Fun With Guns

by Jennifer Harlow

"Write what you know" is practical advice for writers. Writing can be a bit like method acting, you pull emotions and experiences from within yourself and put them on the page. This is hard for us mystery/horror writers. Most of us, I hope, have never known someone who was murdered or killed someone ourselves.(I especially hope it's true about that last one.) We want to get close to that edge but not go all the way. This is where research comes in. There are certain things that every writer of mystery or crime novels should know. A little about forensics, the law, police investigations, how to kill someone and what the body does when you do, and what it feels like to shoot a gun. The first four can be accomplished through research, but the last really should be done in real life.

Really, because it's really f%$#@^g fun.

Though I grew up with three brothers and a revolving door of brothers friends living with us, I always ended up being the one to do guy things with my dad. I was the one who tossed the ball around with him in the backyard. I was the one who went fishing with him. And I was the one who he invited to go shooting with him. I had a little experience with shooting as when I was a child of five I fired my first rifle. I just remember a huge bang, pain in my shoulder, and my father, who was behind me, comforting me afterwards. It would be thirteen years before I'd pick up a gun again.

I grew up around guns. Though we lived in the suburbs my dad loved collecting them. Pistols, rifles, even an AK before they became illegal. They were always under lock and key but on occasion he'd pull one out to clean it. They scared me. They could kill people. But as I got older and started to read mystery novels I became more and more fascinated with them. Could I hit the target? What did it feel like to hold a death machine in my hand? When my dad bought my brother a BB gun he quickly got bored with it, but I'd spend hours in the backyard hitting cans on the fence. At eighteen I felt I was ready to graduate to the real thing.

I was nervous when I walked into the shooting range. I was afraid I'd shatter my ear drum. I was afraid it'd hurt my arms. Mostly I was afraid I'd make an ass of myself. And I did. Because no matter how many guns my dad had, he had never shot a one of them since that time I was a kid. But I didn't know that at the time. (More on that later.) I shot a Glock 9mm at first. It was heavy in my hands, heavier than I thought it would be. And when it came time to pull the trigger I was in for a shock. The force was hard, like someone shoving me back. Even with the mufflers the sound made me wince. But...I could feel the power in my hands. And I hit the target seven out of ten times! I left that range feeling like hot shit. Dad and I went twice more, and I went once with my brother, but it was an expensive hobby and I got really busy. I didn't pick up a gun for seven years. Then I moved to California.

My family was worried about me living alone across the country, though I had two roommates, so they insisted I get a gun. A month before I moved Dad and I walked into a gun store, and about two hours later I walked out with a .38 Smith & Wesson revolver (Virginia has very lax gun regulations, not sure that's a good thing.) I put it away and mostly forgot about it until things got nuts in CA. It was a tough time, and working out and screaming into my pillow three times a day just wasn't cutting it anymore. Though I was nervous to walk into a shooting range alone I did it anyway. There I was, firing away, when an elderly man saddled up beside me. At first I thought he was a freak, but then he told me I was doing everything wrong. My stance, my breathing, how I pulled the trigger was totally wrong. (Thanks, Dad.) Here is the wisdom he imparted:

1. Feet shoulder length apart and flat.

2. Use tea cup grip-one hand on base of handle and other around it

3. Lock your elbows

4. Don't put your finger on the trigger until the last moment

5. Keep both your eyes open

6. As you're about to fire take a deep breath, letting it out as you squeeze, not pull the trigger

7. Rinse and repeat

By doing this, I hit the target 10 out of 10 times. So thank you anonymous gun enthusiast. I now know how to kill someone more effectively.

Guns should be considered a tool. Like a chainsaw you need to read the instructions and practice before you use it. It's a good skill to have. And it does make you feel like a badass. I just pray none of us ever really need to know how to use this particular tool.

I’ll Get To It…Eventually

by Alan

We’re writers.

We’re experts at certain things. Procrastination is one of them. Here are my Top Ten Ways For Writers to Procrastinate

(Warning: Do Not Try This At Home).

10. Research every possible detail in the book, including the Zagat reviews of the restaurants where your characters eat.

9. Tell yourself that re-reading To Kill A Mockingbird will put you in the right mood.

8. Dig out all those books on writing to help you power through those rough spots.

7. Revise your first paragraph over and over (and over), even though you know it will be gone by the time you’ve reached your final draft.

6. Go to the kitchen to get a snack. You can’t be expected to do your best work on an empty stomach!

5. Explore the many, uh, faces of Photoshop (see picture above).

4. Aren’t those cat pictures on Facebook adorable?

3. Don’t treat the thesaurus as a tool, but as an afternoon excursion.

2. One word: nap.

 

And the number one way for writers to procrastinate:

Think up Top Ten Lists.

INKSPOT NEWS, MARCH 3, 2012

Lois Winston will be giving a talk and signing copies of Assault With a Deadly Glue Gun and Death By Killer Mop Doll today from 1pm - 2:30pm at
Foxtale Book Shoppe

105 East Main St., #138, Woodstock, GA
FMI: 770-516-9989

Deborah Sharp, author of the Mace Bauer Mysteries featuring Mace's wacky ''Mama,'' will be among a host of nationally prominent authors at Sleuthfest in Orlando this weekend. Join her bright and early today, at 9 am, for the panel: Laugh if You Must (Dying is Easy; Comedy is Hard). Panelmates include Elaine Viets, Donna Andrews, and Joelle Charbonneau. Vincent O'Neil moderates.

Robin Allen, author of the clean, humorous Poppy Markham: Culinary Cop mystery series, will be one of six featured authors at the Bulverde/Spring Branch Library Book & Author Luncheon. Other authors include Stephen Harrigan and Jenny Wingfield.
Wednesday, March 7, 2012

11:00 AM - 2:30 PM

Spring Hill Event Center

2455 Celebration Drive

San Antonio, TX  78261

Milestone Mania

a guest post from Midnight Ink author, Sue Ann Jaffarian

This week marked a major milestone in my writing career – I completed and turned into my publisher my 7th Odelia Grey mystery novel, or, more importantly, my 12th mystery novel in total. Twelve. Four quarters. A dozen. Wow, it astounds me to no end, especially when I clearly remember holding my first completed (and still unpublished) novel in my hands fourteen years ago. It was just a stack of printed white copy paper – not quite a ream – and contained my dream of becoming a published author. It was my first milestone in this long journey.

I was also reminded this week that I've been with my current employer six years. When I came to work here, I had two novels published: Too Big To Miss and The Curse of the Holy Pail. That means in the past six years I've written ten novels spread out across three different series, and held down a demanding day job.

During the fourteen years since I wrote that first novel, I have moved twice, had five employers (and gone two rounds with unemployment), and had three serious boyfriends. I've battled depression, and nearly ended up broke and on the streets twice. But I never lost sight of my dream and kept plugging away, often on hand-me-down computers.

I'm not saying this to garner ooohs and ahhhs, or any sort of kudos or sympathy, but to point out what can be done if 1) you want it bad enough, and 2) you want it bad enough. Only if you want something so much it hurts, will you make the commitment to make it happen, no matter what the obstacles.

The only sure-fire way to fail is to give up.

I've also hit another writing milestone and it involves change. After careful consideration, I decided to move my popular Ghost of Granny Apples series to a bigger publisher with wider distribution, and have agreed to a two-book deal with Berkley for Granny Apples books #4 and #5.

It's not easy to move an on-going series to a new publisher, but the timing was right for the Granny Apples series. Its popularity is growing and sales are strong. The third book in the series, Gem of a Ghost, was just released and going gangbusters. It was now or never. And going to a larger publisher doesn't necessarily mean bigger and better sales. Granny and I are going to have to earn our stripes all over again. I'm up for it, if she is.

The Odelia Grey mysteries will remain with Midnight Ink, where they are contracted through book twelve. I will begin the 8th book in the series next week and look forward to writing it as much as I did the earlier books. The 7th book in the series, Hide and Snoop, will be released September 2012.

I'd better get busy … I see many more milestones ahead of me and want to reach them all.

Processing My Process (or Not)

by Sheila Webster Boneham

Most people have a vague notion of what writers do, and an even hazier notion of what we do.

Was that vague and hazy enough for you? Okay, let me try to explain. I’ve been writing professionally and teaching writing classes for [mumbles incoherently] years, so if I can’t tell you what it is that I do do, I may be in trouble. I bring all this confusion up because a couple of people have asked me recently about my "writing process," and I’ve been processing the question. Most English departments teach writing process as a theoretical necessity.

So what's the theory? Since the 1970s or so, "writing process" has been thought of as a five-part approach to writing.

1. First, they tell us, we "prewrite," which essentially means we figure out what we want to write and who might read it, and we brainstorm what we should include and research the things we need to learn or confirm.
2. Then we "draft," and when we have something that is more or less presentable, we show it to other people for feedback. (Note - "other people" should be neither your mother, who will love anything you write, nor the rabid Tasmanian devils we sometimes find in critique groups.)
3. Next, we "revise." This is a step that many new(ish) writers resist. That’s sad, for them and their work and, if they put it into the public realm, for their readers as well. Revision is the real writing in serious writing for most of us.
4. The fourth designated step is "proofreading." Yes, writers, please proofread. Okay, confession time. I’m a lazy bum about proofreading when I post quickly online. Manuscripts and galleys, though, are subject to my fine-toothed comb to check for my own errors and those inserted by gremlins during the production process. Alas, some still get by, but without the effort, they all would. And proofreading must be done by actually reading, not just by electronic "checkers."
5. The final step in formal process is "publishing," which is used in the old-fashioned sense of "to make public" by sharing. Publication may be what we usually think of – print – or it may be public performance or even simply putting the work in front of a limited group of family or friends.

Is that the way creative people work? I'm sure some do. The five-step process approach may help some people take their first steps as writers, rather like learning the scales helps a fledgeling musician or practicing brush strokes helps the begining painter.

Mostly I think of the traditional five-step construct is a nice way to pretend that we understand what we do when we "go creative."

Back to my readers' questions about my process. Is it the five-step approach? Well, sort of, but my way into, around, and back out of my work is much less tidy. Rather than an orderly multi-course meal, I prefer the deliciousness of creative work in more of a one-dish affair.

Take Drop Dead on Recall, my first mystery (which will be out in October!). It began with a first line that popped into my head as I was driving home from a dog obedience trial. I had a victim with a name. I had a crime, although no idea how it was committed, or by whom. I had a setting. I knew I had a book. I even had a narrator’s voice, although the narrator herself was a bit vague. On its way to publication, the book has gone through all the steps, but definitely not in a linear progression. Not even close.

Beyond that, I can't tell you exactly what happens when I write, but I can tell you that it takes about twenty minutes at the keyboard to warm up, and then the little driver in my brain shifts gears and my writing motor takes off, and creativity happens. Does such an apparently chaotic approach work, or am I in the trouble I mentioned earlier? I’ve written 22 books and hundreds of articles, and currently have two novels, a play, two long essays, and some poems underway, so other than having a lot of irons in the fire, I don’t think I’m in too much trouble. This approach works for me. It might not work for someone else.


Rather than a process, I like to think of what I do as more of a habit. An addiction, really. I write almost every day, and I have done so for thirty years. (Yes, I did start very young!)

Occasionally I take a break, but after three or four days of no serious writing, I break out in mental hives. Please understand that when I say "write," I mean I sit down and I work. Sometimes I get into the flow and pump out five hundred, a thousand, up to two thousand words a day. Sometimes I stare at the screen or (rarely now) paper and write two words. Sometimes I brainstorm or revise or make lists or charts or squiggly diagrams of plot. Sometimes I do all of the above, a few minutes here, a half hour there. And okay, sure, sometimes I play backgammon or surf the web. But I’m in my work place (usually a café somewhere - I like the hubbub), and even when I don’t appear to be writing, my subconscious is hard at it.

I have to assume that the people who asked about my process were really asking what I could offer them to help them write more or better (or at all). I’m sure there are writers whose "processes" are as convoluted as mine, and I’m sure there are writers who are organized and logical and linear as they go about their work. So here’s my advice if you want to write. Three simple steps.

• Read everything you can. Read about writing and read all kinds of writing. Read writing you love and writing you don’t love and learn from all of it.
• Try different approaches to the work, different environments, different schedules, until you discover what works for you. This is creative work, so be creative about how you do it.
• Write. Write. Write.

(And don’t forget to play!)

Sheila W. Boneham, Ph.D., is the author of the forthcoming "Animals in Focus" mystery Drop Dead on Recall as well as award-winning books about pets including Rescue Matters! How to Find, Foster, and Rehome Companion Animals (Alpine, 2009), The Complete Idiot's Guide to Getting and Owning a Cat (Alpha, 2005), and fifteen others. Sheila's books are available from your local bookseller and on line. Learn more at www.sheilaboneham.com or on Facebook at www.facebook.com/sheilawrites.

All images other than casserole copyright by Sheila Boneham. Casserole from iStockphoto.com. Watercolor painting "Pewter and Cherries" copyright Sheila Boneham.

Please Pass the Mayo

I write to you today from the depths of writer's despair.

Yes, I received a critique of my work in progress.  Strangely, my trusted reader did not share my mother's, "I laughed, I cried!" sentiments.

Sure, he said it was fun and funny (the bread) and had cool quirky characters (the other piece of bread) but the meat in the critique sandwich was as hard to swallow as week old dry turkey. A Turkey Club sandwich apparently, because couched in between an equal number of compliments, none of which I can or will ever remember, were some not so delicious slabs of constructive criticism:

"The characters gossip too much."

"Not sure about the pacing in the second 100 pages." 

"Maybe you should add another death sooner in the book."

While I didn't agree with all the comments, I can certainly read between a line or too. My perfect, wry, funny mystery which was going to be finished here in a matter of weeks will need a run through with an eye on tension and a pacing edit before it's ready for the big time.

Ugh!!!!!!

If it weren't for a newly acquired intolerance for lactose and butterfat, I'd have headed right down to Bonnie Brae Ice Cream (If you're ever in Denver don't miss it) for a banana split.

Instead I'm going to quit the writing biz (but only for tonight) and dig back into finishing this not quite final draft tomorrow. As I'm working, I'll be praying for the inspiration I'll need to go along with the perspiration it's going to take to serve up the book the way I want it to be.

In the meantime, I'd love any tricks, hints and suggestions on upping tension and pacing from you pros out there.

Please?  I'll buy the ice cream.

The Good, The Bad and The Ugly

by Shannon Baker

The laundry is about done, the gear is rinsed and drying in the shower, I’m mopping up all the emails and issues that came up in the last week and our dive trip is now memories. But what a mess of memories we accumulated in just one week. I know this post has nothing to do with writing (unless I set my next book along a reef somewhere--which I might) but my brain is too vacation addled to focus.

We have the good:



Diving on Bonaire is amazing. There are so many shore dives with a short swim out to a reef we’d have to go back for years to dive them all. Corral looks like something from a Walt Disney acid trip and fish are so abundant and diverse we’d constantly have our mouths agape if we didn’t have to keep the regulator firmly rooted to breathe.

Then there was the bad:

As in Bad Boys of the Reef

This is a Lion fish. They are invasive and breed like rabbits on speed.


And Bad as in the sorry sack, bottom feeder who busted our window and slinked his way inside to steal my laptop.

And last but certainly not least, there is the ugly:

Who else has some vacation stories to share?

INKSPOT NEWS, FEBRUARY 25, 2012

Lois Winston will be giving a talk and signing copies of Assault With a Deadly Glue Gun and Death By Killer Mop Doll next Saturday, March 3rd, from 1pm - 2:30pm at
Foxtale Book Shoppe

105 East Main St., #138, Woodstock, GA
FMI: 770-516-9989