The Next Best Thing

The booksigning I spoke of in the last post was a gathering of The Outfit, or those writers who blog together under that name: Sean Chercover, Barb D'Amato,and Libby Hellman, (the picture above) and Kevin Guilfoile, Michael Dymmoch, and Markus Sakey (pictured below). I went to hear them speak, which was very entertaining, and naturally I wanted to get some books signed. At the beginning of the event, Augie Aleksy announced that Sara Paretsky had been unable to attend, and sent her apologies.

An elderly woman in the front row didn't hear him, and asked, "Who is it that's not here?"
"Sara Paretsky," he replied.
"Oh, she's the one I came to see," she said in consternation, as six writers sat before her smiling graciously.
She consulted her notes. "What about Barbara D'Amato? Is she here?"
Several hands pointed to Barbara, who humbly raised her hand. "Well, I guess that's the next best thing," said the woman.
I was impressed by her ability to insult so many people at the same time, but she seemed immune to her own talents in this area. I felt partial sympathy with her, because as a reader I would be disappointed if my favorite writer were not present at a signing; still, as a writer, I felt once again what an odd business promotion is, especially when one is promoting something as personal as writing.
You can be a real sport about being willing to come out and greet fans and potential readers, and yet no matter how good your writing is, or how famous you have become in SOME circles, there will always be someone to take you down a peg.

In any case, it was a great signing; these people aren't just good writers, but fun people, and funny people to boot. There was much laughter, starting with Markus Sakey introducing himself as Sara Paretsky (although this did not placate the woman in the front row). I accidentally cut off Markus's book in the picture above, but I doubt it will affect his sales.

In the final picture is local author Donald G. Evans, who wrote the much-acclaimed Good Money After Bad, a book about Chicago's gambling community.

If nothing else, it's nice to see that writers come out for each other. That, too, is the next best thing.

A Nice Little Surprise

Last Sunday I went to a signing (more about that later), and the bookseller said, "Oh, Julia, I'm still reading your galley copy."

"My what?" I asked.

"Your galley," he said, holding up a copy of Madeline Mann, which I did not know existed yet in book form. That was a lovely little surprise to appear at someone else's signing! So I took a picture of it.
Isn't she cute? She still doesn't come out for many months, but it's wonderful to see the book in bound form at long last.

John Dandola Chats About The Vikings, Scaramouche, and Beautiful, Beautiful Lindisfarne

Hi, John. Thanks for chatting with me.

Thanks to my perusal of your website, I know that you are a member of the Mystery Writers of America and the author of six mystery novels. [You have] also written a biography, four children's histories, three non-fiction books, various magazine articles, and [are] a recipient of several writing awards. [You are] the editor of an additional four titles and the ghost-writer of seven more, and your photographs and illustrations have been published both here and abroad. You are also a member of the Writers Guild of America as a screenwriter. Wow! Do you have free time?
What’s free time? Actually, in the ten years that I’ve been married, my wife has forced me to have free time–which is a very good thing. I used to work pretty much non-stop and my writing hours were usually through the night which I found to be the most quiet. I’m the oldest of five children and for solitude and concentration I struck on those hours very early on. Since I’m married, those work hours have now changed. I work days like a real human being. Nowadays, my office is not in the house but in a separate building on my property so my wife can pretty much stand in front of the door and say, “No, you are not going back to work. RELAX!” She’s very sensible. But there are always legal pads around to jot down ideas or dialogue or entire scenes no matter what the time. Did I mention that my wife is also very tolerant?

You are a historian as well as a mystery writer, and you are an expert in the Medieval world, especially the Vikings. So let me get this straight: they were known as the Normans, the Norsemen AND the Vikings?
Vikings were known by a variety of names: Norsemen, Northmen, Danes which were given to them by the monks and scribes who wrote of their ravages on European settlements. The names did not differentiate which of the present-day Scandinavian countries was the home of any particular raiding party. At the time, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, and Iceland shared a common culture, religion, and language (present-day Icelandic is very, very close to the way the Vikings spoke).The origin of the word “viking” is unclear. “Vik” in the Old Norse language means bay, harbor, or inlet. The leap has been made that since that is where ships where sheltered that “to go viking” or “to go a-viking” conveys some sort of idiom suggesting “to go raiding.” Because not all Scandinavians were raiders–they were farmers and traders, the most popular theory is that raiding came about because of over-population and a shortage of land to support it–the word Norse stipulates all Scandinavians at the time. Vikings were merely the raiding faction. Normans, on the other hand, were the descendants of Vikings who raided then settled in what is now called the French region of Normandy.


You’ve lived in many locations, but you’ve noted that the most memorable was Lindisfarne. Where is this? Why is it such a memorable place? Is it related to the Vikings?

Lindisfarne is a small island off the coast of Northumberland just opposite Berwick-Upon-Tweed, the last village in England. Lindisfarne is one of the Farne islands. Lindisfarne is considered the cradle of Christianity in Britain. A monastery was founded there in the mid-seventh century by St. Aidan. It rose to prominence under St. Cuthbert during the late-seventh century. Circa 700 A.D., the illuminated Lindisfarne Gospels were penned there. Because of the monastery, the island was referred to as The Holy Island of Lindisfarne. Now it is simply called Holy Island. It is a tidal island and it can be reached by car or bus at low tide. With the incoming tide, the road and mud flats flood over. This usually happens so quickly that many a vehicle has been stranded and hence several refuge shelters were built on stilts along the road so marooned motorists could wait out the hours until the tide recedes. The island itself supports a village of a few hundred fishermen, pretty stone cottages, two old hotels, a few pubs (of course), and the Lindisfarne Mead Factory (a.k.a. St. Aidan’s Winery). Some of the old fishing sheds have been converted into vacation homes. It has its own small fortress, sixteenth-century Lindisfarne Castle, which rises above the entire island like something out of a fairy tale. It was built as a harbor defense during the Scottish border raids. The centerpiece of the village is the eerie sandstone ruin of a twelfth-century Benedictine monastery. The first monastery was sacked and burned by the Vikings in their first recorded raid in 793 A.D. You can just feel the history which hangs over the place. The surrounding Farne islands are stipulated as bird sanctuaries and birds chirp everywhere. The North Sea glistens all around met by white beaches and emerald green pastures. It’s it’s own little world and it’s heaven. It was also the setting for my first sold screenplay even though the movie never got made.


That’s the damnable thing about writing for movies. You do the job and get paid but so very few screenplays ever get produced due to a million unpredictable, unforeseeable, uncontrollable reasons, that your work never gets seen. What I got out of it was the gift of spending time on Lindisfarne.

You have undertaken an adaptation of Scaramouche for Wolf Productions in Copenhagen. A few questions: How did you get involved with Wolf Productions? Who was Scaramouche? Why did Queen sing that line “Scaramouche, scaramouche, will you do the fandango?”
I met Annette Wolf when we were both living in Los Angeles. She was directing plays and we both managed to be used and abused by the same egotistical actor-turned-producer. Annette’s daughter is a well-known Hollywood publicist. In due time, both Annette and I left L.A. She returned to her native Denmark and continued her theatrical career; I came back to the east coast and continued my writing career. The Scaramouche connection goes as follows (the small details are to the best of my recollection): When Annette was a young girl, her uncle was some sort of Danish diplomat stationed in England. The 1952 M.G.M. screen version starring Stewart Granger had recently premiered and during a reception, she actually met the actor. He was everything a young girl would have expected of a swashbuckler–all charm and polish and kindness and good looks.

Needless to say, the occasion was memorable for her. When Annette and I met, the movie came up in conversation and we both agreed it was among each of our favorites in that genre. She asked what I thought about doing a remake. I’m always hesitant about remakes especially when the original was such a hit but I did know from having read the novel (by Rafael Sabatini who also wrote Captain Blood) that a great deal of censorship had to be applied in the previous two screen adaptations (one had been an M.G.M. silent film). I set out to craft a more complex, less censored screenplay but I also appreciated and respected the work of the 1952 screenwriters so I stipulated that their work was to be taken into account and fully credited. All a moot point since it’s another project which has yet to be produced.

Scaramouche is the name of a character in Commedia dell’arte which was a popular form of theatre for the European masses during the fifteenth to eighteenth centuries in which specific characters wore specific masks and costumes as a form of shorthand so that audiences automatically knew what their roles represented. Theatre Majors study about it in college but the best feeling and rendition of how it was played can be seen in the 1952 M.G.M. film in which a swordsman masquerades as the Scaramouche character to elude the French authorities.

Somehow, Queen was struck by the character and added him to the lyric in “Bohemian Rhapsody.” Who knows? Maybe Freddie Mercury was taken by the character’s costume–white leotards with thick black wavy stripes.

You spent the summer of 2003 “adapting the English mystery novel, A Wisp of Smoke, which is intended as the pilot for a British television series based on the Arnold Landon Mysteries by Roy Lewis. The nineteen (and counting) novels feature an amateur historian in present-day Northumberland.” What drew you to this project? Why do you love Northumberland?
A screenwriter friend sent me one of Roy Lewis’ books because it involved a Viking element and Roy’s style of writing is similar to my own. I liked what I read and tracked down his other books–all of which have medieval overtones and frequent archaeological digs. I saw some of myself in the Landon character and I thought I could bring out something special in the novels if I was the one to adapt them. They had, at that point, been optioned who knows how many times and the options were all allowed to lapse without anyone ever having attempted writing a script. That’s the amazing thing about the modern movie-making mentality, a producer shells out a sizeable amount of money to option a novel or series of novels but doesn’t hire someone who specializes in adaptations to take a look at the book. They just pass the novel around and if it isn’t apparent exactly how to make heads or tails of the way to proceed, they let the options lapse. Roy and I communicated for the better part of a year and then I took on the project. It’s still making the rounds but I will continue to adapt as many of the novels as possible so that they’re ready to go. I’m at work on another two as we speak.

Why do I love Northumberland? Because it’s all wrapped up in the history that I love, set against a landscape that I love, with the style of architecture that I love. It’s home to Bamburgh Castle, the Roman Wall, Holy Island. It reeks of the Dark Ages. It has wide sweeping terrain checkered with a green and yellow patchwork of farmland (the yellow is a crop called “rape” which is raised for feed and the color is positively luminescent in the sunlight). Even in summer, there’s always that bit of nip in the air which exhilarates me. It’s like an extension of Ireland. I’m half Irish–-my wife corrects that I’m all Irish, since my Irish grandmother had a hand in my upbringing (the Italian half is from Northern Italy, which doesn’t seem to count for much here in America).

I need to live in places where I can identify with the local heritage. I’m not big on our Civil War, so our South holds no interest for me. Cowboys and the Old West can only preoccupy me for so long. Our northeast has colonial roots which appeals to me but except for small pockets most of that has been built over and lost. In Britain, you can still see how things might have been and feel how things might have been. That’s why Northumberland.


You just debuted a stage adaptation of G.K. Chesterton’s Father Brown Mysteries. Are you a fan of Chesterton’s mysteries?
I’m a fan of one of my former college theatre professors, who asked me to do the adaptation. He likes my mystery novels and thought that my doing the adaptation would be a good marriage of adaptor to material. He was correct. I hadn’t ever read any of the Father Brown short stories, but what was supposed to happen in a good adaptation happened: I immediately got a visual sense of the material and I was in tune with Chesterton’s writing style. Even though these stories were written in the 1910's when authors tended to be verbose, the edits to dialogue and dramaturgy were so second nature that it was a breeze to complete. We did it as a radio play live on stage, sound effects and all. There are plans to record it and there’s talk from the G. K. Chesterton Institute (who co-sponsored this production) of doing several more. If I was born forty years earlier, I could have made a name for myself writing radio drama and loved every minute of it.

Despite all of your lovely British connections, you live in West Orange, New Jersey. Is there also an interesting history of West Orange?
I live in a house built for my family in 1923 by the grandfather of a high school classmate. I’ve stayed in town because of some family obligations. My Dead mystery novels use 1940's West Orange as a backdrop and a springboard.

West Orange has a very interesting history with seventeenth-century roots even though it wasn’t christened “West Orange” until the 1860's. During the last seventy-five years, I’m the only one who has written any accurate, in-depth, down-to-the-present histories of the town. No one else seems to know how to research or write anything historical without fabricating and exaggerating things for political gain.

My family has lived here for more that two-hundred-and-fifty years. My wife’s family arrived here from Ireland about one-hundred-and-twenty years ago. West Orange used to be a town like that; people stayed, families stayed. Now it’s over-built and over-taxed. People and families are no longer staying. We’ve got a mayor who double-dips as a state legislator. First, he raises municipal taxes through the roof, then he co-sponsors a state bill for tax relief. That’s the God’s honest truth. I write fiction and I couldn’t ask my readers to believe that if I made it up.

The town’s biggest claim to fame is that Thomas Alva Edison lived and worked here for the last fifty years of his life. My grandfather worked as one of Edison’s personal messenger boys running from his laboratory to the different buildings of his factory. West Orange is the unlikely home of the world’s first motion picture studio and it’s where M.G.M. held the World Premiere of Edison, the Man starring Spencer Tracy in 1940.

None of your mysteries is set in the present. How do you research your books?
Actually, my series of Wind novels are set in present-day New England with flashbacks to the past. For the Wind series, I develop an historical fiction premise and intertwine it with present-day happenings. Because the premise is historical fiction, I have enough latitude in making the pieces fit together. When it comes to research, I am dogged. I just seem to have that extra bone in my head which makes me question everything I should be questioning and making sure I find real and true historical facts to back up my premise. My Dead series is much more difficult to research and those novels take much longer to write because I establish a timeline in the telling and I go out of my way to make sure what was happening on that day both locally and globally. Mystery Scene Magazine recently said when it comes to such elements, my approach “melds them seamlessly.” I take great pride in having accomplished that.

Tell us about Dead at the Box Office and Dead in Their Sights. Were these your first two mysteries? What was appealing about the 1940's as a setting?

My first mystery novel was Dead at the Box Office. My second was Wind of Time.

I wrote Dead at the Box Office at the urging of the late Orson Welles, who found my family connection to Edison fascinating. A murder mystery was set against the World Premiere of Edison, the Man in West Orange, the novel debuted in time for the fiftieth anniversary of that event. I had considered it a one-shot deal but the novel went through several printings, had its movie rights optioned several times (I wrote the script), and amazingly got enough fan mail to make me consider writing a sequel. Dead in Their Sights deals with potential World War II sabotage of the Edison factory which was a very real concern at the time. Sights fared just as well as Box Office and a series was born. Dead by All Appearances will be the third novel.

As for why I find the 1940's appealing, as I said previously, I was born at the wrong time. Having said that, I must give the following explanation: as an historian, I know full-well that considering life in another time, people more often than not tend to forget about daily mundane factors such as lack of hygiene, lack of medical and dental treatments, harshness of living conditions, etc. I do not. But the 1930's and 1940's offer such things close to our own standards even though current medical breakthroughs make it seem as though those decades are removed from ours by light years. Another stipulation I must make is that styles in music, fashion, cars, and architecture are not really determined by precise decades. They usually follow from halfway point to halfway point (1935-1945, 1945-1955, 1955-1965, etc.) Recently, we’ve lost sight of that and we attribute styles and mindsets to decades which often provides glaring errors in soundtracks and designs for period movies (i.e. the hippie movement didn’t take up until the late 1960's, the first half of that decade was just a run-on of the 1950's).

As for 1935-1950 or so, I just like the styles of pretty much everything. In architecture, the old still survived along side the new. Women’s clothes were gorgeous and flattering; I need to like the way women look in their attire when I write about them. Since my Dead mysteries employ a movie-hook, the Studio System of the time was a factory environment which made clear-cut sense. You knew who was in charge of what, unlike the movie business today. It was a period just on the edge of becoming modern and high tech yet there were societal amenities and niceties. People actually spoke to one another; read books; went to movies in real theatres with big screens; socialized in a much less hectic way. Things were just fast enough but not too fast. People took the time to do things because they had no other choice and they learned to enjoy or at least to tolerate the process. As far as the dramaturgy of a mystery novel is concerned, it gives an author much more leeway. Having a character find a telephone booth and work at getting the correct change to place a phone call is much more tense and dramatic and obstacle-driven than just having a character snap open a cell phone. Having characters talk and conjecture and trick and spy is much more interesting and ingenious than having them jump onto the internet. It’s a time period in which I can employ the intricacies of puzzle-solving with limited technology yet still be in the twentieth century so that the reader can identify with what is being talked about but, at the same time, it doesn’t just hand the solutions to the reader.

This is a little off-topic but it also is tied in. The oddest question I am repeatedly asked (and it’s always asked by women readers) goes along these lines: Why did I chose to have women as half of my mystery-solving teams and, being a man, what do I have to do to prepare myself to write for woman characters? This is a question which would never have been asked years ago. It is a part of the modern mindset in which women are perceived by both sexes as oddly different. I don’t and won’t ever get into any of that discussion. I will say that I have always been surrounded by strong, independent, intelligent women who also happened to be damn good mothers and grandmothers and aunts. I like women. I find them extraordinarily interesting. In many ways, I think they often make better choices in situations than men. Creating a pairing to solve mysteries gives an author two sides of a coin. One partner tempers the other. It doesn’t matter if the pairing is comprised of the same sex or if it is comprised of opposite sexes. What matters is that the pairing has to work within the parameters of the author’s intentions. As a writer, I write about people and personalities (of both genders) whom I know and understand. If that resonates with readers, it’s because I’ve created well-rounded characters with strengths and weaknesses and foibles that are clearly understood. It has nothing to do with mind-reading or role-playing or the current political-correctness on my part.

Your Wind novels sound fascinating. How did you come up with the plot for Wind of Time?

Wind of Time came about because of a screenplay I had written based on someone else’s novel. The novel didn’t lend itself well to a direct adaptation and I had to disassemble and reassemble the chapters and elements to make it work for the screen. In doing so, I had to invent a great many of my own original scenes and elements to make it blend. I write in a similar fashion as movies are shot and edited; which is to say that, once I set my premise, I often write scenes completely out-of-sequence and then fit them together later. By the time I had finished the screenplay in question, I had entire files of original scenes and elements left over. They were what I considered good and very original scenes and elements and they were entirely of my own creation. I set them aside.

A few years later, I visited a quirky historic site on my way to vacation on a small island off the coast of New England. I like small islands (personally, Martha’s Vineyard, Nantucket, and Block Island are too large to give me that insulated feeling I need on an island). I think well in the isolation of a small island–especially on the beach lulled by the surf–and pieces for a story started to come together in my head. Historic facts and mysteries and speculations entered the mix along with those good and very original scenes and elements I had written a few years before. I topped it all off by using the small island as a setting with the characters making jaunts back and forth to the mainland. I know it sounds odd but that’s how Wind of Time evolved. It even got optioned for a motion picture and, once again, I wrote the script.

Do you spend most of your time writing or researching, or do you spend some time on promotion?
I’m always writing something; often several things simultaneously. Research is done as needed. I love to do it, so I have to guard myself that I’m not getting so hooked I might be going off on too many tangents and not focusing on the work at hand. A necessary evil of a writing career is, of course, promotion. I know how to go about it and I do it quite willingly, but it’s a double-edged sword, since I’m never sure I like being that much the center of attention. Writing is something one does alone and behind closed doors; sometimes it’s difficult getting past that...

What are you writing now?
I’m trying desperately to finish the third Dead mystery so I can get to work on the fourth Wind mystery (preliminary scenes for which are already written). The third Wind manuscript has been turned in to my publisher. To clear my head, I always start tinkering with another Arnold Landon script or an occasional stage play.

Aside from historical texts, what do you like to read?
I find that the worst part about being a novelist is that I don’t read as much fiction as I once did because I’m afraid of being too influenced. That said, I always eagerly await the next Spenser novel by Robert B. Parker and the next Arnold Landon mystery by Roy Lewis. I make time to read those.

How can readers and history lovers find out more about you and your work?
Thankfully, my name pops up all over the internet but the most direct route is to go to my web site (www.JohnDandola.com) which is always kept updated. I also can be contacted through the e-mail link on my site and I love hearing from readers.

Thanks for chatting with me, John, and for sharing these beautiful photographs!

Flower of Mystery, Flower of Danger

"O'er pine-clad hills, and dusky plains,
In silent state rhododendron reigns.
And spreads, in beauty's softest blooms,
Her purple glories through the glooms."

--George Shaw

One of my favorite books is a little volume called Forget Me Not: Sentiments and Plant Lore from THE LANGUAGE OF FLOWERS. In it one can find the symbolism and literary allusions for all plants. Today I looked up the plant that signals danger, and that honor goes to the lovely Rhododendron.

According to author Pamela Todd, "The danger signified by the rhododendron lurks in its flowers, for honey made from their pollen can be poisonous." However, it is also a healer: "The rhododendrum crysanthum is native to Siberia, where it was used as a remedy for rheumatism and gout."

Good ol' Rhododendron. It can kill or cure, and through it all it retains its loveliness.

Master of Winds, Marshal of Storms

Happy March, of which Swinburne wrote, "March, master of winds, bright minstrel and marshal of storms that enkindle the season they smite."

Bring on the winds.

Wise Words from a Nobel Prize Winner

"The best way to have a good idea is to have a lot of ideas."

This inspiration for the day comes from Linus Pauling, who was born on this day, in Portland, Oregon (hear that, Bill Cameron?) in 1901. According to the website of the Linus Pauling Institute, "He is the only person ever to receive two unshared Nobel Prizes — for Chemistry (1954) and for Peace (1962)."

Ironically, Pauling's peace-loving attitudes interfered with his career as a scientist. "Pauling often urged scientists to get involved in politics and society: "It is sometimes said that science has nothing to do with morality. This is wrong. Science is the search for truth, the effort to understand the world; it involves the rejection of bias, of dogma, of revelation, but not the rejection of morality... One way in which scientists work is by observing the world, making note of phenomena, and analyzing them."

In 1964, Pauling gave up his tenured position at Cal-Tech because of pressure from conservative administrators and trustees who disapproved of his activities.

Read more about Linus Pauling at http://lpi.oregonstate.edu/lpbio/lpbio2.html

Beautiful Icicle

" . . . the secret ministry of frost
Shall hang them up in silent icicles,
Quietly shining to the quiet Moon."

--Coleridge
from "Frost at Midnight"

I'm very proud of this photo, which I took last night. It captured both the icicle, bright with the reflection of my flash, and the icicle's evil twin there on the snow. As a writer I tend to see symbolism in a photo like this, but I'll let you find your own. :)

The Snow Continues

The snow continues here, making a comfy chair and a mug of hot chocolate more appealing than any sort of outdoor activity (although it's lovely to watch from the inside).

My children, a hardier sort, want to march right into the whiteness the moment it begins to descend, although half an hour is usually enough to soak their clothes and lessen their high spirits; then they trudge back up the stairs and inside, where warm dry clothes await.

Today, snowbound as I am, I shall spend some time writing a new book (instead of avoiding it, a behavior at which I've become quite talented).

Congratulations, Sandra

Big congratulations to my friend and fellow Deadly Daughter Sandra Parshall, whose mystery THE HEAT OF THE MOON was nominated for Best First Mystery in the Agatha Awards competition.

I've read the book, and it's quite compelling and seamlessly written.

Good job, Sandra!

Her next book, DISTURBING THE DEAD, will be available soon.

And The Snow Keeps Falling in the Midwest . . .

Last night, as we watched the snow shawl down outside our window, a relief of white against the blackness, I was reminded of this poem:

Acquainted With The Night

by Robert Frost

I have been one acquainted with the night.
I have walked out in rain--and back in rain.
I have outwalked the furthest city light.

I have looked down the saddest city lane.
I have passed by the watchman on his beat,
And dropped my eyes, unwilling to explain.

I have stood still and stopped the sound of feet
When far away an interrupted cry
Came over houses from another street,

But not to call me back or say good-bye;
And further still at an unearthly height
One luminary clock against the sky

Proclaimed the time was neither wrong nor right.
I have been one acquainted with the night.

Sometimes My Cat Can't Face His Problems

He's a lot like me that, way, is young Pibby Tails. When confronted with a huge project (say, a new novel or the revision of an old one), I am at first more likely to press my face into the chair in the way modeled above by my gray feline.

Eventually, however, one must come to terms. I do think that sleep is a remarkable healer, and it can even give one courage, assuming one sleeps for the proper length of time. In my case this can be up to ten hours. In Pibby's case, it can be twenty-four. :)

J.A. Konrath on The Hard Work of Promotion, The Importance of Buying Beer, and The Truth Behind his Mysterious Moniker

Thanks for talking with me.

Do people ever try to guess what your initials stand for? James Anthony? Joshua Albright? Jonathan Abelard?
They stand for Joseph Andrew, though if you talk to my wife she’ll tell you they’re short for a synonym of ‘donkey.’

Wives tend to be right most of the time. The name Konrath sounds Hungarian, like Namath and Horvath. Do you have Slavic roots?
Konrath is Austrian and/or German. I don’t know much about my ancestors, but I believe that I was somehow descended from them. That’s only a guess, by the way.

Your protagonist is a woman named Jack Daniels, and the titles of your books are all the names of drinks: Whiskey Sour, Rusty Nail, Bloody Mary. Is it a challenge, as a teetotaler, to come up with these titles? :)
A lot of research goes into every title. At least, that’s what I’m telling the IRS.

You recently went on a much-publicized 500-store (actually 612) book tour to promote Rusty Nail. How did that work out for you? Are you able to measure the results by the piles of diamonds, rubies and emeralds in your secret vault?
I was gone for 68 days, hence my wife’s nickname for me. It wasn’t easy, but I found it very effective. I met over 1400 booksellers, and thanked all of them in the acknowledgements of DIRTY MARTINI, coming out June 2007.

Results are tough to gauge, but I believe, with all of my effort, I sold five or six extra books.

Seriously, though, you are seen as an expert in the realm of promotion. Do you have a background in sales? What sorts of jobs have you had in your life?
I was a bartender. Go figure.

I also was a bookseller for a few years, which I loved.

I began to learn about marketing and promotion the hard way---by getting published. But it’s amazing how much you can pick up if you’re paying attention. For example, I just picked up a quarter I found on the floor.

What are you writing now? How would you say your time is divided between writing and promotion? Is one more difficult than the other?
I just finished a stand alone that my agent is going to shop around, and now I’m working on the fifth Jack Daniels thriller, FUZZY NAVEL.

But I only spend about 10% of my professional life writing. Mostly, it’s promotion. And that’s definitely harder.

You edited the newly-released anthology, These Guns for Hire. How did you make the leap from author to editor? Did you enjoy the process?
I have a lot of author friends, and I thought it would be fun to pester them incessantly for hit-man stories.

It was. The collection is wonderful. You need to buy a copy, right now. Visit www.thesegunsforhire.com to learn more about it.

You mentioned on a panel at Love is Murder that no one can get into one of your anthologies unless they buy you a beer, and you’ve already told me that I can’t just send you the money. :) What if a wonderful writer lives far from you, in New Zealand, and has not the option of buying you a beer? Can they send you cyber champagne?
If they want it bad enough, they’ll hop on a plane.

You wrote on your blog recently that you are going to be taking a vacation and putting your workaholic tendencies aside. While on that vacation, will you be visiting bookstores?
Absolutely not. I need a break from all the promotion. Vacation will be dedicated to spending time with my family, and stopping in a few libraries for quick speeches.

I assume you're kidding about that last part. Have you always been a workaholic?
No. I’m actually pretty lazy. I love lounging. I’m very good at it.

Unfortunately, no one wants to pay me to lounge around.

What are you reading right now?
I’m blurbing. Just finished MARKED BY FATE by Laura Bradford, and am halfway through ALL THE PRETTY GIRLS by JT Ellison.

Both are excellent, and I’m not just saying that because the authors bought me beer.

Do you make long-term plans? Do you have a plan for the Jack Daniels series? Will there be a new series with a new protagonist in the future?
No plans. I would like to do some spin off series, but not with my characters. Think Lee Child would let me do a Reacher book?

Maybe if you bought him a beer?

What was your first publication? Do you remember your reaction to finding out you were published?
Whiskey Sour was my first sale. I was pretty pleased, because I’d had over 500 rejections at that point for nine previous novels. Both my wife and I began to scream in joy, and a neighbor called up because they thought I was murdering her.

You’ve met a whole lot of authors at book conferences. Is there an author out there somewhere that you’ve never met but would like to meet? If so, who is it?
I haven’t met Robert B. Parker yet, and I’d like to someday.

I’d also like to meet John D. MacDonald, but he isn’t much into conversation lately.

What’s the farthest you’ve gone (geographically) to promote your books?
I drove over 17,000 miles on my last tour, to 29 states.


Your website is quite a labyrinth of information, puzzles, and special offers. Did you create it yourself?
Yeah, I do my own website. I’m pleased with the content, not so pleased with the visuals.

How can people find out more about you and your books?
They can ask my mom.

Thanks for speaking with me, Joseph Arthur.

You’re welcome, Juliette. :)

Keith Raffel Chats About Sales, Scottish Names, and Silicon Valley

Keith, thanks for chatting with me! Your book, Dot.Dead, came out this year. What lessons have you learned since the publication of your first mystery?
To appreciate the female reader. When I stand in a bookstore with a tabletop of books to sell, about 75% are purchased by women. Men come into the bookstore and head over to the nonfiction areas like science, business, sports, history, and biography. Women make a beeline for fiction. As Ian McEwan has said, “When women stop reading, the novel will be dead.”

Good for both of you. You spent twenty years working for “high tech companies, big and small.” Did you like working in Silicon Valley?
Starting my own company, building it up to success, working with an enthusiastic team – wow! That was terrific even if it transformed me into a monomaniac. At times, though, I have found myself tied up like a dogie on the range in the bureaucracy of larger companies. In those cases I just remind myself – like a caveman of yore going hunting mammoths with a club – that I am doing it to feed my family.

The name of that company was UpShot Corporation, and in 2003 you sold it. I think we all want to know: are you as rich as Bill Gates? :)
There’s a great Talmudic saying which I have hanging on the wall in my office that asks the question “Who is a rich man?” and answers it by saying “The man who rejoices in what he has.” By that criterion, I am a very rich man indeed.

You are wise beyond my understanding. :) What’s the premise of your mystery?
Ian Michaels is a Silicon Valley hotshot. One lunchtime he comes home to find a young, beautiful woman stabbed to death in his apartment. Gwendolyn Goldberg was a stranger to Ian, but her family, old boyfriend, and the Palo Alto police seem to think they were lovers. He waits for the police to start looking for the killer, but realizes they are building a case against him. It’s up to him. As the investigation heats up, so does Ian’s interest in Gwendolyn’s sister, Rowena. By the end of the book, Ian realizes that there are far more important things in life than stock options and business success.

What are you writing now? Is it another Silicon Valley tale?
Way back when, I was counsel to U.S. Senate Intelligence Committee where I worked on anti-terrorism legislation, reports, and such. That’s a rich vein of literary ore to mine. Currently, I’m working on revising a book called Coup, where a Stanford history professor is called back to D.C. to work for – what a coincidence! – the Senate Intelligence Committee.

You have a wife and four children. That’s a fairly big family by today’s standards. Do you find yourself torn between work, book promotion, and family time?
Is it a big family? I know people who have told me they’re only having two kids because they live in a three bedroom house and want the kids to have their own bedrooms. Then I ask them who their favorite person is. Usually it’s a grandparent. Then I ask if that grandparent had his/her own bedroom. “Oh, no,” they laugh. “She grew up with seven siblings in a two-bedroom flat on the Lower East Side.” Typically, they don’t even notice the incongruity. Well, enough ranting on that.

I started a software company. That was all-consuming. I worked long hours six days a week (taking Saturdays off). On the day I signed the papers to sell the company, I got home at noon or so. My then 5-year old said, “Is it bedtime already?” (I have a good time in Dot Dead making fun of the fanaticism endemic to start-ups.) My current schedule is a lot easier than that was.

Your website tells me that much of your novel was written at “the crack of dawn.” Are you an extremely disciplined person?
Disciplined? I don’t think so. I do my writing at a café where there’s no WiFi so I can avoid the tempting diversions of email and the World Wide Web. Goal-oriented? Definitely. My objective was to get Dot Dead written and then published. I put the manuscript away when I started my company, but came back to it. Then after finishing it up, I queried dozens of agents before finding Randi Murray. I met Jackie Winspear at a Left Coast Crime; she’d worked with Randi and told me, “Don’t worry. Randi will find the right publisher.” And so it proved.

Growing up, you watched “local orchards and dairies replaced by tilt-up buildings filled with software engineers.” How did you feel about that? Did you see it as an inevitability?
In Dot Dead, I take an impish delight in contrasting the way Silicon Valley was when I grew up and how it is today. As an entrepreneur, I certainly have been a beneficiary of my hometown becoming the focal point of the world’s high tech industry. Still the changes are definitely not all for the better. When I went to Palo Alto High, the parents of classmates included school teachers, custodians, and shop owners, not just the venture capitalists, executives, lawyers, and doctors who are the parents today. Back in those days, we left our front doors unlocked. My mother dried apricots in the backyard every year. In fact, the old nickname of what’s now Silicon Valley was “The Valley of Heart’s Delight.” I can’t help missing those days and wonder why Silicon Valley should end up here, in the midst of some of the world’s most fertile farmland. Still, I feel awfully lucky to have grown up in the “good old days.”

Your protagonist’s name is Ian—a very cool name which I chose for my first-born. How did you go about naming your sleuth?
My mother said she wanted to give me a name unusual enough so that when she called me for dinner, I was the only one who showed up. That’s how I myself ended up with a Scottish first name. If it was good enough for me, I reckoned it was good enough for the protagonist of Dot Dead. When it came to the murder victim, I played around a little with the incongruity of a Celtic first name and a Jewish last one and named her Gwendolyn Goldberg.

Your plot begins with sort of an homage to some of the classic mysteries: a beautiful woman is found dead in a man’s bed. Are there any writers in particular who inspire you?

Besides that woman who wrote The Dark Backward?

Your flattery is most effective.

More than the books of any writer, I think the films of Alfred Hitchcock provide inspiration to me. You know, there’s some poor shmo blithely leading a middle class life when out of nowhere he or she gets caught up in a spy ring or a murder mystery. We have this ordinary person --played most often by Jimmy Stewart, but also by Robert Donat, Teresa Wright, and even Cary Grant -- who is confronted by an extraordinary challenge and has to raise his/her game and become heroic. That’s what I tried to capture in Dot Dead.



Stuart Kaminsky describes your hero, Ian, as “befuddled.” Is this a plot device, or just a way to make your character seem more human?
Ian had never been a suspect in a murder before. It would be a little unlikely for him to discover that he has an inner Jack Reacher. So of course, he’s confused just like one of us would be.


What’s an average day like for Keith Raffel?
Roll out of bed. Do some push-ups, 33 minutes on the exercycle while I read the Journal, Times, and Mercury, then eat breakfast, and drive to the office listening to a book on tape. At the office, go to meetings, talk on the phone, write memos, and answer e-mails. On the way home, stop at the local café and get in two hours of writing. Then dinner, spend time with the kids, read to my eight-year old (now in the midst of Peter Abrahams’ Behind the Curtain), read on my paisley armchair for an hour. If I haven’t fallen asleep reading, stumble into bed. Next day, the whole thing over again, just like Groundhog Day (one of the best 10 movies of the last quarter century).

Groundhog Day was very existential. And I admire the push-ups. I’ll have to try those. In case you didn’t notice on my blog, I invited you to lunch with me in Chicago. Will you ever be touring in this part of the world?
I’m a native Chicagoan (a Northsider, for those who care about such things). When I was a boy and student and went back to visit, I would be overwhelmed by grandparents, aunt, uncle, and cousins. Last time I was in Chicago was for a relative’s funeral. They’re all gone, either passed away or moved away. It’s kinda sad. Lunch with you though might be just the draw I need to get myself back there.

Okay, then. What are your hobbies, aside from buying and selling software companies?
I used to love betting on the horses. In fact I supported myself that way for six months – pre-wife, pre-kids, pre-high tech job, pre-writing. Who has time now? I read, I write in my “spare” time. That’s it. Oh! One more thing. I love going to a few mystery conferences a year. They’re sort of like summer camp for adults.

How can readers find out more about Keith Raffel and his mysteries?
Like you, I have both a website (www.keithraffel.com) and blog (www.keithraffel.typepad.com). It would be great to have people stop by the blog and leave a comment. Sometimes I think I’m just talking to myself there. It’s nice to have company.

In space no one can hear you scream. :)

Thanks for chatting, Keith!

T.S. Eliot Reflects on The Day

There's a wonderful solemn contrast between Carnival and Ash Wednesday; I hope to work it into a novel some day. Human beings have a long history of acknowledging their own mortality. Once upon a time when a person received the ashes they were told "Remember, Man, that you are dust, and unto dust you shall return." The words have been softened considerably now, but the solemn implication is there, and it's ultimately rather satisfying. Here's a bit of Eliot's famous poem:

from ASH WEDNESDAY

by T.S. Eliot

This is the time of tension between dying and birth
The place of solitude where three dreams cross
Between blue rocks
But when the voices shaken from the yew-tree drift away
Let the other yew be shaken and reply.

Blessèd sister, holy mother, spirit of the fountain, spirit of the garden,
Suffer us not to mock ourselves with falsehood
Teach us to care and not to care
Teach us to sit still
Even among these rocks,
Our peace in His will
And even among these rocks
Sister, mother
And spirit of the river, spirit of the sea,
Suffer me not to be separated

And let my cry come unto Thee.

Happy Fasching!

When I was a youngster, my mother, who was raised in Germany, would greet us each Tuesday before Ash Wednesday with a joyous "Happy Fasching!" This is the German equivalent of Mardi Gras, and my mother would make us an after-school feast of warm homemade jelly donuts rolled in sugar, which we would eat with great contentment while we contemplated what our evening costumes would be. Fasching, you see, requires some sort of costume or mask, and this is a tradition that goes way back. As the Fasching website reveals,
"In Catholic Bavaria and Austria people celebrate Fasching. The word "Fasching" is assumed to be a derivation of the Middle High German vaschanc or vastschang (Fastschank), the last drink served before the Fast. Historically, during Fasching the lower classes were allowed to wear costumes and masks and to mimic aristocracy and heads of church and state without fear of retribution for mockery. When things got out of hand, the custom was forbidden, for a while anyway. Even Empress Maria Theresia (1717-1780) decreed at one point that masks would no longer be allowed in the streets; whereupon the revelry was moved indoors. This was the beginning of the splendid balls, for which Vienna has become so famous."

Now, Mom is not from Bavaria or Austria--she's from a little West German town called Paderborn, but the tradition was very much alive there and throughout Germany, and therefore it was alive in our Illinois home. So tomorrow I will celebrate Fasching again--my last Catholic hurrah before the beginning of Lent on Wednesday. I haven't picked a costume, but I'm sure I can persuade my children to don one--or at least to eat jelly donuts. :)

Meeting Bob Morris, The Caribbean King

I was thrilled to hear that Bob Morris would be in Chicago promoting his new book, Bermuda Schwartz (which I had read and enjoyed). I brought my husband Jeff to the event, and it was no big sacrifice for him, since Bob made the traditional drink of Bermuda, the "Dark and Stormy," for everyone present, and those are some tasty drinks.
Jeff thought so, too, and he is excited about starting the book tomorrow, now that it's signed by Bob and the two of them bonded over the pleasures of rum.
Here is the ubiquitous J.A. Konrath, who I was surprised to see with liquor in his hand. :)
And Henry Perez made it, too, although he had to come a long way and, like me, he got caught in a snarl of Chicago traffic. Still, Bob made all our problems go away with his fun talk and the Dark and Stormies he passed out to the crowd. He told us tales of the far flung islands, including his first trip to Jamaica as a fifteen-year-old boy, which made such an impression on him that he knew he would write about the islands some day. And now he does. Great meeting you, Bob!

Nothing that is Not There

The Snow Man

Wallace Stevens

One must have a mind of winter
To regard the frost and the boughs
Of the pine trees crusted with snow;

And have been cold a long time
To behold a juniper shagged with ice,
The spruces rough in the distant glitter

Of the January sun; and not to think
Of any miseries in the sound of the wind,
In the sound of a few leaves,

Which is the sound of the land
Full of the same wind
That is blowing in the same bare place

For the listener, who listens in the snow,
And nothing himself, beholds
Nothing that is not there and the nothing that is.

The Mysterious Vera Ellen

I've always admired Vera Ellen, who was born on this day in 1921. I watch her every year in White Christmas and marvel anew at the extreme thinness of the woman, and yet the supreme strength contained in her little body as she taps and twirls and leaps across the dance floor with the wonderful Danny Kaye.

A little research reveals, however, that Vera Ellen is a rather mysterious figure in Hollywood lore, and that when her career ended rather prematurely in the 1960's (after her second divorce and the loss of a baby to SIDS) she holed up in her house, rather like Greta Garbo, and died much too young in 1981.

Because Vera Ellen "disappeared" from the public view, she is perhaps not as famous as women who kept a high profile, although she will always be one of my glamour favorites. My brother, after about 45 years of watching her dance in black and white movies, is still as in love with her now as he was as a boy.

(image: www.geocities.com)

The Greatest Loves . . . in Mystery

In honor of the day, I've been contemplating some of my favorite romantic relationships in the world of mystery and suspense. Many of these, for me, are in the romantic suspense novels of Mary Stewart back in the sixties and seventies. Stewart had a gift not only for sophisticated plotting, but for creating characters that you rooted for, even if those characters seemed unlikely as a romantic pair. Some of her characters top my list, but I've added in some other favorites, as well. Please do comment and tell me your favorites!

Lucy Waring and Max Gale
THIS ROUGH MAGIC
(Mary Stewart)

Peter Wimsey and Harriet Vane
STRONG POISON, HAVE HIS CARCASE, GAUDY NIGHT, etc.
Dorothy L. Sayers

Simon and Deborah St. James
(The Elizabeth George Series)

Nancy Drew and Ned Nickerson
THE NANCY DREW MYSTERIES
(Carolyn Keene)

Chief Inspector and Dora Wexford
The Wexford Mysteries
(Ruth Rendell)

Stephanie Plum and Joe Morelli
The Stephanie Plum Mysteries
(Janet Evanovich)

Claire Malloy and Peter Rosen
The Claire Malloy mysteries
(Joan Hess)

Henry and Emmy Tibbet
The Henry and Emmy mysteries
(Patricia Moyes)

Amelia Peabody and Radcliffe Emerson
CROCODILE ON THE SANDBANK
(Elizabeth Peters)

Nick and Nora Charles
THE THIN MAN

Which ones am I forgetting?

But If It Had to Perish Twice . . .

These photos were sent to me in an e-mail; they were taken in a town called Versoix, Switzerland, and the title of the missive was "You think you're cold?"

The images got me thinking of setting and its power to evoke mood, both in life and literature. This is not just ice, it's a city turned to ice, frozen motion, and there's something both terrifying and beautiful about it, almost as though we have to be reminded of Nature's power in different ways, sometimes, in order for us to see that it is universal.
And naturally, because everything reminds me of poetry, either that someone has written or that I would like to write, I thought of Robert Frost's famous poem, "Fire and Ice."

Fire and Ice

by Robert Frost

Some say the world will end in fire,
Some say in ice.
From what I've tasted of desire,
I hold with those who favor fire.
But if it had to perish twice,
I think I know enough of hate
To say that for destruction ice
Is just as great,
And would suffice.
I also wonder about the people of Versoix. Is this a regular occurrence for them, something they take in stride each winter? Or were even they surprised by the intensity of this ice, the seeming permanence of it, as though Poseidon had cast a frozen curse upon the land?
In any case, the e-mail served its purpose; sure, it's snowing again here in Chicagoland, and it's supposed to snow all week, but it won't be that much of an effort for me to flick the light stuff off of my car windows. And when I do I'll think of the ice in Versoix.

Tim Maleeny Chats About Dangling Participles, Dragons, and Dangerous Euphemisms

Hi, Tim! Thanks for chatting with me. Your name is Irish, but your book, Stealing the Dragon, is set in China, on Alcatraz, and in San Francisco. You didn’t want to do an homage to the family turf by setting it in Galway or Donegal or somewhere?
I suppose I could have written a novel called Stealing The Shamrock, but that didn’t occur to me. I’ve always been fascinated by China and fell in love with Hong Kong when I was there, so writing Stealing The Dragon was a way to mentally return whenever I wanted, through my characters.

Your website (www.timmaleeny.com) is fabulous. Did you design it? If so, will you design mine?
My web designer is Heidi Mack of Xuni.com (www.xuni.com), an insanely talented woman who works with a lot of crime writers, including Lee Child, Ken Bruen, David Corbett, Cornelia Read, Barry Eisler, and Louise Ure, to name a few. What I love is how every website she creates reflects the unique style of that particular writer, no two alike. She’s amazing.

How did you come to write mystery novels?
I wanted to write the kind of book that I like to read, and most of my favorite authors are crime novelists. And now that I’ve met some of the writers I’ve admired for so long, I’m glad I chose this genre. Though it might be counter-intuitive, mystery writers are the nicest people you’ll ever meet – I think they get all their aggressions out of their system and onto the pages of their novels. Maybe the world would be a better place if everyone wrote stories about murder and mayhem.

Your second book has the intriguing title of Beating the Babushka. My Hungarian Grandma wore a babushka every time she went out. Is this a mystery about a Hungarian grandma?
Babushka actually means “grandmother” in Russian, but the headscarves often worn by old Russian women are sometimes referred to as babushka in English, but in Russia they would never call them that. Beating The Babushka deals with the Russian mob and their involvement in the movie business, and the title comes from a pivotal scene with a retired Russian gangster living in Brighton Beach. But since another writer recently asked me if Beating The Babushka was another euphemism for masturbation, I’m relieved it just made you think of head scarves.

Well, NOW it makes me think of masturbation. Regarding your exciting titles: I notice you use the present participle for a more active feel. Are you afraid you’ll run out of present participles? Or are they infinite, like space?
As long as my participles don’t dangle, I’m good.

Stealing the Dragon comes out next month. Are you excited? How are you promoting the book? Do you still work a day job?
I work in the sordid world of advertising, an industry that involves enough irrational behavior to make you want to kill someone, which might be the real reason I chose to write crime fiction.

For Stealing The Dragon I’ll be visiting as many bookstores as possible, getting the word out online, and appearing at a number of writers’ conferences over the coming months. And, of course, doing interviews on influential blogs like this one.

Thanks. I am incredibly influential--in Bizarro World. When do you write, and what sort of writer’s environment works best for you?
I have a wife and two daughters at home, so between my day job and wanting to spend time with my family, I have to steal time to write whenever I can. Writing professionally for so many years has made me pretty fast on the keyboard, so while I try to write every morning, sometimes I write late at night when everyone’s asleep, and I’ve written more than a few chapters on airplanes or in restaurants while traveling.

How long do you want to continue the Cape Weathers series? More importantly, how did you come up with the name Cape Weathers? Was that your name when you played cops as a kid?
I didn’t really play cops as a kid. Superheroes were big, and I always dreamed of writing comic books. It’s great to see accomplished mystery writers like Denise Mina, Gary Phillips and Ian Rankin writing graphic novels, people who were obviously comic fans growing up and still are.

As for Cape’s name, it came to me as I was grocery shopping, out of the blue. I liked the sound of it, and the character has some fun inventing a plausible backstory for his name.

You have a book coming out in 2008 called Jump. Why no present participle? And is this also a Cape tale?
This reveals the temptation and the risk of having a website, since even my publisher doesn’t know this book exists yet. The title is different because it’s a stand alone novel, featuring a couple of characters I developed for a short story that’s running in Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine later this year, a San Francisco cop and his retired ex-partner.

Cool. Your website says that your first Cape Weathers mystery involves “the aid of two neurotic cops, a drug lord, an autistic computer genius, a mayoral candidate, and a reporter with sentient hair.”

--First, what is sentient hair?
There is a character named Linda Katz, an investigative reporter for one of the San Francisco papers, whose hair has major attitude. I describe her hair as a reflection of her mood, sort of a Medusa-style expression of her subconscious. If Linda is pissed, her hair will let you know.

--Second, don’t they weed out the neurotic cops in the training sessions? :)
The two cops, Beau and Vinnie, share that dynamic you see in two people that have been together so long they finish each other’s sentences, get on each other’s nerves, but trust each other implicitly. Sort of like an old married couple with guns.

That perfectly describes my husband and me. What are you writing now?
Trying to finish the third Cape Weathers Investigation, which will take place in San Francisco and Mexico. The title is Greasing The Piñata, which is my favorite title yet. (If you smiled when you read that title, then we’re off to a good start.)

When you sell the movie rights to Book One and head off to Hollywood (and we know it’s just a matter of time, what with your exciting plot and setting), will you let me be the Key Grip?
I’m not sure what a Key Grip does – it sounds like something I’d put in the title of one of my books – but if my wife doesn’t object, consider yourself hired.

What sort of books do you like to read?
Mystery, science fiction, some historical novels, and nonfiction related to a book I’m researching. In the mystery genre, anything by Loren Estleman, Carl Hiassen, Robert Crais, Lee Child, Joe Landsdale, Laura Lippman or SJ Rozan, but that’s a small subset of the crime writers I enjoy. If only I could read (and write) faster!

Here are some suggestions for your future titles. Let me know what you think:

Eating the Cookie Dough
Strangling the Dog
Taking out the Garbage
Falling Asleep

Oh, wait—that’s just my to-do list for today. :)
Mine, too.

We have so much in common, Tim. How can readers find out more about you and your soon-to-be released Stealing the Dragon?
Visit my website, www.timmaleeny.com, and then visit your local bookstore. If they have a copy on the shelf, please buy it, but if not, they can order it. After you’ve finished, send me a note and tell me what you think. And if you enjoy the book, I’d recommend buying one for a friend. But if you don’t enjoy it, then buy several for your enemies.

Thanks for playing, Tim.

Thank you.

Chatting with the Women's Guild

On Tuesday I had the pleasure of being invited as the guest speaker at the local Women's Guild. The ladies were extremely kind and welcoming, and asked some very intelligent questions about my book. (Names to follow).
We chatted in a book-group type setting, lounging on comfy couches and chairs while we talked about the book, and then writing in general. The room was in a Lutheran church, which is why the lovely stained glass window is visible in the background.
My hostesses were most gracious (though annoyingly tall, blonde and pretty). :)
I was thrilled to see so many people holding The Dark Backward all at once. It was a writer's dream. Thanks so much, Guild Ladies!

Meeting an Icon

 One of the highlights of Love is Murder was an accidental meeting with Anne Perry, whom I had never met. Not only is she elegant and lovely, but she is a charming and humorous conversationalitst. The problem with reading someone's books before you meet the person is that you tend to give that person icon status, and then can become totally tongue-tied at one of these conventions, and might feel undeserving to breathe the same air as said icon.

But Anne Perry and the other "big name authors" that I met made me see that they do not necessarily feel this way about themselves, and are perfectly willing to mix and mingle with us lowly first-timers. :)

Even in an average dialogue, though, Anne has a way with words, and it seems inevitable that she became an author. She gave a lovely keynote speech at the dinner on Saturday night, and now I am even more of a fan.

Here she poses with Lonnie Cruse (left) and me.

Interesting People, Interesting Plotlines

I was lucky enough to view a panel at LIM about the writing of violence. The two gentlemen above, Marcus Sakey and Ken Bruen, were notable members of the panel, although they were both mild-mannered and extremely funny, and hardly the type one would think would write violent books. Someone in the audience asked if the writing of violence were in any way similar to the writing of a sex scene. Marcus Sakey pointed out that there was a sex panel right down the hall, "And ya'll are sitting here." Good point, Marcus.

At right is the lovely Tasha Alexander; at left is a fan whose name I forgot to jot down. Sorry!
Phil Locascio was on a newcomers panel with me; he is not entirely a newcomer, as he's written several horror titles. His books sounded intriguing, as his focus is always on characters with a moral dilemma--rather Stephen King-esque, I thought. I will have to look up Phil's book THE SINS OF ORVILLE SAND. So many good books at this conference . . .
I was thrilled to be at the same dinner table as the beloved Charlaine Harris and the sweet Jeanne Stein. Jeanne was also on a panel with me (in fact I spilled water on her--I like to baptize all of my fellow members). Charlaine had done a luncheon interview with Nancy Pickard that was downright hilarious, and I was thrilled to get a chance to chat with her.
Here are Shane Gericke (who warned me about spilling the water, but would I listen?) and Jeff Markowitz, whose setting of the Pine Barrens sounded downright fascinating. I'll have to check out his book, too: A MINOR CASE OF MURDER.

Love is Murder Highlights

I had a lovely time at the Love is Murder Conference in Rosemont, Illinois. I had the opportunity to re-connect with Bouchercon friends like Deb Baker, pictured at the signing table with me, above. Deb and I got to chat about promotion and future books and the challenges of the writing life. And naturally we shared some laughs.

I also had the chance to meet my e-friend Lonnie Cruse, pictured here with Jeanne Stein and Shane Gericke, two people from my "First Timers" panel. Lonnie and I have recently started a blog together (Poe's Deadly Daughters), so it was wonderful to meet her in person.
This week I'll be sharing photos and stories from this terrific conference. It was a nicely planned, smoothly run event, and there were many terrific panels that piqued my interest in many authors and their books.

Imagination and Fiction

"Imagination and fiction make up more than three quarters of our real life."

--Simone Weil (who was born on this day in 1909)

(image from www.forum3D.kom-net)