Bouchercon - Day 1 (Thursday)

Another Bouchercon - my third - is in the books. This year's event was held in New Orleans, which is my new favorite place on the face of the earth. If someone could have just shipped Sophie to me, I could have just moved into that hotel room permanently. I didn't even mind the god-awful humidity. It feels weird to know that I've already been home for three weeks. Mentally and emotionally I'm still back in Louisiana. Get this girl some gator bites.

One of the great things about this year's Bouchercon was that instead of packing the book bags with random books as they've done in the past, everyone got to pick six books from the "book bazaar", many of which were from authors who were appearing on panels. It was hard to pick just six, there were so many good ones available. But good idea, not to mention it probably saved the volunteers tons of time not having to pack the bags.

Here are my Thursday panels:

Hank to Hendrix: Beyond Chandler and Hammett
Peter Rozovsky (moderator), Martin Edwards, Gary Phillipe, Eric Beetner, Rick Ollerman

The panel was asked to discuss writers who are not as well-remembered as say, Chandler and Hammett, but who in their opinions should be. Here are their picks and reading recommendations:

Beetner: William P. McGivern - An Edgar Award winning author whose novels were turned into great noir films, including The Big Heat with Glenn Ford. Later, McGivern wrote for TV shows including Adam-12 and Kojak. Also recommended: Shield for Murder, Odds Against Tomorrow.

Edwards: Michael Gilbert - A prolific British author of crime and spy novels, as well as numerous short stories. He was a lawyer and did a lot of his writing on his commutes to and from work. Ironically, Raymond Chandler was once a client of his. Recommended: Smallbone Deceased, Death in Captivity.

Ollerman: Peter Rabe - Fled Nazi Germany and landed in the United States as a teen. In addition to his crime novels, he also wrote a couple episodes of Batman. He was once misdiagnosed with terminal cancer (he was accidentally given another patient's diagnosis). His take on noir: "You start out screwed, you end up screwder." Recommended: Kill the Boss Goodbye, The Silent Wall.

Phillips: Clarence Cooper, Jr. - An African American author whose stories revolved around Black American life at the time, especially in regards to  violence, drugs and jail, the last two of which Cooper was well acquainted with. He started out as a newspaper editor, but his heroin addiction landed him in prison, where some of his books were written. Unable to get a handle on his drug problem, he died in his mid-forties, destitute and strung out. Recommended: The Scene, The Farm.


Guest of Honor Harlan Coben interviewed by Michael Connelly

Connelly interviewed Coben in front of a packed house. Coben is the author of thirty novels, plus he is also the creator of a British series called The Five. His bestseller Fool Me Once is in development with Julia Roberts attached, with Coben writing the script. Some other things discussed:

• Personal loss is influential in his writing due to his own experiences. By age 32 he had done seven eulogies, including his parents and a three-year-old niece.
• He doesn't outline. 
• He doesn't write for the market and doesn't recommend it.
• On what he is going to do next: "I'm gonna write a book."

One More Time: Character on the Screen

Lee Goldberg (moderator), Nina Sadowsky, Burt Weissbourd, David Morrell, Alexandra Sokoloff, Phoef Sutton

Goldberg has been at almost every book event I've attended the past few years, and he's always entertaining. In fact, I just saw him at Writers' Police Academy in August. Despite the title of the panel, they discussed adaptation more than seeing their characters brought to life.

• Panelists offered best adaptions in their opinion (movies at least - if not better - than the books): Jaws, Terms of Endearment (six separate characters in the book were combined into the one played by Jack Nicholson), Silence of the Lambs, The Godfather, The French Connection, Psycho.
• Sokoloff: Find 6 to 8 things that are key to the story and keep those. Think of scenes that a reader would expect to see in the movie trailer. Sutton: Find the main set pieces.
• Sadowsky: The more successful the book, the less you can change in the adaptation because of reader/audience expectations - she gave the Harry Potter books as an example.
• Morrell, the author of First Blood, talked about how his book became a series of movies that took on a life of their own. First Blood - which has never been out of print - introduced the character of Rambo, who would later be played by Sylvester Stallone, and Morrell talked about how the tone of his story was changed quite a bit in the process of being adapted for the big screen (not to mention that Rambo dies in the novel, which didn't go over well with test audiences).
• Goldberg related the story of meeting with a studio executive to discuss his book The Walk. The main character in The Walk is a male TV executive who has to walk from Downtown Los Angeles to his home in the San Fernando Valley after a major earthquake. The executive wanted to change the main character to six midwestern cheerleaders and the quake (too cliche) to a flood. Goldberg passed.

Can't You Hear Me Knocking: Social Media and Promotion

Sarah Williams (moderator), Cara Brookins, Tess Collins, Jennifer Kincholoe, Maddee James

How to navigate the internet, social media and self-promotion as an author was the focus of this panel. Some of the advice:

• Don't depend on social media sites to manage your readership. Direct traffic to your website - you own your mail list. Your website should be the hub of your online presence. 
• Run your online presence like you're running for President.
• Think about interaction and community, not just your sales pitch. 
• When responding online, make it count. No "LOL", "Thanks" or "Heh".
• Publishers will take notice of how many followers you have.
• Pay for a professional profile photo, logo and website design.

Dead Man's Party: The Realities of Death Scene Investigation

Ayo Onotade (moderator), Jan Burke, Alistair Kimble, DP Lyle

• Burke, in addition to being an author, is also the founder of The Crime Lab Project, which is trying to bring awareness to the fact that most crime labs aren't well-outfitted like the ones you see on TV. A lot of them are underfunded and backlogged (especially in terms of DNA samples waiting to be tested for rape and murder cases) and The Crime Lab Project is working to correct that. D.P. Lyle, who I blogged about here (and whose expertise I called on again when editing my LAst Resort story) is also involved. Burke and Lyle also do the highly regarded Crime & Science Radio Show podcast. 
• Lyle and Kimble (who is an FBI Special Agent) joked about the "CSI Effect", the phenomenon of the public believing that crime scene investigation, crime labs and other aspects of crime investigation are what they see on TV. It becomes a problem when viewers end up on juries and wonder why real-life doesn't imitate art.
• Kimble's FBI forensics team worked the Aurora, Colorado theater shooting. Their crime scene was covered with popcorn along with brain matter, and inside the theater it was hard to tell the difference. As a result, a number of people on the team can no longer bring themselves to eat popcorn.
• Burke: DNA is a great tool. A sample the size of a dot from a pen on a piece of paper is sufficient to test. 
• Kimble was asked how his bosses at the FBI feel about his writing fiction. The FBI requires its employees to get permission to take on any additional employment and don't usually give it, but because he can write on his own time he gets a pass. They do review all his manuscripts. He joked that the FBI's 3-day turnaround on his work is faster than most editors.
• Lyle on being the difficulty of being writer: "After sixteen books, there's still that 50,000 word panic, like you don't know what you're doing, you're a fraud, this is horrible, why are you doing this, go kill yourself. Happens every time."

It was a long day - Friday was a bit more sane and is up next.

Number 14 I will definitely use

24 Pictures That Will Forever Change the Way You Eat Food.

If this works I will attain Avocado Master Ninja Status.

10 Things Only HGTV Addicts Understand

I don't really consider myself an HGTV addict, except when my Mom comes over to the beach for a few days to escape the periodic heatwave, and then it's all we watch because it's really the only TV viewing we have in common now that Downton Abbey and Poirot are done. And then it's hours and hours of Chip and Joanna and people with totally unrealistic expectations and those twin brothers who are simultaneously hot and kind of creepy. I don't know how they pull that off. Probably a twins thing.

But even with my rare HGTV binging, I totally got this: 10 Things Only HGTV Addicts Understand. The whole thing nails it, but here are a couple of my favorites:

Favorite lines include: "Oh, we'll just knock down that wall." "Let's just add a second story." "We can just move the bathroom to the first floor." "What do you mean load-bearing?" "Can't we just take it out?" "Oh my god, that carpet is hideous." "I can't live in a house with that color." 

The tears you shed knowing you could buy a home in Waco for next to nothing. CHIP AND JOANNA, WHY DO YOU TORTURE ME?

No kidding. Why does it have to be Waco? Why can't it be the beach here in Southern California, or the French Quarter in New Orleans, or Hawaii, or some other place I'd actually be open to living in? I know people with higher car payments than what some of these people are paying for their mortgages in Waco.

That feeling you get when you correctly guess which house they'll buy on House Hunters.

I have to say, House Hunters is pretty addictive, especially when they're in areas I'm either familiar with or would be open to living in. And then it becomes personal.

Whoever put this list together knows their HGTV shows. Check it out and H/T to Veranda on FB for the link.

Words of Wisdom: New Orleans edition

Don't you just love those long rainy afternoons in New Orleans, when an hour isn't just an hour - but a little piece of eternity dropped into your hands - and who knows what to do with it? --Tennessee Williams

New Orleans gets right into your bones and into your blood. --Toni McGee Causey

What happens in Vegas may stay in Vegas, but what happens in New Orleans goes home with you. --Laurell K. Hamilton

New Orleans is unlike any other city in America. Its cultural diversity is woven into the food, the music, the architecture - even the local superstitions. It's a sensory experience on all levels and there's a story lurking around every corner. --Ruta Sepetys

In America, I would say New York and New Orleans are the two most interesting food towns. In New Orleans they don't have a bad deli. There's no mediocrity accepted. --Mario Batali

New Orleans lives by the water and fights it, a sand castle set on a sponge nine feet below sea level, where people made music from heartache, named their drinks for hurricanes and joked that one day you'd be able to tour the city by gondola. --Nancy Gibbs

And you find as a writer there are certain spots on the planet where you write better than others, and I believe in that. And New Orleans is one of them. --Jimmy Buffet

Baking humor

Courtesy of I'm Not Right in the Head on FB.

September Words of Wisdom

Stop doing four screenplays at once. Do one at a time and address the problem. --Ridley Scott

There are only two ways to live your life: One is as though nothing is a miracle; the other is as though everything is a miracle. --Albert Einstein

One who possesses hope is forever young. --Daisaku Ikeda

If you are always trying to be normal, you will never know how amazing you can be. --Maya Angelou

You, yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe deserve your love and affection. --Buddha

First, find out what your hero wants. Then just follow him. --Ray Bradbury

Fill your paper with the breathings of your heart. --William Wordsworth

Writing is a demanding profession and a selfish one. And because it is selfish and demanding, because it is compulsive and exacting, I didn't embrace it. I succumbed to it. --Rod Serling

Drinking is another way of living. It gives you two lives instead of one. --Charles Bukowski

Weight Watchers humor - When beautiful losers weigh in

After missing four weeks (two of which were spent traveling to and from New Orleans and one of which was a Monday holiday), I finally returned to my Weight Watchers meeting this week. And despite every effort to eat anything and everything alligator, red beans and rice, white chocolate bread pudding and beignet while in NOLA, I weighed in this week at exactly the same number as I did last time I went in. So I was pretty happy about that. Definitely a "no news is good news" situation.

Weighing in can be an art form for members of Weight Watchers. Anything that can add so much as a fraction of an ounce may be shed before stepping onto the scale, and that subject came up during this week's meeting and it was hilarious. Attendees admitted to everything from removing earrings to having weighed their clothes at home to find out which outfit weighs the least (and becomes their official, weekly WW uniform). Since we're big girls, most of us have underwire in our bras and so sports bras often get worn to meetings because apparently they weigh less than our everyday bras. A lot of us, myself included - won't eat or drink anything before weighing in. That's a big reason why I attend a 9:30am meeting and bring a protein shake with me that gets opened as soon as I sit down after weighing in.

Our meeting leader, who has been a member of Weight Watchers since the 1980's, regaled us with stories of weighing in at her meetings in New York City, where she lived at the time. Her co-workers always knew when it was Tuesday (her weigh-in day) because she wore the same outfit, a light silk blouse with a light silk skirt, because it was the least heavy outfit she owned. If the weather was bad, she simply wore a heavy coat over it. She also told us that the Weight Watchers in NYC had signs at the scales forbidding members from completely undressing, because apparently people would do that. She also had it happen once here when weighing someone in and had to tell the member that no, she wasn't taking her clothes off.

I'm pretty low maintenance, just a pair of jeans, a light shirt and flip-flops, the latter of which get kicked off before I get on the scale (everyone takes off their shoes). I figure it will all even up over time. I don't wear heavy jewelry, but I do always have two toe rings on these days (one from Hawaii and a new one from New Orleans) and now I can't stop wondering what would happen if I took them off and put them on a scale. After all, WW does count our weight and more importantly our weight loss, down to tenths of pounds...

Hmmmm. The jewelry thing doesn't sound so crazy after all.

ACCEPTED!!!

To the UCLA Extension TV Writing Certificate Program. Which is all on waitlists now. So maybe in January kids.

In the meantime, I guess this means I'm a Bruin of sorts, despite my mad love of all things USC during the L.A. Times Festival of Books on the Trojan campus.

It's all good, I guess, where writing is concerned.

Missing NOLA

I'm not even close to getting all my pictures from the New Orleans trip downloaded and organized, but since I am missing NOLA already, here are some to keep you (meaning me) going until I get them all together:

Streetcar on Canal Street

Crescent City Connection Bridge

Steamboat Natchez. We took a ride the next day.
It was wonderful for so many reasons.

Cafe Du Monde. I'm hooked.

Mule-drawn carriage on Decatur Street. 
They're  all over the French Quarter.

Statue of Andrew Jackson in Jackson Square, 
with the St. Louis Cathedral in the background.

May the curse be with you.

View from my room, looking southeast.

This is incredibly cool

Underwater footage of a horse swimming.

What's really amazing is when you consider that with those skinny legs, horses don't look like they're built for swimming, but somehow they manage it anyway.

For Father's Day: A public service announcement

Today marks the fifth Father's Day non-celebration since my Dad passed away in 2011 and his absence has been felt in ways I never anticipated. My Dad was the guy in the family who kept everyone in line. Not all of us needed to be kept in line, but when the need arose, he checked it. Sometimes just being the wealthy, successful one in the family is enough to keep certain people kowtowing, but he also just didn't take any crap from anyone, and more often than not it was a pretty effective combination. I wish I had inherited his assertiveness and ability to relish a good fight, but I didn't. I just don't see the appeal of battle. I like people to just be decent to each other. Take the high road. It isn't that hard.

Kona Jim.

Since I won't be celebrating today, let me offer some advice in my Dad's memory. This is probably going to sound terrible, and a lot of people will think it can't or won't happen in their family, but I can tell you from experience it's important. No matter how close you think your family is (or isn't), bad things often happen when someone dies if there's a lot of money or property involved. It happened to us and during the period after my Dad's death, it seemed like everyone had a inheritance battle horror story to share with me.

If you want your wishes regarding how your estate is to be distributed - and especially to whom, and who gets what - you need to have a will or trust. You need it in writing and made legal, because no matter how well you think everyone gets along, or is getting along at the time you shuffle off this mortal coil, once you're gone it's a whole new ballgame.

And now that you're gone it's a free-for-all. If there's money involved, trust me when I say there is no depth that can't and won't be plumbed, your final wishes be damned. And it's not just money - people can and will misrepresent what your relationship with them was really like if it will make them more sympathetic and seemingly entitled. I can't emphasize this enough: There is no depth too low for certain people if there's money involved. And it only takes one person to go that route for it to turn into an ordeal. And that's on top of the rest of your family wanting to mourn you. Now they've got this shitstorm to deal with. I know, because I lived it and as executor I had to deal with all of it, and as a result I feel like I never got the chance to mourn my Dad properly. There was too much drama - much of it manufactured - but all of it not how he wanted things to go after his death.

My Dad did have a trust, but it wasn't updated. There were two major changes he was planning on making because things had changed and he knew his health was failing, but he thought he'd have more time to do it. He didn't. He talked about what he was going to change and he made notes, but neither is legally binding. A lot of people (myself included) knew about his plans for his estate, but once he was gone that didn't matter. And knowing that in addition to everything else that happened, there was the idea that a family member just shit on his final wishes and by doing so, his memory just rubs salt on the wound.

We buried my Dad's ashes at sea off the coast of his beloved
Kailua-Kona. A black flag indicates "a vessel in mourning".

I got my share of the inheritance that I was entitled to, but someone else got screwed, and someone else got the other half, rather than the monthly allowance my Dad was going to set up for them. Yeah, you can get a lawyer and sue and drag out the unpleasantness for God knows how long. Not everyone has that kind of stamina and not everyone wants to drag their family into a court battle. I'm not even sure it would matter - my trust includes the line ...after the death of the Trustor, this Trust shall be irrevocable. This Trust may not be modified, amended or revoked by an guardian or conservator of the Trustor, nor by any Court. So I think it's pretty iron-clad. Another reason to not only have one, but keep it updated as things change in your life.

And sometimes a person is just so horrible and toxic - and are free to be themselves now that they don't have to toe Dad's line - that you can find yourself willing to pay any price to have them out of your life. Which isn't hard, because I can tell you from experience that there are people who are more than happy to choose money over family, and/or despite the last wishes of a deceased, supposedly loved one.

Now that I've gotten all that out of my system (sometimes you just need a good rant) I want to get back to the point of this post. If you don't have a will or living trust, get one. I know with a trust you don't have to go through probate, with a will alone I think it depends on the size of the estate, so I would recommend going with a trust. I have one. My mother has one. No more of my Dad's hard-earned money will ever go to someone contrary to his wishes.

I'm guessing the laws and cost will vary depending on where you live, but I paid about $1,000 for my living trust here in Southern California and it's worth every penny to know that when I die, my family won't be left with the clusterfuck that followed my Dad's death. As a bonus, it also includes power of attorney for both personal affairs (including finances) and medical care.

Another thing to note is that if there is someone in particular that you want excluded from any claim to your estate, I highly recommend that be included in writing as part of your will and trust. You don't have to give a reason, just state that you are not providing for them. It was in my Stepmother's trust, it's in mine and in my Mom's. If I kick off tomorrow I don't need to worry about someone slithering in to try another ripoff or wreaking more havoc. It's all in writing and it was done through a lawyer, and it's irrevocable.

I hope this may end up being helpful to someone. I wouldn't wish what we went through with my Dad's estate on anyone. And for those of you celebrating, have a wonderful Father's Day. Just make sure your affairs are in order, for the sake of those you love and wish to provide for even after you're gone.

South Park deals with the NFL/anthem debacle, and it's sheer genius

The other night the world welcomed South Park back for its 20th season and a few days prior to the premiere the trailer leaked, indicating that Matt and Trey would address the issue of famous, filthy rich professional athletes refusing to honor our National Anthem prior to games. The world waited with bated breath to see how they would skewer the situation and we weren't disappointed.

And just for good measure they also tossed in a drive-by poke at the whole Ghostbusters 2016  fiasco as only they could, as Cartman is accused of claiming women can't be funny. With typical slimy Cartman insincerity, he hands various female classmates a mic during assembly asking them to be funny. They all refuse to even try, showing a total lack of sense of humor about the situation.

The Ghostbusters 2016 dig is also tied into the anthem storyline. The townspeople approach J.J. Abrams about writing a more inclusive, acceptable version of the anthem - I mean, rebooting the anthem.  Because if there's someone who knows how to reboot a beloved classic, maintaining and respecting what made the original so popular, while bringing in a whole new generation of characters and fans, it's J.J. "Star Wars: The Force Awakens" Abrams.

All of which led to this brilliant moment:

For our national anthem we now ask you all in solidarity
to please rise...or sit, or take a knee...in order to honor
 America!