ABOARD THE BUSTED FLUSH by John M. Floyd I like good titles. The Matarese Circle, The High and the Mighty, “The Gift of the Magi ,” A Walk Among the Tombstones, etc. — to me, those are interesting, and eye-catching. I also think it’s interesting when an author chooses to follow a pattern with his […]

JOURNALISM by John M. Floyd 1 All of us have heard plenty of advice on how to write, and how to write better. Some of the more common tips include “show, don’t tell,” “write what you know,” “don’t overuse adverbs,” etc. And one that shows up on at least a few lists is “keep a […]

GETTING CAUGHT by John M. Floyd Living as I do in the hinterlands, it’s always fun when a nationally known writer comes to our area for a signing. That was the case a couple weeks ago: bestselling author Harlan Coben visited Lemuria Bookstore in Jackson. I was of course in attendance, to buy his latest […]

DREAMING OF MONEY by John M. Floyd For me, one of life’s pleasures is discovering a piece of fiction that has been around awhile but that I somehow never noticed. It doesn’t happen often, but when it does it’s usually been as a result of the columns and comments posted at this blog. Several dozen […]

A GOOD STORY AND OTHER STORIES by John M. Floyd The title of my column today is actually the title of a collection of short stories by Donald Westlake. But it should probably have been called “A Good Story and Other Good Stories.” All of his were. I recently saw a DVD interview with Mr. […]

SETTING THE STAGE by John M. Floyd I and my colleagues at Criminal Brief (and several guest bloggers) have occasionally done pieces on the subject of effective openings in fiction. That’s probably because openings, like endings, are fun to write — but whatever the reason, all of us know it’s important to gain reader interest […]

A MATTER OF TIMING by John M. Floyd Question for the day: What does fiction writing have in common with stand-up comedy? (Sure, it has to be entertaining, if you want to keep your audience. But what else?) The answer is timing. If you study the routines of successful comedians — Seinfeld and the late […]