SPELLBOUND by John M. Floyd I sometimes agree to help with or conduct projects — workshops, anthologies, classes, contests, etc. — that involve reading other writers’ stories and making decisions based on (or providing feedback about) the quality of their manuscripts. These experiences have served to remind me of a persistent problem some of us […]

LOCATION, LOCATION, LOCATION by John M. Floyd As readers and writers, we talk a lot about the importance of choosing appropriate names for fictional characters, and the fact that those names sometimes (if the author is extremely fortunate) go on to become a part of our language. The same might be said for fictional settings. […]

PSYCHOBABBLE by John M. Floyd Confession time: I am a Netflix junkie. Things have now progressed to the point that our postman would probably have an anxiety attack if my mailbox didn’t contain at least one outgoing or incoming red envelope every day. (Like the glutton at a smorgasbord, I almost certainly make management wish […]

DON’T READ PAGE 80 by John M. Floyd I’d like to open with a question (actually, several questions). Do you agree with the use of profanity in short stories and novels? Do you object to it? Do you find it distracting? Do you think it’s sometimes necessary, depending on the scene or situation? Does it […]

THIRTY PAIRS of SHORTS by John M. Floyd A couple weeks ago, my friend Leigh Lundin (who’s been appointed head fred[1] of our Criminal Brief band while JLW is globetrotting) suggested I do a column about my own two collections of short mystery fiction. At first I was reluctant, since that sounds a lot like […]

PLAYING FAVORITES by John M. Floyd I was looking through the past few months’ columns and remembered that I thoroughly enjoyed Rob’s April Criminal Brief piece on “favorite” short stories. As he said, the stories he chose to list wouldn’t necessarily be called the best (although I thought many of them would have fit that bill […]

MAD for MAGAZINES by John M. Floyd I read a lot of short stories. Mostly mystery/suspense stories, and mostly those featured in magazines. There are of course two other good places to find short fiction: (1) anthologies containing the work of different authors and (2) collections of stories by the same author. I read a […]