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Writing can be an isolating experience, but it doesn’t have to be. There are ways to get plugged in to the writing community: join a group, read a forum, sign up for a listserv, etc.

Organizations (national): The Mystery Writers of America and Sisters in Crime (which is not just for women.)

Absolute Write has a great forum for mystery writers.

The Writers Write website offers links to mystery research tools: “finding crime resources;” “crime and police procedure;” “forensics;” “government sites;” “types of crime;” “equipment, weapons, and poisons;” etc.

Mystery Readers International has links to mystery-related publications and bookstores, and has a journal you can access online with articles on topics like “academic mysteries,” “ethnic mysteries,” etc.

The Bloodstained Bookshelf publishes lists of recent and upcoming mystery releases.

There are several Yahoo Groups you can join for more contact with other writers, as well as research information and other support: 4 Mystery Addicts, Murder Must Advertise, Crime Scene Writer, Wicked Company, Weapons Info .

The most popular listserv focused on the mystery genre is Dorothy L. (as in Dorothy L. Sayers.) To subscribe, send an e-mail to listserv@listserv.kent.edu with the message “subscribe Dorothyl (first name) (second name)” (with your name and without the parentheses).

You can check out a couple of newsgroups related to mysteries, too. http://groups.google.com/group/rec.arts.mystery/topics?lnk=srg&hl=en and http://groups.google.com/group/alt.pulp/topics?lnk=srg&hl=en . Once you get used to the layout of Usenet groups, you can find interesting articles, topics, and information.

Facebook also has groups devoted to mysteries. Search for “”Sherlock who?” The Ellery Queen Appreciation Society!”, “The Golden Age of Detective Fiction,” “MWA (Mystery Writers of America),” ” Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine,” and (for all writers) “Poets & Writers.”

The Mystery Writer’s forum http://www.zott.com/MysForum/ ( http://mwf.ravensbeak.com/forum/index.php?topic=664.0) has useful links on everything from forensics (including crime-scene cleanup, drugs and poisons, and crime scene investigation) to forgery and hacking.

Writers Net and Writing World offer forums and articles to help connect writers with each other and with resources and information.

Here are two sites that will help you protect yourself from unscrupulous people who prey on writers (yes, they’re out there): Writer Beware blog, and Preditors and Editors.

What’s your favorite type of mystery to read?  Your reading preferences usually help determine whether you’re writing a police procedural, noir, private eye, or cozy mystery. 

My favorite genres of mystery are the police procedural (think Elizabeth George) and cozies.  But I’ve found that I’m particularly partial to the amateur sleuth cozies. 

There are many aspects that draw me in.  For one thing, solving the case is similar to working out a puzzle.  The sleuth is getting the clues at the same time the reader is.  How, or if, we put them together is up to us. 

For another, I like the way that the sleuth is working on a different level than the police.  Instead of the forensic evidence in a police procedural, books featuring amateur detectives frequently employ different information-gathering techniques.  These may include listening to local gossip, forging relationships with police and other people in the know, and being, in general, a busybody.  The amateur uses their natural talents and “little gray cells” (in the case of Hercule Poirot) to solve the case instead of relying on DNA droppings.

The settings for the sleuth novels are another draw.  The reader is frequently treated to a visit to a small town or village.  We are introduced to a limited number of suspects, whom we get to know well.

Amateurs make mistakes that lead us on red herrings.  Or they believe witnesses and gossips that take us on wild goose chases.  Sometimes, realizing we’ve hit a wall heightens the urgency.  We can sympathize with the sleuth, since we’re in the same boat–we haven’t solved the mystery, either.

Amateurs aren’t loaded down with weapons in their battle with the villain—usually their only self-defense is a sharp tongue and a quick mind. 

Sleuths are smart, connected, motivated, and human.  It’s fun to follow along as they work out the puzzle and bring a sense of normalcy to their quiet corner of the world.

  I’ve mentioned before that I think placing clues is the trickiest part of mystery writing.  After all, you don’t want your clues to be too obvious (no neon signs screaming for the reader to pay attention) and you don’t want clues to be so hidden that the reader feels duped.

I recently found several pages on the web that I thought would be helpful references for writers looking for skillful clue planting examples.  Agatha Christie was a master of the mystery genre, and these websites uncover ways she placed clues.

The first site is actually a study guide for Christie’s And Then There Were None.  The guide  provides a clue tracker that goes chapter by chapter, illuminating the clues that point to the murderer.  Naturally, it’s more helpful if you’ve read the book (which is fantastic, if you haven’t).  You could do some clue-tracking yourself by picking up any paperback mystery and reading it through with a highlighter and pen–marking the clues/red herrings as you go.  It’s useful to see how other mystery writers create their puzzles.

The second site is an under-construction Wikipedia article.  It’s, oddly-enough, marked as a possibility for deletion, as of this blog date (click on the “discussion” tab at the top of the article page.)  The designation for deletion appears to be a mistake….all the references in the article were from Christie’s actual novels.  At any rate, it provides an excellent listing of the plot elements (clues, red herrings, etc.) Christie used.  Some of them are: clues hidden in plain sight, missing elements, supposedly unreliable characters, and chance remarks.  Books that include these elements are mentioned for our reference. 

The third site is a website devoted to Agatha Christie.  It also includes a list of plot devices used by Christie to puzzle her readers. 

Naturally, at the top of the your list should be an accountant or tax preparation service. Most writers are word-people, not numbers-people.

If you are going solo, or plan on using tax preparation software and need to know what schedule to file, etc, you can find a good deal of information online. Of course, like any web research, you should make sure the information is cross-referenced on different sources. Or go to The Source itself: the IRS website’s self-employed page.

There are several pages of handy overviews for tax-weary writers: Moira Allen’s article on Writing World, Publishlawyer.com’s article on Taxes and the Writer,Authors and the Internal Revenue Code by Linda Lewis, an article on Hackman-Adams’s site entitled Writer’s Guide to Taxes, and Profit vs. Pleasure on the Fiction Factor site.

I’ve discovered that I’m really, really lucky. The art department at Llewellyn Publications (Flux/Midnight Ink) has tremendous talent and has been receiving much acclaim for their covers.

They sketched out a preliminary cover early in the production process and shared it with me as soon as they had the draft ready. The acquiring editor asked me my thoughts. I thought it was fantastic, and told him so. I would never have been able to envision the cover they designed. Plus, they had obviously spent a good deal of time reading through my book to even formulate the idea.

Apparently, though, other authors aren’t so lucky. Agent Kristin on her Pub Rants blog delves into the importance of a cover consultation clause in authors’ contracts, and what editors say and what they mean when it comes to covers.