Category: Janis Patterson

Say What?

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by Janis Patterson

I read… a lot. Lately, however, it hasn’t been as pleasant as it used to be and more than a few books have hit the (metaphorical) wall. Without exception it’s the fault of the authors. Nearly every one was a first time author – I did verify that, but it really wasn’t necessary. Their writing said it all.

One of the most common (and worst) errors is a misuse of words. Not quite as bad as the homophonic mayhem such as broach/brooch or affect/effect or grisly/grizzly and the like, which sadly are quite common even among multi-published professionals, but I’m talking about the more egregious mis-choice of language. I’ll explain; there are two kinds of word usage – dialogue and exposition. Dialogue is what the character actually says/thinks – what actually comes out of the character himself.. Exposition is telling what is done.

I believe that dialogue should be true to the character speaking. (And in ‘dialogue’ I include written communications by the character – letters, texts, etc. – anything that is ‘spoken’ by the character, such as interior thoughts.) Is the character a crusty old fisherman who hates people? A feisty young heroine-type who prances through life cooking, talking with her cat and showing off her shoes? A silent but heroic Navy Seal with a deep sense of patriotism and a distrust of women? A culture-vulture society woman with a drive to climb higher on the social ladder? All have the potential to be great characters, but they shouldn’t sound anything like each other. They all need their own voice.

Each character has (or should have!) their own history, their own background, their own socio-economic standing, their own individuality. That means they have their own character-specific language, their own vocabulary, their own rhythm of speaking whether exterior (speaking to other characters) or interior (thoughts, letters, etc.). You can get away with almost any kind of grammar/word choice in dialogue AS LONG AS it is congruent with the character speaking and the time/location frame of the story. For example, you would not have a Regency dowager or a 1850s Plains Indian saying “Fer sure” or “You’ve got to be kidding me.” If you do have a social doyenne speaking like a dockworker or vice versa, you’d better have a very good reason for it stated in the book.

Expository writing, however, is different. This is everything that is not dialogue. This should be written by grammatical rules with correct and perhaps neutral vocabulary. Even in deep third POV expository writing is the author, not the character, and should be correct both in grammar and word choices.

That said, remember first person works have their own problem, for there the expository writing is from the viewpoint character and should reflect his age, status, attitude and general personality.

Correct use of both dialogue and expository writing can give your characters a depth and life. Done correctly, the reader should be able to determine who said what by the language they use, even if you don’t add a dialogue tag. However – both using a dialogue tag and not using one are constructions which should not be overused.

Writing is always a balancing act, but it becomes easier for both the writer and the reader when the languages choices are correct to the character.

Catching Up

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by Janis Patterson

This is going to be short, because – quite frankly – I’m tired. I was away from home more than half of September. A wedding in Boston; a wedding in Alabama; a family reunion in East Texas; the Novelists, Inc. conference in Florida. Whew! My luggage has never been fully unpacked this entire month and our beloved furbabies – two neurotic cats, one prissy little dog – probably thought we had abandoned them to the boarding kennel. They’re home now, and hopefully they’ll forgive us before long.

We got in late last night and this morning I went to pick up the furbabies. Had to do two trips – three carry cages in the car is just too much; besides, I don’t really like the odds of being outnumbered three to one. Got them all home, plugged in the cat pheromone tranquilizer (wonderful stuff!) and let them run. Big cat Chloe has taken over my lap, which makes typing difficult, prissy little dog Mindy Moo is lying right where my feet need to go, and oldest cat Squeaky Boots – a tiny thing of 6 lbs who rules the house with an iron paw and a single deadly little fang – has taken over our king-sized bed by sprawling in the exact center. Yes, life is back to what we laughingly call normal.

My work isn’t, though. Sigh. Wonderful month, saw lots of people and places and learned lots of things, but my writing this month has totally gone south. Barely ten pages all month. Lots of ideas, lots of plotting, even a nifty idea for a mystery series – which has garnered some interest, believe it or not – but two books that desperately need finishing and two more ready to be self-published, all  ignored.

Well, that will change tomorrow, just as soon as I hit the grocery store and lay in enough supplies to make sure that The Husband and I don’t starve to death. Though with all the wonderful meals out we’ve had in this month that eventuality is far from being a worry. I still say that whoever invented elastic waistbands deserves instant canonization.

If there is anything that I have learned in the last couple of decades of being a writer, it’s that you can’t plan. You can make all the business models you want, set up all the spreadsheets and project charts you like, but life can and will get in the way. I guess that’s true in any other field as well, but it seems to affect writers and artists more.

Like the NINC conference – without doubt the best conference for professional working writers on the planet. In three and a half very full and very long days I learned so much that my head is about to explode. Unfortunately, there was so much that I learned – stuff that really should be done NOW for the advancement of my business – that somehow the writing of new stuff gets shoved even further back. I did take my tablet and computer to Florida just so I could work in my down time, except there wasn’t any down time. When I wasn’t in workshops or exchanging information with other writers, I was trying to enjoy a little time with my adored Husband in a tropical paradise. Work? What’s that? Sleep? Who needs it?

Anyway, I have already made and paid for our reservations to next year’s conference, and will contact the hotel about rooms tomorrow or the next day. I’m already excited.

And tired. So – please forgive if this is a less than coherent post. My mind is going off in twenty different directions, and my body is going to bed. Night!

Villainous ‘Tells’

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by Janis Patterson

Once upon a time, in most books and movies everyone smoked. Not to smoke was abnormal, if not downright suspicious. It showed the character was weak or of no account. Likewise, any unkempt or scruffy person, especially one with no manners or a rough/insufficient vocabulary, was instantly suspect. Today it’s exactly the opposite. Anyone who smokes, dresses above the average, is conspicuously erudite and has exquisite manners is automatically regarded as a potential villain, especially in a contemporary story.

There are all sorts of sociological and psychological reasons for this reversal, none of which are the business of this blog. What I’m trying to do is spotlight the ‘tell’ – the little nuances of behavior that ‘tell’ the reader the person is a villain, and there are many.

It has become almost a cliché that he/she who smokes is a villain. When was the last time you read about a hero (or heroine) who smokes? Except in an historical novel, of course, even though it’s fairly rare even there.

Almost equally obvious is the conventional straight-laced man who wears a suit and tie, cares about his grammar and is punctilious in his manners. He is either gay and the heroine’s best friend, or her stuffy beau who wants to give her a nice house, nice children and a nice, unexciting life but with no excitement, or he is an untrustworthy villain. Or, in some rare cases, he can be the comic relief, but usually he turns out to be the villain.

Yet another is the older, avuncular, seemingly trustworthy character – of either sex – who seems to exist only to care and guide the hero/heroine but who secretly hiding a dreadful secret. Great-Aunt Hattie as a serial murderer? Why not? Anyone who is so ostentatiously innocent is automatically suspect.

A cheap shot is when a seemingly normal character makes an appearance early on and then isn’t seen very much at all until the end of the book, when it is revealed that he is the diabolical killer. Several TV shows use this trope – so much so that it has become almost laughable.

There are other ‘tells.’ For example, the character with the habit that eventually points him out as the killer, such as folding the paper from his soda straw in a certain way, or a particular scent he wears. Any character, guilty or innocent, can do anything; it is how the author handles it whether it becomes a ‘tell’ or not.

And I guess that’s the crux of the matter. Idiosyncrasy or ‘tell’ – which? As a writer you should play fair with your reader, but that doesn’t mean you can’t play with them. Misdirect them. Confuse them. Can they figure the mystery out? Or do you hand it to them on a plate?

The Perfect Murder Weapon

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by Janis Patterson

We all believe that killing someone is easy as pie (remember, I’m speaking of in pixels only here) but it’s not as simple as it seems. The main trick is doing the deed and getting away with it. I mean, letting your character get away with it. Harder still is to make it so your sleuth can find enough clues to solve the mystery without making your killer seem like an idiot or your sleuth some sort of psychic/savant. What’s really hard is when your villain is so smart you really have to work to make it possible for your sleuth to catch him. I’ve had that problem in my current WIP, so I know whereof I speak!

One of the main things to catching a killer is the murder weapon. Guns and knives have traditionally been regarded as men’s weapons of choice, while poison is regarded as a more of a woman’s weapon, the rationale being that women are dainty little creatures of great sensibility who don’t like to see blood and gore. Really? And they kill people? Give me a break.

One of the main choices of murder weapon is dependent on its availability and traceability. A gun? Who owns it and how did the murderer get it? With the forensic ballistics available today – not to mention the creeping cancer of the gun control nuts – it’s harder and harder to make it believable that a villain can just grab a gun, shoot someone and get away with it. Of course, there are workarounds. The gun could be stolen. The gun could be bought on the black market. The gun could be ‘borrowed’ with the intent of framing the legitimate owner. Something else to be considered is that so much information needed to catch the villain – ballistics, registration, etc – is not available to an amateur sleuth unless they can wheedle it out of a policeman.

Forensics today can trace a knife down to the minutest measurement and shape and, if it is unusual enough, to the brand and store from which it came. If I were going to commit a murder with a knife, I’d go to the local Target or WalMart and buy the commonest knife I could, then afterwards boil it in bleach to kill any blood on it and donate it to some charity or other or leave it in a batch of kitchen utensils at a garage sale – after carefully wiping off all fingerprints. Of course, this is assuming the killer is strong enough both internally and externally to handle the strength necessary and the resultant blood, which is going to get all over his clothes. If you want to see how hard it is to stab someone, take your murder knife and stab a big, thick roast. It’s hard to get a knife deep enough to cause a fatal wound, but not as hard as stabbing a real life person, because the roast isn’t fighting you back!

Then there’s poison. First of all, where does the killer get it? Today so many of our commonly available compounds have had their poisonous elements removed or neutered. There’s nicotine, of course, sold for e-cigarettes, and it’s commonly available, but how do you know how much to use, and then there’s the problem of getting it into your victim. Same with prescription meds, which are generally fairly traceable because of limited availability. There are also the plant based poisons, but first you have to know about them, and again think of how much to use for a fatal does and how you’re going to get the resultant product into your victim Unfortunately for the killer plant based poisons are notorious for being both variable and unreliable. Poison contents vary according to the plant, the location where it was grown, the season of the year – and the phase of the moon for all I know. You never really know if you’ve gauged your dosage correctly until your victim either dies or survives. Also, this is considered rather esoteric knowledge, known to a smallish group of people (other than mystery writers) and fairly easily traceable.

For the hardy, there is always the staple of your two hands and a good old fashioned strangling. Of course, you have to know the victim well enough to get that close to him, and you have to be strong, for he will be fighting you. Strangling takes a great deal of strength as well, which basically rules out the delicately built person strangling a larger one. It also is harder than it seems. Life is tenacious, and it takes at least four minutes if not longer to strangle a person until death is assured, no matter how easy and quick it seems on television. Same objections with smothering. Unless the victim is unconscious your villain will both have to subdue and smother. Not easy.

So – is there a perfect murder weapon? Not that I know of. Every one has plusses and minuses, and in its way that is perfect for the mystery writer. You can choose one that fits your villain and your victim, but each method has built-in clues and difficulties that can, with a little accuracy and lots of creativity on your part, make it possible for your sleuth to capture your killer, no matter how smart that villain thinks himself to be.

Also, if you’d like to read the article The American Research Center in Egypt did on me and my upcoming novel A KILLING AT EL KAB, here’s the link – http://www.arce.org/news/u162

Why We Kill

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by Janis Patterson

It is not, as some of my friends have said, because I am an old grump who wants to do away with everyone who annoys me. Not all the time, at least.

That said, however, taking someone whom you dislike intensely, who has been egregiously rude/cruel/unmannerly/whatever, and offing them can be very relaxing and therapeutic. (Of course, I’m talking about killing only in pixels.) It’s cheaper than therapy, can be done multiple times if the first time is not satisfying enough and no one gets really hurt. And, if you’re lucky, you can make a little money.

But why do people want to read about people being killed? After all, killing is messy. It’s permanent. And it’s very very illegal. I think the reasons are as varied as the readers. And the writers. Sublimation. Wish fulfillment. Excitement. The thrill of the chase. All basic human emotions, but I think the main reason is that in a mystery novel we want the assurance that all will turn out right – the murderer will be caught and properly punished. Balance in the world is restored. Justice is served.

I believe every rational person has a deep sense of justice. A lot of times the murder is committed because in some possibly twisted way it fulfills the murderer’s sense of justice – as incomprehensible as it might be to anyone else.

When we write or read mysteries we are not only indulging in escapism, we are shoring up the foundations of justice. The crime is solved. Balance returns. Our inner world is stable once more, even if the real world is far less simple or predictable.

Which means that we as writers are fortunate. I mean, how many people can say that we not only entertain, but we contribute to the happiness and mental health of the world? And all by killing people…