Home is Where the Heart Stops

Like many authors, I feel an emotional attachment to most of the characters in my books. I’m sure Kathy Reichs feels an attachment to Tempe Brennan, and Patricia Cornwell does to Kay Scarpetta. It happens with stand-alones, but I think it happens even more when you write a series. You spend a lot of time with your characters. You see them grow and change. So I wasn’t surprised that I became attached to Madison Cross and the other characters in my books.

 

One thing that did surprise me was how attached I have become to the crime scenes in my books. Although parts of each book take place in fictional locales, most of the action takes place in Philadelphia, and most of the crimes take place in real places. Whether it’s the University of Pennsylvania, St. Peter’s churchyard, the Schuylkill Expressway, or Thirtieth Street Station, I’ve been dropping bodies all over this town. With Body Trace, Blood Poison and Freezer Burn, I have three books out now, and I find that as I’m driving around the city, I’m usually not far from the scene of some horrendous death of my own invention. Maybe I’m a sick pup, but this usually makes me smile.

 

Part of the attachment to these settings is probably formed while researching the books. If you’re writing about a real place, you can’t fudge the details. If it’s a location where you’ve never been, you have to visit it and study it, and it’s exciting discovering and exploring someplace new in the city where you’ve lived all your life. Much more likely, it’s a place you’ve been to hundreds of times before, but when you write about it, you find yourself looking at it and getting to know it in a totally new way.

 

This is true to a lesser extent with the other settings in the book, as well — a chase through Northern Liberties, a funeral in Manayunk or just a quiet conversation at Silk City Diner. All of these places become a part of you when they become a part of your books.

 

But with the setting of a death scene, it’s different.

 

I thought maybe the locations were emotional surrogates for the unfortunate characters lying dead on the ground. Like I said, I get attached to most of my characters. The murder victims are usually dead before I meet them. But while I don’t get to know them like the other characters, they do have back stories and histories with plenty of details, even if that’s not usually included in the book. But then again, I do get to know some of them before killing them off late in the book. Could it be that since I know what fate awaits them, I subconsciously try not to get too attached? 

 

Nah, that’s ridiculous; some of the dead characters are among my favorites. In fact, I think there should be a subgenre of zombie books about all the dead literary characters who were too much fun to die. You could kill them all over again (it’s easy — you just have to go for the brain).

 

Maybe it’s a combination of all of these things, plus that fact that while writing can be hard work, writing crime scenes and murder and carnage never is. That’s just fun. And we all remember fondly the places where we have fun.

 

Either that or I really am a sick pup.

Noir at the Bar 3

Well it ain’t Sunday, and it definitely ain’t the first Sunday, but it’s still Noir at the Bar!
Peter Rozovsky is back once again with his excellent Noir at the Bar series at the Tritone Bar, 15th and South St. in Philadelphia, 6:30 tonight, Tues., Aug. 19.
Dave White, Derringer Award-winning author of When One Man Dies and his latest, The Evil That Men Do, will take questions from interviewer, reviewer and crime-blogger Sarah Weinman, as well as from the crowd.
Dave White was nominated for the Private Eye Writers of America’s Shamus Award for best first novel for When One Man Dies, and he’s a heck of a guy.  So come on out to the Tritone in Philadelphia on Tuesday, Aug. 19, at 6:30 p.m. to congratulate Dave and hear him read, and stick around for the best mahi-mahi burgers and fried candy bars in all of crime fiction.

Find out about Dave’s work and read his short fiction at http://www.davewhitenovels.com/.

Detectives Beyond Borders
“Because Murder Is More Fun Away From Home”
http://detectivesbeyondborders.blogspot.com/
presents
 
“Noir at the Bar: Come for the mystery,
stay for the mahi-mahi.”

Where: The Tritone, 1508 South Street, Philadelphia
215-545-0475  http://www.tritonebar.com/
When: Tuesday, August 19, 6:30 p.m.

Writers Coffeehouse is Back!

Just got great news from Jonathan Maberry that his recently suspended monthly writers’ coffeehouse is resuming. If you’re a writer and you live anywhere near Doylestown, you should make an effort at some point to attend one of these. It usually attracts a wonderful group of writers from across genres, disciplines and levels of success, from absolute beginners to bestsellers. It is an open discussion (with coffee) loosely moderated by Maberry and greatly enhanced by his vast industry knowledge. Here’s the announcement Jonathan Maberry sent out:

The Writers Coffeehouse is BACK!

Come and join us on Sunday, August 10, from noon to 3pm at the Bucks County Coffeehouse in Doylestown PA for a free networking session.
It’s a bunch of writers sitting around talking about writing…with coffee.

No agenda…just chat about the latest trends in the industry, about  markets, about pitching and selling, about frustration, about keeping the inner fires alight, about dealing with our families, about how damn tough it is to make it as a writer at the best of times and what writers can do to stay afloat in these troubled economic waters.

This is stuff that writers can’t really talk about with someone who isn’t a writer. Writers get other writers: they’re of a species.

We used to hold these coffeehouses at the Writers Corner USA, but with that closing we moved to a nice comfy new home at Bucks County Coffee.

Now we’re back and everyone is pretty jazzed that there’s at least one place each month where they can go and be themselves around other people who understand them: WRITERS.

No previous publishing experience necessary…the Writers Coffeehouse attracts everyone from absolute beginner to award-winners and bestsellers. We’re all writers.

So come on out and join us. This will be a monthly event. Grab a cup of coffee and head on downstairs to the Conference Room.

See you Sunday.

-Jonathan Maberry

For more information, drop me a line at jonathan_maberry@ yahoo.com
Bucks County Coffee Company
22 N. Main Street
Doylestown, PA 18901
(215) 345-0795
http://www.buckscountycoffee.com/

Click here for directions 

True Crime Fiction

Crime is wrong. I know that. And so is spam, even the non-criminal variety (unless it’s me, shamelessly promoting my next book, like Freezer Burn, which comes out June 3, 2008  from Penguin Books). But every now and then, a piece of scam-spam comes along that is so wrong, it just feels right. In this case, I am talking about an e-mail I received with the subject heading:

 

SCAM VICTIMS REIMBURSEMENTS PROGRAMME

 

which was sent, faithfully, from

 

GEORGE OLUMIDE,

Processing/Transfer Officer,

FRAUD VICTIMS/$150,000 BENEFICIARIES DEPT.

 

 

The missive runs 545 words and is one of the finest examples of free-form Nigerian bank scam prose I have so far encountered, but more important is the scam itself: a solicitation to previous victims of Nigerian bank scams, offering to reimburse them for their losses. All victims need do is hand over the same information they handed over when they got taken the first time. And they will be sent $150,000.
They are self-selecting a for people whose gullibility has already been demonstrated. It’s downright elegant.

Could anybody really fall for it twice? I think it’s a legitimate question, and apparently, so does “George Olumide.” Looking around at the state of the world, I have to think the answer is probably yes.
And frankly, if “Mr. Olumide” manages to get any money from this particular scam, I say let him keep it.

 

Writing and Being Read

I just checked out the new podcast of my short-story Grounders on Variant Frequencies and I think it’s pretty cool. You can judge for yourself if the story is any good, but the people at Variant Frequencies did a heck of a job producing it, and Thomas “cmdln” Gideon did a great job reading it.

 

 

 

 

 

I first started talking about podcasting the story with Seth Harwood a couple of months ago. Seth writes and podcasts the Jack Palms crime series, including the recently published and (deservedly) much buzzed-about first in the series, Jack Wakes Up. Seth does the reading himself on his podcasts. He does a hell of a job and he makes it sound easy. When we first discussed podcasting Grounders, Seth told me to practice reading it.

Now, I have always thought I did a pretty good job of reading my work (and I undeniably  kill reading Dr. Seuss), but as I sat at my dinner table, reading my story aloud to myself, it sounded lame and flat and terrible. Luckily, Seth forwarded the story to Rick Stringer at Variant Frequencies, and Rick agreed to produce it for podcast, which meant someone else would be reading it. Thank god.

Rick tapped Thomas to read it, a great fit not only because of his talent as a reader, but also because of his extensive background in computing and his excellent blog, Command Line, both of which are relevant to the story itself. Hearing his reading brought home how much difference a great reader can make.

 

I was thinking about this the other night at the Tritone Bar in Philly, at the first night of Noir at the Bar, a new monthly event put together by Peter Rovosky. Duane Swierczynski, author of the crazed and amazing Severance Package among other excellent works, was the featured guest (I’ll be doing the second Noir at the Bar, on July 6). Duane is an excellent public speaker, but adamant about not reading in public (he very well might need corrective lenses, but we don’t know because he won’t even read an eye chart out loud). The program that night had two parts: an interview by Duane’s friend (and mine) book critic Ed Pettit (a.k.a. The Philly Poe Guy); and a reading of the first chapter of Severance Package by Ed’s wife, Kate, who is an actor. I’ve been to plenty of author readings, and I’ve enjoyed them immensely, but there is a big difference listening to a trained actor up there, inflecting, intoning, doing all those actor-ly things, and really doing justice to what was on the page. Duane’s book is great, but Kate’s reading made it even better.

This is probably no revelation to all you playwrights out there and authors with books on disk, but listening to someone else reading your work aloud is an amazing experience, like hearing a singer sing a song you’ve written (an experience from my misspent youth). You learn things about the language and

 

the writing that you would never have noticed reading it quietly, or reading it aloud yourself.

 

 

I’m thinking of asking Kate or Thomas to come with me next time I get my eyes checked. I can hear it now, a voice rich with emotion and meaning, reading:

 

E

 

DG

KXBL

HVWXP

 

Finding a Literary Agent

We all know that in order to get published these days, agents are pretty necessary. Occasionally, you hear of people getting published without them, but you hear of people winning the lottery, too.

 

While a publisher probably won’t give you a good look if you don’t have an agent, they might still give you a look. Unfortunately, that’s not always a good thing.

 

Say you shop your manuscript to all the publishers you can find and get rejected because you’re stuck in the slush pile. If you later get an agent, one of the first things that agent will likely request is a list of publishers to whom you have already submitted your work. Since most agents will not submit something to a publisher who has already rejected it, you could find yourself with a great agent, but no publishers to whom that agent can submit your manuscript.

 

So how do you get an agent?

 

Well, if your uncle is an agent, bingo; ask him to represent you. If you have friends with agents, ask for a referral. (Now is as good a time as any to do away with any last vestigial traces of shame; it will only get in the way later.) But if your uncle isn’t an agent, you might have to look elsewhere.

 

Some people think you should always aim high; approach the biggest agents around and maybe you’ll find a powerhouse to rep you. That might work, and if you do get a powerhouse agent, congratulations (although it is possible to sign with an agent so big that you are not on their radar and you end up neglected).

 

But if that doesn’t work for you, keep in mind that one of the most important characteristics in an agent is that the agent is actually open to representing new writers, or even actively seeking them. Otherwise, they probably will not even consider you. If you can find an agent who is actively looking for writers to represent, you have found an agent who is much more likely to read your manuscript, and much more likely to consider representing you.

 

So how do you find such open-minded agents? Books like the Guide to Literary Agents, have lists of agents who indicate they are open to new writers or are actively looking, but since a year or more has probably passed between the time the agents fill out their questionnaires and when the book comes out, those agents will very likely have filled up. The strategy I found was to try to find an agent in a state of transition: newly hired, newly promoted, newly independent, etc.

 

Publishers Marketplace is a great source of personnel news, both the website and the e-mail, Publishers Lunch. Publishers Weekly also has a good website, although you need a subscription. It ain’t cheap, but it gives you access to their archives. If you subscribe, you can search the recent archives, maybe a year or so, and read all their personnel news columns. These days, new sources of  information are popping up all the time, and you can use them to find agents who will be as happy to hear from you as you are to contact them.

 

And if all else fails, maybe you can talk your uncle into changing careers.

Some Things Never Change

When my first book came out, Body Trace, I was asked by several interviewers if there was any influences I had as a young writer. I listed several writers who had an impact on me, but I also mentioned Irv Rotman, my English teacher at Central High School in Philadelphia. In addition to being a great teacher, Irv spent extra time reading my short stories and then spending his lunch break going over them with me I appreciated the help, but it meant even more that he would take the time do this — his time — and that he took my writing seriously enough.

After the initial burst of post-Body Trace-promotions, I decided to look Irv up and tell him I had gotten published. I Googled his name and made a few phone calls, but couldn’t  find a trace of him, other than the fact that he had retired almost twenty years earlier. From this you may have already figured out that it’s been more than twenty years since my high school graduation, and in the back of my mind, I wondered if maybe Irv had graduated, too, if you know what I mean, as in that big “after-school activity in the sky.” I didn’t remember him as having been particularly young when I was in high school (he must have been at least thirty!), so I wondered if maybe I was too late.

When Blood Poison, my second book, came out, the same questions came up, and so did Irv’s name. It was a pretty hectic time — working on the next book, promoting the previous one, etc., plus, I had moved in the meantime. I looked again, not as thoroughly, but using a few different resources. Still couldn’t find him. 

A couple of weeks ago, I was doing an early interview for Freezer Burn, my next book, which is coming out in June. Again the same question came up, and when I mentioned Irv, I decided I had to look a little harder. I didn’t want to stalk the poor guy, but I figured there had to be a way to find him or what had become of him. I started out using the same (free) online white pages services I had used before, but this time, I started looking in the communities just out side the city, like the one in which I live, and, apparently, the same one in which Irv lives. About forty yards away from me.

I was floored.

I stopped over a couple days later with a couple of signed books and my eight-year-old son. I was a little concerned about what I might find, but Irv opened the door and recognized me almost immediately (I don’t know if that’s a good thing or bad; high school was an awkward time…) Irv looked almost exactly the same, though, which made me feel a lot better about my own rapidly accruing age.

I gave Irv the books and we chatted for a while. I met his charming wife and we talked about writing, and about my alma mater, trading stories about some of the nuttier teachers (even twenty-plus years later, there’s still a thrill about hearing dirt about the teachers).

A couple of days later, I got an e-mail: Irv had finished reading Body Trace, and he enjoyed it very much. Just for a moment, I felt a swell of pride. Then I saw it. There at the bottom.

“PS: I must discuss a point in grammar with you.”

Some things never change.

A.L.A. ala M.W.A.

I recently participated in a book-signing event organized by the Mystery Writers of America (NY) at the American Library Association’s winter conference in Philadelphia.

As always, whenever I stop writing and participate in one of these events, not only did I have a great time, but I also learned a lot, too.

This time, I re-learned some things that I already knew — librarians are a hoot, for example, as are mystery writers.  But I also learned some new things, like why there is so little sex in cozies (cozy mysteries, that is, not the knitted coverings English ladies put on their teapots – there’s probably plenty of sex in those).

The event, which consisted os a Friday night reception followed by signings throughout the weekend, was put together by Rosemary Harris (MWA-NY Board Member and author of the just-released Pushing Up Daisies) and Jane Cleland (MWA-NY Regional President and author of Deadly Appraisal, among others), and as always, they did a great job.

Something else I learned is that in addition to being lovely and talented, Rosemary is also boundlessly energetic. Watching her in a blur of action, I remembered recently sending her a vaguely whiny e-mail about having to schlep up to New York from Philly for an MWA event. She promptly replied with some helpful suggestions and said she would be able to help me more when she got back …from Tanzania. Schlepping, indeed.   

As it turns out, Rosemary is also a hopeless D.D.G. (you know, a Damn Do-Gooder – lots of time and energy helping people, making the world a better place, etc. Don’t tell her I told you, though).

In addition to Rosemary and Jane, I also got to hang out with Liz Zelvin (Death Will Get You Sober), who I usually only see on Myspace. I also got to spend some time with fellow Philadelphian Merry Jones, whom I had met before, but only briefly. Merry has many wonderful qualities, not the least of which is that she laughed at most of my jokes.

 

 

After the Friday night reception, fellow Philadelphians Cordelia Frances Biddle and Steve Zettler (sometimes collaboratively a.k.a. Nero Blanco) welcomed the lot of us into their home. In addition to being lovely themselves, Cordelia and Steve have a lovely home and they made us very welcome in it. It was great hanging out with other writers, talking about the business and the craft of writing and learning about both (see “Sex in cozies,” above). 

 

 

On Sunday, I was back down at the conference for a book signing. Duane Swierczynski unfortunately had to bag out since he was under the weather (and by the sounds of it, practically under the ground). That was a shame, because Duane is a lot of fun and a great writer (it was also a shame because he was stuck at home feeling like crap). We did manage to dispense all the copies of Duane’s excellent thriller, The Blond (and no I did not snag one for myself (I already read it; it’s great (although I did not read the bonus short that came with this edition – damn, shoulda snagged one!))). 

 

 

On the upside, I got to hang out with Marco Connelli, with whom I share a background in music (the difference being that he is still performing and has achieved some success). I also got to hang out briefly with Jeff Markowitz, who was a lot of fun, and the hilarious Jack Getze, with whom I had a great time sharing the signing table.

People took loads of photos over the course of the weekend, which was great, but unfortunately, I look like a goober in all of them. Which brings me to the last thing I learned from the event: it might not actually be the photos that are making me look like a goober.

Show Me a Signing

In my last post, I wrote about some book signings that had gone pretty well, and how they prompted me to set up some more for a few weeks later. Late November, early December, I figured, thinking it might not be a bad idea to make myself available to Christmas shoppers (personally signed books do make excellent gifts).
Well, now it’s the week after Thanksgiving (my house: lots of family, lots of fun, lots of turkey, lots of work), Christmas is right around the corner, and I’m suddenly realizing that seven of the signings I booked are spread out over the next ten days. Which begs the question: What the heck was I thinking?
Apparently, in the midst of the excitement, I forgot that I actually have a life (such as it is).
While hopefully my presence at the signing tables will solve some gift-list conundrums for mystery lovers and the people who love them, all these signings won’t leave me much time to do my own Christmas shopping (and I doubt the “personally signed books making great gifts” rule holds true if you’re giving your own book as a gift …or do you think I could get away with it?)
It’s not that I don’t enjoy book signings, because for the most part, now I do. Sure, it’s a little awkward mumbling “…forensic mystery series… set in Philadelphia” to anyone who fails to sufficiently avoid eye contact or is lured in by the sight of my little bowl of candies (dark chocolate Hershey’s kisses… who can resist?).

But each time, I’ve met some great people, a particularly valuable perk if you are someone who spends countless hours sitting at a computer lost in a world that exists only within your own head (at least, until you can get someone to publish it).
As this is my second book, I’ve even been able to enjoy that most wonderful occurrence, the glad-to-meet-you first-book-reader who tells you how much they are looking forward to reading the next.

One person even asked, “Are you really D. H. Dublin?” – a particularly existential question if you happen to be writing under a pseudonym. I’m not exactly sure why this person might have doubted I was, in fact, D. H. Dublin (maybe he pictured someone with more of a chin?), but my hesitation as I considered how to answer him probably served to heighten his suspicions. As it turned out, he had already read both of my books and enjoyed them very much – an especially timely ego-boost coming, as it did, after a particularly long streak of successful eye-contact-avoiders.
So, it’ll be a hectic couple of weeks, but it should be fun. I’ll get my shopping done somehow (it’s not like I won’t be near a mall). In the meantime, if, in the next ten days, you happen to find yourself near a bookstore in The Gallery in Center City, Willow Grove Mall, Cherry Hill Mall, Liberty Place, Doylestown, Springfield Mall, or Granite Run Mall, stop in and see me. And if you see my family, tell them I said “Hi.”

Here we go.

After a year or so of halfhearted bloggin on Myspace , Amazon, Crimespace, etc., I have finally decided to do the real deal and start at WordPress. Yay.

I’ll be starting out wih some of the posts from my other blogs, so you’ll know what I’ve been up to, and hopefully I’ll keep up with this a little more regularly than I have in the past.

Hope to hear back from you.

 

Hopefully.