Photo by Dimitri Houtteman on Unsplash

The best-laid plans…

I was so proud of myself for writing today’s blog ahead of time and finishing it on Monday, March 16. It was supposed to be about the ways in which authors could spend their time while dealing with all of the hoo-hah about social distancing and the like. The feeling lasted until Thursday, March 19, when the wondrous and wonderful Jordan Dane posted her blog titled “A Writer’s Guide to Surviving Social Distancing and Quarantine.” 

Whoops. Jordan’s post was so much better than what I had prepared — no surprise there — that I couldn’t even be frustrated. That said, one might expect that such a state of affairs would have put me into a state of panic, given that my deadline was near. Well,  contraire, mon frere. I have it covered. There is always something, and something else, to discuss. 

I am of the age at which one may find oneself attending at least one organ recital on a weekly basis, if not more often. By “organ recital” I refer to one of those gatherings which takes place — or at least used to until recently — at a coffee shop or diner, where a group of duffers might gather and trade war stories about their latest hospitalizations, surgeries, doctor visits, blood work results, and gradual deterioration. I don’t want this to be that at all. But here goes.  

I have for a few years experienced occasional episodes where I’ve been awakened at night by knocking. Two knocks, to be exact. My impression has in each instance been that someone is knocking at my front door. My bedroom and its window are in front of the house on the second story. I leave an outside light on at night as well. I accordingly can quickly obtain an excellent view of the front yard. I never see anything, such as a neighborhood urchin dashing madly way, following these knocking episodes. I also go downstairs and check to see if possibly Steve Harvey, Michael Myers, out-of-season after curfew trick-or-treaters, or missionaries are there. Nope. Nope. Nope. Nope.

These episodes don’t happen frequently or regularly. I can go a year or more without one and then experience one every few weeks. In the past, I have forgotten about these episodes until I have had another. After experiencing one earlier this week, however, I did a little research and discovered that I apparently have something called EHS.

Photo courtesy quickmeme.com

What is EHS? It’s “exploding head syndrome.” EHS is described as being benign, and it is, in my experience. The condition was first noted in medical literature in 1876 by Dr. Silas Wier Mitchell but was given its charming name in 1988 by Dr. John M.S. Pinafo…er…Pierce.  Those who experience it hear loud noises and occasionally see flashes of light at the beginning or end of a sleep cycle. There is no medication for EHS but some prescription sleep aids have been reported anecdotally to be helpful. It doesn’t bother me enough to take Halcion or Ambien or one of those medications whose potential side-effects include walking down a highway disrobed while singing the soundtrack from Hamilton. It’s not worth it. 

EHS may have been around for quite a while. I found a British legend that solemnly declares that if someone is awakened by one phantom knock it meant that good fortune (Steve Harvey) was coming. If awakened by three, however, it meant that death (Michael Myers) was imminent.  The legend is moot, however, as to two knocks. Maybe hearing two knocks means that nothing will happen. I should be so lucky.

Have any of you heard of EHS or experienced it? My most experience has inspired me to fool around with writing a Cthulhu Mythos story, even though I don’t know what I’m doing with it.  Porter stumbled toward the front door, jumping each time the ponderous knock sounded. As he reached out to turn the doorknob Porter heard a slithering and hissing noise, as if hundreds of snakes were seeking entrance via the door hinges.  Porter tried to keep his voice steady as he yelled, “Get back, I say, get back! The Innsmouth Police are coming!” I might share it here if I finish it. Or not. In any event, be well and safe. Thanks for dropping by The Kill Zone, where you don’t need to call or knock first. 

Photo by mostafa meraji on Unsplash

Photo credit: jessie daniella – Unsplash

By Debbie Burke

@burke_writer

Welcome to today’s Brave Author who submitted a first page entitled Closure.

TKZ’s intrepid website wrangler, Lynne, included a note with this submission that the prologue occurs nearly two months after Chapter 1. That means the scene below is actually a flash forward, not a prologue, something to keep in mind as you read the submission. Please enjoy and we’ll discuss it on the other side.

Prologue

Sunday, December 31^st   9:19 PM

There was nowhere to run now.

Her head throbbed by now.  The agony blurred her vision as blood poured from the nasty gash just above her eye.

She cared little about that now.

Girl get it together, she thought to herself as she dragged her body—uncooperative legs and all—from behind a corner trash bin to the underside of the rusted stairwell.

“No one will find you, Reverend Sinclair.  It’s New Year’s Eve. And you’re about to die.”

The rush of pain exploded with every dreaded movement.

The hell I will, she thought, steeling her mind against the expectation of excruciating pain.  Her legs barely cooperated thanks to her foe’s quick thinking and lead pipe. As she dragged herself from one corner to the next, she suddenly spied an old vent partially covered by plywood.

“It’s over, Reverend Sinclair.  It’s finally over,” the faceless voice bellowed.

She opened her mouth, her mind searching for a retort.  Nothing came out. She needed to squeeze into that vent and in a hurry.  Somehow, grinding her teeth and clinching her bloodied fists, she managed to dislodge the board enough to squeeze through.

Every prayer she ever heard her grandmother pray ran through her mind.  She should have left things alone.

Then again, she couldn’t.  She was never one for that. Like sirens from a distant sea, the “things” had beckoned her, lured her into a whirlwind of unimaginable danger.  Her phone fell out when she bolted through the warehouse from the menace. Her bloodied knuckles, overworked from trying to take out a creaky door, prevented her from wiping the muddled mess from her cheeks.  Life had already stolen so much from her to begin with. Did she really have anything to lose at this point?

“My God,” she whispered, tears rolling down her face in a mingle of blood and dust from her secret abode.  Her body sore and her eyes heavy, Venus longed for rest. Only a flash of light through the crack of the board gave her hope.

“Light? Who is that?” she posited under her breath with a faint smile.  Hope flickered enough to dull the pain that shot from her left knee as she leaned closer to the peak through the splintered plywood.

“Thank you, Jesus…”

Her smile faded quickly when the answer to her question resounded with a crushing rejoinder.

Fire.

~~~

At TKZ, we encourage starting with action right off the bat and Brave Author has certainly done that. A woman named Reverend Venus Sinclair is fleeing from someone who has already caused her serious injury with a lead pipe and intends to murder her. A female cleric is an unusual and interesting character, not a typical protagonist. The premise that someone is trying to kill a woman of God is shocking and grabs a reader’s attention immediately. Well done!

There’s lots of vivid sensory detail—blood pouring from a nasty gash over her eye, legs weak and uncooperative because of intense pain, bloodied knuckles. The reader feels Venus’s agony and desperation as she scrambles to find a hiding place to escape her attacker.

So far so good.

But…action without context can be confusing and frustrating to readers. In this case, there’s too much excitement and not enough explanation.

It appears the author is starting at the brink of the story’s climax then intends to double back to the events that led to this point of crisis.

If that is the author’s intention, this page is not a prologue but rather a flash forward.

A prologue is a scene that happens before the current story begins.

A flash forward, or prolepsis if you want to sound really literary, happens in the future to foreshadow events that have not yet unfolded in the story. Here’s an explanation from k12reader.com:

A flash forward, on the other hand, is when some event that has yet to happen in the present narrative time intrudes. A flash forward are [sic] like foreshadowing in that both provide clues as to what will happen later on in a story. But foreshadowing gives only an impressionistic sense of future events, while a flash forward shows the reader or viewer exactly what the future holds in store, even though the reader may not have enough information to make sense of this detail yet. Sometimes, a flash forward is nothing more than an opening line that reveals a major event in the future. “In a week’s time, the Thomas family will be dead.”

I suggest the author delete the word “Prologue” and simply use date stamps to indicate time sequence.

Now let’s dig in to the writing. The main problems are overwriting, repetition, and lack of clarity.

There was nowhere to run now. – This is a decent opening line but now is used three times in three sentences. Suggest you cut the last two.

Cut repetitive descriptions of her injuries to leave more room for important context and setting information. You don’t need both throbbed and agony.

Her head throbbed, by now.  The agony blurred blurring her vision as blood poured from the nasty gash just above her eye.

She cared little about that now. Show this with her actions instead of telling.

Girl, get it together – take this opportunity to introduce her name. Venus, get it together.

Italics makes it clear she’s thinking. Delete she thought to herself.

uncooperative legs and legs barely cooperated are repetitious. The crucial point here is the attacker is armed with a lead pipe and has disabled her. Emphasize that.

from behind a corner trash bin to the underside of the rusted stairwell. – This is the first hint of where the scene is taking place but more detail would help ground the reader. I can’t visualize where she is. Is it a deserted alley behind her apartment building? The dark parking lot of her church? Withholding the location doesn’t increase tension but instead causes disorientation.

“No one will find you, Reverend Sinclair.  It’s New Year’s Eve. And you’re about to die.” Another strong line but, without attribution, it’s confusing. Who’s talking? You don’t necessarily have to reveal the person’s identity. Presumably that’s meant to come as a surprise revelation for the climax. But specify if the voice is male or female.

The rush of pain exploded with every dreaded movement and the expectation of excruciating pain are repetitive.

There’s a corner trash bin followed by she dragged herself from one corner to the next. More repetition plus it’s unclear—the corner of what? The trash bin? A building? A city block? Be specific so the reader can visualize where the action is taking place.

The hell I will is another strong line that shows her personality and determination.

she suddenly spied an old vent partially covered by plywood. Need more detail. How big is the vent? Large enough to crawl through? Where does it lead to? Into the basement of a warehouse? A restaurant? Her church?

“It’s over, Reverend Sinclair.  It’s finally over,” the faceless voice bellowed. Good line. The reader wants to find out what it is.

She opened her mouth, her mind searching for a retort.  Nothing came out. She needed to squeeze into that vent and in a hurry.  Somehow, grinding her teeth and clinching her bloodied fists, she managed to dislodge the board enough to squeeze through. Clench not clinch. More overwriting. Instead of having her think about what she’s going to do, go directly to the action. Her reasons are clear to the reader.

An alternative: She longed to shout a retort but that would give away her position. Instead, she clenched her teeth and yanked at the plywood with bloodied fingers. It barely moved but allowed her to squeeze inside, out of sight.

Every prayer she ever heard her grandmother pray ran through her mind.  She should have left things alone. 

Then again, she couldn’t.  She was never one for that. Like sirens from a distant sea, the “things” had beckoned her, lured her into a whirlwind of unimaginable danger.  These sentences bring the action to a dead stop. Plus they’re distracting. Sirens from a distant sea – this simile adds no meaningful context and further disorients the reader.

Condense her thoughts to the bare minimum like: Her grandmother’s prayers ran through her mind. She should have left things alone. But she couldn’t.

Her phone fell out – From her jeans? The pocket of her communion robes? Use this opportunity to further describe Venus’s appearance. Does she retrieve the phone? Why doesn’t she use it to call for help?

when she bolted through the warehouse from the menace. At last, a specific location is named—a warehouse. Add a couple of words of description. Is it vacant and echoing? Floor-to-ceiling shelves full of auto parts she can hide behind?

Bolted doesn’t ring true when, a second before, she was so crippled she had to drag herself.

Her bloodied knuckles, overworked from trying to take out a creaky door, prevented her from wiping the muddled mess from her cheeks. Delete repetitive description of her injuries. Would she really worry about wiping her face now?

Instead, concentrate on the creaky door. Creaky implies she tries to open it but you never show that. Where is the door? On the other side of the warehouse? Is it locked? Is it an escape or a dead end?

Life had already stolen so much from her to begin with. Did she really have anything to lose at this point? Again, these thoughts stop the action yet don’t reveal anything about why she’s now in this precarious position. Suggest you either delete these two sentences or add an intriguing detail that makes the reader curious.

Possibility: She’d lost her congregation and family. She had to prove her innocence before this maniac killed her.

“My God,” she whispered, tears rolling down her face in a mingle of blood and dust from her secret abode.  Her body sore and her eyes heavy, Venus longed for rest. Introduce her first name, Venus, earlier in the page. Delete repetitious description and focus on her silent, desperate call to God for help.

Only a flash of light through the crack of the board gave her hope. Another potentially strong line but confusing. A few sentences ago, she bolted, implying she ran and is now farther away from the vent she crawled through. Is the board the same plywood she pushed aside? Or is it part of the creaky door? You need to clear this up.

“Light? Who is that?” she posited under her breath with a faint smile.  Posited is a pretentious word that doesn’t belong. She wouldn’t speak out loud, even under her breath, and give away her position. Since she doesn’t know the source of the light, her reaction seems unrealistic because it’s more likely to be the attacker than, say, a rescuer with a flashlight.

Hope flickered enough to dull the pain that shot from her left knee as she leaned closer to the peak through the splintered plywood.  Delete extra the. Peak should be peek. I’m totally confused where she is now. Didn’t she bolt across the warehouse? Did she return to the plywood-covered vent? Or did she never leave there?

“Thank you, Jesus…” Good line but you need to give a plausible reason why she believes she’s now safe. Does she hear police sirens?

Her smile faded quickly when the answer to her question resounded with a crushing rejoinder. More overwriting. Resounded and rejoinder are jarring words that draw attention to themselves. Suggest you delete the entire line. Instead, focus on her brief instant of hope that’s immediately dashed.

Fire. Excellent scary development. If her pursuer can’t beat her to death with the lead pipe, he’ll burn down her hiding place. That’s great tension. But, again, it stretches plausibility unless you show that she’s cornered and trapped. Otherwise, presumably she would have time to escape out the other side of the warehouse.

Overview: 

Focus on painting a crystal-clear picture of the scene. You don’t need long descriptions but be sure the reader can visualize the alley (I’m presuming it’s an alley but still am not sure), the vent in the warehouse wall, and the inside of the warehouse. You mention the underside of the rusted stairwell. That is a good example of the type of specific detail I’m suggesting.

Establish her injuries right away. Example: She dragged her left leg, useless since the attacker had smashed the knee with a lead pipe. Blood from the nasty gash on her forehead obscured her sight. She wiped her eyes with bruised knuckles.

Then move on. The reader knows she’s seriously injured without constant, repetitive reminders of her pain.

Clarify Venus’s position and the choreography of her movements. When she’s outside, she’s dragging herself on the ground. Then she crawls through the vent. Once she’s inside the warehouse, show her movements so the reader can visualize exactly what she’s doing. Does she crawl? Stand up? Bolt?

Watch out for plausibility problems mentioned above. Is the scenario realistic? Are her thoughts and actions believable?

The title, Closure, is vague and general. If you work on using specific details in the story, you can probably find a stronger title.

Brave Author, once you clean up the writing and improve the clarity, I would like to read more about Reverend Venus and how she got into this life-or-death situation.

~~~

TKZers: I’ll be traveling all day and won’t be able to comment until later. Meanwhile, can you offer any suggestions to help out our Brave Author?

~~~

HAPPY ST. PATRICK’S DAY! Celebrate with a green beer and a FREE copy of STALKING MIDAS!

Susanna and the Elders by Domenichino 1603

By Elaine Viets

Sex, violence, perjury, crooked judges, blackmail – and police procedural techniques still used today. All these are in the first detective story.

So which one is it?

Some say the first detective story was Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Murders in the Rue Morgue” way back in 1841. Wilkie Collins generally gets credit for the first detective novel, “The Moonstone,” in 1868. And others claim Metta Victoria Fuller wrote the first American detective novel, “The Dead Letter,” in 1866. After that, scholars slug it out until we get to the undisputed champion, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and his detective, Sherlock Holmes, in 1887.

But I agree with M.T. Logan that the first detective story was published several thousand years earlier. It’s the story of Susanna and the Elders. If you’re Catholic or Greek Orthodox, Susannah is in the Book of Daniel and is considered divinely inspired. For Protestants and many other religions, the story is part of the Apocrypha, the books that didn’t quite make the cut.

Detail from Susanna and Elders by Tintoretto

Susanna was a young married Jewish woman, living in Babylon. She was God-fearing and good-looking. Susanna liked to walk in her husband’s orchard, and two old pervs – excuse me, two highly respected judges – liked to watch. They fell madly in lust with her, and conspired “when they might find her alone,” as the Good Book says. The old creeps lucked out.

On a hot day, Susanna decided to take a bath in the orchard. The two old men hid themselves and watched as she told her maids, “Bring me oil, and washing balls, and shut the doors of the orchard, that I may wash me.” As soon as the maids brought the things for Susanna’s bath, they shut the doors and left. Nobody knew that the two old degenerates were lurking in the orchard.

Once the doors were shut, the horny old coots cornered Susanna, and said she’d better have sex with them, or they would lie and say “that a young man was with thee, and therefore thou didst send away thy maids.”

Susanna realized she was damned if she did and damned if she didn’t, but she’d be damned if she’d have sex with those two creeps. “It is better for me to fall into your hands without doing it, then to sin in the sight of the Lord,” she said.

Susanna and Elders by Anthony van Dyck

Susanna screamed and the old blackmailers screamed, and there was a trial. The judges testified falsely against Susanna, claiming she was with a young stud under a tree, and they’d tried to stop this terrible sin of adultery. The young man got away, but the judges caught Susanna. “The multitude believed them, as being the elders, and the judges of the people, they condemned her to death.”
This was long before #MeToo, and while adultery was a sin for both sexes, it was a bigger sin for women. The patriarchs didn’t want free-range women begetting someone’s child.
Susanna called out to God, “I have done none of these things, which these men have maliciously forged against me.”
In stepped young Daniel, who said, “I am clear of the blood of this woman.”
He lectured the crowd for condemning Susanna “without examination or knowledge of the truth.”
He then conducted his investigation the way all good modern police officers do. He separated the two judges.
He asked the first judge under what tree did he see Susanna doing the wild thing with the young hunk. The judge said, “under a mastic tree.” That tree is where chewing gum comes from.
The second judge claimed Susanna did the deed under a holm tree, a type of oak.

Holm tree

The two lying judges had convicted themselves “by their own mouth.” They were killed.
So there you have it – a detective story with a victim, two villains, and a hero who knew how to search for the truth.
##################################################################
Just out! A STAR IS DEAD, my fourth Angela Richman mystery. Publishers Weekly calls it “skillfully plotted” and says it has “witty dialogue and well-defined characters.”
Buy it now: https://www.amazon.com/Angela-Richman-Death-Investigator-mystery/dp/0727890166/ref=sr_1_1?crid=3P57RLYRP7F08&keywords=a+star+is+dead+by+elaine+viets&qid=1583967357&s=books&sprefix=A+Star+Is+Dead%2Cstripbooks%2C170&sr=1-1

By John Gilstrap

Full disclosure: This post originally appeared here in TKZ on July 23, 2010, with the title, “Skin Like Leather.”  I bring it back here today for two reasons: 1) It’s still relevant; and 2) I’m crashing on a deadline.

We always tell up-and-comers that they’ve got to have a thick skin if they’re ever going to break into the publishing business. As the rejections pile up, it’s hard not to lose faith in your own abilities. When the news finally turns good, and an agent wants to see the manuscript, and later when an editor decides to buy it, you feel vindicated. Ha-ha and neener-neener, you think. Clearly all those rejecters were wrong.

What clearer affirmation of talent can there be than a publishing contract, right? If you’re not careful, you might start rubbing aloe on that leather-tough skin, thinking that it’s time to shed the bullet-proof coating.

Oh, that it were true.

I won the 2010 award at Thriller Fest for the Worst Review Ever, for an opinion of Nathan’s Run that appeared in an upstate New York newspaper: “The glue boogers in the binding were more captivating than Gilstrap’s torpid prose.” That it followed dozens of major market rave reviews from around the world softened the blow to the point that I laughed out loud when I read it at the time. Now I treasure my award, which is a lovely wooden box containing a fossilized dinosaur turd. All in good fun.

As I write this, I am again in the early stages of a new book launch (Hostage Zero, 19 days straight in the Top 30 in Amazon’s Kindle store), blessed with a starred review from Publisher’s Weekly. I’m very proud of the book. Frankly, I think it’s my best work, but then I always think that when a new book comes out.

I almost took out the aloe again. Not so fast.

This is the age of the amateur Internet review, where the opinions of casual readers wield influence equal to that of professional critics. Among many very positive reviews, one fellow calls my book “surprisingly decent.” Another expresses surprise that as a “second tier suspense writer” I have had such a long career. I have been chastised for leading with my left-wing politics, and I’ve been chastised for leading with my right-wing politics. One reviewer chastises me for coming off as stupid because I can’t seem to keep my own politics straight.

Interestingly, several reviewers have accused me in an online forum of writing my own raves, one of them going so far as to praise my ability to change my writing style to accommodate my various fictional identities. (For the record, I’ve never done such a thing.)

God bless them all. Once the book is written and I’ve launched it out to the world, it belongs more to the reader than it does to me. It’s the nature of art that perception trumps intent. A review is a review, after all, and since the major media markets have decided that books are no longer worthy of ink and newsprint, I’m just happy that someone’s paying attention.

The need for thick skin doesn’t end at the impersonal review, however.

Nine times out of ten, people are wonderfully supportive of me and my work. With the exception of certain engineered opportunities—book signings, etc.—I have little desire to be the star of a social setting. I’d much rather discuss current events than the mechanics of writing. Among these friends, the launch of a new book warrants a congratulations and a couple of signed books and that’s about it.

Then there’s the remaining one out of ten who just sort of baffle me. Consider those among my relatives who ostentatiously don’t read my books (even though I think they do), yet ask me to autograph editions for their friends. A day-job colleague of mine went out of his way to list the stores he’d visited where none of my books were in stock, and another rarely missed a public opportunity to express shock that my books do as well as they do. What am I supposed to say in response to such things? It seems sometimes that people go out of their way to be hurtful.

Over the years, I’ve come to understand that the rudeness—whether by acts of omission or commission—is rarely intended to be hurtful. The family stuff is weirder than the collegial stuff, but I’ve decided that artistic success—even when it’s second tier—makes some people feel both empowered and uncomfortable. The public nature of book writing empowers people to criticize, while public success—and the minor celebrity that comes with it—can upset the balance of an insecure relationship.

One of the most valuable lessons I’ve learned over the past 25 years toiling as a scribe is to respond thusly to even the most scathing review: Thank you for reading my work and taking the time to comment.