I’ve lost my mind. Again. I have begun a new novel on a subject about which I know absolutely nothing. Zip. Nada. I did it again. Did I not learn my lesson from the last Alvarez Family Mystery, The Drop-Dead Temple of Doom? Apparently not. But that’s a writer for ya. Or at least, that’s me for ya. I get an idea, I embrace it, I love it, it becomes mine, and I’m off and away.

It’s only when I plop myself down at the keyboard and have no idea how to start the first sentence do I realize I am in deep doo-doo. That’s what happened with Drop-Dead. My fingers hovered over the keyboard waiting for words to come to me. They didn’t. I had no idea what a Guatemalan jungle was like. I didn’t know the first thing about archeology. And, truth be told, an ancient Mayan could have risen from the dead, bit me on the knee, and I wouldn’t have had the first clue as to who, what, or why. I left my office and dove headfirst into a martini, the first of many. Ernest Hemingway may have said, “Write drunk, edit sober,” but you gotta know SOMETHING about a subject before you can write about it.

I have to do a little research for all my novels, but I had pushed the limits on this. A Guatemalan jungle? Even though I was born and raised in South Florida and have been to Parrot Jungle, it’s not the same. Archeology? Simply because I’ve streamed “Lost Cities With Albert Lin,” that didn’t mean I knew the first thing about digging anything up other than weeds. And the ancient Mayans? Ditto, ditto, and ditto.

But I had a fire in the belly. I wanted to tap into the real-life story of a young woman who is an Indiana Jones of today. I’ll call her Indiana Josie. She tromps around the jungles of Guatemala uncovering all kinds of wondrous things. And thanks to the development of LIDAR (Light Detection and Ranging), the exploration of ancient Mayan cultures has exploded. This is truly the golden age of discovery for this remarkable culture.

So began a crash course in not one, not two, but three subjects. As the world was in lockdown from Covid, even if I’d wanted to fly to the jungles of Guatemala for firsthand experience, I couldn’t have. Instead, I bled Indiana Josie dry of any knowledge she could give me. I watched every documentary on archeology, not merely as a spectator, but as a student. I read anything I could find on the ancient Mayan culture, gasping at pictures of their paintings, jewelry, and tombs. I marveled at what they had created, believing as many do, they rival the Egyptians in many ways. Eight months later, while not an expert on any of these subjects, I was able to sit down at the computer and write.

After completing the latest novel in my other series, Hotshot Shamus, Book 4 of the Persephone Cole Vintage Mysteries, I now return to the Alvarez series, with Bewitched, Bothered, and Beheaded as the next project. For whatever reason, I decided to write about a magic trick gone wrong, a dead magician, and the protagonist, Lee Alvarez, as the chief suspect. Belly fire returning. No antacids working.

Of course, I find I am in deep doo-doo again. I know nothing about the subject, nothing about magicians or their tricks. Leave it to me to have a misadventure with a guillotine trick front and center, basically starting the story off. Naturally, I can’t write a word until I investigate this. So it’s off to Vegas for a crash course in magic. I recently contacted David Copperfield for an interview. Start at the top, right? Maybe he’ll give me a few tips. If not, I’ll work my way down. I hear there’s a magician, Melvin the Magnificent, performing in a San Jose parking lot. Maybe he’ll talk to me.

Meanwhile, I need to face it. I just never learn.

I was recently reminded by my own ineptness that the grief of loss has no timelines. Nor should it in telling a tale, most especially a tale of murder. For each murder done, someone grieves for the dead, be it the detective, the killer, or the friend. And this grief displays itself in action, the resolve to find the killer, the need to hide motive, and, perhaps, revenge.

The protagonist (detective or innocent) is called upon to develop a relationship with the dead whether the loss is personal or not. As the protagonist wades through the suspects to resolve the central mystery, each character brings their hurt with them. They have all suffered a loss and so are at some stage: shock, denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance/hope. Since each step along the path takes as long as it does, any given character may be in any stage at any time, offering endless possibilities to the storyteller.

The framework of grief is one piece of the scaffolding for my military family saga The Cooper Quartet. In Dead Legend (Book 1), two boys are left adrift by their father Mac’s death. The oldest son, Byron, sixteen when his Navy pilot father dies, quickly moves on to bargaining while keeping one foot firmly planted in denial. The younger son, Laury, hits anger and stays there for twelve years. Each of the four thrillers in the saga moves along the continuum of loss toward growth and forgiveness.

From Dead Legend: Navy Pilot LT Byron Cooper

“Let’s get out of here.” Byron shucked dollars out of the right hip pocket of his slacks as he stood.

“Mac doesn’t come to you?”

Byron grabbed Chloe’s arm. His hand felt hot on her flesh. “Yes. Tonight—with you—with everyone. Happy now?”

Marine First Sergeant Laury Cooper

Laury took the photograph that Vincent held out to him. He put two fingers between a pair of cigarette smoke caked blinds to let a ray of sun splash the picture. His eyes locked on the blood smeared down the leather bucket seats of Mac’s MG and wouldn’t let go. When the shock passed, he fixated on Mac’s right hand extended as though he had been gripping the gearshift knob the moment before. Laury’s hands shook, sweat rode up his back and down his armpits. He ran a hand over the lengthening stubble on his head.

Grief is not simple. It is recurring, a memory at the oddest moment, a moth in the morning. It is not a thrown-off phrase (My fiancé died in the war). Loss haunts us, it should haunt characters as well impacting their judgment and actions.

From Head First (Book 2):  LTjg Robin Haas (their cousin)

She clamped the rounded pewter ends of the POW bracelet she wore tighter on her wrist then traced the name and date with her fingers, LT Harry A. Stillwater, 10/5/68. Four years, two months, and fourteen days, in that time he had been Killed in Action, Missing in Action and now was a Prisoner of War. At least, they thought he was.

Who really knew? Robin had gone to North Dakota to Harry’s funeral, sobbing with the sisters Harry adored, the mother he treasured and the father he idealized, trying the while not to crawl into his empty grave. Yellow roses made her cry. A-6s made her cry. Even Gunner, their tabby tom cat, made her cry.

Throughout it all, characters must remain true to themselves. Good grief in a story might be silent to raging but it must always be organic. And in so being, the character’s action or reaction to any element may surprise, revealing a new facet or changed state that alters the reader’s perceptions and the resolution of the story.

From Don’t Tell (Book 4): Kate Van Streain Cooper (Laury’s new wife)

Each afternoon, she checked out a chaise from the nut-brown beachboy at the kiosk as he ran his eyes down her long limbs. They would skim over the inked drawing between her shoulder blades, still fresh after a week, and follow the Chinese characters tattooed on her spine to her dimple. Feeling admired, she languished by the water in her chaise, alternately reading Michener’s Hawaii and dozing. She opened her eyes at each passing shadow expecting to see her husband smiling down at her, his azure blue eyes blazing beneath his long dark eyelashes.

Good grief hovers below the surface of the plot, providing motivation and color. It remains just out of reach, shading the past and the future. A character in its own right. In The Cooper Quartet, it takes two brothers four books to come to terms with their father’s loss. In the process, their lives are changed forever by the Vietnam War and the actions they take to protect each other and their families.