In the Still of the Night

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Since it seems to be the week for blogs on the paranormal, I thought I’d chime in with my one and only ghostly encounter. I do believe in an afterlife, although it’s a vague concept that basically has me chatting on a daily basis with relatives I miss. I haven’t completely resolved in my mind how heaven and hell really work and I confess to a childish vision of their operations. For those I want to condemn to the celestial fiery furnaces, I’m hoping there is no such thing as purgatory because I want those evildoers on a nonstop express directly to the heat. And for those angels on earth who have done nothing but good in their lives, I want them enjoying the sweetness of heaven as soon as possible.

My mother, the original Evelyn, died six weeks after my daughter’s birth. I was, quite simply, an unholy mess. I went through all the stages of grief simultaneously, while at the same time, was numb to the point of emotional paralysis. How could I deal with my loss when everyday life was so demanding: a husband, three active sons, a newborn, home, writing commitments, legal issues with Mom’s estate – all on zero sleep?

About a month after she died, I finally fell into a dreamless slumber. It was so deep that not even a noise that would, pardon the pun, wake the dead, would have caused me to stir. But in a vision that is still as clear to me as if it happened just last night, my mother came to my room and stood next to my bed. I can’t tell you what she was wearing, although she looked healthy, unlike those last months when she became a shadow of herself. She wasn’t young; there were no halos, which makes sense because my mother was the epitome of style and there’s no way she’d ever wear a hat that didn’t have a snappy brim; no celestial music which also makes sense because my mother loved jazz so unless Ella Fitzgerald was scatting in the background, she would have turned off the sound.

Mom was kind, but brief and to the point – exactly as she was when alive. She told me that she was fine – and that I would be okay too. It wasn’t a long discussion, no descriptions of the better place she was in; not even, and I would have liked this, a “hello” from my dad. But it was such a comforting visit that I awoke at peace for the first time in weeks. My mother believed in taking care of business – and not even death could stop her from getting me back on track.

Was it my psyche healing itself? I don’t think so. I could definitely feel her presence and despite being a writer, I can’t get more descriptive than that. My mother was in the room with me – of that I am sure. And today, in heaven, she’s smiling that all these years later, she still has the power she always had to comfort and reassure her daughter. Thanks Mom.

Have you had any ghostly encounters?

Evelyn David

Believe

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All of Evelyn’s ghost talk got me thinking about…ghosts.

And spirits, and the supernatural, and the occult, and tea leaves…which all lead me back to my Irish grandmother, Maga.

Maga—a name she received from me because I could say neither “Margaret”—her given name—or “Grandma”—the name given to her by my older cousins—was an immigrant from a small county in Ireland that nobody has ever heard of—even the Irish. She came to America as a broke nineteen-year-old who crafted a real estate business out of nothing, “flipping” houses after renovating them from a state of disrepair to a state that was attractive to home buyers. She lived in many neighborhoods in Brooklyn, some quite fashionable these days. My mother, her daughter, moved a lot, as they traveled from one neighborhood to another buying and selling houses.

When my mother married and she and my father decided to move to the suburbs, Maga, now a widow, accompanied them, leaving behind her beloved Brooklyn for the sticks. One of our nightly rituals was a post-dinner snack of tea and toast. The tea was really sweet, the toast covered in butter, and the stories scary and eerie. There was the one about her walking home from school (uphill both ways in the snow) and seeing a man sitting on his “honkers” (the best translation we can approximate is “haunches” but it sounded much, much scarier with “honkers” inserted) on the side of the road. When she confronted him, he disappeared into thin air. My brother and sisters still shudder at the thought of a little man, crouched down and scaring a young girl on her way home from school. There was also the story of her father bringing the children together to pray for the victims of the Titanic—which as it happened, was an event that happened the day after this collective family prayer.

But Maga’s special gift was reading tea leaves. She predicted many an event—from my Aunt’s being trapped in a big hole (she broke down in the Holland Tunnel the next week) to a friend of my mom’s, long finished bearing children, bringing another person into her bed. (That was set us giggling for a few days, as this was a very passionate and gorgeous Italian woman who resembled a blond Sophia Loren—we could only imagine who would be joining her.) The other person turned out to be the son she never thought she would ever have, a son who was about thirteen years younger than her youngest child. Incidentally, said child slept with his mother and father until he was eight.

I was there when she took a look at another family friend and felt the presence of an impending tragedy that ended up happening the very next day. She wasn’t specific and she wasn’t sure what was going to happen but she knew something bad was afoot. And she was right.

I can’t explain it and I don’t know what it was, but the woman had a special “shine” that showed her things that were meant to be. What she couldn’t predict was the triumph of the human spirit as my aunt got out of the tunnel and conquered her claustrophobia, my mother’s friend embraced her new child and made him the light of her middle-aged life, and our family friends carried on from the tragedy that changed their lives. There was nothing she could do to stop the wheels from turning but her faith in the world and the divine made her take it all in stride.
Crazy, right? I know how it sounds. But my siblings, cousins, aunts, uncles, and friends all had at least one experience where they witnessed the impossible. It has been twenty-seven years since her death but every once in a while we reminisce about the stories she would tell, the things she would predict, and chuckle. We’re imagining what we remember, right? we ask ourselves. We’re embellishing the facts, yes? Who knows.

I had a very vivid dream a few years ago in which I was sitting in my uncle’s kitchen in Brooklyn with him, a place he vacated close to thirty years ago. My uncle–Maga’s oldest–and I were drinking tea and eating toast when my grandmother came in, just as real as ever, and sat down to chat with us. I implored her to stay. “We miss you so much,” I said, crying. She looked at me sadly. “But I have to go home,” she said. “I live in a new home now and I’m so happy there.” I knew that home didn’t mean the place where she had grown up, any of the houses in Brooklyn, nor our house in the suburbs. The way she said home made me believe that she was in her eternal home and that was the place she needed and wanted to be. It broke my heart—I woke up crying—but the beauty on her face as she consoled me made me feel that she was okay where she was. And that she had been near for just a few short minutes.

Recently, my brother sent his naughty three-year-old daughter to a chair in the corner of the dining room and told her to sit there until she composed herself. While in the kitchen, he heard her talking, an animated one-sided conversation about the injustice of having to sit in the chair, protestations about her innocence. He had heard her do it before and chalked it up to childhood imagination. But he heard some specifics in her rant and finally asked her who she was talking to.

“I’m talking to Maga,” she said. “I always talk to her.”

Draw your own conclusions. I know that I have.

Maggie Barbieri

On Giving Talks About Writing

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Lately I’ve read several blogs about what to do when appearing on TV or giving talks. I love giving talks about writing and about my books.

This video was taken when I gave a talk at the Hanford CA library about my books.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aYf11ShLhKo

I had a runny nose that night, which you’ll certainly pick up on as I keep wiping my nose. My daughter-in-law is sitting by the books, and she is who I picture in my mind when I’m writing about Deputy Tempe Crabtree.

This is more or less how I look and sound when I’m giving a talk most anywhere–though I don’t usually have a runny nose.

I recently gave a talk on Self-Editing to a pleasant and welcoming group of authors at a lovely bookstore in the foothills on the way to Yosemite National Park. Everyone was welcoming–and no one challenged me after they realized I really did know what I was talking about. Another thing that helps is I always tell mistakes I’ve made and managed to get through into my published books, despite all the eyes that looked at it in manuscript form.

The biggest goof was in Deadly Omen, the first in my Deputy Tempe Crabtree series. Tempe drives around in a Blazer which becomes a Bronco and then turns back into a Blazer, and this happens several times. I admit it, I don’t pay much attention to cars. Whenever I get a new one I make sure that my adhesive banner with my website on it is stuck on the back of the new car so I won’t have trouble finding it in a parking lot.

In Calling the Dead there’s a name change on a page–the man is called something, then his name changes (it’s a close name) then changes back. When a reader pointed it out to me, I informed the publisher and it was changed before the next round of printing.

I always warn all writers to print out their manuscript when they are ready to proof-read. Proofing on the computer just doesn’t work. Your eye seems to fix all the mistakes.

Once when I had a broken ankle, I decided to work on an old manuscript because I didn’t feel like starting anything new. I went through the novel zealously, changing words, making sure pronouns agreed with nouns, all the things I know to do when editing. But–I didn’t print the book out. Instead I sent it off to a publishing house that has always published everything I sent. What I received from them was a polite note that I should consider what the first reader had to say, and if I fixed all my mistakes, send it back for another look through.

When I read it again, I was horrified to see that in many cases where I changed a word, I left the old word in too. There were other mistakes too–ones that I’d have easily caught if I’d printed out the manuscript and edited it one last time before sending it off. And no, I’ve never tackled it again.

Another good idea is to put the manuscript aside for at least a week, then go over it one more time.

Going back to the presentation, I hope that I saved those writers from the humiliation that I felt when I received that message from the publisher.

All in all, it was a terrific afternoon. I enjoyed meeting new writers, seeing two old friends, and talking about my favorite subject–writing.

Marilyn
http://fictionforyou.com

Ghost Hunting – Part 2

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Old creepy hotels are well … old. That was my first brilliant observation as my brother and I lugged our stuff from the parking lot up the front steps into the Crescent Hotel in Eureka Springs, Arkansas. The entrance doorknob was about six inches lower than a normal doorknob. At 5 foot 7 inches, I had to stoop to open the door. With my hands filled with two bags, my oversized purse, and my laptop, the maneuver was awkward and uncomfortable. Much like the rest of my stay in the Victorian hotel.

Old creepy hotels in the South in July are well … hot. Swelteringly hot. The Crescent Hotel has window air conditioning units in the guest rooms but the rest of the hotel is dependent on ceiling fans and cold spots created by ghosts.

Yep, ghosts.

First let me report that I didn’t see any ghosts. I don’t think I heard any ghosts. And I probably didn’t sense any ghosts. You’ll note that I’m a lot more definite about not seeing any manifestations, orbs, or unusual shadows.

We went on the Ghost Tour on Tuesday night, our second night, at the hotel. Starting at 8:00 P.M. a psychic with an intricate knowledge of the hotel’s history led a group of twenty or more through the hallways and basement of the 1886 Victorian hotel.

Originally a resort hotel, it later became a women’s college and dormitory, then a cancer clinic run by a charlatan, and again a hotel. Aside from a stone mason killed in an accident during construction and a young student who went off a balcony to her death, most of the reported ghost sightings involve patients from the hotel’s infamous cancer hospital days. Dr. Baker, a self proclaimed physician despite no medical training, cruelly butchered, through experimental surgeries and treatments, and generally swindled thousands of cancer victims. Many are buried or cremated on site. Check here for more details about the hotel’s history and ghost sightings.

The tour lasted more than two hours. I had plenty of time to watch for ghosts and to watch the people in the group watching for ghosts. By far the people watching was the most interesting. The demographics of the tour group ranged from 2 to 70-plus years in age, from male to female to uncommitted. All were busy with digital cameras trying to catch a spirit appearance. The two-year-old did a lot of running and screaming down the hallways. I had a feeling that if a ghost had shown up, the toddler would have had company.

My brother took over a hundred photos, one that showed a possible orb (a spirit with only enough energy to appear as a ball of light in photos). Or it might just have been the sun through the skylight.

And one that showed something we couldn’t identify. He took several photos of empty chairs in spots where ghosts were reported to hang out. In the photos as in real life, the chairs appeared empty.

Personally I think the ghosts were absent because of the heat. It felt like a 110 F in the non-air conditioned lobby and hallways. What self-respecting ghost would choose to suffer those temps when they could be out in the gardens or the pool scaring humans?

Okay – so I didn’t see any ghosts on this trip. And I mentioned above that I don’t think I heard any ghosts. The reason I’m not as sure about the audio encounters is that between the organic noises of the old building (banging elevator, creaking floors, unbalanced ceiling fans, sounds from substandard plumbing, noisy window air conditioner units turned to the “freeze please” setting, etc.) and the loud voices of flesh and blood guests who’d spent too much time in the bar, I wouldn’t have been able to hear a ghostly whisper, moan, or groan if my life depended on it.

Okay – the first night I might have heard metal gurneys from the 1930s being pushed back and forth in the hallways. Or more likely, I heard the sounds of living guests pulling their wheeled suitcases over the wooden floors. I had a digital audio recorder with me. And like the investigators on Ghost Hunters, I had planned to sit in my empty room, turn the recorder on, and then ask if any ghosts wanted to talk to me. But … I kept thinking, what if they did? What would I do if I asked a question and got an answer? How would I react? My world view would be changed. My religious beliefs would be challenged. And most importantly, I would have had to pack up and find a Holiday Inn in the middle of the night. I decided it was better to leave the recorder in my purse.

So no visuals. No sounds. What about sensing ghosts?

Maybe.

When I was in the basement (the location of the old operating and autopsy rooms) with the tour group, the keys I had in the pocket of my slacks, moved.

It felt like someone had passed a magnet by my hip and the metal hotel key and metal fob clanked together and moved away from my body. It was a strong enough sensation that I asked the tour guide if there were magnets in the area. He said, “No. Ghosts like to play tricks with keys.” He told me that I’d been “touched.”

I’m not so sure. I’m a born skeptic. But I admit the possibility forced me to sleep with a light on my last night at the hotel.

Will I go back? Probably not. At least not in the summertime. Maybe Halloween?

Even though I didn’t leave with concrete proof of ghosts, I did leave with a good story. For a writer, that’s all that matters.

Evelyn David

Smoking and Not Smoking

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Kaye Barley is an avid mystery reader and Dorothy L poster who lives in the beautiful North Carolina mountains with her handsome husband of 22 years, Donald, and their faithful companion, Harley Doodle Barley – the cutest Corgi on God’s green earth.

I’ve quit smoking.

I think.

Just taking it one hour at a time. But I think I have it licked.

The Stiletto Gang has invited me to talk about it, so I’ve decided to come clean with why I decided to quit.

During a conversation with a girl friend living in Maryland, a bell went off in my head when she mentioned that Maryland was becoming a totally smoke-free state. I’m going to be in Baltimore for a week. In a hotel. Unable to smoke. For a week. EEK! This is when I started having the same nightmare night after night.

Imagining myself at Bouchercon – finally meeting writers I’ve admired for years, being nervous, of course. But not able to have a cigarette. Finally meeting folks from DorothyL, which might also make me a little nervous. Unable to have a cigarette. Nervous and unable to have a cigarette tends to make a smoker a bit grumpy. So there I’d be. Nervous, wanting a cigarette, knowing I couldn’t have one, making everyone around me miserable, turning into a raving lunatic woman, ending up in handcuffs and dragged off to the hoosegow for being disruptive and disorderly, and still not being able to have a cigarette. Oy – what a fun trip this could be.

It just seemed easier to try to quit.

And so I did.

When Evelyn invited me here, I decided to do a little light research, which meant a stop at Amazon.com to see what books I might be able to find to start me off. I found “No Smoking” by Luc Sante, which is an interesting book whatever your views and feelings are about smoking. First of all, the packaging had to have been thought up by a marketing genius.

Secondly, I think the book gives a fair, fun and interesting picture of what an important part of our culture cigarettes once were. As “No Smoking” points out, there was a time when the whole world smoked.

My parents are both from large families and to the best of my recollection, everyone smoked except my Aunt Belle. My earliest memories include huge family get-togethers with kids running wild in big backyards while the grown-ups sat at picnic tables eating, drinking and smoking. Each of them keeping a close eye on all the kids, each of them always available for a hug, and each of them recognized as a constant source of deep affection, offered up in equal parts of nurturing along with life lessons, and rules to be learned and followed.

These are treasured childhood memories that come to mind often, and always bring a smile. They’re times my family recall with love and laughter.

At the head of one of the tables my much adored grandfather, Pop-Pop Wilkinson, would preside with either a cigar or a pipe, and it was his attention we all vied for.

Cigarettes were everywhere. Were there any movies made in the 40s or 50s in which people weren’t smoking? How many of us still think some of those were the greatest in the history of film? As opposed, maybe, to the graphic blood and guts violence we now see in movies? Is watching that healthier for us and our children than seeing Audrey Hepburn smoke a cigarette in Breakfast at Tiffany’s?

And it wasn’t just the movies. Great mysteries had good guys and bad guys smoking up a storm. Nick & Nora Charles “wore” their cigarettes as part of their elegance. We have a few protagonists smoking in today’s mysteries, but most of them, like Elaine Flinn’s Molly Doyle, and Kathryn Wall’s Bay Tanner, are in a constant battle with themselves in an attempt to quit. In I. Van Laningham’s short stories, Andi Holmes successfully quits. Bill Pronzini’s Nameless Detective starts out a smoker. If the protag isn’t trying to quit, he/she is most likely one of the bad guys, as is the case of Ken Lewis’ Curt LaMar, in “Little Blue Whales.”

Who can imagine Frank Sinatra on stage singing those torch songs without that cigarette? We may not see singers on stage with a cigarette in hand any more, but does it really mean they’re all living a cleaner, safer lifestyle? And why is it the world’s business anyway?

I was never one of those people who fantasized about “if only I could quit.” In my mind, my future was me being this feisty old woman flicking ashes on anyone who might even suggest I put my cigarette out while in their presence. Driving my scooter hell bent for leather all over the Wal-Mart parking lot, daring anyone to get in my way, smoke billowing around my head like it once did Pop-Pop Wilkinson’s

To those of you who don’t smoke – believe it or not, there are some people who don’t want to quit. That’s their choice. And there are the people who are trying desperately to quit but just haven’t yet been able to. I’ve been one of the lucky ones, I think. I’ve had tons of support. Lots of phone calls, and some awfully nice cards, and notes and email from people offering encouragement. It’s meant a lot. It also meant a lot that of all the people who took the time to write, no one preached at me. Praise glory and thank you for that.

If you’re a non-smoker and want to help those you care about stop smoking, try huge doses of patient kindness. I can promise it’ll work a lot better than a constant negative pounding. Smokers already feel like the latest in a long line of persona non-grata. The lowest of the low. The only one lower might be a person who smokes while wearing a mink coat. Let’s all feel free to stone that poor dumb clod to death. And while I’m on this little rant (I love to rant), why has the government, at any level, gotten involved in our business about this? To protect the health of non-smokers? I’m sorry, but really. Smoking laws coming from a government who can’t clean up the air or water from industry pollution? Let’s see. The EPA was created when? 1970? Gloriosa, don’t even get me started.

With the help of a prescription written by my doctor, it really hasn’t been too tough. Not as tough as I thought it might be. Tough enough though, that I hope I make it this time ‘cause I’m not sure I’d do it again.

So, you people who think the whole world needs to hear what you’re saying into that cell phone of yours? If you see me smoking – please try to have this number handy – 1-800-424-8802. That’s the number for the EPA National Response Center. It’s the number you call to report an environmental emergency. Better to do that than tap me on the shoulder to give me your opinion about my smoking.

Kaye Barley

When Bad Movies Happen to Good People

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Meryl Streep is the gold standard. If you describe Pamela Anderson’s performance in Blonde and Blonder, and point out that “she’s no Meryl Streep,” everyone knows exactly what you mean.

And while Pierce Brosnan is no Meryl Streep either, he can certainly hold his head up when walking down Hollywood Boulevard.

So what happened when they both signed on the dotted line for Mamma Mia? Did Meryl decide that with enough emoting, it didn’t matter that she was 20 years too old for the part? Did Pierce resolve that even if he sounded off-key in the shower, when he hit the big screen, suddenly he’d be Pavarotti?

In fact, the elements were all there for a fantastic movie: a stage show that’s been seen by more than 30 million people worldwide, a cast of phenomenal actors, fun music, gorgeous locale …so what went wrong?

Rick McCallum, legendary producer of the Star Wars movies, once said, “the truth is, nobody ever sits down at a table and says ‘hey let’s make a bad movie’. No producer, director, writer says ‘God I’ve got a really great idea for a sh***y film’. It doesn’t work that way. But something in the process, something about the compromises, the timing, the studio, the phenomenal pressure that artists have to go through, causes something to go really wrong.”

That happens with books too. How often have you read a book from a favorite author and the magic is gone, the story is flat, or you don’t recognize the characters you’ve grown to love?

On the other hand… Maybe somebody (or in the case of a movie, several somebodies) just had a bad day. Ty Cobb has the highest lifetime batting average (.366), but that means that he got a hit only three out of every ten times he was at bat. Babe Ruth struck out more than 1300 times in his career.

Are we too demanding? If a good-faith effort is made is that enough? Or for $10.50, plus the cost of buttered popcorn, are we entitled to better? Or was I just too hot and tired to fully appreciate the joy of ABBA music, even if sung off-key?

What do you think?

Evelyn David

In Training

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So, after all my protestations, excuses, crying, whining, and the like, I just had my second training session with my friend, S., the personal trainer. You remember her—the one who told me that in order to lose those extra five (ten?) pounds that I’ve been wailing about incessantly, I should cut out the Chardonnay, some carbs, most of the sugar, and a host of life’s other delights. After which I banned her from my house. We have since made up (how could we not? She is without a doubt one of the kindest, most generous people I’ve ever met) and began training last week.

And now for the most surprising part: I like it.

I am as surprised as you are. Because let’s face it: I would rather sit at my desk and write , talk on the phone, and surf the Web all day than go outside to pick up the mail. I would rather have root canal, really. Talk about taking me on a two mile walk or leading me in a spirited session of a hundred crunches and I’m heading for the hills.

But all this stuff that I previously thought was gobbedly-gook like the “high” you get from exercising and the “sense of satisfaction” is all true, by golly. S., the most enthusiastic and invigorating of personal trainers, has gotten me moving again and it feels good. She checks in periodically after our work outs to find out how I’m feeling. The truth? After yesterday’s session in which she had me making sweet love to a five-pound medicine ball, I couldn’t raise my arms to cut my son’s ham sandwich. But, in her inimitably positive way, she assured me that that was “GOOD!” Because everything S. says when it comes to training is in ALL CAPS and delivered with much enthusiasm. Why? Because she has about ten training sessions per week, so she is on a constant high from all those endorphins flowing through her veins. And you can bounce a quarter off of her abdominal muscles; who wouldn’t be happy about that?

She called to check on me again this morning. I was still feeling pretty good—actually, pretty smug—about my state of being. But the muscle soreness has increased in the last several hours. Some of these muscles haven’t been worked since we played the fake Olympics in my childhood home’s backyard in 1976, so I can see why they’re protesting. But all of that soreness means that in three months time, if I keep S. in my life as a trainer and not just as a friend, those muscles may make a reappearance. And I may just look a little bit more like S. and a little less like Ernest Borgnine in “Marty.” And that is all good.

I don’t think I would have begun this training regimen had I not been bombarded with constant images of Michelle Obama in sleeveless dresses and blouses waving at the adoring voters who visit her husband’s rallies. Because the difference between me and Michelle Obama—besides the fact that my husband is not a Presidential candidate and I’m not a five foot ten gorgeous lawyer—is that when I stop waving, my arms don’t. There is a little bushel of fat right in the underarm area that says “But wait! We’re not done waving yet!” That doesn’t happen to Michelle Obama. When she stops waving, she just stops waving. Everything ceases moving. And that’s my goal.

S. is an amazing cheerleader. Yesterday, our session seemed to last ten minutes when in actuality, it was an hour. We exercised while talking about our sons (who are very good friends), our weekend, our week to come, and our love of Target. All the while, S. was telling me that I could do it, I was doing a great job, and that I only had another fifty crunches to go. (I know! If anyone makes me laugh or god forbid I have to sneeze, I’ll have to take a pain killer. And change my underwear.)

I don’t want any more junk in the trunk, I don’t want fries with my “shake,” I don’t want a “muffin top” to spill out over the waistband of my jeans. I don’t delude myself that my nearly 45-year-old body will resemble the one that I had twenty years ago but I think there’s still time to make some minor adjustments, a couple of improvements. If S. and her killer abs are any indication of what awaits me, I’m in.

Stay tuned. I might still be on that endorphin high.

Autism and Writing

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I’m not sure how many people are aware of the number of children who have been diagnosed with autism. My first introduction to autistic children was years ago when I taught in a school for child development for pre-schoolers with various developmental disabilities. We didn’t know much about autism at the time, but it was amazing how much they changed as we worked with them. No, not miraculous cures, but they tolerated us more and more and actually started to do the tasks we introduced to them.

One of my great-granddaughters had autistic tendencies and started school in special classes. Now at age 11, she’s in regular classes, does wonderfully well in mathematics, in fact, likes to solve math problems for fun. (Certainly didn’t take after me.) Only once in awhile does anything she does have an autistic quality. Here’s one: She loves track and is doing well. At one of the meets she told her dad, “I’m going to try for third.” Her dad said, “Why don’t you try for first?” “No, I’m going for third.” She is a most loving child, likes to hug and be close, something some autistic kids can’t tolerate.

We had a young teenager who attended our church from time to time who was diagnosed as autistic. He was more difficult, didn’t communicate, and some people were scared of him. There was no need to be scared–he just didn’t want to be bothered. He is now in a group home that specializes in autistic young men and doing quite well.

I helped at Vacation Bible School all week and one of the children who came was a beautiful nine-year-old girl with autism. She loved the songs and dancing that went along with them, sometimes would go on stage with the rest of her class, at other times preferred to remain in the pew. She told me she was a mermaid and then asked, “Do you believe in mermaids?” And of course I told her yes.

Now I’m going to bring this all around to writing. In one of the classes, the kids were supposed to fold paper to make a canoe, she said, “I don’t want to. Can I have a pen?” She was given a pen and wrote a story. It was a darling story about a little girl who was a mermaid–she gave her a name–and a little girl who was autistic–she gave her a name too, but it wasn’t her own. These two girls went on vacation with the family. The story ended like this, “They spent a lot of time in the bathtub.” I asked her why, and she said, “Because one of the girls was a mermaid.”

We talked about writing stories and I told her I was an author and wrote books. She was fascinated. Every time she saw me after that she said, “You’re an author, aren’t you?” “I told her she was one too.”

This child fascinated me and in particular the fact that she could write so well and had such a great imagination. I hope I’ll get to see her again some time.

If you’d like to watch a video taken when I was at the Hanford Library talking about my books, here it is: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aYf11ShLhKo I had an extremely runny nose that evening.

Marilyn
http://fictionforyou.com

Ghost Hunting

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What’s your favorite ghost story? Was it a movie? A book? A short story? A tv series? I confess I love ghost stories, especially haunted house stories. I like the creepy ones best.

Shirley Jackson’s The Haunting of Hill House continues to be one of the scariest things I’ve ever read. Steven King’s The Shining comes in a close second. The television series Dark Shadows and The Night Stalker gave me rich fodder for my childhood nightmares. Movies that pulled a scream from me? These are some that I remember the best: Poltergeist, Session 9, The Sixth Sense, The Ring, The Amityville Horror, Burnt Offerings, and White Noise.

White Noise was a movie about ghosts communicating though the static “white noise” of radios and televisions that are tuned to empty stations. The movie introduced me to the concept of Electronic Voice Phenomenon (EVP). Apparently if you want to communicate with ghosts, one way is to use a tape recorder. You might not hear the ghosts talking to you, but the tape recorder will. You’ll hear them later when the tape is played back slowly and at an increased volume. I’m using the term “tape recorder” but of course everyone uses a digital recorder. Apparently ghosts don’t have a preference.

Watch Ghost Hunters on the SciFi channel and you’ll see the investigators go into a darkened room, turn on their tape recorder, and then try to provoke ghosts to answer questions they pose aloud. Usually they ask something like, “Do you want to talk to us? Do you want us to go away?” Something that only requires a short answer. You don’t want to overtax ghosts.

I enjoy watching the Ghost Hunter episodes although I have doubts that ghosts always cooperate with the show’s production schedule. They set up elaborate cameras and recording devices in an alleged ghost-filled location, spend a couple of hours, and then pack it up. I want to see someone set up camp in a haunted house for about six months with all the cameras and recorders going 24/7. That would be a great reality show.

Okay, so why am I talking ghosts today? Because I’m going to be spending tonight and tomorrow night in a haunted hotel; one of the places where Ghost Hunters filmed an episode during their second season. I’ve got reservations for the Crescent Hotel in Eureka Springs, Arkansas. My brother is going with me (another fan of the Ghost Hunter show). We’re going to take the evening Ghost Tour and learn a little more about the history of the structure built in 1886, then spend two nights watching for ghosts.

Half joking, I told my brother to bring his digital camera so we could get shots of orbs and other physical manifestations if the ghosts show up while we’re there. He agreed, but informed me that they would probably drain the camera’s batteries before we could get a shot.

“Drain the batteries?” I asked. He didn’t seem to be joking.

He gave me a knowing look.

Okay, so maybe I don’t watch the show that closely. Or take it that seriously. Maybe I just have it on while I write, glancing over at the screen when the screaming starts. I actually did watch the entire episode about the Crescent Hotel though. The scariest part wasn’t the sounds or the shadows the investigators managed to catch on their monitoring equipment. It was when an investigator’s laptop computer was moved, through means unknown, from the top of the hotel bed to a position leaning against the exterior door. That really creeped me out.

Nobody, ghost or human, touches my laptop.

Check back later in the week for updates to this blog.

Update: 4:00 P.M. Central – 7/21/08

Arrived at hotel and got checked in. About 100 degrees F. outside. Rooms were on the fourth floor and very hot until I got the window units going. There is wireless internet in the hotel but it’s very, very slow. So far the only odd thing is that I had to put new batteries in my wireless keyboard. But it might have just needed new batteries – it’s been about 2 months since I used it.

Plan to participate in the ghost tour tonight at 8:00 P.M. Central.

So far my first impression is that old buildings are great to tour but maybe not so great to stay overnight in. Nothing special about the room that I’m in – just old.

Evelyn

Ned Rust, Undercover

/in /by

Ned Rust lives with his family in Croton, NY, and works in the publishing industry. His writing has appeared in Rolling Stone, McSweeney’s Internet Tendency, The Rocket, and The Stranger.

I work in the book-publishing industry. I can’t really say much about it in public like this because I happen to work in a somewhat high-stakes area, and, as you would have soon guessed from my nervous, backwards-scrambling sentence-structure, I’m deeply paranoid.

I don’t quite blame the industry for making me this way. I’ve only been working in the field for 5 years and there were signs I was given to an inflated sense of self-worth (i.e., people MUST be interested in finding out more about me) and over-caution from before. Like how I compost any piece of mail that has my name printed on it. Yep. Right in there with the coffee grounds and the watermelon rinds. I have a theory that the identity thieves will find my fly-infested compost bin as malodorous and generally daunting as my spouse and children do.

Except when companies use non-biodegradable stickers—“Affix this to your mail-in coupon for a free bonus subscription to Yachting for Kids!”— everything works out pretty good. In fact, the years have proven that promotional offers—and letters from my parents I can’t bear to look at—nicely balance the “wet” compost of kitchen scraps. With time and stirring, you’ll have a lovely loamy—and, importantly, informationally secure—mix within six months.

But there are things within the publishing industry, as you may have discovered yourself, that could begin to make even a well-balanced person paranoid.

I could go on and on, but this is my first ever blog entry and prudence tells me I should maybe start with just one topic. Beyond composting, I mean, which I don’t expect is what Maggie and Evelyn were expecting from me.

So let me touch on one topic that’s near the beginning of the publishing alphabet and never fails to make me look over my shoulder—agents . . . literary agents.

I mean why do they even call them agents? Who else is an agent? Insurance people (creepy). Internal Revenue Service folks (creepy). Operators in the MI5, ATF, CIA, OSS and FBI (I rest my case).

And what do they do? You don’t go to school for it. You don’t need a license. There isn’t even an accreditation or support organization for them—like lawyers have the Bar Association—at least so far as I’ve heard. I mean have you ever seen a news story about a literary agent getting defrocked by her or his peers?

Maybe part of the problem is they don’t seem to do anything they might even have to bother putting on a frock to accomplish.

So far as I can tell—and I should confess I don’t have a lot of direct dealings with them and that I know one or two who seem lovely in person—agents need 2 principal things to make a living:

1) Enough paralegal-level savvy to hoard and be conversant with the appropriate legal forms and contracts to make writers promise to give them a hefty portion of any money they might make and to understand that the generally guile-less publishing houses aren’t taking any legal advantage.

2) The ability—through experience, charm and, or, connections—to get calls & emails answered by the people who acquire manuscripts and sometimes by those who market the finished books at the publishing houses.

The rest of it—recognizing good writing, answering the telephone occasionally, light xeroxing, brushing one’s teeth before going out in public—most of us regular folk have down.

But somehow they keep on doing their thing. Even now, in the 21st century, they’re taking often double-digit percentages out of author’s and publisher’s hands.

I mean, isn’t that a weird system? And there’s like, no transparency whatsoever. So you never know if like Agent Y is brother-in-law to Publisher X.

And you never really know if Agent K really does have your best interest at heart and thinks you could be BIG, or whether he’s just treating you like a mineral claim that may or may not prove to contain valuable gems but the land’s so dang cheap, why not just go ahead and put a binding deed on it so nobody else can do anything with it?

Oh well. I don’t really have anything specific to point at, but the whole scene just makes me nervous. Speaking of which, I think I hear somebody out at the composter.

Bye

Ned Rust