. I cannot envision myself ‘retiring’ from writing.

What is one thing your readers would be most surprised to know about you?

In the mid-2000s I studied Celestial Navigation - it nearly killed me. It was a difficult, difficult course, and took this non-Math person a year to complete, but I can theoretically use a sextant to find my way around the planet’s oceans using nothing but the math this planet provides.

What do you like to read for pleasure?

My favorite reading is mysteries, of course, but I enjoy a lot of genres. One of the funnest things I’ve done lately is to join a book club. We read a wide variety of books, including Canada Reads selections and Gov. General Award finalists. It has really broadened my reading. and I love it. I feel I’m learning a lot.

Give us a summary of your latest book in a Tweet

Everything is not as it seems aboard sailboat Blue Peace and when one crew member is found dead and another goes missing, Captain Em Ridge finds herself right in the middle of mayhem on the high seas.

Award-winning author Linda Hall has written eighteen mystery novels plus many short stories. She has written for Multnomah Publishing, WaterBrook Press, Random House and most recently for Harlequin’s Love Inspired line. Most of her novels have something to do with the sea. When she's not writing, Linda and her husband Rik enjoy sailing the coast of Maine aboard their 34' sailboat aptly named - MYSTERY.

MYSTERY REVIEW - REALLY DEAD

REALLY DEAD
by J.E. Forman
Dundurn

Exotic settings with a touch of murder make a perfect escape for these frigid winter evenings. Really Dead by J.E. Forman, the first in the Ria Butler Mysteries, does just that. With a sleuth who's also a travel writer, the reader is assured of some tantalizing armchair travels.

Along with being set in the British Virgin Islands, it also takes place on the set of a reality TV show. Talk about a hot topic these days. Ria is persuaded by an old friend to visit the taping on location when a severed foot turns up as an unscripted part of the show. The premise of this show is to find the next manager for an exclusive resort that just happens to belong to the Butler clan (that's as in Ria's family) and it's being produced by her brother, James. Although reluctant to get involved, the fact that he may be involved in something far more dangerous than temperamental actors sends Ria packing. She's also aware she has to go it alone and cannot rely on investigative reporter Glenn Cooper to help, until their rocky relationship is defined. Ria arrives on the island of Soupsor and the reader is delivered into a behind-the-scenes world of a reality TV show in the making.

Ria quickly understands that James is mixed up in something far more complicated than the fact that he's sharing his villa with a bimbo. As the plot thickens, as more actors descend into the filming mix and Ria realizes she's attracting unwanted attention, she calls on Glenn for help and the reality becomes a deadly business.

Really Dead really delivers. There's humour, missing body parts, a producer everyone loves to hate, exotic locations, and a well-plotted mystery. That's not surprising since J.E. Forman sports a list of credits that are evident in the writing of Really Dead. She's been a television producer, a screenwriter and, under cover of a pseudonym, a romance novelist.

I wonder where Ria Butler is heading next?

MYSTERY REVIEW

THE BODY ON THE T
by Mike Martin
Baico Publishing

Reviewed by Carole Dalgleish

This is the second book in a good “down home” series set in Newfoundland, with characters you'd enjoy spending time with in real life. You'd also learn to cook – the descriptions of the Newfoundland cuisine had my mouth watering throughout the story.

RCMP Sergeant Winston Windflower is a Cree from Northern Alberta, who has lived in Grand Bank, Newfoundland for three years. He doesn't want to leave. He has a girlfriend, Sheila Hillier, and has gained the respect and acceptance of the locals – most of them anyway.

However, the local bad guys threaten to turn his newly-settled world upside down and shatter it. Discovery of a floating body in the sea nearby is the beginning of an ugly, wide-angled case connected to a previous one. (Recommendation: Read the first book in the series, The Walker on the Cape.)

The story takes the readers into Windflower’s and Sheila's deepening relationship as well as through an RCMP investigation that takes in aspects of Newfoundland history. This includes present day conditions after the collapse of the centuries-old cod fishing industry.

Windflower's ways of dealing with life blends his Aboriginal heritage well with the fast-changing Newfoundland culture as a crisis hits him an Sheila.

A good read. Enjoy!

MYSTERY REVIEW

TAKE FIVE
By Jack Batten
Thomas Allen Publishers

Crang is back and he’s as gutsy, smart-mouthed, and clever as ever.

It’s been a few years, twenty it says on the book flap, since the Toronto criminal lawyer known by one name, Crang, graced the mystery bookshelves. And the hiatus hasn’t tamed him in any way. Who else would impersonate a judge, break into his client’s house, and then do it again?

He has a reason. Crang’s latest client has taken off before a court date for sentencing, stiffing him for $75,000. Good reason for the above-mentioned actions, I’d think. When he finally does catch sight of this grow-op fugitive, Grace Nguyen, she’s deeply embedded in another get-rich scheme and not about to place nice and follow Crang back to court.

As he follows the trail through a mobster’s home and to a ceramics museum, Crang is aided by various wise cracking sidekicks: from the slightly sleezy Maury, who is a retired independent burglar; his live-in companion, Annie who has a lot better sense than Crang, most of the time anyway; some elderly gents with a penchant for sleuthing; and various colleagues from the legal world in which he travels.

Along the way, someone dies, surprisingly not Crang, schemes are thwarted, and justice prevails. Somewhat.

If you like your crime with an edge that’s tinged with sarcasm and smart remarks, the Crang mysteries by Jack Batten are for you. There’s a lot of jazz info, one of Crang’s passions, that’s sure to delight music lovers. And the reader takes a tour of Toronto, comparing neighbourhoods, and indulging in some tasty meals. There’s a lot going on in Take Five along with a very smart mystery.

MYSTERY REVIEW

The Book of Stolen Tales
D.J. McIntosh
Penguin

My first impression after finishing The Book of Stolen Tales was, what an incredible amount of research, what a vivid imagination, and what a great writer! I enjoyed the mixture of history and adventure in her first book, The Witch of Babylon but this, her second in a trilogy, gripped me from the start. Might be partly because of the notion of ancient books and the quest to recover them. Whatever the reason, this is a book I couldn’t put down.

We meet New York art dealer John Madison, several months after his earlier adventure where he barely escaped with his life and tattered reputation. This time, he’s asked to travel to London to bid at an auction on a rare seventeenth century book of Italian fairy tales, on behalf of a mysterious purchaser. He’s successful but before delivering his purchase, he gives into temptation and opens the book. He’s been forewarned though about the book’s dark history and the dire consequences that might befall him. Foolish man!

It turns out the purchased book is not a series of five within one cover as stated, but only one.Next thing we know he's confronted by a mysterious, perhaps even a bit magical, dark stranger who manages to steal the book. From that point, Madison’s life is filled with fear and anger, as he pursues not only the stolen copy but the other four books also, in order. He travels to Naples, where the writer had lived, to meet the person who consigned the book to auction. Here we’re treated to wonderful historical images and tales of long ago.

He meets up with a mysterious woman who, it turns out, was the actual seller of the books. However, she had stolen them and her life is in danger. Her intermediary is murdered and, she and Madison are forced to evade several pursuers as they continue the chase together.

The Book of Stolen Tales is a weaving of fairy tales, examining the same tale as presented or re-told through the ages, becoming what we loved as children. It’s a tale of strange disease that leads to death and draws the U.S. army into the fray. There are dark and dangerous islands, moments of total terror for the two, and a breath-taking ending.

D.J. McIntosh, who lives in Toronto, is currently working on the third book in this trilogy of historical thrillers. The Globe & Mail asks if she's the next Dan Brown. She doesn't have to be. She's D.J. McIntosh. Write it down.

CRIME ON MY MIND

Getting it done!


I heard on the radio the other day that an expert says that "To Do" lists do not help things get done. Huh? I rely on my list and think it's most effective. Part of that stems from having to write the task down, which helps imprint it somewhere in my brain. And also, I get a great deal of pleasure when I cross an item off the list, although I don't seem to be doing that nearly enough these days.

The expert's reasoning is that it adds to a person's stress, knowing there's this list and therefore you waste time pondering the threat of the list, rather than just getting to the task. She/he recommended doing tasks in blocks of half-hour time slots, then re-assessing or moving onto a new one.

There is sound reasoning behind these claims, I think and could I but ponder it longer, I might even remember some of them. But I have this long list of tasks that I need to get done before the day ends and nowhere does it say, "ponder purpose of no lists".

I enjoy hearing or reading these tips on daily living and sometimes find them quite useful. For instance, free green grapes and add them to a glass of white wine. I'm convinced though, that the only thing that will get me using my time more efficiently is if I hire an executive assistant to take care of all those items on the list, except for the writing novel entry.

That might even allow me to keep on track with this blog and update it as promised. Although, I don't know about that. Life seems to be exceedingly busy these days and it's easy to get sidetracked. And I find that leads to more lists. If it's not written down, it might easily get forgotten.

So it seems I'm not giving up my "To Do" list any time in the near future. Now, I'll just progress to item #1 -- write novel.

Linda Wiken/Erika Chase

READ AND BURIED
Berkley Prime Crime, now available
A KILLER READ, also available at your favourite bookstores and online.
Nomianted for an Agatha Award, Best First Novel 2012
COVER STORY available for pre-order; coming Aug. 2013.

ARTHUR ELLIS ON MY MIND

It's shortlist time!



The annual Arthur Ellis awards from Crime Writers of Canada are approaching -- where is the time going? This year, the winners will be announced at the Arthur Ellis banquet to be held in Toronto on Thurs., May 30th. It promises to be an exciting evening, as they always are, with lots of crime writers, publishers and readers joining in on the festivities.

But first, the shortlist must be announced and Crime Writers in the various regions across Canada will each host their own events on Thurs. April 18th. In Ottawa, the evening of mystery takes place at the Ottawa Public Library, main branch, 120 Metcalfe St., in the Auditorium. Also announced that night is the shortlist for the Audrey Jessup short story contest, sponsored by Capital Crime Writers.

Join Ottawa's top crime writers for an evening that promises to be entertaining as well as entlightening. There will be a panel "discussing" Hard-Boiled or Laughs: What makes a great mystery?, refreshments, and books for sale from Books on Beechwood. And, of course, the awaited shortlist announcement.

For more information, check the Crime Writers of Canada website, www.crimewriterscanada.com.

Join in the criminal activities on Thurs., April 18th! Hope to see you there.

CRIME ON MY MIND

Not another one!

I'm looking at a drawing of a blonde woman with the caption "1 Rule of a Flat Stomach". Do you see it, too? It's on the right of my screen, one of those pop-up ads that's so annoying on the internet. At the bottom, impinging on my blog site and making it difficult to edit until I zap the strip away, is the "Web Promotion Tools" toolbar. Why are these people trying to take over my screen or at the very least, my thought processes?

It's bad enough that the Amazons blast me every day with books I'll surely want to purchase. (That's what happens when you cave and buy something from their sites!); that every store where I've added my email address sends me daily reminders of sales (ok, my fault, I know -- but sometimes really great coupons appear); that Expedia, Air Canada, Travelocity and every other travel site I've used feels I need a holiday (although, they may be right); and that in a fit of curiosity, I signed on to several writing digests (my fault, I know)and now I'm inundated with the messages that I sometimes quickly scan, at other times just delete.

It is addictive, this wanting to know what others are thinking, reading, experiencing and it's the reason the internet is taking over lives. I read today that Facebook is looking at more ways to generate income -- watch out for more onslaughts of ads, etc. and even if you don't read them, they're an annoyance that needs to be dealt with before you can get on with the real stuff, like checking on 'Friends' and posting the most exciting moments of your life. Otherwise, it's all to easy to accidentally click on one of those tiny spots that then morphs into an entire screen.

And that, my internet friends, is my first rant of the new year. I've now totally forgotten what I wanted to blog about but maybe you can relate more to this. Either way, I wish you a year of interesting internet experiences.

Linda Wiken/Erika Chase

READ AND BURIED
Berkley Prime Crime, now available
A KILLER READ, also available at your favourite bookstores and online.

WICKED WEDNESDAYS

A special thanks to readers!

Writing is a partnership between writer and reader. Each brings their past along for the ride. I had a touching experience this weekend that reminded me once again that good things happen when we pay due respect and attention to each other.

I received an email from a reader who is a lover of mysteries and had been enjoying one of my books until he reached a graphic, heart-wrenching murder scene involving children. At this point he threw the book in the garbage and in the email chastised me for the gratuitous, sensationalist, and largely irrelevant scene.

Writers love to receive emails from readers, and although most of them are laudatory, even the critical ones can be very helpful in honing our craft. When we write, we know what we are intending to say, but it is readers who tell us what we actually said. When I receive a critical email I generally thank the reader for their observation but don’t attempt to explain “but what I really meant was…” Words have to stand on their own, and if a reader misses the author’s intent, it is the author’s fault for not communicating it effectively. This is a difficult and humbling but crucial lesson for authors to learn.

In this case, however, I decided to try to explain. Perhaps it was the image of that particular book in the garbage, perhaps it was the obvious distress of the reader. Perhaps it was the fact that 20 children had just been massacred two days before. Or perhaps it was that the reader’s accusation cut too close to the bone for me as a child psychologist.

So I wrote back about the difficulty I had in writing the scene, which was actually based on true events that had haunted me as a psychologist for years. I wrote about its purpose in explaining my detective’s character and his relationship to another major character and also its connection to the overall theme of PTSD in the book.

This prompted him to write about his own experiences and to examine why he had reacted as he did to the scene. I do think it was the worst possible weekend to read that scene, but that too is context that an author can’t control. After an exchange of emails, he took the book out of the garbage and plans to finish it. I don’t know whether he will enjoy it (if enjoy is the right word for a gritty, gut-wrenching book) but I felt much better. The gap between our perceptions had been bridged, we both understood a little better what we had both brought to that scene and how it influenced its meaning for us.

Writing mysteries has its risks. We write about strong emotions and events – rage, terror, despair, human brutality – which can touch readers in powerful, unexpected ways as they relate it to their own experience. I don’t want to shy away from this, because it is why I write. Not simply to entertain but to share an emotional journey. But it’s humbling to be reminded that once my words are out there, the journey the reader takes with them is his alone.

Most of the time, we never know how our words are taken. For this opportunity, and for his willingness to share, I would like to thank this reader, and all the readers who take the time to write us authors with their thoughts. You are our mirrors, you tell us what we have said, and without you we are just tossing meaningless words into the wind.

Merry Christmas, Happy Whatever, and may the new year bring peace, joy and all good things.

Barbara Fradkin is a child psychologist with a fascination for how we turn bad. In addition to her darkly haunting short stories in the Ladies Killing Circle anthologies, she writes the gritty, Ottawa-based Inspector Green novels which have won back to back Arthur Ellis Awards for Best Novel from Crime Writers of Canada. The eighth in the series, Beautiful Lie the Dead, explores love in all its complications. The ninth, The Whisper of Legends is due in April. And, her Rapid Read from Orca, The Fall Guy, was launched last year.

CRIME ON MY MIND

Writing at Christmas.

Although my new book, Read and Buried, takes place at Christmas, there's another type of Christmas writing that's on my mind this morning. That's the annual ritual known as the Christmas letter.

I'm not an email greeting type of person. I love sending and receiving cards by old-fashioned snail mail. That goes for any occasion (and as my son will attest, I send cards for every possible event), but especially now as Christmas approaches. Since childhood, I've looked forward to the mail in anticipation of cards each day. I was indulged by my parents who allowed me to open anything that looked like a card and I guess that fueled the obsession.

These days, I rush to check the mail as soon as I hear the noisy closing of the mailbox lid. Every evening, I take a few minutes to look through the accummulated cards. And, I spend a long time reading and re-reading the annual Christmas letters that come from afar. What better way to stay in touch with family and friends, even though it is the Reader's Digest version of life.

I want to know what has happened during the year, what joys and sorrows have touched their lives, what matters enough for them to share it with me. I don't mind a form letter...in fact, that's what I send these days, although I do personalize each with specific questions and replies. I'm hoping those on my Christmas list also enjoy the annual 'catch up' letter. And, since I haven't heard otherwise, I'll continue writing them.

This year I'm down to the wire. My week's time-out in Victoria has pushed everything back by a week. I loved having an early Christmas out there, and although letter writing was on my list of things to do, there was never the opportunity. So, it's now or never.

Fiction writer turns to non-fiction. That's this morning's task. But it's more a pleasure because to me, a letter written on paper that arrives in the mail means so much more.

Call me old-fashioned. But send me that letter, please!

Linda Wiken/Erika Chase

READ AND BURIED
Berkley Prime Crime, now available
A KILLER READ, also available at your favourite bookstores and online.
www.erikachase.com

WICKED WEDNESDAYS

Editing 101 Continued

In a blog not too long ago, Linda talked about her editing process which included retyping the manuscript. My fingers grew tired even thinking about such a challenge and I knew I’d never do that. But I realize why I must edit at least four times before I even send the words off to the ever patient and always helpful members of my writing group.

For my first book, Cut Off His Tale, I had an outline. I knew who the killer was and what rationale he use to justify the murder.

Then, because some of my critiquing group, notably Barbara Fradkin, claimed it was more fun for the writer and later for the reader if you winged it, I tried that method. For a type A Virgo it was a challenge because it forced me to wait until the synopses clicked in my brain and inspiration arrived. This frustrated me but I did find that I liked the unexpected twists and turns that happened.

At times I worried that it wouldn’t work out, that I couldn’t knit the strands together. It did eventually coalesce into finished form. Once I had that I read through to see if it hung together. It more or less did but ghosts of ideas partially explored or incorporated and then erased lingered. Because it took almost a year to write the ending turned out to be much stronger than the beginning when I’d been feeling my way and I had to go back and beef up the beginning.

Once I reached that stage I worked through unifying the text, checking time sequences, names, ages, all the things that need to be attended to if I was to persuade a reader to suspend belief.

Then I began honing the manuscript, eliminating cliches, passive voice, redundancy. For guidance when doing this I rely on Theodore Cheney’s, Getting the Words Right: How to Rewrite, Edit and Revise. In the last part of his book he deals with figurative writing and while I understand simile, metaphor, analogy and personification I have never quite understood metonymy but probably use it along with hyperbole and allusion without realizing that I am.

Three times through but it wasn’t ready for inspection. At that point I checked the beginning and ending of chapters, questioned the pace, the tension and asked whether or not I’d resolved all the issues without rushing to a conclusion. When those questions were answered to my satisfaction it went out to my critics. When it returned there was more work to do and then, finally, the manuscript was ready to go to the publisher.

Is there any easier way or is this the way all writers prepare for the end?

A member of the Ladies Killing Circle, Joan Boswell co-edited four of their short story anthologies: Fit to Die, Bone Dance, Boomers Go Bad and Going Out With a Bang. Her three mysteries, Cut Off His Tale, Cut to the Quick and, Cut and Run were published in 2005, 2007 and 2007. The latest in the series, Cut to the Bone, was published this month by Dundurn Press. In 2000 she won the $10,000 Toronto Star’s short story contest. Joan lives in Toronto and Ottawa with two flat-coated retrievers.

MYSTERY REVIEW

ALL IS CLAM
By Hilary MacLeod
Acorn Press

Hy McAlister and the eccentric villagers at The Shores are back again in a quirky tale, this one set at Christmas. If you’ve read the first in the series, Revenge of the Lobster Lover, you’ll already be familiar with the colourful characters that inhabit this forgotten part of the Eastern coast.

This time, the legacy of a local abandoned house, Wild Rose Cottage brings into play a tale of mystery, tragedy and eventual release. A family traveling from Dawson Creek, B.C. makes the cross-country journey to claim the family home of Rose, wife of Fitz, and mother of Jamie. Their tale is one of abuse and sorrow but eventually encompasses the inhabitants of this outport.

There’s another newcomer to The Shores and her story is also one of quilt and secrecy. She’s Const. Jane Jamieson of the RCMP, unhappy at her new posting, but eventually her reserve is whittled away by the sad tale of Rose’s family.

And then there’s Hy, comfortably ensconced in the community, directing the Christmas pageant and just as unsettled about her relationship with local Ian Simmons; her friend Lili and husband Nathan; the elderly Gus; and, the interfering Moira…all return in this tale of greed and guilt. With a healthy dose of gusto.

Hilary MacLeod splits her time between Ontario and PEI. She manages to skillfully blend the dark side with the light, threading humour in characters and dialogue through the serious tale of human foibles and tragedy. This is the third book in The Shores series and an offbeat story for the Christmas holidays.

WICKED WEDNESDAYS

I love my book club. And I expect if you're like most of the women I know, you love your book club too.

What's not to love? Here we have a group of women who enjoy reading, researching and discussing books. All kinds of books. One year my club read only Orange Prize winners. Another year we concentrated on mystery and spy novels. Still another we read exclusively from the European renaissance period.

I first met the women in my book club fifteen years ago when I was invited to speak about Canadian crime novels at one of their meetings. When, at the end of the meeting, they invited me to join the club, I jumped at the chance. How could I not? Here was a group of intelligent, articulate and intensely curious women. These gals question every assumption and it's made for some fine and heated arguments over the years. We’re mostly retired now, former teachers, a CBC executive, a librarian and a senior public servant. Without the tyranny of day jobs, we can get together in the afternoon over a cup of tea and fancy cakes. But being retired doesn't mean the discussion or arguments are any less intense. The hostess often prepares handouts and a list of questions and God help anyone who hasn’t read the book.

We've been through a lot together, my book club and I. We've lost members to cancer and heart disease and supported one another through family tragedies. These women turned up in force for my launch of Locked Up, and they bought dozens of books to give away as gifts.

One curious thing about book clubs is that they're almost always the domain of women. I wonder why more retired men don't join or form book clubs. Maybe they do, only they call them something else. My husband has a group of friends who meet for lunch once a month and call themselves The Gentlemen's Lunch. When I ask what they talk about, he says, "Oh, books mainly." But when I suggest it might be a book club, he looks horrified. Book clubs apparently, are only for women.



Sue Pike has published a couple of dozen stories and won several awards including an Arthur Ellis Award for Best Short Crime Story. Her latest, Where the Snow Lay Dinted appeared in the January issue of Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine. Sue and her husband and an opinionated Australian Shepherd named Cooper spend the winter months in Ottawa and the rest of the time at a mysterious cottage on the Rideau Lakes.

WICKED WEDNESDAYS

The Next Big Thing continues....

It's my turn today! On Monday, Mary Jane Maffini took The Next Big Thing challenge. Today, it's Erika Chase on board! I was invited to take part in this blog circle by my good friend and fellow mystery writer Barbara Fradkin. It’s sort of a ‘tell five friends’ thing. These questions funneled down from our friend Vicki Delany. You can find Barbara over at www.typem4murder.blogspot.com and Vicki at www.klondikeandtrafalgar.blogspot.com.


The Next Big Thing:


What is your working title of your book?
The third book in the Ashton Corners Book Club mysteries is titled COVER STORY and it’s due out early next fall.

Where did the idea come from for the book?
My often-overactive imagination. I’ve been wanting to introduce a ‘colourful’ Southern gal to the mix and I think I’ve found her in Teensy Coldicutt, an old school friend of Molly Mathews who returns to town after many years away, having written her first novel, which she describes as a modern Gone With the Wind. When asked what she’s done about the civil war component, Teensy states she’s compensated with a lot of steamy sex. (Don’t worry….she never reads from these scenes!)

What genre does your book fall under?
Cosy mystery.

Which actors would you choose to play your characters in a movie rendition?
I’d love a slightly younger (sorry, Sandra) Sandra Bullock to play Lizzie Turner, the teaching specialist who starts the book club and is the main character. Still casting for Lizzie’s love interest, Police Chief Mark Dreyfus. I see Candace Bergen as Molly Mathews and Nicholas Campbell would make the perfect Bob Miller.

What is the one-sentence synopsis of your book?
The upcoming book launch of Teensy Coldicutt’s first novel unleashes a plot to steal the books, leading to assault, murder, counterfeit money and general mayhem for the Ashton Corners Book Club sleuths.

Will your book be self-published or represented by an agency?
The publisher of the series is Berkley Prime Crime, part of the Penguin Group. I’m represented by Bookends Literary Agency.

How long did it take you to write the first draft of your manuscript?
I’m on a nine-month deadline with each book so I’d probably say it took about 5 months for the first draft. Or so.

What other books would you compare this story to within your genre?
Books by fellow Berkley authors Mary Jane Maffini, Janet Bolin, Victoria Hamilton – all Canadians, too!

Who or what inspired you to write this book?
My contract. And, as I mentioned earlier, the desire to create a colourful new character.

What else about your book might pique the reader's interest?
Each character presents his or her own reading list, offering possible new suggestions for the reader. If you enjoy mystery books, this is the book club for you!

We’ve been asked to link to five other writers but, writers being writers, most are busy writing. I’d love you to visit Victoria Hamilton’s site, though. It’s at http://www.victoriahamiltonmysteries.com. Enjoy this new cosy series!

Linda Wiken/Erika Chase

A KILLER READ
Berkley Prime Crime, now available
READ and BURIED, coming Dec., 2012, available for pre-order
www.erikachase.com

CRIME ON MY MIND

One of those days...

Well, maybe it's been one of those weeks so TGIF!

I'm seriously considering having a computer-free weekend. I would have made it today, Friday but realized I have this blog plus another commitment that requires the computer. My reason -- I'd really love to have a stress-free day in my life.

I know I've ranted (very recently, too) about my electronics woes. Well, they have continued. I've just bailed two computers out of the service centre which leaves me wondering, what did we spend our money on in those days when we didn't have computers, iPads, iPhones, iWhatevers?

Ah, but the tale continues. Time to whip up a new bookmark and also update Erika's website. Bad move, trying to do them both at the same time. Added stress.

Question -- what sound does a writer make when nothing uploads to a site? You don't want to know. Bad enough I was having trouble with one site but to have the second one be uncooperative at the same time -- total, major stress.

And, having both computers in the shop meant, what to write on? Ok, I could do it the old longhand way and I do know writers who do their, or her in this case, first draft in longhand. But I have this problem of not being able to read my writing after the first two paragraphs or so. May this added a bit of stress, too.

My computer also let me know that Douglas & McIntyre has thrown in the towel. That's another very savvy, very respected Canadian publisher that's out of the picture. However, I refuse to take the gloom & doom road. It's not a bleak picture, it's just in transition. I'm hoping with all fingers and toes crossed that publishers and booksellers are adjusting to the changing market and by doing so, will eventually (note this word!) result in a stronger platform for the writers!

Time will tell and I'm sure I'll find out on the internet. Because although I need a break from this stressful world, it does have it's benefits. I did receive a very nice email from a reader today!

Maybe, it's time for a holiday!!

Linda Wiken/Erika Chase

A KILLER READ
Berkley Prime Crime, now available
READ and BURIED, coming Dec., 2012, available for pre-order
www.erikachase.com

WICKED WEDNESDAYS

New tricks for an old dog

Writers are creative multi-taskers; we are often promoting one book while doing final edits on the second and brainstorming the first draft of yet a third. The wheels of the publishing world move very slowly and unless we are a couple of spins ahead, there will be long gaps between books.

Thus it is that I find myself writing the initial chapters of the tenth – tenth!! – Inspector Green mystery before the ninth has even hit the bookshelves. The Whisper of Legends is due out in April 2013, and I am thinking about launches, book tours, signings, appearances and all that fun stuff. But lest there be another two-year gap between books, I am also preparing the next book for submission to the acquisitions editor. With my new publisher, this process includes writing a dreaded synopsis. Every writer’s nightmare.

The challenge for me is that I have always written without an outline or any clear idea of where I’m going, what’s going to happen and how it will all be resolved (including whodunit). Difficult to write a synopsis when you don’t know the plot. When I absolutely could not get out of writing a synopsis, I did it after the book was written.

However, an interesting thing happened to me on the way to this new book. I wrote two Rapid Reads easy-read novels for another publisher. Quite a different writing process and style! These books are short, linear and chronological. For the submission process, three opening chapters and a detailed chapter outline were required. Chapter outline? Even worse than a synopsis, where at least you can fudge the middle and maybe even the ending.

I managed to do the outline for the two Rapid Reads books, because they were short and linear, and I also found that, contrary to my fear that the outline would stifle my creativity during the actual writing, I was able to move easily back and forth between the outline and the actual story, allowing each to influence and improve the other.

That was an interesting revelation. But surely it only worked on these simple books, with their uncomplicated story arcs and limited subplots and characters.

So I embarked on my first draft of the newest Inspector Green using my time-tested “fly by the seat of my pants” technique. I wrote the first four chapters in this fashion, enjoying the freedom but being troubled by the niggling question of ‘where was this going?’ Until this book, that question had never bothered me, but now I was fretting about the synopsis I still had to write about the rest of the book. What would I say? What were the plot twists and discoveries?

After finishing the chapters, I sat down to sketch out some plot ideas, and before I knew it I was writing a chapter outline all the way to the end! (Sort of). Aack! I was going to short-circuit the creative process and end up with a paint-by-numbers book!

The chapter outline is now sitting on my computer, waiting for me to play with it, throw it out, use it for the dreaded synopsis and then throw it out, or maybe even use it to help me write the book. But it is there, concrete proof of my first foray into the world of pre-planned writing. Whether it will improve my writing or not, it’s been an interesting experience. It’s the first time I’ve had a vision, however flawed, of the whole book including the end. I know the outline will be a comforting refuge when I confront those moments of terror every writer experiences. That moment when you wonder where on earth you’re going and why are you pretending to be a writer anyway.

So stay tuned for further updates on my first draft efforts of None So Blind, and the success of the outline approach. Does it improve or stultify? I’d love to hear your thoughts.

Barbara Fradkin is a child psychologist with a fascination for how we turn bad. In addition to her darkly haunting short stories in the Ladies Killing Circle anthologies, she writes the gritty, Ottawa-based Inspector Green novels which havewon back to back Arthur Ellis Awards for Best Novel from Crime Writers of Canada. The eighth in the series, Beautiful Lie the Dead, explores love in all its complications. And, her Rapid Read from Orca, The Fall Guy, was launched last year.

WICKED WEDNESDAYS

On Looking Back

Recently, in preparation for writing a memoir intended for the family, I’ve sorted through the diaries I’ve kept spasmodically over many decades. Diaries reveal what you really think and feel, not the impression you try to give to the world. You write them to record what’s happening but also what you’re thinking and feeling.Reading through mine I’ve learned a thing or two about myself.

The most disconcerting thing I found was the consistency, the lack of change despite the ups and downs of my life.

To give a few examples, when I was twenty-two I read vociferously, loved the CBC (as I lived in a remote northern bush community it truly was a link to the outside world), and thought Canadians were the best and luckiest people in the world. I wrote at length and raged at all nations in the pre-World War II years for not allowing Jews into the country when it was apparent that they needed refuge. In my teens I’d been in the southern US where the Jim Crow laws prevailed and I couldn’t believe the reality and unfairness of what I saw. In our remote community we ordered the New York Sunday Times (which arrived by train on Thursday) and useless though it was I cheered for voter registration and wished I could do something to help.

At twenty-two genealogy fascinated me as it does now. And back then I tried my hand at writing, painted and did all kinds of crafts.

And so it went. I was then as I am now.

Are all of us much the same from our twenties onward? Do attitudes that we have when we’re young change? Certainly I’ve known friends who were avowed Communists in their youth and now vote NDP or Liberal but is that a difference in degree and not in basic philosophy? I also have friends who were hippy protesters and still support social movements, march and petition for change. We all know individuals who make radical changes in their lives but I wonder if the seeds were planted and unacknowledged years before.

As a writer it’s important to discover why and how characters change. Or don’t, if they’re like me.

A member of the Ladies Killing Circle, Joan Boswell co-edited four of their short story anthologies: Fit to Die, Bone Dance, Boomers Go Bad and Going Out With a Bang. Her three mysteries, Cut Off His Tale, Cut to the Quick and, Cut and Run were published in 2005, 2007 and 2007. The latest in the series, Cut to the Bone, was published this month by Dundurn Press. In 2000 she won the $10,000 Toronto Star’s short story contest. Joan lives in Toronto and Ottawa with two flat-coated retrievers.