That Damn Book

It was 9:30 in the evening, April 25, 2016. I was sitting in front of the computer, staring at that damn book. I couldn't take it any more. I decided to take a break and quickly checked my email. There it was, right there in front of me: an email from Leigh, asking where my post was for tomorrow. Post? What post? OMG, that damn book! I quickly explained to Leigh that I was trying to make a deadline in three days and I was still @#*& words short. He rescued me – at least from the post.

So it was back to the book. That damn book. I'd basically finished the story at @#*& words, which weren't nearly enough. So I added weather: an ice storm. That would be good for a few thousand words, I thought. Wrong. Less than one thousand. Okay, bite the bullet (so to speak) and kill somebody else. Over a thousand words! Yay! Still short.

My hero, Milt Kovak, was the only one of the regulars in the book who'd not been targeted by the bad guy. Okay, let's get Milt. I didn't want to shoot him – the Milt books are basically first person narrative. It would be difficult for him to narrate while dead or even hospitalized. I didn't want to physically hurt his family. A fire! I thought. Scary but not necessarily harmful to anything but his house! And of course Milt's not there because --- because it happens in the middle of the ice storm! Two thousand words! I was on a roll! But I still had @#*& words to go.

Someone suggested a bomb. I'd never done a bomb. Did this book even call for a bomb? Not really. But what the hell! I added a bomb.

The minutes, the hours, the days wore on. And still not enough words for that damn book. But with one day to spare, I finished it. It was ready to go. I didn't want to even think about reading it yet again, but I knew I had to. That damn book! Well, actually, it wasn't half bad. It could be better – every book could be better when you send it off – but it wasn't half bad. But mainly, it was gone.

Now on to the second book in the contract!

P.S. And thanks, Leigh, for the title to this post!

Farewell My Lovelies

For those of you who have been with SleuthSayers for a while you've seen this before: I tender my resignation, it's accepted rather too quickly, everybody has a round of high-fives.  Then, before you've had time to clear away the empties and dump the ash trays, I'm back; cardboard suitcase in hand. Well, not this time--this time it's farewell, my lovelies. 
Sometimes you just know when it's time for a graceful exit, and this is that time for me.  My years with SleuthSayers have been a great learning experience and I've enjoyed every minute of them.  The staff at HQ, Leigh, Velma, and Rob have been terrific and whenever I needed technical assistance it was forthcoming without additional charge.  In fact, during my time amongst the cast and crew of SleuthSayers I've come to consider them (you all) as friends.  Virtual friends in most cases, though it has been my pleasure to meet a number of our contributors in the flesh, but still friends, or at least fellow travelers.  After all, some of history's great relationships have been those of pen pals, and so it feels to me here.

When I look back over my contributions I find they fall into but a few categories--a reflection of my limitations, I'm afraid: Police procedure, New Jersey, Native American history, Catholicism, a smattering of historical murder investigations, and a bit now and then on writing.  In any event, you've had the benefit of my wit and wisdom on these subjects and I pray that no one was irreparably harmed by the exposure.  If you feel you may have been, Velma entertains all such complaints and will be happy to hear yours.  I understand that she takes such calls strictly between the hours of 11:39 and 11:41 AM on alternate Tuesdays of 31 day months.

For my part, I will be spending all this new free time waiting outside my local watering hole.  There's a sign in the window that reads, "Free Whiskey Tomorrow!"  Everyday I return, but the barkeep just points at the sign and shakes his head.  You can see why I have to prioritize--sooner, or later, tomorrow will come!  And I intend to be there with an empty wallet and a full glass.

            

           

“Every Goodbye Ain’t Gone”

Today our friend and colleague, Louis Willis, announces his retirement.

I first came across Louis in his own blog, where he critiqued black mystery authors and novels featuring black protagonists. He contributed articles to Criminal Brief and, as SleuthSayers was being formed, we invited him to become a permanent member. I often thought of Louis as ‘our academic’, because he studied literature more than most of us.

After his discharge from the Navy in 1958, Louis never lost his joy of learning and pursued higher education at Illinois Institute of Technology. Halfway through a degree in engineering, his love of literature induced him to change majors to English lit.

There he encountered… or more correctly didn’t encounter studies of black authors such as he’d appreciated in high school. When made aware of this shortcoming in their curriculum, IIT invited him to lecture about black authors in American lit.

Louis was familiar with Richard Wright and had begun reading James Baldwin. As he immersed myself in the research, he discovered Zora Neale Hurston (whose Florida home is minutes from mine), Ralph Ellison and many more.

Following formal retirement from the government decades later, he returned home to Knoxville from Richmond, California with his youngest daughter and her son to care for his mother who died a year later in 1997. With time on his hands, he returned to his love of learning and enrolled in a graduate degree program at the University of Tennessee and graduated in 2004 with a Masters in English.

Louis also has a son who attended Lemoyne Owen College in Memphas and had three sons himself, the youngest born a year ago on 31 December, nearly a New Year’s baby.

Louis’ favorite authors are Langston Hughes, Zora Neale Hurston, James Baldwin, Ralph Ellison, Hemingway, Faulkner, Katherine Anne Porter, Anton Chekhov, Edgar Allan Poe, and Jorge Luis Borges. Recently, he's studying Eudora Welty. In crime fiction, his favorites are Arthur Conan Doyle, Raymond Chandler, Dashiel Hammett, Richard S. Prather, G. K. Chesterton, Dorothy L. Sayers, Dame Agatha Christie, and of course all SleuthSayers authors.

— Leigh Lundin

The Long Goodbye that Isn't
“Every Goodbye Ain’t Gone”

by Louis Willis

I usually limit myself in writing an article to no less than 300 and no more than 700 words. Because goodbyes should be short, this post is under 300 words.

The title of this post is in quotation marks because I took it from a forgotten novel, a poem, or a line in a blues song. It expresses how I feel in having to say goodbye to all my SleuthSayers friends. I won’t be posting any more articles but I won’t be gone either, for I shall continue to read and occasionally comment on your posts. I’ll also continue writing critical reviews of African American crime fiction novels on my blog, which you can access here.

During the past three years, I’ve learned how writers think in constructing their stories. As I read your post, I experienced the sweet misery you go through while constructing your stories. Your posts also confirmed something I’ve always thought: writers write because they cannot not write.

As I write this post, I’m glad you can’t see me because I’m getting all choked up. Saying goodbye to good friends is not easy.

Thank you Leigh for giving me the opportunity to write for an appreciative audience.

Thank all of you for being an appreciative and encouraging audience.

When I Was Three

It's been three years now. To tell the truth, I never thought, even at the low rate of posting once every fortnight Friday, that I would last three years at this blogging thing. So far, I've talked about writing topics and about my writing successes, failures, how-to's and humorous outcomes. Sometimes, as novelist Raphael Sabatini said, you just gotta laugh at the world. I've told tales of the street, touched on some facets of law enforcement and dug up facts on peoples, customs and oddities out of various times in history. Don't know what you guys out there thought upon reading some of these bi-weekly contributions, but it's been fun on this end. It's also been great learning about all you guys and what you know.

SIDE NOTE: Yeah, I know there appears to be a male gender in the word guys if you happen to be thinking in terms of guys and dolls, but in my 1960's Webster's, definition 3, Colloquial, it says person, which is not gender specific, thus I mean all of you. Sure, I almost lost the argument in my 1974 Webster's, but that dictionary is a small paperback version. And, I get my genderless definition back in my giant 2002 Barnes & Noble Webster's Encyclopedia version which says in definition 2: a group of people regardless of gender. Hope we're all good with that one..

As for my tales of the street, don't take any of those as bragging when I mention events I played a part in. For our Sleuth Sayers blog, they are merely meant as entertainment for yourselves and as possible use for characters or events in the writing of your fiction. When these same types of tales are told among law enforcement personnel, this becomes a way of informal training having nothing to do with age, rank or length of service in the field. Everyone learns from the storyteller, which may mean a better chance of survival on the street. Every agent has different experiences during his career, thus his or her telling of these experiences gives fellow officers a chance to learn what worked under a certain set of circumstances, and maybe what didn't work out so well and could be done better the next time those circumstances happen to occur. Either way, it could be a lesson in life or a life lesson.

Photo by Puschinka 2009

It has been my great pleasure to rub shoulders with all you posters and readers on this blog site for the last three years, and to actually have been able to meet and converse with a few of you in person at writers conferences or other gatherings. Know that I look forward to your future postings and comments.

Happy 3rd Sleuth Sayers Birthday to all and a special thanks to Leigh, Rob and everybody else who keep this thing going..

Three Years Later...

Three years ago this web site and blog went live with John Floyd’s column “Plots and Plans”. Readers who have been with SleuthSayers from the beginning know it was spearheaded by former members of Criminal Brief, an influential web log devoted to mystery short fiction. CB, as it was affectionately known, had run its course. In 4½ years, it had covered a broad range of topics and insight in the realm of crime-writing. In the same month that Criminal Brief closed shop, September 2011, Leigh, Rob, John, and Deborah - as well as Janice Law, who had just joined CB seven months earlier - launched SleuthSayers. And what a great three years it has been.

Today we celebrate the third anniversary by bringing back all of the regular weekly columnists from Criminal Brief to provide brief updates of what they've done and where they've been during these three years. Let me say I’m glad to be back among old friends once again. So now I welcome to the stage Deborah, John, Melodie, Janice, Rob, Leigh, and Angela. It also seems fitting - we couldn't have it any other way - that Criminal Brief founder James Lincoln Warren will have the final word.

Thank you. And Happy SleuthSayers Anniversary!

— Steve Steinbock

Deborah Elliott-Upton.  Criminal Brief arrived at a pivotal time of my life. I had finished teaching a series of writer’s workshops and longed for a new challenge. A weekly blog fit perfectly. I enjoyed the camaraderie of my fellow CB writers, some were new acquaintances, amid some I’d known for a while.  This allowed enough familiarity to be comfortable, enough new to make me strive to do my best. I think we learned from each other as much as we shared our knowledge and experiences with the readership.

My favorite columns to write for Criminal Brief during the four years were one on Nick Carter (great time researching that one!) and two that complimented the other: “Good Bad Guys” and “Bad Good Guys.” Of course, I have fond memories of my very first experience with CB with “Take a Seat” – my entrance to the blogging arena.

When James decided Criminal Brief should end, many of us immediately signed on as SleuthSayers. We met some new writers as columnists and also reached many new readers, too. Personally, I was most grateful for those that traveled with us from old to new blogs.

Taking a sabbatical from SleuthSayers, I went back to school, majoring in psychology. After all these years, I am still curious about what makes people tick and why they do or say or act like they do. These differences make life much more interesting. I plan to never stop learning and I can’t stop writing; both are addictions. I am so happy to be among people who feel as I do.

John M. Floyd.  There’s nothing special going on in my world, which is exactly the way I like it. I still teach fiction-writing classes in the Continuing Education department of a local college, I still carry out my wife’s every order (well, almost every order), and I still read or watch all the mystery/suspense books and movies I can get into my hands or my Netflix queue. In the summers I mow our yard once a week whether it needs it or not, and in the winters I spend a lot of time wishing we lived even further south. Since retiring, most of my traveling has been to visit our children or my mother, or to attend the occasional (but not often enough) Bouchercon.

On the writing/publishing front, I have two novels currently out with an agent who (bless his soul) remains excited and encouraging about them both, but--as always--most of my time is spent writing short stories. Over the past year I've been fortunate enough to place stories at AHMM, The Strand, Woman's World, and The Saturday Evening Post, and unfortunate enough to add a lot of entries to my stunningly long list of rejections. At the moment I have new stories upcoming at both AHMM and EQMM, and my fifth book will be released next month. This one is another collection of shorts, appropriately titled Fifty Mysteries.

Melodie Johnson Howe.  I miss blogging and my blogging buds. But I have been busy, busy. My new Diana Poole novel, City of Mirrors, has been received with raves and I have a contract for the second in the series. I’m writing away and pop my head up to go to Bouchercon, and speaking engagements. City of Mirrors has come out in the UK in e-book, so you Brits out there take a look at it.

I’m looking forward to the Bewitched Fanfare later this month. They will be showing ‘Generation Zap’, the episode I starred in. I will be interviewed afterwards. Who knew there was a Bewitched Fanfare?! It’s in L.A. at the Sportsmen’s Lodge. This should be fun. My long ago acting career is alive!

We have a new puppy called Satchmo in honor of Louis Armstrong. The attendant at the vet thought Satchmo was named after an action hero. I told her he was. Which reminds me of a black standard poodle we had called Madame Bovary. And people kept calling her Ovary. But I digress.

We have a great granddaughter, Addison, who just turned one. Beyond adorable. Bones and I will be married for 50 years in March. What’s in a number? Many years of living, adjusting, talking, laughing, arguing, passion, and always love and respect.

I must leave now to get my roots blonded. I find it’s good for the soul and creativity.

Janice Law.  Since Criminal Brief shut down, I spent a year writing bi-weekly blogs for Sleuthsayers and discovered that I do not have an endless supply of clever ideas and interesting activities. The SS gang has been kind about allowing me an occasional space.

I have published the three volumes of my trilogy featuring Francis Bacon, painter, as the detective, which is not as impressive as it might sound given that I sent The Fires of London to my then agent in 2006 and did not find a publisher until Otto Penzler accepted it for mysteriouspress.com in 2011. Because I had ignored the hint that the publishing world was uninterested in both me and Francis, I already had the second novel, Prisoner of the Riviera, written by this time. The publishing mills grind exceedingly slowly in my case.

I have also published a volume of short stories – don’t ask me how long Blood in the Water looked for a publisher – and thanks to a suggestion by Rob Lopresti, there have been numerous outings for Madame Selina and her assistant, Nip, in AHMM. I think it is about time Nip acquired a legitimate trade or profession and Madame retired to Newport or Saratoga.

Lately, I have been trying to market some novels close to my heart but apparently not to the demands of the market. As a result, I’m spending a lot of time painting, with quite happy results.

Robert Lopresti.  What have I done in the last three years? Gotten much more than three years older, I think. Sold ten stories, more or less. Won two awards.

The future looks exciting. My first collection of short stories will be self-published quite soon. A new novel will be out next year. (Can't tell you about it yet, but I wrote a lot about it in the first year of SleuthSayers.) And, speaking of blogs, I have a new one starting next year. No, I won't be leaving SS, but I hope a lot of you will enjoy it. Read all about it here on January 7. In fact, I hope all you good folks will keep reading what we turn out here. You make it all worthwhile.

Leigh Lundin.  In comparison with my colleagues, I submit very little but work a lot. I know, I know; I actually have to send things in!

The problem with ADD is that too many things interest me. Not long ago, I helped edit math textbooks and wrote a few chapters for one. More recently I’ve been editing novels of new authors who’ve turned their backs on the self-pub short-cuts and want to present at a professional level.

A couple of stories are wending their way to editors’ desks and I’ve been working on a couple of novel-length projects. Well, one's a novel and one isn't, but more on that later.

In the meantime, SleuthSayers keeps me occupied, albeit with considerable help from my cohorts, especially Rob. And did I mention I spent the better part of a year in South Africa? And would love to again?

Steve Steinbock.  For a fuller disclosure of what I've been up to since the days of Criminal Brief, take a look at my recent guest post here on Sleuthsayers. The short version: Last year I attended a large number of mystery conventions and events - Bouchercon, Bloody Words, The Edgars, and Malice Domestic - as well as, on a lark, a Dark Shadows gathering in Tarrytown, New York. I continue to write my regular Jury Box colum in Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine.

On the personal side, my youngest child just began his senior year of high school. After he graduates, I plan to relocate to Washington State, just a few hours from Sleuthsayer and former Criminal Briefer Robert Lopresti. I spent most of this past summer in the desert region of Eastern Washington as well as in Seattle. I also took my son on a college exploratory trip to California, where we were able to catch up with old friends James Lincoln Warren, Melodie Johnson Howe, and Murder She Wrote and Columbo creator William Link.

Angela Zeman.  Hello! It’s been forever since I’ve checked in on SleuthSayers, thanks, Leigh for the invitation. When browsing your blogs, I detected that nobody here has been idle. (Elementary, heh heh.)

Life is good. I'm still attached to the amazing Barry Zeman, who Leigh thinks would make an ideal Mickey Spillane.

Since appearing in the Mystery Writers of America anthology, The Prosecution Rests, I've continued to write and developed a high-end web site. Most of you know that for several years, disk/back issues have disrupted my writing and my life. But tah-dah, it’s over. Well, I’ve had to stop leaping tall buildings. But I’m content with short hops. So, friends, to all directly concerned with my production (you know who you are) whatever I promised you… it’s going to arrive late. But I’m on it, no worries.

Oh yes, I'm 30,000 words into a thriller with a touch of horror. I'm so excited to be writing again!

James Lincoln Warren.  By 2006, I had tried at least twice (two-and-a-half times, if you count my short-lived Diction City Police Department attempt) to establish a presence on the internet as an author with his own blog. Can you say crash and burn? Running a personal web log takes a hell of a lot of work and a monstrous amount of discipline—that, or a pathological graphomania, and I’m a slow writer. Frankly, it isn’t possible to keep such a website completely current, and since new posts were generally erratic, it was also hard to keep it fresh. A blog really needs to be updated every day.

Several of my novelist friends had solved the necessary-update-every-day problem by joining rotating blogs, i.e., they shared the same blog, but each author posted on a regular schedule once a week. So I thought, why not a rotating blog for short story writers?

I pitched the idea to Rob Lopresti, who was enthusiastic, and after both of us had worked in putting together a regular list of contributors, Criminal Brief was launched on May 7, 2007. It was a resounding success.

The “Mystery Short Story Web Log Project” lasted for four and a half years. It was a very different website from SleuthSayers in a couple of ways. First, it had an extremely specific goal, to wit, promoting the crime short story, although other peripherally related topics were tolerated. Secondly, I was the editor and ultimate authority regarding what could be posted. (This latter condition caused some friction now and again.)

But toward the end, its content had gotten so broad that it was no longer even remotely sticking to the topic. Since it had pretty much become a non-paying full-time job for me, this made me unhappy. I was working very hard on something I did not really have a passion for.

Was CB still relevant to its primary purpose? The answer was clearly no. But then I realized that CB had actually accomplished its purpose. I wasn’t willing to let what had been so lovingly been crafted turn into just another author blog, not that I have any objection to such blogs, but the reason Rob and I had founded CB in the first place was because we wanted something unique. Regretfully, I decided to shut it down. That pretty much made everybody unhappy.

So I suggested to the others that if they wanted to continue to write posts, that they establish a new blog among themselves with a broader mandate. The indefatigable Leigh Lundin picked up the gauntlet, and three of the seven authors from CB joined him, which I thought was absolutely grand, and the SleuthSayers shortly thereafter began to pronounce their auguries. Look at them now!

SleuthSayers is a much bigger project than CB ever was. From the short story acorn has grown a mighty oak of crime fiction contributors. Here’s Criminal Brief’s swan song. That will tell you what I think we achieved, and explain my pride in the project. One thing at the time I didn’t suspect was what would happen to that acorn, though—I only left it on the ground. The SleuthSayers themselves are the ones who nurtured, pruned, and watered it into what it is now, and they’re the ones who should be justifiably proud of their accomplishments.

What Was I Saying?

As you know, this blog's birthday was yesterday, two days before my birthday, which is also International Talk Like a Pirate Day.  Aaar!   So, all these festive occasions having put me in a reflective mood, I have been consdiering what all of us have been talking about here.

And it seems to me that each of us has his or her own themes.  I see emphases on: true crimes current, true crimes historic, professional experience (as cops, soldiers, spies, psychologists, etc.), childhood memories, current family news, book reviews, favorite books, authors, or films, and of course writing techniques.

In any given week any one of us might write about any of those subjects, and do, but we each seem to have favorites.  I suspected I knew what mine was but I tested it out by tossing all my columns for the past two years into tagcrowd, which pulls out the fifty most commonly used words.  (Incidentally, I also use Tagcrowd on any piece I am about to send to an editor.  It helps me spot words I have overused.) 

-->

ago author best book called case character course crime enough example fiction friends going guy happened hitchcock idea library lot magazine man mystery name novel people person piece plot point probably published read series short something start story stout think thought times used week wolfe work writer writing wrote year

created at TagCrowd.com

Which supports my theory: my main theme is the writing life.  I have been blogging here, mostly, about how it feels to get an idea, grind out a rough draft, edit, submit, get rejected, etc.  Here are a few examples, describing different parts of the process:

Restless Brain Syndrome
Backtalk
The Rising Island Method
RSI
Picking More Black Orchids 

My conclusion is that I use this space as a sort of writing diary and you good readers are my excuse for keeping it up.  I hope you don't mind.

And I hope that you will put up with me and my fellow bloggers for a long time.  Because they - and you - are good company.

Two Years and Counting

It's hard to believe that September 17 will be SleuthSayers' second birthday. What's even harder to believe is that I've been able to come up with something to say every alternate Saturday for those two years. (Notice that I didn't use the phrase "something meaningful to say.") Not surprisingly, my greatest thrill in participating in this blog project has not been the writing of my columns but the reading of my blogmates's columns every day. I never fail to learn something about mysteries, writing, or life in general.

My fond memories of the SleuthSayers experience will always be linked to my fond memories of its predecessor, Criminal Brief. For four years I wrote the Saturday column there, which we called "Mississippi Mud"--a reference, probably, to both my location and the clarity of my writing. I remember that when James Lincoln Warren invited me in 2007 to jump aboard the CB train, I was delighted and honored to be one of the seven bloggers on the team (I still can't figure out how I was allowed to join such a stellar group), but I was also scared to death. I was a short-story writer, not a blogger/columnist. How in the world could somebody--anybody--come up with something to write about a specific subject (short mystery fiction, in this case) once a week, every week? 

The answer, of course, is that all of us occasionally ventured away from the clearly-marked trail and dabbled in other topics, although they usually did relate in some vague way to mysteries or writing. The same goes for SleuthSayers. We're mostly crime fiction writers here, but now and then we take our notepads and canteens and wander off into the weeds to cover other subjects. I'm particularly fond of movies, and especially suspense movies (watching them and writing about them), so most of my off-the-rez columns have been cinematic. Hopefully our sideline discussions, which I try to keep to a minimum, are either interesting or entertaining or instructive. And the variety does helps keep us sane (or less insane).

I also had to learn not to worry about blundering into an area of crime writing that someone else might have already written about. Ronald Tobias once said there are only twenty "master plots" in fiction, and the challenge is to approach them in different ways. That's also true with regard to blogs/essays. No topic, even if it was covered the previous week or month, is off-limits as long as it's presented in a new light. Another quote: According to Mark Twain, Adam was the only person who, when he said something, could be certain that no one had ever said it before.

To us writers, a big advantage of a project like SleuthSayers is that it's more than just an opportunity for us to voice our thoughts. Because of the "comments" capability of Blogger, we can also see the immediate responses of our readers and colleagues. I've often enjoyed the exchange of comments as much as I enjoyed the columns themselves--whether I was the writer or the reader. And I've learned a lot from the comments my pieces have received. This blog has been fortunate to have a fair number of followers, and--as at Criminal Brief--some have been truly loyal. I value their views and opinions. No small part of all this is that I've also received a number of recommendations to read novels and stories and to see movies that I probably wouldn't even have known about otherwise.

The main thing, though, is that it's just a pleasure to be in the company of others every day who share a love of writing and reading crime fiction. I've always believed that the reading public is attracted to mystery/suspense stories and novels because of two things: (1) conflict is always there in abundance--it's a built-in part of the genre--and (2) they give us a chance to see justice triumph, whereas in real life the bad guys (and good guys) sometimes don't get what they deserve. And for writers, I think the puzzle that's almost always at the center of mystery fiction is the reason we do it. As in no other genre, things must eventually tie together and make sense, and the placement of those puzzle pieces is not only challenging but fun.

What I'm saying is, I love this blog and its mission, and--God help me--I even like putting together these biweekly rants. Matter of fact, I'm headed out of town today to yet another booksigning, and I plan to use the driving time to try to come up with something for my column on September 28. (Maybe even something meaningful, this time.)

Until then, I'd like to sincerely thank our readers and my fellow Sayers of Sleuth for all the things you've taught me over these past two years. I've had a wonderful time. 

Happy birthday/anniversary to all of us.

Happy Boid-Day

by R.T. Lawton

Somehow, I envision two broad shouldered, heavy-set guys in dark pin-striped suits standing in front of a birthday cake which is resting on a highly polished wood bar in a classy speak easy. I see candles on top of that frosted, multi-layered cake. The candles spell out two words.

The guy in the grey pin-stripe suit and matching fedora has a five o'clock shadow that has probably been there since noon. As he leans forward to light the candles, his suit coat opens far enough to divulge a glimpse of a shoulder holster containing a blue-steel Colt .45 automatic. He also keeps a tommy gun in a violin case somewhere close by.

Then the other guy in the blue pin-stripe beckons us all closer and raises his arms. I don't know what the rest of you are going to do, but I'm going to sing. And I'm going to do it loudly. He drops his hands like a philharmonic orchestra director and leads us in song with his gravelly voice and East Coast accent.

Happy Boid-Day to you
Happy Boid-Day to you
Happy Boid-Day dear Sleuth Sayers
You're now age two.

They both blow out the candles. Then one pulls a switchblade. My nerves twitch and my feet want to run, but it turns out he's only going to cut the cake. I gratefully accept my piece. There's no way I'm going to mess with either of them two guys, cuz they know what they're doing. And, I'll be doubly careful not to get crosswise with their beautiful secretary Velma.

There can be some mean streets out there in this thing of ours if a person isn't careful, so yes sirrie, boss, I'm writing as fast as I can. One more year of crime, criminals and everything that goes with it. Nothing personal, it's just good business.

Have a good one.

Happy Birthday!

by Eve Fisher

So SleuthSayers is 2 years old this week!  I just went to a birthday party for my god-child's daughter, so I'm all up on 2 year olds.  This means SleuthSayers should be walking, talking, rebellious, curious, determined, and eating all the cake it can get its little hands on before doing something unmentionable behind the playhouse.  Sounds appropriate to me.


I have been contributing here for a year and a half, and I feel (1) grateful to be a part of it; (2) right at home with the rest of the crazies - you know who you are - and (3) amazed at how fast time flies, especially when you're talking crime. And what a crowd we have!

Both David Edgerley Gates and Leigh Lundin are always good for scaring the crap out of me about privacy and security, on-line and off.  (Although deep down I don't believe there is any such thing as privacy other than what's between my ears.  But more on that another time.)

Fran Rizer's article on "Adolescent Sexist Swill" sent me racing down memory lane to the ASS I have read and strangely loved, but then all of Fran's articles trigger me.  Her amazing life story deserves a book of its own.

And speaking of backstory - I look forward to each and every one of R. T. Lawton's many tales from his undercover days. Keep them coming! 

Elizabeth Zelvin understands intimately life with and around and infused with addiction; it's so nice to know that someone else lived a dysfunctional life! 

Rob Lopresti - well, besides his wonderful articles here (my favorite is probably "Rosencrantz & Guildenstern want something"), go over and check out his Facebook page.  Some of the best zingers in the house...

John Floyd is the go-to guy for verse around here, that's for sure.  Remember his "Candy is Dandy"?

Terence Flaherty's "The Wordsworth Trap" really got me thinking about the self - past, present, future - and the endless tinkering we do.

Brian Thornton and I share a special bond - an endless on-line infatuation with a certain British agent (the name is Elliot, Charles Elliot).  Let's put it this way, when I found out that Our Man Elliot was related to Robert Louis Stevenson, Brian was the first one I e-mailed.


Louis Willis' "Surrounded by Bigfoots" brought back all sorts of Southern memories, not to mention legends of the foggy Appalachian mountains...

Dale Andrews (whose grasp of mysteries - movies and novels - is amazing and entertaining), Dixon Hill (my favorite - "To Weave a Tangled Web"), Jan Grape (who seems to understand every problem that I encounter in writing, but with more solutions), Janice Law (what a great book "Fires of London" is - get it now!), you have all entertained and informed me.  If I have left anyone out - what can I say?  We have a stellar crew here.  Period. 

Meanwhile, I'm off to the pen this weekend, where hopefully I will come up with more material for another blog.  Again, Happy Birthday and thanks for all the criminally cozy, murderously funny, grimly hilarious entries over the last two years!  And more to come!

Baby to Toddler to Published

Our SleuthSayers blog is coming up on its second birthday on the 17th of this month. Wow, we're not babies anymore. We started out not really knowing where we'd go or who we might meet along the way, but it's been fun so far. We have an outstanding group of award-nominated and award-winning authors. We have a couple of writers who had to go on hiatus because of writing deadlines, yet we were able to add wonderful new folks immediately. Now at the terrible two stage, I expect more mystery, murder and mayhem, daily. If you only come around periodically, I suggest you try to come by on a regular basis. You might be surprised at our new running, walking, toddling stage and the very grown up published state.

The idea of comparing SleuthSayers to a baby just brings to mind how a writer is born, grows and develops. Not every writer, okay, there is the odd one or two published the first time out. Those are rare cases. And in reality most of those honed their craft in newspaper or magazine writing or editing. They could even have a background in public relations, advertising or graphic work. It's possible they have a background/work history which they then used to write, like a policeman, a CIA agent, a lawyer, a crime-beat reporter or they were a real private detective. Being a bit of an expert in their field helped their writing craft.

Most writers have to start somewhere in their life, usually at an early age writing. I know authors who wrote a novel when they were ten or twelve or fourteen years old. At any rate, they almost always thought about or wanted to be a writer. I knew one children's author who told stories to her class when the class work was over each day. She quickly learned in telling her tales to stop at the day at an exciting part so the other kids wanted her to continue the story the next day. She was a baby writer who grew up fast.

Another friend who wrote a novel at age 12, went around neighborhood selling copies. I know writers now who write and have children in school. They have to work their schedule around when the kids are gone and then be ready to be a parent when the kids come home from school. I knew one lady who had toddlers underfoot, who would type a line or two, then change a diaper or fix a bottle. More power to her.

I know a lady who is a best-selling author whose husband died from a heart attack and she had three small children and since she had always wanted to be a writer, decided to see if she could make it. She did.

Another writer I know, also a best-selling author who wrote a couple of medical mysteries because his wife was a doctor and he had someone who could help him with the technical parts. Then he wrote private-eye novels and next wonderful thrillers and he stays home and takes care of the kids, being Mr. Mom while he writes.

I always wanted to write and publish books but I worked as an X-ray Technician and Radiation Therapist and after doing that all day and with three kids at home, I didn't try to have anything published. Well, that's not exactly true. I wrote an essay for English class my senior year and unbeknownst to me, my teacher had it published in the school paper. The paper came out that morning and after first period class a bunch of kids came running up and told me that Miss Moore had published my essay in the school news paper. It was What Christmas Means To Me. I was so excited, kids wanted my autograph and that's when I knew I wanted to be a writer. Unfortunately, that publication didn't survive and I don't have a copy of it.

My next publication was a scientific paper on a new machine we got in Austin at Holy Cross Hospital called a telecopier. This was before fax machines. The oncology radiologist I worked with was able to send a preliminary treatment plan using this machine and transmit this plan to an oncology radiologist specialist in Houston (not MD Anderson) where they also had a physicist. The Houston folks worked out all the details and transmitted the final plans back to our department in Austin. The article I wrote was entered in the Local Radiological Society contest and the Texas State Radiological Society contest and I won both prizes. The TSRS sent it to the American Society and they published it in their monthly journal. The local prize was $50 and local publication, but the TX RT Society prize was $500 and the promise of the publication in the national journal. That was the first paid publications and it was about twenty years before I was paid for a short story. And it wasn't a mystery. Another five years passed before I published my first mystery short story. Good thing I kept my day job.

But when I started writing with an eye to actually trying to be published, I was a baby writer. I had to learn to crawl, then to walk, and finally to run as a writer and get published more often.. I learned that as long as I kept writing...not really worrying about getting published but sending query letters out and eventually getting feed-back that I improved. I grew as a writer. And strangely enough I noticed there seemed to be a change, or a growth spurt about every six months. The best way to do that as all you SleuthSayers know and any of you aspiring writers want to know is to write, write, write. and read, read, read.

So keep in mind most of us start out as baby writers and we keep growing with all the trials and pains of a toddler and then a teenager, but finally we learn and become a published author. There're a lot of growing pains along the way but it's worth it. Just ask any SleuthSayer.

Day Trip to New York, May 2, 2013

On 2^nd May 1952, the era of commercial jet passenger service began as a BOAC de Havilland Comet carrying 36 passengers took off on a multi-stop flight from London to Johannesburg, South Africa.

                              Associated Press

                              Today in History
                              May 2, 2013

           Fast Enough to get there,
           Slow enough to see,
           Moderation seems to be the key.

                              Jimmy Buffett
                              Barometer Soup
   

The reception:  Mystery writers everywhere!

     What better way to celebrate the anniversary of jet passenger service than to follow Mr. Buffett's advice and take a train trip?

    The beginning of May is many things to many people. To mystery writers there is a special anticipation that comes with the first Thursday in May, this year May second, since that is the day when the annual Edgars award celebration takes place in New York City. And for a smaller subset of mystery writers, those whose passion is the mystery short story, the day offers up a related treat -- the annual authors cocktail party hosted by Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine and Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine.

     I’ve never been a fan of air transportation. it is a necessary evil when my family heads off to favorite vacation spots in the Caribbean, and sometimes one surrenders to the indignities of air transportation when held hostage by time constraints. But I fail to understand anyone who travels between Washington, D.C. (my home) and New York City by any means other than rail. And that is why this piece begins as I find myself  signed on to Amtrak’s wifi service, comfortably ensconced in a window seat and typing away on Amtrak’s Acela headed north. The trip is 2-1/2 hours each way, and deposits me a pleasant 30 minute walk from the Andrew Haskell Braile and Talking Books Library where the cocktail party takes place at 3:30.
  

Janet Hutchings

   Now that walk in Manhattan is not as easy as it sounds -- 14 Manhattan short blocks followed by 2-1/2 Manhattan long blocks is exercise, but it should otherwise be pretty simple.  New York City, however, has always been a little daunting fot me. So the walk is always just long enough to convince me that my chances are equally divided between finding the party and roaming forever on the streets of Manhattan. (At least Charlie got to sit down on the MTA.)
   

Janice, Liz, R.T.

     But, as always, I get there. And, also as always, the party makes up for all of the investment. The EQMM/AHMM pre-Edgars parties have descended a notch from the glory days of yore, when they were held at the Manhattan Club and other storied locales, with several full bars and waiters hovering with platters of shrimp. But the wine bar, served up by magazine employees, and the table of hors d'oeuvres is just fine.  And it is also not why we are here.  What this occasion offers is the opportunity to visit with those who share common interests in mystery short story writing, to connect with people who otherwise are known only on-line.   Janet Hutchings meets me at the door, and a few minutes visiting with her, and then with Linda Landrigan, is itself worth the price of admission.

      At last year’s reception SleuthSayers was represented by David Dean and me, but this year we are out in force. R.T. Lawton and his wife Kiti are standing near the window as I enter, and within a short time Janice Law Trecker, Liz Zelvin, David Dean, R.T. and me are together for the first time in the non-cyber real  world.
   

Liz, me, David and R.T.

     Another great thing about the reception is getting that first lead on  things mystery-related that are about to happen. This year Peter Kanter, who presides over Dell publications, announced a pending major re-vamp of the Ellery Queen and Alfred Hitchcock websites, which promises a new level of interaction among writers and readers.  This could be fun!

     Awards, of course, were announced, including the second place Readers’ Choice award won this year by our own David Dean for his story Mariel, which appeared in the December issue of EQMM.   David also reports that he is making good progress on his new novel, which has kept him away from SleuthSayers for some time now.

  

Joe Goodrich

     Some of the best tidbits I picked up during this year's party were from Joe Goodrich, who, as SleuthSayer readers will recall, is the author/editor of Blood Relations, the recent volume collecting the letters of Frederic Dannay and Manfred B. Lee.  Joe recently adapted the first  Ellery Queen Wrightsville novel, Calamity Town, for the stage.  The work, as previously reported, had a read-through performance last January at the New Dramatists Playhouse in New York City.  This summer Joe reports that the play will have its first full-stage production, under the directorial hand of fellow Queen scholar Arthur Vidro.

     Equally interesting is the locale for that presentation:  the play will be performed by the Off Broad Street Players in Claremont, New Hampshire.  The Off Broad Street Players are no stranger to the works of Ellery.   In fact, beginning tomorrow the company is presenting an on-stage production of two classic Queen radio dramas.  But the claim to fame of Claremont itself runs even deeper. Those familiar with some of the more obscure clues in the Queen backstory may recall that Claremont has been rumored to be the model for Queen’s New England town of Wrightsville.  What better site for the world premier of Calamity Town? The troop's production of Calamity Town is likely to run only two nights, probably this coming September 7 and 8.

    On other fronts, Joe also spent time this last year adapting a Rex Stout mystery, The Red Box, for the stage.  The play has already been scheduled for an extended run next summer at the Park Square Theater in St. Paul.

     Oops.  It’s 5:00. Time for me to see if I can find my way back to the train station!