Can We Be SANE Without Writing?

 

Recently, I reached an age where I admit to being in my 60s. 

This milestone has got me thinking about what it means to be a working author at a time when all your friends are retired. (Husband as well, the poop.)

For instance, today Mike is golfing.  I - in contrast - am sitting at my computer taking a break from three solid hours of going through publisher edits, working to a deadline of Friday.  This includes several hours yesterday, the day before and the day before that.  

My neck hurts.  I'm not sure I'll be able to get out of this chair without help. And as I look wistfully out the window at lake Ontario on this glorious day, I can't help wondering if I'm doing the right thing.  There are only so many hours left to live.

 

1000 HOURS A BOOK

It takes me a year to write a historical mystery, from the original first draft, the endless research, to the final edited version.  1000 hours for each book, I estimate.  

My 18th book will be published in March.  My 19th (the work in progress) will be a year after that. My 70th short story will be published this November. 

Even ignoring the short stories, that's 20,000 hours of writing for 19 published books. (The first didn't get published, to my immense relief.  Even I thought the protagonist was a whiny nincompoop.)

I have writer friends (the best of the bunch) and non-writer friends (incredibly patient and tolerant) who seem to have more brains than I do.  So I ventured this question out loud to them:

WILL SOMEBODY PLEASE TELL ME WHY I'M STILL DOING THIS?

Bless them all. Here are the two best answers I got:

YOU HAVE A PUBLISHER, NINNY!

For so many of my writing students, getting a publisher is the Holy Grail.  And indeed, I thought so too, as I shlepped my work around twenty years ago. 

Having a publisher means your work is still getting read, and is making the publisher money.  They let you go if it isn't. 

I'm under contract for two more books, but it does make me wonder what comes after that.  And this leaves the ultimate question: do we quit writing novels on our own terms, while they are still being sought, or do we wait until a publisher no longer wants them?

 

WHAT ELSE WOULD YOU DO?

At first I burst out laughing, when Thom said this to me. My friend and writing colleague Thom Bennett is blessed with wisdom and good nature.  He also deals in tough love.  I listen when he talks.

He tells me this:  "What else would you do with that time you spend writing? I know women your age who have nothing to do but go to lunch. They spend hours lining up people to have lunch with every day, desperate to keep their calendars full.  Is that who you want to be?"

I like lunch.  But I have to admit, he made me think.  If you had a full time job in your middle years, and kids at home, you probably didn't have time to develop many hobbies outside of work.  My hobby was writing, of course.  Which is why we are having this soul searching today.

To which I add my own question:  

CAN I BE SANE WITHOUT WRITING?

I honestly don't know.  Can you?

I've been writing since I was eight. I earned my first award when I was a high school senior (a City of Toronto children's book award.)  

I can't imagine my life without days full of writing.  In fact, it scares the hell out of me.  

At the same time, I worry that - on my death bed - I will regret having spent so much of my final decade/s alone in my office at a keyboard.

How about you? Any advice? Do you ever question whether spending your 60s and upward years writing is the right thing to do?

 

Melodie Campbell has been called the "Queen of Comedy" by The Toronto Sun.  Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine called her "The Canadian literary heir to Donald Westlake." You can get her books on Amazon, and all the usual suspects.

 

 

  

Where Have All the Gentleman Gone?

 

Warning: Controversial material ahead 

 

Mike and I had a favourite couple over for dinner last weekend, and something Cindy said has been haunting me ever since.

Where have all the Gentlemen gone?  

It used to be that Cary Grant and David Niven were role models for young men.  All the girls swooned over Cary Grant, so young men wanted to BE like Cary Grant. 

It wasn't just his looks.  It was the way he treated others. He was a Gentleman.

I remember other gentlemen from the movies: Frank Sinatra, Jimmy Stewart, Elvis and even John Wayne!  Men who treated women with respect, but were still highly regarded as men who would step up to battle (be it personal, or wartime) if needed.

A gentleman was strong. He was sure of himself. He didn't have to belittle others to make himself feel good.

My own favourite was Humphrey Bogart.  Yes, he was way before my time, but movies like Casablanca and To Have and Have Not, cemented my ideas of what an ideal man would be like.  Someone who is decent and honorable, but also a protector.

You ask any woman what she wants in a man, and most will say 'a Gentleman'.  What do we mean? A fellow who treats her with respect.  Who understands that she deserves agency over her own life. Who does not use blue language around her. Who especially does not refer to women's body parts crudely, as if talking about a prostitute. ( I'm reminded of a certain political candidate here...)

I ask again: where have all the gentlemen gone? How did we lose this ideal?

My friend puts this sorry change down to the movies. In the old days, many movies put value on the way a man behaved.  If he treated women well, was honest with others and decent in his behaviour, he was a good guy.  He got to wear the white hat. This reflected societal values - the values I grew up with.

Now, so many movies and thriller novels portray the 'good guy' as a killer; they glorify bullies who use crude language that belittles women, while blasting their way through countless people, grinning all the while.

If that is the current idea of a hero in Hollywood or thrillers, then it's no wonder young men are seeing this as a role model.

But I tell you, men - it's not what women want.  Ask us.

 

With thanks to all the men in my life, and on Sleuthsayers, who are Gentlemen.

 

Melodie Campbell loves creating steadfast, courageous heroes with honour, who are gentlemen.  You can read about them in The Merry Widow Murder series, including the upcoming Silent Film Star Murders.  Available now for preorder at Barnes and Noble, Chapters/Indigo, and all the usual suspects.

 

When Book Clubs become Fight Clubs (A bit of humour for a tough month...)

My 17th book, The Merry Widow Murders, came out last year, and my publisher said, "get out there!"  And provided me with a bunch of places to go.

I like my publisher.  And I like book clubs.  It's fun to meet with like-minded people, and discuss our mutual love of mystery books.  Usually, you hear good things about your novel, and I've learned to wear protective clothing around my ego for those times when things don't go quite as planned.

Witness the crazy, loopy scene that took place last month, at a particularly large, mixed book club gathering.  Bless them all.  They gave me a story to tell in perpetuity.

It all started with research. 

(What follows is verbatim, I swear.  I had it fact-checked by one of the women :)

I explain the exhausting amount of research involved in writing The Merry Widow Murders, which is set in 1928.  All about the food and drinks of the time, fashions, music that just came out, fuel used by a 1920s era ocean liner, social mores...

Man of a certain age shoots up his hand and says:  "Speaking of research.  You wrote that they sat on a bale of hay.  I looked it up, and hay balers didn't come out until 1938.  So there couldn't have been bales of hay in 1928."

One could call his tone triumphant and be  accused of understatement.

Sounds of silence.  A woman's voice says, "And here we go..."

Another man:  "Didn't they call them bales before?"

Me:  "I can tell you that my father worked on a farm before WW11 and he called them bales of hay."

At which point, every man in the room grabs his phone to look stuff up.

Man 2:  "Here it is!  John, you're wrong.  Bales have been used to describe hay since forever."

Man 3:  "Hah! The fur traders called them bales of pelts way before 1928. You're wrong, John. WRONG."

Woman:  "Can we talk about the book please?"

Me:  "Wait a minute.  The Merry Widow Murders takes place on an ocean liner.  There aren't any bales of hay in that book."

John (grumping):  "Well,  I read it somewhere."

Me, thinking fast:  "You may have read it in The Goddaughter's Revenge, from an old series, maybe ten books ago.  It takes place during Halloween in today's time period, not 1928."

Another woman's voice:  "Oh for the love of Gawd..."

Man 2:  "Speaking of 1928.  You realize that you're only talking about a small slice of society in this book.  It's all about rich people in first class.  The elites."  (He barely keeps from spitting.)  "Hardly representative of the life of a normal person in 1928.  People on farms."

"Baling hay," says another man, snickering.

Woman:  "For Heaven's sake, Roy!  That's the people we want to read about!"

Man 3, still looking at phone:  "About those hay bales-"

"ENOUGH ABOUT THE HAY BALES!" yell several women in unison.

Melodie Campbell promises there are no bales of hay in The Silent Film Star Murders, out next winter.

Don't Ask a Writer

Inspired by Melodie Campbell's excellent SleuthSayer's article of 25 May 2024 – Three Things You Should Never Ask an Author, I'd like to add some stuff.

The questions Melodie listed were:

1. How much money do you make?
2. Do you used a pen name?
3. I'll give you my unpublished manuscript to read for free, if you'll recommend me to your publisher.

I'll add the follow things you should not ask a writer. I have been asked these questions, many more than once.

1. I have this idea. I'll give you the information. Why don't you write it up and we'll split the money?

Used to get this a lot when I first started writing, especially from my old buddies in law enforcement. My answer – I'm writing another book right now and have enough ideas for the next ten years.

2. Who's your ghostwriter?

I've never had a ghostwriter. I make up my own stuff.

3. You still writing?

Get this one a lot. Just got this one from a relative I haven't spoken with in a while. I told him my 49th book was published in June, I just finished two short stories this month and I'm half way through another novel.

4 . Where do you get your ideas? (A question asked of nearly every published writer)

Life. I get my ideas from life. What I see, hear, touch, taste, smell, and imagine. I also subscribe to an idea service in ... wait, I'm sorry, it's secret.

5. Where to you live?

I can't tell you. It will upset Cthulhu and we don't want to upset the big guy.

Cthulhu widescreen wallpaper © free4kwallpapers.com

The Big Guy in profile

6. How do you write from a woman's point of view, when you're not a woman?

I use a computer. I used to use a typewriter but the balls quit working (I used an IBM selectric typewriter with the revolving typeball ... never mind). Before that I had a Smith Corona portable electric, and before that a big, bad Underwood manual typewriter.

7. Why do your characters have sex in your books?

I've asked my characters this and they tell me to shut up and write what they do. I'll echo Ray Bradbury here, "All my characters write the book. I don't write the book."

AND William Faulkner who said, "It begins with a character, usually, and once he stands up on his feet and begins to move, all I can do is trot along behind him with a paper and pencil trying to keep up long enough to put down what he says and does." (Also, there isn't sex in all of my books and stories).

8. Why don't you write a best seller?

Oh, Lord. If I wrote a best seller I'd be a best selling author, when, in fact, I'm a barely selling writer, which is more ME.

9. Why hasn't anyone made a movie out of one of your books?

Two answers. 1. Hollywood is too busy filming big movies with big explosions and lots of CGI stuff. 2. Hollywood is also too busy remaking movies that don't need to be remade because they are too lazy to try new stuff. OK, they do try new stuff but not enough.

10. What was that book you wrote? The one with the good ending.

No response.

11. Do you know any big writers?

Yeah. Most writers are bigger than me. I'm only 5'6". (168cm)

That's all for now,

www.oneildenoux.com

SleuthSisters, Movies, and the Bechdel Test: Part II

The last time our beloved SleuthSayer buddy John Floyd, who everyone agrees watches way too many movies, listed his favorites, fellow SleuthSayer Melodie Campbell and I both commented, "You are such a guy, John!" What did we mean? What does John's love for Casablanca, The Godfather, and The Big Lebowski have to do with gender? Aren't they all great films? Yes, but. Melodie gave me the best way yet to explain why many women may admire these films but not necessarily adore them when she told me about the Bechdel Test.

The Bechdel Test, created by cartoonist Alison Bechdel, who now says she was only kidding at the time but thinks it's cool that it's worked so well and come to mean so much to women who love movies, is a simple three-part measure to apply to any movie.

Does the movie have at least one scene in which (1) two women characters talk (2) to each other (3) about a subject other than a man (or men)?

I grew up in a household in which the women—me, my mother, and my sister—outnumbered the lone man, my dad. Add in a gaggle of loquacious aunts, maternal and paternal, on holidays—I've recently learned that the linguistic technical term for the constant interrupting in any New York Jewish gathering is called "overlapping" and is a feature of our "dialect"—and the men could barely get a word in edgewise. At age 92, my mother, who by then called herself "the oldest living lawyer," made friends with Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who was twenty years younger. The first time they had lunch together, we asked Mom, "What did you talk about?" "Everything!" she said. And that's what I want women in movies to talk about too.

In Part I, my SleuthSister Melodie discussed why it's important for all of us to have movies that pass the Bechdel test: for some, characters that we can relate to and admire; for others, frequent reminders that women have more interesting things to talk about than men, men, men.

If you missed Melodie's post, you can read it here.

Now, here are some examples: 26 (a double baker's dozen!) wonderful movies that pass the Bechdel Test (in no particular order):

1. Enchanted April

Four women seeking respite from their lives in dreary post-World War I London are unexpectedly transformed by a month in a castle in Italy.

2. Hidden Figures

Black women's work as mathematicians at NASA was crucial to America's success in the Space Race; their story is finally told.

3. The Help
The women who work as maids to the young white wives of Jackson, Mississippi just before the Civil Rights movement risk their jobs and their safety to tell a woman journalist the truth about how they're treated.

4. Nyad
A woman in her sixties comes back from repeated failures to swim from Cuba to Florida, with the support of the woman friend who coaches her.

5. Fried Green Tomatoes
Two pairs of women form enduring friendships: a modern housewife in need of empowerment with an old woman in a nursing home and an independent woman in the 1920s with an abused wife in need of an escape route.

6. Little Women

Four sisters share dreams and ambitions in Civil War-era New England. Seven movies have been made of the novel that more American women still read for pleasure than men read Moby Dick or Huckleberry Finn.

7. Erin Brockovich
A single mother fights environmental crime and corporate greed in a small community.

8. Norma Rae
A millworker finds her voice when she leads a fight to unionize.

9. Made in Dagenham
Women strike for equal pay at a Ford plant in Britain.

10. Songcatcher
A woman in the 1930s goes to Appalachia to collect folksongs and learns more than she expects to.

11. Beaches Two very different women's lifelong friendship begins and is renewed on beaches.

12. Marvin's Room
A dying woman seeks a bone marrow transplant from members of her dysfunctional family.

13. Howard's End

Two Edwardian sisters devoted to each other, culture, and their independence diverge on issues of class and how to use their privilege for good.

14. The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel
A group of aging British women and men relocate to India in hopes of a more satisfying life in their later years.

15. Still Alice
A brilliant woman facing early onset dementia struggles to connect with her daughters while she can.

16. Monsoon Wedding

The prospect of a wedding stirs up secrets in a prosperous Indian family.

17. National Velvet
A little girl with an eccentric but loving family dreams of winning the Grand National on a horse she won in a raffle.

18. Nine to Five
Three women friends plot revenge against their abusive boss

19. Girl, Interrupted
Two girls in a locked psychiatric institution become friends.

20. After the Wedding
The birth mother and adoptive mother of the bride meet, and their complicated history is revealed.

21. Calendar Girls
A group of respectable British women raise money by posing nude for a calendar.

22. Bend It Like Beckham
Two girls from different backgrounds become friends after being rivals at football (soccer to Americans).

23. Boys On the Side
Three young women join forces on a road trip that becomes a trip on the run.

24. Julia
The writer Lillian Hellman tries to help her friend Julia, who works against and is ultimately killed by the Nazis.

25. Outrageous Fortune
Two actresses who hate each other become friends in a mashup of buddy, spy, and caper movie.

26. Steel Magnolias
The women in a small Louisiana town shares their joys and sorrows at the local beauty salon.

How many of these have you seen?

SleuthSisters, Movies, and the Bechdel Test: Part I

John has inspired us!  A few months ago, John Floyd made a list of movies he really enjoyed which might have been overlooked.  This inspired Liz Zelvin and me to start talking about movies we loved, and why they might be different from those on John's list.

To that end, we decided to write joint posts.  Mine follows, and Liz's will be on Monday.

Thanks for inspiring us, John!

SleuthSisters, Movies, and the Bechdel Test

Many readers of this blog know that I taught fiction writing at college for over 25 years, going back to the early 90s.  The dialogue below happened so often in class, I could phone it in.

Me to adult male student:  "There are no women in your book.  Over 60% of books are bought by women.  You might want to put in someone they can relate to."

Student:  "Yes there is!  See?" (pointing)

Me:  "She's the victim.  You kill her off on page two."

Then much of the class sat dumbfounded, as I pointed out the "Campbell factor," as they called it.

If you want to sell books to 60% of the market, write real women into your books.  Women we can relate to.

 

HOLLYWOOD DRIVES ME CRAZY

The same applies to Hollywood.  In so many movies released in the past twenty years, and by my count, the majority of action movies and thrillers, there are perhaps two women present in supporting roles.  The victim and the babe.

That's it.  Not surprisingly, a lot of thriller books sport the same two female supporting characters. 

(To be fair, sometimes the babe is a villain.  Groovy.  I am encouraged to relate to a victim or a villain.  Or - worst of all - the only supporting female character is a goodhearted prostitute.  Please save me.)

Which is why the Bechdel Test came to be so famous.  Do you know it?

To pass, a film must have:

*Two named female characters

*Who talk to each other

*About something other than a man.

You would be shocked at how few films pass the Bechdel Test.

 

THANK GAWD FOR AGATHA

I cut my reading teeth on Nancy Drew, and then moved on to Agatha Christie.

When I was a teen, Christie was my favourite author.  She's still up there in my top ten.  It's no surprise to me that she is the best-selling fiction writer in the world.

By why, you ask?  Surely there are other greats from the same period, even other female authors - Dorothy Sayers, Ngaio Marsh etc - who wrote terrific mysteries.

Curious about that, I decided to look at what I liked about the Christie books and movies, as opposed to other great writers.

It was immediately clear.  I could see myself in her books!  I could relate, as there were several females, young and old, in all of her books.  Far beyond the victim and the babe, Christie wrote female sleuths as well as female village characters (Miss Marple and Tuppence Beresford, for starters.)  Real women of all ages, not just gorgeous young ones that needed to be murdered or rescued, or sat around waiting to be a reward for some hero.

 

WE MADE OUR LISTS

So when Liz and I decided to make our lists of films that passed the Bechdel test, the first ones I thought of were all the Agatha Christie films that have been released in the past 25 years.  And while I might not prefer the way Kenneth Branagh's recent films deviate from the books, they still pass the Bechdel Test with flying colours, so they're on the list.  Here's a sample:

Death on the Nile

Crooked House

Murder on the Orient Express

The Secret Adversary

And Then There Were None

Murder in Mesopotamia

Why Didn't They Ask Evens?

4:50 From Paddington

Murder is Easy

Endless Night

The ABC Murders

The Moving Finger

All of the Miss Marple films (too numerous to list here)

WHY IS THIS IMPORTANT?

Why is it important to see characters you can relate to and admire on the silver screen?

As someone who went to business school in 1974, and had no female profs for the entire four years, I can tell you the following:

Not only do you have no role models, but if you aren't seen, you aren't heard.

Everyone wants to be seen and heard.  Everyone of all ages and gender.

Now let's see what Liz has to say about the subject on Monday!

 

Melodie Campbell's books always pass the Bechdel Test, but with a large dose (some might say overdose) of humour.  The Merry Widow Murders is out now.  Look for The Silent Film Star Murders, second in the series, arriving next winter.

 

 

 

A Gal out of Time (aka Why Write Historical Crime?)

A few months past, I said on these pages that I would offer a post about writing historical fiction.   

In fact, I wish I had read this post before I started writing historicals!

Now, I had been forewarned.  Several years ago, my friend, the excellent writer of cozies, Vicki Delany, said to me:  "Don't write historical crime.  You narrow your market by doing that."

What she meant was this:  I've heard that only about 20% of the crime reading market read historicals.  Of those potential readers, most have preferences for  a certain time period.  Some read Victorian, and no other.  Some like classical Rome, and no other.  Some like between the wars, like me. Very few historical crime readers read all periods.

So you are reducing your market considerably.

I can attest that this is true, and would speak the same words to aspiring writers today.  But my emphasis for this post is different.

Here's what I have to offer, while writing the third book in the 1928 Merry Widow Murder series:

The trouble with writing historical novels strikes me as a very similar to that of writing comedic novels:  Not only do you have to come up with an original plot, wonderful characters, engaging dialogue, compelling pacing, and believable motivation like every other author, but you have this additional requirement that other authors don't have.  You have to make it funny.  And you don't get paid any more for doing it.

Historical novels - and I write exclusively mystery/crime novels now - are of the same ilk.  You have to include all the traditional elements of a great mystery book, but you also have to do a tremendous amount of research to get the time period right, and I don't just mean setting. Yes, I give great attention to detail of the food and drink of the time (was Chicken a la King served then?  How about a Sidecar?)  Music of the time (When exactly did Mack the Knife become available in sheet music?)  And clothing (the Flapper look wasn't the only look for clothing in the 1920s, and short skirts weren't as short as Halloween costumes now would have you believe.)

Questions like:  When did ocean liners move from coal to bunker C fuel?  (1917ish - after the Titanic)  

What were the mores of the time?  The etiquette?  Could respectable women travel alone on an ocean liner, in first class?  (Yes, with a maid.)  Did the maid have her own cabin, or did she stay in yours?

I nearly go mad with the research I have to do!  Every single page I write, I'm looking something up.  And that brings me to the comparison with comedic writing:

In historical novels, you have to do everything a writer of contemporary fiction has to do, but you also have this extra requirement:  you must research, you must get it right, and - you don't get paid any more for doing it.

I can speak to the importance of getting it right.  My first series was actually fantasy, the Rowena Through the Wall series, which takes place during the dark ages in Great Britain.  

'But even in fantasy, you have to get it right.  In book two of that series, Rowena and the Dark Lord, magic occurs.  Rowena inadvertently brings forth a Roman Legion fighting Bodicea.  Now, I did the usual thing.  Researched Celtic warfare, and researched Roman warfare, so I could get the battle styles right.  I also researched Roman armor and weapons, vs Celt.  It then occurred to me that I needed to dig deeper into what it would mean for a Roman Legion to vanish from battle.  Would they be considered deserters?  (Yes)  Would this affect their families back in Rome (Hell, yes.)  So they would do everything possible to get back to the battlefield, even if it mean imminent death.  And that created a turning point for my plot.

Believe it or not, and to my great surprise, some Roman scholars read the book, because they like to read everything that has anything to do with ancient Rome.  And one professor emailed me to say, "I can see you used Legion number XXX in the book, located at XXX in the month of..."  He enthused about the thrill of reading accuracy in fiction.  (Good thing I was a college professor at the time...)

Now, I know that if I had not done my research, I would have heard about it.  Even though the book is a fantasy!  People love to point out when you get things wrong in a book.  So I breathed a sigh of relief, that this time, I carried it off.

But it's a heck of a lot of work.

I've been lucky to get a two-book contract for books two and three, and an option for the 4th.  In some ways, I'm relieved, because I'm learning this period of time inside out, and it's good to be able to use it for more than one book.

But I have to ask myself:  why do it?  Why write fiction set in historical times?  I ask myself that every day, writing this third book.  And I've come to some sort of conclusion.

There's a certain amount of security, in writing and reading a book that takes place in the past.  Why?  It's a simple as this:

The world is still here.  Mankind survived the trials from the time of our book, survived WW1, the depression, WW11.  There's comfort in knowing that the world lives on after the book ends.

But in our world today, who knows?  The future is a blank.

And that's why I love writing about the past.

Melodie Campbell can't resist a classic mystery crackling with humour, and that's why she wrote one herself.  The Merry Widow Murders is her 18th book, and the first of a new series.

The Best Movies You've Never Heard Of

  

A friend once told me he thought I'd seen more movies than anyone else he'd ever known. I also seem to recall him rolling his eyes a bit when he said that. I didn't mind. I'm well aware that I spend a lot of time in fantasyland, and I also realize that even though I've enjoyed a great many of those movies, I've also seen many that were a stupendous waste of time.

My post today is about some that weren't.

An Unscientific Study

First, I should point out that my all-time favorite movies (Jaws, The Godfather, Jurassic Park, To Kill a Mockingbird, Casablanca, Raiders of the Lost Ark, L.A. Confidential, 12 Angry Men, Once Upon a Time in the West, The Silence of the Lambs, Aliens, Lonesome Dove, The Big Lebowski, etc., are some of them) aren't included in the following list. Why? Because you've probably seen them. All of those are well-known. 

I also didn't include three that I would've listed among the unknowns a few years ago--Galaxy Quest, In Bruges, and Blood Simple--because they've recently become more popular, maybe because viewers like me have tried to tell everyone about them. (If you haven't seen those, I suggest you treat yourself.)

Anyhow, here are my recommendations of movies of all genres that you might not know about but that I think are cool enough to watch many times each (the ones I consider the very best are at the top of the list):

50 Hidden Gems (and some Guilty Pleasures)

Sands of the Kalahari (1965) -- Stanley Baker, Stuart Whitman, Susannah York

The Dish (2000) -- Sam Neill, Patrick Warburton

Before the Devil Knows You're Dead (2007) -- Ethan Hawke, Philip Seymour Hoffman

Medicine Man (1992) -- Sean Connery, Lorraine Bracco

A History of Violence (2005) -- Ed Harris, William Hurt

The Spanish Prisoner (1997) -- Steve Martin, Campbell Scott

Signs (2002) -- Mel Gibson, Joaquin Phoenix

From Noon till Three (1976) -- Charles Bronson, Jill Ireland

Always (1989) -- Richard Dreyfuss, Holly Hunter, John Goodman

Wait Until Dark (1967) -- Audrey Hepburn, Alan Arkin, Richard Crenna

Monsters (2010) -- Scoot McNairy, Whitney Able

Suburbicon (2017) -- Matt Damon, Julianne Moore, Oscar Isaac

An Unfinished Life (2005) -- Robert Redford, Morgan Freeman, Jennifer Lopez

The Last Sunset (1961) -- Kirk Douglas, Rock Hudson, Dorothy Malone

Wind River (2017) -- Elizabeth Olsen, Jeremy Renner, Graham Greene

The Hanging Tree (1959) -- Gary Cooper, Karl Malden, George C. Scott

The Gypsy Moths (1969) -- Burt Lancaster, Gene Hackman, Deborah Kerr

The Ghost and the Darkness (1996) -- Michael Douglas, Val Kilmer

Magic (1978) -- Anthony Hopkins, Ann-Margret, Burgess Meredith

Ransom (1996) -- Mel Gibson, Gary Sinese, Rene Russo

Under Siege (1992) -- Steven Seagal, Tommy Lee Jones, Gary Busey

Third Man on the Mountain (1959) -- James MacArthur, Michael Rennie, Janet Munro

Lady in the Water (2006) -- Bryce Dallas Howard, Paul Giamatti

The Rocketeer (1991) -- Billy Campbell, Jennifer Connelly, Timothy Dalton

Sorcerer (1977) -- Roy Scheider, Chick Martinez

Secondhand Lions (2003) -- Robert Duvall, Michael Caine, Haley Joel Osment

Shadow in the Cloud (2020) -- Chloe Grace Moretz, Taylor John Smith

Vanishing Point (1971) -- Barry Newman, Cleavon Little

Used Cars (1980) -- Kurt Russel, Jack Warden

A Life Less Ordinary (1997) -- Holly Hunter, Ewan McGregor, Cameron Diaz

Waterhole #3 (1967) -- James Coburn, Carroll O'Connor, Claude Akins

Brassed Off (1996) -- Pete Postlethwaite, Tara Fitzgerald

The Ballad of Cable Hogue (1970) -- Jason Robards, Stella Stevens

Fall (2022) -- Virginia Gardner, Grace Caroline Currey, Jeffrey Dean Morgan

Out of Sight (1998) -- George Clooney, Jennifer Lopez

Night Moves (1975) -- Gene Hackman, Jennifer Warren, Melanie Griffith

Silver Bullet (1985) -- Gary Busey, Corey Haim, Everett McGill

While You Were Sleeping (1995) -- Sandra Bullock, Bill Pullman

Idiocracy (2006) -- Luke Wilson, Maya Rudolph

Stranger than Fiction (2006) -- Will Ferrell, Emma Thompson, Dustin Hoffman

Lockout (2012) -- Guy Pearce, Maggie Grace, Peter Stormare

Someone to Watch Over Me (1987) -- Tom Berenger, Mimi Rogers, Lorraine Bracco

Amelie (2001) -- Audrey Tautou, Jean-Pierre Jeunet

Joe vs. the Volcano (1990) -- Tom Hanks, Meg Ryan, Lloyd Bridges

No Way Out (1987) -- Kevin Costner, Gene Hackman, Sean Young

Kings of the Sun (1963) -- Yul Brynner, George Chakiris, Shirley Anne Field

Necessary Roughness (1991) -- Scott Bakula, Kathy Ireland, Evander Holyfield

Cat People (1982) -- Nastassja Kinski, John Heard, Malcolm McDowell

No Escape (2015) -- Owen Wilson, Pierce Brosnan, Lake Bell

The Blue Max (1966) -- George Peppard, Ursula Andress, James Mason

Questions for the Class

Have any of you seen these? Did you like 'em? Any additions to the list? Full disclosure, here: Also among my favorites of the well-knowns are Die Hard, Blazing Saddles, and Rustler's Rhapsody, so you should consider that before taking any of what I say too seriously. But thanks for indulging me.

Have fun at the movies!

The Matter of Arthur

I’m not quite sure why Rosemary Sutcliff floated into my periphery, recently - I saw her name somewhere, obviously - but as soon as it happened, I immediately went out and found her Arthurian historical, Sword at Sunset, which had fallen off my radar in the interval of fifty years, and read it again.  If you’re not familiar with the book, it reimagines the legend of Arthur much the way Mary Renault does with the mythological Theseus in The King Must Die, as an actual historical person, not a demigod.     

Arthur is, of course, the “Matter of Britain,” a story every English schoolchild once knew by heart.  The basic lineaments were around long before Sir Thomas Malory and Le Morte d’Arthur, in the 15^th century, going back to Geoffrey of Monmouth, in the 12^th.  I’m more concerned with the modern iterations.  Leaving aside Prince Valiant, no disrespect, Hal Foster’s draftsmanship is astonishing, but he positions the Round Table in some sort of fairytale medieval period; excuse me, but no.  That puts Arthur some time after the Norman Conquest, which just doesn’t fly.  The better guess lines up with Rosemary Sutcliff and Bernard Cornwell, who place the historical Arthur after the fall of Roman Britain, the withdrawal of the legions to Gaul, around 400 AD.  Then come the Saxons, raiding across the North Sea, and the Picts, from beyond Hadrian’s Wall.  Arthur would appear to be the last hope of civilization and order, fighting a losing battle against the darkness.  

The version most of us know is T.H. White’s Once and Future King, which is the source material for Camelot.  I saw the Broadway-bound tryout.  (Back in the day, the big shows would work the kinks out on the road.  They’d open in Toronto, and then circle through Boston, Philadelphia, and DC, before they got to New York.)  The production of Camelot in Boston ran, as I remember, four hours.  They cut at least an hour, after that.  For my money, I would have watched Richard Burton for six hours.  He made Arthur tragic in a way I’d never even considered.  I thought the story was about Lancelot and Guinevere.  Not that Julie Andrews and Robert Goulet were chopped liver, but when Burton was on stage, every other character was a walk-on.  I wore out the original cast LP, and it reduced me to tears every time I listened to it.  

Camelot is somewhere in that Neverland along with Prince Valiant.  It’s a backlot fantasy, it doesn’t have the smell of smoky hearths and scorched meat, unwashed bodies in thick fur cloaks, blood and bowels and rape, but there’s a counter-narrative to both: Marion Zimmer Bradley and Mary Stewart, The Mists of Avalon and The Crystal Cave, which feminize the story, in the one case, and foreground the otherworldly or magical, in the second, but these are mirror narratives, the female principle (in myth, at least) a correlative of sorcery.  

Robert Warshow wrote a famous essay about the Western, in which he said there were only X archetypes, of plot, and character.  And we could haul in Joseph Campbell, or Robert Graves, or Jung, but the arc of the hero bends in similar ways.  A friend of mine was leaving Excalibur, and he overheard a young person say to their date, “It’s just like Star Wars.”  

We draw the sword from the stone, and our fate is foretold.  There’s no escaping it. 

Pure Luck!

A few weeks ago, I got talking to my gal pal and colleague Sydney about the good or bad luck we writers can have during our careers, and I said, "Oooh, that would make a great topic for SleuthSayers!  Why don't you write it?"  Bless her, she did!  I really enjoyed her take and hope you do too.

Pure Luck!

by Sydney Leigh

With the recent passing of St. Patrick's Day, I've been thinking about the idea of luck.  The term 'luck of the Irish' has its roots in the late 19th century during the gold rush in America.  Several Irish miners made their fortunes and the expression was born.

But the concept of luck is not strictly for the Emerald Isle.  In fact, it seems to span across the globe, from a range of places and cultures.  There are all sorts of different objects and rituals that are believed to bring luck.

Today, one of the most obvious places it can be seen is in sports.  From community league hockey to major league baseball, there are all sorts of rituals that athletes seem to subscribe to.  Superstitions abound and can often explain seemingly inexplicable behaviour.  For example, have you ever noticed a pitcher tap his leg twice before throwing a ball, or a big hitter refusing to shave a beard or wash a uniform?  This can often be explained by the player's belief that the behaviour will result in a win.  We are talking about elite sports players who are making millions of dollars!

Within the publishing world, luck often plays a role.  Bad luck comes in waves, such as the shutting down of small presses, which leaves authors scrambling and without a home.  Agents and editors leaving the business can also be a big blow to authors.

When good luck prevails, it can be a tremendous help.  I was introduced to my dream agent at a time she was looking for something light, making me feel like I'd struck gold.  Other authors have found luck when putting themselves out there.  Desmond P. Ryan, author of A Pint of Trouble Mystery and The Mike O'Shea Series, explains his good fortune:

I keep meeting people who end up being instrumental in my career.  And, without meeting one of those people, I wouldn't have met the next.  They are THAT clearly linked, including how I met my agent and signed two book contracts back to back.

Award-winning author, Melodie Campbell, who has over 200 publications, tells us how luck can also play a role in spreading the word about your book.

In my writing career, nothing makes me smile more than this bit of luck that took place prior to Covid.  I was on the speaker circuit and agreed to do a presentation on the History of Humour (and how we write it) for a large retired teachers association in the metro Toronto area.  About 200 people were in attendance, and the talk went very well, but sales of my books were, alas, not as robust as usual.  Teachers, apparently, use libraries!   I perked up when a few days later I got a call from The Toronto Sun, asking to interview me.  Apparently, one of the attendees from the talk had a niece who worked as a reporter for The Sun, and was full of praise for my comedy.  The Toronto Sun article came out, and it was a full-page doozy.  They called me Canada's "Queen of Comedy," something I've been grateful for ever since, and not just for the quote.  To wit: a producer from Sirius XM saw the article, contacted me, and I've been on radio with them more than a few times.  It continues:  the alumni magazine at Queen's University is writing a feature article on me for the spring issue.  To this day, I marvel at the luck I had from doing a speaker event that was initially disappointing, but turned into the biggest networking experience of my life.  Needless to say, my publishers have loved all this exposure!  Moral:  don't turn down any invitations, as you never know who might be in the audience.

When luck is on your side, it can make a difference.  Is it possible to turn bad luck into good?  Hard to say.  But given persistence and a willingness to keep putting yourself in a vulnerable position will hopefully pay off eventually.  For some it comes faster and easier than others.  And with that, I wish you all good luck in the coming year.

Are there any rituals that you would like to share that bring you luck?  Or do you dismiss the idea all together?

Sydney Leigh spent several years running a seasonal business, working in the summer so she could spend cold months in cool places.  Now she writes cozies and thinks about murder.  She is a member of Sisters in Crime, International Thriller Writers, and served on the board of Crime Writers of Canada from 2018-2021.  Peril in Pink, the first book in the Hudson Valley B&B Mystery Series came out in March 2024 from Crooked Lane Books.  You can find her at http://www.sydneyleighbooks.com

 

 

The Spy Who Shunned Me

I was glancing at a not-so-recent Stacker.com ‘Best 100 Spy Movies of All Time’, thinking it was right up the dark alley of our spymaster, David Edgerley Gates. If you did something extremely stupid, he could make you disappear.

And then I noticed something stupid.

Where was Ipcress File? And Day of the Jackal? Manchurian Candidate? Riddle of the Sands? Casablanca? And where the hell was 39 Steps? And why the Hail Freedonia was Duck Soup in the list? Hey, I love the Marx Brothers but it bears as much resemblance to a spy movie as Margaret Dumont does to John le Carré.

I had to stop because so many possibilities flooded my mind. The article should be retitled ‘100 Pretty Good kinda-Spy Movies of Small Time, Give or Take.’ I bet David could name many more.

So here is the core of Stacker’s list followed by a few unranked suggestions of my own.

100	Body of Lies	2008	Ridley Scott		50	Clear and Present Danger	1994	Phillip Noyce
99	Salt	2010	Phillip Noyce		49	Rogue One: A Star Wars Story	2016	Gareth Edwards
98	Moonraker	1979	Lewis Gilbert		48	Breach	2007	Billy Ray
97	Never Say Never Again	1983	Irvin Kershner		47	Spy	2015	Paul Feig
96	Shadow Dancer	2012	James Marsh		46	Eye in the Sky	2015	Gavin Hood
95	Octopussy	1983	John Glen		45	Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol	2011	Brad Bird
94	The Man from U.N.C.L.E.	2015	Guy Ritchie		44	The Bourne Identity	2002	Doug Liman
93	The Informant!	2009	Steven Soderbergh		43	Red Cliff	2008	John Woo
92	The Eagle Has Landed	1976	John Sturges		42	Emperor and the Assassin	1998	Kaige Chen
91	Atomic Blonde	2017	David Leitch		41	Flame & Citron	2008	Ole Christian Madsen
90	Until the End of the World	1991	Wim Wenders		40	Inherent Vice	2014	Paul Thomas Anderson
89	You Only Live Twice	1967	Lewis Gilbert		39	No Way Out	1987	Roger Donaldson
88	Cloak & Dagger	1984	Richard Franklin		38	Black Book	2006	Paul Verhoeven
87	The Fourth Protocol	1987	John Mackenzie		37	The Age of Shadows	2016	Kim Jee-woon
86	RED	2010	Robert Schwentke		36	Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation	2015	Christopher McQuarrie
85	Mission: Impossible	1996	Brian De Palma		35	The Bourne Supremacy	2004	Paul Greengrass
84	Snowden	2016	Oliver Stone		34	Europa Europa	1990	Agnieszka Holland
83	Allied	2016	Robert Zemeckis		33	Lady Vengeance	2005	Park Chan-wook
82	The Matador	2005	Richard Shepard		32	Dr No	1962	Terence Young
81	Michael Collins	1996	Neil Jordan		31	Inglourious Basterds	2009	Quentin Tarantino
80	Eye of the Needle	1981	Richard Marquand		30	The Imitation Game	2014	Morten Tyldum
79	Horror Express	1972	Eugenio Martín		29	The Man Who Knew Too Much	1956	Alfred Hitchcock
78	Patriot Games	1992	Phillip Noyce		28	The Quiet American	2002	Phillip Noyce
77	OSS 117: Cairo, Nest of Spies	2006	Michel Hazanavicius		27	A Beautiful Mind	2001	Ron Howard
76	The Front Line	2011	Jang Hoon		26	Infernal Affairs	2002	Andrew Lau, Alan Mak
75	Thunderball	1965	Terence Young		25	Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy	2011	Tomas Alfredson
74	The Hunt for Red October	1990	John McTiernan		24	Ghost in the Shell	1995	Mamoru Oshii
73	Spy Game	2001	Tony Scott		23	The Constant Gardener	2005	Fernando Meirelles
72	Mission: Impossible III	2006	J.J.		22	Bridge of Spies	2015	Steven Spielberg
71	Despicable Me 2	2013	Pierre Coffin, Chris Renaud		21	Skyfall	2012	Sam Mendes
70	True Lies	1994	James Cameron		20	From Russia with Love	1963	Terence Young
69	Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid	1982	Carl Reiner		19	Casino Royale	2006	Martin Campbell
68	The Falcon and the Snowman	1985	John Schlesinger		18	Enter the Dragon	1973	Robert Clouse
67	The East	2013	Zal Batmanglij		17	The English Patient	1996	Anthony Minghella
66	Official Secrets	2019	Gavin Hood		16	Mission: Impossible: Fallout	2018	Christopher McQuarrie
65	Lust, Caution	2007	Ang Lee		15	The Conversation	1974	Francis Ford Coppola
64	Sneakers	1992	Phil Alden Robinson		14	House of Flying Daggers	2004	Yimou Zhang
63	Fair Game	2010	Doug Liman		13	Stalag 17	1953	Billy Wilder
62	Confessions of a Dangerous Mind	2002	George Clooney		12	Goldfinger	1964	Guy Hamilton
61	Charlie Wilson's War	2007	Mike Nichols		11	The Bourne Ultimatum	2007	Paul Greengrass
60	Kingsman: The Secret Service	2014	Matthew Vaughn		10	Letters from Iwo Jima	2006	Clint Eastwood
59	Three Days of the Condor	1975	Sydney Pollack		9	Zero Dark Thirty	2012	Kathryn Bigelow
58	GoldenEye	1995	Martin Campbell		8	Le Petit Soldat	1963	Jean-Luc Godard
57	Walk on Water	2004	Eytan Fox		7	Barry Lyndon	1975	Stanley Kubrick
56	Marcel Proust's Time Regained	1999	Raoul Ruiz		6	The Departed	2006	Martin Scorsese
55	Where Eagles Dare	1968	Brian G.		5	Duck Soup	1933	Leo McCarey
54	Top Secret!	1984	Jim Abrahams, Zucker Bros.		4	The Lives of Others	2006	Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck
53	A Most Wanted Man	2014	Anton Corbijn		3	Notorious	1946	Alfred Hitchcock
52	The Spy Gone North	2018	Yoon Jong-bin		2	Pan's Labyrinth	2006	Guillermo del Toro
51	X-Men: First Class	2011	Matthew Vaughn		1	North by Northwest	1959	Alfred Hitchcock
	The 39 Steps	1935	Alfred Hitchcock			Topaz	1969	Alfred Hitchcock
	Day of the Jackal	1973	Fred Zinnemann			Riddle of the Sands	1979	ony Maylam
	The Ipcress File	1965	Sidney J Furie			Casablanca	1842	Michael Curtiz
	The Manchurian Candidate	1962	John Frankenheimer			Dark of the Sun	1968	Jack Cardiff

For worst movie, I seem to recall Our Man Flint (1966), directed by Daniel Mann, was embarrassingly awful.

What is your take? Enquiring spies want to know.

---

Check out Prohibition Peepers, a Michael Bracken anthology.

What is Real Courage?

Earlier this week, Melodie Campbell ran a column here at SleuthSayers about courage—how it takes guts to be a writer. She mentioned Harper Lee's groundbreaking book, To Kill a Mockingbird, which addressed what true courage is in a conversation between Atticus, the father in the story, and his son, Jem. Atticus says, "I wanted you to see what real courage is, instead of getting the idea that courage is a man with a gun in his hand. It's when you know you're licked before you begin, but you begin anyway and see it through no matter what."

Interestingly, I was planning to write about the same subject today. I have a new story that should be available soon titled "Real Courage," inspired in part by the same goal that Harper Lee mentioned, showing what real courage can be. My story doesn't involve a good man standing up to a town full of racists. Harper Lee did that better than I ever could. In my story, you'll see some courageous acts that are big and others that might seem small, but they all take guts. Here are some of them:

• Standing up for yourself when the other person can ruin you
  
• Following through with a promise to help a friend no matter what, even if the "no matter what" is risky—something no one would expect of you
  
• Covering up a crime to protect your child
• Risking your future to make things right

"Real Courage" is told linearly from four points of view, starting with a teenage girl in the 1980s, moving on to her child more than thirty years later, then onto her husband, and ending with the perspective of another teenage girl, one the mother tried to help. It's a story about the ramifications of a seemingly insignificant incident and how it winds up affecting so many lives over so many years. It's a story about unexpected consequences. And it's a story about courage.

I don't want to go into too many details. I'd rather you read the story and be surprised. But I will say that one thing I wanted to illustrate with the story is that sometimes what seems right yet difficult, what can be courageous to do, is also the wrong choice. Not always but sometimes. 

"Real Courage" is included in issue 14 of Black Cat Mystery Magazine. The issue is listed as available for purchase on Amazon, but due to some behind-the-scene issues, the only current seller is a bookshop in England. I'm told Amazon itself should show up as the seller soon (I believe, I hope, that means in the next week or two), enabling people in the US to get local delivery.

Finally, a bit of BSP before I finish: I'm happy to share that last week my story "Beauty and the Beyotch" won this year's Macavity Award for Best Mystery Short Story. The story also won the Agatha Award in the spring and the Anthony Award in September. It originally appeared in issue 29 of Sherlock Holmes Mystery Magazine. I'm beyond thrilled by the reception the story has received. If you haven't read it yet, I hope you will.

The Guts that it Takes to be a Writer

"I wanted you to see what real courage is, instead of getting the idea that courage is a man with a gun in his hand."  Harper Lee

As I sit at my desk looking out the window at the black October lake, it occurs to me that I've been contemplating how to write this post for a long time.  Perhaps I was waiting for a suitable trigger [sic].  Ironically (just can't resist these puns) I sold the last of my gun collection after Sandy Hook, and no longer engage in sport shooting. For that reason, and perhaps the fact that I also no longer fly small craft and gliders, a person close to me hinted that I had become rather conventional.  

For some reason, that bothered me. Dagnabbit, was he equating conventional with boring?  That got me thinking about being a writer.  And frankly, I don't think any of us are conventional.  We are the very opposite of that.

The point of this post:

I've always told my classes that you need three things to be an author:

Talent -  the ability to come up with new story ideas again and again

Craft -  the dedication to learn the craft of writing, which takes time, instruction, and what I like to call an 'apprenticeship'

Passion - the determination to spend hours alone at your keyboard, creating those stories

I've known a lot of adult writing students who have talent.  I've been able to teach them the craft.  But if they don't have the passion that being an author requires, then the first two don't mean much.  It takes me nearly 1000 hours to write an entire novel, in final form.  That's a lot of butt-in-chair passion. 

In addition, I have taught people who show talent and passion, but won't take the time to learn the craft.

But lately, I've come to recognize something I've overlooked, something absolutely critical for a writer to stay in the game.  I'm adding a fourth essential to the list:

Courage.

I didn't fully understand how much courage it took to be a writer, until after I'd been published a dozen or so times.  Now, with more than 60 short stories and 18 novels, perhaps 200 humor columns and comedy credits, I've found my courage faltering at times.  But what exactly do I mean?

Voices stronger than mine have said that writing is easy - you just open a vein and bleed.  I can attest that my protagonists, while different from each other, often have my moral beliefs and views on life.  They put forth and discuss issues of ethics and politics that support a Canadian woman's viewpoint.  Mine.

So that when I am writing fiction or humour, I am not only demonstrating (for better or worse) my talent as an entertaining writer.  I am also exposing the things that are important to me and that I believe in.  What it boils down to is this:  not only is my writing open to being criticized, but my personal beliefs and morality are also up for grabs.

For this, I have - like many female writers - been hounded by trolls on social media.  Usually men (but not exclusively) who wish to make me uncomfortable, to diminish me in some way.  To erode my confidence, and hopefully make me fearful.  In all cases, they wish to silence me.  They hide behind the screen of anonymity.

In the old days (by this I mean pre-Amazon) we took criticism from professional critics, plus our editors.  In a way, it was a jury of our peers, and we accepted that.  Now, to use a military analogy, we can't see the enemy.

It takes real courage to put your work out there, and take the slings and arrows of  criticism from unknown players, many of whom have sinister intent.

It takes guts.  

Harper Lee said it best.

Melodie Campbell writes from the northern shore of Lake Ontario.  Mainly mob capers, but also classic whodunits like The Merry Widow Murders, online and at most bookstores.

What Are You Reading?

It's been the hottest driest summer in TX that I can remember in 75+ years.

How hot is it? I saw a robin blowing on his worm before eating. 

How hot is it? Hotter than a ten-dollar pistol at a Saturday night jewelry store. 

How hot is it? Hotter than a witch's... uh wait, that's a colder than reference.

Oh, I remember this year, and oh that year, and oh yeah, that other year. Yet I'm talking now about 47 straight days of 100 plus and they often were 103 to 108 or 110. Then we had one day of ONLY 99, but the next day and week, and the next week after that was 100 plus for every day again.

I had the lovely idea of doing my best to read for escape. To get so lost in a book I wouldn't even think about the relentless heat outside. 

For my big escape journey I began rereading books by Dana Stabenow. I say rereading because I'd read most all before. All are set somewhere in Alaska. Almost all set in ice and snow with below freezing temperatures. So far, in the last couple of months, I've read 18 or 19 of the Kate Shugat series and I think maybe five of the Liam Campbell books. Which I'm not sure read one of those before. Nice benefit of getting older is forgetting a book you have read before. In Alaska, even when it's summer there, they're talking about 80 degrees in the daytime and it cools down to sweater or light jacket weather for evening.

If I'm lucky it will cool down here around about Thanksgiving. 

Thanks Ms Stabenow. You've really saved my life. 

A couple of other books I read lately is Countdown, a thriller by Brendan DuBois, with James Patterson. It's the kind of book that keeps you quickly turning pages and forgetting hot and dry.

And recently reread, To Hell and Gone in Texas by Russ Hall, a local Austin writer, I've known for years. This book came out in 2014 and is just re-released for all y'all who love reading about bullets and blood and brothers with several twists you never expect. 

All in all books have helped me make it through these hot days that only cool to around 75 at 3:00am.

So what are y'all reading and why?