Am I a Texan or a Chicagoan

 

I’ve lived in Texas since the summer of 1965—that’s a whopping fifty-eight years, well over two thirds of my life. That first summer saw the flourishing of the “Born in Texas” movement, and shopping malls, which we frequented then, had kiosks with T-shirts bearing that slogan and others, like, “I wasn’t born in Texas, but I got here as soon as I could.” You could buy certificates that certified that you were a native Texan, although of course it would have been easy to cheat. In a few years, by the time I had children and wanted T-shirts for them, the craze was over.

People in Texas thought I talked funny with my Chicago flat speech, but after a year, when I went home or talked to a relative back home, they all laughed at my southern accent. To this day, my kids say my accent depends on what I’m talking about—If I am, as I frequently have in the past, talking about author Elmer Kelton, one of my heroes, they say I get a cowboy twang.

Much of my career—as an author, as director of the TCU Press—revolved around Texas, and over the years I began to feel like a native Texan, even if it was a bit of a lie. Still folklorist Joyce Roach and I had a dog-and-pony show we took to meetings and other places—once even performing for an elite group of big donors at TCU. Joyce talked about the glories of being a fifth-generation Texan. My talk was titled, “Notes from an outsider.” I knew my place.

Not every book I’ve written has been about Texas, but a high percentage of them have. I’ve been best known for writing about women of the American West—Elizabeth Bacon Custer, Jessie Benton Frémont, cowgirl Lucille Mulhall, and Etta Parker of the Hole in the Wall Gang. But there were lots of Texas titles—a book about Elmer Kelton, books about Texas food from chili to great chefs, and most recently, three mystery series set in Texas. Yes, I claimed my credentials as a Texas writer.

But in the last ten years, a feeling for Chicago—I’m not sure how to describe it, but perhaps affection is a good word—has increasingly taken a place in my thinking. Years ago I wrote a y/a novel, I Wish I Lived at Eleanor Lee’s House, about something that really happened when I was a teen. I was then published by a small Texas press, and the publisher had no market for a Chicago title, so I put it aside. I’ve recently gotten it out and reread it with some interest.

But it was The Gilded Cage, a fat historical about Bertha Honore (Cissy) Palmer, wife of hotelier and robber baron Potter Palmer, that first renewed my interest in Chicago. I loved exploring the complex history of the city in the late nineteenth century, from the Great Fire to the Columbian Exposition, with the Civil War, the Haymarket Riot, Pullmantown, and a myriad of fascinating subjects.

None of that, though, explains why I set a new series of mysteries in Chicago. What may have sparked my more intense identification with the Windy City is a trip there with all four of my children. We toured the neighborhood where I grew up and the University of Chicago where I went to school, gazed at the lake, ate in fine restaurants, and took the historical tour at the Palmer House. I fell in love with the city all over again.

That may be behind the Irene in Chicago Culinary Mysteries though I cannot tell you where the characters came from. They were just there one day: Irene, the domineering, demanding faux French chef who claims a Cordon Bleu background she does not have, and Henny James, her apprentice, who tells the stories in a slightly snarky tone of voice.

Now, suddenly or so it seems to me, there are four Irene mysteries—Saving Irene, Irene in Danger, Finding Florence, and Irene Deep in Texas Trouble. They haven’t set the bestseller lists on fire, but they’ve earned respectable stars on Amazon and enough people have commented that I think someone out there enjoys Irene’s shenanigans.

A couple of months ago, I started a new Irene book—Missing Irene—and then for reasons unknown to me I set it aside, tried to write a bit on a memoir, fiddled and procrastinated and didn’t know what I was doing. Tonight I went back and read what I have of that new manuscript, and guess what? I rather liked it. Maybe I’m getting bolder but it will revolve around a case of incest. I think for the time being I’ll go back to it. I hope you’ll read it one day.

Living in a fictional world

 

The Old Neighborhood Grill
a very real place in Kelly O'Connell's 
fictional world

“Life is real, life is earnest/Dust thou art, to dust returnest.” Henry Wadsworth Longfellow sometimes had a dour outlook on life, but his words too often ring true. Real life is sometimes earnest and complicated and difficult—and you want to find an escape a place to hide. Readers and authors have such a place—the alternate worlds created in fiction.

On the listserv of Guppies, (stands for Going to be Published, the international electronic chapter of Sisters in Crime), a well-published author recently lamented that she was writing the last book in a series, and it made her sad because she hated to leave the people and the world she had created. Others chimed in, some saying they worried about the future of characters they’d come to love. Someone else assured that it's okay if you leave the characters in a good place with positive outcomes ahead for their lives. Even if you have to write it only for yourself, you may want to have those characters find the job they have yearned for, marry, have children, take a cruise. Whatever would make their lives happy.

I can testify to that. In my Kelly O’Connell Mysteries (my very first mystery and first series), I created a world built around the neighborhoods I know—Berkeley and Fairmount in Fort Worth—with landmarks such as Lily B. Clayton Elementary, The Old Neighborhood Grill, Lili’s Bistro, and lots of the Craftsman houses that dot Fairmount. And I peopled it with characters I could like—Kelly, whose a single mom (one of my daughters said it was a  highly autobiographical novel), Mike Shandy, her policeman love interest, Keisha, her girl Friday who has the sixth sense and is irrepressible.

Perhaps the greatest compliment I ever had as a writer is that those people were someone you would meet in your local grocery store. And one reader wrote that she thought she saw Kelly going into the Old Neighborhood Grill. Those comments meant, to me, that I had succeeded in creating a believable world.

The Kelly O’Connell series ended a few years ago. I had felt it winding down, partly because I let Kelly’s daughters, who were essential to many of the stories, age out. But still today, sometimes my mind wanders back to Kelly and I think of a plot hook that might work. The woman who “saw” Kelly going into the local restaurant still occasionally posts, “I miss Kelly.”

I’ve moved on to other series, other characters, and perhaps that part of the writing life—learning to let go when it’s time. Somehow, there are lessons there for us in daily life, though I’m not sure how to put them together—but having fictional worlds, if only in your daydreams, is not a bad thing. But there’s also a point at which you have to let them go and face reality. Maybe all of that is where the label “escape reading” came from. I admit tht a lot of time I think my mysteries are escape reading.

One of the things I keep reading about is what kind of footprint we each want to leave on the earth—not just our environmental footprint, but for what do we want to be known? I’ve long felt it important to contribute to the world in some way, but I am not a firefighter rushing into burning buildings (guess what’s on the TV in the background as I write) or a physician, saving lives, or even a teacher, helping to spread knowledge. I write for people’s amusement.

I have a friend, a much better and more popular novelist than I am, who tells me to banish such thoughts. By providing escape and entertainment and maybe a bit of enlightenment, I am improving the quality of some lives. I hope it’s true. I hope the fictional worlds of Kelly O’Connell or Kate Chamber in the Blue Plate Murders series or even wacky Irene in my current series carry readers away from the earnestness of their daily lives into a fictional world where, for some time, however short, they are free and happy and safe.

Speaking of making a contribution to the world—and of neighborhood institutions, I can’t help loudly cheering for the surgical team at Fort Worth’s Cook Children’s Hospital who today, in a first for the hospital, successfully separated cojoined twins. The baby girls are only a few months old and are tonight doing well. What a wonderful milestone. I’m in awe, but I also couldn’t help wondering if this provided a moral dilemma for the pro-lifers. If every life is God’s creation and sacrosanct, then perhaps God meant those babies to be forever joined, and surgeons were going against God’s will by separating them. I don’t for a moment believe any of that, but I can’t help wondering what the extremists among us think.[

Meantime, blessings on those babies and their parents who tonight must be enormously relieved. And thanks be to God for skilled surgeons—and fictional worlds.

Thoughts on fiction and fictional thoughts

 

There’s a new website, shepherd.com, where authors are encouraged to post about their favorite books in categories of their own choosing. Some choose books by topic, others by author. There’s a page, for instance, for the best five books with quirky detectives from around the world, and another for novels that get you inside the minds of historical figures. How about a page for books on good and evil? Or the best books for yoga teachers who feel stuck in a rut? Something for everyone, and a great site for browsing.

I submitted a page (five books plus one of my own, per the rules) on outrageous cozies, and it went live this week. Traditional mysteries have many sub-genres--the sci-fi mystery, the thriller, the hard-boiled/noir, the police procedural, the historical, and of course the cozy. Even within the cozy, there are subdivisions, like the noir cozy which is a real contradiction in terms. So why now the outrageous cozy?  I don’t know that it is yet a recognized sub-genre, but I’m working to make it so. The graphic above is for my page, and the link is https://shepherd.com/best-books/outrageous-cozy-mysteries. I hope you find some outrageously good reading in those books. Of course, I included the first of my own outrageous series, Saving Irene.

A friend in a small, online writer’s group recently commented that it amused her that I speak of my characters are though they are real people—sort of like they’re in the same room with me. It’s true, I feel that way about them. Irene and Henny, the narrator, live with me all the time when I’m working on one of their books.

Currently, Irene and her French entourage—Chance, Jean Claude, and daughter Gabrielle—are in Fort Worth for Christmas, visiting Henny’s family. The mere idea of putting the diva chef, with her faux French ways, in the middle of Cowtown is alive with possibilities, and I’m having fun. In line with my political beliefs, I supported a fund-raising campaign titled, “Mystery Loves Democracy.” (Two years ago, “Mystery Loves Georgia” contributed a hefty amount to the campaigns of senators Joel Osoff and Raphael Warnock.) As part of my commitment, I auctioned the right to name a character in my work-in-progress. The woman who bought the right chose to name the character after a friend, and so Kathy Fenton entered my story.

I was about to introduce Kathy as a character when I realized her backstory had already been told. All I had to do was go back and change her name. Once that was done, Kathy added yet another complication to the plot and another name on the list of possible murder suspects. (For me, that’s sort of how writing goes--as I write, ideas pop into my head, and they generally work better than if I had planned them ahead.)

But honest to gosh, when I renamed that earlier character, I thought to myself, “I must remember to tell Henny that I’ve made that change.” I had to slap myself upside the head to remember Henny is a fictional character and only knows what’s on the page. She won’t remember that first name at all. But that’s how real Henny had become to me.

This morning Jean sent me a link to an article about the reading habits of Ken Burns. His reading is so wide and so deep that it’s humbling. I realized once again it’s a tiny, tiny corner of the book world that I inhabit. Burns has a great familiarity with the Russian writers, refers casually to people I’ve never heard of, and cited a long list of those that I have never read but should have, such as Gabriel García Márquez. I was more comfortable with his admiration for Mark Twain and Willa Cather—he was getting closer to my comfort zone. I can’t help recalling that my first adult novel, Mattie, was panned by one reviewer because Cather had told the story better. I didn’t know enough to know my work was derivative, but I still think any comparison to Cather is a compliment.

And speaking of American greats in the literary field, this is a bonus week, with new books due from Cormac McCarthy (The Border Trilogy, No Country for Old Men--it’s been a long time since he had a new book), mystery writer Lee Child (the Jack Reacher books), Jude Deveraux (historical romance, including the many volumes about the Montgomery/Taggert family), and Patricia Cornwell (crime writer best known for books featuring medical examiner Kay Scarpetta). Surely something for every taste from these literary lions.

 

 

An outrageous day

 

Let’s talk mystery for a minute. Because “the mystery” as a literary genre is so varied, no one definition fits, so over the years sub-genres have developed: the traditional mystery (for which everyone keeps trying without success to find a definitive description), the sci-fi mystery, the thriller, the hard-boiled/noir, the police procedural, the historical, and of course the cozy. Frequently, the lines between blur.

But I think there’s a new kind of cozy—the outrageous cozy. The reader must suspend disbelief with these books—no individual, no set of circumstances could possibly be that outrageous. These books have one thing in common: a snarky, irreverent narrative voice, lots of spoofs about society and pretensions.

Of course I’m think of my Irene in Chicago Culinary Mysteries. Irene Foxglove, my diva chef, was never intended to be a believable character. You won’t meet her in the grocery store or the beauty salon. Henny keeps rescuing Irene from kidnappers and death threats, but the truth is Irene’s behavior is so impulsive, so demanding, so difficult that any self-respecting criminal would have dispatched her long ago. After one book, Irene rekindles her love affair with the fabulously wealthy French father of her only child and spends her time jetting back and forth across the pond in his private jet. Once again, she’s unbelievable—and it takes Henny’s voice to make the reader accept her outrageous behavior. Escape literature with no heavy moral message but some good food hints and recipes.

A few other series fall into my outrageous category—there’s Lois Winston’s Anastasia Pollock craft series, in which trusting wife Anastasia learns her husband, supposedly at a business meeting, has died at the Vegas roulette table and lost their nest egg, the tuition money for two sons, and the money he owes a loan shark who’s threatening her. He left her with the burden of his mother, an eighty-something, card-carrying, loud-mouthed Communist.

Or there’s Julie Mulhern’s Country Club Mysteries. featuring wealthy and widowed artist Ellison Russell who has probably stumbled over close to fifty bodies. She finds them in swimming pools, the hostas in her front yard, the country club parking lot. These murders are set against the waning of country club social ways in the 1980s, with Ellison dealing with her stereotypical dominating mother, her rebellious teen daughter, the cop she’s fallen in love with, and her almost psychic housekeeper.

And then there’s Finley Donovan Is Killing It by Elle Cosimano. A struggling novelist and always-broke single mom, at the mercy of her smarmy ex, Finlay is overheard talking about the plot of that novel that’s stalled and is mistaken for a hit woman. Lured by an enormous pay-out, she goes along with the charade, thinking she can bow out at any time. Of course the consequences are frightening—and hilarious.

In Two Parts Sugar, One Part Murder by Valerie Burns, social media expert Maddy Montgomery, left standing at the altar, is #StartingOver in small-town Michigan after inheriting her great-aunt’s bakery and a 200-pound English Mastiff named Baby. Her plan to sell the bakery and go back to her sophisticated life is spoiled by a restriction in the will requiring her to spend a year in New Bison. Maddy doesn’t bake, and her Louboutins aren’t made for walking giant dogs. But when she is prime suspect in two murders, she has no choice but to stay.

And today I discovered another outrageous cozy: The Ex Who Wouldn’t Die by Sally Berneathy. When Amanda's lying, cheating, scam-artist husband, Charley, saves her life in a near-fatal motorcycle accident, she can almost forgive him for dragging his feet on their divorce. Then she discovers he'd been dead for several hours at the time she thought he rescued her. And not just dead…murdered. She's the primary suspect in Charley's murder and, as if that isn't bad enough, Charley's ghost shows up in her apartment. He was rejected, not allowed to go into the light. He claims to be unable to go more than a few yards away from her. She can't even be certain he isn't peeking when she undresses for bed. She must solve his murder so she can send him back to the light and be rid of him forever.

I don’t think outrageous cozies will ever become a big trend, but they’re fun to read—and I’m having fun writing one. If you’re looking for a way to escape all the stresses of our world, try an outrageous cozy.

Summertime books and the larger world picture

 

No blog last night partly because it was one of those “I have nothing to say” days, but also because I started a new and charming cozy mystery and let it hold my attention. Murder in G Major, by Alexia Gordon, is first in a series of four Gethsemane Brown Mysteries. Gethsemane is an African-American classical musician stranded in Ireland by lost luggage and a lost job opportunity. To earn enough to get back home, she accept the challenge of shepherding a rowdy boys school orchestra to a championship. A cliffside cottage is offered, and she moves in, unaware that it is inhabited by the ghost of a composer she has always much admired. He wants her to clear his name of the murder of his wife and his own suicide. The Irish setting is fun, Gethsemane is a compelling character, and the ghost is a pure delight. The covers to all four books are gorgeous.

But that’s a digression because my real announcement today is that Finding Florence is now available from Amazon Books in trade paper or as an ebook. Finding Florence: An Irene in Chicago Culinary Mystery - Kindle edition by Alter, Judy. Mystery, Thriller & Suspense Kindle eBooks @ Amazon.com. This is Irene’s third adventure, and Henny definitely has mixed emotions about having her back in town. Irene’s friend, Florence, has died, but when Irene asks about a service, etc., it turns out that Florence’s body is missing. Irene is obsessed, and Henny’s life is a mess, torn between helping Florence and struggling to keep her job as a TV chef. The character that surprised me in this novel is Irene’s lover, the mysterious billionaire Chance Charpentier, also the father of Irene’s twenty-year old daughter, but that’s another story from a previous book. Chance turns out to be a perfectly charming, take-charge kind of a guy. Who knew? I’m so excited about this that I’m already planning Irene’s next adventure in my head—she’ll visit Texas, though she despises Texas food. Which reminds me, the new book has both recipes from Irene, French of course, and Texas recipes from Henny’s mother’s kitchen.

This morning I woke up thinking there is not a thing in the world I have to worry about today. I’ve planned an easy chicken salad for supper, I have leftover meatloaf for lunch, Sophie is well and happy (no chicken bone problems), I know what I have to do with the project on my desk. Of course, I forgot about the heat—but since I’m not out running around it doesn’t bother me.

But what I forgot about big time was America as it is today, with a rogue court handing out disastrous decisions and a Republican Party determined to cling to authority at the cost of democracy. All that hit me as soon as I booted up my computer and checked the news. Do you read, “Wake Up to Politics”? It’s an online column by Gabe Fleisher, a college sophomore in D.C., Georgetown U. He’s been writing this bipartisan column since 2011 (which makes him pretty young when he started it). Today he ran down a list of potential 2024 challengers to both President Biden and trump, and I have to say everyone on the Republican list, from Ron DeSantis to Ted Cruz, scared the heck out of me. Check it out if you’re so minded.

Jordan comes home this evening after a few days in Key Largo, with several girlfriends at the family home of one of the girls. (That's Jordan in front with green glasses, and no, those aren't MAGA hats!) Good get-away for her and some needed relaxation. And Jacob is still at camp, but Christian and I seem to have survived nicely. I’ve cooked quite a bit, got lots of work done, had plenty of visitors. My world does look good—now if we could just do something about the bigger picture.

Justice, computers, cozy mysteries, and sloppy Joe

 

Sloppy Joe

Count me among the many who rejoice today that we now have Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson (why can I not get beyond wanting to spell it Kenanjti?). When Biden first announced, way back before the South Carolina primary which gave him such a boost, that he would appoint a Black woman, I cringed—not because I didn’t think there was a qualified Black woman but because I thought he had boxed himself into a corner where he could have been accused of a kind of reverse racism—not considering qualified Anglo candidates. That is not, of course, what opponents overtly objected to, though it may well have been the underlying thought. On the surface it was that she was too progressive, too lenient on pornography, too this, too that. They tried to trick her with everything from “Do you attend church?” to “Can you define a woman?” They were rude and insolent and demeaning.

Through it all Judge/now Justice Jackson was cool, calm, and clever. She never fell into the verbal traps. Her answers were intelligent, straightforward, and respectful. I have seen a chart that indicates she brings more professional credentials to the nation’s highest court than any of those now sitting.

She shifts a balance—white men will now be in the majority, and she will be one of four women sitting on the Supreme Court. Conventional wisdom is she will not be able to do much in the face of the “originalists” who dominate, but I somehow have faith in this woman. I think she will have a major impact. And I rejoice, not because she’s Black, not even because she’s a woman, but because she’s highly qualified, which is a pleasant change from the last three appointees. No, I’m not afraid to name them: Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, and Bartlett. A packed court, but Justice Jackson may make some cracks in that originalist wall.

I realized today, with a gulp, that she is the same age as my oldest daughter, coincidentally a lawyer.

Yet another computer problem day. This afternoon for several hours, I could not establish a Wi-Fi connection. I am trying to determine whether it’s just our property, just me, or a neighborhood problem. But when I don’t have Wi-Fi there’s not much I can do—not even save Word files, nor print. Just read a book, as long as I have one downloaded. No Facebook, no email, none of that. It’s a huge frustration. I can get most of that on my phone, but I don’t like the small screen or keyboard. If I get desperate, I boot up my iPad but I don’t keep it charged.

Not quite ready to broadcast it about, but the last couple of evenings, I’ve been exploring posting to Pinterest. I think when I gave it up several years ago, I was simply a consumer and not using it to market my own books. I was using it like Jordan who searches it for recipes. Besides, when it was new and wildly popular, I created boards like a madwoman with no sense of organization, so now I am working on eliminating irrelevant boards and organizing posts. But I did get a board up for Irene in Chicago Culinary Mysteries. And I did write more yesterday and today, so I’m creeping toward the conclusion of the third mystery in that series.

On a mystery listserv, we’ve been discussing cozy mysteries. One point that came up was whether it is a convention of the genre to have justice served in the end. I always remember Texas novelist Elmer Kelton who said life is not tied up in pretty packages with a bow and plots should not be either. But many see that as a criterion of the genre. I think a lot about that as I work toward the end of Finding Florence.

Ona lighter note, Jacob and I were alone for dinner tonight. Days ago he rejected my idea of sloppy Joe, but I’d been waiting for a chance to cook my own special recipe (posted on Gourmet on a Hot Plate last October) and I was not to be deterred. Tonight, when push came to shove, he was hungry and asked for a sandwich. His verdict was, “Pretty good.” I asked if I can now put it back in the menu rotation and he said yes. It was awfully good—if I hadn’t burned my bun. I was more careful with his. For those who are interested, Sloppy Joe is thought to have begun in the 1930s as a "loose meat" sandwich in Iowa served by a cook named Joe. References to it began to appear in print in the 1940s. You can still get loose meat sandwiches at restaurants in the Maid-Rite chain.

 Burtons will be out for dinner again tomorrow, and I know Jacob won’t like my plan: an old-fashioned, seven-layer salad. Now that’s what I call good eating!

An absolutely nothing day

My first "outrageous cozy."

It didn’t start well, but it started early. By two o’clock this morning, I had been in bed maybe two hours and was sleeping soundly. Sophie woke me, clicking her nails on the wood floor and doing the dance she does when she needs to go outside. As I let her out, I lectured her on coming right back in—but she never does. While I waited, I booted the computer and checked something that had been on my mind. Then I sat in the doorway, hoping she’d come to me.

Instead, Christian appeared. After we both said, “What are you doing up at this hour,” we straightened out that I was up because Sophie was out, and he was up because he heard Sophie’s distinctive bark and thought something was wrong if she was out at two o’clock. Then he looked out the window, saw me at my computer, and thought that was definitely wrong. He brought Soph inside, and we all went back to our beds.

Only Sophie was desperate to go out again at four o’clock, five-twenty, and six-thirty. One time I watched to see if she really had a problem—and she did. She tried hard to throw up. Another time, knowing she gets out and won’t come to me, I put her on her leash and sat in the doorway holding the leash. Of course, she just stood there looking bewildered.

After the six-thirty adventure, we both slept until almost nine. But she is clearly not feeling well. She's turned down both turkey and Velveeta, the things I use to sneak a Benadryl into her. Although she’s not snuffling as much as sometimes, I think it must be her allergies. She’s been eating grass for a couple of days and hasn’t eaten her food. Guess who’s calling the vet in the morning. And meanwhile hoping for a good sleep tonight.

With a late start, I was just a bit “off” all day. Wrote almost a thousand words, but they weren’t my best words, did odds and ends, put on my activist hat in a couple of instances—truth is I can’t tell you exactly what I did with the day.

Jordan came out to have a companionable glass of wine while we watched the evening news. Christian was in Dallas at a get-together of his high school friends, and she was going out to a business dinner. We talked about what Jacob would eat since he would not have the tuna casserole I was fixing for myself. With homemade chicken broth and white wine and topped with crushed potato chips, it was so good I ate too much. As I was cooking, Jacob came in trying for casual and said, “Hey, what are you doing for dinner tonight?” When I said I had already offered to share my tuna, he laughed and shook his head. Pretty soon he was back, asking nicely if he could have my credit card to order a hamburger. He came in a minute ago, handed me the card, and announced he had ordered McDonald’s. I told him he’s a real class act.

The good news is that surgeons were able to align grandson Kegan’s broken leg today, under anesthesia, cast it, and secure it with pins. No surgery necessary—surgery is difficult in a fifteen-year-old because the insertion of a rod would mess with the growth plate. So Kegan is lucky, and we are all relieved. In hospital pictures, he’s got kind of a wry smile but at least it’s a smile.

And last night out of the blue I had a chatty call from my oldest grandchild—Maddie, in Denver. She’s working at an Apple genius bar and preparing for nursing school which she will start in June and which preparation is more complicated than I realized. She called just to say hello and check in. Be still my heart!

So now I’m going to tackle a few more words on that mystery. If they’re not my best words, at least they are something on paper, and I can change, edit, etc. later. I am calling the Irene in Chicago culinary novels “outrageous cozies.” Want to read my thoughts on this sub-genre I may have named if not invented? I talked about it on a guest blog today. Here’s a link: https://saraheglenn.blogspot.com/.../judy-alter...

Sweet dreams, y’all!

Color Me Done!

I have been poked and prodded, studied and examined, from head to toe—well almost. Within a very few weeks, I have been to the cardiologist, the dentist, the endodontist, the podiatrist, the ophthalmologist, and my family physician. I have worn a Holter monitor, had a mammogram, learned that my eyes aren’t as good as I thought and rechargeable batteries are no longer available for my hearing aids. I have had blood drawn and, today, a root canal. I am through, I tell you---through, through, through!

Mostly, the intensity of my medical update is my own fault. During the omicron surge, I cancelled appointment after appointment. When it comes to medical matters, I am not one to do it today if I can put it off till tomorrow. Eventually, of course, my conscience catches up with me—along with a little voice that says, “what if?”

Anyway, today was the root canal. I will not lie and say I was not nervous, because I was. Afraid of the fear and anticipation. I would not want to have the procedure often, but it was painless—just a lot of lie still, don’t move, and don’t’ swallow kind of stuff. The doctor was kind, the set-up incredibly efficient and professional—and now it is behind me. I am so grateful.

I read a blog today by an author who is a good friend. We’ve never met, but we’re Facebook friends, and we agree on a lot of things. Today she wrote about distraction in these difficult times—how hard it is to write. I really found that true these last few weeks when I was so occupied with medical matters—and dread of the root canal. All that seemed to pile on top of Ukraine trauma and global worry, for what Putin has done attacks not just Ukraine but the balance of the global system.

I think most of us, at one time or another, think what’s the point? What’s the point of putting one foot in front of the other, if the world as we know it is going to end? Oh, I’m not talking about nuclear holocaust, though that possibility looms on the horizon again as it did in the 1950s. I’m talking about a change in world order—from democracy to autocracy, Fascism, dictatorship, whatever you want to call it when a handful of the entitled rule and have all the wealth while they make life miserable for the rest of us. As a person of faith, you can’t tell me that is what God intended for our earth.

We see all the danger signs, the biggest of course being the ongoing brutality in Ukraine. But never overlook the small warning signs here at home—book banning, laws passed by the states that over-ride the Constitution and a Supreme Court that seems inclined to look the other way, the denigration of public education in favor of charter schools, the overreach into people’s personal lives, be it their reproductive life or their parenting of trans children.  It’s all very scary.

The blog I read today gave me pause about one thing: the cozy mysteries (hopefully humorous) that I write seem so insignificant, so trivial in the face of the world situation. But neighbor Mary reassured me tonight that people need the distraction, they need to escape to another world. And heaven knows, as an author, I need that other world too.

So tomorrow, I begin again after a hiatus, putting one word on top of another until, the Lord willing, I end up with a novel. It’s a challenge I’ve issued to myself.

You too, no matter what your life consists of, can put one foot in front of the other. And then contribute in whatever way you can to support the people of Ukraine, to fight censorship and authoritarianism here at home. None of us can afford to sit back in complacency.

Remember the words of William Faulkner in his 1949 acceptance speech at the Novel Banquet in Stockholm: “I believe that man will not only endure. He will prevail.”

Preaching over.

.

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.

Winter must be around the corner

 

Christian made us our first pot of chili of the Fall tonight. Yes, it’s been hot and muggy all day, not chili weather. But last week, when I first asked for it, the weather was much cooler, so much so that I had a sweater over my shoulders in the early mornings. And tonight, as I write, I hear bursts of wind followed by that calm that precedes a storm. We are under a tornado watch until two a.m., with the storms about to reach here any minute. Just heard the first thunder. As long as there are no tornados—and they should be north of us—I enjoy a good storm. Sophie not so much.

A lazy day. I took a vacation and spent much of the reading Deadly Summer Nights by Vicki Delaney. Set in a resort in the Catskills in the 1950s heyday of those resorts, this cozy mystery mixes a murder with a hint of a Communist cell, an aging diva and her daughter, an obsessed fan, a blustering sheriff, and a whiff of romance. Elizabeth Grady’s mother, the aging but still proud and glamorous diva, Olivia, inherited a resort and convinces her daughter to manage it. When a reclusive guest is murdered, it’s discovered that he was writing a book and had the Communist Manifesto on his desk. The local sheriff leaps on the idea of communists and calls in the FBI. It’s all here—the ‘50s scare of reds under the beds, the lifestyle from egg creams, cigarettes, and martinis to pantyhose and girdles, the whole atmosphere of the families who came to Catskills resorts, most of them with eastern European backgrounds and newfound wealth. Yet amidst the slightly mocking recreation of times gone, there’s a well-plotted murder mystery and just the slightest hint of romance. Along with likeable characters. I thoroughly enjoyed my lazy day. Elizabeth Grady, the no-nonsense protagonist and narrator of this book, particularly drew me, because she is one of a school of feisty, young heroines we find in mysteries these days. She doesn’t play games, romantic or otherwise, and she’s honest with herself and with others. She has a way of cutting through the folderol to get to the heart of the matter. When she orders dinner from the dining room, she describes a dish of tender fish on a bed of greens bathed in a scrumptious sauce and then says bluntly: “I hate fish.” It’s just one time I laughed aloud. I think maybe I like Elizabeth because in a way she reminds me of Henny of my Irene in Chicago Culinary Mysteries. One thing I tried for was to make Henny honest, outspoken, and not always tactful. A friend who read an early version of the manuscript of Irene in Danger said she wasn’t feisty enough, and I tried to ramp it up. I think, too, I owe some credit for inspiration to Julie Mulhern’s Country Club Murder Series where widowed socialite/artist Ellison Russell trips over bodies all the time and is open about her verbal wars with her mother who still, in the eighties, always wears pearls, a hat, and gloves. Such was country club life in the day. I remember it. The thunder and rain have come and gone quickly, but maybe there will be more during the night. Praise be if we have no hail—I worry about my herb garden, though Jordan has tried to shelter it under the eaves of the cottage. Stay safe, everyone.

 

A birthday and my week that wasn’t

 

Blatant self promotion to lead off a post about cozy mysteries
with the cover of one of my own, but Dame Agatha
doesn't need the sales, and I do.

Happy Birthday today to Dame Agatha Christie, the queen of cozy mysteries. Christie, who was born in 1890, died in 1976 at the age of 85, having published sixty-six mysteries, fourteen short story collections, six novels under a pseudonym, and the world’s longest-running play, The Mousetrap, which played in London from 1952 until 2020. In my world of mysteries, she’s like a mother figure, with a major award named after her.

For many mystery authors, the occasion of Christie’s birthday sparks a nostalgic look back at the books that drew us to the genre. No surprise that many cite Nancy Drew as their inspiration, but there was also Cherry Ames, the nurse, and Trixie Belden, detective. I remember, before that, the Bobbsey Twins and the Little Colonel Stories—no, they’re not mysteries but they were books that fed my early interest in reading. And after Nancy Drew, I was drawn to the New Orleans/Mississippi River/plantation life novels of Francis Parkinson Keyes.

Confession: I never have read much of Agatha Christie. I am not as much drawn to the British mysteries as some readers are. Sometimes, because of my love of Scotland, I try to read some of the better-known Scottish mystery authors, but they tend to be gloomy—must be all that dark and dreary weather in the Highlands. There are a few cozy mysteries with a Scottish background that I have enjoyed—the Paislee Shaw mysteries by Traci Hall (a single mom eking out a living with a yarn shop) and Paige Shelton’s Scottish Bookshop Mysteries.

What I have read and thoroughly enjoyed is a book about Dame Agatha—and the time she disappeared for two weeks. I recommend The Mystery of Mrs. Christie, by Marie Benedict.

Pretty much though, I’m a fan of American cozy series. Although some authors, more likely thriller than cozy, are finding success with stand-alone novels, the conventional wisdom in mystery circles is that you draw readers to the characters in your series so that they want to read more about them. I have read and enjoyed most of Sue Grafton’s Alphabet Mysteries, several of Margaret Truman’s mysteries, and most of Ellery Adams’ Book Retreat Mysteries. Some of my favorite series have ended—Julie Hyzy’s White House chef mysteries and her Manor House Series were both work-for-hire, and then the publisher shut them down, Hyzy did not own the rights to the characters—a blow to many readers. These days I jump with delight if I discover a Goldy Schultz book I haven’t read or a culinary mystery by Diane Mott Davidson. My current favorite series are Susan Wittig Albert’s China Bayles herbal mysteries and Ellen Crosby’s Wine Country Mysteries.  

I have some mysteries on my to-be-read (commonly known as TBR) list—Leslie Budewitz’s Bitterroot Lake, her venture into thrillers (I like her Spice Shop Mysteries and Food Lovers Village Mysteries) and Vicki Delany’s new Deadly Summer Nights, set in a Catskill resort.

 I’ll need those books because this was to be a busy week, but I am wondering if I’ve offended the gods of calendars or something. All the fun things I had scheduled have cancelled, even my neighbors’ weekly Tuesday happy hour fell through. Tonight, I was to go to a birthday celebration with three longtime and dear friends, but one thinks she was exposed to Covid and cancelled, so we postponed until we could all be together. Tomorrow I was to have lunch with Melinda, who worked with me at TCU Press and who is a special person, but her elderly mom fell and broke some bones. What was not cancelled? A trip to the Department of Motor Vehicles to get an official identification card now that I no longer have a driver’s license. Sort of like going to the dentist.

How’s your week going?                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                       

Blog dilemmas—what to write?

 

The first Kelly O'Connell Mystery
published in 2011; republished, 2016

No post last night because I had nothing to say, except maybe to jump into the political fray or the great mask hullabaloo which I generally avoid doing in the blog. I have strong feelings about masks, as you might suspect—I can sort of understand vaccine reluctance, though I pretty much view it as superstitious or stubborn—but I can’t understand all this crowing about masks and freedom. How did the two become intertwined? Your freedom ends at the point it intersects mine, or as someone put it, your freedom to swing your arm ends at the tip of my nose. There, that was more than I wished to say.

And Afghanistan: I feel strongly that the media is crucifying Biden when they should be praising him for managing the largest human evacuation in history—nearing 100,000 tonight. Yes, he and his administration made mistakes, but I am weary of Facebook experts who know just what he should have done. Truth is, even with all I’ve read, I don’t understand the complexity of the Middle East and couldn’t begin to discuss it intelligently. Questions about how many Americans are left in Afghanistan and how many Afghans we’ve been able to get out are all over the net, with a lot of accusations and misinformation. I shared a couple of informative articles on my Facebook wall. Check it out if you’re interested.

I was accused tonight of being a racist because I posted thoughts on the difficulty of getting Afghan citizens out of the country—I failed to mention women and the terrible fate that awaits them under the Taliban. Yes, I am heartsick about it, but that wasn’t what I was posting about. The subject was evacuation, and how my accuser went from that to claiming I only care about white women, never those of color, I will never understand. Here’s the funny part: I was so indignant when I read the criticism that only the first name registered, and I thought it came from someone I considered a friend. Turned out it was a stranger. Whew! Glad I didn’t jump my friend. But the huge problem of racism is not something I’ll tackle in my blog.

I did have a couple of successes today: after two days of fruitless effort, I managed to create a series page on Amazon for my eight Kelly O’Connell mysteries. Now I have to wait 72 hours to see if it really worked. But you know the satisfaction you get from figuring out a computer tech problem? That was me. And I registered a dispute with Discover over a pair of shoes for which I was charged but which never arrived. (Seriously, thirty minutes after I filed the dispute, the shoes arrived.)

I do have writing news that makes me happy—I’ve started editing the second Irene book, Irene in Danger, and I’ve reached out to editors, readers, and a designer, tentatively scheduling the publication for late October. With two books, Irene’s story is now a series, and I need a series title. You can help. My thought so far is to call each book “An Irene in Chicago culinary mystery.” That gets Irene and Chicago in there but leaves out Henny and Patrick. Still, it’s the best I can do without creating a title that is an entire paragraph on its own. Your thoughts? Comment below or write me at j.alter@tcu.edu.

I even had vague thoughts about a third book—Irene Saves the Day. Irene has been on the victim side in the first two books, so maybe it’s time for her to switch roles. And maybe Henny opens a restaurant—or becomes a chef in an upscale Chicago restaurant? I won’t get it written for over a year because I have two more major projects on my desk. But it took me that long to think about the second book, so who knows?

And those are all the things on my mind tonight. The writing and cooking parts make me happy because they are the only ones I can control. Know that feeling?

A pleasant nothing day

 

Dancing with more grace than I ever managed

Today I found a quote and two new words for the day that I want to share. That alone tells you what kind of a day I’ve had. The quote (stolen from I don’t remember who): “Reading is breathing in; writing is breathing out.”

The first word: myrmidon: “a follower or subordinate of a powerful person, typically one who is unscrupulous or carries out orders unquestioningly.” I read that guess where? In an article about people who are still promoting trump’s Big Lie, and I immediately had to look it up. Once I found the definition, it was so appropriate I couldn’t resist sharing. A lot of names come to mind, more every day as more facts are revealed.

The other word is much more personal: it’s balter. I’m not sure what context I read it in, but it struck me, maybe because it was my last name with one letter added. And then the definition really struck me: it means to dance gracelessly. I’m quite convinced that’s how I’ve gone through life—dancing, but without a lot of grace. It doesn’t bother me, because dancing is a good thing, a sign of joy.

Gracelessly makes me think of my mom who once said to me, “I wish I’d given you ballet lessons. They would have made you so graceful.” Don’t get me wrong: I adored my mother, and we were best friends for all the years until her mind slipped. But she was right. Even as a child I had no reliable sense of balance. As a young married, I had a good friend who was equally graceless, and my ex referred to us as the dance team of Ox and Klutz. I guess it’s all about accepting who you are and how God made you. It doesn’t, however, help my graceless state that right now, as I write, I have one eye on the Olympics where American women are running like gazelles.

And yes, it’s been that kind of a day: I was at my computer almost all day, and I can now see light at the end of the tunnel. I’m about to reach the end of Irene in Danger, and in the last week or so of a spurt of writing, I’ve added lots of words more effortlessly than usual. For a long time with this novel, I thought I never would get even to the 20,000-word mark. A typical cozy mystery is at least 60,000 words and preferably about 75,000. I’m now at 40,000, but I feel I’ve got a head of steam. Once I write that last scene, the real work begins—editing, expanding, filling in plot holes. The first draft of a book is sometimes sheer agony, like pulling teeth; editing and rewriting is almost pure joy.

The Covid surge is much on my mind these days. The last couple of times I’ve been out to restaurants I’ve forgotten about masks, only to remind myself that I must start wearing one again. In the Stockyard, for instance, I saw no masked, and Pru reminded me, “Not in this crowd.” But I have friends who were inadvertently exposed to someone who tested positive a day or two after they were together, so my friends are quarantining and self-testing, interspersed with professional testing, for two weeks. Would that all our citizens were that responsible and that caring for the community around them. I’m so alarmed by the people who resist vaccination, for whatever reason, that I have begun dreaming about being in a small group and learning that one of the people is not vaccinated.

We all know how the issues of vaccination, politics, and personal freedom got entangled. It traces right back to the former president. But that people still are singing that song appalls me. I think governors DeSantis and Abbott should be arrested for dereliction of duty. Wouldn’t that be a hoot—Abbott who is threatening to arrest Democratic members of the Texas Senate if they come back for the second special session he’s called (spending untold millions of taxpayer dollars). We have gotten to be such a divided, litigious, angry society that I sometimes despair that the atmosphere will ever change. But mask wearing should be above that—it’s a matter of public health, not your freedom, etc. A bit uncomfortable? There’s a wonderful graphic on the internet showing what happens when they intubate you. Don’t talk to me about freedom or discomfort.

Until this current surge is over, I will not knowingly see anyone who is not vaccinated. And I don’t intend to be shy about asking. I asked the wonderful lady who cleans my house and gets all those corners I can’t get from a walker, and yes, she has had the shots. Still, she wears a mask when she is here.

I have rambled on, but I leave you with this suggestion I saw online: what worked with enforcing seatbelts was the slogan, “Click it or ticket.” How about “Mask it or casket.”

Sweet dreams everyone and dig out those masks and put them on again.

A blog for a day with nothing much to say

I love finding new words, so here are two to increase your vocabulary:

Ever feel like tearing your hair out? There’s a word for that: trichotillomania. And here’s a word that I think is appropriate for so much around us: jackasseries—the actions of jackasses.

Which brings me to a topic that has been much on my mind and was a major point of discussion at happy hour tonight, with a surgeon chiming in: mask wearing for kids in schools. I have five grandkids going to public school in Texas this fall, and I am indignant, furious, beyond angry at Governor Abbott’s decree (as though he were king) that schools cannot mandate masks. I know teenagers well enough to know that if other kids in the classroom aren’t wearing masks, they won’t either. If they were mandated, no problem. Most would comply, and those that didn’t would be disciplined accordingly. It’s not rocket science, Greg—it’s logical medical science, and if you put your mind to it, instead of concentrating on your political career, you’d see that.

Would you believe I have two granddaughters out of high school? One recently graduated from Colorado University and I’m not sure what she’ll do this year—she’s contemplating a career in nursing. The other, her sister, is off to UCLA and said to me this weekend, “Juju, when you see me next, I’ll be a California girl.” Ha! I told her not to get carried away with the idea, but the truth is she will fit in California perfectly, and like her Colorado sister, I’m afraid she’ll never come back to Texas for more than an occasional brief visit.

But I digress. I am worried about the remaining five: they are all old enough to be vaccinated, thank goodness, but as the current surge continues, I’m afraid we’ll be back to quarantine conditions. This will hamper both their educational and social experiences, and I worry about it a lot. The FWISD, where Jacob is enrolled, reported a major drop in scholastic achievement after last year’s remote schooling. This year, so far, all the kids have to be present in the classroom, but there can be no mask requirement.

Blessings on the Houston mayor who has issued a mask mandate in defiance of Governor Abbott. Let’s see what the guv does about that.

I do realize there are other things going on in the world at large—like the Olympics, and three cheers for Simone Biles who returned to win a bronze today. I saw someplace where she said, “I had to go out there for me.” Best reason ever.

There are also things going on in my small, constricted world. Like I wrote another thousand-plus words today on the novel-in-progress and can suddenly see how it’s going to work out. A criticism I’ve heard of several of my mysteries is that the ending seems rushed, so I’m trying hard to avoid that. But I can see the plot structure—and, for me, a pantser who never outlines, that’s a great plus. What I do, often, after a day of writing is make notes on what it’s occurred to me will happen next.

Tonight neighbors came for happy hour—they had been to El Paso with their four children this weekend for the first communion of their third child, a daughter. Having lived in El Paso for many years, they were full of stories of reunions and good times. Jordan and I on the other hand shared stories of our weekend in Austin. So it was jolly—until we got to the subject of masks.

Jordan had said we would have dinner on our own tonight, so I ordered Dover sole with yesterday’s Central Market order. Cooked it tonight, and guess who ate half with me—Miss Jordan. Jacob, who had his second Covid vaccine yesterday, was asleep, and Christian was at a happy hour. Fish was good and will be the subject of my Gourmet blog this Thursday. Sort of all things fish because I have lots of fishy stories.

But tonight—back to that Diane Mott Davidson mystery that I haven’t gotten to for almost a week. Good times ahead, folks. Wear your masks and be happy.