By Beth Terrell
Christmas Day is winding to a close. The theme from A Charlie Brown Christmas is playing on our stereo; my husband and I are double-stuffed with turkey, ham, pumpkin pie, and a bounty of holiday fare; and my mom and I just finished watching Miracle on 34th Street, the original, with Edmund Gwenn as Kris Kringle and Natalie Wood as the skeptical little girl who learns to believe in Christmas magic. I love this season--the lights, the music, the shiny wrapping paper, choosing gifts for loved ones, the message of love and spirituality. And only 364 days until the next one!
For those of you who aren't quite ready for the merriment to end, here are some mysteries, thrillers, and suspense novels that take place around the Christmas Season.
1) Slay Ride is Chris Grabenstein's third published novel. This book is darker and more violent than Grabenstein's popular Ceepak series, but it should come as no surprise to anyone who reads Chris's work, he handles it well, weaving the plot lines together seamlessly. FBI agent Christopher Miller investigates a series of murders by a killer dubbed "The Man In the Moon," who kills cab drivers on the nights of the full moon. Meanwhile, successful young ad exec Scott Wilkinson makes the fateful mistake of calling a cab company to complainabout a driver who gave him a hellish ride to the airport. The driver, a dangerous criminal intent on vengeance, will stop at nothing to destroy Wilkinson. If you like your crime fiction dark (with a splash of holiday flair), check this one out.
2) A Puzzle in a Pear Tree by Parnell Hall features Cora Felton, the feisty protagonist of Parnell's "Puzzle Lady" series. Parnell says senior sleuth Cora is a lot like Miss Marple--if Mis Marple drank, smoked cigars, gambled, and had more ex-husbands than she could count. This light-hearted romp, the fourth book in the series, centers on a small-town Christmas pageant and a killer who leaves clues in the form of acrostic puzzles. The Chicago Sun-Times called this book "“a joy for lovers of both crosswords and frothy crime detection."
3) Christmas is Murder: A Rex Graves Mystery by C.S. Challinor is the first in a cozy mystery series featuring "charming sleuth" Rex Graves, a Scottish Barrister. The story is set in a hotel that was once an old English manor. Those who like Agatha Christie might enjoy this one; the tone and style are similar, and the story, a classic "closed group"mystery, should appeal to fans of the Golden Age mysteries.
4) Visions of Sugar Plums: A Stephanie Plum Holiday Novel by Janet Evanovitch is a "between-the-numbers" book featuring bounty hunter Stephanie Plum. I have been a huge Stephanie Plum fan for years and devour each new installment as they come out. The "between-the-numbers" books are very different in tone and substance than the regular books in the series and contain fantasy elements that do not seem in keeping with the rest of the books. They are slim books, and if you're looking for the usual Stephanie/Joe/Ranger byplay, you will be disappointed. If, however, you're looking for a quick, fun read with a holiday theme, give it a shot. I found this book pretty enjoyable after I decided to think of it as one of Stephanie's dreams or fantasies.
5) In Hercule Poirot's Christmas (Hercule Poirot Mysteries) by Agatha Christie, family patriarch Simeon Lee, is murdered during a family holiday gathering at Lee's country home. This is a classic "locked room" mystery that will delight any fan of "Dame Agatha."
6) Sugarplum Dead, the twelfth book in Carolyn Hart's Death on Demand series, features mystery bookseller Annie Darling and her husband, Max. The plot involves a long-long father, a troubled teenager, and a spiritualist who is more--and less--than he seems. This is a great holiday read for anyone who likes cozies and well-paced, wholesome mysteries.
7) A Classic Christmas Crime edited by Tim Heald is a collection of short stories from such greats as P.D. James and Peter Lovesey. If a good short story proves that good things really do come in small packages, this book, with its wide range of voices and moods, is a treaure trove of good things.
8) A Holly Jolly Murder, a Claire Malloy mystery by Joan Hess, takes place during a New Age celebration of the winter solstice. When a follow of the Arch-Druid Malthea is murdered, the Book Depot proprietor and amateur sleuth is determined to discover whether her new-found friends are killers or victims.
9) Cold Light by John Harvey is another dark mystery. This is the sixth book in the Charlie Resnick series. A cabbie is bludgeoned to death; a social worker goes missing; and messages from the kidnapper indicate that he has killed before--and will again. It will take all of Resnick's wit and resources to find the killer and stop him. But will he be in time?
10 ) The Stupidest Angel: A Heartwarming Tale of Christmas Terror by Christopher Moore...A disreputable fake Santa is murdered. A seven-year-old witness prays for a Christmas miracle. The prayer is heard and answered by a intellectually challenged heavenly being. Result: zombies for Christmas. Okay, so it's not a pure mystery, but honestly, who could resist this?
11) In Six Geese A-Slaying by Donna Andrews, a grumpy parade Santa is murdered. Heroine Meg Langslow and Chief Burke must solve the mystery and save Christmas. This is Donna's tenth novel in the "fine-feathered cozy series."
12) Publisher's Weekly calls Nobody's Child by Janet Dawson a "finely crafted, absorbing adventure." Thus is the fifth book in a series featuring Oakland, California PI Jeri Howard. In this installment, a young woman's body has been found in a burned-out home, and an alcoholic woman hires Jeri to find out if the dead woman is her daughter, who ran away three years ago. It is. Jeri learns that the dead woman had a daughter, who seems to be missing. With Christmas approaching, Jeri searches for the lost girl and tries to solve the murder of the girl's mother. The book explores a nmber of modern-day issues such as homelessness, racial tensions, and HIV infection.
As you can see, Christmas is a popular season for Crime Writers. For more books set during the holiday season, check out http://www.mysterynet.com/Christmas/books/, http://www.sldirectory.com/libsf/booksf/mystery/topic.html#holiday, and http://www.wppl.org/webresources/recommended_reading/Mysteries/Holiday.htm.
Happy Reading!
Showing posts with label Stephanie Plum. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Stephanie Plum. Show all posts
Thursday, December 25, 2008
Thursday, October 9, 2008
Follow the Love
By Beth Terrell
Once, in a book about acting, I read that, when performing a scene, you have to find the love.
Let's say Bob and Melanie are fighting. If they're fighting just because they hate each other, it isn't especially interesting. There's not much depth or complexity in that. But if they're fighting because he loves her but he's afraid she's in love with another man, and she does love the other man but she also loves Bob, there are all kinds of levels to work with. If John murders Sarah because he hates her, it's flat. And by extension, he seems flat. But if John murders Sarah because he loves Stephanie, and Sarah caused the accident that left Stephanie in a vegetative state...See? Layers. John becomes more complex, more interesting, more believable.
Follow the love.
This advice is useful for writers as well. Thomas Harris's earlier works, Red Dragon and Silence of the Lambs make good use of this premise. In Red Dragon, Francis Dolarhyde is a monster, but he is driven by a yearning for love. Silence of the Lambs is made more chilling (and gripping) by the sense that Hannibal Lecter, in his horrible way, loves Clarice Starling. When he tells her, "The world is a more interesting place with you in it," it sends a shiver through the reader. What could be more terrifying than Lecter's love?
Would Janet Evanovitch's Stephanie Plum series be as popular without the Stephanie/Morelli/Ranger love triangle? I doubt it. I suspect Stephanie's zany antics as a singularly unconventional bounty hunter would wear thin if not for her loving relationships with Morelli, Ranger, her parents, Grandma Mazur, Lula, and even Rex the Hamster. Readers want to know which man Stephanie will choose, what outlandish outfit Lula will wear, what manner of mischief Grandma Mazur will get herself into. We care because Stephanie cares.
Jonathan Kellerman writes a mystery/suspense series about psychologist and police consultant Alex Delaware. Throughout the series, Alex has a deep friendship with a gay detective named Milo and an on-again, off-again relationship with a woman named Robin. These relationships are what bring me back to this series again and again. When Milo, pale and out of shape, puffs up a hill behind Alex in pursuit of a villain, I worry for him. I think, Oh no! Is Milo going to have a heart attack? Whym, oh why did he eat that double cheeseburger?! I know what it would mean to Alex to lose his good friend, and because I know this, every time I read one of Kellerman's books, the stakes are high. It's not the plots that keep me turning the pages book after book (though the plots are intriguing). It's the love.
Writers and critics often complain about Nicholas Sparks. He isn't even a good writer, some say. His writing is simplistic, his plots are dull, and his characters lack depth. Yet, his books strike a chord with readers, who flock to the bookstores to buy his latest works. Hollywood makes poignant movies based on his novels. People openly weep at his endings. They know they are being blatantly manipulated by the author, but they cry anyway. And they can hardly wait for the next book. Why? Could it be because Sparks has a gift for finding and following the love?
It is only when we love that we have anything to lose, and only when a character has something to lose that readers begin to care.
Nicholas Sparks knows that. Readers know it too.
Once, in a book about acting, I read that, when performing a scene, you have to find the love.
Let's say Bob and Melanie are fighting. If they're fighting just because they hate each other, it isn't especially interesting. There's not much depth or complexity in that. But if they're fighting because he loves her but he's afraid she's in love with another man, and she does love the other man but she also loves Bob, there are all kinds of levels to work with. If John murders Sarah because he hates her, it's flat. And by extension, he seems flat. But if John murders Sarah because he loves Stephanie, and Sarah caused the accident that left Stephanie in a vegetative state...See? Layers. John becomes more complex, more interesting, more believable.
Follow the love.
This advice is useful for writers as well. Thomas Harris's earlier works, Red Dragon and Silence of the Lambs make good use of this premise. In Red Dragon, Francis Dolarhyde is a monster, but he is driven by a yearning for love. Silence of the Lambs is made more chilling (and gripping) by the sense that Hannibal Lecter, in his horrible way, loves Clarice Starling. When he tells her, "The world is a more interesting place with you in it," it sends a shiver through the reader. What could be more terrifying than Lecter's love?
Would Janet Evanovitch's Stephanie Plum series be as popular without the Stephanie/Morelli/Ranger love triangle? I doubt it. I suspect Stephanie's zany antics as a singularly unconventional bounty hunter would wear thin if not for her loving relationships with Morelli, Ranger, her parents, Grandma Mazur, Lula, and even Rex the Hamster. Readers want to know which man Stephanie will choose, what outlandish outfit Lula will wear, what manner of mischief Grandma Mazur will get herself into. We care because Stephanie cares.
Jonathan Kellerman writes a mystery/suspense series about psychologist and police consultant Alex Delaware. Throughout the series, Alex has a deep friendship with a gay detective named Milo and an on-again, off-again relationship with a woman named Robin. These relationships are what bring me back to this series again and again. When Milo, pale and out of shape, puffs up a hill behind Alex in pursuit of a villain, I worry for him. I think, Oh no! Is Milo going to have a heart attack? Whym, oh why did he eat that double cheeseburger?! I know what it would mean to Alex to lose his good friend, and because I know this, every time I read one of Kellerman's books, the stakes are high. It's not the plots that keep me turning the pages book after book (though the plots are intriguing). It's the love.
Writers and critics often complain about Nicholas Sparks. He isn't even a good writer, some say. His writing is simplistic, his plots are dull, and his characters lack depth. Yet, his books strike a chord with readers, who flock to the bookstores to buy his latest works. Hollywood makes poignant movies based on his novels. People openly weep at his endings. They know they are being blatantly manipulated by the author, but they cry anyway. And they can hardly wait for the next book. Why? Could it be because Sparks has a gift for finding and following the love?
It is only when we love that we have anything to lose, and only when a character has something to lose that readers begin to care.
Nicholas Sparks knows that. Readers know it too.
Wednesday, August 6, 2008
Pencil, We Hardly Knew Ye
By Beth Terrell
This is a story about a snake.
It began in driest part of August, when the office I work in was empty except for the five full-time employees and a few die-hard temporary employees. Scotty, one of my co-workers, came into my office and said, “Could you come out here and see if this snake is real? Because I’ve passed it three times and it looks more real every time I pass it.” I did go, and it was real, but the confusion was understandable, because the snake was lying perfectly still, its head slightly lifted. It looked kinked (though there was some discussion later as to whether it was actually kinked, crinkly, or crinkled). As it turns out, this is what happens to snakes when they are stressed and dehydrated. They crinkle. Who knew?
At any rate, Scott and I looked at the snake, and though neither of us thought it was of the poisonous type, neither of us was quite certain enough to be willing to pick it up and see. (It was too small--and I am too nearsighted--for us to be certain of the shape of the head.) So we brought in an expert, or the closest thing we had to an expert: Scott went in and got our site manager, Steve. Much discussion ensued. No conclusions were reached. We finally decided to sweep the little snake into a box, after which I would take him down to the Aquatic Critter’s Reptile Zoo and find out what he was. Scotty was in charge of acquiring the box, I was in charge of holding it open, and Steve was in charge of gently, oh so gently sweeping the snake into the box.
Then I loaded the box into my car and drove to the Aquatic Critter, quite possibly the coolest store in Nashville, with tropical fish in one half of the building and a reptile zoo in the other (caiman feedings on weekends; I am too squeamish to go). The experts behind the desk said our visitor was a rat snake, a harmless, reasonably docile snake. They took him out of the box and we passed him around, and I'm happy to say that the docile part was true, because he didn't try to bite, even when I held him in my hand. The experts also said he was too small and dehydrated to survive the winter, so what could we do but buy a little tank and some snake accouterments and bring him back to live in my office until the next spring? Besides, our project monitor, Mary Beth, was out of town, and we knew she would want to see him, because she is wild about reptiles.
The snake, having come to live with us for a time, now required a name. We tried on several for size. At various times, he was called, Chris Crinkle, Kinky Friedman, Earl Whirly, and a number of other equally fitting names, but the one that stuck was the one Mary Beth gave him: Pencil. This was fitting, because, even though he lived in my office, she loved him best. She would come into the office and point out the cute shapes he would make, or the way he would squeeze himself into the tiniest crevice of his cage, or the way he was growing so strong and healthy that one day we realized he wasn’t kinked at all. And so the bittersweet day came when Pencil was to be set free. Mary Beth and I took him to a walking trail far from the site (which will come as a relief to many of my co-workers). We walked some distance down the trail and climbed down a little embankment to the creek. She was carrying him and wearing a purple glove, because he didn’t enjoy the ride over and was making what she called "bitey faces." She set him down on the ground beside the water. To our surprise, he didn’t race away. Instead, he glided into and out of the water, away from us and then back toward us, as if he knew he was being set free. Then he swam across the creek and disappeared into the brush on the other side. We miss him already.
I wrote about this in our office newsletter a few months ago, but I thought of it again today as I was thinking about the book I've been working on. There is no real mystery in this little story, except the everyday mystery of why we (both human and animal) do the things we do. Why did Pencil come into our office building? Why did we adopt him instead of chucking him out the back door (or worse)? Why was Mary Beth so enthralled?
But these are the kinds of mysteries that keep us reading. While good plotting is essential, it's the human mysteries that keep me coming back for more. For me, at least, the question is not, "Will Jack Reacher defeat the bad guys?", but "What is it in himself that Jack Reacher is really running from?" Not, "Will Stephanie Plum survive?"--I assume she will--but "Does Stephanie's heart lie with Morelli or Ranger?" I want the action and the plot twists and the puzzle too, but it is the quiet moments, like the rescue and release of a little office snake, that show me who the characters really are.
This is a story about a snake.
It began in driest part of August, when the office I work in was empty except for the five full-time employees and a few die-hard temporary employees. Scotty, one of my co-workers, came into my office and said, “Could you come out here and see if this snake is real? Because I’ve passed it three times and it looks more real every time I pass it.” I did go, and it was real, but the confusion was understandable, because the snake was lying perfectly still, its head slightly lifted. It looked kinked (though there was some discussion later as to whether it was actually kinked, crinkly, or crinkled). As it turns out, this is what happens to snakes when they are stressed and dehydrated. They crinkle. Who knew?
At any rate, Scott and I looked at the snake, and though neither of us thought it was of the poisonous type, neither of us was quite certain enough to be willing to pick it up and see. (It was too small--and I am too nearsighted--for us to be certain of the shape of the head.) So we brought in an expert, or the closest thing we had to an expert: Scott went in and got our site manager, Steve. Much discussion ensued. No conclusions were reached. We finally decided to sweep the little snake into a box, after which I would take him down to the Aquatic Critter’s Reptile Zoo and find out what he was. Scotty was in charge of acquiring the box, I was in charge of holding it open, and Steve was in charge of gently, oh so gently sweeping the snake into the box.
Then I loaded the box into my car and drove to the Aquatic Critter, quite possibly the coolest store in Nashville, with tropical fish in one half of the building and a reptile zoo in the other (caiman feedings on weekends; I am too squeamish to go). The experts behind the desk said our visitor was a rat snake, a harmless, reasonably docile snake. They took him out of the box and we passed him around, and I'm happy to say that the docile part was true, because he didn't try to bite, even when I held him in my hand. The experts also said he was too small and dehydrated to survive the winter, so what could we do but buy a little tank and some snake accouterments and bring him back to live in my office until the next spring? Besides, our project monitor, Mary Beth, was out of town, and we knew she would want to see him, because she is wild about reptiles.
The snake, having come to live with us for a time, now required a name. We tried on several for size. At various times, he was called, Chris Crinkle, Kinky Friedman, Earl Whirly, and a number of other equally fitting names, but the one that stuck was the one Mary Beth gave him: Pencil. This was fitting, because, even though he lived in my office, she loved him best. She would come into the office and point out the cute shapes he would make, or the way he would squeeze himself into the tiniest crevice of his cage, or the way he was growing so strong and healthy that one day we realized he wasn’t kinked at all. And so the bittersweet day came when Pencil was to be set free. Mary Beth and I took him to a walking trail far from the site (which will come as a relief to many of my co-workers). We walked some distance down the trail and climbed down a little embankment to the creek. She was carrying him and wearing a purple glove, because he didn’t enjoy the ride over and was making what she called "bitey faces." She set him down on the ground beside the water. To our surprise, he didn’t race away. Instead, he glided into and out of the water, away from us and then back toward us, as if he knew he was being set free. Then he swam across the creek and disappeared into the brush on the other side. We miss him already.
I wrote about this in our office newsletter a few months ago, but I thought of it again today as I was thinking about the book I've been working on. There is no real mystery in this little story, except the everyday mystery of why we (both human and animal) do the things we do. Why did Pencil come into our office building? Why did we adopt him instead of chucking him out the back door (or worse)? Why was Mary Beth so enthralled?
But these are the kinds of mysteries that keep us reading. While good plotting is essential, it's the human mysteries that keep me coming back for more. For me, at least, the question is not, "Will Jack Reacher defeat the bad guys?", but "What is it in himself that Jack Reacher is really running from?" Not, "Will Stephanie Plum survive?"--I assume she will--but "Does Stephanie's heart lie with Morelli or Ranger?" I want the action and the plot twists and the puzzle too, but it is the quiet moments, like the rescue and release of a little office snake, that show me who the characters really are.
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