Tag Archive for: Linda Rodriguez

Untitled Post

/in /by

What Can We Learn From the Century’s Bestsellers 
by Linda Rodriguez

Matt Kahn is a blogger with an unusual idea. He is reading the 94 books that have been listed as the year’s bestseller by Publishers Weekly for each year of the 100 years since PW began announcing the bestselling book of each year. http://www.kahnscorner.com/2013/02/100-years-94-books.html

The list below comes from his blog. It’s eye-opening, I believe, to see what outsold all other books each year. Fifteen books on the list are books that still live, excepting the most recent years for which we have no real knowledge yet of which books will live on and which will sink into oblivion. If we knock off the last ten years’ books for that reason, that still leaves us with only fifteen out of eighty-four. Most of these books are unknown in the present day. Modern readers may know who H.G. Wells and Zane Grey are, but most will never have heard of Mr. Britling Sees It Through, The U. P. Trail, or The Man of the Forest. Other authors, such as Vicente Blasco Ibáñez, A.S.M. Hutchinson, and Henry Morton Robinson, will be unrecognizable to today’s readers.

What can we learn from this list then? One thing we can learn is that bestseller status doesn’t necessarily mean that the books are the best for their time—or even good. A second is that many great books don’t ever make the top bestsellers list. Missing are all of Faulkner’s and Hemingway’s, and they were both Nobel Prize winners. Also, you won’t find Fitzgerald’s, Willa Cather’s, Henry James’, Edith Wharton’s, Harper Lee’s, Truman Capote’s, and Kurt Vonnegut’s titles, to mention just a few writers with major literary reputations. A third lesson is that—witness the books listed for Wells and Grey—a writer may write his finest books without such success and then find a lesser book on the list by virtue of the quality of those earlier volumes.

The final take-away is that all of this is out of the author’s control. All we can do is write the best books we can. When I get discouraged at the difficulty of bringing my books to the attention of readers, I pull this list out and read and note the significant omissions.

Publishers Weekly Annual Bestsellers List                                                                                                          

• 1913: The Inside of the Cup by Winston Churchill
• 1914: The Eyes of the World by Harold Bell Wright
• 1915: The Turmoil by Booth Tarkington
• 1916: Seventeen by Booth Tarkington
• 1917: Mr. Britling Sees It Through by H. G. Wells
• 1918: The U. P. Trail by Zane Grey
• 1919: The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse by Vicente Blasco Ibáñez
• 1920: The Man of the Forest by Zane Grey
• 1921: Main Street by Sinclair Lewis
• 1922: If Winter Comes by A.S.M. Hutchinson
• 1923: Black Oxen by Gertrude Atherton

•  1924: So Big by Edna Ferber
• 1925: Soundings by A. Hamilton Gibbs
• 1926: The Private Life of Helen of Troy by John Erskine
• 1927: Elmer Gantry by Sinclair Lewis
• 1928: The Bridge of San Luis Rey by Thornton Wilder
• 1929: All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque
• 1930: Cimarron by Edna Ferber
• 1931: The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck
• 1932: The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck
• 1933: Anthony Adverse by Hervey Allen
• 1934: Anthony Adverse by Hervey Allen
• 1935: Green Light by Lloyd C. Douglas
• 1936: Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell
• 1937: Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell
• 1938: The Yearling by Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings
• 1939: The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck
• 1940: How Green Was My Valley by Richard Llewellyn
• 1941: The Keys of the Kingdom by A. J. Cronin
• 1942: The Song of Bernadette by Franz Werfel
• 1943: The Robe by Lloyd C. Douglas
• 1944: Strange Fruit by Lillian Smith
• 1945: Forever Amber by Kathleen Winsor
• 1946: The King’s General by Daphne du Maurier
• 1947: The Miracle of the Bells by Russell Janney
• 1948: The Big Fisherman by Lloyd C. Douglas
• 1949: The Egyptian by Mika Waltari
• 1950: The Cardinal by Henry Morton Robinson
• 1951: From Here to Eternity by James Jones
• 1952: The Silver Chalice by Thomas B. Costain
• 1953: The Robe by Lloyd C. Douglas
• 1954: Not as a Stranger by Morton Thompson
• 1955: Marjorie Morningstar by Herman Wouk
• 1956: Don’t Go Near the Water by William Brinkley
• 1957: By Love Possessed by James Gould Cozzens
• 1958: Doctor Zhivago by Boris Pasternak
• 1959: Exodus by Leon Uris
• 1960: Advise and Consent by Allen Drury
• 1961: The Agony and the Ecstasy by Irving Stone
• 1962: Ship of Fools by Katherine Anne Porter
• 1963: The Shoes of the Fisherman by Morris L. West
• 1964: The Spy Who Came in from the Cold by John le Carré
• 1965: The Source by James A. Michener
• 1966: Valley of the Dolls by Jacqueline Susann
• 1967: The Arrangement by Elia Kazan
• 1968: Airport by Arthur Hailey
• 1969: Portnoy’s Complaint by Philip Roth
• 1970: Love Story by Erich Segal
• 1971: Wheels by Arthur Hailey
• 1972: Jonathan Livingston Seagull by Richard Bach
• 1973: Jonathan Livingston Seagull by Richard Bach
• 1974: Centennial by James A. Michener
• 1975: Ragtime by E. L. Doctorow
• 1976: Trinity by Leon Uris
• 1977: The Silmarillion by J. R. R. Tolkien and Christopher Tolkien
• 1978: Chesapeake by James A. Michener
• 1979: The Matarese Circle by Robert Ludlum
• 1980: The Covenant by James A. Michener
• 1981: Noble House by James Clavell
• 1982: E.T., The Extraterrestrial by William Kotzwinkle
• 1983: Return of the Jedi by James Kahn
• 1984: The Talisman by Stephen King and Peter Straub
• 1985: The Mammoth Hunters by Jean M. Auel
• 1986: It by Stephen King
• 1987: The Tommyknockers by Stephen King
• 1988: The Cardinal of the Kremlin by Tom Clancy
• 1989: Clear and Present Danger by Tom Clancy
• 1990: The Plains of Passage by Jean M. Auel
• 1991: Scarlett by Alexandra Ripley
• 1992: Dolores Clairborne by Stephen King
• 1993: The Bridges of Madison County by Robert James Waller
• 1994: The Chamber by John Grisham
• 1995: The Rainmaker by John Grisham
• 1996: The Runaway Jury by John Grisham
• 1997: The Partner by John Grisham
• 1998: The Street Lawyer by John Grisham
• 1999: The Testament by John Grisham
• 2000: The Brethren by John Grisham
• 2001: Desecration by Jerry B. Jenkins and Tim LaHaye
• 2002: The Summons by John Grisham
• 2003: The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown**
• 2004: The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown
• 2005: The Broker by John Grisham
• 2006: For One More Day by Mitch Albom
• 2007: A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini**
• 2008: The Appeal by John Grisham
• 2009: The Lost Symbol by Dan Brown
• 2010: The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets Nest by Stieg Larsson
• 2011: The Litigators by John Grisham
• 2012: Fifty Shades of Grey by E. L. James
• 2013: To be determined…

* Publishers Weekly did not include the Harry Potter books in its listings. Harry Potter and the Order of the Pheonix was the bestselling book for 2003, and Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows was the bestselling book of 2007.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Linda Rodriguez’s third Skeet Bannion novel, Every Hidden Fear, was published in May 2014. Her second Skeet mystery, Every Broken Trust, was a selection of Las Comadres National Latino Book Club and a finalist for both the International Latino Book Award and the Premio Aztlan Literary Prize. Her first Skeet novel, Every Last Secret, won the Malice Domestic Best First Traditional Mystery Novel Competition, was a Barnes & Noble mystery pick, and was a finalist for the International Latino Book Award. Her short story, “The Good Neighbor,” has been optioned for film.

Untitled Post

/in /by

What Makes A Good Writer’s Group by Linda Rodriguez
Over the years, I have been a part of many writer’s workshops, groups, and organizations. I have been a founder of several. When I was a young wife and mother, I desperately wanted the companionship of other writers, other people who understood this difficult thing I was trying to do.

Since those days, I have developed many wonderful writer friends who truly understand this difficult thing I still try to do. Better yet, I am now married to a writer-editor and have a son and foster-son who are talented writers. I also belong to four writer’s organizations that I helped found—The Writers Place, Latino Writers Collective, Border Crimes, and The Novel Group—three that I had no part in developing but still love and support—the Macondo Writing Workshop, Wordcraft Circle of Native American Writers and Storytellers, and Con Tinta.

Before these groups, there others that were not so helpful or successful, a series of undergraduate and graduate writing workshops, a group of activist writers putting out an underground newspaper (back in the day of underground newspapers), a short-fiction critique group, a freelance writers group,  a novel critique group, and even a romance writers group. So I have broad experience with writer’s organizations and groups.

One of the key elements of a good writer’s group, whether it is nationwide like the Macondo Writing Workshop, citywide like The Writers Place, or just a few writer friends like The Novel Group, is respect, respect for the group, for the other members and for the purpose of the group. Respect involves giving honest and helpful criticism without making it hurtful or personal. Respect involves valuing the distinctive differences of each member, as both a writer and as a person, appreciating what those unique qualities bring to the group as a whole.

Another hallmark of a good writer’s group is enthusiasm. Good groups are excited about writing and the writer’s life. When members grow discouraged, they can come away from a meeting of their group re-energized and back in touch with their passion for writing.

If a writer’s group or a subset of the group functions as a critique group, it is important for all the writers in the group to be writing at a similar level of experience and ability, otherwise the group will eventually fail as a critique group, no matter how congenial the individuals are. Often, however, beginners may be a part of a group led by an experienced author for a fee. This can be a good foundation—if the goal of both the leader and the members is for the members to outgrow the group.

What has your experience of writers groups been? If you have not been able to find one, would you consider starting one of your own?

Check out the award winning Skeet Bannion series.  Every Last Secret (Minotaur Books), won the Malice Domestic Best First Traditional Mystery Novel Competition, was selected by Las Comadres Conversations With…, and was a Barnes & Noble mystery pick. The second book in the Skeet Bannion series, Every Broken Trust, was published in Spring 2013 followed by the third book, Every Hidden Fear.

Learning to Read like a Writer

/in /by


By Linda
Rodriguez

A
serious writer should be reading all the time. Buy books so you can reread and
mark them up, figuring out how they do the incredible things they do and how
they made the mistakes they made that you want to avoid. Read the first time
the way any reader does—for enjoyment and delight, to find out what happens
next. Then, read over and over—very slowly. Read and ponder. Read like a writer
reads—for technique. These writers are your teachers—for the cheap cost of a
book, $40 at the max for a big hardback. Learn everything you can from them.
Learn from the best. Then go practice some of those good techniques in your own
work. You can do this quietly in bits and pieces of time without having to go
away anywhere. You’re a writer. Think on paper.
There
are lots of areas in our life where we need to step out of our comfort zones in
order to grow and achieve our goals. It can be difficult to do this because it
feels so weird outside of the spaces where we’re accustomed to spending time,
and that leads to discomfort. Most of us, however, have learned that we have to
stretch ourselves at times. But we seldom do this in our reading. Teachers may
have made us read things we didn’t care for, but on our own—if we read at
all!—we read only what we’re comfortable with.
Writers
must read. We must read for enjoyment and delight and relaxation. We must read
to stay up with what’s going on in our field. Above all, we must read to
learn—and that involves sometimes leaving the warm cocoon of blankets and
stepping out onto the cold floor of books and authors we might never choose for
enjoyment.
We
tend to read people who write like we do, who believe what we believe, who have
the same style. It’s natural and normal—like looking in the mirror. I write
accessible poetry with a narrative behind it. When I turn to poetry, won’t I
read the same thing? I did. I still do. Reading Mary Oliver is like looking in
the mirror at myself—years younger, many pounds thinner, and much more
beautiful, it’s true—but an idealized self. My favorite kind of crime novels
tends to be novels that focus on character, complex plots, and fine writing. I
could recognize the artistry of good comic, pulp hardboiled, and puzzle crime
novels, but I tended not to read those except when I had to because they weren’t
“my” crime novels. But there were things for me to learn from these writers who
didn’t write “my” books—exactly because they wrote a different style of book
that required different skills. I could learn things from them that I couldn’t
learn from someone just like me.
This
is not just applicable to novels, either. You may only want to write fiction or
narrative nonfiction, so why would you read poetry? As a matter of fact, many
acclaimed writers of fiction, including some bestselling authors of commercial
fiction, start or end their days reading poetry because they want to learn the
skills of precise word choice, compression, verbal musicality, and many others
they can learn from poets who’ve worked for years to be masters of those
skills. The prose writers believe they can use those skills profitably in their
own novels, stories, and narrative nonfiction.
Will
all writers offer examples of all of these skills? Of course not. You must
search out the best in each style or school. You always want to learn from the
best. Where else can you as a writer turn to learn from your reading? Well,
what do you want to learn?
Is
narrative structure and plot your weakness? Do you never have any conflict in
your stories or books? Look to the best of mystery fiction. These are the
masters of narrative structure and plot. A good mystery has to have the plot of
what really happened and then the plot of the unraveling and discovery of what
really happened. Good mysteries have to have dramatic structures that are tied
into strong characterization, motivation, lots of conflict, and suspense. Good
examples can be found in authors like Nancy Pickard, Julia Spencer-Fleming,
Margaret Maron, and Louise Penny. (Also, many of our Stiletto Gang members!)
Are
you unable to build a believable, engrossing background for your characters? Do
your characters wander in a void? The best writers in science fiction and
fantasy excel in world-building—making a fictional world so believable in its
details that it will draw the reader in as if it were a real place. They must
make worlds that never existed outside their heads into places that readers can
see and believe in. Game of Thrones,
anyone? Good places to start here are C.J. Cherryh, Ursula K. LeGuin, Octavia
Butler, and N.K. Jemison.
Need
help with writing action scenes, check out men’s action adventure and technothrillers
with an explosion a minute. Can’t deal with emotion or relationships on the
page? That’s the romance writer’s specialty. Look to them for techniques.
(Again, see some of our Stiletto Gang members.)
Reading
as a writer can help you with any writing problem you have (except the
constants of procrastination and lack of confidence). If your current problem
is transitions, find writers who write fabulous transitions, even if you don’t
like the rest of their work. They may be literary writers or writers in some
commercial genre, but they write transitions that really work. Learn from them.
Take apart the way they write transitions. Identify their techniques. Then
practice them. This kind of reading to identify and break down skill and
technique is a valuable tool for any writer. Good writers have books that are
underlined, highlighted, and have notes scribbled in them.

REPLY TO COMMENTS (because Blogger hates me):

Linda will reply to comments later; a doctor’s appointment today turned into a little more than she expected.

Jan, lots of women writers have problems with physical action scenes when they start writing fiction, and action/adventure and techno-thrillers would be very helpful because they’re usually non-stop action. Those marked-up books are helping you to learn.

SuperB, I can still read for enjoyment, though I’m ever pickier, the more experienced a writer I become. But after reading through once for enjoyment and to become familiar with the story, I go through marking examples of the technique I want to learn and make notes on how the effect I want was accomplished.

I have a few writers where I do that, also, Ramona. Though I have started to take apart some of their older books to see how they made them so great.

I Am Not Supposed to Be Here

/in /by


By Linda Rodriguez

I’m not supposed to be here—on the computer. Mainly because I
have post-surgical lymphedema in my right arm and am supposed to be keeping it
elevated constantly until my custom-made compression sleeve arrives. So, once I’ve
posted this blog, I will be back in my living room with my arm lifted above the
recliner arm by two fat bed pillows until it’s even with my shoulder.

I have discovered that I can write in longhand with great
difficulty from this position, but I cannot operate a computer. So I am trying
to write my novel-in-progress with pen and notepad. It’s slow going, but I’m
happy with what I’m getting. 
That makes three things I didn’t know that I
now do—that lymphedema exists, that there is such a thing as a compression
sleeve, and that I can write, by hand at least, even with my arm stuck up in
the air.

This has been a time for learning new things, so here are
some others that I’ve learned recently, sometimes the hard way.

Your insurance company can dump your surgeon right before
the operation, and you can be operated on by a complete stranger, who will then
turn out to be a nightmare to deal with. And a corollary: If enough people all
over the country raise enough fuss about a bad insurance decision that affects thousands,
the insurance company will finally get its head out of its nether regions and
do the right thing so that your second surgery can be with your actual, sweet,
kind, understanding surgeon.

It does no good to tell phlebotomists that you have bad
veins in your arms, and they should start out with your hands. They simply view
that as a challenge and have to hit you an average of three times, leaving
huge, painful bruises on your arms, before they give up and get the necessary
blood from your hand.

Nurses are a divine gift to undeserving humans. (Seriously,
people, treat those great nurses better! I don’t care how much you’re hurting.
There’s no excuse for taking it out on a wonderful human being who’s trying
very carefully to help you.)

There is such a medical doctor as a lymphedema specialist.
Also, lymphedema educators. And occupational therapists who specialize in
lymphedema. A whole medical industry for swollen limbs! And I’ve been referred
to all of them, which will be extremely expensive, I’m certain.

Since I am not supposed to be here, I will not be online to
respond to your comments, and I do beg your forgiveness for that. But of
course, that gives you the option of really trolling me with hate-filled
insults like “Linda has a fat arm that they’re going to put in an arm girdle”
or “Look at all those track marks on Linda’s arms—she must be an absolute
junkie and a bad aim with the needle, too.” I’ll never know. So have at it,
pals.

Just, please, don’t tell my doctors I got on the computer to
write and post this blog.

Out of Character

/in /by
by Linda Rodriguez

My husband and I have been binge-watching Prime Suspect on Netflix lately. Helen
Mirren is awesome, as always, but the ensemble cast is of extremely high
quality, also, and the writing is superb. Until. (You knew there had to be an “until”
hanging around there somewhere, didn’t you?)

Suddenly, one episode begins with Mirren’s character DCI
Jane Tennison doing something so out of character and just plain stupid (for a
very smart, savvy character) that both husband and I are screaming, “What? Jane
would never do that!” This out-of-character action she has taken is an obvious
set-up to provide lots of conflict later for Jane, but between us, we came up
with four different ways the author could have set up the exact same conflict
without having Jane commit an action totally wrong for her character.

Normally, I don’t even worry about this in movies or TV
shows because I usually simply can’t hold them to as high a standard as I do
books, but this series is so well-written that I do expect that kind of
intelligent writing. It’s happened before in books by excellent writers, as
well. I can understand the impulse behind it because I think there are times we
all are frustrated in our plotting and tempted by the lazy way to put our
protagonists where they need to be.

The writer of one of the strongest, best-written mystery
series around (who shall remain nameless because she’s never done it again) did
this in one of her books, causing her protagonist to violate the essence of the
character the writer had spent four books building up in order to allow that
protagonist to learn something the author needed the protagonist to know and to
create conflict for the protagonist. It was darned near a
throw-the-book-against-the-wall moment for me, and if this author hadn’t
already built up so much respect, I would have.

I finished that book, in which the character went right back
to being the person delineated in the previous books, and have continued
reading that author. Although we stopped midway in the Prime Suspect episode, the others have been so good that we will
probably give it a chance and finish it. But I have stopped reading some less-stellar
authors’ series when they’ve pulled that kind of boner. If you can’t believe in
a character’s reality, it pretty much blows the whole show, I think.

How do you feel about a major character making a move that’s
not just a surprise but completely wrong and out of character? Do you just
shrug and move on, or does it bother you as it does me?

REPLIES TO COMMENTS (because Blogger):

Mary, yes, a good editor will catch these moments, so if they show up, they’re a failure in editing, as well as in writing. It can be a temptation to force your character to do something s/he’s too smart/ethical/whatever to actually do, simply because you need it to happen for plot purposes. But there’s no sense in working your butt off to create a realistic character to turn her or him momentarily into a cardboard cutout for convenience’s sake. 

I know just what you mean about that itch, Mary S. The right motivation can make anyone do just about anything (Sophie’s Choice, anyone?), but you’ve got to show me the motivation. My Skeet Bannion is not a hot dog/cowboy cop like so many protagonists and wouldn’t normally charge in alone after an armed murderer with a child hostage, but in Every Last Secret, she does just that because the antagonist has started hurting the child.

Pre-Surgery Rant

/in /by
by Linda Rodriguez


By the time you read this, I’ll be recuperating from some
major surgery, but at the time I’m writing it, the surgery hasn’t taken place
yet. So I’m nervous. Aren’t we all in such a case?
Scary as surgery is, however, dealing with health insurance
companies has become even scarier. Between the time I left my surgeon’s office
and the date my surgery was scheduled, my insurance carrier had been bought by
another huge insurance company. Doctors who were approved providers on my
original plan but not on the buying company’s plan were instantly dropped from
coverage and told they must re-apply to be accepted. 
Guess whose surgeon was
one of these? She went between supper and breakfast from being an approved
surgeon under my insurance to being out of network, which means I’d have to
essentially pay for most of this surgery entirely out of my own pocket. One of
the partners in her practice had been approved under both plans, so rather than
wait the months it could take to get her approved again—since that really is
not an option for this surgery, which is not elective—or pay about $20,000 that
I simply don’t have, I agreed to have this older man I’ve never met be my
surgeon while the young, smart woman who met and examined me, impressed me, and
developed a rapport with me will only assist. And my follow-up care and
treatment plan will also have to be with this man, who is probably an expert
surgeon and a lovely person but is totally unknown to me. As the internet cats
would say, I haz sad.
Over the years, I’ve heard many arguments against
nationalizing health care to make sure that every citizen can have the health
care he or she needs. They usually fall back into “Do you want the government
to decide which doctor you can have or which medicine you can take?” pretty
quickly. 
Although the government has never yet made those decisions for me,
health insurance corporations have done so again and again. They have decided
that medicines my doctor prescribes will not be covered. They decide which
doctors I can see and which specialists, and all tests prescribed for me must
first be cleared with them. Now, they have changed their minds midstream and
told me I cannot have the surgeon I want and have been seeing with their
approval. I know people who have died because their insurance companies, to
which these people had paid hefty premiums for years, decided they could not
have the life-saving treatments their doctors, who were approved by their
insurance companies in the first place, said they needed.
So, how are we any better off with what we have than with a
national single-payer healthcare system? As I wait to go into surgery at the
hands of a complete stranger and read of the Supreme Court decision privileging
the personhood of a major for-profit corporation over the personhood of actual,
living, breathing, individual women, these issues suddenly become immensely
personal.

In Real Life, Pirates Aren’t Sexy or Nice

/in /by
by Linda Rodriguez

Pirates with a heart of gold are a mainstay of romance,
fantasy, and science fiction, as well as defunct historical novels. They’re
dashing rebels with sexy outfits and underneath the disguise of the rogue, they’re
really nice guys who do the right thing. We see them on the book covers and in
the movies and television shows. We even celebrate them with Talk Like a Pirate
Day.
But in real life, in the modern world, pirates aren’t any of
those things. They’re not Robin Hoods stealing from the rich to give to the
poor. Despite a lot of discourse on the internet, they’re not rebels against
the establishment, hurting no one and setting “content” free.
Content. Like the book I worked on for years and still haven’t
earned out my advance on. Like the book series my friend wrote and went into
debt to promote until her publisher dropped her because her sales weren’t
rising fast enough—while people were downloading those books for free from
pirate sites.
I have young relatives who use these torrent sites. It makes
for heated discussions at holiday dinners, their mother embarrassed, them
seeing it in that internet-discourse rebel-RobinHood fashion, me trying to
explain the facts of life. I notice all the time that they and the internet
groups that they parrot like to use George R.R. Martin, author of the
bestselling Game of Thrones, as their example. “What can it hurt him with his
millions?” they say disdainfully.
On the other hand, I’m in the field. I see the other 99% who
are damaged by it. One or two hundred copies sold through an outlet that
records the sales and pays the publisher and author versus that same number
ripped off and given away without any record or payment can make the difference
between an author being able to continue to write the books readers want to go
on reading or being dropped by the publisher and having to give up that series
and try again, often under a pseudonym or even in a new genre. George R. R.
Martin and J.K. Rowling, they are not.
Today, again, I found my first novel, Every Last Secret, on a pirate site. It doesn’t take long for those
free downloads to destroy a career for most midlist writers, which is what the
majority of us are. Even more than the money in royalties lost, which is not a
tiny problem for those of us who must make rent and buy food for our families
with it, even more than that, the lost sales are a problem because they can
lead to a writer being dropped. So I’m not happy about finding my book pirated.
I’m of the generation who were taught that it’s wrong to
steal, and that’s that for us. Many of the younger ones I know don’t have the
same idea of stealing=wrong. They see that equation only some times. When it’s
convenient for them. But perhaps if they realized that pirating was a good way
to kill the author’s chances to publish the books they like so much, perhaps
then they would stop and ask themselves if it was really worth it.
What’s your opinion on the pirating question?

No High Heels!–Guest blog by Edith Maxwell

/in /by


Hi, Linda Rodriguez here! Today, I’d like to introduce you to my friend, Edith Maxwell, who writes three wonderful mystery series,  the Speaking of Mystery series (as Tace Baker), the Carriagetown Mysteries, and the great Local Foods Mystery series. Her newest book in that last series, ‘Til Dirt Do Us Part, is out right now.

“The
produce is local–and so is the crime–when long-simmering tensions
lead to murder following a festive dinner on Cam Flaherty’s farm.
It’ll take a sleuth who knows the lay of the land to catch this
killer. But no one ever said Cam wasn’t willing to get her hands
dirty.
..


Even
an amateur detective like Cam can figure out that one of the resident
locavores went loco–at least temporarily–and settled a score with
Irene. But which one? With the fall harvest upon her, Cam must sift
through a bushelful of possible killers that includes Irene’s
estranged stepson, her disgruntled auto mechanic, and a fellow CSA
subscriber who seems suspiciously happy to have the dead woman out of
the way. The
closer she gets to weeding out the culprit, the more Cam feels like
someone is out to cut her harvest short. But to keep her own body out
of the compost pile, she’ll have to wrap this case up quickly.“


No
High Heels!

I’m
coming out, right here, right now. Get ready for it: I do not wear stiletto
heels. I do not wear high heels. I do my best to avoid wearing any heels at all
if they aren’t
flat! 
I hope this won’t disqualify me from
writing a guest post here, on this blog with so many authors I respect and call
friends (waving to my buds Debra, Linda, Dru Ann, Marilyn, the Sparkles!). I
love you guys. 
But it became clear to me many decades ago that,
despite being less than five feet, two inches tall, heels were not for me. One
reason was comfort. I have wide little feet and hate having my toes pinched.
Another was safety. I want to be able to run if I need to, whether it’s from threat of
tornado or attacker, whether I’m running toward an approaching train or
sprinting away from a falling tree.
Probably the most important reason was my natural
trend toward things, well, natural. We have bodies with feet that rest on the
ground. We are meant to walk heel-toe-heel-toe. Of course I do wear shoes – kinda have to for half
of the year in New England (even though I’m a native southern
California) –and I drive a car, and so on. But I just don’t believe in high
heels. For me.  

I’m also a long-time Quaker, and we have this
thing called the Testimony of Simplicity, which totally suits my personality.
My path of least resistance is to own one pair of Birkenstock sandals, one pair
of tennies, and one pair of lace-up black suede shoes. Okay, and a pair of fun
knee-high leather boots. Flat-soled boots. And then replace with exactly the same
model every couple of years when a pair wears out. 
Now that I’m a published author,
though –yikes. I have author events at libraries and
bookstores. I’m on panels at conferences. I haven’t snagged a major award
nomination yet, but hope to, and then I’ll be visible at an
awards banquet. And I want to look nice. Respectable. My professional
compromise to date is pair of black clogs, which boost me a hair higher off the
ground but are still almost flat. And I’ll confess to ordering
a pair of nearly flat silver sandals for my 
niece’s fancy wedding today. But Hank Phillippi
Ryan I’m not!

All this non-stilettoing, though? It leaves me more
time to write, which is what makes me happy.

Readers: Are any of you all non-heel wearers? Or do
you prefer to go shoe shopping for the latest stilettos?

 

 

Edith Maxwell writes the  Local Foods Mystery series (Kensington
Publishing), the Speaking of Mystery series under the pseudonym Tace Baker, featuring Quaker linguistics professor
Lauren Rousseau (Barking Rain Press), and the historical Carriagetown
Mysteries, as well as award-winning short crime fiction.

A mother, world traveler, and former technical
writer, Edith lives north of Boston in an antique house with her beau and three
cats. She blogs every weekday with the Wicked Cozy Authors. You can find her
here: 

@edithmaxwell

My Writing Vacation – Or Books I Enjoyed When I Let Myself Read for Fun by Debra H. Goldstein

/in /by

Many of you know I stepped down from the bench a year ago to give myself the freedom to write during the day.  The results were mixed.  In the beginning, I couldn’t get disciplined enough to do much more than organize my daughter’s wedding, travel, and watch every possible episode of How I Met Your Mother and NCIS. I finally found my writing “legs” and finished a novel that beta readers are now reviewing and wrote and submitted a number of short stories.  Four of them, “A Political Cornucopia,” “Who Dat? Dat the Indian Chief!,” “Early Frost,” and the “Rabbi’s Wife Stayed Home,” were published by Bethlehem Writer’s Roundtable (November 2013), Mardi Gras Murder (2014), The Birmingham Arts Journal (April 2014) and Mysterical – E (April 2014), respectively. At the same time, my 2012 IPPY Award winning mystery, Maze in Blue, was re-released by Harlequin Worldwide Mystery as a May 2014 book of the month.

When I received notice that Maze was reissued and the fourth story had been accepted for publication, I

decided to take a two week vacation from writing and rejoin the world of being a reader.  Some of the books I could have done without (diet books – I’ve gained weight since I decided to write), some were simply okay (a biography of Barbra Streisand), but some proved to be pure fun.  One of the exciting things to me, is that many of the books I really enjoyed were written by authors I have met at various conferences and who, in many cases, have written guest blogs for “It’s Not Always a Mystery.”(http://debrahgoldstein.wordpress.com)

For a good suspense read, let me recommend Hank Phillippi Ryan’s Agatha winning The Wrong Girl.  I read her Mary Higgins Clark MWA winning The Other Woman last year and eagerly was awaiting this book.  Then, I picked up the third book in the Skeet Bannon series written by Linda Rodriguez.  Every Hidden Fear was published the week I took my reading vacation, I couldn’t put it down – each book only has hooked me on Skeet since Linda won the Malice Domestic Best First Traditional Mystery Novel Competition for Every Last Secret.

I wanted to get a little food and farm reading in so I turned to Edith Maxwell’s A Tine to Live, A Tine to Die which I followed with Leslie Budewitz’s Agatha winning Death al Dente. Food wasn’t my only companion during my reading excursion.  I added a little comedy and romance with Kendel Lynn’s Board Stiff.

Much as I enjoy mysteries, I needed to spice up my life with a few good looking men so my bedtime reading was Robert Wagner’s Pieces of My Heart.  Tonight, I’m snuggling up with Rob Lowe’s book, Love Life.  I plan to read fast because tomorrow I’m giving myself back to writing.

How to Keep Your Favorite Writers and Books from Disappearing

/in /by
by Linda Rodriguez

Since
my third Skeet Bannion novel, Every
Hidden Fear, came out just last week, I’m thinking seriously about book
sales right now. I’ve written and spoken a number of times about what an avid
reader can do to support the authors s/he loves, and so I thought I’d compile
all of those actions into a blog post for today.
As a
reader of novels, I was often disappointed and horrified when authors that I
loved disappeared or stopped writing series I loved and started writing another
that I might not be as fond of.  After I
became a published and got to know many other published novelists, I discovered
how these things happen and what I as a reader can do about them. 
A couple of
examples—one writer’s books always get rave reviews in the big journals,
usually starred reviews, she always earns out her advances, and every single book
has been a finalist for some of the biggest awards, but her publisher, one of
the Big Five, has dropped her. Why? Her books aren’t increasing in sales enough
from book to book, even though they are increasing and are profitable to the
publisher. She is looking at writing novels in a different genre now. Another
writer had an award-winning series of witty, well-written private-eye novels.
He was dropped because it was determined that private-eye novels wouldn’t be
selling well soon (a prediction that turned out wrong). He couldn’t get a
publisher then. So he had to take a woman’s name and start writing very
successful cozies under that.
Often
even famous writers are just a breath or two away from tumbling down the slopes
in the fickle game of publishing, and success is even more volatile for midlist
authors. There are dozens of other stories like these that I could tell. This
is what’s happening to the authors you love who vanish and what may well happen
to the authors you love now. Even selling enough to earn out their advances is
not enough, if they are not increasing their sales drastically with each book.
How can we help the authors we love to do that so we can keep reading the books
we’re addicted to? Here’s a little list.
Pre-orders— pre-orders
have become more and more important to writers. Publishers often decide how big
a print run and how much, if any, promotion they will give a book based on
pre-orders. Bookstores base orders on that, too. So pre-orders can determine
whether your book will be on the shelves in bookstores around the country or
have to be special-ordered.
Other things you can do to help are
clicking “likes” and “tags” on Amazon. Reviews on Amazon
and Goodreads count more toward sales than those longer ones on my blog or
elsewhere, and don’t
forget Barnes & Noble and Library Thing. Post your author’s book in your
WantToRead file on Goodreads when you know the book is coming. Publishers tell
us that is important, that other readers look at those and often decide whether
to buy the book based on how many other people have listed it as something they
want. But reviews on your blog or other
review sites do help, as well. I know I’m doing a lot more book recommendations
now and not just waiting for folks to ask me.
As soon as I know a book is coming
out by one of my favorite writers, I will request my library system order that
book—and my own pre-orders for those books will be through local bookstores
because that helps them decide whether or not to order in that book to have on
the shelves. Ask
your library to order the book, and then check it out. Library sales are
important to most authors, and we love libraries. If you check out our books,
the libraries will keep buying them and won’t sell us off for pennies at the
Friends of the Library book sale. (Many libraries get rid of books that haven’t
been checked out in more than a year, so even if you own a book, checking out
from your local library helps keep your author alive there.)
When we order books from our local
bookstore, we need to tell them what we like about that author and why s/he
might be a good fit for the store. That not only can convince them to order the
book, but also gives them something to tell people when they ask about it.
Talk up
your author and book on Facebook and Twitter. I know for a fact that people
have bought my books because of wonderful things some of my fans have posted on
those two platforms about them. Word of mouth is still the best advertising.
If
you’re in a book club or book discussion group or anything like that, suggest
your author’s book for the group to read and discuss.
If you
take one or more of these actions for your author, you have given great support
and taken steps to make sure that s/he will be able to continue writing and
publishing the books you love. Anything we can do to help others learn about
the authors and books we love helps to keep them available to us, too.

Are there things you do to support your favorite authors that I’ve missed? Please add them in the comments.

REPLY TO COMMENTS (Blogger still won’t let me comment GRR!)


Sue, you’ve got a good point. Many writers who’ve been dropped in recent years have turned to self-publishing. I don’t think it’s a good route for unpublished writers usually, but it can work very well for those who’ve already built a backlist and a cadre of fans.

Kay, you’re right. I always feel it’s not up to my readers and fans to promote my or any writer’s books, but for those who want to be sure to have more of them to read, these are some ways they can help. I have seen too many writers whose work I love stop publishing–or at least stop publishing those books I love so much–because of the lack of escalating sales.

Debra, yes, the publishing world has been changing ever since the multinational corporations took over most of the big old firms and demanded a much higher ROI than publishing can really sustain. They think the bestsellers are the only way to go, but the old pub houses sustained themselves on the many midlist authors. But midlist authors are no longer respected by the big companies who always want the “big kill.”