Mystery Writing

Mr. Monk and the Dirty Review

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MR. MONK AND THE DIRTY COP comes out on July 7 but the reviews are already starting to come in. Bill Crider enjoyed this one as much as the previous books, or so he says on his blog today. He says, in part:

Lee Goldberg's books about Monk never let me down. They're always good for a some smiles and laughs, but that's the least of it. I've talked before about the themes of loyalty and friendship in books by other writers, and Robert B. Parker couldn't fill up ten pages without writing about them. People take the themes seriously in other books because, well, the books are serious. Goldberg has a lighter touch, but if you don't think those themes are treated just as seriously in his work, then you should read Mr. Monk and the Dirty Cop.

Thank you so much, Bill. I'm flattered. I believe there's one thing that stops the MONK episodes and the books from becoming a slapstick cartoon, that prevents his character from becoming Maxwell Smart or Inspector Clouseau. It's this: amidst all the comedic situations that arise from his OCD, there's always something emotionally true about the stories…something that reveals Monk's essential sadness and grounds the character in reality. Maybe not our reality, but a reality just the same.

The hardest thing for me with the books isn't the mystery or the comedy…it's coming up with that emotional center, the heart-felt conflict that gives some shading to the broad humor. I always try to find something in the story that will put Monk and Natalie's relationship to the test, that will reveal something about who they are, and that will bring them closer together (or give them a deeper understanding of one another). I don't consciously think of a theme, but one seems to reveal itself to me along the way…and then I try not to belabor it or pay attention to it…I prefer to let it emerge on its own as a strand within scenes or in lines of dialogue.

I'm glad that it comes across.

Uncle Burl Barers All

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Carl Brookins recently interviewed my Uncle Burl Barer, the Edgar Award-winning author of such true crime bestsellers as MOM SAID KILL and MURDER IN THE FAMILY. It's a fun interview. Here are some excerpts: 

What’s the hardest thing about being an author? Making money.

What surprised you the most when you became a published author?

I was surprised that authors don't have groupies such as the ones who pursue rock stars and famous actors, or even disc jockeys. Never be an author to pick up chicks.

Have you ever collaborated on a novel? Would you consider it?

Yes, I collaborated on a novel (unpublished) with someone who wasn't a writer. I would love to collaborate with someone who is a writer. I did contribute to one of Lee Goldberg's pulp fiction novels that he wrote under an assumed name. I helped him with one of the sex scenes. He was, at that time, not as experienced with that topic as he has since, no doubt, become. When his Nana complained that the book was nothing but sex and violence, Lee wisely shifted the blame to my brother and me. My brother deflected criticism by insisting that he only helped Lee with the legal/courtroom scenes. When Mom called me, she asked How could you pervert your little nephew that way? I told her Mom, I only helped him write one sex scene, honest! She replied, It was the one with the ice-cream wasn't it? She was right. It was.

You Can Become a Kindle Millionaire

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My friend author Joe Konrath has done extraordinarily well selling some of his unpublished books on the Kindle, making $1250 in royalties this month alone. That's very impressive. And since its free and easy to upload your book to Amazon for sale on the Kindle, I'm sure that Joe's success is very exciting and encouraging news to a lot of aspiring writers out there. But I suspect Joe's success is the exception rather than the rule. That said, he is encouraging others to follow his lead. He writes:

The average advance for a first time novel is still $5000. If Kindle keeps growing in popularity, and the Sony Reader opens up to author submissions like it intends to, I think a motivated writer will be able to make $5000 a year on a well-written e-novel. Or more. All without ever being in print.

[…]Robert W. Walker, has written over forty novels. Most of them are out of print, and the rights have reverted back to him. If he digitized and uploaded his books, and priced them at $1.59 (which earns him 70 cents a download), and sold 500 copies of each per month (I sold 500 of Origin and 780 of The List in May), he'd be making $14,000 a month, or $168,000 a year, on books that Big NY Publishing doesn't want anymore.
Even if he made half, or a third, or a fifth of that, that's decent money on books that he's not doing anything else with. Now, all of us aren't Rob, and we don't have 40 novels on our hard drives, especially 40 novels that were good enough to have once been published in print.
But how long do you think it will be before some unknown author has a Kindle bestseller?

Joe is making a lot of assumptions based on the admirable success of his own Kindle titles. It's a big, big, BIG leap to think, just because his book has done well, that Robert W. Walker (or any other mid-list author) will sell 500 copies…or even 50 copies…of his out-of-print books on the Kindle each month. 

But just for hell of it, I decided to follow Joe's advice and put my out-of-print 2004 novel THE WALK and a short-story collection THREE WAYS TO DIE up on Amazon for sale on the Kindle and see what happens. 

So far, after only a few days on Amazon, sales of those Kindle editions have been brisk. For instance, today THREE WAYS TO DIE was ranked as Amazon's #30 bestselling Kindle short story collection and the 40th top-selling hard-boiled Kindle mystery. 

Pretty impressive, huh? 

And it's paying off in the wallet, too, my friends. I've already raked in ten dollars in royalties. So I spent today at the Bentley dealership checking out the car I'm going to buy at year-end with my Kindle royalties.

I do not mean to belittle Joe's success on the Kindle. It is truly impressive and its a reflection of his considerable promotional skills (as well, I'm sure, of the quality of the books themselves). But do I think the vast majority of published, as well as unpublished, writers can easily achieve the same success he has with Kindle editions? No, I don't.

But I would love to be proved wrong. I'll report back at the end of the month on how my Kindle sales on these two titles are doing.

(Incidentally, several of my MONK and DIAGNOSIS MURDER books are also available on the Kindle. Although the MONK books sell very well in hardcover and paperback, the Kindle sales are miniscule…and keep in mind that my MONK books, unlike those that an unknown writer might put up for sale on the Kindle, benefit from the huge advertising, promotion, and brand awareness that goes along with a hit TV series)

UPDATE 6-11-2209: Joe Konrath has updated his Kindle sales figures and they are pretty impressive. Here's a sample:

On April 8th, I began to upload my own books to Kindle. As of today, June 11, at 11:40am, here is how many copies I've sold, and how much they've earned. 

THE LIST, a technothriller/police procedural novel, is my biggest seller to date, with 1612 copies sold. Since April this has earned $1081.75. I originally priced it at $1.49, and then raised it to $1.89 this month to see if the sales would slow down. The sales sped up instead. 

ORIGIN, a technothriller/horror occult adventure novel, is in second place, with 1096 copies sold and $690.18. As with The List and my other Kindle novels, I upped the price to $1.89. 

SUCKERS is a thriller/comedy/horror novella I wrote with Jeff Strand. It also includes some Konrath and Strand short stories. 449 copies, $306.60.

Joe also talks about some of the lessons he's learned along the way. I'll post the stats from my experiment at the end of the month.

Jutting Breasts and Willing Hips

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I prowl by night James Reasoner has posted a terrific article by Brian Ritt about pulp author Orrie Hitt. Here's an excerpt: 

His women were too hot to handle, ex-virgins, frigid wives, sin dolls, wayward girls, torrid cheats, easy women, frustrated females, inflamed dames and, most often, trapped. Their names were Sheba, Sherry, Honey, Candy, Cherry, Betty French, and Lola Champ. They used what they had to use to make a buck–limited opportunities left them few other choices. They were duped and deceived, approached and abandoned.

Meet one of Hitt's women: "Jutting breasts, a flat stomach, willing hips, anxious thighs and legs that demanded all of the man in me, bringing to both of us an ancient pleasure which never grew old."
—Man-Hungry Female, Novel Books, 1962, pg. 127

Hitt wrote two novels a month (a pace James Reasoner could certainly appreciate, if not match), writing from 7 a.m until the late afternoon, stopping only twenty minutes for lunch. He wrote 145 books from 1953-1964. Most of his books were "sleazy" paperback originals, written under a variety of pseudonyms.  

His research allowed him to write convincingly enough so that author Susan Stryker, in her book Queer Pulp: Perverted Passions from the Golden Age of the Paperback, says, "Only one actual lesbian, Kay Addams, writing as Orrie Hitt, is known to have churned out semipornographic sleaze novels for a predominantly male audience." Stryker actually thinks "Orrie Hitt" is a pseudonym, and "Kay Addams" is a real lesbian author! I'm sure Orrie'd be laughing his ass off about that one.

I really enjoy reading about hard-working pulp authors like Harry Whittington and Orrie Hitt — both of whom were far better writers than they were given credit for because of the genres they toiled in and their astonishing productivity.

Brimstone

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Brimstone It's a lousy book, a dull compendium of Robert B. Parker cliches… including the endless discussions about "men who are men doing what they have to do" and still more bland iterations of the Spenser & Hawk/Jesse Stone & Jenn relationships, only this time played out in the old west (there's even a chapter that ends with a character saying "We'd be fools not to," something Parker manages to put in at least once in every book). What's really tiresome is all the filler talk about how wonderful and invincible gunslinger Virgil Cole is, especially whenVirgil himself keeps saying it.  The banter between Virgil and Everett is witless and dull, and feels more like typing than writing. I was a big fan of APPALOOSA and RESOLUTION, the earlier, and much better, books in this series, but this one is an aimless, lazy, clumsy mess…difficult to enjoy even for diehard Parker fans like myself who have stuck by him even as he continues to disappoint. 

Dishing on Disher

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Disher and Lee2 I'm sure glad I recuperated in time to meet author Garry Disher today.  I arranged to pick him up at his hotel and take him on a quick visit to Santa Monica before his 6 p.m. signing at the Mystery Bookstore. 

When I met him at the hotel, he handed me a copy of his new book BLOOD MOON and said "I dedicated this to you." I smiled and opened the book, assuming that he meant that he'd signed it for me. And he had, right there on the title page:  

Lee,

This one is for you, with thanks and admiration. 

Garry Disher

I thought that was a very nice thing to say.  And then I turned the page and was stunned to see this:

For Lee Goldberg

Holy Crap! He actually did dedicate the book to me. I hadn't done anything to deserve such an honor. I honestly didn't know what to say, so I mumbled a thank you and then rambled on about something stupid for the next five minutes as we drove towards the beach. And then I thanked him again, properly this time, by letting him know how surprised and honored I was. 

I'm still not sure why he did such a wonderful thing for me, but I am very, very flattered.  It's the second time a book has been dedicated to me –Max Allan Collins floored me a couple of years ago by dedicating a CSI novel to me. That's two more dedications than I deserved.

We had a very nice conversation over the next two hours. I learned about his writing life and methods, his family, and some of his signing mis-adventures. I also learned something about the Australian book business  – did you know authors get additional payments from book sales to libraries to take into account the books that aren't sold as a result of loaning? And there's good news for Disher fans: there's finally a new "Wyatt" novel coming in 2010. I enjoy his Inspector Hal Challis books very much, but I love Wyatt, sort of the Aussie equivalent of Donald Westlake's Parker. There's even a western version of Wyatt in one of Disher's short story collections (which gave me the inspiration to do a western version of Monk, which you will see in December). 

His signing at the Mystery Bookstore went well. He was followed by Laura Lippman, who came along with her husband David Simon, creator of THE WIRE. So I finally got to meet David, who I've admired for years. It turns out that he's a fan of SUCCESSFUL TELEVISION WRITING, the screenwriting book that Bill Rabkin & I wrote. I told David how much I love the "f-word" scene from season one and use it often when I teach and he shared some anecdotes about how the scene came about.

Garry will be speaking & signing with Laura at M is For Mystery in San Mateo on May 16.  

If you're in the Bay Area, you should go see them. He's also speaking at the First Congregational Church in Berkeley that same day.

After his Westwood signing, I took him to dinner at Jerry's Deli next door and did the fanboy thing of having him sign all the books of his that I've collected over the years.  

It was a great day and I hope I can make it down to Australia some time to see Garry on his home turf.

By the way, Garry will also be speaking & signing at the Velma Teague Library in Glendale AZ on May 19, the Poisoned Pen in Scotsdale on May 20, at Murder By The Book on Houston on May 21, and at the B&N in Reston VA on May 22. He'll also be signing with Cara Black at Mystery Lovers Bookshop on May 23 and at the Scituate Massachusetts Town Library on Tuesday, May 26. Those are just a few of the events on his national book tour…I can't seem to find the rest in one spot on the web, so check out your local independent, mystery bookstore to see if he will be coming to your area this month.

Book Fest, the sequel

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P4260123 It was another fine day at the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books. I chatted with lots of authors and readers….and did a signing with my brother Tod, William Rabkin, Patricia Smiley and Denise Hamilton. BURN NOTICE creator Matt Nix also stopped by and signed some books wih Tod. I showed my MWA spirit, and my rippling muscles, by wearing the new SoCal MWA t-shirts that were hot-sellers at our booth. 

I was in so much back pain yesterday that I neglected to do a proper run-down of events here when I got home (all I wanted to do was lie down). So I didn't mention that Tod and I ran into Joseph Wambaugh, who gave my brother a big hug and me a signed galley of his upcoming novel HOLLYWOOD MOON. I think Tod was envious. Friends get hugs, fans get cool galleys.  

Tod moderated a very funny panel on humor and race with Christian Lander, Lalo Alcaraz and Larry Wilmore and only made a half-dozen references to mastubation and didn't mention his bowels even once. 

Some other observations…

The green room served the same food that they have in years past, which made me wonder if we were actually eating left-overs to save money.  

Barnes & Noble, Borders, Book'em and some other bookstores were noticeably absent this year but there were a lot more booths for self-publishing companies, cults (Scientology had at least two booths) and products, including one for Volvo. 

This was the first year that I saw a couple having sex at the Festival. Granted, it was in the parking structure, but it still counts. It's nice to know that books still make some people hot.

After my panel signing, me, Craig Johnson, and Robert Dugoni went over to the tent selling our books and offered to sign the remaining stock. But they were already packing the stuff up. I suggested they might want to keep some signed stock around for people who couldn't make it to our panel. The clerk says "we aren't a bookstore, we're the School of Health Sciences. We don't sell books." Apparently, they were only making the books available for the panels and then immediately packing up the unsold stuff without even trying to sell it over the rest of the Festival. This seemed particularly dumb to me. Authors and readers lose out…and so did the School of Health Sciences, which missed out on lots of potential sales. See, in past years, B&N or Borders handled the panel signing sales…and kept the books available all weekend, which was great. It meant you didn't have to snag immediately after the panels… you could come back later…in fact, you could browse by several times during the course of the Festival and always find new stuff. I wonder why the UCLA Bookstore didn't handle the sales this time. In any case, I hope they find a bookseller…or at least someone who will behave like booksellers…next year. 

(You can see more of my Lee-centric book fest photos here. I took lots of shots of the MWA booth, and the MWA sponsored panels, for our friends on the MWA National Board.  I wanted to show them the big bang we got for our sponsorship bucks)

Party Hearty

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The Mystery Bookstore in Westwood and the Mystery Writers of America are hosting a big pre-Book Festival party at the store on Friday night, April 24, 5-9pm. Here's the skinny:

PRE-FESTIVAL OF BOOKS PARTY!

Join us for this annual celebration of crime fiction, featuring food, drink, and visits from dozens of our closest friends. Our guest list is always subject to last-minute changes, but these are some of the folks who have promised to join us:

Shilpa Agarwal, Brett Battles, James Scott Bell, Cara Black, Marc Blatte, Carol Higgins Clark, Mary Higgins Clark, Dianne Emley, Tom Epperson, Christa Faust, David Fuller, Michelle Gagnon, Victor Gischler, Lee Goldberg, Chris Grabenstein, Robert Greer, Denise Hamilton, Naomi Hirahara, Gregg Hurwitz, Sue Ann Jaffarian, Craig Johnson, Leslie Klinger, John Lescroart, Paul Levine, Sheila Lowe, Lisa Lutz, Robert Masello, George Mastras, T. Jefferson Parker, Gary Phillips, William Rabkin, Cornelia Read, Patricia Smiley, Susan Arnout Smith, Mark Haskell Smith, Eric Stone, Kelli Stanley, Louise Ure, Sarah Weinman, Stuart Woods, Robert Dugoni, Jeri Westerson, John Morgan Wilson and Edward Wright!

Nosebleed Heights of Adventure

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Hunt at the Well of Eternity
My friend James Reasoner, one of the most prolific authors on earth, just got a starred review from Publishers Weekly for his HUNT AT THE WELL OF ETERNITY, the first in a new series of pulp adventures from Hard Case Crime. Each book is written by a different author under the "Gabriel Hunt" pen name, but it's James who kicks off the series with a bang:

James Reasoner (the Civil War Battle series) is the first to take the shared Hunt pen name and launch an adventure series that raises the action bar to nosebleed heights. After a mysterious beauty delivers a bloodstained Confederate flag and a whiskey bottle full of water to the Hunt brothers at a fund-raising reception, millionaire adventurer Gabriel Hunt and beautiful, gun-toting museum director Dr. Cierra Almanzar follow clues and an ambiguous map from Manhattan to Guatemala, only certain they're on the right path when somebody's shooting at them. Hunt, armed only with his fists, bullwhips, a Colt .45 double-action Peacemaker and a vintage Civil War muzzle loader, is often outnumbered but never outwitted. Pulp adventure fans will be thrilled to see the genre so smashingly resurrected.

Congratulations James! It's great to see him getting the recognition he so richly deserves.

Money Won and Lost today for Novelists in Hollywood

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There was lots of news today about money being made…and lost…by crime novelists in Hollywood. 

Informant Media has optioned the late William Diehl's novel HOOLIGANS as well as the screenplay adaptation that he wrote. Diehl is perhaps best known for his novel SHARKEY'S MACHINE, a remake of which is in development at Warner Brothers as Mark Wahlberg project. Diehl's novels EUREKA and 27 are also in active feature development. It's a shame he wasn't this hot while he was still alive to enjoy it.

Clive Cussler probably wishes he'd never got a call from Hollywood.  He was just ordered by the L.A. Superior Court to pay Crusader Entertainment $14 million in legal fees after losing the lawsuit he filed against the studio over the film version of his novel SAHARA. The pricetag doesn't include the $13 million he's already paid his own lawyers. Naturally, Cussler is appealing. It must be nice to be able to afford to spend that much on lawyers.

Patricia Cornwell is someone who probably knows what it feels like to be that rich. She's just signed a deal with Munich-based Tandem Communications, which will produce movies for Lifetime based on her books AT RISK and THE FRONT.