Writers Who Kill

Dolly Parton by Teresa Inge

2026-09-07T04:00:00.000-04:00

I first discovered Dolly Parton watching The Porter Wagoner Show with my mother, who never missed an episode. Dolly arrived as the “new girl singer” after Jeannie Seely left for her solo career, and from that moment, my mother and I were hooked. Dolly sang like an angel and delivered jokes with a sharp, playful wit that made us laugh out loud.

I thought she was hilarious—bold, raw, and unafraid to poke fun at herself. In many ways, she reminded me of my mother, who grew up poor in the country with a house full of siblings, one faded dress, worn‑out school shoes, and barely enough food. Yet my mother was a natural storyteller and gifted joke‑teller. Watching Dolly felt like watching a piece of her—tiny, funny, beautiful, and determined to make people smile.

An American Story
Dolly’s life has always been an American story—raw talent, relentless drive, and a joy that came from her heart. Raised in a two‑room cabin with no running water or electricity in Tennessee’s Great Smoky Mountains, she grew up in a large family where money was scarce, but music was abundant. With a preacher for a grandfather, faith shaped her world as much as song. On that humble porch, singing to anyone who’d listen, she began honing the voice that would one day captivate millions.

Early Singing Career
By ten, she was performing on local radio and TV. The day after high school graduation, she headed to Nashville to chase her dream. Her big break came in the late 1960s on The Porter Wagoner Show, as mentioned earlier. Though Porter later sued her for leaving, Dolly never denied her gratitude for the opportunity. Still, she had bigger ambitions and wanted a solo career on her own terms.

Songs from the heart
Her storytelling reshaped country music. Songs like “Jolene,” “Coat of Many Colors,” and “I Will Always Love You” came from personal truth. She wrote about

working women in “9 to 5,” suicide in “The Bridge,” and the grief of a stillborn child in “Down from Dover,” subjects many artists avoided.

Film Star and Philanthropist
Her success stretched far beyond music. She became a film star in 9 to 5 and Steel Magnolias, a businesswoman who built Dollywood, and a philanthropist whose Imagination Library has gifted over 200 million books to children worldwide. Her generosity in literacy and disaster relief earned her global admiration.

Despite her fame, she stayed grounded, crediting her upbringing for her resilience and creativity. Her signature style—big hair, bright clothes, and sparkling humor—reflected her belief that life should be lived boldly and joyfully.

The Passing of an Icon
After her passing last week, the world continues to mourn a cultural icon. Her life remains a testament to authenticity and kindness, showing how a girl from the Smoky Mountains could inspire and uplift hearts around the world.

Checking Out Libraries by Mary Dutta

2026-09-05T01:00:00.000-04:00

My local library branch is closed for a year for renovations. It’s a temporary situation, but losing that access has me thinking about all the wonderful time I’ve spent in libraries over the years.

I grew up in a town with a Carnegie library. It was a red brick building built in 1904, with a Civil War-era cannon out front. That library played a crucial role in making me the avid reader I remain. I remember the summer reading programs and the gradual graduation from the children’s room in the basement to the adult shelves upstairs. I still know my library card number: 206F.

My college and graduate school years in New York City had me doing a lot of research at the main branch of the New York Public Library on Fifth Avenue. That’s the one with the famous lions, Patience and Fortitude, flanking the steps. In those days, paper call slips whooshed through pneumatic tubes to the vast stacks, and the requested books would be delivered to the stately and stunning main reading room.

I passed my love of libraries on to my kids. First in Boston and then in Virginia, our local libraries played a prominent role in their growing up. They proudly signed up for their first library cards, participated in their own summer reading programs, and loaded up at the annual book sales.

Here in Alabama, I take advantage of all my county system has to offer. One branch holds the biggest selection of travel books. Another has a peaceful forest setting. A third has the best friends-of-the-library bookstore. While my closest option is closed, there are still plenty of welcoming spaces available for a book lover like me.

I was a reader long before I was a writer, and I owe much of that identity to the libraries that shaped me. They have changed over time, in more ways than one. My hometown library quadrupled in size after I left, and the NYPL finally retired its pneumatic system in favor of an all-electronic one about ten years ago. I know my local branch will be a bit different when it reopens next summer, but it will always be a home for me.

How important are libraries in your own life?

What's Not to Like? by Lori Roberts Herbst

2026-09-04T01:00:00.000-04:00

Truth is, I don’t find perfect people too interesting—though to be fair, I’ve never known any.

Nor do I care for the righteous, holier-than-thou types.

And don’t bother me with a syrupy sweet goody goody who can do no wrong.

I like ‘em flawed and funny and smart. And apparently, so do most of us.

Authors, and especially series writers, understand the importance of a “likable” protagonist. If readers are going to continue to follow a character through book after book, they need to feel an affinity for the person and a desire to spend time with her. But what exactly defines “likability”? For me, at least, it’s not what you might think…

Here are a few examples. One of my all-time favorite TV characters is Dr. Gregory House, played brilliantly by Hugh Laurie. The character’s arrogance is boundless, as is his self-absorption. He verbally bludgeons employees and rarely exhibits kindness or compassion. At first glance—and even under deeper scrutiny—the man appears to be the antithesis of likability.

But we do grow to like him. We admire his intelligence, his skill, his abilities, and the fact that he uses those talents for good instead of evil. We enjoy his acerbic wit. And though he doesn’t display it in an obvious way, House is loyal to people he cares about. A brief scene every so often convinces us that within that tortured soul beats a good heart, and we stick with him in anticipation of its continuing emergence. (Side note: Did you know House is the medical mirror image of Sherlock Holmes? Until recently, I didn’t, but in hindsight, it’s obvious. House/Holmes. Wilson/Watson. Keen powers of deduction. Drug addiction. Residence at 221B Baker Street. Face palm. How did I miss these connections?)

I’ve also fallen in love with Lucas Davenport, the protagonist of John Sandford’s Prey series. Though Lucas softens emotionally as the series progresses, he is a fundamentally aggressive vigilante cop who believes the end justifies the means. But the “end” always occurs in the service of justice, so readers can support him when he takes the law into his own hands. Plus, the man is witty and charming. What’s not to love?

Same with Sue Grafton’s private eye Kinsey Millhone. We admire her intelligence, her cleverness, her loyalty—and her quirks. She is far from perfect, far from sweet, and a bit damaged by her past. But she strives for insight, and she journeys toward what is right, good, and fair.

When I consider the real world, it’s much the same. The people I’m drawn to exhibit depth, eccentricity, and passion. Though I would cringe if they went around killing criminals in the name of justice, I can sense that potential in many of them (you know who you are). I like them not because they’re perfect, but because they’re always trying to be better. And they have a sense of humor. For me, that’s critical.

Following my analysis of likability, I re-examined the protagonist of my own Callie Cassidy Mysteries, as well as Shelley Shore, protagonist of the upcoming Seahorse Bay Mysteries. I’m pleased to say that I believe they fit the bill. I find them tenacious, humorous, flawed, and interesting. They have made—and will continue to make—mistakes, but they own those mistakes and strive for personal growth. Their friends and families rally around them and genuinely like them. As do I.

I hope readers like them, too.

How do you define likability in characters? Who are some of your favorites?

The Callie Cassidy Mystery series is available on Amazon Kindle, Kindle Unlimited, and paperback.

***
Lori Roberts Herbst writes the Callie Cassidy Mysteries, a cozy mystery series set in Rock Creek Village, Colorado, and the soon-to-be-released Seahorse Bay Mysteries, set in a Texas cruise port town. To find out more and to sign up for her newsletter, go to www.lorirobertsherbst.com

Literary Chronological Confusion, Oh My! By Susan Van Kirk

2026-09-03T03:00:00.000-04:00

This is a blog post guaranteed to confuse you. I’m already confused, and I’m the writer. (Also, this post has spoilers if you haven’t read the Endurance mysteries but plan to.)

When I began writing my Endurance mystery series about Grace Kimball, a retired English teacher, it began with Three May Keep a Secret, and the setting was the small town of Endurance from July through October of 2011. So far, so good. Unlike other writers who knew about series arcs, I simply wrote one book and hoped it would sell. It did. Now what?

I decided if I were going to write a series, I would challenge my mind with something different in each book. The second story was a novella called The Locket, so I had to figure out how to write a novella. Marry in Haste, the third story and second novel, had a double plot, a bit over one hundred years apart, and now I had to scratch my head with how to intertwine the plots and imagine an Endurance in 1893 and 2012. This led to book four, Death Takes No Bribes, where I took Grace back to the high school where she taught and from which she retired. In book five, The Witch’s Child, I moved into the paranormal. Totally different. That story ended with Jeff Maitlin, whom Grace met in book one, asking her to marry him. The most recent book, Fabric of Lies, had Jeff and Grace married, a decidedly different vibe when it came to the relationships among the characters. Whew! But it also had two flashback chapters where readers met her deceased first husband, Roger. Oh, he was alive back then. By the end of this novel, it was only the summer of 2014. Six stories took place in four years. I think people in Endurance should have moved elsewhere with all those murders.

Now what? Time to really confuse my mind with a new adventure that would have to fit around the framework of the years I’ve created with the series. I’m writing two more novellas to fit with The Locket, and I’ll publish them myself in one book this fall. It will be called From the Casebook of TJ Sweeney and will have three of her cases, ending with The Locket. Stupidly, I didn’t write these in chronological order, so that’s where the confusion begins.

The third novella, “The Locket,” is already written and published only as an ebook. The second novella will take place during TJ Sweeney’s twentieth high school reunion. TJ graduated from high school in 1989, college in 1993, became a police officer shortly after that, and a detective in 2000. (This means she is in college when Fiona Mackenzie is born, leading to the story of The Witch’s Child.)

This second novella is called “Two Graves.” High school reunions are often bittersweet, but TJ’s sets in motion a dangerous plot. Gosh, not everyone liked their high school experience, did they? This novella will take place before any of the Endurance novels. That’s easy to keep straight.

I was halfway through the second novella about the class reunion when I realized The Depot, a restaurant run by Grace’s former students, Abbey and Camilla, had not opened yet. So, I had to remove that and change my restaurant to a pizza place called the Saucy Slice. And how old was Grace in 2009? She hadn’t retired yet, nor had she met Jeff Maitlin. Were her children still at home? No, the third child left in 1998. Had “The Locket” happened yet? No, it was two years later. See how complicated it can become when you go back in a series instead of straight forward?

Time out for a time check. “The Locket” takes place in November 2011. That means it fits right between Three May Keep a Secret in July 2011 and Marry in Haste in January 2012.

I have no title yet for the third novella, which will be the first story in the book. It’s a prequel because it takes place in TJ’s third semester of college, which would be fall to winter, 1991. (About this time Conrad Folger and Emily Peterson got married, setting up the disaster that will result in Marry in Haste.) In 1991, Grace is still teaching but all three of her children are in junior high and high school. This means I’ll have to imagine them since they’ve only been mentioned in the novels. TJ has left Endurance for the state university and is known as Theresa Sweeney. She’s an English Literature major, hoping to follow in Grace’s footsteps and become a college professor of English.

What?

Then how did she become TJ Sweeney, renowned Endurance police detective? This novella will answer that question.

If I’m correct on all these dates, here’s the order: “Unnamed college story” is in Fall 1991;“Two Graves” the second novella, is in Summer 2009; Three May Keep a Secret takes place in July 2011; “The Locket” is in November 2011; Marry in Haste is in January 2012; Death Takes No Bribes is in early March 2012; The Witch’s Child is in May 2012; and Fabric of Lies is in Summer 2014.

Right now I have five different documents containing timelines. I think it may be time to put them all together. Do you ever notice errors writers make in their books because they’re off on a date or time?

Susan Van Kirk is the author of six Endurance Mysteries beginning with Three May Keep a Secret. Her standalone mystery, A Death at Tippitt Pond, was followed by the Art Center Mysteries beginning with Death in a Pale Hue. The third book of the trilogy was nominated for the Anthony Award for Best Paranormal Mystery of 2025. She is a member of Mystery Writers of America, Sisters in Crime, and is past president of the Guppy Chapter of SinC. Her website: susanvankirk.com

The Layers of Revising

2026-09-02T02:00:00.000-04:00

by Maddie Day/Edith Maxwell

I’m beginning the last month of revising my 41^st mystery, due October 1, so I thought I’d talk about what that whole process is like for me.

All writers know that finishing the first draft is only the beginning. I plot very little, and I like to charge through the first draft and get the story onto the page. To that end, I leave lots of notes to myself in square brackets throughout the manuscript to check for facts, for research, for consistency with earlier books in the series. My first revision pass is going through and resolving all those.

Then I do passes for plot holes, sometimes writing several new scenes to flesh out an idea or a subplot. I go through the book checking each scene for hooks at the start and end. I make another pass to make sure I have brought in all the senses, but only in the service of the story. I print out the book and read straight through, marking up whatever I notice, then I put in all my green-in self-edits. I see things so differently on paper than on the screen. For me, this is a valuable and necessary step.

I check for elegant language, again only in the service of the story, and make sure any descriptions of people relate to who they really are. And I run a spelling and grammar check.

All that happened a month ago. When the book is as polished as it can be – or when my eyes glaze over as I’m looking at it – I send it off to an excellent independent editor (Amy in Wisconsin).

She returns it with changes and suggestions marked in Track Changes, and she also includes an editorial letter. The letter includes all the hard stuff: “We need more about what happened to Bella.” “We need more about the beef between Stu and Rick.” “Deanna feels a bit underutilized.” “We need more interaction with the Broads and Michelle.” And so on. Amy asks questions and sometimes makes suggestions on how to implement the comment.

My process is first to go through the Track Changes stuff. I work in Scrivener, so I have the Word document open next to my Scrivener project for the book. As I go, I knock off all the easy fixes, things like the wrong name, adding missing quotation marks, clarifying language, and other bits.

Then I take a deep breath and start addressing the harder edits. What was Rick’s reason for being angry, anyway? I have no idea, but I either have to come up with one or change/remove the scene where he’s irate. And on and on.

What I’ll be doing in the next month is the hardest part of the whole process. The book is done. I’m ready to move on to the next one. Any big changes I make can ripple through the story. I often have to dig deep to figure out how to address each issue.

I’m sure it’s hard partly because I didn’t do this work before I started writing, as some authors do. I know my protagonist pretty well, but I might not have spent enough time getting acquainted with my villains and other major cast characters. This particular book, Ruthie Drew Cleans Up, is also the first in a new series, so it’s necessary work.

But I can do it. I have a month left before the due date, and except for a few quick family visits (occasional Grammy day care with my grandgirl, which I love), I don’t have any travel or book events scheduled for September. I know I can meet my deadline by showing up for work every day by seven.

After I turn in the book to my Kensington Publishing editor, I might receive a few high-level comments from him, but for some books he simply writes, “It looks great. No changes needed. I’ve put through the payment.” Yay! A few months later I’ll get copyedits, and sometime after that proof pages to pore over and make last-chance tiny fixes (but nothing that would cause page numbers to change).

I go through this process for every book I write. It happened a year ago for my new book, Murder at the Toy Soldier.Despite all these passes and eyeballs on the manuscript, someone (often my keen-eyed sister in Ottawa) invariably reports a typo or a consistency error. Gah. I’m grateful my editor is willing to make the change in the ebook and in the next printing. I haven’t heard of any errors yet for the new book, which released last week. Fingers crossed!

Readers: Do you report errors in books to the author? Authors, how do you feel about being notified of a flaw in your beloved book that you worked so hard on? Is your editing process appreciably different from mine?

Murder at the Toy Soldier: Cape Cod bike shop owner Mac Almeida is extra busy during a cold, wet February as she and Tim do their best as working parents of a preschooler and a baby. With Ella’s fourth birthday approaching, Mac uses her lunch break to shop for a gift at the Toy Soldier. Behind the counter is Zia Carven, a young woman Mac recognizes. Mac finds a gift Ella will love and Zia offers to gift wrap it. Mac plans to pick it up after work, but when she returns, she finds Zia slumped over the counter, dead, with dried blood on a toy rifle nearby.

Mac’s mother, Astra, confides that she’d been trying to help Zia, and now the police want to speak with her, which worries Mac. Then Mac discovers that Zia had been in town searching for her birth mother, which only multiplies the questions—and the suspects. One thing is certain: Mac and the Cozy Capers book group will have to double down to find a killer who isn’t playing around . . .

Maddie Day writes the Cozy Capers Book Group Mysteries, the Cece Barton Mysteries, and the Dot and Amelia Mysteries. As Agatha-Award winning Edith Maxwell, she writes Agatha Award-winning historical mysteries and Agatha-nominated short crime fiction. She’s a member of MWA and a proud lifetime member of Sisters in Crime. Day/Maxwell lives north of Boston with her beau and their cat Martin, where she writes, cooks, gardens, wastes time on Facebook, and delights in Grammy duties. Find Edith and Maddie at mysteryloverskitchen.com and at edithmaxwell.com.

The lady doth protest too much, methinks

2026-09-01T01:00:00.000-04:00

By James M. Jackson

“The lady doth protest too much, methinks.”
~ Queen Gertrude in Hamlet, Act III, Scene II

I teach a two-week class on story structure. One of the key early lessons is that every good story has two parallel structures: one for plot and the other for character development. Today, I want to talk about character development.

I’ve always been jaded at protestations by politicians about how bad or evil someone else or some other group is. It seems to me that more often than not, fear-mongering or hate is as much inner-directed as directed toward the “offensive” individual or group.

Without naming names, recall the politicians who have been most vituperative describing homosexuals, who were themselves gay. Those most praising the sanctity of marriage were serial philanderers. Those loudest about the need to drain the swamp of corruption are the most corrupt.

Those are perhaps egregious examples of politicians gaslighting the public to hide their misdeeds. Somewhat more subtle are individuals who state what they in fact believe, but they increase their intensity because they know they exhibit the same characteristics they wish to eliminate in the world.

That understanding has taught me to listen carefully when someone sounds off because it can provide clues about what things they don’t like about themselves. This applies equally to people and fictional characters.

It took me a while, but I realized Niki often espoused her appreciation for teamwork and lambasting those who looked out primarily for their own best interests. She points to her participation in team sports, particularly her college championship softball team, on which she played second base, to demonstrate that she practices what she preaches.

And yet, softball is one of the most individualistic team sports. Yes, teamwork is required to turn a double play or to sacrifice bunt or hit behind the runner. But it’s you as the batter against the pitcher and catcher; it’s you who has to catch the ball. Her other high-school team involved target shooting—again a solo event.

She joined one of the most team-oriented law-enforcement agencies in the world—the FBI—and became an undercover operator. She relied on the team—until she went undercover. Then, she was by herself and wanted it just that way.

In Niki Unbound, the final book in the Niki Undercover Thriller trilogy, she learns of a plot to kill the president and disrupt the presidential succession. And she cannot stop it herself. If the enemy is to be defeated, it will require a team's coordinated skills and actions. This realization means Niki must address part of her shadow that she has danced around and actively tried to suppress: she does not trust other people to the extent necessary to be a true team player.

Her challenge in this story is to find some way to change so that when the pressure becomes intense, she maintains her trust in her team. Or will she revert to what’s worked for forty years and go it alone?

Sound interesting? Niki Unbound is available in paperback, Kindle (and free to read on Kindle Unlimited), and as an audiobook on Audible.

Have you ever caught yourself protesting a little too loudly against something you quietly recognize in yourself? For me, it’s lamenting people wasting money on crap with no value other than a quick endorphin boost. Any confessions?

* * *

James M. Jackson writes justice-driven thrillers with brains and bite, including the Niki Undercover Thriller trilogy and the Seamus McCree series. To learn more information about Jim and his books, check out his website, https://jamesmjackson.com. You can sign up for his newsletter (and get a novella and two free short stories featuring his protagonists).

Thoughts on Writing by Nancy L. Eady

2026-08-31T01:00:00.000-04:00

The quote, the way I heard it, was “All writers hate writing; all writers love having written,” attributed to Gloria Steinem. Today, a little investigation courtesy of Google has revealed that the quote is attributed to Dorothy Parker in its original form, which was “I hate writing. I love having written.” Even further investigation, however, shows that no record exists proving Dorothy Parker ever said or wrote the quote attributed to her.

Regardless of who said it, I disagree. I admit I have days when writing is a chore, when it is all I can do to keep my fingers typing out words, while my brain keeps encouraging me with helpful comments like, “This is the worst writing you’ve ever done.” But there are other days, too. Days when I enter “the zone,” and the words fly from my fingers to the screen, barely keeping up with my brain. It feels like flying. On those days, writing is not a chore.

The other fallacy in the statement is that each author has individual preferences for what they like about the writing process. Some people love writing the first draft but suffer through the editing that comes next. Other people struggle to crank out the first draft but love the magic they find in the editing process, as they sculpt their raw material into a polished, readable work. And there are others, nuts like me, who have days and times when they enjoy both.

Writing and editing remind me of counted cross-stitch, a craft I enjoy. In counted cross-stitch, the crafter takes a fabric such as linen or Aida, with a regular, discernible weave to it, chooses a chart of a picture marked up with symbols to stand for certain colors of thread, and then builds the picture on the fabric with tiny “x” stitches by following the chart. I love the building block process of counted cross-stitch, when I’m filling in the basic colors as indicated in the chart. But there is also magic in the finishing details, when back-stitching (a way of stitching straight lines) is used to create additional perspective based upon what structures in the picture are outlined, and in what colors. Writing the rough draft of a story or novel is like filling in the basic building blocks in cross-stitch, and editing adds the finishing details that make the story a marketable project.

There are parts of writing as a business that I have found few, if any, writers love. “I am writing a synopsis today,” said no writer with glee ever. However, the one solid, basic fact you learn in law school is that every rule has an exception, so I’m sure someone is reading this post in disbelief, thinking “But, Nancy, don’t you know the synopsis is the best part?”

All of which leads me to wonder, fellow readers, what you think of the quote. Do you hate writing but love having written? Do you prefer bringing that first draft into the world, or is your favorite part when you edit that first draft repeatedly to make it the best work you can present? Or is there some other part of writing that you cherish more?

Literary Citizenry

2026-08-30T03:00:00.000-04:00

By Robert T. Kelley

When I was struggling to finish my first book, I didn’t think much about the publishing world except how I was going to get into it. But the goodwill and good work of my fellow authors was all around me, supporting me and cheering me on.

There’s so much negative press right now about publishing being dead, about kids not reading whole books, about AI replacing us as writers (and maybe as humans), yet I couldn’t be more excited about writing and the business of writing.

This weekend I was at Killer Nashville (my first time!), and I couldn’t help but think about how important conferences have been to me as a writer. Everyone finds inspiration in different places, but for me, writing conferences were a critical support structure for my development as a writer.

A Maine crime writing friend said to me that they didn’t go to conferences until they were published, that they didn’t feel like they belonged there yet. But for me, it was attending them that helped me feel like I belonged. I’m very, very fortunate to be one of the members of a crime writing group that blogs as Maine Crime Writers, but I knew this crew long before I wrote with them. They volunteer to run Maine Crime Wave, New England Crime Bake, various readings, showcases, and bookselling events. And they’re regular people. Regular generous people.

Someone on a panel with me this weekend at Killer Nashville made a point that I think we need to revisit with regularity. We are not competitors. Your great book just makes my book better. We all started as readers; we are all still readers. We love losing ourselves in a book. And as writers we love throwing our story out into the world. But there’s even more we can do. We can bring other authors along with us.

Almost all the conferences I attend are run by volunteers: writers who want to share the wealth, who want to feature friends and fellow authors, who want to dig in and talk about their craft. What could be better?

There are only so many hours in a day, and we have to guard our writing time like a dragon sitting on a pile of gold (admittedly, in publishing the pile is very, very small). But I’m finding the literary citizenry work to be almost as rewarding as the writing.

This past year after my novel came out, I’ve served on panels at conferences, on committees organizing conferences, set up talks with other authors, and just got my first request to blurb a colleague’s book. All of it is fun, but more importantly, all of it matters.

I was under the impression that the first book would be really hard then they would get much easier. The path gets more familiar, true, but the hill is just as high each time. But the journey is made so much easier when you accompany, and are accompanied by, your fellow writers.

Set up talks at libraries with other writers. Volunteer to help plan conferences you love. Review good books. Do things that support other writers, that give back to readers, that make the whole enterprise better and more accessible. That’s how we make sure that the publishing world still works for readers and writers.

It’s a gift we writers give ourselves.

Robert T. Kelley writes high-stakes, high-velocity thrillers in which power, privilege, and peril collide. He is the author of short stories and novels, including the technology thriller Raven, a finalist for the Maine Literary Awards. Formerly the publisher of the literary journal, The Maine Review, Rob now regularly writes on the Maine Crime Writers blog. He received his undergraduate degree in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Missouri-Rolla and his PhD in English from Indiana University. He lives with his wife, author Margot Anne Kelley, in Midcoast Maine and Boston. You can find him at https://www.roberttkelley.com.

Where do we get our ideas? It’s complicated

2026-08-29T03:00:00.000-04:00

by Maureen Milliken

The newspaper article wasn’t anything exciting. Someone in New Hampshire was running out of time to claim their $100,000 lottery win. I read the story half-hoping that I'd bought a Powerball ticket in Franklin, New Hampshire, last September and somehow forgot about it and the winner was me. Even though I haven’t bought a Powerball ticket in a while and can’t remember the last time I was in Franklin, New Hampshire. I’d moved on to wondering if the person was just playing some kind of sick game, waiting for the last minute to cash in, half-admiring their steely control. Or maybe they bought it and just forgot, a sadder story, but more likely.

Then it happened. If you write mysteries, you may be familiar with the feeling. That out-of-nowhere blast of inspiration. The excitement of seeing a story behind a few words, even if you don’t know what the story is yet.

No, it wasn’t the topic of the story itself, but this paragraph halfway through the story: “This wouldn’t be the largest unclaimed prize in New Hampshire lottery history. In 1987, a Tri-State Megabucks player never stepped forward to claim their $2 million jackpot…”

We’re often asked where we get our ideas. Depending on my energy level, my answer is “everywhere,” or it’s a more elaborate explanation of how ideas can come from anything – a newspaper article, a conversation overheard in the grocery store, a nugget excavated from a long otherwise boring story a friend is telling you.

I can never quite explain, though, the reality of it. That something that may seem mundane, or boring, sparks something deep in my brain and explodes. That feeling the second I read or hear something that it’s the start of something. There’s a story there. It’s big. It’s good. It’s exciting.

With the lottery story, I’m not sure what it is yet – I haven’t thought much about it and don’t want to get derailed from the book I’m writing now. That’s okay. That gives it time to form and grow and get tattoos and baggage.

I took a screen shot (I read my newspapers on my iPad) and marked it up with “mystery plot!!!!” in red. It’ll be there when I need it.

That’s not how all ideas happen, of course. There are different levels of ideas. There are the big shining book-writing-motivating ones, like the uncashed lottery ticket. Those don’t happen all the time, probably a good thing since I can only take so much excitement.

There are also the smaller ones that can work for a scene or character development.

The same day I read about the uncashed lottery ticket, I read in one of my local papers (yes, I do read a lot of newspapers, a blog post for another day), about a neighbor feud in which one drove a log skidder into the side of the other’s house, which caused about half of it to collapse. Sure, that’s something someone in one of my books could do.

Boom. Another screen shot.

One day a few months ago I was at the transfer station (the dump, for those of you from away) and a sheriff’s deputy pulled up behind a woman who was sorting her recycling. He tried to serve her some papers, which she ignored, so he put them in the front seat of her pickup truck. He was being kind of a jerk, taunting and harassing her as she sorted her recycling into the bins and ignored him. It was like a whole scene from a book, with characters I hadn’t written yet. I played it over in my head until I got home and wrote it down.

It’s in the same folder on my computer with some other scenes like that, of characters who I haven’t written yet.

The inspiration for the book I’m working on now was sparked by the story of a guy who was making a movie in Maine back in the 1970s. It was his lifelong dream, but wasn’t going very well. Then someone killed him. It’s not so much the ready-made plot that struck me as the poignancy. The guy had quit his job, moved his family halfway across the country and put his marriage at risk to live a dream. Even though it wasn’t working out, he didn’t seem to know that yet. Then some jerk killed him for a really crappy reason.

It actually took me a long time to work a plot out, but that wasn’t the point of the inspiration. It was the feeling of it that struck me.

The thing is, I know there are some days I would’ve read that paragraph about the uncashed lottery ticket and thought, “Gee, that’s too bad,” and moved on.

There are days when I would’ve read about the splitter being run into the house and said, “That’s Maine for you,” and turned the page.

Maybe on a different day I would’ve watched the deputy harassing the woman at the transfer station and felt annoyance and nothing else.

The murdered movie-maker? Maybe in a different mood, I would’ve thought it was a great topic for the podcast my sister and I do and that’s as far as it would’ve gone.

When someone asks me where I get my ideas, sometimes I toy with the idea of explaining all of this. How sometimes there’s a convergence of thought and feeling that comes together in my brain and heart and blows something up into an idea, big or small. Other times, though, ideas pass by without me catching them.

I never do try to explain it, though. I know from hard experience that the stuff going on in my head doesn’t translate well.

Instead I just say, “They’re everywhere. If I’m lucky, I catch a few.”

Maureen Milliken bio

Maureen Milliken is the award-winning author of the Bernadette “Bernie” O’Dea mystery series. The fourth book in the series, “Dying for News,” won the 2025 Maine Literary Award for Crime Fiction. The fifth book in the series, “News From Away,” is due out later this year. She has also been co-host since 2016 of the Crime & Stuff podcast with her sister, Maine artist Rebecca Milliken. She lives in Central Maine.

Always on Nights and Weekends by Nancy L. Eady

2026-08-28T01:00:00.000-04:00

As I write this at 8:30 at night, I am waiting for my daughter to get back from the pet store, gearing up for the fight I know we’re going to have as soon as she gets back.

It’s not that she’s coming home with a pet we haven’t given her permission to have (been there, done that, with three rabbits, a guinea pig, a kitten, two frogs and four hermit crabs over the last four years), but one of our three dogs, Daisy, cut the top of her paw between two of her toes this evening. After some searching, we found the cone we keep on hand. It looked pretty shabby. In fact, it’s really not a cone anymore, but kind of a misshapen mountain peak with a narrow caldera on top.

My daughter is convinced we need to toss Daisy into the car and head for the 24/7 emergency vet about an hour away. I am not. Daisy’s not bleeding out; she’s not crying in pain; she’s not even limping. Yes, the cut looks a little deep, but there’s no bone showing. I’ve sent my daughter to get us another cone and some other supplies. When Kayla gets back, we’ll probably have a fight over whether to take Daisy to the emergency vet. Vets cost a lot as it is; emergency vets are even more expensive.

My husband agrees with me that we are going to bandage the paw, put the cone on the dog and then see what things are like in the morning. (He had to work tonight.) If Daisy’s doing bad at that point, he’ll be able to drop her off at the vet’s office then. Hopefully the dog won’t need the vet at all.

We have used the emergency vet before. Years ago, with a different set of dogs, one of our dogs tore the ear on the other dog by stepping on it while they were playing. Of course, this happened on a Saturday morning. That was the day we learned that ears are very vascular, and they don’t bandage well at all. To fix a torn ear properly, the vet has to do full surgery, with anesthesia. That was that particular dog’s first Very Expensive Vet Bill. The same dog’s second Very Expensive Vet Bill came the afternoon she decided to eat a box of golden raisins. Grapes are toxic to dogs, and raisins are concentrated grapes. I got home that day from work about 5:45, took one look at the box of raisins, and threw two dogs, one 10-year-old and myself into the car, high-tailing it to the emergency vet about 30 minutes away. By the time they reached her, she was already past the narrow window a vet usually has to get the raisins out before they cause serious harm. But this particular dog truly lived a charmed life. She was saved from the raisins by a sock. We have no idea how long the sock had been in her stomach, but it pre-dated the raisins. This accidentally "medicinal" sock blocked the raisins from being absorbed into her body. Even the vet tech was giggling about that one.

I really don’t know why emergencies are so inconsiderate; you’d think at least once in a lifetime they would occur at a convenient hour. Once you make it through them, though, they certainly make great story fodder!

And for the record, there was no fight – instead, my sweet daughter got the cone on the dog and then took the misshapen cone and put it on herself to try to help the dog not be afraid. It didn’t work, but it was a noble effort.

Do you have any emergency vet story, emergency room visit, or mechanical failure you have been able to use in your writing?

Five Sure-Fire Ways to Kill Your Writing Career by Connie Berry

2026-08-27T08:30:00.000-04:00

Writing is a Craft and a Career

My all-time favorite craft-of-writing book is Chris Roerden’s Don’t Sabotage Your Submission (published originally as Don’t Murder Your Manuscript). I learned so much from that book as a new writer that I’ve recommended it to others many times. The book covers no fewer than twenty-four newbie traps to avoid, including Bloody Backstory, Fatal Flashback, Dying Dialogue, and Killed by Cliché.

While Roerden’s focus is producing the best manuscript you can, I’d like to submit a few lessons I’ve learned about writing as a career. There are more ways to kill a budding career as an author than trying to sell a novel that isn’t ready for prime time.

Five sure-fire ways to kill your writing career:

1. Write in a vacuum.

Is your attitude “I don’t have time for all that. Just let me write.” The English poet John Dunne famously said “No man is an island.” That is certainly true for budding writers. We need the encouragement and inspiration of others. We need to learn and grow. We need to see beyond our own horizons. We need friends and colleagues.

2. Refuse to take advice.

Advice can be devastating, and writers can feel defensive. “What does she know??” The first time I got feedback from a developmental editor, I joked that I was on suicide watch. I wasn’t, but it was definitely a shock. Only when I finally took her advice and the advice of other writers along the same lines did I move forward in my career. Don’t assume you know best, even if you have an advanced degree in literature and writing as I did. You don’t know what you don’t know.

3. Treat other writers as competitors instead of colleagues.

Are you jealous when someone else gets a writing contract? Do you fail to give someone a five-star review because it feels like you’re aiding the enemy? My favorite motto from the writing community is: No one has to fail in order for me to succeed. That deserves to be cross-stitched and hung above our computer screen.

4. Defend yourself when you get a bad review.

This can be hard. When someone levels a criticism, everything in us rises up in defense—especially when the criticism is unfair or unwarranted. I got a one-star review once because the reader read politics into my book. Which was not only untrue but bizarre. Everything in me wanted to defend myself. But I didn’t. Replying in a snarky or self-defensive way to a bad review will only hurt your reputation.

5. Give up when success doesn’t happen quickly.

You know this one, don’t you? Winston Churchill, who knew a thing or two about discouragement, once said, “Never give in, never, never, never, never—in nothing, great or small, large or petty—never give in except to convictions of honour and good sense." The only manuscript you can submit is the one you finished.

How to give yourself the best chance of success

Simply take my five examples and flip them around:

1. Seek community.
2. Be willing to take advice.
3. Treat other writers as colleagues.
4. Let bad reviews die their miserable deaths.
5. Persevere.

I’d love to hear your thoughts!

An Interview With James M. Jackson

2026-08-26T02:00:00.000-04:00

by Grace Topping

Niki Unbound

Devastating intel. No one left to trust. A government that wants her erased. But walking away isn’t in Niki’s DNA. All her working life, she’s disappeared into false lives to keep her country safe. Now that country has cut her loose—no sponsor, no support, no return. Then she learns of an imminent decapitation strike designed to seize the presidency—and no way to stop it without re-entering a world where hundreds of armed felons know her face. Knowing it's her or no one, Niki builds her team: four generations of family and friends with skills no one expected. The Justice Department's vast web is pulling threads—and each one leads to the team. Subpoenas land. Laptops seized. Questions sharpen. The people who volunteered to stop the coup are the ones now suffering. Can Niki stop the traitors and shield those who helped her—or will saving her country cost her everyone, including herself? www.jamesmjackson.com

Author James M. Jackson spent a career as an actuary, dealing with math, statistics, and money theory. But after reading his latest political thriller, Niki Unbound, I’ve begun to wonder if Jim was an actuary by day and something else entirely by night. Read Niki Unbound and see what you think. But be warned. It’s a page-turner that will have you looking at your cell phone and computer differently afterwards.

Welcome, Jim.

Thanks so much for having me today, Grace.

From your previous books in this trilogy, readers recognize that Niki is an undercover name for Ashley Pendergast Prescott. In Niki Unbound, why did you identify her frequently throughout the book using both names?

Names can be complicated, can’t they? That’s especially true if you’ve lived more than a decade of your life bouncing between much of your “real” self as Ashley and your undercover life as Niki.

Consider an author who has written under a pseudonym. Most people know them by their pen name; friends know them by their real name; and really good friends know them by a nickname. That’s the same with Ashley/Niki, but it’s more complicated because some of her friends (Seamus McCree and his son) were around when the Niki persona came into existence and fondly use that as a nickname for her (and that’s passed on to other members of the family).

Ashley reminds herself to shift into her Niki mindset. How different is Ashley from her alter ego, Niki?

Over the years, despite Ashley wanting to be unaffected by her undercover life, the two personas have blurred. That’s not surprising. Psychologists and philosophers before them have long understood that our actions (or those we actively visualize) will eventually change our thoughts and emotions. That’s the psychology behind the common expression to “fake it until you make it.” It’s an issue she actively experiences and tries to fight against by naming the Niki role before immersing herself in it.

With three female primary/support characters (Niki/Ashley, Lisa, and Cindy), what was the greatest challenge, if any, you faced writing female characters?

I’ve been writing female characters for years, so that isn’t a huge challenge. However, in reading an early draft, I realized Lisa sounded like another version of Niki. I revisited Lisa’s past (hacker extraordinaire, the kind of person who commands a room) and reviewed every scene she was in to make sure that personality shone.

You write that Lisa Latoya was the youngest brevetted general since the Civil War. What is a brevetted general?

A brevet is a commission that gives a military officer a higher nominal rank than their actual rank so they can act as though they had the higher rank. Consider it a promotion on paper and in practice, but not in fact. If you don’t want to learn more about brevetted generals, skip to the next question, ’cause I’m about to explain in detail.

The Army has one of the most rigid pecking orders you can imagine. Not only are there various ranks, but the date an individual obtains that rank determines which of two officers of the same rank is superior. That works fine until there is a crisis. During the Civil War, the crisis was that the Army expanded so quickly they needed high-level officers to command armies, but they didn’t want to lock in those ranks because they believed the Army’s size was only temporary. For example, George Armstrong Custer graduated from West Point in 1861 as a second lieutenant in the regular army. By age 23, he was a brevetted Brigadier General and ended the war as a brevetted Major General (two stars). After the war, he lost those brevetted promotions and resumed life in the regular army as a captain (and died a lieutenant colonel).

In Lisa’s case, the Army needed someone at the rank of Brigadier General to run the “Red Team” group of hackers tasked with trying to break into electronic systems before the enemy finds the weak links. But since Lisa had not spent the required time-in-service to be that rank, they used the brevet system. Lisa’s promotion is a fictional invention because, as I understand it, Congress changed the law in 1922 to prohibit brevetted promotions.

Tom decides not to become part of the team, saying that Niki and Seamus’s plans go against his core beliefs. Because of his beliefs, shouldn’t Seamus and Niki be concerned that Tom might turn them in?

Tom was a partner with Lisa and Patrick McCree right after college and has the same hacker mentality as they do. He’s just gone 100% legit. But he surmises how Lisa plans to use a botnet (see below); he doesn’t know it or witness it. No reason for him to squeal, and even if he did, he couldn’t prove anything, so they aren’t worried.

You write very realistically about computers and communications technology. It almost makes me want to resort to smoke signals to ensure confidentiality. Is the technological capability you include in this book real, or is some of it your creation?

The electronic sleuthing capabilities the characters use are real. Their applications are fictional. Your mother may have told you something similar to what mine told me seventy years ago: if you don’t want someone to know, don’t do it. In today’s wired world, it’s excellent advice. And smoke signals won’t work; someone’s camera will catch them and AI will interpret them in short order.

What is a botnet? And what is a Hail Mary anonymous call?

A botnet is a network of internet-connected devices infected with malware that allows a bot-herder (aka cybercriminal) to control them remotely. The owners of the devices are usually unaware. Botnets are often used for distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks where the bot-herder overwhelms a computer, network, or server with traffic, spam, and phishing campaigns, etc.

In this story, they are used to create the equivalent of a supercomputer, distributing massive work over an extensive network of “captured” devices.

“Hail Mary,” when it doesn’t mean a traditional Christian prayer, refers to a last-ditch, desperate effort. In football, it’s often a 60-yard pass into the end-zone with the hope that one of the good guys will come down with it. In the novel, it’s making phone calls hoping someone will believe them about the decapitation event before it’s too late.

You have a surprising twist at the end. Did you plan it all along, or did you decide on it as you pantsed along?

A funny thing happened as I was creating the first draft. I realized my subconscious had all along been plotting the Niki Undercover Thriller series as a trilogy. I’d spread the breadcrumbs, sown the seeds, pick your metaphor—they all pointed to the resolution resulting in the twist you refer to.

That’s one advantage of being a pantser: my intuition works way ahead of my fingers on the keyboard. The disadvantage is that you don’t know until suddenly you do know.

The details in Niki Unbound were so involved I just shook my head in wonder as to how you kept it all straight. Was this book more of a challenge for you than your others?

The most challenging part for me was knowing the story’s ending before I wrote it. I’ve never experienced that before, and I felt a lot of pressure to do it justice. I shouldn’t have worried so much because by the time I wrote the ending, my pantsing self came through with a few tweaks that made the story even stronger.

The details arrive after the first draft, and I attempt to ensure everything holds together. In read-throughs, I keep track of Chekhov’s gun rule: you must use every item shown in a story later, and its corollary that every item used later in the story must be foreshadowed. I despise deus ex machina and try to avoid any hint of it in my stories.

In addition to your writing, you spend a lot of time editing things like anthologies and teaching writing classes. Is there one among them that you enjoy more than the others?

I enjoy helping other people. I’ve found the best way I can do that is through teaching with a personal touch, where students have homework, and I can provide personalized feedback.

What is the most valuable thing you’ve learned since you started writing?

I can’t do it alone. It takes a community, of which Writers Who Kill plays a central role.

So with the conclusion of the Niki trilogy, what’s next?

That is the question. For the next few weeks, I’ll apply my energy and time to marketing, family visits, and teaching an online class on story structure. By then, I’ll have a focus. I have a nonfiction book for writers that I would like to complete, and I have the stirrings for two novels. The best way to keep in touch with my plans is to join my Readers Group Newsletter (and get a free story or three).

Thank you, Jim. I look forward to whatever project you take on next.

Grace Topping is the author of the Laura Bishop Mystery Series.

Yinzer Love by Martha Reed

2026-08-25T05:30:00.000-04:00

The Mary Roberts Rinehart Pittsburgh chapter of Sisters in Crime recently announced an open call for their next anthology titled: “Gold Bridges, Dark Rivers.” Oddly, I’ve never written anything set in my hometown, so I sharpened my pencil and got down to it.

Pittsburgh has so many idiosyncrasies I didn’t know which one to pick. The most glaringly obvious one is Pittsburghese, our local dialect, which is grammatically incomprehensible, impossible to decipher if you’re not already fluent, and sort of like having a secret insider handshake. When two Pittsburghers meet and slip into it, you know they’re not jagoffs.

Here’s a quick primer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0OHGYNud5Go

Since I wanted to write a story that readers could actually comprehend, I decided to skip that one.

Next was some consideration on how to connect with readers. Food is always a good emotional hook – just look at the plethora of mysteries that include recipes in their back pages. Then came the difficulty of explaining pierogies (delicious usually potato and cheese filled dumplings), haluski (cabbage and noodles), a traditional Pittsburgh grilled salad (mixed greens with ranch dressing topped by French fries), or a Primanti Brothers corned beef sandwich that includes a fried egg.

Nope. I began to panic. Sports teams? The Stillers, the Buccos, or the Pens? What topic could I possibly use to lure readers into being curious about my native land?

Going nuclear, I settled on Three Rivers, ground zero and where Pittsburgh began.

In Colonial American times, George Washington recommended using the Forks of the Ohio River as a strategic military location. In 1803 Lewis and Clark floated past The Point when they launched their expedition, but local history goes way beyond that. Prehistoric Indigenous people heaped a mound at nearby McKee’s Rocks which existed until the powers that be bulldozed it to make way for a cement plant.

Don’t get me started. The way we casually discard our history makes me cross my eyes and slap my forehead. Wait a second. There’s a hook I’m passionate about. Magically, the prologue from William Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet popped into mind:

“Two households, both alike in dignity,
In fair Verona, where we lay our scene,
From ancient grudge break to new mutiny,
Where civil blood makes civil hands unclean.
From forth the fatal loins of these two foes
A pair of star-cross'd lovers take their life;”

Inspired, I started to noodle around with the idea of two star-crossed lovers living on opposite Ohio riverbanks and whose families were historic enemies. That gave me the story’s base, the framework to build from, and my short story “Sacred Drums” was born.

The anthology’s projected publication date is year-end 2026. I hope you’ll look for it. Meanwhile, if you’d like to read my other free read short fiction, they’re posted on my website: https://www.reedmenow.com/short-fiction.

Enjoy and let me know what you think!

Filling the Blank Page by Nancy L. Eady

2026-08-24T01:00:00.000-04:00

There is nothing worse than knowing that you have a deadline and staring at the blank page (or screen) and having absolutely no idea what to say. I mean zilch.

What guidelines do I use in deciding what to write for this blog? My first requirement is that it be a topic that can carry me for somewhere between 500 and 1000 words. Sometimes I’m just under, sometimes I’m over, but that length works well. My second requirement is that the topic has the potential to inform or entertain my readers. My favorite topics are those that morph into something funny. It makes my day whenever I learn that something I wrote made someone laugh. I hope they are laughing with me, and not at me, but even if they’re laughing at me, I still feel a sense of accomplishment. Laughter is good for the soul. I try to find a topic related to writing or mysteries, but I long ago decided that my role here as a blogger makes it imperative that I have a post up on my assigned days. If a topic other than writing or mysteries accomplishes that, then so be it. (Sorry, fellow WWK bloggers, but it’s true.) Besides, variety is the spice of life.

I have a notes section on my phone where I can jot down incidents or thoughts that might develop into a blog. Unfortunately, I hate typing on my phone, so try to make my notes as short as possible. I might have four potential topics, only to realize I can’t decipher any of them.

When I’m working on a manuscript, one way I’ve discovered to avoid blank page syndrome is to bring my writing to a halt at a point where I know what needs to happen next. So, a draft might describe a social function, then have the words below reminding me, “Next time, have Susan meet the killer at the library.” That gives me a place to start once I come back to writing.

Another way to get started on a manuscript when I’m unsure where to go next is to edit some of my preceding work. Doing so slides me into my story, but I have to be careful when I try this. It is possible to get so involved in editing that you never move forward with your writing.

Some people try freewriting, which is sitting down, setting a timer for 15 minutes (or more) and writing whatever comes to their mind. The problem with that for me is akin to the problem I have with meditation. The words that I freewrite are things like, “Why am I doing this? I really need to be working on x, y, and z. Are my 15 minutes up yet?” When I try to meditate, thoughts push into my head in a similar fashion. “Why am I doing this again? Boy, the fan sure is loud. What is this supposed to do? How much time do I have left?” Please don’t misunderstand me; I am not opposed to meditation per se. Many people have found it effective and helpful for achieving peace of mind and mental balance. I just don’t know how to shut my mind up long enough to make it work.

So now I’m sitting at my computer screen, scrambling through my mind for a topi—Oh wait! Look at that. I’ve come up with a blog post after all. I guess the sign a friend gave me years ago is true—the best inspiration is a looming deadline.

What are some ways you deal with writer’s block and decide what to write about?

There’s More to Writing Than Just Writing by Annette Dashofy

2026-08-23T00:00:00.000-04:00

Over twenty years ago, when I first decided to focus on my lifelong passion of writing fiction for publication, I had a vision of what my days as an author would look like. I would spend the mornings creating prose, then spend my afternoons with my feet up, reading the latest bestsellers to keep up with the trends.

I confess, on rare days, this fantasy comes true. Maybe one day out of the month, if I’m lucky.

All these years (and 19 books) later, it has struck me that a large part of life as a full-time novelist has very little to do with writing.

Most days, yes, I write. Often seven days a week. But that’s only for an hour or two.

Unless I’m approaching a deadline, in which case I write until I’m unable to focus on the computer screen or spell even the simplest words.

The rest of the day, my time is spent on the business of writing, but not necessarily the creation of pages or chapters.

My mornings begin with checking and responding to emails. Or deleting and blocking the handful of AI-generated scams, which gush over one of my books while pointing out how crappy they are doing in the area of sales or reviews. And how THEY could help me with that. For a small fee.

Then I switch to social media, where I create posts for myself on Facebook and Instagram, and for Sisters in Crime on SinC LinC and Bluesky. You see, I’m on SinC’s social media committee, which is one of my side gigs to support the organization that has been supporting me for most of my writing life.

With my online tasks complete, I switch to drafting my current WIP until lunchtime. After lunch, my days are always full, but with a variety of chores. Because much of being a writer doesn’t involve writing.

What does it involve? Researching podcasts or blogs where I might be able to snag a guest spot. Writing guest posts for blogs that have agreed to let me post. Researching topics involved in my WIP. Attending writing group meetings, book club meetings, critique group meetings, etc. Speaking of my critique group meeting, during the week leading up to our monthly gathering, I’m reading and editing pages from my critique buddies.

I’m always contemplating future stories, jotting down thoughts in a notebook, or plotting in my head. Yes, sometimes “writing” looks a lot like staring out the window.

If I have a writing conference coming up, I’ll spend weeks working on my presentations.

Some days, I put aside a few hours to watch a webinar or catch up on reading articles about either writing or a topic I want to write about. Or take an online course.

Yes, I do read quite a bit, but I’m often reading a book that I’ve been asked to blurb prior to its release. Lately, I’ve had the privilege of being a conversation partner to an author who is visiting our city. (I was chosen as James Patterson’s conversation partner several years back!) This is always fun, but I do my homework. Not just reading the book but also checking out the author’s website and watching other interviews they’ve done on YouTube.

Then there’s the chore of preparing marketing material for my books to help my agent shop them around the publishing world. I just love writing synopses (said no author ever!)

And, yes, on rare occasions, I put aside an afternoon to put my feet up and read the hottest new release to see what trends I need to pay attention to. Hey, I never said I didn’t love my job. Overall, it’s pretty amazing and a lot of fun.

Fellow Writers Who Kill, what non-writing tasks have I missed? And readers, what visions do you have about what a writer’s life is really like?

HAUNTED BY “LESS IS MORE”

2026-08-22T03:00:00.000-04:00

by Jule Selbo

Being a ‘guest’ on a blog is an honor. The regulars on Writers Who Kill have years of writing experience and great books resting under their blog-umbrella. Being a guest here means I get a chance to talk about my latest book, 6 DAYS, A Dee Rommel Mystery, and muse a bit about my writing experience and the fact that I am a ‘recovering Hollywood screenwriter’.

My screenwriting career jumped off from my playwriting efforts. My short plays were performed in high school, college and when I moved to New York City, I had a few produced off-off Broadway. One of the plays got some attention and opened doors in tv and film.

My years as a screenwriter set a ‘style’ in my writing because the craft is often about using as few words as possible. The term ‘white space’ refers to the look of a script page. A tired executive whose job it is to read 20-30 scripts a week picks the ‘next’ script off her desk and flips through it. She either smiles or curses, depending on the amount of ‘white space’ on the page. More white space, in most cases, equals a ‘faster read’, that the writer hasn’t gotten verbose and doesn’t use over-explicit descriptions of locations, characters, motivations, or dialogue. ‘Less is usually more’ in a screenplay because the camera/visuals will fill in details.

How often was I with actors on sets, in their dressing rooms, or at social gatherings who lamented having to handle dialogue that carried exposition? Or dialogue that explained their emotions? Or doing scenes that didn’t have a strong story purpose? The answer? A lot. Why? It comes back to the camera again. Actors feel like they can emote with their eyes/their faces/their bodies. They don’t like to have to do ‘explain’ scenes, they like the ‘actions’ of their characters to fill in their personalities and intentions.

I wrote in various story genres (action, adventure, coming of age, bio-pic, romance , sci fi and comedy) during my Hollywood years and learned about the need to fulfill ‘genre promises’ so that the audience would be satisfied. TV and movie scripts often use a few ‘supporting’ genres to fill out characters’ lives (such as romantic relationships, friendships, family, fears, silliness). I still enjoy thinking how different story genres will illuminate my characters while keeping the crime/mystery genre in its primary place.

Budgets were always talked about in the film/tv industry; the producers want to keep the cast costs low by only including characters who were absolutely needed for the story. Locations should be kept to a minimum because the getting of permits, the moving and re-setting up of crew and equipment was time-consuming and expensive. I hear from readers of crime/mysteries that too many characters can get confusing – and yes – we build stories with red herrings and various suspects, but I try to keep the ‘cast list’ low.

The above are just a few things where I feel my screenwriting experiences have influenced the Dee Rommel series. Who’s Dee Rommel? Her childhood dream was to be a top police detective in Portland, Maine. ‘Bad guys’ changed all that when, as a young cop, she was going after perps of a hit-and-run (a child died) on a wintry-icy night and tracked them to the top of a building under construction. Dee was the first on her team to the roof, where she was sideswiped by the villains. Sliding off the roof into a dumpster filled with insulation and drywall, she sustained a serious injury that was going to sideline her (after rehab) to a desk job at the Police Department. She needs to come to a decision: should she stay with the police force or join her godfather’s PI firm?

The Dee Rommel series is a 10-parter. 6 DAYS was released this summer (2026) and follows 10 DAYS, 9 DAYS, 8 DAYS, 7 DAYS (you see the pattern). She has 10 days to solve the first case; the next case needs to be solved in 9 days (again, you see the pattern). It’s countdown to 1 DAY.

As a screenwriter, I worked on a few television series that were serialized (Melrose Place, Life Goes On, Space Above and Beyond and more). Of course, the ‘long’ character stories had to stretch 10 to 22 episodes, but each week we had a ‘short’ story that needed a beginning, middle and end. The Dee Rommel series has a 10-book character arc for Dee and some of the other ‘core’ characters, but I wanted to make sure that people could read them out of order too. I didn’t want Dee (or any character) to have to do the heavy backstory ‘exposition’, so the challenge of finding new ways to catch-the-reader-up has been fun.

6 DAYS has a bit extra in it too, genre-wise. I wanted to add a bit of thriller/horror to the crime/mystery genre, a sense that ghosts haunted a private island that was home to a family with deep, dark secrets.

An ethereal beauty, heiress Freya Cummings hasn’t left her private island in Maine for over twenty years, not since she was thirteen. Her reclusive lifestyle is infamous. When a teenager files a maternity suit against her, and mysterious evidence seems damning, former policewoman and now private investigator, Dee Rommel, is hired. She travels up the coast from Portland to flesh out the truth, and as avenues of investigation are shut down, and New England’s blood banks are hacked, and bodies are found, Dee discovers dark secrets can create dangerous chaos for the families and for her own relationships.

Thanks again to WRITERS WHO KILL for giving me this chance to muse on some of my writing thoughts—and share my excitement about the release of 5^th book in the Dee Rommel Series: 6 DAYS. Halfway through the series! Yeah! Jule Selbo, Portland Maine

Duck Tape by Nancy L. Eady

2026-08-21T01:00:00.000-04:00

I unexpectedly needed duck tape Wednesday at 8:00 a.m. in the morning. Pulling into a parking spot, thinking about a project with a deadline instead of my parking, I ended up grinding the front of the car on a low curb. I have done that before, but today was special. This time, the scraping shook the plastic bottom of the front bumper loose on both the driver’s and passenger's sides of the car. It wasn’t just loose; it was low enough to scrape the pavement, even though the center was still firm.

I did what any other smart, independent, married woman would do in such an emergency—called my husband. Unusual circumstances kept him from being able to come help me, so he decided the solution was duck tape. Ten years ago, I would have had to beg a ride, but in this day and age, I hit a few keys on my smartphone and voilá! DoorDash delivered duck tape to me. The bottom of the bumper is now firmly stuck to the top, and the makeshift repair survived the drive home on the interstate at 70-ish miles per hour.

Using it made me curious. The most important initial fact I wanted to establish was whether the stuff is called “duck tape” or “duct tape.” According to Wikipedia, citing the Oxford English Dictionary as its source, both terms are appropriate, but the original term was “duck tape.” Why? The earliest versions of duck tape weren’t tape at all, but strips of duck cloth used in the late 1800s and early 1900s for things like protecting shoes, protecting cables from wear, and decorating. At one point, someone sold Venetian blinds whose slats were held together with the stuff.

Duck tape took the form we are familiar with during World War II. A munitions worker, Vesta Stoudt, learned that the troops were having trouble opening boxes of ammunition sealed with paper backed with glue. The factory would leave a thin strip of tape on the outside of the box to help with opening it, but the strip often tore off in transit, leaving troops frantically trying to open the box under fire. She first suggested to her supervisors that they use fabric tape, and they ignored her. Tired of being ignored, she sent a letter to President Roosevelt telling him about her idea and providing him with diagrams for a prototype. He forwarded the letter to the War Production Board, which called on Johnson & Johnson to see what they could do. The War Production Board ultimately wrote a letter back to Mrs. Stoudt, telling her that the Ordnance Department had approved the change, and believed her idea was of “exceptional merit.” A division of Johnson & Johnson had been manufacturing an adhesive tape made of thin duck cloth on one side and adhesive on the other for medical purposes, so, at the request of the War Board, they looked at their product and figured out a way to make it easy to tear with your hands. To this day, Johnson & Johnson credits Vesta Stoudt with inventing duck tape. It was a smash hit with the troops, who quickly learned that it could repair everything from boots to Jeeps. Then, post-war, the tape also was used for sealing things such as HVAC vents, so the name also became “duct tape.”

One other fact about duck tape concerned me—the modern version of the product is not used much in HVAC systems anymore because it breaks down in the heat. As you will recall from one of last month’s posts, I live in the Deep South, and it is now late August. I got into my car the other day where, even though it had been sitting all day in a covered parking garage out of the sun, the temperature registered by the car was 101! So, this little detail about heat breakdown became important to nail down. I need this repair to last at least until Saturday, when my husband and daughter will figure out a more permanent fix. I was relieved to learn that the temperatures at which the adhesive begins to break down are over 180 degrees Fahrenheit. Even in the Deep South, I think I’m pretty safe.

Just for grins and giggles, what is the most unusual or creative use you have ever seen for duck tape?

A Few Thoughts About Cats by Marilyn Levinson

2026-08-20T00:00:00.000-04:00

When it comes to cats, I sometimes think there are two kinds of people. The cat haters shudder when you mention the word "cat." "They're sneaky." "They climb everywhere." "They don't listen." "They won't love you like a dog will." The cat lovers smile when you tell them you have cats and are eager to see photos of your fur babies. Often they will pull out their phone to show you pictures of their own.

I am a cat lover and the carer of two cats. Of course I think the world of dogs and loved my Mini Schnauzer. But I not only adore my kitties, I find them fascinating. My dilute tortie Juliet speaks to me constantly. As soon as I sit down, she's on my lap and eyes me soulfully--her way of telling me to put down my Sudoku puzzle and rub under her chin. Her medium-haired brother Romeo retrieves cards and papers from the dining room table and drops them at my feet with the quietest meow. Both cats are always close by, and when they aren't they come as soon as I call them.

Yes, they do some of the things the haters accuse them of. While my two felines usually obey me when I tell them to stop doing something, they insist on climbing onto the kitchen table though they don't touch our food. They're good about using the scratching pads scattered around the house, but occasionally need to be reminded not to claw the dining room chairs. They are loving and affectionate.

Cats were revered in Ancient Egypt, but they haven't always had an easy time of it. In the Middle Ages, cats were reviled as witches' familiars and in league with the devil. Many were massacred. So many, in fact, that it's been said that the Black Death/Bubonic Plague in the fourteenth century killed so many people because cats, that would have killed the rats and the fleas on them that carried the plague, had been exterminated. Nowadays cats are popular pets, probably because of the invention of kitty litter in 1947.

Cats are clever, curious, and comical. They make wonderful companions to their sleuths in cozy mysteries and often add a dimension to the story. In my Haunted Library series, Carrie Singleton finds Smoky Joe, who started out life as a barn kitty, when he wanders onto her lawn. After he jumps into her car, she ends up bringing him to the library where she's head of programs and events.

And when Smoky Joe proves to be sociable with the patrons, he quickly becomes the library cat. He even takes part in the mysteries Carrie resolves—finding diamonds that no one can locate in one book and saving Carrie from a murderer in another.

These days, it's not only cozies where cats have a role. A kitten makes an appearance in the latest "Reacher" season on Netflix.

What do you think about cats as a pet or as a character in a mystery?

Killer Questions - Favorite Type of Books to Read

2026-08-19T00:00:00.000-04:00

Killer Questions – Favorite Type of Books to Read

We are often asked what each of us likes to read. Consequently, as part of our year of favorites, here is what each of us most enjoys reading:

Annette Dashofty: Mystery and thriller.

Heather Weidner: I like lots of genres, but mysteries are always my go to favorites. Nancy Drew, the Hardy Boys, and Alfred Hitchcock’s The Three Investigators (along with a host of 70s cartoons like “Scooby-Doo”) were my gateway books to so many adventures.

James M. Jackson: A crime novel series. I enjoy watching the main characters live and change while bringing their version of justice to the world. Second choice is a well-written nonfiction book on almost any topic.

Martha Reed: Crime fiction with a paranormal element. I love solving the whodunnit but keeping something mystically unresolved gets me every time. Think the Merrily Watkins series by Phil Rickman.

Molly MacRae: Clever, funny mysteries with satisfying endings – like The Librarians by Sherry Thomas and The Thursday Murder Club by Richard Osman.

Sarah E. Burr: I really love reading manga, especially the slice-of-life genre. The relationships are so sweet, and it’s just an enjoyable reading experience.

Kait Carson: The kind with words. I’ll read anything and often venture out of preferred genres of Mystery and Romance just for fun.

Debra H. Goldstein: I am an avid reader of cozy and traditional mysteries, but I also enjoy biographies and memoirs.

Elaine Douts: I love culinary mysteries for the food, of course, and mysteries that include pets.

Margaret Hamilton: When I’m deep in writing mode, non-fiction, essays, and poetry. Otherwise, traditional amateur sleuth mysteries and for long trips, the latest Daniel Silva thriller.

KMRockwood: Crime fiction. Who knows why?

Lori Roberts Herbst: I read most genres, so it’s impossible to choose. I can get lost in a humorous whodunit, a heart-stopping thriller, intense crime fiction, or nail-biting horror.

Grace Topping: Historical mysteries. I enjoy a mystery that transports me to a different time. I learn something new about that time period with each book.

Korina Moss: Crime fiction. Who knows why?

Shari Randall: Mysteries of course! Especially those that have a rich sense of place like Anne Cleeve’s Shetland books.

Mary Dutta: Mysteries! I love the challenge of a puzzle and the satisfaction of a resolution.

A Return to Mythology

2026-08-18T00:30:00.000-04:00

by Paula Gail Benson

I was excited to see The Odyssey as the big summer movie. I remember the joy I had reading Bernard Evslin’s The Trojan War, and very much anticipate watching Christopher Nolan’s adaptation.

Maybe another reason I feel “connected” to Nolan’s production is through the actor Logan Marshall-Green, who plays Melanthius, Odysseus’ disloyal goatherd. Logan and his twin brother, Taylor, are the children of my high school drama teacher, Lowry Marshall, and my college theatre director, Russell Green. I saw the twins as babies not long after they were born. After divorcing, Lowry moved to Rhode Island, where she taught students John F. Kennedy, Jr., and John Krasinski at Brown University. Fortunately, Facebook allowed me to reconnect with her a few years before she passed away. I know she would be tremendously proud of Logan.

Madeline Miller’s books The Song of Achilles and Circe drew me back to mythological reading. Miller’s work brings the stories to a modern audience. She’s extremely skilled at character development and helping readers understand what motivated these mythic and somewhat mysterious beings. I had the chance to meet her when she attended the Decatur Book Festival and was very impressed she had spent some time at Yale School of Drama to learn how to better portray scenes and action.

Currently on my bookshelf is the adult debut novel I, Medusa by New York Times best selling author Ayana Gray. The first book in her speculative young adult series, Beast of Prey, has been optioned by Netflix for a series. In I, Medusa, Gray explores the origin story of a young woman who becomes an acolyte for the goddess Athena then falls from grace.

Recently, I’ve come across another novel reinventing mythology. Ungodly Rich by Katharine McGee is recommended by People and Woman’s World magazines. It’s the contemporary story of Julia Dodds, a young woman working as a tour guide, who meets Harry Adams, an adventurer. There is instant chemistry. After they begin living together, Harry asks her to come home with him to meet his folks. The parents happen to be Zeus and Hera and Harry is actually Ares. How Julia navigates the modern pitfalls of becoming involved with the gods of Olympus is the story.

I’m looking forward to reading Gray’s and McGee’s books. I’m wondering how those works should be categorized. McGee’s sounds as if it might be considered “romantasy,” a combination of romance and fantasy. But is myth categorized as fantasy? Maybe it should be a corollary of speculative fiction called “mythic fiction.” What do you think?

Returning to CozyLand - The Joys and Challenges of Writing Cozies by Kassandra Lamb

2026-08-17T00:00:00.000-04:00

Returning to CozyLand ~ The Joys and Challenges of Writing Cozies by Kassandra Lamb

I recently had a little chat with myself about whether I should retire from writing. My third series is winding down (four if you count the romantic suspense I’ve written as Jessica Dale), and I was debating where to go next. I decided to go back to writing “just for fun,” and not worry so much about the business end of things.

And “fun” writing meant cozies for me. Why do I enjoy them so much?

First, they are more lighthearted than other subgenres of mysteries. The characters don’t take themselves quite so seriously, even though they’re still trying to solve a murder (or two or three).

And this ties into my second reason. The main character can be spunky, sometimes even snarky. My second series, The Marcia Banks and Buddy Mysteries, were cozies, and the MC, a service dog trainer, even had an alter ego whom she dubbed Ms. Snark.

In this new series, The Aging Ain’t for Wimps Mysteries, the protagonist is seventy-one, so snark might not wear as well on her. But she can be spunky. When Amy Parker suddenly finds herself widowed, she

begins to realize how subtly controlling her husband was. As she starts to spread her wings (and sets out to solve a murder), she finds her spunk.

Third, writing the first draft seems to go faster with cozies. Maybe that’s partly because of number one above, the more lighthearted tone. It may also be because the plots are a little bit less complicated, especially less so than police procedurals (my third series, The C.o.P. on the Scene Mysteries).

And a faster first-drafting experience means I get to the part that I like best sooner—the editing. I love editing. Watching the story shape up, getting all the rough edges polished off, is so much fun.

Fourth, the world building is fun too. Cozies are usually set in small towns, and populating a fictional town is kind of cool. There’s the local law enforcement of course, the sheriff and his or her deputies. Then the merchants and professionals—the grocer, the librarian, the veterinarian, the auto shop owner—and the nosy but also supportive neighbors.

And fifth, the characters can be quirky. Indeed, some of them are expected to be quirky.

Which brings us to the sixth reason, the MC usually has a pet.

And Amy’s pet is my favorite quirky character in this new series. She’s a gray tabby cat that Amy inherits from her sister. Her sister called her Misty, but Amy’s name for her is Nuisance. Nuisance is not a very friendly cat, and Amy starts out barely tolerating her. But as the story unwinds, she warms up to her some, especially after discovering why the cat is so standoffish.

But there are some challenges to writing cozies as well.

The main one being the rule about no swear words. That can be tough to pull off, especially when law enforcement folks are around (cops swear!), and still have the story feel realistic.

The age of most of my characters, in their sixties and seventies, helps here. Older gentlemen, even older sheriffs, try not to cuss in front of women. Indeed, gray-haired, bushy-eyebrowed Sheriff Andy Taylor is my third favorite character so far in this series, after Amy and Nuisance. (And yes, he gets a lot of jokes about his name, like folks asking him if he’s from Mayberry).

The other two main rules regarding cozies are easier to follow—no on-screen sex and minimize the gore. I’m not a big fan of gore myself, so that last one is totally easy.

And while I enjoyed writing sex scenes in my first series—The Kate Huntington Mysteries, with a psychotherapist amateur sleuth—they are not easy to craft. I’m just as happy not to have to deal with them here.

Indeed, I haven’t even decided yet if Amy will have a love interest. She’s still grieving her husband and also enjoying her independence.

And I’m having so much fun helping her do the latter.

Which do you prefer to read (or write)—regular whodunnits or cozy mysteries?

What does it say about you when your coming-of-age story begins at seventy-one?

Kassandra Lamb has two loves: writing and psychology. In her youth, she discovered that writers need day jobs in order to eat. Partial to food, she studied psychology. Now retired from a career as a psychotherapist and college professor, she spends most of her time in an alternate universe with her characters. The magic portal to this universe (i.e., her computer) is in Florida, where her husband and dog catch occasional glimpses of her. Kass has authored over 40 books, including four mystery series and a romantic suspense trilogy.

WEBSITE: https://kassandralamb.com

Troubled Water, An Aging Ain’t for Wimps Mystery (#1 in a new series)

Amy Bridges Parker asks herself that question as she resists her domineering sister’s attempts to take over where her subtly controlling and recently deceased husband left off. Then her sister turns up dead, and the sheriff suspects a young man claiming to be the grandson of Amy’s first husband, who died in the Vietnam War. Amy, however, is not convinced. Her sister—a mean girl back in high school—had plenty of old enemies. But who hated her enough to actually kill her?

AMAZON: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0H7YZSQG3

BARNES & NOBLE: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/troubled-water-kassandra-lamb/1150617824?ean=2940196583292

The Vacation That Almost Wasn’t by Sarah E. Burr

2026-08-16T00:30:00.000-04:00

Last week, my husband, our two dogs, and I headed to Maine to spend some time with my parents. I was fully prepared to relax. I brought a stack of books and planned to sit outside, enjoy the lake, explore a few towns, eat good food, and generally do as little as possible. After a busy summer of releases, promotions, and more, I thought I’d earned it.

Maine apparently had other plans for me.

Things started going sideways when my mom threw her back out the day after we arrived. Naturally, that changed the dynamic of the trip because she was hurting and couldn’t move around normally, so there was a lot of checking on her and adjusting plans. Still, George and I figured we could roll with it. We were all together, we were in Maine, and there were plenty of other things we could do.

Oh, silly, naïve Sarah. I don’t know what happened to the refreshing Maine summers of my childhood, but this was not one of them. For the first week of August, it was oppressively hot, the kind of heat where you walk outside and immediately regret every decision that brought you to that particular moment in your life.

Then we lost power.

Thankfully, my parents have a generator, so this wasn’t quite the disaster it could have been. The problem was that the generator couldn’t run everything in the house at the same time. Choices had to be made, and when it’s a bazillion degrees outside, air-conditioning wins. Hot water is a luxury. But oddly enough, as the week continued, the generator eventually became preferable to having actual electricity. You see, once power came back on, the electric company started having brownouts across the state. The Maine community Facebook pages were flooded with complaints and horror stories. For our family, we technically "had" electricity, but there wasn’t enough of it for the air conditioners to run at full capacity. So, we went from having no power, to generator power that could run the AC but no hot water, to real power that couldn’t run the AC as well as the generator. Nothing says “relaxing Maine vacation” quite like discussing whether you’d rather have fully functioning air-conditioning or hot water while Central Maine Power struggles to provide enough electricity to accomplish either.

As if the heat and power situation weren’t enough, George and I briefly thought our credit card had been stolen. Late one night, our credit card company called to ask whether we were making purchases at a Texas Target, which sent us into a spiral of checking charges, wondering what had been compromised, and mentally preparing to deal with fraud while on vacation. Except it turned out the card being used was our old credit card. The one that was already inactive. Yep. That’s right. After all that concern, there was literally nothing for us to do. No stolen card. No active fraud on an account we use. Just a pointless little burst of panic dropped into the middle of an already chaotic week.

Meanwhile, we had four dogs sharing one old farmhouse. For those keeping score, George and I brought Eevee and Itto, while my parents have Louise (a Shih Tzu) and Niko (a German Shepherd). These dogs do not share a beautiful friendship. Every visit becomes a complicated system of who can be in what room, who needs to go outside, and why everyone is suddenly mouthing off. I often felt less like someone on vacation and more like the manager of a very poorly organized doggy daycare. Thank goodness my parents installed heavy-duty dog gates in all the doorways after our visit last Christmas. Lessons learned!

We still had sightseeing plans, though. What could go wrong with a little tourism? With that positive outlook, George and I headed to Rockland to wander around Main Street. Rockland is exactly the kind of coastal Maine town where you expect to spend a Wednesday afternoon popping into cute shops, looking at art, grabbing something to eat, and generally enjoying yourself. Except almost everything was closed. George and I walked around staring into darkened storefronts wondering if we had somehow missed an announcement to shelter in place. Every time we spotted somewhere that looked interesting, we’d walk up to the door and discover that, nope, apparently, that place didn’t want to see us either.

But the whole reason we were in Maine this particular week was to celebrate my dad’s birthday. As part of the fun, we made reservations at a fancy local restaurant we'd yet to try. This was supposed to be one of our big outings. We’d get dressed up, have a lovely dinner, and enjoy a nice evening together. Sounds great, right? Wrong. On the morning of my dad's birthday, we got a call. Not to wish him a happy birthday, but to tell us that the restaurant was closing because of the heat. Yes. It was apparently so hot in Maine that even the restaurant decided it had had enough. At this point, the trip was beginning to feel slightly cursed.

Thankfully, one outing went as planned. Rallying after the canceled birthday plans, the four of us piled into the car, drove forty-five minutes to Hallowell and had a wonderful meal at The Liberal Cup (such a great name for a cozy mystery locale). It was a restaurant my dad had long wanted to visit, and we figured, if not now, then when? The food was great, we got to relax, and for a little while, nothing broke, closed, lost power, injured itself, triggered a fraud alert, or otherwise went dramatically wrong. It was glorious.

Despite how all these mishaps make the trip sound, we really did have an enjoyable stay. Maybe it wasn’t the relaxing Maine vacation I’d envisioned, but we were together. We laughed a lot, ate well, spent time by the lake, and somehow found plenty of good moments tucked between all the things that didn’t go according to plan. By the end of the week, I realized those were probably the moments I’d remember anyway. That’s the funny thing about family vacations. You can plan where you’re going, what you’re doing, and where you’re eating, but you can’t plan what happens once everyone gets there. Sometimes the trips that go completely off script become the stories you tell the longest. Someday, I’m sure someone will say, “Remember that vacation in Maine…?” and we’ll all laugh, conveniently forgetting how exasperated we were while living through it. Then, eventually, someone will suggest we do it all again. And we will. Because it’s family, and getting together is always worth the trip.

But next year, I’m bringing lower expectations.

Research Snags When Creating Settings by Judy L. Murray

2026-08-15T00:00:00.000-04:00

Here I am. Drowning in research. Let me explain why I could use your help.

As many of you know, mystery series is centered around a busy little town at the very top of the Chesapeake Bay. Over the span of my first four books, I decided that Helen, my heroine, is more believable and interesting when she gets caught up in crime solving that introduces what I consider ‘a setting within a setting’. Helen may get entangled in sleuthing because of her friendships and career life as a real estate agent but the people she helps and the villains she tracks down have different expertise from her own. Unfortunately, as a writer, these differences can make storyline accuracies a challenge.

In Murder in the Master, Helen’s family, friends, and work life are introduced. The town of Port Anne, with its tiny shops and restaurants and generations of businesses, all reflect a blend of locals and newcomers that don’t always see eye to eye. Helen discovers a builder in the master bedroom of a new McMansion. Since I know the real estate business like the back of my hand, I could concentrate on plot, dialogue, and character building.

In Killer in the Kitchen, a celebrity chef and client leads Helen into the world of an online home shopping network like QVC. I had to learn about the back-office world of television production, products, and guests. To entertain readers, I learned terms and built a setting that reflects real life. Did I tie it all into real estate? Yes.

In Peril in the Pool House Helen is thrown into solving a politician’s family secrets of missing pilot boat captains and fraudulent shipping up and down the bay. I researched abandoned lighthouses, float planes versus seaplanes and environmental law affecting the Chesapeake. I enjoyed it.

Villain in the Vineyard immersed Helen in dealings with wine connoisseurs and questionable vineyard owners. When Detective Joe McAlister asks Helen what she knows about wine she says, “I’m never quite sure what to do at a wine-tasting. Do you?” “Taste wine?” Joe retorts. I still don’t know how to discern wines, casks, or soil but I learned enough to generate dialogue that wouldn’t be criticized later by a wine expert.

Back to my current misery. My fifth book is centered around the world of thoroughbred horse racing, principally because Fair Hill International Training Center is minutes from my home and can be another setting within Helen’s world. Thoroughbreds who win races at Saratoga and the Kentucky Derby train here in unsurpassed facilities. But I’m stumbling around trying to get a footing within this horsing community and it hasn’t been easy.

Dear Research Experts, what ideas do you have to break into a close-knit, private, and competitive world? I’m inclined to keep plotting based on potential crimes in this world and stop worrying about editing for accuracy at this point. Thoughts?

From a writer who doesn’t know the difference between a trot and a canter, Judy

2026-08-14T00:00:00.000-04:00

What Grover Taught Me about Writing Mysteries

By Heather Weidner

I am Gen X, first-generation Sesame Street and first-generation MTV. One of my favorite children’s books of all time was the classic, The Monster at the End of This Book. I still have my copy. Mystery, fantasy, suspense, monsters. This book had it all.

As I look back on some of my childhood favorites, I realize I’ve been reading mysteries for a long time. Here’s what this Little Golden Book and the blue fuzzy monster from Sesame Street taught me about writing mysteries.

You need to build suspense in your stories to keep your readers engaged.
Your readers need to like or empathize with your protagonist.
Everyone is afraid of something, and writers need to tap into fears to build tension.
Write strong (and fun) dialog. Make it sound like real speech, slang and all.
Use pacing correctly. Slow down the action to build suspense, and speed it up to amp up the excitement.
Your protagonist needs a challenge or a problem to solve.
Your character should not be perfect. Little (or big) flaws make your character relatable and interesting.
Make sure your character is not flat. He or she needs to be a real person (or monster) with all the things that life throws in the way. Your protagonist has to stumble and make mistakes.
When you think your character has had enough and is close to breaking, pile it on. Add more tension.
Don’t load up your work with a lot of narrative and back story. Readers want to stay in the action.
And most importantly, never forget that reading is fun.

Do you have a favorite children’s book that taught you some life lessons?

Heather Weidner writes cozy crime fiction for readers who want justice with a sprinkle of fun and a southern accent.

Through the years, Heather Weidner has been a cop’s kid, technical writer, editor, college professor, software tester, and IT manager. She writes the Pearly Girls Mysteries, the Delanie Fitzgerald Mysteries, The Jules Keene Glamping Mysteries, and The Mermaid Bay Christmas Shoppe Mysteries.

Originally from Virginia Beach, Heather has been a mystery fan since Scooby-Doo and Nancy Drew. She lives in Central Virginia with her husband and a crazy Mini Aussie Shepherd.