Donald Westlake

Otto Penzler has a great remembrance of Donale E. Westlake in today's weekend section (Leisure & Arts) of the Wall Street Journal. I came to the MWA Edgar Awards too late to see or meet Westlake, but he must have been a delightful raconteur as well as a great mystery writer. I didn't know he had written the screen play for The Grifters, an exellent movie that I may put onto my Netflix queue and view again.

Speaking of Netflix, we saw The Visitor this week, another great movie. I find these small indy films much more entertaining and even gratifying than the big blockbuster films. Give me a cinematic experience with no blood, no explosions and no cars driving through plate glass. Yes!

Except for novels by Joseph Finder, Stephen Frey and Brad Meltzer, so-called business or financial thrillers are a rare breed. This puzzles me, because so many of us work or worked in offices, for businesses, and caught glimpses of the power struggles, the weird corporate cultures, the sleaze, the grasping and greediness, shoot, all the stuff that makes books work. At least television has tuned into this with The Office and 30 Rock.

Maybe these books aren't escapist enough. We want romance and dust blowing across the Khyber Pass. Finances require attention to detail, due diligence, and all those things requiring mental effort. Guess that's why Madoff got away with his schemes for so long. Nobody (well, hardly anyone) bothered with due diligence.

I can't read enough about the Madoff thing, and expect that writers are churning out international and financial intrigue fiction by the ream these days. The Journal today wrote that only BLACK PENS were permitted at Madoff HQ. No blue, no green, and red ink must have really been anathema. All good stuff. The secrecy, the conflicts. Just screams to be written about.

And how about the woman in Vienna who had that bank and had sold Madoff's stuff to the Russian Mafiosi and is now in hiding? There's a plot for you. Yes!

Hie ye to your keyboards and write. Good story lines, great conflict, all on a world stage with the most revolting people and sleaze and Palm Beach and big houses and the Hamptons! Jeeminy Criminy maybe I should write it myself.

Naw. But my drug dealer will have been burned in a similar Ponzi scheme. Hoo boy is he mad. I love Lotto.

Grapeshot, besotted with her own sleazy characters

Mad about Madoff - it's Only Money

Gosh, we're all going to be poor, not just us retired slobs who have seen our IRAs tank, the fools who bought houses with no money down and no assets, and the working stiffs out of a job or with their 401Ks in tatters. Now, it's the super rich who have invested with Mr. Madoff who may be selling pencils on the street.

Does anyone actually sell pencils on the street? I don't think so. For everyone out of money or in reduced circumstances, there is fallout for the rest of the economy. The New York Times had an article about nannies and cleaning help out of a job. We haven't gone out to eat nearly so much in the last few months. Drove to Chicago instead of flying to California. Shopped at Kohl's and Eddie Bauer's outlet instead of Macy's and, well, you know. Baking bread, getting creative with leftovers, shopping the grocery store specials.

In days of yore, I spent some time in Palm Beach, shopping and visiting trendy restaurants. It was fun and I loved to have lunch at Ta-Boo on Worth Avenue, and watch the passing scene.
http://www.taboorestaurant.com/ For a writer, it should be a write-off. Of course it would help to publish something. In Palm Beach I discovered Sesto Miucci shoes ( http://www.zappos.com/n/br/b/145/Sesto%20Meucci.html) that my feet love so well. Saw the Chuli glass at the Museum. Walked Worth Avenue gaping at the show windows.

One would think that resorts and winter homes would be more casual and laid back, but I saw these hideous formal gew-gaws and knick-knacks and table settings and lamps that looked like something in the Newport mansions of the 1800's. Why? Nothing informal about it. Stiff and pretentious and totally boring.

On always thinks of the very rich as somehow financially savvy, folks who would know to diversity and realize that slow and steady wins the race. Apparently not. Why settle for 5% on your investment if you can get 10%?

I feel sorry for the charities that will be busted, but not so much for anyone else. Greed, you know. The greedy have been getting their comeuppance. Is gluttony next?

Tomorrow we'll unpack the ancient ornaments collected over four lifetimes for the real tree and decorate the house as it has been done forever. I make my Mom's cookies and my own and try some new recipes. It would never occur to me to buy Christmas cookies.

We ate the pork roast again last night, and it looks like there's two more meals left. The last two will be our own stir fry, with yummy veggies and not much fat. Cheap, nutritious and filling, with good Basmati rice.

In my new novel, I'm contrasting the Cuban sandwich in the eyes of the bad guy and the heroine. I think the economy being in the toilet will give the bad guy some fits, too. After all, maybe his clients will be using less cocaine. The high cost of transportation. Yes, everyone feels the economic crisis, even drug lords.

Onward with baking and writing and holiday prep. Don't be too depressed. It's only money.

Grapeshot

First Chapter

The first chapter of Such Stuff As Dreams is done! Doesn't seem too bad. Nice not to have to dump a body right away.

I am recovered from the Amazon fiasco. Lots of good writers didn't get the nod. Some good ones, did, however. I've been reading a few of the chosen ones and some are good, good, good!

Between Clubs, by John Ochwat, a golf/coming-of-age novel really struck me as excellent.

On the mystery front, Peg Herring's Shakespeare's Blood was also a good read. I liked Murder in Palm Beach (beach read), and my review disappeared. How did that happen? Hindsight Carousel was intriguing. What a crazy party. Glad I'm too old for those anymore.

Today at Toastmaster's I told them about the 2008 banned words. Had the feeling I wasn't coming across. Marching to a different drummer, as usual. If all of us who marched to "different" got up and marched together, what would it look like? A weird dance? A freak army? A religious procession? I give up. Monty Python's silly walks in parade?

So, onward with the new book. And the course I'm taking has made me realize that Festival Madness needs a new opening line. And after two editors already have it. Well, if they get past the first paragraph, maybe it will all work out. How many years have I been saying that?

In a way, it's a relief to NOT be writing about technology. It's such a turn off for some, including many editors and agents who are real technophobes. Not all of us liberal arts types embraced it like yours truly. Why was that? A good reliable paycheck, for starters. And finishers. And compelling, interesting, always a challenge, learn something new, make a machine do your bidding. Lots of reasons. Geeks always march to a different drummer, or is it to the click of a mouse?

Annie and Thisbe were "cats of the day" on some website today. Must go find. Made lasagne rollups for dinner last night. Combined two recipes, one for chicken, one for spinach. A-OK. We're eating it again tonight, along with a nice salad. Found some ranch dressing that isn't too salty.

More snow tomorrow and then, ick, rain. I worked out this morning so will stay in unless the weather is decent.

Onward, and possibly even upward.


Grrrrapeshot