Books

Box of Books

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Today I received my author’s copies of MR. MONK GOES TO HAWAII. I’ve seen the book in bound galleys and I’ve seen the cover… so technically it’s not like I’m actually seeing it for the first time. Even so, it’s always a thrill when that box of author’s copies arrives. Duane Swierczynski knows what I mean. He got a few boxes full of bound galleys THE BLONDE of his third book today…

Anyway, there’s really no thrill like seeing your novel in bound form
with a kick-ass cover (designed by the mega-talented Kathryn Parise)…
times one hundred. God help me when the actual hardcover arrives in a
few months. It’s a thrill that will never get old. And if it does, then
it’s probably time to me to retire and weave baskets, or something.

The Thrill of Sexism?

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The International Thriller Writers has enjoyed nothing but success, praise and enthusiasm since it was co-founded by Gayle Lynds & David Morrell two years ago…until now. On the eve of ITW’s first convention in Phoenix, Author Elaine Viets has criticized the organization’s inaugural list of Thriller Award nominess:

It’s tough to define an award-winning thriller, but the new International Thriller Writers has succeeded:

It’s anything written by a man.

That’s not what it says on the ITW Website. That tells us,
"Thrillers provide a rich literary feast – the legal thriller, the spy
thriller, the action-adventure thriller, the medical thriller, the
police thriller, the romantic thriller, the historical thriller, the
political thriller, the religious thriller, the high-tech thriller, the
supernatural thriller. The list goes on and on, with new variations
being invented constantly. This openness to creation and expansion is
one of the field’s characteristics."

Unfortunately, the plums at this literary feast are served to men
only. For the first ITW Thriller Awards, every single novel nominee is
a man.

Best Novel – five men.

Best First Novel – five men.

Best Paperback Original – five men.

And the winners of these Thriller Awards?

No surprise there: They’re all going to be men.

So is the recipient of the first ITW Life-Time Achievement Award.

The judges were men and women. So was it sexism…or did men simply write the best work this year? You tell me. I didn’t check, but how many Jews were nominated? Jews write lots of crackling thrillers. Hmm.

UPDATE 6-23-06: Novelist Joe Konrath calls Elaine Viets "a troll" and ITW co-founder Gayle Lynds reponds to her charges. Gayle wrote, in part:

As an author (not as a woman who has spent her life battling sexism), I
could complain that no women were nominated. At the same time, I could
also complain that no people of color were. I’m not sure whether any
Muslims or religions other than Christian or Jewish were nominated, but
I think they weren’t either. There also might be a preponderance of
nominees from one section of the United States, which could be taken as
a prejudice favoring that area.

As long as awards are given in
whatever field, there are always going to be those who say, "I wish it
were otherwise. And because it isn’t, it’s prejudice."

The only
time there’s really an institutional problem, at least in my mind, is
when there is a history of one group of people being disenfranchised.

Since this is ITW’s first year, the organization can have no track record of institutional prejudice.

The Perils of Signing

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Author Barry Eisler signed THE LAST ASSASSIN at a small, independent bookstore in the mid-west and then left and signed stock at two nearby big chain stores in the same town.  Barry reports that this did not sit well with the independent bookseller, who wrote:

Signing
stock at chain stores signals to the people who did take the time to
come to your [our independent bookstore] event and support you that
their effort was not necessary. More importantly, calling attention to
that fact that you need to leave to do such a thing is insulting to
your hosts. If that was something you felt compelled to do, you
probably should have done so without drawing attention to yourself. I
chalk it up to you not understanding the dynamics of the situation.
Other booksellers may not be very forgiving. Some in particular that we
know would simply stop carrying your books without comment.

[…] Like many of the key independents, we’re in the business of selling
books and we also produce author events. In order to drive the
publicity for an event, particularly for genre fiction, there has to be
a unique quality to the experience we’re offering. Part of that
uniqueness is the opportunity to meet the author and purchase a signed
book. If someone can go anywhere in town and purchase a signed book,
then that unique aspect of the event marketing is lost.

Is the independent bookseller over-reacting or did Barry make a  mistake? Barry doesn’t think he did:

I can’t apologize for signing stock at chains, my friend. They’re
important distributors in my business, and I can’t make a living
selling through independents alone (nor would I have been able to build
my business as I have without the backing of independents). If I
insulted you by doing I see as best for my business, I regret it, and
am somewhat surprised, as it’s not a reaction I’ve run into before.

If you’d like to have me back for another event, I would be delighted,
as you, along with other key independents, have done a tremendous
amount to get me where I am, and where I hope to go. You also run a
first rate signing and seem like good people. But whether I do a
signing with you or not, you should know that I’ll also sign stock at
as many chains in town as I can. This is a business decision for me,
not at all personal, and you shouldn’t feel insulted by it.

What do you think? Was Barry right or was he wrong? I’m not in my friend Barry’s league, but I can see both sides of the argument.

I know one independent bookseller who was very upset to find out that a week before they were hosting a signing for A Big Bestselling Author, signed copies of his book were being sold at the Costco two miles up the street (he’d signed thousands of copies at their distribution center) and he’d signed stock at the Barnes & Noble  less than a mile away a day earlier.

After the signing at the independeant bookstore, the Big Bestselling Author made sure he stopped by the nearby Borders, too. The independent booksellers were pissed…but there wasn’t much they could do about it. They still sold a lot of his books, just not as many as they could have sold if they weren’t undercut by the much cheaper signed books at Costco and B&N.

On the other hand, people who came to the independent bookseller’s event got to meet the author…something they couldn’t do at Costco, B&N or Borders. And they presumably were willing to pay a little extra for that priveledge.  I do believe the indie offered something unique that the other stores couldn’t, and that the people who’d buy the signed book at Costco aren’t necessarily the same customers who’d attend an author signing.  One doesn’t necessarily cancel out the other.

Like I said, I can see both sides.

I wonder how the independent feels about authors who do signings at another indies in the same city? I know it happens all the time in L.A. area and authors are very upfront about it.  Mystery/thriller  authors frequently sign at Mysteries to Die For the same day as Mystery Bookstore and Book’em… and even ask for directions (as Barry did, asking the indie how to get to B&N). If the indies here mind, they haven’t said anything about it that I know of…

Following Your Muse

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Novelist Keith Snyder posed an interesting question in the comments to my John Irving post. He wonders:

Personal muse-following vs. doing what you’re paid to do can coexist in theory, but in practice, how well does it work?

For me, it’s worked well. I "follow my muse" with the MONK and DIAGNOSIS MURDER books and have a great time. With the DM books, for example, I have been able to challenge myself and take some moderate risks with the franchise. The books are usually told in the third person and are set in present day. For THE PAST TENSE, I set half the book in 1962 and told it first person from the hero’s POV. That was risky for me in a lot of ways but I think it turned out to be the best book in the series so far. For MONK, I chose to write the books in first person from a woman’s POV, something I have never done before and that, at first, scared the crap out of me. But it also made the books stand out from the TV series and, in many ways, made them my own. So it’s possible to challenge yourself in a work-for-hire environment and still do the job you were contracted to do.

I also think it’s possible to when you’re freelancing a script for a TV series…which is also work-for-hire. Our first TV job was a freelance episode of SPENSER FOR HIRE. They bought our SPENSER spec… which was a comedy. It was a SPENSER, but unlike any SPENSER they had done before. A freelance script assignment usually begins with <i>your</i> idea, and you’re hired because it’s something that staff hasn’t come up with themselves yet. So, from the get-go, the script comes from "your muse." Of course, lots of other people get involved from that point, but   every one of our freelance scripts has been a big challenge for us.  I like to think that those scripts  — for shows like MONK, NERO WOLFE, SLIDERS and the upcoming series PSYCH — gave the producers who hired us what they wanted but also expressed our unique voice.

Like a Needle in a Haystack

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Author Jerry B. Jenkins has some very good advice about removing cliches from your writing over at Writer’s Digest. Yep, Writer’s Digest. Hard to believe.

Clichés come in all shapes and sizes. There are just as many clichéd
scenes as phrases and words. For instance, how may times have you seen
a book begin with a main character being "rudely awakened" from a
"sound sleep" by a "clanging" alarm clock? Have you written an opening
like this yourself? Wondering where to start, you opt for first thing
in the morning. Speaking of clichés, been there, done that. We all
have. Don’t ever do it again.

Compounding that cliché is having
the "bleary-eyed" character drag himself from his bed, squinting
against the intruding sunlight. And compounding that is telling
the reader everything the character sees in the room. What comes next?
He’ll pass by or stand before a full-length mirror, and we’ll get the
full rundown of what the poor guy looks like.

Are you cringing?

LOST Novel Author Outed

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Variety has revealed that "Gary Troup," the fictional author of the LOST tie-in novel BAD TWIN, is actually acclaimed novelist Laurence Shames.

Insiders say writers on "Lost" were asked to provide a list of elements that Shames could incorporate into the novel. But the author had his own vision and wound up including only a few of the elements.

[…]Show staffers also were frustrated that the book referenced copyrighted elements for which the publisher had not sought clearances, saying it would make it difficult to use those elements on-air.

But Hyperion told ABC that, like all publishers, it doesn’t normally seek clearances on copyrighted items in its novels. The house also said the book’s production schedule could have been held up if such clearances were sought.

Good Advice from John Irving

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“If you don’t feel that you are possibly on the
edge of humiliating yourself, of losing control of the whole thing, then
probably what you are doing isn’t very vital.  If you don’t feel like you
are writing somewhat over your head, why do it?  If you don’t have some
doubt of your authority to tell this story, then you are not trying to tell
enough.” John Irving

(Thanks to Herbie J. Pilato for the quote)

Giddy Up

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Legendary western writer Richard S. Wheeler pointed me to a great interview at the American Enterprise with Elmer Kelton, justifiably proclaimed by the Western Writers of America as one of the best western writers of all time.

Saturating Kelton’s work is his love of West Texas. Kelton is no
flowery panegyrist of the tumbleweed; growing up amongst men who regard
poetical expression as effeminate will stifle one’s urge to write odes
to cacti. But he loves his land just the same. As he writes in The Day the Cowboys Quit,
"Some people would never understand the hold this land could take on a
man if he stayed rooted long enough in one spot to develop a communion
with the grass-blanketed earth, to begin to feel and fall in with the
rhythms of the changing seasons. There was a pulse in this land, like
the pulse in a man, though most people never paused long enough to
sense it."

Buck Kelton, Elmer’s father, "never was totally convinced that I was
making an honest living because there wasn’t a whole lot of sweat
involved. That’s how he measured work–by whether you sweated or not."

Writing 45 novels extracts its own measure of sweat. So, for that matter, does tracking down The Time It Never Rained. "The Western shelf is in the back of the store," says Kelton. "You gotta hunt for it."

Hunt for it. You’ll be glad you did. Elmer Kelton is a great American novelist–no "Western" modifier necessary.

It Never Entered My Mind

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Paramount has reversed course and the season one DIAGNOSIS MURDER boxed set, to be released in September, will now include "It Never Entered My Mind," the pilot which aired as an spin-off episode of JAKE AND THE FATMAN. In the pilot, Dr. Mark Sloan was a widower without any children. His investigative sidekicks were Kristoff St. John  and Ally Walker (as Dr. Amanda Bentley, a role later played by Cynthia Gibb and Victoria Rowell). But it still looks like the set won’t include the TV movies that preceded the weekly series.

Mr. Monk and Mr. Bill

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Bill Crider made my day by praising my book MR. MONK GOES TO THE FIREHOUSE on his blog:

A lot of the book’s humor arises from Monk’s attempts to adjust to living away from his own environment, and
the whole plot is generated because Natalie’s young daughter is upset by the death of a firehouse dog. Monk declares he’ll find the killer, and the book is off to the races. I had a lot of fun reading this, and
if you’re in the mood for a couple of hours of pure entertainment, you probably would, too.

Thanks, Bill!