Category Archives: Writing

The Art Of The Em Dash Interruption

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By John Gilstrap

For fiction to work–for it to feel right–countless tiny elements have to come together in a manner so seamless that readers are unaware that they are being manipulated. Clues have to be planted and red herrings launched so subtly that they don’t draw attention to themselves. And then there’s pacing–the key to providing all the information the reader needs to know in a way that doesn’t stop the story for a data dump. This can get particularly tricky in the middle of the story, when characters have to reveal details to each other that the reader already knows.

Over the years, I have developed a shortcut technique that I call the “em-dash interruption.” Here’s what it looks like:

Jake strolled into the kitchen, still buttoning his shirt. “Smells good in here. Are we–“

 

“You left the water on all last night,” Angie snapped. “Now the roses are overwatered, and they’re not going–“

 

“I’m sorry. I got the call from Aunt Lucy last night and I guess I–“

 

“You’re always sorry, Jake. I don’t ask you to do a lot around here but every time I do, there’s always something . . .”

 

He knew the speech by heart. How could he not? They’d had it twice a day since–

 

“And it has nothing to do with the baby! I know that’s what you think. I know that’s what everyone thinks!”

I just made this up on the fly so you know as much about what’s actually happening in the scene as I do, but the point I’m trying to make is that you don’t need complete sentences to tell a story–especially when the details of the dialogue are secondary to the mood of the scene. In the example, we don’t really care what Angie is cooking or what is going to happen to the overwatered roses or even what Aunt Lucy wanted to talk about. What’s important is the fact that this couple is in crisis and there’s a way to convey the crisis in a snappy way.

Note, too, that I used the em dash to interrupt narrative as well as dialogue. I do that all the time. Here’s an example from Zero Sum, the Grave book to be released next month:

They weren’t upset that his boy had been killed—no, they didn’t give a shit about that. If it had been the original team of agents, they would have—

            Wait. Why weren’t they the original team of agents? 

Here, we have a character working through a problem in his head, asking questions, testing theories, and the thought process leads the character to have a lightbulb moment (the em-dash interruption of his own thoughts) that leads him to ask a question that is critical to the plot.

I’ve used the same technique to introduce a startling moment for the character. Again, making it up on the fly:

Charlie needed to find himself another job, something better suited to his intellect. Security guard money wasn’t bad but goodness gracious, all he did was wander hallways and rattle doorknobs. Same doorknobs every hour, every night, and always locked. They could hire a trained monkey to do this gig. Hell, they could hire a trained–

 

What was that? Something made a noise from behind the

Here, we take a couple dozen words to anchor the reader with a character and then zing ’em with an em-dash interruption to jump the story along.

So, what do you think? Does this make sense? The blog entry is a bit short today, because I figured I covered the topic, and–

Wow!

 

Found But Not Lost:
A Dusty Ode To Our Genre

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By PJ Parrish

This is a story about treasure hunting.

I am a sucker for estate sales. We have a lot of them in summer up here in northern Michigan. My town, Traverse City, is awash in splendid old Victorians left over from the days of the logger barons. And we have hundreds of listing barns crammed with family flotsam.

Among the cool stuff I’ve gathered: A set of ten Baccarat champagne coups (eight bucks) Two circa-Forties prints of gaudy cockatoos from a Miami Beach hotel (how they got in a Michigan basement I can’t guess). A Paint-by-Numbers of a naughty can-can dancer. A pathetic sock monkey (I have a huge collection, the uglier the monkey the better). And a dirt-encrusted mantel clock from the Fifites that keeps perfect time.

But yesterday, I struck gold. An old antique store was going out of business here. You know the place — an old barn stuffed rafters-to-basement with jade jewelry, molting hats, rusty New Era potato chip tins, lethal looking pitchforks and creepy one-armed baby dolls.

I spotted a handsome looking leather book. It had heft and smelled like rotting candy.

A digression: That great old book smell? You’re not imagining it. It comes from the chemical breakdown of the books after they’re exposed to light and heat for a long time. The break down releases volatile organic compounds that create a palette of those old book smells — mainly almonds and vanilla but also toluene, which produces coffee overtones.

That old book smell has an official name — bibliosmia. In other words, what you’re smelling is the scent of a book slowly dying.

I had to save this one. The title on the spine was The Omnibus of Crime. The name was Dorothy Sayers. It is a compilation of detective stories she gathered together. It is pristine, first edition. I Googled it on my phone and it goes for about $300 among collectors. It bought it for $20.

It wasn’t until I got home that I found a leaflet stuck inside. It is the original Book-of-the-Month Club News. Sayers’ anthology was the August 1929 selection. Its price was $3. I think I got a bargain.

The book is over 1,200 pages and many of the stories are by names lost in the haze of our genre’s history. But there are some famous folks — Poe, Doyle, Stoker, Dickens, H.G. Wells, Joseph Conrad, Ambrose Bierce. Did you know Aldous Huxley wrote a short story called “The Giocanda Smile”? From that story:

Whatever she said was always said with intensity. She leaned forward, aimed, so to speak, like a gun, and fired her words. Bang! the charge in her soul was ignited, the words whizzed forth from the narrow barrel of her mouth. She was a machine-gun, riddling her hostess with sympathy.

The book is arranged historically, from the seminal roots of our genre in Latin, Greek and “oriental” primitives, logs through the “modern” contributions of Poe and Doyle, lurks through the shadows of vampires, witches and ghosts and ends with a section titled “Tales of Cruelty and Blood.”

Can’t wait to get to that part.

But I’ve just cracked the book, and first lingered in Sayer’s inspired introduction. I have to share my favorite passage from that intro, wherein Sayers argues why detective stories are, in the words of the Book of the Month Club editors, “sufficiently dignified”:

There is one respect, at least, in which the detective story has an advantage over every other kind of novel. It possesses an Aristotelian perfection of beginning, middle and end. A definite and single problem is set, worked out, and solved; its conclusion is not arbitrarily conditioned by marriage or death. It has the rounded (although limited) perfection of a troilet.

Okay, I looked up a couple words for you:

Aristotelian: Coming from the philosophy of Aristotle, an emphasis upon deduction and upon investigation of concrete and particular things and situations.

No argument from us on that, right?

Troilet: A poem form, invented by 13th century French minstrels. It has — get ready folks — eight lines, with the first line being repeated as the fourth and seventh lines and rhyming with third and fifth, while the second line serves as a refrain in the eighth and final line and rhymes with the sixth. Most commonly written in iambic tetrameter but almost as often in iambic pentameter.

Let’s just say that Sayers is trying to tell us that a good detective story has a nice structure.

I can’t tell you much more about my book yet. The editors of the Book-of-the-Month-Club news are sort of stuffy and borderline snide in their introduction, burbling on about how the English write better detective stories than Americans, that the Russians had a влюбился on Sherlock Holmes and that Sayer’s collection is “an agreeable summer’s afternoon reading.” (Is that like a Beach book?). They finally, at the end, loosen their man buns and concede:

“But come! The Omnibus of Crime is intended to be enjoyed. We can think of no book that offers so sure and innocent a nirvana for an active mind.”

I guess that means they thought it was sorta kinda okay to like detective stories. I’d rather you listen to what Dorothy Sayers has to say about our genre. Her words are as relevant today as they were in 1929.

Man, not satisfied with the mental confusion and unhappiness to be derived from contemplating the cruelties of life and the riddle of the universe, delights to occupy his leisure moments with puzzles and bugaboos….The fact remains that if you search the second-hand book stalls for cast-off literature, you will find fewer mystery stories than any other kind of book. Theology and poetry, philosophy and numismatics, love-stories and biography, [man] discards [these books] as easily as his old razor blades. But Sherlock Holmes is cherished and read and re-read, till the covers fall off and the pages crumble to fragments.

Keep searching those second-hand book stalls. We endure, crime dogs.

влюбился = Russian for man crush

Those Stubborn Characters

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So, Hopeful Author, you came up with a great plot and over the course of several months, or years, you’ve hammer out 30,000 words in fine order. With the first act written, polished over and over, and massaged into a form you can live with, the next phase begins.

It’s the pesky second act that gives me headaches, and not because it’s hard to write, but because the whole world seems to slow down, and the words come slow. You might have experienced it also, when the universe conspires to keep you from writing, and all those carefully crafted characters develop minds of their own and refuse to move, lounging around, drinking coffee and puffing cigarettes.

“I can’t think of anything to write when I get to that point!”

This was a comment I heard the last time I talked with a group of writers. The young woman’s voice was full of tension, and frustration.

“I have a suggestion.”

The assemblage waited, pens poised…and in one instance, a woman held her fingers over the home keys on her laptop’s keyboard.

“Start a new chapter and throw a couple of your characters together. Start a conversation, or give them a nudge, and see what happens.”

Raised hands.

“That’s all?”

A voice came from the back. “What if it doesn’t go anywhere? I will have wasted those hours.”

“If nothing else, you’ve finished an exercise in creative writing. Delete those sentences, or pages, and give it another shot.”

Frowns. Eyebrows came together in dark lines over hooded eyes.

“Does that work?”

“It does for me, and remember, there’s nothing concrete about creative writing.” I quoted Miss Adams, my high school English teacher who still whispers advice in my ear on occasion. “Put words on paper, and those words will lead to others.”

Another question from under a raised hand sent us off into a new direction. “I keep working on this scene, but it won’t develop.”

“Maybe you’re trying to make your characters do something that’s not necessary at that time. It could be you’re wanting them to go against their fictional codes. Listen to your subconscious. Stop trying to make them do what you want, and approach it from another direction.”

“I didn’t know there would be so many complications.”

“None of us did when we started out.”

I experienced a similar lag this week. I finished the first act of a novel contracted with a new publisher, satisfied with the plot and excited about where the story was going. Then it happened. Act II refused to move.

I went back and read those pages and realized I hadn’t utilized a character to her full extent. It was time for her to walk on stage. We needed to hear her story. Putting her into an uncomfortable situation with little support from anyone she knew, I watched Victoria’s back stiffen with resolve and she moved the story forward in a direction I hadn’t anticipated.

The story is rolling along today, and the tension is rising as fast as this summer’s temperature. Don’t let that second act slow you down. Once you’re through to the other side at around 60,000 words, it’ll be a downhill race to the conclusion.

Write away!

Reader Friday-Revisions

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Ah, revisions, revisions . . . music to our ears, yes?

Maybe, but today we’re going to talk about a different kind of revision. Not the kind that produces blood, sweat, and tears. Not the kind that makes us want to throw our notebooks and laptops against the nearest tree and go for a long walk.

What, then?

Which path do I follow now?

All of life on earth is just one big revision. And for some of us, there came a time when we read something that changed us forever, sent us down a new path, or brought the next step we needed to take into clear focus.

Here’s the question for us to ponder, and hopefully share today:

Tell us about a book or story that changed your life, revised your thinking, maybe sent you down a new path you hadn’t considered before, or thought you could never negotiate.

(Mine will be in the comments.)

Editing Tricks of the Trade

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Editing Tricks of the Trade
Terry Odell

Playing Tricks With EditingHitting “The End” on the manuscript doesn’t mean you’re finished. Once I have the full manuscript done, and have let it marinate for a while, it’s time to read it from the beginning. I wrote about my process several years ago, and I hope you don’t mind a repeat performance here. Some of my “Tricks of the Trade” might be helpful, either as a refresher for TKZers who’ve been here a long time, or for those who’ve joined more recently.

I finished my personal edits on the manuscript of my next book, Double Intrigue, and I thought I’d share some of the tips I’ve discovered over the years for that final pass before turning the manuscript in.

We want to submit the cleanest possible manuscript to our editors, agents, or the sales channels. By the time most of us hit “The End”, we’ve been staring at the manuscript on a computer screen for months. We probably know passages by heart, we know what it’s supposed to say, and it’s very easy to miss things.

What we need to do if fool our brain into thinking it’s never seen these words before. My tricks:

Trick #1– Print the manuscript. It’s amazing how much different it will look on paper.

Trick #2 – Use a different font. If you’ve been staring at TNR, choose a sans-serif font. In fact, this is a good time to use the much-maligned Comic Sans.

Trick #3 – Change the format. You want the lines to break in different places. I recommend printing it in 2 columns, or at least changing the margins. That will totally change the line scan, and it’s amazing how many repeated words show up when the words line up differently.

marked up manuscript printed in 2 columns

Trick #4 – Read away from your computer. Another room, or at least the other side of the room.

The above are all “Fool the Brain” tricks. Moving on to my basic process.

Trick #5 – Read from start to finish.

As I read, I have a notepad, highlighters, red pen, and a pad of sticky notes. This pass isn’t where I fix things; it’s where I make notes of things to fix. I don’t want to disrupt the flow of the read by stopping to check out if the character drove a red Toyota or a green Chevy. I have a foam core board by my chair, where I’ll post my sticky notes. Also, because it’s a hard copy, there’s not simple “Find” function.

When repeated words or phrases jump out, I note them on a sticky for a future search-and-destroy mission. I’ll circle or highlight words that could be stronger, or places where I might be able to come up with a metaphor that doesn’t sound writerly.

I’m also critical of “does this move the story?” as I’m reading. The beautiful prose might not be all that beautiful when reading it in the context of the entire novel. Don’t be afraid to use that red pen. On the flip side, you can also note where a scene needs more depth, or something needs foreshadowing. Are characters behaving consistently? Or do their personalities change because the author needs them to do something for the plot.

Another thing I look for is named characters. Naming a character tells the reader “this is an important person.” Do they play enough of a role in the story to earn a name? Can they be deleted, or referred to generically?

Once I’ve reached the end, I’ll go back to the computer and deal with the notes I’ve made.

The last pre-submission editing chore for me—and it’s a tedious one—is to let the computer point out all the clunkers I’ve missed. Because, despite all the ‘trickery,’ the story is still familiar enough that I don’t catch everything.

For this, I use a program called “Smart Edit.” (I might do a full post on this software another time.) I use the version that’s a Word add-on, and run its checks. I know I have my standard crutch words, but it seems that every manuscript brings a few new ones that I lean on too heavily.

Once I’m finished with the Smart Edit purges, the manuscript goes off to my editor. My work up front means she should be able to spend more time looking at the story, and less time dealing with clunky prose.

The last step for me, which comes right before I’m ready to publish, is to let Word read the manuscript to me. I’ve talked about that before, and using ears instead of eyes is another way to trick the brain into thinking the story is new. And yes, I still find things to fix.

What about you? How do you deal with whipping your manuscript into shape before submitting it?

How can he solve crimes if he’s not allowed to investigate?

Gordon Hepler, Mapleton’s Chief of Police, has his hands full. A murder, followed by several assaults. Are they related to the expansion of the community center? Or could it be the upcoming election? Gordon and mayor wannabe Nelson Manning have never seen eye to eye. Gordon’s frustrations build as the crimes cover numerous jurisdictions, effectively tying his hands.
Available now.

New! Find me at Substack with Writings and Wanderings.

Terry Odell is an award-winning author of Mystery and Romantic Suspense, although she prefers to think of them all as “Mysteries with Relationships.”

Six Questions to Ask Beta Readers

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by Debbie Burke

@burke_writer

Cover by Brian Hoffman

Whew!

I just typed “The End” on the draft of Fruit of the Poisonous Tree, the ninth book in my Tawny Lindholm Thriller series.

But “The End” doesn’t mean THE END. Far from it.

Now the fun begins.

Print out the manuscript.

Pro Tip: print the hard copy in a different font than the one used onscreen. Errors and typos pop out more visibly.

Grab the red pen and let it bleed all over the pages. Look for inconsistencies, plot holes, chronology problems, dangling subplots, name or description changes (blue eyes to brown, blond hair to auburn), etc.

Oops. I changed one character’s name from “Fram” to “Framson” and hit “replace all.” But I forgot to put a space on either side of the name. Therefore, every time the letters “fram” appeared, it was changed to “Framson.” The same petite frame now read The same petite Framson.

Once you transfer corrections from the hard copy into the digital copy, it’s time to send to beta readers. Their fresh eyes are invaluable because the author is too close to the story and can’t judge it objectively.

How can you help beta readers help you?

  1. Choose beta readers carefully.

They don’t necessarily need to be other writers, but they do need to be avid readers. Their function is to assess your book as if they plucked it off the bookstore shelf.

Find people who read in your genre. You probably shouldn’t choose a fan of blood-and-guts action thrillers to beta read a picture book for young readers.

But don’t eliminate a possible beta simply because they don’t often read your genre. A viewpoint from a different perspective frequently gives additional dimension your story wouldn’t otherwise have.

  1. Find people you can depend on to read in a timely manner. If you have a deadline, let them know it.
  2. Find appropriate experts.

Do your books have legal, medical, law enforcement, professional, technical, and/or historical elements?

Are you writing about a society, nationality, culture, ethnicity, religion, or other group that you’re not familiar with?

If so, ask for an expert’s help to make your depictions authentic.

Experts are often busy professionals in their field and may not have time to read the entire book. You can send them select passages that you’d like them to review.

For instance, in Deep Fake Double Down, I wanted short, understandable descriptions about how to create and detect deep fakes, but not too many details to bog the story down. I sent several short excerpts to the expert (say that three times fast). He made suggestions and corrected out-of-date information. The review only took him an hour (including our phone conversation) and my story had accurate details.

  1. Ask specific questions.

Do character actions seem plausible and realistic?

Is the plot interesting? Can you follow it?

Does the writing flow smoothly?

Were you confused? Please note where.

Did you lose interest in places? Please note where.

Are there dangling threads that need to be wrapped up?

Please note anything that bothered you.

If you are concerned about particular issues, let betas know so they’re on the lookout.

5. Series writers need to consider additional factors when asking for feedback from beta readers.

Are your books a series?  Or are they serials?

Generally, a series (Sherlock Holmes, Sue Grafton’s Alphabet Series) features continuing characters in a common location, during a similar time frame, often with consistent themes. Each book stands alone with a self-contained plot arc of beginning, middle, end. A reader does not necessarily have to read the books in order.

PublishDrive.com defines serials as:

“…literary works published in sequential installments rather than as complete, standalone books. A serial is a continuing narrative that must be read in the proper sequence to understand the plot.”

Serial examples are The Hunger Games trilogy, Harry Potter (seven books), and Breaking Bad on TV.

Serials can be:

Duology (2 books)

Trilogy (3)

Tetralogy (4)

Pentalogy (5)

Hexology (6)

Heptology (7)

Octology (8)

Ennealogy (9)

Decology (10)

For this post, I only talk about series, not serials.

Generally, readers prefer to read series books in order even though that’s not necessary.

With each book, series writers need to establish the ongoing characters and their relationships to each other, the world where the story takes place, and the time frame.

My Tawny Lindholm Thriller series features investigator Tawny Lindholm and attorney Tillman Rosenbaum. All books (except one) take place in Montana. A common theme is justice will be done (although not necessarily in the courtroom!). Each is written as a standalone.

In the first book, Instrument of the Devil, Tawny is a 50-year-old recent widow who unwittingly becomes entangled in a terrorist plot to destroy the electric grid. Tillman is the attorney who keeps her from going to prison, then hires her to be his investigator.

Although their relationship arc changes and evolves through the series, the plot of each book is separate and self-contained.

For series authors, the balancing act is always how much review is needed to orient new readers vs. too much rehashing from past books that bores ongoing readers.

My regular betas know the series history. But with each new book, I seek out at least one fresh reader who hasn’t read prior books. For that person, I ask specific questions like:

Are relationships among characters clear and understandable?

Can you follow the plot easily?

When events from past books are referred to, can you still follow the current story?

Are past references confusing or unclear?

Do you want more information or clarification?

  1. What about spoiler alerts in a series? Over a number of books, continuing characters often undergo changes in marital/relationship status, children, mental or physical abilities, and even death. They can move to a different location. They shift jobs or functions.

The overall theme may even evolve. One great example is Sue Coletta’s Mayhem series. Hero Shawnee spends several books under attack from serial killer, Mr. Mayhem. Then (spoiler alert) they become unlikely allies as eco-warriors against common enemies that threaten wildlife.

Some spoilers are inevitable. The most obvious is the hero survives the life-or-death catastrophe from the prior book. Otherwise, s/he wouldn’t be around for succeeding stories.

Where does a series author draw the line about giving away secrets?

In Fruit of the Poisonous Tree, I wrangled with a difficult spoiler and even asked for advice from TKZ readers.

The surprise ending from the third book, Eyes in the Sky, comes back to haunt the ongoing characters in the ninth book. I had to weigh whether it was more important to preserve the surprise from Eyes or tell a current story built around that in Fruit. Ultimately, I gave up worrying about revealing it and wrote the new story that demanded to be told.

Fruit of the Poisonous Tree is now out to beta readers, and I’m interested in their reactions to this spoiler.

~~~

Beta readers are important friends for writers to have. To thank them, I always acknowledge them in the published book, give them a signed copy, and, if possible, take them out for lunch or dinner, or send them a small gift.

Make your beta reader’s job as easy and painless as possible. The resulting rewards are well worth it!

~~~

TKZers: Have you used beta readers? Any ideas for other questions to ask them?

Have you been a beta reader? Did the author include questions or concerns for you to watch for? Did that help?

~~~

Deep Fake Double Down was chosen as a Top Pick for the Silver Falchion award, sponsored by Killer Nashville, and was the Mystery Finalist for the BookLife Prize.

Available at major online booksellers.

 

Visit debbieburkewriter.com for more information and release dates for Fruit of the Poisonous Tree.

Clues

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Clue – noun — anything that serves to guide or direct in the solution of a problem, mystery, etc.

* * *

According to the online Merriam-Webster dictionary

‘The word clue was originally a variant spelling of clew, meaning “ball of thread or yarn.” Our modern sense of clue, “guide to the solution of a mystery,” grows out of a motif in myth and folklore, the ball of thread that helps in finding one’s way out of a maze. ‘

 

The “ball of thread” mentioned in the M-W etymology refers to one of my favorite stories in Greek mythology.

The Clue of Ariadne

It all started when there was a war between Crete and Athens. Crete won the war, and the rather sadistic King Minos of Crete exacted a horrible punishment on the Athenians. He required that the king of Athens periodically send seven young men and seven young women to the Isle of Crete to become dinner for the horrible monster, the Minotaur.

The Big M was housed inside a labyrinth constructed by none other than the ingenious Daedalus.  The labyrinth was so large and complex that it served as a prison for the Minotaur. When the poor Athenian sacrifices arrived, they would be forced into the maze. At some point in their wanderings, they’d encounter the Minotaur, and things wouldn’t go well for them.

After this horrific nonsense went on for a few years, a young man named Theseus, the son of the Athenian king, decided enough was enough. He vowed to put a stop to the awful goings-on by sailing to Crete, entering the labyrinth, and killing the Minotaur. That was a noble plan, but it had one problem: the labyrinth was so complicated, he probably wouldn’t find his way out.

That’s when our heroine, Ariadne, entered the picture. Ariadne was the daughter of King Minos, and she fell in love with the dashing Theseus. He promised to marry her if she could figure out a way to get him back out of the labyrinth after he offed Mr. M. (At this point, I feel compelled to say that without Ariadne, Theseus was clueless.)

I truly love simple solutions to complicated problems, and I especially admire people who come up with them. That Ariadne was a problem-solver for the ages. She handed her true love a ball of thread, known as a clew, and told him to unwind it as he wandered around in the labyrinth. Then after he killed the Minotaur, he could just rewind it as he followed it out. Brilliant. And it worked!

Sounds like a Happy Ever After kind of ending, eh? Unfortunately, that scumbag Theseus broke his promise and didn’t marry the beautiful Ariadne, but I think she won out in the end. She got to go down in history as the very first mystery solver, and that’s endeared her to millions of readers through the years, whether they knew her name or not.

* * *

Clues in a modern mystery are a little more sophisticated than a simple ball of thread, and detectives do more (at least we hope they do) than just wander around until they find the culprit.

However, there is one major similarity in our mysteries to the story of Theseus: the detective and the readers are led into a labyrinth. Only this one is constructed by the author. The answer to the mystery is within the maze, but the detective needs to know which clues to follow and which are red herrings.

I liked some of the clue categories listed on zaraaltair.com:

Physical clues: A gun or knife left at the scene of the murder. Maybe a button torn off. Of course, the villain can plant a clue at the scene to misdirect the detective.

Biological clues: Strands of hair, DNA, fingerprints.

Psychological clues: Profilers try to identify the type of person likely to commit a murder, but the detective uses his/her own knowledge of human nature to decide on suspects.

Timing clues: This is one of my favorites. Alibis are established based on the time of death, but clever villains might be able to manipulate that piece of evidence. A smashed watch is always a good clue that might be a red herring.

Clues of Omission: Another favorite. Something should be evident, but it isn’t. There’s a famous example from the Sherlock Holmes mystery “The Adventure of Silver Blaze” by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. Holmes (naturally) notices something everyone else has missed.

Gregory (Scotland Yard detective): Is there any other point to which you would wish to draw my attention?
Holmes: To the curious incident of the dog in the night-time.
Gregory: The dog did nothing in the night-time.
Holmes: That was the curious incident.

 

 

I don’t know about you, but if I can include clues in such a way the reader finishes the story and slaps him/herself on the side of the head, thinking, “I should have seen it,” then I’ll be happy.

* * *

So TKZers: How do you decide what clues to have in your mystery novels? What clues have inspired you?

 

In Lacey’s Star, there’s only one  clue to the murder, but it’s just a child’s note. It couldn’t be important. Could it?

Lacey’s Star is a Silver Falchion Award Top Pick (Cozy Mystery) at Killer Nashville.

On sale now at  Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, Google Play, or Apple Books.

Reader Friday-Isn’t It Romantic?

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Romance is a staple of human existence. It’s been that way since the beginning of life on planet earth. It looks different in every era and culture, but it’s there.

 

 

My husband and I met at a 7-11 store, where I worked, and he stopped in to get a cold drink on his way to a service call. We met on November 11, 1987, and married on January 23, 1988. And I have not used a 7-11 or that date in my stories–yet.

So, TKZ friends and lovers, here’s your question for this Reader Friday episode:  How did you and your significant other meet?And, have you used that time and place in your own writing?

We have company from Atlanta today, so I’ll be in and out. I have a fancy-schmancy phone, though, so I’ll be lurking around the TKZ halls spying on y’all.     🙂

***

 

Two novels which explore the uncertainty of life on earth, and how our relationships with each other provide joy in the midst of that uncertainty. Available on Amazon, B&N, and ThriftBooks.

 

Not My Type

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A 17-year-old gamer who goes by mythicalrocket holds the world record for the fastest typing speed – 305 words per minute for 15 seconds. According to news stories, rocket also typed “The Hobbit,” a tome with more than 400 pages, “in less than six hours.”

Rocket reached these supersonic speeds on an Apex Pro keyboard.

Pretty darn good, rocket. Now let me tell you what typing was like when I was in high school.

We used manual typewriters. In my touch-typing class, I reached the astonishing speed of 45 words per minute – with an amazing 47 errors. I didn’t have a lightweight high-tech keyboard, either. The keys on a manual were heavy and you had to pound them.

I used a Remington typewriter, a green tanklike beast. Talk about heavy metal – in the late 1960s typewriters weighed between 25 and 40 pounds. A professional typist could achieve 80 words per minute on these monsters, with no errors.

So why I am telling you about my pathetic 45/47?

I worked hard to screw up my typing. Back then, careers for women were rare. We were supposed to get married and have kids. Before the kids arrived, we could work as teachers, nurses or secretaries.

Nothing wrong with those professions, but they weren’t for me. I wanted to be a reporter. I figured if men didn’t have to learn to type, neither did I. Some part of my brain thought this was the way to equality.

After college, when I got my first job at a newspaper in 1970s, I was surrounded by men who could only type with two fingers, a process known as “hunt and peck.” I was proud to be one of these incompetent typists.

We typed our stories on cheap newsprint, the stuff that’s now used for packing.

Manual typewriters had a lot of disadvantages. There was no spell check, so if we made a mistake, we x-ed over it, or corrected it in pencil when we finished typing.

If we wanted to move a paragraph, there was no highlight and paste, or cut and paste button. We had to cut and paste for real, and we couldn’t use Elmer’s, glue guns or glue sticks.

First, we’d find the scissors (or steal our neighbor’s), then cut out the paragraph we wanted to move, grab the glue bottle with a brush, smear yellow glue on the paper, and glue in the new paragraph.

Since our news stories were often written on deadline, glue bottles could easily overturn, leaving yellow tumorous masses on our desks.

One more fun fact about manual typewriters. The only way we could get copies was with carbon paper, which got on your clothes and hands. Carbon paper was inserted between two pieces of copy paper, making a sort of sandwich. I was skilled at putting the carbon paper in wrong and carboning the back of my story.

No point in asking to use the office copy machine. They were expensive and restricted to upper management. I’d have a better chance of getting a pint of blood out of the managing editor than using the precious office copy machine.

On the internet, there are typing communities, and competitions for the fastest typists. Here’s mythicalrocket at work. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GGwKCi4FX84

I love watching those fingers fly over the lightweight high-tech keyboards.

That’s impressive.

But I’d like to see a real old-school speed competition on manual typewriters: deft digits manipulating unmanageable metal.

That’s the key to a real competition.

NOW HEAR THIS: Many of my audio books are free with a 3-month Audible trial. Including my Angela Richman mystery, DEATH GRIP. https://tinyurl.com/393ywnj2

The Myth About Time

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By John Gilstrap

In the two years leading up to the pandemic, I flogged my social media accounts pretty hard, producing and promoting over 30 videos on writing and then posting them on my YouTube channel. Each new video linked to previous videos, and then I posted promotional links on Facebook and Twitter. I picked up enough subscribers and viewers to monetize the channel, bringing in enough extra scratch to fund a Mickey-D’s drive through every six months or so.

Then Covid hit and brought with it social fractures that left me stunned. We avoid politics on this site, and I don’t want to relitigate all that passed during those awful years, but suffice to say they left me Angry. Notice the capital A. I’ve learned since that friends were worried about me.

The saving grace for me was that we had a dream house to build out in God’s wilderness. All those selections and decisions were exactly the kind distractions I needed to distance myself from the urban insanity that I would soon leave behind and embrace the rural calm that awaited us in West Virginia. Our dreams of Utopia were shaken pretty hard when out son suffered a workplace accident that broke his leg in 10 places, but that crisis also passed–just about the time we got the new puppy.

Oh, I should mention that January of 2020 marked the beginning of my first-ever (and last-ever) contract to write two books per year for two years. With my emotions on edge and my calendar packed, something had to go. Thus, no new videos on the channel in the past two and a half years.

I’d like to start doing them again, but . . . here it comes . . . I don’t have the time.

And that is 100% a lie. I have the same 24 hours in every day that I had when I toiled away at a Big Boy job, zig-zagging across the country making speeches and providing consulting services while running a 7-person department and still writing a book per year. The difference is, back then, my writing hours were from dinnertime till 11pm every night. I rarely if ever watched television. I just worked, whether one job or the other. That was the schedule for 11 books over 11 years.

When it comes to starting the videos again, yes, it’s something I would like to do, but clearly I don’t want it enough to give up unclaimed downtime. Empirical evidence shows that I would rather go to shooting range than make a video, and when that’s done, I’d rather clean the guns. When it’s not so stinkin’ hot, playing Frisbee with Kimber is more important, and so is just hanging out with my bride.

“Where do I find the time?”

If you lurk around any of the writer-oriented sites on Facebook or elsewhere on the internet, you’ve seen the question posed dozens of times: “I have a story in my head that I want to get on paper, but I just don’t have the time. Between my work schedule and the kids and their athletics, I just can’t do it.”

In the words of that great philosopher, Col. Sherman Potter, horse fritters!

The time is there. Heck, the time it took for the complainer to post the complaint (and check back three dozen times to see what the responses were) is time they chose not to dedicate to writing. So is that half hour they spent playing Wordle in the morning and the hours they spent playing video games or watching the baseball game on television.

Time is a constant. It cannot be lost and it cannot be found. It just is. Each of us finds the way to prioritize that which is important to us. For me, family is always the top priority, so back in the days of early books, soccer games and endless concerts and recitals always took precedence over anything book-related, because those things were fleeting and fixed in space. One and done. If you miss it, it’s gone forever. But the book still needed to get done. The four hours of productivity I lost that night could be made up in 30-minute increments over the next writing sessions.

Truth can be harsh, but I think we need to be truthful with ourselves. When you hear a friend complaining that they don’t have time to do a thing, and you sense that they’re truly looking for a solution, ask them what less valuable time suck they are willing to give up to make room for the new thing. Hint: I know many people who never watch television and do very well on only five hours of sleep.

It’s all about choices.