MAYHEM ON MONDAYS

Ah, stereotypes: where would we be without them as people and as writers? Our brains’ tendency to put people into categories and judge them accordingly probably allows us to get through our days. We look at individuals and draw conclusions. The child is innocent and helpless. The bank teller will give us our money. The mail carrier won’t force his or her way into our home. The librarian will frown and tell us to shhh. That little old lady is dithery, helpless and harmless. We don’t need to pay attention to her.

Stereotypes mean we don’t have to start from first principles with every person we deal with or pass on the street, helps us to manage expectation and the perception of danger. But these stereotypes are often wrong. We’ve seen in quite recent history how stereotypes and stereotypical views have held people back: remember the days not too long ago when people believed that no one would ever take a woman television anchor seriously. Female voices were ‘wrong’ and lacked authority.

Two groups of people really benefit from our unquestioned belief in stereotypes: crooks and mystery writers. Oh yes. Fraudsters will take advantage of the fact that people believe attractive, well-spoken and congenial folks could never do any harm. And mystery writers, me including, are thrilled if readers can be misdirected by the seemingly harmless appearance of certain characters. Little old ladies can absolutely be trusted to do something wicked or dangerous in my books and stories. Serves you right if you think they are all the same.

As a librarian by training I am often stunned by the pervasive nature of librarian stereotypes (especially considering the party animals who were my classmates). Do I use that? You betcha. So imagine how thrilled I was to read an intriguing piece about art theft this week. The notion of thieves breaking into museums or galleries, dodging complex security pitfalls and successfully stealing and selling valuable art works is simply not the case most times according to experts. Want to know who is likely behind the disappearance of art works? Staff. That’s right.

Staff means librarians and curators. I was tickled by the complicit librarians, but hang on. Curators? Aren’t they timid and colourless individuals, wandering corridors vaguely in rumpled beige, with bow ties and misplaced reading glasses? Thinning hair too. What? Uh oh! I’ve been betrayed by stereotypes.

Still, this article made my week. I have been pondering the international art thief librarian motif. I could have fun with that. The curatorial possibilities are also amusing.

Of course, I need people to continue to rely on the mental ‘short cut’ of stereotypes for me to pull the wool over their eyes.

I think it will happen. In the meantime, shhh!


Mary Jane Maffini rides herd on three (soon to be three and a half) mystery series and a couple of dozen short stories. Her thirteenth mystery novel, The Busy Woman’s Guide to Murder, which hit the bookshelves this spring, is brimming with names, no two the same.

MYSTERY REVIEW

DAGGERS AND MEN'S SMILES
Jill Downie
Dundurn Press

This is the first in a series from Canadian author Jill Downie and it's off to a fascinating start.

Take the setting. The English Channel Island of Guernsey. Then there are the investigators -- Detective Inspector Ed Moretti and Detective Constable Liz Falla, his new partner and we watch them build a working relationship as they solve the murders. That's right. Plural.

The other characters include the Marchesa Vannoni, transplanted from Italy, and an international cast of actors shooting a movie at the Marchesa's estate. Then there's the brassy British author of a bestselling novel upon which the movie is based. His gorgeous American wife, a former ballerina, adds some allure to the plot. And of course, there are the usual guys in the precinct.

The novel and therefore the movie, focus on an aristocratic Italian family at the end of World War II and some deeply buried secrets which of course, surface. The question for Moretti and Falla is, how much fact is there to the fiction? And could the Vannoni family be involved? And, how many more deaths before they find the truth...and the killer?

There's a good deal of historical fact woven into the story, along with a solid mystery and exploits in both Guernsey and Italy to please any armchair traveler. I look forward to reading the next installment in the Moretti & Falla mysteries.

Jill Downie is a compelling writer...as she should be, being the author of five historical novels, non-fiction, and plays. She's a welcome addition to the Canadian crime writing scene!

CRIME ON MY MIND

Time for a brainstorm...

I'm at that point in writing book #2 where the deadline is looming and I'm re-writing like crazy. Filling in the blanks (or the xxx's as it were). And looking for a title.

I've been using a working title up until now, knowing it won't be the final title. The reason -- it can be read in two ways. There's that word, 'read'. For my working title you have to read it as 'red'. The other way & it falls flat.

It's Read & Buried. I like it but as I said, if you 'read' it wrong, it's a goner.

So, time to brainstorm...and I'm looking for help. The plot involves a visiting author who is murdered; the amateur sleuth & her book club members jump into the investigation...and it's almost Christmas. Being book two of a series, the main characters remain the same as does the small southern Alabama town.


Book one, which is out next April, is titled A Killer Read. Berkley Prime Crime likes them snappy and short. Oh, yes...and relevant.

So, taking all of that into consideration...do you have any suggestions?

Dying to Kill, came to mind this morning. As did Plotting to Die. They're already in the discard pile. Creating titles is a fun game to play when on a long car drive, on a long early morning walk, on hold for a long time with whatever major company you're calling. But it's time to get serious.

Titles, anyone?????


Linda Wiken/Erika Chase
A Killer Read coming April, 2012
from Berkley Prime Crime

LADIES' KILLING THURSDAYS

Lost and Found

For an author, short stories are a wonderful experiment in new ideas, voices, themes and settings. Because they are about a 20th of the length of a novel and take about a month to write rather than a year, the author feels free to try on new personae and venture into new storytelling techniques and characterization that would be too risky in a 300-page novel. My novels tends towards the dark and complex, but in short stories I have tried out humour, lived inside the head of a comatose patient and a small child, and traveled to unfamiliar, exciting locales. Short stories are rejuvenating and invigorating, like the palette cleansers between heavy courses in the literary life of a writer.

My very first published short story, the poignant, disturbing “Secrets of the Night”, appeared in 1995 in the inaugural anthology of The Ladies’ Killing Circle,

itself entitled THE LADIES’ KILLING CIRCLE. And what an exciting moment it was! I remember when Linda Wiken, then the owner of Prime Crime Mystery Bookstore in Ottawa and herself a member of the Ladies Killing Circle, phoned to say the first shipment of books had been delivered to the store from the publisher. It was a blustery, wet day in November, but I leaped into my car and drove down right away. The thrill of opening that book to see my name in print for the very first time is a feeling I will never forget. Since then, I have had the privilege of having eight short stories published in the seven Ladies Killing Circle anthologies, and have become a member of that deadly circle myself, but the thrill never fades.

One of the frustrating things about short stories, however, is that they are often published in magazines and newspapers that disappear with the passage of time. Since that first publication sixteen years ago, I have had almost thirty short stories published, but only a handful are still accessible to readers. Most are buried in magazine archives somewhere, hidden from even the most thorough Google search. And so it is with that very first story in the inaugural anthology. THE LADIES’ KILLING CIRCLE has been out of print for years, and until now a persistent reader had to scour the used book stores to get their hands on it. Lost in the passage of time was the award-winning story by Mary Jane Maffini entitled “Cotton Armour” and the wickedly funny twist on killing your husband in Vicki Cameron’s “Birdbrain”. Gone are stories by the unforgettable Audrey Jessup, founding member of the Ladies Killing Circle, as well as LKC members Joan Boswell, Linda Wiken and Sue Pike.

But no longer. The arrival of ebook technology has made lost stories accessible again, and we six members of the Ladies Killing Circle have decided to venture into this brave new but exciting world. We have spent the last couple of months packaging our original six stories, plus the story entitled “The Little Treasures” by Audrey Jessup, who died in 2003 but remains our mentor still. In her honour, we have named the mini ebook LITTLE TREASURES, and for most of us, it contains the first stories we have ever published. Truly milestones to be marked. The ebook will be out in all formats soon, and we are justifiably thrilled. Because apart from the joy of seeing our firstborns back in print, they are all damn good stories. So stay tuned!



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. And, her new Rapid Read from Orca, The Fall Guy, was launched in May.

WICKED WEDNESDAYS

There is a condition familiar to all mystery devotees: Mid-series Stress Syndrome, or MSSS (MISS). I’m a fan, and I’ve been there. It is characterized by a tightening of the chest, and a rise in blood pressure, followed by a moment when you snap. The delicate balance of admiration and devotion alters into frustrated expectations, and your fidelity as an aficionado morphs into exasperation. It’s been too long! Where’s the next book in the series? When will the torture end!

As readers, we give our time and our imaginations into the keeping of our favourite authors and their literary creations, and our principles can become a bit skewed from the vexation of waiting. Anticipation becomes thwarted desire. An excellent
recent article in the New Yorker magazine outlined the territorial tendencies of series readers (the piece was mostly about rabid sci-fi junkies, but we mystery readers know that we too are guilty). At some point, fans become consumers, and consumers demand gratification. Hardly a new phenomenon – think of the legion of followers who would not let Sherlock Holmes die, much to Conan Doyle’s chagrin. But we’ve become accustomed to a new sort of consumer speed: when we want something, we want it now and delays are unacceptable.

In my days behind the desk at Prime Crime, it was common to hear, ‘When is so-and-so’s book due? Why the long wait? They should be chained to their computer until they finish it.’ Spoken in jest of course, but there was that edge of irritation and entitlement – they weren’t getting what they craved, no doubt due to the writer’s moral turpitude and sloth. We need our fix, before the plot of the last book fades, and the characters begin to blur. Really, we’re only half fooling about that chaining thing.

We get pretty proprietary about the series we love, and feverish waiting for the next instalment. But books differ from other ‘products’ (and how I loathe that term in relation to works of the imagination.). What writer hasn’t longed for a big hit, only to discover they’ve become a commodity? There’s a delicate contract between authors and their follower; as the New Yorker points out, there is an ever-closer connection with all the blogs, Tweets, web pages, and Facebook updates, but this all takes a lot of time – time spent not writing. Their work has to be produced the old-fashioned way: one person, an empty page, and an inspiration – you can’t get it ‘on demand.’ Writers have lives, and they have to live to write, as well as write to live.

Sylvia Braithwaite has been in the book world in one way or the other, her entire life: fanatical reader, bookseller, publicist – and occasional writer. This summer, she is spending a lot of time in her garden, which also involves plenty of reading in the shade, and dreaming up plots as well as tending them.

TUESDAY BRINGS TROUBLE

Just open a vein...

I seem to recall some writer using the phrase, opening a vein. I can't recall the name (not unusual for me) but I do remember he or she was talking about how to write with truth and emotion. Digging deep into your psyche and letting it come out through the character.

I'm reading Daggers & Men's Smiles by Jill Downie at the moment, and will be reviewing it this weekend on Mystery Maven Canada. It takes place on Guernsey and

involves the making of a film, actors and of course, death. In it, a seasoned actor comments on how a beautiful young actress has developed more depth in her acting after her lover is murdered.

Writers are like actors in that sense. You can fake the setting to a certain degree, relying on research and observation even if you're lacking the sense of place that comes from being raised in a location. You can certainly research all the forensic information you'll ever need to use in a crime novel. But how do you get the characters' real?

Do we have to suffer in our own lives in order to portray a sleuth who's been jaded by events? Can the feelings of grief be evoked and set on the page? Does a writer need a degree in psychology in order to get the characters right?

Or do we try to know our characters so deeply that they react naturally in a scene?

Or is there a tacit agreement between writer and reader that you can keep your veins closed and just write a damn good novel with believable characters, a sharp mystery and a setting that sweeps you away...and all will be accepted?

On the other hand, there's a saying we all use...'it's all research'! So suffer away?


Linda Wiken/Erika Chase
A Killer Read coming April, 2012
from Berkley Prime Crime

MAYHEM ON MONDAYS

Little things make a difference.

Bullets. Traces of poison. DNA. Punctuation. We would do best not to ignore them. I’ve decided to muse about a few little things today. Punctuation appears to be newsworthy this week. Who knew?

The New York Times style section last Sunday had a feature on the exclamation point. That’s right! Apparently email, in which everything is fairly flat and emotionless, is a breeding ground for exclamation points. Like mosquitoes in standing water, exclamation points are exploding in this new environment. People like me who can write a book without a single exclamation point (and rightly so), can’t write a three-sentence email without seven. Otherwise normal people, ahem, are using them to convey support, enthusiasm, distress or an emerging hissy fit, any of which would take more words and more thought than an email message usually gets!!!!

Then there’s the comma, long a thorn in the side of the writer and the editor. Apparently, University of Oxford in a pre-emptive strike, has given the boot to the serial comma. Out in the blogosphere, there was rejoicing in some quarters and gnashing of teeth in others. Supporters claim that the serial comma is important to eliminate ambiguity. The common example is: I’d like to thank my parents, Ayn Rand and God. Much more clear if you write I’d like to thank my parents, Ayn Rand, and God. Ponder that.

As far as I can tell, wars have been fought over less.

This set me to thinking about other punctuation and its importance. I am hoping that someone will come up with a witty and pointed article on the ironic quotation mark, its uses and abuses. Finger quotes as they are known in conversation, can undermine the literal meaning of a phrase. For example: I just love you. As opposed to: I just ‘love’ you. Or even I ‘just’ love you. Consider: She’s such a good writer. Compare it to: She’s ‘such’ a good writer. Hmm. In our family, finger quotes are used the way some people might use, say, crossbows.

My point, and I do have one, is that even tiny bits of punctuation can contain pitfalls. How else did Lynn Truss manage to craft a bestselling book on punctuation in Eats, Shoots and Leaves?

Today as I work my way through a draft of a new book, I am filled with that writerly panic that often assails me when I think of the whole manuscript. If there are such pitfalls in commas and other punctuation, how can any of us hope to manage the 80,000 words or so that it takes for a contemporary mystery? It’s quite paralyzing when you think about it. Joan Boswell in her post last Thursday asked if creating a book shouldn’t be fun and challenging. I’d say yes. And it can also require courage just to get it out there, knowing that there will be pitfalls and errors and reviewers and critics ready to pounce. We writers are nothing if not a gutsy lot.

Speaking of small, dangerous things and gutsy lots: The Ladies Killing Circle is at it again. Keep an eye out for clues about an exciting e-publishing project! Yes, watch coming posts here at Mystery Maven Canada. But remember: you read it here first. And, trust me, it will turn out to be small and dangerous.


Mary Jane Maffini rides herd on three (soon to be three and a half) mystery series and a couple of dozen short stories. Her thirteenth mystery novel, The Busy Woman’s Guide to Murder, which hit the bookshelves this spring, is brimming with names, no two the same.