Catching Several Birds with One Book

by Sheila Webster Boneham

Yippee! It's alive! It's launched! It's a book! Oh, sorry, but even after nineteen books published, it's still exciting to know that the new one is out there, on bookstore shelves, in libraries, on e-readers, in people's hot little hands. My new one is The Money Bird, second in my Animals in Focus Mystery series. The first book, Drop Dead on Recall, has been well received, especially among my fellow dog & cat fanciers and dog-sport enthusiasts. It was even named one of the Ten Best Dog Books of 2012 by NBC PetSide! 

The Money Bird begins when photographer cum accidental amateur sleuth Janet MacPhail sees her friend Tom's dog, Drake, retrieve something mysterious during a retriever training session. As in the first book, the setting for the story includes an animal-oriented activity taking place in northeastern Indiana. I've been involved with animal sports since I was a kid -- first with horses, then with dogs -- and I've been writing about dogs and cats for nearly 20 years, so I know this world and its many characters well. 

I know that there's more to the world of animals, even those we bring into our homes as companions, than sometimes meets the public eye. Although my first goal as a mystery writer is to spin an entertaining story, I also hope to tickle my readers' curiosity bones. I believe that fiction can raise people's consciousness without beating them over the head, which is why my mysteries all quietly raise issues for consideration. In The Money Bird, the issue is wildlife trafficking, specifically the ugly but lucrative trade in tropical birds, many of them members of endangered species. 

So in The Money Bird we have dogs -- lots of dogs, many of them wet! -- and Leo, Janet's heroic little cat, and some birds who shouldn't be flying around a lake in northern Indiana. And aside from all this, Janet has to continue to meet her normal challenges: she's running a business, dealing on many levels with her mother's dementia, and trying to sort out just what she wants her relationship with Tom to be. That's a lot of birds - let's hope Janet has a big net!

~~~~

Sheila Boneham has published 17 nonfiction books about dogs, cats, and animal rescue, six of which have won "best book" awards in their categories in competitions of the Dog Writers Association of America and the Cat Writers' Association. Her feature articles have been published in Dog Fancy, Dog World, The AKC Gazette, Cat Fancy, and more. She holds a PhD in folklore from Indiana University and an MFA in creative writing from the University of Southern Maine. Sheila lives in North Carolina with her husband Roger and her retriever girls, Lily the Lab (that's her, not Sheila, in the photo!) and Sunny the Golden. She's at work on the third Animals in Focus Mystery. You can reach her at www.sheilaboneham.com or on Facebook at www.facebook.com/sheilawrites. She'd love to hear from you!

What My Dogs Have Taught Me About Writing

by Sheila Webster Boneham

For the past couple of decades, I've spent a lot of time, energy, sweat, tears, and love on my writing and on my dogs. In that time, I've written twenty plus books, had articles and short stories published in national magazines, anthologies, and journals, and in itty bitty newsletters.

In that time I've also not only lived with and loved a lot of dogs (and cats, but they'll have their day later), but also competed with my dogs in several sports, founded two rescue programs, fostered and rehomed many Labrador Retrievers, Australian Shepherds, and other dogs, volunteered as a trainer and evaluator for three shelters, volunteered with my registered therapy dogs, and bred highly competitive Australian Shepherds. 

Sunny (left) and Lily, aka
UCDX Diamonds Perennial Waterlily
AKC CD RN TD CGC, ASCA CD, TDI

Right now, my husband and I share our home with Lily, a 7-year-old Lab, and Sunny, a Golden Retriever we adopted last November when she was 11.5.  

As you might imagine, my Animals in Focus mysteries have paw prints all over them. Dogs, cats, and other animals are realistic, vital characters and are essential to the plots of the books. What most people don't imagine is how many of the lessons my dogs have taught me over the years apply to writing as well. So I thought I would share a few of them.

Sage, aka Perennial Meadowsage,
retrieving at 7 weeks old. 

Work is play, play is work. The expression "work like a dog," means to labor without joy, but the truth is that dogs who have fun work harder and better. Even when there's heavy lifting involved. 

Jay (UCD Perennial See You At
the Top, AKC CD, RN, CGC,
ASCA CD, Delta) & Lily

You don't always have to do what you're told, but....

Summer (Master Agility Champion
Perennial Hot Sultry Summer)

...sometimes you have to jump through hoops to get the reward.

Kitty Boneham, dog expert.

Ideas can come from unexpected sources, so don't discount anyone. 

Me and Katy during a canine safety
session at an elementary school.

It's important to make time for your friends. Writing is a solitary pursuit, but without love, friendship, and social interaction, we have nothing to write about. 

And now, according to my technical advisors, it's time for a game of tennis ball!



Sheila Webster Boneham is the author of 17 nonfiction books about dogs and cats as well as the Animals in Focus mystery series. Drop Dead on Recall came out in 2012, and The Money Bird will be out next month. Autographed copies of Sheila's books are available on her website at www.sheilaboneham.com. 

Details, Details

by Sheila Webster Boneham

 



Years ago (at least fifteen), I passed a novel I had enjoyed along to my husband. Roger is a geologist, and the "love interest" in the book is a geologist, and I thought he might enjoy the story and relish meeting one of his own in a romantic lead of sorts. And he did, for the first chapter or so. Then he put it down in disgust.

"Some geologist!" he said.

Turns out the guy in the book had waxed eloquent about the cleavage in a piece of quartz. Problem is, quartz has no cleavage (which means that when it breaks, it has no parallel surfaces). That booboo clattered right by me, but for the reader in the know, it was a book-stopper.

I run into this all the time in books with animals, especially dogs. (I've shown, bred, rescued, written about, trained, and judged dogs for more than two decades, so, yeah, I care that "dog things" are accurate.") I recently read a novel in which the protagonist's dog is identified as a specific rare breed. Exciting! Then the dog is described. She's a color combination that doesn't occur in the breed and she weighs about half what she should. I had enjoyed the first pages of the book, but found it hard to keep reading past such glaring errors.

And then there was the best-selling memoir a few years ago about growing up in southern Indiana, a place of forests, deep ravines, and rolling country that I know well. I perused the book at a conference in Indianapolis, thinking I would buy a copy, but when I read that Indiana is "flat as a pancake," I was finished. Well, almost finished - I did point out the passage to a friend and the two of us snorted and laughed and snarked about pandering to East-Coaster sterotypes about the Midwest. The author's mother was standing right behind us. Ah, well.

I'm sure we've all read things in which some error in our own field of knowledge damaged or destroyed our faith in the author. In fact, almost everyone I've asked about this has produced an example from personal experience. Many of them also express similar reactions. Disappointment ("I was looking forward to this book, and then..."). Loss of trust ("If the author is wrong about the things I know, how can I trust the rest of the information?). Disgust ("It's not that hard to check the facts!").

And really, it's not hard at all. First, of course, we have the Internet. Granted, we have to be judicious about our sources, but as long as we use credible websites, blogs, forums, and other online resources, we can check out almost anything. Or at least get a leg up.

We can also go old school - libraries, books, reference librarians. All good.

We can find people who know. I saved myself from a serious error in Drop Dead on Recall by asking a physician friend read a passage in which a character uses an epinephrin pen on his wife, who seems to be having an allergic reaction. Myfriend's terse response? "Well, he just killed her." Seems my character's technique left a little to be desired. I learned, and he does it properly in the book. In that case, I called on a friend, but it isn't hard to find people in the know, and most people are generous about helping us get things right.

Need the skinny on a location? As my husband, Roger, likes to say, there's nothing like a site visit. Whether its a place or a kind of event or an institutional setting, we can do lots of reading, watch videos and films, peruse photographs, but nothing beats being there. How does the quality of light shift by the minute on the Carolina coast at sunrise? How does the heat dissipate in the high desert as the sun drops behind the Sierras? How does the grooming area at a dog show smell, or the waiting room in a hospital sound? If we can't get there, then once again, finding someone who has been there to read what we write can save us from grievous goofs, and may even give us some telling detail to add.

I'm working on the third Animals in Focus mystery right now, and am planning a couple of site visits of my own. I've already lined up some experts to keep me honest, and I have files upon files of background info. Luckily for me, the research I'm doing for this book isn't tedious at all. I get to interview lots of lovely cats and dogs.

Fun with Anthropomorphism

By Deborah Sharp

An osprey flew overhead the other day as I sat on the backyard dock. The big bird clutched a mullet in its talons. Sometimes, I watch as a fish flops and wriggles, trying to escape. Once I saw one break free, splashing into the New River and darting away in a streak of silver.
But not this fish. He didn't wiggle. He didn't struggle.
''Check out that mullet's face,'' I said to my husband. "He looks completely resigned to his fate.''
"Oh, great. Now you're reading the fish's mind.''
Now, I know that many scientists -- along with my husband -- scoff at ascribing human emotions to finned, furred and feathered creatures. We're just projecting our own feelings and interpretations unto them, the scientists say. Still, in the proud tradition of many a mystery author, I'm not above a bit of anthropomorphism now and then. In my Mace Bauer Mysteries, a gator may look accusingly at the main character -- who has a sideline as a trapper. Sometimes, a cat that Mace inherited seems to listen sympathetically to her problems.
In my life outside fiction, I frequently imagine I know how an animal ''feels'' by the expression on its face.
A squirrel scurrying across an oak branch took a tumble and hit the ground, right at my feet. He wasn't hurt, but before he scrambled away, he shot me a look of sheer embarrassment. Recovering quickly, he replaced it with what looked more like cockiness.
"Uh, yeah, I intended to do that,'' said the look on his pointed little face.
I've also seen proud horses, regal birds, and confident cats. They reveal so much in the way they hold their heads, along with the look in their eyes.
I thought I was alone in this little quirk until I stumbled across thousands of hits for ''Guilty Dogs'' on the Internet. (Honestly, you can get lost, but here's one fun site: http://thefw.com/guilty-dogs-in-act/  )
Not only do all these jillions of people believe their dogs feel guilt, they catch them conveying that very emotion through adorable expressions. Here's one picture of such a dog:

And another:

Cat lovers have also jumped on the bandwagon. As far as I'm concerned, the feline pictures don't measure up. The cats don't appear remorseful to me. They look brazen. Defiant. But maybe I'm just projecting my own feelings onto them. You be the judge as to whether this kitty feels bad: 

Right. I didn't think so. 

How about you? Do you use (or like to read about) animals in your mysteries? Do they express human emotions?

“But” is a Four-Letter Word

“It shows promise, but…”
“I liked it, but…”
“I had a good time, but…”
“You’re very talented, but…”

Admit it. You laughed at the title of this post till you read those examples. I’ve been on the receiving end of a lot of “but”s, and none of them ever followed this pattern:

“We checked our records, but we were wrong. Your lottery ticket is the prizewinner after all.”

When Force of Habit was on sub to editors, I was on the receiving end of many “but”s. They were complimentary. They were polite. They were always professional. And they were the worst messages I ever read.

I’ve heard a lot of “but”s in my life. The guy who dumped me on my college graduation night (“I used to love you, but…”). The stage roles I didn’t land (“Your audition was very good, but…”). I often walked away from them feeling like I'd been thrown in the boxing ring with Muhammad Ali.

To be fair, while there were a lot of theater “but”s, there were also many “you got the part”s to compensate for them. And there was a wonderful contract from Midnight Ink that more than compensated for the on-sub "but"s.

My “but” compensation strategy involved chocolate and therapeutic housecleaning. One very useful takeaway from my convent years was learning to take out anger and frustration on dirty floors or walls or anything that required long, hard scrubbing.

What’s your “but” compensation strategy? I’m always on the lookout for new techniques. Because right now I’m starting to think about giving the cats a bath when the next “but” arrives--because there's always a next "but". Save me from certain injury, please!

P.S. This will be my last Inkspot post for a few months. I need to focus on book writing. I'll still be hanging around, though!

Turned Off by Turn Offs

A while back, the topic came up on DorothyL about turn-offs in mystery novels. Show stoppers, those things that when you read them make you put the book down and never pick it up again. Those things that makes you dash off breathless letters of condemnation. Those things, even, that make you want to buy Author Voodoo dolls and use them for a game of Author-in-a-Blender.

Some oft-cited examples, in no particular order:
• Swearing
• Smoking
• Tattoos
• Women protagonists who blindly walk into peril
• People who won't talk to the police
• Sub-plots involving adultery
• Did I mention swearing?
• And smoking?

All this surprised me. First of all, it was a little alarming because my follow-up to Lost Dog features a fair degree of swearing and smoking (and extensive craving of a smoke) as well as people who won't talk to the police and a sub-plot involving adultery. I even have a minor character with lots of tattoos. I don't have a woman protagonist who walks blindly into peril in this one, which is my one saving grace I suppose. Oh, and I don't kill a dog, an act so heinous it doesn't even need to be listed.

My own personal pet peeve, as described in a previous post, is unrealistically great first time sex, with ubiquitous, unstoppable computer hackers running a close second. Other than that, I am pretty tolerant. We're talking about a novel here, after all. It's not like I have to hang out with these people.

Take smoking. My guy, Skin Kadash, smokes like a chimney in Lost Dog, but has mostly quit in my second novel, Chasing Smoke. All throughout Chasing Smoke, however, he's craving a smoke. I mean, he just quit, and it's hard. Sometimes he almost breaks down and lights up, but even when he's not smoking himself he's watching others smoke, and thinking about it. A lot.

Now, I'm not a smoker. I'm not even a former smoker. I'm gracious about it with my friends who do smoke, but I admit I don't care for the smell of tobacco smoke and I don't care for smoker's breath and smoker's hair. But, hey, let's face it, it's not my decision and if my friends want to smoke, it's their choice. If we're out having a beer and a friend lights up, no worries. I like my friends a LOT more than I dislike smoking. And no doubt I have plenty of habits that others don't care for.

In writing about smoking, I went to great lengths to create a character who was sympathetic, and whose need for a smoke actually accentuated his intrigue as a person. Aside from the challenge it posed to me as a writer, it also just fit in with who he is. How successful I am with Skin I'll leave for my readers to decide, but I would hope that no one would dismiss him, or the book, out of hand simply because he's a smoker.

Consider that other great taboo. Killing a dog or cat. As crime fiction writers, we can kill off untold numbers of people, but lay a finger on the fur of a single fictional pet and we're Hitler. Kids are pretty much sacrosanct too, though we're actually allowed to put children in danger at times.

True, some folks have gotten away with the killing of the innocents. Glenn Close still had a career after boiling the bunny. Steven Spielberg still gets to make movies despite T-Rex eating a dog in Jurassic Park II. And there are a number of successful books and films in which children come to a dark end. But for the most part, those are events we dramatize fictionally at our peril. "After he killed the pomeranian, I resolved to never buy another book by him, and to picket bookstores that sell his books, and to mail little ziplock bags of dog doody to his mother, and,... and,... and,..."

That's disappointing to me, and not because I want to kill a dog. I love dogs. And I love kids. And I love people, though certainly not all of them. But as a writer, I want to feel free to tell stories as they unfold, not feel constrained by lists of no-no's. And, as a reader, (and let's face it, I read a LOT more books than I'll ever write), I want authors to feel that they can tell the stories they need to tell without stressing about the Verboten!

I'm not advocating gratuitous butchery here. But let's be honest. We're killers, as writers, and voyeurs of killing, as readers of crime fiction. Even the coziest among us produce a body count that would be shocking if it weren't on the page. The distinction between a bloodless death in the drawing room and serial slaughter in an abattoir isn't all that great, even if sometimes we pretend it is. And certainly I know there are any number of topics that probably cross the line for the vast majority of us. I'm not saying there aren't valid lines. I'm also not suggesting that we have to read or write about topics that don't interest us. There are a million books out there, and none of them are for everyone. I just wonder if, considering the mayhem we do tolerate, some lines aren't a little arbitrary and unmindful of what's really going on here.

I don't smoke, and I don't have a tattoo, and I won't commit adultery. But I write about all these things, and many others that probably make it onto scold's list somewhere. I guess, in the end, if we're okay with Colonel Mustard doing it in the library with a candlestick, might it also be okay if he has a smoke afterwards, and maybe cops a feel from Mrs. White at the biker bar up the road while getting his tats touched up? We're being entertained by imaginary murder. Is a cigarette or illicit affair so awful in comparison?

Toons to Tempt the Muse

by Nina Wright

That’s not a misspelling. Although music moves me as I write, so do visual images, including—yup—cartoons.

Now you know why I subscribe to the New Yorker magazine and have for almost 20 years. My office bulletin board is festooned with recent faves; I rotate them to suit moods and assignments. Current attractions include cartoons by Tom Cheney and P.C. Vey. Since I don't have permission to post them here, I'll (lamely) describe a couple that connect to my work. If you're curious, I'll email you the jpegs.

You may think I like cartoons because I write mainly humorous stuff. But there’s more to it. I'm in awe of art forms that are at once succinct and insightful. While I, the novelist, trudge through tens of thousands of words to deliver my point, other artists perform their jobs with stunning concision. In that camp I include cartoonists, poets, short-story writers, songwriters, musicians, potters, painters, and photographers, not to mention comedians, floral designers, and chefs. We can appreciate their work in a single sitting, a glance, a gulp. And when it thrills us, we replay it. We view it from various angles. We chew slowly.

A cartoon, like any good picture, is worth a thousand words, and may require as many to describe. You can recount a cartoon to someone who can’t see it, but there’s no way you’ll match the artist's punch. It’s like describing a hedonistically delicious dessert or a brilliant comedic monologue. (Or, for that matter, great sex, but that's for another blog.) In short, you gotta be there.

But cartoonists face some of the same challenges that we novelists do. For instance, they must create a viable world. A favorite Tom Cheney toon features a Realtor showing a property with a gaping hole in the floor through which the cosmos is visible. The Realtor says, "Of course, the real charm of the place is that hole in the space-time continuum."

I write about fantastical phenomena and Realtors, though not always at the same time. Drafting my novel Sensitive, I took pains to vividly render my characters astral-projecting and talking with the dead. Since I had never done either, I had a license to imagine the experiences as well as an obligation to do enough research to get the details mostly right. When we spin suspense fiction, our series protagonists regularly bump up against violent death. Thus we must build a universe on the page that makes heinous crime both shocking and inevitable. Whiskey Mattimoe is a Realtor whose clients have a high probability of turning up dead. I enhance that probability by making Magnet Springs a resort town that attracts the rich and greedy.

Like all true artists, cartoonists make connections where none typically exists. They twist clichés and thwart expectations. And yet they make sense. If they don’t, we don’t "get it," and the cartoon fails. The same is true of the stories we tell on our own broad canvases. Our characters must be recognizable but completely fresh. Our endings must satisfy and surprise as solidly as a single-frame cartoon.

In closing, allow me to describe a toon by P.C. Vey: Two women are having tea. Next to the hostess is a cat wearing a Zorro mask. The hostess says, "I know it's illegal, but quite frankly we couldn't get by without the cash and jewelry he brings home every night."

Yeah, yeah, you gotta see it, and I did. And it started me drafting a new mystery series starring a woman who trains her Devon rex cat to steal. If you think that's impossible, you haven't seen this video or met my Devon rex, Flannery, who as far as I know steals only hearts. Still, Flan gets into enough trouble to make a genuine cat burgler seem plausible. At least in the world of art I can make.
P.S. Happy birthday to fellow Midnight Ink author, G.M. (Gin) Malliet! My protagonist (Whiskey) and I raise a glass to you.

Morphing Felines

by Nina Wright

Meet Flannery Florida Wright, my monkey in a cat suit. Sure, she looks relaxed, but that’s because she’s resting after wreaking havoc. Flan is a Devon Rex, a breed known for its athleticism and sociability, cat-fancier euphemisms for hyper-activity and neediness. Our nicknames for Flan include “Alien,” “Flying Squirrel,” “Heat-Seeking Missile,”and “Waxhead” (don’t ask).

As you may know, I write a mystery series starring an Afghan hound and featuring the following canine crew: a golden retriever, a German shepherd, a Rott Hound (Rottweiler-bloodhound mix), and a shitzapoo (technically, a shih poo). Every dog I love or ever have loved lives on in Abra and her peers. However, I also live with and write about cats. See the cover of Whiskey and Tonic! (Give yourself a pat on the head if you can spot Flannery in Bunky Hurter's delightful art.) To date, four of my many felines have wandered, slightly disguised, onto the pages of my books.

Flannery has inspired two fictional felines: Yoda in Whiskey and Tonic and Ruby Tiger in my middle-grade work-in-progress, The Fine Art of Following Cats. I gave Flan a sex change for Yoda and a red-fur makeover for Ruby Tiger, who is actually a blend of Flan and a stunning Abyssinian I once owned. Also featured in The Fine Art is a cat based on Lola Felina, a fluffy all-white beauty who found me on a hike through the backwoods of West Virginia. Lola’s extraordinarily sensitive nose and communicative twitchy tail inspired Fiona Whiffer, cat detective.

Rocco the “serial-killer cat” in my teen novel, Homefree, is based on Oreo, an insanely fearless tuxedo cat who slew pheasants, ground hogs, and young foxes on my farm in Michigan. When we moved to Florida, he bit the heads off snakes. Minus a few teeth, part of an ear and the tip of his tongue (don’t ask), Oreo has now settled into urban retirement.

Something tells me I'm not finished writing about Flannery (who looked like this when I chose her from the litter). Here's how one cat fancier lovingly describes Devons: "Pixie-like with a cheeky face, turned-up nose, and large pointy ears....Respond well to training and often learn to perform simple tricks like fetching, begging, and opening cupboard doors....Will follow you, talking in chirps and trills; you'll never again go to the bathroom alone....Can arrange themselves around your neck like a suede scarf....Are astonishing leapers who amaze their owners by landing on book cases, refrigerators, and the tops of open doors."

All true, except that no one had to teach Flannery to fetch, beg, or open cupboards. As for the part about Devons jumping, they prefer to jump onto people, specifically backs and heads. Hence the "suede scarf" reference. If Flannery can’t access your back, she may, without warning, leap onto your chest. Or she may scale you like a mountain, using her claws as crampons. When that happens, even devout animal lovers scream. I do my best to warn visitors. Anyone with a heart condition or anxiety disorder is immediately placed in a Flannery-free zone. No wonder I’m contemplating a Devon Rex as a murder weapon. In a future mystery, I mean.

Then again, I may switch genres. One of my imaginative friends suggested that if aliens wanted to invade earth, they'd probably come in the bodies of cats, who are innocuous and ubiquitous. Following that argument, aliens would need to design a feline so that it contained certain technical components. Devons might fit the ticket; the breed can practically fly, their coats require no maintenance, and their ears could double as satellite dishes. And aliens probably wouldn't realize how odd Devons look.

If Flannery's leaps don't unnerve my guests, her relentless close-range gaze does. I don't joke about her as a potential alien, recording and beaming images to the Mother Ship. I’m saving those notions for future fiction. But I no longer let Flan follow me into the bathroom....