Author: Elizabeth Spann Craig

I was always a writer, like many writers are. I was the elementary school class reporter, the middle school reporter, the high school reporter and worked on the literary magazine. That was my extracurricular activity of choice.

So I was in London, working for a weekly magazine. My editor, John, was a nervous, hyper, chain-smoking fellow. I wrote whatever they wanted me to: I interviewed people, reviewed books, wrote articles on “slimming,” whatever. I was waaayyyy down on the totem pole, but they were all really nice to me.

One day John came to me in a panic. It was deadline day and somehow they’d come up short when they were laying out the copy.

“I need,” he said as he dashed up behind my rolling chair, “a story. Right now.”

“On….?” I asked.

“Spring fashions. Yeah. London’s spring fashions.” He dashed off again—this time out the door.

Well, I was in a fix. This was before the internet. Okay, yes, there was internet in the early 90s, but it was in some government building somewhere and the computer it was running on was as big as a city block or something.

At that moment I realized that nonfiction could be a major pain in the rear end. I was recently off the plane from America. I don’t follow fashion. I didn’t have any contacts to call up.

So…I made it up as I went along. It was my opinion of what the trends would be in London–heavily influenced by the trends in South Carolina, USA. Oh, I did look out the window for a few minutes to see what people were wearing as they walked down the street, but that was about it.

I continued working for different magazines after that, but I was a whole lot more interested in making things up full-time.

I chose fiction and my genre because that’s what I read. I’d read so many of them, I knew I could write my own.

I still write articles occasionally and they’re challenging in their own way. But…it’s actually easier for me to make stuff up.

Have you ever changed from fiction to nonfiction or vice versa? Did you like them both equally? Have you found your niche? Are you happy with it?

Lasagna at the Mystery Lovers’ Kitchen today, y’all! Run over and help your plates…

I’m one of those people who usually likes to go with the flow. I think that’s because I’m in a writing fog half the day. But once I come down off my happy imaginary high, reality hits. And once I get my hackles up, watch out.

I’ve unfortunately been on a roll the past week of problems that needed to be addressed. The tipping point for each thing, the bit that spurred me into action? My children, each time.

It started with a group my son volunteers for. It was a school night, the day before a test. Pouring down rain, very chilly. He was with some other middle school boys, removing a barbeque pit that they’d help set up the week before for their yearly barbeque sale to raise funds for the group.

He had a nasty cold. Two hours into the mandatory volunteer work in the cold rain, I called his cell phone. “I’m on my way to get you.”

“Mom—they said I’m not allowed to go.”

“Well, I think you’ve done well to work for two hours. I’m going to pick you up and you can work on studying for your test tomorrow.”

“Mom—he says I’m not excused. We have another hour to go.”

A pause.

“Tell this gentleman your Mama wants to talk to him.”

A moment and a quick conversation later and suddenly it was absolutely fine that I could pick up my 12 year old so he could study for his math test.

Ohhh, I hate to act ugly. Why is it that the squeaky wheel gets the grease?

Confrontations or getting ready for a confrontation is stressful to me. I’m a very different person when I’m stressed out or angry.

My characters reach their tipping points, too. Everybody has something that’s going to set them off. In a mystery, that straw that broke the camel’s back could result in a murder.

As I’ve mentioned before, our characters are stressed out. Their lives are completely upside-down. I wrote about the way the confusion they might feel a few posts ago. Yes, they would feel very taken aback at the way their lives were running completely off track.

But what about stress? What kinds of things might a character do under stress?

• They could say something they shouldn’t have said. This could cause a ripple effect in many ways but could especially create a rift between characters during an argument.
• Stress could cause them to briefly act out of character. Have you got a well-controlled, polite character? Reacting to a stressful situation could make their temper flare up and open up some plot possibilities.
• A character might drink too much under stress. This could create a whole host of other problems and conflicts in our plots. They might start a bad habit, like smoking, again.
• They could react in a very wholesome way—increasing the amount of exercise they’re getting, watching what they eat, and trying to work in more sleep. (But really, what fun is that to write with? :) )

In my murder mysteries, stress causes my murderer to kill again. Naturally, the killer wants to remain unknown and will eliminate anyone who knows his identity.

Stress causes my suspects to point the finger at other suspects—who had been their friends prior to the murder investigation.

Character stress causes arguments and conflicts in my small town settings and old grievances bubble up to the surface again.

Got stress?

I had a problem with one of my kitchen cabinets for over a week.

The problem was that when I opened the door to the cabinet, Pyrex dishes and Tupperware flung themselves at me. “$%#$#$!!!” I’d say, but would end up stuffing the glassware and plastic back in there with one hand while pulling out whatever it was that I needed.

The next day was a repeat. I’d open the cabinet and, “^#%$R#$#!!!!” once again.

Yes, I had a whole week of getting assaulted by my own cookware. Each day I’d have to stop what I was doing to work around this problem.

Finally I actually got a clue, opened both doors to the cabinet, sat on the floor, and looked at the problem critically. Oh. Two round pitchers on the bottom of everything. Yes, that’ll do it. Round things aren’t good to put a collection of 9 x 13 inch glass casserole dishes and stacks of Tupperware on. Once I took out the pitchers, my problem was over.

I have this scene in my next Myrtle Clover book that was the same way. Every time I read over the scene in my revisions, I’d frown at it. Something wasn’t right. But I never really stopped to find out what the problem was—I just skipped right over it and kept on reading. Whatever it was wasn’t too egregious, but it just wasn’t right.

Then I looked at it critically. I’d obviously liked the scene when I put it in. But now:

*It seemed awkward
*The actions of the protagonist seemed out of character.
*And—the kicker—it didn’t further the plot that much. I’d already accomplished the point I was trying to make in an earlier scene. It seemed like I was belaboring the point.

Thanks to the magic of computers, I cut out the scene and pasted it on a blank document, in case I wanted it back. Then I read over those pages again, this time without the scene.

Much better.

I think sometimes it could possibly mean the scene isn’t in the right location—too early in the story or too late in the story. Or maybe you’ve written in some scenes in the revision process that made the old scene unnecessary and redundant.

Either way, when something is popping out at me, I’m going to pay attention for a few minutes to correct it.

While I was at the beach this weekend for a house party with friends, I got a great idea for a book. I could see the whole book—murderer, victims, clues, red herrings, and the role the setting would play in the novel. It would be a house party gone horribly wrong.

The only problem? I can’t write that book right now.

My next Myrtle Clover book is due in early November. My next Memphis Barbeque book is due April 1.

There’s no way I can work a beach party into my Memphis book. It would be geographically challenging. :)

After the April due date, I have a November one for Penguin and have the plot for that book set already.

Soooo….I’m thinking I can’t write this book for about a year.

My memory? It’s awful.

Usually I just create a new Word file, sketch out my idea, name it, and save it out to another location (usually I’ll email myself the file….lazy, but I can always locate it.)

This time, though, there’s a lot of data that I need to capture and I don’t think I have time right now to write out a full synopsis. Plus the fact that I don’t like writing to outlines.

Today I’m going to try something new and see how it works. I’ve got a voice recorder and I’m going to talk out the plot and characters. I’m hoping that it’s going to get all of my thoughts and ideas down, but won’t be as “official” as an outline or synopsis. I might see how far I can talk it out.

It’s the saving of the voice recording that I’m not sure of. I’ll need to make sure it’s someplace I can find it again.

I’m hoping that when I listen to it again, the excitement in my voice will ignite the creative process again and make it a quick write.

Does anyone else use a voice recorder? How does it work for you?

Today, I should be on my way back home from a fun, hopefully relaxing, weekend at the beach (Isle of Palms, near Charleston). My wonderful parents took the children for my husband and me and we headed off with friends.

In preparation for the car ride to the point where my husband and I were handing off the kids to my folks, I went to the Blockbuster movie rental place and got several videos for them to watch on their little DVD players in the car.

This means the most relaxing car ride for the adults.

My sister and I got along extremely well in the car when we were kids. But we did get bored on the long drive to Macon, Georgia to see our grandmother. We’d play the license plate game, look for VW bugs (beetles, we called them), etc.

When I suggested the cow counting game to my son, he looked at me in disbelief. I explained, “No, it’s fun! You count as many cows as you can and if you pass a graveyard, you lose all your cows.”

“And Nana came up with this game?” he asked, stunned. Then, of course, I realized that the number of farms in the South had greatly decreased. And there aren’t too many cemeteries lining the interstate highways.

Mom had dated herself once more.

I’ve touched on this before, but I’m trying not to date my books. I have high hopes that they’ll live on for a few years in libraries, and I don’t want to draw people out of the story.

I did mention Twitter in passing for the Memphis book. I had to think about it, but decided it’s a strong enough pop culture reference that it’s going to stay on for a little while. It’s star is still rising. But that was the only thing I can really think of that will place my story in a particular place and time.

How about you? Do your characters ever Facebook? Tweet? Do you refrain from making social media references at all?