New Beginnings

A friend and I have been discussing beginnings and when to leave them alone. I've always been of the theory that as far as my writing is concerned, I need about forty pages to get warmed up, then the real story starts. In an attempt to cut down on those pages that end up trashed, I'm forcing myself to start where the story begins, right off the bat. I'm not sure it's working for me. A hundred pages into a book, and my mind wanders back to page 1, and I feel this almost uncontrollable need to start again. I've decided this urge is hitting me because I didn't get warmed up doing those forty pages, and something inside of me misses knowing that part of the story that no one else will ever read but moi. Sigh. Writing habits are hard to break, especially when they're longstanding. On another note, my new website will be online any day now, and I can't wait for ya'll to check it out. Along with a beautiful new format, it will have a smattering of pictures from races we've attended. Nascar, of course. I had to fight the urge to post hundreds of them, just for my own amusement. New beginnings in many ways - web sites and starting a new book - are wonderful. I'll let you know this fall how it feels when my racin' child goes off to college and our house is down to the two of us for the first time in many years. That'll be a new beginning, for sure!

Junior! Denny!!

Well, the weather was a factor Friday night for the Busch races, that's for sure. After two and a half hours of sitting in the rain in Turn 2, we wimped out and headed for the parking lot. The hours leading up to the green flag were great, except for a gust of wind that crumpled our tent's metal legs and sent it flying into the people parked next to us. They were fine, and I've never liked that tent anyway - setting it up makes me feel stupid and incompetent. The day's real success came when the girls (all three high school seniors) got to meet Kasey Kahne and have him sign their various hats, pass holders, etc. Evidently he thanked them - which sent the girls into the stratosphere. Waiting in line for an hour to get into the pits was definitely worth it. And finding out that Kasey Kahne is a gentleman was priceless. (Why do I sound like an American Express ad?) How about that Denny Hamlin??? Local boy comes home to race his friend and hero, nineteen stitches in his hand, and comes close to taking the checkered flag. While I'm happy for Junior and his win, my heart started pumping peanut butter when Denny took the lead. Oh my stars - talk about a heck of a race! Harvick should have won, and would have if he'd taken tires when everyone else pitted. That's what makes racin' what it is - a wild time filled with second-guessers who think they know what it takes to win a stock car race. I'm smart enough to know it's beyond my comprehension. Visiting the various racing establishments near Charlotte, N.C., taught me how much skill and expertise is needed to just walk into one of their while, gleaming, and seriously silent workshops. This is weighty business, ya'll, and not for those who aren't at the top of their game. Like my newest protagonist, who is figuring out just how naive she is when it comes to high stakes and playing for keeps. She has a steep learning curve, but she's getting there. Now that my racin' weekend is finished, I'm getting back to her and seeing if I can't make things worse for her, page by page.

Under the Lights

May 1, and the furnace is still running. EEK. I'm praying for warmth and lots of sun for this weekend's Richmond races. Can't wait - RIR is the best short track, bar none, and racing under the lights is magic. Watching testing a couple of weeks ago during daylight hours was interesting and fun, but nothing like the real deal when the lights pop on and night waves its wand over the racers. I'll report back about the festivities - we're taking our youngest and her best friends to the track for her high school graduation present, complete with pit passes. Yes, my baby will be out of high school and on her way to architecture school at VPI in a few months. Where has time gone? I'm going to miss my racin' child, but we'll pick her up for local races close to her university, so it's not as if she's disappearing. At least, that's what I tell myself....

Now back to work on the action/adventure/romance. I'm dying to see how these two, Matt and Frankie, figure out they can trust each other. Trust is the first step to love for them, but it's going to be a long row to hoe. I believe in making life hard for my characters, on the theory that they have to earn their right to happiness. Working hard for the good stuff makes for a better story and better people, in life as well as in fiction.

MD Report

Malice Domestic was its usual fun and continues to be one of the conferences I always enjoy. Talking with readers is a highlight, as well as chatting with the other writers. The ladies on the "Legal Attitudes" panel were more fun than should be legal, and I can't wait to meet up with them somewhere, sometime in the future. I hope you all get a chance to attend in the future. Next year's date is the first weekend in May, I believe, at the Marriott Marquis in Washington, D.C. Now that I'm home and the new printer is up and running, I'm hard at work on a fun book - more action/adventure with romance thrown into the mix.

Malice Domestic this Weekend!

I'm heading out the door this weekend for Malice Domestic in Washington, D.C. Hope to see some friends, chat with mystery lovers, and buy tons of books to add to my TBR pile(s). (To Be Read = TBR) I'm on a panel titled "Legal Attitudes" on Sunday morning, with a booksigning following around 10:00 a.m. Last year's conference was a lot of fun, mostly because the attendees are so great. There's nothing I love more than talking about books with other people who love them as much as I do. If you live in the area and love mysteries, you can register on site. (It's a bit more expensive, but worth the money.) I'll report back about the conference when I'm home.

Shame on NBC

My imagination has been seized by another story, and the research is drawing me in as swiftly and surely as Kasey Kahne did Tony Stewart in last week's race. Speaking of races, Martinsville was its usual interesting bang-em-up paperclip racing. A lovely day, bare chested men burning their winter-white skin, tailgating on a 50 degree hill, yes, it was a classic Martinsville experience. Speaking of which, I'm still fuming over NBC's attempt to create a 'situation' by importing Muslim-looking men and fitting them with hidden mikes. The only conclusion I can draw is that NBC believes all NASCAR fans are redneck loudmouths with a surfeit of racism. As I read what happened, it was a bust for NBC. No one paid any attention to bearded men in robes and funny hats. The guys were checking out the girls in their summer halter tops, more likely. And the girls were checking out hunky Carl Edwards and cute Kasey Kahne. That's what makes NASCAR racing great - the only controversy is over who bumped who on the track and was it a racing move or revenge? The sell-out crowd was there to see good racing, and until Kasey blew an engine, that's what they got. Why try to spoil a fun day by inciting an 'incident?' Shame on NBC. Believe me, the tattoos, pink and green hair dye, and umpteen different kinds of people didn't draw any attention - the racing did. And that's how it should be.

Letting Go

I'm in the throes of ripping out whole chunks of my current WIP (work in progress), not because the writing stinks, but because these chapters don't help drive the story forward. Ouch. As tempted as I am to save these wonderful words (my designation, LOL), I find it's easier to send them into the black hole of the delete button so I'm not tempted to try to work them in somewhere else in the book. That ploy has never worked for me, so it's better and less painful to say a fond adieu and hit the death key. Sigh. I know it's for the best, but . . . .

It's the same with my closets. Packed to the gills with the extraneous. I've toyed with the idea of a mass throw-away. A wholesale tossing of stuff no one cares about. However, there's one problem with my resolve to make more space. In my family, one line of women were sewers. Their creative talents showed up in smocked baby dresses, embroidered blouses, and elegant gowns that have been passed down through the generations. When my oldest child had to dress as her book character for a book report in the third grade, I found a 1930s dress for her to wear as she pretended to be Beverly Cleary. The other daughter discovered an original Hawaiian 1930s gown to wear to a dance, a style and era that fit her curvy figure perfectly. The same daughter wanted a graduation dress that wasn't like everyone else's (they have to wear long, white, and no cap and gown), so we shopped for a pattern and fabric to her liking. It's finished (thank goodness, well before the big day), and she brags to everyone how she and her mother made her dress. I'm sure her friends think she's insane for not buying a wedding dress, which is the norm for this crowd. She'll be the one in a simple white eyelet sundress she helped sew. One day, she'll find that dress in the back of a closet, and it'll bring back memories I hope she'll cherish. So for now, I've talked myself out of tossing the closet contents.

Unlike my story-stopping chapters, they can stay.

spring, Fast Openings, and Malice Domestic

The first day of spring, and my favorite time of year is about to bloom. After the freezing rain and snow, of course. My daffodils and the forsythia should survive, and the tulips are still a few weeks away, so they’ll be okay. I can’t wait for the azaleas and trees to burst out. Of course, better weather creates a dilemma for a writer. The alluring scent of new mulch and bright green grass is a huge temptation for those of us who like to play in the outdoors. We’ll see how much resistance I can muster.

I heard a talk by the incomparable Merline Lovelace a couple of weeks ago and was very grateful for her comments about how to start a story. I know what to do - get into the story with a solid swan dive. But for some reason, I always have to work out about forty pages before the story starts. The current work-in-progress has had at least five opening incarnations - a record for me. And I’m still not happy with it. Merline reminded me of the basic truth I’ve always worked with, and I just need to take a strong hand to the first three chapters and delete like crazy. Easier said than done, LOL.

Oh, I just received my panel assignment for Malice Domestic. Nine a.m. on Sunday, the 23rd of April, with a book signing to follow at ten a.m. Yes, the River Knows has been out since December, so maybe those of you who’ve read it would like to stop by and tell me what you think. I’d love to see you!

Killing Characters

I've been struggling this week with a plot device that has nipped me in the nether regions once before. In my Kiowa western series, a full-blown character rose from the computer screen to protest his imminent demise. He told me in no uncertain terms I couldn't kill him off. I relented and let him live, although his death would have made a great scene.

Since mysteries are focused on murder and mayhem, I haven't had this problem - until yesterday. I sat down to write the murder scene for a character to whom I've become inordinately attached. She's solid, living, and needed to die to propel the action. Couldn't do it. Just couldn't leave her dead in the fields of Culvert County. Instead, I gave her a reprieve by telling myself I could use her in another way, and proceeded to shoot a secondary character. He'll have to get a bigger role in rewrites to make his death serve the same plot function as Elnora's would have, but at least I skipped over the dilemma of losing Elnora.

This power-of-life-and-death thing is scary, sometimes. When and if you meet Elnora, congratulate her on her ability to take her own destiny into her fictional hands, and let me know if I did the right thing for the story by reprieving her. I sure hope so.

Oh Yeah, Racing is BACK

If I've been MIA for the past two weeks, it's because the lure of Daytona and Speedweeks was the siren call that lured me out of my office and into the Florida cold and drizzle. Well, to be honest, there were some sunny days, but I was grateful for a heavy jacket and raincoat, especially during the 500. I was almost too cold to stay to the end, but I made it! No matter what you think of Chad Knaus and his "modification" to the 48, Johnson ran a smart race. It didn't hurt to have Casey Mears on his bumper, either. For me, though, the really heart-stopping races came in the IROC (Mark! Out too soon!!) and the Busch races. The last lap, three wide and at full throttle, scared me silly. Elliot Sadler's win in the 150 was sweet as well. Despite the circus atmosphere, the racing was pure, flat-out, unmitigated war. Kudos to the survivors. Now, it's back to work. I've crawled back into my story and it's working its way out of my head onto the hard drive. Now and then, though, I get flashes of Michael Waltrip spinning through the grass with the other crash-ees at the finish line, and have to work hard to get back into the imaginary world of my WIP.

Fear and the Writer

No, I'm not talking about the so-called writer's block enigma. The scary blank page. The unfinished book that has no end in sight. Those are too easy. I'm talking about fear of the government. Yours and mine. Just this week, I needed to research a plot point for the current work-in-progress, and my first instinct was to hit the Internet, the library, and then friends of the law enforcement type with experience in arresting this particular form of illegal activity. When I mentioned the plot device to my husband, he visibly paled. "Don't run that through Google," he sighed. "What if the FBI shows up at our door and takes all our computers?" His fear stopped me cold, then I began to analyze it. He was right. Information on the Internet isn't free- our government is watching, I'm sure. Even we writers who need to learn stuff for a book. Small defense, that one. As a lawyer, I recognized the implications once I set aside my writer cap. So, I took the next step that made sense - I emailed a friend with law enforcement expertise, and put in the heading of my email the topic I needed to discuss. His phone call came almost immediately. "Don't put anything like that in an email, okay?" he ordered. "The government has a program that'll find it and who knows what comes next?" Yikes. I'd done it this time. Fortunately, he shared his special knowledge with me over the phone. Although we laughed that the conversation was probably being monitored, I wondered later if it was a joke. I won't know unless and until the men with badges take me 'downtown.' In the meanwhile, I'll keep writing, using my friend's good information to make the plot device plausible, and hope I've swooped under the government's increasingly pervasive radar. Sounds like the Sixties again, doesn't it, with Herbert Hoover's unrestrained invasion into the privacy of thousands of unsuspecting Americans? Oh well, I cut my teeth on controversy - you can't practice law and avoid it. But if you don't hear from me in a while, send up the distress flags.

Art as Activism

We saw SYRIANA last night, and I went to bed thinking about it and woke up doing the same. Go see this movie! It's not only good entertainment, it's a pretty potent statement about oil, the U.S., terrorism, and the price one pays to do good or what passes for good. I'd like to compile a list of entertainment vehicles (film, books, TV) that use their forums to get out a message that needs broadcasting, while at the same time giving people a ride into the dark side they're willing to pay for. Photographs deliver a potent message, one that's immediate in the instant they're snapped. Films require more of an amusement value. People aren't as willing to sit through them as they would be to slog through a book everyone is reading, even if it's as dense as granite. Television offers such a vast array of shows, it's even harder to get people to sit still and watch something that isn't light or fluffy. THE GIRL IN THE CAFE' is a prime example of stellar television that kept me hanging onto its every word, its every plot turn. I also learned a heck of a lot about the G8, world hunger, and the death toll in Africa.

I wish my fiction drove people into action to right wrongs and do what's right. Think of CRY, THE BELOVED COUNTRY. What a novel! All I can do, so far in my career, is shine a light in the dark corners of the individual human experience as my characters live it, and hope the revelation spreads luminosity and healing once the last page is turned. If the stories are entertaining as well, I'll be halfway there.

Activism and Courage

Yesterday, we drove down the road a bit to hear Shirin Ebadi, the 2003 Nobel Peace Prize winner. A lawyer and an Iranian, she devotes her life to defending her countrymen who have been imprisoned by the current government. More than that, she helps to support their families while her clients are imprisoned. One of her fellow activists, an attorney, is jailed now for the crime of defending dissidents to the Iranian regime. Her speech, given in Farsi and translated into English, resonated with the audience. Make a difference. Take a stand, even if it means you could end up in a very bad place. Sacrifice self for the good of those who need you. And don't confuse religion with those who say they act in its name. A Muslim, she believes God is with her in her work, and that the evil done in His name must be fought by all of us.

Good words. Strong words. A Turkish novelist, recently accused of crimes against the government for his criticism of its practices, is another activist who has garnered international support. Charges against him were recently dropped. We can make a difference. Speak up if you see wrong being done. Don't tolerage even a tiny bit of it. Work to obliterate evil done in the name of the "greater" good.

When you think about it, novels are a pretty good vehicle to carry the message. In the guise of entertainment, they can unmask the ugly, laud the good, and condemn the bad. My last mystery, Yes, the River Knows, deals with racism in the South, but its message is about redemption. Even the worst of all the ills can't hide if writers keep pulling back the skin to expose the wound to the light of day.

Think about the potential difference each of us can instigate. Mind-boggling.

Wonderful Words/Bad Laptops

Flipping through the latest Vanity Fair, I found a car ad that was sprinkled with words that lit a fire within me. The fold-out was titled "vibrant design is..." and I immediately read it as "vibrant writing is..." The words that follow give me hope. They are: iconic, focused, unconventional, intuitive, visionary, brave, artful, powerful, organic, distinctive, unexpected, simple, moving, fresh, alive, magnetic, mysterious, beautiful, timeless, breakthrough, engaging, challenging, unforgettable, and emotional. Wouldn't it be stupendous if every book bore the imprimatur of even a few of these ideas? I write with both hands wide open, praying I snag some in the tales that evolve from the stories that crowd my mind.

On another note, I'm sick of Hewlett Packard computers and their crummy warranty service. Long tale made short, HP refuses to replace a disintegrating keyboard on a less than three-month-old laptop. Keys fly off willy-nilly, keys stick, and I haven't even had a chance to abuse this Pavilion yet. Their attitude is arrogant and condescending, and I'm willing to take them on in court. Tackling a big corporation is going to be fun. It may even find its way into a book!

Blowing in the Wind

January's winds shake the pines and rattle what's left of the oak leaves. The Japanese maple's remnants skitter from the gutters and leap down the street, as if celebrating. This is a January I can endure, if not love. Writing with gray, gloomy skies doesn't interest me in the slightest. It's like writing at night - not my favorite time, either. Like my hundreds of newly planted tulip and daffodil bulbs, I crave sunshine and warmth to create anew. Meanwhile, I'm working on a couple of projects simultaneously, and telling myself spring is only a couple of months away.

The good news is, Florida and the Daytona 500 are a mere four weeks hence. Yes! I've taken my Mark Martin hat from the shelf and started wearing it around instead of my wool cloche. The sunglasses have gone into my race day backpack. I'm plotting our route to the track, where we'll park, what food for the tailgate party.

The sun toasts my arms, the engines rumble and scream like the Allman Brothers on a roll, and high octane fuel spits out fumes - in my imagination. Four more weeks! Yes! I can hold out!!

Good Friends, Good Writing

Tracy Dunham
I'm really lucky, and I know it. I have writing friends who are not only nice people with good hearts, they have the courage to tell me when I'm messing up a manuscript. I just returned from a weekend where we camp out at a friend's condo in the mountains and work. And I mean, work. We brainstorm, critique, plan, encourage, etc. I discussed a book I wasn't happy with, and they hit right at the heart of the problem. Now, I just need to rip it apart and start over, but at least I was only sixty pages into it. It could have been a lot worse.

On the up side, everyone came away with a firm idea of what to do next with the writing and how to get there, and that's pure gold. There's nothing like creative energy that mushrooms, and we had that going on. Good food, good friends, creative energy, and a beautiful view - what more could a writer want? Oh yes - husbands who held down the home front while we worked. Boy, are we lucky, each and every one of us. And we know it.

Battlefields

Our family holiday traditions include two that are, maybe, a bit odd. They started years ago when we were reading Shelby Foote's wonderful Civil War books and decided we'd visit every battlefield we could reach. Elkhorn Tavern and Wilson's Creek are two of my favs, but every year we re-visit Drewry's Bluff and Cold Harbor. Drewry's Bluff is reserved for Christmas Eve, which started as a trek designed to wear the kids out so they'd go to sleep that night. Not that the ploy worked, but we tried. Now, we hike the trail to the bluff overlooking the James River, listen to the Park Service sign tell us about how the Union tried just once to attack Richmond by river, and enjoy the sight of the city rising in the distance, framed by bare-limbed trees and a washed-out winter sky. The walk, except for one year when it was sleeting, is pleasant. Nothing scary remains at the site where the Confederates blew the heck out of the unfortunate ironclad.

Our second trek takes us on New Year's day through Cold Harbor, where Grant threw men like confetti at Lee's army. He wrote in his autobiography that Cold Harbor was his one regret. Men pinned their names on scraps of paper to the backs of their uniforms, hoping their bodies could be identified when the shooting stopped. Corpses were stacked for barricades, as Union soldiers tried to shield themselves from bullets that ploughed the dirt fields without ceasing. We just returned from there, and as has happened each time my feet hit the ground at Cold Harbor, I feel uneasy. There's something about the place that forces me to walk faster, get back to the car quicker. They're still there, the thousands of dead, and I honor their sacrifices, their horror, their sheer guts that forced them to their feet to run into a wall of sharpshooters when the command to do so bugled forth.

Every time we pull into the tiny parking lot, I remember what those men, dead so long ago, sacrificed to keep our country a union. I feel, through every inch of my being, a pale shadow of those long, awful days under a hot June sun.

Last Blog of 2005

Christmas is over, done, gone, finished. December 26 is the end of the holiday season, as far as I'm concerned. I want the tree down, the decorations packed and stored. And I'm almost there. The last bits will go to the attic, where they'll have to wait another year before they can escape their boxes. My poor children - they probably wonder why they were cursed to have a mother who wants to wave a magic wand and have all the Christmas mess disappear.

It's probably because what I really want to disappear is all the chaos. I want my routine back. Like a baby, I need a schedule. Writing is a discipline, and the holidays are a month-long cherry bomb set off in my attempts to keep an orderly writing life. It's just once a year, I remind myself as I cook, bake, decorate, clean, entertain, clean again, cook some more, scrape up candle wax, vacuum pine needles, replace the wilting magnolia leaves, shop, wrap, shop yet again (heaven spare me from a grocery store the week before Christmas), and finally, put it all away. The good china, the silver, the crystal, the decorations, home again in their respective places. I can breathe once more. In my office. At my desk, enjoying the best gift of all - quiet. The complicated people in my imagination are starting to speak to me again....

Organization

My dream, my desire, my ultimate goal is to be organized. Perfect cubby holes built in the exact spots where needed, shelves with labels, drawers with nothing stashed and forgotten: Nirvana. Everyone who knows me may now stop laughing.

The best I can do for today is a closet filled, top to bottom, with husband-built shelves, groaning under the weight of too many research books, and filing cabinets I periodically dare to open. "Dare" being the operative word here - because usually they crash over from the weight of the extended drawers. I swear I'm not a packrat, but you just never know when you're going to need the phone number for Military Records in D.C., or a copy of the original map of Ft. Larned, Kansas.

The one thing I can control is my writing's organization. I plot. Re-plot. Play with the plot some more. Move a pink character card into the space for Chapter Three and out of Chapter One. On a wall covered with thick rubber mats (the sort used by cashiers), are hundreds upon hundreds of thumbtacks, all holding storyboard cards. I love the ease of moving story elements around on 4 x 6 index cards. Nothing's permanent until the galleys, and then it's too late. Sometimes I play with the plotting so long, an entirely different story emerges than the one that originally popped into my head. And that's just fine. I need to know where a story's going to end before I start it. The final chapter may be the first one written, giving me a bulls eye to aim for when I start the first chapter.

Now if I could organize the rest of the house. . . .

Holidays and Writers

With the last of the turkey in the soup pot, I'm feeling fighting the urge to relax and pretend the work is finished for this year. It's not, of course. Cards and wrapping gifts, getting them to the post office, decorating, baking - it's once a year and I love the whole hustle and bustle of the holidays. But it's rough on a writer. Silence and peace are my most precious gifts, the ones I hate to share. Take anything else - it's fine, you can have it. But time and quiet are the hot commodities in my house. I'm not one of those writers who can work with music in the background. I find I get lost in the melody and the words in my head slip into musical notes. Round about now, Christmas carols, repeating themselves in alarming renditions in the malls, play in my head and I have to fight them off. I need to hear the voices. The characters who talk away and tell me what they need to do get very annoyed when anything interferes with office hours.

So for all you writers out there, I wish for you the best gifts of the season - time and quiet. May your writing flow like the river, swift and sure as the currents, exciting as Class V rapids.

And for the NASCAR fans out there, may we all hold on until Daytona in February. It's hard, folks, but we can do it, right?