Tag: Angelina Jolie

Four to the Floor

Dream Lover: Monday morning back to the office blog; in which I had a productive weekend; finished a short story; figuring out what I need to do; thinking about being a Louisiana tourist; and back to the gym.

https://gregwritesblog.com/2024/02/26/dream-lover/ via @scottynola

Ah, the torturous path Murder in the Rue Ursulines took on its way to the book stores.

There was, if you will remember, a lot of turmoil going on at Alyson at the time. I had worked with a different editor for every Chanse book, and as I waited and waited and waited for an offer for the fourth book, my third editor was fired as the company reorganized its publishing arm yet again, with the end result that they didn’t make an offer on the book until they realized that the fall catalogue had been neglected during these transitions and they made the offer so long as the book could be finished in six weeks (I hadn’t started writing it yet) but I said yes on two conditions: I could work with an outside editor of my choosing, and the contract had to be for two books, rather than one–so I wouldn’t have to go through this again for the fifth book in the series. I kind of figured they wouldn’t meet my demands–but they did, of course, and then I had to write a draft of a book in six weeks.

Constant Reader, I managed it.

The original Alyson cover on the left; the Bold Strokes edition on the right.

“Chanse MacLeod to see Loren McKeithen,” I said to the pretty woman at the reception table. She looked to be in her late thirties, and of mixed racial heritage, her skin the color of a delicately mixed café-au-lait, her hair copper-colored. She gave me a wide smile. There was a wedding ring on her left hand, and a diamond tennis bracelet on her right wrist. Her nails were done in a French manicure. On her forehead was a smudged cross made of gray ash. I was tempted to ask what she’d given up for Lent, but decided against it.

“Have a seat, and I’ll let him know you’re here.” She gave me a smile, picking up her phone. “It shouldn’t be more than a few minutes.”

I nodded and took a seat in an overstuffed leather chair, picking up an issue of Crescent City magazine and idly paging through it. I was tired, probably way too tired to be taking on a new job. The aspirin I’d taken hadn’t kicked in yet, either. Every muscle in my body ached. I’d planned on spending my entire Ash Wednesday in bed, or lazing around my apartment, recovering from the overindulgence of the last five days. But Loren was a good guy, and threw me some work every now and then. So, I’d roused myself out of my post-Mardi Gras stupor and come to his office.

Besides, it never hurts to have a prominent attorney in your debt. You never know when you’re going to need one.

This story actually started out as a Scotty book, what I thought would be the fourth in that series, Hollywood South Hustle. This book was inspired by something that happened to me on my way to work one morning. When I originally went to work part-time at the NO/AIDS Task Force part time, I worked out of the CAN (Community Awareness Network) office on Frenchmen Street in the Marigny. Full time staff had free parking in a lot around the block on Elysian Fields; I had to find street parking in the neighborhood, which was never a guarantee. This particular morning I found a place to park over on Kerlerec, and as I was locking up my car a family on bicycles was coming around the corner at Chartres. The adults raised a hand in greeting and I automatically said “Good morning” pleasantly back to them with a smile, and it wasn’t until after they rode past that I realized it was Brad and Angelina and two of their kids; they lived a few blocks away. As I continued on my way, I smiled at the coolness of the moment and I thought Brad has hair the same color as Scotty and is about the same age and size as Scotty and he lives right around the corner and wouldn’t it be interesting if Scotty was walking past their house and someone shot at him, thinking he was Brad? And that would be the start of something. The more I thought about it as I walked, stopping at the little Vietnamese grocery to buy cigarettes, the more i liked it, and by the time I sat down at my desk the entire story was taking shape in my head.

And yes, instead of doing work that day (I didn’t have any), I wrote up the story, the idea, the title, and began the proposal. I also wrote the first chapter and over the rest of that week I wrote the first five, feeling like I was onto something. I polished up the proposal and the first chapters, while continuing to write, and sent it to Kensington, who held the option on the series. While i waited to hear back from them, never doubting for a moment they would exercise their option and take the book, I kept writing. It was incredibly easy, and I was clocking between three and seven thousand words per day.

The day after I finished writing the first draft, Kensington didn’t exercise their option and cut the series loose.

So, when Alyson came back to me with a book contract offer and a due date that was only six weeks out from signing the contract…I thought, I can just turn this Scotty book into a Chanse book, easy-peasy.

NARRATOR VOICE: It was not, in fact, easy.

Scotty books are not easily adapted into something else, particularly when the new adaptation is more serious than something meant to be farcical and funny and over-the-top crazy…plus, Chanse and Scotty are completely different physical types. I had to change a lot of things, which took the “looks like” gambit down from three to two–but I think that worked better with fewer people and I was a bit concerned that the previous Scotty had also involved three look-alikes…problem solved. But it was a lot harder to do than I originally thought (nothing is ever as easy I think it is when I am pondering what to do), and in retrospect, it probably would have been much easier to simply write something entirely from scratch, but why do things the easy way when I can make it much harder?

Murder in the Rue Ursulines did well; it sold well and got decent reviews, and I’ve always felt it wasn’t a proper follow-up to Rue Chartres.

But…here we are.

Vieux Carré Voodoo

Ah, the fourth Scotty.

I know I’ve told this story about a hundred times, but I think it matters to the entire Scotty canon review thing that I’m doing now, and it kind of does shape the rest of the series. One afternoon when I was heading to work at the old CAN office on Frenchmen Street, I always parked on Kerlerec Street, which was one of the few places in the Marigny neighborhood that wasn’t restricted to two-hour parking and a potential ticket (I didn’t get a parking spot until I went full time). I got out of the car, locked it, and saw some people riding towards me on bicycles. I said good morning and they said good morning back and smiled and kept going. I took a few more steps before realizing that was Brad and Angelina and a couple of the kids! I smiled to myself–one of the things I love most about New Orleans is the regular celebrity sightings–and of course, they lived not far from my office at the time. As I kept walking, some thoughts started riffing in my brain: Brad is blond and not all that tall; Scotty is also blond and not all that tall. Brad and Angelina live essentially right around the corner from Scotty. What if Scotty was walking home one night and when he’s in front of their house someone takes a shot at him, mistaking him for a Brad type actor living in the Quarter? Someone is trying to kill him and since Scotty looks like him, they hire him to get to the bottom of it as well as to run interference?

I really liked the idea–Hollywood South Hustle (keeping the “H” alliteration I was going for when the book was going to be Hurricane Party Hustle)–and when I got home that night I wrote the proposal and first three chapters in a fever…spent a few days refining and polishing it, and submitted it to my Scotty publisher–and they turned it down.

Womp womp.

Around the same time, my Chanse publisher–who had yet to make an offer on the next book in the series–suddenly made an offer but gave me a two month turn around on the book. It was do-able, of course, but I thought I deserved something in return for that insane turnaround and so asked for a two book contract and more money; they were clearly desperate since they agreed to both. And I thought, Hmm, I can just turn that Scotty book into a Chanse book and thus it became Murder in the Rue Ursulines (and it wasn’t as easy as I thought it would be but that’s a story for another time).

And then one day, I was walking from the parking lot at my old office to where the Gay Easter parade was lining up (my office had a carriage and I rode) and as I walked underneath a balcony I barely avoided getting drenched (those who turn their balconies into lush gardens have to water them, after all, and the excess water has to go somewhere; it’s one of those Quarter hazards we’ve accepted) and in a flash, I thought that very thing–walking under balconies in the Quarter can be hazardous–and then imagined Scotty on his way to the Gay Easter parade to ride on his parents’ business’ float when he gets drenched by someone watering their balcony garden. And just as quickly as I had that thought, I thought of course Scotty would be dressed as a slutty Easter bunny in a white speedo and rabbit ears and tail and then it just got really funny to me. The next morning I wrote that scene, which grew into the first chapter, and since I needed to wrap up the personal story left hanging in the previous book, I ended the chapter with him seeing someone in the crowd he thought was Colin–a thought he quickly dismisses as impossible, and we were off to the races.

No live organism can continue for long to exist sanely under conditions of absolute reality; even pigeons and palmetto bugs are supposed, by some, to dream. New Orleans, not sane, stood by itself inside its levees, holding darkness within; it had stood there for almost three hundred years and might stand for three hundred more. Within, walls continued to tilt, bricks crumbled sloppily, floors were termite-chewed and doors sometimes shut; silence lay steadily against the wood and stone of New Orleans, and whoever drank there there, drank alone.

Yeah, right. People only drink alone in New Orleans by choice.

My name is Scotty Bradley, and I’m a private dick who works the mean streets of New Orleans. I right wrongs. I help the downtrodden find justice. I punish the guilty. I ferret out crime, and protect the innocent while punishing the guilty. Criminals tremble when they hear my name, and get out of town if they know what’s good for them. Dame Justice may be blind, but I see all too clearly. The helpless come to me when everyone else has failed, when hope is gone, and the night seems darkest. I’ve got a mean right hook and never back down from a fight. I drink my martinis shaken, not stirred—because I like my gin like miscreants who cross my path, bruised and a little battered. I am on a never-ending quest for truth, justice, and preserving the American way of life. I rescue dreams and bring nightmares to an end. Don’t call me a hero, because any one of you would do the same if given the chance. There is no case too small for me to handle, and there is no case so large that it is intimidating. I’ve taken down a corrupt political machine, and would gladly do it again tomorrow. I’ve found lost treasures and stared down the Russian mob. I’ve stared evil in the face until evil blinked and backed away in mortal terror. I have—

Yeah, right. And I have a bridge across the Mississippi for sale, if you’re interested.

My name is really Milton Bradley, like the board game company—my parents have a slightly twisted sense of humor. Scotty is my middle name, but it’s what everyone calls me. I really am a private eye—bonded, and licensed by the state of Louisiana. I was born and raised in New Orleans and have lived here my entire life except for two misspent years at Vanderbilt University up in Nashville. I live on Decatur Street with my partner, Frank Sobieski. We’re business partners, and life partners. We met on a case a couple of years back, and it was pretty much love at first sight. Frank is one of the most gorgeous men I’ve ever seen outside of a porn movie. He’s in his early forties, about six foot two, and when he had hair, it was blond. Now that he’s balding, he shaves it down to a little buzz. He has the most hypnotic blue eyes, a strong chin, and a scar on the right side of his face. He also started lifting weights in his twenties—and there’s not an ounce of fat on his hugely muscled, amazingly defined body.

He also has one of the most amazing butts I’ve ever laid eyes on. Woof!

Well, okay—it was lust at first sight. Love came later.

I love treasure hunts, always have, and have always wanted to write one. One of my favorite series when I was a kid (they’re still actually quite fun to read now) are the Three Investigators series; which was originally called the Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Series as he introduced each case and sometimes even referred potential clients to the boys. Many of those books were treasure hunts, and those were always my favorite books. One of their adventures, which was also a favorite, was called The Mystery of the Fiery Eye and was loosely based on Wilkie Collins’ The Moonstone, which I read as a teenager and have always remembered fondly. I decided I wanted to do an homage to both books; the treasure everyone is looking for is a stolen, notorious jewel that is very important to a south Asian religious cult, and it’s name was Kali’s Eye, because it was mounted in an enormous statue of her in a temple in a very small, remote south Asian country.

And it was stolen during the Vietnam War, and they’ve been looking for it ever since.

After Scotty gets soaked in his slutty Easter bunny attire, he swears very loudly and the person on the balcony hears him. Turns out to be an old family friend–Scotty wasn’t really paying attention to where he was; his mind was elsewhere as he walked–and gets invited up, so the friend, Doc–he was a professor at University of New Orleans when Scotty’s parents went there–can give him a towel and run his outfit through the dryer quickly. While Scotty is there, Doc gives him an old stuffed toy Scotty had left there years ago, when he was a small child. This strikes Scotty as odd, but he humors Doc and takes the stuffed bunny. When he gets to the parade, his mother is thrilled to see Mr. Bunny, so he gives it to her.

And later, when he is walking home, there are cops at Doc’s. He fell to his death from his balcony, and his apartment was ransacked. Then the new tenant on the top floor of Scotty’s building (he and Colin gave up that apartment after Colin disappeared) wants to hire Scotty and Frank to solve a mystery for him–but soon he, too, is murdered–and also turns out to not be who he had claimed to be. Are these two murders connected, and if so, how?

My absolute favorite part of the book to write was the treasure hunt itself; when Scotty and Frank realize that Doc left clues behind for Scotty to solve and find the missing jewel; which takes them on a trail from the apartment on Decatur Street uptown in the rain. That was so much fun, and of course, when I was polishing the manuscript before turning it in, I had to actually go and follow the trail I’d set out for them to make sure it was accurate and worked and was something someone could actually follow…and of course, it was pouring that day so I did it, like they did, in the pouring rain.

I dedicated the book to my friend Poppy Z. Brite, a writer I’ve long admired and whose friendship I have always cherished. He was always a big fan of the Scotty books, and his support meant the world to me. He was actually the person who convinced me–one drunken night at the House of Blues for a Banned Books Night reading–that I could indeed write another Scotty book, and the boost of confidence was just what I needed to get back to work on this series. (And the Vietnam stuff was a nod to a private joke between us.) And it was, indeed, fun to get back to work on Scotty and produce another book.

And here I am, all these years later, writing another one. Go figure.