Getting back into my groove

 

Creativity is a funny thing. Some think it’s some sort of spontaneous will o’ the wisp kind of thing, and I’m inclined to agree, at least in part. I certainly don’t believe creativity is always “turned on” at the same level in an individual. Take short stories for instance—I cannot write one to save my life unless inspiration hits, Once when asked to contribute a short story to an anthology about World War II, I dithered forever about what to write. And then, an idea came out of the blue—I clearly heard an old woman’s voice lamenting her children lost to war. I wrote the first draft in about two hours and called it, “A widow’s lament.” The same is sort of true for novels—an idea has to “hit” me. I’m sure what really happens is that an idea simmers in the back of my brain and then bursts forth in my consciousness.

I thought for instance that I was through writing about my diva faux French chef, Irene Foxglove. But then an idea struck me—as I’ve been telling it, Irene tapped me on the shoulder and said, “Ahem, we’re not through with my story yet. I have to tell about the family I’ve left behind.” My fried Fred, who advises me, says if I ever am really through with Irene, I’ll have to drive a spike through her heart. Meantime, she’s given me the idea for a new story. That doesn’t mean writing it has gone smoothly. There’s that thing called writer’s block.

Writer’s block is an even funnier thing than creativity, though not in an amusing way. The dictionary tells us writer’s block is a state of being unable to think of what to write or how to proceed with writing. It happens to me, predictably, somewhere between 20K and 40K words. I write short—I know writers whose first draft of a mystery runs up to 90K to 100K but mine are often 55K at best. A good traditional or cozy mystery should be about 70K.

When I get to that middle point, my sticking point, my instinctive thought is “There’s so much more to go! How will I ever fill those pages? I’m ready to wrap this up now.” Hank Phillippi Ryan, an author much more talented and prolific than I am, calls that point, “The muddle in the middle.” I have been known to shelve a manuscript at 20K words, go back months later, and think, “Hey, this isn’t so bad!” That has happened with at least two books in the Irene series. And it happened with the current one which I’m calling, Irene in a Ghost Kitchen.

We are told in writers’ groups that persistence is the basis for success as a writer. Classic advice: put your butt in the chair and keep it there. I guess that’s where I failed. I put this manuscript aside at 32K words and focused on my cookbook. Then a friend, whose literary knowledge I respect, commented on what a good character Irene is, and I thought, “Hmmm. Maybe I should go back and re-read that.” I did, and suddenly my head is teeming with ideas. Whereas before I had no idea how it would work out, now I can see the ending. I’m just impatient to get it all down on paper.

Last night, Sophie and I didn’t sleep well, partly because one or the other of us had to pee. But I also lay awake for great bunches of time writing in my mind. I’m not one of those who gets up in the middle of the night to make notes, so I am trusting that some—most?—of that night-time activity is tucked away in my subconscious and will surface when needed.

Excuse me. I’ve got to go now, because I left Irene in a precarious situation. But PS I am delighted that people find Irene funny, interesting, complex, all those things. I call her outrageous. But I hope the narrative voice, which belongs to a much younger chef Henny James, is as riveting with her wry sense of humor and her clear understanding of Irene—well, almost.

Want to start the series? Try Saving Irene. Amazon.com: Saving Irene: A Culinary Mystery (An Irene in Chicago Culinary Mystery) eBook : Alter, Judy: Kindle Store

Irene's in Texas--whooppee!

 

Here it is! The cover to the forthcoming Irene Deep in Texas Trouble, fourth in my Irene in Chicago Culinary Mysteries.

Irene Deep in Texas Trouble is all about love and romance—and murder! Fred Erisman thinks it’s the best Irene saga so far.

It’s Christmas in Texas. Henny’s best friend, Charlie, is marrying the love of her life, rich and spoiled Rick Scott, and Henny is to cater the wedding supper. Irene and Chance are spending the holiday with Henny’s family, and Irene steps in as Henny’s sous chef. When there’s a sensational murder at the supper, Irene is the prime suspect. Things are complicated by a wild set of characters and events—a mysterious stranger, threatening notes, a runaway couple, and a kidnapping. But Henny persists—and learns that there are all kind of couples in this world.

Come on down to Texas and wander the historic Fort Worth stockyards, watch a rodeo, learn about a new competitive sport, and eat some Texas food. While Irene detests most of the Texas menu, you’ll probably like it. Recipes included.

A note on Irene’s changing face: readers have pointed out that the Irene on the cover of the first book, Saving Irene, looks older than subsequent covers. In the first book of course, she loses her husband to murder, sours on Chicago, and flees to France. By the second book, she has established her save in Peyrolles-en-Provence and sweets into Chicago to cater Henny’s wedding—or so she thinks. She’s more self-confident, settled.

But ah, the third book: Irene is a woman in love. You can see it on her face, in her smile. And in this book? She is a woman well loved, secure enough to be a bit demanding, a bit manipulative. See it in her eyes?

 

 Thanks to designer Amy Balamut for terrific covers!

 

Odd notes on a Saturday

 

lamb ragu

Sometimes on a Saturday night you can find yourself doing the oddest things. I just finally stopped myself from scrolling through a site that listed 50 dressing styles and trends women should avoid if they don’t want to look old. Do you realize how endless 50 pages can be? And yet it was one of those situations—you tell yourself, “Just one more. I just want to see the next one.”

Some of these were no-brainers: don’t wear our mother’s pearls, avoid too much blush or eavy black eye-liner, old lady handbags (calls Queen Elizabeth II to mind, much as I admired her). Knee socks with sneakers (really? Who would?). But the fashionistas, whoever they are, can just keep their hands off my stretch jeans now that I’ve finally found a pair that fit. And don’t tell me I can’t have short hair—except in rare instances, I think long hair on a woman over, oh let’s be generous and say sixty, looks dated and out of place.

I am angry at myself every time I get caught up in one of those sites with the endless “Next” button. Often they tell some heartbreaking story, and you’re caught up in it before you know. Because such are a vehicle for ads, writers draw the story out too many pages, repeating details, coming at them from another direction, delving too far into the back story. Still I get caught, even while I’m thinking what a mindless way for a writer to earn a living.

It's not been that kind of Saturday at all, so I’m a bit surprised at myself. I spent the morning keying in corrections to Irene that my mentor found—and occasionally feeling triumphant because I was right. It is Spaghetti-Os, not Spaghetti O’s. and a Frenchman would call a police station a commissary because the French term is commissariat de police.  I had great three-o’clock-in-the-morning thoughts about the next Irene adventure—can you believe this? The fourth is not anywhere near a publication yet—at least another two months —and I’m planning the fifth. But I had a great opening scene in mind and hastened to write it down. I have nary a clue what happens after that.

We are at sixes and sevens as Christian’s mother is hospitalized, and he is spending a lot of time with her in first a Grapevine hospital and now a Bedford nursing center. So we never know who will be where when. Which means I don’t know what to do about dinner. Jean was coming tonight, and I couldn’t wrap my mind around what to do—should we go out? No, I didn’t want to gear up and dress up enough to go even to the Old Neighborhood Grill. Should I ask Jean to bring something, though I couldn’t think of any convenient, reasonable take-out between her apartment at Trinity Terrace and my cottage. No surprise that the easiest option was to cook. Christian brought my curbside order from Central Market, the order that I flubbed yesterday and finally placed for today. There was a pound of ground lamb in it, and I decided to make a lamb ragu. Served with butter lettuce salad with Newman’s Own Caesar salad dressing and lots of grated pecorino. A good dinner, if I do say so. I’ve decided I’m going to keep a pound of ground lamb on hand—it’s so good for burgers, makes a terrific shepherd’s pie, and was great tonight in ragu. Not sure I’d know what to do with a leg of lamb anymore, because it’s gotten so expensive. But ground is a good way to get the flavor.

So that’s my Saturday. Here I sit, dishes all done, cottage as neat as it’s going to get, candles flicking odd shapes and lights on the ceiling, Sophie asleep in her crate. I’m going to read a bit and then slink off to bed.

Kind of a nothing day but an evening of nostalgia

 

The Madison Park Apartments
Hyde Park Boulevard at Dorchester Avenue
Chicago

All work and no play, they say, makes you dull. Sort of how I feel today. I read emails, caught up on odds and ends, did a bit on the novel but not a lot, and the day just sort off went by. Jacob and Jordan were up at five this morning so that he could be at Farrington Field by six to go to a golf tournament. He came home and went right back to bed. Christian had an event tonight, so there Jordan and I were staring at each other. “What’s for dinner?” She has mapped out meals from now until Thanksgiving and we’ve done grocery lists—so organized. Only there was no plan for tonight.

She had said a big green salad with chicken, so as she came and went between the cottage and the house I thought surely she’d start to make a salad any minute. Finally, when she came in around seven, I said, “Starving.” (I confess for once I’d been enjoying not cooking.) Then it came out that she was not at all hungry, and Jacob had gone back to bed—they have to repeat the five o’cock thing tomorrow. She was full of apologies, said to eat the chicken, but by then I just wanted something quick and easy. So for the second night this week, I had scrambled eggs. And a bit of last night’s German potato salad.

So there I was, after a nothing day, looking at a nothing evening. But I began a little research for the current Irene novel. If Henny and Patrick are now happily married, they need to move out of two, small but adjacent apartments. I wanted to give them an old cottage in Hyde Park, but the more I looked, the scarcer cottages were and the higher real estate. It’s not at all uncommon for a modest house to be a million and up. Henny and Patrick can’t afford that. So I prowled around and gathered enough information to invent a house for them. I’m rather captivated by it

Built in the twenties, it’s a tall and skinny wood frame structure, with bay windows downstairs and up, dark, natural woodwork and wainscoting, hardwood floors, and pocket doors. Somebody kept all the good features of an older home—it’s hard to find original wainscoting these days. The kitchen however was maybe updated in the fifties, certainly not suited for a chef on the brink of her career. They have a lot of renovation to do, bit by bit.

This is sort of like playing with paper dolls when you were a kid. You get to make up houses, clothing, food, all aspects of life. A lot of fun. It occurs to me that traditionally the main character in a cozy is a single woman, in her twenties or thirties a the most, often with a love/hate romantic entanglement, though those parameters are branching out all the time. Still, I seem to keep marrying off my protagonists. So far, I’ve sustained series with married couples, and I’m counting on it to be true with Henny and Patrick. As she says early on, they are deliriously happily married.

Of course, Irene will be returning from France, this time drawn back by a murder. This time she announces that since she visits so often, she is thinking of taking a small apartment in a residential hotel. (No need to dwell on Henny’s reaction to that.) So I went back online to check residential hotels—and there are none under that classification. I guess I was thinking of the grand old hotels of my youth, where aging widows and spinsters lived and took their meals in quietly elegant dining rooms. The woman I worked for, as a gofer/typist, when I was I high school used to take me to such hotels for lunch. Once, wanting me to impress someone we were with, she suggested I have the calavo pear with tuna salad. I replied that I would if it were avocado, but I didn’t much like pears. She kicked me under the table. How was I to know calavo was another name for avocado? At any rate, those hotels are gone.

On an impulse I searched for the Madison Park Hotel—I grew up in Madison Park—and lo! It’s still there, in all its grand glory, but now called the Madison Park Apartments. No restaurant, but a breakfast bar and they’ve gotten modern with an exercise facility. The blurb says it still has its grandly luxurious lobby and all the amenities. I guess that’s where Irene will land.

Such fun to wander around my old neighborhood, even if only online. And fun to play with paper dolls.

Have a good sleep, everyone.

Ta-da! Here it is!

 

The cover to Irene in Danger, second in my series, “Irene in Chicago Culinary Mysteries.” I’m delighted with the cover. In this one, Irene has been in France for a year, running a small café, but she’s back in Chicago now for Henny and Patrick’s wedding, a small but classy affair to be held at the legendary Palmer House Hotel. In the week between her arrival and the day of the wedding, murder, drug smuggling, and kidnapping combine to make Henny doubt she can pull off the day of her dreams. Through it all, Irene remains the diva—demanding, spoiled, always the center of attraction, and yet somehow a sympathetic character.

The arrival of Henny’s family from Texas adds a whole new set of characters to the story—and a new cuisine to rival Irene’s insistence on everything French. Henny includes some of Irene’s recipes, the best of French cooking like a gibelotte, and recipes from her mom’s kitchen. Down-home Texas food at its best. Henny’s mom will tell you the simple way to make the best pot of beans ever and suggest an unusual addition to deviled eggs.

Irene in Danger launches November 14, unless supply chain problems cause delays. For comparison, I’m attaching the cover to Saving Irene, available at Saving Irene: A Culinary Mystery - Kindle edition by Alter, Judy. Mystery, Thriller & Suspense Kindle eBooks @ Amazon.com. If you are a Kindle Unlimited subscriber, it’s free.