By Elaine Viets

For nearly a year I’ve been fighting a series of computer scams. Let me tell you what I learned. The hard way.

The problem started last spring when I found an extra $120 from Instacart in my bank account. I contacted Insta and was told I needed to call a special number for seniors.

I did. The person on the phone assured me the extra money would be taken back. I left for a trip to St. Louis.

A day later, about four in the afternoon, I got a frantic call from a young man with a cornpone accent who said he was in California. The poor country boy said he’d made a terrible mistake and “accidentally” put $1,200 in my account. Now he was going to be fired. Could I please go to the nearest Western Union and wire him the money? Please, please, please?

No. I had to give a speech.

I hung up. Cornpone called back. He begged. He pleaded. He did everything but break down in tears. “Please ma’am, I’ll lose my job. This money will come out of my paycheck. I’ll go broke. Please wire me the money.”

No. I hung up again.

This time Cornpone called back and said, “OK, if you can’t wire the money, could you write a check and mail it?” He gave me the name of a woman in South Carolina, all the way across the country from California.

Wait a minute? I said. Why do you want this mailed to a woman in South Carolina? Why not send it to Instacart?

“She’s my supervisor,” he said.

Nope. Something didn’t smell right. I closed my bank card and the account.

When I got home, the money in my compromised account was transferred to my new account. Including the $1,200. I also filed a police report. I didn’t expect the police to haul Cornpone and his pals off in handcuffs.

I’ve had at least three suspicious incidents since then, for purchases I couldn’t possibly have made. Each time I’ve closed my bank card. The most recent attack this Saturday was more serious. I got this text in all caps: DID YOU ATTEMPT PURCHASE TARGET $789.88 ORLANDO. Y(YES) N (NO). CASE #818992 TO OPT OUT REPLY.

Orlando? I live 220 miles away in south Florida.

Before I could reply, I got a phone call from a young man with an instantly forgettable name. I think his last name was Johnson. He asked if I’d made the Target purchase.

“On my BigBucks bank card? No,” I said.

He said he would instantly close the card. Fine. He then asked me to call up my account and confirm my recent purchases, which I did. The latest was from a gas station. I also told him the amount in my checking and savings accounts.

He said this was “a very serious case of fraud” and he needed the physical card. He gave me an address that was the headquarters of BigBucks Bank and asked me to take the card to FedEx. I said no.

He said he’d send a Lyft driver in a red Prius to pick up the card and take it to FedEx. The helpful Mr. Johnson stayed on the line while I waited outside my condo building and handed the card to the Lyft driver.

I thanked Mr. Johnson for alerting me to the fraud. He warned me not to buy gas from a pump. “That’s probably how they got your bank card number.” He hung up.

In the elevator on the way upstairs, I wondered why BigBucks needed the physical card. Didn’t it have all that information in the computer?

At about the 12^th floor, I realized I’d been had. I ran to my condo, locked my bank card and all my accounts. I ignored the latest text from Mr. Johnson, which said, “Alert. Your new Temporary User name is BigBucks41946. Reply with old Username to deactivate.”

No, thanks. I called my bank’s fraud division. They confirmed what I suspected. Fraud.

What were the clues?

Check out that text again: DID YOU ATTEMPT PURCHASE TARGET $789.88 ORLANDO. Y(YES) N (NO). CASE #818992 TO OPT OUT REPLY.

Notice what’s missing? The bank’s name. Which I helpfully provided.

It took two days to get a new bank card and bank account. I also made a police report and alerted condo security.  That so-called “Lyft” driver was in on it, too. He didn’t have a sign on his car. Thanks to security, we now have video of that red Prius.

Again, I don’t expect the scammers to get caught.

But all they got was my time. No money.

And scammers don’t always win. After all, I got to keep that $1,200.

Where did the scammers get that kind of cash? The bank said they have a sort of revolving scam fund – when they get the money from one scam, they use part of it for the next scam.

I’m not the only one who nicked them. One banker said a Latino woman went through the same thing. She found an unexpected windfall in her account from a company. The scammers wanted their money back. Something didn’t seem right to her. The woman got scared and went to her bank.

The bank closed her account ASAP. The scammers cruelly threatened the woman, telling her they’d report her to immigration.

The bank said, “Sorry, the account’s closed.”

She kept the money.

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By Elaine Viets

          What the heck?

Lately, reading has been a painful experience. Especially online. One story after another has some outrage against the language. I wanted to rant like a pedant and point out each mistake, but I showed some self-restraint. After all, pedantry is still outlawed in most southern states.

Instead, I put these errors into a short story. There are at last 30 mistakes in the story. See if you can spot them all.

A Horrifying Tail of Murder and Mutilation

The Corliss boys, Billy and Justin, created a rein of terror in the town of Blister Bend. The thugs would exorcise their ferocious Dobermans in the town square. The snarling dogs were all teeth and mussel. The very site made mothers grab they’re children to protect there tots.

Sherriff  Sam Wich said, “The Corlis’s are the most callus outlaws in the county. No regard for anyone’s feelings.”

Deputy D. Awg said, “Billy tried to bribe me when he didn’t break at the red light on Main. Pulled out a hundred-dollar bill and waived it in my face. I said I wasn’t for sail.”

“Billy keeps a loaded weapon on his mantle,” Sheriff  Sam said.  “What I wouldn’t give to test that. I bet its connected to at least three grizzly murders.”

“Ever thought about going to the staties?” the deputy asked.

The sherrif glared at him. “What good would that do? I should complain to the state troupers? About Billy Corlis? Whose been paying off the Colonial for years? Are you trying to get me killed?”

“Uh, no, sir. I forgot.” The deputy gave him a rueful smile. “I’m sure one of the Corlises will slip up and we’ll catch them.”

Sheriff Sam snorted. But Deputy D. Awg showed real forsight. Less than a week later, he suprised Billy and Justin burying a body at a construction sight on the edge of town. The deputy got the drop on the killers, and handcuffed them both.

Turned out the decreased was the town butcher.

Sherriff Sam arrived on the seen and staired sadly at the dead meet man. “Its a gristly end  for a good man,” he said.

Then he growled at the cuffed killers. “But those two . . . Now their an arresting site.”

“Why, Sheriff,” the deputy said. “I had no idea you were homophonic.”

A Horrifying Tail of Murder and Mutilation: The Reveal

The Corliss boys, Billy and Justin, created a rein of terror in the town of Blister Bend. The thugs would exorcise their ferocious Dobermans in the town square. The snarling dogs were all teeth and mussel. The very site made mothers grab they’re children to protect there tots.

Sherriff  Sam Wich said, “The Corlis’s are the most callus outlaws in the county. No regard for anyone’s feelings.”

Deputy D. Awg said, “Billy tried to bribe me when he didn’t break at the red light on Main. Pulled out a hundred-dollar bill and waived it in my face. I said I wasn’t for sail.”

“Billy keeps a loaded weapon on his mantle,” Sheriff  Sam said.  “What I wouldn’t give to test that. I bet its connected to at least three grizzly murders.”

“Ever thought about going to the staties?” the deputy asked.

The sherrif glared at him. “What good would that do? I should complain to the state troupers? About Billy Corliss? Whose been paying off the Colonial for years? Are you trying to get me killed?”

“Uh, no, sir.” The deputy gave him a rueful smile. “I’m sure one of the Corlises will slip and we’ll catch them.”

Sheriff Sam snorted. But Deputy D. Awg showed real forsight. Less than a week later, he suprised Billy and Justin burying a body at a construction sight on the edge of town. The deputy got the drop on the killers, and handcuffed them both.

Turned out the decreased was the town butcher.

Sherriff Sam arrived on the seen and staired sadly at the dead meet man. “Its a gristly end for a good man,” he said.

Then he growled at the cuffed killers. “But those two . . . Now their an arresting site.”

“Jeez, Sheriff,” the deputy said. “I had no idea you were homophonic.”

***

As you probably guessed, most of these mistakes are homophones, words that sound alike but are spelled differently. These words have tripped up many unwary writers:

tail/tale

exorcise/exercise

rein/reign/rain

mussel/muscle

callous/callus

break/brake

sight/site

seen/scene

waive/wave

sale/sail

mantle/mantel

troopers/troupers

grizzly/gristly, and grisly

stair/stare

meet/meat

whose/who’s

Misusing it’s for its drives me crazy, (and that’s a short drive). My teachers pounded this helpful hint into my head: “It’s” is a contraction of “it is.” Replace “its” with “it is” and if the sentence makes sense: “It is a gristly end . . .” you’re using it correctly.

Ditto for whose/who’s. Whose is a possessive adjective, as in “Whose book is that?” It also identifies someone or something: “I haven’t seen my ex-boyfriend, whose name I forget, in years.”

Who’s is a contraction of “who has” or “who is,” as in “Who’s a good boy?”

If you’re not sure, replace “who’s” with “who is” and see if it works.

As for the grisly business of grizzly, gristly, and grisly: Innocent grizzly bears and gristly, tough T-bones are being accused of grisly murders.

Misspellings include forsight, colonial for colonel, decreased and surprise. I worked for a newspaper that printed an expensive color Sunday magazine. The printed magazines were delivered early in the week.

On the color cover was a huge one-word headline: “Suprise!”

“Sheriff” confuses me so badly, I have to write down the correct version on a Post-it note to get it right.

“Sheriff” with one R and two Fs is the correct spelling for a law enforcement officer.

The double-barreled “Sherriff”  (two Rs and two Fs) is an English author, screenwriter and playwright, R.C. Sherriff, best known for “Journey’s End,” based on his World War I experience.

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Last, but not least, are the perilous possessives for a name ending is S.

TKZer P J Parrish has warned us to avoid using names that end in S, but sometimes we can’t help it.

I had the evil Corliss boys. This line: The Corlis’s are the most callus outlaws . . .” should not have any apostrophe.

What if you want to say something belongs to the Corlisses? That’s depends on what style you or your publisher uses: Mine prefer Corliss’s. Others use Corliss’.

Both are correct.

Enjoy these tips to become better writers. Or is it righters?

My new Florida Beach mystery is due out in June. Preorder Sex and Death on the Beach here: bit.ly/3W6Y2Rp

I’m rushing to finish the rewrite of my new novel.  Will the reviewers like it? Here’s a repeat of an interview with a reviewer.

Confessions of a Book Reviewer

By Elaine Viets

A reviewer for a major print magazine complained to me about a novel he was reading, when it dawned on me – this was news writers could use. If we know what’s wrong, we can fix it before the reviewer writes about it, for all the (mystery) world to read.
This reviewer is not some crank who looks for excuses to rip writers. If he has to give a book a bad review, he agonizes over that decision.
But here are some writing wrongs that upset this reviewer.

(1) Padded Middles. This is my reviewer’s number one problem – novels that slow down in the middle. “The padding doesn’t advance the narrative,” the reviewer said. “It’s pages and pages of the thoughts and feelings of people who aren’t very interesting. They offer no valuable insights. Sometimes, I wonder if editors make writers add this unnecessary information because big books are so popular. Most books I’ve read recently are 20 to 30 pages too long. Often, there’s a good book buried in that excess fat.”

(2) Switching names. “The character is introduced as Joseph Smith. Then the author proceeds to call him Joe, Joey, Joseph, and sometimes just Smith. It’s hard to figure out who the writer is talking about.”

(3) Who’s talking? “A character is introduced in the first 50 pages, and then shows up 200 pages later with no ID.” Take tax accountant Mary Rogers. She has a brief scene in Chapter 2 and then in Chapter 25 we see this line: “I think the suspect embezzled half a million dollars,” said Mary Rogers.
Huh? Our reviewer said, “I’m frantically pawing through the book, trying to figure out who Mary Rogers is and why she’s saying that.

“It would help if the author gave us a hint who Mary was. Something like this:

‘I think the suspect embezzled half a million dollars,’ said tax accountant Mary Rogers.’ That two-word take makes it easier for readers.”

(4) Writers who fixate on a certain word. “Like ass. I read an author who used ‘ass’ constantly. His character fell on his ass, showed his ass, got his ass kicked and had his ass handed to him. He dealt with asshats, ass clowns and of course, assholes.”

Cuss words are necessary for realism, but don’t overdo it.

(5) Dumb and proud of it. “Writers who want to assert their real-people identities trot out lowbrow snobbery. Their favorite phrase is ‘I don’t know anything about . . .’ Then you can choose one or more of these – opera, classical music, gourmet food, Shakespeare.”

Assume your readers are intelligent – after all, they bought your book.

(6) The hero with the drinking problem. He – or sometimes she – “is haunted by the awful things they did when they were on the sauce. Yes, people drink. And some authors handle this well. But most of these characters are tiresome cliches.” Reading these novels is like getting your ear bent by the garrulous drunk at the end of the bar.

(7) Writers who don’t do their research. If you really want to frost this reviewer, have your hero open a Heineken with a twist-off cap – there’s no such animal. And Jack Daniel’s whiskey always has an apostrophe.

If you’re writing a thriller set in Nazi Germany, you’ll score extra points with this reviewer if you don’t say “Hitler was elected president in a democratic election.” You’ll find plenty of people who’ll write that, but the Website Mythfact.com says it’s complicated.
“In America we hear ‘Hitler was elected President in a Democracy’ a lot,” the website says, “but the sentence is so semantically wrong . . . In summary, the whole thing is almost too complex to apply the ol’ ‘Hitler was elected democratically’ quip to, but since it is important, perhaps it is best phrased as, ‘Hitler and the NAZI party seized power in a democratic system.’”
Got that? Good.

(8) Basic copyediting errors. “These are turning up in books by major authors,” our reviewer said. “I’ve seen ‘grizzly murders,’ when I’m quite sure the local bears are innocent. Clothes are tossed down a ‘laundry shoot,’ and people ‘tow the line.’” If you really want to see steam come out of this reviewer’s ears, mix up “it’s” with “its” and “your” with “you’re.” Granted, we all make mistakes, especially when we’re writing quickly. But somebody should catch those errors before the book is printed.

(9) TMI in the first chapter. Nearly every one of us at TKZ has written about this problem. Overcrowded first chapters slow the pace of your novel. Our reviewer said, “It stops a good book dead when the first chapter has an overlarge cast of characters and I can’t keep them straight.”

Reader, what stops you when you’re reading a novel?

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By Elaine Viets

          I’m writing a new mystery series set in South Florida. Here’s one of the hairiest problems I considered: did I want my protagonist to have a pet?

I like pets, and they’re popular with mystery readers. Especially cat and dog mysteries.

Many cozy readers are familiar with Laurie Cass’s Bookmobile Cat series. And that’s just the start of the good felines. There are series with Cat Cafes, Klepto Cats, Magical Cats, witches’ cats, library cats, bookstore cats and more.

Cats who talk and solve mysteries aren’t my cup of tea – my cats can’t even open a can of food for dinner. But what do I know? Readers love felines who can perform semi-human feats.

I could also give my new protagonist a dog. Dog mysteries are definite people pleasers. There’s a pack of them, including David Rosenfelt’s series, featuring work-avoiding, dog loving lawyer Andy Carpenter and his golden retriever, Tara.

Tara is a lovable companion. Other mystery series feature working dogs, such as FBI special agent Sara Driscoll and her search and rescue Labrador, Hawk.

Here are more good reasons to have pets in mysteries:

Walking a dog is a good way to meet people.

Animals are good judges of character. Dogs (and some cats) can rescue or defend you, warn you with a timely bark or hiss, even uncover a clue.

A pet in your mystery can be plus. Readers identify with pets. “Your cat reminds me of my orange tabby, Ginger. She loves to . . .”

But there are major downsides to consider. Pets need care. Your detective can’t be on the track of a killer and suddenly stop the investigation to make a phone call. (“Psst! Mark. I’m staking out the killer’s house. Will you walk my corgi? I just got a new living room rug.”)

Dogs also have to be fed and groomed. Cats are a little more easy care. Your detective can open a big bag of dry food and leave out a bowl of water, but sooner or later the litter box has to be cleaned.

Janet Evanovich’s Stephanie Plum series has a unique, easy-care animal, a hamster named Rex. Rex lives in a cage on her kitchen counter. Rex sleeps in a soup can and runs on his hamster wheel. Stephanie occasionally tosses him a grape for a treat.

But she’s such a good writer, Rex seems real. Once, some thugs held Rex for ransom, and I genuinely hoped the little critter would survive.

For this new series, I decided to go pet-free.

***

Many authors love animals. Here are some quotes you may enjoy from the masters.

“Dogs are wise. They crawl away into a quiet corner and lick their wounds and do not rejoin the world until they are whole once more.” — Agatha Christie

“A boy can learn a lot from a dog: obedience, loyalty, and the importance of turning around three times before lying down.” — Robert Benchley

“A dog reflects the family life. Whoever saw a frisky dog in a gloomy family, or a sad dog in a happy one? Snarling people have snarling dogs, dangerous people have dangerous ones.” — Arthur Conan Doyle

“I would like to see anyone, prophet, king or God, convince a thousand cats to do the same thing at the same time.” — Neil Gaiman

“A cat has absolute emotional honesty: human beings, for one reason or another, may hide their feelings, but a cat does not.” — Ernest Hemingway

“Owners of dogs will have noticed that, if you provide them with food and water and shelter and affection, they will think you are God. Whereas owners of cats are compelled to realize that, if you provide them with food and water and affection, they draw the conclusion that they are God.” — Christopher Hitchens

“Once you have had a wonderful dog, a life without one is a life diminished.” — Dean Koontz

“When you feel lousy, puppy therapy is indicated.” — Sarah Paretsky

“Everything I know I learned from dogs.” — Nora Roberts

“All his life he tried to be a good person. Many times, however, he failed. For after all, he was only human. He wasn’t a dog.” — Charles M. Schulz

“Happiness is a warm puppy.” – Charles M. Schulz

“A dog…is a bond between strangers.” — John Steinbeck

“Ever consider what our dogs must think of us? I mean, here we come back from the grocery store with the most amazing haul—chicken, pork, half a cow. They must think we’re the greatest hunters on earth!” — Anne Tyler

“If you hold a cat by the tail you learn things you cannot learn any other way.” — Mark Twain

“If you pick up a starving dog and make him prosperous, he will not bite you. This is the principal difference between a dog and man.” — Mark Twain

“The dog is a gentleman; I hope to go to his heaven not man’s.” — Mark Twain

And in case this sounds too sentimental, consider these words from Winston Churchill: “I am fond of pigs. Dogs look up to us. Cats look down on us. Pigs treat us as equals.”

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