Villainy & Garbage

By Bethany Maines

I’m sitting in my backyard listening to my neighbors complain about one of their roommates. Apparently, the miscreant roommate has three bags of trash sitting by the door to his room that he has failed to take out. 

“I mean, that’s not a problem… exactly.”

Each of the guys carefully, and politely denote their own housecleaning failures. 

“I never make my bed.” 

“You never saw my apartment; I can get meh-ssy.” 

“I have empty bottles in my room too.”  (“Not like that,” interjects the first guy.)

They each tiptoe up to the line of declaring the roommate’s behavior an actual problem, but don’t cross it.  Clearly, the garbage is still being contained in the room.  But equally clear is that they all find the roommates sloth disgusting.  Note to the miscreant: When 3 twenty-something dudes, who have only a tentative grasp on hygiene, find your housekeeping habits to sub-par on the rank of foulness, you just might have a problem.

All of which got me to thinking about villains and bad guys and wondering whether or not they realize that they are failing at their end of the social bargain. What if villains are just totally incapable of realizing that their 3 bags of garbage is offending the other roommates? Getting kicked out of the house will come as a total shock if you have no idea that a hazmat suit shouldn’t be required dress for your room. Maybe if Sauron had just been a little tidier maybe he wouldn’t have had to move in with the Orcs.  If Darth Vader hadn’t grown up with Jabba the Hut as role model maybe he wouldn’t have gone to the dark side. If Voldemort hadn’t had to live on the back of some guy’s greasy head maybe he wouldn’t have been so peeved all the time. What do you think? Do villains choose to deviate from the social norm, or do they just blow right by the stop signs without seeing them at all? 

Bethany Maines is the author of the Carrie Mae Mystery series and Tales from the City of Destiny. You can also view the Carrie Mae youtube video or catch up with her on Twitter and Facebook.

Stepping into the Big Leagues

by Marjorie Brody

When I imagined becoming an author, I visualized book signings, travel, interviews and photo shoots, writing on deadlines, searching for fresh ideas, juggling personal and professional tasks, influencing book cover concepts and designing stickers for book plates, giving presentations, answering readers' emails, teaching craft and encouraging new writers, and even creating a new genre, but I don’t think I ever thought I’d be on a panel with heavy hitters. Oh sure, I envisioned having friends who are best selling authors—and in fact, I do—but to be sitting next to a Hollywood screenwriter and TV staff writer, attorneys with legal thriller series, and a host of a crime and science radio show, well, I guess my imagination didn’t stretch that far.

In July, I’ll be on a panel at the International Thriller Writers conference. The topic is “Ego or Id, Unlock Your Character's Psychology” and the Panel Master will be Dennis Palumbo. On the panel will be D.P. Lyle, MD, Katia Lief, Laura Caldwell, Lynne Raimondo, and oh yes, a little known author whose psychological suspense debuted last year, me.

So how will I not be in tongue-tied awe?

I could remind myself that all of these authors started with a single book. I could remember that they write about what they know (forensics, or criminals and the legal system, or psychopathology and serial killers—well, they don’t need to know about that personally, I assure you, although on second thought, maybe they do!), and I write about what I know (resilient yet flawed protagonists, and self-deluded, maladjusted antagonists). Or maybe I could just see these panelist as colleagues who happen to share with me the same field in our second careers.

Or maybe I could remember why I was asked to join this panel in the first place; someone thought I’d be a valuable addition to the group. So, I guess it’s time for me to knock the dirt out of my cleats, pick up the bat, and step up to the plate. Who knows? I may just hit a home run. And even if I don't, it'll still be fun to play on the team.

Have suggestions for me based on your experience? I’d love to hear them.

Marjorie Brody is an award-winning author and Pushcart Prize Nominee. Her short stories appear in literary magazines and the Short Story America Anthology, Vols. I, II and III. Her debut psychological suspense novel, TWISTED, delves into the secrets that emerge following a sexual assault at a high school dance and features a remarkable teen who risks everything to expose the truth. TWISTED was awarded an Honorable Mention at the 2013 Great Midwest Book Festival and won the Texas Association of Authors 2014 Best Young Adult Fiction Book Award. TWISTED is available in digital and print at http://tinyurl.com/cvl5why or http://tinyurl.com/bqcgywl.
Marjorie invites you to visit her at www.marjoriespages.com.

Mind Over Murder

By Evelyn David

Frank Herbert, the science fiction author, once said, "Without change, something sleeps inside us, and seldom awakens. The sleeper must awaken." 

While the two halves of Evelyn David aren't moving into writing sci-fi, we did make a conscious decision to try, for our newest project, something entirely different. It's not that we don't love Mac Sullivan and gang, and adore Brianna Sullivan and her whole crew in Lottawatah. And of course, we are positively cuckoo crazy about Whiskey and Leon, our canine stars. 

We even started a new Mac-Rachel story, and we'll get back to it, but about a third of the way through we hit the proverbial brick wall. The Southern half sent the Northern half, the first two chapters of a book we'd begun a few years ago. Bingo! We started writing, like a house on fire (or in this case, two houses afire). The scenes unfolded so fast that we could barely keep up. 

New characters, new setting. What has stayed the same is our love affair with mysteries – and this one is a doozy. MIND OVER MURDER will thrill you, chill you, delight you. As always, there's a healthy dollop of humor, because, well, that's us. There's also a terrific romance because we're suckers for a good love story. 

Nothing bad ever happens in Seamont, New York, a quiet village 20 miles outside The Big Apple. Nothing, except for the brutal murders five years earlier of Lee and Vera Chang. But the local police made a quick arrest and life returned to suburban normal in Seamont. Except Valentine Zalmanzig Cohen knows differently. She knows, without a shadow of doubt, that Alex Fletcher, the man sentenced to life in prison, didn't kill the Changs. Val is a psychic. But the local cops don't want anything to mess up their slam-dunk case. 

Five years later, when the Bermans, a middle-aged couple who had just bought the Chang house are also brutally murdered, the police come knocking at Val's door. Is it a copycat killer? Has Fletcher hired a hit man to mimic the crime so he can appeal his own conviction? Or is there a serial murderer loose in quiet Seamont?  

Val doesn't want to relive the gruesome murder scenes that cloud her mind, but she wants to stop this killer once and for all. Things go from bad to worse after a brutal attempt on her life results in the loss of her psychic abilities. Val discovers that when all is said and done, she has to rely on her wits to save herself before the killer strikes again.  

Evelyn David and Valentine Zalmanzig Cohen invite you to find out whodunnit and why in this spine-tingling, roller coaster of a ride, new mystery. 

MIND OVER MURDER will be available for sale in late June. Thanks for all your continuing support and encouragement. You make it possible for us to take on new challenges. 

Marian and Rhonda, the collective Evelyn David

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Evelyn David's Mysteries 

Brianna Sullivan Mysteries - e-book series
I Try Not to Drive Past Cemeteries- Kindle - Nook - Smashwords
The Dog Days of Summer in Lottawatah- Kindle - Nook - Smashwords
The Holiday Spirit(s) of Lottawatah- Kindle - Nook - Smashwords
Undying Love in Lottawatah- Kindle - Nook - Smashwords
A Haunting in Lottawatah - Kindle - Nook - Smashwords
Lottawatah Twister - Kindle - Nook - Smashwords
Missing in Lottawatah - Kindle - Nook - Smashwords
Good Grief in Lottawatah - Kindle - Nook - Smashwords
Summer Lightning in Lottawatah - Kindle - Nook - Smashwords
Lottawatah Fireworks - Kindle - Nook - Smashwords
Leaving Lottawatah - Kindle - Nook - Smashwords

The Ghosts of Lottawatah - trade paperback collection of the Brianna e-books
Book 1 - I Try Not to Drive Past Cemeteries (includes the first four Brianna e-books)
Book 2 - A Haunting in Lottawatah (includes the 5th, 6th, and 7th Brianna e-books)
Book 3 - Lottawatah Fireworks (includes the 8th, 9th, and 10th Brianna e-books)
Book 4 - Leaving Lottawatah (includes the 11th Brianna e-book and some special features.)

Sullivan Investigations Mystery series
Murder Off the Books Kindle - Nook - Smashwords - Trade Paperback
Murder Takes the Cake Kindle - Nook - Smashwords - Trade Paperback 
Murder Doubles Back Kindle - Nook - Smashwords - Trade Paperback
Riley Come Home (short story)- Kindle - Nook - Smashwords
Moonlighting at the Mall (short story) - Kindle - Nook - Smashwords

EVELYN DAVID AUDIOBOOKS 

I TRY NOT TO DRIVE PAST CEMETERIES

Audible

iTunes

THE DOG DAYS OF SUMMER IN LOTTAWATAH

Audible

iTunes 

THE HOLIDAY SPIRIT(S) OF LOTTAWATAH

Audible

iTunes

UNDYING LOVE IN LOTTAWATAH

Audible

iTunes

 

 

A HAUNTING IN LOTTAWATAH

Audible

iTunes

MURDER OFF THE BOOKS

Audible

iTunes

 

 

MURDER DOUBLES BACK

Audible

iTunes

In Real Life, Pirates Aren’t Sexy or Nice

by Linda Rodriguez

Pirates with a heart of gold are a mainstay of romance, fantasy, and science fiction, as well as defunct historical novels. They’re dashing rebels with sexy outfits and underneath the disguise of the rogue, they’re really nice guys who do the right thing. We see them on the book covers and in the movies and television shows. We even celebrate them with Talk Like a Pirate Day.

But in real life, in the modern world, pirates aren’t any of those things. They’re not Robin Hoods stealing from the rich to give to the poor. Despite a lot of discourse on the internet, they’re not rebels against the establishment, hurting no one and setting “content” free.

Content. Like the book I worked on for years and still haven’t earned out my advance on. Like the book series my friend wrote and went into debt to promote until her publisher dropped her because her sales weren’t rising fast enough—while people were downloading those books for free from pirate sites.

I have young relatives who use these torrent sites. It makes for heated discussions at holiday dinners, their mother embarrassed, them seeing it in that internet-discourse rebel-RobinHood fashion, me trying to explain the facts of life. I notice all the time that they and the internet groups that they parrot like to use George R.R. Martin, author of the bestselling Game of Thrones, as their example. “What can it hurt him with his millions?” they say disdainfully.

On the other hand, I’m in the field. I see the other 99% who are damaged by it. One or two hundred copies sold through an outlet that records the sales and pays the publisher and author versus that same number ripped off and given away without any record or payment can make the difference between an author being able to continue to write the books readers want to go on reading or being dropped by the publisher and having to give up that series and try again, often under a pseudonym or even in a new genre. George R. R. Martin and J.K. Rowling, they are not.

Today, again, I found my first novel, Every Last Secret, on a pirate site. It doesn’t take long for those free downloads to destroy a career for most midlist writers, which is what the majority of us are. Even more than the money in royalties lost, which is not a tiny problem for those of us who must make rent and buy food for our families with it, even more than that, the lost sales are a problem because they can lead to a writer being dropped. So I’m not happy about finding my book pirated.

I’m of the generation who were taught that it’s wrong to steal, and that’s that for us. Many of the younger ones I know don’t have the same idea of stealing=wrong. They see that equation only some times. When it’s convenient for them. But perhaps if they realized that pirating was a good way to kill the author’s chances to publish the books they like so much, perhaps then they would stop and ask themselves if it was really worth it.

What’s your opinion on the pirating question?

Much Ado About Something

by Sparkle Abbey

When we attend conferences, besides meeting readers (our favorite part of cons and the biggest reason we attend) we’re often on panels with fellow authors, and we also try to attend as many of the other panels as we can. We admit we’re sometimes (okay, frequently) distracted by catching up with friends and finding out what’s going on in this crazy world of publishing. And margaritas.

But we do attend panels.

Often these panels are so great that a panelist says something and we go away and need to think about it. It may be just a snippet but there are times when the “something” hangs with us long after the plane ride home. After the unpacking. After the laundry’s all been done. After we’re back to the routine of the day job. It often pops back into our heads the next time we sit down to write.

Lee Goldberg said one of those “somethings” in a panel we attended. At this point, we’re not even sure of the topic of the panel, but in any case, Lee said, “No one remembers the mystery plot of a Monk episode.” We shared a shocked look, sure that wasn’t true. Lee must be wrong. However, he went on to explain that mostly when fans of the series talk about a storyline, they say ‘the one where there the trash collection workers were on strike’ or ‘the one where Monk had a look-alike who was a crime boss.’

His point was that as writers we often think that the backdrop of the story is secondary, but really it's vitally important to the story as a whole. If plot is “what” the book is about, the backdrop or sub-plot is tightly hooked into “who” the book is about. And together the what and who make the why, and that’s the trifecta that creates the richness in a series. It's what makes us remember a book and come back to a character. As a reader, you've now lived through an experience with Monk. (Or in our case, Caro and Mel.)

That's a very cool something.

We belong to an online book discussion group and recently everyone was sharing their all time favorite book(s). Wow, what a wide variety of novels were noted as favorites.

We were again reminded of Lee’s statement.

Fiction books are read for entertainment. We don’t read fiction for knowledge - though it’s very cool when we learn new things as part of the experience. We've tried to sprinkle in a few of things we learned about Greyhound rescue in our latest book, Fifty Shades of Greyhound. But when readers talk about the book we hope what they remember is the unique adventure Caro had as she worked to solve this whodunnit.

Because when we discuss our favorite books we talk about the people in the books and all that was happening to them while the story was going on. We share their experience. And that's the magic of a memorable book.

Now, it’s your turn to think about Lee’s “something”

How about you? When you talk about you favorite books what do you remember?
(Oh and thanks, Lee.)

Sparkle Abbey is the pseudonym of mystery authors Mary Lee Woods and Anita Carter who write the Pampered Pets mystery series for Bell Bridge Books. They are friends as well as neighbors so you’ll often find them writing at ML’s dining room table or at their local Starbucks. They live in the Midwest, but if they could write anywhere, you would find them on the beach with their laptops and depending on the time of day either an iced tea or a margarita.

They love to hear from readers and you can find them online at:
Website: www.SparkleAbbey.com
Facebook:  facebook.com/sparkleabbey  
Twitter: @sparkleabbey
Goodreads: goodreads/sparkleabbey

Returning to the Scene of the Crime

By Kay Kendall

Tomorrow I fly north to attend the Canadian mystery conference named Bloody Words. Location: Toronto.

This is something akin to poetic justice. Not only is this my first Canadian writers and fan conference but also Toronto is the setting for my debut mystery. Yes, Toronto.

New writers are often advised to “write what you know.” Yes, I do know Toronto. I lived there for three years, albeit twenty years after my fictional murder takes place there. At least I know the climate, the architecture, the street layout. For the right atmosphere for the time period of DESOLATION ROW, 1968, I consulted friends who lived there at that time.

Thanks to the joys of the internet—Facebook, Twitter, and the like—I’ve made many virtual friends in Ontario. I’m excited to know that I will be meeting some of them, live, for the first time after many months of correspondence. With Canadian authors like Cathy Ace, Vicki Delaney, Gloria Ferris, and Dorothy McIntosh I’ll soon be discussing different ways to bump off our fictional victims. If past mystery conferences are anything to go by, these chats will be replete with great cackling and fueled by a fair bit of vino.

Bloody Words has a novel way of winding up. It should be a hoot. People attending the closing banquet are encouraged to dress as characters from mystery fiction—preferably historical. I’ll be going as my amateur sleuth Austin Starr, in full hippie mode. Do expect photos later!

The life of a writer is not what I always thought it would be. Thanks to technology and to the gregariousness and kindness of folks in the mystery-writing world—both authors and readers alike—my several years as an author have been anything but solitary. For an extrovert like me, this is a great joy.

*******

Kay Kendall is an international award-winning public relations executive who lives in Texas with her husband, four house rabbits, and spaniel Wills. A fan of historical mysteries, she wants to do for the 1960s what novelist Alan Furst does for Europe in the 1930s and 1940s--write atmospheric mysteries that capture the spirit of the age.

Nothing Stays the Same

The end of May we attended two graduations--great-grandkids, a brother and sister, both from high school. The boy graduated from his regular school. His sister changed schools in September, took an accelerated schedule to graduate a year early. We've been to lots of high school graduations over the years, our own kids, grandkids and one other great-grand.

It's always exciting to see what roads they will take. Only a few have gone on to college, others have found professions they love, and some have married and started families. Last year, about this time, it was grandkids' weddings we were attending.

Even with us--the patriarchs of our family--sounds weird, but that's what we are--a lot has changed.

Traveling to far places just isn't fun anymore. For our 60th wedding anniversary we went on a cruise. The drive to the harbor through Southern California traffic to the ship was harrowing. Waiting in the line in the hot sun to get on board wasn't fun or easy. The cruise was great, but we found climbing stairs much harder than in the past. Getting off the ship at the end of the cruise, finding our luggage, waiting for the ride to get us back to the hotel where our car was parked, and the horrible drive home was not fun. Hubby said, "That was our last cruise."

I've always loved going to conventions all over the country. Hubby decided flying wasn't fun anymore when we not only had to change planes but also airlines (going through security two times each way). I've continued flying, but have had second thoughts when I almost didn't make it to my connecting flight and had to be zoomed to it in a wheelchair.

Since then I have flown to another convention, shorter distance, and to a place I'd flown to several times before. It wasn't too difficult. I did decide against going to Bouchercon this year, even though it's in California because the only way for me to get there was fly into L.A. and then take a shuttle. Didn't sound like fun.

We used to attend many book fairs and craft festivals, haul and put up our tent, table and chairs as well as the books. That's too difficult now too. Still going to those that provide the tent and tables.

And the driving--hubby has decided driving into the L.A. area is no longer something he wants to do. Even though L.A. is where I learned to drive, it's far too scary for me too. We still drive over to the coast and to Northern CA, but if we need to go where the drivers seem to be a bit on the crazy side, we ask our middle daughter to be the driver. (She was a school bus driver and has nerves of steel.)

One other change. We have lots of little ones in our family. I once was the grandma who loved to babysit--also raised a couple of grandkids, but no longer. I can't catch a toddler who decides to run away--and I need a nap more than he or she does.

Right now we have one great-grand (the girl who graduated early) who comes to our house to sleep most nights, but that involves no energy on my part.

No matter how things are now, be prepared, nothing stays the same.

Marilyn

P.S. What is the same, I'm still writing and loving it.

Signs of Summer

As I write this on my lunch hour from the day job, I’m eating a BBQ chicken salad made of leftovers from last night’s grilled dinner. When the weather turns warm, we grill a lot of our dinners. And on the weekends, some lunches as well. Last year, it was a matter of necessity as we were remodeling the kitchen and had no stove for a while. I love making a green salad and then topping it with whatever meat I choose. (Which is frequently fish.)

Last summer's trip to the ball game

 Walking this morning, I saw another sign of summer, water flowing down the gutter. One of the homeowners was power washing the outside of their house. As a kid, we lived in a neighborhood that flood irrigated. Irrigation day was glorious. The cold water would build up on the lawn, two or three inches deep. Then overflow into the cement gutter that would warm the flowing river from the heat of the day. We walked barefoot through the neighborhood, feeling the cool water splashing our feet.

Taste of Cincinnati - street fair = street food! 

 Once the water receded, we’d catch night crawlers for fishing. Bigger than worms, they would be floated out of their homes when the water filled the ground.

Last week a different walk took me past a blooming peony plant and reminded me of our annual trips to the cemetery to decorate the family graves.

With Fourth of July on the horizon, what’s your must do summer activity? I’m thinking ice cream can’t be too far down my list.

Enjoy your summer,
Lynn