My entry to a contest for a spot in an anthology has a six percent (6 %) chance of winning. That is actually better than the odds of being published as a novelist.
At the end of the month, I travel to the Big Apple from Beantown for Edgar's Week. This year I'll be pushing my suspense novel (hopefully finished by then), the last of my crime fiction writing. It's been an interesting eighteen (18) years. This last book wasn't supposed to be, as I had intended to write my Southern California in the late twenties novel, but the damn character came to me, sat on my shoulder and started telling her story. Of course, she didn't tell all of it, and I had to fill in a lot of blanks. I have no feeling for how good it is. My writing group has gone from enthusiasm to neutrality, shall we say. Significant Other like my earlier novels, but is not all that enthusiastic about this one. Actually, he liked Promiscuous Mode and the Shadow Warriors.
I don't know why I stuck with crime fiction for so long. Some time ago I realized that the parts of my novels I enjoyed writing most were not the cop scenes, the action scenes or the crime scenes, but more the stuff of everyday life. By then I had so much energy tied up in Mystery and Suspense that I kept at it.
"They" say the definition of insanity is to keep repeating the same act, expecting different results. That's me and my so-called writing career. So onward, to finish In Flight and then to Such Stuff As Dreams.
I have some short stories to write, and a decision to make about the last crime fiction story I had to truncate to keep the word count down to the contest level. I spent 3 weeks cutting words. Should I write the story to its "proper" length? Dunno. Looking forward to penning the short stories, some of which are about animals.
Speaking of which, we have a huge red-shouldered hawk in the woods by the slough, stalking the birds. I shudder for my poor little terrorized gold-finches, titmice and chickadees, to say nothing of the doves, the robins and the sparrows! And all the other feathered friends. I know. I know. Hawks gotta eat, but they can go to another yard, and not treat ours as a smorgasbord table.
Loved watching the Masters this week and am still so happy that Phil Mickelson won. And how about them Red Sox? Now if Big Papi could just hit a few out of the park. One can waste so much time watching sports. Still, the drama and conflict and effort remind me of writing fiction.
Wish me luck in my new non-crime writing career. I can go where my whimsy takes me, and have learned good rules about suspense and conflict and plotting which will serve me in other genres.
Sucking it up, as per usual. Yup. Yup.
Grapeshot
Showing posts with label crime fiction. Show all posts
Showing posts with label crime fiction. Show all posts
Monday, April 12, 2010
Friday, June 26, 2009
The Difficulties of the Genre Novel
Naturally you want your crime fiction novel to be exciting. The use of pacing is giving me fits right now.
I have been humming along alternating action and excitement with moving the plot along. There is a budding romance, a road trip, trying to escape from the bad guy, and setting up the story for the next scenes.
Just wrapped up some drama in Jacksonville, FL, and now the characters need to be sitting in the CVS parking lot in a Boston suburb. I don’t want to describe the rest of the trip in any detail, (alas, it's not a Road Novel), but need to tell the reader, notice I said tell, not show, that my trio stopped in Myrtle Beach and that the romantic relationship has now expanded to include sex. That the little girl has got one of her heart’s desires, that the motor home has broken down causing a day’s delay. That a short day's drive has expanded due to a nightmare mess on I-95 in Connecticut, a not uncommon event, making the characters almost late to get to the bank before it closes to get the account number for the Cayman Islands bank where huge gobs of illegal drug money is stashed. Remember this is a crime story. Suspense!
Now the characters have to get to Chicago on the double, but hurry to get to the bank has created a huge PLOT Point.
Man, this writing business is hard work.
So I think what I’m going to do is set the van down in the middle of the traffic jam and let the characters sweat a little and tell us about Myrtle Beach, and the prior two days in a few short paragraphs. Then the race to the bank. All hell breaks loose. Of course the way they’ve been robbing banks in suburban Boston, I could even have a bank robbery. Hey, that’s a good idea. A man with a gun comes through the door. Yowsa! Oh boy! Yes!
Grapeshot, who is closing in on 220 pages and lots of words.
I have been humming along alternating action and excitement with moving the plot along. There is a budding romance, a road trip, trying to escape from the bad guy, and setting up the story for the next scenes.
Just wrapped up some drama in Jacksonville, FL, and now the characters need to be sitting in the CVS parking lot in a Boston suburb. I don’t want to describe the rest of the trip in any detail, (alas, it's not a Road Novel), but need to tell the reader, notice I said tell, not show, that my trio stopped in Myrtle Beach and that the romantic relationship has now expanded to include sex. That the little girl has got one of her heart’s desires, that the motor home has broken down causing a day’s delay. That a short day's drive has expanded due to a nightmare mess on I-95 in Connecticut, a not uncommon event, making the characters almost late to get to the bank before it closes to get the account number for the Cayman Islands bank where huge gobs of illegal drug money is stashed. Remember this is a crime story. Suspense!
Now the characters have to get to Chicago on the double, but hurry to get to the bank has created a huge PLOT Point.
Man, this writing business is hard work.
So I think what I’m going to do is set the van down in the middle of the traffic jam and let the characters sweat a little and tell us about Myrtle Beach, and the prior two days in a few short paragraphs. Then the race to the bank. All hell breaks loose. Of course the way they’ve been robbing banks in suburban Boston, I could even have a bank robbery. Hey, that’s a good idea. A man with a gun comes through the door. Yowsa! Oh boy! Yes!
Grapeshot, who is closing in on 220 pages and lots of words.
Friday, November 14, 2008
New England Crime Bake
The place to be today, tomorrow and Sunday is in Dedham, MA at the mystery conference The New England Crimebake (http://www.crimebake.org/).
Authors, agents, editors and fans are coming to master classes, panels, and to meet guest of honor Harlan Coban. Attendees can even watch the French movie taken from Coban's book Tell No One tonight. A gala banquet caps Saturday's activities.
I'm not blogging anymore until Sunday because I'll be baking in crime, so to speak. Hoping, as always to connect with an agent or editor that will love my writing enough to represent or publish it.
Someday it will happen. I hope not posthumously.
In the meantime, I baked this vegetarian quiche for us to eat Sunday night after the conference is over and the guests are on their way home and it's kind of a let down but we bask in the glow of a job well done. Again, the yin and the yang.
Onward.
Grapehsot
Monday, November 10, 2008
Writing Bad Guys
One loves one's literary characters and doesn't want anything bad to happen to them. I am really starting to like my Columbian Drug Lord, as I flesh him out. He sees himself as a businessman with "product" and all of these disasters descend on him--supposedly loyal employees skimming money, a missing laptop, employees swimming at the shallow end of the gene pool, bad luck, smart opponents, a greedy girlfriend, huge outlays of cash for his little submarine fleet, and this woman who has disappeared, a woman who has caused him so much grief, a woman who needs to be killed. But where the hell is she? He has a grudging respect for her, and she for him. Throughout the book they will be doing this dance. I love the way he cusses and views the world and what he really wants, which is to go home to Cartagena. But of course he can't. Life is complicated. For all of us.
Tonight I took the scraps of chicken (some pretty big scraps) and made a tasty chicken pot pie with homemade crust, again the food processor recipe which takes one minute and rolls out like a dream. I had chicken fat left over, and all the savory pan juices, garlicky and lemony and chickeny. I bought a few mushrooms, but the peas, carrots, celery and onion came from the fridge. There was one problem. So good we couldn't stop eating. Not a good thing. About a million calories. Thank the lord I didn't add any heavy cream as the Food Network recipe called for. The recipe made enough for three, so there is a lunch to die for in the fridge.
We have been very busy getting ready for the mystery conference, the New England Crime Bake, and I've done mail merges for labels, which I have to relearn every time I do them, although I hope that I'll remember at least enough to do the Christmas card labels. Doing the mail merge is NOT like riding a bicycle. You forget practically everything.
Late fall is here. The colors are mostly drab and there are more leaves on the ground than on the trees. I put the acorn squash seeds outside for the critters and fed the Highland Scottish cattle their fruit and veggie scraps. The little herd has increased by four new cows with tags in their ears. A second bull has been added. Everyone seems to be getting along. They liked the acorn squash skin and the grapefruit rind and the apple cores. Banana skins always popular. We have taken recycling to a new level.
More anon.
Grapeshot
Tonight I took the scraps of chicken (some pretty big scraps) and made a tasty chicken pot pie with homemade crust, again the food processor recipe which takes one minute and rolls out like a dream. I had chicken fat left over, and all the savory pan juices, garlicky and lemony and chickeny. I bought a few mushrooms, but the peas, carrots, celery and onion came from the fridge. There was one problem. So good we couldn't stop eating. Not a good thing. About a million calories. Thank the lord I didn't add any heavy cream as the Food Network recipe called for. The recipe made enough for three, so there is a lunch to die for in the fridge.
We have been very busy getting ready for the mystery conference, the New England Crime Bake, and I've done mail merges for labels, which I have to relearn every time I do them, although I hope that I'll remember at least enough to do the Christmas card labels. Doing the mail merge is NOT like riding a bicycle. You forget practically everything.
Late fall is here. The colors are mostly drab and there are more leaves on the ground than on the trees. I put the acorn squash seeds outside for the critters and fed the Highland Scottish cattle their fruit and veggie scraps. The little herd has increased by four new cows with tags in their ears. A second bull has been added. Everyone seems to be getting along. They liked the acorn squash skin and the grapefruit rind and the apple cores. Banana skins always popular. We have taken recycling to a new level.
More anon.
Grapeshot
Tuesday, October 14, 2008
Fifteen pages!
During a busy week, I have written fifteen pages, which is a huge amount for pokey 'ol me. Maybe it's the impetus of the food writing class. Maybe I'm actually a non-fiction writer. Who knows? I even sent in two queries, and tried to figure out where to send the pimp short story.
I'm not sure that it's even crime fiction, although one guy pulls a knife on another. Nobody gets hurt, at least not physically. The fish story is not really concerned with crime, although drug running plays heavily into it. I'm voting for the loosening of the marijuana laws in Massachusetts. Did you know that MJ is the#one cash crop in the U.S.
Of as we used to say back in the dark ages of high school. Put that in your pipe and smoke it. Ha ha. Just kidding.
There was a confrontation north of Winnemucca (Northern Nevada) between pot growers and some biologists working for the BLM (Bureau of Land Management). When the smoke (another ha ha) had cleaned the growers bailed on five million dollars worth of plants and some already harvested crop. They were growing it along the river in the middle of nowhere, but as my young friend likes to say, everywhere is somewhere. Not quite far enough into the middle of nowhere. Nowhere close to where I was visiting.
In my novel and even my fish short story, I'm writing about the submarines that the drug runners are now using to ferry "product" between Columbia and ports of call in the U.S. These submarines can't be detected by radar and each can carry a huge stash of coke. When they are discovered, the crew scuttles the boat and has to be rescued. There's no evidence, so they can't be prosecuted. Clever, eh?
Just think if all the effort that went into breaking the law were harnessed for some kind of good. Zowie!
Caribou Barbie is speaking in New Hampshire tomorrow, and I would think seriously about going up there to heckle her, except that I have a meeting to attend. No, not that kind of meeting. The Republicans have stooped lower than a snake's belly with their rumors and innuendo. Will a campaign ever be fought (and won) on the issues? Not in my lifetime.
Something that no one mentions: if investments continue to tank, and jobs continue to be lost, and no one has any money, where will the tax revenues comes from to bail the country out? Seems like one impact of what's going on will be less tax money. People seem to hate economics, but how about Paul Krugman? Yay! Love his columns in the NYT. He was even on Bill Maher. Or was it Jon Stewart? Can't remember anything.
Tonight is the last night of the delicious bean soup. I ran out of salad fixins', so we're having a cute little antipasto. Call it creativity in the kitchen.
Bon Appetit!
Grapeshot
I'm not sure that it's even crime fiction, although one guy pulls a knife on another. Nobody gets hurt, at least not physically. The fish story is not really concerned with crime, although drug running plays heavily into it. I'm voting for the loosening of the marijuana laws in Massachusetts. Did you know that MJ is the#one cash crop in the U.S.
Of as we used to say back in the dark ages of high school. Put that in your pipe and smoke it. Ha ha. Just kidding.
There was a confrontation north of Winnemucca (Northern Nevada) between pot growers and some biologists working for the BLM (Bureau of Land Management). When the smoke (another ha ha) had cleaned the growers bailed on five million dollars worth of plants and some already harvested crop. They were growing it along the river in the middle of nowhere, but as my young friend likes to say, everywhere is somewhere. Not quite far enough into the middle of nowhere. Nowhere close to where I was visiting.
In my novel and even my fish short story, I'm writing about the submarines that the drug runners are now using to ferry "product" between Columbia and ports of call in the U.S. These submarines can't be detected by radar and each can carry a huge stash of coke. When they are discovered, the crew scuttles the boat and has to be rescued. There's no evidence, so they can't be prosecuted. Clever, eh?
Just think if all the effort that went into breaking the law were harnessed for some kind of good. Zowie!
Caribou Barbie is speaking in New Hampshire tomorrow, and I would think seriously about going up there to heckle her, except that I have a meeting to attend. No, not that kind of meeting. The Republicans have stooped lower than a snake's belly with their rumors and innuendo. Will a campaign ever be fought (and won) on the issues? Not in my lifetime.
Something that no one mentions: if investments continue to tank, and jobs continue to be lost, and no one has any money, where will the tax revenues comes from to bail the country out? Seems like one impact of what's going on will be less tax money. People seem to hate economics, but how about Paul Krugman? Yay! Love his columns in the NYT. He was even on Bill Maher. Or was it Jon Stewart? Can't remember anything.
Tonight is the last night of the delicious bean soup. I ran out of salad fixins', so we're having a cute little antipasto. Call it creativity in the kitchen.
Bon Appetit!
Grapeshot
Tuesday, October 09, 2007
Series versus Standalone
Whether to write a series or a so-called standalone is a decision every mystery and suspense writer faces. The beauty of a series is, that if it takes off (think Spenser and Reacher and Kinsey Milhone) you will not only be laughing all the way to the bank, and chortling and clicking your heels and stopping in at all the stores along the street, but you have already developed your main characters. Again, think Spenser and Hawk and Susan and the dog. Each book doesn’t require starting from scratch with all the characterizations which means the author can develop the characters even more and concentrate on the story.
The down side of the series is that often after 4-6 books, or even less, the series tanks, sales are flat or worse, and the publisher drops the author like, well, the proverbial hot potato. And then whatcha gonna do?
Many very successful series writers take time off for a standalone. I am thinking of two excellent writers: Laura Lippman and S. J. Rozan. These have been real breakout books. Look at Dennis Lehane. He had his Boston series and then bam! Mystic River.
So the best of all worlds is to write both. Sounds easy, huh? I am here to tell you it isn’t.
I have 5 books in my series: the “in the closet” book, the published book, the two for sale and so-far unsold, and the third one soon to be ready. Actually, I took World of Mirrors out of the series, by changing the back story and changing the characters names and the age of the female lead. The reason I did this was that otherwise the series character would be getting excessively old. And I was able to cut almost 15,000 words out of the story, never an inconsiderable feat. But anyone who did a close reading would find the series heroine, Emma, and the stand-alone main character, Zara, soul sisters. Zara, being younger and feistier, puts up with less crap.
So now I want to do this 1928 California book, not crime fiction, not series, and a historical to boot. This ain’t easy. I’ve been thinking about it and doing research for a few years and it still seems awfully difficult to get going. What is the hardest thing is that I don’t really know these characters yet. I haven’t been working with them for 15 years. And do to the time difference, I don’t think they’re going to come to me fully dressed with all their little tics and peccadilloes.
Nope, there’s going to be a lot of work involved. Eeek! I never thought it would be a breeze, not did I think it would be THIS HARD. Of course I could just slap a first draft together and do serious character development in subsequent drafts, but that’s not my style. Hmmm. Time to roll up the sleeves and think. Thinking is hard. Suck it up and think? Thinking is messy. One doesn’t think in a straight line.
Nonetheless. . .
The down side of the series is that often after 4-6 books, or even less, the series tanks, sales are flat or worse, and the publisher drops the author like, well, the proverbial hot potato. And then whatcha gonna do?
Many very successful series writers take time off for a standalone. I am thinking of two excellent writers: Laura Lippman and S. J. Rozan. These have been real breakout books. Look at Dennis Lehane. He had his Boston series and then bam! Mystic River.
So the best of all worlds is to write both. Sounds easy, huh? I am here to tell you it isn’t.
I have 5 books in my series: the “in the closet” book, the published book, the two for sale and so-far unsold, and the third one soon to be ready. Actually, I took World of Mirrors out of the series, by changing the back story and changing the characters names and the age of the female lead. The reason I did this was that otherwise the series character would be getting excessively old. And I was able to cut almost 15,000 words out of the story, never an inconsiderable feat. But anyone who did a close reading would find the series heroine, Emma, and the stand-alone main character, Zara, soul sisters. Zara, being younger and feistier, puts up with less crap.
So now I want to do this 1928 California book, not crime fiction, not series, and a historical to boot. This ain’t easy. I’ve been thinking about it and doing research for a few years and it still seems awfully difficult to get going. What is the hardest thing is that I don’t really know these characters yet. I haven’t been working with them for 15 years. And do to the time difference, I don’t think they’re going to come to me fully dressed with all their little tics and peccadilloes.
Nope, there’s going to be a lot of work involved. Eeek! I never thought it would be a breeze, not did I think it would be THIS HARD. Of course I could just slap a first draft together and do serious character development in subsequent drafts, but that’s not my style. Hmmm. Time to roll up the sleeves and think. Thinking is hard. Suck it up and think? Thinking is messy. One doesn’t think in a straight line.
Nonetheless. . .
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