Tag: books

Sweet Time

And it’s New Year’s Eve.

I slept well last night but my blankets were all tangled up this morning, indicating the sleep was more restless than it has been for weeks. I also wasn’t in the mood to write my blog when I first woke up, so I decided to read, drink my coffee, and maybe have some breakfast before getting cleaned up. I usually write this over my morning coffee, and since I don’t reread or re-edit once it’s written, that could explain the run-on sentences, word repetitions, and occasional poor grammar no one ever points out to me. This blog began nineteen years ago (!!!) on Livejournal (the anniversary was 12/26), migrated over here in about 2016 or so, and still somehow keeps chugging along. It always surprises me that people read it, to be honest. It was always meant mainly for me, and was originally intended as a daily exercise to get me writing again. I guess it worked. When I started I had published four novels, a few anthologies, and some short stories. Nineteen years later, I’ve way surpassed that total, despite some fallow years in which I produced nothing.

I did some more picking up around here yesterday while watching football games. It was fun watching Mississippi beat Penn State, and don’t even get me started on the Florida State-Georgia game. I get the disappointment at not making the play-offs, but you also knew you were scheduled to play Georgia, another team disappointed in not making the play-offs, but instead of showing everyone that the committee was wrong and showing up to beat Georgia…and Georgia also had star players injured and over a dozen opting out and even more entering the transfer portal. This would have been a play-off game had either Auburn or Georgia beaten Alabama this year, but that’s how things go. Auburn went 13-0 in 2004 and wasn’t invited to the BCS title game. You don’t always get what you want in life or sport, and the question is how you handle that. If this was going to be the case, don’t accept the damned bowl bid. Your fans spent a lot of money to go to that game, and it was incredibly disrespectful to the team, the fanbase, and the university to show up and get embarrassed like that. After Coach O was fired in 2021, LSU went to its bowl game with 39 scholarship players and got trounced by Kansas State….but how does it appear in the record books? KSU 42, LSU 21. Twenty years from now when people look back at the history of college football and bowl games, it will read Georgia 63, Florida State 3. It’s a program and culture problem, and all the FSU fans apologizing for this disgraceful beating–do you quit when you don’t get a raise or promotion you worked hard for and feel like you deserved? The word for that is quitter…and for the record, Georgia played it’s back-ups, walk-ons and so forth in the second half and still beat your ass 21-0.

And if LSU went 12-0 and didn’t get picked for the play-offs…and pulled the same shit? Sure, I’d be angry about the play-offs but I’d also call out the Tigers for embarrassing the state and the university that way.

I’m really enjoying Danielle Arsenault’s Glory Be, and am savoring every word. What a fresh and unique voice! I have to say I am so glad I realized I needed to be better about my reading choices and should read more diverse writers. It’s been a great education for me as a reader, a writer, a person and a citizen. I’m still learning how to be better about race and gender and gender identity and sexuality; and I strongly encourage other readers to do the same. Crime fiction is so much stronger and healthier when it represents everyone, I think, and while I don’t consider reading diverse writers to be the total education I need on any social issues facing the country–I need to read more non-fiction and theory.

I rewatched The Birds yesterday after the football games, and it was pretty much as I remembered it. I’d only seen it twice before; originally as a child edited for television, when it frightened me so badly that I had nightmares (I was prone to them growing up) and for years could never see crows on a jungle gym or a wire without feeling uneasy and then again as a rental in college after I’d read the short story again and wanted to see how faithful the film was to the story. I didn’t care as much for it the second time around–the acting is really terrible and so is the script–but the suspenseful parts still held up and were scary. This third time around confirmed my second viewing; and I noticed some other flaws in the picture. Rod Taylor’s mother isn’t much older than he is, and why is there about a thirty year age gap between him and his sister? I think the short story is better than the film, but I can also see why people like it. I do consider it one of Hitchcock’s lesser films.

Since tomorrow is a day for thinking ahead and coming up with some goals for the new year, I suppose today should be a recap of sorts of this past year. It was, as I mentioned in a previous entry, a rather up-and-down rollercoaster of highs and lows with very little level ground in the middle. The recognition of mainstream award nominations for my work–even queer work–was a delightful surprise this past year. But even more important than that is I think my work is getting better. I had felt, some years ago, that my writing was becoming stale and that I wasn’t growing as a writer anymore; I’d become stagnant and that was one of my biggest fears. I wound up deciding to take some time away from writing books on deadline and write things just for me, things that I wanted to write but also wanted to take the time to do correctly. It was during this time that I worked on both #shedeservedit and Bury Me in Shadows in early drafts, and also started the novellas and working more intently on my short stories. I accepted the challenge of writing stories to themed anthologies, and produced some terrific ones of which I am really proud. When I dove back into series work with Royal Street Reveillon, I wanted to write something non-formulaic for the Scotty series. I also wanted to shake things up with Scotty a bit, as the series was getting a bit too comfortable and safe for me. Royal Street Reveillon certainly was neither comfortable nor safe, and neither was Mississippi River Mischief.

Bury Me in Shadows was not easy for me to write. When I went back to the book after setting it aside for awhile, I realized several things: I couldn’t ignore race and racism, I had to address the Lost Cause narrative, and I also had realized while doing more reading and research that the stories my paternal grandmother used to tell me about the Civil War and Alabama and the family were apocryphal stories you can turn up about almost everywhere in the rural South. The book wasn’t working, in fact, because I was trying to elide those issues because I was afraid of doing it wrong…so it pushed me to do better. And actually addressing those issues made the book easier to write. The same thing was true of #shedeservedit; I’d been working on this book in one form or another since I actually lived in Kansas. But again, I realized when I went back to it that what I was doing didn’t work because I wasn’t going there with toxic masculinity and rape culture because it wasn’t personal enough for my main character, and so I bit the bullet and made it more personal for him. It dredged up a lot of memories, some of them painful, but it also made the book better and stronger. I had been wanting to write a cozy for the longest time, and decided to try it for something different and new–and that became A Streetcar Named Murder. I was also very pleased with it, even though the deadline and the turnaround on it was a bit insane…but I still managed to take my time and turned it into something I was proud of when I got the final author copies.

My two releases of this year–Death Drop and Mississippi River Mischief–are also books of which I feel proud. I also published three terrific short stories this year: “Solace in a Dying Hour” in This Fresh Hell; “The Ditch” in School of Hard Knox; and “The Rosary of Broken Promises” in Dancing in the Shadows.

I think I’m settling finally into an acceptance that I am pretty good at what I do. I may not have the master’s or PhD in creative writing or literature of any kind; but I’ve never really wanted to be an academic writer. I never wanted to be Faulkner, but Faulkner did inspire me to interconnect novels and stories in my own fictional world (also Stephen King). I would like to do some non-fiction studies of genre and writers I enjoy, but in an accessible rather than academic way. Academics used to make me feel stupid and uneducated, and I also used to envy those writers who had that kind of background because I felt it made their work stronger than mine, or gave them insights into writing and building a novel that I’d never had, which made me and my work somehow lesser. But that wasn’t on them; that was on me. I was the one who felt inferior and lesser, not talented or good enough. That chip was on my shoulder and I was the one who put it there. My peers actually consider me a peer, and newer writers look at my longevity and my CV and are impressed by the prodigious output, if nothing else. I used to think all the award nominations were kind of hollow because I so rarely won; which was incredibly ungracious because some writers are never nominated for anything…but it doesn’t mean their work isn’t good. Now, I just find myself grateful to make a short-list of five out of all the possibilities for that slot, you know? I’m lucky, and I’m blessed.

I’ve reflected a lot on my life and my career this past year–Mom’s death had something to do with that–and I’ve identified, in many cases, why I am the way am by remembering the event that triggered the response in my brain of “okay, never want to experience that again” which led to so many self-toxic and self-defeating behaviors. But the bottom line of it all is I’ve finally accepted myself for who I am, have determined to stop self-deprecating, and take some pride in myself and my career and my life. I know the most amazing people and have the most incredible friends. I have a day job where I make a difference in people’s lives. I have an awesome life-partner, an enviable writing career, and I get to live in New Orleans.

Not bad, right?

Break It To Me Gently

It’s cold this morning in the Lost Apartment, and I didn’t want to get out of bed. The new meds are marvelous for sleeping–I can’t remember the last time I went to bed and was so damned comfortable and relaxed that it was a real struggle to force myself up out of the depths of Morpheus and into the world of the living again. I only have to go into the office twice this week–tomorrow I have PT first, which means waking up even earlier–but there’s another three-day weekend on the horizon and I really like the idea of all the rest and relaxation I’ll be able to get this weekend.

I did manage to get the apartment back into some semblance of order yesterday, with Sparky being absolutely zero help in that regard. He’s a bit rambunctious, to say the least, and still has that Big Kitten Energy thing going for him. The neighbors dropped off some toys for him for Christmas, and these were the first toys he’s actually shown any interest in for longer than a few moments. We watched some more War of the Worlds last night, which is a really interesting take on the old H. G. Wells novel; I don’t really remember the book anymore, which I read as a teen. I know the 1950’s version of the story was shown to me in elementary school; it terrified me and gave me nightmares for weeks. In retrospect, with all the fuss about education and all the right-wing bullshit attempts to take down and out public education, why the hell were elementary school children shown War of the Worlds in our classroom?

I couldn’t decide what to read next yesterday as I worked on the apartment, so I still haven’t started my next book. I’d intended to just read cozies for the rest of the year, but I am rethinking that, and thinking I need to mix it up more. I have a first novel by a Lafayette writer, who is a Black woman–I know, right? A Louisiana crime novel by a Black woman? I’ve been waiting for this forever–now if only we could find a gay Black crime writer in New Orleans….the book is Glory Be by Danielle Arsenault, and it comes highly recommended…and I’ve not read an “Own Voices” book in a while, which is entirely on me. Outside of James Lee Burke, there aren’t many crime writers who write about Louisiana but not New Orleans, and the book is highly recommended by a couple of friends, so I am really looking forward to breaking into it tonight or this weekend. I do have to run by the post office on my way home, and there are definitely chores that need doing around the house, so I’m pretty sure that’s how my evening will go. I also have PT at seven tomorrow, so I’ll be getting up early, too. Yay.

I’ve also been thinking about goals for the new year, and what I need to do in order to achieve those goals, and come up with a plan. I’m trying to remember what my favorite reads and watches of the year were–I did read a lot, somehow–and think about a writting schedule for the year. I’d like to do another Scotty book this year, a short story collection, and maybe something with those damned novellas-in-progress that I never seem to be able to finish. I definitely want to be better organized in the new year, and hopefully getting into that position before the new year rolls around, too. Maybe I can get all these “drafts” finished and posted at some point as well; wouldn’t that be nice?

And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines. Not a great Wednesday blog–I’ve really not been doing a great job with these entries, lately, have I? Ah, well, maybe tomorrow’s will be better. Have a great day, Constant Reader, and will check in with you again later.

Knock on Wood

I was Executive Vice President of Mystery Writers of America for three years (2020-2022), and it isn’t something I talk about much. I never wanted to be seen as using this volunteer position (which basically was chairman of the board) to promote myself or my career, which is why I never really talked about it much other than referring to it here as “my volunteer work.” It was exhausting, exhilarating, and frustrating at the same time. I dealt with a lot of firsts–first EVP to cancel the Edgar banquet, first EVP who had a Grand Master die on him before the Edgar presentation, on and on and on–but one thing I am really proud of that I accomplished in the role was the creation of the Lillian Jackson Braun Award, facilitated by two board members. Cozies are often overlooked when it comes to awards–they are the romance novels of the crime fiction community, looked down on, mocked, and not taken seriously–and I’ve experienced crime writers talking smack about cozies from even before I was published. The establishment of this award was a first step, I felt, for MWA to appreciate and uplift this subgenre so that it’s taken more seriously.

I had always wanted to write one, and that became A Streetcar Named Murder. I’ve also been reading more of them, too, since I realized I had allowed the opinion of others to influence my reading habits. I’ve long enjoyed Donna Andrews’ and Ellen Hart’s series, and there are so many terrific cozy writers out there…Ellen Byron, Sherry Harris, Katherine Hall Page, Leslie Budewitz; the list could go on forever, really.

So I’d been meaning to get around to the first Lillian Jackson Braun winner, presented earlier this year–and what a pleasant surprise Buried in a Good Book by Tamara Berry turned out to be.

“There are at least three dead bodies in there.”

Tess Harrow stood in front of the log cabin, mentally calculating where each of the corpses would be found. The basement would have one of them. She could see damp seeping up from the underground barracks, the stonework crumbling with neglect. It would be a crime not to store a body there. The lean-to on one side of the cabin, which was living up to its name and looked one strong breeze away from toppling over, was ideal for another. The chimney was large enough for someone small, and…

“Four. Four dead bodies.”

She nodded once and hefted her suitcase. There would be an additional corpse under the porch–she was sure of it. The rotted wood and craggy slates made the perfect cover for one final interment.

“You are so weird,” muttered Gertrude. Tess’ s teenaged daughter didn’t bother lifting her own suitcase, opting instead to dragit on the ground. The bump of the bag matched the slump of her shoulders. The prospect of sharing her home with a few corpses wasn’t doing much to improve a mood that had been questionable to begin with. “Please tell me we at least have Wi-fi out here.”

At first, I wasn’t sure what was going on in this opening sequence, and Berry draws this out a little bit, as we slowly are introduced to bestselling thriller writer Tess Harrow and her teenaged daughter, Gertrude (Gertie). Tess and Gertie’s father divorced some six months before the start of the book, and he’s pretty much ignored her since leaving Tess for a younger woman. Tess, behind on her latest book–she hasn’t started it–decided to remove herself and her daughter from Seattle and come out to stay at her grandfather’s extremely rural cabin–no power, running water, or wi-fi–so she can focus on finishing her book and get Gertie away from the Internet so she won’t know her dad isn’t reaching out to her. Within moments of their arrival, they head down to the pond on the property just as the water explodes and it starts raining fish–and body parts. A dead body had been in the pond, and the “blast fishing” not only killed the fish but dredged up the corpse. Soon we meet the local sheriff–a dead ringer for Tess’s police detective, and she starts plotting her new book by basing it on what is happening around her.

This is an wickedly clever concept: Tess isn’t investigating the murder, but trying to figure out how to plot her book since it’s based on the criminal investigation going on around her. These are some of the most amusing parts of the book–as Tess tries to change the crime so it’s not obvious she is basing it on a true crime, and changing characters and relationships around so they don’t bear too close a resemblance to the real thing, but she keeps stumbling on clues–and the police detective is getting awfully tired of her bizarre theories and interruptions. Berry makes this even funnier, by having the cop actually be one of her readers, and constantly telling her how she gets things wrong in her books. There are a lot of weird things going on up on these woods–and every element, no matter how disparate, ties in to the mystery–a flock of toucans, an eccentric’s missing cat, Bigfoot sightings, and a town full of suspects, including identical triplets (I did this in a book too!)–and there were several points where I had no idea how this was all going to play out and work out, but I was also having an incredibly good time reading it. It’s funny, and I really like the characters of Tess and Gertie, as well as their supporting cast.

I am looking forward to the next for sure!

(It’s Going to Be a) Lonely Christmas

Merry Christmas to those who celebrate, and if you don’t–well, happy Monday off!

Yesterday was not a good day. I woke up feeling like crap, and it never really got much better until later in the day, when I realized it had started raining during the night. It rained all day, actually, and I was so tired and dragged out and felt so terrible that I didn’t put it together until late in the afternoon–oh, this is SINUS related, because of the rain–and took a Claritin-D, which made me feel somewhat better. I also slept super good and slept in, too. I did manage to get some things done yesterday too–I finished reading Buried in a Good Book (more on that later) and started reading another one. We also finished watching both Looking the series, and then watched the wrap-up film (more on that later as well). I am going to pick out my next read, spend some time with it this morning, and at some point today we are probably going to watch Saltburn. I also have to put the turkey breast in the slow cooker (pulled turkey is quite delicious) and put dishes away, but I also have tomorrow off, so am not overly concerned about getting things organized and cleaned up. I worked on the books some more and pruned some more out, and started learning how to use the microwave–which does make a difference.

Christmas is usually when I started looking back on the year, and 2023 was a bit of a rollercoaster for me (they usually are). My personal life really sucked balls this past year, but it was a very good year for me professionally. The year started with me behind on two deadlines, but I managed to get both books finally finished and turned in, once I was able to turn MWA over to my successor, which was part of the delay on the books. In late January I injured my arm, and got misdiagnosed by my primary care physician. As we rolled into Mardi Gras, Mom had a massive stroke and I drove up to Kentucky to see her one last time in hospice. She didn’t really know me, she was pretty much unresponsive unless she was in pain, and it was rough. I drove home that Sunday, and she died on Valentine’s Day, so I had to drive up to Alabama that last weekend of Mardi Gras for the funeral. Not going to lie, it was tough losing my mother, and it’s been tough all year. I have sublimated most of my grief into worry about Dad, frankly. I went up and met him in Alabama for their anniversary, and we convoyed up to Kentucky, where I stayed for a week. I met Dad at my aunt and uncle’s place in Panama City Beach in October for their birthdays. When my primary care finally recognized what was wrong with my arm (torn biceps), I got referred to a orthopedic surgeon–but I needed a specialist. I had all my teeth removed finally in September, right after Labor Day, but didn’t get my new teeth until the week before the arm surgery, so was on a soft diet for two months which sucked….and then had to go back on it after the surgery because I couldn’t really cut up food. I also got hearing aids, which was great and has helped dramatically.

I also finally realized what the core mental issue was, thanks to a conversation with Dad–when I found out she suffered from generalized anxiety disorder and the light bulb went on over my head: that is exactly what is wrong with me, and all these years what I thought was “normal” because I didn’t know any different and I just always thought I was like Mom…yeah, I am like Mom, and all these years all I’ve been doing is treating symptoms and not the root cause. In consultation with my new primary care doctor, I weaned off the old medication and started treating the anxiety and the insomnia (anxiety related) properly, and it has made such an amazing difference in my life. I think more clearly, and I can analyze myself better. I’ve also started thinking about how most of my life I’ve tried to avoid confrontation (like Mom) and whenever something has happened that hurt me…well, I’ve tried to avoid those kind of situations again. My trust issues come from the anxiety and being hurt before, and I also realized that my socialization as a child was delayed and/or stunted because of being unable to control my brain. I had undiagnosed ADD as a child, and I feel pretty sure that’s carried over to my adulthood, as well. I couldn’t focus or concentrate because I didn’t know how to shut my brain off or keep it until control. The only time I could find peace, really, was reading or writing.

Professionally, I started off the year by getting nominated for a Lefty for Best Humorous for A Streetcar Named Murder, which was a very pleasant surprise. I debated going, but the timing was bad and with all the traveling I was having to do for family stuff, I had to conserve and preserve paid time off. This was followed up by an Agatha nomination for Best Children’s/Young Adult for #shedeservedit, and this time I did go. I lost to Enola Holmes, but I also became friends with Elizabeth Bunce (we’d been nominated together for an Anthony the year before) and Frances Schoonmaker, who was an absolute delight. I was nominated for three Anthonys at Bouchercon this year–Children’s/YA again; anthology for Land of 10000 Thrills, and Best Humorous for Streetcar again. None of those nominations ended with a win, but for me the nominations alone were the real win. I never ever thought I would be shortlisted for mainstream mystery awards, and what a delightful surprise.

I did publish two novels this year–a new series debuting with Death Drop, and the ninth Scotty, Mississippi River Mischief. I also got an (undeserved) editorial credit for School of Hard Knox, along with Donna Andrews and Art Taylor, for publisher Crippen and Landru–which meant working with my dear friend Jeffrey Marks. I have a story in the book, too–“The Ditch”–which was something I’d been working on forever. I also published two more short stories, “Solace in a Dying Hour” in This Fresh Hell, and “The Rosary of Broken Promises” for Dancing in the Shadows. I’m pleased with both stories, but I also need to get more. I have any number of incomplete projects that are nagging at me that I would like to finish in the new year. SO MANY PROJECTS.

But I feel good today, and very rested. I’d intended to take today as a do-nothing day, but I will probably do stuff because I am not really wired to not do anything all day.

And on that note, I will wish you happy holidays for the moment and head into the…well, not the spice mines, but perhaps a spice resort?

Cool Yule

Work-at-home Friday. I had early morning PT this morning, but when I checked my phone when I got home from work my surgeon had called to reschedule, so the rest of the morning for me is free. I’d taken sick time for this morning, which I can now cancel and use at another time, I guess for when the appointment is rescheduled. This was a bummer for me, because this was the removal of stitches and hopefully cleared from the brace appointment. I’d planned all of this out so that I can get it all taken care of on my old insurance, since I have new health insurance in January and a deductible to meet. Ironically, I had just been thinking that despite everything, this wasn’t ruinous financially. I was also hoping to be cleared from PT until late February. Here’s hoping I can be rescheduled next week sometime, but it’s the week between Christmas and New Year’s, so what are the odds that he’s either working or has anything available? I am trying really hard not to get anxiety over this, but it’s kind of hard. Sigh. No sense in stressing about something unknown, so when I finish this I’ll go ahead and call his office.

I knew it was all too good to be true.

But I’m glad I got it taken care of, anyway.

I was tired yesterday. The adventure of making a red velvet cheesecake one-handed and assembling it while making frosting with a nosy high energy kitten exhausted me, and once my caffeine wore off I was exhausted. I did get a great Secret Santa gift–a rechargeable battery operated hand-held vacuum I can use in the car, which I’d been wanting for a while–and I cannot wait to use it. If the weather is sunny this weekend, I may even wash the car. Ooooh, crazy talk, right? And I am getting my new microwave this weekend, which I am unnaturally excited about, frankly. This time I am keeping the instruction manual and teaching myself how to use it properly, rather than just reheating stuff.

I do have a lot to get done this weekend, which was partly why I was hoping to lose the brace for good today. But I can work around it and the High Energy Kitten, who slept so adorably in my lap last night while we watched Reacher and started watching Looking, which we are really enjoying. At the time it came out, it got terrible reviews and queer people seemed to hate it, and no one watched much. At the time I only knew Jonathan Groff from Glee, and not one of its highlights, so it didn’t take much for me to decide not to watch. But now having seen him in Hamilton (on Disney) and in Mindhunter, I was more open to it when Paul suggested it last night, and I was very pleasantly surprised with how realistic it was. It’s very well done, and while I personally didn’t identify with any of the characters, it showed a part of gay life and culture that I know exists. (One of my primary disappointments about the Queer as Folk reboot was the writers clearly weren’t from here–maybe they were, I don’t know–but it wasn’t a real New Orleans I saw on that show, and it was such a missed opportunity. Queer life in New Orleans is very rich and very much a part of the city’s culture in and of itself; imagine doing a queer show set in New Orleans and not mentioning the gay krewes, the leather community, and Southern Decadence is just sitting there, waiting for it’s film/television debut! I primarily watched the entire season for friends who worked as extras–my former supervisor Joey’s drag persona, Debbie with a D, was in the show a lot.)

I also want to finish reading the Tamara Berry novel and move on to the next. I am really enjoying the Berry, despite not being able to focus on reading this week in the evenings, so hopefully part of my cleaning plans this weekend can be broken up with an hour or so of reading every day. I really miss reading. I was scrolling through my ebooks on my iPad, lokoking for a cookbook which was one of the earliest ebook purchases tlast night and was stunned to see how many books I’ve gotten electronically over the years since I got my first iPad back in 2010. (I’d purchased the cookbook in 2011.) So, yes, my TBR stack is much larger than assumed because I never think about the ebooks. Sigh.

And on that note, I need to get to work. Have a lovely Friday Christmas Weekend Eve, Constant Reader, and I’ll probably be back at some point today.

Boogie Woogie Santa Claus

I also am hearing today’s title to the tune of “Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy of Company B.”

It’s Tuesday morning and I survived Monday’s early morning PT. It went extremely well, so I am hoping that my surgeon will release me from it until February, when I can start strength PT. The wounds have healed, and cleanly, which is super nice. The bicep is also starting to look like a bicep again and not like a flat tire.

I also got back to writing yesterday and it flowed extremely well. I am very excited to be back on that horse again, and now that I know the plot for the book it’ll be a lot easier to get it finished. The middle (or Act II) will be a struggle as it always is, but at least I know how to end it, and I also know what the primary plot is going to be, and I do think it’s going to be really funny. I rewrote with a mind to the new plot, and everything just kind of was clicking into place and easy, which is AWESOME. I’m itching to finish this and get back to what I was working on before this project fell into my lap*. And I am having fun writing again. Maybe the surgery and the new meds served as a hard reset, like I unplugged my brain and then plugged it back in? I also slept well again last night, showing that Sunday’s restless night’s sleep was an aberration.

It’s very cold here this morning–it’s 44 outside–and thus did not want to get out from under my pile of warm blankets this morning as the alarm started its horrendously annoying beeping sound. This of course brought Sparky out from his fort under the bed, and he cuddled with me until it was time for me to stop hitting snooze and get up, which made it even harder for me to get up. (The affection is merely to make sure that he knows the exact moment when I get up, so I can feed him–he doesn’t fool me! He was nowhere to be found last night once I sat in my chair and edited what I wrote yesterday.) But the good news is I feel very rested and have some energy, so here’s hoping this carries me through the day. I have to go shopping for my secret Santa gifts, and I also have to pick up the mail and figure out when to make the red velvet cheesecake for Thursday’s potluck. I may go ahead and make the red velvet layers tonight, and then do the cheesecake tomorrow night, putting it all together on Thursday morning before work. That sounds like a plan.

I also went a little overboard preparing food for the week. There’s way too much of it, and I’ll need to eat dinner every night when I get home to get rid of it all. I also hadn’t calculated on the potluck Thursday (denial that Christmas is this weekend, no doubt), and one of my co-workers wants to get lunch with me tomorrow, so that’s two days I won’t need to bring lunch. Heavy sigh. I also think I will take Christmas day off from everything; no emails, no writing, no social media–I wonder if I can do it? I’d like to finish reading the Tamara Berry to move on to the next cozy in the TBR pile; there are so many ones with diverse voices and characters I am having a very difficult time choosing one. I am trying not to buy new books until I’ve made a significant dent in the TBR pile (with exceptions, of course–my always must-reads like Laura Lippman, Lou Berney, Megan Abbott, etc.) or donated more books to the library sale. We went to Costco over the weekend, and I had some stuff delivered; so another goal for the week is to do something about the box congestion in the living room; one of the reasons I’m not big into box stores as much as I could be is I don’t have enough storage space in the house to accommodate the things I could get; I’d be in real trouble if I did have the space. I am going to clear out the cabinets in the kitchen; there’s a lot of stuff we don’t need that has just been collecting dust for years.

And the cabinets and laundry room are seriously in need of organizing.

And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines. Have a lovely Tuesday, Constant Reader, and I may be back later.

*Perhaps my goal for 2024 should be to finish everything unfinished in my files…

Feliz Navidad

I do love me a good cozy mystery.

Cozy mysteries often get little respect from the other subgenres of crime fiction, and their authors likewise generally only get respect from their cozy colleagues; but the disdain they get from a lot of other crime writers is actually kind of criminal. It’s no easier to write a cozy than any other form of mystery; if anything, I would think it would be harder to write about a murder without much blood, no violence, no profanity, and no sex on the page. Part of the reason I decided to write A Streetcar Named Murder was the challenge of writing one, and it was far harder writing that book than it was writing the ones in other subgenres of crime; I wish I had a dime for every time I backspaced over a profanity I’d automatically typed; I curse a lot and so do my characters.

So while I am writing a new cozy–the sequel to Death Drop–I thought I’d read some while I wrote to get a good feeling for the subgenre.

And I am finding one can never go wrong with Raquel V. Reyes.

Halloween was a week away, and we didn’t have s single decoration up. The living room was littered with shopping bags, extension chords, four-foot-tall plastic jack-o’-lanterns, and one handsome Frankenstein.

“Babe, we’re going to need a ladder and a staple gun,” Frankenstein said.

“Can you borrow one from a neighbor?” I asked as I squeezed my foot into a shoe that had fit perfectly a few weeks ago but was now tight. My costume, like my husband’s, was a modification of something I already had. I’d taken a white apron and smeared it with beet juice. In red marker, I’d written Chef Vampira on a paper toque, the tall hat fancy chefs wore. I was not a trained chef, but I had reached local stardom with my two cooking shows, Cocina Caribeña and Abuela Approved.

“Do I look undead enough? Do I need more white makeup?” I asked.

I got a copy of Raquel’s Lefty Award winning novel for Best First at Left Coast Crime in 2022. I read it later that year, and kind of fell in love with the series and its main cast. After years of living in New York and working as a food anthropologist, Miriam, her husband and son all move to his hometown, Coral Shores–a town within Miami’s borders. As she found her footing in this rich and posh neighborhood of McMansions and racist snobs (including her mother-in-law) she gets involved in a murder when someone–her husband’s ex and whom his mother wanted him to marry–died of poisoning right in front of her at a charity luncheon–and Miriam develops a nose for mystery.

This second book in the series is a welcome second offering. This time out, there are bodies everywhere. Did the chef at the country club accidentally fall to his death, or was he pushed?The mother of the victim in the first book is found unconscious and incoherent on the side of Miriam’s house. Her neighbor is found unconscious and frothing in the mouth on Halloween night, so she has to take in his dog until he’s recovered. AND her mother-in-law has coerced her into putting together the charity fundraiser at her snooty country club, so she is constantly picking at Miriam…even in front of her grandson. And then there’s another murder. Miriam can’t help sleuthing, everything keeps building until the night of the gala–when Miriam gets to the truth finally and puts her own life at jeopardy.

I love this series. I love Miriam, and I love that Reyes doesn’t italicize Spanish words (she says she writes in Spanglish) and that she authentically sprinkles Spanish organically through the books. I love that the books focus on Caribbean cooking, and how it developed culturally and anthropologically. I cringe at the racism Miriam experiences (while getting angry at it; I despise bigotry), and I really care about Miriam; which is the key to writing a good cozy mystery: a main character the reader can identify with and like.

Do read this series. I can’t wait to get my hands on the third!

Father Christmas

Well, it’s early and I’m a bit groggy; a groggy Greggy, as it were. It’s very dark outside and the heat is running, so I would also guess that it’s also cold out there too. I have PT this morning before I got to the office, and have errands to run after work as well. I still haven’t done holiday cards yet, and time is running out. Heavy heaving sigh. But I am also oddly not stressed about it. I’ve screwed up so many years and wound up not sending the cards, and I have just proved to myself that even when I get great cards and stamps in advance still doesn’t mean I’ll get them done early or on time. I’m holding on to the belief that I can still get them done and in the mail before the end of the week.

I’ve got high hopes!

It was a nice, restful, and relaxing weekend. I somehow managed to get a lot done, which was lovely, and if I didn’t make as far through my weekend to-do list as much as I would have preferred–still, I did manage to get a lot done. The oil change was vitally important, and I am very glad I managed to get that taken care of–the long life of the car is an absolute necessity, and whatever I can do to keep it running and as lasting as I can, the better. I do NOT ever want the return of having another car payment ever again, as long as I live; I am hoping the car outlives me, actually.

I got some other things done that needed doing, like hanging my nomination certificates from the Agathas and the Anthonys for the vanity area of the apartment, and I did get some good work on the book done. I think I have the entire plot figured out completely now, which will make finishing it that much easier. I need to make an extensive to-do list that will carry me through the end of the year, and I don’t think it will be a problem going forward ticking things off the to-do list; this weekend I felt more like myself than I have since at least before the surgery, which was a lovely nice change. The new medications are keeping me level and calm and anxiety-free (some slips in every now and again, which I am able to squash before things get stressful…and in some cases it’s really just habit to react with stress and anxiety at first before quelling the feelings). We watched several movies yesterday and enjoyed them all: Barbie, The Family Plan, and No Hard Feelings, and yes, quite aware what an interesting mix of film types that was, too. Paul has recovered from that little bout of flu that we both had, and he seems more balanced and centered, too. I’m kind of looking forward to this long holiday weekend that’s on deck, too.

I also spent some more time reading Buried in a Good Book by Tamara Berry, which won the first-ever Lillian Jackson Braun Award from Mystery Writers of America earlier this year. I’m really enjoying the book. I like the authorial voice and I find the main character, Tess, a bestselling thriller writer, to be quite droll and funny, and I appreciate her relationship with her rebellious daughter, Gertrude. I do tend to find common cause with characters that are writers, even as I try to avoid writing about writers myself. I also got a lot of chores caught up, and have cleaned up/made functional the workspace, which was way overdue. I’m going to try to stay on top of it as much as possible, but I always say that and always fail at keeping up with the kitchen and the workspace, alas.

Well, I was right, it’s 48 outside, which is cold for New Orleans. I have an easy day at the office today–and by that I mean I don’t have to see clients; it’s my paperwork catch-up day and I’m not quite as behind on that as one might think, given I was out for three weeks. (My supervisor kept on top of some of the paperwork that was pressing and couldn’t wait, which is much easier on me for today.) I am going to have to stay vigilant with the paperwork because the next two Mondays are holidays, but we’re never super busy just before and between those holidays, historically speaking. It’s odd, but I don’t think this first Christmas without Mom is going to be nearly as hard as the first Thanksgiving without her; Thanksgiving was more Mom’s holiday once we got older, and my sister took over Christmas. It’ll still be a bit sad, I think, but I have both Monday and Tuesday off for the holiday, so at least if I am sad on Christmas I have a whole other day to get over it.

And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines. Have a lovely Monday, Constant Reader. and I’ll probably be back later.

Reindeer Boogie

Up ungodly early on a Saturday because I have to cross the river to the West Bank to get my oil changed. One of the most interesting things about this surgery recovery is it seems to have wiped my memory banks or something–kind of like an Apple OS update. Yesterday on my way to PT I checked the car’s systems and was stunned to see that I was due for an oil change. It seemed like I’d just had it done, but now that I think about it, it may have been as far back as June, when I went to Alabama and Kentucky and back. I’ve done a lot of driving since then, including a weekend drive over to Panama City Beach in October, and so it’s not really surprising that it’s due again–and thank God I checked, right?

But I continue to sleep well, and I am really looking forward to sleeping late tomorrow and just lazing around until I feel like getting up. Monday morning I have PT early, and then have to head into the office for my paperwork day. It’ll be a great and interesting week of trying to get everything caught up so I can take my four day Christmas break with a clear conscience–at least as far as work is concerned. My PT visits continue to go well, and I like both therapists I’ve worked with so far. (If you’re local to New Orleans and need physical therapy, I highly recommend Physiofit in Uptown on Magazine Street.) I am hoping I won’t need the brace after I see my surgeon again next Friday, and what a lovely Christmas gift that would be, wouldn’t it? It’s just cumbersome and awkward now, and the greater dexterity I get with my hand the more annoying it is to have to type around having it on. I also have noticed how easily I tire now, too–but I also know my body had a major trauma that it hasn’t completely recovered from just yet, and three weeks of being sedentary wasn’t a huge help; I have to build my stamina back up.

We watched the final episode of Fellow Travelers last night and while it was terribly sad, there was a kind of release at the end as well. It’s an incredible show, and both Matt Bohmer and Jonathan Bailey deserve to be nominated for Emmys next time around. I doubt that it will get a lot of Emmy nods–It’s a Sin, which was also brilliantly done and brilliantly acted, was completely snubbed by the Emmys. Twenty years ago it would have not only gotten a lot of nominations, it would have probably run a clean sweep on award night, but sadly, the history of AIDS and gay suffering simply doesn’t have the cachet it did when everyone wore red ribbons to awards shows and red carpets. I do recommend the show, and I want to move the book up in my TBR pile. (I am taking Raquel’s Calypso, Corpses and Cooking with me this morning and I am hoping I’ll be able to finish it while I wait to get the car back.)

We also started watching the second season of Reacher, which is very fun. Alan Ritchson, who was already huge in the first season, used the time between filming to bulk up even more. He certainly embodies the character physically far better than Tom Cruise could ever hope to, with no offense to Cruise; he’s just not the right physical type, and since one of the best known facts about the character is his enormous size, well…he was never going to please fans of the books. I stopped reading the series about ten or so years ago–I have no grasp of the passage of time, so you’ll have to give me some grace on that, nor do I recall why I stopped reading it. Obviously, Lee Child isn’t missing my money, but I was a big fan of the series and still remember it fondly; there were some terrific books in that series, and The Killing Floor may be one of the best series-launch novels of all time.

I have to work today when I get home from the oil change and other errands this morning; I really need to spend some time with the book today and I also need to work on the house a lot more. The apartment has really slid, and allowing Sparky free range to do as he pleases has resulted in a lot of debris on the floor–and all of my good pens are missing. Paul’s cigarette lighters, highlighters, scissors, spoons, plastic wrap, plastic bags, dryer sheets, and a lot of other miscellaneous stuff is scattered all over the floors both up and downstairs…and he’s also wreaked havoc in the laundry room and the bathroom. The kitchen floor has never really been completely cleaned up since the ceiling collapse, either. I have decided, though, that this year’s Christmas present to myself is going to be a new microwave. My current one is well over ten years old, and it works fine…but I never read the manual and so am never sure how to use for anything than reheating something. Paul uses it more than I do, and he also never cleans it, so it’s always a filthy mess. Since I never really use it, I tend to not pay attention and then I always notice it when I don’t have time to clean it, and then forget. They had a great one on-line at Costco, so I think next weekend I’ll go pick it up, and then donate the old one (after a thorough cleaning) to work so we have one in our department.

And that’s how I know I am officially old: appliances are my preferred gift.

I Know There’s Something Going On

I love cozy mysteries.

I do, and while they may not make up the majority of my reading pile, it’s always a joy to find a new cozy series I enjoy. One of my favorite mysteries of all time, James Anderson’s The Affair of the Blood-Stained Egg Cosy, is definitely a cozy mystery–a house party murder, with secret passages and international espionage and a jewel thief–and is LONG overdue for a prestige mini-series, preferably by either Acorn or Britbox. (I should reread that book; it’s been a hot minute) I don’t think cozies and their writers are given the respect they deserve, ever–rarely do you see a cozy on a Best of the Year list or making the short-list for awards (besides the Agathas), and I’ve heard crime writers slag off the sub-genre, way more times than I would prefer. Anyone who thinks a cozy is lesser or somehow “easier” to write than any other kind of crime novel is more than welcome to give writing one a try. It’s always amusing to me to see the hypocrisy of crime writers whining that literary writers don’t take them seriously…and then in their next breath go on to mock cozy writers. (I did have a wonderful “gotcha” moment with a straight white male mystery writer once; he was complaining about how crime fiction isn’t considered literature, and later on in the same conversation he made a snide remark about cozy writers…and boy did he stumble for words when I replied, “So when lit writers treat you like a cozy writer you don’t like it?” He won’t talk smack about cozies in MY presence again…)

Anyway, I digress. One of my favorite series of all time is the Meg Langslow series by Donna Andrews, and we are on book thirty-three now, with thirty-four on my chair sidetable, halfway finished reading, and Book 35 available for preorder already.

That is a pretty impressive track record, and career. If I wrote a Scotty per year from now on, it would take me until I am eighty-eight to get to book 35. YIKES.

“This is the life,” I said, as I wriggled into an even more comfortable position in the hammock.

I wasn’t talking to anyone in particular. As far as I knew, there was no one within earshot. But just in case there was, I was going to do my best to look–and sound–like someone who was deeply contented and should not be disturbed for anything short of an actual emergency. Although the people most apt to – me were safely occupied elsewhere–Michael, my husband, was teaching his Friday classes at Caerphilly College, and my twin sons, Jamie and Josh, were at school until three.

My-notebook-that-tells-me-when-to-breathe, as I called my comprehensive to-do list and calendar, was nearby, but I’d already checked, and nothing in its pages had to be done right now. For the next hour I was on hammock time. I could read. I could put on my headphones and listen to some music. Or I could just lie here and enjoy the balmy May weather, the masses of blooms in our flower beds, and the fascinating aerial ballet of hummingbirds darting to and from the nearby feeder.

The hummingbirds. I sat up with a frown. The last time I’d found the time to watch them, there had been half a doxen of them, impossibly small, their iridescent jewel-toned bodies sparking in the sunshine as they paused, sipped, and darted away. Now there was onlyone, flitting around the feeder. And he didn’t seem to be feeding–just darting about.

And that title is a gem.

The entire series has bird-puns for titles, which is amazingly hard to do, and if you don’t think so–try coming up with thirty-three bird pun titles for crime novels without looking at Donna’s backlist. I suggested one to her many years ago that I keep hoping she’ll use–but she hasn’t yet, and I despair my bird pun title will ever make it into her canon.

I do feel that I also should, in the interest of full disclosure, let you know that Donna Andrews is not only one of my favorite writers but one of my favorite people in this business. We first met years ago when we were both on the MWA board (she was on The Good, the Bad, and the Emus back then), and I found her to be intelligent, kind, charming and funny. That was when I started reading her, and what a joy this series has been for me all these years. Donna’s books, to me, are the perfect example of why this sub-genre (amateur sleuth, no blood or sex or violence–at least not much, and little to no swearing) is called “cozy”–because that’s how reading one of her books makes me feel, cozy. Honestly, there’s nothing better than curling in my easy chair with a blanket, a purring kitty in my lap, as I revisit my friends in Caerphilly again.

Because she writes so well it seems like a real place, one that I am happy to escape my life into twice a year.

I could talk about this series all day, I love it and the characters so much. Caerphilly reminds me a lot of Schitt’s Creek and Ted Lasso–ensemble casts in places where everyone is kind and looks out for one another, but also doesn’t interfere and lets you make and learn from your own mistakes. This time out, Donna has added a new McMansion style neighborhood to the town, Westlake, with people retiring from major cities to the “rustic” charms of Caerphilly–only to complain incessantly about those very rustic charms to begin with–and beekeeper Edgar is square in their sites, his hives just across a small stream from their backyards. Meg calls them the NIMBYs (not in my backyard), and I think we’ve all encountered these types (which is why dumps and toxic waste always ends up around poorer communities). Someone has poisoned all of Edgar’s bees–and Meg agrees to look into who could have done something so heinous. But while looking for an old African American cemetery, Meg and her friends not only find the cemetery deep in the woods, but they also find the dead body of one of the worst of the NIMBYs, and the game is afoot.

The sadness at finishing the book was derailed by knowing this year’s Christmas Meg murder mystery was already in my TBR pile, which I immediately started reading when I finished Birder She Wrote. Don’t be daunted by the massive backlist, either–if you’ve not read any of these books, you can start anywhere and then work your way through the series; there are never any spoilers other than those from Meg’s personal life–and frankly, I don’t mind those kinds of spoilers, because its fun to go back and see how she met her husband, when they got married, the twins, etc.

Hey Apple TV–this series is a natural for y’all.