How People Used to Live

Still poking among the ancestors. Now, however, I've worked around to the folks who were here within living memory (mine). As you might expect of any storyteller, my immediate forebears were storytellers, too. So I've heard many of the family stories over the years. These tales are of interest to my cousins, and maybe also to you. I feel that we are an extraordinary race. Your family is, too. There are, after all, no dull people, only forgetful relatives.

So we remember each other. There are family members whose titanic personalities cause them to stick out above the rest of the tribe like the faces on Mount Rushmore. My father's mother, for one, known to all as Ma Gallison, who used to run the family store in Vanceboro, Maine, without a bank account. She took the train to Bangor to settle the accounts with the wholesalers in cash. Ma ran the family as well as the store; she was feared. Her father, George W. Eales, Sr., was another towering figure. He joined the British navy at the age of ten, in 1825, and got off a ship in Halifax, Nova Scotia, at the age of thirty, declaring that he was now a farmer. Thanks to various cousins I have pictures of him. He was clearly a seaman, even when he was old. That jacket looks to me like original purser's issue.

He died in 1907. In addition to his widow he left four sons and three daughters, of whom my grandmother was the youngest. His sons had daughters who were friends with my grandmother. All these women remained close their whole lives long, helping each other in time of need. I used to hear their names all the time, but since most of them married, their names were all different. I never understood exactly how we were related until last week, when I sat down with Ancestry.com and mended the Eales branch of the family tree.

Two of those cousins or aunts or whoever were expected to come and take care of little Bobbie, Aunt Mildred's boy, so that Mildred could pursue her career with the Bureau of Immigration and Ma could work in the store. One would come for six months, then send a letter to the other one, who would come and relieve her. I heard this story from my father, but I can't remember which aunts or cousins were involved. Anyway the one who was on duty gave my dad the letter asking to be relieved, and he put it in the pocket of his band uniform, which was hung in the closet and forgotten, band season being over. When the second woman failed to show up for duty it caused much ill feeling and many hard words.

You're thinking, why did they do that? Why didn't they hire an au pair, or send the kid to day care? It wasn't done. First of all Vanceboro practically ran on a barter economy, especially during the Great Depression, when Bobby was small. Secondly, the tradition was to take care of one's own. My great grandmother, George Eales's wife, prepared corpses for burial, my father told me. She was the one who did that in Vanceboro, washed the bodies and so on. You didn't pay a funeral director to do that. You didn't pay for help when someone was sick in the house, either. You summoned a cousin. When my mother was operated on for breast cancer in 1948, Cousin Mae Glew came all the way from Vanceboro to Crystal Lake, Illinois, to take care of us while she recovered. The loveliest woman. She used to make us cinnamon buns, all hot and buttery. They would be waiting when we came home from school.

And needless to say you never stayed at a hotel when there was a cousin within fifty miles. Our house in North Plainfield, New Jersey, was on the road to Florida for some of the cousins. I remember a number of merry visits. If we didn't have enough beds we doubled up. Good times.

Now and then I think about the old Vanceboro days when I hear people talk about the American Way of Life. What way is that, exactly?

© 2013 Kate Gallison

How I Stumbled Into Crime Writing and Why I Stuck Around

Meet Charles Salzberg, a wonderful writer and an eloquent champion of fine writing and writers. Charles is the author of the Shamus Award nominated Swann's Last Song, and the sequel, Swann Dives In.  His latest novel is Devil in the Hole, based on a 40-year old true crime.  The third in the Swann series, Swann's Lake of Despair, will be published next fall.  He also teaches writing at the Writer's Voice and the New York Writers Workshop, where he is a Founding Member.

 I once heard Charles describe why he prefers pantsing to outlining.  Until then, I always thought I should be outlining carefully alla Agatha and my heroine Ann Perry. I just couldn't make myself do it.  Every time I tried, my fingers just started typing out the real story instead.  Then at the launch of the his second Swann novel, Charles said, "If I already know what's going to happen, I'll get bored."  Bingo! I thought.  I need to keep myself guessing in order to keep the reader guessing.  Now when I get that scary feeling that I don't know where my story is going, I think of Charles's words, take heart, and then surprise myself.  Here is the story of how Charles surprised himself by becoming a crime writer.

Annamaria Alfieri

I never meant to be a crime writer and in fact, I still don’t see myself that way.  But I am.  Three novels published with a fourth on the way.  All crime.  So yes, I guess I am a crime writer.

            As a young wannabe writer I was partial to authors like Saul Bellow, Phillip Roth, Bernard Malamud, Norman Mailer, Henry Roth, Djuna Barnes, Margaret Drabble, Fitzgerald, Twain, Dostoevsky.  But writing in that vein, with a heavy emphasis on character and inner dialogue, although satisfying, was getting me nowhere.  I became too involved with character and not enough with plot. 

            And so—I would like to think it was late one night as I hunched over my typewriter, but I doubt that was the case—I came up with a plan.  I would force myself to write plot.  The best way to do that, I decided, was to write a detective novel, because there is nothing more tightly plotted than a good detective tale. I would write a mystery novel that seemed to be in the tradition of masters of crime, but with a twist.  In preparation I gorged on the genre.  Everything from Hammett’s The Continental Op to Charles Willeford’s Hoke Moseley, and Raymond Chandler’s Phillip Marlowe, even throwing in a little Mickey Spillane and James M. Cain. Once I finished, I knew what I would do.  I’d shake things up a bit.  I’d start with the requisite missing person, progress to a murder, have the detective follow all the clues looking for the killer, but in the end, he would not solve the crime.  A friend called it “an existential detective novel.”  I liked that.    

I finished that novel, but although praised by agents and editors, no one wanted to publish it.  “You can’t disappoint your audience.  You’re writing a detective novel, you have to have the detective solve the crime.”

            That kind of ruined the point I was trying to make: that the world isn’t tidy, that things didn’t always add up, that sometimes chaos rules over reason. So, I tucked it in a drawer—yes, those were the days when you had an actual manuscript—and moved on to make a living as a magazine journalist.

          

          Years passed.  I got older.  And somewhat wiser.  I pulled out the manuscript, tinkered with it a little (on a computer, this time), changed the ending, and the book was published.  The title, which I loved, didn’t quite make sense anymore—Swann’s Last Song, because the detective is so disillusioned to find that the world is not necessarily knowable and logical that he quits the business—but it was too good to let go. 

            

         That was going to be it. I had written what is called a stand-alone.  I had no interest in continuing to write crime novels.  I would go back to what I loved, writing character driven, literary novels. But to my surprise, the book was nominated for a Shamus Award for Best First PI Novel.  I lost.  I got ticked off.  I’d show them.  I’d write another. (Get it: revenge). And so Swann Dives In was born.  I had so much fun writing it, that I wrote a third, Swann’s Lake of Despair.  In the next two Swann books there are no murders.  That would be too easy.  There are way too many more interesting crimes to write about.

            Sounds like I was hooked on crime, but really not so much.  At least not as in the conventional crime novel that focuses on murder and robbery.

An Alternate View of Justice

The other day, Rose and I were treated to an excellent lunch at the Century House in Latham, an impressive Restaurant/Inn catering to business types. The Domestic Violence Project of the Capital District Women’s Bar Association decided I deserved the Stanley A. Rosen Memorial Award for 2013. The plaque says I’d “demonstrated an ability to litigate matters on behalf of victims of domestic violence while showing the utmost professionalism and integrity in dealing with the Court, litigants and attorneys, qualities exemplified by Stanley Rosen during his lifetime.” The plaque-givers are lawyers, of course, and that’s how they talk. I’d never heard of the late Stanley Rosen but learned he was the dean of matrimonial lawyers up here in Albany.

Actually, what I do is go into the Family Courts in Albany, Rensselaer, Schenectady and Saratoga Counties with battered women as their lawyer and kick ass. I don’t like their abusers, who run the gamut from smarmy-mouth con men to redneck morons to killers-in-the-making. They’re called “the Respondents” and they’re always male. I much prefer the on-the-edge boys—their anger seeping out of them, issuing forth in insolent responses to the Family Court Judges, almost uniformly women. If I’m especially blessed, they’re not represented by a lawyer who’d try to get in my way. They usually don’t have lawyers as don’t most of their female victims. Makes it easier for me to provoke them, to stick them good like the picador on horseback taunts the bull with the lance. Very unlawyer-like, I know. But when they lose it in front of the Judge, I’m more than half-way to the right verdict. And my clients appear to love the spectacle.

I volunteered for this work when I relocated from New York City to Albany six years ago this October. I’d never been in a Family Court despite having been in most of the City’s criminal courts during 18 years as a trial lawyer with the Legal Aid Society. I was curious about how it worked in Family Court, and was fairly certain that my clientele would be uniformly female. Having been a New York City policeman for 20 years prior to my lawyering job, I had a first-hand knowledge of the desperation of the women held in domestic servitude by these louts.

That’s pretty much what I said, briefly, from the dais as I was given the plaque by Rosemarie Rosen, Stanley’s widow. In the other photo, I’m flanked, on my right, by Lydia Kulbida, a local TV anchorwoman who grew up in the Bronx, and Lisa Frisch, on my left, who directs the DV Project and confided that she liked that part about sticking it to the men. Mostly lawyers from big firms in the audience, social workers and media people. Another thing I said, I described myself as an accidental lawyer, having gone to Fordham Law School at night while I was a NYC Patrolman—not thinking (never mind, intending) to ever practice law. Went because I had the GI Bill and a curiosity about the law. (Didn’t want those law firm types mistaking me for one of them.)

By pure chance, the old guy who sat down next to me was Neil Breslin, our Albany State Senator, and we found we had Fordham in common and were both friends of Carolyn Wheat, mystery novelist. They were on Law Review together at Toledo (Ohio) Law School way back when, while Carolyn and I worked together in the NYPD Legal Bureau in the late 1980s.

Best moment, however, was at the end of the festivities. Mrs. Rosen—a charming, middle-aged woman who’d been Deputy Controller of New York State—confided that Stanley would have liked me because he’d much preferred being an Albany County Assistant District Attorney in Criminal Court to being the head Matrimonial Partner at McNamee, Lochner, Titus & Willams, PC. I could sympathize.

© 2013 Robert Knightly

What Am I Doing Wrong?

You and Your Platform for Writers…

Times have changed. Publishers now expect you to do the heavy lifting on you P.R., marketing, etc., getting your name and Brain Children out there. Every serious writer knows this—and lots of us wonder–How In the World Do I Do It on My Own?

Fear not, friends and colleagues. Help is around the corner.

P.J. Nunn is one of those professional sources ready to help you fight the P.R. Monsters!

Today she pays Crime Writer's Chronicle a visit - to share with us all her ideas, her skills, her expertise.
If you are one of the lucky ones who routinely make the List—as golden Bestsellers of the Week—we honor you! But 98% of us don't make the Holy List, or grin all the way to the bank regularly!

P.J. offers a fail-safe platform. You might want to explore further her AOEs—Areas of Expertise!
Welcome, P.J., to our blog for SCW - Serious Crime Writers!

Thelma J. Straw

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Times, they are a-changin’. And authors, we’d better be changing too! Ten years ago, the ideas of e-book success and being self-published were ridiculous. The thought that one might aspire to selling 1000 ebooks a month was laughable. Yet here we are, and those are reachable goals for just about any author willing to work for them. So why are so many authors not getting near these numbers? There are several reasons. I’ll address a few here.

1. Lack of research

2. Failure to plan ahead

3. Budget imbalance/DIY (do it yourself)

Lack of research is probably the thing I see most often. People decide to publish and jump at the first opportunity that looks like a match. Either they’ve made up their minds that they don’t want to self-publish and have heard a little about what it takes to get published traditionally so they think they know what to do, OR they’ve decided to self-publish and think they know what to do. In most cases, whichever version you choose, they find out there’s a lot they don’t know. Alas, they often find out too late after contracts have been signed and they’re left to make the best of a bad situation. I’m saddened by the number of clients who’ve hired me thinking they are traditionally published only to learn that by industry standards, they’re not. They’re self-published BUT they’ve signed a contract with a vanity press and now there’s no turning back.

I realize it’s hard because when you’re just starting out you probably don’t know enough about the industry to even know which questions to ask. That’s why I can’t stress enough that if you believe you want to get published one way or another, the very best thing you can do is get involved with a well-established writer’s organization such as Sisters in Crime, Romance Writers of America, Florida Writer’s Association, etc. They’re everywhere and what you’ll learn in groups like these can save you years of heartache as well as a lot of cash. At the very least, get involved in some e-groups or lists and just lurk for a while. There are a lot of myths on the Internet and not everyone who acts like an expert IS an expert but you’ll come across some like myself who’ve been in the business for many years and are willing to answer a question or two. Don’t hesitate to ask and ask again until you get an answer.

Failure to plan ahead is another problem I see often. Most people wouldn’t dream of starting a new business without a business plan firmly in hand that included marketing strategies for at least one year, usually five years. So why in the world do people think they can launch a whole new career as an author, thinking it will provide a retirement income, flying by the seat of their proverbial pants?? Every day I see this. They want it to be a viable career with a steady, livable income, but don’t want there to be any expense! Nice work if you can get it but I haven’t seen that happen yet.

Every new business has expenses and must have a plan to get information in front of potential customers and, once those potential customers have become customers, to keep them coming back. All too many authors seem to think that writing the book is enough and it will do the rest of the work for them. Or maybe they don’t think that, they just don’t think that far ahead. If your book is scheduled for release in December, do you have a grand opening party planned? Have invitations been sent? Ads designed and purchased? Cake ordered? Media alerted? Seriously.

And more importantly, assuming your grand launch is a success, what’s the next event you have planned to capture potential customers who didn’t make the launch party? And what about the potential customers that never heard of your book until March? Or July?

What type of marketing activity do you have planned for the fall, before it’s time to launch another book in December? Will there be a new book in December? Lots and lots of questions and planning to do.

Budget imbalance and DIY (do it yourself) usually come about as a result of the Lack of research and the Failure to plan ahead. Somewhere along the way, especially if you’ve opted to go the Self-Published route, you realize there are necessary expenses but you don’t have the money. Now what? Some authors make a list of things they think they need and just start at the top until they run out of funds. Others try to prioritize in a variety of ways, but still come up short. Necessity is the mother of invention, so they say, but be careful. Some of us just aren’t cut out for website design or other graphic endeavors. If your work when doing it yourself isn't good enough for someone to pay you for, it's probably not good enough to represent you well either. Be smart and know your limitations. A bad cover can really hurt sales. Staff your weaknesses. A web site that looks “home made” may be the kiss of death.

Take time to make a good plan. Start over if you have to. What matters most is the finished product and release dates can always be delayed. If you’re diligent in your research, you’ll find graphic artists who are both talented and affordable. I shudder when I hear some of the prices authors have paid for cover art or web design. That old adage you get what you pay for doesn’t always apply here. GET REFERENCES.

Most of all, approach everything from a business standpoint if you hope to achieve business income. Otherwise we’re talking “hobby” and you can pay whatever you want. Is it possible to sell more than 1000 books a month in today’s market? Absolutely. In fact it’s probably easier than it’s ever been. But the average small press/self-published author sells approximately 250 copies. The real question is—is it possible for you to sell more than 1000 of your books with the business plan you have in place? What do you think?

© 2013 P.J. Nunn

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In 1998, PJ Nunn founded BreakThrough Promotions, now a national public relations firm helping authors, mostly of mystery novels, publicize themselves and their work. The business is thriving and PJ is excited about the release of her first novels,Angel Killer: a Shari Markam Mystery and Private Spies: a Jesse Morgan Mystery. PJ lives with her husband and some of their five children near Dallas, TX. Learn more at http://pjnunn.com.


Links:

Facebook/PJ - https://www.facebook.com/authorpjnunn

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Blog – pjnunn.wordpress.com


PJ Nunn 972-825-1171
BreakThrough Promotions
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breakthroughpromotions.net

53 Shopping Days till Xmas. Buy Witty Tee Shirts.

Halloween is gone and past for another year (without a pumpkin! I forgot to get a pumpkin!). It must surely be time to think about Christmas. Right? And presents. Presents for other people, that is. Be prepared, for a change, that's my motto. What all my friends will probably get this year are paperback copies of BUCKER DUDLEY, whether they want one or not, since that's what I can afford to give them. But if I had twenty-five or thirty bucks apiece for presents for my friends, I could do worse than to get them each a tee-shirt from Zazzle. I was browsing their site this morning and came across some of the most charming things.

For Lesley, in honor of her cat, Mao

For Annamaria, who,
like me, is bothered and
irritated by politics

For Leanne

For Harold (Hey! It's customizable!)

For Lee

For Jonathan Maberry

For Bob

For Thelma

For Stephanie, the demon reader

For Sheila, the film fan

…And one for me, since it's all virtual anyway.

Merry fifty-three days before Christmas.

© 2013 Kate Gallison