M.M Gornell: my MYSTERY WE WRITE blog tour guest of the day

BOOK GIVEAWAY! Madeline will be giving away three copies of Reticence of Ravens to selected commenters at the conclusion of this blog tour (December 9.) The winners will be selected by her pooch, Buster.

Madeline (M.M.) Gornell has three published mystery novels—PSWA awarding winning Uncle Si’s Secret (2008), Death of a Perfect Man (2009), and her latest release, Reticence of Ravens (2010)—her first Route 66 mystery. Reticence of Ravens is a 2011 Eric Hoffer Fiction finalist and Honorary Mention winner, the da Vinci Eye finalist, and a Montaigne Medalist finalist.

Thank you, Jinx, for hosting me on your blog. And since you’ve given me free rein, I thought I’d talk about a question that came up in a recent interview. This particular one intrigued me—I think because it was about an aspect of my writing I’d never really thought about. It was interesting figuring out my answer!

Interviewer Colleen Walsh Fong noted she saw some themes connecting my books, and asked how much in my stories came from real life. I believe I’m writing fiction, yep, making it all up!

But as I answered then (and have subsequently thought more about), there is more from my life in my novels than I might want to admit. To start, my dedications are to loved ones—now moved on—but who left their marks on my psyche, and bits and pieces of our shared experiences are in my writing. On a happier note, dogs have to be in my story. Not as key characters, but dogs are so much a part of my life I can’t imagine a novel without them. And all my canine characters are ones I know, or have known.

Then there’s gardening. I love healthy, growing, plants—trees, flowers, fruit, roses… you name it. Unfortunately, the Mojave Desert is challenging when it comes to growing anything, and I’m lazy when it come to gardening work. Fortunately, I can have successful gardening characters like Hubert Champion (Reticence of Ravens), Marie Shipley (Death of a Perfect Man), and Martha Milton (Uncle Si’s Secret). Characters with “green thumbs” have been my gardening panacea.

I’m also a potter, and have managed to put together a small studio, and when I can, love doing pottery. The primeval feel of throwing a pot is a wonderful tactile experience. I do what’s called high-fire reduction firing, and have a propane kiln for that. I never know what the fire-gods are going to deliver up, but sometimes I get a piece that touches me in the same way a perfect phrase of prose does. It’s a marvelous experience, akin to holding that first copy of your latest book! The protagonist and first murder victim in Death of a Perfect Man, are potters. I wonder why?

Thanks so much, Jinx, for letting me ramble-on about myself. It’s been a fun visit with you today, and a fun Blog Tour!

Madeline’s books are available at Amazon.com, Barnes & Noble.com, and Smashwords, in paper and e-book formats. You can visit her online at her website http://www.mmgornell.com/, or her BLOG http://www.mmgornell.wordpress.com/, or email her directly at mmgornell@earthlink.net

Buy link for Reticence of Ravens:
http://www.amazon.com/Reticence-Ravens-M-Gornell/dp/1608300390/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1314747098&sr=8-1

Timothy Hallinan: my MYSTERY WE WRITE blog tour guest of the day

Book Giveaway! Tim will be giving away a complete set, all four!, Poke Rafferty series hard cover books, plus one of hisJunnior Bender books.

In order to win, leave a comment and he will draw from the pool at the end of the MYSTERY WE WRITE blog blitz (December 9).

Timothy Hallinan is the Edgar-and Macavity-nominated author of the traditionally-published Poke Rafferty Bangkok thrillers (most recently THE QUEEN OF PATPONG), and the Junior Bender mysteries, which are ebook originals. The newest Junior book is LITTLE ELVISES. Earlier this year, Hallinan conceived and edited a volume of original short stories by twenty first-rate mystery writers, SHAKEN: STORIES FOR JAPAN, which is available for the Kindle at $3.99, with every penny of the price going to the 2011 Japan Relief Fund. (Please buy it.) He lives in Santa Monica and Southeast Asia, and he is lucky enough to be married to Munyin Choy. His website is http://www.timothyhallinan.com/.

Tim is going to tell us today about Books Unwritten, a subject near and dear to any reader's heart.

The world is full of books I want to read, but some of the ones I most want to read don't actually exist. They're books that haven't been written yet, by authors who seem to be taking very long sabbaticals.

The nonexistent book I most want to get my hands on in the whole world is Banana Yoshimoto's next. It's been seven years since the English translation of Asleep was released, and even Asleep, as amazingly delicate and note-perfect as it was, was a collection of three long stories, some of which had been written earlier. (It's about three women who can't sleep or who can't not sleep, and it's as delicate as dusk.) Her last novel, as far as I can tell, is the endlessly mysterious and beautiful love story The Lake, which was published in Japan in 2005 and released here in 2010. (If you haven't read her, get Kitchen, her first, and clear the decks.)

Six years is a long, long time between books, especially for a writer as young as Yoshimoto is. If it would have any effect, I'd find out where in Tokyo she lives and stand under her window, like Brando did in "Streetcar" when he shouted, "Stellaaaaa." I'm not sure shouting "Bananaaaaaa" would have the same effect, but I don't know what else to do, and I don't just want another Banana Yoshimoto novel. I need one.

And then there's the new Sheila Bosworth novel that doesn't exist, the follow-up to two of my favorite books of the last century (doesn't that sound Victorian?), Almost Innocent (copyright 1984) and Slow Poison, which came out in 1992. One was published by Knopf and the other by Simon and Schuster, so Bosworth was taken seriously by the right people, as she should have been, since the books are Southern fiction at its most florid and idiosyncratic: compelling, tropically lush, richly colored, and on occasion feverishly funny, with a truly skewed perspective. Sheilaaaaaaaa!!! Where's the new one?

Keith Snyder wrote six terrifically funny mystery novels set in, of all places, Pasadena, primarily in a leaky, decaying mansion that has become a boarding house for a collection of indolently brainy, intermittently crazy young people, centered (for the purposes of the books, at least) on a musician and conversational polymath named Jason Keltner. The mysteries themselves are fine -- nicely structured, with lots of forward momentum to keep your page-turning finger moistened, but they're primarily devices to get these people talking, which they do brilliantly. And then they talk some more. I could listen to them for days, and have.

Ruth Ozecki was responsible for My Year of Meats in 1998, which promptly earned a central position on my personal altar of phenomenal novels, books that managed to break my heart, turn my stomach, make me laugh, and make me cry, sometimes simultaneously. She followed it up in 2002 (I think) with All Over Creation, American magical realism—of which there isn't much—at its absolute best. (Ozecki would probably hate hearing the book described as magical realism.) So here we are, nine years later, and where's the new one? There's permanent negative space on my bookshelves, waiting for it.

Once in a while, though, a writer who seems to have hung up his pen for good suddenly re-emerges with a vengeance. The case in point that makes me happiest right now is Martin Limon, who in 1992 wrote Jade Lady Burning, a sensational mystery about two American military investigators stationed in Korea just after the war. He got pretty much everything right, although one of his two cops, Ernie Bascom, is something of a Neanderthal and takes some serious putting up with. In 1997 and 1998, Limon put out Slicky Boys and Buddha's Money, both terrific books -- and then he went away forever. I asked everyone -- agents, booksellers, publishers -- what happened, and nobody knew. And then, in 2005, he returned on the scene with The Door to Bitterness, and last year (he's really in a spurt now) Soho Crime released The Wandering Ghost. So welcome back.

Any nonexistent books you'd like to read? I limited this post to living writers, but you don't need to. What nonexistent book would you most like to have appear under your pillow some long winter's night?

Jackie King: MYSTERY WE WRITE guest of the day

Book giveaway! Leave a comment and Jackie King will put your name into a drawing for a signed copy of THE INCONVENIENT CORPSE and a signed copy of THE FOXY HENS AND MURDER MOST FOWL! http://www.jacqking.com/

jackie@jacqking.com

Today Jackie is going to tell us why: Killing People on Paper Is My Therapy.

Thanks, Jinx, for hosting me.

It’s the 4th day of our Holiday Mystery Blog Tour and Thanksgiving is behind us. (The literal truth of those words hit me just as I keyed them into my computer. Alas, I did over-indulge and have to sit on what I ate, transformed by nature into soft padding, of course.)

Christmas is just ahead with all of its fun and challenges and I’m excited. I suggest giving books to each person on your list! Be sure and add yourself, I always do.

Or you might win a mystery on our GIANT MYSTERY TOUR GIVEAWAY! Be sure and leave comments on each blog site to give yourself the best chance. (Don’t you just love free stuff?) We’re giving away 44 books during this two-week period.*

My latest book THE INCONVENIENT CORPSE is a cozy mystery set in Northern California. Grace Cassidy, the protagonist (heroine to plain folk like me) starts in hot water up to her neck. Imagine opening the door to your Bed and Breakfast bedroom and finding a dead guy in your bed. Buck naked, no less. Next she learns that all of her considerable assets have been siphoned off by her rotten husband, Charlie. Add a 19-year-old son, a stray cat and some quirky old ladies to the mix, and this poor woman has her hands full.
No money, no credit cards, and an empty bank account. Will Grace have to live in a cardboard box or under a bridge? Or perhaps jail since a hard-nosed police sergeant thinks she’s the murderer?

Not Grace Cassidy, she’s made of tougher stuff. After a brief sinking-spell she pulls herself together, finds herself a job in the Bed and Breakfast, and eventually solves the murder. Well, sort of, after a little hand-to-hand combat with the murderer.

My character’s background and reactions are based on my own experiences. (Except for the rich stuff, that’s all pure fiction.) You see, I found myself unexpectedly single after almost 30 years of marriage, and I was ready to murder someone. Then I considered the face that I don’t look good in black and white stripes, so I called to mind my grandparents' courage. The two of them homesteaded in what was once called “No Man’s Land” and now is the Panhandle of Oklahoma.

It also came to me that I could get paid for murdering people on paper. That seemed a better solution for my life than moping over a man struggling with his midlife crisis. (I didn’t have time for a midlife crisis; I had to finish raising our three close-to-grown children.) That’s why when my fingers hit the keyboard I’m all set to murder some odious person on paper.

Jean Henry Mead: MYSTERY WE WRITE Blog tour guest today.

Jean will be giving away one of her mystery ebooks at the end of each of her 14 blog appearances, as well as three print novels at the conclusion of the tour. Be sure to leave a comment and email address to be eligible for the drawings, and visit her blog at http://jeansblogtour.blogspot.com/   and
http://theviewfrommymountaintop.blogspot.com/

Jean Henry Mead is the author of 15 books, half of them novels. She’s also an award-winning photojournalist and children’s author. She previously served as a news, magazine and small press editor, with articles published nationally as well as abroad. Jean's latest Logan & Cafferty mystery/suspense novel, Murder on the Interstate, is available at: Amazon.com: http://tinyurl.com/6znjvsa (print and Kindle) and Barnes and Noble: http://tinyurl.com/3vxzppy (Nook)

Jean is writing today about one of my favorite topics: The research required to write a book, and how we learn from it. 

All That Research!

I love research. In fact, it’s my favorite part of writing. When I was young and foolish, I spent two years at a microfilm machine to research a centennial history. Needless to say, I’ve since done my research online, in person or on the phone. The best part was having a stack of typewritten notes leftover that I used for my first historical novels, with enough notes remaining to write several more.

When I began writing mysteries, I had my own police procedural information at hand because my husband is a former highway patrolman, and I was a police reporter. However, because I had written about so many disturbing and heartbreaking events,  I decided to write about amateur sleuths and a lovesick sheriff. Humor is an integral part of my work and I include it in all my books, both fiction and nonfiction, with a little romance sprinkled in.

I brought my two 60-year-old feisty women sleuths along when we moved from my native California to my husband’s native Wyoming. So Dana and Sarah also sell their homes in the San Joaquin Valley— where a serial killer has murdered their friends in A Village Shattered— and they buy a motorhome. They’re traveling in Colorado in Diary of Murder when Dana Logan gets word that her sister Georgi has taken her own life. Dana knows that would never happen so they drive through a Rocky Mountain blizzard to reach Wyoming.

The research for that scene happened several years earlier when I had to drive our motorhome through an unexpected snowstorm. I couldn’t let the terrifying experience go to waste so I began my second mystery novel with it. Then, in Murder on the Interstate, I used my experience driving the RV along a Northern Arizona highway in a rainstorm while listening to truckers on my CB radio. So, when Dana and Sarah discover a Mercedes convertible with a murdered woman inside, “Big Ruby” McCurdy, a woman trucker, comes to their rescue.

The humorous CB chatter that follows is authentic because I had listened to it for weeks. I later interviewed a woman trucker who hauled produce, so I knew that drivers have to pay for their loads if the lettuce wilts before it gets to market. Later, when Dana and Sarah conduct research to find the killer, I send them to the newspaper morgue and library, and have them interview witnesses, along with Dana’s journalist daughter. My own news reporting came in handy but I also used online sources such as the Wikipedia for information on sulfuric acid spills. I then interviewed a chemical engineer to write about homegrown terrorism. Map Quest refreshed my memory of the Arizona terrain as well as an Indian Reservation south of Scottsdale, where the chemical spills occur.

If I had any doubts about the accuracy of the Wikipedia, I was reassured by bestselling author Lucia St. Clair Robson, a former librarian, who told me that the Wiki is as accurate, if not more, that the Encyclopedia Britannica. I use the online source extensively, but also check the facts in other ways as well.

The only research problem I have is spending too much time reading instead of writing. There are so many fascinating subjects that I have a difficult time putting the research aside to begin spooning it into my novels.

Marilyn Meredith: MYSTERY WE WRITE guest today

Marilyn Meredith is the author of over thirty published novels, including the award winning Deputy Tempe Crabtree mystery series, the latest Bears With Us from Mundania Press. Writing as F. M. Meredith, her latest Rocky Bluff P.D. crime novel is Angel Lost, the third from Oak Tree Press. Marilyn is a member of EPIC, Four chapters of Sisters in Crime, including the Central Coast chapter, Mystery Writers of America, and on the board of the Public Safety Writers of America. Visit her at http://fictionforyou.com/ and her blog at http://marilymeredith.blogspot.com/

BOOK GIVEAWAY: Marilyn will be giving away a copy of Bears With Us to a lucky commenter on the MYSTERY WE WRITE blog tour ending December 9. Leave a comment on this blog and maybe you will be the lucky winner!

So, heeeers Marilyn!

First, to tell you a bit about myself, I’m probably the old lady of the group, but I certainly don’t let age stop me. Well…to tell the truth, I don’t last as long as I used to, and partying no longer interests me because I usually go to bed pretty early, but I love to hang out with my friends and family, writing is a passion, and it’s fun to promote. I’ve made so many good friends as I’ve traveled the road of publishing and promotion and I consider it a major benefit of being an author.

She also mentioned that we could tell what our writing style it so I’ll talk about what I consider it to be for my Deputy Tempe Crabtree mystery series. In most cases, the stories contain a mystery, often times a murder, but because Tempe is a deputy of a small town and its surrounding area, she always has many things that come along to challenge her. In Bears With Us, bears take top priority, but she also is dealing with a teen suicide and parents who aren’t reacting as she’d expect, a complaint against her and her preacher husband by a prominent Bear Creek woman, a woman with dementia who keeps wandering away from home, and a secret long-ago romance that is causing a big problem.

With each new book I like to think about problems that may crop up in a mountain community like Bear Creek. Most books are told completely from Tempe’s point-of-view as this one is. I also like to let people read about Tempe’s and her husband, Hutch’s relationship. He is always supportive until she becomes too involved in the mystic side of being an Indian. Because she’s Indian, she has friends on the reservation, and often gets involved in helping out with crimes that occur there.

My writing style isn’t complicated. I’ve always considered myself more of a story-teller—one who likes to weave a mysterious web that includes a Native American female resident deputy, her preacher husband, her Indian friend, Nick Two John, whom she often consults, and a small community that includes the mountains and old-timers and people who have moved from the city. And though I am writing a series, each book is complete so they do not have to be read in any order.

Where you can purchase Bears With Us:
As an eBook or trade paperback from the publisher: http://mundania.com/
For Kindle or trade paperback from http://Amazon.com/
As a trade paperback from http://barnesandnoble.com/

Review of Bears With Us:
Marilyn Meredith's latest Deputy Tempe Crabtree offering, "Bears With Us," is full of the well-crafted twists and turns we've come to expect from her. It also has a lot of bear action, as we might expect from the title. For those readers who may not live in bear-y areas, it accurately depicts what life with those creatures can be like. (Just check out some of our National Park's pages like Yellowstone and Yosemite and see the real damage bears can do!) Far from the cuddle teddy bear image we've grown accustomed to, we are treated not only to a well-crafted tale, but also it's topped off with the unpredictability of 'nature.' And isn't that what really happens in our lives? Unpredictability. --Victoria Heckman, author of Hawaii Mysteries and "Burn Out." Sisters in Crime-Central Coast Chapter President

Mike Orenduff: My MYSTERY WE WRITE blog tour guest of the Day

Mike will be giving away a copy of The Pot Thief Who Studied Ptolomey to a lucky commenter to this blog when our Mystery We Write Blog Tour is completed on December 9.

Mike Orenduff grew up in a house so close to the Rio Grande that he could Frisbee a tortilla into Mexico. He came by his love of pueblo pottery during weekends, buying small pots from the pueblos his family visited and – in one case – acquiring one when his sister traded chocolate chip cookies for it. His love of pottery expanded to a general interest in archaeology which he studied as an undergraduate.


While in graduate school at the University of New Mexico, Mike worked during the summer as a volunteer teacher at one of the nearby pueblos. He went on to serve as President of New Mexico State University and as a visiting faculty member at West Point and President of Bermuda College. After retiring from higher education, he rekindled his love of the Southwest by writing his award-winning Pot Thief murder mysteries which combine archaeology and philosophy with humor and mystery. Among his many awards are the New Mexico Book of the Year, the “Lefty” national award for best humorous mystery and two “Eppies” for the best eBook mysteries.

His first book, The Pot Thief Who Studied Pythagoras, was described by The Baltimore Sun as, “funny at a very high intellectual level and deliciously delightful,” and his latest, The Pot Thief Who Studied Escoffier, was called "the perfect fusion of murder, mayhem and margaritas” by The El Paso Times.

Welcome, Mike. Tell us about your writing career.

During my four college presidencies (University of Maine at Farmington, The American University in Bulgaria, New Mexico State University and Bermuda College), I did a great deal of writing. I penned budget requests for legislatures, reports to alumni about how their alma mater was doing, and letters to high school students urging them to enroll at my university. In short, I was a fiction writer.

So when I retired, I decided to put my writing to work for nobler causes than seeking unneeded tax dollars, cajoling gifts from alumni and trying to increase enrollments. I decided I’d try to make people laugh.
What keeps me writing is knowing someone will spend a pleasant afternoon reading one of my books. I love to imagine a reader getting a laugh from a line I wrote. I know they do because they tell me so. And my books must be funny because the third one, The Pot Thief Who Studied Einstein, won the “Lefty” as the Best Humorous Mystery Novel of the Year. The award is based on votes, so it is at least as legitimate as Congress.
When I receive an email from a new fan telling me she loved my latest book and kept reading lines to her husband, it sends me running to the computer to write the next book. I admit it; I’m a reclusive ham. I’m not on stage now like I was as a president, but I still have an audience. And they aren’t complaining about high tuition and uncaring faculty. They are laughing. If I had known being a writer of humorous murder mysteries was so much fun, I would have retired early to get started. Just think of all the legislators, alumni and high school students who would have been spared from reading mail from me.

Website: http://www.orenduff.org/

Blog: http://www.thepotthief.blogspot.com/
Buy link: http://tiny.cc/hkps0

ABOUT MIKE'S POT THIEF BOOKS:
“Hubert Shuze, pot thief extraordinaire, operates an ancient pottery resale shop, not entirely legally, in the middle of Albuquerque's town square. His activities, both in the selling and creating of ancient pots and their knock-offs, tend to get him mixed up in an assortment of marginally ethical activities, murder generally being the most profound. Shuze operates by a complex set of ethics that allows him to sell questionably legal pots, burglarize, and launder money -- but never to lie, cheat or steal. Along the way, Shuze, a perpetual student of life, educates us on his philosopher du jour. His previous novels featured the philosophies of Pythagoras, Ptolemy and Einstein. "The Pot Thief Who Studied Escoffier" is a quirky repast of piñon-infused chimeneas, New Mexican sunsets, and a delightful band of foodie misfits. It is best enjoyed in the fading glow of a Southwestern sunset, a fire crackling beside you, a faithful dog at your feet.” The El Paso Times

Information about the books:

The Pot Thief Who Studied Pythagoras, The Pot Thief Who Studied Ptolemy, The Pot Thief Who Studied Einstein, and The Pot Thief Who Studied Escoffier are published by Oak Tress Press and are available as paperbacks in many Barnes & Nobles, Hastings, and Independent bookstores and as ebooks on Kindle and Nook readers.

BIG BOOK GIVEAWAY! MYSTERY WE WRITE BLOG TOUR

BIG BOOK GIVEAWAY STARTS NOVEMBER 25, WITH FIFTEEN AUTHORS GIVING AWAY 60 BOOKS!

CHECK MY BLOG DAILY AND SIGN UP TO WIN. 
Nov. 25 – Mike Orenduff
Nov. 26 – Marilyn Meredith
Nov. 27 – Jean Henry Mead
Nov. 28 – Jackie King
Nov. 29 – Timothy Hallinan
Nov. 30 – M. M. Gornell
Dec. 1 – Wendy Gager
Dec. 2 – Alice Duncan
Dec. 3 – John M. Daniel
Dec. 4 – Pat Browning
Dec. 5 – Ron Benrey
Dec. 6 – Beth Anderson
Dec. 7 – Anne K. Albert
Dec. 8 – Earl Staggs

                                                             

I will be a guest blogger on the following blogs, and will gift fourteen books, (e-book only) to those who make comments on these blogs. I will put all the commenters names in a bowl and let Mad Dog (that's my husband) choose fourteen of them on December 9.

Nov. 25 – Earl Staggs http://earlwstaggs.wordpress.com/ 
Nov. 26 – Anne K. Albert  http://anne-k-albert.blogspot.com/ 
Nov. 27 – Beth Anderson http://www.bethanderson-hotclue.com/blog/
Nov. 28 – Ron Benrey http://blog.benrey.com/
Nov. 29 – Pat Browning http://pbrowning.blogspot.com/
Nov. 30 – John M. Daniel http://johnmdaniel.blogspot.com/
Dec. 1 – Alice Duncan http://aliceduncanblog.blogspot.com/
Dec. 2 – Wendy Gager http://wsgager.blogspot.com/
Dec. 3 – M. M. Gornell http://mmgornell.wordpress.com/
Dec. 4 – Timothy Hallinan http://www.timothyhallinan.com/blog/
Dec. 5 – Jackie King http://www.jacqking.com/blog/

Dec. 6 – Jean Henry Mead http://mysteriouspeople.blogspot.com/  and http://theviewfrommymountaintop.blogspot.com/
Dec. 7 – Marilyn Meredith http://marilynmeredith.blogspot.com/
Dec. 8 – Mike Orenduff http://thepotthief.blogspot.com/

Whew! After this I'll need a siesta. I'll be reminding everyone of these great blogs and bloggers as we go, and good luck on winning a book or two!