You have to love a nation that celebrates its independence every July 4, not with a parade of guns, tanks, and soldiers who file by the White House in a show of strength and muscle, but with family picnics where kids throw Frisbees, the potato salad gets iffy, and the flies die from happiness. You […]

McKNIGHT WORK by John M. Floyd Much has been said at this blog, both in columns and in comments, about how to write mystery fiction — short and long — and how to discover and rediscover works by authors who already do it well. Photo by Jerry Bauer I met one of those authors several […]

ELMORE AND MORE by John M. Floyd Several weeks ago one of my mystery-writer friends told me a new Elmore Leonard novel had been released. What was really welcome news, though, was that Dutch was planning a trip to Lemuria Bookstore here in Jackson to sign that novel. (He’s been here several times before — […]

SMARTLY DONE by John M. Floyd As usual, I was digging through old files awhile back, and found something from my IBM days. It was several pages of notes I’d taken during the joint IT department meetings we used to have at the local banks each week — except these notes weren’t about technical issues. […]

ENGLISH COMP-LICATIONS by John M. Floyd A month ago my CB column discussed what I consider to be the ten most irritating grammar errors. As a followup, I’d like to cover some ways that might help us (they certainly help me) avoid other easy-to-make mistakes in grammar and word usage. The key, I think, is […]

LOOKING WEST by John M. Floyd This week I’m straying, as I sometimes do, from the usual subject of short stories and the mystery/crime genre. The reason? I’ve been reading (gasp!) western novels. And I don’t mean novels about western civilization. I mean novels about the rip-roaring, wild-and-woolly American West of the late 1800s. And […]

WHAT’S THE BIG HURRY? by John M. Floyd I once saw a skit that poked fun at the talent-competition part of televised beauty pageants. It featured a young lady who marched onstage and announced that her talent was “speed reading.” She spent the next minute or so staring with fierce concentration at the book in […]