Tag: Janis Patterson

Following Through

~ janispattersonmysteries ~ 1 Comment

by Janis Patterson

There is not much about writing in this post. Actually, not much about anything. Remember last month when I posted about the necessity and occasional dangers of researching? Well, I put my money (and lots of it this time!) where my mouth is.

As you read this I am – if our somewhat fluid itinerary is accurate – bouncing along in a jeep somewhere in the desert between St. Catherine’s Monastery in Sinai and Petra in Jordan. Am I researching a new book? Probably, though that was not the intent of the trip. However, I can do research on a book with a trip to the grocery store, so that’s not surprising.

No, my husband and I have decided to spend as much time as we can traveling – while we can afford it and are still physically able. I know it’s a luxury, but we’ve both worked hard all our lives and it’s something we want. And we don’t want to miss a chance to fulfill our dreams just because we got lazy.

We started a few days early in Cairo, to visit both a few of our favorite spots and to see old friends, then joined the small group of pilgrims to go on to the Dead Sea. I’ve been there before, and it is still as much of a moonscape as I remember. Then to the fabled St. Catherine’s… ah, but I’m telling too much. Next month I’ll talk a little about my trip and show a few pix. There will be more of both on my website, though, if you want to see more!

And – just a bit of writing news. I’m part of a new anthology called July 4th Murders – where every story takes place on July 4th, but each in a different time period. It’s a fascinating concept and one of which I am proud to be a part. I’ll let you know the exact date it goes up for pre-order.

After we get back from Petra, though. That’s been on my bucket list for years, and I intend to enjoy every second of it!

Research, or the Lure of the Rabbit Hole

~ janispattersonmysteries ~ 4 Comments

by Janis Patterson

There’s nothing more frustrating than a novel which mangles history. Unless, of course, it is alternative history (at best a bastard genre) and clearly labeled as such. What raises my ire is when someone writes what is purported to be historical fiction but has such factual clangers in it as to stop the reader cold. My favorite example of this is from a contest I judged when a Regency hero – handsome, wealthy, arrogant as all of them are – pulls a fountain pen from his pocket to sign some important document.


Really? A fountain pen?


The bladder fountain pen that we all know wasn’t invented for at least fifty years after the Regency. Even the steel-tipped dip pen wasn’t invented until after the end of the Regency. Before that, writing was done with feather quills, usually goose.


Of course I dinged the writer severely for not doing proper research, and sent a rather kindly note of explanation of her low score, hoping to raise her consciousness about the necessity of research. Instead she attacked me viciously, not only in a private letter but on social media, ranting that it was an old-fashioned pen and who would know the difference anyway.


And there is the crux of the matter. Far too many people get their ideas of history from novels (and movies, and TV) and therefore as writers we owe them the honesty of real facts.


Such a high-minded ideal is not without its dangers to us, though. I was working on a fairly early Victorian Gothic where my librarian heroine had to make some ink. Now I knew she couldn’t just pop off to the allsorts shop in the village for a bottle, so I went online and looked up how to make ink.


Who knew there were so many ways to make ink? And there are so many people making it today? Well, it was a plethora of information and I started reading happily. Only thing was, I realized that some of the recipes used items to which my early-Victorian-working-in-remote-Scotland heroine would have no access. But I had to make sure of what was available, which took me to botanical sites and shopping sites and each of them led to other sites, most of which had little to nothing to do with Scotland, libraries or ink, and before I knew it hours later I was deep into the intricacies of making Scottish country cheese. Still don’t know quite how I got there, but it was fascinating.


Now I don’t know if I’ll ever need any minutiae about the making of country cheese in Victorian Scotland, but it did give me a deeper insight into the Scottish rural people of the time, their lives, their chores, their way of living. Besides, I believe that everything is useful in some way, some time, some how. Who knows when some snippet of rural Victorian Scottish life/mores/cheesemaking – or something influenced by them – will show up in a totally unrelated story? It’s one of the dangers and the magic of writing!


Doubtless by now you have figured out that I like research. And, having an inquiring (some say nosy) mind, I must admit I do. It’s one of the most fascinating things in the world. And one of the most dangerous. It can take hold of a story, turn it every way from up, then hand it back to you in a form totally different from the way you originally envisioned it. Or, if you are strongminded enough to corral your story to its original form, those little snippets of research are still there, adding depth and shading – and an occasional surprise – to your story.


A prime rule of good writing is Do Your Research. Another rule of good writing is Do Not Let Your Research Take Over. Usually I manage both, but it’s most definitely a delicate balancing act.

Happy New Year! or Bah, Humbug!

~ janispattersonmysteries ~ 2 Comments

by Janis Patterson

Somewhere it seems to have been written that the first post of a new year is supposed to be a joyous burst of ambition, resolve and anticipation about all the wonderful things the new year brings.


Humbug!


If you’re like me, the new year is startlingly if not exactly like the old year, but with the added stress of having to remember to change from 2024 to 2025 every time you have to write a date. The house is still messy, laundry has to be done, my daily word count has been ignored, meals have to be planned, cooked and cleaned up after… Plus, I’m tired. And fat. Between the gustatory excesses of Thanksgiving, assorted parties (including a family wedding), and the several days of Christmas gatherings and the pure physicality of extra cooking, shopping and gift wrapping – naturally all done with appropriate snacks and meals – I find myself wishing that the lovely clothes I received were all a size or two larger.


Of course, this too will pass. I will return to what I was before the holidays (and hopefully lose a little more!) and wear my new garments with pride, the house will get clean (okay, cleaner) and life will return to the occasionally bizarre standard we regard as normal.


After the final excesses of New Year’s Eve.


There was a time I went out on New Year’s Eve. Friends would have parties – I even gave a couple myself – or on rare occasions my escort of the minute and I would go clubbing, where at the stroke of midnight we would scream, kiss and hug anyone within reach, dodge a flood of balloons and sip champagne. Where did we get the energy?


This New Year’s Eve The Husband and I did what we usually do on New Year’s Eve – stay home in our jammies, eat a good meal (usually leftovers from December’s overwhelming bounty), sip either a good bottle of Veuve Clicquot (the best champagne ever!) or a mug or two of egg nog (usually virgin) and make a concentrated effort to stay awake until midnight, when we kiss and express our hopes for a better new year for us and for everyone. It doesn’t get better than that, folks. This year we actually stayed up after midnight – not because of any resolution or desire to see the New Year in or a result of our libations… You see, one of our local TV stations was running a Twilight Zone marathon…


Anyway, that is why this is a most untraditional post. I am not going to wax eloquent of the delights inherent in a fresh start, or how you really can keep a resolution to write X number of words every single day, or that you now are free to really work towards making the NYT list, or any such nonsense. That would be as ridiculous as telling you to buy a gym membership and actually keep your promise to go Every Single Day… (Does anyone ever really fulfill that resolution? Anywhere?)


Truth is, you can do any of that or any other kind of beginning any day of the year. Back in my youth there was a popular poster proclaiming Today Is The First Day Of The Rest Of Your Life. Kind of cheesy, but also very true. Every day is a new beginning.


Today is your new beginning. So will be tomorrow and the day after tomorrow. Enjoy each and every one of them, but use them wisely.


Happy New Year.

Jobs, Responsibilities and Big Girl Panties

~ janispattersonmysteries ~ 3 Comments


by Janis Patterson

Hope all of you had a wonderful and calorie-filled Thanksgiving! Ours was quiet and simply splendid. I even took a week off from writing… from the computer itself. No email, no games… and my kitchen has never been so clean! We had a lovely and incredibly delicious dinner at my sister-in-law’s with my mother-in-law and aunt-in-law and a lazy afternoon of conversation and multiple desserts. God did indeed bless me with my in-law family, and I am intensely grateful because mine is pretty much all gone. (Now if He could just make holiday calories not stick to my ribs and other portions of my anatomy…)

Anyway, back to the business of writing! During my computer hiatus I did a lot of thinking and enjoying old memories and a long holiday phone conversation (normally I loathe telephones, much prefer email) with a friend of many years. She is a gifted and somewhat well-known actress in regional theatre, now semi-retired, and as we talked for some reason my memory dredged up another conversation from a number of years ago. I had just submitted a book right on deadline (I always prefer to be early) which had probably been the hardest, most miserable writing experience I had ever had. The book just didn’t gel, I could not deal with the characters, the plot that had seemed so perfect (and which worked well on paper but not in execution) just didn’t work… and I had a deadline. Deadlines are great motivators, and I got the book done.

How, my friend asked in wonder, had I managed to do that? How could I create without an overwhelming inspiration?

It was my turn to wonder. After all the performances she had done, the plays she had appeared in, the various roles she had created, I asked, had she never done one on technique alone?

She said no… not, at least, the entire part. Some performances she had started on technique alone, but she swore that once it had gotten running it the inspiration had clicked in. Some times, she confessed, she had let her understudy play the part because she simply could not summon the involvement she had to have.

I don’t understand that kind of thinking. If one is a professional one gets the job done. One doesn’t have to wait for a mental green light or an overwhelming ‘feeling’.

She did not appreciate that sentiment when I expressed it to her by simply saying I was a professional. Writing is a job. While it is wonderful when it happens, one does not need inspiration to do a job. You just sit down, put on your big girl panties and start writing. Put one word after another. It doesn’t make any difference if you have to change them later, you are writing. You are doing your job.

The best piece of writing advice I ever heard was said by the wildly successful Nora Roberts. “Write the book, even if it’s garbage. You can fix garbage. You can’t fix a blank page.”

In other words, be a professional. If you’re a writer, you write. You don’t wait for inspiration or magical insight or anything else. You do your job and you write.

Falling In Love With Your Characters

~ janispattersonmysteries

by Janis Patterson

Don’t worry – this isn’t a post about romantic love, though show me a woman who writes romance (as I do sometimes) who doesn’t get all hot and bothered over writing the perfect hero. Just imagine… you can create the perfect man with muscles, a twinkle in his eye, a rugged but handsome face, sensitivity, strength… the perfect Build-A-Hunk kit.
That said, however, we all know there are many kinds of love, so for this post, at least, let’s forget the idea of hearts-and-flowers romantic love.


Do you believe writers should love their characters? I do. Now I will admit that any competent professional writer can create a believable character on technique alone, without anything empathetic or sympathetic or even liking between writer and character. I’m not talking about whether this character is a villain or a hero – we’ve all either written or read a story where the villain is the most likable character. I’m talking about a deeper connection – an instinctual, inner knowing how the character feels/reacts opposed to declaring through technique how the character will feel/react.


Personally, I am all for the empathetic (it’s more than that, but we need to give it a codeword for this essay) approach than the purely technique-driven format. You and the character – perhaps all the major characters, and yes, it’s possible to jump from head to head – almost meld into one. You know what he is going to say. You know what he is going to do. It is almost as if you were doing it yourself.


By contrast, the technique way is very one sided. You have created a character, maybe even using the old trick of the character interview – a questionnaire which you answer as your character. This is supposed to give you an insight into the character’s mind and being. There are the standard questions of name and age and eye color, but some are so detailed they go in to truly deep (and in my opinion useless unless there is a direct tie-in to the plot) question such as the maiden name of the character’s grandmother and his favorite flavor of Jell-O. My personal reaction is this creates a Frankenstein-like character – everything is there, everything works, but it isn’t really alive.


Most of my writer friends look at me askance when we talk about character development. Many of them use some version of the character interview model, whether or not they use a written sheet of questions or just keep the information in their head. Some brainstorm with other writers. I’ve never heard of anyone using my method, which really isn’t a ‘method’ at all.


I get a wisp of an idea – a situation, a relationship, sometimes a thing – and start to build from there. Then the characters come. They just walk in, tell me their names and a little something about them (but not everything, as they like to keep surprises for me for later in the book, mischievous little creatures that they are) and the story starts to grow.


And they are not always little darlings, either. One hero in particular had a name that I just hated, so in a moment of hubris I decided that I was the writer, I was in control, and I could change his name to something I liked. Except I couldn’t. He shut up and for at least a week refused to talk to me. The story died. Oh, I wrote every day, and then spent the next morning tearing up what I had written the day before.


Finally I caved and gave him back the name he liked – the name I hated – and from that moment on the book was one of the easiest I’ve ever written. I liked the book, but I didn’t like that character, which was a shame, as he was a great protagonist – strong, smart, courageous, with just enough flaws to make him totally human. My readers loved him and I’ve gotten requests to put him in another book.


Perhaps the reader won’t realize the difference between an empathetic and a created character, and with a skilled writer they shouldn’t be able to, so some people will ask if it makes a difference. To the writer it makes a lot of difference, the difference between being a collaborator and a puppet master. Each technique has its adherents, and a writer can use either or both according to his need. Thank goodness there are no hard and fast rules in how to write – other than the obvious dictate to produce the best book you can.


Now you know I can’t go without a commercial, and this is a good one – Christmas is coming, and I’ve got news of a great sale for you! I have blogged for years with a wonderful group of women mystery writers called Ladies of Mystery and this year to celebrate the season we’ve put together a bunch of 29 books about Christmas. Some are mysteries, some are romance, some are on special sale, some are not, but they’re all good stories by proven and popular writers. The sale begins 15 November, so you’ll have a good long time to read and enjoy a bunch of Christmas stories! Go take a look – here’s the link:

Ladies of Mystery Catalog

Hope everyone has a wonderful Thanksgiving!