Novices and postulants, c. 1961
Here are a few of the religious celebrations this month:
My best wishes for a Happy Holiday!
(If none of these applies to you, you can celebrate the arrival of the first Pony Express in Sacramento on April 13, 1860!)
From the Metropolitan Museum of Art, a meditation for Holy Week: a painting by Childe Hassam.
Spring Morning in the Heart of the City
This is an old story, from the days of my first book, back in the ’90s, but you may not have heard it.
The Preamble
Twice a year, members of Sisters in Crime of Northern California host a “showcase” where we’re invited to read from our newly published work. One after the other, usually about 8 or 9 of us at any given event, stand behind the podium and read a selected passage. Maybe the first chapter, maybe a particularly funny or gripping section from the middle. We have 5 minutes.
Question: How many typos can you expect to find in an already printed book in 5 minutes?
Answer: I don’t know, and I certainly don’t want to find out.
To make sure that doesn’t happen, I never read from my latest release, or any book of mine that’s been published. I know I couldn’t stand it if I came across a typo and could do nothing about it. In fact, I never even open my books once they’re published. Call it Typophobia.
At the showcases, I read from a Work in Progress – that way if there’s a typo or an awkward phrase, I can fix it on the next draft.
The Incident
I guess it serves me right that one day at a signing, I came across the WBT—the World’s Biggest Typo in one of my books.
A woman bought a copy of “The Hydrogen Murder,” in hardback, from the bookseller and brought it to the table for me to sign. At least, on the outside, it looked like “The Hydrogen Murder.” The wrap-around paper cover was right, the flap copy and photo were correct.
I opened the book, ready to pen my name. But something was off. What was Simon & Schuster’s logo doing on the first page? Avalon was my publisher at the time.
I kept going, flipping pages, gasping as I went. The printer (or someone!) had put the entire text of Ray Bradbury’s “Fahrenheit 451″ between the covers of my book. I removed the paper cover and saw that the printing on the hardback spine was correct for “The Hydrogen Murder.” In the photo, you might be able to make out the flap copy (mine) on one side, and the title page (Bradbury’s) on the other.
I’m sorry to tell you that there is no resolution here—the bookseller had no idea where she’d gotten the book; no other book in her stock of Hydrogen Murders was like this one. I did, of course, keep the book, making sure the purchaser’s money was refunded. It remains in my inventory as one of a kind.
I’ve often wondered if the great Ray Bradbury ever opened one of his copies of “Fahrenheit 451″ and found “The Hydrogen Murder,” by Camille Minichino.
If so, it might not have fazed him—after all, he wrote sci fi.
Can you top that for a typo? I’m willing to relinquish my title to the WBT for a good story.
One last post during Women’s History Month.
Here’s a paperback from my shelves — this is one of those no-need-for-a-long-comment reviews.
Note the title of this series: AMY VANDERBILT SUCCESS PROGRAM FOR WOMEN (across the top), and the title of this volume, by Florence Brobeck: SERVING FOOD ATTRACTIVELY.
Inside there’s all you need to know about giving unforgettable parties—from the importance of garnishes to sections on shrimp, horseradish, lemons and limes. And, under C, caviar and celery. Recipes abound. I was tempted to try the one on spumoni until I saw that one ingredient is instant nonfat dry milk crystals. It did take the magic out of spumoni for me, and where would I even buy those crystals?
The book was published in 1966. I would have guessed 1956. I wonder if it’s still selling with a certain demographic.
Most exciting book I’ve read this year: WOMEN IN SCIENCE – 50 Fearless Pioneers Who Changed the World, by Rachel Ignotofsky.
Here’s a sample — not that you can read the text, but to show the fun illustrations. This page spread is for RITA LEVI-MONTALCINI, Italian neurologist and senator.
The biographies are detailed enough to whet your appetite; the side bars give you a glimpse into these amazing lives. Montalcini, for example, in spite of being treated badly by the Italian government during WWII, persevered in her lab work and won a Nobel Prize for Physiology and Medicine. She worked until her death at 103 years old.
Bear with me. Only two more Thursdays after this one, in Women’s History Month.
Today, I’m going to resurrect an anti Women’s History blog, or at least an anti Women in STEM blog, featuring the otherwise wonderful Angelina Jolie.
The movie was a long time ago — “Salt,” 2010. I’d like to think this scene would have a different ending today. Here it is:
A great action scene: Evelyn Salt (Jolie) is on the run from the bad guys. She’s crawling along the side of a building, several stories up, holding on for dear life. In her backpack is an adorable little dog. She slips, she recovers, she enters a window and crashes into a room where a little girl is doing her homework. She asks the little girl to take care of her dog.
What a heroine! The little girl is in awe of this wonder woman. Salt has only a few moments to spare for the child, who tells Salt that she’s having trouble with her math homework. The little girl looks at Salt adoringly, waiting for a word. We know she’ll remember the next words for the rest of her life. What an opportunity for Salt.
What message does Salt leave the little girl with? I held my own breath, waiting.
“I hate math,” Salt says.
What? Not “Let me show you. Math is fun.” or “Do your math and you’ll be like me when you grow up.” Not cool, apparently.
It’s not just Angelina. How many times have you heard the same thing — “I hate math” or “I hate physics” from the mouths of movie and TV stars? Did every screenwriter in Hollywood flunk algebra? Is this the revenge of the C student as many physicists cried out when the Superconducting Supercollider was scrapped by Congress?
Maybe we need an I Love STEM postcard campaign.
While we’re focusing on women’s history—
Earlier this week we celebrated the birthday (March 6, 1937) of Soviet Cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova, who was the first woman to travel into space. (What you missed it?)
Valentina was launched in Vostok 6 on June, 16, 1963. After 48 orbits and 71 hours, she returned to earth, having spent more time in space than all U.S. astronauts combined to that date. She was honored with the title Hero of the Soviet Union. She went into space two decades before America’s first woman astronaut, Sally Ride. She earned a doctorate in engineering and continues to work for world peace.
Once you are at this faraway distance, you realize the significance of what it is that unites us. Let us work together to overcome our differences. – Valentina Tereshkova
Here’s a list of other women in space, and a tour of a space ship.
President Jimmy Carter initiated March as Women’s History Month by designating one week, the week of March 2-8, 1880 as Women’s History Week.
Here are some inspiring images from the Library of Congress:
America’s first Suffragette parade, marching up Broadway to Union Square, New York, February 1905.
Women marching with a banner “National Woman Suffrage” at the Woman Suffrage Parade in Washington, D.C., March 3, 1913.
Photo of Solita Solana, leader of a parade on Beacon Street in Boston, 2015.
Ratified on August 18, 1920, the 19th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution granted American women the right to vote.
What good is a rant if you can’t reuse it?
Here’s my latest, on The LadyKillers blog a couple of weeks ago.
One of my biggest pet peeves in crime fiction is HEAD-HOPPING. You know what I mean – the practice of switching point of view within a scene.
I spend a good deal of time discussing POV with my writing students, and invariably one will point out a best-selling author who does this willy nilly (at random, every which way, here and there, all over the place, in no apparent order).
After I ungrit my teeth, I try to explain. And I try to find good articles on the topic. Here are a couple of favorites.
http://www.advancedfictionwriting.com/blog/2014/04/30/head-hopping-fiction-writing/
http://theeditorsblog.net/2011/09/10/head-hopping-gives-readers-whiplash/
https://ellenbrockediting.com/2013/11/26/the-difference-between-omniscient-pov-and-head-hopping/
Head-hopping is common and acceptable in the romance genre:
As Billy Bob and Sally Jo danced, he felt he was in heaven and she couldn’t wait for the last chord.
But in a romance, it’s the relationship that’s the main character, the romance matters more than either Billy Bob or Sally Jo.
Head-hopping in a mystery, however, is detrimental to the story. The best-selling author (I’ll call her P. L.) who invaded my class most recently at least plays “fair,” in that she gets into the head of every principal character except one—the killer’s, of course. So, after four or five head-hopping chapters, you can identify the killer. He’s the one whose thoughts you’re not privy to. Booo.
Another best-selling author (I’ll call him S. J.) cheats! You get into the head of every character, including the killer, but while you’re in the killer’s head, he “acts” as innocent as all the others, wondering what the killer’s motive was, how the killer managed to escape, and so on.
Both the cheating and the non-cheating versions are IRRITATING. (Yes, I’m shouting.)
Now—your turn!
Does head-hopping bother you? What does?
A clue to the cryptoquote
In keeping with my proclamation of February as mathematics and puzzle month, here’s a cryptoquote for your solving pleasure.
As usual, there’s a prize for the first 3 correct answers emailed to camille@minichino.com
AHUDMVUAVA BIDPF PQJLV BJUMC CIDPV VTUMCA; DMCUMDDIA BJ VTDF.
– EPFDA FUHTDMDI
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Apr.13,2017