Month: October 2022

A Quiet Life by Karen Shughart

~ kshughart47 ~ 4 Comments

When my husband and I decided to move from Central Pennsylvania to a small village on the south shore of Lake Ontario it was because we agreed that in retirement, we wanted a quiet life. We knew it was a trade-off. In Pennsylvania we had easy access to cultural events and were within minutes to shopping and restaurants of every sort. But we also had to contend with gridlock traffic on the highways, light and noise pollution, a drive of between 15 and 40 minutes to visit with our friends and the hustle and bustle that goes with living near a state capital.

Photo by Magda Ehlers on Pexels.com

Up here, along the lake, we have a traffic jam when there’s a car at each stop sign at “four corners”, the four-way intersection as you enter our village. We travel a distance for symphony, ballet and opera performances, the nearest mall is a 45-minute drive, and supermarkets between 15 and 30 minutes from our home. But we have an abundance of restaurants, farm markets, small grocery and liquor stores, a post office and hairdresser, the beach and even a golf course within walking distance.

There’s music everywhere in the summer, concerts on a bluff overlooking the water, and groups performing at restaurants and parks. Friends live nearby, and the longest drive to visit them is at most five minutes. What some might call noise soothes my soul: waves pounding upon the shore, the morning cacophony of birdsong, the chittering of squirrels, the soft chirping of crickets on a late summer’s eve, and the mournful call of the loons.

The quiet here is also a balm for me as a writer. A short time ago I took part in a discussion with a Cozy writers’ Facebook group where the administrator asked how many of us write with music playing in the background. I discovered that I am in the minority, most of those who responded are stimulated and feel more creative with background music of every sort. Some were surprised when I said that I get distracted, it’s hard for me to concentrate when there’s too much “chatter”.

It was an interesting discussion, and as I thought more about it, I realized how creative juices are stirred in so many ways. Writing for me is meditative, I can write for hours without paying attention to the time, and sometimes without taking a break. My husband teases that he knows not to try and discuss anything important with me when I’m writing. If he tells me he’s leaving to play golf or run errands, I’ll nod and later not remember a word he’s said and wonder where he is.

As I thought more about it, I realized that as I’ve aged I choose not to multitask as much as I used to.  I can cook and listen to rock and roll, show tunes or jazz at the same time, and do word puzzles or Sudoku while watching TV, but for some reason, writing, reading, or listening to certain types of of music are activities I want to savor individually. There’s immense pleasure and something to be said about immersing oneself in quiet pursuits.

Guest Blogger ~ Joyce Woollcott

~ patyjag ~ 4 Comments

I’ve always been a reader, always. Even as a child when I look back, I remember particularly enjoying adventure and mystery. I grew up just outside Belfast and in those days, I couldn’t lose myself in social media so I lost myself in books. The Famous Five, The Secret Seven, anything I could get my hands on really. I think you can see the beginning of a trend.

I read the classics too of course, for school and pleasure, but I always enjoyed a good murder, just like my mum.

After graduating I came to Canada, got a job, married, raised a daughter and read. Michael Connelly, Lou Berney, Denise Mina, Ann Cleeves, P.D. James, and the like. I wrote while I still worked, as I suppose a lot of aspiring writers do, but only in a half-hearted way, feeling out of depth. When I took early retirement and could finally take the time, I enrolled in some night classes and learned how to format, what typeface and size to use. It was from those classes that I started to read my favourite books again and actually learn from them.

I started to paint too, somehow the idea of just writing seemed so foreign to me. Could a person write? I used to paint when I was younger and I thought I could fill my days doing both, and if the writing didn’t work out, well I could always fill my days painting …

Mist on River.
Early Fall
Loch Erne, N. Ireland.

I signed on for a summer workshop at The Humber School for Writers in Toronto and the next year was accepted into a year-long, on-line, post-grad class there with Canadian novelist Robert Rotenburg. This was the beginning of a journey to complete my first ever manuscript. Abducted.

I passed the year with a Letter of Distinction. Encouraged, I entered Abducted in the Arthur Ellis Awards Unpublished contest. I was long-listed in December 2018.

Spurred on by this, in February 2019 I entered the Daphne du Maurier Awards with my second novel, A Nice Place to Die. In May, 2019 I got a call from New York, telling me I was a finalist. On 24th July I watched the Awards via video link. I won the Daphne! This is for their largest group, Unpublished Mainstream Mystery/Suspense.

January 2020, I received notice that A Nice Place to Die made the long-list of the Arthur Ellis Awards, Unpublished, and finally in 2021, I made the short-list as a finalist in the Crime Writers of Canada Awards of Excellence.

As you can tell from this, my road to publication has been long. I was full of doubt and sought a backup plan, but in the end, writing took over and I was offered and signed off on a two-book contract in 2021. That contract is for A Nice Place to Die and the second book in the series Blood Relations. It’s been a lot of work but it’s been worth it and I do believe this is a process most writers have to go through. Yes of course there are debut novelists who hit the ground running, straight out of school or university or college, but I think this is the exception not the rule. We need to read, we need to write and we need to learn. This takes time and determination. Take courses, ask for help, seek out critique partners and readers. And listen to the criticism, because it will come. And when all that is done, submit your work. And good luck!

A Nice Place To Die

The body of a young woman is found by a river outside Belfast and Detective Sergeant Ryan McBride makes a heart-wrenching discovery at the scene, a discovery he chooses to hide even though it could cost him the investigation – and his career.

The victim was a loner but well-liked. Why would someone want to harm her? And is her murder connected to a rapist who’s stalking the local pubs? As Ryan untangles a web of deception and lies, his suspects die one by one, leading him to a dangerous family secret and a murderer who will stop at nothing to keep it.

And still he harbors his secret …

Buy Links:

US: https://amzn.to/3CGIzi0

Can: https://amzn.to/3TroD8K

UK: https://amzn.to/3CU4diN

B&N: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/a-nice-place-to-die-j-woollcott/1142154246?ean=9781685121662

J. Woollcott is a Canadian writer born in Northern Ireland. She is a graduate of the Humber School for Writers and BCAD, University of Ulster. Her first mystery, Abducted, was long-listed in the Canadian Arthur Ellis Awards in 2019. Her second book, A Nice Place to Die, won the RWA Unpublished Mystery/Suspense Daphne du Maurier Award in 2019 in New York. A Nice Place to Die was also long-listed in the Arthur Ellis Awards for 2020 and short-listed in the Crime Writers of Canada Awards of Excellence in 2021. She is working on part two of the Ryan McBride Belfast Murder Series, Blood Relations, due out in August 2023.

She is a member of Crime Writers of Canada, Sisters in Crime, International Thriller Writers,  and the Suncoast Writers Guild.

Website: https://www.jwoollcott.com

Twitter: @JoyceWoollcott

Of Very Big Trips, Layovers and Refrigerators

~ janispattersonmysteries ~ 5 Comments

by Janis Patterson

Well, we are back from our Very Big Trip, and a Very Big Trip it was, too. Two and a half weeks cruising the Nile from Cairo to Luxor. Our ship was modest but still luxurious and only for our group, the staff eager to please, the food 4 star delicious, the accommodations more than comfortable. We were met at the airport in Cairo and when the tour ended in Luxor flown back to Cairo on a chartered plane to begin our trips home. Our ‘shore excursions’ were spectacular; even though this is my seventh (and The Husband’s eighth) trip to Egypt, we saw things we had never seen before, such as the ruins of the Hawara Pyramid of King Amenemhat III (currently scholastic frontrunner to be the Pharaoh of Joseph) and the gloriously painted images of the foreign dignitaries in the tombs of Beni Hassan. We were accorded the rare (and almost never granted) privilege of going down into the Sphynx precinct where we could stand between the paws (almost twice as tall as I) and touch the Dream Stela of Thutmosis III. This was The Husband’s and my second time in this carefully guarded area, as before we were married my darling friend Zahi Hawass had given us permission to explore. And of course we saw the must-sees of Karnak Temple, Deir el-Bahri, Amarna, Abydos and the Ramesseum. And more.

If you would like to know more about our incredible trip, you can go to my website (www.JanisPattersonMysteries.com) and subscribe to my newsletter, where I will write about it in more detail. Originally I intended to do just one newsletter about it, but it looks like it might become two, because my personal Trip Diary is now topping 40K words and even a truncated version will be most healthily-sized!

However… lest you think life is perfect, my life had problems. About ten days before our departure, our aged HVAC went out, for five days leaving us with no AC during the early September heat of Texas. Worse, my hot tub (a necessity for my arthritis-ridden body to exercise) died. Our similarly-aged refrigerator died. Even our landline phone needed work! We soldiered on, though – the HVAC was replaced, my wonderful hot tub man had it fixed, filled and ready for me to use when we returned, the phone was taken care of, and we had decided to leave the fridge problem for when we got back.

Then two days before departure Lufthansa cancelled our DFW/Frankfurt flight and switched us to United (meh – not my favorite airline) for DFW/Houston/Frankfurt. Well, okay… except the DFW/HOU flight was ONE AND A HALF HOURS LATE taking off, giving us just 26 minutes to get all the way across the Houston airport. We managed, though – barely – and made the HOU/FRA flight with four minutes to spare. Once we finally arrived in Cairo everything was fine.

Our return flight was not cancelled or rearranged (thankfully) but because of the screwy flight schedules we had a 14 hour layover in Frankfurt. For years and years I have insisted that Frankfurt airport is one of the seven circles of hell, and this trip just underscored my belief. Rather than book into the airport hotel, we decided to save the $250+ it would cost (saving it for our next trip in 18 months or so) and just find a comfortable customer lounge to wait in. Except we came in after midnight and landed in one of the most remote and unused terminals. The train connecting the terminals had stopped running, there were no food or drink kiosks and no customer lounges… just a small customs station which would take us out of the security area and miles of brightly lit marble halls. Oh, the AC was on full blast and it was both chilly and raining outside.

A kindly driver of one of the little electric trams in the terminal was off duty, but he volunteered to take us to an area several floors up where passengers and short-layover crews could sleep. Good on them if they could sleep there, because I barely managed a short nap. This was a hallway, a plain open hallway, with about 20-30 army-style cots. No pillows, no blankets, no nothing but a bunch of very uncomfortable cots. And no people. After the tram driver left we saw no one until after 6 am except a Japanese couple who appeared to be in the same fix we were. There was a restroom, though, some 50 yards and two hallways away. It was sort of like being in one of the grimmer Twilight Zone episodes.

Now it’s a funny story to tell. Then it was pure uncomfortable, teeth-chattering misery.

So how does this all relate to writing? It’s obvious – when you really really really want something in life (writing or anything else) you do whatever you have to do, endure whatever you have to endure in order to get it. This trip to Egypt was important to us, and whatever the gods flung at us we handled because that was the way to get what we wanted. And it was worth it. If you want to write, you must write, no matter what life throws at you. Only you can decide if your writing is a hobby you dabble in when the conditions are perfect or if it is a career where you forge on through in spite of everything. Your choice.

By the way, The Husband bought me a refurbed MacBookAir (which I promptly named Maxine) to take on this trip mainly so I could keep a comprehensive trip diary to share with my readers. I wasn’t going to write a book; I was going to take a rest, as I don’t have any contracts starting until January. I don’t have to tell you what happened, do I? And I’m already 8K words into a new story about a murder on a Nile cruise ship…

A final word about our dead refrigerator. The day after we returned we went shopping, not illogically expecting to have a new refrigerator within a couple of days. My kitchen is very bright and light, so of course I wanted a white refrigerator. We were shocked to find that all the off-the-floor ones with the features we wanted (French door, bottom freezer, ice and water in the door) are available only in stainless steel or rarely in black. Well, that’s fine for those who don’t mind looking like they live in a laboratory or a morgue, but I wanted white. Finally after a day of searching we found a place that agreed to special order a white one for us. White – a special order! (And at a cost roughly twice that of my first car!) Who would have thunk it? As you’ve probably guessed, I will do what is necessary to get what I really want, so we’ll have our new refrigerator in three weeks.

The next three weeks are going to be interesting.

What To Write

~ patyjag ~ 9 Comments

While I always have a lot of ideas bouncing around in my head, when I finished the latest Spotted Pony Casino book, I wasn’t sure which idea I should write next.

Should I just pick one of the titles? I have a list of gambling terms that I use for the titles in the Spotted Pony Casino series. Or should I use one of my ideas and figure out which term/title would work for it? I pondered this as I began the next Hawke book. I like to be thinking about several books ahead while I write the current one. It’s how I can finish up one and dive right into the next one, because I’ve been thinking about it in the back of my mind.

I had a little help from my subconcious.

One night as I was taking a shower a scene popped into my head and I knew which idea I’d be using. I got out of the shower and wrote the scene down. Now that I know the direction the next story is heading, I can pick one of the ten titles I have to go with it, and I can begin plotting the suspects and motives.

When I finish writing the current Hawke book, Bear Stalker.

Because I write two series, hopping from one to the next I have also been wondering which of my Hawke ideas would be the next book. There are times I can have two to three books in a series lined out in my head and on paper, but I’m working on book 10 in the Gabriel Hawke series and while I have three more ideas written down, I wasn’t sure which direction I wanted to go.

The other night, just as I was about to drift off the opening scene for the next Hawke book trickled through my mind. I immediately grabbed the notebook by the bed, went into the bathroom and closed the door to not wake hubby and the puppy, and started writing it down.

As I wrote the opening scene, I realized the story would play out differently than I had originally planned for this scenario. I love when my brain figures out a better story line than what I’d first thought.

This new idea should make the readers who like when Hawke tracks in the mountains happy and will keep them wondering how many bodies Hawke will come across. 😉

When ideas come to me like this- out of the blue when I’m not trying to figure something out-I call them gifts. Because they are always better than what I had come up with while forcing myself to figure out a story line.

The mind is a wonderful thing. I hope we don’t lose our originality and creativity to machines.

Real Recipes from a Fictional PI by Heather Haven

~ Heather Haven ~ 6 Comments

When you treat your characters as living, breathing entities, things can happen. This includes those near and dear thinking you’re peculiar. For instance, when writing the third book of the Alvarez Family Murder Mysteries, Death Runs in the Family, the two cats from the series, Baba and Tugger, were catnapped and in the back of the villain’s station wagon speeding from Palo Alto to Las Vegas. For reasons I can’t remember, I had to stop writing the story at that point. For three whole days I was uncomfortable about it. I kept telling myself, it’s just a story, right? They’re not real cats trapped in carriers in the back of a station wagon without food or water for days on end, right? Wrong.

On the third night, even though I knew all the above intellectually, I woke up at two am and leapt out of bed, determined to write the fur balls into safety and a bowl of kibble. At nine am I staggered back to bed. But now I could sleep. The cats were fed, cuddled, and loved by Lee Alvarez, the protagonist of the series. On another note, even though my husband is not a writer, he knows me. That night he rolled over and went back to sleep, totally understanding my getting up and needing to save my fictional cats then and there. At least, that’s what he said. And still says. He shoulda been a diplomat.

Any writer will tell you giving fictional characters the same traits as living people is a good idea. Keeps things real, don-cha-know. But like anything else, it can depend on how far you go with it. I tread a fine line. Let’s get back to my protagonist, Lee Alvarez. I’m an eater. So she’s an eater. Of course, she’s a svelte size eight, because this is fiction. I’m a svelte Omar the Tentmaker. But I take great joy in her being a foodie. Which runs in the family. Her uncle, Tio, another character in the series, is a retired chef. His recipes just add to the fun. Sometimes I feel the need for Lee to share one of these recipes. Like now:

Lee here. Even though my idea of cooking dinner is to stop at the nearest deli for a roast beef sandwich, as the central character of the humorous Alvarez Family Murder Mystery Series, I do get to eat a lot of epicurean meals. That’s because my Tio was an executive chef at a well-known restaurant here in the Bay Area. During his career, his recipes were often written up in gourmet food magazines. They’d throw in a few pics of him, too, because Tio is one classy-looking guy. I have articles and pictures in a scrapbook I started in my early teens. That was before my PI days. I don’t have time to make scrapbooks anymore – I don’t have time to do squat anymore – except I do seem to find time to sit down at the dinner table and scarf down one of his culinary masterpieces!

Tío may be retired but his skills aren’t. He still likes to create great meals, but now just for family and friends. While doing so, he tends to make a dish again and again until it reaches his idea of perfection. Meanwhile, lucky me gets to gobble up every version, as he strives for the ultimate. When Tio was working on his Flan de Naranja, I gained six of the happiest pounds of my life. Fortunately, I spend a lot of time chasing bad guys over rooftops, so I can lose the weight as fast as I gain it.

No lie, his flan has gone down in song and legend. If I could sing, I’d demonstrate. Tio even picks the oranges himself right off our backyard tree. I thought it would be nice to share his recipe with you. If any of you make it, though, I sure hope you will invite me over for a helping. It’s a real winner!

Tio’s Flan de Naranja

Serves 4-6:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C).

Ingredients:

5 egg yolks

1 cup white sugar

3 cups heavy cream

1 cup half-and-half cream

1 vanilla bean, split and scraped

1 orange peel

1/2 fluid ounce orange liqueur

2 ounces candied orange peel, grated

Preparation:

In a medium bowl, beat egg yolks. Beat in sugar until smooth. Set aside.  In a large saucepan over medium heat, combine cream, half-and-half, the vanilla bean and its scrapings, and the peel of one orange. Heat until bubbles form at edges of liquid, reduce heat to low and simmer 15 minutes. Remove orange peel. Beat hot cream into egg mixture, a little at a time, until all is incorporated. Stir in orange liqueur. Pour into 4 to 6 individual custard cups.

Line a roasting pan with a damp kitchen towel. Place cups on towel, inside roasting pan, and place roasting pan on oven rack. Fill roasting pan with boiling water to reach halfway up the sides of the cups.

Bake in preheated oven 45 to 60 minutes, until set. Let cool completely.  Sprinkle candied orange peel on top of each cup before serving. Olé!