The following has nothing to do with murder mysteries, book publishing, film noir or anything else you’re used to reading about here. I’ll return next time with an article on mystery writers’ ideas and techniques. This is about the future of truth.
Where do you find out what’s going on each day, TV news, radio, newspapers, Twitter, Facebook? Increasingly the latter two choices form the foundation for how Americans understand the world. And it scares the hell out of me. Continue Reading →
When you read the plot synopsis and cast list, Kiss me Deadly, adapted from a novel by Mickey Spillane, sounds like a run-of-the-mill detective movie: A private eye finds a lost girl along on a road at night. This film, however, is really more complex.
I rented it recently because I thought it would be filled with campy fun. Turns out, some people see this as a classic noir detective yarn that ranks with the best of the genre. Continue Reading →
I just got a great idea. I’m writing the second installment of my Nostalgia City mystery series and in the middle of one chapter, my flow of words slowed to a trickle. An idea occurred to me for an exciting, conflict-packed chapter later in the book, so I stopped what I was doing and wrote the chapter I’d just thought of.
This is good example of one way to avoid ever being at a loss for words: write what you’re most excited about first. That was one of the suggestions I covered last time in this three-part series on the make-believe scourge, writers block.
Here are my final three techniques to lubricate your creativity. Continue Reading →
Nostalgia City Mysteries 