Maine Crime Writers

It was in July, 2011, that a group of us first gathered under the Maine Crime Writers banner to talk about all things Maine and all things mystery. The membership has changed over the years, but the goal, and the pleasure of being part of a supportive writing community has not. Here’s a conversation we had back in the beginning about crime writers and research. The members writing in this conversation are: Kate Flora, Sarah Graves, Gerry Boyle, James Hayman , Barbara Ross, Kaitlyn Dunnett/Kathy Lynn Emerson, Vicki Doudera, and Paul Doiron.

Kate: Before I started writing, I used to think that writers sat at their desks and made it up. But writing crime novels often forces us out into the “real world” for research. Sometimes that research takes us strange places or puts us into interesting circumstances. As an example, a few years ago, to better understand the Portland, Maine police officers in my Joe Burgess books, I took a citizen’s police academy. On the night that we got to play cops, and our instructors got to be the bad guys, I was doing a mock-traffic stop. Getting out of my cruiser in front of the whole class, I caught my nightstick on the door handle, tipped forward, and smashed my nose into the window. Red-faced and smarting, I walked up the window of the car I’d stopped, asked the driver for his license and registration, and he laughed. “Look at that little girl cop,” he said. “Isn’t she cute?” I was instantly in the shoes of a real rookie cop.

Sarah: A lot of the time, I do sit at my desk and make it up. But when I’m not doing that, I’m often doing some old-house repair chore that naturally also goes straight into what I’m writing. Depending on whether or not I know how to do the job I’m attempting, hilarity may or may not ensue. Starting out trying to install a new faucet handle, for instance, once ended with my having to call a plumber and an electrician on a Sunday afternoon. (This is an old house, remember; touch one thing and half a dozen others go down like dominoes.) And although the experience was embarrassing, it did double duty in the research department, teaching me: (1) why you never start a plumbing repair, however simple, on a Sunday afternoon, and (2) how kind Eastport people can be to newcomers.

Gerry: I always start writing before I know what I think I need to know because if I waited until the research was complete, I’d never write the book. I learned long ago that research is endless and deadlines are not so I learn enough to launch myself into the subject and book and then pause every few chapters when I hit a gap in my knowledge. Then I can ask myself: do I need to know the minute details of whatever is going on? Or should I push on and not let the pace of the book flag, the narrative meander while I explain? I have a saying when it comes to writing fiction: A lot of knowledge is a dangerous thing. As a former and now-sometimes journalist I know that reportage is an important part of being a crime novelist. But it’s just as important not to show readers everything you know. Hold some of that research close to your vest.

Jim: I do a fair amount of research mostly during the writing process. One of my favorite research stories started with the fact that the body of the victim in The Chill of Night was found frozen solid in the trunk of her BMW on the Portland Fish Pier. “How,” I asked myself, “do you autopsy a frozen corpse.” Naturally I Googled “Autopsy Frozen Corpse.” Over one million hits. The best was an article titled “How Do You Autopsy a Frozen Corpse” that was written by a forensic pathologist in Charleston, SC. The article was not available online but her email was. She was kind enough to send me the article and agreed to become a regular research resource online. I’ve probably asked her over a hundred autopsy-related questions since.

Barb: Wow, Jim. That is a great story. I was on the phone with an oncologist this winter and I said, “I need some kind of cancer that women get, that if symptoms are ignored can kill you in a matter of months.” So he made a suggestion and went over it in detail to make sure I understood it and I’m asking–What would the symptoms be? How might you end up in the emergency room? How long would the tests take to determine someone has this? Finally it got to me and I let out sort of a nervous giggle and said, “This is a ghoulish conversation.” “All in a day’s work to me,” he said and kept right on going.

Kate: Barb & Jim…I think we should wear little “Be Careful What You Say” buttons when we’re out in public. When I was working on my fourth Thea Kozak mystery, An Educated Death, involving a student death at a private school, I found myself at a Harvard reunion lunch with the Principal of Exeter. I borrowed some paper from our hostess, sat down, and proceeded to ask her a zillion questions about how they’d handle an unexplained student death. She went through the list–counselors, reassurance, bringing the student body together, making faculty and advisers available. And food, she said. Put food wherever they will congregate. It will be comforting. At the same party, I found an ER doc and, like you, Barb, started asking about the physical effects of wild hemlock poisoning. I left with a list of symptoms, including pulmonary edema and hallucinations. “She will be breathing air, and it will feel like she is drowning.”

Kaitlyn: One of the things I love about writing contemporary mysteries (as opposed to the historicals I’ve done as Kathy Lynn Emerson) is that there is so much less to research. Not only am I writing about, literally, my own back yard, with the fictional Carrabassett County tucked in between Franklin County (where I live) and Oxford County, but I have an in-house expert to ask questions of, my retired deputy sheriff/probation officer husband. Example: In A Wee Christmas Homicide, which involves smuggling items from Canada into Maine, I needed to know how easy it would be to slip across the border. I knew there was no fence, and that border crossings were few and far between, but I had a sneaking suspicion there was something to deter “alien” invasions. The in-house expert had the answer. Trees are clear-cut on both sides to mark the line between Maine and Quebec in northern Franklin County. At first I wasn’t too happy, since I needed to sneak a snowmobile across, but in the end that detail ended up adding a whole new dimension to a crucial scene.

Vicki: Are the rest of you ever worried that if someone searched our computers’ histories they’d think we were responsible for a whole host of heinous crimes? I know that I spent a heck of a lot of time researching multiple stab wounds (along with wicked mojito recipes) for KILLER LISTING…

Kate: I know that I was about to hook up with a bomb expert to learn how to blow up the Portsmouth Bridge (fictitiously, of course), but then 9/11 happened and I felt I had to tone it down. But yes…I’m sure that if anyone searched our computers (or hacked our phones?) we’d been in deep trouble. BTW, are you going to share those mojito recipes or do we have to read the book?

Kaitlyn: I don’t have any bomb stories, but I have used poisons a fair bit in my historical mysteries. In fact, since the Moxie Festival in Lisbon Falls is this weekend, I am reminded that I once used our infamous official state soft drink (which you either love or hate) to hide the taste of a near-lethal dose of morphine. This relates to our research topic because this scene is in Lethal Legend (w/a Kathy Lynn Emerson), which is set on an island off the coast of Maine in 1888. I had to do some digging to find out how Moxie was packaged back in the days when it was considered a cure for all kinds of ailments, and also to discover how difficult it would have been to get hold of opium and morphine. As it turned out, both were alarmingly easy to buy in the late nineteenth century.

Paul: I have a familiar hobbyhorse that I ride from time to time whenever I get asked to be on a conference panel. Thorough research is absolutely indispensable, and the last thing I want as a writer is to ruin a reader’s experience by including some stupid error in a book that breaks the suspension of disbelief. But I read too many crime novels where the author is trying so hard to be “factual” (“and then I pulled up Form 5D on the department’s antique Dell laptop”) that my eyes start to roll. Wasn’t it Hitchcock who said that “drama is life with all the boring parts cut out?” Personally, I find lots of crime novels overflowing with boring parts. Knowing what to leave out is another way of establishing your authority as a storyteller. I guess I am echoing Gerry here.

Kate: And Elmore Leonard reminds us to leave out the parts that people skip.

Today we thought we’d share some of our July 4th traditions, photos, memories, etc. We’d love it if our readers would share some of theirs as well. Hopefully, it will finally be full summer and we can put away our fleeces and not gravitate toward the grill like it’s a fire pit.

Kate Flora: My mother loved picnics, so we always had a picnic by the lake for the 4th. Swim in the lake. Eat all the great food everyone had brought. Loll in the sun on the hillside. Prowl for late wild strawberries or early blueberries in the grass. Now we’ve reinstituted the tradition on Bailey Island, where new generations are joining us. Here are some photos.

Gathering on the dock

Jule Selbo here:  The 4th in Fargo, North Dakota for a young teen? Memories are of deep emerald green grass, soft breeze off the lake (well this was Minnesota, 45 minutes from my home in Fargo, a cabin my parents bought for basically the price of a Jimmy Choo slingback or a Christian Louboutin men’s loafer today that I actually think of more as my home than Fargo, even though it wasn’t winterized and could only be used three (if that) months a year), my dad and brothers heading across the street to play golf, the sunfish we caught off the dock already cleaned and flash-fried and eaten for breakfast, my dad and brothers heading across the street to play golf, me with a book on the dock, my sister sunbathing, my mother smoking cigarettes with the neighbor and talking about getting the hangar steaks marinated and the adding bacon to the brown beans before baking them. I became an annoying stickler early on for “real whipped cream and homemade biscuits for strawberry shortcake”, so that was on my to-do list because most others would have been fine with store-bought and Ready-Whip. Friends came over, we played croquet, and dodgeball, and swam.  I don’t remember liking the holiday at all, too many people and too many martinis for the adults. But of course, now the memory makes me feel lonely, and wishing I could get back those idyllic days and give myself permission to enjoy them.

Kait Carson: So many memories of 4th of Julys in New Jersey. The smells of popcorn (JiffyPop on the grill), grilled hot dogs and hamburgers, the scratchiness of the wool picnic blanket, and the smell and sounds of fireworks exploding across the river. We were lucky that the fireworks were the only explosions. Somewhere along the way, someone figured out sending fireworks up that close to fuel storage tanks might not be the best idea and the fireworks were moved to a high school football stadium in a nearby town. Didn’t matter, we still picnicked and barbecued, and laid out on that blanket!

Happy 250th USA.

Fourth of July 2006 Wallagrass, ME

Matt Cost: The Fourth of July, to me, is based on the notion that ALL people are created equal. That is the fundamental piece of the Declaration of Independence and the part that has held up, and will hold up, for eternity. As a former social studies teacher, delving into the creation of this historic document is so much more than the paper it is written on, and it is much more significant than the 13 colonies breaking away from England. The Fourth of July is an idea that, at the core, we are all the same. We breathe, live, and love.

John Clark: The Thomaston 4th parade was a staple when our daughters were young. Then it was back to Sennebec Hill Farm for the family picnic. Alas, times have changed and yesterday I experienced sticker shock when I passed a bin of watermelons that were $12.50 each.

EveryThing vs Max Creed is now published! My 19^th published book is doubly pleasing as it was delayed five weeks in its release, not to say that this is a good thing, but the excitement twisted with relief of it finally being out leaves me a bit wrung out.

This is the second book in the Modern-Day Chronicles of Max Creed, in which Max and his band of not-so-merry people seek justice for those who have been wronged by the ultra-wealthy. Much like his predecessor, Robin Hood, Max is an anti-hero with a dark past that has led him to this point.

This time, the target is a social media mogul twisting the minds of young and old through an algorithm that shapes and triggers people’s actions, turning it into a fierce weapon that could lead to catastrophe.

Alfred Prince has created a social media site that is… EveryThing.

“I am looking for investors to support a new tech startup that will transform the world.” Prince had apparently moved into business mode. “It is an app called Triangulation, with an avatar named AL, for Artificial Learning, that will gather the data gleaned by EveryThing, Universe, and Totality.”

Max Creed is a modern-day Robin Hood, an anti-hero willing to do whatever it takes to enact justice for those who have been wronged by the ultra-wealthy. He and his band of not-so-merry people investigate a billionaire for shoddy safety protocols on EveryThing, but quickly discover that the diabolical plot is much more elaborate than merely warping hearts and minds.

Prince plans to sow the seeds of discord, create chaos, burn the establishment down, and emerge as the de facto emperor of the world. Max Creed is tasked with stopping him. What will happen when an unstoppable force collides with an unmovable object? An electrifying thriller that rivets the reader to the page with a breathtaking climax.

This book anchors us in the world we live in today, but in this case, someone is doing something to make the world a better place. Check it out. You might just find it thrilling and heartwarming all at the same time.

Find EveryThing at:

Amazon

Barnes & Noble

Bookshop.org

Matt Cost was a history major at Trinity College. He owned a mystery bookstore, a video store, and a gym before serving a ten-year sentence as a junior high school teacher. In 2014, he was released and began writing. And that’s what he does. He writes histories and mysteries.

Cost has published six books in the Mainely Mystery series, starting with Mainely Power. He has also published six books in the Clay Wolfe Trap series, starting with Wolfe Trap. There are two books in the Brooklyn 8 Ballo series, starting with Velma Gone Awry. For historical novels, Cost has published At Every Hazard and its sequel, Love in a Time of Hate, as well as I am Cuba. The Not So Merry Adventures of Max Creed began a new series this past April. The second book in the chronicles, EveryThing vs. Max Creed, is now out.

Cost now lives in Brunswick, Maine, with his wife, Harper. There are four grown children: Brittany, Pearson, Miranda, and Ryan. Cost now spends his days at the computer, writing.