Say What?

By Louise Ure

I’m not touring and teaching like Alex this week, nor have I been at a high-powered writers’ workshop like Pari, or out striking big TV deals like Rob.

What I’ve been doing is falling in love with words. Again. As usual.

In my last post I wrote about my gelatophobia, one of those top-drawer words that does not mean at all what it sounds like. Others on my “I don’t think so” list would be: enervate, choleric, pulchritude, necromancy, fungible and my newest favorite, gongoozler. “Choleric” has nothing to do with cholera, “pulchritude” is actually a good thing, and a “gongoozler” is an idle speculator, especially one who stares for a long time at nothing.

That’s me today.

And that idle staring has taken me on a detour through idioms today. An idiom is an expression that usually can’t be translated literally. Its meaning is often quite different from the specific word-for-word translation. They’re the worst kind of clichés if we dare to use them in our writing. In dialogue, they connote a lazy-thinker or someone from Hicksville.

“I’m not pulling your leg.”

“It’s no good crying over spilt milk.”

“I’m living the life of Riley.”

They’ve become such comfortable, worn out moccasins of phrase that we don’t even think about them any more. But they jump up like a soliloquy on stage when you hear them in another language.

“I’m not hanging noodles on your ears” (Russian) and “I’m not pulling the hair out of your nostrils” (Japanese) = Not pulling your leg.

“Biting the elbow” (German) = Crying over spilt milk.

“To fart into silk” (French) and “live like a maggot in bacon” (German) = Live the life of Riley

In Spain, if you feel like a fish out of water you’re “like an octopus in a garage,” and if two things are well suited for each other they’re “like fingernails and dirt.”

A “mouse milker” in German is a detailed-oriented person, but an “ant milker” in Arabic is a miser or a tightwad. In Spanish, that same tightwad would be someone who “walks with his elbows.”

In English, you could be “in a jam” or “in a pickle.” In Latvian, you’d be “up a stovepipe.”

We make a mountain out of a molehill, but the Poles “make a fork out of a needle.”

We think of ourselves as “the third wheel” – the unnecessary one – on a date, but the Portuguese would say they were “holding a candle.” Yep, someone just standing there, lighting the scene so the two lovers could see each other.

When the Japanese dine with a foreigner, they’re having “a sideways meal.” (Since the Japanese write vertically and most westerners write sideways, talking to a foreigner is “speaking sideways” and lunching with one becomes equally horizontal.)

When the French stand someone up for an appointment, they “donner le lapin” (give a rabbit.) For the Spanish, it’s “give a pumpkin.” Which would probably leave their Russian date “looking like September” (looking miserable).

If an Italian woman decided to “reheat cabbage” (rekindle an old romance), her Chinese husband might be accused of “having a pretty green hat” (having a cheating wife).

A window-shopper in France is “window-licking” and to attempt the impossible would be like “biting the moon” (French) or “climbing a tree to catch a fish” (Chinese). That would be nothing more than “making tea with your navel” (laughable, in Japanese).

Clearly, you should always look before you leap for, as the French say, “in candlelight, a goat looks like a lady.”

I know I’ll never be able to use this linguistic exercise in my work. I don’t want to write in trite idioms nor do I often like characters who speak that way. But it’s fun. And it gets my mind working.

And maybe, just maybe, it helps me come up with new metaphors on my own.

Whatcha’ think, Rati? Do you have any favorite idioms (English or otherwise) that I’ve missed? Or would you like to create a new one to confound all future students of English As A Second Language?

The Faces of Evil

by Alafair Burke

Thanks to some truly memorable writing by a guy called Thomas Harris, and some wicked good acting by a dude called Anthony Hopkins, many of us picture this guy when we think “serial killer.”

Or if we take our models from the real world, we might conjure up images of these fellows.

The paradigmatic “serial killer,” as we tend to use that term, is, by definition, both evil and genius. We know he is evil because he not only takes life, but does so repeatedly and often methodically. We know he must be genius because he is able to get away with his acts, repeatedly and methodically. Ted Bundy convinced grown women to get in a car with him. Charles Manson controlled his own cult. The Zodiac Killer was never caught. And Hannibal Lecter? Well, he managed to outwit even Clarice Starling. How wiley is that?

But I spent some time last week thinking about our fascination with the particular type of romanticized evil epitomized by the pop culture figure of the serial killer. My thoughts were first sparked by this season’s insanely delicious performance by John Lithgow on Dexter, based on the groundbreaking novels by Jeff Lindsay. Dexter himself was a terrific twist on the usual serial killer depiction: He only kills people who deserve it. And, in some ways, the killer portrayed by Lithgow checks off all the usual boxes: methodical, intelligent, manipulative – check, check, and check.

Except … he’s also married. And he sings loudly and earnestly at church. And he wears goofy shirts. And he gets angry when a new acquaintance lingers too long near his dead sister’s ashes. And he totally wigs out when he hits a deer with his creepy kidnapper van. And he looks like this.

Not wiley. Not genius. Just a little off. And kind of dorky.

I was also thinking about serial killers when I dusted off an old war story for my criminal law students this week. When I was a young Deputy District Attorney in Portland, I prosecuted a guy called Sebastian Shaw. The facts? He threw an onion at his sister with such force that it, in her words to the police, “exploded.” (No offense to my siblings, but you all did way worse to me, and I never called the cops.)

In all honesty, I might have only pushed the necessary papers on the case had it not been for persistent phone calls from a friend of the defendant’s family (coincidentally, a writer you’ve probably heard of). She warned me and anyone who would listen that Shaw was dangerous. We had to do something. To the best of my recollection, Shaw was convicted of assault and received what was probably a typical sentence for the crime of injuring another person.

I moved on to the next case (or hundreds) and never thought of it again until the First Assistant called several months later, asking for information about a guy called Sebastian Shaw. “Oh yeah,” I said, “the exploding onion case.” I could tell from the First Assistant’s response that my levity was misplaced. (I know. It probably still is.)

You see, Shaw had been stopped by police in a car that happened to have the following items in the trunk: a blindfold, plastic zip ties, duct tape, mace, a knife, a lead weight in the end of a sock, ski masks, latex gloves, and pornographic magazines. That’s all the police needed to know to conclude that Shaw was up to no good. But it wasn’t proof beyond a reasonable doubt.

Fortunately, Shaw smoked. And littered. After he flicked a cigarette butt to the ground outside a grocery store, police linked him through DNA evidence to a rape and two unsolved murders. The last time I checked, Shaw claimed to have killed ten or fifteen people, and law enforcement continued to connect him to bodies.

It wasn’t until after he’d been identified as a serial rapist and murderer that all the stories started to come together. The threat to his roommate’s life during an argument about the dishes. The eerie statements that had gotten him suspended from his cable company job. The outburst at his co-workers when he was a security guard. And don’t forget about the exploding onion.

All that time, all those stories. Apparently his family suspected something was deeply wrong. But I imagine that, to the people who had only superficial encounters with him, Sebastian Shaw seemed sad. Bizarre. Pathetic. Lonely. A loser.

Not evil. Not wiley. Not genius.

Now police in Cleveland have found eleven bodies in the home of this man, who had lived with his stepmother and did not drive. Sad. Pathetic. Not wiley or genius.

All of these stories were bouncing against each other in the pinball machine I call my brain when I asked my Facebook pals what I should blog about. I got some great suggestions that I may use later, but one stood out when my friend, Steve, said, “How about the banality of evil?”

It shouldn’t have taken Steve’s suggestion for me to tie John Lithgow to Sebastian Shaw to Anthony Sowell in Cleveland. I grew up in Wichita, Kansas, terrified of a murderer who called himself BTK. Bind. Torture. Kill. Thirty years without capture. Evil. Wiley. Genius.

But then they caught him because he was stupid enough to send police a CD-rom initialized with his full name. In his job enforcing low-level code violations in his tiny little town, he was known to measure grass with a ruler. Not wiley. Not genius. Just a sad loser. But still evil to the core.

So if evil doesn’t usually come in a super-smart, fava-bean eating package, why are we so fascinated with the prevailing paradigm? Maybe it’s simply because characters like Hannibal Lecter make for much better fiction than overweight landscaping police. But I suspect our preferences run deeper. We want to believe that evil is both recognizable and rare, not the nondescript guy in the next office.

If you’re fascinated by real-life serial killers, which ones fascinate you and why? And, as a reader (and perhaps writer), how do you respond to fictional portrayals of evil? Which ones stick with you?

Short Stories

By Allison Brennan

I just finished a 4,000 word short story that’s going in a special edition of ORIGINAL SIN that will be exclusively at Walmart, and then later I’ll give it away free on my website (sometime before CARNAL SIN comes out at the end of June.) This is the fourth short story I’ve written (fifth if we count my 38,000 word novella). I’ve learned a lot about short stories since, but mostly I learned that they are damn hard to write.

Short is not my strong point. When I was in high school American History, I had a fabulous teacher (Dwight Perkins) who gave me an “A-” on my final essay because I, “so eloquently said in 10 pages what could easily have been said in 5.”

Why did I ever think I could write a short story? I didn’t even consider writing short stories when I started writing-I wanted to write a book. I meaty, 100,000 word novel. But in Stephen King’s ON WRITING, he lamented the death of the short story and what a wonderful medium it was. And I reflected how much I enjoyed reading short stories, from when I was a little kid through adulthood. To this day, some of my favorite stories are short stories. “A Sound of Thunder” and “He Built a Crooked House” by Ray Bradbury; “The Lottery” by Shirley Jackson; “The Cask of Amontillado” by Edgar Allen Poe; “Harrison Bergeron” by Kurt Vonnegut; “The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County” by Mark Twain; “Mrs. Todd’s Shortcut” and “Quitters, Inc” by Stephen King. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg, what I can think about off the top of my head, the ones I think of from time to time when a theme or image from the story plays out in my life. If I took the time to cull through my shelves I would likely find a dozen or more short stories that I could call a favorite.

So when I was asked to write a short story in KILLER YEAR edited by Lee Child, I jumped at the chance (not to mention that it was being edited by Lee Child. I mean, I’m not an idiot. Most of the time.)

“Killing Justice” in KILLER YEAR was 5,800 words (over my allotted limit, but since my “mentee” Gregg Olson came way under his word count, JT was kind enough to let me keep my words.) Kind? Well, maybe not, because that story could have been better if I knew more about short stories.

Don’t get me wrong, I still love the story. It takes place in the California State Capitol and takes what I know about politics and deals and legislation and puts them in a very short story about a subject I care deeply about: child predators. But the structure of the story was like a novel-multiple viewpoints and multiple scenes. This doesn’t work well when you have less than 6,000 words.

My second short story was “A Capitol Obsession” in TWO OF THE DEADLIEST edited by Elizabeth George. Yep, you guessed it, I took a setting I was intimately familiar with (the Capitol) thinking that would be easier to write the story. I had more words to play with-7-9K (my story ended up just over 10K. Remember Mr. Perkins!) But I had learned from my first short, so I focused on one crime, primarily one setting, and only two viewpoints (a female state senator and a homicide detective who were on the “off” swing of an on-again/off-again relationship.) I started with a dead body (a lobbyist) to get immediately into the story (on the fantastic advice of Ms. George who commented that my first draft didn’t really begin until the second scene . . . so I cut the first scene during revisions.) I had my cop and my senator working parallel investigations. It was fun. In hindsight, I would have cut one scene (where my cop goes to the victim’s employers and apartment to gather information about her) simply because though the information was important, I could have probably incorporated it in such a way so I never had to show my characters outside of the Capitol.

Next came a story that hasn’t come out yet that will (hopefully) be in the HWA anthology. It’s tentatively titled “Her Lucky Day” and is a supernatural “light” horror story. I put it aside for a couple weeks and will edit it one more time. One POV and two settings AND I came in under my allotted word count of 4,000! Woo hoo! (A little bit of trivia: I originally wrote the scene as the prologue for CARNAL SIN, but it didn’t fit the tone or the direction that the book ended up going, so I cut it . . . but I really liked it, so I reworked it and gave it a conclusion.)

The given criteria for my short story in the back of ORIGINAL SIN was that I had to use major characters from the book in the story. As I thought about it, I realized that I also couldn’t have anything majorly pivotal to the series happen in the story because it’s “bonus content.” So no blowing up buildings in my fictional town that I’ll be visiting again, or killing off a major character, or anything that changes the goals or motivations of my main characters. I considered a lot of different ideas, but ended up with the same problem: too big. Just thinking about the ideas, I could see the bigger story behind it. That was my problem with “Killing Justice”–there was a much bigger story I tried to tell that didn’t fit well in the short word count.

When I was driving back from my trainer on Thursday (amazing, I often think of murder and mayhem after working out . . . ) the idea just popped into my head: a ghost story. Well, not just popped because I’d been mulling this issue over and over for days. But the story goal, the set-up, the setting, the conflict, it was all there bam!

It was perfect for me on multiple levels. First, the series is about demons and witches, not ghosts-but I’d set up in the book that ghosts exist and could cause problems for my characters. So if I wrote about a ghost, I wasn’t messing with my major antagonists-they could safely remain in hiding. Second, I had a perfect setting for the story where something tragic happened during the course of the book. Third, I had a plausible story conflict that didn’t mess with my series characters primary conflicts-I could use them more as catalysts rather than being considerably changed by the event. And the one character who is truly affected had already discussed her conflict about the situation in the book, so it’s believable for the story as well as if I use the issue in the future. (Sorry for being so vague, but I don’t want to give anything away.) And finally, I had a “villain” (the ghost) and who had a strong motivation for his “crime.”

Believe me, I was totally excited about this. I started writing. I set up my sheriff going to the scene and why . . . and my heroine and hero going to the scene and why . . . over 1000 words before they even got to the main conflict.

Argh! Seven pages and . . . they all had to go. Sure, I tried to convince myself that they didn’t have to be deleted. I told myself that those 1,000 words were really the first act of the story and they did end in a mini-climax/hook. Yes, we delude ourselves when we don’t want to delete something. They weren’t bad pages-in fact, even the first draft was pretty tight and to the point. But I had to remind myself that this was a short story. I didn’t have to painstakingly set the scene. I didn’t have to SHOW why the sheriff went to the scene; I didn’t have to SHOW my heroine’s growing worry and sense of foreboding when she couldn’t reach her friend (the sheriff.) Yes, in a full-length book such scenes are necessary at times especially leading up to the final confrontation. But for a 5,000 word story? No.

I realized I could SHOW my heroine’s fear as they arrive at the scene and find all the streetlights broken, adding to her growing apprehension; be with her and the hero when they see two cars parked in the back, one being a stranger; listen as they hear a scream and gunshots as they’re about to break into the building. All that in less than two double-spaced pages. It sets the tone and the scene and the primary goal (save the sheriff) without the longer, meatier lead-in. Why the sheriff is there de facto comes out as the scene unfolds.

I also made the choice to keep the entire story in my heroine’s POV. Believe me, this was tough because I LOVE multiple POVs. But it kept the story tighter and more focused and, therefore, the word count down.

Easy? Hell no! As hard as writing a book. Sure, a 100,000 word novel-or in the case of ORIGINAL SIN 125K-takes far more time, concentration and revising, but no individual scene was harder than the short story.

Every short story I’ve written has taught me lessons about writing that I couldn’t have learned in class. I was thinking about this after reading about Pari’s absolutely incredible experience with her in-depth writer’s program. I was itching to do something like that as well, to learn more about how to write, the different types of writing I can do, how to really dig deep and challenge myself.

And maybe, some day, I will do something like that.

But in the end, the key lessons I took away from Pari’s post was that they wrote every day. They practiced. They challenged themselves by doing–not just thinking about writing, not just talking about writing, but writing.

The short story is hard for me, but the only way I can learn to do it well is to do it. I was as giddy typing THE END on the short as I was typing it on my last book.

I’m hoping that with the multiple anthologies of novellas and short stories coming out these past few years and in the future that there’ll be a resurgence of sorts in short fiction. What do you think?

Readers, do you like reading short stories? Novellas? Or prefer to stick only with full-length novels? What is a short story you’ve recently read that stands out, or one you read years ago that you still think about?

Writers, do you like reading and/or writing short stories? Putting the time factor aside, is it easier or harder than a book? Some of your favorites?

Taking the gift

by Alexandra Sokoloff

You all get more tour journal today because tour is ALL I’ve been doing, since – I can’t even calculate since when. I don’t even remember what it’s like to write, by now, which scares me, oh, just a little. This is the last day of traveling, though, at least until one big week at the end of the month, but apart from some cool publicity with that, that week is going to be just about writing, MY writing.

Whatever that is.

My last stint has been teaching Screenwriting Tricks For Authors on a beach in Charleston – an incredible week long retreat for writers and aspiring writers sponsored every year by the Lowcountry Romance Writers. It’s all women except for one man, who is taking those odds very much in stride, and the focus is paranormal, historical romance, and romantic suspense, although to my delight there is one horror chick so I don’t feel like the complete voice of doom.

I had a fabulous drive from Raleigh to Charleston, nice to be on the road again. The great thing about driving toward South Carolina is that you get all that beach music, which I never knew it was its own genre of music until I actually lived in the South, and then I could see it in EVERYTHING – the Spinners and Temptations and Marvin Gaye and everyone.

I got to the bridge over to the island where our retreat house is, just at sunset – WOW. I drove straight out to the beach strip and pulled into this – incredible – mansion. To say it is luxe is the understatement of the year. Exquisite. Cherrywood floors, and three levels of absolute perfection, elevator accessible of course – but in a very beach, livable way – there’s a lot of Southwest influence, which is where the family of owners is from. This porch that I’m out on now, or terrace or whatever you call it in the South, has multiple living areas, with fireplaces of course, and the ocean is right there, in front of me (past the pool and volleyball court, naturally) and that SOUND, and the air – I’m just in a tank top and I’m fine, and this incredible fragrance – it’s not jasmine, but something sweet and completely intoxicating, and there are turtles, apparently, out there in the sand doing their thing in a way that is so protected that you can be arrested for turning on porch or pool lights after sunset.

And my room. Well, the word is suite. With sweeping ocean view, entertainment center and kitchen, and spa bath. Yes, I could get used to this.

I truly believe that anyone who commits to this kind of week-long writing intensive, at the prices that get charged for them, is ready to move to another, professional level, and I’ve never been disappointed in the calibre of students.

We had a fantastic dinner and got to know each other a bit, and out of 25 people about half are either psychiatric professionals or law enforcement or social welfare. Unbelievable stories at dinner, I’m so psyched to be here – as usual, I’m going to learn every bit as much and more as the students.

—–

Funny, here, how it’s incredibly cloudy, layered and stormy and brooding and you look away for a second and when you look back the whole sky has gone dazzlingly sunny, just the slightest wisps of clouds. I have noticed, oh man, have I, how Southern temperaments are just like that weather. Violent moods and storms that shake the earth and are forgotten in the next minute. Not what I’m used to.

It’s another warm day but not so humid, easier. I’m on the terrace again (and that sweet smell is jasmine, I found the vines) and I am noticing that in the overgrown yard next door there is a swing set, rusting, covered in brambles. Tragic. It would be lovely to swing and look out over the ocean. But an overgrown swing set is a good image…

Romance conferences are great – for many reasons, but what I’m thinking of specifically right now is the swag. Authors who can’t come contribute these extravagant giveaways for the swag bags – lush beauty products, flavored condoms, chocolate lip gloss, chocolate cock suckers (chocolate, chocolate, women and chocolate – someone’s in the kitchen right now making double chocolate biscotti). Once in a while there’s even a mini-vibrator. I used the body lotion from my bag and now, in the sun, my whole skin is sparkling with tiny iridescent flakes – the label on the bottle says it’s mica. It’s making me feel like a mermaid or something.

People here are great. The entire house is now vibrating with deep creativity. Four of us who just had their periods have started them again from all the free-floating estrogen, just like in college. Everyone is so excited. And for me there is nothing like being able to draw a fantastic plot line out of a beginning writer – who up until that second didn’t even think she could do it. I tell people: “You would not have had the idea if you were not capable of executing it.” (Something I am always fervently hoping for myself…)

Whether they do execute it or not, you never know – that’s more about endurance and a certain ruthlessness than about talent. But I have been privileged and proud to see people I taught show up at a conference a year later with book deals – NOT saying I did it, but that I could see that it would happen, and told them so.

—PM—–

I taught my class again today and people are now constantly laughing out loud in surprise when they saw how brilliantly formulaic film structure is and how much easier their lives are going to be from now on, knowing a few simple tricks.

And my horror chick is a real author. One of those that I wouldn’t dare give notes to, she is so dead on about what she’s doing. Naturally the most nervous one here, almost fainted before she had to read, and the most surprised that what she’s written is what it is. And it is so great and logical and right that the Universe has put her here because I’m one of the few women out there writing what she’s writing and I will be able to save her about a year of grief and possible disaster when it comes time to get an agent, the right agent, and between me and my other dark female author friends we can help her navigate what’s going to be her new life.

(And this happens over and over and over again at these workshops and conferences – for authors, for aspiring authors, for me personally. If you do it, the Universe understands that you’re serious about your writing and lifts you to the next step in a way you could never do for yourself.)

She’s one of the ones I bonded with last night, staying up way too late watching an excruciatingly bad horror movie called Orphan. But finally there was a plot twist so sublimely ludicrous we were screaming, laughing – worth ever single minute we wasted with the rest of the movie.

Sunset was about three hours long, wave after wave of color crashing over the clouds, with a full moon on top of that, and dinner was Fettuccini Alfredo, from scratch.

No. It doesn’t suck.

——

Things I love about this place.

– The spiral staircase, going up three floors, that polished, cherry wood…

– The elephant tapestries on the second floor. Ganesh, god of happiness.

– The knockout 180 view of the ocean you get walking through the archway into the living room.

– The theme of palms – I’ve always loved that as a design element anyway, and I was in THE palm room, they were on everything, pillows, pictures, shower tiles, ceiling fan. Just like the Atlantic ocean is a softer ocean than the Pacific, these are softer palms than California palms, feathery and feminine.

– That sea foam. Didn’t Venus come from sea foam – the sperm of Zeus? Never got how of course the Greeks would think that, before this trip. Totally fitting for a romance retreat.

– Omg, the food. As anyone who has read this blog for a while has no doubt noticed I am NOT a foodie but we have had some spectacular meals – one night crab legs and oysters, which were cracked and fed to us by the Charlestonians – this beautiful auburn-haired lithe elegant woman named Kathy, with the sexiest, butteriest accent – standing in front of me with a knife and opening oysters for me – full well knowing the picture she was creating and the primal pleasure of it all…

– And sparkly Lisa from Florida, who owns an apparently quite famous bakery/café in St. Augustine, the Cookery, made a five course Hungarian feast: sweet beets with sour cream, flat herbed egg noodles for goulash, this incredible sour cream and dill cucumber salad, green beans. And homemade, soft granola in the morning… ummm….

– The surfers. It cracks me up to see surfers trying to surf the baby waves here, but some of these guys were actually catching some rides…. Mystifying. Looked great in the wetsuits, too.

– The butterflies – so many of them, little animas, everywhere, fluttering right in front of our faces, fearless: bright yellow ones and tiger-striped.

– The company of women. The comfort level – open, loving, supportive, sexy, giggly, earthy, hilarious.

—-

As you can probably tell, I had a cosmically wonderful time, and got some seriously good teaching done.

And yet I kept getting these anxiety – not attacks, but prickles, that I was not getting any of my own work done, that any time I had a free moment, not that there were many, I’d walk on the beach or get talked into another horror movie marathon or just sit on the porch baking in the sun and staring out at the ocean.

Why do we do that to ourselves?

I’ve been touring NON-STOP for over a month now, because of the Halloween thing and because The Harrowing came out in the U.K. in September. It was a total, Universal gift to have a week on the beach, in such overwhelmingly beautiful circumstances. I wasn’t slacking, I was teaching, and yet I was beating myself up that I had gotten no further on deciding my next book (that would be after the next TWO that I’m writing at the moment).

Is there not something a little crazy about that?

Well, finally I relaxed and decided I was just going to take the gift. And maybe instead of forcing a decision on my next book, I will just listen, and see what I might be being told to write, if I just manage to stay quiet enough to hear.

So that’s my message today. We’re given all these gifts, all the time. Life is so abundant, and a writer’s life seemingly even more so – just magic things, all the time. Do you take the gifts you’re given? Doesn’t it work better that way?

CRAZYWOOD

By Stephen Jay Schwartz

Comparing the world of publishing to the world of filmmaking as I did in my last blog reminded me of the fact that, while I hate Hollywood, I really love Hollywood.

I’m not alone. Anyone who only loves Hollywood has never really met Hollywood. Hollywood is a deceitful little bitch, but God she’s cute. Sure, she can be admired from afar, but if you get too close, those little vampire teeth start to come out.

But I do have some telling stories about my days as a D-Guy, and one came to mind the other day….

This is the story of how I made the transition from being an Assistant to being a Story Editor when I was working for film director Wolfgang Petersen. I ultimately transitioned to Director of Development, but the real crucial segue happened at this earlier stage, when I found it essential to prove that I had enough “story sense” to become a D-Guy.

By the way, this is a tale that reveals more about the dysfunctional chaos of Hollywood than it does about the qualifications I did or did not have to fill the position.

At the time, there were two people in our development office: a Director of Development, and me, the lowly Assistant. It was her job to find the next big Wolfgang Petersen project, and my job well, to answer phones. But, as anyone in Hollywood will tell you, most of the submissions are read by the assistants first. Especially if that assistant wants to move up the ladder.

Now, I knew the kind of films Wolfgang wanted to direct. Big films with a social or political theme, films that dealt with universal issues, with social ramifications that could be felt around the world. “Outbreak” was a great example of the kind of idea that excited him—how one little virus could polarize a nation, could ultimately take out a significant number of the world’s population if it wasn’t held in check. What would we, as Americans, do to stop this from happening? Would we destroy an American town? These were the kinds of questions Wolfgang liked to consider.

So I received this spec script submission and, by God, it had everything I knew Wolfgang was looking for. It was a very complex story about an American scientist who discovers a plot to bring a Russian nuclear weapon into America and detonate it in New York City. It was a very smart script, much more akin to “The French Connection” than to any of the popcorn terrorist scripts that had been circulating at the time. But the plot was so complicated it required a very focused reading just to “get it.”

There were clearly problems with the script. But they were problems that could be addressed in development. The important thing was that it was a smart political thriller that met Wolfgang’s requirements. I felt that he should know about it and at least have the opportunity to read it and say “yes” or “no.” The Director of Development wasn’t willing to stand behind the project. She said that I was free to pitch it to Wolfgang if I wanted.

Now, I wasn’t really sold on the script as it stood; I was sold on what it could grow into, with Wolfgang’s guidance. But I had to make a decision – do I stick my neck out for this or not? I decided I would.

That decision was the key that turned the switch to Crazywood.

Wolfgang didn’t have time to read the script, but, based on my pitch, he felt we should go for it. Go for it…what the fuck did that mean?

His producing partner turned to me and said, “Well, that’s it then. It better be good, Steve.”

And we went for it. Which meant that we took the script to our studio and asked them to purchase it for us. Suddenly Wolfgang was “attached” to the project. And the town reacted.

Now, remember, I was THE ONLY ONE at the company who had read this script. And suddenly every production company in town was demanding to see it, and many were passing it up the ladder and submitting it to their studios.

But no one really took the time to READ the script. Those who did, read it quickly, paying little attention to the details. As things started heating up my producer came to me and said, “Steve, I’m getting all these calls from producers I know and no one understands this script – they can’t follow the story. Either you’re a genius or you’re duping this whole town.”

Okay. No pressure there.

So the studio where we had our first-look deal passed on the project, which freed us up to take it to other studios.

What happened next characterizes the world of Hollywood and is the stuff that keeps the sane from crossing the Arizona border into California.

Now, Universal Studios had just hired a new President of Production, and this guy was intent upon making a name for himself, and quick. He was determined to create relationships with top film directors by purchasing their pet projects and launching them into production. So, when he saw that Wolfgang was “attached” to this spec script, he swooped in and made a preemptive purchase of the script for 500 against 1.2.

That means that the writer was paid $500,000 for the script and, if it went into production, he would get another $700,000.

Just to make sure that we’re all on the same page here—this studio executive had not read the script.

When the dust settled and people actually READ the script, everyone turned to me and said, “What’s this story about?”

It was at this point that I was bumped up from Assistant to Story Editor.

I sat down and wrote a 25-page, beat-for-beat synopsis of the script, putting it in the simplest terms I possibly could. I never said the script was ready to go, I only said that it seemed like the kind of material Wolfgang would like. Suddenly I was responsible for a $1.2 million dollar deal and a marriage between Wolfgang and Universal Studios.

But wait, it gets worse.

This was the exact moment when a little studio called Dreamworks was born. Spielberg, Katzenberg and Geffen. They were their own studio, but they existed on the Universal lot. They had a deal and a working relationship with Universal. They had been developing a project that would become their very first feature film. The storyline had been kept under wraps from everyone except the most inside of Hollywood insiders.

As it happens, it was exactly the same story as the spec script Universal had just purchased for Wolfgang. Suddenly we were in a war with Spielberg.

And this was a huge embarrassment for the new President of Production for Universal, who really should have known what was being developed at his own lot. He shouldn’t have gone out and bought a project that competed directly with the debut film from their boy wonder’s new film company.

Spielberg got hold of our project and read it and agreed that it was a smart script. He suggested that we combine efforts, with Dreamworks producing and Wolfgang directing. We read their project and we agreed that ours was smarter, more interesting, more realistic. But ours still needed a huge amount of development work. Spielberg’s project was almost ready to go. Wolfgang declined their offer and we went to work on developing the script we had purchased.

Dreamworks moved quickly and cast their project with George Clooney and Nicole Kidman. We were still rewriting drafts of our project when they went into production for “The Peacemaker.”

“The Peacemaker” was no “French Connection.” It was the popcorn version of what could have been an extraordinary film about the real-life consequences of the fall of the Soviet Union. But it was Dreamworks’ first film and its release effectively killed our project. So, our writer never did get that additional $700,000.

But the process gave me my Story Editor stripes. I think my salary was bumped up to $35,000 per year.

As crazy as this was, how could it not be fun? How could I hate Hollywood when the ride was always this dynamic? It was great, as long as I didn’t put my heart into it. The day I really began to care was the day I had to leave. And heal.

* * *

On a completely different note, I wanted to post a link to my interview on “Connie Martinson Talks Books.” Connie has been doing author interviews for almost thirty years and I was very honored to have been chosen to participate in her series.

Something to Bridge the Gap

By Brett Battles

So this week has been a very interesting one for me. By interesting, I mean…well, let’s just say there’s an installment of AT PLAY IN THE FIELD OF THE WRITTEN WORD coming up, and it’s a doozy. Can’t do it this week because a few things are still up in the air, but should be raring to go in two weeks.

That said, what has been going on has kept me a little occupied, so I hope you’ll excuse me if I post something that has appeared on-line before. It’s a short story.

Now, I haven’t written a ton of short stories. In fact, with the exception of several flash fiction piece (one of which is below), I’ve really only written two average length shorts. One is a sci-fi piece I worked on about ten years ago, but never really did anything with. And the other was “Perfect Gentleman,” the story that appeared in the KILLER YEAR ANTHOLOGY in 2008. (Side note: I am very honored by the fact that “Perfect Gentleman” was also selected by Tyrus Books to be included with their recently released BETWEEN THE DARK AND THE DAYLIGHT AND 27 MORE OF THE BEST CRIME & MYSTERY STORIES OF THE YEAR anthology.)

So, I guess what I’m saying is that while I don’t do a lot of short fiction, I do enjoy it. Anyway, on to the story. For those of you unfamiliar with Flash Fiction, it refers to short stories that are limited to a certain small word count, quite often 1000 words. In this case, the limit was 500.

Apologies to those of you who’ve already read it.

CAFÉ LATTE

By Brett Battles

“The large one.”

“You mean venti?” the barista asked. She was probably just barely out of high school.

“Sure. Venti. That’s the large, right?” the man asked.

“That’s the large.”

“Good.”

“Can I get your name?”

The man looked around. “Why? Is there a line?”

There was no line.

“Right. Sorry. I’m a little nervous,” she said.

“This your first day?”

“No. Third.”

“You’re doing fine.”

And she was, too. Her customer service was all he could have expected.

“How much?” he asked.

She hesitated for a moment like she hadn’t understood what he was saying, then shook herself and rang up his drink.

“Three forty-five,” she said.

“Annie.” It was one of her co-workers. The red-headed kid who looked like he could use a little sun. “Just give it to him.”

“It’s okay,” the man said. “I don’t mind paying.”

He pulled a five dollar bill out of his pocket and handed it to the girl. Once she had given him his change, he dumped it all in the tip jar.

While the rest of her co-workers and pretty much everyone in the coffee shop watched, Annie made the made a venti latte. No one offered to help, but she seemed to have everything under control.

Somewhere in the distance, there was the faint sound of a siren.

The man waited contentedly as she finished frothing up the milk and adding it to his cup. Once she was done, she put a lid on top and slipped a safety sleeve around the base. Her hands weren’t even shaking as she handed the drink to him.

The sirens were closer now, probably only six or seven blocks away. The man took a sip of the latte, then smiled.

“This is great.”

“Thanks,” Annie said.

“You have a good day,” he told her.

“You, too.”

Except for his footsteps on the tiled floor, the coffee shop was silent. Everyone’s eyes were on him, but he acted like he didn’t notice. The only abnormal thing he did was step over the dead body of the would-be robber lying in the middle of the floor.

The unlucky bastard’s gun was still in his hand. An ancient .38 special. God only knew how much damage the kid had done with it in the past.

As the assassin opened the front door, he glanced back at the counter. Annie was still there, watching him. As he gave her a little wave, she mouthed the words, “Thank you.”

He smiled and walked out to his car. A glance at his watch told him he was still ahead of schedule. That was fine. It was never good to kill someone when you were in a rush.

_________________________

Read a good short story lately? Tell us about it. And, if you can, tells us where to find it.

Take Back That Stapler

by Rob Gregory Browne

Everyone steals.

Oh, don’t try to deny it. You know you’ve done it at one time or another in your life, even if that theft was something as innocuous as the really nice stapler you took from work.

But there are different kinds of theft, aren’t there? Different levels.

Yes, you can say stealing is stealing, but I would certainly never get upset about that stapler — I mean, really, who cares other than the company bean counter or the secretary whose desk you swiped it from?

I mean, we’re not talking someone’s car, right?

But stealing is stealing and it’s quite common in our society.

Kids steal each other’s toys. Teenagers steal music. Friends steal each other’s spouses. Or maybe borrow them once in awhile. Yet that’s still stealing in a way, isn’t it?

People who are particularly bold may walk into a bank and steal money from an unsuspecting teller. Or step into a Seven Eleven and force the counter man to empty out the cash register.

It happens all the time, and we crime writers make our livings because of it.

We can forgive the minor crimes — the stapler stealing — but the larger thefts, depending on who the victim is, tend to get us a bit riled up. Probably because they scare us. And if we’re the victim, if things are personal, we get very scared indeed.

We feel violated.

When I was in my twenties, my beautiful soon to be wife and I were living in an apartment complex in Santa Barbara, California.

Late one night, out of the blue, a work friend of mine showed up at the apartment, wanting to hang out and have a drink. He even brought the beer.

I was a little surprised to see him, but we sat down, drank the beers as we shot the bull. About twenty minutes passed and my friend abruptly stood up and said he had to go. And he never did explain why he had stopped by in the first place.

The next morning, I went out to my car, only to discover that it had been broken into and my tape deck and a box full of cassette tapes were gone.

And I had to wonder. Had my friend set me up? Could he have been distracting me while a cohort stole my car stereo?

These were, of course, questions that never got answered. Although I suspected him — didn’t want to, but did — I never said a word to him about the incident and we continued to be friends for a couple more years before my wife and I moved back to Honolulu.

But what never went away was that feeling of being violated. And I think that’s how we can measure the severity of theft. By how violated the victim feels.

I was recently violated in a different way.

The theft did not scare me. No tangible item was actually taken from me. But I felt violated nevertheless.

Still do.

Nearly a decade ago, I wrote an article that was published on my website. That article was subsequently published many different places on the web, including here on Murderati and in an international print magazine I used to write a column for.

A couple months ago, I got an email from a reader who thought she had spotted some possible plagiarism of that article. She had read it and had stumbled across an excerpt from a book that was posted on the web and some of the content of that excerpt looked suspiciously familiar.

I investigated and lo and behold, the author of the excerpt had lifted entire passages from my article. Word for word.

With no credit to me. No link to my original article.

There wasn’t a huge amount of theft involved, just a few short passages, as well as a way of describing a writing concept that I feel is original with me, but when you see your own words being credited to someone else — in a published book, no less — that tends to make you feel a bit victimized.

I won’t go into any details. I’ve had exchanges with the author and the publisher and came up with a solution to the problem that I think is fair, and I feel no need to go public with the details.

But for the life of me, I can’t understand how someone can do something like that. I can see inadvertent theft of someone’s work — a lot of ideas are similar, and sometimes we borrow without actually realizing we’re doing it.

But word for word? I just can’t quite get my head around the idea of copying someone else’s work and claiming it as your own. What kind of person does that? It just makes no sense to me.

So I feel victimized. And, yes, I’ll get over it in time, but no matter how much time goes by, I’ll still be shaking my head at the audacity of it all.

If you’re going to take credit for something you didn’t write, for chrissakes, at least don’t be so blatant about it.

Have a little class.

Or stick to staplers.

—————————————

Today’s question: Have you ever had anything stolen from you? If so, how did you feel?

who are your readers?

by Tess Gerritsen

Last weekend, Michael Palmer and I taught a writing workshop in Cape Cod. One of the participants asked a question: “Who are your readers?” It’s a very good question, but it’s one for which authors have only a hazy answer. Because, for the most part, we’re not certain. We get a general idea based on the fan mail we receive, and we see who turns out at book signings, but as for real statistics? For the most part, we’re just guessing. I suspected that my readership reflected the general readership of fiction readers in the country: 75% female, on the older side. And the audiences at my book signings tend to support that general female/male ratio. But these are just spot samplings, and I had no hard numbers.

Then I got back a survey of readers around the country, which checked the demographics of my readership. And what I’d suspected to be true has turned out to be pretty accurate.

— Women were four times more likely than men to rate me as one of their favorite authors. (Which is actually not all that different from other female mystery writers.)

— My readership tends to be on the older side, with the percentage peaking in the 45 – 54 age group. Again, this is probably right in line with other authors.

— My readership tends to also like mystery, thrillers, horror — and romance. But I have very few readers who also favor graphic novels, manga, and science fiction.

— My book THE KEEPSAKE was most popular among two groups: those under 18, and those between 55-64.

— No surprise, many of my readers work in the healthcare industry.

These results are just for the U.S. I have a feeling that those numbers might be slightly different outside the country, just based on who attends my signings overseas. At some of my UK and German booksignings, the male/female ratio has been close to 1:1. And the only time I’ve ever had a man approach me in a hotel lobby to ask if I was Tess Gerritsen, it happened in Berlin.

My reader demographics are probably similar to those of other female mystery authors. What can we all gather from this?

Our readers are primarily female, and older. I also have a fan base that’s under 18, but once a reader hits their twenties, it seems their novel reading slows down for a few decades. They’re busy with college, marriage, motherhood, and careers, so it’s not surprising they might cut down on their pleasure reading. But once the kids are raised, and they have more control over their lives, women seem to go back to reading again. I’m not sure there’s much we can do to snag more of those 18 – 40 year-old women readers.

As for the male readers, obviously I have a ways to go. But then, so do we all. How do we get more men to read us? How do we convince them that, yes, a woman writer can tell a story they’d enjoy? That’s the challenge.

Master Class

by Pari

For the past two weeks, I’ve been struggling with how to write about my experience in the writing master class I took in Oregon.

Short version:
Grueling, exhausting. Life changing, transformative.

Medium version:
Other than childbirth, it was the most difficult thing I’ve ever done in my life. And I know my writing and writing career changed forever the minute I committed to the process.

Long version:

This is where I get stumped. Where to start? Do I try to describe the schedule? It was basically boot-camp style – I kid you not. Daily classes from 10 am – 1:30 or 2 pm. Go work on assignments. Eat. Classes from 7 pm to 11 or later. Go work on assignments. To bed between 1:30 (really, really early) and 4 am. Get up by 8:30. Shower, shake the cobwebs off. Have breakfast and start all over again. Fourteen days solid.

Do I talk about the technique and style & content exercises we did to improve craft and to study writing genius on a daily basis? Do I talk about the short stories we wrote that stretched every single one of us so far and hard that we can never look at ourselves in the same way again? Have you ever written a 10,000+-word story in less than 72 hours while going to at least 8 hours of classes daily and having other assignments as well? What about the anthology we had to create with stories we – and former class participants – wrote? We were given a word count, budget and payment guidelines and three days to go through more than 100 stories to create a table of contents and then be able to defend the decisions we made. Boy, does that give a person perspective on an editor’s life.

Do I discuss the overwhelming amount of information we got on business – how to read contracts, copyright; the history of the publishing industry; the game we “played” that simulates the life of a writer over the course of 8 years—complete with bad and good life events, books and short stories sold; the lectures on strategies to really earn a living; the cautions about shooting yourself in the foot? Do I talk about the pitches and proposals we wrote for new novels (I hadn’t gone to the class with any ideas and came back with many viable ones)—sometimes several a day?

Do I try to recount all the myths about craft and business that we writers live with and promote . . . and the way the instructors blasted so many I can’t even begin to remember them all?

Do I spend hours pouring over the two full notebooks of notes I took to try to give a hint of everything that we did and learned during those fourteen days?

The problem is, I’m still stunned. Really.

Stunned.

The instructors told us it would take months before we realized some of what we learned, that years later we’d be surprised with the insights we’d acquired without realizing.

So . . .

Here I stand. Altered. And unsure just how deep those lessons went in.

Before I stop this lengthy host, please indulge me. I want to give a shout out to the Kip, Misty, Amy and the others at the Anchor Inn in Lincoln City. If you want a writer-friendly place to stay, go there. Just go.

Now for the main instructors: Dean Wesley Smith, Kristine Rusch, Loren L. Coleman, Phaedra Weldon, Christina York, Shelly McArthur (Yes! Shelly from the Mystery Bookstore in LA; he’s landed in Lincoln City and has a wonderful bookstore there: North by Northwest), Ginjer Buchanan, John Douglas (there were also several local writers who helped with the class and served as acquiring editors for our pitches in the game; I’m sorry I don’t know all of their names.)

And watch for books and short stories from my fellow classmates who are among the most dedicated and talented writers I know: Mike Jasper, Susan Wingate, Darren Eggett, Kamila Miller, Bob Sojka, Carolyn Nicita, Jane Killick, Ryan Williams, Thea Hutcheson, Paul Tseng, Michael Bellomo, Mario Milosevic, Brenda Carre.

Today my question to you is simple: Have you ever attended an intensive class or workshop that left you altered for life?

writer chat…

by Toni McGee Causey

This weekend, I’m at the most amazing writer’s retreat with a group of friends; we’re overlooking a gorgeous bay with cerulean blue skies, giant white cranes lazily circling the docks as competent white motorboats slide past in the bay. The weather has been stunning—low 80s, clear, light breezes—and the food has been wonderful. And in spite of all of that beauty, we managed an amazing amount of work done. This is the first time I’ve done this sort of a gathering of writers with a goal of workshopping (brainstorming) and it’s been one of the best weekends, ever.

What made it even more of a joy was that the writers I got to spend time with are women I respect and admire, whose writing styles span several genres and who have a great enthusiasm for storytelling at its finest. One of those women happens to also be a friend, CJ Lyons, who has a terrific new book out this week called URGENT CARE

I asked CJ a few fun questions that I’d like to share with you today, because it’s always a kick to me to ask questions of long-time friends and still be surprised by their answers.

Question: If you were to go to the great Coffee Shop in the sky, which five authors would you love to meet for conversations?

CJ: Hemingway, Dumas, Rilke, E. E. “Doc” Smith, and Shakespeare.

The reason for those five is that they know how to tell a damned good story and captivate your imagination. Hemingway could use very few words to evoke large emotions. Dumas understood the complexities of people as well as their society. Rilke for his ability to paint with words. Doc Smith for his ability to imagine new worlds and Shakespeare because he understood that it was as important to laugh as to cry.

Question: Who inspired you?

Ray Bradbury.

He was the first author that I read that understood that adult themes were not out of bounds for kids and didn’t talk down to children. He also introduced me to the idea of words, other than poetry, being able to portray emotion more than just creating action on the page.

Question: How long have you been writing and how did you know you wanted to write fiction?

Actually, I guess I’ve been writing fiction all my life, because I’ve been telling stories all my life. I had a hard time telling the difference between reality and not-quite-so-truthful reality, which ended up giving me a lot of time in “time out”… which, of course, meant I had more time to create new stories.

I was an early reader and an early writer. In grade school I created a Civil War saga about a blind orphan girl and her horse—because there always has to be a horse—who rescued other orphans from Confederate marauders. I didn’t write for publication until 2003 when I joined RWA and entered the Golden Heart contest (where I finaled) and I sold that book six months later.

Question: Tell me a little bit about your background which helps to give your current series so much verisimilitude?

My background includes 17 years of practicing pediatrics and pediatric emergency medicine in some of the east coast’s busiest trauma centers. Also, I lived in Pittsburg, where the series is set. But the most important thing is understanding the emotional costs of practicing medicine while working in an urban ER, because the stories are not just about the medicine, they’re about the people and their relationships. The idea for the series was that it wasn’t medicine that saves lives, but people who save lives.

Question: Your newest book hit the bookstands last Tuesday. Tell me about URGENT CARE.

URGENT CARE is darker and more emotional than the first two books. In it, ER Charge Nurse Nora Halloran must face her greatest fear when the man who attacked her two years ago returned and is now killing his victims.

Question: What is the funniest thing (non-X-rated) that you’ve ever seen in the ER.

Well, I was amazed to learn just how many men changed their light bulbs while naked and where the light bulb ends up. Note to the wise: wear jeans.

Here’s the summary of URGENT CARE, which I know is a terrific read because I had the great fortune of getting to read this in an earlier draft and was wowed by it:

URGENT CARE (Berkley/Jove, October 2009) by CJ Lyons. An ER charge nurse must face her deepest fears when the man who sexually assaulted her returns…only now he’s killing his victims. CJ Lyons’ novels give readers “a powerful and dramatic look into the frenzied world of emergency medicine…Lyons’ characters are dynamic and genuine.” ~Suspense Magazine

About CJ:

As a pediatric ER doctor, CJ Lyons has lived the life she writes about in her cutting edge suspense novels. Her debut, LIFELINES (Berkley, March 2008), became a National Bestseller and Publishers Weekly proclaimed it a “breathtakingly fast-paced medical thriller.” The second in the series, WARNING SIGNS, was released January, 2009 and the third, URGENT CARE, on October 27, 2009. Contact her at http://www.cjlyons.net

So even though CJ’s story is a very dark tale, I’d love to know what’s the funniest / silliest / craziest thing you (or a relative or friend) managed to do that called for a visit to the ER.