June 2024 – Page 3 – Ladies of Mystery

I started a new novel a few weeks ago, Cleopatra Slept here, Book 11 of the Alvarez Family Murder Mysteries. All enthusiastic, I got off to a rip-roaring start, only to peter out several days later. I found any excuse not to sit down and write, some of them pretty lame. Watching the leaves grow on a rosebush is not a valid excuse. Neither is watching the new season of Bridgerton, although the costumes are fantastic and there is a lot of huggy-poo-kissie-face. But still, not a good enough reason to put off my work. So, I called myself on it and found, as usual, I was in a stall because I was on the wrong road.

I should be used to this. I am directionally challenged. I remember back in ’86, when my husband and I packed up everything we owned, including two reluctant cats, and headed from New Jersey to California. It was December 14^th. Chilly weather, but drivable. Naturally, the car hitch to the truck didn’t work. As it was a Sunday and Avis Rent-a-Truck was closed, we decided he would drive the truck (alone) and I would lead the way driving the car (with the two cats). I was the leader because I was in charge of the Trip Tik, an involved layout of driving instructions from Triple A, before the internet was a going concern. I think I mentioned I am directionally challenged. That was the day we found out. December 14, 1986.

Instead of heading west and south to Texas, I managed to head us northwest, even with directions. We discovered this error about 9 hours later, 5 miles to the gallon, during a blizzard. Divorces have been caused by less. Norm became suspicious about the blizzard and not seeing any signs for Texas. He honked me over to the side of the road where reality hit. Lake Erie was in view.

Near the border of Canada, we crashed for the night at a Motel 6 when it really was 6 bucks. I will not go into the discussion about me leading us closer to Lake Erie than we had ever been before or since, but sufficeth it to say I gave up my rights to the Trip Tik or any other directional leadings in the future. But at least my husband was still talking to me, even if it was through tight lips. The cats were not talking to me, so it was a long night, blizzard and all. A week later we arrived in California, no thanks to me.

I allude to this December 14^th snafu as it has a direct bearing on my writing. Metaphorically speaking, I was heading in the wrong direction, about to run into the Lake Erie of writing, a lovely lake I’m sure, but not my destination. Initially, I may not have known that’s what I did to myself, but somewhere in the deep recesses of my soul, Life’s Trip Tik did. It took a while because I didn’t have a snow-covered, tight-lipped husband standing over me with flames shooting from his mouth, but eventually, I got the message. I had gone north when I should have gone south.

This is particularly important with book 11, Cleopatra Slept Here. I will elucidate. Book 9, The Drop-Dead Temple of Doom, takes place in Guatemala, the storyline dealing with ancient Mayans, archeology, and what have you. So here I am in book 11 writing a storyline dealing with ancient Egyptians, archeology, and what have you. I knew from the beginning the story had to be as different as possible from book 9 but Laudie, Laudie, Laudie.

Leave it to me to head north when I should be going south. I’d started out with the same scenario as book 9. It was comfortable. Missing person, trip to the pyramids for Lee Alvarez, protagonist; former Navy SEAL husband, Gurn; and she-who-must-be-obeyed mother of Lee, Lila. Really, Heather? It took me a long time to find a U-turn from that road.

After I slept on it, played in my garden, and bought things on the internet I am now returning, what to do hit me. Start the stupid story ANEW. Forget anything you wrote before. Pretend you never wrote book 9. Don’t be influenced by it. Every series writer knows it’s tough not to repeat yourself, but you simply can’t. The readers remember, bless their hearts. And it’s about as close to cheating as you can get. I mean, plagiarizing yourself? How gauche.

And I realized I did want something different in book 11. I wanted the entire Alvarez family together on a ship floating down the Nile. The three mentioned above, but I also wanted Tío, retired chef uncle; brother and IT guru, Richard; his wife, Vicki; their 2-year-old daughter, Steffi; and Lee and Gurn’s 2 cats, Tugger and Baba. Why? Why not. The more, the merrier. But how to accomplish that?

A 2-week vacation! No need to stick in missing people, mishaps, or mysteries in the story. Yet. Just a family vacation laid out as simply as possible, with everything falling into place. This includes free private transportation to Egypt, thanks to Gurn’s pilot buddy who happens to be flying a large plane to Luxor and needs him for a co-pilot. There’s also free lodging on the Blue Nile, a ship with rooms to spare, thanks to the original dig seeking out Cleopatra’s tomb in Alexandria being canceled and most dig members scattering. Gurn’s parents, amateur archeologists, were willing to pay through the nose to be included in this canceled dig but have been persuaded to join a new one, the search for Cleopatra’s mother.

Cleopatra VII, of Julius Caesar and Mark Antony fame, was born in early 69 BC to the ruling Ptolemaic pharaoh Ptolemy XII and an unknown mother, possibly Ptolemy XII’s wife Cleopatra V Tryphaena. But it is not certain. The Dig Director and main benefactor of the original dig decides instead of following the pack in Alexandria trying to locate Celopatra’s tomb, sailing aboard the Blue Nile for Aswan to find out just who the queen’s mom was is the way to go. The Alvarez family decides to join in the search. And all for free!

But nothing is free in this world, not even in fiction. What starts out as a gentle, family-oriented vacation lolling around on the Nile ends up with the Alvarez clan being caught up in a mind-numbing ride of murder, drugs, and other chicanery. The trade of heroin may persist in Egypt, despite efforts by security forces to eliminate it, but something is mightily wrong with the elegant Blue Nile. Who are these strange voices heard in the middle of the night? Why do missing waiters seem to be commonplace aboard this ship? And what is the secret the elusive captain’s log holds?

Egypt’s strategic location makes it a significant destination and transit point for heroin moving from Asia to Europe, Africa, and the US. But all of this settles in on the Alvarez clan too late to do anything but ride posse on the truth, camel-style.

I don’t consider myself a pack rat. Others may differ. Well, maybe I will admit to pack rat tendencies. But not the whole rat. I don’t have empty plastic yogurt tubs and months’ old stacks of newspaper cluttering up my home. I really do try to recycle and reuse, and throw out, if need be.

I am, however, a paper magnet. It’s a tendency acquired early in my writing career. I spot something in the newspaper or a magazine, clip it out and set it aside, thinking I might use that someday, in a story or a novel.

And I have. Here’s where recycling comes in. Back in 2005, I clipped a short article from the San Francisco Chronicle. The story concerned a stash of old wallets found in the rafters of a barracks at Camp Roberts, in central California. It’s a California National Guard base now, but during World War II it was an Army training base. The contents of the wallets dated back to that era, the 1940s. The theory was that the wallets had been stolen, all valuables removed, and the wallets then disposed of in the rafters. I was so intrigued by the story I kept it pinned to my bulletin board. And indeed, I did use the story in a Jeri Howard novel—Bit Player.

I started writing in the ancient times before computers and the internet, so I would stash all these clippings and assorted notes in file folders. Some of those folders date back decades and are still hanging around in file boxes, taking up space in my office. I really would like to purge that paper. But I am reluctant to get rid of anything that I might use someday. I know, I know, the mantra of a pack rat.

These days, with the internet, I can save the article onto my computer, or at least the URL. Saves paper and space, that’s for sure. I can even use my iPhone to scan documents. I have file folders of clippings and notes awaiting such action. Then maybe I can throw out all that paper and free up some space in my office.

There’s another kind of throwing out. I’ve excised scenes from novels and told myself the finished work is better for it. At times, though, I reuse a scene. In the Jeri Howard novel Nobody’s Child, Jeri gets shoved off a BART platform in San Francisco. That scene originally appeared in an early version of Till the Old Men Die. I really like the excitement of the scene, with Jeri’s narrow escape from an onrushing BART train. Too good not to reuse.

I also recycle and reuse characters. An earlier unpublished novel had a character named Lowell Rhine. He was a shifty character. I liked the name, so I recycled it in Cold Trail, using the moniker for a somewhat shady lawyer. As for that unpublished novel, and another lurking in my files, I have some recycling and reusing in mind.

Frequently characters who appear in my books wind up in other books. History professor Lindsay Page first appeared in the Jeri Howard novel Witness to Evil. Later she had her own book, my standalone novel What You Wish For. After attending my 50^th high school reunion, I wrote a novella, But Not Forgotten, about a semi-retired reporter named Maggie Constable, who attends her reunion, determined to solve a long-ago mystery. I like Maggie a lot, so she appeared in my most recent Jeri Howard book, The Things We Keep. Maggie is going to have a book of her own, as soon as I can get around to it.

And yes, I did write a short story about a pack rat. Entitled Pack Rat. I’m not as bad as the guy in the story. Really.