Month: November 2018

 TRACEE: The third in the Detective Byron Mysteries, Beyond the Truth, released October 30th, so first off, Congratulations.  BRUCE: Thanks so much! And for the invitation to guest on your site. TRACEE: Anyone who reads the John Byron series knows that they are classified within mystery as police procedural, and as a former law enforcement officer you are known for “getting it right.” I remember chatting with you at the Malice Domestic conference a few years ago when you were debating the theme for your next book. What struck me in our conversation was your complete focus on John Byron’s emotional trajectory. Is his story always central to how you approach the book?  BRUCE: Yes. When reading a series I really get attached to the characters. In creating the Detective Byron mystery series I sought to create a character whose past was integral to who he is as a person. I wanted a character who fights constantly against his demons, while striving to become a better person. I knew where I wanted John Byron to be by the third novel even as I wrote the first. Byron’s development will remain central to every book in this series. TRACEE: Writing fiction is inventing things that sound believable enough to draw the reader into the story. Authors who arrive at any form of crime fiction without a law enforcement background check and double check details to get them right, aiming to sprinkle in enough to paint a scene accurately. Your perspective is the opposite. The details of the law enforcement side to crime solving is second nature to you. What are your dilemmas in terms of painting the scene or creating characters to keep the story in balance with your wealth of technical knowledge and experience?  BRUCE: I think the most difficult part for me is the temptation to give the reader too much detail. While I do want to make each investigation as realistic as possible, I don’t want to bore or overload the reader with details that they don’t require. As with most storytelling, it becomes a balancing act. I also strive to give the reader the emotional aspect of the job. Whether we show it or not, every cop feels and carries the weight of these cases with them, even after we’ve retired. TRACEE: I’ve heard you speak about creating John Byron and making him real. He has struggles in his personal life and at work. In that context, you’ve said you are aware of balancing the trust of the colleagues you’ve worked with for decades in terms of painting a dark hero while at the same time you don’t want to sugar coat the realities of the burdens of their service. Could you talk a bit about that balance and how it impacts John and the problems he faces, and solves? BRUCE: I am often asked what my former colleagues think of my novels, the underlying question is whether or not they are bothered by anything negative that my police characters do. I think most people are surprised to learn that the police community as a whole is very supportive of the Byron series. The reality is that police officers are the same as everyone else. We have fears, weaknesses, biases, personal problems, things we do very well, and things we don’t. The job police officers are asked to perform can be extremely difficult at times, and the vast majority of cops do it very well. John Byron represents the best and the worst of policing. He is a diligent investigator who cares not only about justice but also his detectives. Where he falters is in his personal life. John’s demons are the demons commonly found amount veteran cops, firefighters, EMS workers, military personal, anyone who deals with life or death trauma on a daily basis. Maintaining a healthy marriage, a healthy lifestyle, and a healthy mind becomes harder as the years pass. Stress can manifest itself in many unhealthy ways until finally a choice must be made. I am taking John Byron on a journey, and hopefully, if I do it right, I take the reader along too.   TRACEE: I’m not surprised that law enforcement is supportive. I think you aim for reality, not expose and anyone in a tough job knows that reality isn’t perfect.  Before we close out, could you pull back the curtain and share a little about your writing process?    BRUCE: My writing process is similar to every other creative endeavor. I constantly live with the current novel in my head. Whether I’m sitting down and typing or not, the story is constantly playing in the background. I work out plot points and character issues every moment I’m awake. I believe that is the key to writing a good novel. Much like an actor may insert themselves into a character for a year or more (see Daniel Day Lewis) I think writing novels requires that same discipline. As the story becomes more solid in my head, so too will it become real on the page. TRACEE: Maybe I should have interviewed your wife. Does she wonder if you are Bruce or John at different points in the day? At least Daniel Day-Lewis was probably on set for only a few weeks or months. As you mention, we writers are in the head of the character all the time.  Thanks for joining me today Bruce, especially since you’ve been dealing with some flooding issues at home. In fact, I envision the waters rising right now. I hope everyone else is enjoying Fall weather and looking for a great book to spend the day with. Might we suggest  Beyond the Truth?  For more about Bruce: www.brucerobertcoffin.comAnd a direct link to purchase the latest in the series.     

TRACEE: I’ve had travel on the brain recently, which led me to think about my favorite travel based mysteries. Not mysteries set in exotic locations, but books where the premise is intertwined with travel not merely destination. Agatha Christie wrote two classics with this premise: Murder on the Orient Express and Death on the Nile. (I’ll confess that I have several non mystery favorites that rely on travel, including Larry McMurtrie’s Lonesome Dove, certainly a 1,000 mile cattle drive qualifies!)  Any favorite voyage-themed books on your list?  PAULA: I’m a sucker for pilgrimages stories of all kinds: The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry by Rachel Joyce, Hector and the Search for Happiness by Francois Lelord, The Alchemist by Paulo Coehlo, to name just a few…. TRACEE: Ah yes, The Alchemist, that was a great book. And according to legend Paulo Coelho wrote in in two weeks, writing straight from the soul. I suppose that should be a novel in itself. PAULA: He made the Camino de Santiago pilgrimage and wrote about it in a book about that called The Pilgrimage…loved that too.  ROBIN: Bill Bryson’s books come immediately to mind. A Walk In The Woods made me want to hike the Appalachian Trail. I read In A Sunburned Country right before my first trip to Australia. Actually, now that I’m thinking of it, I’m a sucker for travel-as-a-metaphor, self-discovery stories like On The Road by Jack Kerouac and Wild by Cheryl Strayed. I love adventure travel myself so throw a trek across mountains or through a desert in a book and I’ll read it. SUSAN: I loved Lonesome Dove, Tracee, though it is responsible for my fear of snakes. And water. I also loved True Grit, the movies. That’s a sort of quest story. There’s a book called Seeds by Richard Horan about his quest to accumulate seeds from the trees on the homes of various writers and I love that, though it’s not a mystery. I also love Stephen King’s The Stand. I’ve never read The Alchemist, though I know I should.  MICHELE:My first travel read was as a girl. Toujours Diane introduced me to European travel and sounded so sophisticated. My Love Affair with England and other books by Susan Allen Toth were a grand orientation to traveling in England. Of course I love the books that are journeys of growth and courage. Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert and Wild by Cheryl Strayed (which I’ve called the scariest book I ever read) were both terrific reads. And like Robin, I loved A Walk in the Woods by Bill Bryson, which I read on a hammock under a tree in the Wellfleet Audubon campgrounds while I was grounded with strep throat. Somehow, I didn’t feel “confined” as I vicariously trekked through the Appalachian Trail. But don’t all books take us on a voyage somewhere? TRACEE: I agree that all books take us on a voyage, which is why I started to think about books that have literal voyages in them and how they are different and in the end, not different. The voyage of the mind is as impactful as the physical one. Which basically means reading is an awesome mental gymnastic.  I’ll add the Life of Pi to the list. A voyage of the mind and body.  CATE: I recently read The Flight Attendant by Chris Bohjalian which was a really interesting, frightening take on the journey story. I also learned a bit about murder laws in Dubai and why you never want to die on a plane. Anita Shriev’s The Pilot’s Wife certainly had me thinking about the life and double lives possible when travel is baked into a character’s existence.  ALEXIA:In addition to Murder on the Orient Express and Death on the Nile, I’d add Strangers on a Train, The Lady Vanishes, Throw Momma from the Train, and Mrs. Winterbourne to my list of favorites. Hmmm, I sense a theme forming. You may want to avoid traveling with me.Less lethal travel favorites include On the Road, Travels with Charlie, Heart of Darkness (which is pretty lethal, I guess), The Grapes of Wrath, and The Island of Lost Maps. Which, strictly speaking, is about rare map theft, rather than travel, but maps make me think of travel. ALISON:  Such a fun question! I love books set someplace I either know really well or don’t know at all. I read Hemingway’s The Sun Also Rises on a flight to Madrid a few years ago. When I was flying to Utah several times a year, I fell in love with Terry Tempest Williams. She’s a master of painting scenes of the intermountain west. When Women Were Birds and Refuge still are two of my favorite books. When I lived in Leningrad/St. Petersburg, I fell in love with Ivan Turgenev after reading A Sportsman’s Sketches, which included so many portraits of place in Russia. On a lighter note, Helen Russell’s The Year of Living Danishly was an absolute delightful introduction to life in Denmark…and I didn’t have to step out into the bitter Billund winter. TRACEE: I’m busy taking notes here, a few of these I’d like to re-read and quite a few I haven’t, and can’t believe it! And Alexia, yes, for the record, Heart of Darkness should be bumped out of a less lethal category. That’s one I haven’t read since high school. Probably should re-visit.  Thanks everyone for chiming in…. lots of good rainy day reads here.        

Showing up is half the battle in everything. Writing is butt in the chair and putting in the time. Democracy is showing up to vote.  I’m writing today – and it’s a chore to sit when I could be out raking fall leaves, but the professional stakes are high for me. I need to finish this revision and send it into the hands of people who matter. From there it will hopefully make its way into the world.  I voted early, still I’m distracted by what everyone else is doing in this very important mid-term election. Are people taking that part of their lunch hour, their coffee break, their free time to do their duty and vote? And, yes, voting is a duty. Being a citizen comes with rights and privileges, and voting is one of them.  So…. I’ll keep my butt in the chair and do my job, because I’ve already done the other one. Now come on everyone. Get to the polls! This is the absolute greatest part about being a citizen! VOTE! Remind yours friends, family, and colleagues; offer to take someone who doesn’t have easy access to their polling place.  There is nothing more American than voting, so do it!

I couldn’t let Halloween week go by without acknowledgment. This week, we share the books that scared us 🙂 Robin: I stayed up all night to read The Exorcist by William Peter Blatty because I was too afraid of nightmares or things going bump if I stopped reading to go to sleep. Paula: I avoid scary stories, since the few I’ve read continue to terrify me decades later. Stories like Shirley Jackson’s The Lottery and Poe’s The Tell-Tale Heart, which I read as a kid and still haven’t gotten over yet. The last scary book I read—because Michele Dorsey made me— was Tana French’s Broken Harbor. I had nightmares for a week afterward. Tracee: Thank you Paula for having a fright level on par with mine. A bookseller recommended Jo Nesbo’s The Thirst to me when it was new, and since the bookseller was hosting my event and was so enthusiastic I bought it. I was literally up all night reading because I was too afraid to put it down. I finally- at 4 am- skipped ahead 40 pages to the final 50 and when finished went to sleep. Awoke (alarm ringing) two hours later… and went back and read the pages I’d skipped. Susan: I cannot watch scary movies, but scary books don’t really bother me. Except for It by Stephen King. I read it once, decades ago. Will not read it again. Will not see movie. Don’t like to walk by drains. Michele: Without question, the scariest book I ever read was Helter Skelter. I was terrified by it, but could not stop reading until I was done. I was horrified mostly because it was TRUE! I’m more frightened by real human behavior than I am by sci-fi or fictional horrors. I think that’s may be why Paula reacted to Tana French’s Broken Harbor. What was scary there was how the human mind can break down and result in the unthinkable. I do stay away from horror or scary books and movies. I had to leave the room toward the end while watching “Jagged Edge” with my husband years ago. I stood in the hall and called in to him, “What’s happening now?” I just couldn’t watch. Stephen King’s books (On Writing excepted) scare the sh*t out of me. Alison: Count me with the scaredy cats! Even though I completely love dressing up as something creepy for Halloween, I can’t bring myself to read scary books or watch scary movies. Alexia: The scariest book I’ve read was actually a short story–“The Boogeyman” by Stephen King. King didn’t fill the story with blood or gore or explicit violence. You never even saw the monster clearly. You just knew “something” was there and that whatever it was, it was bad. The sense of anxiety and dread is what made the story stick with me over the years. It’s one of the few that’s ever gotten to me enough that I don’t want to re-read it.I’m always more frightened by what I imagine is around the corner than what’s actually around the corner. It’s the same with horror as with tests. I was the one who worked herself into a pre-test anxiety frenzy, complete with stomach cramps, appetite loss, palpitations, and frequent trips to the bathroom. Then, the moment I sat down to actually take the test, I was fine. Even if I was guessing at answers, I wasn’t anxious or afraid–until I had to wait for the test scores and the anxiety level skyrocketed until scores were posted. Blood and guts and evil people don’t phase me (thanks, med school). “Jump scares” are more like jump startles (not really scary) and are disappointing about 3 seconds after the adrenaline rush wears off. I’m like, “Is that all you’ve got?” What’s in my head is far worse than what’s in front of me. Knowing brings relief (and the release of tension/suspense). That’s why I prefer horror that doesn’t show me what the monster looks like but, instead, tells me the monster is there and drops some serious hints about how dreadful the monster is, then lets my twisted imagination do its worst. I used to read H.P. Lovecraft and found his stories were as terrifying as Stephen King’s but then I learned what a POS Lovecraft was and I can’t bring myself to read him anymore. There’s a horror series that’s Lovecraftian, I can’t recall the name of the series now but I read it in high school, featuring a woman who was sweet and charming and loving on the surface but literally a monster underneath. That series is the second most frightening thing I’ve read, for the same reason. I imagined what the woman was capable of and wondered why the characters in the novel couldn’t see what I saw. The uncertainty about whether the characters would get a clue before the woman got them meant high anxiety for me. How about clowns, Susan? How do you feel about clowns? 😉 Susan: I don’t mind clowns, Alexia, as long as they are not hiding in trains and trying to grab my foot! Paula: I’m still trying to get over Killer Clowns from Outer Space, Which my BFF from my reporter days John Waters made me watch. Robin: And now I’m picturing Paula hanging with John Waters and wishing I’d been there. Happy Halloween! 

This time of year is tricky for me. The days are getting shorter yet I’m still trying to cram each one with all the same things I do in the longer daylight hours of spring and summer. Striking that balance between physical and mental accomplishments.  I do most of my writing at night so fall and winter tend to be periods of higher productivity for me on that front. However, between my day job and writing, I spend a lot of time indoors so I also like (need?) to do outdoor activities that tend to be unsafe or unwise to do after dark. I’m in that twixt & tween state where my body says “go” and my brain says “no.” Some days I try to fit it all in and some days I just get tired. Until I get into a new seasonal routine, either way I feel like I’m running behind. The time change this weekend will be a bit of a relief. But adjusting my expectations is hard. If only my internal clock was as easily reset.