Dwight Holing – Ladies of Mystery

Because I am one day away from taking off on my month-long vacation, my friend and author, Dwight Holing is filling in for me this month.

Spare me the moldy one-liner about journalism being the world’s second-oldest profession and nowhere near as well-compensated as the first or the old saw of never letting facts get in the way of a good story. After years as a freelance writer covering environmental issues and nature travel, I’ve learned that facts not only give fiction more depth, but create greater reader engagement.

Characters, conflicts, and settings were always the keystones to the articles and nonfiction books I wrote. It’s the same with fiction, but bringing facts about the backdrop of the southeastern Oregon setting for my Nick Drake Mystery Series to the forefront has been a game changer. Be it geography and geology or wildlife and weather, realities about the natural world provide ready-made ingredients for crafting a story’s arc and layering in suspense, action, and mood.

By doing so, I can pit my US Fish & Wildlife ranger hero not only against villains, but have him battle searing heat, wildfire, snowstorms, and raging rivers. How he deals with nature’s adversity bares his strengths as well as his weaknesses. I also use the sublime beauty of nature to reveal his spirit and that of the other principal characters. All provide insights and revelations that help them continue to develop as “real” people and make them all the more endearing to readers.

Chiseled on a tablet somewhere is the adage Write about what you know. I’ve found that even more important is Write about what you want to know. Why? Because my excitement of discovering something new and infusing it into my novels is shared by readers. How do I know that? Nick Drake readers tell me by email and in person at book talks and writer conferences.

Some say they read my mysteries while Googling at the same time to learn more about the subjects I explore, such as why there’s such an abundance of archaeological sites in southeastern Oregon or how come so many different bird species migrate through the national wildlife refuges there or what were the forces that sculpted and shaped such an amazing landscape. Others have sent me photos of the trips they’ve taken that were matched to the settings of my stories. Still more email notes with ideas for the next Nick Drake Mystery. Now, that’s reader engagement!

I’m certainly not the first author to discover the natural world delivers honesty as well as a roundhouse punch to a mystery story. Raymond Chandler’s opener to “Red Wind” shows—not tells—what I mean:

There was a desert wind blowing that night. It was one of those hot dry Santa Anas that come down through the mountain passes and curl your hair and make your nerves jump and your skin itch. On nights like that every booze party ends in a fight. Meek little wives feel the edge of the carving knife and study their husbands’ necks. Anything can happen. You can even get a full glass of beer at a cocktail lounge.

While the high lonesome setting of my Nick Drake Mysteries is the gift that keeps on giving, it’s up to me to listen to all of its natural elements and give them voice. That takes more than online research—it takes being there.

I need to drive every dirt road that I put Nick Drake and the flinty old county sheriff on as they chase vicious killers. I have to talk to ranchers about caring for livestock so I know what Nick’s romantic partner is up against as she works as a large animal veterinarian. Chatting with long-time residents about everything under the desert sun is a joy while sleeping beneath a blanket of stars that has no beginning or end is a must.

Most of all, I need to stand atop Steens Mountain and in the middle of Diamond Craters and on the edge of Blitzen Valley so I can feel the wind, watch the birds gather, and admire pronghorns racing across the sage scrub. Like my characters, I rely on the sublime beauty of nature to unlock my own spirit so I can capture the creativity blooming both inside and all around me in order to share it with readers who love learning while kissing their nights goodbye turning the pages of an unputdownable mystery.

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Wildlife rangers Nick Drake and Loq take separate paths, but both lead to action, murder, and mystery in a thrilling and emotionally charged chapter in this bestselling series.

When his sister goes on the run with a charismatic Indian rights activist wanted for murder, Loq risks everything to find her. He teams up with a beautiful police officer tracking a member of her own tribe who joined the fugitive too. Danger, desire, and treachery test the pair as they follow a trail through the wilds of Oregon, Idaho, and Montana made famous a century before during a legendary and bloody flight for freedom.

Can they stay ahead of a ruthless federal agent, solve who’s responsible for leaving bodies on the trail, and rescue people who don’t believe they need to be saved?

Meanwhile, Nick Drake embarks on a hazardous undertaking of his own when his adopted son continues to be haunted by his traumatic childhood in war-torn Vietnam and a loved one is stricken with terminal cancer. Father and son go in search of healing and meaning, but deadly forces turn their quest into a fight for survival.

BUY LINK: https://books2read.com/TheBrokenBlood

Dwight Holing lives and writes alongside a river in California. His mystery and suspense series include The Nick Drake Novels and The Jack McCoul Capers. The stories in his collections of literary short fiction have won awards, including the Arts & Letters Prize for Fiction. He is married to a kick-ass environmental advocate; they have a daughter and son, and two black labs who’d rather swim than walk.
Buy Link: https://dwightholing.com/nick-drake-novels/

Website: https://dwightholing.com
Facebook: https://facebook.com/dwight.holing

Instagram: @dwight_holing

I am back home after spending last week driving around western Oregon and stopping at 5 bookstores.

Backstory: Last summer I attended a talk by author Dwight Holing at my local library. He was there talking about his series that is set in Harney County- where I live. When he was asked about how he advertised his books, and he mentioned Bookbub didn’t work well for him, I said, “Yeah, it doesn’t work well for me either.” He looked at me and said, “What genre are you?” My reply, “Same as yours.”

He asked my name and then said, “Your books stalk mine on Amazon!”

My rebuttal was “No, yours stalk mine.” We had a chuckle and he said to come talk to him after his presentation.

I did and we decided since we both write crime fiction set in Oregon with game wardens, his a federal agent and mine a state police officer, that we should team up and do something.

Dwight Holing and myself at Bloomsbury Books in Ashland, OR

Fast forward a few months and we came up with a book tour when we both had a new book out. We spent months setting up bookstores and planning to do it all in one week.

We just finished that week of visiting bookstores. After a phone conversation we’d decided to do a back and forth, “This is why I… What do you do?” format. And we had lots of encouraging comments about how well we played off one another. Then we would read from our books and take questions. It was interesting that most of the questions were from new or emerging writers. Though we did each have some fans or family at each of the stops we had.

Me talking at Grass Roots Bookstore in Corvallis, OR.

I was lucky enough to meet Sharon Dean who has been a guest of this blog. She came to our Ashland event. It was fun to meet someone in person who I have only exchanged emails with.

And in Bend I was able to meet up with some writer friends that before I moved to Princeton, we met once a month and had lunch and talked about writing.

The one thing that both Dwight and I concluded from this trip is that in-person events are no longer something that brings readers in. We had small groups at everyone of the events even though we both talked it up in our newsletters and social media and put out news releases in each town we visited. He said he’s going to start doing Zoom Book Clubs and will invite me to participate when he gets it all figured out.

While I enjoyed my week of driving around Oregon and meeting new people, I do agree that I won’t be doing another event like this any time soon. I think being set up where people are already gathered like flea markets, oktoberfest, and such is the way to go instead of bookstores.