Catching Up and Around the Web

Well between me doing a ridiculously unusual amount of traveling, and Blogger being sick last week, things got a little off course.

I apologize if you've contact me recently and I haven't returned your email or message. I'm still catching up. Hope to get there soon!

I have been starting some crime fiction-related groups over at Copia to have a nice place to post questions and discussion topics. My plan next month is to start a book discussion on THE TWO DEATHS OF DANIEL HAYES. If you read my review, you know I just felt like I wanted to talk to people about the book. And I still do. But I don't want to give spoilers or wreck twists for anyone who hasn't read it. So, I thought I'd use the forum at Copia to create a place where we could chat about the book. I'll put up some questions, thoughts, etc., and you can comment in those areas or add your own questions and thoughts. If it works out, maybe I'll try it the following month with YOU'RE NEXT. I'm reading that right now and just having an amazing reading experience. What are you thoughts? Anyone interested in participating with me?

I'm actually still figuring out all the ins and outs of Copia; I hope you'll come log in and find me: Mysterious_Dame. I think it'll be fun to share a book club of sorts across the miles.

In other news, I've shared with you that I'm working with Maddee James of xuni.com. Absolutely loving that. The dangerous part, though, has been finding even more authors I want to check out and read. If you're on Facebook, come like the xuni.com page and I'll corrupt YOU with new authors, too. And if you read YA at all, or have some YAs in your house, xuni is a great place to find books and authors!

And speaking of Facebook, I received an email from someone trying to find me on Facebook. I don't have a link for that up here, do I? Shame on me. I think I usually manage to mangle Facebook links, but let me see if I can get my own right here. Try this.

Next week I'm headed to BEA and will be on a panel at the Book Bloggers Convention right after BEA. Looking forward to that. Definitely say hi if you see me. I'll likely be the person looking completely overwhelmed and lost!

And now for a few fun tidbits to share. In addition to my traveling, I've had the opportunity to see a slew of great author people lately. At the very beginning of May, Brian Freeman was here in the Cleveland area. It was a lot of fun to meet he and his wife. They both have a great sense of humor and it was fascinating to learn about his road to writing crime fiction.

Last Monday and Tuesday, Chris Grabenstein came to Lorain County for the annual Young Author's Conference and he was a huge hit with all the county's aspiring young writers. I had the honor of being his chauffeur for those days. Here are some fun pictures of Chris:

And finally yesterday I went to the Marion Public Library to see Craig McDonald. There was just a small group of us there, but the discussion was fun, I was able to see his wife Debbie again, and this time I also had the chance to meet Craig's daughters.

Just a reminder about Bouchercon. If you are planning to attend but haven't registered yet, you'll want to make sure you do so soon. The host hotel is already booked for the convention-rate rooms, but there are plenty of surrounding hotels in close proximity.

I don't think I had a chance to mention here that my friend and fellow blogger Pop Culture Nerd is hosting the first Stalker Awards. Be sure you stop over there and nominate your favorites for those awards. They're great categories!

Just today Naomi from The Drowning Machine announced the ten qualifiers for the Watery Grave Invitational Short Story Contest. I can't believe it's that time again already. Check out The Drowning Machine for all the fun on that contest.

I'll wrap up today's post with a video from Joseph Finder about being "buried alive." Have a great week and happy reading!

VANISHED giveaway

In June Joseph Finder is releasing BURIED SECRETS, the sequel to VANISHED, which introduced private spy Nick Heller. This is the first time Joe's had a series character and he discussed that a bit at Love is Murder earlier this month.

I'm excited to announce that the folks over at Team Finder have a copy of VANISHED that they're allowing me to give away. So if you didn't have a chance to read VANISHED yet, you can win a copy here and read it in time to catch BURIED SECRETS when it comes out this summer. I know most of you can't start a series mid-way, and you can find out how Joseph Finder climbed the corporate ladder to CEO of Suspense.

All you need to do to enter is complete the form below - one entry per person. You need to have a U.S. postal address on this one and no P.O. boxes, please. I'm headed out of town on Thursday and will return on Saturday night, so I'll draw the winner from all the entries then. Good luck!

Love is Murder

I was mentioning this morning about having a case of the grumpies. This is about the time of year when I've taken all I can take of the winter. I have a very passionate disdain for winter to begin with, but after three to four months of snow, cold and darkness I really hate the season. So that's why Love is Murder was such a welcome reprieve. For one weekend I didn't have to worry about shoveling snow or how ugly my gas bill is. Instead I hung out with great writers and wonderful friends at Chicago's Intercontinental Hotel.

I had to know the weekend was going to be great when the first one to greet me was Dally:

Is she not the cutest little bundle of fur you've ever seen? We became fast friends, especially after she was so generous with her kisses. And she loves to snuggle.


I attended a bunch of panels and for me, they just never get old or stale. I don't think I've ever walked out of any panel having not learned at least one new thing about the authors involved.

The very first panel I attended was related to "Writing Fight Scenes." My good friend Tom Schreck was on this panel along with Jamie Freveletti as the moderator. Then I saw for the first time: Jon Land, David Case and Michael Black. Case and Black both have first hand experience in law enforcement and of course Tom is a boxer. Jamie is involved in the martial arts, both in her own practice and as an instructor. The panel discussed their pet peeves about literary fight scenes, their favorite examples and their least favorite examples.


The other session I attended on Friday was Dana Kaye's session on "Spreading Your Marketing Virus" where she shared some excellent tips on how authors can effectively market their books. She included great ideas for both social media and grass roots approaches, emphasizing the idea that you must make yourself known. She also offered up suggestions on how you can be creative and think outside the box with your marketing approaches.


Saturday I made use of the whole day attending sessions all day long. The first panel was called "Agents of Thrills: Not Cops, Not PIs, But Still on the Job for Someone Else." This one included Joe Finder, Andrew Grant, Jon Land, Laura Caldwell and the moderator Austin Camacho. It was lively and fun as the panelists shared information but also joked good-naturedly with each other as well.


The "Movie Mania" panel may have been my favorite panel. The content was enlightening and the panelists were definitely energetic. They included James Strauss, Jon Land, Marcus Sakey, Joe Finder, Hal Ackerman and Raymond Benson as the moderator. James Strauss and Jon Land spoke rather passionately about their negative experiences while Hal Ackerman and Joe Finder were much more positive. Marcus claimed he bribed his way onto the panel and he likes simply associating his name with Tobey Maguire's.


The last panel before lunch dealt with telling a good story versus having a "high concept" plot. Dana Kaye moderated this panel with Marcus Sakey, Andrew Grant, Patrick Hunt and Hal Ackerman. This was my first opportunity to hear Patrick Hunt. He has written a trilogy that deals with a portal that is allowing alien technology to enter Earth. I'm not usually intrigued by content that leans toward sci-fi, but I found this book concept very intriguing.


After lunch I found the "Thrills and Horror: How to Get to the Oh! No!" This panel was moderated by Scarlet Dean and the panelists included Jamie Freveletti, Shane Gericke, Marcus Sakey and F. Paul Wilson. This was another fun panel because the panelists worked well together, shared fun stories and all had great senses of humor. Definitely interesting stories about writing. For example, each writer gets about 200 pages into a book and then starts to feel like they've written crap and want to throw it all out. All the writers, with the exception of Paul Wilson, agreed the second book was the hardest to write. And everyone on this panel, except Jamie, outlines.


I have to admit that I attended the PI vs. Police Procedural to see exactly why they assigned Tom Schreck to it. Tom writes an amateur sleuth. He was joined by David J. Walker, Michael Black and a self-published author named Lee Williams. This panel was moderated by David Case and I was taking notes because Case really did a nice job as moderator, but otherwise I was pretty baffled on the construct of this one.


The final panel I attended was Sunday morning and I'm going to save that panel for it's own post on Friday. I have pictures and video, so we'll give it its own highlight.

Some names that aren't mentioned above in the panel events but who made the weekend great are of course the Jordans. And this weekend I had the chance to hang out with Jen Jordan really for the first time. I wish she were my sister, but at least I get to claim her as my Crimespree family sister. Super wonderful woman. Also Jill Thompson and Brian Azzarello who are fascinating and funny. Ben LeRoy and Alison Janssen from Tyrus Books, more wonderful people I want to add to my immediate family. I didn't get to see Bryan Gruley on a panel, but I always enjoy any chance to see him. What a fun guy. And my bestest roomie who puts up with my constant fangirl, my coughing in my sleep, and waking up at the crack of dawn to go to the gym...Judy Bobalik.

Of course, a conference simply can't be great unless you make new friends. I met Keir Graff and Darwyn Jones. Now I can count myself a richer person!

An all around fun weekend that definitely helped the winter uglies. Thanks for tolerating my ridiculously long post today. Hope the pictures made up for my blathering.

Happy Reading!

CAUGHT - Joseph Finder

Look out! Joseph Finder thought he had the place all to himself, but Ali Karim caught the CEO of suspense reading Stav Sherez's THE DEVIL'S PLAYGROUND. Joe's own thriller VANISHED was released last year (the paperback will release this summer), kicking off a new series featuring "private spy" Nick Heller.

Technorati Tags: Stav Sherez, Joseph Finder, Crime Writers Caught Reading Crime

Drum Roll Please!

O.k., you have to wait just a tad bit longer - oh the suspense! I wanted to pass along a few tidbits of information first. And this is all good stuff having to do with winning free books!

We need to congratulate Karen from Minnesota who won the copy of SOUTH OF BROAD by Pat Conroy. Congrats Karen. I will be forwarding your information along and the book will be sent from the publisher.

Next, if you're a Facebook user, Joe Finder is having a contest to win a signed copy of the UK paperback of his book VANISHED. Anyone with a U.S. address who is a fan on his fan page by April 15th will be entered in that drawing. Here's the link if you haven't already joined his page.

And finally, in next week's "Detectives Around the World" theme week, there will be numerous opportunities for you to win free books both here and on several of the other participating sites. One of the major ways you can win is through the scavenger hunt. You can pick up the questions for that starting tomorrow. So be sure to check back.

And now, the moment you've all been waiting for. The two detectives who will be going head to head in our Championship round are:

Harry Bosch (78%) vs. Sherlock Holmes (22%)

Phillip Marlowe (56%) vs. Hercule Poirot (44%)

Congrats to Bosch and Marlowe who will face-off starting Monday in the Championship of the "World's Favorite Detective" tournament. Start spreading the word. See you then!

Technorati Tags: Detectives Around the World, book giveaway

You Have the Right to Six Words - The Countdown Begins

It is that time of the week again. I've been going non-stop since last Friday and I'm bound to run out of energy here pretty soon, but the memoirs always give me a little pep. But, this week we're going to start the countdown. December 9th with be the final memoir date for this season. I've decided that I will continue to collect memoirs and have a Season Two start somewhere close to summer in 2010. In the interim, I have a couple projects I'd like to try out, gads of reviews to share, and many interviews that are in the works. Hopefully you'll keep visiting to share all this fun with me.

However, we still have four weeks of memoirs to present, and to think when this started I worried if I would even have enough to make four weeks of posts! This week we have a little bonus, so let's get started.

My first memoirist this week is a crime fiction writer in the making! Jonathan Quist is a life-long native of the Chicago-area. He spent much of his childhood running home at lunch time to watch WGN TV's storied version of the Bozo franchise, neither understanding nor caring that he was audience to one of the last incarnations of Vaudeville theater.

He made that connection years later, while researching his first novel, "Break a Neck", which is set in the world of American Vaudeville in 1919 Chicago. Frustrated by attempts to categorize a comical mystery featuring a Vaudevillian amateur sleuth into ever-changing genre definitions,he settled on "Humorous Historical Traditional Mystery".

On the verge of empty nesthood, Jonathan remains in the Chicago area with his wife of 21 years, Karin, also a Chicago native. After his day job in IT and work on the mystery, his remaining time is juggled between a second, non-mystery novel, old-time radio reenactments, and all the usual suburban suspects in the death of spare time.

I have to tell you that I absolutely love Jonathan's memoir because I think it connects to the crime fiction community so well. He explains that "very few of the things we accomplish in life are truly solo accomplishments. Whether literally baking pies, writing, or expending effort in any other worthwhile endeavor, I don't mind sharing the credit...but I'm not giving it all away," so...

Making pie; I expect my piece.

L.J. Sellers was born in California but was raised in Oregon. She still resides in Oregon today, after a short stint in Arizona following college graduation. While she earned her degree in journalism from the University of Oregon, she initially didn't have aspirations of writing fiction. She worked in her chosen field until encountering a less than stellar novel one day. L.J. felt she could write better than that and set off to do so. While her first couple attempts at the novel didn't make the publication presses, her writing did cause Al Zuckerman to take notice. Zuckerman's interest was the impetus L.J. needed to persevere. During her time persevering, she took a job as an editor for PHARMACEUTICAL EXECUTIVE magazine where she learned about the other end of the writing table, the editor's role. When the magazine closed and L.J. was job searching, she was also working on the beginning of her series that WOULD see the publication presses. This was the time that L.J. wrote the first Detective Jackson series book, THE SEX CLUB.

While L.J. still juggles several jobs, including freelance work and working part-time at her local newspaper, she puts her fiction writing first every day. That work ethic has thus produced SECRETS TO DIE FOR that came out this past September and two more novels in the pipeline.

So, with all this dogged perseverance, I think her memoir is especially fitting:

Against the odds, never gave up.

Next up is a writing team. Alice and Roy keep their work all in the family. This husband and wife writing team is better known as Allyson Roy. Roy graduated from the University of the Arts in Philadelphia where he studied acting. Roy also spent time doing stand-up routines and in comedy and nightclubs. He says his inspiration stems from his contact with a wide range of people set against offbeat locations within Manhattan, Brooklyn and Philadelphia.

Alice earned her philosophy and dance degrees from the State University of New York. She says that this degree combination is reflective of her attraction to the romantic suspense genre, "The genre blends elements of each, combining problem-solving questions and logic puzzles with a desire for physical action, sensuality and the creative possibilities that can happen when individuals meet."

Together Alice and Roy have written two acclaimed novels featuring sex therapist Saylor Oz. The first book in this series is titled APHRODISIAC and it was followed up this year by BABYDOLL.

So what do they each have to say for their memoirs? Alice asks,

Why walk when you can dance?

And Roy says,

I could have been a contender.

And rounding out this week we have the "CEO of Suspense," best selling thriller writer Joseph Finder. The recipient of the Barry and Gumshoe awards for Best Thriller and the Thriller Writers of America award for Best Novel, Joe's career actually stems from a non-fiction work he published in 1983 at the age of 24, RED CARPET: THE CONNECTION BETWEEN THE KREMLIN AND AMERICA'S MOST POWERFUL BUSINESSMEN. His book revealed that the CEO of Occidental Petroleum had worked for Soviet Intelligence in the 20s and 30s. This controversial book resulted in threats of a libel suit. When Joe couldn't legally tell the "whole story" in this non-fiction work, he opted to turn to fiction and his first thriller was born, THE MOSCOW CLUB.

Joe continued to write thrillers, including HIGH CRIMES that would be made into a major motion picture, but his 2004 publication of PARANOIA parked Joe squarely on the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and Publisher's Weekly best seller lists. This past April a movie deal for PARANOIA was also announced.

In addition, Joe published VANISHED this year, which is the kick-off to a four-part series featuring corporate security specialist Nick Heller. In addition to his fiction thrillers, Joe has also written on espionage and international affairs for publications such as Forbes, The New York Times and The New Republic.

Joe Finder could have gone in many different career directions. While in college at Yale he sang with the legendary Whiffenpoofs; he was recruited to the C.I.A.; and he spent time teaching on the Harvard faculty. But instead he chose fiction writing and he

Asked dangerous questions, got amazing answers.

The genre hasn't been the same since.

Once again, I am extremely honored to have this group of authors join us and share their six-word memoirs. Thanks to Jonathan, L.J., Roy and Alice, and Joe. I'm so glad you wanted to play along!

And thanks to everyone who's continued to stop by week after week. We'll do this again next week. I will be on hiatus until Friday when I post again for the Buy Books for the Holidays blog. This week I'll be talking about books I've read this year that I would recommend as holiday gifts. Hope you'll stop by to check that out and offer some suggestions of your own.

Until then...Happy Reading!

Power Play - Joseph Finder

At the last minute Jake Landry is asked, or rather required, to attend an "off-site" with the top executives of Hammond Aerospace Corporation. This comes as a bit of a surprise to Jake because he's far from a top executive. But he finds himself en route to this resort in Canada where there are no phones or computer lines, not even cell phone reception. And while he's in the lush, lavish company jet, he's summoned to the CEO's private quarters. Here he encounters an old girlfriend, Allie, who is also the personal assistant to Cheryl, the CEO. Allie has recommended Jake to Cheryl as someone who can spy on the other execs and find out about a rumor that the Defense Department has been offered a bribe by Hammond to secure a contract. But the spying becomes far less important when they reach the resort and are kidnapped by a group of mercenaries who are demanding 500 million dollars in ransom.

I listened to this book on audio, and the narrator is excellent. I'm familiar with him from several shows on television.

The plot, however, left a lot to be desired for me. I have read a couple of Joseph Finder's books in the past and never found them to be as predictable as this one was. While I liked Jake as a character, I found him to be a little too unbelievable. When the occasion occurred that he was the only person who knew how to splice a satellite line because he happened to work for a cable company for a couple weeks one summer, I just kind of rolled my eyes and thought, "of course he did!"

Cheryl was supposed to be this highly intelligent superstar executive, and she believed that the mercenaries were "lost hunters" until Jake pointed out all the reasons they couldn't possibly just be lost hunters. I'm no Einstein and I figured that one out - Cheryl couldn't?

This book was also heavily gruesome. I understand that Finder was trying to drive home the psychotic nature of the kidnappers, but the gruesomeness didn't have a positive effect on my reading experience.

Overall the book was o.k. to listen to on audio. I recently gave up on Gorky Park, so it at least kept me interested enough to listen to the end. But it was a white hat - black hat kind of plot, and those are fine stories, but I don't feel that they challenge me as a reader. Finder has definitely produced better than this one.