Trials and Jury Duty

The only people I know who ever want to be on juries are mystery writers. I’m actually excited about being notified to be a jury candidate later in August. In fact, I spent parts of four days several weeks ago sitting in on some of the testimony for four felony trials. The trial I followed the closest was a woman accused of theft and forgery. She worked for a safe house program and was accused of stealing money from undocumented Hispanic women who had been abused, spoke little English and were seeking legal assistance. The total amount of money taken was approximately seven thousand dollars, which may not seem like a lot, but was significant to people who primarily worked as house cleaners for between seven and ten dollars an hour. The defendant was in a position of trust, spoke Spanish and took advantage of people who had little education, didn’t understand the American legal system and feared calling attention to themselves in their undocumented state. The defendant was not supposed to take any money from clients of the safe house. The victims testified they had given cash and money orders to the defendant but received no legal services. The most damning evidence came from the testifying detective showing bank records of money orders deposited in the defendants account. The defendant was found guilty by the jury. One of the procedural matters I learned about concerned the selection of jurors. Twenty-five jurors were called. The defense and prosecution could then interview and dismiss six each, leaving thirteen. All thirteen went through the trial and before the jury was sent to the juror room to deliberate, the judge dismissed the thirteenth (the alternate). In a sexual abuse case I heard testimony about, the victim, working with the detective, made a pretext telephone call to the suspect. This was a call that was recorded and the victim confronted the suspect with her statement of being sexually abused. This along with abusive text messages sent from the defendant to the victim and testimony by the victim were instrumental in convicting that defendant. An interesting week for me learning more about the judicial system. All helpful background material for a mystery writer.

Mike Befeler

WHERE WILL NEW WRITERS COME FROM?

by Earl Staggs

We who write today carry a responsibility during our time to maintain a level of writing quality as it was passed on to us by those who came before.  When our time is done, we will pass that task along to the next generation of writers.

A recent incident gave me serious concern about the writers who will follow us.

I drive a school bus as a part time job.  Writing is a solitary profession and this job gets me out of the house every day for a couple hours and provides interaction with other members of the human race.  One day, several students reported to me that other students in the back of the bus were using profane language. Sure enough, I checked the tape and found it. Our buses have cameras on board with audio recording capability.  Two boys back in the last row used language unsuitable in mixed company anywhere, let alone in a group of children.

 I wrote an Incident Report, copies of which go to the school principal and to the parents of the students involved.  I don’t know what the parents did to their kids, but the principal suspended them for a few days.

The principal also required the boys to write a personal letter of apology to me.  Here’s an excerpt from one of those letters exactly as it was written:

“Dear mr. earl I now what I did was wrong I have taken ownership for what I did I will start being a leader and a better kid being that this is my first offince. . .”

Both letters were in printed letters, not cursive, and the penmanship was so bad, they were difficult to read. They obviously knew little about capitalization, punctuation or spelling.

You might think these letters were from second or third graders.  No, these boys were in eighth grade and would move up to high school in a few short months.

Their lack of writing skill concerned me as much if not more than the offensive language they used. It bothered me that young people were not being schooled in the craft of communication via the written word. 

Instead, they become expert in texting and posting on social venues such as Facebook.  Their language is much simpler than ours.  Instead of asking, “How are you?” they type “? R U.”  Instead of asking, “How are you doing,” it’s “Sup dude.”

Maybe there will be no need for writing skills in future generations.  Maybe the ability to write personal letters in legible script will not be necessary in a technically advanced age.  Perhaps correct word usage, spelling and punctuation will be relegated to the old days.

But who will write books?   Who will create printed material for reading and learning use?

I must admit there are a small number of exceptions on my bus. Occasionally, I’ll see a student carrying a book and spending  the travel time reading.  Sadly, a very small number.

This situation has bothered me since the day of the incident.  A few days ago, however, I received a newsletter  from the superintendent of the school board in which he discussed plans for the coming year.  Part of it said:

“This year’s theme is Once Upon a Dragon. ..with year-long emphasis on reading, literacy and storytelling.  I think you’ll agree that reading is a cornerstone for success across all courses, grade levels and subjects. While it certainly isn’t our only focus, we do plan to emphasize reading during the 2012-2013 school year. We want our students to read for fun and use their imaginations. We want them to hear tales told by expert storytellers, participate in their own creative writing activities and integrate new technologies into their love for reading.

“Many of our campuses already have ongoing programs to promote reading, but you’ll be hearing more about opportunities to incorporate a love for reading into your everyday lesson planning, how to encourage parents to read with their children and how some of our Dragons are already published writers!”

I was greatly encouraged and uplifted to read this.  It indicates that school administrators are becoming as concerned as I am about the reading and writing skills of students.   

Along those lines, I had a personal experience at one of the schools on my route. I was invited to speak to a class about writing. Sounds easy, but the class happened to be Kindergarten. How do you talk to a room full of five-year-olds about writing?  You’re invited to read “My Kindergarten Challenge” at http://earlwstaggs.wordpress.com

In spite of the plan outlined for my school district, I’m still concerned as far as where the next generation of writers will come from.  Maybe – just maybe, however - there is some hope.

Writers Are Stories in Themselves

By Jackie King

Even though I write murder mysteries, just the thought of a haunted house puts shivers down my spine. Perhaps it’s because I grew up in a time when kids entertained themselves by telling ghost stories around a campfire in the dark. Or maybe I’m just a natural born coward. For this reason I have the highest esteem for anyone who cohabits (and cheerfully, too) with ghosts. Being a writer, most of my friends also write, and a couple of them, a mother-daughter team, live in an honest-to-goodness haunted house. They even have a blog where they share ghost stories about their home and other spooky places.

Needless to say, these women are my heroes. (Heroines?)

Let me introduce you to Lynn Somerville and her talented daughter, Katie Somerville, co-authors of SCARY MONDAYS-VOLUME I.

http://tinyurl.com/d6ggwo6

This collection of short stories were first published on their blog, http://lynnsomervillefiction.wordpress.com

Lynn and Katie Somerville

This blog features a weekly ghost story guaranteed to make you shiver. I asked Lynn how she came up with so many ideas in this genre, and she said one story came about because of her hearing disability. Read on:

Inspiration for A Black Confession

By Lynn Somerville

As writers we’re often asked where our stories come from. Where do we get the ideas for our tales? And the answer is, anywhere and everywhere. Here’s an example of what I mean. It’s a little embarrassing, but it’s a great illustration–the seed of a story can come from the strangest places.

I wrote a short story called Black Lace, published in my anthology Scary Mondays Volume One. It’s about a widower who’s dead wife is taking possession of him. I got the idea from a song by Soundgarden. Now I’m hearing impaired, so the words I heard Chris Cornell singing was, “I put on black lace.” That conjured in my head the image of a man dressing as his late wife at her direction. Her ghost tells him to wear her favorite black dress and put on make-up just as she did, all so she can live again inside him.

The funny thing is, being hearing impaired, I heard the words of the song incorrectly. Cornell wasn’t singing “I put on black lace.” The lyrics are “I fell on black days.”

Black Lace is one of my favorite short stories and it’s one inspired because I heard the wrong words to a song.

And that’s where stories come from!

~~~~~~

Lynn Somerville and Katie Somerville are a mother and daughter writing duo. Lynn writes a weekly blog, Scary Mondays, http://lynnsomervillefiction.wordpress.com. Follow Lynn on Twitter at http://twitter.com/lsomervilleinOK or on Facebook at http://facebook.com/lynnsomerville author

When Katie Somerville is not writing about zombies and ghosts, she plays bass and guitar and sings lead vocals. She is a college freshman and loves to bake. Both Lynn and Katie live in Oklahoma.

~~~~~~

I’ll bet you’re as impressed with these brave gals as I am.

Cheers,

Jackie

Recalculating!

By Mark W. Danielson

If you’ve ever snickered at the insurance commercial with the GPS causing an accident, then you can appreciate this article.  Today’s use of the Global Proximity System has become as common as a cold.  Thanks to our military’s toned-down version, cell phones can track kids, direct us to restaurants and entertainment facilities, and most of all, guide us in unfamiliar territory.  But unlike airplane or ship navigation systems that define courses by pre-programmed latitude/longitude waypoints, our portable GPS units rely on typed-in addresses or data-base locations.  If you selected your intended destination ahead of time, your GPS will likely be a valuable asset.  However, serious problems can develop if your navigation system never reset itself from a previous location or you are attempting to change your destination while steering your vehicle.  Any police officer will tell you that sending a text, talking on the phone, or fiddling with the GPS while driving can be as dangerous as driving while intoxicated.  This is why GPS lawyers added the requirement that you agree to only programing your GPS while your car is parked.  No doubt some will still blame their GPS for their ensuing accident and win. 

We have all heard the funny pronunciations from computer-generated voices when text is translated to voice, but when my wife and I were driving in unfamiliar territory and our GPS told us to turn left on “Wha wha”, all we could do was laugh and try to determine what “Bitchin’ Betty” intended.  Once we realized she was telling us to turn left on “Wolf Road” we were fine.  Soon after, when we were told to turn left on “Shelby” when the actual street was named “Shell Bay”.  A cautious turn kept us on the correct track.  Learning to understand your GPS’ voice is probably no different than understanding your children or your dog.  Personally, I find it easier to keep my head outside and listen to the voice commands rather than physically looking at the moving map.  At least I stand less of a chance of causing an accident that way.

GPS has its limitations, thus it’s always best to have basic orientation on where you should be traveling.  Doing so will avoid the “recalculating” commands.  For example, if you’re supposed to be heading south and find the setting sun in your eyes, you should know that something’s probably askew.  Nowadays, many cars are equipped with electronic compasses, so use them to your benefit.  And if you are in a big city such as Manhattan, know which way the streets and avenues run.  (Yes, Virginia, there was a master plan when they built this city.)  As a general rule, avenues commonly run north and south while streets travel east and west.  East/West Interstates run are even numbered.  North/South Interstates normally end with a “5”.  Big cities like LA have all kinds of designations so be prepared.  Most of all, remember that cruise control is NOT an autopilot, so keep your head outside and drive safe.  I truly enjoy meeting new people, but not as a result of a car wreck.    

The Fear Artist Is an Award Winner

By Chester Campbell

Tim Hallinan is my favorite thriller author. His Poke Rafferty series hits you at the gut level. The characters are a diverse lot that will tug at your heartstrings, make you laugh, absolutely infuriate you, and bring about a dozen other feelings. But they'll remain indelibly impressed on your mind. The stories take you into the heart of Bangkok's seamy side and keep you on the edge of your seat as Poke tangles with a succession of bad guys. I just finished the fifth book in the series, The Fear Artist.

With Poke's Thai wife, Rose, and their adopted daughter, Miaow, visiting Rose's mother in the north of the country, Poke is ready to repaint their house when he collides with a man who dies of gunshots in his arms. The man utters a woman's name and a U.S. city before dying. This makes Rafferty a person a great interest to Thai secret agents who want to know his connection to the dead man and what he was told.

Poke winds up on the run from the police and an American named Murphy who is working with them. In an effort to find out what he's up against, Poke seeks out a motley group of former spies who inhabit one of Bangkok's offbeat  bars. He learns he's been caught on the fringes of the War on Terror being masterminded by Murphy, a man who was involved in the Phoenix Program during the Vietnam War. He's the most sadistic, unprincipled character I've run across in ages.

Like all of Hallinan's books, The Fear Artist delves deeply into the rationale behind the characters' actions. He brings back Poke's half-Chinese half-sister, a sharp-witted, quick-acting teenager, and his best friend Arthit, a Bangkok policeman, who he unhappily deceives. Poke, an expatriate American, expresses a lot of angst at his home country's actions involving the War on Terror and treatment of ordinary citizens, but he is no less critical of his adopted country's policies.

Two Vietnamese women, one with leftover wounds from the war in the sixties and seventies, and a mistreated waif of a girl, a daughter of Murphy's, are particularly poignant characters. The ex-Russian spy Vladimir lends some comic relief to the story.

The Fear Artist, check it out here, should win some awards.

Visit me at Mystery Mania

The Other Brazilian Cocktail

by Leighton Gage

The caipirinha (the name translates as “little country girl”) is Brazil’s great cocktail of success, the one that spilled across our borders into the bars of half the world.

But how many of you have heard of the Caju Amigo? (Friendly Cashew.)

Aha! Got you there, didn’t I? (Most of you anyway.)

Caju Amigos are, basically, a mixture of cachaça (can spirit, extracted from sugar cane juice as opposed to rum, extracted from molasses) and juice from the cashew fruit.

Yeah, that’s right. Fruit.

The cashew fruit is native to Brazil.

The name, in English, is derived from the name in Portuguese.

And the name in Portuguese originated with our Tupi Indians, who called the fruit acajú, which means “yellow head”.

See that little appendage on the bottom?

That’s a double shell.

Which contains the nut.

The shell is quite poisonous.

The nuts have to be carefully roasted to destroy the toxins.

But the fruit is anything but poisonous.

And it’s quite delicious.

I don’t think it’s likely you’ll  have a cashew tree in your garden.

Not unless you happen to live in Brazil, Goa, the Philippines, Panama, Mozambique, Malaysia, Thailand, or a few other places around the world where their cultivation is popular.

The juice, however, is a different story.

You can get it in many major cities.

I’ve bought it in New York, San Francisco, London, Paris and Rome.

And I always found it the same way: by going onto the internet and locating a shop that sold Brazilian products.

And once you score a bottle of the stuff, there’s nothing simpler than making a Caju Amigo. All you have to do is to mix 2 parts of cachaça, one part cashew juice and a teaspoon of sugar. That’s it!

Serve it in a tall, chilled glass, over ice. Use vodka, or even rum if you can’t get cachaça.

You can also put the ingredients on a blender – and call it a Batida de Cajú.

But, if you’re lucky enough to be able to get your hands on one of the fruits, then try it this way:

Put a slice in your mouth and chew it. Then take a shot of straight cachaça – and swallow the fruit and the drink at the same time.

That’s the way the machos do it.

Saude!

A Conversation with Bestselling Author Julie Kramer

by Jean Henry Mead

Julie Kramer moved from journalist to novelist. She writes a mystery series set in the desperate world of television news—a world she knows well from her career working as a freelance news producer for NBC and CBS, as well as running the WCCO-TV I-Team in Minneapolis, where she won numerous national investigative awards. Her thrillers, Stalking Susan, Missing Mark, Silencing Sam, Killing Kate and Shunning Sarah take readers inside inside the newsrooms and demonstrates how decisions are made amid the chaos. She's won the Daphne du Maurier Award for Mainstream Mystery/Suspense, Minnesota Book Award and the RT Book Review's Best First Mystery. She's also been a finalist for the Anthony, Barry, Shamus, Mary Higgins Clark, and RT Best Amateur Sleuth Awards.

Julie, tell us about your latest novel, Shunning Sarah.

Shunning Sarah pits two very different cultures against each other: TV news vs. the Amish. I grew up on a family farm in rural Minnesota near some Amish and later spent a career in television news. Writing this book allowed me to incorporate both experiences and live my research. It is a very topical story dealing with real life issues amid the closed society of the Amish - including hair cutting by a rogue Amish sect.

Here’s the story basics: A sketch of a homicide victim’s face is broadcast on the news, but when she is identified as Sarah Yoder, a local Amish woman, the police have difficulty investigating because her family believes in forgiveness rather than prosecution. Because of the biblical ban on graven imagines, they also object to her picture being used by the media. But when a TV reporter finds a clue the cops miss, she uncovers a dark web of fraud and deception - driven by motives as old as the Bible: sex and money.

How does this latest novel differ from the others in the series?

While each of my thrillers features the same protagonist - investigative TV reporter Riley Spartz - they are all self-contained, so new readers don’t have to start with my debut to make sense of the others. But each book delves into very different murders and news stories, so fans won’t feel they’ve read this before. Besides incorporating Amish elements, SHUNNING SARAH also looks at how television newsrooms are changing - and not always for the better.

Why did you decide to use two word titles with the same letters for all your novels?

While writing my debut, Stalking Susan was my working title. My editor loved it and didn’t want to hear any others. For my second book, my working title was Never Worn - after a wedding dress want ad. I thought it sounded mysterious and poignant. My editor thought it sounded dull and boring. In a smart-alecky moment, I asked,“So what do you want to call it? MISSING MARK?” She said, yeah...and didn’t want to hear any other titles. That’s how my books became branded. The verb is actually more important than the name. Once I’ve locked in on the verb I figure out a title character name. For instance, I wanted to use “shunning” and I needed an Amish name, so I picked “Sarah.”

How did your protagonist Riley Spartz come about? You gave your TV reporter an unusual name. How did it originate?

Her name didn’t seem unusual at the time. Spartz was my mother’s maiden name and I used it as a salute to her. I’ve always liked the name Riley, and had wanted to use it for one of my kids. But my husband didn’t. So they are named Alex and Andrew. But when the time came to name my heroine, I didn’t hesitate. Neither my agent nor my editor ever suggested changing her name.

Which character traits do you share with Riley Spartz?

I spent a career in television news, I like to think my protagonist and I are both smart, savvy and relish scooping the competition. But she is more ratings driven than I was....partly because it’s now become more of a necessity in TV news. I was always a news producer so my work was behind the scenes - in the field and in the newsroom. I decided for storytelling purposes, my heroine needed the added pressure of being on camera.

You’ve had some great reviews. Which do you cherish most?

I’ve gotten fabulous national reviews from People Magazine, USA Today, and the Associated Press, but I cherish any positive review and especially enjoy hearing from readers.

Advice for fledgling novelists?

Don’t worry on page one whether or not your concept is believable or not. It’s your job as a writer to make it believable. That’s a better question to ask a hundred pages into your manuscript, otherwise you might talk yourself out of a cool premise. Remember truth is stranger than fiction. Sometimes a reader will ask me, “That couldn’t really happen, right?” I reply that nothing in my books is as crazy as what they’ll see on the news tonight.

What’s the biggest difference between writing fiction and writing news?

In fiction, books always have resolution. In real life news events, that doesn’t always happens. Those cases are the ones that haunt victims, their families, law enforcement and the media.

Thanks, Julie.
ramer interview questions