Thanks to my People, by guest Edith Maxwell / Maddie Day

Catriona here: I've got warm feelings for most of this mystery community, and now is not the place to name the very few exceptions, but this woman? Edith Maxwell / Maddie Day? This woman I genuinely love. She's prolific without being intimidating, serious without being sombre, light-hearted without being daft, and devout without a scrap of sanctimony. This blog post is a case in point: read on for the straight gen about the mix of grit and luck in any writing career.

And now, Edith:

Thanks so much to Catriona for inviting me over to celebrate next week’s release of Scone Cold Dead! I’m thrilled that my thirteenth Country Store Mystery will finally be out in the world. 

I hear there’s a topic of the week around here about writing organizations. OMG, can I ever talk about that. It’ll involve a bit of autobiography, but what the heck. 

Bold Assertion #1: I would not be published without having been part of writing organizations, mostly Sisters in Crime. 

My new book would not be my thirteenth in a series and my thirty-seventh traditionally published mystery in twelve years. I would not have written seven traditionally published series, two of which are ongoing. I would not have thirty short stories published. I would not have been nominated seven times for an Agatha Award and won once for Charity’s Burden, my fourth Quaker Midwife Mystery. Most important, I wouldn’t have made the dear friends for life that I have (including Catriona) in the crime fiction world. 

So, can I back up Bold Assertion #1? Sure. For starters, I wrote fiction constantly as a kid but then left it aside for several other kinds of writing for a few decades. When I resumed and decided to write a cozy mystery, I found a writing group led by this year’s President of Sisters in Crime New England, Susan Oleskiw, already a multi-published traditional mystery author in the mid-nineties. That’s the first connection. 

I didn’t finish the book I’d started that year because of increased work commitments (and two growing sons and a difficult husband, now -ex), but I started writing short crime stories. My first was published in the second annual Crime Stories by New England Writers anthology in 2004. In 2006, Susan mentioned the New England Crime Bake conference, held that year in Lowell, MA, 45 minutes from my house north of Boston. 

I went for one day. Lisa Scottoline was the guest of honor. I won a raffle of books from Hallie Ephron. I bought a SINCNE calendar featuring members in all kinds of crime settings (handcuffs, the morgue, and so on). And I said, “Why am I not a member of this fabulous organization?” Readers, I joined SINC on the spot and have missed only two Crime Bakes since. I joined the conference committee and was co-chair in 2018 and 2019.

The next month I attended my first chapter meeting, a packed and welcoming gathering in Kate Flora’s living room. Sheila Connolly announced signing her first two contracts. The following meeting I met Hank Phillippi Ryan walking, gorgeous as always, into another host’s home but looking as nervous as I felt. She announced her first mystery was releasing the following year.

Over the years, Hallie mentored me. Hank mentored me, Sheila became a close friend. I joined the Guppies and studied how to write the perfect query letter. I was laid off my tech writing job and dug out that unfinished novel until I found another job. By 2011, I was shopping a finished mystery, striking out with agents, and settling for a micropress when Sheila, then New England chapter president, sent around an email to the membership saying a New York agent wanted to work with writers, published or not, on cozy mystery proposals. 

See? Connections.

“Aha!” I shouted (or perhaps whispered). “This is an opening and I’m not going to waste it.” I wrote and polished a letter, including a couple of ideas for cozy series, and hit Send. The agent called three days later while I was out walking. He sent me a sample proposal and gave me feedback. After I returned mine and the first couple of chapters of the Local Foods Mysteries, we signed with Kensington within a week. Now all five books in the series have been re-released as authored by Maddie Day, since she’s more popular these days than Edith. 

It sounds lucky, but I was ready for that opening. Besides being determined to be traditionally published, I had already laid the groundwork by learning from my people. (I used to say my tribe, but not being part of an actual indigenous tribe, that seems rude, so I stopped.)

More connections.

One of the most felicitous connections was joining forces with five other SINCNE members to form the Wicked Authors blog. Four of us had responded to that agent’s outreach and all four snagged cozy contracts at around the same time. The other two had series contracts within the next year or so. Our group effort, much like this one, boosted all of us, increased our visibility with fans, and provided a valuable support network for eleven years. (Sadly, two have left the group and the rest of us are still regrouping as to how we want to present the blog going forward.)

I’ve been so grateful for my SINC connections, for what I’ve learned from workshops and conferences and private conversations, that I served as the New England chapter president for two years (we are the second or perhaps third largest chapter, so it’s a big job). I’d be nowhere without my fellow Sisters (and Misters). I’ve been a member of MWA since I was first published, but I’m not very active in the New England chapter, and I’ve never (yet) attended the Edgars events. Still waiting for that nomination!

Of course my modest successes are mostly due to working hard alone in my office and always writing the best book I can. Here’s my latest shelfie (not including the new book).

But a couple of other writers’ groups have also provided wonderful support. In my earlier years as an author, I was part of a great in-person critique group (found, yes, through the SINCNE newsletter). I read every scene of my first five or six books to the members, who provided invaluable feedback. I’m also part of a cross-genre writers’ group in my area. We meet for social potlucks or summer parties, and sometimes have speakers or do member-reads nights. We attend each other’s launch parties and generally are a booster and resource group, but we don’t exchange critiques.

These are important connections, too. Go figure -- I guess I don’t have Bold Assertion #2. But, when asked at an author talk what my most important advice to budding authors is, I always say, “Write the best book you can, and find your people. Find the other writers in your genre. Learn from them, offer to them, form a community.” Right?

Readers: Who are your people, your organization that backs you up and teaches you?

Edith

In Scone Cold Dead, country store and café owner Robbie Jordan is just weeks away from giving birth, and it seems Robbie and her husband, dad-to-be Abe, aren’t the only ones grappling with anxiety. A stranger is causing a stir in town and Robbie’s Aunt Adele appears unusually preoccupied at the baby shower. But when someone finds a body in the ram field on Adele’s sheep farm, it’s Robbie’s turn to be worried. Especially after Chief Buck Bird uncovers a troubling link between Adele and the possible murder victim. Robbie has no choice but to knit the clues together and solve this mystery before anything else gets flocked up . . .

Maddie Day writes the Country Store Mysteries, the Cozy Capers Book Group Mysteries, the Cece Barton Mysteries, and the historical Dot and Amelia Mysteries. As besotted first-time Grammy Edith Maxwell, she writes the Agatha-Award winning historical Quaker Midwife Mysteries and short crime fiction. She’s a member of Mystery Writers of America and a proud lifetime member of Sisters in Crime. Maxwell/Day lives north of Boston with her beau and their cat Martin, where she writes, cooks, gardens, and wastes time on Facebook. Find her at her web site, at WickedAuthors.com, and at Mystery Lovers’ Kitchen