I am off work on this glorious Friday, as I prepare to slip into the Festival weekend. I do have things to do–writing–so I am fortunate that I have my mornings free all weekend, so I can get that writing done. I did have a good writing day yesterday–three thousand words and a whole new chapter, which isn’t bad for a Festival widow. I don’t have any assigned duties today, but I am going to head down for the opening party and there’s a panel at 4 I’d also like to attend. I need to do some writing and some chores here before I head out–as well as some errands to run–but I have some time today and it’s going to be a lovely one, methinks. It’s kind of gray outside this morning, but I think it’s going to be a nice day–even though the weather this weekend may not be the greatest.
I got some work done on the book last night, and I feel good about that, and as always, I am quite convinced it’s terrible work. Someday it would be nice to write something I feel satisfied with immediately after, but maybe that will happen for me at some point in the future. But I feel pretty good this morning, well rested and relaxed and my coffee is just simply superb. I’ve started laundering the bed linens already, Sparky seems content to hang out here by my desk and watch Cat TV out the window, and yes, I know he’s just waiting for me to vacate my desk chair–but at least he’s not being obnoxious about it…yet. There’s still plenty of time, especially since I need to unload the dishwasher and reload it and yes, I have a lot of domestic god things to get done this morning before setting out for the day.
There are worse ways to spend a day, you know?
After finishing my word count for the day yesterday (2700 total), I was pretty worn out and drained. It was a relatively easy day for the clinic, so I was able to get a lot of things caught up so I won’t be as behind when I go back in on Tuesday (I took Monday off also this year; I didn’t the last couple of years and totally regretted it); I’ll just have to catch up on Monday’s paperwork and so forth. So, yes, I am feeling good this morning, and I guess last night’s excellent sleep was due to getting the word count in for once and it was the sleep of the righteous. Ugh, just looking around the apartment this morning…yeah, I need to do some cleaning this morning around the writing.
I am also pleased to report that Crime Writers for Trans Rights met our auction goal on only the second day! We still have several days left for the auction, so get in there and bid bid bid! There’s all kinds of great stuff with very low bids on them, and some items that are awesome haven’t got any yet! I cannot even begin to tell you, Constant Reader, how the response to this auction has sort of (not completely, of course) made me feel a little better about this community I belong to. After the intense disappointments and homophobia I’ve experienced, including from people I thought were friends, my opinion of the crime fiction community was pretty fucking low, and as I said, after the betrayal of the election last November, I’d had it. Let me put it to you in a way that’s more understandable, okay, because I know some people have trouble letting go of their own privilege: when you not only will not call out a friend for saying something homophobic, and actually play along with it, what you are telling your queer friends is we can’t count on you if and when things get bad for us…and that election result was a promise that things were, indeed, going to get bad for us. If you won’t say to your buddy, “dude, that’s not cool and homophobic,” how can I expect you to do a fucking thing in the face of a coordinated government effort to strip me of my rights, my humanity and my citizenship? And joining in tells me you not only won’t do a fucking thing when push comes to shove, but you may actually become an informer.
And how I am supposed to feel safe around you, ever again? For the record, that’s what I mean when I say I don’t feel safe–I don’t trust the people I’m around to have my back in the face of homophobia, which isn’t a good feeling.
But at least my fears of negative responses from people to the auction have proven untrue, and my worries about not meeting our goal were clearly unfounded. It’s nice to be reminded that not everyone in this community is a bigot. Doesn’t mean I’m going to start attending crime fiction community events any time soon; I don’t feel safe there, despite the good people, and no, I will never forget having someone who has claimed to be “one of the good guys” saying faggy to my face at Bouchercon in Toronto, or being told I was “nobody” by Bouchercon programmers (speaking of fucking nobodies and hangers on).
I want to preserve my peace, and why the fuck would I spend that kind of money to go get treated like shit and have no one in the organization care? Which, again, is “you’re nobody.”
But thank you to everyone who donated and to everyone who is bidding for restoring some faith in the community for me.
And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines. May your Friday be everything you want it to be, Constant Reader, and I’ll be back tomorrow morning.
I have really come to love Bouchercon, and it’s always a highlight of my year.
Things have seriously changed for the better.
Queer Crime Writers after a dinner out in San Diego, with Marco’s lovely husband Mark Gutkowski
Bouchercon last week was a marvelous, marvelous experience. I had such an amazing time, saw some people I’ve not seen in quite some time (and quickly remembered why I love them so much), and stayed up way later every night than I should have–one of my many neuroses is FOMO, of course; I still regret not going to Dallas in 2019–but I laughed a lot, had some great panels, and made some new friends, too. I ate great meals, had some marvelous cocktails, and I really liked the hotel (once I figured out the shortcuts to the meeting spaces). It also made me think about my own history with the event, how things have changed for the better, and how I hope it keeps changing for the better. There were so few of us queer writers who used to go back in the day; now we have enough of us to have a happy hour where we get together and drink and chat about writing and the business and oh, how we all laugh. It’s wonderful.
When I first got started in this business, publishing was different. I had to explain this recently to someone I am hiring to do the ebook for Jackson Square Jazz for me; why I didn’t have a pdf file, because back then there were no ebooks and you got your page proofs in the mail, as well as your marked up manuscript for the editing process. So all I have on hand is the unedited version of the book I turned in. But what also was nice back then was there was a support system for queer writers that we no longer have–there were queer newspapers, queer magazines, and queer bookstores. We had a queer book of the month club–Insightoutbooks–and their influence in shaping and developing my career cannot be underestimated. After Hurricane Katrina and the six months spent touring for Mardi Gras Mambo, I kind of withdrew back into myself. I don’t remember much of 2006-2008, to be perfectly honest; I just know that I went back to work full time in 2008 and after adjusting my writing/editing schedule to that, it was around 2009 or 2010 that I resurfaced and started thinking about promotion and marketing again.
And what I found was that during those lost years (I call it the Hibernation) everything had changed. The queer newspapers and bookstores were mostly gone. ISO shut down. And I realized, with a sinking heart, that I was going to have to start going to mainstream conferences to promote myself. After working so hard in the mid to late 1990’s ensuring I could exist in almost entirely queer or queer-friendly places, I found myself having to essentially start over. Queer writers never mattered to the mainstream crime organizations and conferences, and I braced myself, knowing I was going to encounter homophobia yet again.
It didn’t take very long–although in retrospect, I’m actually surprised it took as long as it did.
I joined Mystery Writers of America, and later, Sisters in Crime. I also went to Bouchercon in Indianapolis and San Francisco. I didn’t know more than a handful of people and tended to glom onto the people I did know (sorry about that, guys; social interactions at events where I don’t know anyone ramps up my anxiety, so I glom onto the people I know). Indianapolis I wasn’t in the host hotel, I was across the street–and it was cold. It was the weekend of the Ohio State-Purdue game, I can remember that because my hotel was full of OSU fans, so I found myself mostly hanging out in my hotel room and reading, while braving the cold to go across the street for my panels and events. It was nice, and decided to go to San Francisco for it the next year. There I was in the host hotel and realized oh you really need to stay in the host hotel in the future, because it made everything easier. I was starstruck most of that weekend–I rode in the elevator with S. J. Rozan once and another time with Laurie R. King, which was incredible. I only had one panel, at 4 pm on Friday afternoon that no one came to, but I had a really good time—and even decided to put together a bid to host it in New Orleans (and that is a whole other story), before yet another person decided that it was time for a Bouchercon programmer to put the fag back in his place, letting me know that I and my books weren’t important enough (the exact wording was “surely you have to understand that someone who’s edited a couple of anthologies doesn’t really deserve to be on panels”–despite the fact that my tenth novel had just been released…and of course, the greatest irony of this was that I went on to edit three of their anthologies) to grace any panel, and that any panel I’d been given in the previous two years should be considered a gift.
Should be considered a gift.
A fucking GIFT.
(For the record, Paul is an event planner by trade. He is executive director of both the Tennessee Williams/New Orleans Literary Festival as well as Saints & Sinner, a queer litfest. Just to be certain I wasn’t overreacting and being a diva-bitch, I let him read the email. His response? “If one of my staff, interns or volunteers wrote an email like that to an attending author I would fire them on the spot.” And before anyone starts up with the “programming a Bouchercon is hard” I will remind you that Margery Flax and I wrote over one half of the program for Dallas in three fucking days and contacted everyone with their assignments and then reorganized and redid the program to accommodate schedules and wrong panel assignments for about two weeks before it was done–with the local chair constantly throwing things at us that made us start pulling threads and weaving it back together again….nothing like “oh, sorry, I forgot that I promised these people a panel for this” after you’ve redone it for the fourth time. That happened a lot. And the entire time, we were incredibly polite and friendly and did whatever we could to accommodate people; apologizing and fixing it repeatedly. NOT ONE PERSON RECEIVED A FUCKING EMAIL TELLING THEM TO CONSIDER ANY PANEL THEY GOT AS A GIFT.
But then, I’m not an unprofessional piece of shit whose pathetic ego sees programming as power to abuse, either.
I wasn’t saying (and was very respectful) oh I am such a big deal how could you not give me an assignment, all I asked was hey, I know how hard your job is, but I don’t understand how you get on a panel and what can I do differently in the future to get one? What am I doing wrong? I approached them with kindness and respect for the work they were doing and got bitch-slapped, demeaned, and insulted in response. No author who is paying their own way to a conference and essentially providing the event with free entertainment for its audience should ever be treated so contemptuously by event organizers, period. The fact that when I expressed these concerns to the national board all I got back was mealy-mouthed excuses and “we’re sorry you’re offended” told me everything I needed to know about the organization and its board; the way they were treating me about the New Orleans bid (I had planned on having Susan Larsen–former chair of the National Books Critic Circle, chair of the Pulitzer Prize for fiction twice, long time programmer for the TW Fest and a nationally respected book reviewer–help out along with Pat Brady, long time publications chair of the Historic New Orleans Collection, huge mystery fan, and also a long time programmer for TWFest only to be told their vast knowledge and experience wasn’t “good enough” and I needed to get the homophobic trash who told me I was nothing to program New Orleans–yeah, like that was ever going to happen) was also egregiously horrible, condescending, insulting, and unprofessional.
Needless to say I cancelled my trip to St. Louis and never considered attending Cleveland; I tend to not go where I am not welcome. I am not taking my hard-earned money from my “nothing career” and giving it to a homophobic organization, where I then get to beg for scraps and get treated like shit. I have better ways to spend my money, thank you. (And yes, I know who the programmers were and yes, I will carry that grudge to the grave.)
I withdrew my bid to host for New Orleans, and I washed my hands of the mainstream mystery community. Who needs it? They were never going to accept me or my work, they were never going to read my work, they didn’t give a shit about me, and it was pretty clear they never would. I was kind of at sea for a few years, there. There were no more queer newspapers, no more queer bookstores, no more gay Insightoutbooks.com book club, nothing. Outside of the TWFest and Saints & Sinners, I had no conference outlets to promote myself and my work. The mainstream mystery world clearly wanted no part of me, so what was I supposed to do? So, I just kept writing. I operated my social media pages as a promotional outlet for my work, and I kept writing this blog. I did finally return to Bouchercon when it went to Albany; friends convinced me to go, and one powerful friend requested me for a panel she assembled–and it came through. Having friends made a huge difference, really, and through my friends I met and made more friends, and Bouchercon slowly became a must-go event for me every year…eventually reaching the point where I never had to be concerned about getting on a panel, while at the same time no longer caring whether I did or not. It became more about seeing my friends and being around other writers than a work/promotional thing for me. Ironically, once I no longer cared or worried so much about being on things…I started getting put on more and more things, with bigger and increasingly more important co-panelists (I still can’t get over the fact that I was on a panel with ATTICA LOCKE in Minneapolis. I was too nervous to say anything to her; I spent that entire panel looking at my co-panelists and listening to them speak and wondering why the fuck I was on that panel).
And now, of course, we have a group: the Queer Crime Writers, and a core group of us have been showing up together at conferences ever since we bonded at Left Coast last year (and bonded even more with more of us at Bouchercon Minneapolis last year): John Copenhaver, Marco Carocari, Kelly J. Ford, and Robyn Gigl–who’ve all become very dear to me over the last year or so. Teresa Cain/Carsen Taite joined us in San Diego, and became my con-wife; what a great time we had!
And somehow, I am getting nominated for mainstream awards, an outcome I could have never predicted. I won the Anthony for Best Anthology for editing Blood on the Bayou, and was nominated for Best Short Story at the Dallas event for “Cold Beer No Flies” (I lost to S. A. Cosby, no disgrace there). Last year Bury Me in Shadows was nominated for Best Paperback Original (losing to Jess Lourey) and Best Children’s/Young Adult (losing to Alan Orloff); neither of those losses were devastating because Jess and Alan are also friends of mine, and I couldn’t have been happier for them both. This year I had three nominations in three categories for three different books–Best Anthology for Land of 10000 Thrills (losing to S. J. Rozan for MWA’s Crime Hits Home); Best Children’s/Young Adult (losing to Nancy Springer for the latest Enola Holmes, hello, no disgrace there); and Best Humorous for A Streetcar Named Murder (losing to Catriona McPherson for Scot in a Trap)–again, with the exception of Springer, I lost to very talented friends I like very much (I’ve not met Springer). That’s seven Anthony nominations in total, to go along with the Macavity, the Agatha, the Lefty, and the Shirley Jackson nominations. Not bad for a queer writer, wouldn’t you say? Ten mainstream award nominations? I certainly never would have dreamed all those years ago when I was told “any panel you get should be considered a gift” by Bouchercon programming.
That doesn’t mean the community is free from homophobia; it’s still there. I have mentioned before the mainstream cisgender male author who is clearly afraid to acknowledge my existence and always beats a hasty retreat whenever I walk up; I find his homophobia amusing. You’re not hurting me, bro, because I don’t want to know you, either. It doesn’t mean that I can’t be sitting in a booth in the hotel bar with a bunch of friends only to have a straight man look at me, smirk and say “faggy” in a sentence, as though daring me to call his ass out because he’s so much more important than I am; no worries, asshole, I don’t even have to repeat the story to anyone because since then you’ve shown all the big names you’re buddies with that you’re actually a piece of shit, and yes, I’ve watched it all with the same fucking smirk you had on your face when you thought you’d pull out your micro-penis and slap it down on the booth table in Toronto, and when I hear stories about you, I am delighted to pull out “Well, I’ve known he was trash since he said faggy in front of me, looking me in the face and smirking as he said it”.
Assholes will always out themselves, at least in my experience–and I’m very patient. I store the receipts and pull them out to corroborate horrific behavior when the timing is right.
I’ll save the racism, sexual harassment, and homophobia I faced in Albuquerque at Left Coast for another time.
I’m very pleased with the progress that has been made in our community over the last five or six years–I mean, the Rainbow Diversity panel about queer crime writing in Toronto was packed, when such panels in the past only drew maybe four or five audience members. Codes of conduct have been implemented to protect attendees from sexual harassment and pervy conduct, as well as racism and homophobia.
Progress is often slow, and it is easy to get impatient. I don’t know if my involvement with Bouchercon has made things better for queer writers there, but I do know the award nominations show other queer writers that such things are possible for them. Nothing says you’re welcome here than seeing members of your community nominated for the awards. The more of us that attend also means that more of us will get nominated, be on panels, and be able to talk about our work to readers who might open their minds and read our books. Being visible at these events is crucial and important.
And like water wearing down a stone, we have to keep relentlessly pushing.
(John, Marco, Kelly, and Rob Osler have all been nominated for mainstream awards over the last year, along with me. Edwin Hill and PJ Vernon have also been recognized for their brilliant work, too. This is so wonderful to see–I’d be delighted even if I weren’t with them in this grouping. And if you’ve not read any of us, there’s not a single person I’ve mentioned by name you can go wrong with. It’s also exciting seeing the new queer talent rising in writers like Margot Douaihy.)
I was torn about going to Nashville next year; their anti-trans and anti-queer laws have me not really wanting to spend my queer money there. But the point was made that going and being very present was an act of defiance…and Lord knows I love defying homophobes, so I guess I am probably going to go. I can visit Dad either before or after, so it actually makes sense for me to go. I’ve decided to write a very gay story to submit to their anthology (which means I need to get back to work on it), and so yeah…I think defiance is the way to go.
Plus….I love my Queer Crime Writers. I can’t imagine not being around them next year, and I would absolutely go nuts from FOMO.
So, in closing, thank you, Queer Crime Writers. I love you all, and thank you for letting me into your group. Let’s keep making a difference, shall we?
We made it to Wednesday, Constant Reader! Can you believe it? I barely can. And yet here we are, at the crest of the week and ready to head downhill into the weekend, in which Paul comes home. Huzzah! Huzzah! I have to say I am rather proud of myself. Despite being alone–which isn’t a regular occurrence in the Lost Apartment–I’ve managed. I’ve only gotten bored a couple of times, and the loneliness isn’t pronounced; it’s there, but not in the forefront of my mind and it’s just kind of there. I was actually thinking the other night (morbidly) you know, I could probably handle the living alone thing if and when it comes to that. Not something I want to happen any time soon, mind you–and I certainly have no desire for it, but I kind of get it where my dad is coming from. Obviously, being alone in the house, given that Mom died earlier this year and how much Dad is going through, is of course going to make me think about being alone and living alone and having to go on alone. I’ve thought about this before–any number of times over the years, especially every time Paul’s had to undergo surgery of some kind–which is morbid, yes, but realistic. We’re at the age where we have to start recognizing that we aren’t immortal–my aching and sore body reminds me of that fact every damned day, thank you very much–and start planning. Wills and so forth, legal protections, potentially even getting married because of Louisiana’s insane inheritance laws. (Thank you, research for A Streetcar Named Murder.)
I also have to get my driver’s license renewed, and I may as well get one of those Real ID things while I am at it, since the deadline for getting one is next May and since I have to go to the OMV anyway, I may as well get this done. What a royal pain in the ass this is, I might add; I’ll have to find my birth certificate or my passport (which is probably useless as it is most likely expired since we went to Toronto several years ago), and some other things. Aggravating, yes, but in a worst case scenario I won’t be able to find my birth certificate and my passport will have expired, so I will need to wait for Paul to get home because he knows where they are kept (I do not; I lose things so Paul is always in charge of important things–but I’ve not managed to lose the title to my car!). Ah, a trip to the West Bank. Which means Sonic for lunch! Huzzah!
It seriously doesn’t take much to please me.
I should have looked for things last night when I got home from work but I was drained. When I got into the car the temperature outside was about 102, and by the time I’d driven home through the nightmare that is the Central Business District after four thirty in the afternoon, I was a bit worn down so wound up taking the evening off. Literally. I didn’t do a fucking thing last night (I wrote about 150 words on chapter five of the WIP) and went through my journals. I meant to read a short story, but I dozed off in my chair around eight, and finally staggered up to bed sometime between nine and ten. I do not understand why last evening turned out the way it did, but I also slept really well last night and feel very rested and together today. (I think it was primarily being drained from clients yesterday, we were busier than usual–a good thing; I’d prefer we had a full schedule–and I’ve grown unused to that much human interaction, so it made me tired.) I am not going to lambaste myself over not getting much accomplished last night; part of my “be kinder to yourself” goal of this year is to accept that I am not superhuman and will occasionally be tired, worn out, unable to work and thus need rest instead. I do not have to continue the pace of productivity I set for myself when I was younger and had more energy.
I think tonight when I get home, after I do some chores–seriously, how does one person mess up so many dishes and laundry–I’ll write for a bit and then try to get caught up on Superman and Lois, which means going back to the first episode of this season and rewatching, because I don’t remember what is going on this season. I know they replaced the actor playing Jonathan Kent, which I wasn’t thrilled about (but should give the new actor a chance; I was unimpressed with the new actor), or maybe start the third season of Titans, which I had also started and gave up after a few episodes. I mean, I love me some super-heroes, but I’m also starting to get a little burned out on them. I probably won’t watch any more Marvel movies, and I am beginning to get a bit bored with the DC movies, too. I do want to watch the next season of Loki, and I do like Superman and Lois…but it’s all starting to feel a little stale to me. Maybe I should go get caught up on my comics reading? We stopped watching both Arrow and The Flash because every episode of Arrow started to feel the same and the fight scenes became repetitive; with The Flash, it was because how many times can one person go back in time to change the past and fuck everything up for the present and then keeps doing it?
I don’t like my super-heroes to be that stupid, frankly. It’s a shame, too, because I’ve always loved the character and Grant Gustin is terrific in the part. Ah, well.
And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines. Have a lovely day. Constant Reader!
One of the fun things you get to deal with when you’re a queer mystery writer is the diversity panel.
What, you may well ask, is a diversity panel?
It’s what used to happen back in the day when well-meaning non-minority people realized they had to do something with non-white non-straight mystery writers coming to mystery conventions. What better way than to wash your hands of working for diversity by throwing all of the non-white non-straight writers at a conference onto a “diversity panel”?
Back when I was getting started and still was doing touring for book store events, I used to joke that signings/readings always made me feel like a sideshow freak hawking snake oil; the mass signings at events like BEA (Book Expo America) were the worst for this. I always wound up sitting next to someone enormously popular or famous (when they’re done alphabetically, I always expect to be seated next to Charlaine Harris, which is quite humbling. The most humbling of all was sitting next to Sharyn McCrumb at the South Carolina Book Festival. Her line literally went out of the room and into the hallway….ao I just started opening the books for her to make it run more smoothly. Might as well be useful since I was just sitting there doing nothing.)
But that was years before I was ever put on a diversity panel. Ah, the well-meaning diversity panel. Make no mistake, it’s always meant well–the path to hell and all that–but inevitably these panels would devolve into let me teach you nice straight white cisgender people about homophobia/racism/misogyny. The problem was always not the intention, which was good (inclusivity is never a bad thing), but the mentality that you could throw everyone outside the straight white cisgender class onto that type of panel and not worry about actually putting those authors onto other panels wasn’t the best. Conference diversity was the goal, and tossing out a “diversity panel’ to check off that box…yeah, no thanks.
As if having your entire writing career reduced to, in my case, who I fuck isn’t a bit disheartening, to say the least. It also very clearly sends the message that the only benefit any audience would ever get out of listening to me speak would be my ability to teach them about what it’s like to be a GAY writer. Not a mystery writer, not a writer, but a GAY writer. When I taught the character/stereotype class for SinC into Good Writing at New Orleans Bouchercon, I opened with “I don’t get up in the morning and shut off my gay alarm and go down my gay staircase and make myself a gay cup of coffee. I shut off my alarm, go downstairs and make a cup of coffee like everyone else does.”
I’m a gay man, and I write (mostly) about gay men. I’ve written and centered characters who were gay men before, and will probably do so again. My driving passion, though, is to write about my community and people like me. I long ago accepted I’d never get rich doing so, but I write what interests me and the concerns and plights of gay men are usually at the top of that list. I bristled whenever I was assigned to a queer panel or a diversity panel at a mainstream community event, but I also felt obligated to do the work–and I’ve always (wrongly) believed that complaining sounds like ingratitude. (Ah, that Christian brainwashing!) If I do sit on the panel and talk about the history of queer crime fiction, writers from the past who influenced me but are out of print today, and talk about why I write what I write, maybe some hearts and minds can be changed, or at least influenced to do some reflection and processing that can lead to effective change.
But…I can also talk about writing, and inspiration, and plotting and character development and dialogue and the mechanics of novel/story construction. I can talk about suspense and cliff-hangers, and how to keep the reader turning the page. I can talk about setting and place, scene and mood and voice, first person v. third or present v. past tense. I mean, I get it. If you want someone to talk about gay crime writing, you should get a gay crime writer; every writer can speak to those things, but not every writer can talk about being a gay crime writer. But it’s so nice when I can talk about something else, you know?
The diversity panel all too often would also be the only panel we “others” would get assigned to, because clearly the only interesting thing about us and our work was it didn’t center straight white cisgender people. They were always scheduled at terrible times–either super-early in the morning or late in the afternoon; and inevitably, there would be panels scheduled against packed with superstars everyone wants to hear. If having your work and career distilled down into simply being about you fuck is disheartening, imagine being assigned to a panel at 4 in the afternoon on Friday to talk about how who you fuck makes you different from the majority of authors to the six or seven people who show up for it (if you were lucky).
If signings or readings made me feel like a sideshow freak hawking snake oil, diversity panels tend to make me feel like some exotic creature behind glass in a zoo somewhere. (There is, however, a defense for these panels, in that they do make marginalized writers easier to find for marginalized readers, but that’s an argument for another day.) I made the conscious decision to start refusing to do them quite a while ago, probably after the St. Petersburg Bouchercon. I did agree to do one at Bouchercon in Toronto, and I only agreed to do that one because Kristopher Zgorski was moderating and he pulled the panel together.
But I will say this: the diversity panel in Toronto was very well attended, and I met not only some writers and readers that were new to me, but those folks have become friends in the time since. I was pleasantly surprised that we had a full room; which I took as an incredible sign because it wasn’t an all-encompassing diversity panel but restricted to queer people, and that many people showed up. (I suspect a lot of that had to do with Kristopher’s blog readership more than any of us who were actually on the panel.) I believe the panel was–and forgive me if my faulty memory leaves someone out–Owen Laukkanen, Stephanie Gayle, John Copenhaver, Jessie Chandler, and me. It was great. We had an amazing conversation, I got to meet Stephanie and John for the first time, and it’s always fun hanging with Owen and Jessie. Kristopher asked great questions. When it was over, I was pleasantly surprised. The audience was receptive and also asked great questions.
When I was helping do the program for Dallas Bouchercon, the local committee really wanted a diversity panel. I agreed to put one together on two conditions: 1, that I would be the moderator so could control the topics under discussion* and 2. it would not be the only panel the participants would be assigned to. I made sure that was the case since I was helping write the program, and knowing I had the power to ensure that happened was the only reason I agreed to organize it. I also asked everyone who was on the Dallas panel if they minded being on the panel, and guaranteed them another panel while asking. I also assured them refusing the diversity panel would not affect any decisions about other panels, either–because you have to worry about that, too! I called it “Not a Diversity Panel” and I had planned on not talking about any of us being writers from the perspective of being marginalized, but at most, how being “on the margins” impacted how, what, and who we chose to write about.
Ironically, I wound up not going to Dallas after all; an inner ear infection kept me in New Orleans.
Diversity panels have come a long way from what they used to be, but that danger is still there. I would urge conference programmers to think long and hard before deciding to put together a diversity panel, and why you think it’s necessary to have one. If you do decide that it’s something needed for the program, remember that the authors on it should have a chance to be on a panel where they can be an author, not just a diverse author. Diversity issues and concerns should be discussed, and diversity panels are often the place for those conversations that are so important and necessary to happen. But they can easily can go down the path to the dark side, very easily, in which the panelists are made to feel like zoo animals being poked, prodded, and observed. It’s great that people will show up in droves to these panels now–but that’s why sensitivity and a moderator who has experience with marginalization is essential, to bar a repeat of that horrible diversity panel where a well-respected and lauded editor, about three quarters of the way through the panel where a very great discussion was being had decided to opine, But it has to be about the writing! The writing has to be good!
Because of course diversity is pushing bad work forward? Because work from non-white non-straight writers usually doesn’t measure up? I was horrified, and lost any respect I had for the editor along with any desire to ever work with said editor.
I will forever feel ashamed for not calling out that comment in the moment, but I was so stunned and shocked I didn’t know what to say.
Well, wasn’t yesterday an amazing day for one Gregalicious? Not only was it payday, but I stopped and got the mail on my way to the office (there was a check!), and then right around the time I got to the office my phone (which was in my pocket) made the sound of breaking glass, indicating I’d gotten a notification from Facebook; I pulled it out of my pocket on my way up the stairs and lo! The Anthony Award short-lists had been announced, and I’d been tagged in the post. This usually means one thing and one thing only–a nomination–but I thought, no, that can’t be. But sure enough I clicked on the notification, scrolled down the list, and there I was, nominated for Best Short Story for “Cold Beer No Flies” from Florida Happens…along with four other amazing writers–Art Taylor, S. A. Crosby, Barb Goffman, and Holly West!
Wow.
It’s really lovely to be nominated for awards, and I know I’m luckier than so many others–who can go their entire careers without ever getting any award recognition. This is my second time up for an Anthony (I won, in Toronto, for Best Anthology for Blood on the Bayou), and came as an incredibly pleasant surprise; the decision to not have a Best Anthology Anthony for Dallas Bouchercon was, I thought, the death knell of any shot I might ever have at possibly getting another Anthony nomination. I certainly never dreamed I’d somehow make the short-list for Best Short Story for my contribution to Florida Happens, “Cold Beer No Flies,” a story that’s been hanging out in my files in various different forms since the late 1980’s. But I am also pleased that it’s a story about a young gay man trapped in a small, conservative Florida panhandle town who has big dreams to get out of there–and isn’t afraid to break the law in order to make those dreams come true. This is also my second time nominated for a Short Story award from the mainstream mystery community–the first was the Macavity in Toronto, and the nod was for “Survivor’s Guilt” from Blood on the Bayou–and I also can’t even begin to tell you how thrilling it is to be nominated for a short story in the mainstream; but “Cold Beer No Flies” is, as I said before, a story with gay character/themes…and it might be the first time such a story has been nominated. (John Copenhaver is also nominated for Best First Novel, for Dodging and Burning–still in the TBR pile–and he’s also an openly gay writer of a book with gay characters and themes; I think it’s possible the two of us may have made history with our nominations as the first time this has happened; I could be wrong.)
This is especially thrilling when I take into consideration the fact that my writing self-esteem (never high in any discipline) is particularly low when it comes to short stories, as Constant Reader is undoubtedly aware. I love them, and I love the challenge of writing them, but…I’ve never had much luck with selling or placing them in places, but sometimes I do catch lightning in a bottle and the story works.
I spent most of yesterday trying to keep up with the congratulatory posts, comments, tweets and emails yesterday but failing miserably; I woke up this morning to a lot more of them and I suspect a lot of my free time today will be spent making sure I thank everyone.
Which is, frankly, kind of a lovely problem to have, amirite? I mean, I’d certainly rather spend a day basking in the glow of warm congratulatory messages/posts/tweets/comments than pretty much anything else, to be honest. Who woudn’t?
And to be on a short-list with talented writers like Art, Barb, Holly, and Shawn? Very very cool, quite frankly, and just the kind of flattering ego-stroke I needed at this moment as I struggle with the WIP (which I didn’t touch yesterday, for obvious reasons) but I am hoping to get back to today because things will, I am sure, be settling down somewhat. What’s interesting is that Holly is also nominated for her Florida Happens story; Barb also has a story in Florida Happens but is nominated for another work; and Art was the person who got me involved in working on Bouchercon anthologies in the first place. I met Shawn briefly in St. Petersburg at this last Bouchercon, and I am certain at some point in the future we’ll have a professional connection of some sort like these others–I certainly hope that’s the case, at any rate.
And now it’s back to the spice mines. Have a lovely Thursday, everyone, and thank you!
Home. Sunday night–early evening, really–and I am exhausted. Bouchercon just sucks the life right out of me every year, but I wouldn’t miss it for anything. I have the best time every year: reconnecting with friends I don’t see nearly enough; making new friends; drinking waaaaaaaaaaay too much; and laughing until my abdominal muscles hurt and hurt and hurt. Right now I think if I started laughing I’d also start weeping in agony–that’s how much I laughed this weekend. (And let’s not talk about the ten hours of non-stop drinking that was Friday evening. Oooooooohhhhhh.) I often have trouble sleeping when I’m home; this is exacerbated when I travel, so I’ve not had a good night’s sleep since I left on Wednesday. I am now very close to running out of steam, but am struggling to stay awake so I can hopefully get a good night’s sleep tonight.
And I won the Anthony Award for Best Anthology; rather, Blood on the Bayou: New Orleans Bouchercon Anthology 2016 won. I just edited it. It’s kind of thrilling; it was an incredibly difficult category and I was seriously just honored to be in the company of the other nominees. Art Taylor deservedly won the Macavity Award for Best Short Story; again, I’m just so thrilled that I was even on the shortlist that I really didn’t care about winning, and Art’s story was simply phenomenal.
Okay, I am too tired to think clearly. I’ve been trying to write this for hours now, and I think I should just go to bed and finish in the morning.
Monday morning. I slept so good last night. I woke up several times during the night, and I did wake up much earlier than I thought I would, but I feel rested; it was good sleep, and that’s always a plus. It’s also weird because it’s not light in the mornings anymore; it’s fine, and I’m going to love the extra hour whenever we get it–but I always hate giving it back.
Wow, what a weekend. As I said before, I laughed so hard all weekend; it was almost non-stop. I can’t believe how much I drank…but every year Friday turns into an epic drinking marathon. (This year broke Raleigh’s record.) So many great friends, so many highlights…the only low light was the “not able to sleep in hotels so am always running on accessory” thing, and that’s my low-light of every year and every conference. I met some amazing new people and made some amazing new friends; I was on two glorious panels with fantastic people and fantastic moderators and fantastic audiences; my biggest regret is the same as it is every year–that I didn’t get to spend as much time as I would like with everyone I would like. Toronto was absolutely lovely, and so was the hotel. (The hotel bar was just okay, but the private lounge on the 43rd floor was fantastic.) I read two books on the trip–Burnt Offerings by Robert Marasco and The Vines by Christopher Rice, and started reading Oh, Florida! by Craig Pittman on my way home–which is also fantastic. I got some new books that I’m looking forward to reading: The Blinds by Adam Sternburgh; Sunburn by Laura Lippman; and the new Ivy Pochoda, Wonder Valley. (I finally met Ivy this year, and she told Paul and I a story about visiting Louisiana with her mother that had us both sobbing with laughter.) I had some awesome meals–but I think my favorite was the noodles I had for lunch on Friday, with the fish and chips on Sunday night at Braddock (not sure if that was the place) a close second. I drank wine instead of martinis–the martinis in Toronto were somewhat less than what I would have hoped for–and I got to laugh with so many wonderful friends. Paul, of course, was with me for this entire trip, and he fit in like I knew he would–I swear I think some of my friends like him better than they do me (I’m looking at you, Wendy) and oh, how I could go on.
I even ran into the ChiZine crew–Michael Rowe, Brett Savory, Sandra Kasturi–on Saturday night as two of my writing worlds converged!
And that LSU game on Saturday! That and the books are getting their own posts.
But probably the best–and this is simply because it was bigger than just being a good time for me–part of the weekend was being on the Writing the Rainbow panel. Moderated by Kristopher Zgorski of BOLObooks.com, the other panelists were Owen Laukkanen/Owen Matthews (seriously, buy his books!), John Copenhaver (whose debut novel I can’t wait to get my hands on), Stephanie Gayle (read her books–and she looks like Laura Dern with dark hair), and Jessie Chandler (seriously, read her books). When I was assigned the panel, my first thought was great, three people will show up for this.
I was wrong, The room was packed. Kristopher had great questions for us, and the answers were all fantastic and thought-provoking. We talked about great queer books and great queer writers, talked about our own experiences writing about queer characters, and the audience was so receptive and amazing. I almost got teary and emotional, honestly; it was the first time I’ve ever be on such a panel at a mainstream event to have such a great audience and such a great crowd. We’ve come such a long way. I just wish some of the great writers who were publishing when I first was getting started were still publishing so they could have enjoyed this moment as well. It was an honor to talk about Michael Nava and John Morgan Wilson and R. D. Zimmerman and Mary Wings and Katherine V. Forrest and there were so many others we didn’t get to mention…and there certainly wasn’t enough time to mention all the great people doing the work now–although we were definitely able to plug the two great lesbian writers, Ellen Hart and J. M. Redmann.
And now, I have some things to get done around here while my other blog posts take form in my head, so I will leave you with a picture of me and my partner in crime for the weekend, the always amazing and hilarious Wendy Corsi Staub:
Tomorrow morning at this time I will be running around, hoping that I am not forgetting to do something before we leave for Toronto. I haven’t had much of a chance to get excited about the trip, but this morning it’s starting to be kind of real to me. The kitchen is a mess–I made Swedish meatballs last night–and so I need to get the dishwasher loaded, start gathering things to pack for the trip, etc.
I also queried another agent yesterday, and submitted another short story. I have three more agents to query on my list today, and I might submit yet another short story to another market. We’ll see how that goes.
I also printed out Jackson Square Jazz last night; I am going to do the ever popular copy edit with it. It also occurred to me that this is a golden opportunity, as the ebooks for the first two Scottys are about to go live, to re-edit them and therefore make the ‘new’ versions of them worthwhile to have for people. I haven’t completely decided whether I am going to re-edit the books or not, but we shall see how it goes. It’s really dependent on the time factor, and since I am trying to finish writing another Scotty at the same time…it’s also not a bad idea, as rereading the originals will put me in a Scotty mindset, which can’t hurt, you know?
I started reading Robert Marasco’s Burnt Offerings last night, and was very quickly absorbed into the story. The beginning is reminiscent of several other horror classics–Rosemary’s Baby, Harvest Home, The Haunting of Hill House–and thoroughly enjoyable. It’s clearly a ‘haunted house/bad place’ story; I’ve never seen the movie nor had I read the book before, so I am kind of excited about it. I also need to pick out the books I’m going to be taking with me on the trip.
We also finished watching Harlan Coben’s The Five mini-series last night on Netflix. There are ten episodes, and it’s a interesting show with several different mysteries, several different crimes, and they are all connected in some strange way to the disappearance of a small boy some twenty years earlier. The main characters–Slade, Danny, Mark, Pru–were all friends, and one afternoon they were off in the woods playing, with Mark’s younger brother Jesse in tow. Being older kids, they wanted to go off and do their own thing, so they sent Jesse off on his own and he disappeared. A child molesting serial killer later confessed to killing him…but the body was never found. Flash forward twenty years, and Jesse’s DNA has turned up at a brutal crime scene, which begs the question, is Jesse still alive? How did his DNA wind up at a crime scene twenty years after he disappeared? And then his DNA turns up at another brutal crime scene. What is the connection between the cases? Lots of twists and turns, and several big surprise twists made it quite enjoyable to watch. The cast was also really good, and the mini-series format gave the writers the opportunity to delve into the characters and their lives a lot more. It also was very haunting in that it’s theme–the damage the disappearance of a child can do to those left behind–is something I am fascinated by.
Monday, and in two days I’ll be jetting off for Toronto. Huzzah! Needless to say, this is a very exciting thing for me; Bouchercon has become one of my favorite times of the year.
In other exciting news, I discovered an electronic final copy of Jackson Square Jazz yesterday. It was there the whole time, but I didn’t think it was the final copy because the first chapter, every time I opened the file, was only like 3300 words and I thought, no, that’s not it because it’s not long enough…and then I looked at it again yesterday, saw how many actual chapters there were, pulled them all into one document and realized that yes, indeed, this actually was the version I turned in. So, it’s not copy edited, which means I’ll need to copy edit it and it won;t be the same version, ultimately, as the print version when the book goes live…but I don’t have to retype the entire thing.
I’d much rather do a final polish than retype almost a hundred thousand words, believe you me.
Another horror novel bit the dust last night, not surviving the fifty-page test. (For those of you who are wondering that that is, I give a book fifty pages to engage me in some way. If by page fifty I don’t care about the book in any way, or it has annoyed me in some way, into the donation pile it goes.) Likewise, I try to give a television show at least three episodes before giving up on it. I’m also trying to break the habit of watching shows that I once enjoyed once they’ve run out of steam. Much as I hate to say it, Paul and I have abandoned a lot of the superhero shows currently airing because they’ve either run out of steam or just gone off the rails. I loved Flash, but seriously–how many times do you go back in time and alter the timeline and fuck up everything before you decide “hey, maybe this is a bad idea”?
For the record, it should have only taken one.
So much to do before I leave for Bouchercon on Wednesday! I’ve made my packing list, still need to put together a to-do list, and figure out if it’s a stupid idea to take things with me to work on (since I never work on anything at these things, but of course, you know the one time I don’t take anything with I’ll not only have the time but will want to work on something and be enormously frustrated I didn’t bring anything); decide what books to take along to read (remember: I am only reading horror for October–I am thinking about reading Burnt Offerings by Robert Marasco next), and get the suitcase started.
But I have to get through this week first. Two days at the office. Heavy heaving sigh. And I need to send out some more queries this morning.
C’est la vie.
And now, back to the spice mines. Here’s a hunk for you, to get your morning rolling.
Ah, Thursday. I am a bit wrung out from this week so far; I am hoping to get rested this weekend since I am not working. I just have some errands to run on Saturday, and other than that I am going to spend the weekend writing and cleaning the house and packing, trying to get ready for my trip next week to Toronto. Our flight is actually later in the day so I can sleep late and make sure everything is ship-shape before we head to the airport; our flight is at 3:20 so we don’t really need to leave for the airport until around 12:30. Which, of course, is absolutely lovely.
Later is always better.
We get into Toronto on a non-stop (thank you, Air Canada, for operating non-stops between New Orleans and Toronto) around 6:20 pm, and are going to take the UP Express train from Pearson Airport to Union Station. It’s less than a mile to walk from there to the hotel, and there’s also a subway…but I am leaning toward the walk, you know? It’ll be chilly so it’s not like we’ll sweat to death or anything, and the exercise will be lovely. And our suitcases roll, so that’s not an issue.
Today I am starting to send out the queries to agents. Wish me luck, Constant Reader! I am, of course, putting it off…but seriously, I need to start doing this and getting it out of the way. I think the stress is what is actually hurting my work on the Scotty book. And so what if I get rejected? Writing is such an insane life, isn’t it? One really needs a strong ego to face down all the rejection…but at the same time, our egos are so fragile…
Ah, well. And here’s a Throwback Thursday treat: the original cover of Murder in the Rue St. Ann, from 2004. I’ve always thought this was a better book than it was ever given credit for, but it also was released during a bad time in my personal life and I did no signings, interviews, or promotion for it. Ah, well.
At this time next week I’ll be in Toronto at Bouchercon! Woo-hoo! Although I glanced at the weather forecast and was horrified to see that it’s apparently winter already up there; forecasts in the 60’s? Dropping into the 40’s at night? Madness, absolute madness.
My panels, if you are there and would be so inclined as to hear me speaking, trying desperately to sound like I know what I am talking about (and usually failing), are:
Best Anthology, which is described as Meet the editors of your anthology Anthony nominees.
Moderated by Sarah M. Chen, the panelists are Lawrence Block, Jay Stringer, Eric Beetner, Jen Conley, and Greg Herren (me!). It’s Friday morning at 10 am, in the Grand West Ballroom.
Reading the Rainbow, which is described as An LGBTQ panel.
Moderated by Kristopher Zgorski, the panelists are Stephanie Gayle, Greg Herren (me!),
Owen Laukkanen, John Copenhaver, and Jessie Chandler. The panel is at 2:30 on Saturday, October 14th, in Sheraton Meeting Room B.
I will also be at the opening ceremonies on Thursday night, during which the Macavity Awards will be presented; I am nominated for Best Short Story. (Eep! At least I have lots of practice being at awards ceremonies where I lose.) I’ll be missing the Anthony Awards Sunday, as we will be flying home at the time, but it’s still quite an honor to be nominated.
Look forward to seeing everyone there!
Here’s your Throwback Thursday hunk for the morning, model/actor Ed Fury:
Queer and Loathing in America 