Tag Archive for: suspense

Olympic Skates

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Like many sports fans last week, our TV was tuned to the Olympics. Gymnasts, swimmers, divers, track-and-fielders. Such amazing athletes! This year, for the first time, we also watched skateboarding.

Skateboarding may not strike purists an Olympic-worthy sport, but I can understand how the hobby— embraced for decades by renegade spirits of all ages—made it through the international committee that decides such things. Perhaps it went something like this: “Well, we’ve got snowboarding in winter, so…”

Pixabay

This year’s event aired just in time to put the finishing touches on a scene in my next mystery. In researching the sport, I’ve learned a few bits of language that thrashers (skateboarders) speak—like grind, ollie, and tail-grab five-forty—as they zoom around a skatepark’s cradles and bowls.

Here’s a peek at that scene: 

He leaped into the bowl, flipped his board with his feet, reconnected to it in mid air, zipped down to the bottom and up another slope, gaining speed as he went. On his last approach to the top, his feet left the board and he went airborne, flipped upside down and still somehow managed to reconnect feet to board and land the trick. Someone shouted, “Rip it up, Skeeter!” The crowd went crazy.

After watching eleven- and twelve-year-old girls compete for an Olympic medal in Tokyo, a different skateboard scene, this one in The Body Next Door, popped into my head. (Five years on, I forgot I’d written it!) Instead of a skatepark, it’s set in the parking garage of a high-rise where Samantha Newman watches the forlorn ten-year-old Lizzie Mason struggle to teach herself how to ride her big brother’s cast-off board.

That scene led me to remember another one from the book, one that features Krav Maga, which is a perfect sport for the Olympics. Invented by the Israeli military, and adopted by law enforcement organizations around the world, it’s a form of hand to hand combat in which you learn to neutralize an assailant (or unruly criminal) as quickly as possible. No weapon needed. In my novel, however, the self defense system dissolves into a silly pillow fight between Samantha and the ever-elusive Carter Chapman. While it could be said that their attraction to one another is of Olympic proportions, we shall save that conversation for another day. 😉

Did you watch the Olympics this year? What’s your favorite event?

Gay Yellen writes the award-winning Samantha Newman Mysteries, including The Body Business, The Body Next Door, and the soon to be released Body in the News. She’d love to hear from you here, on Facebook, BookBub, or via her website.

 

Serendipitous Discovery!

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By Kathryn Lane

A week’s’ worth of newspapers, yes,
old-fashioned printed versions, beckoned me on the coffee table. I confess that
in the midst of downsizing and moving, I’d been too busy to read them.

Working my way through
the papers, I hit serendipity! An article about the changing car culture.

Ford’s 1896 Quadricycle

What was serendipitous
about that? It covered a topic I’d mentioned in my May newsletter.

First, I should explain
that I ask my newsletter readers to submit their favorite quote to me,
promising that I will use it in a future newsletter.

This month’s quote was:
“My friends are my estate”, submitted by Ann McKennis, a fabulously supportive
fan of my work. Instead of analyzing why an introvert like Emily Dickinson would
write these words to a friend in a letter, I explored the idea of friends.

So I wrote about the
lifelong friendship of inventors Thomas Edison and Henry Ford. In 1896, Ford
introduced his quadricycle. It ran on gasoline. Edison congratulated his
friend, but told him to “keep at it”, predicting electric cars were the wave of
the future. It also inspired Edison to work on an electric version.

Thomas Edison and Henry Ford 

As a writer, why are
cars important to me? Authors use them in novels all the time. Think getaway cars
in a robbery, luxury vehicles villains use to impress women, and forensic
investigators recovering evidence from cars involved in homicides. Vehicles often
break down on dark, isolated roads in crime stories. The list goes on.

Cars are important in real
life crime as well. John Dillinger, the infamous criminal, made the Model A
Ford synonymous with a gangster’s choice in driving during the 1930s. Then
Bonnie and Clyde used a 1934 Ford 730 Deluxe Sedan, a car later riddled with
bullets when they were killed.

The Bonnie and Clyde Car

I marveled at the
coincidences of stumbling upon a great article about electric and gasoline
cars, especially since Edison and Ford were mentioned. Plus, I learned
something new: in the early 1900s in New York City, there were more electric
cars than those that ran on gasoline.

So what happened?
According to Daniel Yergin, Edison put money, effort, and his personal prestige
into developing an electric vehicle, but Ford’s gasoline Model T won the hearts
of car buyers. Almost a century later, General Motors introduced a mass-market
electric vehicle. In 2008, Tesla introduced the stylish Roadster.

Fiction writers will
follow the trend. Electric cars are here to stay. The infrastructure to support
self-driving vehicles is under construction. I’m anxious to see authors using self-driving
cars for getaways. Of course, institutions that villains can rob may be all
online, making the getaway car obsolete.

***

Are you using electric cars in
your novels?

Kathryn Lane started
out as a starving artist. To earn a living, she became a certified public
accountant and embarked on a career in international finance with a major
multinational corporation. After two decades, she left the corporate world to
plunge into writing mystery and suspense thrillers. In her stories, Kathryn
draws deeply from her Mexican background as well
as her travels in over ninety countries.

https://www.kathryn-lane.com

https://www.facebook.com/kathrynlanewriter/

The
Nikki Garcia Mystery Series: eBook Trilogy https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08GZNF17G

 Photo credits:

Quadricycle: “1896 Ford Quadricycle
Runabout, First Car Built by Henry Ford” by The Henry Ford is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND
2.0

Thomas Edison and Henry Ford by Tom Raftery is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND-SA 2.0

The Bonnie
and Clyde Car “DSC_0081” by Jay Bonvouloir is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND
2.0

Newspaper
Article: Wall Street Journal, Weekend Edition ─ April 24-25, 2021; “The
New World of AutoTech” by Daniel Yergin.

Kathryn’s books – designs by Bobbye
Marrs

I Dream in Science Fiction!

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By Kathryn Lane

Fiction
writers take ideas from everywhere, the reason a saying says, “Be careful what
you say around me – I’m a fiction writer.” To prove the point, I’ll paraphrase one of T.S. Eliot’s
quotes: “Good writers borrow; great writers steal.”

Dreams
offer me a favorite reservoir of ideas to borrow. I dream in full technicolor,
and in Spanish and English. Several short stories have come directly from stuff
obtained during my REM sleep.

However,
I was shocked when I had a science fiction dream, complete with language from
an Orwellian future. I read sci-fi, but I’ve never attempted to write it. I do
not have the grasp of physics, astrophysics, astronomy, chemistry, and artificial
intelligence to write convincing sci-fi, so I limit myself to simply reading
it.

Years
ago, I’d read a lot of Ray Bradbury, who said, “Anything you dream is fiction,
and anything you accomplish is science; therefore, the whole history of
humankind is nothing but science fiction.”

Now back to my sci-fi
dream. I was at a
party, complete with fireworks, set in futuristic surroundings. An older couple
left the party and drove away in a self-driving car. In the amorphous
environment of dreaming, I was concerned about them so I called to make sure
they were okay.

I heard an automated voice inform me
through my implanted earphone that “Public driver 00Z1921 was detained by a
squadron of public protectors for bypassing the self-driving controls of
00Z1921’s auto.”

“What’s
the accusation,” I asked.

“Reckless
speeding and endangering the disciples,” the automated voice responded. The voice further instructed me to
locate 00Z1921 at the hostile crisis center.

Still dreaming, I arrived at the center and found the small
self-driving car surrounded by ten hostile-looking storm trooper types.

Then I woke up! Unfortunately,
the dream ended before I learned the outcome of poor old 00Z1921.

Guess I’ve been reading too many futuristic articles
on the speeding up of technological advances resulting from our lockdown, and
those ideas zoomed me into a future time zone!

Or
maybe, as Ray Bradbury might have said, we are all living in a science
fictional world.

***

Do you dream in technicolor?
Do you have dreams set in a sci-fi future?

Kathryn Lane started out as a starving
artist. To earn a living, she became a certified public accountant and embarked
on a career in international finance with a major multinational corporation.
After two decades, she left the corporate world to plunge into writing mystery
and suspense thrillers. In her stories, Kathryn draws deeply from her Mexican background as well as her travels
in over ninety countries.

https://www.kathryn-lane.com

https://www.facebook.com/kathrynlanewriter/

The Nikki Garcia Mystery Series: eBook Trilogy https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08GZNF17G

Photo Credits:

Fireworks: “Looks like the Sky will
bleed with Colors tonight. Wishing everyone a wonderful evening of fun &
excitement!” by williamcho –
licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0

Waymo
self-driving car front view by Grendelkhan – licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0

Storm
Trooper at Oxford by Sheng P. – licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

Kathryn’s books – designs by Bobbye
Marrs

How We Spend Our Time

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Sparkle Abbey welcomes Lori Rader-Day

Today we’re thrilled to welcome our friend, the brilliant, talented, and award-winning author, Lori Rader-Day who shares her thoughts on how we spend our time. 


Take it away, Lori…

Big news. I have all the time there is. I’m newly out on my own as a full-time writer for a while and now I’m considering the ways in which a break from the 9-to-5 grind might be used to its fullest potential.

Do I set off on a multi-state bookstore tour?

Do I offer to visit every library in the state?

Do I visit all the friends I haven’t seen in two or more years, ever since I’ve had to start using all my day-job vacation time for book conferences and such?

*deep breath*

There’s a certain itching panic involved in realizing you could do WHATEVER THE HECK YOU WANT. That you have, for possibly the first time ever, the time to focus on making your dreams come true.

I should be doing. I should be going. I should teach here, speak there, offer this, volunteer that.

And yet—what did I want from this time so much that I made the leap in the first place? What was so important to me?

I wanted the time from my time. And not time for more promotions or more blog posts (with apologies to Sparkle Abbey, for hosting me today). Time for writing.

So. Writers retreats. Should I apply for a two-week residency somewhere? I’ve never had two weeks to rub together before. It’s attractive—coming off two years without a vacation, though, I wonder if I would panic at that vast amount of alone time.

A few of my friends have taken mini-retreats to write. Book a hotel room, get away for a day or two, scribble. That sounds pretty good, too, and less of a commitment. But am I the only person who’s stayed in a hotel recently? They don’t exactly inspire me, and sometimes you get neighbors who have booked a hotel room for distinctly different pleasures than silence. Ahem.

What I want to do is create a daily retreat practice at home, based in reality and therefore perhaps more sustainable over the time I have off work and into whatever I do in the future. I know it’s crazy, but I like my husband and dog. I don’t want to spend two weeks away from them. I want to do the morning dog walk and then take my husband away from his desk for dinner. Instead of escaping from my life, what I want to do is escape into it—live it deeply and with an attention that I haven’t had in a while. Instead of retreating, actually, I want to charge forward.

So? No solutions here. Only thoughts that haven’t quite coalesced into a plan. If anyone has ideas on how to make the best use of time—golden, precious time—leave a comment. I’d love to know how you used your time best or would spend a few months of freedom if you got the chance.

By the way, thanks for spending the time you have on this post. Anne Dillard said, “How we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives.” We all just want to spend our days, our hours, our minutes on things that matter. I wish that for everyone.

Thanks so much for stopping by today, Lori. And readers, please be sure to check out Lori’s latest book Little Pretty Things. Kirkus Reviews says: “Rader-Day…writes absorbingly.” 


We agree!

Lori Rader-Day’s debut mystery, The Black Hour (Seventh Street Books, 2014), received starred reviews from Publishers Weekly, Booklist, and Library Journal and was a finalist for the Mary Higgins Clark Award. Her second mystery, Little Pretty Things, is out now. Her short stories have appeared in Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine, Time Out Chicago, Good Housekeeping, and others. She lives in Chicago with her husband and spoiled dog and is active in the Mystery Writers of America Midwest Chapter and a member of Sisters in Crime and International Thriller Writers.

Cozies versus Suspense/Mysteries

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I’ve been doing a lot of thinking about the difference between a traditional mystery verses a suspense (or hybrid suspense/mystery) and a cozy mystery.

For me, understanding the differences has been key as I craft a proposal for a new cozy series. I’m the type of person who needs to really process through things and understand the foundation, and once I have that firm foundation, I can build the house, making changes as I go. If the foundation is strong, then changes as I go won’t make the house collapse.

Here are the key differences as I see them:

Mystery (cozy) verses suspense (or hybrid suspense/mystery)

  • Narrow World View

or

  • Larger World View

By this I mean that the detective in a mystery focuses on a smaller community, a collection of suspects, unraveling the secrets and lies within that community, in order to get to the truth.

In a suspense the action leads the hero to a larger, sometimes international, world which is where the clues lead.

  • Traditionally, the detective is not the center of the drama or action

or

  • The hero/heroine is the at risk him/herself and that is at the center of the drama

Especially in the mysteries of old, the detective doesn’t have personal growth or, put another way, he/she doesn’t go through a hero’s journey. More contemporary mysteries, particularly cozies, do have sleuths who undergo change or growth.

In a suspense, the center of the story is the hero/heroine. He/she is the one in danger and that is what drives the pursuit of justice (or the defeat of the villain). The hero/heroine is not on the periphery as the sleuth often is throughout a big portion of the cozy.

  • Who committed the crime? Will the puzzle be put together

or

  • Will the hero/heroine survive against a smart villain?

This is fundamental. In a mystery, will the detective put the pieces of the puzzle together in time before another death (sometimes the sleuth by this time) occurs? In a suspense, the question is really based on tension that is built from the danger the hero/heroine is in. Whether or not the villain will win is the driving force of the story.

  • Keeping the detective ahead of the reader.

or

  • Keeping the reader ahead of the hero/heroine.

In a mystery, the detective must be smarter than the reader! The puzzle has to be complicated or crafted well enough to fool the reader and keep him/her guessing, yet not too complicated or convoluted. In a suspense, or hybrid, the reader is really ahead of the hero/heroine because we know the danger that’s coming and we’re on the edge of our seats hoping that the hero/heroine is as smart as we are.

I’ve realized that I prefer the cozy model better. For starters, I don’t like to be on the edge of my seat in a heart-pounding scary way.

Blair Witch Trial?

NO WAY!

Hercule Poirot?

DEFINITELY!


So I’m curious, which type of mystery speaks to you? Do you like being ahead of the game as in a suspense, or a few steps behind the sleuth, hoping to put together the puzzle by the end?

~Misa