by
Scott D. Parker
"Do you know what the difference between a saxophone and a lawnmower?" my college band director asked all of us sax players one day. "Vibrato."
We all chuckled, mostly, and then reminded ourselves that at least we didn't play the French horn. I mean, really, you know the difference between a French horn and a Scud missile? The Scud's more accurate.
More chuckles. Then the slew of "How many trumpet players does it take to screw in a light bulb" jokes. We band geeks have a ton of internal band jokes that we laugh at and no one else gets.
I thought of this the other day when I polled my fellow DSDers on a simple question: What, if any, are the differences between a traditional mystery and a cozy? If you've been reading my recent posts, you'll remember my reading and writing interests are changing (or, rather, expanding to encompass more types of stories).
While I got some good feedback, Jay raised a separate, but important, question: Do we keep talking about all of these distinctions because they're real and important, or are they real and important because we keep talking about them?
It's a natural inclination. We mystery readers like mystery books so we gravitate towards others with the same interests. We create societies, we create awards to bestow, and we have in jokes. So do the SF folks. And the romance group. And so on for just about every group in the world. It helps us feel good that we fellows who like what we like.
What about Jay's question? Does the talking about the distinctions between cozies and noir and traditional mysteries and police procedurals and hard-boiled PI stories make them real and important or are they important because we talk about them?
TV Show of the Week: "Harry's Law" I watched the first two episodes last night and I have to say that I always enjoy watching David E. Kelly character pontificate in court. And I still miss "Boston Legal."
Saturday, February 12, 2011
Friday, February 11, 2011
Ethel the Aardvark Goes Quantity Surveying...
By Russel D McLean
Today, returning from Edinburgh after attending the launch of Tony Black’s excellent new novel, TRUTH LIES BLEEDING, I found myself stuck for an hour or so in a small town waiting for the next train. I took a walk around and found myself in the local bookshop. A bookshop even locals don’t seem to know exists.
I find this strange. I know people in this small town, people who are avid readers, and they are completely unaware that this shop exists. Many of them have lamented the lack of a local bookstore – citing a long remembered indy that closed down in the early nineties when the owners retired – and do not seem to have noticed that this store has existed in their town centre for… well, a long time apparently.
The store itself is not large but it has the potential to be one of those little hidden away places you delight in discovering. But it suffers from huge problems. A lack of local publicity. And the frankly appalling stock management. I have been in this bookstore before and every time have noticed the same trends; a distinct lack of interest in local authors (of which there are a fair few, although even those advertised outside are not clearly in stock) and a shelving system that seems to be based along the lines of “lets throw it on and see what happens.” I’m not event going to mention the “feature table” that was just random books thrown on with some balanced on plastic displays. Not a shred of passion evident. Not a jot of local personality. Not only that, but to the best of my knowledge the store has no internet presence, either. And one can talk about the perils of the internet until they’re blue in the face, but the fact is you need some kind of presence on there. Not neccesarily a store front, but a presence, something that lets people know who and where you are and why they should come to you if they are in the local area.
During my recent tour of the states, the best indies I visited had much in common: they thrived on knowledge, enthusiasm and a welcoming atmosphere. They were well organised (even if they initially looked chaotic) and most of them thrived on local atmosphere. And events. Offering something chain stores and the internet could not; a chance to meet authors. This local bookstore has shrugged when presented with authors from the area in the past (Even when customers have asked for authors from the local area, they’ve been met with a shrug and a “I haven’t heard of them. What, they were in the local paper? Why would I read that?” response). In short, they were good at what they do. They were on the ball. They were part of the local community. They were supportive of authors.
This bookstore is none of these things, and it depressed me to see. In the current climate, I think that while ebooks offer a challenge to print, they are not – and some people are going to disagree with me on this – going to entirely replace them. I think that physical bookstores; by offering more than a place where one goes to buy books, by offering a hub and a face to face community* where readers can engage both each other and, yes, authors. Oh, I’m a believer in good author events, in that unique physical interaction and in the fact that a personally signed book is genuinely worth something that is immeasurable in money terms.
Yes, e-books are here to stay and probably at cheap prices that will appeal to mass buyers. But physical books and bookstores need to up their game to stay relevant. They may never have the dominance they once enjoyed (and I believe that is a shame) but they need to remain as the bastion of the joy of books and written-word storytelling, as the people who know whereof the talk, the people you go to, the people you who genuinely love what they are selling. You should want to walk in because they can offer you the kind of discussion that cannot be had with Amazon’s “recommend” system and because they can offer you a uniquely human and direct link to their product.
*at last year’s Bouchercon I was struck by toastmaster Eddie Muller talking about how face to face interaction encourages romance in the world. My interpretation of what he said was that he meant not just lovey-dovey romance, but that genuinely exciting feeling that comes with real interaction - - something that online forums cannot replicate entirely, despite presenting the illusion thereof and despite having an undeniable place in modern society.
Today, returning from Edinburgh after attending the launch of Tony Black’s excellent new novel, TRUTH LIES BLEEDING, I found myself stuck for an hour or so in a small town waiting for the next train. I took a walk around and found myself in the local bookshop. A bookshop even locals don’t seem to know exists.
I find this strange. I know people in this small town, people who are avid readers, and they are completely unaware that this shop exists. Many of them have lamented the lack of a local bookstore – citing a long remembered indy that closed down in the early nineties when the owners retired – and do not seem to have noticed that this store has existed in their town centre for… well, a long time apparently.
The store itself is not large but it has the potential to be one of those little hidden away places you delight in discovering. But it suffers from huge problems. A lack of local publicity. And the frankly appalling stock management. I have been in this bookstore before and every time have noticed the same trends; a distinct lack of interest in local authors (of which there are a fair few, although even those advertised outside are not clearly in stock) and a shelving system that seems to be based along the lines of “lets throw it on and see what happens.” I’m not event going to mention the “feature table” that was just random books thrown on with some balanced on plastic displays. Not a shred of passion evident. Not a jot of local personality. Not only that, but to the best of my knowledge the store has no internet presence, either. And one can talk about the perils of the internet until they’re blue in the face, but the fact is you need some kind of presence on there. Not neccesarily a store front, but a presence, something that lets people know who and where you are and why they should come to you if they are in the local area.
During my recent tour of the states, the best indies I visited had much in common: they thrived on knowledge, enthusiasm and a welcoming atmosphere. They were well organised (even if they initially looked chaotic) and most of them thrived on local atmosphere. And events. Offering something chain stores and the internet could not; a chance to meet authors. This local bookstore has shrugged when presented with authors from the area in the past (Even when customers have asked for authors from the local area, they’ve been met with a shrug and a “I haven’t heard of them. What, they were in the local paper? Why would I read that?” response). In short, they were good at what they do. They were on the ball. They were part of the local community. They were supportive of authors.
This bookstore is none of these things, and it depressed me to see. In the current climate, I think that while ebooks offer a challenge to print, they are not – and some people are going to disagree with me on this – going to entirely replace them. I think that physical bookstores; by offering more than a place where one goes to buy books, by offering a hub and a face to face community* where readers can engage both each other and, yes, authors. Oh, I’m a believer in good author events, in that unique physical interaction and in the fact that a personally signed book is genuinely worth something that is immeasurable in money terms.
Yes, e-books are here to stay and probably at cheap prices that will appeal to mass buyers. But physical books and bookstores need to up their game to stay relevant. They may never have the dominance they once enjoyed (and I believe that is a shame) but they need to remain as the bastion of the joy of books and written-word storytelling, as the people who know whereof the talk, the people you go to, the people you who genuinely love what they are selling. You should want to walk in because they can offer you the kind of discussion that cannot be had with Amazon’s “recommend” system and because they can offer you a uniquely human and direct link to their product.
*at last year’s Bouchercon I was struck by toastmaster Eddie Muller talking about how face to face interaction encourages romance in the world. My interpretation of what he said was that he meant not just lovey-dovey romance, but that genuinely exciting feeling that comes with real interaction - - something that online forums cannot replicate entirely, despite presenting the illusion thereof and despite having an undeniable place in modern society.
Thursday, February 10, 2011
Some Doings
So, thanks to the kind people at Needle Magazine--coughandweddlecough--I'm going to be putting almost all the old Jackson Donne stories up for the Kindle. Here's the link to check out the official announcement.
The intro was written by one of my favorite writers, Mr. Ray Banks. And Weddle got on me to write an afterword for the anthology. Here's a taste:
“Closure” is when it all clicked.
I didn’t realize it then—probably didn’t even realize it completely until I started looking over the stories for this collection. But that’s where it all started to come together for both Jackson Donne as a character and me as a writer.
What’s funny is, the story almost didn’t see the light of day. I wrote it for myself, just as a way to deal with 9/11. Like most, I had a lot rolling around in my head and I just needed to get it out. It sat on my hard drive for probably three months, before I finally showed it to someone, and finally sent it to an editor.
Before that story, Donne was just another PI. Vaguely self-destructive, but beyond that not too much to him. A regular old tough guy. But after Donne sees what another person who lost of loved one went through, he starts to change. Wake up.
I realized that the stories needed to be more about Donne, the character. They couldn’t be about Donne solving the case. They had to be about how the case affected him. “Get Miles Away” had to do with Donne trying to date again. Simple, but not really.
The anthology should be released next week. So for Valentine's Day... fall in love with Mr. Donne all over again.
The intro was written by one of my favorite writers, Mr. Ray Banks. And Weddle got on me to write an afterword for the anthology. Here's a taste:
“Closure” is when it all clicked.
I didn’t realize it then—probably didn’t even realize it completely until I started looking over the stories for this collection. But that’s where it all started to come together for both Jackson Donne as a character and me as a writer.
What’s funny is, the story almost didn’t see the light of day. I wrote it for myself, just as a way to deal with 9/11. Like most, I had a lot rolling around in my head and I just needed to get it out. It sat on my hard drive for probably three months, before I finally showed it to someone, and finally sent it to an editor.
Before that story, Donne was just another PI. Vaguely self-destructive, but beyond that not too much to him. A regular old tough guy. But after Donne sees what another person who lost of loved one went through, he starts to change. Wake up.
I realized that the stories needed to be more about Donne, the character. They couldn’t be about Donne solving the case. They had to be about how the case affected him. “Get Miles Away” had to do with Donne trying to date again. Simple, but not really.
The anthology should be released next week. So for Valentine's Day... fall in love with Mr. Donne all over again.
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