THE IDEA MACHINE by John M. Floyd If you’re a fiction writer, it’s a question you’ve heard a lot, whether it was from customers at book signings or cousins at family reunions or neighbors at the grocery store: Where do you get your ideas? It’s also a question that’s been discussed at this site several […]

SCREEN TEST by John M. Floyd Let me begin with a question: Do you think all avid readers also enjoy movies? My guess would be that they do. Much has been said, in these columns, about the impact and the influence of films of all kinds — some adapted from novels or short stories and […]

THE USUAL SUSPECTS by John M. Floyd The print media loves lists. Every time you pick up a magazine, you see an article about someone’s top ten movies, best vacation spots, favorite recipes. Such pieces do well because we as readers and consumers love lists too. It’s not only a way to compare our choices […]

LITERARY VS. GENRE by John M. Floyd Several years ago, a fellow mystery fan mentioned something I found interesting. She told me she’d just finished James Lee Burke’s Edgar-winning novel Cimarron Rose, and said it was one of the best literary mysteries she’d ever read. A “literary” mystery? I wasn’t even sure you could use […]

IN THE LAND OF COTTON by John M. Floyd Southern fiction. What’s the big deal about it? you might ask. Why in the world do so many readers seem to be fascinated by stories written, or set in locations, south of the Mason-Dixon? And why has this area of the country produced so many authors? […]

TITLE TALE by John M. Floyd Let me ask all you crime-fiction readers a question: What first attracts you to a story or a novel, if you know nothing about it beforehand? Its author? Its length? Its cover (or, if it’s a short piece, its illustration)? The fact that, when you flip through the pages, […]

LOST in TRANSLATION by John M. Floyd I realize I’m probably strange. Most fiction writers are. But I don’t think I act particularly strange, at least most of the time. Now and then, though . . . Now and then I do something that reminds me of a sitcom, when almost every action is either […]