May Day

Dangerous: Writing while Reading, by Jess Lourey

2011-07-07T19:13:00.001-05:00

What, if anything, do you read while writing? For me, usually nothing. I’m a full-time teacher and mother of a 12 and a 9 year-old. I also have a wonderful boyfriend, serve on the national board of the Mystery Writers of America, am active in Tae Kwon Do, and volunteer in my community. When I add writing a novel on top of that, reading goes by the wayside. However, the young adult novel I’m working on at the moment requires a great deal of research. I find myself writing in fits and spurts, broken up by necessary reading, and it’s driving me crazy!!! I can’t meet my 2000-word-a-day minimum, and I feel like a humongous slacker.

So maybe this post is more about asking how you all make time for writing. I get asked that question all the time, of course. Every writer does. One time, a couple years ago, I half-jokingly (which=embarrassingly true) told a reporter that I have time to write novels because I don’t watch TV, have a social life, or shower on the weekends. That become the two-page, full-color headline for the article, over a photo of me with my 19-year-old cat in my arms: “I Don’t Have a Social Life and I Don’t Shower on Weekends.” This is how cat ladies are born, people. Shame combined with the realization that personal hygiene is negotiable.

Nowadays, when I teach creative writing for MWA-U and am asked how I make time for my writing, I gently correct my students. We all make time for what is important, I say, so the question is not how to make time for writing but how to make writing important to you.

That answer works great as long as you’re not under a deadline, right? I need to get this YA novel done by September 1, the December book in my Murder-by-Month series by December 1, and I hope to have a magical realism novel completed by May 1. I had it all within my grasp, right up until I realized I had far more research to do for the YA novel than I had allotted time for. So I repeat: how do you make time for writing, especially when it requires researching?

On a profoundly unrelated note, last month, my publisher kindly put forth June Bug as a free ebook download. Tens of thousands of copies were downloaded, and even more exciting, the sales of the other five books skyrocketed. You know what else? The entire six-book e-series is still in the top 10,000 ranking for Amazon.com’s Kindle downloads, weeks after June Bug has returned to full price. Thank you to Midnight Ink for their brilliant support and inventiveness, and for allowing me this opportunity.

E-xcited? by Jess Lourey

2011-06-01T10:49:00.001-05:00

I never owned a security blanket as a child, but a book serves the same purpose for me as an adult. I love the feel, smell, and potential of a book in my hands. Would holding an ebook give me that same sense of comfort and safety? Maybe. It’s possible I’ll never know, though, because I am an o-reader: old-fashioned.

I no longer use paper to pay my bills, do most of my clothes shopping over a computer, and as a college professor, I teach 80% of my classes online. However, I prefer my eating, sleeping, and my reading to be tangible.

But as an author, I’m not blind to the future. On May 19, Amazon.com announced that their ebooks are now outselling print. According to this article, ebooks may not be ecologically sound, but they are convenient and appeal to the tool-loving monkey in most of us. And soon, photos with and personal messages from your favorite author will become part and parcel with your e-version of their book—consider it Author Signature 2.0. This writer even sees a future for professional editors to make the jump to ebook publishing with little or no start-up costs.

Anyone who tells you what the future of books looks like is guessing and hoping, but we know it’s changing. That is why I’m grateful to have a publisher who continues to position themselves in the future. I recently found out that June Bug is going to be a free Nook download and free Kindle download for the month of June! To those of you who have taken the technological leap to ebooks, cheers. If you have not yet checked out the series, now is a safe time to start. Please spread the word, and have a happy June.

Education and Writing, by Jess Lourey

2011-04-07T12:36:00.005-05:00

I have two semi-related issues to discuss with you. The first is the pronunciation of the word “ribald.” Kirkus Reviews wrote of October Fest, it’s “funny, ribald, and teeming with small-town eccentrics.” (They also wrote some crap about the plot falling apart toward the end, but I can’t really remember that part—I subscribe to the ellipses method for getting the stains out of book reviews.) I was pretty happy with that little blurb and told lots of people about it, including a best-selling mystery author out in New York I was trying to impress. Here’s how my conversation with him went:

“Getting any reviews on your latest?”

“Yeah! Kirkus Reviews said October Fest is funny and ribald.”

Pause. “RYE-bald, hunh?”

“Yep!”

It was that pause that signaled to me my pronunciation was off. Honestly, it was the first time I’d ever said the word out loud. I got off the phone and hurried to my computer. Turns out it is really pronounced “ribbled,” like how a giggling frog feels. Really. Hear it here.

I got to thinking. I consider myself pretty smart. In fact, I am an English teacher, and a well-larded vocabulary and a tight-lipped stare of derision are prereqs for the job. However, my book reviews have consistently shown me how meager my spoken vocab is. I had to look up “surfeit” when a reviewer of May Day wrote that the protagonist has a “surfeit of sass.” Another reviewer called her “insouciant” in June Bug. Now, I don’t want to embarrass you, but did you know that word is pronounced “in-soo-sient” and not “insoochiant?”

What kind of world is it we live in that reviews of my own books go over my head?

And now that I’ve established my credibility as a teacher of the written word, I am asking for your input. I’m putting together mystery curriculum on behalf of an MWA committee I’m on. My goal is to create six teaching modules: three on mystery-focused creative writing and three on mystery-focused literature/reading, each group divided by age lines (middle school, high school, and college). These modules will be available for any teacher to use, free, and will hopefully bring further legitimacy to the mystery genre as well as provide interested teachers a way to expand their curriculum. What I’d like from you are suggestions as to the “best” mysteries out there. I’m looking for mostly dead authors so there is no favoritism, and as much gender variety and multiculturalism as possible (I've already got the dead white male mystery writers covered, me and the rest of society). Within those guidelines, what should students be reading?

My New Website Is Live! by Jess Lourey

2011-03-28T15:46:00.002-05:00

My last post discussed my travails in creating a website and asked YOU for your input on a new one. Most of you agreed: author websites should be clean, uncluttered, without flashing and blinking, and easy to navigate. I took your input to heart, I hope. You can see my new site here.

Beth Tindall of Cincinnati Media did a brilliant job of making the site navigable and clean. Steve Tuytschaevers of PlanetMaker Design worked with her to craft the seasonal trees (Murder-by-MONTH mysteries, get it?) in the banner and the thriving secret garden walls of the side columns. Thank you both. I’m super happy with how it turned out!

Whee!

In honor of my new website, I’m listing some of my favorite online time-suckers below.

Hyperbole and a Half. Sometimes crude, always funny mixture of adolescent artwork and simple stories. If you can get through her writing about moving cross country with her dogs, or her parents and tipsy aunts humoring her Christmas play without laughing tears, you’re made of concrete.
Jezebel. A beautiful mix of politics, feminism, pop culture, and humor.
Awkward Family Photos. Because we’ve all been there. Like literally. I think that might be me and my sister in that photo.
The Nation. This is one of the few places I can still regularly find investigative journalism.
The Onion. Because sometimes I need a break from investigative journalism.
Awful Plastic Surgery. Because it’s rude to stare in person.
Groupon. Are you kidding me? I’m stuck on this site and I haven’t even bought anything from it yet. The old grandma in me loves to vicariously save money. And shake her fist at kids.

Where’s your favorite place to waste time online?

What’s in a website? Would that with which an author advertises smell as sweet in any other format?

2011-02-07T20:08:00.001-06:00

Yes, I’m updating my website. It’s not something I like to spend money on, and the promotional part of this writing business has never fit me well, but it’s time. If you visit Wayback Machine, you will discover that my first website (2006) looked like this:

No, that’s not Dorothy Hamill, and yes, I tried to make my website mirror Carl Hiaasen’s (he’s since updated his). I figured, at the time, that it was the “funny author” prototype website. Probably you’re thinking that’s odd because it has a leafy morgue feel, overall. A leafy morgue with Dorothy Hamill as the mortician. Don’t judge me.

Looking for something brighter, I updated to this website in 2007:

I take full credit (blame) for the above layout. I wanted a strong feminist feel (note the “woman” symbol as page divider), and I also wanted to convey that I intended to write across genres (the feminist stick lady wears a different hat on every page; I know--subtle like an axe). Seven mystery novels later, I chalk up my cross-genre dreams to the same delusional tendency that has me hang on to those size 5 Levis that will fit if I ever find a time machine or am lucky enough to lick a tapeworm.

Last year, in honor of my first three novels being reissued with new covers, I had my boyfriend, who is a wonderful graphic designer (but, it turns out, allergic to Dreamweaver), create this site, my third update:

I love his design. However, because the web software ended up handing him his own ass (let the records indicate that he fought the good fight), the site is really just a bunch of photos of pages rather than a true website. That means I can’t update ANYTHING, from my author info to my books to my events page. Bring on Beth Tindall, website designer extraordinaire, mystery fan, and Most Reasonable Woman I Know. She’s going to work with Steve to make me an uber-site, completely focused on the Murder-by-Month series, and dynamic. The new site’s go live date is March 1.

Which brings me to my question for you: what IS in a website? In other words, what do you like about the websites you like? What brings you back? What’s your favorite feature on your site (include a link so we can see what you mean) or what author site is your favorite (also include a link)? Join the conversation, and help me! Please. You see what I’m capable of when left to my own devices. Without your help, this could be my future:

Misunderestimating, by Jess Lourey

2011-01-11T13:09:00.001-06:00

I was recently reminiscing with a friend about a gentleman we both worked for. He has since risen very high in the world and is now the commanding general of the ROTC for the state he lives in. At the time we worked for him, he was just our boss who had a bad habit of assuming everyone saw the world the same way he did. My favorite illustration of that was relayed to me by colleague, Catherine, who speaks Spanish and went on a church trip to Mexico with him as his translator. On their third day, the two of them presented to 60 teenaged girls who wanted to learn about volunteer opportunities in the U.S. My boss, thinking to set them at ease, told them he was happy to be there. They received this well. He told a couple jokes,which Catherine translated, and the whole audience erupted in laughter and applause. Encouraged and possibly suffering from jet lag, he next told them that they were foxes. My friend Catherine slid him a look, but he was too caught up in the positive energy, so she shrugged and translated, "he thinks you are small furry rodents.” The 17 year-olds are all WTF? as he is leering appreciatively at them, and he moves on from there, having completely lost his audience.

Language barriers (and lack of personal filters) can cause a lot of misunderstandings. For example, there is the “Ladies are requested not to have children in the drinking lounge” in a Norwegian bar, or “Drop your trousers here” at a Bangkok dry cleaner. In writing fiction, though, misunderstandings are more subtle, as I’m reminded every time I get my manuscript back from my fabulous friends and family who edit for me. Sections I thought were funny are…not. I was also advised to remove “BFF” and “WTF” from my manuscript by my mother, who said many people will not know what they mean. I had a horrible character say a horrible thing, and I was told by several people that the horrible thing was so offensive that it took their breath away, in a bad way.

I listen to everything they say and play it against my internal rubric. I know, most of the time, what good writing looks like and what bad writing looks like. It’s just that when it’s my own, it’s hard to see the difference. Until someone points it out to me, that is. I end up making most of the changes recommended to me by editors, because most of the time they’re right.

My question to you is, how do writers tell the difference between what must stay and what should go?

You Write Like Sarah Palin

2010-11-14T10:43:00.001-06:00

Yesterday, I drove three hours to Fargo (yeah, that Fargo) to sign books as part of the Altrusa book fair. This wonderful group raises money to build bookshelves in Habitat for Humanity homes and then stocks the shelves with brand-new books. Twila, the woman running the event, said the children who move into these houses are so happy to have books of their own that they run straight to the shelf when they first enter their new house and plop on the floor to read. Sigh. Makes you happy to be part of this world, doesn’t it?

During this signing, a lovely woman in her 60s picked up a copy of September Fair, turned it over in her hand, and asked me why she should buy it. I said, “It’s funny.” (I’m not a saleswoman, never have been, don’t wanna be.)

She “meh’d” and hemmed and hawed before deciding to give it a try. As I’m autographing the title page, she remarks that I sign my name just like Sarah Palin, whose book this woman had recently waited eight hours in line to get autographed.

As my brain tries to sort out all the implications of her comment, the woman leans forward and conspiratorially whispers, “You know, I wouldn’t trust that lady to run our country, but she was really kind to the people in wheelchairs who were waiting a long time. She walked over to all of them personally.”

Her comment tickled me on all sorts of levels, but mostly because it was so perfectly Midwestern: kind but judgmental, with a total absence of irony. I wrote down the line in my “buttons” book, where I keep all sorts of great dialogue that I hear. Last Thursday at the train station, for example, my boyfriend and I were waiting for the Empire Builder to Milwaukee when we heard deep laughter rumbling out of the closed back room of the depot, where a group of conductors were meeting about something.

Two grizzled travelers were seated next to us. It was Veteran’s Day, and they had been talking about their service in the Korean War and how it was a shame Amtrak gave 20% discounts to students but only 10% to veterans. When the laughter spilled out of the back room, one commented to the other, “Sounds like they’re having fun back there.”

And the other guy nodded and said, “As much fun as four men can have, anyhow.” Then they both started chuckling.

Love that random, unrehearsed stuff. Have you heard any great lines lately?

Pyramid on Point Method, by Jess Lourey

2010-08-17T09:45:00.001-05:00

Remember that episode of Friends where Phoebe jogs?

That’s how I write novels—disorganized, flailing, a little fear and a lotta hope. This has worked for me so far, I guess, but then I got tapped to teach an “After the Idea: How to Write a Novel” class for MWA-U, the Mystery Writers of America’s new writer’s education series. I couldn’t spend an hour telling people how to reinforce the seat of their pants, so I had to hunker down and develop a legitimate method.

And I did.

And it works. It works so well, that I finally understood why I couldn’t get past page 60 of the four mainstream lit novels sitting on my laptop, and I saw how I could give my mysteries the extra layer of of character complexity I’ve always felt they’ve lacked. Check out this graphic representation of my method, which I call the Pyramid on Point method, because it reminds me of a square on its side:

Here’s how it works. First, you write a one-sentence summary of your novel idea. This will come in handy when you’re marketing your manuscript or later, talking about it at conferences, but for now, the purpose is to coalesce your idea. Here’s the one-sentence summary for the November novel I’ll begin writing this winter: “A newly-minted Minnesota PI investigates a suspicious hunting accident, uncovering a brutal small-town secret.” Notice that specifics aren’t important—names, places. You’re just taking an aerial photo.

Next, expand that summary into a paragraph. This should take about an hour. Include the status quo state at the beginning of the novel, what obstacles the protagonist encounters, and how the novel ends. After you’ve got that summary, invite your characters. Get a notebook or open a document on your computer and create a page for every character who’ll appear in the book. Flesh out the basics, like age and appearance, but more importantly, spell out their goals and motivations, the conflicts they encounter and how they’ll grow from them, and their general storyline in this novel. The detail you add here is what will separate your novel from the pack by making it a character-driven story. Don’t be afraid to rewrite your one-sentence or one-paragraph summaries if your characters call on you to do so.

The next step is my favorite: physically sketch your setting(s). If your novel takes place mostly in a single town, draw a street and business layout. If it also spends a lot of time in a specific house or office, draw the floor plan. Also, keep on the lookout for photos online or in magazines that strike a chord with you. Print or cut them out and glue them into a notebook (where you may already have your character bible). When you get writer’s block later, looking at and writing about these photos will push you over the hump. Just don’t spend too much time at this step or you’ll go from writer to scrapbooker.

Next, expand each sentence on your one-paragraph summary to a full page. Include lots of sensory detail, especially smell, touch, and sound. These make your writing cinematic. After this, roughly outline your plot. I don’t believe in detailed outlines, which take the surprise and so the fun out of writing. Simply create a post-it note for each character conflict you’ve come up with (you’ll find these in step 3), with the character name at the top of each post-it, and rearrange these so they happen in a logical order. These conflicts are the nails on which you string your story.

Finally, write the dang novel. This is the thrilling part. You’ve done the difficult work of creating the structure, and it’s time to sit back and take dictation from the Muses. When you get stuck, recharge with your pyramid. Voila! I hope this method brings joy, structure, and depth to your writing like it did to mine. And please, add to my stone soup. What writing tips/method have worked well for you?

p.s. If you’re describing this method to your friends, don’t take the natural step of making an upside-down pyramid shape with your hands. I did this (frequently, and at waist level) during my presentation, and it turns out it means something entirely different in sign language, and it ain’t “pie.”

Humorous Writing through the Ages

2010-07-20T12:38:00.002-05:00

I write a humorous mystery series based on the idea that a big city gal is trapped in a small town where a murder happens every month. Hahahaha! See? It’s funny. I’ve also just begun work on a young adult novel with a three-book arc. My desire to write it arose mainly out of the fact that I want a forever snapshot of this period in my kids’ lives (they’re 11 and 8), along with a mash-up of ideas percolated by reading The Magic Treehouse series, Inkheart, and three of the Percy Jackson books with my children.

Without giving too much away, my modern YA novel idea requires me to read and research a lot of 1800s-era novels, starting with HG Wells’ The Time Machine and Dickens’ A Tale of Two Cities. We’re all familiar with the plot of Wells’ novella, and I can unconditionally recommend it as a fun, short, and creepy summer read. A Tale of Two Cities was a reread for me, but I loved it in high school and appreciate it even more now. And in reading these books, I found something amazing: the authors are funny. Dickens in particular is so dryly humorous that he actually makes me giggle while reading about the French Revolution. And in researching Wells and Dickens, I find that they were both progressive, intelligent, politically-active human beings who believed and worked hard for basic and universal human rights.

Maybe this is a newsflash to only me. (If so, thanks for keeping the eye rolling to a dull roar.) Anyhow, my first thought upon discovering this was, “I wonder how many other authors in the canon were politically active and progressive, and what does this say about the mind and personality of a successful writer as a whole?” That was just a passing thought, though. Mostly, I’m happy that that there is an established history of nuanced, funny writing that not only entertains but can change the world.

What other bright and funny classic authors am I missing? I’m specifically looking for novels written in the 1800s by humanists, and I should warn you that I couldn’t get farther than the second paragraph of The Last of the Mohicans.

Whose Kids Are Those? by Jess Lourey

2009-10-12T15:49:00.001-05:00

Bouchercon 2009, coming this Thursday and lasting through Sunday, marks the end of my September Fair book tour. Those who know me, particularly those who rely on me for love, food, and shelter, refer to my book tours as "Mom's Crabby Time," a period where I’m so busy I forget what my kids look like and what my nice voice sounds like.

Yet despite the personal and financial cost, I continue to go on book tours. Here’s why:

I want my series to do well.
I value my publisher, Midnight Ink, and I understand the risk they're taking by publishing my novels and what they expect of me in terms of pushing the product.
I like to see people who like my books.

But because I have a full-time job, two kids, and a partner who likes it when I occasionally acknowledge him, I now specialize in the "Work Smarter not Harder" style of book touring. It hasn't always been this way. With May Day, published in March 2006 and the first in the series, it was more of a Monica Lewinsky approach, where I was trying to please everyone. Not anymore. And I’d like to share with you the nuggets of efficient book touring I’ve picked up:

Choose library engagements rather than bookstore booksignings. Libraries pay and in my experience, draw a larger crowd. And they always let you sell your books.
Plan multiple booksignings in a single day. Three in one day, nine in a weekend is my record. I totally gave that weekend over to booksignings, which was exhausting but allowed me to schedule family time the rest of the week. And once you’re in signing mode, I say go for it.
Contact local media at least three weeks before each signing. If you don’t have a great publicist like me, do this yourself. I’ve done it before, and they’re almost always grateful for a light news story. Only one signing in my two-month tour was not accompanied by a newspaper article or radio or television interview.
Support your indies. Not just because it’s the right thing to do, but because they are the people who will handsell your books. A tiny store in northern Minnesota sold over 40 copies of September Fair the month it came out, and it’s because I connected with the owner. In my experience, booksignings are as much about making friends with the staff as they are about landing a new reader or two.
That said, I always hit a couple B & Ns and Borders. It’s easier to get publicity for those, and B & N CRMs are some of my favorite people out there.
Put writing on hold while on book tour, and keep the book tour to a limited span. You may disagree with me on this one, but I think writing and promoting run counter to each other, and it’s best to focus on one or the other. That’s why I keep my book tours to two months and turn down almost every request that doesn’t fall in that time period.

That’s about all I know for sure. Let me know if you have any questions about the above, or tips of your own to add. Hope to see you in Bouchercon!

TV, by Jess Lourey

2009-08-31T16:19:00.001-05:00

You’re not supposed to look at the image of yourself in the console on TV while you’re on TV. You are supposed to have a facial expression other than “frozen smile melting into fear.” You’re not supposed to stare so intently at the host that it looks like you’re wondering what her hair tastes like.

This is what I know about promoting your book on television, and I learned it all the hard way on Showcase Minnesota last week.

My publicist, Courtney, has been doing a fantastic job setting up media appearances to promote September Fair. She’s nailed numerous newspaper, radio, and television appearances, not because I’m in demand but because I have serendipitously written a murder mystery that takes place at the Minnesota State Fair that just so happened to be released two weeks before the Fair opened. Turns out people like a little “dairy princess getting murdered while her head is carved from butter” mixed in with coverage of the prize-winning pumpkin, the farmer whose gone to every State Fair since he was born except for the year he was away at war, and the “how to make ____-on-a-stick” recipe segments.

But here’s the dirty secret: most of us don’t write because we like attention, and we certainly don’t like being on TV. We write because sitting in front of a computer, writing, wearing pjs so worn that the butt area is more screen than door suits us just fine. When I’m on TV, I’m not thinking deep or sparkly thoughts, and I’m not having fun. I’m hoping I don’t snart, do remember the name of either of my two children, and don’t accidentally blurt out “two city busses,” the calming mantra of my two-year-old second cousin.

It does get easier, however. A little Vaseline on my teeth so I don’t do the snaggle-toothed smile, a couple homeopathic stage fright pills that taste like sugar and probably are, and clothes that don’t cling, and I can stumble through an interview all right. Or not. You can be the judge above. And wish me luck—I’m doing Fox Morning News and Twin Cities Live tomorrow.

September Fair, by Jess Lourey

2009-08-11T00:01:00.000-05:00

The fifth book in my Murder-by-Month series has been released, and I am days away from having a new website! How much excitement can one gal take?

The Minnesota State Fair—beloved home of 4H exhibits, Midway rides, and everything on a stick. The festival fun is riding high until the recently crowned Milkfed Mary, Queen of the Dairy, a Battle Lake native, is brutally murdered while her regal likeness is carved in butter. Can Mira James, covering the fair for the Battle Lake Recall, expose a deadly State Fair secret and win a blue ribbon for caging a killer? You’ll have to read September Fair to find out, but the smart money is on “yes.” :)

I am giving away three free copies of September Fair, and YOU could be a lucky winner. To be eligible, in the "Comments" area of this blog, tell me your three favorite State Fair foods/areas/events/rides. The winner will be chosen based on an empirical formula taking the following into account:

How related to me you are (less is better).
Whether or not I can recycle your answers in future interviews.
Poignancy and/or humor.
Last but not least as long as I am drawing breath, spelling and grammar.

Octoberfest, by Jess Lourey

2009-06-30T13:29:00.001-05:00

September Fair, the fifth book in my Murder-by-Month series, comes out this September, though it may be available as early as August. This one is far and away the best in the series, and my plan was to quit on this high note. I’ve got a historical novel in the queue, and I’m hammering out a magical realism story that has completely captivated my imagination and it thrills me to write it.

Plus, I’ve recently fallen in love (first time in eight years!), I have two kids who each just got a new little animal (one puppy and one kitten), and I’ve got a full-time job. All these other draws on my time pretty much guaranteed that the Murder-by-Month series would need to take a break after September Fair.

So why can’t I let the series drop? Why do these Battle Lake plot ideas, character lines, and setting details pop unwanted into that area between my brain and eyes, where they spread like creeping Charlie? Sigh. It’s gotten so bad that I asked my agent to ask my publisher if they want another, tentatively titled Octoberfest, even though I’d already told them I didn’t want to write it. I’m waiting to hear back. Part of me hopes they don’t offer me a decent contract so I can get on with the rest of my life. The rest of me wants an excuse to write that damn novel.

And I’ve heard from my readers. They both want me to write Octoberfest, too. Do you have one of those? A story or novel idea that won’t let you go, even though you know your attention is needed elsewhere, the literary equivalent of the dark-haired, black-eyed man on a motorcycle, sitting outside your house come hithering you when you know you should be inside cleaning and baking? (p.s. I may have let you too far into my head with that analogy.)

The Rhetoric of Online Dating

2009-05-17T16:00:00.001-05:00

I have tried online dating off and on for the past several years. I start out hopeful but always seem to end up across the table from a post-operative transsexual, acne-ridden adolescent, or sexually-confused man. And so I quit for a while, and I have my fictional mystery characters spout lines such as, "Men, like leather pants, should never be shopped for online." Then I remember I really like men, and that Minnesotans are too polite to flirt or pick one another up in public (and prefer white food), and so if I want to date again, I have to go back online. It's a vicious cycle, one a friend and I are going to plumb to our journalistic advantage. We're going to research the rhetoric of online dating and try to publish an article on the topic. We're both college English instructors, which lends credibility to our seedy topic, don't you think?

Here are three random online profiles featuring men in my immediate area. Join me in my research, if you will, and help me to study how they use and misuse language to reach their goals:

WhiteyBlue69
My favorite thing to eat is barbeque ribs. My color is purple. When it's raining out I like to work on my crafts, sit and cuddle watching a movie with the special person in my life. I love music & reading the newspaper. I Like to go bike riding. I love to eat at Famous Daves Barbeque or even a nice romantic restaurant.

OK, I'm gonna give him the benefit of the doubt and assume the "69" refers to the year he was born and is not a crude sexual promise of beautiful things to come, and I'm even going to ignore the "See Dick run" construction of his sentences. What I can't escape are the double references to his love of smoked meat and the use of "cuddle," and "special person" in the same paragraph. That's gotta be code for something.

Duckfiend
i like all wild game, seafood, pizza and a good steak. i'll watch anything that is funny, south park old sitcoms.scary movies.i listen to music alot, e-bay, nap, my dog, and of course duck hunting. I WANT TO MEET A WOMAN WHO IS NON-JUDGEMENTAL OF OTHERS, NOT A GOLD-DIGGER, HAPPY WITH HER LOOKS AND BODY AND A CUTE SMILE.MUST BE WICKEDLY SEXY AND NAUGHTY. NO FATTIES. HOPEFULLY SHE LIKES TO FISH AND AT LEAST NOT BE AGAINST HUNTING.THE MALL ISNT ONE OF MY FAVORITE PLACES, I'D RATHER GO TO THE GROCERY STORE. SOMEONE WHO LOVES ANIMALS, ESPECIALLY DOGS.DONT WANT A HEALTH NUT OR VEGETARIAN. SOMEONE WHO LIKES TO GIVE AND GET A MASSAGE.

I'm guessing that the only handle worse than "Duckfiend"--FreeMustacheRides--was already taken. But what I'm getting from this is that I have to be slender, not care that he's fat, and hang out at home watching the dogs and waiting to be wickedly sexy and naughty as soon as he gets off the duck blind, reeking of elk urine and Schlitz lite. Have I already sufficiently horrified you with the online dating prospects in rural Minnesota, or do you want one more?

BestKisser1
Have youever seen stars after a kiss I can make it happen. I like doing all kinds of outdoor activities like fishing, camping, hiking , sitting around a campfire, Ilike to cook for someone special like to cuddle on the coach and watch movies with the fireplace going and have some hot popcorn (I like to surprise the one Iam with flowers, little notes a hug or a kiss when they are not expecting it like to have candles lit in the house makes for a romantic setting I like to run a hot bath for that special person and have candles lined along the tub I also give very good back rubs. I like to watch football sometimes

You can see someone tried to help this guy--tell them you like to cuddle and bring flowers!!--but he has his own idea of what women like, as you can see from his posted picture. And who am I to say he's wrong? There are surely women out there who like a simple man who can provide, as well as decorate their double-wide with dead animal parts whilst running them a bath in the rust-stained tub. My point is that Duckfiend, WhiteyBlue69, and BestKisser1 are all you get on the rural Minnesota buffet of love. From this well springs inspiration to continue my Murder-by-Month series, featuring an amateur sleuth looking for love in greater Minnesota and ending up with dead bodies, instead.

Any advice for me, or the guys above?

UPDATE: I've expanded my online dating net to Iowa and surprisingly, may have scored. Who would have guessed?

Like Buttah

2009-04-20T13:44:00.001-05:00

The fifth novel in my Murder-by-Month series, hits bookshelves September 2009. The book, set at the Minnesota State Fair, was originally titled September Mourn. I loved this title so much that I worked Neil Diamond into the plot. Unfortunately, my publisher discovered another mystery already has that title. Neil Diamond stayed, but the title went, replaced by September Grace.

Strike two.

Not catchy enough, said my publisher, offering up September Fair instead. Nothing was ever going to be as good as the original, so I said fine, grateful to have a publisher who even asks for my input on such things.

Then I saw the cover mock-up.

Midnight Ink has rightfully won awards for their cover art, ranging from the beautiful to the eerie to the complex. With August Moon, I talked them into a streamlined cover more in keeping with the comic mystery genre. They agreed and stuck with that theme for September Fair, for which I was again grateful. But that color. The background was described to me as "butter." I would call it "light nausea." Your thoughts?

And what about that bloody tiara? It was originally an old-fashioned bottle of milk with a blue ribbon draped over it, but since Milkfed Mary, Queen of the Dairy, gets murdered while her head is being carved out of butter in Chapter 1, the bloodied crown seemed more fitting. Other thoughts for what could occupy that space instead, or is the tiara compelling to you?

p.s. My cousin just emailed me to say that you can buy a used copy of the as-yet-unreleased September Fair through Amazon.com for $1000. I will sell you the manuscript fresh off my laptop for half that. :)

Write of Spring

2009-03-30T18:32:00.001-05:00

Every year since 2002, on the first Saturday of spring, Minnesota's premier mystery bookstore, Once Upon a Crime, holds its annual Write of Spring. Pat and Gary, the owners of Once Upon a Crime, bill their store as "informal, low-tech, and happy to provide the best customer service around." The Write of Spring epitomizes this attitude.

Over 60 authors are present, hanging out in one-hour shifts to talk to, meet with, and sign books for fans and aspiring writers. Many of us blur the line between fan and author when we find ourselves standing between the likes of William Kent Krueger and Laura Childs while chatting with Ruth Jordan about the future of the mystery genre. All this in a tiny store no larger than my dining room and kitchen combined, no cover charge, no pretension.

For me, this is what independent bookstores are all about. You have camaraderie, connecting, employees who can give you an exhaustive answer to the question, "If I like this book, what other books would I like?" Once Upon a Crime, whose motto is, "For a Good Crime, Call," also hosts book groups and writing groups as well as putting on weekly signings.

Pat and Gary, who incidentally got married in their store two years as Gary battled leukemia, put as much effort into supporting emerging authors as the bestsellers. I remember setting up my first signing at the store, for May Day, which came out in 2006. My ego was bruised from trying to set up events at larger stores. I expected more of the same from Once Upon a Crime, but Pat's email response to my request read something like this: "May Day was a hoot! You let us know what day and time you want to set up a signing, and we'll make it happen. In the meanwhile, I ordered 40 copies of your book, so stop by and sign stock. Looking forward to meeting you!"

Hunh? She'd not only read my book but had ordered copies of it? If you've dealt with Once Upon a Crime, I know you've had a similar experience. They're champs in the mystery field, the unsung underdogs who connect readers directly with writers, and vice versa. And I bet they're not the only ones out there. What's your favorite indie, and why?

(The photos are, starting with the upper left one and working clockwise: Pat, co-owner of the store, along with a children's book author; a writer of books, Lori L. Lake, and William Kent Krueger--one of the best mystery writers out there; Ellen Hart and Michael Allen Mallory. I apologize for not knowing the names of two of the authors pictured. I'm lame that way.)

Are You a Journey or a Destination Person?

2009-03-02T13:50:00.001-06:00

New-age, find-your-chakra, smell-a-rose philosophy would have us valuing the journey over the destination. If you sense some reluctance there, it's because I'm an impatient person. I'm always in a hurry to get somewhere, and when I finally arrive, I scurry off to somewhere else. I WANT to enjoy the journey, but unless I'm on a road trip or reading a book, I'm a seeker by nature, looking forward instead of around.

This is particularly apparent in my writing career. I would rather have a book done and off to my publisher than be writing one. I figured all writers were that way, until I interviewed Janet Evanovich, who told me she enjoys the journey way more than the destination.

Shit. Turns out I'm the weirdo.

Until I started writing Blue Moon. I've had the idea for this novel in my head for years, but I had no avenue for redemption for the main character, and so no skeleton around which to build the story. Last month, though, her redemption came to me, and the story has literally been writing itself ever since then.

The novel is Minnesota magical realism and is inspired by the strong women in my life and the fascinating research of Dr. Bryan Sykes, who compellingly argues in The Seven Daughters of Eve that mitochondrial DNA proves that all human ancestry can be traced back to seven women. We're all related, and there's magic in those genes.

Viva la journey!

And so, do you prefer the journey, or the destination?

I'm a Mystery "Writer," by Jess Lourey

2009-02-07T19:18:00.001-06:00

Like most writers, I heart punctuation. Well, at least if it's used correctly. Misused punctuation hurts. The worst? When people put two spaces after a period, which is technically a formatting rather than punctuation error (you know who you are; you learned how to type on a typewriter instead of a computer). The best? When a guy uses a semicolon correctly in a love letter. Hot, hot, hot. Well, punctuation geeks, we are not alone. Check out my new favorite "blog": The "Blog" of "Unnecessary" Quotation Marks.

This is a potpourri blog post by the way, a threefer, and number two is this video, which briefly presents the real story of how a spark becomes a novel:

And finally, number three: my good friend Michelle today shared with me a new word she invented after a particularly intense rest stop experience. The word is prestenchination, loosely based on the Christian concept of predestination, and it refers to the fact that if you are in a public bathroom and have eight empty stalls to choose from, you will inevitably enter the stinkiest one.

See how much I do for you? It's because I'm a natural educator.

Subcultures, by Jess Lourey

2009-01-28T08:49:00.001-06:00

I teach sociology at a small Minnesota college, and this week, we're discussing subculture and counterculture. A subculture is a segment of society that follows their own norms, but those norms are not outside the boundaries of majority society. Think Purple Hat ladies or Trekkies. Counterculture groups, on the other hand, violate the mores of a society and therefore disrupt it. Think skinheads. Or mystery writers.

The lecture got me to thinking about all the fantastically fun subcultures out there that keep our world interesting. Take the subculture of roller derby, a subject brought up recently by a friend who has actually been to a match of this surprisingly popular underground sport. You know--the sport where women (and sometimes men, but we all agree that's not as fun) in circa 1980s roller skates, short shorts, and fabulously tacky names like "Camel Toe-ny" skate around a rink and elbow each other into submission.

The best part of the sport is the names. What would yours be? Mine is Alison Plunderland, according to the "What's Your Roller Derby Name?" quiz. It's not as edgy as I'd like, but apparently I've got more speed than fight in me. I've never actually seen roller derby, outside of a particularly campy Charlie's Angels episode, Death on Wheels:

They just don't make TV like that anymore. Act on, sisters. So what subcultures do you belong to?

Merry Christmas!

2008-12-22T09:10:00.004-06:00

GM Malliet, mystery writer and author of one of the best books of 2008, recommends creating trailers to promote your books. If she recommended wearing blue mascara and tube socks over your pants, probably we should do that, too. Fortunately, she's only gently nudging us toward the digital era, and out of respect to her bona fides, I have created a trailer for August Moon:

I love how writers share marketing tips. It reminds me of the first time my son Xander sparred at a Tae Kwon Do tournament. He's tall for a six-year-old and as kind as the day is long. His dad died before he was born, and I try to fill the role of both parents. In that spirit, I was coaching him on how to best kick ass (you can decide whether that is normally mom's or dad's job).

"All I know about sparring," I said, "is that as soon as the ref drops her hands to start the match, you get in there with a chinning kick. Catch your opponent off guard and they'll be running for the rest of the match."

So I get him all pumped up. "You can do it!" I tell him. I put in his mouth guard and yank on his shin and forearm pads. I walk him over to the waiting pen, where he nods to the three boys he'll soon be fighting. He indicates for them to lean their heads in close, and when they do, he pulls out his mouth guard and says, "OK guys, all I know about sparring is that as soon as the ref drops her hands..."

That's my boy. He likes winning, but not nearly as much as he likes treating people well. And so generous writers like GM and Joanna Campbell Slan and countless others share their marketing secrets, knowing full well that if we're all doing the same thing, their efforts will have less impact. I guess they just like treating people well. Thank you to all the generous writers out there for your gifts of blurbing, a pat on the back, sharing marketing tips, and all the nice stuff you do to make this a writing community! Happy holidays to all!

p.s. As a gift to myself, I have just completed and sent September Grace to my agent. Here's the first chapter. I'm pretty dang proud of this one. Now, my kids and I are off to be with friends and family. Stay warm, full, and generous.

What Have You Done for Me Lately? by Jess Lourey

2008-12-11T22:03:00.001-06:00

I have just been elected to the national board of the Mystery Writers of America (MWA). Thank you to all of you who voted for me, even if you just checked the box next to my name because there were only as many candidates as there were spots.

Harlan Coben is the current president, and other board members include mystery-writing greats like Lee Child and Reed Farrel Coleman. They're flying us all out to New York in January to rub elbows (lay money on me making an ass of myself) and get oriented.

I don't know what crazy series of events led to my nomination for this position, but now that I'm in, I feel obligated to represent what I know: the small press mystery writers, independent bookstores, and cozy/soft-boiled readers out there. To those of you in those categories, I ask you:

What do you want MWA to do for you? It's a huge organization with some big guns in it, originally founded by amazing mystery writers in 1945 who believed that "Murder doesn't pay--enough" (here's a slightly more detailed history). MWA has brought recognition and respect to the field over the years, but now when I hear mystery writers mention the organization, it's only as a line in their bio. It doesn't have to be that way. Here are some points I'd like to see addressed:

Could MWA have more visibility in schools and/or bring mystery reading program to at-risk/low reading score schools? MWA Reads is a wonderful program that's grown dusty; would it be worth it to revive to help promote all the great YA mystery authors out there?
Genre diversity. Edgar-nominated novels, while all amazing, are almost without exception all dark and gritty and feature heterosexual male protagonists. Is it time to broaden what the MWA/standard-bearer considers a great mystery? Can it be soft-boiled or a cozy, take place in a small town, or feature a gay and/or female and/or supernatural protagonist? Or maybe, how are the judges chosen (besides based on their heroic commitment) and what are their guidelines? I don't know the answer, but this is a conversation that I'd like to enter at the national level.
How can we link MWA up more actively with book clubs? Create a list of books, organized by sub-genre, that have discussion questions included and whose authors are available for teleconferences, free of charge? Get list to box stores, independents, libraries, and book club sites?
I found this on the MWA website: "MWA also works to educate writers and those who aspire to write regarding their rights and interests, and to make writers and readers aware of matters which may affect crime writing through legislation, publishing industry practices, judicial decisions, or in other ways. " How do we help published writers get better contracts, represent a united front to publishers, get more film and TV options? Is this something we need to pursue more actively?
What about health care for members? This came up in the past. Should it be revisited?
Recently, the guidelines as to who can be considered an active member (or a published author) were updated, eliminating a wave of small press authors. Should that decision be revisited, and if so, why?

Are any of the above issues important to you? Do you have others that aren't listed up there that I should bring to the board? What would your ideal mystery-writing organization do for you and for the community? If you aren't a member of MWA, why is that? Please start a lively discussion that I can take to NYC, or, if you'd rather your comments remain anonymous, email me at jesslourey@yahoo.com, and I'll forget where I heard them.

p.s. One thing everyone who knows anything about MWA agrees on--Margery Flax does a fantastic job as coordinator/supporter of the organization.

Teleplays

2008-11-23T10:35:00.002-06:00

I am addicted to House. In fact, I consider Sunday nights date night with my television because a double-header of House reruns are on USA Network, and Hugh Laurie always puts out. Actually, it's the series' writers who always give me what I need. The show is consistently uncomfortable, intelligent, funny, and original (though I've noticed an over-reliance on chelation in season 4). It's the best detective show on the air, and millions of people, like me, can't get enough.

The genius of the show is the central character, Dr. Gregory House, played by Hugh Laurie. (My friend Julia Buckley says she has a hard time adjusting to his American accent but we both agree that he nails the role.) His character is an eminently unlikable and doesn't care, which makes him fascinating. He doesn't run with the herd yet he manages to succeed, and we all want to know why.

On a recent Sunday during my House juggernaut, I was flipping stations during a commercial and ended up on the Discovery channel, which, as usual, was covering something really gross. I watched long enough to get the gist and flitted to E!, which was airing The Girls Next Door. One of the ladies was having a problem due to her enhancement surgery. I switched back to House, which was now on, and an idea began niggling at me. There was a thread connecting these three shows. So, I turned back to the Discovery channel, back to The Girls Next Door, back to House, back to the Discovery channel, back to The Girls Next Door, and voila: I had a thrilling idea for a House episode--there'd be the central medical drama thanks to what I'd just seen on Discovery, continued character development in line with the direction of the series, and the humor that holds the show together, inspired by the "issue" I'd caught on The Girls Next Door (thanks, fake boobs). Talk about a strange stew.

As I sketched my ideas, I started to imagine what it would be like to write words that other people act out, to create characters that real people slip into like suits. I'm a novelist, and the words I write are meant to stay on the page, a note from me to you. But to write a script? I was taken with the idea. The television writers I have heard speak and those writers I know whose books were lucky enough to be turned into movies grumble at the experience--too many cooks spoiling your broth--but I thrive on collaboration.

So I've begun the teleplay for the House episode burbling in my head. I own one book on writing teleplays, penned by Lee Goldberg, and in it, he assures me I'd have better luck turning water into wine than selling a teleplay on spec, but that's true of any fiction writing, right? It's not a business venture for the practical.

In that vein, anyone have advice for me on writing teleplays, or the phone number for David Shore, the head writer and showrunner for House? Or show ideas of your own?

Trick or Treat

2008-10-30T21:29:00.001-05:00

Halloween is one my favorite holidays because I love a good masquerade. The holiday originates from the old Celtic festival called Samhain (pronounced "sah-win"). The Celts believed that the new year occurred on November 1, when the summer harvest was over and the cold winter was settling in. The night before the new year, October 31, the boundary between the living world and the dead became blurred, allowing the dead to walk the earth and the living to access a wider range of their powers.

When Christianity hit the land of the Celts in the 800s, the Church piggybacked on a lot of their rituals and altered them slightly so they became church-sanctioned. The Celts' new year became All Saints Day or All-hallowmas (from Middle English Alholowmesse, meaning All Saints' Day), and the night before became All Hallow's Eve. From that came what we now know as Halloween, where our little demons and ghouls walk the earth and collect candy to appease their souls.

Whee! In honor of the roots of Halloween, I offer you a trick and a treat. First, the trick, and I warn you that it's a really scary puzzle and you shouldn't do it if you have a heart condition. You need the sound turned on to hear the directions, and the link will take you to a new site where the maze is located (I don't have copyright rights to post it here).

Now for the treat. A librarian just informed me of the HowDunit series, which I'm ashamed to say I've never heard of but if you are a mystery writer, appears to be indispensible. The series was initially published by Writer's Digest and is a series of books written for crime fiction writers. There's a book on poisons, a book on crime scene investigation, a writer's guide to weapons, a writer's guide to private investigating, and my personal favorite: Body Trauma: A Writer's Guide to Wounds and Injuries, featuring such gems as, "What the Glasgow Coma Scale is, and why it's important," 'and, "The Dirty Dozen: dreadful-but survivable-chest injuries.". How have I been writing mysteries this long without this information?

Oh, and here's one more treat. A friend of mine got a Wonder Woman costume for Halloween when she was 10 years old, which would have been about 30 years ago. She'd don the red, white, and blue swimsuit, the white pleather go-go boots, the gold circlet on her head and the bullet-repelling bracelets, and strap on her golden lariat and wear it for days after Halloween had come and gone. She slept in this costume, and she got so good with the golden lariat that she actually roped one of her much-older sisters. My friend, Heidi-cum-Wonder Woman, said to her sister, "You must be honest with me as you are now ensnared in the Lasso of Truth." And her sister said, "You're a dork." See? The lasso worked. Happy Halloween!

The Janet Evanovich Interview, by Jess Lourey

2008-10-05T15:16:00.001-05:00

Thanks to Janet Evanovich, I write humorous mysteries. (At least I hope they're funny.) About seven years ago, I was having no luck getting my embarrassingly autobiographical "fiction" published, and I needed something to distract me. A friend suggested I read One for the Money. Couldn't put it down. What a person likes to read is personal, but I consider that book one of the top ten best mysteries ever written. It hit all the right notes--suspense, humor, sex, food. When I found out there were more in the series, I devoured them. When I was at the end, and she wasn't writing fast enough, I decided to try my hand at it, and so, the Murder-by-Month series was born.

So yeah. She's one of my idols. And on a whim, I recently emailed her and asked if she would agree to a brief interview, made up of five questions only a Stephanie Plum geek could love. Imagine my surprise when she graciously answered them! Here is the interview:

JESS: You are famous for your dedication to your fans, touring when it is no longer a career necessity. What keeps you going back on the road?

JANET: It's a way of staying in touch with my readers. And I love room service.

JESS: Ha! That room service never seems to find me in the basement of the Motel 8, but it's probably for the best. I don't know what they'd bring, but I'm pretty sure it'd have a hair in it. OK, next question. Tess Gerritsen tells a story of having one of the big dogs reviewing her first book. The review said, essentially, "This book will only appeal to readers who move their lips." Do you have any mortifying interview/review anecdotes that could make us mere mortal writers feel better about ourselves?

JANET: First, let me say that I've been known to move my lips while reading. Second, stop reading the reviews and interviews and use that time to improve a couple sentences in chapter three. Third, just about everything I do is mortifying ...it's a way of life.

JESS: Hallelujah! Back in your pre-published days, you wrote a few novels that would be categorized as literary, or mainstream, fiction. Ever think about dusting those off, revising them using your hard-won writing skills, and publishing them?

JANET: Nope. They wouldn't meet reader expectation in their present form and the editing would be so time consuming it wouldn't be cost effective.

JESS: And I certainly don't want to pull you away from creating more Stephanie Plum adventures! OK, Mark Twain once said, "I prefer having written to writing." (He also said, "Clothes make the man. Naked people have little or no influence in society," but that's beside the point). How about for you? Do you enjoy the act of writing, or is it still a challenge, albeit a grand one?

JANET: I prefer writing to having written. I love the process, the isolation, the unique world I go into every morning. Once the book is off my desk it belongs to someone else. The only really good part to having written is that someone sends me a check which allows me to go on writing.

JESS: That is a nice perk! OK, here's the big one, the one many of your fans are dying to know. If you were single and Joe Morelli and Ranger both came to life, whom would you choose? (Morelli would come with a lifetime supply of Cheetos; Ranger w/limitless grocery store birthday cake with crusty buttercream frosting.)

JANET: That's an easy one ...birthday cake.

Ha ha! Thank you to the lovely, ever-funny, and talented Janet Evanovich for her time. Happy fall, and thanks for reading!

Karma, New Mysteries, Sherlock Holmes, and the Sarah Palin Effect

2008-09-07T15:20:00.001-05:00

Today, I am cleaning the lint trap of my mind into this space. I think when I'm done, my overall life performance will improve. First, many many many mystery writers, including me, have recently gotten this email:

Hello,

My sister is one of your biggest fans and she has terminal breast cancer and her birthday is coming up and I was wondering if I could get her an autographed copy of one of your books. She would enjoy it so much.Thank you so much.

Kathy Sickles

Her address is below:

Cindy Lewis
3816 Highway Avenue
Highland,Indiana 46322

I was raised by a paranoid man, which makes me a suspicious woman. My first response was that it’s a scam. However, I’m also a mother, which makes me a bleeding heart regarding issues of death and sadness. Fortunately, I’m also a writer, so I used my mad letter-penning skills to sniff out the truth. Here's what I sent back a week ago:

I'm so sorry to hear about your sister, Kathy! That is truly very sad, and thank you for contacting me. The email you sent me has also been sent to many other mystery authors, no? Many of us have been discussing it in our online communities, and though we all strive to be supportive of those in need, the fact that you are mass emailing us and telling many of us that we are your sister's favorite author sends some concerns that your request is not legitimate. Since many of us are on a limited budget and have to buy our own books, would it be possible for you to address this issue so we can do the right thing without feeling taken advantage of?

Best,

Jess Lourey
Murder by Month Mysteries
www.jesslourey.com

I haven’t heard back from her/him/it/them. Suspicious Jessie wins another round, and Compassionate Jessie is saddened by the bad karma the original email is generating. On to happier news. I have a new agent, Victoria at the Levine/Greenberg Literary Agency, and I’m thrilled with her. She’s currently negotiating the contract for September Mourn, which will be released fall 2009 if all goes well. Also, I just last night got a shiny, sparkling, funny, edgy idea for a new mystery series! It’s my first whole new full-length mystery idea since I started writing the Murder-by-Month series six years ago, and it’s about freaking time.

Finally, I took a trip to London a couple weeks ago and ate dry chicken, delicious warm custard, and bubbly cider at the Sherlock Holmes pub (right off of Baker Street. Seriously). Good times! Inside, they have this weird, dusty dioramic room set up to look like Sherlock Holmes’ office as described by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. You can peer at it through glass, and it appeals to the inner Wall Drug/Corn Palace child in all of us. Feast your eyes on this.

p.s. For the past week, I've been thinking how familiar Republican Vice Presidential candidate Sarah Palin looks. I thought it was just because she was the archetypal high school Queen Bee, all grown up. You know the one I mean. She was nice to your face but slapped a "kick me because I'm fat and think a french kiss is a new line of Hershey's candy" sign on you when she faux-hugged you? She's pretty and uber popular with the guys, and always complains to them how she doesn't have any female friends because we're all so catty? Yeah. Her.

But then, when I read that as mayor of Wasilla, Alaska, Ms. Palin tried to fire the local librarian because she wouldn't censor books, I realized why she looked familiar. Sarah Palin is one of the villains in August Moon. The book features an extreme religious group that believes they are God's warriors, that religion should be taught in science classrooms, that their small group should decide what books are acceptable at the local library, and that civil liberties should only be offered to those who look and think like them. When writing that book, I found humor in satirizing that tiny, zealous slice of the U.S. population. Guess the joke's on me.

Confessions of a Catastrophic Thinker, by Jess Lourey

2008-06-26T20:35:00.004-05:00

I am a catastrophic thinker. I have known this about myself for the past twenty years, but stumbling across Harley Jane Kozak's Lipstick Chronicles post, Blog of Fear, convinced me to come out of the closet. When I admit to being a catastrophic thinker, I'm not saying I'm a worrier, or that I have an overactive imagination. I'm saying I'm crazy. Here's a perfect example, and it happened about three months ago:

I returned from Tae Kwon Do with my kids. We go every Tuesday and Thursday, and every Tuesday and Thursday, we return to our little house in St. Cloud at 8:30 pm. One Thursday in early April, we got home, and there was a potted begonia on our back step. The temperature was hovering around 12 degrees above zero, but that begonia was green and fresh in its brown paper bag. Somebody knew exactly when we were returning home and had timed their flower-leaving accordingly. Five more minutes, and it would have been frozen solid.

My kids thought it was a nice gesture, and I encouraged that. In my head, though, I was thinking: We've recently moved to town. We don't know anyone here. All my friends and family live at least 30 minutes away. No one I know would leave a flower on my back step without a note. Clearly, a serial killer has been tracking me and my babies for weeks, he has learned when we come and go, and he's leaving his calling card--the orange begonia--right before he murders us in our sleep.

That night, I slept on the couch with a knife. It was my chef's knife without the tip, which I had broken off a couple years ago in a pound of frozen ground turkey that wasn't thawing fast enough. It was the sharpest one I had, but that's hardly the point, is it? SOMEBODY LEFT ME A FLOWER AND IT MADE ME SLEEP WITH A KNIFE.

And there's something about having kids that super-revs the powers of catastrophic thinking. I have to travel to conferences and out-of-state signings about five times a year, and I leave my kids, ages 6 and 9, with my parents. Every time I go, I say the same thing to my mom: "Don't forget you're watching them."

And she always says the same thing back. "Don't worry. I raised you, remember?"

I might not be her best reference. I remember how many times she let me walk to the store alone when I was five, or how she encouraged me to miss two weeks of 5th grade because we didn't like the politics of the long-term sub. But I get her point. I survived, and my kids will too.

Still, when my plane leaves the ground or my wheels cross the state line, my catastrophic thinking kicks in. What if one of my children was kidnapped? Would I be able to find them? Could I go on living if I didn't find them? Or if they were in the hospital, how long would it take me to get back to them? What do you even thinking about when you're waiting to get a flight back to your children in a hospital? Should I call and make sure they're okay? Or should I wait until I've been gone five minutes?

Agh. And don't even get me started on public speaking. You know how people say, "It was an honor just to be nominated?" I mean it. I like staying in the audience. I'm pretty sure that if I ever had to stand and speak in front of of a crowd of people I respected, I'd start bleating like a sheep right before my bowels relaxed.

So there you have it. The true confessions of a catastrophic thinker. I imagine there is a medication for it, but I think the same part of my brain that takes these wicked spirals is the part that allows me to love reading and spinning stories. All it takes is a spark, and I can run with it. Also, the superstitious part of me is sure that thinking about all this stuff is protection AGAINST it happening. Sorry, author of the The Secret.

p.s. An old college friend who lived 35 miles away and had heard I'd moved back to town was the one who left the begonia. She was dropping it off on a whim and didn't leave a note because she didn't have a pen. See? All my worrying scared off the serial killer. So what do you worry about?

Who Do I Have to Sleep with to Get Published?

2007-11-26T18:28:00.000-06:00

Midnight Ink, the Minnesota-based mystery imprint of Llewellyn Worldwide, hosted an unofficial MWMWA meeting at their Woodbury offices on November 15. A delicious catered meal and the promise of having their burning publishing questions answered drew a crowd of over 30. Midnight Ink publicity director Alison Aten and publicist Brian Farrey answered the audience’s top ten publishing questions:

10. Does Midnight Ink (MI) ever take on a series begun at another publisher? Yes, but this is not necessarily true at other publishing houses. Midnight Ink, which shipped out its first books in the fall of 2005, produces 20-25 books a year. Initially, to build credibility, they took on authors whose series was started elsewhere, such as Richard Schwartz and Elena Santangelo.

9. What mystery genres does MI plan on publishing? MI publishes a little bit of everything, but with some notable exceptions, cozies have been their best sellers.

8. Do you recommend being represented by an agent for manuscript submissions? Yes. Agents are good for getting through dizzingly complicated business contracts and allow writer to focus on the creative aspect while the agent focuses on the business aspect. MI accepts both agented and unagented authors, but as their reputation grows, they’re getting and signing on more agented authors. If you do submit your manuscript without an agent, make sure to read and follow the publisher’s submission guidelines.

7. What is the publication process a book goes through at MI? If the book is on an extra fast track, it will go from the contract stage to being on the shelves in a year. First, if the acquisitions editor likes it (and it takes 3-6 months to decide this), she takes it to the weekly editorial meeting. If they also like it, the book goes to sales and marketing, where they discuss whether there is a market for the book. If it’s okayed, it goes to a vision and launch program, where they discuss the best release date, maybe do preliminary cover art, and discuss title, series potential, etc. Next, the book hits the cover designers (who are in-house at MI, which is a rarity) and the product editor for copy-editing (also in-house at MI, and copy editor sometimes does developmental/substantive editing as well).

Shortly after, galleys are made (MI makes galleys for every title, which is also unusual). Sales reps take the galleys to face-to-face meetings with buyers at Baker, Ingram and Taylor, Borders, Amazon, independent mystery sellers, and Barnes and Noble. Also, publicity sends galleys to reviewers and the foreign rights rep shops them abroad. This stage is done 3-5 months before the book’s release date.

Also, once an author signs a contract with MI, s/he receives the agreed-upon advance, which ranges from $500-$5000. MI has an average first print run of about 5000 books. They are pleased with any book that sells through that initial print run in its first year, and thrilled if it sells through 10,000 in its first year. In 2004, Llewellyn Worldwide, which includes MI, had $15 million revenue.

6. How many books are part of a typical contract for a mystery writer? If the writer is unknown, a one-book contract is standard, though there are exceptions. MI has signed two- and three-book contracts. It’s important for authors to understand that contracts are not the same from publisher to publisher, and they’re all negotiable.

5. What is the acceptable length of a synopsis? Always follow the submissions guidelines. If they’re not clear, probably two pages max, and three is pushing it. “Ms. Snark’s now-retired blog has a wealth of great information on crafting query letters, writing hooks, and composing synopses, among other things. One specific hint offered by Ms. Aten, head of publicity: “Don’t use the word ‘unique.’ Everyone is using that word. If you call your work ‘unique,’ it isn’t.”

4. Who do I have to sleep with in order to get my manuscript read? Despite mystery author Pat Dennis’ assertion that sleeping with people would reduce her chance of getting published, the presenters made clear that sexual favors do not usually play into publishing decisions. Pre-published writers are better off composing a solid query letter (view Ms. Snark’s blog for info on what that entails), and/or crafting a two-sentence pitch for their book and shopping it at conferences were acquisitions editors and agents are there for just that purpose (MWA and Sisters in Crime are two great sources for conferences listings). With either option, writers should research the agent/publishing house beforehand to find out what they represent. Publishers Marketplace and Literary Market Place are good places to start. Be prepared to hear “no” a lot, and always be professional.

3. How are foreign rights deals made? Foreign rights reps at MI go to international conventions at London and Frankfurt, among other places, and sell the rights. These deals are often lucrative for authors, who can get 50% of the advance and royalties, as opposed to the 5-15% royalties they usually get with their initial publisher. The contract MI signs with the foreign publisher is similar to a publisher to author contract, except it is a publisher to publisher contract.

2. What is the future of publishing, taking into account advances on the Internet and self-publishing? The publishing industry is in a state of flux. Different models being discussed include going digital, and currently, academic publishers are selling some chapters of books digitally.

Self-publishing exists, but if an author chooses this route, s/he must know it’s a full-time job—you are not only the writer, but the publisher, marketer, publicist, etc.

Co-op publishing, for example AuthorHouse and iUniverse, is a step up in that you’re buying into publishing your book instead of doing it all yourself. However, authors should still be leery of this route. The books are not necessarily on shelves, and you are still your own salesperson/marketer. Also, if you self- or co-op publish your first novel, it makes it difficult to sell your second novel to a traditional publisher.

Custom publishing is another option. Currently, there is a device called the Espresso Machine, similar to a bionic Kinko’s printer. Individual buyers type in the title they’re looking for, and the Espresso prints it and binds it while the person grabs a cup of coffee. The book box stores are considering putting them in all their stores to save on distribution and warehousing costs.

The idea of the paper-based book is still popular in the U.S., but in Asia, people are reading books digitally. New innovations, such as amazon.com's Kindle, may change the way we read in the U.S.

Basically, the publishing industry is in the same phase the video industry was when deciding between BetaMax and VHS. The music and newspaper industries are going through similar growing pains, but publishing is further behind.

1. Why is it so darn hard to get publishes? Every year, 190,000 new books are published. According to a 2004 report from Nielsen Bookscan, the go-to source for book sales info, of 1.2 million books that they sampled:

950,000 sold fewer than 99 copies

Another 200,000 sold fewer than 1000 copies

Only 25,000 sold more than 5000 copies

Fewer than 500 sold more than 100,000 copies

10 books sold more than 1 million copies

Thank you to Midnight Ink for sharing their time, space, and invaluable insight!

Going into the Cave

2007-11-08T12:32:00.000-06:00

I've begun writing a non-mystery. The research has consumed the last six months of my life, including field research, Internet research, and secondary source research. That last month of researching (October, to be specific), I realized that I was no longer truly researching. I was hiding from writing.

The novel will be about a Lakota (western South Dakota Sioux) girl captured from her home and forced into an Indian boarding school in the early 1920s. I didn't go looking for this story, and the last few weeks, I've spent a lot of time wishing it hadn't found me. It came to me in a dream, as a few of my story ideas do. I was visiting a friend in Wausau, Wisconsin, with my kids. In the middle of the night, I sat up in the futon bed, pushed her cats off of me, and looked down at my son and daughter, who were sleeping on the floor. They were safe. What had woken me up?

When my heartbeat slowed, the dream I had been having flooded back to me and played on the far wall of the bedroom like a movie. I was watching a girl with black hair and skin the color of sand. She was in a kitchen, hungry and looking for food. An older woman came in and argued with her. She sent her back to her room, which was really a dormitory with bed after bed after bed of dark-haired girls. The dream moved in real time, so the girls tossed in their sleep, some of them cried, all of them were lonely. With this movie still playing out of my head, I started writing down the details. And then I went back to sleep, and after a week or two, the vivid dream shuffled into the gray area in the back of my mind.

Several weeks later, I came across an article on the boarding school experience of a Lakota boy. I realized that was what I had seen in that dream in Wausau--an Indian boarding school, and judging by the furniture and nightclothes, it had been around 1900. My curiosity piqued, I started researching, and the more I found out, the clearer the story of the girl in the kitchen became, like a sculptor removing wood to find the shape that lies underneath.

Researching is enjoyable to me, and I immersed myself in it. My kids and I traveled to South Dakota to visit existing and closed boarding schools. I bought and read book after book on the subject. I visited websites created by Lakota individuals and groups. I learned bits of the language. Last month, however, it became clear to me that I had enough research and was just scared to start writing.

My biggest concern was what the Lakota people would think of me writing this story. Native Americans have had their culture appropriated in every way imaginable, and I would just be one more person stealing their history. Even if I could overcome that hurdle, what if I couldn't pull off a story of this scope? I write mysteries, which are challenging but also familiar. This would be historical, literary fiction, which is a whole other beast. If I could even get the blessings of the Lakota to write the novel, and if I could even pull off writing good literary fiction, what if I couldn't get a publisher and all that stress and time was for nothing?

And then finally, there is the simple act of writing, which is invigorating but is also emotional work. Isabel Allende, one of my favorite authors, calls this work "returning to the caves of dreams and human memory." It's thrilling, but it's also lonely and sometimes scary. It can be hard to make yourself go into the caves every night.

So that's where I am. I've written six pages, and I like what I've written, but that was a week ago, and I've been afraid to go back. I have a full-time job, I'm raising two kids, my house needs cleaning, I could volunteer more in my son's classroom, shouldn't I put the storm windows on? That's what I tell myself, but the truth is, I'm afraid.

I've Moved

2007-03-21T12:33:00.000-05:00

Well, my blog has. I've joined the crowd at Inkspot. Check us out!

JUNE BUG

2007-03-13T13:30:00.000-05:00

RIP

2006-10-04T10:04:00.000-05:00

You are currently reading the last post to my blog. Thank you, dear reader, for taking this short ride with me. I've enjoyed the time we've spent together and hope you felt entertained and appreciated. However, I find myself channeling all my writing energies into blogging instead of novelizing, and so I'm quitting cold turkey. Sort of. I'm going to update my website and have a molasses blog on there, one that is updated weekly or every two weeks instead of daily.

So, I'm not completely ditching you. See? And if you fill in this form, I promise to send you an email whenever a new book of mine comes out or when I'm in your area.

Plus, I'm leaving you in good hands. Julia Buckley has a fantastic blog that I recommend you start dating after we break up. She interviews cool writers, has pictures, is regular, and allows you to peek inside the trials and tribulations of a new author.

Thank you!

...And the Beat Goes On

2006-09-29T22:32:00.000-05:00

It's true. No one is rude at Bouchercon. The one Rudinator from Love Is Murder has been surprisingly sober every time I see him, so who's left? Oh wait, there was that one guy, the smirking-laugh-at-you-corrector-of-everything-you-say, but I needed a new villain to kill off in the next mystery, and he was a great prototype. So thank you, Mr. New Rudinator.

Otherwise, all good. Sandra Ruttan, despite her offer, would be hard pressed to pull off rude with any believability (although I bet she does pissed off pretty well, :) if you give her a reason), Tim Maleeny is not only an interesting storyteller but a charming person, Bill Cameron is a little bit meaner than Santa Claus and not quite as nice as Mister Rogers, and I'm pretty sure Julia Buckley is nice, too, but she was too busy being clever and funny for me to be sure. By the way, check out her blog. It's fabulous.

Today, I got Kent Krueger and Laura Lippmann to sign their new mysteries for me, so yay! I also accidentally sat next to a crazy man who writes short stories but wouldn't tell me what they were about because they're private and only his publisher can see them (and I couldn't help noticing his age spots were the same color as his eyes). Ah, the tales from Bouchercon. Tomorrow, my goal is to meet reviewers, but the deal is that somehow you can't tell them apart from the rest of us regular folk. I hear they float when you drop them in water, though.

What I've learned so far at Bouchercon:

1. How to take a shoe imprint out of snow (hot sulfur, interestingly enough).
2. Paint chips are used in identifying criminals, but there needs to be at least eight layers of paint in the chip for it to be admissible. (Got both those tips from Jerry Geurts, Director of the Wisconsin State Crime Lab. You know, the real CSI guy for Wisconson.)
3. I never want to read a medieval mystery. It's just me, and I think it has more to do with the disappointment at finding out there are not automatically wenches and swords in them as much as anything.
4. Midnight Ink has a great line-up of authors, and a fantastic team all around (everyone I meet loves the covers!).
5. I automatically take people with British accents more seriously because they're smarter.
6. According to mystery writer Barb D'Amato, death is not funny, but people are funny. I would like to add to that that sex is funny, but dead people having sex isn't.
7. All mystery writers are nice, except for the three assholes, and everyone knows who they are. I stole that from Tim Maleeny, who heard it in a presentation yesterday. It's true and brings this post full circle, except for one more thing:

The Otter Tail Count Review is finally available, as of today. It is a great collection, and all profits benefit library and literacy programs in the Upper Midwest. Check it out!

Bouchercon 2006

2006-09-28T20:52:00.000-05:00

Not one person has been rude to me. In fact, several have been very, very nice (Bill Cameron and Margery Flax, you bastards!). So, I have nothing to write about other than the fabulous roasted portabello salad I had today with Barbara Moore, Acquisitions Editor Extraordinaire at Midnight Ink, and the hot little shuttle driver (three months away from a B.S in Chinese Language and Literature--all the boys and Madison are cute and smart). Sorry. I'll see who I can antagonize tomorrow.

(Ooops) I Did It

2006-09-26T18:21:00.000-05:00

I sent Britney Spears a copy of May Day. I really did. I figured that dream where I was her nanny, followed by the book club meeting on Britney Lane, all meant something. It had to. So now Britney has something to read whilst chewing gum on the treadmill and getting back that tight little body of hers. Enjoy, Britney.

Oh, and maybe I sent a copy to Sandra Bullock, too, while caught in the throes of star fever. Maybe. But you can't prove it.

Onto the grist. Gristle. Grist. The stuff that matters. I was at the St. Cloud Barnes & Noble today, talking to their MS book club, where I was asked how I deal with writer's block. I actually am too shallow to get writer's block with any regularity, but the times that I do get it, here's what I do to overcome it:

Outline. If the scene won't come to me whole, like it usually does, I outline it. Creating a sketch of it usually gets me past the mental hairball clogging my creative process.
Stop and go to bed. The trick is, it has to be close to bedtime and I have to be thinking about what I am stuck on as I fall asleep. I usually wake up with an idea, if not a whole scene. I have a notebook next to my bed for just this purpose.
Write crap. Oftentimes, writer's block is not an inability to come up with an idea so much as the fear that the idea lurking in the back of our head is crap. If you allow yourself to put the crap on paper, you can move past the block. A lot of time you'll find out it wasn't really crap, or at least that it's easier to shape crap into something worthwhile than it is to start on a blank page. As Ernest Hemingway said, "The first draft of anything is shit." I think that's the shortest sentence he ever wrote.

Ah, pearls of wisdom. Next time I blog, I will be in Madison, Wisconsin, enjoying the premier mystery convention in the world, Bouchercon. While there, I'm going to do my darndest to antagonize that famous writer who was rude to me at Love Is Murder last fall so I have something exciting to write about. Stay tuned.

A Riddle for the Ages

2006-09-25T11:17:00.000-05:00

First things first. I was invited to attend an Alexandria book club reading May Day on Saturday, and it was a blast! I was wondering where all the smart, hip chicks (besides the ones I work with) were hiding out in this town, and now I know! Great food, great fun, great wine, and some good ghost stories. That's a Saturday night worth having, I tell you. And what really tickled me was that the host of the party lives on Britney's Lane, which was named after Britney Spears. Hee hee! She hates that. The host, not Britney Spears.

Next: I overheard this at the riddle booth at the Ren Fest and can't for the life of me solve it. Suggestions? "I have no mother and no father and was born without skin. I made a noise at birth and haven't made a sound since. Who am I?"

And finally, the local grocery stopped carrying my favorite cereal, Rice Twice, and so now I had to order a case of it online. What is this world coming to? It's delicious, by the way. Crispy brown rice mixed with puffed rice--crunchy, puffy, sweet! You should order yourself a gross and be cool like me.

Jesus Camp

2006-09-22T12:32:00.000-05:00

My friend Berns sent me a link to the new documentary, Jesus Camp, and a link to the theaters showing it. It looks worth seeing and talking about, so check it out if it's in your area! I won't be able to see it because I live in a bunker in the woods, but I will have to check it out when it comes out on video as my fourth mystery, August Moon, is set in a Bible Camp sort of like this one. Coincidence? Yes.

The September May Day contest winner is the Williams Library at Northern State University, courtesy of an entry filled out by Jennifer Jenness, Technical Services Coordinator. Thanks, Jennifer, for entering! A free copy of May Day for the Williams Library plus a treat for you are hurtling through snail mail as we speak.

Tomorrow, I'm speaking to the drunken, tattooed, five-finger-discount-leaning Alexandria Book Club. Actually, I'm sure they're very nice, but a gal can always hope. I hear there will be Nut Goodies there, though! If your book club is within 50 miles of Alexandria, I'd love to come out and meet you all, too.

OK, you know why I'm blogging so much this week? Because I'm supposed to be starting August Moon. This is work avoidance, people, and you're enabling me. Stop. It. Oh! But I do have a five-page outline of August Moon, which is my longest outline ever. I have a plot, a sub-plot, three fantastic new characters (plus lots of returning favorites), a central theme of the repercussions of blind faith, maybe a dead cheerleader, and clues dropped throughout a la Agatha Christie so you will be able to solve this one if you read closely. And if I ever write it.

Guns Don't Kill People. People with Mustaches Kill People.

2006-09-21T10:18:00.000-05:00

That's my new favorite t-shirt, which I saw at the Ren Fest last Saturday. I had a great time! I went with my friend Christine and my two kids. They were all in costume: Christine ("I feel pretty. I'm pretty!") was a wench, Zoe was a queen, and Xander was a gladiator (time travel is acceptable at the Ren Fest). I broke down and bought and wore a classy wench costume, too, and was cinched into it so tight that I had a boob. I'll post real pix when I get them, but in the meanwhile, let me introduce you to Ariana Swordswallower.

If you have a minute, go to Bill's blog, scroll down to the Hobbit post, and check out the Infinite Cat Project. I can't stop thinking about it!

And now, I begin to write August Moon. Wish me luck.

Clooney Lectures United Nations

2006-09-18T11:53:00.000-05:00

I'd like to quote my good friend Holly when it comes to this article:

"Really. Really?? Really. Now Hollywood stars are lecturing the decision and policymaking bodies of the world. That's hot."

'Nuff said.

OK, you know how the tagline for May Day was:

New job. Small town. Dead boyfriend. Ever have one of those months?

You don't? Well it was. Anyhow, now I need a tagline for June Bug. Mr. B. is recommending, "It says 'Last Resort' on my ass for a reason" (you might need to get a magnifying glass on her butt). Inarguably catchy, no? Any other suggestions? Seriously. I want to get some mood pens made up, and I need a tagline. Here's a summary that might be helpful:

In June Bug, the second book in the Murder by Month series, Mira dives into a secret nearly a century old. In the late 1920s, a diamond necklace lost in a nearby lake prompts the wealthy owners of an island to fire their staff and sell the property. This intrigue resurfaces when a Minneapolis newspaper creates a contest to find the necklace. The quirky characters from the first novel return as Mira contends with a traveling theater troupe, competitive resorts willing to do anything to attract business, a town eager to find the necklace, and long-buried rivalries.

And here's a link to Chapter 1. If I use your tagline on the pens, I'll send ya one! A pen! A whole pen! And maybe a Nut Goodie bar.

p.s. Last night I dreamt I was Britney Spears' nanny. I kid you not. I don't know what karma debt that was, but I can tell you I took good care of those little boys and only fed them organic food (only it was organic liver in my dream). Brit and Kevin Can'tStopSpreadingYourSeederline were making out a lot in the background. What is the meaning of this?

Loose Change 2nd Edition Recut

2006-09-18T09:14:00.000-05:00


A student sent me this video, which makes for a fascinating discussion. Where's Mulder when you need him?

This Blog Has Been Interrupted to Report: Majority Of Americans Unprepared For Apocalypse

2006-09-14T14:48:00.000-05:00

It's true. And I also want to report that although I'm saddened by the death of Steve Irwin, my favorite article title on the subject is, "Well, He Wasn't Called the Stingray Hunter."

I'm thinking of taking my kids to the Renaissance Festival this weekend. Can you do anything about the rain?

My hair shirt doesn't stand up to moisture so well.

Laker Girls

2006-09-13T09:15:00.000-05:00

Last night, I met with two book clubs at the Shoreline in Battle Lake--the Clitherall Lake Book Club and the Battle Lake Book Club (the Laker Girls). It was fun! They had M & Ms and good questions, and there were no haters. I even picked up some solid gossip, like:

Battle Lake is the only Minnesota town to birth TWO Princess Kays of the Milky Way. And one of them was at the meeting last night, cute as a freakin' button.
I should read books by Shirley Hazzard.
Women never forget their first loves (which means I've never had one because I don't remember him. Oooh! Or maybe it means I'm not a woman.).
Men in Otter Tail County don't read. They CAN read, but choose not to. It's hard to juggle The Secret Life of Bees and the thirty ought the same time, so something's gotta go, and it sure ain't gonna be the gun. That's my hypothesis.

Fun stuff. I'd do it again. I also had time before the book club meeting to run up Inspiration Peak (a site featured prominently in the forthcoming Knee High by July), which is gorgeous this time of year. Make a trip there!

I was just going to sign off, but then obsessively checked my amazon.com rankings and realized that the official June Bug cover is out there! Whee! Great work, Lisa!

August May Day Winning Library (Yes, August)

2006-09-08T09:38:00.000-05:00

Congratulations to the Glendale Public Library in Glendale, California! Thanks to the fantastic entry skills of Lyndsay McCollum, Reference Librarian, the GPL is the proud owner of a brand spankin' new copy of May Day, which is hurtling through the postal service as we speak. If you work at a library, you should enter!

Oh, and my publicist wants to turn me into a sparkling, dancing monkey to draw crowds to my future book signings. It's tempting, but I am more likely to go this route.

Last Friday, I sent off my applications to the University of Minnesota (MFA in Creative Writing and PhD in Literature) and University of Madison (PhD in Literature as their MFA in fiction is on alternating years, next year 2008). I'm also in the process of applying for a Bush Foundation Fellowship for literature. Any one of those paths will give me more time to write, which is my goal.

Mickey Spillane Moves On

2006-09-05T20:45:00.000-05:00

I don't mean to turn this into an obitu-blog (what an idea), but did you know Mickey Spillane died? (And did or did not Stacy Keach a hairlip have?) I'm not a huge fan of the male romance novel, but I do admire Spillane for his fortitude and aphorisms, as well as the way he modified and stretched out the whole hard-boiled genre. This article does him some justice.

In happier news, Mysterical-E, an ezine with great articles and free giveaways, positively reviewed May Day ("With a cynical and sassy approach to life and murder, Mira sets out to solve the mystery of her lover's demise, and why not get a great story for her boss at the newspaper, in the bargain...[s]eries fans will find themselves looking forward to another visit with Mira and friends, like a comical and cozy sitcom.") and interviewed me (scroll down down way down).

It does seem that they're not a fan of the "crude remarks" in the first installment of the Murder by Month series, and I vacillate between telling people that June Bug is just as funny and suspensful but less pervo (I'm not defensive, you're defensive) and just standing behind my writing, which I actually happen to like. :) What hat shall I wear today?

Before I decide, let's all weigh in on the beauty that is Baby Suri. I need a body language expert to weigh in on the parental distance between TomKat and baby and tell me what it means. On the surface, I gotta say, she's pretty cute.

Stingray Kills Crocodile Hunter

2006-09-05T09:44:00.000-05:00

A moment of silence as we mourn the passing of a crazy man. A stingray barb to the heart is how he would have wanted to go, but jeez. This is sad. I hate it when the conservatives are right. "Don't dangle your baby over a hungry crocodile, Steve." "Don't film a show called 'The Ten Most Painful Ways to Die Featuring Creatures God Intended Us Not to Swim With,' Steve." Sigh.

What's in Your Cards?

2006-08-31T12:17:00.000-05:00

Llewellyn, the mother of my publisher, Midnight Ink, has a free online Tarot card-reading service. Find out what's in your future, but I warn you: it may be bleak. Apparently, my move to St. Paul is going to be ruinous and awful. I think the exact forecast, when I was focusing on my future as a writer, was, "Be prepared to gain the world and sell your soul." Super. I need to get my chakras realigned. Or maybe I just wasn't focusing hard enough. I may have been thinking about the peanut M & Ms I wanted to eat.

Could that have infected my reading, like when the fly gets in the transformer in The Fly? Barbara? Help me.

And my fantastic friend Berns wanted me to post this link, so if you want to share or ask an opinion, go check it out!

Behind the Scenes: Thongs, Gordon Lightfoot, and Trumpets with Julia Buckley

2006-08-30T09:33:00.000-05:00

Julia Buckley, author of The Dark Backward (Eht Krad?) has kindly agreed to share her insight on writing, publishing, and promoting mysteries. Read on, you crazy diamond!

You are doing a fantastic job promoting your debut mystery, The Dark Backward. You have interviewed big-name authors (and me) on your blog, you've set up booksignings, you are active on Murder Must Advertise (a mystery-promoting listserv), and you sell Dark Backward-themed items on your website. What promotional effort has been your favorite, what has been your most effective, and how well is the Dark Backward Classic Thong selling?

Tee-hee. A thong. Now there’s an idea—but not for me to wear. And it’s not practical, because not enough people would see it, so it wouldn’t necessarily promote the book. The items make me no money, anyway, it’s just a link to Café Press, but it’s always an option for promotion, since the cover is so cool (not my doing, but Kevin R. Brown’s).

My favorite activity, aside from writing the books, has been doing the interviews, because they’re very fun and I really feel that I’ve “met” a lot of people, who I now look forward to meeting in person at conferences. Jess Lourey, for example.

The Dark Backward begins with the death of its protagonist, Lily Caldwell. How did you come up with such a compelling and original opening?

It was actually done out of spite. I had written the Madeline Mann mysteries FIRST, you see, and they made the rounds with my agent, and people said they loved Madeline and liked the books, but they didn’t buy them. My agent suggested that perhaps things didn’t get moving fast enough in the plot, which is of course the big debate in mystery fiction: can a writer have some exposition, or must one thrust a knife into someone’s chest on page one?

(The author of this blog completely endorses using writing as a vehicle for spite.)

So in rebellion I began a chapter with the death of my main character—a violent shooting death—in the first line. And then I brought her back to life. At first I was just channeling my disappointment, but then I really got into my own story. So I must be a consummate storyteller. (As the Adam West Batman would say, “The only possible conclusion.”) How’s that for a literary allusion? Batman.

When I see the picture of you on your blog, I think you are holding a trumpet that you are just about to play. Is it a trumpet in the picture, and if so, how good are you?

That is hilarious! I never noticed that before. Sure, let’s say I play the trumpet really well, and I travel with a jazz band when I’m not promoting books or teaching English. But alas, it wouldn’t be true. That “trumpet” is just the back of a chair; the photo was taken at The Rainforest Café in Chicago, where we had taken our boys for a treat. I chose it because I didn’t look tired or old.

However, I do have a notable jazz connection: my father-in-law, Dick Buckley, is a Chicago legend for his jazz show on WBEZ. No one knows more about jazz than this man does. Feel free to challenge me. And the sad thing is, BEZ has decided to change its programming, so Dick’s show, after many years on the air in Chicago, will be eliminated in the coming months. He has a huge cult following who are circulating a petition. Any Chicagoans can still hear his show—for the time being—on Sundays at noon.

Your first Madeline Mann mystery hits bookstores in 2007. How is she different from Lily, and how many books do you envision in the series?

Lily Caldwell is a loveable young woman, but she has a very serious mission and an unhappy past, and so the book is not really lighthearted (although it does contain humor). Madeline is much more a product of the fun me; she is independent and intelligent, but she tends to be rather unpredictable in her behavior, which she attributes totally to the “vibes” she has at any given moment. For this reason, her brothers have nicknamed her “Madman,” and so far she has not been able to prove them wrong.

There are serious themes in the Madman books, but I think I get to them through more humorous paths. Maddy isn’t meant to depress people, nor are her mysteries. They’re supposed to lift the spirits and even make readers laugh. An assortment of odd characters, including her family, sort of heighten the humorous tension.

On your website, you refer to your writing group. How did the group begin, how many of you are in it, and how often do you meet?

My town used to have an arts organization called River Oak Arts, and it sponsored evening classes for adults in things like poetry writing, short story writing, and the one I took—novel writing. All of the classes were taught by professional writers, and mine was taught by the novelist Karen Lee Osborne. The class lasted eight weeks and taught me a lot about what should and shouldn’t go into a novel. I signed up for another, more advanced class a few months later—also taught by Karen—and then some of the group members who were really serious about their writing asked if we couldn’t just meet every month even after the class was over. That was about six years ago, and we still meet.

The advantage of the writing group, for me, is that after a while, when you’re composing, you can almost hear the voices of your group members in your head, telling you to cut out that adjective or eliminate this repetitive dialogue, and it becomes a sort of writer’s conscience. It’s helped me a great deal. I think my writing is much better now than it was before I joined the group.

What do your husband and children think of your writing?

They’re supportive in that they don’t stop me from doing it. And my husband is good about reading manuscripts. He doesn’t comment very heavily, but he’s great at spotting inconsistencies and giving me honest feedback. He gives me a little smiley face in the margin for everything that amuses him, so if I get something back and it doesn’t have a smiley at a spot I thought was funny, I’ll say, “Hey, that was funny!” And he’ll just shake his head. The smileys are not given randomly.

Other than that, they (the family) just sort of go about their business. My husband’s wine store did host a signing for me, which was nice. But my children attended one signing only, where I learned that they are not old enough to go to book signings. My seven year old told me that the word “the” on my cover was not properly capitalized, and my eleven-year old raised his hand and asked why there was profanity in the book. I turned about five shades of red. Naturally he hasn’t read it, but he was told he couldn’t because it had adult language and situations. So he managed to embarrass me at my very first book signing, and since then the boys have been relegated to the home with only a bowl of water.

(Blog author's note: I find if you crush up some Valium in the water, it goes a lot farther.)

How's the Master's in Literature coming?

Slowly but surely. It’s starting to feel like I’m on the ten-year plan, but it’s actually only been two years, and I’ll have earned half of my required credits by the end of this year. I had to take a little hiatus last year for financial reasons—after we pay my sons’ school tuition and the mortgage, there’s not much left for my tuition, and my employer only gives me a small percentage of the cost. So sometimes I have to stop, cry broke, and wait until I accumulate some savings again. I’m sure it’s character-building, this living in genteel poverty while I am immersed in the language of academia.

What three pieces of advice would you offer to an author whose first book is just about to hit the bookshelves?

Be proud of yourself. I tend to forget this one, either because I always set a higher goal and then forget to celebrate the one I met, or because I’ll find some negative aspect of my success. My family always says this is the Hungarian soul in me, because as my father has pointed out, “We’re a very sad people.” So I have to remind myself—hey, this is an accomplishment!
My Dad’s classic advice: “You don’t ask, you don’t get.” Profound, yet practical, isn’t it? This was always his advice to me when he noticed my natural reluctance in all things. So I have to sort of make myself go up to a bookstore counter and ask if they might carry my book, and how well is it selling, and have they lost weight? or whatever schmoozing thing I’m supposed to say in order to make them love me. (But I still don’t really do it. Number of bookstores visited: two).
Put things in perspective. This book is not going to have the impact, or the staying power, of something like Gone With The Wind, but a year ago I had no book on store shelves, and now I can stroll into a store and see a beautiful acknowledgement of my work, and can enjoy the occasional e-mail that I get from strangers telling me that they liked the book. Which I guess can be called fan mail.

How do I get my hands on the next Julia Buckley opus?

Hey, Jess, just say the word and I’ll send you the whole fat manuscript in hopes that you’ll eventually write a blurb like “Julia Buckley is a revelation!” or “If you read only one book this summer, read this one!”

(I can't promise a blurb, but I'd love a galley copy when they're available!)

Otherwise, you have to wait until August of 2007, which I believe is the release date for Pity Him Afterwards (although I just found out that will not be the title.)

And finally, on your blog, you claim to enjoy Gordon Lightfoot, Abba, and the Monkees. If you had to sing one of the following songs at a karaoke bar filled with English professors, ex-boyfriends, mystery reviewers, and Hollywood producers, which would it be? "The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald," "Dancin' Queen," or "Hey, Hey, We're the Monkees."

Wow, that’s a toughie. The first two are great songs, but they’re totally out of my range. Gord tends to span a couple octaves rather effortlessly, while I end up hunting all over the place for the note an octave higher or lower. Not that it stops me from singing along. “Gord’s Gold” is my number one sing-along cd for chore doing or checkbook balancing. Abba, however, has been a favorite since childhood. My sister Linda and I would learn the melody and the harmony, so one of us could be Annifrida and one Agnetha and we could sing in the car and such. We are a singing family—very Von Trapp Family, if you want to know the truth. It’s because my German mother taught us to sing on family car trips, and she literally had a little choir in the back seat. My brothers sang bass and baritone, my sister and I were soprano or alto, my mom was alto. And my dad listened.

So back to your question: The Monkee’s Theme is the easiest to sing (although not my favorite song by them). So I would sing that, but I would have to ask you to sing it with me, along with two other people, so that we could link arms and do that special Monkees walk, leg over leg. It’s more difficult than it looks. We can practice at Bouchercon.

In any case, I doubt the mystery reviewers or the Hollywood producers would find much to write home about.

At karaoke, I'm the back-up dancer only, but I'll bring my go-go boots! Thanks for your time, Ms. Buckley. :) (I'm a whore with my smiley faces.)

Don't Forget Your Angry Eyes

2006-08-28T12:45:00.000-05:00

Cool Nancy Chick just sent me this article, which is provocative in an angrifying way. It's a rehash of the "don't get too smart, ladies, or you'll never land yourselves a man" argument. I imagine it's as insulting to intelligent men as it is to intelligent women, so I'm sharing it with you all. Don't forget your angry eyes.

On to happier (and possibly even scarier) items. I put my house up for sale last week. Next summer, I'm going to pack up my kids and cat and move us to Madison, Wisconsin, or St. Paul, Minnesota, where I will pursue an MFA and a full-time writing career (you don't need one to have the other, but I love writing, teaching, and being in school, so I'm going to smush all three into the next three years). Join me as I make magic or fall flat on my ass.

VH1 Behind the Scenes: Jess Lourey

2006-08-25T08:45:00.000-05:00

Julia Buckley, author of Dark Backward and consummate interviewer, has probed the heck out of me in an insightful interview. I'll be returning the favor next week. And I love the title of Julia's blog--"Mysterious Musings"--but I think "Mysterious Muffins" would be more provocative. People would look for all sorts of meaning that wasn't there.

The Original Book Tour

2006-08-21T12:00:00.000-05:00

Before I published May Day, when I thought of authors, I thought of people who had it made, writing away in their sun rooms, a cup of tea by their side, shielded from the world as they created literary art and cashed royalty checks.

I had it part right. I do often have tea while writing. Otherwise, the money for beginning authors is not great. I've heard that publishers are happy to sell 5,000 copies of a debut novel, and the author makes about 50 cents a copy. My experience supports that.

As for time, a lot of it is taken in promoting the book. With 100s of thousands of books out there, it takes a lot of leg work to separate yours from the pack. This involves book signings, media interviews, blogging, submitting shorter works to magazines and anthologies, and sending out review copies of your novel. I enjoy a lot of it, but it's not writing novels, which is what I love to do.

That's why I thought the following information was so interesting. It seems writers have NEVER been in their ivory tower, creating literary art, and that writing has always been a cutthroat business. Not as romantic as the vision most of us have of authors, but interesting nonetheless. (The information below was posted on a writing listserv, but I'm afraid I can't find the name of the original poster.):

"There has never been an ivory tower for writers. Dickens went on long book tours, reading extracts of his books to audiences. George Eliot, Thackeray and others also did public readings, and went to the various social events arranged by their publishers. Defoe, Swift and company contributed to magazines and satirical publications and also went to social gatherings, like the literary salons arranged by the likes of Elizabeth Montagu.

Childrens' writers contributed to comics and magazines, went to schools and libraries to do readings. Shakespeare appeared in his own plays. Marlowe worked for the government on the side, to make a few pennies. Or were the plays his sideline? The ones who did no promotion of any kind are as rare as hen's teeth. Chaucer worked for the Crown and no doubt pushed his books at his work colleagues and at Court. So I can't think of a time when writers haven't promoted. More's the pity. The ivory tower looks beautiful from here."

It's work, but it's great work. :)

Beyond the Mystery: Secret Stories--the Truth Behind the Fiction

2006-08-19T20:46:00.000-05:00

Bouchercon is THE conference for mystery readers, writers, editors, publishers, fans, and creative writing instructors. This year, I'm going to my first Bouchercon, and it's in the beautiful city of Madison, home of progressives, the farmers market to beat all farmers markets, and a great bookstore.

That's the good news. The more good news is that I will also be presenting, along with Gail Lukaskic, Julie Hyzy, Gammy Singer, and Susan Slater. The five of us were given the panel heading of "Beyond the Mystery," and told to narrow it down. We came up with "Beyond the Mystery: Secret Stories--the Truth Behind the Fiction." Here's the description:

"Five diverse authors tell all—sharing true stories that brought their scenes to life. Covering everything from social issues to recent events—whether to use a novel as a soapbox—and revelations of embarrassing moments, this will be a fast, funny and insightful discussion of what lies Beyond the Mystery."

All good, except our panel time. We are scheduled for 10:30 on Sunday, the very last day of the conference, when most people are on their way home. It's okay. We're paying our dues, and presenting on a Sunday means I won't miss any of the other great presentations on writing, editing, publishing, and marketing.

What's that? You want to know what I did yesterday? I canned like a beaver (??) with my mom and aunt. I left with exactly 50 jars--horseradish dill pickles, regular dill pickles, whole tomatoes, crabapple jelly (and two accidental crabapple syrups), salsa, pickled peppers (I accidentally first typed "pickled peckers," as in shorthand for "a peck of pickled peppers"), and jalabeanos. Yum!

I start back at work full-time Monday, and my fall semester goal is to write seven pages a day, five days a week. If I can stick to that, August Moon, the fourth novel in the Murder by Month series, will be in hand by December. My fortune cookie today (I don't have daily ones; I happened to have Vietnamese for lunch) said, "The dream that keeps returning is your Destiny." Ah. I'm grabbin' it.

Paynes-ville Booksigning

2006-08-18T16:57:00.001-05:00

Hello! I'm back. The Paynesville booksigning went well. It's my hometown, the one I explored big hair, lime vodka sours, and pinned Guess jeans in during the 80s. My parents still live there, and my sister lives close by in Cold Spring (she's a kick-ass chiropractor, literally--second degree black belt). I was invited to sign books at Ben Around Books, owned by Kay and Bob McDaniel.

Bob and Kay are fantastic--graphic designers from the Dakotas--who are taking it as their personal mission to bring culture to a small town. They're doing a fantastic job and are warm and wonderful people. They did a great job advertising my book signing by making bookmarks, buying ad space in the Paynesville Press (we'll get to that), putting up posters everywhere, and spreading the word.

Long story short, 18 copies of May Day were sold at the signing, I signed a pile of the 12 that were sold before that, and I saw a significant jump in my amazon.com sales afterward.

I met some wonderful people at the signing, and it's hard to pick favorites, but I really enjoyed Karla from Grove City (she's my kind of gal), Marion from Paynesville (ladies over 70 are funny and strong like beef jerky), Lucy who prefers ice cream to fruit, and the daughter of the mayor of Battle Lake ("He really didn't like your book, you know.").

Good stuff. More next week.

Short Stories, Shmort Stories

2006-08-12T12:01:00.000-05:00

Yesterday, I finished the second draft of my short story. It was original titled "The Wedding Dance," because that is the central event (oh, and the murder), but the dead body is found alone in a tiny fish cleaning house, locked from the inside. It's the Minnesota version of the locked room mystery.

So, the new title is, "The Locked Fish House Mystery." See how that works? Hopefully, the Minnesota Crime Wave will find it entertaining enough to print in their next anthology, though it's going through at least one more revision before I send it off.

Writing short stories is hard and not particularly rewarding, but I have to say I did enjoy making a secondary character from May Day into a main character in the short story. She's a real hoot to write.

I'm out of town for all of next week, so I'm going to write a lot of short paragraphs today so you feel full until then.

This Thursday, I'm returning to my hometown of Paynesville for a booksigning at Been Around Books from 4-7. Refreshments will be served. The bookstore is attached to an art gallery, and it should be a fun, cultural sort of event, so join me!

Also, in breaking news, a Phoenix, Arizona, mystery group is discussing May Day on Monday. I'm afraid I can't physically make it there, but I am available for online chats or phone conferences with out-of-state book groups, and I am available face-to-face for book groups meeting within two hours of Alexandria.

A friend sent me the secret life of the President video clip (see following post), and it's very clever. I bet it was more fun to be Clinton's pilot, though. And be sure to check out these hilarious videos (unless you have dial-up) recommended by Jeff on the First Offenders blog. Bye for now!

The President

2006-08-12T11:50:00.000-05:00


The Bush pilot himself reports about his job and the obstacles involved

Help Me!

2006-08-09T08:58:00.000-05:00

I just got assigned a section of Composition for the fall, and I'm going to use Zinn's, A People's History, as the textbook (in addition to a writing handbook). It would be great fun to present the idea that history is not static--the exercise would hone student's critical thinking skills as well as present a unique opportunity to learn how to dig for research. The Zinn book would be the catalyst for discussion of this concept, but I need to come up with topics for students to independently research. What are some common historical "facts" your average 18-year-old takes as the gospel? You know, like Abraham Lincoln was in it for the slaves, or there has never been a female Pope. Help me.

In return for your services, I will entertain you. First, the poison (a taste: "Dress Beautifully. You’ve heard the old adage 'If you look good, you feel good.' It’s true. I try to dress up in skirts and special jewelry everyday. I wear fancy aprons when I cook. Not only is it fun to dress up; it helps to elevate your mood. I call it the 'Donna Reed Syndrome.' You feel you can get more done while wearing skirts and pearls!"). Then, the antidote.

Bon appetit.

How to Write

2006-08-03T11:09:00.000-05:00

I just finished Stephen King's writing manual/memoir, On Writing, and it was excellent. I've always been a fan of King's writing, if not his subject matter, and in this book, he gives practical and accessible (and entertaining) instruction. Basically, he says writers have to read and understand Strunk and White, eliminate adverbs, and write honestly. That last one is a vague and elusive concept, but King is right that it's the key and he gives great instruction on how to do it. His publishing suggestions are weak and a little out of touch with the current climate, but he does well by directing aspiring authors to the Literary Marketplace and The Writer's Market (both available in most libraries). And don't tell me you don't like reading horror. This book isn't about horror. It's about how to write, and it's written by a man who is very successful in the field.

On a good note, May Day hasn't fallen off the amazon earth, June Bug preorders are outselling the work of that other Lourey on amazon, I've been invited to speak at another local book club, and my kids are happy and healthy. Zoe turns eight today! She had her party yesterday, and today, we're going to hit Crazy Days at the Library.

First, though, let me tell you that I just finished Monkeewrench, by the mother-daughter team of PJ Tracey. I usually like their stuff, but found Monkeewrench to be just a good thriller as opposed to a great one, like Live Bait. The two major issues--too many characters and a loud and fumbling deux ex machina--can be attributed to this being their first novel in the series. This is called first book disorder (FBD: see, phonetically spelling out Kennie Rogers' Southern accent in May Day). The book was still a good read, and I'm excited to check out Snow Blind when it comes out. The authors will be at Once Upon a Crime in Minneapolis on Monday, August 7, and if you're close, I encourage you to go. The bookstore is fantastic, and it'd be interesting to hear how the two of them collaboratively write these complex thrillers.

Okay, off to Crazy Days!!! Happy week.

Whut to Read

2006-07-30T15:04:00.000-05:00

I just finished the entire No. #1 Ladies' Detective Agency series by Alexander McCall Smith, and I enjoyed it. Plus, I ate a lot of feta cheese while I read it, so now, whenever I think of the series, I think of feta cheese and feel happy. My point is that I recommend the series. The mystery is never particularly convoluted or clever, but the setting and characters are fantastic, and Smith completely immerses you in Africa. Check it out, and eat feta cheese while you read it. You'll be a better person for it.

Holly sent me this list, so you know it's funny:

The top 10 unintentionally worst company URLs

Attn: Entrepeneurs Everyone knows that if you are going to operate a business in today’s world you need a domain name. It is advisable to look at the domain name selected as others see it and not just as you think it looks. Failure to do this may result in situations such as the following (legitimate) companies who deal in everyday humdrum products and services but clearly didn’t give their domain names enough consideration:

1. A site called ‘Who Represents‘ where you can find the name of the agent that represents a celebrity. Their domain name… wait for it… is www.whorepresents.com

2. Experts Exchange, a knowledge base where programmers can exchange advice and views at www.expertsexchange.com

3. Looking for a pen? Look no further than Pen Island at www.penisland.net

4. Need a therapist? Try Therapist Finder at www.therapistfinder.com

5. Then of course, there’s the Italian Power Generator company… www.powergenitalia.com

6. And now, we have the Mole Station Native Nursery, based in New South Wales: www.molestationnursery.com

7. If you’re looking for computer software, there’s always www.ipanywhere.com

8. Welcome to the First Cumming Methodist Church. Their website is www.cummingfirst.com

9. Then, of course, there’s these brainless art designers, and their whacky website: www.speedofart.com

10. Want to holiday in Lake Tahoe? Try their brochure website at www.gotahoe.com

As if that's not enough, check out Stuff on My Cat, and tell me this isn't gonna be a good week. Enjoy.

Battle Lake Booksigning

2006-07-24T22:41:00.000-05:00

The Battle Lake booksigning on July 22nd went really well. The Art of the Lakes Gallery is a good place to be, and there was a steady crowd. I ended up selling around 44 books and signing many more. The highlight of the signing was having Francine (see left), one of my former students and a strong writer in her own right, drive all the way to Battle Lake with her witty friend Carmen. They were on their way to a wedding dance in Perham.

Speaking of, I finished the first draft of my short story to be submitted to the Minnesota Crime Wave, and it features a murder at a wedding dance and The Macarena. I still have the revision process to sort through, but it's better than the starting process. Always better.

But back to the book signing. There is a rumor circulating that my friend Christine accidentally dumped the meat and cheese tray on a major Alexandria street pre-Battle Lake book signing. I can neither confirm nor deny that rumor. I can, however, say that the most interesting moment at the signing was when a large man slapped down a copy of May Day, title page open, and said, "You know your autograph is only worth something if you're dead." Nice day.

Overall, I'd call the signing a success, thanks to the good nature of the Battle Lake folks, the warm welcome of Chief Wenonga (note to authors: schedule book signings during street fairs and/or Crazy Days), and the help of my good friend Christine, who solicited buyers outside the Gallery.

The Locked Fish House Mystery

2006-07-21T17:43:00.000-05:00

It's time for me to write my short story, and I think I'm going to eat some popcorn first. Then, I'll write. I've decided to save Lex Ham's fabulously postmodern writer writing about writing story for something longer and instead write a locked fish house mystery. Is that the name of the little hut that you clean fish in at a resort? There's going to be a wedding dance still, and during "Brick House," everyone is going to hear a scream and rush to see him (it's gotta be a him, but I don't know who), with a knife in his back? chest? dead in the fish house, which is locked from the inside. The screens are nailed down and whole, so who killed him? How did they get out?

That's why it's called a mystery. In the meantime, for those of you who like trivial knowledge or aspire to someday make a living as an author, here's some totally un-fact-checked facts I just read:

From Publishers Weekly, some sobering statistics:

In 2004, Nielsen Bookscan tracked sales of 1.2 million books in the US.

Of those 1.2 million, 950,000 sold fewer than 99 (yes, ninety-nine) copies each.

Another 200,000 sold fewer than 1,000 copies.

Only 25,000 books sold more than 5,000 copies. Fewer than 500 sold more than 100,000 copies. Only 10 books sold more than a million copies each.

THE AVERAGE BOOK IN THE US SELLS ABOUT 500 COPIES.

On that note, I hope to see you in Battle Lake tomorrow! Stop by the Art of the Lakes Gallery for some free refreshments, some May Day, and a little bit of Jessica in your life, and stay for the parade and the great homemade fudge next door at Granny's Pantry. They have Nut Goodie fudge, btw...

I Await Your Kidney

2006-07-17T14:42:00.000-05:00

That is my favorite, computer-generated email subject line to date, and not because it preceded a rhetorically sound argument for why Viagra can turn my life around. It's just that it proves the axiom that if a million monkeys type for a million years, they really can come up with something. AND, it sure makes you want to keep reading, which every good title must do. I wonder if I can work it into the Murder by Month Series. I Await Your Kidney in January.

In news that is sure to give adolescent teen boys and insurance convention attendees everywhere a momentary pause of sadness, the chairman of Hooters was found dead in his home. It is everyone's hope that this will not uspet the delicate balance allowing camel-toe shorts and chicken wings to come together in one delicious place.

On a much happier note, I have been asked to do a booksigning in my hometown of Paynesville, at the Blessing Well, from 4-7 on August 17th. Refreshments will be served (I asked for a keg and a bag of pretzels, but I can't promise anything), and it will be fun! Come one, come all.

Right now, I am creating some kick-ass online Creative Writing curriculum. If you're interested in learning more about the craft, you should register for my fall online course. It's a regular college course, and so transferable to most institutions, but it's all online so you can be anywhere to take it. Back to it.

Promoting Your Novel

2006-07-14T08:29:00.000-05:00

I spent yesterday promoting May Day. Before finding a publisher for the book, I had done a lot of research on "being an author," and the one point that kept coming up was that you're going to spend as much or more time promoting as you did writing the thing. "Ha!" I said. "How could that possibly be?"

Sheesh. It's the truth. There's what, 2.2 million books in print? If I want people to hear about mine, I need to do a little leg work. Here is a list of yesterday's legwork:

Began online research to find gardening and resort magazines that I could send review copies of May Day to. It's called "niche marketing," I believe, and since the Murder by Month series is set in a resort town, and the protagonist, Mira, loves to garden, those are niches I am exploring. Any suggestions for magazines?
Went to Magpie, this fantastic store in Alexandria that sells one-of-a-kind purses, jewelry, and stuff you didn't know you needed until you saw it. They're selling May Day, also, and were out. I restocked them, which goes back to an earlier blog post of mine--you gotta keep really accurate records of all the money you take in and send out (travel expenses, review copies, mailing expenses, promo materials, that new laptop I need to buy, etc.). It can all be written off on the taxes.
Drove the 45 minutes to Battle Lake to put up posters advertising the 7/22 May Day signing and assorted revelry at the Art of the Lakes Gallery. Brian, my hardworking publicist, made the posters, and they're bright and big and informative, and come with this headline: "Living in Battle Lake Can Be Murder." Eye-catching, no? Ask me how to sneak into a gas station/restaurant/knick knack paddywhack shop, molest their bulletin board with your 11 x 14 full-color poster, and sneak out without having to actually talk to anyone who might say, "Um, we WANT people to come to Battle Lake." Ask me.
Stopped by the Apothecary while in town to drop off 24 more copies of May Day for them to sell. Dished with Jay, the pharmacist, about Medicare. I put in my plug for universal healthcare, but I don't think he was buying it. Can I mention he had not a hair out of place, sort of biggish glasses, a nice button-down cotton shirt, and pressed jeans? I also saw him an hour later, on his hog, wearing snake-thin mirrored sunglasses and a wife-beater which accented his barbed-wire tattoo. I'm serious. The transformation was almost super-heroish. Do you see why I set the mystery series in Battle Lake?
Contacted Michael Lourey, famed author of Just Say Yes, to see if he wants to tour with me. We could call it something catchy, like Lourey To Lourey. Something about this line in his bio tells me we could draw a diverse audience: "When Michael and Linda, his wife of ten years, walked into the Cerritos 1st Assembly of God Church he was still a color wearing, drug addicted, alcoholic, angry and bitter biker. When they walked out they were Christians with a call on their lives."

That was it. That was yesterday. When people ask me, "How do you find time to write a book?", they don't know the half of it. I've given up TV-watching, a social life, and wearing make-up. What else can I cut out of my life to make time to write, which means also time to promote? I've got that short story to finish yet, and when I was at Holly's house last week, I had a really vivid dream that I think I can make into a strong literary novel (Holly, it wasn't that one I told you about with Mulder, Scully, and the buffalo), and I'm also working on August Moon (in my head, at least), the fourth in the Murder by Month series. And in a few months, the promoting of June Bug will begin.

The time issue is one of the reasons I'm considering taking a three-year leave of absence from my teaching job at Alex Tech to pursue an MFA. It would give me the degree I'd need to teach at a four-year college, but it would also give me more time and skillz to write. And really, all I want to do is write. I'll keep you updated.

I'm Home, and the Cat Barfed

2006-07-12T18:43:00.000-05:00

Okay, I'm back in the saddle. Here's my last six days in a nutshell: Zoe, Xander, and I went to Walnut Grove, Minnesota, which has sort of a trailer-park Laura Ingalls feel. And I'm not just bitter because Zoe didn't win the look-alike contest. This fall, maybe we'll try Pepin, Wisconsin. I'm getting the kid on a circuit. Those freckles are worth their weight in gold, dammit.

Then, the three of us visited Xander's grandma in Rochester. She took us out to eat at Subway and then we headed to Kellogg, Minnesota to Lark Toys, the #1 grandparent stop in the state (read: candy, toys, rides, candy, ice cream, and candy). Then, on to Wausau to visit Jason, Holly, and Trixie (and get stroked by the Schwan's man--Mr. "You like ice cream, right?"). Finally, we went to River Falls, Wisconsin, to visit my wonderfully anonymous friend Andrea, who is coincidentally cyber-stalking Holly even though they've never met. Andrea, her kids, and my kids all drove around St. Paul to scope out my future neighborhood (looking at Highland Park) and stop at the Science Museum.

Good time!

And I'm home now. Today, I ordered the meat and cheese (yes, meat, Brian) and vegetable trays for the Battle Lake event of the year. Turns out it's cheaper if you just get celery, elk salami, and government cheese, and since I'm on a budget...I splurged on the pop, though. Real Dr. Shasta. Just joshing. The eats'll be great.

And now, in the educational corner, check out everything you wanted to know about the publishing industry, in shorthand (thanks uber-artist Lisa!). And in the humor corner, check out the latest in publish on demand (thanks, Mr. B.). Oh, and the cat did just barf. I think he missed us.

Update

2006-07-10T07:58:00.000-05:00

No, I'm afraid Zoe did not win the Laura Ingalls Wilder look-alike contest. It was a travesty, and I realized I have it in me to be scary stage mom ("Take the bamboo fishing pole up with you. No! Take it! They love props. You want to win, don't you?"). On a good note, Zoe remains unaffected by her near brush with fame, and now has forty-nine new friends who look just like her.

More later. I'm in Wausau at a friend's house, and we are going to play at the splash park today!

Laura Ingalls Wilder

2006-07-05T15:50:00.000-05:00

When I was growing up in Paynesville, Minnesota, back in the 80s, I had long brown hair, freckles, and my mom sewed my clothes. I'm serious. If you ever wonder from what angst a writer is born, there you go. But the saving grace was that if I put my hair in braids, I looked like Laura Ingalls. Not the real one. Who cares what she looked like? No, I looked like Half-Pint, Ms. Melissa Gilbert herself. Only she had better teeth. Again, unfortunately, I'm serious. You better click here before you continue reading, and take a moment to study the picture below.

OK. My point is that I have an irrational amount of love for Laura Ingalls because thanks to the TV show spawned from her books, freckles and brown braids weren't considered as repellent as they could have been when I was growing up. As such, it is only appropriate that I will be spending this weekend camping on the banks of Plum Creek and enjoying the Laura Ingalls Wilder Pageant in Walnut Grove. I am so Minnesotan. Oh, and I convinced my seven-year-old daughter, who also has long brown hair and freckles, that it was her idea we were going. If she wins the Laura Ingalls look-alike contest on Saturday, well, I'm tearing up. I just am. Life is good.Before I sign off, check out the truth about booksignings. Thanks, Mr. B.

Oh wait! The Fergus Falls Daily Journal and the Battle Lake Review have both promised to write articles on the official May Day "Coming out in Battle Lake: Party and Booksigning" from 1-3 on July 22! And Midnight Ink is springing for the food, so you gotta come. AND, Xanadu Resort is now selling copies of MD, AND you can now preorder copies of June Bug on amazon. Good, good stuff!

That's all for now. Until next week...

Wisconsin Book Tour Wrap-up

2006-07-03T08:08:00.000-05:00

Thank you all for following me along my green, sparkly Wisconsin book tour. As you know, it was a mixed bag, but here is what I learned:

I'd make a crappy rock star. It only took until day three until I was singing that angst-ridden, "Somewhere on the highway, east of Omaha...here I am, on the road again, there I go, playing star again," song about the tribulations of life on the road. And I was in an RV with my mom and dad and two kids.
I enjoy presenting to people in libraries. The audience is usually decent-sized (at least ten), the people there are receptive, and I feel like I am giving people something in exchange for their time and money--the presentation is entertaining (my seven-year-old daughter disagrees), and I share what I've learned about writing and publishing fiction. Most people in the audience are either mystery readers or aspiring authors. As a side bonus, I've noticed a disproportionate number of journalists (um, one) in most audiences, and have snagged a couple interviews/articles out of these.
Bookstores that just sell mysteries are the most fantastic place to be, even if not so many people show up to get their books signed.
Chain bookstores are not a place to sign, unless you're already famous. As an author, your time is better spent stopping by to sign their stock and chatting for five or ten minutes with the people who work there as they slap on the "autographed copy" stickers.
May Day's amazon.com ratings were taking a dip before the book tour, and have been raising steadily since the day of my first presentation on the book tour. Now, I know what supposedly smart people say about these rankings and their meaninglessness, but I'm addicted to the rankings (and you will be, too, once your book gets published), and since I've taken a statistics class in my lifetime, I feel qualified to say that they are an accurate quantitative measure of the overall success of the book tour. Whee! Oh, and I still like my family, even after ten days in an RV with them.

And, in a fun twist, I am scheduled to sign books at the Art of the Lakes Gallery in Battle Lake, Minn esota, setting of the Murder by Month Mysteries, from 1-3 on Saturday, July 22. This is my first Battle Lake outing. Want to come and get my back? Oh, I forgot the best part. That weekend is Chief Wenonga Days. You better be there!

The Dirt on Box Stores

2006-06-27T16:28:00.000-05:00

I'm happy to report that May Day is getting reviewed in Tulsa, Oklahoma? South Dakota? Georgia?

Also, I have picked up some tasty knowledge on how box stores, specifically Barnes & Noble and Border, order and stock books. Here's how I got it. Last night, at my Rice Lake public library presentation, a woman in the audience said she had gone to two Borders, and both of them told her that they do not stock May Day because it's an "order only" book. I asked my bookselling/publicizing/publishing guru how the box stores work, and here is what He said:

"When a box store buys X number of a book, they allocate copies to their stores based on how they sell in that book’s genre. For instance, mystery might sell well at one Barnes and Noble but not another. Once a new title is on the shelves, the box store buyer (usually one person in a region who oversees many stores simultaneously) monitors its sales. If it sells well (don’t ask me how they define that, but they usually evalute sales on a book after its been out for about three months), they will then make a recommendation that the book be 'modeled.' Once a book is modeled, it has a minimum number that must remain on the shelf at all times to meet demand (this number is usually small; 1-3). As soon as a copy is sold, one is automatically reordered by the computer to replenish and bring it back to model.

If a book doesn’t sell well, it will most likely be pulled from the shelves and sent back to the distribution center. Certain restrictions may apply. For instance, even if May Day doesn’t sell well enough in Minnesota to make model, most buyers will make sure that a copy or two stay on shelves simply by virtue of the fact that it’s by a local author (or has a local setting). Once a book is pulled, it is still available for ordering but won’t be on the shelves as a matter of record. The book's publisher has no control over that.

I am pretty sure there’s no such designation as 'order only.' (Technically, EVERY book is order only.) Order only may have been shorthand for 'that book is not modeled, ergo it will not be auto-replenished, ergo the only way to get a copy is to order it.' The important thing to remember is that anyone who wants MD can walk in and order it at any time and they will get it as long as Borders stocks it in their warehouse."

Interesting stuff, no? I also saw David Morrell speak at a conference last fall, and he said that all placement at box stores, including everything but the New York Times bestseller's display, is paid placement. So, if you walk in and see a "Barnes and Noble's bestsellers" display, for example, you'll know that those books are there only because their publishers paid Barnes and Noble big bucks to put them there. Seems dishonest somehow, no? It's one more good reason to support independent bookstores, where the recommendations you get are first-person and free.

Wish me luck at my Rice Lake Bookworld signing tomorrow (Wednesday, 5:30-7:30), the last stop in my J Lo Takes Wisconsin Book Tour, 2006!

Confession: I went to a WalMart Super Store on this trip. I'm sorry Christine. I feel dirty. Later, I donated my hair to help raise funds to pay the legal fees of those unfairly held at Gitmo, and the universe is back in balance. For the record, the superstore had okay prices but a lousy selection, so it wasn't even worth the karma debt.

Rice Lake not Dicey

2006-06-26T21:04:00.000-05:00

I just got done with the Mystery Writing Is Murder presentation at the Rice Lake Public Library, and it was superfly! The audience was receptive, intelligent, and fun, and they all got a reformed (as in "it used to be a different shape"--it's hot in the RV) Nut Goodie for their fabulous audienceness. Thank you especially to Nancy Chick for all her help setting up and promoting the presentation, and thank you to Peter and Tami for making me feel so welcome.

I like Rice Lake. Good people, grocery store with organic food, well-stocked library. If you didn't catch me tonight, I'll be at the Bookworld in Rice Lake from 5:30-7:30 on Wednesday. (The picture above is of me at the Marshfield signing, but I looked the same in Rice Lake.)

In more good news, I got an email from Bernie in Montana (originally from Duluth), who hearts May Day and is going to order another copy to send as a round robin to her friends and get them hooked on the series. Pimpin' it old school. Thanks, Bernie!

Marshfield Is on a Marsh

2006-06-25T09:40:00.000-05:00

Marshfield also has an excellent medical facility and quirky characters, most of whom were apparently at the festival about ten miles up the road, as only eight twelve people came into the Bookworld when I was there for yesterday's signing. Stephanie, Wendy, and Amy, the bookstore employees, were incredibly helpful, having my poster plastered all over the windows, having stuffed flyers promoting my signing into bags all week, and having drawn a chalk outline of a body, with signing information and a big arrow, directly outside the door. Alas, it wasn't in the stars. Marshfield was a ghost town yesterday, and I only sold four copies of May Day, two to employees of Bookworld. :)

The other copy was to a librarian, and the final copy was to an interesting man who told me how he broke out of jail in Nebraska when he was 16. He had three daughters and was sure at least one of them would like May Day, but wasn't sure which one, so had me write, "To a wonderful daughter" on the inside cover. Hee hee. Anyhow, I can see why publishers don't want to spring for book tours for the authors. Phew. What a bust. On a good note, Amy, the manager of the Marshfield Bookworld, had me sign the 20 copies of May Day she had on hand before I left.

I would like to add to the Wisconsin Rapids post on what I know, the hard way, about booksignings. If you're an author set on booksignings, and you're not famous and/or in your hometown, create a group, like the Minnesota Crime Wave. You'll widen your potential audience, particularly if the other writers have different styles, and you'll promise more entertainment potential to your audience.

I've been reading Deadly Housewives, in preparation for the short story I'm going to write. I'd like to preface what I'm about to writing by making clear that I don't normally enjoy short stories--as my mom says, "If it's good, you don't want it to end, and if it's not good, why read it?"--and that I do normally enjoy the writing of many of the contributing authors to the Deadly Housewives anthology. That said, the short stories in the anthology are terrible. I've paged through the first five and been unable to finish any but one, and I only finished that one because it was extra short.

The others have zero character development. An effective short story author has to be able to paint a memorable character with only a few keystrokes. That can be done by focusing on a couple physical characteristics and a telling line of dialogue or two. For example:

Lisa shuffled to the nearest table and slid quickly into a fold-out chair. She was careful to smooth her lily-covered sundress under her first. The dress was new and expensive, and she didn't want any telltale wrinkles when she returned it on Monday.

That's the best I can do on short notice, but the point is that you know Lisa is lacking in self-confidence, and she's thrifty. She's a type, and you have enough to create a mental image of her so you can feel more confident in following the plot. Now, being a mystery writer, I've got to give Lisa some dark twist later in the story, something you didn't see coming but can swallow given the compulsive repressedness I've hinted at above. Maybe she runs a cockfighting ring in the basement of her home daycare. I'll just have to see.

Anyhow, the point is that a short story needs to be a study in character, unless you've got some incredibly clever plot to throw out in a couple pages or less. Otherwise, as a reader, I want to really be able to dig in and understand the people I'm reading about.

Off to the Duck Boats. It's cold and a little rainy in the Dells, but the kids are happy!

Wisconsin Rapids Isn't

2006-06-23T19:01:00.000-05:00

Rapid. It's pretty mellow. There is a haunted house on Baker Street, though, if Mark is to be believed. Mark is, by the way, one of three people whose book I signed at the Wisconsin Rapids Bookworld signing today. I'm not complaining--Mark was charming, intelligent, and funny, and talked to me for a half an hour. Gayle and Al also made me laugh and feel welcome. The third guy, the one who said, across the store, "That Garrison Keillor is so damn liberal. I just can't read his stuff," was sort of an anomaly.

Jamie, Kaaren, and Jane were excellent hosts and recommended a couple books (a Kris Radish and a Louise Erdrich) that I bought and am excited to read.

So, I consider it a success. For those of you thinking of becoming authors, or those of you who are authors, however, I need to present my Wisconsin book tour as sort of a wake-up call/cautionary tale/reality check. Unless you are Anne Rice, consistently naked, John Grisham, famous for sleeping with rock stars, Stephen King, or an actor, people aren't really going to come to your book signing. They just aren't. How many book signings have you yourself gone to in the past year. See?

As someone who has signed at book stores, feverishly researched book marketing, and given various presentations on writing/publishing, I have learned some things, and I am passing them on to you, grasshopper. Here they are, in no particular order:

IF YOU WANT TO SELL A LOT OF BOOKS:

You need to present and/or align your book with some sort of conference. Case in point: at the Business Professional Women's state conference, I was their lunchtime speaker. They were a fabulous crowd, made me feel smart and funny, and bought 32 copies of May Day. This works whether the crowd is there for a new business opening, a pharmacist's conference (rock on), or an art show. The point is, if you are a B-list or lower author, the crowd won't come to you, so you have to go to the crowd.

IF YOU WANT TO LEARN ABOUT THE WRITING, PUBLISHING, AND BOOKSELLING BUSINESS

Set up readings and signings at independent bookstores. First, it's just good to support independents. They have the personal touch, the feel, the appreciation of books and authors, that the box stores just can't. Second, you will find yourself around people who like and appreciate books and authors. Guaranteed. That's why they own/work at the independent bookstore (mostly. there might be some guy working there because the store was below his apartment.). When you're there, ask questions, be nice, and buy a book or two.

IF YOU WANT TO PROMOTE YOUR BOOKS AT THE BOX STORES

Call to make sure they have your book in stock, and then stop by and offer to sign stock. Be gracious, charming, memorable, and keep it short. You will leave as much of an impression on them as you would if you sucked their air for two hours sitting at that lonely author's table during a formal booksigning, but you would be saving your time, theirs, and you'd still get the cool "signed copy" sticker on your books which, as a frequent book buyer, I can guarantee you sets your book apart from the rest.

IF NONE OF THE ABOVE APPEALS TO YOU

Write. We always need a couple Salingers. If you write a fantastic book, I'll buy it, read it, and recommend it, regardless of whether or not you did your time in the cramped corner of a Wisconsin Bookworld, anxiously lighting up whenever someone who wasn't holding a $3.99 Soduko book walked by.

If, however, you have an extended vacation coming up, and the alternative to signing at a Bookworld is to be in a hot RV with your parents and kids, I encourage you to whore yourself at every available opportunity. I love my kids and my parents, and I love them even more after I've gotten a break to go into a bookstore or a library.

This is a pretty nice vacation.

Thank you for taking it with me.

Mad for Madison

2006-06-22T09:47:00.000-05:00

I can no longer say Madison is my favorite city that I've never been to because now I've been there, and I loved it. The magic is in the feel--it's relaxed, progressive, and green, and the people are nice nice nice. I can't wait to come back for Bouchercon in a few months.

Last night, I gave a reading at Booked for Murder, and I can see why Ellen Hart calls it one of the best bookstores in the country. It's not large--in fact, it's on the far side of a strip mall on University Avenue. But once inside, it's warm, and Terri, one of the owners, is fabulous. She's funny, confident, smart, and knows her mysteries. Here's some of what I learned at the reading last night:

Authors publish under different names for various reasons, including: those who publish in different genres or with different characters/styles and don't want to confuse their readers; those who don't want their speciality lines to drag down their hot-selling lines (apparently, the big stores like Wal-Mart order as many copies of a new book as the number the author sold in their last book; if the author knows s/he is going to write a book with a limited appeal, it is in her/his best interest to do so under a different name so as not to pull down future potentially big-selling books); those who are under contract to give their publisher right of first refusal for the next book published under their name and who want to squeak out of that; and crazy eccentric authors like Stephen King (I added that last one).
Bouchercon and Left Coast Crime are the two big conferences. The rest of them keep their numbers to about 200, on purpose, and if they are stationary conferences (same city every year), they will likely draw the same crowd, so as a mystery author or fan, choose wisely when attending your conferences. Focus on your favorite genre, for example, or seek out one where your favorite author will be.
Second printings of books are usually supplemental and not as large as the first printing. The first printing of May Day was 7500, for example, so the second printing will probably be around 2000, unless someone gets murdered in Battle Lake for real. :) (Is it wrong to put a smiley face there? Yes for sure.)

Good stuff. There were only four people at the signing, which is failure if you're a mathematician (or a cannibal with a large family) but success if you like being surrounded by mystery books and smart people. So yay, it was a resounding success! Oh, I also picked up a signed copy of Janet Evanovich's 12th book, a collection of short story mysteries so I can figure out how to write them, and a PJ Tracy novel.

Tomorrow, I'll be at the Wisconsin Rapids Book World from 11:30-1:30, and Saturday, I'll be at the Marshfield Book World (green box on the right, not the other stuff) from 11:30-1:30, passing out writing tips and red hot Atomic Fireballs like they grow on trees. You're gonna want to stop by and get some of that.

Race to Racine

2006-06-21T14:41:00.000-05:00

Finding Internet access seems to be a trick when in an RV. Whoduthought? So, I’ll have to backtrack and post the Racine post the same day I post the Madison post.

Which do you want to hear first about my Racine Public Library “Mystery Writing Is Murder” presentation--the good news or the bad news? The good news? OK. All but two people there bought copies of May Day, and the group was made up of intelligent women, most of them writers. The bad news is that there were only eight people there. I guess I’m not exactly a household name in eastern Wisconsin. Or western. Or anywhere but my own house. The librarian who introduced me to the throng-ette did say I gave a mean presentation and invited me to the Breakfast with the Authors event the library holds the second Saturday in November.

One of the Racine attendees also writes for a regional writing mag and said she would like to do an article on me, so whee! But wait, it gets better. My dad later sold a copy of May Day to the couple from Hibbing who were camping next to us. Apparently, he got tired of having them silently watch him pump our poop from the RV into the ground from their lawn chairs five feet away and so struck up a conversation. They don’t read much but were sure their sister-in-law from Pengilly would like the book because it’s a mystery and she likes John Grisham.

We spent the night at Spring Green and visited House on the Rock, which is crazy cool. It’s a bit overwhelming, though, and gave Xander nightmares. But if you’re older than four, I recommend it. It was bizarre, like being inside someone’s cluttered brain.

On to Madison, my favorite city that I’ve never been to (thanks for the tip on the Capital Times piece, Mr. B.). But first, I need to share with you some light that Mr. B. brought into my life. I don’t know if he likes my sense of humor, but he clearly gets it.

We Have Wisconsin

2006-06-19T08:14:00.000-05:00

The May Day Wisconsin book tour has begun! Whee! Currently, I am in Alma Center, Wisconsin, at the lovely KOA. Over the next ten days, I will be hitting six cities to spread the good word about the Book. If you follow along, you will find out what the glamorous world of an author really entails.

Currently, my kids are outside the RV playing with their new fly-shooter guns, bought for them by their Opa, who is presently enjoying his morning ablutions (that's a nice way of saying guy bathroom time, which is crazy long considering how little they do). My mom is cooking breakfast for everyone but her and me, as we are on an Ultrclear cleansing diet. The race to the bathroom is on...

I've also been researching the way to make the most out of booksignings, which have been a mixed bag for me, and presentations, which I enjoy but am nervous about. My mom has made a lovely full-color brochure, extolling the virtues of May Day, to which my kids will affix red hot Atomic Fireballs (Lex Ham Rand, do you see a Menard's/Fleet Farm candy pattern emerging in my literary career? What could it mean?). I'm going to hand those out to people who come near my table at signings, but do it in a low-pressure way as I hate pushiness. I've also bought 32 Nut Goodies for my Wednesday night presentation at Booked for Murder, both because I'm happy to visit Madison for the first time AND because Terri and Linda picked May Day for their May read.

Tonight, I am presenting, "Mystery Writing Is Murder," at the Racine Public Library at 7:00 (anyone know if there is a time change from Minnesota?), so stop by if you're around! It'll be a blast.

May Library Winner

2006-06-14T11:07:00.000-05:00

The winner of the May May Day Librarian Contest is....the Adult Services Librarian at the Westborough Public Library in Westborough, Massachussetts! Because s/he was the May winner, s/he gets the special added treats--a Nut Goodie, a magnet, a pen, and a May Day canvas bag to carry books and such in. Oh, and the WPL gets a free copy of May Day.

In more good news, I've been invited to speak to two Battle Lake book clubs on September 12th and the St. Cloud Barnes & Noble mystery club on September 26. Yay! Speaking of Battle Lake, I'm going there on Saturday to do some research, so let me know if you need anything.

In the latest literary news, Product Placement Makes the Leap from Films to Books. Whaddya say, Mr. B.? Can we get me on the Nut Goodie website? If that's not a lucrative tie-in, I don't know what is. At the very least, May Day should be on the Battle Lake website, underneath the soothing banner, "Battle Lake--Easy to Get to, Hard to Leave...if you're dead! Enjoy the latest Battle Lake mystery from author Jess Lourey, available online and at your local bookstore." Good stuff.

Las Vegas

2006-06-12T10:17:00.000-05:00

I am freshly back from Las Vegas, and it's good to be home. It wasn't really my kind of town--very artificial, expensive, frenzied, and lacking in history and culture. That said, it was a vacation, and I was with my friends, so how bad could it be... we caught a good Cirque du Soleil show (see above left), looked hot at a Mexican bar (see above right), got kicked out of Tao

because we weren't cool enough (no picture), met some friendly Brits at Studio 54 (see left), enjoyed delicious food that turned out to be accidentally raw (see right), and went to Madame Tussaud's where Xtine made out with Jon Bon Jovi (see below left). We also have a picture of George Clooney cupping Kellie's breast and me doing something unmentionable (he liked it) to our current President of the United States of America, but those pictures aren't fit to print.

Today, I'm back in the routine. I'm sending out a review copy of May Day to Sandra Ruttan at Spinetingler Magazine, who has graciously offered to review it. Then, it's time to revise Knee High by July. I just got feedback from my independent editor, and my favorite comment of hers is, "Skunks are mammals, not rodents." Is that a thorough editor or what? After revisions, I'm going to start updating my fall online Creative Writing course, so watch here for writing tips as I scour the Internet for the best of the best and smush it together with what I've learned the hard way.

Rogue Takes Vegas

2006-06-05T19:54:00.000-05:00

Kellie, Christine, Linda, and I (see earlier picture with us and Ruth Buzzy) are leaving for Las Vegas tomorrow morning, so I won't be blogging for a week. The four of us take a summer trip every year. Last year, we took a train to Chicago (Christine and I had the most fun). The year before, we drove to Winnipeg, and the year before, we road-tripped to Colorado where we whitewater-rafted after hitting the Corn Palace in Mitchell, South Dakota, and Laura Ingalls' house in DeSmet, Someplace Flat.

But this year, it's the big time, a plane to Vegas and the Mirage Hotel, baby, and in honor of it, I got highlights put in my hair on Saturday. Unfortunately, my hair is very dark and my stylist was, like, concerned that the highlights, like, were going to be too light. They are. They're so light, in fact, they look gray, and now I look like a 36-year-old Rogue from X-Men, minus any sort of compensating superpower or tight-ass pleather suit. Wish me luck in Vegas.

Devil in a Blue Dress

2006-06-02T08:54:00.000-05:00

I just finished Devil in a Blue Dress by Walter Mosley. It was Mosley's debut novel and received rave reviews when it came out in 1990. Mosley was hailed as the next Raymond Chandler, probably for his "gritty realism" (read: tough men, much violence, meddlesome yet sexy women who need to be straightened out by the protagonist whom they are reluctantly yet passionately attracted to--the typical male romance novel).

I began the novel with as much trepidation as I watched Capote--I was doing it because it was supposed to be good for me, not because I was going to like it. Turns out I liked it AND it was really really good. You know how when you're at a movie that is so good that you forget you're in a theater? Devil in a Blue Dress made me forget I was reading a book.

Here are my two favorite sections, both of which give you a feel for the sense of place and voice throughout the novel:

"When I opened the door I was slapped in the face by the force of Lips' alto horn. I had been hearing Lips and Wilie and Flattop since I was a boy in Houston. All of them and John and half the people in that crowded room had migrated from Houston after the war, and some before that. California was like heaven for the southern Negro. People told stories of how you could eat fruit right off the trees and get enough work to retire one day. The stories were true for the most part but the truth wasn't like the dream. Life was still hard in L.A. and if you worked every day you still found yourself at the bottom.

But being on the bottom didn't feel so bad if you could come to John's now and then and remember how it felt back home in Texas, dreaming about California. Sitting there and drinking John's scotch you could remember the dreams you once had and, for a while, it felt like you had them for real."

That's good writing. Here's some more:

"I was sitting there, naked on the toilet seat, and watching her go through the mirror-doored medicine cabinet. I felt something deep down in me, something dark like jazz when it reminds you death is waiting."

I enjoy mysteries with strong character development, ones that go below the surface and examine the human condition, and Devil in a Blue Dress does that. Lots. And the language is tight. Oh, and it's a movie! You know it must be good then.

My Lucrative New Career

2006-06-01T10:07:00.000-05:00

In breaking news, I just found out that you can sue for bad and/or misleading dates. I've never hired a matchmaker, so I think I'll just go straight to the source and sue the guys/post-operative transsexuals with whom I had the dates (actually, the post-operative transsexual was very nice and a good conversationalist, but he really should have told me before the date that he was born a woman).

Cripes, I'm going to have to start making a list. I bet I could get $50,000 from the blind date who peed on the 15th hole of the mini golf course (in his defense, there was a rushing waterfall there which was hard to resist; against his defense, pee runs downhill, especially on Astroturf, so a real gentleman would have urinated at the bottom and not the top of the rise).

And I'm sure I could clear a cool 100 Gs for the foreign exchange student who stalked me after one date, finally cornering me outside my apartment building and shoving a size eight pair of women's brown suede ankle boots and telling me he was going to leave the country and could I just give him my social security number in case he needed to get a hold of me? Hmmm. I might be too busy to blog in the next few days...cha ching...

In the meanwhile, keep the great song ideas coming. They are chillingly brilliant in their ability to capture the feel of the central Minnesota wedding dance. Love in an Elevator, the extended version? I Knew the Bride before She Used to Rock n Roll? Yes. Bring it on.

A Wedding Dance It Is

2006-05-31T10:02:00.000-05:00

Thank you for the brilliant wedding dance idea, Cindy! That will be the short story I write--a murder at the wedding dance. And thank you, chelty, for the suggestion of adding a brand new husband too embarassed to dance with his wife, and thank you, Barbara, for suggesting the chicken dance. It is all coming together. Now tell me, please, what is some horrible yet not unexpected music for a wedding dance at a Minnesota resort? "You Shook Me All Night Long?" "Love Hurts?" ...more?

(As a side note, I was going to write a "locked pontoon" short story, which would be a variation on the classic "locked room" mystery, but I just wasn't clever enough. I'll keep working on it.)

Oh, and the resort has to be a Battle Lake resort just because it has to. And because I want Mrs. Berns to crash the wedding dance. Anybody know which Battle Lake resort might have a cow pasture right next to it? It has to actually be ON West Battle Lake. I can't mention the name of the resort in the short story, but I can mention the lake it's on. Which one would you pick?

And do tell, Mr. B. What happened in Itasca?

Publish Your Short Story

2006-05-27T08:10:00.000-05:00

The Minnesota Crime Wave, three excellent mystery writers, are taking submissions for their next anthology. See below:

"Following the success of its first publishing venture, Silence of the Loons, The Minnesota Crime Wave has announced a sequel to the criminous anthology. The new volume, to be titled Resort to Murder, is planned for release in late summer, 2007. The anthology will be published by Nodin Press of Minneapolis, known for its fine carefully designed books in many fields.

Eligible authors must have been professionally published in any genre and must be living in Minnesota. Stories must be set at a real Minnesota resort, although the actual name of the resort may not be used. Authors must tell the Crime Wave which Minnesota resort they intend to use as their setting to avoid duplications. All stories much contain at least one murder and will range from 1,000 to 7,500 words in length. Contracts and payment of $100 will be issued upon acceptance of each story.

Spokesbabe Ellen Hart said, 'This is a great opportunity for authors in other genres who want to try crime fiction.' 'We'll be looking for strong motivation, suspense and interesting characters,' commented William Kent Krueger. 'And don't forget pace and good description,' added Carl Brookins.

The crime wave trio, mystery authors all, has pledged their usual strong efforts to promote the anthology once it is released. The Minnesota CrimeWave has become known for its compelling costumed presentations to audiences at bookstores, libraries and other venues across the country. For more information, contact The Minnesota Crime Wave at:MinnesotaCrimeWave@yahoo.com."

So, if you're a published Minnesotan, you should write a short story. Actually, I should write a short story because this sounds like it's right up my alley, but I have a thing about short stories. And poems. I can't write 'em. Maybe it's time to shake that off. Any plot kernels for me, Mr. B.? Holly? Anyone? A murder at a resort...cripes, I have writer's block.

Which means I'm going to Google myself, which is my favorite work avoidance activity, next to researching which movie stars have gotten plastic surgery. Check this out:

Lourey, Jess: May Day
Lourey, Jess: May Day,Conservative,Book Club,Reagan,Homeschool,Human Events,Eagle Publishing,Religion,Politics,Republican,History,Biographies,National ...
www.forbesbookclub.com/BookPage.asp?prod_cd=IVEVA - 15k -

Ha! That's irony. One of these things is not like the other, one of these things, doesn't belong...OK, I'm taking the kids to get some culture in Alexandria. Hope to see you there!

Take My Johnny Holm, Please...

2006-05-25T07:31:00.001-05:00

Celebrate the Awake the Lakes Festival in beautiful Alexandria, Minnesota, (birthplace of America!) this weekend. Please. I have two tickets to Johnny Holm that I won on the radio yesterday (see previous posting), and I'd like to give them away to some lucky somebody. To be eligible to win, you need to post as a comment to this blog the story of your first kegger, or your first drinking-something-mixed-with-Koolaid-whilst-standing-in-a field party, or first-kiss-in-a-small-town, in 500 words or less. Best story wins two free tickets to the magical Johnny Holm performance, this Saturday.

And if you're an out-of-towner, come early for the fun! Friday there are fireworks, hunks of cooked animal flesh, and Big John Dickerson. Saturday is the Heritage Fest, during which you can get a side of chips and salsa with your lutefisk and listen to the Marv Nissel Family Band. Ah, diversity in west central Minnesota. I love this stuff. And I will be there, with my kids and a big smile on my face.

If you come, I think you'll find Alexandria easy to get to and hard to leave (like Battle Lake, except with less irony). First, though, you must enter to win these Johnny Holm tickets. As anyone who has seen this mellifluous musician perform his Pied Piper-esque rock-n-roll will tell you, this is not an opportunity to be missed. So share your best summer in a small town story, and give me fodder for another book.

And congratulations to Jenn the librarian, who won yesterday's trivia contest and so has a Nut Goodie hurtling through snail mail to her. Thank you for the Johnny Holm link, Jenn. Can you believe I spelled his name wrong?!? And I call myself a Minnesotan.

It's My Birthday...

2006-05-24T09:05:00.000-05:00

...and I'll eat pie? get high? say goodbye? try to fly? hire a super spy? cry if I want to. I turn 36 at 7:36 pm (Pacific Time) today, and here's what I know for sure: I won the trivia question on z99 this morning, sandwiched between the song "Complicated" and that new Kelly Clarkson tune that I'm trying not to like but is so overplayed that I don't know if I'll be able to fight the good fight much longer. Here was the question:

"What 1968 movie was the first to star a computer?"

Holly and Mr. B., I know you know it, so you can't answer. And neither can anyone else whom I know or knows me. But if you are a stranger to me, you can answer that question on my blog for a chance to win a Nut Goodie. I'll send it to you. I'm serious. And, if you live close to Alexandria, Minnesota, and answer that question in my blog before Friday, I'll send you the two tickets to the Johnny Holmes concert that I won on the radio. Again, serious. Oh, and I just tried to find you a link to Johnny Holmes, for those of you who aren't from Minnesota and don't know of this perennial, ageless tourer and creator to the soundtrack of many a Minnesotan gal's first kiss/introduction to beer in a plastic glass (why do those two always go together?), but apparently he shares a name with a famous porn star so I've given up. OH wait, I've found an excellent link that gives you a little snapshot of Johnny Holmes' target audience. Is it legal to use Thoreau to justify not calling your makeover/gossip/bridesmaid friends?

I also won two KFC bowls along with the Johnny Holmes tickets, but I'm keeping the bowl coupons to satisfy my gruesome curiousity. The KFC bowl sounds like gnarly shepherd's pie, and I can't believe it exists. Tom-E Lee on the radio was having a tough time making them sound edible ("potatoes! and gravy! corn! fried chicken! and a cheese blend! all in one bowl?), but not for lack of trying.

Does anyone remember Clucky the Chicken from Saturday Night Live ("They're gonna kill me and fry me up! I love it!")? KFC's soc ial responsibility commitment reminds me of that. Yum! I love a good commitment to animal welfare, with a side of jojos, please.

OK, that's about it, except I took that online IQ test (to make sure I still got it), and here's what I know:

"Congratulations, Jessica!Your IQ score is 127

This number is based on a scientific formula that compares how many questions you answered correctly on the Classic IQ Test relative to others. Your Intellectual Type is Insightful Linguist. This means you are highly intelligent and have the natural fluency of a writer and the visual and spatial strengths of an artist. Those skills contribute to your creative and expressive mind. "

That's a 127, Mr. B. The gauntlet has been thrown down (and thank you for the cyber cake).

Kevin Likes My Blog

2006-05-22T10:43:00.000-05:00

Check out the email I just got from Kevin Douglas:

>>>>
Hello Jess,

I have been reading your blog for quite a while now, and I must say that you are doing a terrific job. I intent to promote a novel titled "street Fame"-an urban tale, via the internet, and I figured out that using a blog would be the best way to go. I therefore humbly request you if it's possible to use your blog as a good platform to promote this book. All it takes is to add our book's banner on your blog and in return we also add your blog's link/logo on our blog ( http://howdoyoulikeyourspam). I believe this will go a long way to benefit both of us in relation to our blogs/sites. How does that sound? Let me know the possibility so that we can add your link/logo on our blog. The code of our logo is:
>>>>>>

Isn't that nice? I don't know Kevin, but he has been following my blog for quite a while now. Kevin, what is it that you like most about my blog? Kevin? Um, Kevin?

Enough of that. I have a link for you to follow, but it's not for kids. Remember those Choose Your Own Adventure books? Well then, be prepared to see some familiar covers with very different titles. Be sure to scroll through them all. The first page is OK but they get better the farther you go. Thanks, Mr. B.

Also, yesterday I read Live Bait, by the mother/daughter team of PJ and Tracy Lambrecht, and I enjoyed it every way but Sunday. The pacing and character development are excellent, it has some nice surprises, and the dialogue is off the chart fantastic. My only complaint is that "Willmar" was spelled wrong (the book is set in Minnesota), but I bet that was some editor's mistake, and not the author's. And you know, if that's the worst you can say about a mystery novel, that's pretty dang good. Read it. You won't regret it.

Dance, Book Clubs, and Gynecologists

2006-05-19T09:37:00.000-05:00

Ah, the trifecta of life.

OK, first for dance. Two people have sent this to me, and so I am sending it to you. It's cute! It's the evolution of dance.

On to the book club and gynecologists. I was invited to speak at an Alexandria book club, which had May Day as their May pick. The book club meeting was held at a gorgeous, tastefully decorated house on a local golf course. There were strawberries dipped in chocoloate, stuffed mushrooms, and delicious wine. I was the first one there, and then the women started filing in--a reporter from the local newspaper, some teachers, a few doctors, and then, all of a sudden, there was my gynecologist.

Usually, when I'm at a party, I'm the only one there who has seen me naked. You can bank on it. But, not Wednesday.

The shock of seeing my gynecologist in civilian clothes in this immaculate house where I was about to come under the microscope of a baker's dozen of slightly tipsy professional women, who had all come to discuss my "a-little-bit-raunchy" chick lit mystery, caused me to hiss under my breath, "That woman has seen my vagina!"

Apparently, gynecologists, like mothers, dogs, and teachers, have supernatural hearing, and she turned in my direction and said, "It must have been normal, because I don't remember it." Ha! That's a great line. My gynecologist is funny. The rest of the night was a good time, though there was much more talk about life than May Day, which is the way it should be. Oh, and they liked the book. :) They were kind enough to compare my writing style to Janet Evanovich's!!! Whee.

Have a great weekend.

Apologies for the Light Blogging

2006-05-16T20:28:00.000-05:00

Phew. Is anybody else out there really busy this time of year? Tomorrow is the last day of the semester at Alex Tech, so I am busily reading and grading mountainous stacks of papers. For the most part, it is gratifying to see the learning that has taken place over the semester, and I have a good group of students who are at college for all the right reasons (beer!). Not beer. An education. But this is also the time of the semester when the "there are no stupid questions" line is shown to be the flaming ball of crap that it is. Phew.

Because today's blog is so lame, I am providing you a laughter surrogate. Watch out--it's sharp.

Tomorrow, I am the invited guest at an Alexandria book club. I'm excited! Wine, and ladies who have read May Day. Wait. Maybe that's scary. Will report.

In the meanwhile, what is the stupidest question you've ever been asked?

June Bug Cover!

2006-05-12T10:23:00.000-05:00

I just received the sketch of the June Bug cover. It's superfun! Thank you, Lisa Novak and Midnight Ink, for your great sensibilities. I also finished pumping up June Bug last night--I paid a freelance editor $5 a page to criticize me, and she earned every penny--and you know, I'm really proud of that book. It's got it all--mystery, love, humor, suspense. I can't wait for you to read it!

Anyhow, Lisa sketches the cover (and she's great), and then Midnight Ink hires another person to polish it up, so the cover that ends up being on June Bug when it comes out next March may not look exactly like what you see to the right, but it's where we're starting. I especially like that Mira has "Last Resort" stamped to her rear in the picture. You'll have to read the book to find out what that means.

On to my new favorite typo, printed this week in a local Minnesota newspaper:

"Seventeen high school thesbians will stage the award-winning comedy, 'You Can't Take It With You,' this weekend in the school auditorium...The thesbians were scheduled to perform the play in April, but it was delayed until May."

I'm pretty sure that thesbians are women who like women with speech impediments, and I think it's fantastic that greater Minnesota is opening its hearts, minds, and stages to a variety of lifestyles. Is that a kick-ass typo, or what? That knocks the woman who wrote, in her cover letter applying for an English instructor position, "It is my goal to leave my job in the private sector and become a pubic worker, where I can touch many more people," right off the top of my all-time, favorite typos list.

Have a great weekend!

Battle Lake

2006-05-08T12:11:00.000-05:00

On Saturday, my friend Christine, my son, Xander (little man with the barbed wire tattoo on the left), and I all road-tripped to Battle Lake, Minnesota. My goal was to drop off gift bags with review copies of May Day to all the local businesses. The Village Apothecary is already carrying it, and they sold out of their first 20 copies quickly, so yay! One Fine Day, the local coffee/gift shop (and the place I got the kernel of the idea for the fictional Fortune Cafe in the Murder by Month series), will now be carrying it, as will the art gallery. The deal with the art gallery is that I have to volunteer there four days this summer as a trade-off, which is just fine because it's important to me to support the arts and the community. Or, I have a crush on the pharmacist (he's cute, funny, AND has troughs of Valium--it's always good to make new friends), and his business is just up the street from the gallery.

Also, Xanadu Island Bed and Breakfast, the inspiration for the fictionalized lost diamond mystery in June Bug, has requested a review copy of May Day. They're thinking of slapping their resort's information in the front cover and selling copies in their gift store. What a fantastic way for them to spread the word about their great resort, eh? Next time you're in the Battle Lake area, check out Xanadu. It's everything they promise.

In more good news, the Praire Renaissance Cultural Center in Morris, Minnesota, will soon be carrying May Day. I am amazed (and happy) at all the support out there for Minnesota artists!

And here's my parting thought for the day, via a fellow teacher whose students gave a presentation on whether or not sexual education should be offered in high schools (yes, some people believe it is debatable). From a student arguing that sex ed should NOT be taught in high schools: "It's human nature, so why do we have to talk about it?!?" Hee hee. I love that. It's so Minnesotan.

BPW

2006-05-08T11:04:00.000-05:00

Big Plaid Waders? Best Pre-dawn Watermelon? British People are Well-turned? No, it's Business and Professional Women, and don't be fooled by their website. They're wild, funny, and smart. I rename them Best Prepared Wildwomen, and they don't even have to change their monogrammed jackets. Anyhow, I was invited by the Minnesota President of BPW, Connie Hill, to give a lunchtime presentation at the state BPW convention at Arrowwood last Friday, and I had a wonderful time. They were the best audience ever and bought 32 copies of May Day! I so enjoyed their company that I joined BPW today. I am officially a business and professional woman...

...which is a great segue to my next point. I had to buy tampons at the gas station yesterday, and I waited until the female checker was free instead of going into the male checker's line, which was much shorter. Why this ridiculous behavior?!?! It was about five years ago that I became comfortable buying toilet paper from any gender, but still not so much with the female hygiene products I guess. How old do I have to be before that is no big deal? Probably when I hit menopause, which is ironic.

Mystery Scene Magazine and the April Library Winner

2006-05-03T11:15:00.000-05:00

May Day has just this week gotten a positive review in Mystery Scene, which IS the mystery scene, so that's very exciting! Here are my favorite lines from the review (and, believe it or not, I didn't have to edit out any bad things, which is what the ellipses usually mean):

"...Hip young Mira James feels a dead-end job and romance in Minneapolis to seek rural comforts in Battle Lake...Nothing is as it seems, and Mira learns the dangerous way whom she can actually trust. Who would have imagined that her boss, the librarian, would have kinky sexual appetites? Who knew that there was a huge market for sex parties geared toward the geriatric set?...It's enough to make one yearn for the anonymity of the big city where perversity is more evenly distributed. Nonetheless, Mira exposes the truth and gets a nice scoop for her paper, too. Meet this witty heroine in Lourey's engaging new series."

Fun stuff. And if you like mysteries, make sure to read Mystery Scene magazine. It's all there, as I'm sure Alison, Assistant Librarian and winner (for her library) of a free copy of May Day (!!!) will agree too. Your library's copy is in the mail, Alison! Thanks for entering the contest. If you're a librarian, you should do the same.

Changing of the Guard

2006-05-02T07:53:00.000-05:00

On Monday, I started the application process to the University of Minnesota MFA/PhD and the University of Iowa MFA. I figured it would be auspicious to begin them on May Day (which is not only the title of my first mystery but also one of my favorite holidays due to the springy feel, the historic roots, and the fact that my stoic father actually gave my sister and me a May Day basket one year as a surprise, one he made himself out of styrofoam cups--that incident made it into May Day, but the rest is really fiction. Mostly.).

You know, when you click on the the May Day link to amazon.com above, I think it brings you to MY amazon.com page, which means you can find out what I order through amazon.com, so I'm just going to come out and tell you I ordered two belly-dancing videotapes yesterday. And that the "Star Wars Revenge of the Sight Lightsaber: Green and Silver by Hasbro" is on my "recommended for you" list. I'm a complex person.

Back to the MFAs. I am committed to writing all twelve of the Murder by Month mysteries, but I also want the time/skillz/practice to write mainstream fiction, alternative fiction, fantasy, and socially responsible fiction. Plus, I need to get out of Alexandria, at least for a while. I'm feeling restless. I had hoped that it would work out in a big way with my hometown crush so I could write and teach online in Paynesville--not as glamorous as an MFA, but appealing and satisfying in a different way and EASIER--but it was not meant to be.

The MFA application process is tedious--I've spent a couple days on it already--but what else do I have to do, right? Except belly dance. With a green light saber.

Happy May Day!

2006-05-01T10:09:00.000-05:00

It is the first day of my favorite month of the year--May. Now you know why the mystery series didn't start in January. I love May because it is the first kiss of spring, with wild green leaves, lilacs, and chicks on "this year I'm gonna do it" diets blooming everywhere. Plus, my birthday is in May. Wanna guess which famous person I share a birthday with? We have similar singing voices, as those who heard me "sing" karaoke at the Holiday Inn on Friday can attest to.

And in honor of May Day, May Day is selling swimmingly on amazon. Yay! I wonder how it'll do on No Pants Day?

One last thing--congratulations to Ellen Hart for winning the 2006 Minnesota Book Award for popular fiction for her fabulous Jane Lawless mystery, The Iron Girl!

Oh wait, one more last thing. I've decided to get a tattoo. Can anyone recommend a good tattoo artist in Minnesota?

Chicks and Hicks

2006-04-26T11:32:00.000-05:00

That's what Mr. B. recommended I call my Great Wisconsin RV Book Tour. Since when is driving around Wisconsin in a 1973 RV with your parents uncool? Chicks and Hicks my ass. I am very excited to bring May Day to the people of The Cheese State. And for those of you who say Wisconsin is just Minnesota Lite, I say pah (in my naked-but-for-my-yellowed-underwear-old-man, fist-shaking voice).

The other day I got an email from William Kent Krueger in which he apologized for not making it to my last Saturday signing at Once Upon a Crime and said that he thought I was the best writer he'd ever read and that I was really fun to be around, too. Or maybe he just said to stop calling his house and asking for Cork O'Connor. I dunno. It all gets so jumbly in my head sometimes.

Yesterday, as I was beginning revisions on the first full draft of Knee High by July with all the enthusiasm I usually save for pap smears, church, and dentist appointments, I had a thought: "How do authors know how long a book should be?" My mainstream fiction (which isn't published, thank you for asking) novel is about 300 pages, but darn it if I can get a mystery past 220 pages. I get to to 200 pages and I think, "done." I race to that 200 pages, and that's where all three have ended. I push myself, push push push myself to get it to 210, and then take feedback from others to get it to 220. Is that me, or is that just the natural arc of the story and I am just a whittler on the wood of the plot, uncovering what was there all along?

Once Upon a Crime

2006-04-24T11:16:00.000-05:00

Saturday, I was signing books at Once Upon a Crime in Minneapolis. Pat and Gary own the place and are wonderful--funny, giving (they supplied lemonade, cookies, and more!), and crazy smart about mysteries. Their store is exactly what you imagine a bookstore (or the library in your house) should look like--neat but tight with books, natural lighting but dark corners, and comfortable furniture. If you've never been, go. There's a mystery for everyone.

Plus, it's right up the street from the CC Club in Uptown, where I used to go and play pool (poorly, but cockily, the way I do many things) and drink shots of Jagermeister. Yuck. And then, my friends and I would stumble over to Liquor Lyle's to dine on the block of government cheese that they put out for "happy" hour. Yum.

Yesterday, I booked a plane ticket for Las Vegas, where I will be flying in June with Christine, Linda, and Kellie. One of us will be leaving with a new piercing, and one of us will be leaving with a tattoo, but we're not sure which or what. I guess they help you sort all that out in Vegas, but I'll take bets here. Assuming you can judge a book by its cover, here's some help when placing bets: that's me on the left, Linda next to me, Kellie popping up in behind, and Christine on the right. That Ruth Buzzy happens to be in the picture is just gravy.

Jesus and L Ron Hubbard Share a Giggle

2006-04-20T10:36:00.000-05:00

Those guys. Having Katie Holmes and Brooke Shields give birth at the same hospital on the same day. I tell you.

The big news is not the ultimate celebrity punking carried out by those two holy rascals, though. It's not even the United States visit by the President of China for a lighthearted game of Risk. No, the big news is that Knee High by July is done. Well, the first complete draft is done--198 pages. The next step is to gather up my "buttons"--little scraps of paper with character quirks, funny turns of phrase, plot twists--that I gather throughout the year, and sew them into the story. That fleshes it out and adds depth.

After that, I send it off to Holly Hassel, who gives me detailed feedback and encouragement. Then, I send it to Jessica Morrell, who tosses her beret in the air and says, "to work!" She gives me little encouragement and a lot of criticism. It's good for me, like a personal trainer ridding my writing of fat, sloth, and joy. After I make those changes, I send it to Barbara at Midnight Ink to stick it in the chute, where it gets a cover, some more editing, and all that other fun stuff.

While Knee High is with Jessica, I'm going to edit June Bug, which I just got back from Jessica yesterday. Man, she's hard on me. Getting edited reminds me of parent teacher/conferences, where the teacher tells you that your child has a lot of potential but no one likes her so maybe work on that. The plan is to have June Bug bionic and fantastic and in Barbara's hands by May 15th, and Knee High bionic and fantastic and in Barbara's hands by June 15th. Whaddya say, Barbara?

Pyromania

2006-04-17T11:38:00.000-05:00

I like to start fires, as do most of the women in my family. That would be a great opening line for a novel, but it also happens to be the truth, especially this time of year when I've got piles of leaves sitting around, taunting me with their incendiary nature. I already burned one pile, even though I'm pretty sure there was a burning ban on, and it was great. That got me to thinking. How many arsonists are female? In the U.S., roughly 16%, in 2003. Hmm. I would have thought more would be female. Or maybe the women just get caught less?

Anyhow, my need to burn things is wholly satisfied by a lot of camping and maybe a leaf pile or two, so whew. But I wonder if it is just the women in my family who like to burn things, or if that is a gender-favoring trait? Happy Monday thoughts. Oh, and good news! The Sunday St. Paul Pioneer Press covered May Day. Thank you, Mary Ann Grossman! (and Brian)

I've Been Blog-Tagged

2006-04-12T10:41:00.000-05:00

I've been blog-tagged by Sara Rosett, author of the Mom Zone series from Kensington Books. That means I need to answer her favorites in fours questions, and then tag four more people. Why does this feel like the new chain letter? I can do it, though, because it beats writing a novel right about now.

4 movies you would watch over and over:

4 places you have lived:

Tacoma, Washington (born here)
Paynesville, Minnesota (raised here)
Minneapolis, Minnesota (rebelled here)
Battle Lake, Minnesota (inspired to write murder mysteries here)

4 TV shows you love to watch:

4 places you have been on vacation:

Cozumel (scuba diving and snorkeling)
Florida Keys (scuba diving)
Aruba (snorkeling and a wedding--not mine)
Canada (um, the Canadians?)

4 of your favorite foods:

Popcorn
Ice Cream
Bagels
Dark chocolate with nuts

4 Websites you visit daily:

4 places you would rather be right now:

I believe in always making the best of whatever place, person, or moment in time I am so I'd like to just say I'm happy right now where I...screw it:

At a bank, cashing a check for $1,000,000 for a three-book deal with Midnight Ink
In the arms of that rare intelligent, funny, and emotionally mature straight hot guy who is telling me he loves me
On a beach with my kids, teaching them to snorkel
At my French villa with friends and family, drinking red wine, eating cheese with crusty bread, and playing Trivial Pursuit

Tag 4 People you think will respond:

Rejection

2006-04-10T12:47:00.000-05:00

I have stuck to my writing schedule for five days in a row. This is good. I have also recently received three smackdown rejections (to be fair, it was three reviewers for the same journal, and it's the American Journal of Sociological Review, which is the big dog and where I cockily began submitting) for my 50-page research article, "Sexual Knowledge and Politics." A sampling:

"There is much to like about this article. It examines a major public issue of concern to social scientists and the public. It is on the whole well written and empirically grounded. On the surface, it is entirely reasonable and its findings and charts straightforward...[h]owever, there were too many parts of it that didn’t make sense to me as a social scientist..."

"This study is an analysis of the association between sexual knowledge and political affiliation/voting preferences. As such, its greatest strength is its selection of an interesting research question...[u]nfortunately...it requires major reworking to remedy the problems outlined below: Overreaching in its scope. Conflating separate issues. Overly polemical tone..."

"This manuscript poses the provocative question: Has the Republican right limited sexual knowledge via abstinence-only education in America? The author suggests that this is the case...The paper does a good job tracing the political history of sex education, but misses the opportunity to engage broader sociological theories that can serve as frameworks for how attitudes are shaped and populations are mobilized around issues...overly selective sample..."

Isn't that nice? I post this as evidence of the thick skin (read: disassociation from reality) required to be a published writer, whether of nonfiction or fiction. I'm now going to scrabble together my strips of dignity, change the title of my research article, and submit it to The Boise Journal of Theses You Can't Get Published Anywhere Else.

I'm Hot-Blooded--Check It and See

2006-04-07T10:54:00.000-05:00

Last night I was doing research for Knee High by July (it was the second night IN A ROW I stuck to my writing schedule!!!) and came across this really fantastic picture of Chief Wenonga. If loving him is wrong, I don't want to be right.

And, in a moving victory for feminism, Girls Gone Wild Have Been Released Back into Civilization. Thank you, Dr. Holly Hassel, for sharing the good news with me. :)

The Winning Library

2006-04-06T12:42:00.000-05:00

Congratulations to Melisa Duncan, Community Relations person at Fargo Public Library!! She won a free copy of May Day for the library by entering the drawing on my webpage. If you're a librarian, you should enter.

And check out the Smoking Gun for the latest on a presidential mishap. Of intelligence. I'm going to float an idea out there. This two party corporate-sponsored system is not really working for me. What about a political system where multiple ideas and demographics are represented? Probably, we'd have to reform the campaign funding and electoral processes to make that viable. What? Someone's already thought of that?

And hey, I got my three pages written last night! Half of one page was part of my outline that I cut and pasted, but I still wrote it so it counts. Mystery writing is unique in that you have to write the ending first. So, I come up with a central mystery idea (murdered love, missing diamond, disappearing fiberglass statue with human scalp left at the base, creationism science camp and a murdered cheerleader, etc.), decide whodunit, and then create a seven-day or so outline starting at the scene of the crime and working toward its resolution (most of my mysteries span a very short period of time). I get the bare bones of what happens each day written down in a table outline, and then I use that to keep myself on track as I write the actual novel. I should do more of that writing the actual novel.

Better Day

2006-04-05T16:57:00.000-05:00

OK, my day's gotten better. Thank god for cute kids who like making cupcakes and playing Star Wars faerie ring forest tag on beautiful spring days.

As of today, my writing goal is to turn out three pages a day, five days a week, which means I will be done with Knee High by July in...six weeks. That's not so bad, right? I'll keep ya' updated.

Oh, and I finished William Kent Krueger's Mercy Falls. If you are a mystery reader, you'll be familiar with the uproar over the ending. I didn't hate it. And the novel itself has the fantastic character development and plot twists that Kent is known for, though less on the fidelity issue, fewer peripheral characters, and more setting and Native American description wouldn't have killed it.

Shoot. My Roomba just got caught on something...

Lickerish

2006-04-05T11:35:00.000-05:00

That's my new word for today--"lickerish." It means lecherous and greedy, and it sounds like that is exactly what it means, which is why it's a great word.

"The lickerish stranger shoved his hands into his pocket and limped away, smiling to himself."

That's about all I have for today because I'm crabby. I was dumped by an emotionally stunted man (must be something in the water in rural Minnesota), my students are being needy ("I wasn't in class yesterday because I was sick, which wasn't my fault, so can I still get points for class participation?"), administration wants to pump my class sizes up to three times their current size (I wonder why students aren't learning as much as they should? Probably diverting money from education will fix the problem.), and Molly Ivins is totally right that the Democrats suck ass.

Clearly, I need to get drunk or skinny and everything will get better (not drunk AND skinny, though, because then I'd be Tara Reid).

The Apothecary Has Taken the Plunge

2006-04-03T14:13:00.000-05:00

Battle Lake news:

I just received a letter from Jay, the pharmacist at the Village Apothecary (featured in May Day), and he has requested 24 copies of the book. This is my favorite part of his letter: "I did, however, practice in Paynesville for 6 years before moving here to Battle Lake, and I must say that Paynesville had just as many oddities as our small town. I see that you hail from Paynesville. Does this mean you are odd as well?" Ha! I like this guy. And yes, it means I'm odd as well.
I got a phone call from the owner of the Nifty Nook Resort requesting a review copy. Fun! I am not hated in Battle Lake. Yet. Of course, they haven't read the book yet.
Actually, one of them has. His name is Lyman, I'm guessing he is on the young side of 80, and he called me Saturday afternoon to tell me he thoroughly enjoyed May Day. He went on to regale me with a story of a horrible and mysteriously bloody human corpse that he stumbled upon a few years back. I don't think I can use it, but thanks for calling, Lyman. There's nothing a single gal likes quite so much as the afternoon call from a stranger who wants to talk about grisly death. Seriously, it was a very sweet phone call, and I appreciated the thought.

That's about it for today, except that I had to get a CT scan this morning, and it was scary. Well, not too scary because it was just to make sure that my enlarged salivary gland is just that (I drool when I type), but you have to sit on your back and get this dye injected into your arm that makes your body feel like it's on fire for a second, then you taste metal, and then you feel like you peed your pants (I'm not making this up, and it wasn't just me). Blah. And the needle is really, really big. But all is well. And I don't really drool when I type. Just when I talk.

Oh wait! I forgot the big May Day news. My mom called me yesterday to tell me that according to the Sunday St. Cloud Times, May Day is the best selling trade paperback in St. Cloud!!! May Day was also generously reviewed by In the Library.