The Back-Story

The Alphabet in Crime Fiction - The concept was started by Kerrie at Mysteries in Paradise. This week's letter is the letter B.

Here are the rules: By Friday of each week participants try to write a blog post about crime fiction related to the letter of the week. Your post MUST be related to either the first letter of a book's title, the first letter of an author's first name, or the first letter of the author's surname, or even maybe a crime fiction "topic". But above all, it has to be crime fiction. You could write a review, or a bio of an author, so long as it fits the rules somehow.

The Back-Story

“The most important things to remember about back story are that (a) everyone has a history and (b) most of it isn’t very interesting.”
― Stephen King, On Writing 

Definition: A backstory, background story, back-story or background is the literary device of a narrative history and set of facts and factors all chronologically earlier than, and related to, a narrative of primary interest.

The problem: For the new writer, the back-story is often told in large chucks of boring and unnecessary information.

How to spice it up: Break it up. Add only what is needed.

(a) wait to add the back-story until the novel is underway. The main story should come first and draw the reader in. If your back-story is so interesting, perhaps it should be your main story.

(b) Tell the back-story in different ways. Have it told in dialogue, have other characters tell it, make it funny.

(c) Break up the back-story. Only add the back-story that relates to the main story.

How have you handled A-Ha moments?

Also, authors I want to check out that start with the Letter B:

Bernard Cornwell

Bernard Cornwell was born in London in 1944 - a 'warbaby' - whose father was a Canadian airman and mother in Britain's Women's Auxiliary Air Force. He was adopted by a family in Essex who belonged to a religious sect called the Peculiar People (and they were), but escaped to London University and, after a stint as a teacher, he joined BBC Television where he worked for the next 10 years. He began as a researcher on the Nationwide programme and ended as Head of Current Affairs Television for the BBC in Northern Ireland. It was while working in Belfast that he met Judy, a visiting American, and fell in love. Judy was unable to move to Britain for family reasons so Bernard went to the States where he was refused a Green Card. He decided to earn a living by writing, a job that did not need a permit from the US government - and for some years he had been wanting to write the adventures of a British soldier in the Napoleonic wars - and so the Sharpe series was born. Bernard and Judy married in 1980, are still married, still live in the States and he is still writing Sharpe.

Gallows Thief is a detective story, set in Regency London, a time when there were no detectives as such. There was a very busy gallows, however. This was a period when the English and Welsh gallows were at their busiest and, very occasionally, the government appointed an 'Investigator' to look into a conviction.












Sources: Wikipedia and Amazon.com
Writing and selling your mystery novel by Ephron

My Guest Post Winner

Thank you all 42 commenters on my Under the Tiki Hut post. I promised two prizes: (a) two free e-copies of my book The Sholes Key and (b) a $10 amazon gift card.

Well, good news, everyone gets free copies because right now, my e-book is free.

However, the winner from the random # draw is JL Campbell. Congrats! I will e-mail you shortly.

Sholes Key by Clarissa Draper FREE on Amazon

Check out the link!

I'm not sure why it's free, but pick it up while you can.
Also, for those who visited Carol's post this week, I'm going to be picking the winners later today.

Keep the Readers Guessing

I'm UNDER THE TIKI HUT today discussing how mystery writers--or writers in general--can keep the reader guessing what will happen throughout the novel. Join me and Carol there.

Also, look below. Carol has just released her new book cover. Isn't it fantastic? I can't wait to read her book.

The A-Ha! Moment

The Alphabet in Crime Fiction - The concept was started by Kerrie at Mysteries in Paradise. This week's letter is the letter A


Here are the rules: By Friday of each week participants try to write a blog post about crime fiction related to the letter of the week. Your post MUST be related to either the first letter of a book's title, the first letter of an author's first name, or the first letter of the author's surname, or even maybe a crime fiction "topic". But above all, it has to be crime fiction. You could write a review, or a bio of an author, so long as it fits the rules somehow.

The A-Ha Moment

Definition: an instant at which the solution to a problem becomes clear

The problem: Usually the clue comes after moments of reflection - through dialogue with someone or internally - and that reflection can often be dry and a bit boring to write.

How to spice it up: Add conflict. How?

(a) Perhaps have the two detectives disagree with how the case should be solved. Or they disagree with how the evidence should be interpreted.

(b) Let the character or characters doubt their own conclusions

(c) Could their be a deadline of some sort (like an execution) that causes the characters to have to step it up

How have you handled A-Ha moments?

Also, authors I want to check out that start with the Letter A:

Ann Cleeves

Ann Cleeves (born 1954) is a British crime-writer. In 2006 she was the first author to win the inaugural Duncan Lawrie Dagger, the richest crime-writing prize in the world, for her novel Raven Black. Hidden Depths has been dramatised as the new TV detective series Vera on ITV, starring Brenda Blethyn in the lead role as Vera Stanhope. It made its debut in May 2011.

George & Molly novels

• A Bird in the Hand (1986)
• Come Death and High Water (1987)
• Murder in Paradise (1988)
• A Prey to Murder (1989)
• Another Man's Poison (1992)
• Sea Fever (1993)
• The Mill on the Shore (1994)
• High Island Blues (1996)

Inspector Ramsay

• A Lesson in Dying (1990)
• Murder in My Backyard (1991)
• A Day in the Death of Dorothea Cassidy (1992)
• Killjoy (1993)
• The Healers (1995)
• The Baby Snatcher (1997)

Vera Stanhope

• The Crow Trap (1999)
• Telling Tales (2005)
• Hidden Depths (2007)
• Silent Voices (2011)
• The Glass Room (2012)

Shetland Island Quartet

• Raven Black (2006); Gold Dagger Award
• White Nights (2008)
• Red Bones (2009)
• Blue Lightning (2010)

Ann Granger

Patricia Ann Granger (born 1939) is a British crime writer. Granger was born in Portsmouth, England. She took a Modern Languages degree at the University of London, taught English for a year in France, but eventually went to work in the visa sections of British consulates and embassies in Yugoslavia, Czechoslovakia and Austria. She married a work colleague in the foreign service and went with him to Zambia and Germany before returning to live in England with their two children. Her first novels were historical romances published under the nom de plume Ann Hulme. After her return to England, her first crime novel, Say It With Poison, was published in 1991.

Mitchell & Markby mysteries

• Say It with Poison (1991)
• A Season For Murder (1991)
• Cold in the Earth (1992)
• Murder Among Us (1992)
• Where Old Bones Lie (1993)
• Flowers For His Funeral (1994)
• A Fine Place For Death (1994)
• Candle For a Corpse (1995)
• A Word After Dying (1996)
• A Touch of Mortality (1996)
• Call the Dead Again (1998)
• Beneath these Stones (1999)
• Shades of Murder (2000)
• A Restless Evil (2002)
• That Way Murder Lies (2004) (the final Mitchell & Markby novel)

Fran Varady mysteries

• Asking for Trouble (1997)
• Keeping Bad Company (1997)
• Running Scared (1998)
• Risking It All (2001)
• Watching Out (2003)
• Mixing With Murder (2005)
• Rattling the Bones (2007)

Lizzie Martin Mysteries

• A Rare Interest in Corpses (2006)
• A Mortal Curiosity (2008)
• A Better Quality of Murder (2010)

Campbell & Carter mysteries

• Mud, Muck and Dead things (2009)
• Rack, Ruin and Murder (2011)

 Sources: Wikipedia and Amazon.com
Writing and selling your mystery novel by Ephron

Which Cover Works Best?

I've been working on some covers for my short stories. Which do you like best? What works? What doesn't? 

I loved you first...

As part of Alex's First Love Blogfest, we're to list the first movie, song, book and crush that we loved. From my choices it will be obvious that I grew up in the 80s and 90s and that influenced me a great deal. Can you imagine? We wore those clothes...and thought we were cool.

The movie I loved first...

Pretty in Pink (1986)--A poor girl must choose between the affections of her doting childhood sweetheart and a rich but sensitive playboy. Stars: Molly Ringwald, Jon Cryer and Harry Dean Stanton

The song I loved first...

It came out while I was in Japan and I insisted we enter a music store and find the single. Back then, it was on cassette tape and I carried my Walkman throughout Tokyo. I found it that day and wore out the tape by the end of the week.

The book I loved first...

Wilbur the pig is scared of the end of the season, because he knows that come that time, he will end up on the dinner table. He hatches a plan with Charlotte, a spider that lives in his pen, to ensure that this will never happen.---IMDB

My first crush...

My first real crush happened in grade six. I sat across from a boy named Danny. He had blond hair and blue eyes and he was--in my eyes--perfect. I moved shortly after to a different school, but I will never forget Danny. I never told him how I felt. Not sure I regret it though.