Thanks to everyone who has read, commented, or appeared on this blog. I hope that you have enjoyed Schooled in Mystery’s brief run! Time constraints require that we shut the doors here–all best to you.
Interview: Linda Rodriguez
Today we welcome Linda Rodriguez, author of Every Last Secret (Minotaur Books, 2012) and Every Broken Trust (Minotaur Books, coming May 7, 2013).
Would you please tell us a little about yourself?
I’m a poet, novelist, and longtime community activist who used to be the director of a university women’s center (and a law school administrator before that). While at the women’s center, I served on the planning committee for Women 2000: Beijing Plus Five, an international women’s conference at the United Nations, and as co-convenor of one of the 12 critical area caucuses, Women and the Environment. I spent most of my adult life in higher education until I left for medical reasons—lupus, several other chronic illnesses, and a surgically reconstructed spine. Having to leave my job (which seemed a disaster at first) allowed me the larger periods of uninterrupted time that novels require, as compared to poetry. My first novel, Every Last Secret, won the St. Martin’s Press/Malice Domestic Best First Traditional Mystery Novel Competition and was published by Minotaur Books in April, 2012.
My husband is the managing editor of a university press and a scholar in Yiddish and Holocaust literature, drama, and film. Together, we rescue animals and run a small literary press. When I have time, which hasn’t been lately due to overlapping deadlines, I also spin, weave, knit, quilt, and garden.
What are some of your favorite books and what is it about them that you admire?
My all-time favorite books are by Charles Dickens—Our Mutual Friend, Bleak House, David Copperfield, Tale of Two Cities, and all the rest. Dickens was the master of character and story. I believe he was our Shakespeare of the novel. I also love Virginia Woolf—fiction, nonfiction, journals, or letters, her prose is some of the clearest and most beautiful language ever written. Doris Lessing and Nadine Gordimer are two more writers whose language soars in any form. I’m also a poet, but I’ll take mercy and won’t toss poets in here. Just be aware that I’m always reading and writing poetry.
I love to read good speculative fiction and fantasy—C.J. Cherryh, Ursula LeGuin, Octavia Butler, Anne McCaffrey, Gene Wolfe, Tanith Lee, among others. In mystery, my favorite Dorothy L. Sayers is Gaudy Night for its incredible evocation of Oxford and life there between the wars. My favorite Agatha Christie varies depending on the day of week or hour of day. I love so many of them. Five Little Pigs (a tour de force of character and psychology), The Pale Horse (a modern investigation of evil), The Moving Finger Writ, A Murder Is Announced, Murder at the Vicarage, it goes on and on among her riches. Patricia Highsmith’s Ripley books and Strangers on a Train offer a different kind of investigation or fascination with evil. Among contemporaries, I love many, but I think Julia Spencer-Fleming writes wonderful ambitious novels, and her latest, One Was a Soldier, is the best exploration I’ve seen yet in fiction or nonfiction of the damage this war is doing to the men and women we keep sending back and back, yet offer nothing in the way of help when they come back broken outside and within. Louise Penny’s Bury Your Dead was an incredible, rich, complex examination of terrorism and betrayal, large and small. Val McDermid, Deborah Crombie, John Lescroart, William Kent Krueger, Hank Phillippi Ryan, Paul Doiron, and Robert Crais are giving us wonderful work. And I must stop here. I believe we’re living in a new Golden Age of crime fiction, so I could keep piling on names of authors and examples of wonderful novels.
Do you write in multiple genres and, if so, how do the experiences differ?
I do write in different genres. I write poetry, literary fiction, plays, mystery novels, nonfiction, cookbooks, and I even write fantasy sometimes. I suspect I’m just partial to the next shiny thing. I find that moving from one kind of work to a different kind functions as well as taking a break from writing for me. Different ideas come to me ready for different forms. I can’t squeeze and twist them into some form that’s foreign to their nature.
In poetry, I’m dealing with image and the music of the language, often drowning in it, but there’s almost always a story of some kind behind my poems, sometimes way back, hidden but still there. I don’t write a lot of literary fiction now. I’m more concerned with narrative drive and story arising from character. That nexus of character and story is the lifeline of plays, mysteries, and fantasy novels.
How did you prepare to write about the academic profession and/or the book’s specific area or field of study?
I had spent many years working in higher education administration, often dealing closely with situations that required the campus police, so it was a natural fit for me.
Can you describe your writing process?
My process starts with character. I make tons of notes and ask myself and my characters lots of questions. I try to learn what my lead character most wants and fears to lose. It’s out of those wants and fears that my story will develop. I do terrible things to my characters. I make their lives very difficult and see how they will behave. I try to plan out my scenes ahead of time. That gives me the confidence that I know what I’m doing, but inevitably I veer from my plan. This causes me much heartburn and hair-pulling, but it always makes a better book.
Which part of the process is the most challenging and how do you overcome it?
The middle of the book is always my big challenge. When I start, I have a pretty good idea of the opening situation and where it’s going. I also have a good idea of how it will end. I usually have at least a hint of an ending scene in my head when I begin (which doesn’t mean that sometimes it won’t change drastically). I may have plans for the middle, but that’s always where I just can’t seem to stay with the plan. I begin to feel the whole thing’s turning stale or boring, and I go into a panic. Then I sit down and write long letters to myself about what the problem is. It always turns out that there is a real problem. Once I can see it clearly, I start brainstorming ways to fix it. In this process, I usually make the book stronger, writing some of the most powerful scenes in the book. Not surprisingly, this often entails making changes in the front end of the book and changing my plans for the ending. I used to panic at this stage. Now, I repeat over and over, “You know this is the way it works, Linda.”
How do you organize plot structure (outline, note cards, intuition, etc.)?
I use scene-by-scene outlines and veer from them as intuition takes me. My outlines become sparser with each book, as I’ve come to realize that things don’t always work out as neatly as I’d hoped they would. I may try note cards somewhere down the line since it seems they would give me more flexibility. I’m always trying something else. If it works in some form, I keep it. If it doesn’t, I let it go. It seems we’d know how to write a book after we’ve written several. But all we really know is how to write the books we’ve already written. We have to teach ourselves how to write the one we’re currently writing all over again.
Would you please tell us about your latest book?
In Every Last Secret, half-Cherokee Marquitta “Skeet” Bannion fled a city police force and family entanglements for a Missouri college town as chief of campus police. Now, the on-campus murder of the student newspaper editor puts Skeet on the trail of a killer who will do anything to keep a dangerous secret from being exposed, and everywhere she turns she uncovers hidden sins. In the midst of her investigation, Skeet takes up responsibility for a vulnerable teenager as her ex-husband and seriously ailing father wind up back on her hands. Time is running out and college administrators demand she conceal all college involvement in the murder, but Skeet will not stop until she’s unraveled every last secret.
Every Last Secret was a Barnes & Noble mystery pick for April and a Las Comadres National Book Club selection. Kirkus said of it, “Skeet’s debut introduces a strong, intelligent woman detective with both a knack for solving crimes and a difficult personal life. The next episode can’t come too soon.” Publishers Weekly said, “Fans of tough female detectives like V.I. Warshawski and Kinsey Millhone will be pleased.”
What are you working on right now?
My second Skeet Bannion mystery, Every Broken Trust, is going out for blurbs right now. It will be launched May 7, 2013. In it, Skeet must track down a killer, even though the hunt threatens to take away everyone she holds dear.
I have two short stories appearing in upcoming anthologies. “The Good Neighbor” appears in Kansas City Noir, which will launch in October, and “Rivka’s Place” appears in Feeding Kate, which will launch in November.
My third book of poetry, Dark Sister, is ready for submission, and I’ll be sending it soon to a university press that requested first look at my next poetry book.
I’m currently working on the first draft of another project that I can’t talk about at this time, but I’m excited about it. And I will start the third Skeet Bannion mystery soon.
What advice do you have for writers who have not yet been published?’
Persevere. Learn your craft. Don’t be in such a rush to publish.
I have noticed that writing students seldom want to know how to make their stories or books better. Instead, they want to know how to find an agent, or, now, how to self-publish. The first step is to learn how to write well. This is the Holy Grail of writers that can never be achieved but must always be pursued. If you’re not constantly looking for ways to make that book better, if one or two easy drafts are enough, you probably aren’t writing well.
Learn to read as a writer. A good writer doesn’t plagiarize the words of another, but a good writer steals technique and makes it her own. Figure out how a writer who’s famous for character or dialogue or transitions does whatever his strength is and apply that same technique to your own work. Good writers read—all the time.
***
Linda Rodriguez’s novel, Every Last Secret (Minotaur Books), won the Malice Domestic Best First Traditional Mystery Novel Competition, was selected by Las Comadres National Book Club, and was a Barnes & Noble mystery pick. The second book in the Skeet Bannion series, Every Broken Trust, will be published in Spring 2013. Linda reads and writes everything, even award-winning books of her poetry and a cookbook. She spends too much time on Twitter as @rodriguez_linda and on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/LindaRodriguezWrites. She blogs about writers, writing, and the absurdities of everyday life at http://lindarodriguezwrites.blogspot.com.
Interview: Will Lavender
Today we welcome Will Lavender, author of the academic mysteries Obedience (Shaye Areheart, 2007), Dominance (Simon & Schuster, 2011), and The Descartes Circle (Simon & Schuster, forthcoming).
Would you please tell us a little about yourself?
I am an avid reader and writer from Louisville, Kentucky. I earned an MFA from Bard College in 2002, and have taught both in the public school system and in the university system here in Kentucky. In 2007, I sold my first novel, a “puzzle thriller” called Obedience; my second novel, Dominance, was published in 2011. Outside a short stint working with the Kentucky state legislature as a researcher, I have been a full-time writer for the past five years. I live in Louisville with my wife and my two young children, and am currently finishing my third novel, The Descartes Circle, which will appear sometime in 2013.
Are there specific books or authors who influenced your life or writing?There are two. The first is Michael Connelly. Connelly of course is a crime writer above all else, and I am not that–in fact I know almost nothing about the world of cops and police procedurals. However, the way Connelly frames his mysteries, the way he uses evidence, the manner in which he treats the crimes in a very intellectual way–all of that interested me right from the start, and I’ve always felt that Connelly is the best this genre has to offer. The other writer I would mention is Michael Chabon, whom I imitated for most of my early 20s. There are certain writers who made me want to be a writer (Stephen King, Dean Koontz), and Chabon is one of those.
What inspired you to become a writer and when did you begin writing?
I’ve always written. Not long after I learned to read I discovered I wanted to be a writer. I’ve always loved to tell stories, been enthralled both with the construction of a narrative and the way a narrative affects its listener (or its reader). I had a family connection with a writer named James Howe; James wrote the Bunnicula books for children. I was enthralled by those books, and also by their author–it amazed me that I knew someone who’d written such wonderful stories. I made up my mind right then that I wanted to write. I was probably seven years old.
What are some of your favorite books and what is it about them that you admire?
There are too many favorite books to name, but one I go back to often is Donna Tartt’s The Secret History. The interesting thing about this novel is that I don’t love the story; it isn’t a thriller, in fact there are long sections that are bone-crushingly boring. But the book is a masterpiece because of its voice; I can think of no other recent (and I’ll call TSH “recent” even though it’s been twenty years or so since it was published) book that got the voice perfectly correct. It’s so correct, so convincing, that at times it becomes almost eerily real and painful to read. Tartt wrote what I believe to be the most perfectly written novel of the late 20th century, and sometimes I reread sections of it to try to spark my own writing. Usually, almost always, I’m disappointed because what I’ve come up with is so far inferior to what she was able to do.
Can you describe your writing process?
I have two young children, so finding time to write is difficult. What I normally do is go down to the small public library in my neighborhood here in Louisville, find a space in the back, and write for about seven hours, five days a week. I love writing around books, whether it’s in a bookstore or in a library. I love the idea that I’m in this place of books, and that the book I’m working on will someday be inside there. It might be a kind of mental trickery, but it seems to work more times than not.
Which part of the process is the most challenging and how do you overcome it?
The most challenging part of writing is figuring out what happens in the middle. Beginnings are easy; endings, while not easy, are interesting because they’re the end and you’re normally in a good state of mind just thinking about getting on with your life. But the middle is the bedraggled, toothless stepsister of the novel-writing process, and it plagues me every time. I usually overcome it by pushing on and trying to let my mind work–I’m a firm believer that the subconcious can bail you out of most jams–but sometimes that doesn’t do it and I’m left looking at a blinking cursor, a picked-at beginning looming before me and a hint of an ending throbbing somewhere out in the distance. The middle has killed many writers, and I’m sure it will at some point be the death of my career.
How do you organize plot structure (outline, note cards, intuition, etc.)?
For me it’s all intuition. I enjoy being surprised by what my characters do, and the moment I pick up a notecard or start an outline, I tend to lose most forward momentum. I like writing in secret, keeping my plots secret, cloaking the whole process in a kind of shadow–my wife didn’t even know I was working on my first novel until I showed her the finished manuscript. The moment I tell someone what I’m doing, it loses its luster–and this applies to myself as well. I begin with a vague idea of what’s happening, and I fight my way through the forest. Writing in this way has its complications, but it is almost always exciting. That’s why I write.
Do you write in multiple genres and, if so, how do the experiences differ?
For the past five or six years, I’ve written only mysteries. I did, however, come out of a literary (and poetry) background. I think all writing is challenging; it doesn’t matter if you’re working on a full-throttle thriller or a literary meditation on love and loss, it’s all difficult. But writing in the mystery genre has offerred up one particular challenge, and that’s in its adherence to reality. I come from a background of surrealism and experimental writing; a lot of times I want to fall back on those tropes, to add things to my texts that are almost nonsensical, even goofy. That’s a no-no in the mystery genre, where readers are expecting a plot that at least references the real world. This has been a big hurdle for me, and it’s one thing I miss about experimental writing. I miss simply going into a text and sort of deconstructing it from the inside, using my characters to get at wild notions of philosophy and truth even if it means they do shit-brained sort of things. Mysteries, good mysteries, are grounded in the real, the plausible. When my books tend to get sloppy, it’s almost always because I’m leaning too heavily on my background as an experimentalist. Strangely, I would say when my books are good it’s because I’m leaning on my background as an experimentalist.
What inspired you to write in the academic mystery genre?
When I began my first novel, Obedience, I was a college teacher–a lowly adjunct. That book comes almost totally from things I thought about and interactions I had with students during that time. Of course the plot itself was invented, but most of the conversations, the things the characters think about, the way the classroom scenes happen–all of that actually happened to me. Around the time I began that novel, I read a novel called Oblivion, by Peter Abrahams. It remains one of my favorite novels. Oblivion isn’t an academic mystery, but it is an intellectual mystery in that it wraps around tself, sort of loops and snakes and then finally ends up eating its own tail. I immediately began to think about books that used a kind of scholarly investigation as a plot device, a novel that made the reader sort of active in the solving of the mystery, and for Obedience, I borrowed some of Abrahams’ world-flipped-on-its-head ideas.
How did you prepare to write about the academic profession and/or the book’s specific area or field of study?
My first novel has to do with a logic class; my second novel, Dominance, is about a literature class; my third book will be about philosophers. So I’ve moved around and changed up the field of study of each book, even though each of these novels is clearly an academic mystery. The reason I do this is because I like reading about different academic disciplines, and I also enjoy building these hidden worlds inside colleges. The college is the perfect locked room; the suspects are all right there, constrained inside the tight geography of the college itself. I like that closed-in environment very much, because it allows me to limit the scope of the novel and toy with a set group of characters. And if you shrink it even further, then you’re dealing with a certain field of study inside the college–an even smaller playground. I like these small, hemmed-in set-pieces; they allow me to play with characters, get them all on one stage together, and my suspects can all interact with one another. It’s very Agatha Christie-esque, but it has served me well so far.
***
Will Lavender’s website is www.WillLavender.com. You can also contact him on Facebook and on Twitter @WillLavender.
Interview: Edith Maxwell
Today we welcome Edith Maxwell, author of Speaking of Murder (as Tace Baker).
Would you please tell us a little about yourself?
I’m a fourth-generation Californian who lives north of Boston. I like growing food and cooking it, exercising in the fresh air, dancing, and spending time with friends and with my two fabulous adult sons. And, most of all, writing fiction. So I am thrilled to have my first mystery, Speaking of Murder, out in the world (under the pen name Tace Baker). And I’m delighted to hold a three-book contract with Kensington Publishing for a Local Foods Mystery series. That series features a geek turned organic farmer, Cam Flaherty, and a Locavore Club that belongs to her farm-share program. The first book, A Tine to Live, a Tine to Die, will be out next June under my own name!
Why the pen name?
The Kensington contract specified that I couldn’t publish any other mysteries under my name during the term of the contract, but Speaking of Murder was being considered right then by Barking Rain Press, so they agreed I could use a pen name. Tace is an old Quaker woman’s name and certainly provided unique Google results as well as an available URL and twitter handle. Baker? It’s near the top of the alphabet, sounds good with Tace, is easy to spell and say, and I like to bake. So, yeah, I pulled it out of a hat.
Can you describe your writing process?
I write at a computer and I write into the headlights. When you’re taking a long trip at night, you can’t see all the way to the destination, but you can see the part right in front of you. So I typically don’t know how the story is going to end but I know what’s happening now and in the next scene or two.
Which part of the process is the most challenging and how do you overcome it?
For me it’s finding the time. I hold a demanding day job as a technical writer with an hour’s commute each way. I really don’t have the energy to write when I get home, so that happens on weekends, plane trips, vacation time, and when I seclude myself somewhere for a self retreat. I long to retire to full time writing but need to wait just a couple more years for that to be feasible financially.
What inspired you to write in the academic mystery genre?
I hold a PhD in linguistics. While I never secured the tenure-track job that Lauren Rousseau holds, I am well acquainted with the life of an academic.
How did you prepare to write about the academic profession and/or the book’s specific area or field of study?
During my years at Indiana University, I was student liaison to the faculty and sat in on faculty meetings. I witnessed extreme rivalries and backstabbing as well as loyalty and support. I sat next to and then taught students of all kinds, from the retired Army officer to a prospective speech therapist to a budding filmmaker. Some were curious about everything, some just wanted the answers handed to them. A campus is a strange microcosm that almost begs to have crimes committed on it.
How did your most important characters take shape (appear fully formed or reveal her/himself gradually)?
I did a long interview with my protagonist, professor Lauren Rousseau, as I started to write Speaking of Murder. The victim is roughly modeled on someone I knew as is Lauren’s colleague Ralph. Everybody else just invented themselves and revealed themselves gradually, I guess.
How do you decide on a title?
Speaking of Murder just jumped out at me. For the Local Foods series, which is more cozy, they want punny titles and I’m terrible at those, so I got some help from the Guppies (see following question about advice to writers).
What was the most interesting part of the book to write and why?
I really got into a suspenseful scene toward the end of the book, where Lauren risks her own safety to rescue her best friend. I felt like I was right there. I acted out various parts in my home office and felt my heart race.
What are you working on right now? I’m plotting ‘Til Dirt Do Us Part, the second book in the Local Foods Mystery series. It starts at a fall Farm-to-Table dinner, and I’m excited that my local farm is holding their last dinner of the season next week. Yes, I have two tickets in hand (I love this kind of research). Plotting ahead of time is new for me (see my comment about headlights earlier in this post) but my editor at Kensington wants to know how the book will end. And I suppose things can always change as I go along.
What advice do you have for writers who have not yet been published?
Keep writing! And definitely join a group or two. My in-person writing group has been a richness of critique and support. Our New England chapter of Sisters in Crime provides regular workshops and events, as well as hosting the New England Crime Bake, the best crime writers’ conference around. And the online Sisters in Crime listserves have taught me everything I know about the publishing world and provided a huge support network, particularly the Guppies (which stands for the Great Unpublished) and a couple of its subgroups.
What’s next for you?
More guest posts. A Boston-area launch party for Speaking of Murder on Oct 10. Finish the outline for the second Local Foods Mystery and send it off. Put in the edits on A Tine to Live, a Tine to Die when they come in. A BIG birthday in a month and a bash at my house. New England Crime Bake. Oh, and showing up at the day job every morning. Looks like sleep is NOT next for me.
Is there anything else you’d like to share with us?
I’m off in a couple of days for a fortuitously timed reunion of my graduate department in Bloomington. My advisor is retiring, and several of my best friends from my time there are showing up to honor him too. I’ll be able to talk up my book and revive memories of some of my happiest and most stimulating years. I’m very excited about this trip!
***
Edith Maxwell is the author of Speaking of Murder (Barking Rain Press, under pseudonym Tace Baker) featuring Quaker linguistics professor Lauren Rousseau. Edith holds a PhD in linguistics and is a member of Amesbury Monthly Meeting of Friends. The book was first runner up in the Linda Howard Award for Excellence contest
Edith also writes the Local Foods Mysteries. A Tine to Live, a Tine to Die introduces organic farmer Cam Flaherty and a colorful Locavore Club (Kensington Publishing, June, 2013).
A mother and technical writer, Edith lives north of Boston in an antique house with her beau and three cats. Find her at http://www.facebook.com/EdithMaxwellAuthor, @edithmaxwell, and www.edithmaxwell.com. Tace Baker can be found at www.tacebaker.com, @tacebaker, and http://www.facebook.com/TaceBaker.
Interview: Maggie Barbieri
Today we welcome Maggie Barbieri, author of the MURDER 101 series starring Alison Bergeron:
- Murder 101 (2006)
- Extracurricular Activities (2007)
- Quick Study (2008)
- Final Exam (2009)
- Third Degree (2010)
- Physical Education (2011)
- Extra Credit (December 2012)
Would you please tell us a little about yourself?
By day, I’m a freelance college textbook editor. I started in college publishing immediately upon graduating from college…and when I say “immediately,” I mean right away. I barely had my cap and gown off when I was sitting at a desk in a publishing office reporting to a lovely English gentleman who smoked a pipe and wrote handwritten letters to his authors, something that I found fascinating even in pre-computer days.
When I’m not working, I write mysteries about a college professor who is also an amateur sleuth. She is assisted by her best friend and a New York City police detective who just happens to be in love with her.
What inspired you to become a writer and when did you begin writing?
I always wanted to be a writer and wrote my first “novel” while still in high school. (It was terrible. I hope it was ruined in a flood or burned in the fireplace at my childhood home.) I would write in my spare time but it wasn’t until I took a poetry course in college, curiously enough, that I thought maybe I could have a career in writing. I’m a poor excuse for a poet but there was something about that class and the professor that really sparked something in me. While working in textbook publishing, I became so busy that I never found the time to write but upon starting the freelance business, I found that I could squeeze in writing between gigs.
Did you encounter any challenges en route to the publication of your first book?
I finished Murder 101 sometime in 2004. Things were going along swimmingly in 2005 when I submitted it to St. Martin’s Press/Minotaur Books and they accepted it, offering me a two-book deal to write the first two books in the series. On the day the contracts arrived, I was diagnosed with cancer and upon returning home from the hospital, found the contracts on my front porch. Needless to say, it was a very emotional day but my husband convinced me to sign the contracts and finish the second book (which was about halfway done). It turned out to be the best advice because I feel like writing books during what was a very dark time played a role in saving my life.
Can you describe your writing process?
I don’t really have a writing process but that’s mostly because I have a full-time job. So, while I’d like to say that I write from eight in the morning until two in the afternoon, I can’t. I write when I have a break in the action of my day job or on the weekends or whenever the mood strikes me and I’m not working on a deadline for one of my textbook projects.
Which part of the process is the most challenging and how do you overcome it?
Writer’s block, hands down. I find that listening to music or just imagining my characters in a situation that may or may not have anything to do with the plot helps me move along. For my third book, I had a terrible case of writer’s block and put Alison in a situation I thought for sure would end up on the cutting-room floor. Turns out it was perfect for a plot twist at the end of the book, so all was not for naught.
What does a typical writing day look like?
Again, there is no typical writing day. I’m looking forward to the day, hopefully in the not-too-distant future, when I can write full time but right now with all of the things that go along with living life in the new millennium and the cost of higher education, I have to work full time. My dream writing day would start with my usual two cups of coffee, six straight hours at my desk, and a perfect chapter a day as output. That’s why it’s my “dream.”
How do you organize plot structure (outline, note cards, intuition, etc.)?
I have post-it notes and little pieces of paper all over the house, in my pocketbook, stuck to the dashboard of the car. Now, after six books, my husband and kids don’t get nervous when they see something that says “Kill X” written in my handwriting next to the grocery list.
How did your most important characters take shape (appear fully formed or reveal her/himself gradually)?
Alison Bergeron has lived inside my head for a long time. When I conceived of the character, I was focused on an ordinary women caught in an extraordinary situation—finding out that one of her students had been found in the trunk of her car—and what that might be like, how that might shape her. A lot of people say that Alison sounds like me, but I think that’s just a function of my writing in the first person. However, she does have a good sense of humor, and has a tendency to call people nicknames that she makes up on the spot.
Would you please tell us about your latest book?
I have two books cooking right now. Extra Credit is the latest installment in the Murder 101 series and will be out in December. In this new tale of Alison Bergeron, her husband’s ex-wife returns from living abroad with her new husband and his children only to find that her long-lost brother has returned and he has a secret or two, all of which add up to trouble for the family–namely, Alison and her husband, Bobby Crawford.
I have also begun another series, the first of which is called The Comfort Zone. It features soccer mom and bakery-owner Maeve Conlon, a woman with a terrible secret that informs every aspect of her life. (That’s all I can say for now!)
What advice do you have for writers who have not yet been published?
Keep writing. Keep reading. Never give up.
Is there anything else you’d like to share with us?
Thank you for letting me post on your site today!
***
Maggie Barbieri is a freelance writer and editor who lives in the Hudson Valley of New York State. She is the author of the Murder 101 series, the seventh of which will be published in December of 2012. When she’s not writing or editing, she pretends that the kayak in her back yard gets used every day, that she loves fitness, and that she willingly passes by the jar of M&M’s on one of her client’s desks when they meet. She lives in a 1920s Colonial with the smallest bathroom known to mankind, her husband, two children, a needy West Highland Terrier, and a large, but docile, Maine Coon cat.
You can find her at www.maggiebarbieri.com or on Twitter at @maggiebarbieri (Maggie says, “I can’t process pithy tweets but I’ll let you know when important stuff is happening…or what I had for breakfast…I’m not the best tweeter”).
Interview: Gillian Roberts
Today, we welcome Gillian Roberts, author of the Amanda Pepper series of academic mysteries.
- Caught Dead in Philadelphia
- Philly Stakes
- I’d Rather Be in Philadelphia
- With Friends Like These…
- How I Spent My Summer Vacation
- In the Dead of Summer
- The Mummers’ Curse
- The Bluest Blood
- Adam and Evil
- Helen Hath No Fury
- Claire and Present Danger
- Till the End of Tom
- A Hole in Juan
- All’s Well that Ends
***
Would you please tell us a little about yourself?
I’m a former high school English teacher, although not in schools even vaguely like Philly Prep. (On the other hand, I won’t say that there aren’t some real-life similarities between real and fictional principals and office staff.) Writing has been my day job for several decades now. I’ve also taught courses in writing fiction, from adult evening classes to community college, to an MFA in Writing program.
I am from Philadelphia where the Amanda Pepper mysteries are set, but I’ve lived in California–first Los Angeles, and now the San Francisco Bay Area, for many moons. I’ve been married nearly 50 years to a wonderful man and we’re the parents of two sons and the in-laws of two fabulous young women and the grandparents of two absolutely perfect grandchildren.
What inspired you to become a writer and when did you begin writing?
Once I realized that books weren’t magical natural elements–that people wrote them–I wanted to write them, too.
No one encouraged this dream for a long time. I vividly remember a conversation my senior year of high school about what we wanted to “be.” I said, “I want to be a wife and mother and writer.” The response from a classmate, said with great seriousness, as an absolute: “that is impossible.”
For some time, I believed it, and I think society believed it. There were almost no female writers mentioned in lit courses when I was in undergraduate or graduate school.
But I murmured on about writing “someday.” And then, when our younger son entered kindergarten, I began talking about going to law school. That’s when my husband asked me why this wasn’t the someday I kept mentioning. And he created an (imaginary, face-saving) grant for me. He said that if I spent three years writing, instead of going to law school, he’d provide food and shelter and clothing and a small discretionary allowance. But I had to write every single weekday.
In short, I was shamed into it.
I was terrified. I envisioned myself ancient, tied by cobwebs to the typewriter, and my grandchildren saying, “she still thinks she’s going to be a writer.” But once I faced down the fear of failure and let the dream out of the bag, it took over.
I have a high school reunion coming up and we’re writing what we’ve learned over the long haul. I’m writing about that boy who told me I couldn’t be all the things I dreamed about. What I learned is that he was wrong.
What are some of your favorite books and what is it about them that you admire?
It’s difficult picking a favorite book–there are way too many. But of all writers, and despite the fact that I read mostly contemporary work (fiction, biography, non-fiction) my favorite would be Charles Dickens. That isn’t a very original pick, I know, but it is nonetheless true. What I love about his writing is its scope, its concern about social problems, its unforgettable characters and most of all, the far-reaching, incredible interest in and love of humanity that lies underneath it all.
Which part of the process is the most challenging and how do you overcome it?
I think it was Ogden Nash who said every book has a beginning, a muddle, and an end. That muddle/middle is the toughest part. It’s fun to write a beginning, but then…the dreaded, endless-feeling middle when things feel as though they’re happening at a glacial pace. And because I seem incapable of plotting through, I instead plod through.
When I’ve passed that hump (and in my mind, the book does have the Everest shape of a mountain) and I can slide down into home–it’s great and it’s fun. Everything’s in place and I know the goal.
What does a typical writing day look like?
How it was: I started writing when my younger son entered kindergarten. I therefore had two and a half hours to work, and work I did. That lasted through their high school years–I’d work during school hours and quit when they were home. And then they grew up and left and I thought I would now have an easy, smooth time of it.
Nowadays: How I think it will be: up early, walk the dog (4 miles) come home, have breakfast, work for 4-5 hours, spend the rest of the work day attending to business matters, etc. This will occur Monday through Friday.
How it is: never like that.
Result: I do the best I can. This stage of life is full of “if not now, when?” issues. My husband’s retired and we want to spend time together and explore this wonderful part of the world and elsewhere. I have other interests I always wanted to pursue (I’m currently taking both painting and piano lessons); friendships are all-important as is being a part of my grandchildren’s childhoods and to my surprise, I have a puppy to train. So I’ve learned to be flexible, to be portable–wherever I am, there goes my laptop–and to keep hoping the day will expand to at least 50 hours. When writing a first draft, I try, no matter what else is looming, to touch base with the manuscript every day so that it stays alive for me. I’ve always found that even when I’m away from it, if I’ve committed to it, it keeps working and growing in my mind.
How do you organize plot structure (outline, note cards, intuition, etc.)?
I wish I were a better outliner, but it appears I never will be. So for most mysteries, I first would get the germ of an idea–a social issue that could affect Amanda or her students or friends, a story about teen mental health issues, a book I read about spousal abuse while doing research for a non-mystery. Something that lodges in my mind and won’t go away.
Then I try to push the idea to think who would be hurt most–who might be pushed to harm someone else because of this and why, precisely.
Then I draw a sort of balloon cluster with the victim in the middle, and sticks going out to other balloons representing who might have wanted this person dead and why. Those are going to be the suspects. I try to give each one a different motive from the actual killer’s motive, and that gives my sleuth many avenues to pursue.
Then I try writing scenes on 3×5 cards, one scene per card, and I line them up, getting a sense of what happens first.
I seldom have many 3×5 cards because inevitably, it all dries up at an early pre-visioning stage, and I give up trying to see my way through the entire book. I have to write it, hear what people say, know what people might do before I can see my way–with them–to the end.
I think it was Thurber who said, “Don’t write it right, write it down.” That’s my philosophy with this first draft. So much of it is wrong, but I keep a separate file of questions and notes about what I think I’ll have to change, and I keep plugging on.
Roughly midway, I stop and do a “backwards” outline. I use the cards again, putting down what I’ve already written, scene by scene, card by card. Then I can visualize the remaining blank path a little more clearly, knowing where I now am, and where I need to go. But I never know in advance how Amanda’s going to actually solve it, and I put out offerings and prayers of hope to the plot gods.
I used to despair about this inability to outline, but I have come to think of my first draft as a long outline. Once I have it and I know the story, I can begin to truly write the book through lots of revision.
What inspired you to write in the academic mystery genre?
As I mentioned, I was a high school English teacher, but in reality, when I began what became Caught Dead in Philadelphia, it had a housewife/mother of young children as a protagonist. She was deeply involved in the parent-teacher association so that I could get her into school a great deal–so much so, that one day I thought I should save the back and forth and make my protagonist a teacher.
How did your most important characters take shape (appear fully formed or reveal her/himself gradually)?
Amanda Pepper revealed herself slowly. First, she was that suburban mother. Then, an unmarried schoolteacher. I knew lots of facts about her, but it took being three-quarters through a first draft before I finally, happily, “heard” her voice, finished the draft in first person and started at the beginning again, letting her have her say.
I think of getting to know the character as a two-stage process. Thinking about her, asking lots of background questions is the dating stage. You think you know this person. Then you write the book. That’s the marriage, when you really do get to know the character through how she reacts, and what she says and does.
Had I but known the book would become a series, I would have given more thought to her having such a cheery middle-class, law-abiding family, and perhaps even a darker past herself. It would have made it easier finding reasons for her to be in the vicinity of crime. Ditto for having C.K. Mackenzie lovely as he is, become her significant other right away. That cut out the possibility of dates with evil-doers..
But I didn’t know to think ahead, and then it turned out that being a teacher was perfect, because a school is really a microcosm of society, and she had classrooms full of young adults about whom she cared.
I think she continued to change and grow throughout the series. I hope I did the same!
How do you decide on a title?
I’ve only been “the decider” for some of my titles. I came up with Caught Dead in Philadelphia, whereupon the publisher, enraptured by Sue Grafton’s alphabet titles, thought that all my titles should have the word “Philadelphia” in them. I came up with two more and then I was out. “Philadelphia” is a wee bit more difficult to work into a title than, say, “B is for…” Even then, I’d wanted to call the third book “Rule of Thumb” because it was about spousal abuse and I’d always heard that there was a rule of thumb and it was that you couldn’t beat your wife with a stick thicker than your thumb. I was voted down by my editor.
Later, I came up with Adam and Evil and jokingly said, “and the next one will be Helen Hath No Fury.” My editor liked that joke, unfortunately. (I am not really a punster.)He declared that all the titles should have a name and a mystery-sounding pun.
I held a contest on my website and DorothyL, and the results were amazing. Almost instantly, I received about 800 punny titles, and many were brilliant. Till the End of Tom, A Hole in Juan, and Claire and Present Danger were all contest winners. My editor picked them out of the total submissions. So many were great that I’m sorry I didn’t have 800 more books to write.
I came up with the final title, All’s Well That Ends.
Titles are strange and difficult. Usually, the book itself gives you its title. Somewhere in the writing process, a phrase or idea or snip of dialogue surfaces and there it is. A work in progress doesn’t feel right until the characters have the right names and the story has a good title.
What are you working on right now?
I wanted a challenge–something different–and for the past few years I’ve been living with the “be careful what you ask for” aftermath. What has emerged, after a staggering amount of difficult research and several incarnations–from a contemporary story with historical flashbacks, to a historical novel with three points of view, to a first person narrative and, to my surprise,a murdered man in the canal. Also to my surprise, it’s a historical mystery set in 1649, the year of the Mexican Inquisition’s largest auto-da-fe. The book is tentatively called “The Heretic’s Boy.” It is not yet out to market but I expect it will be, soon, so stay tuned. (Full disclosure: there isn’t a single academic in it.)
What advice do you have for writers who have not yet been published?
Don’t despair, and don’t give up. This is a lifelong apprenticeship. Learn your craft. Join a critique group and pay attention to whose feedback you admire or agree with when they critique others, then listen to them when they critique you. Writing is rewriting. The more you write, the better you’ll write, so keep going.
Finish the work. Even if you have a brilliant new idea–make notes and go back, get over the hump and to the end. Not finishing is psychologically damaging and you’ll stop believing you can complete a novel. Finish, revise and you’ll have learned more than you can understand at the moment.
Don’t submit anything until you know it is the absolute best you can produce.
Read, read, read. Read for pleasure, for absorbing the rhythms and structure of a good book, for enjoying well-developed characters, for the language. Then read like a writer. Pick your favorite books, and after you’ve read them for pleasure, re-read them to see how those authors did it. Let them teach and inspire you.
Is there anything else you’d like to share with us?
I think I’ve talked too much already!
Thank you for the interesting questions. It’s grand to be a part of this wonderful site.
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Gillian Roberts is the author of the Anthony-award winning Amanda Pepper mystery series that features a Philadelphia high school English teacher and her significant (but undernamed) other (now husband), C. K. Mackenzie. The entire series is being published as e-books (in every format) by Untreed Reads. Gillian’s also written two books in a second series, featuring a pair of private detectives, Emma Howe and Billie August. Emma’s a “woman of a certain age” who has been running an agency for quite a while, and Billie is the inexperienced young trainee Emma reluctantly has hired. That series is set in Marin County, California and the books are called Time and Trouble and Whatever Doesn’t Kill You. Learn more at http://gillianroberts.com.
Discussion: On Perception
Is anyone watching Perception on TNT? Do you think it qualifies as an academic mystery–why or why not?
And what are some other other television or film academic mysteries? Let’s make a list…
