You've Been Writing How Long?

State how long you’ve been writing, and what advice would you give to your younger self before you turned professional?

Brenda

Odd timing - I did a bookstore signing last weekend and at least three people asked how long I'd been writing. I answered that my first published book came out in 2004, so I've been published for 20 years and released my 25th book this past spring. But I'd been writing for years before 'turning professional' in 2004, if the release of that first book marks the official date.

As far back as high school, I was writing stories and poetry with English my favourite subject in school. I went on to study English literature, including a full year creative writing course at university. But it wasn't until after my daughters were born that I began creative writing in earnest.

One of the parent groups had started a magazine (pamphlet) for parents at home and accepted articles from anyone. I submitted five or six humorous stories about being a stay-at-home mom that were published for no renumeration but a lot of self-satisfaction. Later, I went on to have a short story published in Canadian Living magazine and made a whopping $300. After a few more short mystery stories made it into an anthology (When Boomers Go Bad) and a few magazines, I turned my hand to middle grade and adult mystery novels.

My career path always involved a lot of writing, from essays at university, to student reports as a teacher, to media lines and communications plans in my government job. I'd wager all my fellow Minds were also born with a pen in their hand and spent a good part of their lives writing. It's a skill that improves with practice -- a passion that only grows stronger with the passage of time.

As for advice to my younger self, I would say to enjoy the journey and not to worry as much about the destination.

Website: www.brendachapman.ca

Twitter (X): brendaAchapman

Instagram, Facebook & Threads: BrendaChapmanAuthor

Some Old White Guy, by Josh Stallings

Q: Your thoughts on authors asked to write Content/Trigger Warnings for their novels?

A: Old school Josh used to think these were silly. “Come on man, they’re just words.” The title of my first book was Beautiful Naked & Dead, if that title doesn’t upset you the content shouldn’t. That’s what I thought then. I also thought if I’m not afraid walking anywhere in the world you shouldn’t be either. 

I’ve grown up some since then. Here are a couple of events that helped me.

In the early part of the Tump presidency my wife and most of my closest female friends were universally pissed off at men. I took it personally. Hell I was often the only man in the room where they were railing against men. So taking it personally seemed logical. Ultimately I was forced to either believe all these smart wonderful women were trying to hurt me… OR, I needed to do some deeper learning. It always comes down to learning. Luckily as an autodidactic I have spent my life taking deep dives to eradicate my ignorance on a wide range of subjects. 

When asked, my wife put it like this; when America elected Trump, she realized that  she knew some men in this country viewed her gender with disdain, and as prey. She didn’t know enough people hated her gender to elect a proven misogynist rapist. Misogynist rapist is my term, she would point out that the statement is redundant. Rape is about power and anger. All rape is misogynist by definition.The women I know feel unsafe in most public places and have since they were young girls. They don’t get into their own car or any car without checking the back seat, and immediately locking the door once inside. If Trump’s position as the Republican nominee in 2024 made them feel vulnerable, his choice of J.D. Vance as a running mate made them feel even more unsafe. It isn’t because they’re fearful people. It is because they have had to live with these realities from early childhood.

Here are some facts from the National Sexual Violence Resource Center, facts my wife and others knew and I being a 6’4 white male had to learn: 

One in five women in the United States experienced completed or attempted rape during their lifetime.  

Nearly a quarter (24.8%) of men in the U.S. experienced some form of contact sexual violence in their lifetime. 

Nationwide, 81% of women and 43% of men reported experiencing some form of sexual harassment and/or assault in their lifetime. 

About one in four male victims of completed or attempted rape first experienced it between the ages of 11 and 17. 

One in three female victims of completed or attempted rape experienced it for the first time between the ages of 11 and 17.

The numbers are actually higher, these are based on people willing to admit to sexual assaults. And with the way our culture blames victims I can see why many would lock what happened deep in their psyche.

When ONE MORE BODY, the third and final Moses McGuire book came out I did an interview with Amber Love on her podcast Vodka O’clock. When posted she added, “TRIGGER warning because of the discussion we have about his research in guerrilla prostitution which means raping kidnapped girls/women until they comply.” 

Vodka O’Clock https://www.amberunmasked.com/?s=Josh+Stallings

Although I wouldn’t have thought to do this, I was glad she did. I carefully research what I write, BUT I don’t research who might read it. I never want stories I tell to trigger an unwanted emotional reaction. They used to say about PTSD that the best medicine was to walk through the trauma again and again. That is turning out to be false. Unless someone helps guide you through it with loving and gentle kindness you are more likely to re-traumatize the person than to help them. So I guess I come down on the side of, if anyone thinks there should be a trigger warning, we as authors need to look deeply into it. I’m not saying we should always put them on our work just because someone says we should, but we owe it our readers to investigate the why of the matter.

Multiple paragraphs ago I said there was more than one event that helped me grow. When the BLM movement rose up, I was excited. I was raised by civil rights activists. I was taught early about how our country treated its citizens of color. And yet when angry voices yelled about those fucking old white men, I took it personal. I admit my public face was, hell yes! While privately I thought, hey I’m one of the good guys, and isn’t it a little ironic to yell about racism while attacking all us white men like we are a monolith? What I hear is all humans have inherent dignity and worth, except you old white men, you? not so much. Listening as my better self, I see that the folks who say these things are more nuanced in their thinking. They aren’t saying all old white men are the root of their problems, the term Old White Men is shorthand for anger about a certain kind of person. I’m not egotistical enough to think they meant me directly. I also know I have a part to play here. I have worked hard to understand white privilege. And I needed to dig deeper. 

People love nonviolent activists in part because they are nonthreatening. It took Malcolm to open a door, and armed Black Panthers to keep it open. After the murder of Harvey Milk gay men and allies rioted in San Fransisco. By smashing glass and topping cop cars they made clear they were done taking it. It has taken authors yelling, tweeting, and threatening to walk away from writers conventions and organizations to see change. It took anger to get the MWA to see why the DA who railroaded the Central Park Exonerated Five had no place at the Edgars. It took the same noise to convince Bouchercon that Otto Penzler had no place on our stage. It should have been obvious. But many of us old white folk need to educate ourselves.   

It took removing Otto Penzler as editor of Best American Mystery Stories to discover there were in fact lots of great stories being written by both women and writers of color. Otto Penzler said he’d publish women if any were good enough writers to be published. Yes that is crackpot looney tunes crazy. But the fact a powerful man in publishing said it out loud tells me how deep this shit runs.

Steph Cha is the editor of Best American Mystery Stories. Award winning best selling author S. A. Cosby is the 2024 guest editor. S.A Cosby is an amazing man, kind and generous. I am glad we live in a time where he is recognized and held up for his work. Things are changing. Too slowly. But changing.

If my small part in bringing true equal rights for all citizens of this world is to educate myself, speak about what I learn honestly, and be supportive to those struggling, I can commit to that.

I realize as a big old white viking I have gone through life without much worry that what I said, where I went, or how I looked could get me assaulted or killed. I don’t need trigger warnings. But I’m aware enough to see that many others do. We mostly put these trigger warnings on abusive sexual content. I would like to propose we think about doing the same for gun violence. It is the number one killer of young people in the USA. Given that a generation of readers are likely to have been traumatized by firearms, we may want to warn them if they show up in our work. What about trigger warnings for writer’s racist language? 

We have the right to write about anything we want, and readers have the right to not be hurt by reading our words.

Need some good news? It is getting better all the time. A woman of color is waging a battle for the soul of America in the 2024 presidential election. She has fought for prison reform and bail reform. She has fought for women's reproductive rights. She truly is the best person for the job. And we all must do what we can to see that she is elected.

“I WILL NOT GO BACK.” - Another Old White Guy for Kamala Harris. 

How to talk yourself into something you never wanted to do, by Catriona

I'm going off topic today, but briefly, on trigger warnings . . .

My take is that upset, offence and discomfort are part of every life, but PTSD is rare and serious. When someone is triggered into an episode of PTSD, they re-experience trauma as severely as when they went through it for real. Worse perhaps, since you can't escape what you've produced inside your own head. There's no running away. So people with PTSD are adept at avoiding their triggers and, although that much vigilance can be exhausting, no sufferer would rely on an author note to protect them. 

And now for soemthing completely different:

Buy links

I've been guest-blogging and doing appearances for the US publication of THE WITCHING HOUR. Today is the last one, but you can catch up with me at:

• Jungle Reds, talking about comfort food
• Wicked Authors, talking about folklore (mostly the devil)
• Chicks on the Case, talking about houseguests
• Stiletto Gang, talking about in-laws
• BOLO Books, talking about the perfect village
• Dru's Book Musings, outlining Miss Cordelia Grant's typical day.
• The page 69 test, does what it says on the tin.

Here at home, on Criminal Acres, I'm reflecting. Mostly on the fact that I never wanted to write about WWII. When I wrote Dandy Gilver No.1, I set it in 1922, kind of early for the Golden Age, specifically  so there was no chance I'd ever get there. Look how that turned out: The Witching Hour is No.16 and takes place in the spring of 1939, with both Dandy's son in uniform.

Ooft.

On the other hand, over the years I've been writing Dandy's approach to the period in history I never wanted to write about, I've read some brilliant home-front novels, some of which have made me believe a. I could do it and b. I might even enjoy it. Sort of to remind myself and thereby talk myself into saying yes to another book, then, here are my top 5.

5. Mrs Minniver, by Jan Struther.

But the book, not the film. (The film must be the least effort any American studio has ever made to suggest that something's taking place in Britain.) It's almost plotless, having started as a series of magazine articles, but it's full of detail about domestic life, with a few moments of high drama. I'd like to see Dandy in that kind of tight squeeze . . .

4. A Presumption of Death, by Jill Paton Walsh and Dorothy L Sayers

Dorothy L Sayers also wrote morale-boosting articles during the war, outlining the doings of Harriet Vane and the Wimsey family, and Jill Paton Walsh used them as a springboard for an absolutely brilliantly-plotted crime novel, with a clue I use in a workshop about how to plant clues. God, if I could put Dandy into a story like this one . . .

3. Glamour Girls, by Marty Wingate.

I read this to moderate a panel and was blown away. It's not really a home-front novel, since Rosalie is a pilot, but it's an absorbing and rewarding look at women's lives in those six years. It's not a mystery, but you'd never notice as you whip the pages past. Could one of Dandy Gilver's daughters-in-law be as intrepid as this . . .

2. Death of a Flying Nightingale, by Laura Jensen Walker

Mallory and Dolly can't be up in the air though (even if I could begin to get that much research right) because that book has just been written! Laura Walker's series debut, about the nurses who tend soldiers as they're airlifted back across the English Channel from the battlefields, came out last week. It is really, truly, seriously good. It destroys all the excuses about not being able to find a murder plot amongst the war action. Curses.

1. The Village, by Marghanita Lanski. 

Now we're talking. This actually takes place on VE day, or rather night, as two women turn up for their - now unneeded - watch shift and realise that the close friendship they've come to share is over. Each is going back to her life on either side of the great class divide, suspended for the war but already reforming.  I've spent sixteen books leading Dandy Gilver out of the narrow and rather prissy world she was brought up to perpetuate. I'd kind of love to see her reaction as it shatters in the face of a common enemy. Maybe . . . And I wouldn't need to discuss troop movments beyond what's in the papers . . . And rural Perthshire wasn't a target . . .

I seem to be talking myself into writing about the war. But, if I can have a bonus book, there's always:

Never mind WWII novels, Sarah Waters popping into my mind is enough to make me give up writing completely. Fingersmith - plot to die for. Affinity - twist that makes Harlan Coben look like he's writing road signs. The Paying Guests - kill me now. The Little Stranger - remember that short period when Stephen King said he was retiring? I reckon he read this and had to lie down until he felt better.

Gah. 

Cx

Get your finger off the trigger by Eric Beetner

 Your thoughts on authors asked to write Content/Trigger Warnings for their novels?

In short, I'm against it.

Most people take the approach that art should make us confront things, oftentimes ugly things. I think pure entertainment is the same way. I don't think art/entertainment needs to be confrontational, however. There is a difference. But the idea of "comfort zones" is absurd to me.

We all like what we like and there should be no obligation to read subjects we don't like or that make us uneasy. We all know our tastes and our limits for either violence or darker subject matter, which is what this usually boils down to. But yours and mine may differ. To provide some sort of warning plays to the lowest common denominator, or in this case, the most easily offended.

The thing about being offended is that it's all about the offendee, not the offender. Because, again, what you may find offensive or over the line might not be the same for me. I've certainly never written anything to be intentionally offensive, nor would I. But I also know I have books of mine, or just certain scenes, that aren't for everyone. Every writer does.

In the 1980s I bristled at the PMRC and their campaign to put warning labels on records. It was a form of soft censorship and I abhorred it then, as I abhor it now. Those were trigger warnings before we had the term. There is an implication there that what the artist has created is somehow beyond what "normal" people should be exposed to, and I reject the idea that anyone has the power to decide that for anyone else.

Subjects like suicide, mental illness, eating disorders, etc. that some people choose to flag with warnings to protect the incredibly small percentage of readers who might be "triggered" by the mere exposure to those ideas, I feel is a disservice to the vast majority of readers who accept these, admittedly difficult subjects, as a fact of life. Denying that bad things or bad people or bad actions exist won't make them go away.

I certainly feel like subject matter should be out in the open with any book/movie/story. I don't want to go into something expecting one thing and then be whiplashed with topics I didn't know were coming. But if I know a story deals with something like pedophilia, I know I will probably stay away because that's simply not entertaining for me. But if that's the story someone is compelled to write, putting a label on it stigmatizes the work in a way that I find unfair. 

I'm an atheist and if a story goes too deep into a religious vibe, I'll probably start to tune out. Doesn't mean I shouldn't be exposed to those ideas or that I automatically close off a compelling story because make believe characters on a page think and behave differently than I do. That's why I read – to be taken to different worlds and shown different points of view. It's very likely that the very thing that triggers a reaction in me is the thing that will change how I see the world.

Where do you draw the line? Who are the trigger police? Is there an accepted list of triggers? Does that list keep expanding until one day anything to do with death or violence is a trigger? Because that's the day when every single crime and mystery novel gets a label.

In the end, putting warning labels on music did nothing to curb the content. If anything it made the offending material more enticing to exactly the crowd they were trying to "protect". I feel that trigger warnings are likely just as ineffective in the end. That would seem to make the case for putting them on so people who want to ignore them can do so. I do feel like it can have the chilling effect of perhaps a bookstore not shelving a book with a warning. Or at least keeping it off the front table, hiding it in the back with the other "bad" books. 

If that starts happening, if I need to be escorted to a special section of the store to find many of my favorite authors, then I think I'll be triggered. 

EDIT: As soon as I scheduled this post I got this notice from Blogger:

I guess we're already living in a trigger warning world.

Honey Badger Here by Gabriel Valjan

This summary is not available. Please click here to view the post.

Reader Beware: The Meaning of Trigger Warnings

 Q: Your thoughts on authors asked to write Content/Trigger Warnings for their novels?

from Susan

I don’t know what to say about this. I write – and read – crime fiction. I expect there to be crimes, murders, scary moments, bad behavior, evil people. To that end, I try to read enough about the story to know if I will definitely avoid it or not. I try to skip books where a child is murdered, but recently read a really good story where that happens because I know the author and her work, and I was confident she would handle the necessary plot points with care. I definitely skip novels where torture is likely going to play a role, which means most stories featuring Nazis at work get a pass from me. But the massive hit All the Light We Cannot See, while scary and, yes, replete with despicable Nazis, was worth it to me – skipped over a few pages here and there – because of the luminous portrait of the young girl and her protector. Sadism is an absolute no for me, but if I stumble upon it in a book, I just close the book and throw it in the trash (don’t want to pass the poison on, thank you!). 

 

What exactly is a trigger, anyway? Does it mean the reader has an immediate and serious psychological response based on their own or a loved one’s experience that may cause them pain and suffering? And if someone understands the damage coming across something that causes this may happen, does he or she take special care to learn about the story before opening the book? I do believe and have great sympathy for people whose experiences have hurt them this badly. So, I can’t object to trigger warnings.

 

What I wonder is how to present them so they don’t scare away readers? I also wonder if warnings can cover all real causes of fright and pain? If every crime fiction story has, in addition to its cover teaser prose, has to say something like “Be warned, the material in this work of fiction includes references to and descriptions of strangulation, gun violence, beatings, disappearance of a child, attempted rape, corrupt police personnel, attacks on senior citizens, and house invasion” will anyone choose to read that book? Will it sound over the top grim? Will libraries refuse to purchase it? My point is people have such varying, honest, emotional triggers based on terrible experiences that publishers may in future feel trigger warnings must be included on every work of crime fiction to avoid litigation, that great American tradition.

 

Tricky, thorny, sad, even tinged with politics these days. So, as I say, I’m not sure what I believe in answer to this question and will just have to wait until someone decides it for me.

Beware: guns are fired, a drowning occurs, a kidnapping happens

Alert: a senior citizen is attacked, a dog is kidnapped

Conferences, fact and fiction - from Harini Nagendra

Bouchercon and Killer Nashville 2024 have ended recently. Your thoughts on your conference experience. Do you get post conference blues, or does it energize you? 

Before I begin, let me confess - I haven't been to a single writer's conference in the US so far! Sadly, the expense of taking two long flights to attend one short conference creates barriers. I felt this most keenly in 2022, when my debut fiction book, The Bangalore Detectives Club, was nominated for a Lefty, Agatha and Anthony best debut award in the US, and for the CRA Historical dagger in the UK - and I couldn't make it for a single one of these, especially missing the panels where all the other debut authors were in conversation about their books. 

That was definitely a bittersweet moment - or set of moments. In balance though, the sweet far out-weighed the bitter, given that I had never expected the book to receive all these wonderful nominations.

But then, in 2023, I was invited to Motive, the Toronto International Literature Festival's crime and mystery edition, as a speaker - and what a blast I had. Here I am, on the Toronto harbor front, posing in front of a ginormous sign that announced my name to the city - in the company of a stellar set of authors. I hung out with other authors like Vaseem Khan, met a bunch of wonderful readers, went out to dinner with a lovely group of South Asian writers, including Ausma Zehanat Khan and her friends - with whom I am now friends-for-life. Vaseem and I had to rush from our rooms in the conference hotel in the middle of the night, and stand on the street with others for a long while because a fire alarm misfired - that was certainly an unforgettable experience. More grist for the writer's mill! 

I've been to many academic conferences in the US and other parts of the world for the past 30 years of course, but I was struck by the marked difference between academic conferences and writers' conferences - fiction is clearly more fun than fact! I hope to make it to Bouchercon, Left Coast Crime, Killer Nashville or one of the other big mystery writer conferences in the US sometime soon. 

Meanwhile - in news to come - it seems I may be able to make it to a writer's conference in the US later this year! I just got an email today, and hope to be able to share the news soon. I'm looking forward to meeting many authors I know via email, and to meeting readers too - fingers crossed!  

     

A Tree Falling in the Forest from James W. Ziskin

Bouchercon and Killer Nashville 2024 have ended recently. Your thoughts on your conference experience. Do you get post conference blues, or does it energize you?

I missed Bouchercon and Killer Nashville this year. Since 2013, I’ve attended many conferences. Bouchercon, Left Coast, Malice Domestic, ThrillerFest, California Crime Writers, New England Crime Bake, and Maine Crime Wave. In addition to offering opportunities to meet and revisit friends and learn everything there is to know about crime writing, these conferences took me to far-off places. Strung together, they sound like a new version of “I’ve Been Everywhere”: Albany, Long Beach, Raleigh, New Orleans, Toronto, St. Petersburg, Dallas, San Diego, Monterey, Portland (OR), Phoenix, Honolulu, Reno, Vancouver, Bethesda, New York, Boston, L.A., Portland (ME)… 

My favorite might have been Bouchercon Toronto (2017), since I won an Anthony and Macavity award there for HEART OF STONE. I have one minor gripe, however. That was the year they decided to announce the Anthony Awards on Sunday at noon. It was an effort to encourage attendees to stick around for the Sunday morning panels but, alas, everyone left early as they always do, and there wasn’t a huge crowd to hoist me on their shoulders and sing “For He’s a Jolly Good Fellow.”

Bouchercon 2021–held remotely in my least favorite city, Pandemica—was special, too. I won the Barry and Macavity for TURN TO STONE that year. But 2021 had its bitter side. Besides Covid, I mean. It may sound petty, but I felt luck turned its back on me that day. There I was, sitting at my desk, tuned in to the awards ceremony, excited because I was going to win two prestigious awards. (Yes, I knew in advance I’d won.) I’d told my friends and family to watch as well, from as far away as India. I was proud and looking forward to basking in some hard-to-achieve and hard-earned recognition. But when the moment for the Barry and Macavity award presentations arrived, nothing happened. A blank screen. There was some kind of technical glitch—for both award announcements!—during the virtual presentation, and the program swiftly moved on to other business. The Barry and Macavity winners’ names were never announced during the ceremonies that day. Poof. The moment passed. Yes, the videos were eventually posted, but by then few people were watching. My friends and relatives were kind. Said it didn’t matter. The important thing was that my book had won the honors. But I was embarrassed all the same.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m incredibly honored, grateful, and lucky to have won those awards, but I felt like the tree falling in the forest. Nobody got to witness—or hear—my magnificent fall.

If it seems I only remember those two conferences, I’ve done a disservice to this week’s question. Over the past ten years, I’ve had the privilege of meeting so many wonderful people/writers, thanks to these conferences. All of my Criminal Minds colleagues, past and present, in fact. (Well, I haven’t yet met Harini in person, but I hope to rectify that someday soon.) Among my earliest writerly acquaintances were my fellow Seventh Street Books authors. (In no particular order) Folks such as Terry Shames, Lori Rader-Day, Robert Rotstein, Jennifer Kincheloe, Kim Hays, Susan Spann, Allen Eskens, Susan Froetschel, Steve Gobel, John Florio, Robin Yocum, Larry Sweazy, Steven Cooper, Daisy Bateman, Shaun Harris, Stephanie Gayle, Bradley Harper, Gordon McAlpine, and Leslie Budewitz, who I knew before she published with Seventh Street.

Albany 2013 — Lynne Raimondo, Mark Pryor, me, Terry Shames 

Oh, yeah. Mark Pryor, too. I suppose I have to mention him, but only in a very small font.

Lynne Raimondo

And that brings me to my dear, dear friend and fellow Seventh Street author Lynne Raimondo, whom we lost far too soon four years ago. She was the first person I met at my first conference (Albany) in 2013, and she remained a close confidant and partner in crime. We got together whenever we could, spending time together with our families in Boston and Maine, and we even traded insults in our books, naming idiotic characters after each other. See below the passages from Lynne’s DANTE’S DILEMMA and my HEART OF STONE.

I miss Lynne so very much. I think everyone who knew her misses her as well.

Here are some happier memories from conferences past:

Raleigh 2015 — Larry Sweazy, Lori Rader-Day, me

Reno 2018 — with Catriona McPherson

2016 Phoenix — Chris Holm, me, Susanna Calkins, Josh Stallings, Lou Berney

With Louise Penny and Art Taylor Toronto 2017

Eryk Pruitt, Greg Herren, Thomas Pluck, me, 
Nadine Nettmann, Lori Rader-Day — St. Pete

Me with Cathy Ace, Monterey 2014

Robert Rotstein, Jennifer Kincheloe, Terry Shames, me, Lynne Raimondo
San Diego

Alison Gaylin, Gabriel Valjan, Kellye Garrett, me, Lori Rader-Day
St. Pete 2018?

Lesa Holsteine, Wendall Thomas, me in Vancouver???

Camille Minichino and me, San Diego 2023

Criminal Mnds c. 2018

Honolulu 2017

I admit that I’ve been down about conferences for a while now. No fault of the organizers or the attendees, of course, but I just haven’t been feeling it since about 2019. I’ve only attended one Bouchercon since then. Maybe I burned out. Lost interest in participating in panels and hobnobbing. Being “on” all the time. My face got tired of smiling. The booze at the bar became more of a prop than an enjoyment. I began to look forward to the moment when I could shut myself behind the hotel room door and draw a deep breath—a sigh, perhaps—happy to be my sorry self by myself again. I’ve grown to appreciate and love the peace of solitude one can find alone in the middle of big events like a writers’ conference.

That’s not to say I don’t love my writer and reader friends. I do. But I’d be lying if I said I enjoy everyone I meet at conferences. Let’s face it, you come across jerks in every endeavor you undertake. The racists, the misogynists, the predators, the reactionaries, the snobs... These make up a small portion of our community, but one does run into them.

Anyway, I’ll say that I’ve loved my conference experiences and will surely attend again. Not sure when, but I’ll feel better about the prospect someday, and I look forward to seeing all my friends again. And, who knows? Maybe even some of the jerks.

Y thr