Author: Lisa M Lane

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In this issue: Proof copies, Kismet, a possum report, The Night Circus, a romance (plus one) for February.

Proof copies

One of the crazy things about publishing is you get a choice, albeit a small one, of where to print your books. I requested proof copies from both Ingram (which feeds bookshops) and Amazon to check the quality. 

I’m very pleased with both, but proof copies give me a chance to check things. Like here, the gutter (the part of the page near the middle) is too small, so you have to open the book wide to read it. I’ll be adjusting the margins to be smaller on the outside, bigger on the inside.

The Night Circus

This novel by Erin Morgenstern was my read for this fortnight. Written in 2011, and winning prizes for fantasy fiction, the tale is about the people involved in an unusual circus that is only open at night. There are few acrobats and no elephants. Each tent offers guests a different experience.

I’m glad I didn’t know it was a fantasy before I started it; I read it like literary fiction, because the prose was so evocative. It was like total immersion into a different kind of circus–black and white instead of flashy colors, real magic instead of tacky illusions, and a bizarre and varied circuit of appearances. From the clockmaker to the fortune teller, the characters are deeper and less stereotypical than I expected, with their own talents and desires.

Some suspense was created by having two of the characters, unbeknownst to themselves, set into a competitive game by a surreptitious authority. It’s a competition that won’t end until one of them is killed, presumably by the other or as a result of competing magic. Yet the word “magic” is rarely used in the book; such powers are accepted as belonging to certain people, and their use is to delight rather than harm. An excellent read, more steampunk than fantasy.

Possum report

I name the possums that come into our backyard, of course. When a large gray one appeared, I named him Cassius because he was always hungry (see Shakespeare on this). But once his belly dragged on the ground and I saw multiple tiny tails, I realized he was a she, so she’s Cassie. Two of her kits have stayed in the yard. One is bold and the other shy, but they look alike so I’m not sure which one this is on the left:

It’s Cassie having some water on the right. So this means all the possums in the yard right now are female (they have the pointier faces). Last night, I heard one clicking in the night. That’s the sound adults make to let their kits know where they are, so there may be more out there than I think!

Film review: Kismet

While my days aren’t ruled by what’s on Turner Classic Movies, I do find gems there that are worth giving up an evening of writing. Kismet is one of those gems.

Yes, it’s a 1955 musical, so you get the high-waisted costumes and hair sprayed within an inch of its life. There are songs and dances that only tangentially play into the story, and many poorly disguised sexual entendres are broadly delivered. But it has two aspects that make it quite special. 

The first is the source of the story. Hajj the Beggar, his heights of wealth and power alternating with the depths of poverty, seems straight out of the Arabian Nights. Don’t expect any historical “accuracy” — Kismet is set in a “fictional Baghdad” from the tales, not an actual place. This gave the art directors (including Preston Ames, who also did An American in Paris) free reign to create fantasy sets and outrageous costumes.

In addition, the basis of the story was a 1911 play by Edward Knoblock, with the role of Hajj seemingly written for Oscar Ashe, a Shakespearean actor/manager (not unlike my character Cyril Price in Murder at Old St. Thomas’s). On Broadway in 1953, Alfred Drake played the role, and Howard Keel plays him in the film–clearly, an expert who can ham it up is needed!

The second extraordinary thing is the source of the music. Although the lyrics/book were written by Charles Lederer and Luther Davis, the music is primarily adapted from work by Alexander Borodin, a 19th century Russian composer. Songs that became known, such as “Stranger in Paradise”, were based on his musical themes, which makes me smile whenever I hear Borodin on classical music radio. (An American in Paris did something similar, but with the music of George Gershwin, which was very different.)

BOGO at Kobo

In the mood for a bit of historical mystery romance? Kobo is offering a Buy One Get One special through February, and guess what’s on the list?

So you can get A Heart Purloined and another romance book together. Kobo is where I buy my e-books too!

And more!

• Want to read previous newsletters? They’re located here at my website, where you can also find information and buy links to all my books. You can post comments there too.
• Want to read my blog posts on history and writing? They’re on my Lisahistory blog.

Until next time, keep grousing!

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In this issue: Resuming the Victorian mysteries, The Assassination Bureau, Glass Onion, and the Bummer at Luna Beach cover reveal.

Missing the Victorian mysteries?

Me, too! But soon I will be back to writing Murder at the Gasworks, the prequel to the Tommy Jones mysteries. I’ve wondered myself how Tommy became the ward of Cuthbert Slaughter and his wife, so it’s time to get going.

The Victorian era has so much in common with today. Fascinated by the latest gadget? Worried about the environment? Frustrated that the government doesn’t implement the will of the people? Interested in gender issues? All of these were debated and written about extensively in 19th century England.

This is why it’s so enjoyable to do the research. The reader must feel they are part of the era through historical detail, but the overall social setting already seems familiar. And I love technology, so the gasworks is a great subject. There were several gasworks serving London in the 1860s, all competing against each other (oh, yeah, that’s another familiar topic!). The one shown above was in the City of London, which is where much of my novel will take place. 

The Assassination Bureau

I love old movies, as you know, but many of my favorites aren’t commonly known.

Take The Assassination Bureau. Oliver Reed and Diana Rigg are at their serious silly best. Based on an unfinished thriller by Jack London, it’s the story of Ivan Dragomiloff and his nemesis, Sonia Winter. She has discovered that Dragomiloff runs an organization that kills immoral reprobates for pay. She’s decided he’s one of those reprobates.

Set in 1908, Winter is a women’s rights activist, and gets funded by her employer to hire Dragomiloff to assassinate . . . himself. He’s not upset by this. In fact, he’s downright pleased at setting his minions to the task. It gives him an opportunity to purge his organization, because most members are killing for money rather than morality. A very fun film.

Glass Onion review

I like new movies too, or almost new, anyway — it’s 2002. I saw the first film in what is now obviously a series (“A Knives Out Mystery“, says the subtitle).

Glass Onion intrigued me with its title, since I know the Beatles song well. Turns out that’s the name of the actually glass feature in the billionaire’s home, and I was delighted they used so much music, including the song. Janelle Monáe is outstanding.

The beginning was great, because it was set up exactly like an Agatha Christie: a small group is invited to a billionaire’s isolated island retreat for a murder weekend. All the guests (except the detective) have had their careers advanced by the billionaire. What follows are murder, and twists and turns, just like you’d expect, set against a glorious production design I’d call Billionaire Modern.

It’s worth watching just for Janelle Monáe’s portrayal of Andi (Cassandra – don’t miss the classical reference!) Brand. The guest star cameos are fun, too, but unnecessary.

Daniel Craig again plays Detective Benoit Blanc, but I didn’t enjoy his interpretation of the character any more than in Knives Out. I just can’t figure out what he’s trying to do with the character. Any idea, just tell me in comments! 

Cover reveal

Only for newsletter subscribers and visitors to my website, it’s the cover reveal for Bummer at Luna Beach, my upcoming cozy mystery.

Release date is April 20, but I still have a spot for an early reviewer (just email me at lisa@grousablebooks.com). If you are on LibraryThing, I’ll be putting early reviewer copies there too for free in February. After that, the paperback and e-book will be available at all the usual booksellers, including my shop if you want it autographed.

And more!

• Want to read previous newsletters? They’re located here at my website, where you can also find information and buy links to all my books. You can post comments there too.
• Want to read my blog posts on history and writing? They’ve moved back to my Lisahistory blog, which I’m busy reorganizing. (Two blogs was just silly.)

Until next time, keep grousing!

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In this issue: more ARC reading opportunities, a fave Miss Marple, why we love mysteries with hubris, and ordering direct from an author.

ARC reading in the new year

I have expanded the team and have a few more ARC reader spots available for Bummer at Luna Beach, my first SoCal cozy mystery.

What are ARC readers? As I mentioned last time, ARC readers are keen book lovers who receive a free e-copy of a book before it’s published (an Advance Review Copy), then provide general feedback to the author (if they’re comfortable), then share their support of the book with friends, on social media, and anywhere else they can think of. And that’s it!

Bummer at Luna Beach begins with a dead body on the beach, covered in sand at the bottom of a sea bluff. There’s a real police detective on the case, but he’s new to the town of San Benno. In steps Rosie McMahon, 72-year-old maven, to assist.  Like all my mysteries, it’s a story with appealing characters and a serious underlying theme. Definitely in the “cozy mystery” category. 

For this book, I’ll be sending out an e-copy this month, and asking for some sharing by the beginning of March. Book release date (paperback and e-book) is April 20.

If this sounds good to you, email me at lisa@grousablebooks.com.

Miss Marple

Who’s your favorite TV/movie Miss Marple? Margaret Rutherford in the old films? Geraldine Ewan, Julia Mackenzie, or Joan Hickson on Masterpiece? How about Angela Lansbury in The Mirror Crack’d?

Although Agatha Christie’s female sleuth is sometimes thought of as a doddering old lady, most actors played her as more intelligent than the other characters. She is an older woman who is underestimated by those around her, often by her own design. 

Each portrayal is different, but I’d go with Joan Hickson as the most unassuming and underestimated, a Miss Marple you would hardly notice, asking suspects ordinary questions and placing hints for the other characters when they are most needed. But one would have to go back and read the books again to decide who was most faithful to Christie’s character.

Why mysteries? Hubris!

The more chaotic our world is, the more we love our mysteries. In the best novels, the reader has the assurance that justice will prevail, an especially potent motif when it seems like this isn’t happening in the real world. For some, the thrill is the race between the reader and the sleuth to solve the puzzle. 

I am not into puzzles, I’m not a game player, and I’m not fascinated by the criminal mind. Fairness and justice are my ingrained values, while hypocrisy and unallayed selfishness are anathema. Psychotic killers are of little interest to me, which is why I don’t write thrillers. Rather, like Arthur Conan Doyle, I write stories where intelligence prevails and the killer is caught.

Why are they caught? Certainly because the sleuth is cleverer than they are, but also because of hubris. Translated loosely as “excessive pride”, hubris is a self-centeredness so profound that the character follows his own goals heedless of the pain they cause. They haven’t inherited the estate? They kill the person who has. They were rejected by someone they loved? Overlooked vocationally or socially? Bullied or harassed? They get their revenge.

Hubris causes their own downfall, not just the sleuth putting together clues. The guilty characters have brought it upon themselves. Perhaps they lied and were found out, or left behind something that could be traced, or forgot to burn that important piece of evidence. We smirk when the murderer reveals him/herself accidentally. But it’s fun to trace the tales where hubris plays a role, where the criminals are hoisted on their own petard.

Grousable Bookshop

With the recent publication of hardcover editions of the Tommy Jones Mysteries, I am reminded that most readers order from online booksellers like Bookshop.org for print versions, and e-book dealers like Kobo or Amazon for e-reader versions.

All dealers, all retailers, take a cut for themselves—they wouldn’t stay in business otherwise. Ordering directly, however, provides more profit for the author. It can also make signed copies available.

So when you get a chance, visit the Grousable Bookshop. Each of my books is listed there in all the available formats, and I mail it out myself so a dedication or signature is easy.

And more!

• Want to read previous newsletters? They’re located here at my website, where you can also find information and buy links to all my books. You can post comments there too.
• Want to read my blog posts on historical research and writing? They’re here.

Until next time, keep grousing!

 

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15 December

Included within are a Silver Medal award, the Smashwords 50% off sale, behind the scenes at A Haunting in Venice, biography and authenticity, and a request for ARC readers.

An award!

Thrilled to report that A Heart Purloined was chosen for a Silver Medal by the Coffee Pot Book Club in the UK.

The award was in the Historical Romance category. If you’ve been following my ambivalence about romance, and my concerns about writing one, you’ll know I feel especially appreciated by this award. 

50% off special

Now through the end of the month, Smashwords is having a huge sale on e-books, and mine should be available at half off.

So if you’re missing one of the Tommy Jones Victorian murder mysteries, or haven’t yet read A Heart Purloined (the historical romance mystery that just won the Coffee Pot Book Club Silver Medal), now’s the time.

Behind the Scenes

It will surprise no one to know that I watch a lot of historical films. Friends refuse to watch them with me, because I’m horrible. I say things like “that would so not be in the 18th century” and “he wouldn’t say that in 1910”. I question everything from earrings to window drapes. 

At the same time, I have my own history in the theatre world, behind the scenes. I was a pro lighting designer for a short time, and helped build sets and do costumes. So, with that background, allow me to introduce you to the Set Decorators Society of America. Set decorators work with the production designer to make the scenery work for the mood and setting of the film. So for historicals, they are very busy people.

Check out this Behind the Scenes SDSA interview with set decorator Celia Bobak about A Haunting in Venice. She talks about how they created a haunted centuries-old Venetian palazzo.

And yes, A Haunting in Venice is loosely based on an Agatha Christie story, so Hercule Poirot is a main character. He’s played by Kenneth Branagh but these days, you know, there really isn’t anyone else.

Authenticity and biography

When writing a biography, the author cannot help but get tangled in their subject’s life. And although they may seem to be objective, biographies have a thesis like any other history book — the author has a reason for writing it. Perhaps s/he sees previous biographies of this person as deficient in some way. Maybe some new evidence has been discovered. Or maybe the person’s life could be re-examined in the context of the new trends in what’s acceptable behavior.

But it adds another layer to fictionalize the biography into the “biopic”, a movie about someone’s life. Here we take a step away from the biographical work itself to create the person as a movie character (think Alan Turing in The Imitation Game, or Robert Oppenheimer in the recent eponymous film). Then we take a further step as the actor interprets that character written in the screenplay.

It’s tough to argue about the authenticity of a biographical movie, since we’re already so many steps away from the subject. And yet, the performances may fix the historical figure in our minds. To many, Hal Holbrook will always be Mark Twain, William Windom is James Thurber, William Daniels is John Adams. This is despite the fact that often the clothes, hair, and look of the actor playing the role might say more about when the film was made then the time it represents!

When more than one actor has played someone, there are disputes about the best. Strangely enough, one of the most important arguments is over a character who is completely fictional. If you ever want to start a fight in a pub, say who your favorite Sherlock Holmes is. Or James Bond. While we may have an emotional response to someone’s actual life story, we dream in fiction.

ARC readers, please?

I have three slots available for Advanced Review Copy readers to read Bummer at Luna Beach, to be released in April. It’s set in the fictitious southern California beach town of San Benno. Here’s the draft blurb:

A body has been found at Luna Beach, one hairy arm sticking out of the sand at the bottom of the bluff. While police detective Rory Gallardo and his staff uncover the man’s origins, 72-year-old Rosie McMahon and her cat Hephaestus are also on the case. Pursuing clues with the help of her journalist pal Lou and environmentalist student Tiffany, Rosie discovers a mystery bigger than a dead tourist.

Set against the backdrop of a classic Southern California beach town, Bummer at the Beach is a cozy mystery to win the hearts of those who like their beach towns funky.

What is an ARC reader? It’s someone who reads a book before it’s published (an Advance Review Copy), provides general feedback to the author, then shares their support of the book with friends, on social media, and anywhere else they can think of. For this book, I’ll be sending out an e-copy in January, and asking for sharing by the beginning of March.

If this sounds good to you, email me at lisa@grousablebooks.com.

And more!

• Want to read previous newsletters? They’re located here at my website, where you can also find information and buy links to all my books. You can post comments there too.
• Want to read my blog posts on historical research and writing? They’re here.

Until next time, keep grousing!

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1 December

Included within is a free short story, a fun time at the Encinitas Holiday Fair, a book update, railways in Britain, and a Guilty Pleasure movie. Welcome to new subscribers!

Free short story

I’m offering the e-book for “Murder Steampunk Style” free to new newsletter subscribers. But that’s not fair since you already subscribe. Download it here but please don’t share the link. It’s not historical, but it’s fun, and has a guest star. 

When obnoxious steampunk author Vernon Sledge is found dead at the 19th Annual Steampunk Convention in San Diego, it is up to high school teacher Emily Carter and her students to help un- ravel the mystery. Assisted by convention attendees in their neo-Victorian finery and at least one Sherlock Holmes, the team follows the clues from the Mad Hatter’s Tea Party, the vendor tables, and author interviews to discover whodunnit. 

Selling books in costume

What happens when five historical fiction authors sell books at a holiday street fair in Encinitas? Well, things get interesting!

We each dressed in the timeframe of one of our novels, and we looked fabulous! And although the day started drizzly, it ended up sunny and bright. (A little too sunny — I didn’t bring sunscreen and wished I had.) 

Books!

I look forward to doing more appearances in California beach towns, especially once Bummer at Luna Beach is released in April.  It’s revision time since I just received the manuscript from my brilliant editor. Cover reveal coming soon!

If you’re looking for a classic mystery, I just finished reading The Murder of Roger Ackroyd by Agatha Christie. I know, it’s a shame I haven’t read it before. No spoilers here, but it’s a classic because of who the murderer turns out to be. It’s a trick so famous that few authors have used it since. So I already knew whodunnit, but I didn’t know the story, and in this one Hercules Poirot is continually keeping things up his sleeve. Although that does get annoying, his questioning of suspects often seems to focus on the trivial, and you keep reading to figure out what he’s up to. 

In new books, I’m very much enjoying A Fire at the Exhibition. I met T. E. Kinsey at Bouchercon, and he’s as delightful as his work.  Although this is Book 10 in the Lady Hardcastle series and I’ve yet to read the others, it stands alone. Lady Hardcastle and her assistant/companion are friends despite the class difference (a motif that Kinsey told me he enjoys exploring). They solve mysteries together. In this case a valuable book and two artworks have gone missing, a fire set to clear the exhibit, then there’s a murder.

It’s funny that we both happened to have created titles that reference Mussorsky’s musical composition “Pictures at an Exhibition”, both of us deliberately (mine is Murder at an Exhibition).

Train travel in the U.K. 

I have to admit I was still jet-lagged at the Encinitas fair. This time my trip to England went further afield, including to Scotland.

When I first went to the UK, in the 80s, the railway was nationalized (it would be privatized in 1993). Most of the trains ran on time. The Beeching cuts of the 1960s were still a problem, of course — many of the smaller lines had been eliminated. Some of those have reopened to carry the much larger demand. But rail drivers have gone on strike repeatedly, as have other staff, and I wanted to see why.

Trains were cancelling all over the place. Trains were delayed because the crew couldn’t get there from another train, or there were landslips, or there was something on the line (a British woman I spoke with said dismissively, “it’s the old leaves-on-the-rails excuse”). I had splurged for a First Class Britrail Pass (the joys of being an elder stateswoman), but received only one hot meal and a few cups of tea despite many train rides. There clearly weren’t enough staff on the trains, workers were exhausted as they tried desperately to look fresh and helpful, and there were mechanical problems. 

But have I mentioned to views were incredible? If my train from Inverness to Edinburgh hadn’t cancelled, I never would have taken a roundabout route via Aberdeen and seen the east coast of Scotland.

So I am not complaining, except about the companies who are, as another Brit told me, buying routes and then removing them from service to make more money. Clearly no one is getting paid enough; they are currently seeking driver trainees for the Harry Potter train in Scotland because there aren’t enough drivers. 

Guilty Pleasure

I have a number of films that I consider Guilty Pleasures, not only because they are unusual movies, but because I know them so well I can recite whole swathes of the screenplay.

One of these would be To Catch a Thief (1955), where I do know practically every line.

It’s Alfred Hitchcock, but not at all like Psycho or Frenzy. It’s the tale of a man (Cary Grant) who stole jewelry for the French Resistance during the war, and since then has lived well off his proceeds. He now has a maid and a house in the hills above the French Riviera. He was known as The Cat for his ability to prowl rooftops. Similar robberies having recently occurred, the police naturally think it’s him. He must catch the real thief before they arrest him or his old Resistance friends kill him.

Romance comes in the form of Francie (Grace Kelly), an American heiress holidaying with her mother (Jessie Royce Landis) in the Riviera. She wants the excitement of life with a cat burglar, which is exactly what he’s trying to leave behind. The movie has it all: suspense, romance, murder, jewel heists, stunning costumes, and the gorgeous Riviera in the sun. Plus the background: Grace Kelly met her future husband, the Prince of Monaco, while making the film. 

And more!

• Want to read previous newsletters? They’re located here at my website, where you can also find information and buy links to all my books. You can post comments there too.
• Want to read my blog posts on historical research and writing? They’re here.

Until next time, keep grousing!

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This newsletter introduces some older detectives, Paperback Alley in Escondido, and the recent edits of my beach cozy. A big welcome to all new subscribers!

Hurrah for older protagonists

I’ve been enjoying the very lively characters in Richard Osman’s Thursday Murder Club series – I’m almost done with The Bullet That Missed. If you haven’t read these, do yourself a favor. The mysteries are solved by four friends who live in a retirement community and have very different backgrounds, creating a solid team. They meet in the Jigsaw room and have to get out on time to make way for the Conversational French classes. 

Osman’s writing is a master class in witty sentences and smooth cultural references. 

In some ways, the series reminds me of others where older sleuths are featured, in particular New Tricks, a British television show that ran from 2005-2013. 

A police superintendant, recently shamed for a botched job, is given charge of a division that solves cold cases. With few resources, she hires three former police officers all in their later years. Each has particular talents.

Stories with older people are fun because although modern times may challenged old-fashioned ideas. there is usually a theme of wisdom triumphing over youthful enthusiasm. Not always, of course!

Fun in Escondido, more coming November 19

I promised a photo so here it is:

I have no idea why I am leaning so much! Perhaps getting up at 6 am had something to do with it.

These indie authors are, left to right, Jolie Tunnell (author of the Idyllwild Mysteries), Pat Spencer, me, Nancy Mae Johnson, and Celeste Barclay. Next stop will be a Grousable Bookshop booth at the Encinitas Holiday Street Fair on November 19!

Edits on the beach cozy

The beach cozy has gone to my editor. I’m still waffling on the title, but at the moment I’m leaning toward Bummer at Luna Beach because it’s just different, and dead bodies are certainly a bummer. Like all my work, the book contains some serious themes in an amusing story. There are jabs at gentrification and beach towns sacrificing character to money-making, for example.

Sending a book in to an editor is always a bit scary, kind of like submitting a term paper. Will it come back all covered with red ink? The difference is, if it does, I can fix it before a grade is assigned. The moment it was sent, of course, I thought of an explanation I needed to add to Chapter 1.

After editing, I will revise again and give it to a couple of beta readers. Will I be looking for Advanced Review Copy readers? You bet I will! I’d love an ARC team of folks willing to read and publicize on social media. Stay tuned in the next newsletter if you’re interested.

The Hours

I am currently reading The Hours, by Michael Cunningham. It turns out I somehow bought two copies, with two different covers. One has a dark illustration, and the other is this:

Obviously it’s been made into a movie (2002 — good heavens, that’s over 20 years ago!). I wanted to read the book (1998) first. The prose is extraordinary, literary fiction with some close shadowing of Virginia Woolf’s style (and using her character name/situation from Mrs. Dalloway). When I picked it up, with the other cover, I didn’t know when it was published, that there was a movie, or that I already had a copy. All I knew when I read the first few pages was that I was going to like it. 

But it does make me want to read Mrs. Dalloway again.

And more

No room for a garden report this time, sorry. Next time, I hope! 

• Want to read previous newsletters? They’re located here at my website, where you can also find information and buy links to all my books. You can post comments there too.
• Want to read my blog posts on historical research and writing? They’re here.

Until next time, keep grousing!

Literary fiction in hardcover

Whether book readers have been awaiting it or not, I certainly have. My literary novel Before the Time Machine (2021) is finally available in hardcover.

There’s something about literary fiction that seems to require a hardcover version. Maybe it’s the idea that it will be in libraries, or the snob appeal, or just feeling something a little more solid and more permanent in your hand. 

This is the book I had to write, and it was my first published work of fiction.  It’s a dual-timeline novel about a present-day historian researching H. G. Wells, young Wells becoming an author during the 19th century, and the conversation they have across time and space. 

Next up for hardcover: Murder at Old St. Thomas’s.

Garden report

The watermelons dried up after Hilary, the tropic storm that, in this part of California, was not.

Each season something comes to the garden that’s new. I like fig beetles. They’re kinda funny. Last year a few came to drink the juice from the grapes, and ruined a couple of figs. Fig beetles fly with faulty air traffic control systems, bumping into things. I’ve had them bump into my face, and I just saw one bump into a Mourning Cloak butterfly (called the much more lyrical Camberwell Beauty in the UK).  They’re the bumper cars of the natural world.

But this year, they held a bumper car convention in my grapes. I didn’t know. I didn’t see. I failed to notice that some of my green grapes weren’t grapes, that half of the clusters were beetles. They were so quiet about it. I’m afraid there will be no Grousable Jam this year. 

I had to cut down the clusters, because they’d split and it smelled like a winery. The clusters were dropping grapes all over the deck.

I won’t say it was fun, but it was surreal, being surrounded by peckish and angry beetles as I closed the bar at Happy Hour. 

So instead of worrying about grapes, I wrote a poem.

Authors Selling Direct

I join a lot of promotions hoping to find new readers, but this one on Book Funnel (Sept 1-18) is particularly interesting because authors couldn’t get in without having their own online “shop”. The idea is to promote authors who sell through their own websites rather than (or in addition to) a retailer (Amazon, Waterstones, etc.). I only recently opened the Grousable Bookshop at my website. 

What’s the difference? When you order from an online retailer, the retailer takes a significant cut, even of e-books. When you buy direct from the author, there is no middleman. The author does have costs, including the fee to use whatever system is taking the payment, but they’re much lower. 

Having chosen my historical mystery romance, A Heart Purloined, for this promotion, it was fun to see the other books alongside it. Take a look at the Authors Selling Direct page and you’ll see what I mean!

Free short story: Murder Steampunk Style

It’s the last chance to download my contemporary mystery short story e-book for free before the end of Bouchercon on September 3, only two days away! So hurry on over to BookFunnel and grab a copy before it’s too late!

This was the story I originally wrote for this Bouchercon, so it’s contemporary and set in San Diego. But I couldn’t resist some Victorian elements, so it takes place at a neo-Victorian steampunk convention. I hope you enjoy it!

That crazy technology

Some readers noticed, I’m sure, the weird formats of previous newsletters. On some people’s screens they looked fine; on others, not so much. Last time I sent a second version cuz I was so embarrassed by the first one. 

I love online technologies — I really do! But mailing list programs are a little insane. They need to keep everyone’s email — that’s no big deal. But they also need to use certain server settings to discourage the emails landing in a Spam folder at the other end. And they have lots of options, some of which don’t work very well. I’d been trying to get MailerLite to send my newsletter posts to you when I post them, but the formatting was, shall we say, unpredictable.

So two weeks ago, I spent an entire day upgrading to the new MailerLite and learning how to structure my newsletter. I didn’t like any of their formats, so I got into the HTML code (I only get free access for the first 30 days) and started hacking. Long ago (1998) I started teaching online, and if you didn’t know some code (well, it’s actually Markup Language, not code) you couldn’t do anything online. Lots of trial and error, but I’m hoping the newsletter will look better from now on! 

Links

Want to read previous newsletters? They’re located here at my website, where you can also find information and buy links to all my books.

Want to read previous blog posts? They’re here. 

Until next time!

 

Bouchercon Historical Mystery Panel

Big news this fortnight is that I’m on a panel for Bouchercon, one of the biggest mystery writer conferences anywhere.

It’s a panel on historical mysteries, although I believe I’m the only actual historian. Which is good, because then I can bring a different viewpoint. In fact, I hope to mention two salient ideas:

1. Primary sources are fantastic for both ideas and accuracy. (So diaries, newspapers, old photos can both trigger a story and make it more authentic.)
2. Historians have training and tendencies that other historical fiction writers may not have, such as an understanding of the larger historical context in which the action takes place, or an obsessive tendency to find out whether smoke/fog in a can had been on the market in 2004 (see below).

But mostly, of course, I’ll be there to learn things, meet people, and get to know new works. 

Creating a California town

Back in April I had some questions about my Work in Progress, a beach cozy mystery that begins with a body buried in the sand near a bluff: Who is he? How did he get there? And what does it mean that one of those little paper umbrellas was found at the scene?

I’ve discovered that he is Bud Carson, a scout for Western Petroleum in Bakersfield. What was he doing in . . .

San Benno. That’s my So Cal beach town. It’s somewhere vague between Los Angeles and San Diego, a previously sleepy seaside town that’s just become a city. I have a professional sleuth (the new-in-town detective Rory Gallardo) and my amateur sleuth (Rosie McMahon, an older woman who has a writing shed filled with technology, some of which she built herself). And I now know the paper umbrellas came from Dino’s, one of those wood-sided old restaurants with a neon dinosaur decor trying to go upscale. 

Creating a town is a fun thing to do. It’s ironic that I set my English mysteries in real places, but I live in So Cal and I’m going to invent one. 

Featured blog post

Well, to be honest, it’s the only post I did in July! It’s been a busy month. This post is about a mystery writer (that’s me) writing a romance (which I did), and some lessons I learned along the way. 

Featured blog post

Gardening update

Mid-July here in SoCal took us from the amazingly steady rains in June to heat and dryness. That shouldn’t be news — the warm and dry happens every year. How did plants respond? It varied. At first the roses went nuts; now they’re tired. The tomatoes cowered in the cool rainy days; they they started jumping up when it got warm. One of the possums in the yard had her babies. This is her second litter this year. It was easy to tell she’d birthed them–her poor pouch was practically dragging on the ground when she walked, and when she sat to eat your could see little hands and tails poking out.

But this possum has not seen any Disney movies or wildlife websites, so she doesn’t know she’s supposed to do the cute thing: carry around the babies clinging to her back (and singing “When I Was Single”, for those who remember America Sings at Disneyland). As she dide for her last litter, as soon as she can she leaves them hidden in the nest to go feed herself. It makes me feel good that she thinks my garden is so safe. 

AI and writing

The biggest talk everywhere these days, other than the writers’ strike, is the impact of Artificial Intelligence on writing. Already quite a few things we read on the web are written by a computer, so this should’t be news. But most studios, producers, and publishers like nothing better than to make money and getting rid of writers saves money. The creative writing produced by computer may not be up to snuff yet,.

But AI can certainly deal with anything formulaic. This is because AI garners from the web not only its information (sometimes false) but also its format (which it does much better). So heck, go ahead and use AI to write a draft of that form letter/book summary/resumé. Since AI doesn’t have a handle yet on the creative stuff, most people won’l like how it writes fiction. The plots may be good (formula again!) but the expression is banal. Rather like Data on Star Trek reading an adventure story aloud.

Will I use AI to write a mystery? Absolutely not–I’m the author, so I do the writing. Will I use it as a sophisticated search engine? Absolutely. The other night I was trying to research something for my Work in Progress. I needed to know whether they had canned smoke/haze in 2004, since I wanted my sleuth to use it with lasers. Google searches yielded nothing, but ChatGPT told me when it was invented and whether it might be likely or not. 

This month’s e-book promotions: & a free book! 

Starting today through August 20, you can download The Dancing Colonel: A Short Story for FREE in the Find Your New Favorite Author campaign.

Murder at Old St. Thomas’s is being featured through Kobo for UK readers only. Special price is £2.99 through August.

 

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Book news

Book fairs are seriously fun. Readers get to meet authors and vice versa. And when the weather is warm and sunny, people come out thinking they might buy a book. The North Park Book Fair in San Diego was just such an event.

People were there with their dogs and children, and they had a microphone set up for author readings. A very good day.

Here’s some big news: All my fiction e-books are 50% off this month only through Smashwords. So if you’re an e-book fan, now’s the time.

As for works in progress, I am focused for just a little longer on a non-fiction chapter for a book on H.G. Wells. As soon as that’s edited, I hope to get back to writing my California beach cozy. The body has been discovered, and Rosie McMahon is on the case, but how can an elderly woman do more than the local police? And why are there developers sniffing around the town?

A chat

In addition to reading from Murder at Old St. Thomas’s at the North Park Book Fair, I also chatted with a group from the Historical Novel Society on the uses of Artificial Intelligence (AI) programs for writers. 

The best uses of AI for writers are to do business tasks: query letters, library requests. Also, AI can suggest options, create summaries and synopses, make outlines. What it’s lousy at is telling the truth or writing creatively. And sometimes it just doesn’t work.

Murder mystery writers have a hard time getting information on the things that matter to them: the effectiveness of poisons, methods of death, and how to get away with a crime!

Is it Victorian?

The Victorian era is famous for repression — repression of sexuality, women, and open speech. But we know much of this from 19th century “prescriptive” literature. These are books and articles on how a woman should tend to her home and husband, how police should behave on the job, which books are suitable for children. Men and women who don’t know each other, some say, shouldn’t mix in public.

I like to tell my students that if people weren’t committing the crime, there wouldn’t be a law. In other words, people must be doing the opposite if prescriptive literature is trying to encourage certain behavior. So to me, a tract on how women shouldn’t be uppity means that women were being uppity. Treatises on improper literature means that people are reading it, and strict behavioral rules for boys and girls means there were wild and free boys and girls. And men and women most certainly mixed in public. Here’s a bunch of people crammed onto an omnibus:

So while free, sexual, open-minded characters in novels may seem to be outliers, they might not be. If you went back in a time machine to Victorian London, you would see women walking the streets alone, individuals breaking class boundaries, and people laughing at rude jokes. It was not as stiff and staid as rumors would have you believe.

Gentleman Jack

Since I don’t have HBO, I was only able to watch some of Gentleman Jack with a friend, but found it fascinating. Based on Anne Lister, the show used her diaries for information and the character’s direct address to the audience. Lister’s diaries were partly written in code, especially for the sections detailing her love affairs with young women, in the first half of the nineteenth century. She married her lover (unregistered) in 1834.

While she’s not the first lesbian (or even the “first modern lesbian” as web pages assert), she was different from other women yet respected by her tenants and local society as a businesswoman and landowner. That she cohabited with another woman wasn’t unusual; commenting on it would have been. 

The production values for the show are excellent despite a tendency toward exaggeration: Anne did not look quite as masculine and her hair did not have the 18th century double-roll style. She did wear black, unusual for women not in mourning. So yes, she was an outlier. But the fact that she was successful indicates that Victorian mores, while strict and prescriptive, didn’t always hold.

Social media

I’ve been posting daily on Instagram and Facebook, but if you want to see all my posts I have a “social posts” page on the website. It helps me keep track if nothing else! 

More news coming soon from the garden…

Lisa

 

Book news

Well, I manned my table (yes, a woman can man a table) with my mystery books at the Once Upon a Book Fair in Escondido, but although there were many authors there were few customers. Blame the weather (see below) or the location, but it just wasn’t happening. Met some nice authors though. That’s always the good side of these things. And I did sell three paperbacks.

The California Crime Writers Conference in Culver City just ended, my first in-person book conference, so I was glad it focused on mystery books. It was so fun! I got to meet some of my favorite cozy mystery book authors, such as Ellen Byron, and learn from her and other expert writers in the break-out sessions. I did a signing session for my books, and enjoyed talking with other authors, working out plot twists and sticky research situations.

My first Victorian mystery, Murder at Old St. Thomas’s, also received a wonderful Critic’s Report from BookLife Prize. Rarely does a review understand exactly what the author is trying to do, but this one did!

First drafting

Some authors work on one project till it’s published; others work on multiple books at once. I’m afraid I’m one of the latter. 

Blame the hypertext mind, which many of us have from spending so much time on the internet. I could actually feel that happening to me back in the 2010s. The hyperlink (we just say “link” now) was such a cool thing in the 1990s. You clicked an underlined word and–behold!–you were on another web page. Many of us clicked and clicked and clicked until we couldn’t focus on one page anymore. 

This reprogramming means that if I’m working on one novel, and I get stuck, I just open up the next one and work on that. So people ask, “what are you writing at the moment?” and I have to say:

1. a prequel to the Tommy Jones Mysteries, where we learn about Tommy’s childhood and how he got adopted by Inspector Slaughter and his wife, except that I have two dead bodies, one on each side of the river, and I don’t know who the murderer is–or wait, do you think there should be more than one?
2. a California beach cozy, wherein an old lady and her cat Hephaestus work with a local curmudgeon reporter to solve the mystery of the body on the beach–do you think it’s ok to have one of those paper cocktail umbrellas be a clue?
3. a literary novel where I have three characters set up: an older man who lives alone in London, a female tour guide who hates her life in the same city, and a high school student from America who comes over there–not sure what happens yet?

People usually nod off in the middle of listening to me explain #1.

More England stuff

So I promised more about my trip to England. I went to the British Library, both to renew my card after the pandemic years made it expire, and to view some maps.

The cool thing about setting novels in Victorian London is that there are maps: Ordnance Survey maps, maps for tourists, maps showing things like fire department zones. At the British Library, you order from their catalog on the computer, choose a room to sit in (and a table you must remember the number of), then get your books from the desk. 

Ordering off the online catalog, I had no idea how big any of the maps were. I’d also never been to the Map Room. When I got there I noticed the tables were much bigger. I went up the the desk and asked for my order, and they brought out four small items and a book so huge they could barely carry it. I flipped through the small ones quickly, then opened the giant book.

It had huge maps of parts of London, with tons of detail.

Using my new necklace with the magnifying glass pendant, I had a closer look. The guard jumped up from his seat, advised me to ask at the desk for a larger magnifier, then showed me how to use large leather weights to hold the map flat for my photos. So helpful!

The Rose Code

Just finished Kate Quinn’s The Rose Code, and I highly recommend it. Not a Victorian mystery book, and unfortunately situated among the many many World War II novels, it’s about Bletchley Park during the war. I confess I’m a Bletchley fan. I watched The Bletchley Girls on TV, and The Imitation Game. I’ve visited Bletchley and talked with the people there (one of whom told me that the masking tape X’s on the windows wouldn’t have been there then); I’ve seen the bombe work and heard how it sounds. I’ve seen the tangle of wires the characters use to program it.

The Rose Code is a fictionalized account of three women, each from very different backgrounds, who worked there, and Quinn’s research is impeccable. She blends their personal stories, the working conditions at BP, and code knowledge effortlessly, adding in a bit of a thriller element in a rescue of one of them from an asylum. It shouldn’t work, but it does. 

So very Cal

It’s been May Gray and June Gloom here. Those nicknames imply that every May and June is cloudy in the San Diego area, but of course this year is different. Or, as another gardener commented, “I guess it rains here now.” Just hoping it won’t be a No Sky July.

The very rainy winter and spring means that plants look different. A lot of us didn’t realize how much good a little more water (especially water from the sky) could do. Fruit trees and berries are going nuts (and maybe nuts are too — I don’t have a nut tree). But without the sun, those tomatoes and squash we eager beavers put out in May are suffering and many won’t make it. I’m starting more seeds. In June! What the heck?

All of this is due to climate change, of course, and its unpredictable weather cycles. I am trying to get my head around the approach of Monty Don, the king of British gardening. He lost a lot of plants in the wet/dry cycle they had there this year, and is introducing plants that are resilient, rather than those that die if it’s a little too cold, wet, or dry. 

Resilience is a wonderful idea, and not just for plants!

I did it!

No, nothing to do with books or historical fiction–rather something I’ve never had the courage to do. The first time I tried it, I only lasted two minutes before stopping (maybe that is historical fiction, now that I think about it).

Yes! It’s true! I drove in England. And, lest you doubt, I have proof:

Was it difficult? Yes. Did I read the entire Highway Code before attempting it? Yes. Was I terrified? Of course. Did I hit anything? Well, there was this shrubbery on the way in to the carpark in Richmond…

Book news

My historical romance A Heart Purloined e-book has been released from Kindle Unlimited and is now available wherever you buy ebooks (or you can get it from me). 

I wrote that book on a dare. Well, a national dare called NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month). You’re supposed to complete a novel (or at least a draft) in a month and you “win”. Just the glory, not anything else. I even had to buy the t-shirt. But there was also the impetus of a writer friend trying to do the same thing, since neither of us had written romance.

The book automatically turned itself into a mystery, however, so it’s a “clean” romance (no explicit sex) set in the Victorian era around a mystery with a blackmailer who’s just died. Both Amanda Goodwin, who always tells the truth, and Jack Strawman, who lies like a rug, are searching for something from the dead man. They wind up locked in a shed together. Twice. It’s a fun story with some of that witty repartee you might see in a 1930s screwball comedy. 

I wonder what I’ll do next November. Any ideas?

Why I owe libraries

Were you that kid who spent all your spare time in the library? I certainly was. And in the summer, I’d take the bus downtown and spend all day there, sitting in the aisles and reading, then taking home a stack I’d bring back the following week for more. No one told me what to read: I floated between the children’s room and adult fiction and those books marked with the Dewey decimal system. If it looked interesting, I read it. The subject card catalog was my guide.

In college I could not have managed without librarians, as I tended to choose unusual subjects. These wonderful people helped me research and used mysterious machines to get dot-matrix printed answers for me from far away, from university libraries and repositories. 

And now, as an author of historical fiction, I use the databases of articles and sources to find newspapers from the 19th century, and have been assisted by librarians from the British Library and small museums, especially during the pandemic.

Although authors are encouraged to set their “library price” high for their books, since a library will only buy one copy, I set mine low. I plan to publish hardback editions of everything because libraries like them, and I’ve just submitted to the Indie Author Project which helps libraries choose books. When I cull my own books (it happens occasionally!) I donate to the library’s bookshop.

What do you owe your library?

And I’m still a historian

It doesn’t go away just because one starts writing historical fiction — once a historian, always a historian. Without real primary sources and gaps in the actual history, I wouldn’t have started writing historical fiction. 

While in Durham, I went to the Durham Museum and Heritage Center, a small museum staffed by Durham University students. After photographing every display I could find on the Victorian era, I asked about the Henderson Carpet Manufactory’s location in the 19th century. There was a photo of it, but I couldn’t quite place it on a map. (In Murder on the Pneumatic Railway, some of the men Tommy meets work at Henderson’s, including the real life Mackay, who would later open his own factory.)

The Ph.D. student working the desk at the museum that day was Daniel Burrell, and he was very helpful, offering to find an answer in the archives. More importantly, he is a Victorianist also and shared his own work on the Victorian practice of cremation, its proponents and detractors. Fascinating stuff! Perhaps this conflict will appear in one of my novels one day.

A silly play

They’re doing something strange and semi-Victorian in the West End, a play called Bleak Expectations. It’s a send up on the work of Dickens, of course, and they’re doing an interesting thing. The narrator, who is also the protagonist at a later age, is played by different celebrities. We saw Sally Phillips, and if you happen to be in London 8-13 August it will be Stephen Fry. 

Every Dickensian trope was here, and all for comedy: “Pip” growing up happy but then having everything taken away because his father died having lost the family’s money in his business, the woe of his two sisters believing marriage was the only way out, adventures being befriended and then swindled, the evil lecher, the kind benefactor, the street urchin helped by the protagonist who returns later to save him. It was well worth seeing and even if you don’t know Dickens, it was so over the top that didn’t matter.

Just a pretty picture

I leave you with this, a photo of one of my favorite places, Durham Cathedral and the River Wear. 

I did so much while in England — more newsletters and posts coming! And once I get the overgrown garden tamed, I’ll have more garden news (for now just know that two of the possum’s babies seem to be staying in the yard).

Appearance reminders:

Saturday, June 3 I’ll be at the Once Upon a Book Fair in Escondido, California.

June 10-11 I’ll be at the California Crime Writers Conference in Culver City.

NEW June 24 I’ll be at the North Park Book Fair in North Park San Diego. 

Until next time!

Lisa