To be Audacious

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By Clare Langley-Hawthorne
www.clarelangleyhawthorne.com

I literally just flew back from Mayhem in the Midlands and, after delays due to tornado warnings and foul weather, my apologies for being a bit woolly headed now that my body is telling me it’s close to midnight (even if that’s not quite the case back on the West Coast yet). The conference was fabulous, small but intimate, the way Mayhem is supposed to be. After hearing Jan Burke’s great interview of Dana Stabenow and Kent Krueger’s hilarious interview of Zoe Sharp I have come away with a new goal:

To be Audacious


Jan Burke said she thought all writers had to be audacious to be successful. Just committing something to the page and believing it was worthy of another person reading it was audacious in and of itself but, after hearing some background for both Dana Stabenow and Zoe Sharp, I soon realized I am way, way behind on the audacity stakes.

Though I don’t consider myself to be a totally boring wuss in real life, I do have to at least pretend to be the stable, serious mum to my boys (husband included) and this limits my capacity for recklessness in real life. In my writing life, however, I have the freedom to be whatever I want…and I definitely think I need to add more audacity…which got me thinking…

How does one become an audacious writer? How can I constantly challenge myself and the craft of writing? What is the most audacious thing I hope to achieve in my writing? Hmmm…the most erotic sex scene ever? craziest murder victim ever? Perhaps the most unexpected death of main character ever…(hmmm…am I getting anyone worried at this point???) No, I know I need to aim higher – but how?

So help me out here – what do you think is the most audacious thing a writer can do?

What Puts the Thrill in Thriller?

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The Kill Zone is delighted to welcome Alexandra Sokoloff to the blog today. As a screenwriter, Alexandra has sold original mystery and thriller scripts and written novel adaptations for numerous Hollywood studios. Her debut ghost story, THE HARROWING, was nominated for both a Bram Stoker award and Anthony award for Best First Novel. Her second supernatural thriller, THE PRICE, was called “some of the most original and freshly unnerving work in the genre” by the New York Times Book Review, and her short story, “The Edge of Seventeen” is currently nominated for a Thriller award for best short story. Her third spooky thriller, THE UNSEEN, is out now, and is based on real-life experiments conducted at the parapsychology lab on the Duke University campus. She is currently working on a fourth supernatural thriller for St. Martin’s Press and a paranormal thriller for Harlequin Nocturne, and is writing a book on SCREENWRITING TRICKS FOR AUTHORS, based on her popular workshop and blog.

By Alexandra Sokoloff (http://alexandrasokoloff.com)

I’m sure every one of us here has ended up on or attended that particular panel by now, also variously called Thrill Me!, You Kill Me, How to Write Suspense, How to Write a Million Dollar Thriller… (and if you’ve got that last one figured out, would you let me know?).

On my Screenwriting Tricks for Authors blog http://thedarksalon.blogspot.com/ I talk a lot about specific techniques for creating suspense. But the bottom line to me is always – different things thrill different people. In people, in bed, in life, and in books. So the core issue, and something I never get tired of talking about with thriller writers and readers, is – what does it for YOU?

Because there are all kinds of literary thrills. Many thrillers are based on action and adrenaline – the experience the author wants to create and that the reader wants to experience is that roller-coaster feeling. I myself am not big on that kind of thrill. I love a good adrenaline rush in a book (in fact I pretty much require them, repeatedly). But pure action scenes mostly bore me senseless, and big guns and machines and explosions and car chases make my eyes glaze over. Nuclear threat? Not my cup of tea. Spies? I’ll pass. Assassins? Uh-uh. Terrorists?… Can I go now?

I’m not even really that fond of serial killers (God, I hate it when things like that come out of my mouth. Or hands. Occupational hazard…) unless we’re talking archetypally mythic serial killers like the ones in pre-HANNIBAL Thomas Harris, and in Mo Hayder’s darker than dark thrillers.
What I’m looking for in a book is the sensual – okay, sexual – thrill of going into the unknown. How it feels to know that there’s something there in the dark with you that’s not necessarily rational, and not necessarily human. It’s a slower, more erotic, and I’d also say more feminine kind of thrill – that you find in THE TURN OF THE SCREW and THE HAUNTING OF HILL HOUSE and THE SHINING. So although I can learn some techniques from spy thrillers or giant actioners, studying that kind of book or movie for what I want to do is probably not going to get me where I want to go.

There’s also the classic mystery thrill of having to figure a puzzle out. Now that’s a thrill I can get behind. There’s a great pleasure in using your mind to unlock a particularly well-crafted puzzle. I love to add that element to my stories, so that even though the characters are dealing with the unknown, there is still a logical way to figure the mystery out.

But conversely, and this is one of my own more peculiar quirks – I also love the feeling of being slowly taken over by complete madness.

One of my very early discoveries as a voracious young reader was Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s terrifying short story, “The Yellow Wallpaper”, one of the greatest feminist horror stories ever written, in which a new young mother is confined to her bedroom by her physician husband and is not allowed to write because it would stress her. Instead she goes horribly and inexorably out of her mind.

Now, why the vicarious experience of going mad should be such a particular pleasure to me, I can’t tell you – clearly something to do with spending my formative years in Berkeley. Or, you know, all those Grateful Dead concerts. Or those San Francisco clubs where we…
Well, all right, never mind that.
But I have come to terms with the fact that madness is an experience I crave, and I’ve made a careful study of how authors I love (Shirley Jackson, Daphne Du Maurier, Stephen King, Edgar Allen Poe, Anne Rice, the Brontes) create that effect.

Another thing I know about myself, vis a vis the supernatural, is that I need to believe that it could really happen that way. So I’m a real sucker for the slow, atmospheric, psychological build, and I research obsessively to see what people who claim to have experienced the supernatural actually experienced, and I look for the patterns in the stories: what are the common elements? What has the ring of truth?

This was especially important to me while I was writing my new thriller, THE UNSEEN http://alexandrasokoloff.com/unseen.html, because it’s a poltergeist story, and unlike with ghosts, there isn’t that much consensus about what a poltergeist really is. It’s a maddeningly elusive phenomenon.

But I love poltergeists! Just the word is thrilling to me. So I created a poltergeist which might be any or all of the things that researchers have postulated that poltergeists are: a psycho-sexual projection, a haunting, some extra-dimensional being, or very human fraud. Creating a story that explored all of those possibilities meant I got to structure in that mystery kind of thrill that I love – only the question was not only “Whodunit?” but also “Whatdunit?”

And that’s always the best for me – that mix of mystery, madness, and the unknown.
So, all you thrilling people – what kinds of thrills do it for you? What are your early influences that will give us an idea of just what twisted kicks you’re looking for in a book?
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Coming up on our Kill Zone Guest Sundays, watch for blogs from Sandra Brown, Steve Berry, Robert Liparulo, Thomas B. Sawyer, Paul Kemprecos, Linda Fairstein, and more.

I’m Not As Flexible As I Thought

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By John Gilstrap
http://www.johngilstrap.com

First things first: Thank you, John Miller, for swapping posting days with me. For those of you who showed up here today to read his words instead of mine (and who would not?), please scroll down . . .

I just returned from the worst week at the beach that I’ve ever endured. It all seemed like such a sure thing: I was with some of my favorite people, in Hilton Head, SC, one of the most beautiful resorts on the planet. I love Hilton Head. The plan was that we would arrive on Saturday evening and leave the following Saturday morning (that would be today). I would wake up early, as I always do at the beach (and only at the beach), get in an hour or so of writing in the early morning calm, and then we would head to the beach. After a few hours in the sun, occasionally visiting the outside bar, I would excuse myself from the group and log a few extra writing hours before cocktail time. It was going to be perfect.

Then the rain came. I don’t mean drizzle, folks. No misting, spitting or fog. I mean rain. Go watch the movie Platoon or Singing in the Rain if you need perspective. Gulley-washers, we used to call them when I was a kid. As if the sky was one big water balloon and someone popped it.

For five days. That would be Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday. I have no idea what Friday was like because we pulled the plug on Thursday morning and drove home. Not until, however, we had the honor of experiencing the coldest temperatures ever recorded in Hilton Head in May. Ever. A high of 53 on Monday. (Hint: I did not pack for winter.)

So, when you take the sun out of the equation for a beach trip, you’re left with movies (Angels & Demons was very good, I thought, as was State of Play. Ghosts of Girlfriends Past was exactly what you’d expect it to be, and Miller, before you get going, I’ll remind you that I was not traveling alone.), shopping (there was a rush on anything that was a) waterproof, b) warm, or c) both.) or hanging around a two-bedroom condo while four adults stared at each other pretending that it would somehow get better.

I used to tell people that I could write anywhere. Airport departure lounges, coffee shops, hotels, just about anyplace is a fine place to sit and write. I discovered the exception this week. I cannot, in fact, do any meaningful work in a two-bedroom condo where the only desk-like bit of furniture is the dining table in the middle of everything. Those other three adults staring at each other pretending that things would get better didn’t help a bit.

It’s sort of poetic, I think, that Miller’s post yesterday dealt so poetically with rain. I concur that it has its place. I like flowers and human survival as much as the next guy. But would a single day of sun have been too much to ask?

When Roosters Sing

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By John Ramsey Miller

It appears that our long-running drought is over, and we’re up for the year with rainfall. That could change, of course. I love dismal weather. I love rainy days and nights and thunder storms. We’ve had several weeks of the kind of weather I love and the old home place is bright green. In the winter I can see my neighbors’ homes through the trees, but when the leaves come out they are no longer in evidence. I work best when it is dreary. When it rains we sleep with the door open to the screened-in porch, but we have to close it around four AM when our roosters, Ti Ali and Joe Bryant, wake up and want to have loud discussions with each other. I suppose they are bragging about the number of hens they have and how many ground bugs they intend to rid the place of as soon as they are released in the late afternoon. I love the sound of roosters, but at four AM it can be annoying. I wish they had a repertoire of songs to sing, or a few stories to tell, but they are like stuck records with the same shrieking notes in their repertory. “Er er errrr Er.”

There are writers who write the same book over and over again, and their readers want to read the same old plot gathered up and thrown through a larger fan. I’ve been thinking a lot lately about writing another kind of book. I’d keep the violence, the battle between good and evil, but I wouldn’t have a ticking clock, or a race across the landscape with guns thundering, and I’d work on deepening the characters and their relationships. Maybe let them tell longer stories. It couldn’t drag, but it could take place over months or years instead of hours. The relationships would be more complex and be allowed to develop the way they need to without all of the urgency of situation forging them. It would be nice if the female/ male relationship was built on something other than dodging bullets, her ability to load his magazines under duress, or drive through a gauntlet of fire.

I think about my father, who died almost two years ago, and his stand on human rights and dignity for all men in the 60s in Mississippi. I think about how he somehow managed to earn the respect of his friends and enemies alike, and let love, his beliefs and his spiritualism rule his life. At Emory when he was in Theology school my father went to Atlanta’s Ebenezer Baptist Church some Sundays to hear a man he called the greatest preacher of his era, Martin Luther King Sr.. I think, as did my father, that the bravest known man in Mississippi history was Medgar Evers. That man walked into a lion’s den every time he left his house, and he did so driven by his belief in a just world. It was no surprise to anybody that he was murdered, just that he lived as long as he did with the quantity and caliber of enemies he made by standing for what he believed was right and just in an unjust world.

I didn’t know Mr. Evers, but I did meet Byron De La Beckwith, the man who murdered him in cold blood. My father admired and respected him, and later he tried to bring Beckwith into the light of love––a waste of time. The day I took my cameras and accompanied a reporter from New Orleans to interview Beckwith at Rick’s Tractors where he worked at the time. He had been arrested while driving a bomb to New Orleans while heading there to murder A.I. Botnick, director of the New Orleans based B’nai Brith Anti-Defamation League, and he was awaiting trial at the time. Beckwith told me he didn’t care for my father’s politics, but that he respected my father for being genuinely able to love a man while hating his sin. That stuck with me. I have long wanted write a book that goes into the social complexities in the South during the sixties, how change came about on a personal level, and the ultimate value of forgiveness. I know it’s been done and done, but I am egotistical enough to think I can put a new spin on it and make part of that time my own.

I just finished a Thriller, and whether or not it sells, I think I am going to write the book I always wanted to put on paper. I don’t have any idea what it will look like, whether there will be a publisher for it, or whether or not it will be well received if it is published, but that isn’t why I will write it. I will write it because I want to do so, and because I think my roosters really do want to be songbirds.

Never Look Back

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by Michelle Gagnon

Yesterday, Joe discussed knowing where you’re headed before getting started. I received an email from a college friend this week who’s writing his firstnever look novel, and he asked me a few questions about my process. I thought I’d share some of what I said in reply. Of course, there is no one “right way” to write a book; everyone has to find his or her own path. But after hammering out four books, I’ve learned what works for me.


1) At what point do you seek formal feedback, rather than just cranking it out?

I don’t show my work to anyone until I’ve completed two drafts. And then I send it to my “Beta readers,” 5-7 people whose opinion I trust. What I’ve discovered, however, is that they’ll all like different aspects of the story, and they’ll all criticize different aspects. I always take that feedback with a grain of salt. If more than one person is saying the same thing, I know it’s time to go back and figure out where I went wrong.

In Boneyard, one of my readers was so taken with a character in the initial chapter, she felt strongly he should be incorporated into the rest of the storyline. I had fleshed out that character fairly well, so that when something happened to him, you’d fear for his well-being. But ultimately, he was a device to kickstart the plot. Think of it as the garbage men who find a body in a dumpster in the first five minutes of Law and Order. You don’t expect to see the garbage men help track down the killers, or try the accused–they’re there to find the body, then they’re gone. Same with this character. No one else had that comment, so I chose to limit him to that opening chapter.


2) Do you counsel quantity (ie, getting more on paper) over quality (tweaking sentences) early on?

In my opinion what separates published authors from people who have been working on a book for years without completing it is this: never look back. I don’t start editing–at all–until the entire book is written. A lot of people get fifty pages in, then go back and start editing chapter one. The danger in this is that while you might end up with a perfect first fifty pages, by the time you finish those there’s a good chance you’ve lost the thread of the story.

It’s also discouraging to suddenly realize you’ve spent three months on fifty pages, and another three hundred and fifty remain to be written (of course, that’s discouraging whether you’ve stopped or not–I call it the “interminable middle”). I never even re-read what I’ve written until I’ve finished the first draft. (I also spend most of that draft thinking that what I’m writing is the worst junk ever committed to page. But I forge ahead, because I know the next draft will be better.) And then when I do go back, the bones of the story are in place.


3) When does it help to have a literary guide (agent? editor? coach?)? How do you get a good one to take you seriously?
Start the agent search only when your manuscript is as absolutely perfect as it’s ever going to be. That means a minimum of three drafts. And after completing each draft, put it away for a month before looking at it again. That gives you a fresh perspective.

Resign yourself to the fact that the agent search might take months- not always the case, but frequently enough that it’s good to be prepared for it. And not hearing back right away doesn’t necessarily mean you’re going to be rejected. My first agent asked for an exclusive on the full manuscript right away–then three months passed. If I had to do it over, I’d probably call after a month and ask if it was all right for me to submit to other agents. In the end it worked out for me, but I was gnawing my nails to the quick that entire time. A month is more than enough time for an agent to have an exclusive.

Begin by querying your 3-5 top choice agents, always making sure that a) they’re currently acquiring manuscripts, and b) they represent the kind of work you write (these seem like givens, but you’d be surprised). There are a lot of good books on querying an agent (my favorite is Noah Lukeman’s “The First Five Pages”). Your query letter needs to be perfect, as do your first five pages, since that’s what an agent reads to make a snap judgement on your work. I loved what people were saying yesterday about switching the second chapter with the first. About a year ago, I read a tremendous manuscript written by a friend. And the entire first chapter I was yawning-not good for a thriller. It was all back story: how the protagonist got his job, where he went to school, his mother’s medical condition…then, scene two kicked in. The main character picked up a woman home at a bar, was accosted in his apartment by Russian mobsters, was threatened with blackmail and suddenly boom- we were off and running. Telling too much at the outset is a common mistake. Bear in mind you have 100,000 words to develop your characters, so there’s no need to overdo it at the outset. (By the way, this excellent book- FREEFALL, by Reece Hirsch- found representation and will be published next year).

Your agent shops the manuscript to editors. Very few publishers accept unsolicited manuscripts these days.
Getting an agent is hard. My best advice would be to go to a writing conference that good agents are attending- a face to face meeting goes a long way toward getting you out of the slush pile. Incidentally, Thrillerfest is hands down one of the best for finding an agent for a thriller- I can’t think of another conference that gathers forty top agents in one place to hear pitches. Well worth the investment if your manuscript is ready.

4) Not a question but an observation — I can’t seem to help harvesting the real lives and personalities of friends and acquaintances. Ringing in my ears is Elizabeth Gilbert: “Tell the truth. Tell the truth. Tell the truth.”

I suppose my personal life infiltrates the storylines in some places–but it depends on what I’m writing. For the screenplay I’m working on right now, my co-writer and I are drawing heavily on our life experiences. But for my series, much of it is pure creation-I’ve never defused a dirty bomb, chased down a suspect, or done many of the other things my characters do. I just imagine what it would be like, basing it on research and discussions with people who do those sorts of things for a living. So the old, “write what you know” has never been something I strongly adhered to. Otherwise I’d write about sitting alone in a room typing day after day. And trust me, that is rarely exciting.

Start at the end

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By Joe Moore

A topic I’ve mentioned here in the past is Kurt Vonnegut’s 8 rules of writing fiction. They’re worth reviewing and taking to heart. But his rule number 5 is the one that made the biggest impression on me. Rule number 5 is: Start your story as close to the end as possible. This is relevant for both the entire book or a single chapter. We often hear that the most common mistake of a new writer is starting the story in the wrong place.

Well, it happens to published writers, too. Lynn Sholes and I are guilty of writing whole chapters that either occurred in the wrong place, or worse, weren’t even needed. Usually they turn out to be backstory information for us, not the reader. We go to the trouble of writing a chapter only to find it’s to confirm what we need to know, not what the reader needs to know.

So if we apply Vonnegut’s rule number 5, how do we know if we’ve started close enough to the end? Easy: we must know the destination before we begin the journey. We must know the ending first. To me, this is critical. How can we get there if we don’t know where we’re going? And once we know how our story will end, we can then apply what I call my top of the mountain technique. In my former career in the television postproduction industry, it’s called backtiming—starting at the place where something ends and working your way to the place where you want it to begin.

7691695But before I explain top of the mountain, let’s look at the bottom of the mountain approach—the way most stories are written. You stand at the foot of an imposing mountain (the task of writing your next 100K-word novel), look up at the huge mass of what you are going to be faced with over the next 12 or so months, and wonder what it will take to get to the top (or end).

You start climbing, get tired, fall back, take a side trip, climb some more, hope inspiration strikes, get distracted, curse, fight fatigue, take the wrong route, fall again, paint yourself into a corner—and if you’re lucky, finally make it to the top. This method will work, but it’s a tough, painful way to go.

Now, let’s discuss the top of the mountain technique. As you begin to plan your book, even before you start your first draft, Imagine that you’re standing on 9944522the mountain peak looking out over a grand, breathtaking view feeling invigorated, strong, and fulfilled. Imagine that the journey is over, your book is done. Look down the side of the mountain at the massive task you have just accomplished and ask yourself what series of events took place to get you to the top? Start with the last event, make a general note as to how you envision it. Then imagine what the second to the last event was that led up to the end, then the third from the last . . . you get the idea. It’s sort of like outlining in reverse.

This takes it a step further than Vonnegut’s rule number 5 by starting at the end and working your way to the beginning while you’re still in the planning stage. Guess what happens? By the time you are actually at the beginning, you will have started as close to the end as possible. And you will see the logic and benefit of rule number 5.

Naturally, your plan can and probably will change. Your ending will get tweaked and reshaped as you approach it for real. But wouldn’t it be great to have a general destination in mind even from the first word on page one of your first draft?

Do you know your ending before you start writing? Or do you have a general idea for the story and just wing it? Remember that there’s no right or wrong answer here. But what works for you?

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Coming up on our Kill Zone Guest Sundays, watch for blogs from Sandra Brown, Steve Berry, Robert Liparulo, Alexandra Sokoloff, Thomas B. Sawyer, Paul Kemprecos, Linda Fairstein, and more.

Scribd’s new e-book store: A sea change in publishing?

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I was still recovering from Sunday’s 4.7 earthquake in LA when I heard the news that must have sent a shiver of apprehension through the publishing industry: scrbd, the publishing web site that gets around 60 million hits a day, began selling books online. Authors who upload their books will get an 80/20 split of the revenue from books sold on the site. That’s 80 per cent to us, folks.

NPR’s Marketplace pointed out that the two-year-old scribd has an advantage over other e-book publishers because its e-books can be read over many different types of reading devices, including laptops and “smart” phones. By contrast, Amazon’s e-books can be read only on a pricey Kindle.


We’ve been talking quite a bit on this blog about e-books, and debating their merits. I think that scribd’s move into selling books online, in a range of formats, at a price split that dramatically favors the author, has the potential to upend the publishing totem pole. The scribd platform could finally provide the grassroots publishing momentum that puts more revenue and power into the content creator’s hands, rather than the distributor’s.

In her farewell Newsweek column this week, Anna Quindlen described how, in the journalism field, young people have “created online outlets from the ground up…they are quite properly part of the action, not because we made room for them, but because they made room for themselves.”

Most novelists aren’t all that young, but scribd’s publishing model could provide the way for them to “make room” for themselves in the publishing paradigm. We’ll now be able to publish our own ebooks on a site that reaches sixty million potential readers. Sixty million!

But perhaps not all authors would consider taking hold of the reins of their publishing. I can imagine that even established authors might hesitate before taking the plunge into publishing on scribd. Would there still be a publishing contract, for example? Would uploaded works suffer from a stima from being “self-published”?

What do you think? Do you think the scribd book store has potential to change the publishing business paradigm?

Have you browsed through the new book store? Do you think it will become a morass of self-published drek as it develops, or is it going to become a juggernaut to be reckoned with?

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Coming up on our Kill Zone Guest Sundays, watch for blogs from Sandra Brown, Steve Berry, Robert Liparulo, Alexandra Sokoloff, Thomas B. Sawyer, Paul Kemprecos, Linda Fairstein, and more.

How much is a good read worth these days?

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by Clare Langley-Hawthorne

An article in yesterday’s New York Time’s entitled “Steal this book (for $9.99)” caught my eye, especially the first line: “Just how much is a good read worth?” and the story of how readers were boycotting the Kindle version David Baldacci’s latest thriller “First Family’ for being priced around $15 (some $5 more than the majority of Kindle e-books were selling for). The article went on to discuss fears in the publishing industry that e-books cannibalize higher-price print sales (rather like the flood of cheap houses onto a real estate market) and that Amazon’s low price point sets a precedent in the e-book market that may be unsustainable. Offsetting this is the evidence, however, that e-book purchasers are buying more books now than they ever did as print book buyers. This is because of the ease with which they can download the books and (presumably) by the lower price point.
This all got me thinking – what is a ‘good read’ worth these days? Should a bestselling author be able to command a premium e-book price? (though I’m guessing Baldacci’s publisher may be regretting that decision!) Does Amazon’s “loss leader’ mentality in which it basically subsidizes the $9.99 Kindle book create the perception that e-books are only worth $10 or less? And what does that mean to consumer perceptions of the cost of trade paperbacks or hardbacks?
I remember talking to an English publisher last year who said the market in the UK had become horrendous because the majority of books were being sold in supermarkets very cheaply or at chain stores as part of “Buy three get one free” and “Buy two for the price of one” kind of deals. Her argument was that in the UK at least this marketing tactic had made many consumers question the original price of books (their reasoning being, well, if I get two for the price of one shouldn’t they have been originally half the list price anyway?). It also created the perception that books were over priced (God forbid!). I wonder, in the e-book market, will Amazon’s pricing have a similar effect?

So what are you willing to pay for a good read these days? Would you pay more than $9.99 for an author you loved on Kindle? Does the cost of an e-book make you less inclined to plunk down more money for the paper version? As e-books command more and more of the market what effect will their price have on us readers and (poor sods that we are) writers? Is it a slippery slope or just a storm in a teacup???

Q & A with Oline H. Cogdill

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ThCOGDILL20Ae Kill Zone is thrilled to have Oline H. Cogdill, Mystery Fiction Columnist for the Sun-Sentinel in Fort Lauderdale, joining us today. She also reviews for McClatchy Tribune Wire Services, Mystery Scene magazine and Publisher’s Weekly. Her reviews appear in about 250 newspapers and publications world wide. She is a judge for the 2009 and 2010 Los Angeles Times Book Prize. Oline also blogs about mysteries, the publishing industry or anything else that amuses her at www.mysteryscenemag.com/msblog and at
www.sun-sentinel.com/offthepage.

Q. What happens when you review a friend’s book and you don’t like it?
A. I don’t review friends’ books. I am often called a “friend” or a “friend of mysteries,” but that is like using the word “friend” as one does on Facebook. I genuinely like most of the mystery writers I meet or are on panels with. But I am not their friend. There is a difference between being friendly and a friend. I’ll have a drink with them, or even a meal, but that is as far as it goes. (And I pay my own way.) I completely put the identity of the author out of my mind when I am reading a novel to review. I am focused only on the work, not the book. If I felt I was really too close to an author, then I could not review their book. My husband is working on a mystery; I have read the first six chapters and I think he is onto something good. Naturally, I would never review that, although because we have different last names I probably could slip it by. But it would not be ethical.
I want people to respect what I do.

Q. How many pages of a book will you read before you decide it’s not for you?

A. For me, the litmus test would be about 50 or 60 pages, but this actually seldom happens. Once I make the decision to review a book, I am committed to it: good, bad or indifferent. Since the books space at the Sun-Sentinel has been severely limited – and we have no idea what the future holds – the Books Editor and I made a conscious effort to try to publish reviews only on those books we liked. The idea being that we ‘d rather steer readers toward something than away from it. However, that said, if I begin a novel that I have chosen or one I must review and it is dreadful, I am committed to that book.

But there are a lot of exceptions. For one, if I just really hate a novel and don’t want to spend another minute in those characters’ company, I would just move on. Another exception is if it is a local author published by a small publisher. If I hate that book, I would not be serving anyone. I would put the author’s book signings, info in my Local Book News column and move one. Another reason for me not to continue with that novel would be if the publication I am reviewing for doesn’t want negative reviews. When that happens, I call the editor and ask that the book be assigned to someone else.
I take no pleasure in writing negative reviews, and would rather spend my reading time enjoying myself.

Q. How do you decide which books you will review?
A. For Mystery Scene and Publishers’ Weekly, the novels are assigned to me. It is kind of interesting to have novels assigned, because since I started reviewing mysteries sixteen years ago, I have always chosen what I read. Mystery Scene and Publishers’ Weekly have assigned me novels I may not have selected otherwise, opening up my world further.

For the Sun Sentinel or MCT, I choose the books. First criteria: if the author is local. Any South Florida or Florida author gets priority. Second is if the author is coming for a book tour. I can’t do everyone who swings through South Florida, but I try. There are a few – for me – must review authors such as Michael Connelly (who also has a strong Florida connection), Laura Lippman, George Pelecanos, Harlan Coben, Peter Robinson, Ian Rankin and Val McDermid (those are not my only “must review” authors, but a sampling).

After that, I look for something new, something different. I tend to review a lot more hard boiled than cozy or traditional, but I also try to self check myself and maintain a balance. Whether an author is male or female, a minority, etc., shouldn’t matter. It is the work I focus on. On a larger plane, it matters a great deal because I want to give readers a balance. I also try to remember authors I meet at Bouchercon or Malice, anyone who might have something different to bring to the table. Last year at Bouchercon in Baltimore, my husband and I ended up talking to two newbies. They had no idea who I was until at the end of the conversation, when I gave them my card and told them to make sure their publisher contacted me. (I think they are both with St. Martin’s, but that is the only hint.) The books they were describing sounded interesting. Whether they will be or not remains to be seen.

Q. Does a book have to be published by an accepted house (think ITW and MWA members’ books) for you to review it?

A. I don’t know what the accepted houses for MWA and ITW are. For me they have to be a legitimate publisher, not a glorified vanity press or a subsidized one (meaning the author pays part of the cost). I will not review novels from any publishers like that. No self published. There are so many books being published by legitimate houses, both large presses and small, that I can’t keep up with those. Cream rises to the top. If an author has to go the subsidized route, then I wonder why. Yes, I know there are some books that got their start that way, gaining a following and rising to a legitimate press; but those are the EXCEPTIONS, not the rule.

Q. Do you review mainly hardcovers, or does the format the book is printed in not make a difference?

A. It should not make a difference, but in reality it often does. I used to do a paperback a month but now with the cutbacks in space, I will often do a paperback or two a month and put the review on the blog at www.sun-sentinel.com/offthepage and then put it on the MCT wires. That way I can cover it. And those reviews on the wires get picked up a lot. Last year, the ones I did on the novels by Jeffrey Cohen and Julie Hyzy ended up in about 100 different spots.
For the newspaper, the editors prefer hardcover but sometimes I will slip in a trade paperback if I think it is really good. Or a paperback by a local writer such as P.J. Parrish. But as a rule, the novels that are reviewed for the Sun Sentinel are hard cover.
Let me add that I am a fan of paperback originals. A lot of excellent authors got their start in paperback originals. Sometimes the paperback original authors (Joel Goldman, Rick Mofina, Michelle Gagnon, P.J. Parrish) are as good if not better than many of the authors being published in hardcover.

Q. Do you agree with Dick Cavett that there are two ways to tell someone their book isn’t good: A) You book was not my cup of tea, and B) I put down your book and just couldn’t pick it back up?
A. Another thing to say would be “Your fans will love it.” But, ha!, no, I disagree with Dick Cavett. Those are kind of cocktail party responses, things you say to people to not hurt their feelings, though if you think about those responses they are hurtful in a way. I grew up watching Dick Cavett and realizing there was a whole world out there beyond my home town. But that is a milquetoast thing to do. I may try to soften a review, especially if I have liked everything else the author has written, but in the end I have to be frank.
Case in point, I reviewed a nationally known and admired author last year. I have followed this guy since his first paperback original, and have seen him get better and better until he now regularly lands on the best sellers list. But I did not like his latest one. It hurt me to not like it, but that was the reality. So I had to give it a negative review.
A book may not be my cup of tea, but it could be yours. However, I am the one writing the review.

Q. Are there any standardized rules for reviewers, such as not quoting too directly from the book or tempering your praise/criticism?
A. My two main rules are not to give away a plot twist that will spoil the book for a reader and not to fall so in love with my own voice that I forget who the review is for. The first rule is pretty standard – I hate when a reviewer gives away a plot. I remember some review of a Michael Connelly novel (don’t remember the publication or the book title) that seemed to take glee in giving away everything twist and turn. As a reader, that made me mad.

The second rule: I think too often reviewers get so caught up that they go on too much and forget that they are writing that review for the reader, not to hear themselves be clever.
I think all reviewers should follow the rule ( I think it’s from Star Trek), “to do no harm.” That doesn’t mean you can’t and shouldn’t rip apart a book if it deserves it, but review the book, not the author.
Quote from the book as much as you want to – most of the time that is just padding out a review – but don’t give away those vital plot points.

Q. Now that many reviews/reviewers are moving online, do you worry that they won’t adhere to the same journalistic codes?
A. I absolutely worry about that. I believe I am an ethical reviewer and I hope others think that too. I see a lot of reviews on Dorothy L and on a lot of online sites and, for the most part, they seem to be OK. Some of them are not especially well written but they are from the heart. But I worry that people are basing their reviews on grudges, agendas, friendship or anything else. Everyone now seems to be a reviewer. The rise of food review blogs, etc., seems to give many people permission to give their opinion on everything. When certain ethics such as being as objective as you can, approaching each book with a blank slate and others are not followed, I worry that it cheapens all reviews.

Q. What’s your take on ebook readers? Pros, cons as a reviewer?
A. If you mean like a Kindle or a Sony or whatever, I think those are just fine. It is another means to read a book. I like holding a book, that invisible connection to an author conveyed by holding their work. But if you read the book on a device or via the printed page, does it matter? I don’t think so. I would not find that a pro or a con as a reviewer.
The convenience might even encourage more people to buy books and that would be a good thing!
Actually, I wish the New York publishers would get together and put their advanced copies on a Sony or whatever for reviewers. That way I could take an unlimited amount of books on vacation rather than limiting myself to 10. The publishers would save a ton of money, too.

Q. Amazon book reviews: many people think that readers pay attention to those starred, “street” reviews of books. Do you think they’re having a significant impact on book-buying decisions?
A. Lord, I hope not. Anyone can publish a review on Amazon. I know an author (self published) whose wife posted this glowing review on his Amazon site. Like me, she had kept her maiden name so no one else they knew the couple would know they were married. When they got divorced – and I bet you see this one coming – she posted a nasty, vicious review. Again, these reviews on Amazon are fraught with agendas, grudges, etc. I am sure some of the people posting their reviews are writing from the heart but others aren’t.

Sometimes You Get To Feel Optimistic About The Future

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John Ramsey Miller

A friend of mine called me last week and said an old friend of his gave him a short story written by this friend’s 14-year-old son. He thought it was very good, and asked if I would read it and see if I agreed. Kids need encouragement, and I always try to offer an eye and encouragement if I can. We’ve all read drek by the bucket load, and since I have free time here and there, I said sure. We’ve all seen these stories written by young people, and mostly they don’t amount to much. I mean they show some glimmer of promise or they don’t, but judging the potential of a young person by a few pages doesn’t mean much. The 7 pages were single-spaced, and printed on both sides of the pages, and in blue ink. When I got them, I was working on building a structure on the place, so I folded the envelope and stuck in into my back pocket. I forgot about the pages, it was hot, I sweated, and the ink ran some.

Two days later, I finally unfolded the pages and read them, and they were excellent. This kid needs to mature, but I believe he has what it takes. Opens on a rainy night in an alley––a man with a freshly killed (huge) corpse lying on asphalt. Here’s an exert:

“He was here. It was done. Nothing left to do except run. He fumbled with the gun for a moment, wondering whether to dispose of it, or carry it with him. He shoved down in the pocket of his gray trench coat. As he pivoted away from the body and turned onto the sidewalk, he reached into his left coat pocket for his cigarettes. The pack was drenched, but inside there were dry ones left. He stepped underneath the awning in front of a closed-down pawnshop and fished his lighter out of his pants pocket, with some difficulty in maneuvering around his trench coat. He attempted to light the cigarette, but failed. He was out of lighter fluid. He reached into his other pockets looking for matches, but could find none. It was all right, because he was trying to cut back.”

I forget when I was reading that a fourteen-year old wrote it. The short story is well done and entertaining, but mostly it’s exciting to find a young person who thinks about something other than video games and who seems to have been called to tell stories. The kid is thoughtful and already understands character, economy of words, how to set a mood, and he plays his story play out like fishing line …with a nice sharp hook at the end. Yes, it is amateurish in many respects, but there’s a lot of talent there and I am sure this young man will evolve and mature and add something to the world that is hungry for new voices and stories.

How many of us have discovered a young voice and offered encouragement? And how many of these offerings have we had to trudge through to find one that makes it all worthwhile.