My Path to Fiction Began with The Master of Suspense

/in , , , , , , , , /by

My path to fiction began in the early 1990s, when trivia books were popular, and nonfiction was easier to sell than fiction. I wrote a proposal for my first book, What’s Your Agatha Christie I.Q.?, later retitled The Agatha Christie Triviography and Quiz Book. The first agent I queried accepted the project, and three weeks later, I had a publishing contract.

That success led to The Alfred Hitchcock Triviography and Quiz Book and later The Sherlock Holmes Triviography and Quiz Book. I enjoyed writing all three, but the Hitchcock book was especially memorable. I spent an entire summer watching every Alfred Hitchcock film ever made, all 53 of them.

What an education that was. Hitchcock was a master of suspense and one of cinema’s greatest directors, creating some of the most memorable films and unforgettable characters in movie history. Even his villains could be charming, and his stories kept audiences guessing until the final scene. It was impossible to study his work without learning valuable lessons about pacing, suspense, and storytelling—lessons that would later influence my own fiction.

Intertwining the nuances of suspense and surprise, Alfred Hitchcock (1899-1980) always kept his audience on the edge of their seats—right where he wanted them. Hitchcock/Truffaut (1983), by Francois Truffaut, details Hitchcock’s views on the difference between these two elements and how their proper use could make a thriller a triumphant work of art. Hitchcock’s technique was knowing exactly what to tell an audience and when. For the sake of surprise, he felt the audience should know very little about what was to occur. In his conversations with Truffaut, Hitchcock gave the example of a bomb exploding without any warning. There was no anticipation of the event. It just happened, and the audience then had to deal with its bewilderment. Surprise alone did not make a thriller more clever unless it was used as a twist at the end.

Hitchcock believed that suspense took place when the audience was aware a bomb was near and an explosion was imminent. The audience always saw the events unfold as they happened, but the characters in the film remained oblivious. The inability to warn the characters of their fate left the audience feeling completely powerless. However, it also drew the audience into the story, creating an intimacy between the audience and the screen characters. Nevertheless, unable to help, the audience could only watch the events unfold before their eyes. This technique was used in many of Hitchcock’s films: in Easy Virtue (192.7), the suspense centered on an offer of marriage made while a telephone operator listened intently for the woman’s reply; while in Rear Window (1954), the audience held its breath as the villain of the piece, Thorwald, entered his apartment while the heroine, Lisa, was searching his bedroom for clues to a possible murder.

Alfred Hitchcock’s masterful weaving of suspense and surprise always gave his audience bone-chilling thrills before flattening them with his typically shocking endings.

Now for an Alfred Hitchcock quiz: What if several of Hitchcock’s notorious and psychotic characters were committed to a mental hospital? Here are six character profiles from six movies. Can you identify the characters and the actor who played them?

 

  1. This character suffers from schizophrenia and amnesia triggered by trauma from discovering his mother in bed with a stranger. It is believed that he murdered them and subsequently assumed his mother’s identity. He failed to develop mature, healthy attitudes toward sex. His anger is deeply suppressed, and his denial of his mother’s sordid past is reflected in his references to her as his best friend.
  2. The character is a cold-blooded murderer. He killed a college friend he deemed dispensable. He’s an egocentric psychopath without a conscience. He suffers from delusions of grandeur and considers murder a privilege reserved for a few exceptional humans, such as himself.
  3. At age five, the character witnessed her mother’s brutal attack by one of her tricks. Trying to protect her mother, she accidentally killed the man by striking him with a fireplace poker. This traumatic experience led to a psychoneurotic condition that developed into amnesia and kleptomania.
  4. A retired San Francisco police detective, this character suffers from vertigo and recurring amnesia stemming from a fall he sustained while chasing a suspect. Soon after his accident, he became involved in two sordid affairs with a woman who posed as two different women. He often confuses fantasy with reality. His mental condition worsened when he witnessed his lover fall to her death, a nightmare he constantly relives because of his initial accident.
  5. The source of this character’s psychosis resulted from a near-fatal injury as a child, but the link between that accident and his crimes as an adult remains uncertain. He is a misogynist. He especially hates wealthy widows. He believes he has the right to murder them and steal their “undeserved” money. His anger often becomes uncontrollable.
  6. A perpetrator of sexual crimes against women, this character’s sexual perversions eventually led to the brutal murders of his victims. Needless to say, he feels sexually inadequate. He is a very dangerous man.

Kathleen Kaska is the author of the Sydney Lockhart Mysteries, winner of the 2025 PenCraft Award for Best Mystery Series, the Kate Caraway Animal-Rights Mysteries, and the Mystery Trivia Series.

Kathleen’s hardboiled detective novel, Death Without Dignity, won the Amity Literary Award and is scheduled for publication in spring 2027. Across genres, her work is known for character-driven suspense, socially conscious themes, and a generous touch of humor. She lives in the Pacific Northwest and continues to write both series and standalone crime fiction.

Kathleen Kaska

Her latest Sydney Lockhart mystery, Murder at the Faust, will be out in print on September 8. The eBook now available.

https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/2050034

Smashwords: https://shorturl.at/mDuyO

Barnes and Nobel: https://shorturl.at/g89CU

Amazon: https://shorturl.at/gPLfV

 

“Just One More Thing”

/in , , , , , , , , /by

When you hear the phrase “just one more thing,” what comes to mind? If you were around in the 1970s, you probably remember Columbo, starring Peter Falk as Lieutenant Columbo of the Los Angeles Police Department. The series won 22 awards and received 68 nominations, with Falk earning four Primetime Emmy Awards. It aired on NBC from 1971 to 1978 and has since been rebroadcast on numerous networks.

What I liked most about the show was its structure: viewers knew the killer from the start and then watched Columbo patiently unravel the crime. Each episode featured a guest star as the murderer—Martin Landau, Janet Leigh, Ruth Gordon, Vincent Price, Roddy McDowall, Leonard Nimoy, even Johnny Cash, to name a few.

I recently rediscovered the series after making a practical—if slightly risky—decision: changing hairdressers after fifteen years. When I learned my husband’s barber had begun cutting women’s hair for less than half what I’d been paying, I decided to give her a try. I only needed a trim—no shampoo, no styling. The first visit took less than ten minutes, and I was pleased with the result.

On my most recent visit, I didn’t have an appointment. Four people were ahead of me, and I thought about leaving—until I noticed the television was tuned to Columbo. I stayed. The episode featured Ricardo Montalban as a matador in “A Matter of Honor.”

When Columbo arrives on a scene—hair rumpled, trench coat wrinkled, cigar in hand—he’s easy to underestimate. His suspects dismiss him as absentminded, even inept. But his polite, seemingly scattered questions are deliberate. Columbo is a meticulous strategist, noting every clue and quietly assembling the truth. He wears his suspects down with persistence, circling back again and again until—almost as an afterthought—he says, “Just one more thing.”

Alfred Hitchcock also used this technique in his movies Rope, Dial M for Murder, A Shadow of a Doubt, and Frenzy. His forte was suspense rather than surprise. The audience knows what happened as they watch the story unfold. Suspense builds tension, keeping the audience on the edge of their seats as they participate in solving the crime.

Back to my barber. I waited nearly an hour that day and didn’t mind at all. I was hooked as soon as Columbo began his investigation. I knew he’d solve the mystery, and I couldn’t wait to find out how he did it. Next time I need a trim, I may skip the appointment altogether. I’ll take a seat, request Columbo on TV, and bring my writing journal. I’ll study the master detective at work and take notes for the next mystery.

Have you ever written a reverse whodunnit?

Forged in Flame character graphic showing Dalton, Ava, Nina, and a dragon

How Does a Dragon Work?

/in , , , , , /by

Working Dragons

In my 2026 series of paranormal romances, each stand-alone novel is linked through the character of Dante Montanari—a mysterious dragon shifter whose interference in the lives of other characters causes the romances of each book to develop. Ultimately, the plan is to have a book devoted to Dante and his own romance, but that’s currently plotted for book 8, and we’re only on number 2. Usually, when I develop my characters for mysteries and contemporary romance, I only have to worry about the everyday getting to know you stuff—like where a character works, what they’re passionate about, why they keep finding dead bodies—that kind of thing.  But with paranormal romance, there is the added layer of world-building, which means I need to decide how dragons and any other fantasy creatures actually function. And then, even worse, I have to abide by those rules (yes, the ones I just invented) in future books.

Playing by the Rules

Once the rules are set, my life is both harder and easier.  The more I know about each character, the less I have to think about some of the background noise of setting a scene.  And this applies across all genres. In a mystery, if I know that my character doesn’t drink coffee, then I don’t have to think about their order if there’s a scene in a cafe.  In a fantasy novel, some things become more complex. For instance, if a shape-shifter changes, do their clothes shift as well?  (And we will pause here for you to have this argument amongst yourselves.) I have decided that we cannot have proper werewolf-type transformations without tearing clothes, and have chosen to have clothes NOT transform.  But that means that you have to keep track of things like “where did his shoes go” in those scenes. And inevitably, no matter how carefully I establish my rules for this creature or that, I run into a scene where I wish I’d done something else.

Choosing a Course

As it turns out the easiest way to figure out the rules is to do the most horrific of all writerly tasks… write. By writing a character and working through a story, I can stress test my rules and figure out how they apply to the world and other characters.  However, since my big dragon character doesn’t have his own story until much later, that left me with specifically dragonish questions that need to be answered NOW.  Which is why book 2 of the series focuses on Dante’s nephew – Dalton Rosetti.  Dalton and Ava’s romance was the perfect opportunity to find out what makes dragons work and how their world, magic, and culture function. And also, allow me to daydream of a vacation in Hawaii. Because in my world dragons love heat and volcanoes, so of course, they would love Hawaii. This romance was fun to write because (as with all my books) it includes a heavy dose of action and danger and that meant I had to watch Hawaii 5-0 for inspiration.  Yes, I know either iteration of the show is ridiculously not true to Hawaii, but the scenery is still great.  (I may or may not be referring to Daniel Dae Kim as scenery in this sentence.  Language is always open to interpretation.)  What do you think?  What other Hawaii specific shows should I have added to my “research”?

Forged in Flame

Ava FlynnForged in Flame character graphic showing Dalton, Ava, Nina, and a dragon grew up unaware of her dragon heritage, raised by her human mother and stepfather. That changes when Dante Montanari’s nephew, billionaire dragon Dalton Rosetti, arrives—and sparks ignite. Their one night of passion leaves Ava with a secret baby and a future she must face alone. But when deadly enemies close in, Ava and her child are thrust back into Dalton’s world. To survive, she must decide: can she trust a bond forged in flame?

Interested in being an Advance Reader of Forged in Flame?  Sign up here: ADVANCE READER SIGN UP FORM

ARC readers get a free copy of the book in exchange for leaving a review on one (or more) of the common review sites (Amazon, Bookbub, Goodreads).

**

Bethany Maines drinks from an arsenic mugBethany Maines is the award-winning author of action-adventure and fantasy tales that focus on women who know when to apply lipstick and when to apply a foot to someone’s hind end. She participates in many activities, including swearing, karate, art, and yelling at the news. She can usually be found chasing after her daughter or glued to the computer working on her next novel (or screenplay). You can also catch up with her on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and BookBub.  She has also writes under the pen name Sirena Corbeau for spicier paranormal romance novels. Learn more at: bethanymaines.com or sirenacorbeau.com 

See more books from the Stiletto Gang: BOOKS

Behaving Badly: Out of the Drawer

/in , , , , , , , , /by

Dear Stiletto Gang Readers: I am so proud to know today’s guest. Read on; I have no doubt you’ll understand why. ~ Donnell Ann Bell  

Out of the Drawer

By: Rochelle Staab

Author Rochelle Staab

Most every writer keeps one or more unwritten novels somewhere in a drawer/file/box, waiting, hoping for the enthusiasm to finish. Most drawer stories wait forever. Some resurface then fizzle again. My new novel, Behaving Badly, spent ten years in the drawer before the escape. Inspiration didn’t reappear overnight. Unwittingly, my personal journey away from writing, fed into the story and setting and made me a better writer.

After a series cancellation and my frustration in trying to please an editorial team who liked me but not the ideas I pitched, I decided to write what I really wanted to write: noir set in depression/prohibition-era Los Angeles. Using a working title of Above the Fold, I created a gritty, recently widowed female crime reporter who chased front-page headline stories about crime and corruption in 1930s Los Angeles without the convenience of a cell phone or a computer.

I loved the idea. Like so many women who found and claimed their power through the 1920s into the 1930s, my heroine had guts. Tess—my protag’s name has always been Tess—had a character profile, a supporting cast, solid research, and a complicated abduction plot involving a silent screen star lookalike.

Seventeen chapters in, Tess claimed her ground. I deflated. My agent gave me a mediocre response when I pitched a historical noir mystery featuring a female reporter. I feared the same reaction from my editor. I needed to shake off rejection and self-doubt and do something to make me feel good about myself.

Rochelle Staab and hiking buddy Barbara Beck at Escondido Falls, Malibu, California

I had always felt less than because I didn’t have a college degree, something I knew I had the power to fix. I enrolled in the local community college to see if I had what it took to erase my insecurity. My major would be English, because, you know, writer? But a required history class seduced me. One more, and I became a history major. I graduated and moved on to Cal State Northridge to complete my credits. I read primary sources; I wrote essays about world history. I formed opinions. Despite being the oldest history major at CSUN, I did a summer internship at the Autry Museum. I built a blog on the history of chocolate and co-wrote a video about the history of Los Angeles State Historic Park. Without planning, the classes I took, like the history of Weimar Germany, added context to the world surrounding Tess. My Sunday hikes around L.A. gave me a sidewalk-up familiarity (setting!) with Los Angeles infrastructure during the city’s growing years, the city Tess lived and worked in.

During my last semester at CSUN, I had a casual conversation with an acquaintance at my gym, a man who read hard cover novels on his daily stationary bike routine. I told him I wrote three books. A week later I spotted him reading my first book, Who Do Voodoo? on the bike. Seeing him turn the pages of my book fired a spark. I wondered if I would ever have the courage and creativity to write another novel.

Two weeks before I graduated with Honors, the gym guy and I had dinner. He asked what I would be writing after I graduated.  Just so I could call myself a writer and still believe it, I told him about Tess, my 30s reporter. That night I opened the “drawer” in my computer and figuratively pulled out Tess and what soon became Behaving Badly.

I started editing the seventeen chapters I wrote ten years ago and fell in love with the story all over again. Worried about failing Tess one more time, I logged my daily word count but without specific goals. From then on, each day when my gym friend asked how the writing was going, I had an answer. I found my pattern. Editing the seventeen chapters gave me courage. From there, I tried to write a new chapter each week, building the rest of the story without pressure or deadline. My friends smiled at me with that patient “will she ever finish the damned thing?” look. Twenty-eight chapters later, and a much richer story, Tess tied up some loose plot ends, and I typed THE END.

I had promised myself that if my agent still didn’t like historical noir ten years later, I would take charge of my writing future, self-publish Behaving Badly, and reclaim my agency. When he told me that the historical fiction genre had no audience, and perhaps I should write about hiking instead, our gracious parting made me a publisher.

A chance meeting with another author while on a basement tour of speakeasys in downtown L.A.—where else would authors bond?—led to a self-publishing conversation. He offered to school me. I took him up on it, followed the process, commissioned a cover, formatted the document, and within weeks uploaded Behaving Badly to Amazon. The feeling of publishing my own book exhilarated me.

On April 30, Tess and Behaving Badly debuted at #14 on Amazon’s Depression History of the U.S. chart and hit #10 the next morning. Today Amazon named Behaving Badly the “Top New Release” in Depression History of the U.S. Tiny category, but fitting, I think, for a historian, noir mystery author and publisher with her 1930s drawer novel.

Never give up, fellow writers. Never give up.

About the Book:

In 1932 Los Angeles, crime has no consequences

Recently widowed crime beat reporter Tess Hammond turns grief into purpose when her editor assigns her a seemingly small missing-teen story that balloons into murder, corruption, violence, and white slavery in Depression-wrought, Prohibition-era 1932 Los Angeles. As the search for the young woman leads Tess from an underground speakeasy to a Poverty Row studio, from Hollywood Boulevard nightlife to a gambling ship at sea, she encounters a world of mobsters, corrupt cops and, eerily, the chain of duplicity and corruption that cost her detective husband his life and almost ends her own.

About the Author: Rochelle Staab is a Los Angeles mystery writer, avid hiker, trail blogger, and historian with a deep background in the radio and music industry. She returned to the writing community in 2026 after a seven-year hiatus to earn a BA in history with an emphasis on America and Los Angeles. Using Mother Nature as a tour guide, Rochelle has blogged about over 300 different hikes in the mountains, urbs, and burbs of Los Angeles, exploring L.A. from the ground up. Rochelle’s fourth novel, BEHAVING BADLY, the first Tess Hammond historical noir mystery novel set in 1932 Los Angeles, released in May 2026.  ~ https://rochellestaab.com/

Going Home

/in , , , /by

By Leslie Wheeler

Three years after our parents died, my sister and I finally sold our childhood home. Giving up a place with so many happy memories was hard, but I believed we had to do it. Houses are meant to be lived in, and neither my sister, nor I, nor our children wanted to move in.

When I drove away, I didn’t know if I’d ever return. But I did in my dreams, shortly after I left. In those dreams, my parents were still alive and living in the house, though even in the dream world, I knew they were dead and shouldn’t be there. I realized that even more than my parents’ deaths, the sale of the house marked the end of my childhood and that made me sad.

Fast forward to the present day, and I revisited the house under happier circumstances when I used it in my mystery novel, Wildcat Academy. In the book, the main character, Kathryn Stinson, was born and raised in Southern California, as I was, but now lives in New England, as I do and have for many years. She returns to California to attend the funeral of a family member and stays at the house where her mother, who has remarried, now lives.

I went on the plane with Kathryn and shared her alarm when turbulence shook the plane, making it seem like “a paper airplane caught in a twister.” Fortunately, we landed safely at the Los Angeles International Airport (LAX), as I had so many times in the past on trips to visit my parents after I’d moved away. Like Kathryn, I was overwhelmed by the maze of interconnecting freeways that had to be navigated to arrive at our destination. But finally, we reached the house in Pasadena, “a rambling, mid-century ranch with shingles and lots of glass windows and doors” on a hill overlooking the Arroyo Seco and the Rose Bowl with the purple-tinged San Gabriel Mountains in the background.

Kathryn and I sat in lounge chairs by the kidney-shaped swimming pool, catching the last rays of the sun. Later, we had dinner with her family on the patio, and went to bed soon afterward, because we were both tired from the trip. But we both woke up at the witching hour of three in the morning. And since neither of us could get back to sleep, we tiptoed down the long, dark hall from the bedroom area to the kitchen with a flashlight to guide us, like thieves in the night.

In the kitchen, we made ourselves mugs of hot milk laced with molasses. This was an old family remedy for sleeplessness, which I still resort to, though without the molasses. And there in the kitchen, to our surprise, Kathryn’s mother joined us and she and her mother had a long overdue heart-to-heart talk. It was the kind of talk I wished I’d had with my own mother but never did. Still, I was glad Kathryn and her mother were able to share their innermost thoughts and feelings.

Kathryn and I stayed at the house for two more days. Most of our time was spent preparing for the funeral, but we still managed to take a walk in the neighborhood up Linda Vista Avenue past the fire station, then the large white building with a red brick roof where I’d gone to elementary school, and finally the small flat-roofed structure that housed the Linda Vista Public Library, which I’d frequented when in school.

When it was time to leave, I felt a twinge of regret, but mostly I was glad for the opportunity to revisit my childhood home and the surrounding area. I lived every moment of the visit intensely as I was writing it, and even now as I’m reading this, I’m smiling.

Readers, have you gone ever back to your childhood home or some another place that was important to you in dreams or fiction? If so, what was it like?

Wildcat Academy

A Berkshire Hilltown Mystery, Book 4

When Boston library curator Kathryn Stinson visits the Berkshires with her mother and other family, she doesn’t expect trouble. But that’s what happens when her stepsister’s teenage son, a student at a private academy, is found dead beneath a zipline—a device he feared. As suspicions swirl around his death, Kathryn is drawn into a tense search for the truth. Was it a tragic accident, or something more sinister? With resistance from the academy and locals alike, she must navigate family dynamics and hidden tensions to uncover secrets that some will do anything to protect.

Buy Links

Kindle

Paperback

Books2Read

An award-winning author of books about American history and biographies, Leslie Wheeler has written two mystery series, the Berkshire Hilltown Mysteries and the Miranda Lewis series. Her mystery short stories have appeared in numerous anthologies, including The Best New England Crime Stories series, published by Crime Spell Books, where she is a co-editor/publisher. Leslie is a member of Mystery Writers of America and Sisters in Crime, serving as Speakers Bureau Coordinator for the New England Chapter of SinC. She divides her time between Cambridge, Massachusetts, and the Berkshires, where she writes in a house overlooking a pond.

Kathleen Kaska

Treasure Hunt: A True-Life Indiana Jones Saga

/in , , , , , , /by

Treasure Hunt: 

A True-Life Indiana Jones Saga

When you hear the phrase treasure hunt, you might imagine a chest of gold or a legendary artifact. But what if the treasure was a bird—and the hunter an ornithologist?

In the mid-1990s, I joined a field trip to Aransas National Wildlife Refuge on the Texas coast to see the endangered whooping crane. That experience changed my life. I became captivated by the crane’s story—and by the man who saved it from extinction. That fascination grew into a seven-year research journey and ultimately my book, The Man Who Saved the Whooping Crane: The Robert Porter Allen Story.

In the spring of 1941, the whooping crane population had dropped to just fifteen birds. Written off as doomed, the species survived because one man refused to accept extinction as inevitable. Robert Porter Allen, an ornithologist with the National Audubon Society, launched a conservation campaign unlike anything America had seen before.

Long before television or the internet, Allen ignited a nationwide media blitz. Posters flooded public schools. Children wrote letters to lawmakers. Radio stations tracked the cranes’ migration from their winter home near Austwell, Texas, to a mysterious nesting site somewhere in Canada. Life magazine published a rare photo of a whooping crane family, and even an oil company altered its operations to avoid disturbing the birds.

By 1947, fewer than thirty cranes remained. Their nesting grounds—hidden somewhere in northern Saskatchewan, possibly near the Arctic Circle—had never been found. Without protecting that site, the species would vanish. After two failed searches, Audubon turned to its most tenacious ornithologist: Robert Porter Allen, newly returned from World War II.

What followed was a real-life treasure hunt—one that helped save a species and changed the course of conservation history, ultimately paving the way for the Endangered Species Act.

The story of Robert Porter Allen is best described as Indiana Jones meets John James Audubon—and it remains one of the most inspiring conservation adventures ever told.

I wrote the book to pay homage to a man who was all but forgotten. My research led me on my own journey from Texas to Florida to Wisconsin and beyond in an adventure I like to call “On the Trail of a Vanishing Ornithologist.”

Excerpt:

It was April 17, 1948, in the early hours of a muggy Texas morning on the Gulf Coast. The sun at last burned away the thick fog that had settled over Blackjack Peninsula. The world’s last flock of wild whooping cranes had spent the winter feeding on blue crab and killifish in the vast salt flats they called home. During the night, all three members of the Slough Family had moved to higher ground about two miles away from their usual haunt to feed. The cool, crisp winter was giving way to a warm, balmy spring. The days were growing longer, and territorial boundaries were no longer defended. Restlessness had spread throughout the flock. 

            As Robert Porter Allen drove along East Shore Road near Carlos Field in his government-issued beat-to-hell pickup, he spotted the four cranes now spiraling a thousand feet above the marsh. He pulled his truck over to the roadside and watched, hoping to witness, for the first time, a migration takeoff. One adult crane pulled away from the family and flew northward, whooping as it rose on an air current. When the others lagged behind, the crane returned, the family regrouped, circled a few times, and landed in the cordgrass in the shallows of San Antonio Bay. It was Allen’s second year at the Aransas National Wildlife Refuge. He had learned to read the nuances of his subjects almost as well as they read the changing of the seasons.

            In the days preceding, twenty-four cranes departed for their summer home somewhere in Western Canada, possibly as far north as the Arctic Circle. This annual event, which had occurred for at least 10,000 years, might be one of the last unless Allen could accomplish what no one else had.         

            The next morning, when Allen parked his truck near Mullet Bay, the Slough Family was gone, having departed sometime during the night. That afternoon, he threw his gear into the back of his station wagon and followed.

The Man Who Saved the Whooping Crane was published by the University Press of Florida in 2012. It’s still available in bookstores upon request, Amazon,  Barnes & Noble, and University Press of Florida. It’s also from my website: Kathleen Kaska

Contact me at kathleenkaska@hotmail.com for information on my presentation of The Man Who Saved the Whooping Crane: The Robert Porter Allen Story

Food Fight by Gay Yellen

/in , , , , , , /by

I’ve been stuck in a vigorous debate over an important cultural matter. It’s a food fight, of sorts, only with cookbooks. It would be nice to clean up the mess once and for all. So, here’s your chance to weigh in on the silliness.

Are you familiar with the ongoing on-line debate over whether a hot dog is or is not a sandwich? Well, my beef (!) is similar, except it’s about doughnuts.

Let’s start with a bit of history:

Today is National Pastry Day. A reason to rejoice, because the list of pastries associated with this event is mouth-watering, and includes one of my favorites: doughnuts.

A Wikipedia entry defines the doughnut as “a type of pastry made from leavened dough,” which seems straightforward enough to begin with. Wiki continues to state that it may come in many shapes, which explains the latest popular spinoff, the cronut, a mash up with another delicious pastry, the croissant. Given short shrift in the definition is the one made of cake, which contains no leavening yeast.

Lovers of the knock-off seem as passionate about their choice as I am of mine, the addictive, puffy, sugar-glazed delight which has fueled me through many long days at the keyboard.

In my world, as long as the doughnut-adjacent sweet remains qualified by its “cake” modifier, it may be okay, but it doesn’t hold a candle to the real thing.

A bagel is similar in shape, but at least it has the dignity not to call itself a “bread” doughnut.

I believe a cake donut is merely cake trying to pass itself off as a something more interesting. This doesn’t preclude other people from  calling the doughnut-adjacent treat whatever they want. But it will never be the real thing for me.

Which brings us back to the hot dog debate.

If, as some skeptics claim, a hot dog is not a sandwich, I’d ask why the lowly sausage between two pieces of bread doesn’t deserve that appellation. If you slice a tomato, add some cheese, lettuce, and maybe a little turkey‚ then put it all between two pieces of mayo-slathered bread, is that a sandwich, or a chef salad?

I love doughnuts so much, I lent my addiction to the heroine in my Samantha Newman Series. Sam has been known to scarf down a few whenever she’s stressed. And in Book 3, The Body in the News, she manages to bond with a potential murder suspect over their shared appreciation of the glazed goodies.

Perhaps, one day all of us will settle our differences and agree on the same gastronomic appellation of a doughnut/pastry/cake thingy. Then, we could meet in the middle to share a baker’s dozen.

And from there, perhaps, move on to weightier subjects, like sharing Peace on Earth.

Where do you stand in the hot dog sandwich controversy? What about the doughnut/cake/pastry debate?

Gay Yellen’s award-winning writing career began in magazine journalism.  She later served as the contributing editor for the international thriller, Five Minutes to Midnight (Delacorte), which debuted as a New York Times “Notable.”

The Samantha Newman Mystery Series is packed with suspense and laced with touches of romance, heart, and humor. Available on Amazon or order through your favorite bookseller. 

 

What Do the Girls Have to Say About the Guy?

/in , , , /by

A Guest Post by Author M.E. Proctor

Ten years ago, when the character of Declan Shaw, a Houston PI, popped into my head, I didn’t give a second thought to the fact that I’d just committed myself to write, from a male perspective, what could become a series. It didn’t bother me. I wanted to try my hand at a detective story featuring in the main role a bruised romantic shamus, a classic updated for the 21st century.

I completed a first manuscript (full disclosure: that attempt will never be published; it was a trial run) and gave it to my husband. He’s a brilliant writer and my first beta reader. He said he enjoyed the story and proceeded to criticize it down to the bone. It’s good to have a fierce reviewer at home; once you’ve cleared that hurdle there’s nothing the world can throw at you that’ll make you flinch. He picked up two dialogue excerpts and commented: “A guy would never say that.”

Out of a 300-page story, I thought that was a pretty good score. It also made me aware of the stumbling blocks that our subconscious takes pleasure in throwing in our path. Note to self: Guys don’t giggle, unless they’re Tommy Udo and about to push a lady down the staircase. Not the mood I was going for … I fixed the dialogue and toughened it up.

We’re quite a few years later now. I have a ton of short stories under my belt, a retro-noir novella written in collaboration (Bop City Swing) where I take the part of the hardboiled cop and my writing partner, Russell Thayer, is in the female assassin’s head, and two Declan Shaw novels. Girls or guys, pumps or brogues, I’ll slip into the shoes the story calls for.

Except …

In Catch Me on a Blue Day, Book 2 of the Declan Shaw series, my PI gets very close and very personal with Isabel, a cute art gallery manager.

I’ve written quite a few seduction/sex scenes and I’m not new to the challenge, but the story required this one to jump higher in the temperature range than I’d gone before. I could have written it from Declan’s point of view—there’s another scene with Isabel in the book that gives him quite a kick—but for this particular one, I thought I could do more from the girl’s perspective. It’s a decision that changed the structure of the book.

The Declan stories are mostly told from his standpoint. Secondary points of view come into play, out of narrative necessity (for example, I put him in the ICU in Book 1, Love You Till Tuesday, and the plot couldn’t remain frozen for a week).

In this case, changing the angle to Isabel gave me an opportunity to put a different light on the main character, and reveal things about him that would never have surfaced otherwise. He’s a very controlled guy and she pushes his buttons so hard he loses his footing.

Next to Isabel’s star turn, I also gave voice to two other female characters who play a major role in the story. They form the other points of a triangle with Declan in the middle, in the crossbeams, and they balance the narrative.

The first one is Jean. She’s old enough to be his mother and would love to slip into a protective role. She does it, in a harrowing scene, and Declan accepts her help, but he remains reticent and unwilling to let her in too close. She sees herself as a nest builder, and he is a drifting soul. Their alliance can only be temporary.

The second one is Kate, close in age to Declan and Isabel. Fiercely independent, wary of emotional entanglements, and dealing with a troubled past. Her sister was murdered thirty years ago, a death that destroyed the family. Kate never knew the girl; she was only two at the time. She doesn’t open up to people easily, and her trust is hard to win. She’d like to see Declan as some noble defender, but he’s a bit wobbly.

Seen through the eyes of these three women, Declan’s character gains new dimensions.

I enjoyed trading his cowboy boots for Isabel’s sandals, Jean’s sensible shoes, and Kate’s wellies … for a little while.

Catch Me on a Blue Day
A Declan Shaw Mystery, Book 2

“For Ella and all the innocents slain by soulless men.”

It’s the dedication of the book on the Salvadoran civil war retired reporter Carlton Marsh was writing before he committed suicide.

A shocking death. Marsh had asked Declan Shaw to come to Old Mapleton, Connecticut to help him with research. He looked forward to Declan’s visit: “See you at cocktail time, a fine whiskey’s waiting.” They talked on the phone a few hours before the man put a bullet in his brains.

Now Declan stands in the office of the local police chief. The cop would prefer to see him fly back to Houston. He’s never dealt with a private detective, but everybody knows they are trouble. If only there weren’t so many unanswered questions around Marsh’s death … the haunting first three chapters of his book, and that dedication to Ella, a girl whose murder thirty years ago brought the town to its knees.

In Catch Me on a Blue Day, Declan is far from his regular Texas stomping grounds. He’s off balance in more ways than one, and the crimes he uncovers are of a magnitude he could not foresee.

Between the sins of an old New England town and the violence of 1980s El Salvador. And the links between the two.

Buy links

paperback

ebook

~*~ 

M.E. Proctor was born in Brussels and lives in Texas. She’s the author of the Declan Shaw detective mysteries: Love You Till Tuesday and Catch Me on a Blue Day. She’s also the author of a short story collection, Family and Other Ailments, and the co-author of a retro-noir novella, Bop City Swing. Her fiction has appeared in anthologies and magazines like Vautrin, Tough, Rock and a Hard Place, Bristol Noir, Mystery Tribune, Reckon Review, and Black Cat Weekly among others. She’s a Shamus and Derringer short story nominee.

Decisions Decisions

/in , , , , , /by

Donnell Ann BellBy Donnell Ann Bell

Some changes are in store for me in the upcoming months. As I write this, I’m about to join the ranks of hybrid author. After 25 years in business, my publisher BelleBooks/Bell Bridge Books/Imajinn is closing its doors. Debra Dixon, who has owned and operated the publishing house (and admirably I might add), will retire.

As far as this author is concerned, as a publisher and editor, Debra Dixon has been exemplary, following through on every commitment she’s made. And to have the author of Goal, Motivation and Conflict as my editor for my Cold Case Series, has been both and education and has made me a better writer. So, now it’s time for this fledgling duckling—I mean author—to decide what she wants to do next. As I await my rights reversion letter, I look at this transition as an opportunity. For the most part, I’m thrilled with the product that Bell Bridge Books produced that bears my name on the covers. Still, like most books, dare I say, every published novel contains surprise gremlins. These gremlins called errors pop up in spite of critique partners, beta readers, editors, copy editors and proofreaders.

My friend Annette Dashofy is famous for saying if a mistake makes it into our books upon publication, after an author’s painstaking review, followed by the numerous editorial eyes on it, that typo deserves to be in there!!😉While I think her philosophy is clever, I respectfully disagree and want that typo corrected. Being traditionally published, I haven’t had the luxury of fixing a digital copy after it’s published. When my books are returned to me, I plan to fix those pesky errors that have plagued me these many years.

Which brings me to something else I’ve been thinking about and would love your opinions. Over the years I’ve received both good and bad reviews. Some readers lamented I didn’t put enough sex in my books, while other readers appreciated that I didn’t. Then there’s the subject of expletives. My mother worked for a doctor who claimed that using foul language was a sign of a weak mind. Moreover, if the speaker did use expletives, it was because he  couldn’t think of anything else to say. As a young woman, I heard that story so many times, I came to believe the doctor had a @#$% valid point!

In my debut novel, The Past Came Hunting, I used expletives. Namely, because my protagonist is a cop. Further, the story begins with a rebellious seventeen-year-old in the process of making the mistake of her life when she hooks up with a California bad boy (later a vengeful ex-con). While my female protagonist cleans up her act (and her language), and the cop occasionally expels an oath, the ex-con absolutely refused to say, “Gosh” and “Darn.” Honest, I asked him!

My debut won several awards, was requested by agents and was responsible for my publication. I remember receiving one letter about the language while the book has hundreds of positive reviews and hit #7 on Amazon’s list as a new author. I’m pretty proud of that. Here’s another question for you. What is it about criticism that we can receive numerous accolades, but we continually focus on the negative?  Also, as I’m going over the book line by line and have the opportunity to sanitize this manuscript, I’m not sure I want to.

Do I still hate expletives? Absolutely. I try hard not to use them. But it’s not about me. It’s about the characters. Fortunately, my other books don’t include a truculent psychopath. Brooke Terpening, another Stiletto Gang member, sent me the following blog written by author Harry Bingham to help me weigh my decision: Click here (content warning).  Mr. Bingham has an incredibly interesting take on the subject. By the way, the article provides an “f-bomb” score. Believe it or not my index is 28/82 = 0.35 which means my book is “unsweary.” Seriously?

Meanwhile, decisions, decisions.

About the Author:

Donnell Ann Bell is an award-winning author who began her nonfiction career in newspapers. After she turned to fiction, her romantic suspense novels became Amazon bestsellers, including The Past Came Hunting, Deadly Recall, Betrayed, and Buried Agendas. In 2019, Donnell released her first mainstream suspense, Black Pearl, A Cold Case Suspense, which was a 2020 Colorado Book Award finalist. In 2022, book two of the series was released. Until Dead, A Cold Case Suspense won Best Thriller in 2023 at the Imaginarium Conference in Louisville, Kentucky. Currently, she’s working on book three of the series. Readers can follow Donnell on her blog or sign up for her newsletter at www.donnellannbell.net.

Do You Play Games?

/in , , , , , , , , , , /by

In my ongoing effort to declutter, I’ve been taking books to the Family Garden in the park and filling the Little Library there. I’m always thrilled when the last batch I loaded has been taken, and I’m happy to fill it up again. 

But on occasion, there are a few oldies I just can’t part with, like my very yellowed paperback edition of Games People Play, by Eric Berne. I recently spotted it on a shelf behind two other rows of books. (Yes, my bookcases are overburdened, no matter how much I try to lighten the load.)

Mind Games

Berne’s New York Times bestseller was based on his theory of Transactional Analysis, a cultural psychology phenomenon he introduced in the early 60’s. I encountered the book years later when it was assigned reading for an acting class, and again just recently, among other text books from my early days as a theater nerd.

Inside its yellowed cover, I had dutifully underlined paragraphs of Berne’s theories with a red ink pen. Over the years, several pages became unglued. But they were all accounted for, and chock-full of the kind of mind games that define unhealthy interpersonal transactions (or, in non-psychobabble: toxic relationships).

There are 36 “games” identified in its chapters, spread among seven classifications. “Life Games” include Kick Me, Now I’ve Got You, You SOB, and See What You Made Me Do, among others. These are followed by “Marital Games,” “Party Games” (not the children’s party variety) and “Sexual Games,” followed by three more categories. You can see some of them listed on the book’s back cover.

As a treatise on psychotherapy, the point is to get patients to recognize harmful patterns of mind games that are present in their own lives, and eventually, to learn how to stop them, whether the patient is the player or the played-upon. In acting class, it was meant to help us decode the depths of a character’s motivation.

The book is way too technical to be anything but a slog. But on reflection, I realize that I’ve internalized much of its wisdom over the years. It definitely helps me create more fully rounded characters in my writing, especially for villains like E.B. Odom in The Body Business.

And in real life, thankfully, I’ve managed to avoid—or at least identify and remove myself from—most situations in which I might be feeling “played.”

Fun Games

Speaking of more pleasant games, my favorite is the one I play with my husband almost every day at lunch, when I take a break from writing. As I wind down the morning, he’s making a delicious chopped salad which we share over a backgammon table. We’re pretty evenly matched at this game, and the competition’s friendly. Afterward, I’m refreshed for the rest of the afternoon.

Any kind of healthy game can serve as an antidote to any toxic thought gremlins that invade our tranquility. Lots of people I know play Wordle or some variation of it to relieve stress. Group games like Bridge, Poker, and Mahjong are popular again, too.

It may be impossible to permanently shut the woes of the world away, but there’s no harm in trying to raise the fun quotient for a few moments of peace.

Of course, you could also lose the blues by reading a good book!

When you’re plagued by toxic mind games, what do you do to stay calm?

Gay Yellen’s award-winning writing career began in magazine journalism.  She later served as the contributing editor for the international thriller, Five Minutes to Midnight (Delacorte), which debuted as a New York Times “Notable.”

Her multi-award-winning Samantha Newman Mystery Series is full of suspense, with touches of romance, heart, and humor. Available on Amazon or through your favorite bookseller.

© Copyright - The Stiletto Gang