FRAGMENTS AND FOLLIES by James Lincoln Warren While casting my net this week hoping to catch a topic for today’s column, I took at look at what is generally considered the first American short story, Charles Brockden Brown’s Gothic story of murder and insanity, “Somnambulism: A Fragment”. And that word struck a chord: Fragment. My […]

X WHY NOT? Part IV by Leigh Lundin My X Why project has been a combined learning and teaching experience. Without exception, everyone has been supportive and helpful. Several women wrote in on topics that were surprising, even shocking. I’ll sort through these today. White Women and Black Widows Three correspondents complained about women getting […]

SUCCESS STORY by John M. Floyd What is success, anyway? Wealth? Fame? Happiness? Security? More to the point, for our discussion, what is writing success? Is it measured in terms of readership, or sales, or critical acclaim? How about all of the above? I think it’s none of the above. In my opinion, a writer […]

ON A GENDER ROLL by Steve Steinbock I’ve been enjoying the discussion, led by my criminal colleague Leigh Lundin for the past three weeks, on male/female differences as applied to fiction writing. A few days ago Melodie joined the discussion with her own High-Heeled observations. Today I’m jumping on the gender bandwagon just because. We’re […]

TWISTS AND TURNS by Deborah Elliott-Upton Last weekend, I traveled the open road. As expected along the way we witnessed road kill in the form of a snake and a coyote. They didn’t make it across the highway, but just as we passed him, a turtle did. I was surprised how many RV’s shared the […]

AMAZING by Rob Lopresti The first mystery convention I ever attended was Bouchercon XIV, held in New York in 1983. It happened to be a terrible season for the flu, and a lot of authors and attendees stayed home sick. The big entertainment on Saturday night was supposed to be a magician who was going […]

REAL MEN? REAL WOMEN? by Melodie Johnson Howe Leigh’s last two columns got me thinking. When I was learning to write it never occurred to me that it would be difficult to write about men. At least not more difficult that it was to write about women. Jane Austin or Flaubert didn’t have a problem […]