Tag Archive for: women sleuths

A Ten-Year Journey to a Golden Ticket

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By Lois Winston

Many authors mention in their bios that they always wanted to be a writer. Not me. I wanted to be an astronaut. That dream died a quick death due to a right brain that quakes at the sight of anything requiring math skills and a body prone to motion sickness. Some dreams just aren’t meant to be.

I got the urge to write well into my adulthood. While on a business trip, I was attacked by a rabid dream. After a ten-year publishing journey, that dream became Love, Lies and a Double Shot of Deception, which was published nearly seventeen years ago.

The story is a romantic suspense about secrets and revenge and the steps some people will go to protect the former and achieve the latter. I’ve always been fascinated by both secrets and revenge. Who among us doesn’t have secrets? Who among us hasn’t harbored revenge fantasies? Is it possible to get through junior high school without a hefty dose of both?

Years ago, I knew a woman who went to great lengths to project the ideal marriage. She constantly bragged about how much her husband loved her and what a perfect marriage they had. Then I learned the secrets behind the lies. She was carrying on an affair that her husband discovered when he tapped his own phone. Mr. and Mrs. Perfect Marriage were anything but. Although Love, Lies and a Double Shot of Deception isn’t about that marriage, it got me thinking about public persona versus private reality.

So there I was on a business trip back in 1995, and I guess I was subconsciously thinking about Mr. and Mrs. Perfect Marriage when I had this dream. And what was even spookier was that each night for the next couple of weeks I dreamed another “chapter” of the dream. Eventually, I was dreaming up chapters during the day as well as at night. Finally, I decided to commit the dream to paper. Fast forward a few weeks and I’m the proud author of a 50,000-word romance that spanned thirty-five years.

Talk about clueless!

Of course, I didn’t know I was clueless. I thought I’d just written the greatest romance of all time. But when I pushed my baby out of the nest into the world of publishing, she flew right back with her beak stuffed full of rejection letters.

I’d been bitten by the writing bug, though, and I’d already started a second novel. I’ve also got a stubborn streak as long as the island of Manhattan. I wasn’t about to be deterred by rejection letters or lack of knowledge. Undaunted, I handed over my VISA card to a friendly salesperson at Barnes & Noble and walked out with an armload of how-to-write-a-novel books.

Those books introduced me to several national writing organizations where I met some generous people willing to offer advice and share their publishing experiences. Some have remained good friends to this day.

Ten years after I first had that dream, after attending countless monthly writers’ meetings and numerous workshops and conferences, I eventually got enough of a clue to sell my first book. Talk Gertie to Me, a chick lit novel, debuted the following year in 2006.

I never forgot about that first clueless effort, though. I liked the characters I’d created, even if the story needed major surgery. I didn’t think the characters deserved to spend eternity under the bed with nobody but the dust bunnies and me ever getting to know them. I went back and rewrote that book. Many, many times. Eventually that 50,000-word romance spanning thirty-five years transformed into a 90,000-word romantic suspense that takes place over several months.

My publishing journey continued and eventually segued into the world of humorous cozy mysteries, but along the way, I continued to write more romance, romantic suspense, and chick lit. I’ve now published twenty-one novels, five novellas, several short stories, one middle-grade book, and a nonfiction book on writing.

There are many paths to publication. Some people are lucky enough to find the straightest, most direct one. They write a book, send it off, and eventually receive a contract offer. For most of us, it takes years of honing our craft before we’re offered that golden ticket. For me, the journey was certainly worth taking.

What about you? If you’re a published author, how long did it take you to see your first book in print? If you’re in the middle of your own  journey toward publication, how long have you been working at your dream? Does it often seem like you’ll never succeed? Don’t give up! Perseverance is everything.

~*~

USA Today and Amazon bestselling and award-winning author Lois Winston writes mystery, romance, romantic suspense, chick lit, women’s fiction, children’s chapter books, and nonfiction under her own name and her Emma Carlyle pen name. Kirkus Reviews dubbed her critically acclaimed Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery Series, “North Jersey’s more mature answer to Stephanie Plum.” In addition, Lois is a former literary agent and an award-winning craft and needlework designer who often draws much of her source material for both her characters and plots from her experiences in the crafts industry. Learn more about Lois and her books at her website www.loiswinston.com where you can also sign up for her newsletter and follow her on various social media sites.

Ridding the World of Word Clutter, One Description at a Time

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By Lois Winston

I’ve recently had several requests from authors and publishers to write blurbs for soon-to-be-published books. In addition, I’m currently judging a writing contest for recently published novels. Although all mysteries, these books run the gamut of various sub-genres within mystery, everything from cozies to suspense. Disturbingly, I’m seeing one issue that crops up in many of them: over-writing.

Many years ago, the agent who owned the agency that represented me gave me the best writing advise I’ve ever received. He said that every scene and all dialog in a book must do one of two things—either advance the plot or tell the reader something she needs to know about the POV character AT THAT MOMENT. If the scene or dialog does neither, it’s filler and doesn’t belong in your book.

Filler usually manifests in dialog as chit-chat. In narrative, the culprit is often description. Excessive description is the downfall of many of the books I’m reading. Description done well enhances a story. It gives the reader a deeper understanding of the character and the world she inhabits. However, when not done well, description pulls the reader from the story and drags down pacing. No one wants to read a mystery, suspense, or thriller with pacing that induces sleep, but that’s what I’m finding in too many of these books.

Some authors are of the misguided notion that they need to describe all characters from head to toe every time they appear in a scene. They also believe they need to describe every aspect of the setting, from the color of the curtains on the windows to the knickknacks on the shelves. A well-written book only describes that which is pertinent to the character and the scene.

Adjusting your thinking to view filler as word clutter, enables you to adopt a Marie Kondo attitude toward your writing. Doing so will not only aid your pacing but will allow the words that remain to have greater impact.

Here’s an example I’ve used when giving writing workshops. The following is a paragraph describing a fictitious character:

Joe wore a threadbare navy blue and forest green plaid flannel shirt. Two of the buttons were missing, and one was hanging from a loose thread. His legs were encased in bleach-stained black jeans, torn in some places, patched in others. I glanced down at his feet. The cuffs of his jeans were frayed, and his big toe peeked out from a hole in the top of his scuffed and dirt-caked tan work boots. A ratty, stained camouflage ball cap sat sideways on a head.

And this is a one-sentence description of that character that says the same thing in only five words:

Joe wore Salvation Army rejects.

There is no reason to use eighty-two words to describe something that can be described in five—not to mention, described better. Unless there is something about Joe’s clothing that will have an impact on the plot or one of the other characters, the reader doesn’t need to be pulled from the story by having to focus on such minute details. Less is more.

Do you have a pet peeve about books you’ve been reading lately? Post a comment for a chance to win a promo code for a free audiobook of Handmade Ho-Ho Homicide, the eighth book in my Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mysteries.

~*~

USA Today and Amazon bestselling and award-winning author Lois Winston writes mystery, romance, romantic suspense, chick lit, women’s fiction, children’s chapter books, and nonfiction under her own name and her Emma Carlyle pen name. Kirkus Reviews dubbed her critically acclaimed Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery series, “North Jersey’s more mature answer to Stephanie Plum.” In addition, Lois is a former literary agent and an award-winning craft and needlework designer who often draws much of her source material for both her characters and plots from her experiences in the crafts industry. Learn more about Lois and her books at her website www.loiswinston.com where you can also sign up for her newsletter and follow her on various social media sites.

Process Delayed Can Still be Progress…of a Sort

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By Lois Winston

I’m not someone who immediately jumps into the next book as soon as I finish writing the previous one. My latest Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery, A Crafty Collage of Crime, released on June 6th. Other than promotional blog posts, I haven’t written anything Anastasia-related since then. Haven’t even given much thought to the next book beyond the fact that I know I’ll be picking up Anastasia’s story shortly after the recent book ended.

It’s not that I’m tired of writing about my reluctant sleuth or have no ideas. It’s more about a process I’ve found that works best for me. After a book goes off into the world, I devote the next month or so to promotion. Once the flurry of promotion wanes, I give myself permission to clear my head before once again hitting the keyboard in earnest. We all have our process, and I’ve discovered over the years that this keeps me from burning out or developing terminal writer’s block. We all need the occasional vacay, even if it’s only a vacay from the keyboard.

With that in mind, I had set a schedule to start in on serious pondering, mulling, and research the week of August 21st, the day after the Killer Nashville writers’ conference ended. I’d plant butt in chair and fingers on keyboard in earnest September 5th, the day after Labor Day.

Of course, I didn’t factor into testing positive for Covid shortly after Killer Nashville ended. And I certainly didn’t factor in the far from mild case of Covid that broadsided me and still continues haunting me with lingering symptoms. I haven’t felt this tired since suffering through mono when I was nineteen or dealing with an infant who exited the womb never needing to sleep—ever!

About the only things I’ve been able to accomplish when not napping are watching TV and reading, more of the latter than the former, thanks to the writers’ strike and the absence of many of my favorite shows. For someone who has never been a napper, I’m beginning to suspect I harbor some cat DNA. Don’t they sleep about seventeen hours a day?

At least during my daily seven hours of wakefulness, I was able to make a decent dent in my overflowing Kindle virtual TBR pile. For someone used to juggling multiple balls, if nothing else, I’ve achieved a small sense of accomplishment during my illness and recovery.

Not every book I read is worth mentioning. Several fell way short of expectations. However, there were two books that I thoroughly enjoyed: The Book Woman’s Daughter, the follow-up to Kim Michele Rchardson’s The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek, and Kopp Sisters on the March, book 5 in Amy Stewart’s Kopp Sisters series. However, if you’ve enjoyed the other Kopp Sisters books, be forewarned that this book is a bit of a departure from the previous books in the series. Although labeled as a mystery, the mystery element is a minor subplot.

One of the perks of being a published author is getting to read some books before they hit bookstore shelves. I had the absolute pleasure of losing myself in advance reading copies of two books that I highly recommend. If you enjoy women’s fiction, you won’t want to miss the recently released Picture Perfect Autumn by Shelley Noble. It truly is a picture-perfect novel.

If romantic amateur sleuth mysteries are more your speed, you’ll want to read The Body in the News, the third installment in the Samantha Newman Mysteries by The Stiletto Gang’s own Gay Yellen. I was hooked on this series after reading the first book. When I finished this newest addition, I wanted to pick up the fourth book right away. I hope Gay is a fast writer!

What about you? Read any good books lately? Post a comment for a chance to win a promo code for a free download of the audiobook version of Scrapbook of Mystery, the sixth Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery.

~*~

USA Today and Amazon bestselling and award-winning author Lois Winston writes mystery, romance, romantic suspense, chick lit, women’s fiction, children’s chapter books, and nonfiction under her own name and her Emma Carlyle pen name. Kirkus Reviews dubbed her critically acclaimed Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery series, “North Jersey’s more mature answer to Stephanie Plum.” In addition, Lois is a former literary agent and an award-winning craft and needlework designer who often draws much of her source material for both her characters and plots from her experiences in the crafts industry. Learn more about Lois and her books at her website www.loiswinston.com where you can also sign up for her newsletter and follow her on various social media sites.

RIP, Mac

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By Lois Winston

Sometimes, there are no warning signs, no odd symptoms that crop up which would make us suspect something is not quite right. Such was not the case with Mac. Nothing made me question his health, nothing that would lead me to seek out the services of an expert. One moment, he was fine; the next he wasn’t. Worse yet, he failed to respond to all my efforts to make him well.

This all happened three weeks ago. Mac and I had been in a deeply committed relationship for ten years. I wasn’t ready to let him go. So I picked up the phone and scheduled an appointment for a full diagnostic workup. Surely, whatever the problem, something would make him better.

After arriving, I was asked about his prior symptoms. When I said he’d had none, the diagnostician showed surprise. She rattled off a series of the usual suspects, to which I answered in the negative for each one. She shook her head in disbelief. I suspect she thought I was too ignorant to recognize obvious signs of impending illness. I ignored her condescension. I needed her expertise to heal Mac.

When I asked what she thought might be the problem, she offered possible afflictions, some with remedies but others that were fatal. I crossed my fingers as she spent the next hour and a half performing a litany of tests to determine why Mac had suddenly become comatose.

The test results confirmed my worst fears. Mac had suffered a catastrophic failure. Both his hard drive and battery were dead.

I think the ratio of computer years to human years must be greater than that of dog years to human years. However, even if it’s the same, that would have made Mac seventy years old. Ancient as far as my millennial diagnostician was concerned, but I’m at the stage of my life where I no longer consider seventy old. Still, I suppose ten years is considered ancient for a computer, even one as stalwart as Mac had been.

Mac had served me well. During our time together, we’d written nine novels, five novellas, several short stories, one nonfiction book, and countless blog posts. We’d edited two multi-author promotional charity cookbooks and two multi-author box sets.

However, it was time to lay Mac to rest, sending him off to the big Apple in the sky. RIP, Mac. But really, after all we’ve been through together, he couldn’t have died a day earlier before the weekend state sales tax holiday ended?

Scrapbook of Murder, the sixth book in my Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery Series, is now available as an audiobook. Post a comment for a chance to win a promo code for a free download.

~*~

USA Today and Amazon bestselling and award-winning author Lois Winston writes mystery, romance, romantic suspense, chick lit, women’s fiction, children’s chapter books, and nonfiction under her own name and her Emma Carlyle pen name. Kirkus Reviews dubbed her critically acclaimed Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery series, “North Jersey’s more mature answer to Stephanie Plum.” In addition, Lois is a former literary agent and an award-winning craft and needlework designer who often draws much of her source material for both her characters and plots from her experiences in the crafts industry. Learn more about Lois and her books at her website www.loiswinston.com where you can also sign up for her newsletter and follow her on various social media sites.

Summertime…and the TBR pile is calling!

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By Lois Winston

A Crafty Collage of Crime, the 12th book in my Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery Series, released six weeks ago. After a multi-week blog tour to promote the book, I’ve now officially entered the period I call “me” time, a mini-vacation I permit myself after each new book leaves the security of the laptop womb and before I begin seriously thinking about the next book. Much of that “me” time is spent binge-reading (especially since it’s too hot to leave the house!) I’m trying to make a sizable dent in my virtual TBR pile before I add another book to my Kindle library. Here are the books I’ve read so far (in the order I read them) and what I thought.

 

Murder at the Pontchartrain by Kathleen Kaska

Kathleen Kaska always delivers, and once again she doesn’t disappoint in Murder at the Pontchartrain, the sixth book in her delightful 1950s era Sidney Lockhart Mystery Series. This time Sidney and Dixon are in New Orleans, having decided to elope, but it doesn’t take long for a dead body to show up in their hotel room, delaying the nuptials and plunging them into yet another murder investigation as the bodies begin to pile up and Dixon finds himself locked up. Kaska had me guessing whodunit until the very end, and those are the best murder mysteries.

 

The Tiffany Girls by Shelley Noble

A brilliant blending of fact and fiction. When a Parisian woman artist is forced to immigrate to New York, she secures a position at the Tiffany Glass Works, working beside the real women responsible for many of the designs and much of the work attributed to Louis Comfort Tiffany. Noble has woven a well-researched historical novel that will draw you in and keep you turning pages.

 

The Princess Spy by Larry Loftis

A fascinating look at an American woman who worked as an OSS operative in Spain during WWII. I just wish the author had delved more into her life in this biography and spent less time celebrity name-dropping. I also wanted more narrative action and less dry summarization of events.

 

Hamnet by Maggie O’Farrell

For such a prolific playwright, so little is known of William Shakespeare’s life and family, including the circumstances of his young son’s death. In Hamnet, the author weaves an engaging tale of what might have occurred and how it may have become the catalyst for one of Shakespeare’s greatest works.

 

Dead Men Need No Reservations by Terry Ambrose

The latest edition to Terry Ambrose’s Seaside Cove Bed & Breakfast Mysteries doesn’t disappoint. I always love spending a few hours with these characters, especially Alex, the precocious thirteen-year-old wannabe sleuth. If you’re in the mood for a light mystery and a few chuckles along the way, this book will give you both.

 

Going Rogue by Janet Evanovich

No matter the lemons in your life, spend a few hours with Stephanie Plum, and you’ll be sipping lemonade. Going Rogue is just as entertaining as all the other books in the series and will certainly make you forget your cares–at least for a little while–as you slip into Stephanie’s world.

 

The Murder of Roger Ackroyd by Agatha Christie

I had never gotten around to reading this acclaimed Christie mystery, but I did figure out whodunit before the denouement, so for me that was a bit of a disappointment. However, what’s not to love about Monsieur Poirot?

 

Moonflower Murders by Anthony Horowitz

Unfortunately, I didn’t feel this book lived up to the first in the series. I really enjoyed Magpie Murders, but this sequel seemed forced, contrived, and often plodding. I’m someone who enjoys the “book-within-a-book” format when it’s done well, but that wasn’t the case here. The style works best when the two stories alternate, not when the entirety of the second book is dropped into the middle of the other. However, he did keep my guessing whodunit until the end.

 

In addition, I’ve read several mysteries for a contest I was judging and one where I was asked to write a blurb, but since the contest winners have yet to be announced, and the blurb book is not yet published, I can’t mention anything about them.

Now I’m off to tackle the next book on my list…but before I go, If you’re planning a road trip and looking for an audiobook to pass the drive time, I still have a few promo codes available for a free download of A Stitch to Die For, the fifth book in my Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery Series. Post a comment about your summer reading for a chance to win one.

~*~

USA Today and Amazon bestselling and award-winning author Lois Winston writes mystery, romance, romantic suspense, chick lit, women’s fiction, children’s chapter books, and nonfiction under her own name and her Emma Carlyle pen name. Kirkus Reviews dubbed her critically acclaimed Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery series, “North Jersey’s more mature answer to Stephanie Plum.” In addition, Lois is a former literary agent and an award-winning craft and needlework designer who often draws much of her source material for both her characters and plots from her experiences in the crafts industry. Learn more about Lois and her books at her website www.loiswinston.com where you can also sign up for her newsletter and follow her on various social media sites.

The 5-Letter Word that Sends a Shudder of Anxiety Through Most Authors

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By Lois Winston

By nature, many authors are loners. We spend a good deal of our lives sitting in our writing caves, pecking at our keyboards. Survey any group of authors, and most will tell you the worst part of being an author is having to do promo. That’s the infamous 5-letter word of the title in this post.

It doesn’t matter if you’re an indie author, published by a small press, or with a major publishing house. Unless you’re one of the very elite (think Janet Evanovich, Nora Roberts, or James Patterson), you have to do most or all of your own promotion. Even the big names need to promote their books, but they do it through book tours with PR reps managing all the details and doing the heavy lifting.

I’m someone who has vowed to be the last person on the planet not sucked in by most social media. You’ll never find me on Facebook, Instagram, or TikTok. I do have a Twitter account, only because my former publisher insisted, but I rarely remember to tweet anything. When I do remember, it’s never anything controversial, political, or personal, so chances of one of my tweets going viral and resulting in new fans and increased books sales is as unlikely as a rose bush growing at the North Pole.

However, back when I was traditionally published, I used to enjoy giving talks to library groups, book clubs, and other organizations. Covid put an end to that but ushered in the age of Zoom talks.

I’ve participated in several of these Zoom events, and I’m participating in another at the end of the month. On Tuesday, May 30th at 7:30-9:30pm EDT, grab your favorite beverage, settle into your comfiest chair, and hop online for a fun evening of laughs, Q&A, games, prizes, and more with some of your favorite mystery and suspense authors. All are welcome. And best of all? It’s FREE! All you have to do is register.

During this fun event, you’ll be able to Zoom around the various “rooms” where you’ll find dozens of authors happy to chat with you. I’m pairing up in one room with my fellow Booklover’s Bench blogger Maggie Toussaint (appearing under her new Valona Jones pen name for this event.) You can find a list of other attending authors here. Scroll down the page for the registration form. Hope to see you there!

Post a comment for a chance to win one of several promo codes I’m giving away for a free download of the audiobook version of Decoupage Can Be Deadly, the fourth book in my Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery Series.

A Crafty Collage of Crime, the 12th book in my Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery Series, will release on June 16th. Learn about Anastasia’s new adventure, read the first chapter, and find pre-order links here.

~*~

USA Today and Amazon bestselling and award-winning author Lois Winston writes mystery, romance, romantic suspense, chick lit, women’s fiction, children’s chapter books, and nonfiction under her own name and her Emma Carlyle pen name. Kirkus Reviews dubbed her critically acclaimed Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery series, “North Jersey’s more mature answer to Stephanie Plum.” In addition, Lois is a former literary agent and an award-winning craft and needlework designer who often draws much of her source material for both her characters and plots from her experiences in the crafts industry. Learn more about Lois and her books at her website www.loiswinston.com where you can also sign up for her newsletter and follow her on various social media sites.

How Intelligent is Artificial Intelligence?

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By Lois Winston

AI is here to stay, and there is much to worry about. For instance, we’ve all heard about the scams where bad actors contact people and demand ransom for a kidnapped relative. Too many people act out of fear before thinking and wind up losing huge sums of money. Thanks to AI, scammers can now clone the actual voice of the “kidnap victim.”

Writers are worried they’ll become obsolete, that in the future AI will take over publishing. After all, if publishers can use AI to churn out novels, why pay authors? I wondered if authors’ fears are truly founded. So I decided to conduct an experiment. I went on ChatGPT and told it, “Write a manuscript in the style of the Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mysteries by Lois Winston.”

Artificial Intelligence is supposed to be able to analyze text and produce a new work in the style of the author. There are currently eleven Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mysteries and three novellas. First chapters and back cover copy are widely available online, both on e-retailer sites and my own website. It didn’t take AI long to churn out several chapters. Here’s the beginning of a book created by ChatGPT:

Murder and Mayhem in the Crafting World

Chapter One

Anastasia Pollack had been up since dawn, frantically stitching together a wedding dress for her best friend’s daughter. As a professional crafter and owner of the American Woman magazine’s crafting column, Anastasia was used to tight deadlines, but this one felt especially pressing. After all, she couldn’t let her best friend down, and she wanted everything to be perfect for the big day.

In the first sentence, there are glaring errors. I write in first person, not third person. How intelligent is ChatGPT if it couldn’t even discern this? Anastasia is the crafts editor at a women’s magazine. She’s not a “professional crafter,” and she doesn’t “own” a crafting column in a magazine.

It got worse:

Just as she finished the final stitches, her phone rang. It was her mother, who never called before noon.

“Anastasia, darling,” her mother’s voice came through the phone, “I need your help.”

Anastasia sighed, knowing that her mother’s definition of “help” was very different from her own. “What do you need, Mother?”

“It’s your uncle. He’s in trouble again.”

Anastasia’s heart sank. Uncle Ralph was always getting himself into some sort of scrape or another. “What kind of trouble?”

UNCLE Ralph? Ralph is a Shakespeare-quoting African Grey parrot! He makes his appearance on Page 4 of Assault with a Deadly Glue Gun, the first book in the series. ChatGPT scanned enough to know Ralph was a character but wasn’t smart enough to know the difference between a human and a bird.

I won’t bore you further, except to say that ChatGPT also came nowhere close to capturing my voice. I write humorous amateur sleuth mysteries. Anastasia is a Jersey girl with a Jersey girl’s outlook on life. Publisher’s Weekly compared her to Tina Fey’s Liz Lemon from Thirty Rock, and Kirkus Reviews called her, “North Jersey’s more mature answer to Stephanie Plum.” ChatGPT obviously isn’t intelligent enough to understand and duplicate humor beyond the standard Knock-Knock joke.

Not to mention the fact that “mediocre” would be a generous description of the writing ChatGPT produced. I worked for a literary agency for a dozen years. If someone had submitted Murder and Mayhem in the Crafting World, it would have received a swift rejection letter.

However, perhaps I was partly at fault. I had asked the AI to write a manuscript “in the style” of my series. What would happen if I tried again, this time saying, “Create a book in the Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery Series by Lois Winston”?

The results were no better:

A Deadly Yarn in the Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery Series

Chapter 1

Anastasia Pollack had been expecting a normal day at the office. She was going through the piles of paperwork that had accumulated on her desk when she received a call from her son, Alex.

“Mom, I need you to come to the yarn store. I think something’s wrong.”

Anastasia’s heart skipped a beat. She knew Alex wouldn’t call her unless it was something serious.

“I’m on my way,” she replied, grabbing her coat and keys.

When she arrived at the yarn store, she saw Alex standing outside with a group of people. He ran up to her as soon as he saw her.

“Mom, thank God you’re here,” he said, his eyes wide with worry. “It’s Catherine. She’s dead.”

Anastasia’s heart sank. Catherine was one of her closest friends and employees at the store. She couldn’t believe that she was gone.

As she flipped through the pages, she realized that Catherine had been keeping a diary. The entries were cryptic, but Anastasia could tell that something was bothering her friend.

Once again, ChatGPT had created a third person narrative. Once again, Anastasia is NOT a shop owner. And once again, ChatGPT wasn’t intelligent enough to tell the difference between a human and an animal.

In my series, “Catherine” is not Anastasia’s best friend. Her best friend is Cloris McWerther, the food editor at the magazine where they both work. “Catherine” is Catherine the Great, her mother’s cat.

Catherine the Great doesn’t show up until Chapter Five in Assault with a Deadly Glue Gun, but the AI had scanned enough of the text to find her name. If it were really intelligent, it would have picked up on the fact that she’s a four-legged creature, especially since she’s introduced as “Catherine the Great, my mother’s extremely corpulent white Persian cat.”

All ChatGPT would have had to do is scan any of my books’ Amazon pages where it would have found a large illustration of all three pets in the Pollack household. I’m wondering, if I tried a third experiment, would ChatGPT morph Anastasia’s mother-in-law’s French bulldog into yet another human? I decided not to waste my time.

Post a comment for a chance to win one of several promo codes I’m giving away for a free download of the audiobook version of Decoupage Can Be Deadly, the fourth book in my Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery Series.

~*~

USA Today and Amazon bestselling and award-winning author Lois Winston writes mystery, romance, romantic suspense, chick lit, women’s fiction, children’s chapter books, and nonfiction under her own name and her Emma Carlyle pen name. Kirkus Reviews dubbed her critically acclaimed Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery series, “North Jersey’s more mature answer to Stephanie Plum.” In addition, Lois is a former literary agent and an award-winning craft and needlework designer who often draws much of her source material for both her characters and plots from her experiences in the crafts industry. Learn more about Lois and her books at her website www.loiswinston.com where you can also sign up for her newsletter and follow her on various social media sites.

Permission Not to Write

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What do you do when you’re suffering from the literary equivalent of a bad day on the mound? You’re all set to hurl a fast ball that should nip the corner of the strike zone and send the batter swinging at air when you wind up tossing a lob that he hits out of the park. In other words, you’ve got writer’s block.

Some people insist that there’s no such thing as writer’s block. Try telling that to someone who spent the last three hours staring at a blank computer screen. There are many reasons why the words don’t always come, but for me, often it’s because I’m just too tired to write. When I’m tired, my brain shuts down.

And when this happens, I’ve learned to listen to my body. I give myself permission to take a few hours off to rejuvenate. I’ll take a walk. Or watch a movie I’ve been meaning to see. Or curl up with a book by a favorite author or a new one I’ve wanted to read. Whatever I decide to do, I give myself permission not to feel guilty about doing it.

And that’s key.

Most writers can’t afford to quit their day jobs. We juggle our schedules to accommodate work, writing, and family responsibilities. Thus, when we have our writing time, we feel compelled to write and feel guilty when we don’t. We’re wasting that precious writing time. What we forget, though, is that we’re not perpetual motion machines. Writers, like everyone else, need down time. Time to relax. To play. To do nothing but daydream.

I’ve found that when I give myself permission not to write, I’m able to return to my writing with fresh energy and a brain no longer blocked.

I know this is counter to the conventional wisdom which states you should write through the block. Just stick your butt in the chair, place your fingers on the keyboard, and start typing – that bad writing is better than no writing, and you can always go back to fix what needs fixing. To me, that’s just as huge a waste of time as staring for hours at a blinking cursor.

Don’t let the purveyors of conventional wisdom bully you. Listen to your body. If you give yourself permission not to write, you might find that when you next sit down at the computer, you’ll be far happier with the words you produce. It works for me. You have nothing to lose by giving it a try.

What do you do when you hit a wall? Post a comment for a chance to win an audiobook of Revenge of the Crafty Corpse, the third book in my Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery Series.

Also, through the end of the month, the Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mysteries, Books 3-4, featuring Revenge of the Crafty Corpse and Decoupage Can Be Deadly, is on sale for only .99 cents. Find buy links here.

 

 

 

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USA Today and Amazon bestselling and award-winning author Lois Winston writes mystery, romance, romantic suspense, chick lit, women’s fiction, children’s chapter books, and nonfiction under her own name and her Emma Carlyle pen name. Kirkus Reviews dubbed her critically acclaimed Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery series, “North Jersey’s more mature answer to Stephanie Plum.” In addition, Lois is a former literary agent and an award-winning craft and needlework designer who often draws much of her source material for both her characters and plots from her experiences in the crafts industry. Learn more about Lois and her books at her website www.loiswinston.com where you can also sign up for her newsletter and follow her on various social media sites.

Scams, Spams & Caveat Emptor!

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Two years ago, when we moved from New Jersey to Tennessee, my husband and I cut the landline cord. We’d only kept our landline for as long as we had because cell service in our NJ home was spotty at best. If I had to guess, I’d say that at least 75% of the calls that came in on the landline were from spammers and scammers. Now, instead of receiving at least half a dozen spam and scam calls a day, I receive one or less a week.

I never answer the phone unless I recognize the caller’s name or number. Most spammers don’t leave a message because the calls are robocalls made by bots. Answering the phone alerts the call center that the bots have struck gold and they’ve got a live person on the line. If you’ve ever answered one of these calls, you’ll notice a short pause between saying, “Hello” and someone on the other end responding. That’s the time it takes for the system to switch over to a live operator.

Scammers, on the other hand, are usually people, not bots. If you don’t answer, they’ll leave a message, often an intimidating one that threaten you with criminal action if you don’t return their call because you either owe money to the IRS or are a wanted felon. Once you return the call, you’re told they can make the problem go away by paying a fine—in the form of a gift card. Amazingly, too many people fall for this.

A few weeks ago, I received an unusual scam call. Three calls came in within a few seconds, all from the same number, supposedly originating in New York. I didn’t answer, but the caller left a message between the second and third calls. In a very thick Indian or Pakistani accent, he said he was trying to reach Lois Winston, author of Guilty as Framed, because he wanted to invite her to a book festival his company was putting together in a few months in Los Angeles. If I was that Lois Winston, I should call him back as soon as possible for more information.

In the background, I heard lots of chatter. The caller was obviously calling from a call center, and I seriously doubt the call came from New York, no matter what the display on my phone read. New York City real estate is too pricey for call center operators.

I’ve known many authors who have been ripped off by unscrupulous people out to make a buck off them. I have no doubt this was just another scam in a long line of scams that have preyed on authors and would-be authors over the decades.

Back in my early days of writing, before I sold my first book, I even fell for a scam. I had queried a literary agency about my manuscript and received back a response stating that they were interested in seeing the first three chapters. Within days of sending the chapters, I received a note saying my manuscript needed polishing, and if I paid fifty dollars, they’d provide me with a professional critique of the pages I’d sent. If I followed their instructions from the critique, they’d consider representing me.

What I got back were two or three penciled comments, all of a personal nature and having nothing to do with my plot, characters, or writing prowess. One of the comments I remember was, “I knew a person like this.” I later learned I wasn’t the only person to fall for this scam. It was a family operation, and some of the members wound up serving prison sentences.

Unfortunately, scammers have become much more sophisticated since the onset of the Internet and social media, and many of them operate overseas, out of the reach of US law enforcement. Caveat emptor is a Latin phrase that means “buyer beware.” There’s also a saying in English: “If it sounds too good to be true, it usually is.”

I have no idea how the book fair scammers planned to relieve me of my hard-earned dollars, and I wasn’t going to return the call to find out. But I’m sure they had a script filled with carrots to dangle in front of me. And unfortunately, there are probably some authors out there who are at this moment falling for their scam. In the age of spam, scams, fake news, and now ChatGPT, more than ever it pays to be skeptical. Caveat emptor!

What about you? Have you ever fallen for a scam or know someone who has? This month I’m giving away several promo codes for a free download of the audiobook version of Revenge of the Crafty Corpse, the third book in my Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery Series. Post a comment for a chance to win.

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USA Today and Amazon bestselling and award-winning author Lois Winston writes mystery, romance, romantic suspense, chick lit, women’s fiction, children’s chapter books, and nonfiction under her own name and her Emma Carlyle pen name. Kirkus Reviews dubbed her critically acclaimed Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery series, “North Jersey’s more mature answer to Stephanie Plum.” In addition, Lois is a former literary agent and an award-winning craft and needlework designer who often draws much of her source material for both her characters and plots from her experiences in the crafts industry. Learn more about Lois and her books at her website www.loiswinston.com where you can also sign up for her newsletter and follow her on various social media sites.

On Birthdays and Bucket Lists

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By Lois Winston

Have you ever noticed the older we get, the swifter the years go by? I can remember walking home from school and bemoaning the fact that summer vacation was still six weeks away. Six weeks seemed like an eternity to eight-year-old me. Now six weeks often flies by at warp speed.

I bring this up because my birthday month is approaching, and I’m wondering how I ever got this old. Wasn’t it just yesterday that I gave birth to my first son? I remember the day as if it were yesterday. Yet now he’s the father of three, the oldest of whom is in his first year of college.

Who knows where the time goes?

Judy Collins once asked that question in a song. I’m asking it a lot lately. Back in the sixties the Boomer Generation suggested no one should trust anyone over thirty. Now we’re confronted by the derisive insult of “OK, Boomer” by the generations that have followed behind us. To paraphrase a quote from another songwriter of my generation, the times they are a-changin’.

Once upon a time birthdays were something we looked forward to—parties, gifts, cake and ice cream! Yea! So many of those birthdays connoted milestones we looked forward to—Sweet Sixteens, getting a driver’s license, voting, ordering that first legal glass of wine. Wishes were often fulfilled on birthdays, the one other day of the year besides Christmas or Hanukkah when you might receive that new bicycle or pair of skates.

Now at this point in our lives, if we want something, we buy it for ourselves. Most of us have too much stuff already. When we moved nearly two years ago, we got rid of those things we hadn’t used in decades. Why on earth did I keep a soup tureen I received for Christmas more than thirty years ago but never used? Does anyone ever use soup tureens? And I haven’t a clue as to the last time I used the fondue pot we received as a wedding gift. 1980-something? Those items and much more wound up at the donation center. Hopefully, someone will put that soup tureen and fondue pot to good use.

Bucket Lists are now more important than soup tureens and fondue pots. Whittling down the Bucket List had taken priority prior to the pandemic. Now we’re once again thinking about venturing out into the world. I still haven’t gotten to Scandinavia or Great Britain, and I really would love to see the Terra Cotta Warriors in China.

What about you? What’s on your Bucket List?

In celebration of my birthday, I’m giving away several promo codes for a free download of the audiobook version of Death by Killer Mop Doll, the second book in my Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery Series. Post a comment for a chance to win.

 

USA Today and Amazon bestselling and award-winning author Lois Winston writes mystery, romance, romantic suspense, chick lit, women’s fiction, children’s chapter books, and nonfiction under her own name and her Emma Carlyle pen name. Kirkus Reviews dubbed her critically acclaimed Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery series, “North Jersey’s more mature answer to Stephanie Plum.” In addition, Lois is a former literary agent and an award-winning craft and needlework designer who often draws much of her source material for both her characters and plots from her experiences in the crafts industry.

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