Category: Uncategorized

I Wouldn’t Normally Do This Kind of Thing

When I was a kid both of my parents worked, so my sister and I were latch-key kids before it was cool. In the mornings on her way to the bus stop my mom would drop my sister and I off at the home of an older Polish lady down the street, who would feed us breakfast and send us off to walk to block or so to school from her house. Eli Whitney Elementary School didn’t have a cafeteria nor did it provide lunches for the students, so everyone had an hour to walk home to get lunch and come back. We went to our babysitter’s, and she would feed us. She’d had like six or seven kids of her own, and the youngest was a senior in high school when we first started being watched by her; I guess she liked having kids around. Anyway, in the summer time we would spend the days with her–she watched General Hospital, One Life to Live, and Dark Shadows–and sometimes she would go to Goldblatt’s, a department store that seemed a million miles away to us as kids, and do her shopping. Whenever she went–and sometimes we went with our mom–Mom would give my sister and I a couple of bucks to spend. The real treasure of Goldblatt’s was the bargain basement, where they remaindered stuff, and there was always this enormous table filled with books for kids, marked down to 39 cents.

It was on this table that I discovered some of the lesser Grosset & Dunlap series for kids, and particularly the Ken Holt, Biff Brewster, and Rick Brant series (they also had copies of the Chip Hilton sports stories by Clair Bee; I would buy one or two of those because my parents were trying to make me more boyish than I was, and it always pleased them when I showed an interest in something more masculine than usual). I remember the very first two Ken Holts I bought off that table: The Secret of Skeleton Island and The Mystery of the Plumed Serpent. (I would also get The Rocket’s Shadow and The Egyptian Cat Mystery in the Rick Brant series, as well as the first three Biff Brewsters: Brazilian Gold Mine Mystery, The Mystery of the Chinese Ring, and Hawaiian Sea Hunt Mystery.)

And Ken Holt very rapidly became my favorite, above even the Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew.


The phone booth was hot and stuffy, and Ken Holt wiped the moisture off his forehead for the third time. He opened the door slightly to get some fresh air an just then the phone came alive.

“Here’s your party,” the operator intoned.

“Hello,” Ken said loudly. “Hello.”

“Global News,” came the answer. “Granger speaking.”

“This is Ken Holt, Mr. Granger. I’m out at school.”

“What’s up, Ken?” Granger asked. “Need some money?”

“It’s not that. I just wanted to know if my father had come in.”

“Your father?” There was a pause before Granger continued. “Why, kid? He’s not expected so far as the office knows. He’s still in France.”

“I got a letter from him last week saying he’d be in on the eighteenth and that he’d call me. I haven’t heard from him since. And today’s the twentieth.”

Some hundred miles of telephone carried Granger’s booming laugh from the busy offices of an international news agency to the quiet corridor of Galeton Preparatory School.

“That’s pretty good,” Granger said, after he had stopped laughing. “He’s only two days overdue and you’re worried. He‘s famous for that, son. We’ve lost track of him for weeks, but finally he’d let us know where he was or what he was doing. Forget it. He’ll turn up when he gets good and ready.”

Ken blinked a little to get the perspiration out of his eyes. He moved a little closer to the mouthpiece as if that would help Granger understand better.

“But you see, Mr. Granger, Dad wrote me that he’d be in on the eighteenth. He’s never missed a date with me.”

The Secret of Skeleton Island opens with Ken, as you can see, worried about his father, who’s two days overdue for a meeting–and Richard Holt, who tends to disappear or vanish while chasing a story, has never once in his life stood up Ken or been late without letting him know ahead of time–not an easy task, either, in times when operators had to place your phone calls for you and you either sent telegrams or wrote letters.

Having loved those first two Ken Holt novels I’d read, the next time I went to Goldblatt’s I got a few more: The Riddle of the Stone Elephant, The Clue of the Marked Claw, The Secret of Hangman’s Inn, and The Mystery of Gallows Cliff. But after that, they became much harder to find; we’d moved out to Bolingbrook by then, and they had already lapsed out of print (hence the Goldblatt’s sale table), and it took years for me to start collecting them again–in the wake of Katrina and my discovery of eBay. I still don’t have a complete set–and some of the copies I acquired were not in the best shape–and the ones I am missing are generally so rare that they command prices I am not willing to pay. But the quality of the series never let up, even in the later books–and the writing was always stellar.

Ken Holt also was responsible for me having a weird bonding moment with James Ellroy; during his Grand Master interview at the Edgar symposium, he mentioned reading the kids’ series when he was growing up, and preferring the Ken Holt over the rest–and asked, “Does anyone here remember the Ken Holt mysteries?” and I raised my hand, to which he replied something along the lines of, “Ah, only the gentleman right here in the sweater. You, sir, have excellent taste.” He also pointed at me with his index finger, cocked his thumb like he was pulling a trigger, and winked.

Strange, yes–but even with what little Ellroy I’ve read, I can actually see the influence. The Holt novels were pretty hard-boiled for kids’ books; and one of the things I loved about them (just like The Three Investigators) was that Ken actually solved the mysteries; and unlike the Hardy Boys, Ken and his best buddy Sandy frequently were involved in fisticuffs; threatened by criminals with guns or knives; and were often placed into incredibly dangerous situations where they literally had to, by use of their wits and whatever else might be handy, escape with their lives (there’s a particular scene in The Riddle of the Stone Elephant that has always stayed with me; they walked into a set up where the floor of an old shack collapsed beneath their weight, sending them plummeting down an old well; and they had to climb the slick walls of the well to get out; this scene, and its aftermath, had this weirdly homoerotic flavor to it that I remember to this day–and will inevitably write about it, I’m sure).

Shortly after this opening, Ken gets permission from the headmaster to head into New York and nose around his father’s apartment, to see if he can find out any clues to where his father is or what may have happened to him. As he waits at the train station (a six hour ride into the city; still not sure if he’s on Long Island or really far upstate, but my guess is, given speed and so forth, most likely Long Island) he is offered a ride by two men who purport to be from Global News; it isn’t until Ken is in the car with them that he realizes they are liars, and undoubtedly connected to whatever happened to his father–and they plan on using HIM as leverage against his dad. Ken has to figure out how to escape–and manages to do so near the town of Brentwood, running away and dodging into the only lighted building on the town’s main street, the offices of the Brentwood Advance, which is how he encounters the Allen family. He tells Pop, Bert and Sandy Allen–enormous beings with red hair, whom he convinces of the veracity of his story and they get on board with helping him. Sandy is his own age, and all the Allens:

Ken swung around quickly toward the direction of the new voice and saw two replicas of the man before him. They were much younger, one of them looked about Ken’s age, the second a bit older. They too were huge. There was no doubt in his mind that this trio was a father and two sons. Actually, the only difference between them was that the sons had flaming red hair and the father’s was beginning to gray. Ken almost felt like a pygmy surrounded by these three towering figures.

The Allens listen to his story, check it out, and believe hi–and the next morning he and Sandy go out to start looking into the case. The action comes fast and furious after this–there’s one particularly harrowing scene where the boys, captured by the bad guys, are duct-taped to chairs. Ken manages to break an alarm clock, and gripping a jagged edge of glass in his teeth, saws at the tape holding down one of Sandy’s arms (this feat is repeated in The Riddle of the Stone Elephant, only instead of a piece of glass he uses the jagged edges of a can lid, removed by an opener).

The adventure is pretty amazing; the boys wind up escaping the bad guys onto one of the freighters that the bad guys are using as part of their scheme, and find their way back to Skeleton Island, where the adventure also continues. So much action–and it’s all so well-written you feel like you’re a part of it, right there with Ken and Sandy as they basically use the combination of their wits and their brawn to get away and break the case wide open, rescuing Richard Holt and…in a lovely happy ending, it’s decided that Ken will finish his term at the boarding school and move in with the Allens.

It’s a great set-up for a series, and it’s mystifying to me that it never achieved the heights of popularity that the Hardy Boys did. Every one of the books is good–I can’t think of a single clunker in the entire series–and the typical masculinity based boys’ story (9-12 year olds aren’t, apparently, old enough to care about girls yet) sees neither Ken nor Sandy ever have a date or a girlfriend, or even anything remotely close to a romantic interest; in fact, the friendship bond between Ken and Sandy eventually grows so strong they are practically a couple–and that homoerotic undercurrent to the series (which, frankly, also existed in the Rick Brant series) was also an enormous part of its appeal to me. I wanted a “best friend” like Rick or Sandy; and the frequent references to how “big” and “muscular” Sandy is…well, yes.

Perhaps someday I will do an essay about the homoerotic undertones in both this series and the Rick Brant series.

You know, in my free time.

The Boy Who Couldn’t Keep His Clothes On

So, my gym opened last weekend, as a result of the gradual Phase One reopening of New Orleans. I’ve really wanted to go workout (I’ve really missed it since the shutdown started) and yet at the same time–I wasn’t sure if I should.

Since I work in public health, I was torn. Should I do something that is clearly, as a public health worker, risky, not only for me but for others? Is it hypocritical of me, as a public health worker who is recommending that people social distance, etc., to go work out at the gym when I’m not completely 100% on board with the gradual reopening of the city? And if that does make me a hypocrite, shouldn’t I set a better example by not going–not, of course, that anyone would notice whether I go or not.

On the other hand, public health (and most of my training in it) is all about reducing risk, not eliminating it–there are very few ways of eliminating risk completely, and the vast majority of them are unworkable (like the only way you can ever be completely certain you are never exposed to HIV is to be abstinent; which is really not a viable option for the vast majority of people).

Or, was it better to go to the gym and set an example to everyone by social distancing from other people, always keeping my mask on, and cleaning everything before and after I  use it?

Maybe I’m a “Chad”, that privileged white gay man who doesn’t care about the safety of others and whose driving need to workout is more important than my own health, and that of others? (The great irony of going to the gym–which is for my health–putting my own health and that of others at risk does not escape me.)

So, I finally decided that I would, in fact, go and do everything that I could to set a good example to anyone else in the gym. I would wear a mask the entire time I’m there–except when I drink my water–and clean the equipment both before and after I use it. I could also assess, when I arrive, how many people were there and whether I felt comfortable remaining; I could also continue assessing the entire time I was there–if I ever felt uncomfortable or that someone wasn’t obeying the risk reduction protocols, I would leave. 

And so I returned to the gym. I’ve been three times now over the last eight days; it feels good to be stretching and working my body again, and it’s responding already (I am very aware that it’s entirely psychological). My body feels better than it has since before the shutdown. I’m sleeping better again. But the entire time I’ve been at the gym I’ve noticed things–little slips, like forgetting to  use my towel to handle the weights (or forgetting to use hand sanitizer before I pick one up) as I load a machine, for example, or touching a dumb bell without cleaning it first; this is why quarantines are so necessary, you know–because no matter how hard you try to stay safe, there are so many possible ways to mess up. So, on the one hand, I still kind of feel hypocritical and Chaddish; but on the other…it feels good to be working out again. As Constant Reader, I’ve always had a love-hate relationship with my body; I generally don’t see anything that looks okay. Instead, I immediately zero in on a perceived flaw. Don’t get me wrong; it’s not that I ever thought I was so hideous that dogs would growl at my approach and children cry. 

I just seem to, with everything, always hold myself to an impossibly high standard, so high I can never achieve it and therefore can get down on myself about it.

It’s a constant struggle, really, to see myself with any kind of positivity. The great irony is that I can always look at old pictures of myself, back in the days when I worked out regularly, and think, damn I looked great! Why did I think I was fat and needed to drop some more weight?

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Take, for example, the above picture. I was thirty-three, had been working out like a fiend and eating a very restricted diet, and had gone from 215 pounds in August to the above, 155 pounds, by the following June. I was fitting into size 29 waist jeans and shorts.

And yet, when I saw this picture for the first time, my literal first thought was oh, nice, but maybe if I lose ten more pounds…

Ten more pounds?

From where exactly, psycho? And the diet I was following wasn’t a good one; but my weird relationship with food and eating–always problematic–worked in my favor this time. Essentially I ate mostly salads and turkey, and skinless chicken breasts, etc, and nothing that had more than 2 grams of fat per serving ever passed my lips, with one cheat day allowed per week. On the cheat day I’d allow myself a fast food burger and fries, or pizza. That was me, living large in the airline days.

And incidentally, according to those ridiculous BMI charts, at my height, I should only weigh five more pounds than I did in that picture to not be considered “overweight.” Is it really any wonder we have so many issues with body image and body dysmorphia in this country?

But like with everything, I’ve always been my own harshest critic, and my body has never been exempted from that harsh lens through which I view everything about myself; no matter whether it’s the way I look, the sound of my voice, my writing, my job performance, I’m always highly critical, and always have been. I think it  might partially come from an old defensive mentality, learned as a child–a combination of my parents and church constantly pushing humility, plus being mocked and made fun of by other kids eventually turned into if I am meaner about myself than nothing anyone else says can ever hurt me (which, now that I’ve typed it out and looked at it, is really a horrifying way to think, really); and I’ve spent most of my life trying to overcome those deeply rooted and ingrained ways of thinking. For one thing, the humility thing makes it very hard for me to talk about my books and my writing in a positive way, without self-deprecation–and face it, no matter how much we don’t want to believe this about publishing, a writer also has to be a salesperson, selling themselves as their product (which sounds kind of whore-ish when put that way, doesn’t it?)–and you can’t run around putting yourself and your writing down while expecting people to buy it, can you? “Yes, this car? Are you interested? Well, I’m not terribly fond of the color and sure, of course it runs well, but let’s face it, it’s no Porsche” said no car salesman, ever.

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The above photograph was taken in the early spring of 2002. We’d moved back to New Orleans in August 2001, after a year away; a year I generally block out of my memory and pretend never happened; I was incredibly miserable, couldn’t afford a gym membership, and so didn’t work out for over a year, while eating incessantly–directly related to being unhappy–and eating garbage. My weight ballooned, and when we moved back to New Orleans people were shocked to see me. I immediately started working out regularly again and changed back to much healthier eating patterns, and the weight began to drop off again, going from the 200 I weighed when we returned down to the 180 seen above. I was being interviewed for a gay porn magazine–I was writing porn in those days too–and the magazine wanted to interview me, not only about writing and editing porn, but about my mystery novel Murder in the Rue Dauphine, and they wanted to do a photo shoot to go with the piece rather than using book covers and author photos. I was a little taken aback when told to remove my undershirt and unbutton the flannel vest (it was a sleeveless flannel shirt–so yes, a vest, no matter what the sign on the sales rack at Structure read), and a little more nonplussed when asked to remove the vest entirely; it wasn’t so much that I was uncomfortable being photographed shirtless so much as I was worried how I would look in the pictures; plus the thought people would see the pictures and think that I was so arrogant as to demand to be photographed that way. I was sent digital copies of all the pictures, and wasn’t terribly thrilled with how I looked (SURPRISE) but when the piece ran with some of them, including the one above, the response was surprisingly positive, particularly when you consider every other picture in the magazine was of a naked porn star, without an ounce of body fat.

Because yes, porn stars and models are the standard we should use for the sake of  comparison.

Maybe someday I will stop holding myself to these ridiculous standards.

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The above photo was taken in 2003 or 2004; a good friend (who moved away before Katrina–glad he missed Katrina, but still sorry he’s no longer a New Orleanian) was also a terrific photographer, so I hired him to do some author photos for me. I had already started shifting away from writing and editing erotica under my own name, and I didn’t want to use my “serious” author photo for erotica writing, either as me or Todd Gregory; thinking something a little more daring was necessary. He was certainly game, and so I brought a bag of things I’d wear to the bar to give a try. I look at the above picture now and think, seriously? You were self-fucking-conscious about how you looked?

Yeah, I’d love to look that bad NOW.

When Katrina happened, one of the things that convinced me to stay in decimated New Orleans afterwards, when I came back to check on the house and get some more things out of it, was that my bank, gym, and grocery store were all open. And as I’ve said before, one of the things I clung to in the wake of Katrina was the things I could actually control; one of which being my body. When we moved back from DC and I lost all the weight again, I did it primarily by exercising and teaching aerobics–three good weight workouts a week built around teaching six high intensity step classes per week will shed weight from you very quickly, and I soon realized because I had a good base of muscle this time when I started, returning to working out regularly and teaching aerobics again kick-started my metabolism into a high fat-burning machine…and as such, I didn’t really need to be overly concerned about my diet–so I chose not to be. MISTAKE. I should have started eating healthier again, too. The result was those bad eating habits I’d returned to were even harder to change now, and since I was getting leaner without changing my eating…yeah. But since my body was something I had absolute control over, I focused on that to help me get through it all.

And yet, still felt unhappy with the way I looked.

This was a Mardi Gras costume I considered wearing–US Olympic Gay beach volleyball player–but when I saw these pictures…I decided against going out in public wearing this because I was afraid of being judged for not being in good enough shape.

And the only reason I was ever able to dress like that and go out on Fat Tuesday was I would tell myself the entire point of dressing in costume on Fat Tuesday was to look ridiculous.

Now, it’s not really about how I look. I injured my back in 2010, which kept me out of the gym for over a year or so (I could have the dates wrong here); and every time I’d go back, BLAM, I would hurt it again. That was why I eventually hired Wacky Russian; I needed someone to monitor my form and make sure I wasn’t going to injure my back again. Unfortunately, that became a crutch and I stopped going in to work out on my own; and my weight continued to spiral (around the time of the back injury was when I started teaching myself how to cook more and bake; when I started making cheesecakes and brownies, and discovered the joys of both heavy cream and butter) upwards. I started back to the gym last year, but Carnival interrupted my programs and I never went back again…so that’s why getting started up again this year was so good for me because this time I was enjoying it again.

And this time, I don’t honestly care about how my body looks, either to me or other people. I just want my muscles to remain strong and flexible; the exercise is good for my heart and cardiovascular system; and anything that can help get the cholesterol under control so I can stop taking medication for that and my blood pressure would be quite lovely. I’m pushing sixty, and I don’t think I’m ever going to be shirtless and sweaty in a sea of other shirtless, sweaty gay men dancing again any time soon–pandemic or no pandemic–but it feels good, you know? I like how I feel after working out, and I like how I feel in general.

I think having a healthier mindset this time around is also helping.

So, yeah. I’m that gay man.

Boy Strange

And the Edgar winners were announced today! Congratulations to everyone, winners and finalists, for the incredible work, and for raising the bar for the rest of us!

BEST NOVEL: The Stranger Diaries by Elly Griffiths

BEST PAPERBACK ORIGINAL: The Hotel Neversink by Adam O’Fallon Price

BEST FIRST NOVEL: Miracle Creek by Angie Kim

BEST SHORT STORY: “One of These Nights,” by Livia Llewellyn, from Cutting Edge: New Stories of Mystery and Crime by Women Writers

BEST FACT CRIME: The Less People Know About Us by Axton Betz-Hamilton

BEST CRITICAL/BIO: Hitchcock and the Censors by John Billheimer

BEST YOUNG ADULT: Catfishing on Catnet by Naomi Kritzer

BEST CHILDREN’S: Me and Sam-Sam Handle the Apocalypse by Susan Vaught

BEST TV EPISODE: “Season 5, Episode 4” – Line of Duty, Teleplay by Jed Mercurio

ROBERT L. FISH MEMORIAL AWARD: “There’s a Riot Goin’ On,” by Derrick Harriell, from Milwaukee Noir 

SIMON& SCHUSTER MARY HIGGINS CLARK AWARD: The Night Visitors by Carol Goodman

THE G. P. PUTNAM’S SONS SUE GRAFTON MEMORIAL AWARD: Borrowed Time by Tracy Clark

THE ELLERY QUEEN AWARD: Kelly Ragland of St. Martin’s Press

THE RAVEN AWARD: Left Coast Crime

GRAND MASTER: Barbara Neely

Congratulations everyone!

 

 

 

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Birthday Boy

Today is Paul’s birthday, and while he generally prefers to be left out of my blog and social media posts, it bears mentioning. I’m not really sure what one can do for a pandemic shelter-in-place birthday, but I’ll probably stop at the grocery store and get cupcakes or something. We’ve also reached the point in our relationship–25 years this summer–where we really don’t bother with gifts much anymore, for either birthdays or Christmas or anniversaries; we generally don’t need anything much, as we always just go ahead and buy what we want or need when we want or need it, which makes it incredibly difficult when it comes to buying gifts for each other. I’ve always taken pride in how thoughtful my gifts are, but Paul always got me better gifts than I got him, almost from day one, so it’s also kind of nice to no longer feel that competitive impulse and stress anymore.

And yes, gifts can turn into competition, thank you very much. Anything can, if you have a competitive personality. It’s something I personally don’t like about myself, so I try not to indulge myself by giving into that particularly unattractive aspect of my personality anymore.

I’m also seeing a lot of quarantine-themed ebooks being released–primarily, the social media promotional posts about them–and I have to give credit where it’s due. Mid-March was basically when places started going on lockdown, and here we are, a mere six weeks later, seeing books inspired by the situation out there for the reading public. I guess we’re going to find out relatively soon if there’s an audience for these types of books and who that audience might be–leave it to romance to be the first genre to truly dig deeply into it. I myself started writing a quarantine noir story a few weeks ago–triggered by the realization that the construction site two lots over from my house was considered “essential” by the city–and of course, over the weekend I roughly sketched out the start of another Scotty book, set during the quarantine; which also begs the question of timing and so forth. If I start writing the book now–and were able to completely commit to it–the earliest I could conceivably have a strong first draft done would be by July, possibly mid-June; assuming I wouldn’t be able to stick to a schedule of writing a chapter a day. But even if I managed to get the entire thing written and polished and turned in to my publisher, and they rushed it through the process, the earliest it would be available to readers would be by December, and that’s really pushing it. And who knows where we might even be by then? It could already be over by then, or we could still be in the midst of it, and IMAGINE how sick everyone will be of the quarantine by then if we’re still in it. I know no one wants to think about the length of this thing, but it’s entirely possible we could still be dealing with it at Christmas.

And seriously, perish that fucking thought, right?

Nobody wants a pandemic Christmas.

I did manage to get the vast majority of my emails handled yesterday–I took the day off from the day job; I would have been working from home anyway, and yes, well aware I could have pretended to be working but I am not wired that way–and spent some serious time wading into them and answering the ones I’d been hoping might go away at some point; I also filed some of them away that didn’t require a response and deleted still others that were of no consequence. It was actually kind of lovely, and if I can manage, from hereon out, to stay on top of them, perhaps they will not build up to such a disgraceful and out of control number again. I shudder to even look this morning, to be perfectly honest. But I got both stories edited and revised, huzzah, and I even submitted one already; the Sherlock story will be sent in most likely on the day it’s actually due, or this Wednesday. I’m actually relatively pleased with it, to be honest. Is it a real Sherlock story? Perhaps, perhaps not. As I always say, I am not the best judge, and when it comes to Sherlock, what I don’t know would fill the Library of Congress and there would still be things left over.

And now I only have a few odds and ends to get finished–the Secret Project, for one, and I’d like to get some of these other stories out into the wild before I dive back into writing (or trying to write) my book. Madness, right?

Right.

And now, off to the spice mines. Have a lovely Tuesday, Constant Reader.

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A Red Letter Day

And yet another friend studded list! Congrats to all!

 

2020 ITW Thriller Awards Nominees

We’re thrilled to announce the finalists for the
2020 ITW Thriller Awards:
BEST HARDCOVER NOVEL

David Baldacci — ONE GOOD DEED (Grand Central Publishing)
Joe Clifford — RAG AND BONE (Oceanview Publishing)
Blake Crouch — RECURSION (Crown)
Rachel Howzell Hall — THEY ALL FALL DOWN (Forge Books)
Adrian McKinty — THE CHAIN (Mulholland Books)
Denise Mina — CONVICTION (Mulholland Books)

BEST FIRST NOVEL

Samantha Downing — MY LOVELY WIFE (Berkley)
Angie Kim — MIRACLE CREEK (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)
John McMahon — THE GOOD DETECTIVE (G.P. Putnam’s Son)
Alex Michaelides — THE SILENT PATIENT (Celadon Books)
Lauren Wilkinson — AMERICAN SPY (Random House)

BEST PAPERBACK ORIGINAL NOVEL

Max Allan Collins — GIRL MOST LIKELY (Thomas & Mercer)
Alison Gaylin — NEVER LOOK BACK (William Morrow Paperbacks)
Alastair Luft — JIHADI BRIDE (Black Rose Writing)
Dervla McTiernan — THE SCHOLAR (Penguin Books)
Lisa Sandlin — THE BIRD BOYS (Cinco Puntos Press)
Kate White — SUCH A PERFECT WIFE (Harper Paperbacks)

BEST SHORT STORY

Hector Acosta — “Turistas” (Down & Out Books)
Michael Cowgill — “Call Me Chuckles” (Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine)
Tara Laskowski — “The Long-Term Tenant” (Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine)
Lia Matera — “Snow Job” (Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine)
Twist Phelan — “Fathers-in-Law” (Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine)

BEST YOUNG ADULT NOVEL

Jen Conley — SEVEN WAYS TO GET RID OF HARRY (Down & Out Books)
Naomi Kritzer — CATFISHING ON CATNET (Tor Teen)
Natalie Lund — WE SPEAK IN STORMS (Philomel Books/Penguin Young Readers)
Randy Ribay — PATRON SAINTS OF NOTHING (Kokila/Penguin Young Readers))
Tom Ryan — KEEP THIS TO YOURSELF (Albert Whitman & Company)

BEST E-BOOK ORIGINAL NOVEL

Brett Battles — NIGHT MAN (Brett Battles)
Sean Black — THE DEEP ABIDING (Sean Black)
Brian Shea — MURDER BOARD (Severn River Publishing)
LynDee Walker — LEAVE NO STONE (Severn River Publishing)
Kerry Wilkinson — CLOSE TO YOU (Bookouture)
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The Silky Veils of Ardor

As Constant Reader knows, Gregalicious loves short stories. He regrets deeply that they are much harder for him to write than novels (I’ve often joked that I find it much easier to write a novel than a short story; the word count limitations are hard for me as I always tend to write probably more than is needed to illustrate a particular point–take this sentence, for example), and I am sure part of this insecurity comes from my oft-told tale about my first writing professor, who earwormed his petty nastiness into my brain and soul. (But also this gives me an enormous sense of personal satisfaction in that I know I’ve published more fiction than he did during his time on this planet; to this date, I still cannot find a single fiction publication for the prick.)

And while I am a firm believer in the mentality that writers should always be paid–even if merely a token–for their work, I will often write short stories if requested, and don’t mind donating a story for a good cause. The two stories I had in Bouchercon anthologies weren’t paid, nor was my story for Murder-a-Go-Go’s; like I said, when I am asked to write a story I am genuinely so flattered that the editor thought enough of me and my work to ask. I like writing short stories, even if they are a struggle for me, and there aren’t many places where one can get them published these days.

I was enormously flattered to be asked by short story master Josh Pachter to write a story for his anthology of stories inspired by the music of Joni Mitchell. The irony, of course, is that while I am familiar with Ms. Mitchell and her work–and I like what I know of it–I am not as familiar with her canon as I am with women singer-songwriters like Stevie Nicks, Dolly Parton or Carole King; I also realized that the songs of hers that I could name off the top of my head–“Free Man in Paris”, “Help Me”, “Big Yellow Taxi”, etc.–were the same ones anyone could; I wanted something not quite as famous and perhaps a little more obscure, something to which a Joni Mitchell fan would say oh yes, of course you chose that song.

So, I did what I often do in these situations: I asked my friend Michael Thomas Ford (aka That Bitch Ford), and he immediately came back with “You should pick ‘The Silky Veils of Ardor.’ It’s about that hot guy all the high school girls fall in love with and breaks their hearts.”

That was definitely intriguing, so I looked up the lyrics and listened to the song several times as I listened to Joni’s sweet voice singing them…and I knew immediately what story I was going to tell.

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The elevator doors opened. Cautiously, her heart thumping in her ears, she stepped out into the hotel lobby and took a quick look around. At the front desk, a young woman in uniform was checking in a couple. They didn’t look familiar. But it had been so long since she’d seen any of them…would she recognize anyone?

She didn’t notice she was holding her breath.

She walked across the lobby to the hotel bar entrance. A reader board just outside said WELCOME BACK BAYVIEW HIGH CLASS OF 1992!

The black background was faded, the white plastic letters yellowed with age.

The urge to head back to the elevators and punch at the UP button until the doors opened, get back to her room and repack her suitcases—everything she’d just carefully put away neatly in drawers and hung in the closet—was strong. She resisted, recognized the need as irrational, closed her eyes, clenched her hands until she felt her ragged bitten nails digging into her palms.

You can do this you can do this you can do this you can do this….

A dull murmur came from the hotel bar, laughter and talking, the rattle of ice against glass, the whir of a blender. From where she stood, she could see the bar was crowded, cocktail waitresses in too-short black skirts and white blouses with trays balanced on one hand maneuvering expertly around groups of people.

Maybe no one there was from the reunion. Maybe she was early. Maybe—

You can do this!

She’d always had social anxiety. Had never made friends easily, couldn’t make small talk, sometimes said the wrong thing, alienated people without even knowing what she’d done. Parties and dances had always been agony. Even with friends, people she felt relatively certain actually did like her, there was always the irrational fear she’d say the wrong thing, forget a birthday, commit some horrific social faux pas that would turn them against her, show them what a damaged, worthless person she actually was. She’d started seeing a therapist after college, years after she should have, but her parents thought therapy was all touchy-feely mumbo-jumbo for the weak and all you had to do was suck it up and forget about it, not worry, lock it all away in some dark corner of your mind and move on.

I have never attended a high school reunion, and frankly, have little to no desire to ever do so–with no offense intended to anyone I went to high school with. Our school was very small and remote, for one thing–my graduating class had only 48 students, and at that point, were the largest graduating class in our high school’s history. It’s not easy to get there–one would have to fly into either Kansas City or Wichita, rent a car, and drive for at least an hour just to get to the county seat, and of course, my high school was about nineteen miles (give or take) north of the county seat. I do think about going back from time to time, more to take a look around and see what’s different now as opposed to then; to refresh my memories a bit for writing about the region–which I’ve done somewhat already, but not nearly as much as I could. Using Google Earth has already shown me that my memory is faulty–I’ve fallen into Google Earth wormholes frequently–so while there is some idle curiosity about going back, there’s very little desire or motivation. It’s difficult, I think, for my classmates to understand that I really don’t have much desire to revisit that time of my life; it’s certainly not their fault but the four or five years I spent in Kansas also contain some of the darkest periods of my life.

I wrote a short story about a high school reunion under my Todd Gregory pseudonym; “Promises in Every Star,” which eventually became the title story of my Todd Gregory collection. I first had the idea for that story when I received the invitation to my ten year reunion, back in 1988; the title is a lyric from one of my favorite til Tuesday songs, “Coming Up Close,” from my favorite album of theirs, Welcome Home, which I can listen to over and over again, and have, many times; it’s definitely in my Top Five favorite albums of all time. I don’t remember where I originally published that story, but it was many, many years later, after I had the original idea and wrote the first draft (in long hand), and after that, I figured I was finished with high school reunion stories.

Until “The Silky Veils of Ardor.”

As I listened to the song, the more the story began to take shape in my head; a high school reunion, twenty-five years later; returning to the town where she went to high school for the first time since she graduated and moved away with her family. I had already written the opening, for another short story; as I revised and retooled that particular story, the character grew and changed and wasn’t the timid, nervous, medicated woman she originally was–but I loved that original opening, and decided to lift it from the initial drafts of that story onto this one. I found the original word document of the first draft, erased everything after the opening few paragraphs, and renamed the file THE SILKY VEILS OF ARDOR. The rest of the story flowed out of me after I finished rereading and tweaking the original opening to fit the new story, and I was off and running. I revised the story several times, and one of the things, one of the points, I was trying to make with the story is about how differently we see high school than our friends and classmates did–which is an idea I’d been toying with after an exchange on social media with some of my classmates after I’d posted something–a status update or a blog post, or something along those lines–about how miserable I’d been in high school; my friends were all astonished because how I remembered high school was very different from the way they remembered it, and me. I remembered feeling isolated and lonely, like an alien from another planet set down into their midst; a freak everyone kept at arm’s length. They, on the other hand, remembered me as being popular and well-liked by everyone.

And that, my friends, is where this story came from. I still think about those tricks our memories play on us; our inability to see what was right in front of us if we could just see clearly.

The book will be officially released on April 7th from Untreed Reads; you can preorder it at any vendor that sells ebooks. There’s a stellar line-up of writers, and some of the proceeds are going to charity.

And thanks again to Josh Pachter for inviting me.

Here’s a link to Joni singing the song–this is the video I listened to for inspiration.

Folsom Prison Blues

So, my work-at-home day yesterday turned into a “mental health/vacation day”, and you know, I’m fine with it. I stayed in bed luxuriating in my laziness until just before nine; but in my own defense I have to be at work tomorrow at 8, and at 8 every day next week, so cut me some slack, Jack. I didn’t do much writing, of course–I know you’re completely shocked, Constant Reader, but that’s how it happens sometimes–but I did make some seriously major strides towards getting organized.

I even worked on the filing–putting away files that are no longer necessary; putting things that aren’t current into the not-current file box, etc. etc. I even started organizing the stuff I keep on top of my kitchen cabinets (it’s a thing in New Orleans–our ceilings are so high there’s about three feet–if not more–between the ceiling and the tops of the cabinets) so now it doesn’t look like i just threw things up there. Rather, it’s now neat and organized, and I like that a lot better. I’m probably going to do some more of that kind of work this weekend; mostly I’m taking a lot of the surplus copies of my books, boxing them up, labelling the boxes appropriately, and then storing those boxes up on top of the cabinets. I only worked on the side with the sink, refrigerator, and dishwasher; tomorrow I’ll do the stove side, which also has extra storage containers and other kitchen appliances that I rarely use on those cabinets.

I also started, very briefly, my new quarantine noir short story “Condos, for Sale or Rent”; it’s a newish type voice for me, probably showing more of the du Maurier influence–even though she was amazing at voice, there was still a bit of authorial distance in her stories; so I am thinking her use of voice is the primary influence here; and there’s also a bit of Poe’s narrator speaking directly to you in the voice as well–than I usually do. I still haven’t finished reading “Ganymede”–hopefully that will be today. We also finished Chapter 2 of The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina, and I have to applaud their casting choice for Lucifer; he was indeed the most beautiful of the angels.

Since I took yesterday off I keep getting confused about what day it is, particularly since I am used to getting up early on Mondays after having Sunday off (obviously) so my mind keeps telling me today is Monday rather than Friday–which is a day I would usually be sleeping late. Next week is going to be challenging, since I have to be at work at 8 every morning.

It’s encouraging in some ways that I am writing again, even if all I am doing is fragments of stories or new beginnings. I’ve started so many new stories this year–none of which have completed first drafts–but it’s writing of a sort. I am going to try to focus on finishing the first drafts as I go; short stories don’t require the attention span that novels do, but apparently my ADHD isn’t even allowing me to finish short story drafts…so I need to get more focused, methinks.

Having yesterday off was kind of necessary; I definitely needed the rest. I feel good today, neither tired nor exhausted, and actually in a good mood, for the moment.

Heavy heaving sigh.

Well, stay safe everyone, and I’ll catch you tomorrow.

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Breathe

Well, yesterday was wretched. The weather here changed once again overnight on Sunday, so my sinuses went haywire. Again. Coughing, didn’t sleep well, woke up every hour all night–it was dreadful, and there’s simply nothing worse than suffering through a twelve hour day when you’re worn out and don’t feel well. It kept up all through the day as well; I literally thought my head was going to explode a few times. I didn’t manage to get any writing done last night or any reading either; I just sat in my easy chair and whined a lot.

And ugh, how I hate losing an entire day’s work like that.

I do feel somewhat better this morning–there’s still a little congestion and coughing, but I did sleep better last night and do feel a better. I’ll probably go ahead and keep swigging Dayquil all day; it can’t hurt, and it’s not a bad idea. Hopefully I can get some writing done tonight after work. We shall certainly see, at any rate.

Obviously, with all the concerns about the coronavirus–and I fluctuate between thinking they’re over-exaggerating the crisis for ratings and they’re not telling us the whole truth to prevent a panic; sadly, both are viable options. As someone who has read Stephen King’s The Stand about thirty or forty times (it’s one of my favorite novels of all time; I’ve not reread it in a while so who knows if I’d find it problematic now?), alas, it’s easy to see what’s going on now and how it’s being reported as echoes from that novel.

But it’s okay; when your body isn’t up to par it’s okay to lose an evening’s work, even if it puts more pressure on you for the future. It’s also–as I sat in my easy chair waiting for death, like Camille–entirely possible that I won’t be able to get all three stories done in time for the end of the month, and the one I should truly focus is on is the Sherlock since it pays the best. But when have I ever done the thing that makes the most sense? Never. But I keep thinking that somehow I’ll manage to pull all three stories out of my ass somehow; the sale of my story on Sunday was an enormous confidence boost. Yes, I have a lot of responsibility and things to get done in my role with Mystery Writers of America, which has limited my time for writing; returning to the gym regularly also sucks more oxygen out of the room.

It’s interesting how, despite all the years and all the sales and all the books and all the award nominations, I am still insecure about my ability to write and produce good stories that people want to read. I have fought against this lack of confidence most of my life, quite frankly; ironically, I had more faith in my ability to write and create before I started publishing–it was always the fall-back: yeah, this job (or situation) sucks, but once I get my writing career going things will be better. I never had any doubt that I would one day be published; even if I had no idea how to go about making it happen or when, or what to do, or anything. It was only after I started writing and getting published that the doubt and insecurity began to plague me. It never seems to let up, either. I seem to recall earlier in my career, during the Scotty at Kensington/Chanse at Alyson days, that I wasn’t as insecure as I might be now; but it’s also entirely possible (since those were the antideluvian days before Katrina) that I don’t remember it as well; most of that time is fuzzy and seems to be the distant past to me now.

But I do know that I never had much confidence in my short story writing ability; and I think that’s the bottom line of all of this. I can never forget completely that fucking college professor who told me I’d never be published, based on a single short story I wrote for his class. If you’re still alive, sir, I hope your life is a complete misery because you had such a negative, long-lasting impact on mine, you worthless motherfucker. I’m probably the only one of your students who’s ever made it and I am probably the student you treated the worst–although if he did that to me, I’m sure he did it to others, and I wonder how many dreams he killed? And seriously–that is not your job as a writing professor; your job is to help your students get better. Had he ripped my story to shreds, had he taken it apart, bit by bit, to tell why it didn’t work and why the characters didn’t ring true–that would have been brutal at the time, but it would have done me some good. DOn’t just sit there and smugly assert that I’ll never be published. I was willing to learn, and would have worked my ass off with a bit of encouragement and some strong feedback. I’ve always responded well to feedback, and I appreciate it.

I also woke up this morning to the news–well, I was already awake–that Royal Street Reveillon  made the Lambda short list for Best Gay Mystery. It’s been a hot minute since I made their short-list, but I think–and I could be wrong–this is either the thirteenth or the fourteenth time this has happened? I honestly had forgotten about this as a possibility–it’s been around four or five years since the last time; the awards were presented on the same day that Jean and Gillian got married at City Hall in New York, so whenever that was. I suppose I could go to their website and check, but it doesn’t matter to me that much, and the fact that you can’t search a name in their database to pull up said person’s nominations is irritating; you can certainly search by name on Mystery Writers of America’s Edgar database. I stand corrected, and owe them an apology; I just went to count and you can now search by name; so under my own name and various pseudonyms, this is  number fifteen. Yay for me, and so much for never getting published.

That fucker.

I guess, other than feeling like shit yesterday and still not be 100% today, this has been kind of a good week for me.

And on that note, back to the spice mines.

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Sunday Morning Comin’ Down

Well, I don’t know about coming down, but it’s definitely Sunday morning.

Then again, I did have to come downstairs, so I guess that’s somewhat applicable.

I wallowed in bed until nine this morning; I woke up originally at approximately seven AM and chose to stay in bed, it was kind of a lovely thing. The nice thing about football season being over is there’s no longer a need to get up early on the weekends in order to get things done before the games start–I’d forgotten how lovely it is to just stay in bed and relax and stay there until you really feel guilty about staying under the covers for so long. I stayed in bed pretty late yesterday morning–eight or nine, I don’t remember–but it is lovely, even if it throws my sleep schedule off a bit, seeing as how I must rise at six the next two mornings. But c’est la vie, right?

I did get some good work done yesterday on the Secret Project–which is going to be my primary focus this morning before I go to the gym–and I also have emails to answer. I also finished reading Tracy Clark’s terrific debut novel, Broken Places, yesterday, and then spent a good while trying to decide what to read next. As a general rule, I don’t like to read more than one book by a solitary author in a row, particularly when I have three of them to read; I’m interviewing Tracy for Sisters in Crimes’ quarterly newsletter, and so it behooves me to read them all. No worries–I am going to devote an entire entry at some point to Broken Places–probably shortly after I finish this one, to be honest.

I also got the lovely news that the Joni Mitchell anthology i contributed to, edited by Josh Pachter, The Beat of Black Wings, will be out and available in time for Malice Domestic! This anthology is a “crime stories inspired by the music of Joni Mitchell,” and the table of contents is a veritable who’s who of crime writers and people I am lucky enough to call friends. My story, “The Silky Veils of Ardor,” is one I particularly am proud of; I feel like I’ve been doing some terrific work on short stories over the past few years, dating back to the Short Story Project (which reminds me, I have another one I need to get started writing, and soon), and I do hope you’ll get a copy of the anthology. The proceeds are going to a charity; one of which Ms. Mitchell approves, and I believe the anthology is even going to promoted and featured on her website, which is very cool. More to come on that front, of course.

Oh, did I mention I am going to Malice Domestic this year? Yes, that’s correct, Constant Reader, I am going go be at Malice Domestic this coming May; I’ll be taking Amtrak down from Penn Station the morning after the Edgars to Malice Domestic. This is my second Malice, and I am really looking forward to it–particularly seeing friends win Agatha Awards two days after the Edgars. I’ll be flying home the following morning (that Sunday), but it’d going to be an absolutely lovely trip, and one which I hope will once again make me feel once again connected to the writing world.

Krewe de Vieux was last night, but I stayed home; Paul went to watch with friends, but I’m reserving my energy and strength for the St. Charles Avenue parade season, which opens this Friday with three parades. There are four or five more on Saturday, and then another two on Sunday; at least Sunday wraps up early in order for there to be rest and relaxation for the two-day break before the final stretch of six days and seemingly endless parades begins.

I can hardly believe it’s parade season again, but here we are.

I’m thinking, since we’re most likely going to start watching HBO’s adaptation of Stephen King’s The Outsider this evening, that perhaps it’s time to crack the spine of the first edition hardcover I own and start reading it; I do like to read the book along with the series adaptation whenever I can–this worked really well with Big Little Lies–but I am also thinking that maybe I should read a cozy next? It’s been a while since I’ve dipped my toe into the cozy waters, and perhaps it’s not a bad idea to read one next? But I simply cannot seem to make up my mind, heavy sigh. Maybe a reread of Where Are The Children  as a memorial to Mary Higgins Clark?

So many books to read, and so very little time.

Well, I suppose I can put off the decision a little longer…and perhaps it is time for me to get back to the spice mines.

Have a lovely Sunday, Constant Reader!

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Tea for Two

The 2019 Agatha Award Nominees

 

Best Contemporary Novel

Fatal Cajun Festival by Ellen Byron (Crooked Lane Books)
The Long Call by Ann Cleeves (Minotaur)
Fair Game by Annette Dashofy (Henery Press)
The Missing Ones by Edwin Hill (Kensington)
A Better Man by Louise Penny (Minotaur)
The Murder List by Hank Philippi Ryan (Forge)

Best First Mystery Novel

A Dream of Death by Connie Berry (Crooked Lane Books)
One Night Gone by Tara Laskowski (Graydon House, a division of Harlequin)
Murder Once Removed by S. C. Perkins (Minotaur)
When It’s Time for Leaving by Ang Pompano (Encircle Publications)
Staging for Murder by Grace Topping (Henery Press)

Best Historical Mystery

Love and Death Among the Cheetahs by Rhys Bowen (Penquin)
Murder Knocks Twice by Susanna Calkins (Minotaur)
The Pearl Dagger by L. A. Chandlar (Kensington)
Charity’s Burden by Edith Maxwell (Midnight Ink)
The Naming Game by Gabriel Valjan (Winter Goose Publishing)

Best Nonfiction

Frederic Dannay, Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine and the Art of the Detective Short Story by Laird R. Blackwell (McFarland)
Blonde Rattlesnake: Burmah Adams, Tom White, and the 1933 Crime Spree that Terrified Los Angeles by Julia Bricklin (Lyons Press)
Furious Hours: Murder, Fraud and the Last Trial of Harper Lee by Casey Cep (Knopf)
The Mutual Admiration Society: How Dorothy L. Sayers and her Oxford Circle Remade the World for Women by Mo Moulton (Basic Books)
The Five: The Untold Lives of the Women Killed by Jack the Ripper by Hallie Rubenhold (Houghton, Mifflin, Harcourt)

Best Children/Young Adult

Kazu Jones and the Denver Dognappers by Shauna Holyoak (Disney Hyperion)
Two Can Keep a Secret by Karen MacManus (Delacorte Press)
The Last Crystal by Frances Schoonmaker (Auctus Press)
Top Marks for Murder (A Most Unladylike Mystery)
by Robin Stevens (Puffin)
Jada Sly, Artist and Spy by Sherri Winston (Little Brown Books for Young Readers)

Best Short Story

“Grist for the Mill” by Kaye George in A Murder of Crows (Darkhouse Books)
“Alex’s Choice” by Barb Goffman in Crime Travel (Wildside Press)
“The Blue Ribbon” by Cynthia Kuhn in Malice Domestic 14: Mystery Most Edible (Wildside Press)
“The Last Word” by Shawn Reilly Simmons, Malice Domestic 14: Mystery Most Edible (Wildside Press)
“Better Days” by Art Taylor in Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine

We are pleased to announce this year’s Agatha Award Nominees. Please note this year there are six Best Contemporary Novel nominees on the ballot. Winners will be chosen by the attendees of Malice Domestic 32 (May 1 – 3, 2020). Thanks to everyone who sent in a ballot, and congratulations to all!

 

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