Long Time Reviewing Shorts

Recently a discussion on the email list of the Short Mystery Fiction Society  (which you can all join for free, by the way)   led me to talking about my habit of reviewing short stories.  Some members wanted to know more and it struck me that it might be useful to go into detail here, rather than repeating myself to individuals.  So this may get a little deep into the weeds here.

In 2009 I decided to make notes on the best short mystery stories I read and I produced a list at the end of the year that ran in Criminal Brief.    I have kept that up ever since, moving it to SleuthSayers  when we started up.

In 2011 I added a wrinkle.  I started the Little Big Crimes blog where I reviewed the best short mystery story I read each week.  And I've been doing that ever since.

(By the way, I run Litle Big Crimes with Blogger, the same system that we use for SleuthSayers.  It is quirky - and that's being kind - but it has held up all these years - and it's free!)

Why do I review a story every week? Well, a bunch of reasons:

1. I enjoy reading a lot of short stories.  The reviewing process makes me feel like I am accomplishing something by reading them.

2. Since I like to read (and write and try to sell) short stories it is in my interest to encourage people to read them.

3. Finding something to write about every week forces me to think more deeply about the stories which increases my enjoyment and is good for my writing.

Why do I review the best story? I have no desire to write negative reviews of anything.  And as for producing a blistering attack on a short story - well, talk about breaking a butterfly on a wheel.

How do I decide which is the best story? That's easy.  It's the one i like the most.  If, as happens on rare occasions, I am torn between two stories, I choose the one I can think of the most interesting things to write about.

What do I get out of it besides the benefits mentioned above? One thing I don't get is any kind of payment.  It may sound odd to even mention that but I felt I had to say so in my blog a few years ago when there was a scandal about reviewers taking money.  Not that anyone ever offered!

On the other hand, some publishers (and editors and authors) have given me copies of books or magazines to review and I am grateful for that.  Last year I purchased 16 anthologies (plus magazines) so freebies are a nice change.

And that reminds me: since I believe in full disclosure I always mention at the beginning of a review if there is any factor that might have affected my choice, such as receiving a free copy, or the author being a friend of mine.  

That brings up another benefit: I have made friends with a lot of writers who thanked me for selecting them. (They hsve to find that out without help from me, by the way. Notifying them would feel like I was saying "Now what are you going to do for me?")

Another plus, of course, is that some readers find out about me because of my reviews.  This has led to my worldwide fame.  Okay, maybe not. But I do average about 1700 readers a week, and that ain't nothing.

Do I have any regrets about reviewing?  One, I don't read as many novels as I would like or even old short stories.  It's hard to keep up with even most of the mysteries.  I take off my hat to Michele Slung, who reads many more each year for Otto Penzler's best-of collections.

And another regret: I wish more women and people of color showed up in my best-of lists.  Next year I hope to keep track of how many I read of various groups and figure out how the percentages are working out.

The thing is, I really do pick the story I like best each week, and I can't change my preferences by an act of will.  One reason I have written this piece is in the hope that more people will be encouraged to write their own short story reviews.  Who knows? They may even disagree with me.  That would be very welcome!

A Misheard Announcement

 Some months back, I reported in this blog that I had retired from my day job as a criminal magistrate. Those golden years lasted for days.

            I’ve returned to meeting jail inmates, albeit on a part-time basis. The staff calls me on an emergency basis to plug the holes that sometimes occur in any small office—illnesses, vacations, etc. I'm happy to help. I enjoy the work, and the occasional magistrate session keeps my bar card from getting dusty.

            They also allow me to read that collection of typos and misunderstoods that crop up occasionally in police reports. Often, these mistakes happen when a patrol officer in the field calls in their report using the department’s voice-to-text system. Others arise when line personnel use a word and, perhaps, aren't entirely clear on the definition. In either case, the results can be entertaining.

            What follows are a few of the recent examples of reporting errors. Besides a bit of fun, I hope they remind writers and citizens that police officers are human. They make mistakes just like the rest of us. Rarely are the errors cataclysmic breaches or deliberate violations of constitutional norms. More commonly, they are the errors we all make. A failure to proofread carefully or the assumption that what we actually said was what we intended to say. Anyone who has ever dictated a text message understands. We want our police officers to be flesh and blood people so that they might empathize with the individuals they encounter. That doesn’t mean we can’t enjoy it when that humanity is displayed.

            “Behind the driver’s seat, I located a bottle of permanent schnapps.”

J.H. Henkes, Creative Commons.

        The sentence stopped me when I saw it in a police report. I had a vision of a Harry Potter-like, never emptying liquor bottle. If you have a bottle of permanent schnapps, don’t hop on a broom or behind the wheel of a car. Cast a spell for a Lyft.

            “The driver appeared to have delighted eyes.”

            I believe that the officer who called in a report intended to say that the allegedly impaired driver had the enlarged pupils of someone with dilated eyes. The voice-to-text knew better. Maybe Alexa or Siri or whatever system handled the transcription hoped that since the rest of the driver’s body was going to jail, at least his eyes might be happy.

            “I was marinating my right leg across his back.”

            Usually, given enough time, I can discern what the officer intended to say--peppermint schnapps, dilated eyes—before voice-to-text seized control. Here, I still don't have a clue. Perhaps we can make this one a contest. The best answer to the question of what the officer was trying to do during this arrest wins.

            Although, imagining this visual continues to make me smile.

            “The suspect possessed a machine gun conversation device.”

            Although I suspect that the police found the defendant in possession of a conversion device, the sentence as written begs the question. What conversation does one really need to have with their machine gun except possibly, "Don't point that at me, please" or "Put that down now!" Everything else seems useless chatter.

            “He knows he is accomplished.”

            This one may not be immediately as funny as some of the others. Hence, I buried it in the middle. The officer set out facts leading her to conclude that the defendant had sufficient intentional involvement in the crime to be guilty as an accomplice. But, perhaps, the defendant also had a healthy sense of self-esteem. He was an accomplished accomplice. That's good. In court, prosecutors get paid to say bad things about a defendant. Without a healthy ego, the defendant's psyche might be bruised.

            And, speaking of…

            “A bruise farm on her arm.”

            Likely, the officer dictated that a bruise began forming on her arm. In the relationships-as-punching-bags world of domestic violence, however, the phrase as electronically adjusted might be accurate. On some days, the bruising seems to sprout across a field of victims.

            Finally, my favorite for this collection.  

            The following sentence offers a potent lesson on the dangers of misusing homophones. Think about your interpretation and your emotional reaction to the sentence as reported and the sentence as intended.

            “The gun was concealed in his waste.”

            “The gun was concealed in his waist.”

            The second sentence (the intended one) offers a hint of danger, the real-life work-a-day world of the beat cop. The first offers a visual that has stayed with me as I envisioned the grumbling patrol officer tasked with collecting that bit of evidence. Likely, that duty would fall to the rookie officer. In police work, as in other jobs, waste slides downhill.

            I hope your eyes have been delighted to review the list of typos and misheards. If not, toss the blog in the waist basket.

            (I’ll be traveling on the day this posts. If you have an answer to what the officer meant by his marinating leg, I’ll likely be slow in responding to you.)

            Until next time. 

Dear Friend:

            I know you haven’t heard from me for a while.  I’ve been busy, what with geo-political upheavals and the local zoning board hearings, the copy editor’s final notes on the review copy of my book, to say nothing of feeding the needy cats and attending my cousin’s son’s bar mitzvah (I was there for the bris, not actually there, but in spirit) taking so much of my time, I can hardly drag myself into the email ecosphere. 

I do have a topic in mind, and that’s the importance of maintaining a regular correspondence, even though you’re so much better at this than me.  I have two points:  1.  Connections established and preserved over time through the written word are precious and indispensable.  2.  Writing letters is the best practice any writer can ever have.  By that I mean any person who writes for a living/wants to write for a living/loves writing/is occasionally stalled in a big writing project and needs to limber up before going back at it again.  For writers, writing letters is like training for the New York Marathon.  Without the dehydration and sprained ankles. 

You might not believe this, but I’m always very excited to see your emails pop up in my gmail account.   You could tell me anything you want, and I’d be enthralled, because I can hear your voice in your words, see your face, and imagine your life going through various triumphs and travails.  I find myself really wanting to know all about Spotty’s gastrointestinal difficulties, the struggle to pay all those vet bills, your benighted spouse denting the new Subaru, little Evelyn’s soccer goal, and the short-listing for the National Book Award. 

My life is so much less interesting than yours, since most of it is consumed by hours at this keyboard in a tiny apartment on the Upper West Side with two cats and a neighbor whose snoring is loud enough to be entered in the Guinness Book of World Records.  Though by now, it’s become sort of soothing.  I might miss it when I start my book tour, sending me to places where the walls are thicker and the loudest noises are the Harleys fleeing from law enforcement. 

You might realize that we’ve been writing to each other for about thirty years, ever since we started passing notes in Mrs. Braverman’s social studies class, including that one Mrs. Braverman intercepted where I noted she had a little piece of tissue stuck to her chin and nobody had the courage to tell her.   She got very red, but did thank me, sotto voce, after class, to her credit.  Since then, all this back and forth with you has never stopped, even when you were in Beirut and I had that little time away in rehab. 

The thing about letter writing is it’s very different from face-to-face conversation, or talking on the phone, which has it’s own peculiar qualities, positive and negative.  There’s something honest and pure about a letter.  Maybe because it isn’t a two-way communication until you hear back from your correspondent.  You’re writing it all alone in the quiet, dispensing a monologue that you control without interruption, unless a cat decides to jump on the keyboard.  Yet the whole time I’m writing to you, I’m thinking of you.  You’re there in my heart and in my mind.  I know who I’m addressing, and what you might want to hear about.  What amuses you, what stirs you to fire off a rejoinder.  It’s tailored exactly to your sensibilities and the tempo of our relationship.  And thus maybe the most personal of all types of communication. 

I’m sure you’ll answer this with a very funny satire on writers entering the formative stages of sentimental middle age, but I know you know what I mean.  I know because you’ve always sent me two letters, or emails, to every one I write back to you, so I know you understand why this is important.  And so much fun. 

Just because it isn’t a love letter, doesn’t mean you can’t send a letter to someone you love. 

Sincerely,

Your Friend