Ideas – The Writers in Residence

An Interview with Author, Maureen Jennings

By Jill Amadio

It hasn’t yet run as long as Agatha Christie’s “Mousetrap” in the West End, the theater district of London, U.K., but Maureen Jennings’ Detective Murdoch television series is well on its way to a record fourteenth year for the mystery author. A “Brummie” from Birmingham in the north of England who emigrated to Canada as a 17-year-old and now lives in Toronto, she lends her British roots to one of her three series, the World War II DCI Tom Tyler cases, setting the books in the market town of Ludlow, in the Shropshires, U.K.

“I visit Ludlow annually”, she said a few days after being honored at the 2019 Left Coast Crime conference in Vancouver, British Columbia. “I love being in Ludlow. I wanted to write the Tyler series there because of the war years, which affected people so deeply.”

Her first foray into creative writing was three stage plays, all of which were produced, although she says, at very small theaters. She then turned to books.

As one of the top and most popular mystery authors in Canada, the Jennings’ Murdoch Mysteries (titled The Artful Detective in the US) was brought to the viewing public first as three Movies of the Week and then as a television series. Set in Toronto in Victorian days, ‘When people tended to be much more aware of good manners and polite behavior,’ the crime novels number eight so far, although the TV episodes number many more. A team of six writers creates the scripts, with Maureen writing one show a season and acting as creative consultant for the others.

After ensuring that the Murdoch books were pretty well established, but still writing a couple more later, Maureen launched the private investigator Christine Morris series. Although its future as a film is currently in limbo, she notes.

Another project, a drama titled ‘Bomb Girls,’ was a concept derived from a Tom Tyler mystery and has become a TV series, written by Maureen with a partner. Thus, Maureen successfully mixes stage, screen, and literature. Indeed, she is regarded as a national treasure in Canada and has won so many literary awards in North America and in other countries, that it staggers the mind. The Toronto Star newspaper named her as one of 180 people who have influenced the history of their city through her mysteries.

So who is Maureen Jennings?

Married to photographer Iden Ford, who is also her literary agent, she has a constant reminder (at her feet) of her fictional Toronto detective. A dog called Murdoch. ‘He requires a daily morning walk, and that sets me up beautifully. I come back and can get going. In the evenings, I have less energy and usually use that time to read and do research.

As regards the books, I wanted to commune with ghosts of the past in Toronto, which has largely disappeared, and [back then] it was easier to include forensics, which was not as advanced as it is now.’

All the Brits from the Golden Age were and still are her inspiration, especially Arthur Conan Doyle and John Le Carré. ‘I have always loved reading mysteries. Fell in love with Sherlock, still am. I like the notion of two-for-one, that is, you get a good story and learn something at the same time. For me, that’s typically history, which I love,’ she said.

Maureen calls getting her first book published a stroke of luck when Ruth Calvin at St Martin’s Press took a look at her manuscript at the urging of a friend, and bought it. Since then, she has mastered just about every writing discipline: books, scripts, short stories, and poetry. Yet this woman who streams so many, many words didn’t start out to be a writer. She studied psychology and philosophy at the University of Windsor and received an M.A. in English Literature at the University of Toronto.

She turned to teaching at Ryerson Polytechnic Institute, then practiced as a psychotherapist. Maureen believes that her expertise in that field has helped her create characters that are believable and their motives credible, although keeping them straight requires making careful notes. Her latest is the PI Charlotte Frayne series, starting with ‘The Heat Wave,’ which launched in March 2019 and brings the character into contact with Murdoch’s police detective son.

Her writing process involves outlining in detail. ‘That might change in small ways as the book grows, but I have found that if I don’t do that, I waste a terrible amount of time. I know some writers say they just start off, but I couldn’t imagine that. It would be like getting in the car and saying I’m going to drive somewhere now, but I don’t know where exactly. I’m not that kind of traveler. I have to have the hotel booked.’

A lover of history and a meticulous researcher, Maureen delves into primary sources, including newspapers and Coroner and Chief Constable reports, bringing her skills in particular to one of her latest mysteries, ‘A Journeyman to Grief,’ a recounting of life in the small black community in 19^th century Toronto, much of it unknown to most of the city’s present residents.

Maureen’s biggest challenge?

‘Making sure Tyler didn’t look and sound like Murdoch. As for themes, they sort of come to me unbidden as I am researching. For instance, I was recently reading about Safety in the Workplace and how late that was in being established. That immediately became the focus of my next book, which is set in 1936.’

Any advice for first-time writers?

‘Oh dear. I know how hard it can be and how easy it is to get discouraged. But I absolutely believe that passion plus preparation leads to opportunity. I love horse racing and often think of it as a metaphor. Most of the horses and jockeys are more or less of equal ability, but the ones that win do so because they seize the opportunity when the gap opens up ahead of them and they gallop through. They’re ready. They’ve done their homework.

Also, I don’t think you should ever stop studying the craft, whether it be novels or theatre or film.’

AI as a Beta-Reader?

by Jill Amadio

Many of my writer friends are “gung-ho enthusiasts” of Artificial Intelligence, or AI. They run their projects through, often chapter by chapter, to test their writing skills.

When the results come through, there is great interest in what the non-human synthetic experts have to say. While AI is a huge help, I suppose, if we need to be assured that our style and other fundamentals of our writing are up to par, does AI also diminish our confidence in our creativity?

Why do we trust an automatic machine to judge our writing rather than a person with a brain, a soul, and emotions, muddled as they may be? Why do writers believe that feelings expressed by AI have more depth and provide more compelling characters than those from human intelligence?

Certainly, we often feel a need for support when we aren’t sure we are on the right path with our plots and settings, but research can frequently send us on fascinating journeys when we use that old-fashioned tool.

Then, too, a friend might shoot down our joy by criticizing work we’ve spent weeks creating, but at least we can open a debate with said friend to challenge their viewpoint.

I read online that writers should not wait until a first draft is completed before checking it through AI. One should pass our writing chapter by chapter or paragraph by paragraph if we want our books to sell well.

However, brainstorming with AI can be a revolving door if we rely solely on it to give us feedback with which we disagree. We already have Spell Check in our Word program, and there are also grammar sites if we are unsure. Yet, do we want that advice?

I recently edited a book for a client from Liverpool, U.K., who writes in the way he speaks, a style that is occasionally ungrammatical but beautifully reflects his upbringing in a poverty-stricken family. He writes honestly and in detail about his criminal activities before reforming and brings the reader into his world in a personal, delightfully unself-conscious and un-generated-by-AI manner. His style takes us into heartfelt statements about his culture, his bitterness growing up, and how he turned his life around.

His book doesn’t flow strategically or logically. Instead, it takes us on a journey most of us could not imagine but feel compelled to follow to its happy ending. Would AI have come up with anything as mind-blowing as this man’s true story? Granted, AI is consulted mostly for its judgment of our writing, even its relevance to a central theme, but it seems to create doubt rather than determination to follow our own path.

All of which leads to the question of who is actually writing AI’s advice and training AI, and who is instructing us with strategic decisions we are told to make. Perhaps the AI originators are best-selling authors. Maybe they are paid a royalty for each bit of AI advice activated.

I read that AI can be biased and can misrepresent your writing style. It can tell you to make changes with which you disagree, but you can’t help believing that AI knows best.

Seems to me that human creativity is one of the most perfect parts of our mind, albeit for good or evil, and that if AI flags it, then we follow patterns and look twice at what we are thinking.

It also appears that AI can figure out if you are falling into the trap of writing patterns that annoy readers or structures that don’t make sense. All of which leads us to wonder if we could be accused of plagiarism if two or three writers receive the same rewriting from AI. Maybe we need to become our own amateur detectives to discover such an activity, and instead of fact-checkers, we need to become text-checkers for artificial intelligence.

I admit that AI is an excellent tool for writers who dither and are unsure of their characters, plots, and settings. It is normal to want an outside opinion, but there can be a nagging worry that AI cannot truly understand where our plot is going, or how characters can change as we write. Taking the guesswork out of our plots, sub-pots, and themes can lose us readers for future books in our series, and perhaps even prompt an admission that we used AI as an assistant to write the book in a Disclaimer or Introduction.

In conclusion, I am honestly pleased that some of my writer friends enjoy a foray into AI. I just ask them to be transparent and honest about it.

Free Write Your Way Out of Writer’s Block

By Maggie King

Writer’s block. Many writers suffer from this condition. I used to scoff at the very idea of writer’s block, regarding it as another way for writers to procrastinate. But the creative slowdown I’ve experienced for several months has humbled me.

I’m not blocked for ideas, I have them by the dozen. The problem lies in creating a story, one people would actually want to read. My writing skills have gone on hiatus.

My solution: free writing. According to Matt Ellis in his post in Grammarly.com, “How Freewriting Can Boost Your Creativity,” freewriting is a technique in which the author writes their thoughts quickly and continuously, without worrying about form, style, or even grammar.

Mr. Ellis extols the benefits of this practice: “The benefits of free writing revolve around organization, brainstorming, and inspiration, as well as beating writer’s block and relieving certain anxieties. Just getting anything written, even if it is imperfect, can jump-start creativity.”

Author Natalie Goldberg also encourages free writing, or “first thoughts” in her parlance. In this excerpt from her classic Writing Down the Bones: Freeing the Writer Within she explains how to write first thoughts (#6 is a tough one!):

Keep your hand moving. Don’t pause to read what you’ve just written.
That’s stalling and trying to get control of what you’re saying.
Don’t cross out. That is editing as you write. Even if you write something
you didn’t mean to write, leave it.
Don’t worry about spelling, punctuation, grammar. Don’t even care about
staying in the margins and lines on the page.
Lose control.
Don’t think. Don’t get logical.
Go for the jugular. If something comes up in your writing that is scary or
naked, dive right into it. It probably has lots of energy.

Sometimes I write from a prompt (maybe not technically free writing, but who’s nitpicking?); at other times I simply write whatever comes forth. I set a timer on my smart watch for thirty minutes and go, without stopping. At first I went for ten minute sprints, but soon found that half an hour worked best. My thoughts and words flow. When the timer goes off, I pause, then go for another thirty minutes. At that point my hand needs a rest!

My free writing is turning into a memoir. Nothing organized or even chronological—whatever occurs to me ends up on the page. What occurs are often experiences from my past: family, people I’ve known, jobs held, schools attended, challenges faced. I’ve devoted pages and pages to my summers spent with relatives in a rural part of upstate New York.

It’s been an enlightening process, especially as I discover how my perspectives have changed over the years. Frankly, there are memories I’d like to keep buried, but I’ve found it liberating to get them down on paper (See #6 of Natalie Goldberg’s list above).

Since I started this process in July, I now look forward to writing each day. I can’t yet report much creative writing activity, but last week I was invited to submit a short story to an anthology. I have a great idea for a story (remember, I have no dearth of ideas) and now feel up to the challenge of actually writing it.

And now, please excuse me … it’s time to free write!

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How Do Writers Choose the Titles for Their Books & Stories?

This week the Writers In Residence members answered a “group question.”

How do you choose the titles for your books or stories?

1. Rosemary Lord: For me, titles flow as part of whatever I am writing at the time. Sometimes, the title comes first, maybe snatched from a song title or a poem. But the titles have to fit the setting, period, and essence. The title has to match the “inside” and be intriguing or evocative because it is the first thing that catches the reader’s attention.

Once, I thought a writer friend’s book titles were heavy and pretentious, a bit “off-putting.” I felt bad for her as I thought her big publisher chose them. I was going to make a “diplomatic” suggestion. Then she said SHE had come up with all her titles! Oops!

2. Maggie King: There are so many ways to choose a title. It’s not my strong suit, so I often collaborate with others. For Murder at the Book Group, my agent helped. When I re-released MABG as Death Turns the Page, my songwriter husband helped. I don’t recall how the title for Laughing Can Kill You came about, but I think “I” thought of it. For Murder at the Moonshine Inn, I brainstormed with a friend and her son. The son suggested the title based on his many visits to redneck bars (much to his mom’s surprise).

I had an easier time coming up with the titles for my short stories on my own. Maybe being “short” made the titles more apparent.

3. Madeline Gornell: I’m not being flippant, but they seem to come to me out of the blue. Maybe from dreams? Or TV? I say, don’t worry about it, they just come.” Hmmm.

4. Miko Johnston: For me, a good title hints at the theme and tone of the piece before it’s read and summarizes it afterward. Some titles came easily, like calling my short story, featuring a nameless protagonist who creates “art” By Anonymous. Others took a while to find the right title – years in the case of my series A Petal in the Wind – a perfect metaphor for my character.

5. Linda O. Johnston: I generally consider titles for any new series and the book I’ll next be working on as I’m starting to plot them. I jot them down, often on the computer, and modify them as new ideas come to me. And, of course, I anticipate that my editors will most likely modify them again once I submit them, although I do get to approve any new ones.

6. G. B. Pool: This is a fun question. When I’m pondering a new book or short story, the title almost always comes right as I’m coming up with the plot. I couldn’t tell you which came first. This is when I’m actually writing the story, not just tossing around ideas.

I have had a title before I had a plot. I mention this fact in the book of short stories I’m working on right now, called Bits and Pieces. This book is the result of several folders I keep of story ideas I’ve written down, newspaper articles I have saved, or ones a friend like Jackie Houchin has sent me over many years. These “bits and pieces” of ideas just might prompt a story. These are all fragments of an idea, and most have no title listed.

I have changed the title of a story once or twice, but that comes about only if I totally redirect the plot into something entirely different and the title just doesn’t work anymore.

One title I came across in a folder that I haven’t used yet is: “Just Shoot the Archbishop and Pass the Brandy.” All I have is the title. No story. A story may never come of it, but I mention it in this upcoming short story collection just to show how writers work. But I do think the title has to fit the story, the two coming as Siamese twins seems to work.

7. Jackie Houchin: It’s never been published, but a “woman’s fiction” book I wrote had the title of Sister Secrets. It’s about three women who have the same mother but different fathers. They each have a long-standing “secret” that has returned to haunt them. As the story unfolds, each sister’s strengths and talents help unravel and resolve the secret that is keeping another sister captive.

In my children’s short stories set in Africa I tried to make the titles be “teasers” for stories that middle-grade kids would enjoy. Dead Mice, The Eyes in the Well, and Deek’s Wild Ride were a few.

All my titles come to mind in the process of writing the story. They just fit.

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READERS: If you enjoy these “Group Questions” and have one YOU would like to ask us, please mention it in a comment below or forward it to me at Photojaq@aol.com

Remember, if you comment, first click above on the TITLE of this post. (How do writers….)

Christmas in Bangkok & Hong Kong

by Jill Amadio

I looked forward to spending Christmas in Bangkok, Thailand. We’d moved there four months earlier when my husband was posted to Saigon, and I landed a job as a reporter for the Bangkok Post.

Writing about an Asian Christmas energized me, and I eagerly looked around the local shopping districts for gifts, decorations, and seasonal goodies for the kitchen. Writing features and pointing out the differences between our holiday in England and America and our current home seemed like endless discovery.

Alas, none of these visions came to a realization. Thailand, like most other Southeast Asian countries, does not celebrate Christmas because it is Buddhist. With three children expecting to wake up early on The Big Day and rush downstairs to open their gifts, what to do?

Ah! Got it! We’d spend the holiday in Hong Kong, just an hour’s flight away. At the time, the colony was highly attuned to British customs, and the big hotels, I was assured, displayed a splendid farang (foreign) Christmas that would enthrall any Westerner. In addition to enjoying the holiday, I planned to interview hotel guests, locals, market stall owners, and tourists. Among the latter I encountered, were Swiss, German, Swedish, and Australians.

I’d visited Hong Kong several times due to assignments and visited the island of Macau to cover auto racing. There were always a plethora of stories worth reporting for the newspaper in Bangkok but I was eager to experience how stupendous this Christmas adventure would surely prove to be.

My husband and I decided it would be silly to take wrapped gifts with us, so we planned to take the kids shopping to choose their own. My editor agreed that I would write about the trip, sending in daily reports and photos taken with my Polaroid camera before we skipped New Year’s Eve and returned to Bangkok. As our last day drew near and we were anxious to return home, we booked an earlier flight.

Big mistake.

It turned out that December 31 was always a massive celebration for both Brits and Chinese, a richness of reporting I decided to cover, even though I had plenty of stories of our own excursions in Hong Kong. Besides, who wanted to miss the turn of a century in this historic city at the southern tip of China?

Our children had never been in a toy store because two were born in Spain, where Christmas was essentially a religious holiday. Our third child was born in the U.S. during a quick turnaround trip to New York and back to Thailand to ensure her American citizenship by being born in the States. My son was already pledged to fight, at 18, in any war that Spain became involved in because he was born in Madrid, but his second sister was registered as American, as by then, I had received my own U.S. citizenship.

Our shopping trip was a great success with many changes of mind as we, as parents, pointed out the mounting cost of their decisions. Finally, having selected their toys and new clothes, and I had talked to several shoppers from various countries, we returned to our hotel. It was my turn to choose a gift. My husband wanted to go out alone and buy me a watch. I told him I’d like a Patek Phillipe, please. Off he went but returned rather quickly.

“Are you insane?” he asked. “Do you know what those watches cost? No way. You’re going to have to settle for a Rolex.”

At the time, Hong Kong was turning out fake Rolexes by the thousands. Most had wristbands that looked like gold but were, in fact, made from anything but that precious metal. Aha! Another good story! In fact, the bona fide Rolex dealer pointed out our mistake when we showed him the watch we’d bought elsewhere. Never mind. The band looked authentic, and the watch itself was confirmed as the real McCoy.

The festive air in the colony extended everywhere we went through the perpetually crowded streets. I knew that more than 7 million people lived in the small British enclave, and they invaded every restaurant, bar, and all the shopping districts in sight. Antique stores added red ribbons to their vintage wares, and the buildings were ablaze with Christmas lights. Even the hotel’s small office for guest use had a small Christmas tree. Laptops didn’t exist back then, but the electric typewriters fit the bill for typing up my interviews.

After a great New Year’s Eve, the hotel manager asked if we planned to stay on for January 6, the Chinese New Year, but by then, we’d had our fill of festivities.

I returned to Bangkok with a new satchel filled with notes and an extra suitcase for the kids’ toys and outfits. In Bangkok, we had to have our clothes tailor-made as there were no ready-made stores. The upside was that a dressmaker charged $5 or $6 to create a dress, a blouse, or a skirt. I’d simply bring in the fabric, show her a Chanel photo in Vogue or another magazine, and she’d copy it.

We left Hong Kong after two glorious weeks and enough material for several follow-up feature stories in the Bangkok Post.

Now, permanently living in America, with stores brimming with seasonal cheer, I wish my dear friends and readers at The Writers in Residence a Happy Hanukah, a Merry Christmas, and a Happy New Year!

The Week I Rose Before Dawn to Write

My title is a bit misleading. In the days leading up to Election Day, I did rise in the wee hours and did write. I’m not a morning person, but for years I’ve known writers who worked on their stories before sunrise. There are certainly advantages: it’s quiet, the rest of the (sensible) world sleeps, word counts soar. But it was the election that prompted this deviation from my normal schedule.

In a moment of patriotism, I had volunteered to work at the polls as an Officer of Election (OOE) on Election Day, 5am-7pm and beyond. Yikes! I needed to “train” my system to endure such a radical change to my schedule, and that meant early to bed, early to rise. As long as I was at it, I would write.

Starting on Tuesday, October 29, I rose at 6 am for two days, 5am for two days, and 4 am for three days. I enjoyed coffee, my cat’s companionship, and worked on a short story. I read book on writing, touted as a how-to book on craft (we can always learn about craft); in reality, it was a commentary on writing, delivered in a lofty tone. It required a focus that kept me awake. I did not check my email or anything else on my computer (I wrote in longhand).

Bedtime ranged from 9-10pm, and I had no trouble falling asleep—until the night before the big day when I didn’t get to sleep until 12:30pm. That meant I had three hours and ten minutes of shuteye. Would I be able to make it through the day? As Frank Sinatra crooned, “I’m in the autumn of the year” (in more ways than one).

I did make it through, and enjoyed myself. I worked with a nice group of volunteers and the day was incident-free. The voters were pleasant and cheerful, a diverse group representing a range of ages and cultures. Interesting dress and hair styles as well. A writer’s paradise! I mainly helped them scan their ballots and handed out “I Voted” stickers. Many children accompanied their parents and enjoyed the “Future Voter” stickers. I also worked the floor, directing voters to booths, the ballot scanner, and occasionally the restrooms. Voting is at the heart of democracy and I appreciated taking a part in the process.

Would I do it again? Not likely, but it may be too soon to decide. Early voting holds more appeal, as the volunteers work in shifts, a much kinder arrangement. And it would still offer a way to pay tribute to my mother, who worked at the polls for decades.

My feelings about rising early to write: I liked seeing the sun rise and the light growing brighter and brighter. But I found it quite lonely, especially on the 4am days. The quiet was very, well, quiet. I can see the appeal, but it’s not for me.

Happy writing, whenever and wherever you string those words together. And thank you for voting!

Acting Class 101

By Gayle Bartos-Pool

If we’re lucky, we learn stuff everywhere we go in life. I did just that when I moved to California when I was twenty-five. I wanted to write for television and the movies. Me and five million other people. Since I didn’t know anything about the “business” of Hollywood, I thought it would be a good idea to take an acting class to see what writers needed to know when creating a screenplay character.

I happened to get a job working for a talent agent, and he got me in an acting class. This one was taught by Bruce Glover. You might have seen him in the James Bond movie Diamonds Are Forever. He played the sinister/funny character that was trying to kill off Bond.

What Bruce taught was when you’re playing a character, large part, small part, or walk-on, have your character do something that makes him stand out. Have a menacing smile or a delivery of your lines that has everybody notice you. Many famous actors started as bit players and went on to fame and fortune when they did something that stood out on the screen. And that doesn’t mean just having a pretty face.

As a writer, I figured that when I wrote characters, large or small, I would give them something that stood out. It might be their clothes that telegraphed what economic bracket they fell into or a whacky giggle to show that maybe their elevator didn’t go up too many floors. Maybe it’s the words they use that show their high-toned upbringing or their lack of education.

While taking that class, I had to do an improvised scene with another actor. We were to be boyfriend and girlfriend who were having problems. As the other actor and I were chatting on stage pretending we were seeing eye-to-eye while all the time pointing out the major problems we were having with the other character, I had a piece of paper in my hand that I said was the love letter he had written to another woman. I kept folding it in half, long-ways, until it looked like a knife. Obviously, my character was signaling what I wanted to do to my soon-to-be-ex boyfriend. Actions speak louder than words sometimes.
I try to give most of the characters I write that little bit extra to define them, too.

That acting class wasn’t the only one I took. I got lessons from Rudy Solari and Guy Stockwell. Both men had long careers in Hollywood. What Rudy had actors do was write a biography for the character they were playing so they knew exactly who they were when they stepped on the stage. It didn’t have to write pages and pages, just a brief background of that character, stating where he came from, how he was raised, his education, and what he wanted out of that scene.

What this did for the actor was let him know what motivates his character because in a screenplay, the writer usually just provides the dialogue, maybe how the line should be spoken like a whisper or yelling, and a few physical actions like running away or punching someone. Of course, the director will provide even more of those directions.

But the writer of a novel or short story needs to know who this character is, what motivates him, and things like his age, hair color, and stature, because when you’re writing a story, you don’t want to get to page 275 and have your twenty-five-year-old character with black hair all of a sudden be a thirty-six-year-old blond.

I write a short biography for all my main characters, adding to it as I think about what their past might have included that will help the current story angle. And I keep a Character List for everybody appearing in the story so I know who is who, and who they know, and why they’re there. It sure helps when I get to a spot and need to know all the previous things I wrote about that character like their age, hair color, or their role in the story.

And something else about those two acting classes, they gave me the confidence to get up in front of an audience when I’m talking about the books I wrote. I already know my motivation: get people to read.

Group Post #1 – How do you handle TECHNOLOGY?

Occasionally, we have an open spot on our blog schedule. One of our members suggested we all (or those able) could jump in for a group blog question. Our first was suggested by Miko Johnston.

How do you incorporate ever-changing technology in your writing, especially in a series that covers years?

Jackie Houchin — In my short stories, I use the technologies needed in the story’s time and place. I used GPS settings to find a long-buried stash in one mystery set in modern New York. In that story, the dates were firmly set by newspaper clippings. In my missionary kids’ series set in modern but rural Africa, cell service is spotty (indeed, you can’t even be sure of electricity), so I use these technologies but don’t depend on them. Actually, “no cell service” adds to the suspense of the moment when an emergency happens.

Gayle Bartos-Pool — If you write stories set in the Roaring Twenties, you might want to include a bunch of things to define that era, like telephone operators connecting you to whomever you are calling or a radio program providing music and some news. There were no televisions or cell phones back then. The automobile was new with the Ford Model T, and assembly lines were just gearing up.

Every era has its newfangled gadgets, but do they have to do more than set the stage in the story? Sometimes, too much detail distracts from the narrative unless there is one particular thing that plays a key role in your story, like the old typewriter with the damaged key and the ransom note with that same twisted letter. That’s been done before in several old movies, but it worked.

But if you are writing a contemporary tale, do you have to rely on the main character’s cell phone on every page? After a while, it gets old to have the characters pull out his or her phones rather than use their eyes and ears to see the problem at hand.

I do like gadgets, but I don’t depend on them totally in my books. My characters will use a computer, but they use their brains more.

Miko Johnston — Back in the 1990s, before I started my series of historical novels, I attempted to write a (then) present-day mystery thriller that centered around a secret high-tech device. The problem was that I knew nothing about the subject and figured what I’d made up would ring false with knowledgeable readers, so I put the manuscript aside. Twenty years later, I revisited the story and realized I knew enough about what had been developed back then to finish the story with authenticity.

I do incorporate technology in my modern work as it’s such an integral part of life now. For example, my short story, Senior High, comically follows three older women who travel to Washington, one of the first states to decriminalize marijuana. Although they haven’t “partied” since the seventies, they decide to get high one more time but can’t figure out how until Siri comes to their aid.

EXERCISING YOUR VOCABULARY

by Miko Johnston

When I think back to the dark days of the Covid pandemic, I don’t focus on the panic or the shortages. I remember the isolation. Although I had the good fortune of my husband at home and kinship through technology, I found conversations very limited. I began contacting people in my life whom I rarely saw but stayed in touch with, usually with a Christmas card, but many of my friends from the past were mired in their own woes or didn’t respond. Worse, despite having ample time to finish my novel in progress the distress kept me from writing anything…for eighteen months.

I still recall an evening at least six months into the lockdown. My husband, exhausted from yard work, went to be early. His older son called that night. In the past, I’d speak to him briefly before passing the phone to his father, but neither of us wanted to wake him. As I spoke to my stepson I began to realize how much I craved company, even if only over the phone, so what would have normally been a five-minute call stretched into over an hour. I think he, too, longed to talk, and for the same reason.

Our conversation was stilted at first, but not because of any personal reason. He and I were merely out of practice. We’d pause to think of the right word or string more than a few words together in a sentence. It took about five minutes to verbally limber up before we could chat ‘normally.’

That served as a wake-up call. From that day on, I began playing word games. It kept me entertained and, more importantly, prodded me to keep my vocabulary alive and active. Anything that forced me to plumb my memory for words (and spelling). I know many writers use writing prompts, but I wasn’t yearning to write better as much as speak better. I needed something deeper than that.

I began with Spelling Bee, a New York Times creation that gives you a ring of six letters with a seventh letter in the middle. You form words, four letters or more, that must include the center letter. I even got my husband hooked on the game; we still play it almost daily and compare our lists. Later, I added Wordle to my daily routine. You get six chances to find the five-letter word of the day – if you’re not familiar with it, you can read the instructions on the NYT website.

In both cases, trying to figure out the words stimulated my brain. Sometimes, words would pop into my head, even if they didn’t fit the puzzle. That’s when I decided I needed more stimulation and started inventing my own puzzles.

Wordle inspired a new way to challenge myself. I’d pick the first two letters of potential words and list as many as I could. I’d start with my “prompt” letters and work my way through the alphabet with the goal of reaching at least fifty words. As with my conversation with my stepson and my daily dose of word games, the more I challenged myself, the more words I could recall, and the faster they came to me.

Here’s an example:

HOW MANY WORDS CAN YOU MAKE THAT BEGIN WITH THE LETTERS:

BR——-

RULES:

Words must be at least five letters
No adding prefixes like S; ED; ING; LY; NESS to a root word of four or less letters
Only one version of the same word is allowed (ex: float OR floated OR floating)
Homographs are allowed with variations in the spelling to reflect their different meanings

(ex: score [to make shallow cuts]; score [to earn a point] becomes scoreboard)

No abbreviations
No foreign words unless they’re in common English usage (ex: pasta; rondo; bidet; pashmina)
No proper nouns
No acronyms (ex: AWOL)
No hyphenated words or contractions

GOOD LUCK!

Choosing a Theme

by Linda O Johnston

Every writer writes what they know and what they love—at least, hopefully. Sometimes, it’s also a specific genre or genres.

Of course we can go all sorts of directions in our writing as well as in our lives.

But me? It’ll come as no surprise to those of you who know me or read my stuff that I love dogs. And they’re not only important in my life. They’re important in my writing. And they’re the general theme of my writing.

I have had sixty-two novels published so far, with the sixty-second, my fourth Shelter of Secrets story for Harlequin Romantic Suspense, available starting now. It’s CANINE PROTECTION. Yes, canine. And number sixty-three, the fifth in my Shelter of Secrets series, CANINE REFUGE, will be published next year. I can’t tell you offhand how many of my books have featured dogs, but the great majority of them have.

Why? Well, they always say to write what you know, and I know dogs, and yes, I love them. My first mystery series, the Kendra Ballantyne, Pet-Sitter Mysteries, featured a tricolor Cavalier King Charles Spaniel named Lexie—the same name as one of the Cavaliers I owned when I wrote those stories. And Kendra was a lawyer who lived in the Hollywood Hills with Lexie. Yes, I was a practicing lawyer then, living in the Hollywood Hills, writing what I knew, kind of.

And right now, my first ruby Cavalier, Roxie, is staring at me as I write this. Her tricolor sister Cari is sleeping somewhere else, but she very often snoozes under my computer desk as I write.

Yes, I’m hooked on Cavaliers, but I don’t write much about them since I don’t want to overdo it with my readers. But other dogs, including service dogs, K-9s, and even pets—yes!

And including shelter dogs, like those in my Shelter of Secrets series which is ending next year. I’ve started writing the first book in a new series. And surprise, it also features dogs!

I’m always fascinated to learn why other writers write what they do—and if they also have ongoing themes in what they write.

So please comment here, you writers who are reading this. Do your stories contain any ongoing themes, and if so, what—and how did you decide to feature them?

Image by Ermir Kolonja from Pixabay