Clicking Our Heels – Addressing Covid in Our Writing

Authors are divided on how to handle the pandemic in their writing. Kathy Reichs chose to write a book that referred to it in past tense but played on its fears (The Bone Code), Elizabeth Strout embraced the emotional and behaviors it arose head on, (Lucy by the Sea), while Ann Patchett incorporated it by sly references as to why the family was all at home together (Tom Lake). Here is how Stiletto Gang members are addressing the pandemic/Covid in our writings:

Paula Benson – I have written two short stories that take place during the pandemic. In particular, I deal with families coping with the restrictions upon schools and businesses. The first story, “Covid Christmas Economics,” (here’s the link) had an eight grader struggling with home schooling and watching as his family’s restaurant had to make changes in its schedule. The second story, “Crossfire in the Crosshairs,” (published August 2023 by Dragon Soul Press in A DEATH IN THE NIGHT) had a single mother assassin competing with her ex-husband to take out a mark. As the story points out: “Assasinations remined essential services during Covid 19.”

T.K. Thorne – My current work-in-progress is a suspense novel, The Old Lady. It’s set just after the emergency phase of the pandemic, and my character lost her husband to Covid. Funny, at first I wrote “lost her husband to the disease,” but that sounded too impersonal and I changed it to “Covid.” I also notice I capitalized it, as I would a person’s name. I would not have written “lost her husband to Smallpox.”  I guess having lived through it, this one is personified and personal.

Mary Lee Ashford – As I’m working on the fourth in a series and it hasn’t been mentioned in previous books, I’m not addressing it at all. However, I’m also working on a new series and in that one, I am alluding to it but mostly as a part of our lives today post pandemic but with Covid still an issue. I think it depends on the type of book and the audience so I might feel differently if I was writing in a different sub-genre.

Barbara J. Eikmeier – As a writer I haven’t addressed Covid at all but as a reader I feel like a lot of books that were written during the stay home part of the pandemic are now releasing. I always read the author’s notes at the end and appreciate their sharing of their struggles to complete books while schooling children and sharing workspace with spouses or while working in seclusion.

Joyce Woolcutt – I have addressed it by cleverly setting my books before it started. Any new ones, afterwards.

Linda Rodriguez – I’m not currently, because my reading of the zeitgeist is that people aren’t ready to read about it yet.

Debra H. Goldstein – Other than a short story written from the viewpoint of a doctor with Covid for a Covid fundraising anthology, I haven’t had the opportunity to incorporate the pandemic into my current work.

Bethany Maines – During COVID and directly after, I did feel like readers did NOT want to read about it since they were experiencing it too intimately in real life.  However, as we have moved forward, I’m mentioning it as part of the background of my contemporary stories. For example, I might say, “During the pandemic was the only time traffic had been light.”  I don’t see any reason not to mention as we continue to deal with the fallout.

 Saralyn Richard – During Covid lockdown, writing a mystery novel was my salvation, but since I didn’t know what the future held in terms of life changes resulting from the pandemic, I chose to set the book pre-pandemic. In subsequent books I allude to the pandemic (the elephant in the room) in small ways, such as having a character explain why she didn’t host parties for a time, or having a character wear a mask. Since Covid has profoundly marked our generation, I feel it’s wrong to ignore it, but I also don’t give it full reign over my stories.

Lois Winston – Because I write humorous cozy mysteries, I made the decision early into the pandemic that I would not address Covid. My books are meant as an escape from the problems of the real world. In addition, although my Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery series is now up to twelve books, the series has spanned less than two years in the life of my sleuth and her family. Even if I’d wanted to shoehorn Covid into the series arc, it wouldn’t have worked.

Kathryn Lane – My Nikki Garcia mystery – Missing in Miami – has Nikki traveling to Cuba to investigate a missing teenager. I decided to include a minor amount of Covid in that book since the pandemic, like an unpleasant visitor, has stayed around way too long.

Dru Ann Love – As a reader, I prefer not to read about the pandemic, especially in detail. A mention that it happened would work.

Lynn McPherson – I don’t address it as I don’t like to read about it either.