How Do You Grow Your Series?

On Saturday, I attended my first meeting of the Chesapeake Chapter of Sisters in Crime. Donna Andrews was kind enough to drive, and she brought along her neighbor, the superb Barb Goffman, Program Chair for Malice. We picked up Sandra Parshall en route.

I’m thrilled to belong to a chapter with so many multi-published authors. There’s so much to learn from them. For example, chapter member Marcia Talley (the national president of Sisters in Crime) spoke at the meeting about her most recent novel Without a Grave. She decided on the setting in the Bahamas and her protagonist’s temporary job (communicating with the other islanders by radio) as a way to avoid the dreaded “Cabot Cove Syndrome.” That’s author-speak for the unfortunate fact that anyone who lived within spitting distance of Jessica Fletcher always wound up dead!

That made me think about Kiki Lowenstein, and the deaths/crimes in my novels. I’ve spent a good part of today, Sunday, thinking how I can artfully manage to have people die—and to have Kiki care about these deaths—without knocking off everyone in her immediate zip code. In part, we authors have a contract with our readers. You KNOW we’re going to bump people off. It’s our job. But that doesn’t mean we can’t be thoughtful about who, what, when, where and why.

After the meeting, we were getting on the elevator, and Donna said something about a scene and how it occurred to her. That scene set the direction for the book she just turned in. “So that’s how you work?” I asked. “You get flashes of insight?”

“Sometimes.”

I turned to Sandra Parshall and asked her how she works. Sandra says she sits down to write and sees what she gets. Her process is more organic.

All this was wonderful, powerful stuff to consider. After all, Sandra and Donna have both won Agatha Awards. Marcia has been an Agatha Award nominee and received the Romantic Times Reviewers’ Choice Award for Best Contemporary Mystery.

My editor told me last week that Midnight Ink is interested in more Kiki Lowenstein books, and I’m the type of writer who likes to work ahead. (I’m 47,000 words into Book #4 and it isn’t due until March 2010.) So, while I have a character arc (a trajectory of personal growth) for Kiki, today was a day for thinking ahead to future books.

But this morning, I just couldn’t get my brain to function. Finally, seeing what a lovely fall day it was, I took the dogs for a long walk to the local dog park. After being jumped on by a pit bull, my head cleared. (Maybe a Chihauhau would have had the same effect. Who knows? I guess I owe that pit bull a debt of gratitude.)

How do I plan my books?

I start with what I know. I know where I think each important character is heading in his/her life. I know what special events/places/activities in St. Louis I want to feature. I have a file of interesting “stuff.” I have ideas about why people would kill each other.

And I also consider the timing issue. I want each book to move Kiki and her daughter Anya’s lives along…slowly. I put that all in my mental hopper.

By the time I turned the key in the lock of the front door, I was ready to write.

News and Appearances

All the Killer Hobbies Blog Sisters are excited about our online Writers' Workshop Week, starting Nov. 16. Join us for lessons on developing characters, writing a scene, plotting, point of view, getting the most from a critique group (featuring special guest Becky Levine), and setting. We'll be taking YOUR questions throughout the week. Be sure to share the event with all your friends! Why not suggest they click the "FOLLOW" button to make it more convenient?

Starting the week of November 23, we'll share How We Celebrate Thanksgiving--a mix of recipes, guest lists, and so on.

On December 7, we'll start our annual Last Minute Homemade Gifts parade. Be sure to join us for gifts you can create from your heart and hands without dipping too far into your wallet.

On December 14, we'll discuss Favorite Gifts for Crafters including a peek at gifts we could have lived without...

Monday’s author, Joanna Campbell Slan, is hoping to read some, write some, and buy mattresses for her second guest room today.

On November 13-15, she'll be appearing at Murder & Mayhem In Muskegan MI.

On November 18, at noon, Joanna'll be teaching a mini-album class at the Washington County Free Library, 100 S. Potomac Street, Hagerstown MD. Call 301-739-3250 x 186 for details.

You can always follow Joanna's appearances by logging onto http://www.booktour.com/ Put "Joanna Slan" in the SEARCH box.

Tuesday’s author, Camille Minichino (Margaret Grace) will be at the Livermore library on Sunday, November 8, at 2 PM with Ann Parker, Sophie Littlefield, and Juliet Blackwell.

Wednesday's author, Monica Ferris, tells us that next Saturday she will be speaking at the Public Library in Ortonville, MN, from 1 to 3 pm. Her books will be offered for sale, too.

On June 12 and 13 she will be at a grand quilt show in Duluth. The show, Great Lake, Great Quilts, is sponsored by Minnesota Quilts, Inc., and will take place at the Duluth Entertainment and Convention Center (DECC) located right down on the harbor. Lessons, exhibits, merchants -- and our own Monica, signing books!

On October 3 Monica will be debuting the thirteenth Betsy Devonshire needlework mystery at "Gaylaxicon," a science-fiction convention in St. Louis Park (a suburb of Minneapolis). Details to follow.

Thursday's author, Linda O. Johnston is busy being ordered around by her dogs, but reports these special appearances: On Saturday, October 17, Linda will be on a panel at the Bonita Branch of the San Diego Library on Chick Lit, at 2 PM

On Sunday, October 18, she'll be at the Los Angeles Romance Authors Book Fair at noon, at the Barnes & Noble at the corner of Ventura Boulevard and Hayvenhurst in the San Fernando Valley.Please go see her!

Friday's author, Terri Thayer, is probably quilting.

Saturday's author, Betty Hechtman, is busy writing and crocheting.

Visit us every Sunday for updates and news. For specifics or to contact any individual author, click on our personal websites listed in the sidebar. Thanks for stopping by--and be sure to sign up to follow us as we have all sorts of fun adventures planned for the future!

Halloween Report

Another Halloween is over. Once again, I was the sole door answerer. This year I was smart and during the prime tricker treating time, had a stool by the door. At first it seemed like there were fewer tricker treaters out, but I think they just got a late start. The street out front got so clogged with people you couldn’t see across it. And groups of five and ten at a time started showing up.

I was interested to see what the costumes would be this year. I’d heard Michael Jackson costumes were supposed to be a big deal. I only saw two kids dressed up as him. I thought there would be lots of vampires considering how popular everything vampire is. I also thought I’d see some Twilight characters. No Bellas and the three vampires that came to the door were closer to Bela Lugosi than Robert Pattinson.

Some costumes never seem to go out of style. I gave candy to quite a few Dorothy’s from the wizard of Oz. I don’t recall one Harry Potter showing up. There were quite a few lady bugs and kids in black with scream masks.

Some of the trick or treaters really pushed it age wise. Three boys who were way taller than me and probably over the border line of their mid teens showed up as Jesus, a rabbi and Barack Obama. The Obama said he’d say something clever, but he didn’t have his teleprompter. I think the gray haired man in scrubs was over seventy, but that didn’t stop him from coming to the door twice and on the second trip, he kept shaking his bag(it was a white garbage bag) wanting more candy after I’d give him a candy bar.

Quite a few people claimed to be gathering candy for someone at home. True, or were they just adults looking for some candy?

Around nine, it seemed to die down and I thought it was over, but a herd of little girls rang the bell. Their parents were in a car at the curb and driving them from house to house.

I have to say all the costumes were way above the cheesy kind we used to get at the dime store in a box. You put them over your clothes and they tied across the back. I think I went as a hobo a lot because all you had to do was wear old clothes. But then that’s ancient history, I guess.

In the end we went through four huge bags of candy and even though I didn’t keep tabs on exactly how many, I figured we had well over 300 hundred trick or treaters. I still don’t get what was up with the old guy in the green scrubs.

No blog

Sorry folks. I didn't really forget to blog. I forgot what day it was.

I'm at a writing class weekend with Donald Maass, author of the Fire in Fiction and Writing the Breakout Novel. Yesterday we had a session with author Nancy Pickard. Her latest book is The Virgin of Small Plains. A good read. We spent a lot of time dissecting the book and she talked about her process. Endlessly fascinating to us authors. The finale of the day was watching Donald Maass and Nancy Pickard brainstorm her next book. Wonderful to see the sausage being made.

Today was the first of a two class with Donald Maass. He asks us a lot of questions and we write most of the day. It's great fun and makes for some wonderful writing.

So sorry. I missed you all today.

Travel Fun

So where was I a couple of weeks ago when I panicked about the possibility that my younger Cavalier King Charles Spaniel Mystie had disappeared while I was traveling?

New York, New York!

It was a great trip, one we attempt to do annually. Our excuse is to go to the Baron Funds Annual Meeting. We don’t own a lot of their mutual funds, but enough to get an invitation to their free event. Of course we have to pay to be in the area, but it’s worth it to see the surprise entertainment as well as hear talks from CEOs of some of the companies in which the Baron Funds have substantial investments. The surprise entertainment this year was Carole King at lunchtime, and Rod Stewart in the afternoon. Lots of fun!

Even better for me was the opportunity to meet with both of my editors, at Harlequin and at Berkley. It’s always wonderful to see them--and even better that the ideas I pitched to them were met with lots of interest!

By the way, my story in my last week’s blog about worrying whether Mystie slipped out of the house wasn’t the only scare in the family. My mother-in-law’s cat B.D., who’d gone outside in really windy weather when everyone left the house for a while, didn’t show up for dinner that night. My M-I-L looked all over, inside and out. I didn’t want to say anything, but with all the missing cats around our area--and coyote sightings--I feared the worst had also occurred in Ohio... until B.D. decided she was ready to reappear. She had somehow sneaked back in and hidden in a room upstairs where my M-I-L had looked for her with no luck. Not till B.D. chose to let everyone know she was fine!

Do you know of any sneaky kitties or doggies? And what excuses do you use to travel?

Election, Quilt Show

I don't know how this got started, but I am an election judge. That title sounds important, but all I do is help people voting at the polls. There are various stations at a polling place, where we check people in ("Are you Registered?"), hand out ballots, answer questions, explain the ballot, and made sure they put the ballots into the recording box properly. I don't mind it, except it's an extremely long day. Polls open at seven and it takes about an hour to get set up, which means we have to be there at six; and they close at eight, and it takes another hour to take everything down and run the count, which means we stay at least until nine. It all must be done according to a lengthy, important list and we're all amateurs, which is why the setting up and closing down takes a long time.

Am I complaining? I suppose I am, but I'm also glad to get this glimpse of behind-the-scenes, how-it-works in elections. It's an honor and an important part of living in a democracy to be able to do it -- but it is a very long day. Just two hundred and twelve voters turned out in this off-year election, out of a possible thirteen hundred registered in the precinct. Last year brought out a huge number and we registered over two hundred new voters.

One thing that means is I am writing this on the fly again, so again I apologize for the disorganization, if any, of my post. Boy, two weeks in a row of disorganization!

Last Wednesday and Thursday I was in Des Moines at their Events Center, attending a big quilt show. Linne Lindquist's booth, The Craftsman's Touch, hosted me. My hat was a success -- I'll try to post a picture of it. It's a pilgrim's hat with feathers, meant to suggest a witch's hat. One seemingly minor thing that happened lingers in my memory. A young woman came to the booth and bought a number of books with quilt patterns in them. She was having a good time, she really liked the books, she and Linne talked and laughed while she way paying for them -- not that unusual. But our booth was at the end of an aisle and the wall across from it had a row of folding chairs so people whose feet were giving out could rest for a little while before continuing the search for the perfect gadget or fat quarter or pattern. On one of the chairs was a young man whose whole attention was fixed on the young woman. The sweet fondness of his expression, his obvious delight in her pleasure was like a lit candle in a dim room. This wasn't a noisy, newly-wed delight, there was depth and understanding in it. They weren't having fun together; she was wholly invested in the show, he was pleased to see her enjoying herself. He joined her after she finished her purchases, she took his arm, and they continued up the aisle, and I smiled after them for several minutes. What a joy it was just to be in their company for that brief while!

Monday night I gave a talk at a suburban public library -- Westonka Library in Mound -- and the turnout was surprisingly great for a weekday night. Lots of the attendees had actually heard of me and wanted to know more about my books and the characters in them. The woman who runs the library did a great job of letting people know about my appearance. I am ashamed to say I forgot my hat. They asked me to bring books to sell, and I was so busy filling a case with them and getting it down to my car I forgot to wear my great new hat. What's interesting, is that several of the attendees know about my hats were were disappointed. If any of you are reading this blog, now at least you know what I should have had on my head.

Passing the book

The biggest treat for me on October 31 was the grand opening of the new Castro Valley library. The event started at 7 a.m. when volunteers began setting up stations along a 0.7-mile route from the old library to the new one.

About 1500 people registered at the stations. Two of us volunteers were assigned at each station to make sure everyone signed a waiver (in case a particularly heavy book caused litigation-size back pain) and give them a T-shirt.

The participants then stood shoulder-to-shoulder along the route. At 8:30 a.m., the first book, a history of Castro Valley, California, started its journey to the new library. A cheer went up!

Then 299 more books were passed, hand to hand. You can see from the photo that people of all ages showed up for the exciting symbolic passing. (The full collection had been moved by professionals during the weeks before.)
Even a witch showed up. (I'm not telling who was the witch; she wasn't necessarily wearing a big black hat.)



Books of all genres were passed, each bearing a special plate indicating that they were part of the historic move; they went directly to the Friends of the Library store in the lobby of the building.

Once registration was over, I joined the line passing books. The hardest part: we weren't allowed to stop and read the books as they passed though our hands. Some children disobeyed, a heartening sight.

The new library has more of everything: books, parking spaces, meeting rooms, Internet access, and a quiet reading area.



Plus a café!

Plus a new reading group: on the first Tuesday in February 2010, a mystery reading group will begin in the new library. I'll be facilitating—if you're in the area, please consider joining us. If you're a mystery author, consider offering copies of your book and joining us via cyberspace for a discussion.

Judging by the turnout for Saturday's event, reading is thriving in this part of Alameda County.