Maphead?

The map I grew up with

One of the great things about book clubs is that you get to read books you’d never choose otherwise. Take “Maphead” by Ken Jennings, for example, my nonfiction group’s choice for last month. Even if I didn’t know that the author is a record-breaking Jeopardy champion, the title itself would be enough to send my eyes out of focus.

I am perpetually lost. By that I mean, even as I sit at my own computer right now, I have no idea whether I’m facing north, south, east, or west. The Cable Guy knows, and he can tell you that our stove is against the west (I’m guessing) wall. When he gestures to downtown, he really knows where to point. I just give a random wave of my hand.

I have a kind of geographic dyslexia. If the development next door ever takes down its sign, I’ll have trouble finding my house. Really. Or, say I go into the women’s lounge in a department store. Unless I memorize the way back to the mall, I’ll never find my companions again. Or I’ll be stuck in the janitor’s closet.

Some people set themselves geographic challenges, like setting foot in every state, climbing every peak, or sliding down every valley. I have (fanatic) friends in Boston who are completing the task of seeing the Red Sox play in every ballpark in the country; another family I know has visited every continent, even the one where it looks like you have to jump over a whirlpool to get there.

“Maphead” mentions a few other self-imposed challenges, like a guy who has been to every Starbucks in North America – 8500 of them! That’s a lot of foam.

No wonder I feel so comfortable in a fictional city that I make up. In Gerry Porter’s small town of Lincoln Point, California, there are no freeways, just two main streets and one large intersection. I can mark N, S, E, and W right on the sketch I’ve made and take my time figuring out which direction the cars are going in the big chase scene.

It’s not like on the California freeways where you have a nanosecond to read a sign and decide whether you want to go south to San Jose or north to Sacramento, when what you really want to do is go to Hayward.

I’ll admit to being one of Jennings’s “cartographically clueless who can get lost in a supermarket.” Never mind that I got A in solid geometry; apparently I’m failing spatial thinking.

I did get a little annoyed at a recent report that ridiculed the something like 60% of the people in a survey who think Africa is a country. Isn’t it a little unfair to use that test for intelligence? I’ll bet a lot of people think there are only 3 laws of thermodynamics, too.

The Cable Guy says I could learn geography if I wanted to. He’s right, but I’m not much for the outdoors anyway, so why bother? All the hallway intersections in my house have signs on them, so I’m set.

100 blogs


This is my 100th post, beginning with my Welcome message on June 15, 2010.

It seems I should do something special—if it ends in 0, it’s important, right? Reaching 10 years old, 20 games won, 100 pushups, 30000 hamburgers sold. The 50th anniversary, the top 40 songs..

If I look at it purely from the point of view of numbers, I’m fascinated. For example, 100 is the smallest number whose logarithm is a prime number (2). Most currencies are divided into units of 100, and there are 100 tiles in an English language Scrabble game.

And now, 100 blogs at The Real Me.

But important milestones make me nervous. Too many expectations for the perfect birthday party or the most welcome Valentine’s present. My mother was right to fling her Mothers Day card at my father.

“You should have just given me the 25 cents,” she’d say, a sentiment that she shared one holiday after another.

But I can do better. I can celebrate 100 blogs with a list of 100 favorite quotes. In no particular order, observations of life and its trappings:

1. There are some people who, if they don’t already know, you can’t tell ‘em. – Louis Armstrong

2. You can’t get spoiled if you do your own ironing. – Meryl Streep

3. No man has a right to monopolize more than he can enjoy. – Percy Bysshe Shelley.

4. I am one of those who think like Nobel, that humanity will draw more good than evil from new discoveries. – Marie Curie

5. Some day a real rain will come and wash all the scum off the streets. – Travis Bickle

6. If there’s a fork in the road, take it. – Yogi Berra

7. For justice, we must go to Don Corleone. – Bonasera, in The Godfather

8. I am at two with nature. – Woody Allen

9. Never wound a snake; kill it. – Harriet Tubman

10. Oh, life is a glorious cycle of song,

A medley of extemporanea;

And love is thing that can never go wrong;

And I am Marie of Romania

– Dorothy Parker

I made it to √100. That will have to do for now. Except for

11. I’ll make you an offer you can’t refuse (paraphrasing Michael Corleone):

Add your favorite quote and be eligible for a signed copy of any of the books by Camille Minichino, Margaret Grace, or Ada Madison.

Trip Report

I may have mentioned before how I love New York.

This photo is a demonstration. Here are the stats behind the photo:

1. NO SLEEP. We (Ann Parker and I) had just gotten in after a completely full red-eye flight across the country. I can barely sleep well in my special sleep-number bed, let alone sitting in a “cabin” at 30000 feet, so I’d watched reruns of L&O all night.

2. NO FOOD. Unless you count a bag of blue potato chips and mushed peanut butter crackers.

3. NO ROOM at the hotel. Coming in so early in the day (7 am), we couldn’t check into our room; therefore:

4. NO SHOWER/NO CLEAN CLOTHES.

With all that, do I look unhappy? No. Because I’m sitting in a coffee shop above Grand Central Station, a few blocks from the New York Public Library, where a waiter will take my breakfast order and deliver in a New York minute (it won’t matter how long it takes, it will still be a New York minute.)

Now, here were the options open to us while we waited for a room:

1. Hit the sidewalks with some of the 51.5 million visitors expected in 2012.

2. Spend some of the $34 billion expected of visitors in 2012.

3. Fondle the ticket I had in my pocket, to DEATH OF A SALESMAN with Phillip Seymour Hoffman for the next day. (Outstanding, by the way.)

4. Hop in one of the 13,247 licensed taxis and head for one of the 60 museums in Manhattan alone.

5. Hug one of the 600,000 street trees (or the 2 million in parks).

6. Settle in at Lily O’Brien’s Chocolate Shop on E. 40th (We have a winner!)

So began a great trip that included MOMA, the Met, and MWA’s Edgars banquet.

One final thrill as we sat on the runway at JFK, heading for the Malice Domestic conference in Bethesda: we caught a glimpse of the Enterprise flyby on the back of a 747.

Click for a quick view:  IMG_0633

New York never disappoints.

Guest Blogger: Marian Allen

While I relax (!) in New York City for the week, I’m leaving you in the capable hands of MARIAN ALLEN. Thanks to Marian for visiting!

When One Genre Just Isn’t Enough

I’ve never made a secret out of the fact that FORCE OF HABIT began life as a Star Trek (the original show) spoof with a side order of THE PRINCE AND THE PAUPER.

Beginning with the writer’s magic words, I asked myself WHAT IF some of the crew beamed down to an alien planet — I called it Llannonn — for shore leave and a crewmember switched clothes with a native (humanoid, of course) and was kidnapped in that person’s place? The expendability of crewmembers was a running joke among Star Trek fans, but this was supposed to be funny, so there would have to be pressure applied somewhere to make her (of course her) retrieval necessary.

Get the local police involved. Police on an alien planet, with an alien justice system.

Sufficiently involved for a short story.

When I decided to turn it from a piece of short fan fiction into an original novel, characters morphed from Star Trek caricatures into themselves and the story line sprouted subplots like a seed potato sprouts … well … sprouts.

If it were a Star Trek novel, I reasoned, the Klingons would get into the act, since the Klingons were the stock villains in the original show. So I had a gangster and his henchmen. They were from the planet Stokk. Yes. Stokk villains. No, I have no shame.

I brought the local police into the story right at the beginning, turning Pel Darzin from a bit character into a lead.

I’ve since given him a story of his own, co-starring in “By the Book”, a short story I wrote to help promote FORCE OF HABIT. It’s free at Smashwords. I also ran a contest for the right to name a character in that story, and the winner, Holly Jahangiri, ended up as the other co-star. She and Darzin are appearing again together in a story I’m currently working on, “Surviving the Book”.  

But I digress.

I had written several Star Trek spoofs set on Llannonn, in which I explored various areas of the planet, so I used the culture I had developed in those to enrich the action in my novel. (I may, if nobody stops me, turn those stories into novels, too.)

As you see, I didn’t exactly intend to write a cross-genre novel. That’s just the way the story grew. Organic. Kind of like the stuff on the floor of the stable is organic.

Or, as they say on Llannonn, “You can herd pratties or you can have clean boots, but you can’t do both.” {The Real Me notes: I LOVE that line!}

Marian Allen was born in Louisville, Kentucky and now lives in rural Indiana. For as long as she can remember, she has loved telling and being told stories. She writes science fiction, fantasy, mystery, humor, horror, mainstream, and anything else she can wrestle into fixed form.

Allen has had stories in on-line and print publications, on coffee cans and the wall of an Indian restaurant in Louisville, Kentucky.

She is a member of the Southern Indiana Writers Group.

Allen is active in the Friends of Harrison County Library, Woman’s Literary Club of Corydon and Community Unity, which promotes diversity appreciation and non-violent problem solving.

She posts at the group blog Fatal Foodies on Tuesdays and monthly on The Write Type, That Book Place and Echelon Exploration.

Book Blurb: The planet Llannonn is known for its courtesy, but when rebellious space academy professor Bel Schuster goes off-limits during shore leave she uncovers the iron fist inside that velvet glove.

FORCE OF HABIT , $0.99:

http://tinyurl.com/ma-foh-Kindle

http://tinyurl.com/ma-foh-Smash

“By the Book” is free:

http://tinyurl.com/ma-btb-Kindle

http://tinyurl.com/ma-btb-Smash

A Writer’s Wardrobe

I’m always happy when a reader asks a question that takes a whole blog to answer! So thanks, reader and friend Bob for asking.

Here’s a selection of the pins I wear to conferences and book events. Oh, and around town.

1. For the Gloria Lamerino/Periodic Table Mysteries, I wear the same pins Gloria does in the books. These include a collection of “element” pins, sold by the American Chemical Society, and various  ”hi-tech” pins. Pictured here is an old reel-to-reel tape recorder. We also have a nuclear reactor, a TV color bar, a power supply, and lots of tools. (Scale: the element pins are about 1/2-inch square.)

2. For the Miniature Mysteries, I have this pin identifying me as a member of NAME, The National Association of Miniature Enthusiasts.

3. For the Professor Sophie Knowles Mysteries, I wear this crossword puzzle pin with a Victorian flavor.

Because today is Patriots’ Day (no matter that they’re already marathoned), I’ll be wearing my Commonwealth of Massachusetts pin. Alas, it’s too small for me to capture a clear image, so this will have to do: an interactive map of Paul Revere’s ride.

HAPPY PATRIOTS’ DAY!

What Would a Luddite Do?

Colorful quilt raffled at LCC.

Conferences are visually stimulating. Wherever you look, you’ll see eye-catching signs, flyers, and posters. Tables are strewn with bookmarks and postcards of book covers.

Many authors wear signature dress: One writer wears a baseball cap with an array of the small logo pins given out at every conference. Another wears a fedora, still another wears a cowboy hat and silver-studded clothing. A famous Scottish writer usually arrives in kilts.

Buttons are another favorite way of attracting attention. At Left Coast Crime in Sacramento last month, waiting for an elevator, I saw a large, obviously homemade button. A woman wore it on her lapel: LAST LIVING LUDDITE.

I peered at the button and smiled. “That can’t be you,” I said.

“Yes it is,” she said, head held high. “I don’t have a cell phone. I don’t email or text. I’m not on Facebook—”

I had to interrupt. “So, you’re not in line for the elevator?”

She looked confused. “Of course I am.”

But this was a very smart lady. I could tell by her concentrated frown and thinking-cap expression that she knew where I was headed: Real Luddites don’t ride elevators.

“I guess you didn’t drive or fly here, either?” I continued.

The elevator came. The lady turned and walked away. I wonder if she used the stairs or simply took the next car, where she’d be free of annoying questions. (I know, I can be annoying when all I’m looking for is a decent argument. I don’t even need to win; just pummel me with reason.)

I wish the lady had stayed. I love hearing about people’s attitudes toward technology, where their thresholds are. For the mysterious button lady, it seemed she embraced the mechanics of transportation, but not communications devices. I wonder if she owned an “old-fashioned” telephone. Mostly, I wondered what her reasoning was.

A Village of Writers and Readers

Breakfast with members of the LadyKillers blog

I’m just back from Left Coast Crime, an annual mystery convention that takes place somewhere west of the Hudson River every year. One year it was as west as Hawaii; another year it was as east as Bristol, UK (? the west coast of England ?); and next year it’s in Colorado Springs.

Last week, we met in Sacramento, California. About 600 writers and readers gathered for nonstop schmoozing, paneling, snacking, and book shopping.

This wasn’t the first conference that laid to rest one of my fears when I thought of writing as a career: that it would be a solitary occupation.

I’d been a physicist for a long time. No one does physics alone, not since Newton, anyway. Who can accommodate something like a 17-mile-long tunnel to house a collider, or a 192-beam laser, in her garage?

Physicists gather around huge equipment in giant laboratories these days, working as a team. My graduate school mates and I spent long hours together in the same laboratory every day, sharing power supplies, evil-mentor stories, and data. We became close friends and knew each others’ families as well as our own for a few years. Decades later, we still get together for reunions.

As much as I wanted to be a writer, I couldn’t imagine sitting alone in a room with pen and paper, or keyboard and monitor, pouring out my thoughts and plots, in solitary confinement.

What a relief when I discovered that writing—mystery writing especially—was a community endeavor. I discovered not only professional organizations and critique groups, but book clubs, conferences, Internet lists and groups, and blogging colleagues. Who knew?

In case you missed them elsewhere, I’m posting some photos from the conference, including one of me with Dick Lupoff, a friend and veteran writer.

"Loft" of dollhouse offered at the LCC live auction. The toy police car, front & center, is about an inch long.

Dollhouse crime scene. The weapon is an actual ("life size") candlestick from Clue.

Mix-up in Miniature

Another month, another book.

Next Monday, April 2, my 16th mystery, the 6th in the Miniature Mysteries series, will be released. In Mix-Up in Miniature by Margaret Grace, Gerry and the precocious Maddie solve the murder of Varena Young, a bestselling romance novelist and avid dollhouse collector.

I’m in the middle of a 2-month-long blog tour. If anyone tells you they’re easier than road trips, they’re holding back the whole truth. Sure I can tour in my slippers, but writing new material nearly every day is a lot like a job. There are organizational challenges like finding a host site, submitting copy enough ahead of time, monitoring comments on the day of the post, shipping giveaways . . .  it makes boarding a plane or cruising along on a freeway seem like a breeze.

Blogging shoes

But there’s no question that blog tours allow one to “meet” more people, make connections that wouldn’t be possible face to face, and save wear and tear all around. My website has the full tour schedule, with links to host sites, should you want to hop on the cyberbus.

Zip it

Our local post office is small, and a bit rundown. The “carpet” is as thin as a Forever stamp and there are no soundproofing tiles on the walls or ceiling. It’s a good place to scream, if you need help and want paramedics to come running.

But when the scream is from a child who’s been led to believe that all the world, indoors and out, is a playground, I’m the one who needs medical-grade earplugs.

The perp the other day was a 4-year-old (I’m guessing here) who chose to use a stanchion as an exciting new piece of playground equipment.

“Look, Mommy,” she screamed, in sync with the noise the pole made as the rope clamp banged into it every 180 degrees. “I’m making circles.”

I suppose I should have been happy about the geometry reference, but what was decidedly unhappy-making was Mommy’s reply each time.

“Good job, sweetie.”

Good job? It’s my current least favorite phrase. Take a walk through a suburban mall and count the number of times you hear “Good job,” from a mother pushing a stroller or providing personal care in a restroom. The inspiring act can be a slurp from a sippy cup or a—well, let’s not get too graphic about the good jobs in the Ladies Room.

In my day (this is a historical blog) “Good job,” if it was heard at all, referred to handing over a week’s babysitting, lawn-mowing, or paper-route money to “Mommy,” or washing and waxing the linoleum floor.

Times have changed, and now otherwise lovely, intelligent young men and women thrill at their child’s every move and sound, even if it’s a long sequence of screams in a public place.

I understand why “Stop screaming or I’ll kill you,” has gone out of favor, but can’t we at least resurrect “Stop screaming?”

Side note: I did some research to be sure I had the right definition of “stanchion,” and look what I found under “images.”

Hmm. Maybe I can sell this idea to the post office.

Rewriting Our Stories

Now and then The Real Me invites a fellow writer to share thoughts and perspectives. This week, I’m honored to have my good friend Alfred Garrotto join me. Al is at the top of my list as a man of faith and a tireless contributor to the education, spirituality, and well-being of the people around him.

Inviting Readers to Rewrite Our Stories

by

Alfred J. Garrotto

author of
The Saint of Florenville: A Love Story

As an author of fiction who writes for publication, I hold my stories lightly when I share them with my readers. I try not to be too possessive or caught up in “will they get it?” It has taken time, but I have come to understand that no two persons reading the same book will read it the same way, let alone imbibe the author’s precise intent. The same is true of film and the performing arts. No two movie goers interpret the same film in exactly the same way.

I’ve known this all my life as a reader and film lover. Now that I am on the other side of the artistic process, I am aware that I must let readers ‘rewrite’ my novels, find their own interpretation, and apply them to their own lives. I am no longer caught up in whether they “get” my story. Once out of my hands, it becomes their story.

The following “Aha!” passage in Misquoting Jesus by Bart D. Ehrman made this insight click for me: “Once readers put a text in other words, they have changed the words. This is not optional when reading; it is not something you can choose not to do when you peruse a text. The only way to make sense of a text is to read it, and the only way to read it is by putting it in other words, and the only way to put it in other words is by having words to put it into, and the only way you have other words to put it into is to have a life, and the only way to have a life is by being filled with desires, longings, needs, wants, beliefs, perspectives, worldviews, opinions, likes, dislikes—and all the other things that make humans human. And so to read a text is, necessarily, to change a text” (the underline is mine).

Now, I look forward to readers’ interpretations of my stories. I especially enjoy having someone discover a level of meaning beyond my conscious intent. Recently, I received this message in an e-mail from a reader: “The value of The Saint of Florenville: A Love Story is in it’s real life application to modern-day sainthood. In their day, all of our martyred saints’ lives (and deaths) would have been every bit as gruesome.  In a sense, not to die and to live through it, may be even more brutal to the human spirit. Yet these two saints do survive.” That’s more than I had in mind when I wrote the book, and I am grateful to this reader—and others—for helping me to better understand my own stories.

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Alfred J. Garrotto blogs at “The Wisdom of Les Miserables” (http://wisdomoflesmiserables.blogspot.com)