Crime Is All Around
Back from Bouchercon
First and foremost, I owe you all an apology. I held a book giveaway last month and then I forgot to give the book away. So, to refresh your memory, I asked you to tell what you did on your summer vacation in the comments, and you told me. From this pool of responders I have randomly selected Erin Kent as the winner. Since I’m such a slacker, I also selected another winner, who I am still waiting to hear from, so check the comments.
Saturday night I was at a hotel in Minneapolis. It was the last night of Bouchercon, the crime and mystery writers conference, and the bar was packed. The big awards ceremony had just let out, and people were starting to unwind. Writers aren’t a tense group to begin with but the vibe was looser than it had been in the days leading up to it. (The big winner was S.A. Cosby, a gregarious and immensely talented writer. His conversation with Dennis Lehane was one of the highlights of the conference.)
The hotel was also starting to fill up with people in town for the rivalry match-up between the Green Bay Packers and the Minnesota Vikings for opening week of the 2022 NFL season. Lots of people in green and purple jerseys, plus the usual day drinking crowd that marks the beginning of college football season.
Into this mix came a wedding party. The men and women were dressed in traditional garb of their African homeland—or at least that’s what I presumed. The men were dressed all in white and wore sunglasses and carried gold-tipped canes and the women were all stunning. The party assembled around the bar for a shot and the whole lobby cheered. It’s the kind of scene that makes parachuting into a distant city so invigorating. All these people on different paths converging at a seemingly random point in time and space.
I went to Bouchercon because, well, I’ll get to that in a minute, but I wanted to connect with some old friends and make new ones. I don’t have the time or space (or, frankly, the energy) to highlight every interaction I had at the conference but I want to tell you about two because they have books coming out that I highly recommend.
Nolan Knight is no stranger to Message from the Underworld. I’ve talked about the reissue of his novel The Neon Lights are Veins but he has a new collection of stories coming out on September 26, 2022, called Beneath the Black Palms that’s LA noir AF. These stories have colorful characters with lots of action. There’s at least one moment in every story where things get totally unhinged. I love it, and I suspect you will too. Plus, I’ll be in conversation with Nolan on Saturday, October 1 at 5pm at Skylight Books and would love to see you there.
Another friend I got to spend time with was J.D. O’Brien. I had the honor of reading with Joe way back in 2005 when my first book, Big Lonesome, came out. We stayed in touch, which was easy to do when he moved out to LA for a few years, but more challenging after he returned to Massachusetts. We each had screenplays we’d written that we wanted to adapt into novels. While we worked on our projects during lockdown we traded chapters until we’d finished our books. Joe’s novel, a stellar road tale about a washed-up skip tracer and a psychotic stripper who knocks over a dispensary is so funny and smart and violent it will give your brain whiplash. Zig Zag comes out on January 3, 2023 but you can preorder it now.
As for my novel, which is coming next year, I’ll have all the details about what it’s about, what it looks like, and how you can order it soon. But I’ll tell you this. It’s a crime novel set in a near future LA about a dysfunctional vigilante group that has run-ins with all kinds of colorful characters, including corrupt healthcare officials and punk rock bands. I can’t wait to share it with you.
I went to Bouchercon for the same reason I go to any conference: for insight and inspiration. You can try to dial up what kind of insights you’re looking for by attending particular panels and reading specific books. Inspiration, however, isn’t predictable. You can’t order it on an app from an Inspo delivery service. You can’t show up to someone’s panel and say, “Inspire me.”
I pushed myself out of my comfort zone and stayed at the conference hotel to make the most of the experience and not give myself any easy excuses to skip out on events. I’m really glad I did that because I met so many talented writers who were also kind and generous. There were times when I was hesitant to introduce myself to someone and talk to them about something they said on a panel. Even though it felt like I was barging in a conversation, I did it anyway. And guess what? Those feelings of intruding on a place where I wasn’t welcome turned out to be just that—feelings.
I had a great time at the conference and look forward to going back next year, which will be really easy to do since it’s going to be held in San Diego next August.
Something amazing is happening. On the plan back from Minneapolis I wrote in my journal until I ran out of pages. I don’t think that’s ever happened to me before. (By the number of blank journals I have, you would think this was a common occurrence: Oh shit we’re getting close to the end, get the Moleskin people in here stat!)
About ten days ago I woke up with some ideas for a story I’ve been kicking around for years and years and years. But that morning it was immediately clear to me what the story should be and how it needed to be told, which is usually not the way inspiration works for me. Usually my writing projects are much more purpose-driven. I’m exploring the story as I’m writing it, figuring things out as I go. This is one of those rare times when the story feels like it’s being handed to me, like a gift.
The notes I jotted down on my laptop cohered into the beginning of the story and I discovered that by keeping my notebook handy I was able to keep the flow going even when I was traveling or away from my desk. Nor did the heat wave slow me down. Or being low-key obsessed with the LA Dodgers and the NY Giants. Or being jammed into the middle seat in the back of a crowded airplanes. I just kept going.
There’s a line in Jack Kerouac’s On the Road where old Sal Paradise wakes up in a motel in the middle of America and he’s groggy and disoriented. My recollection is that he’s afraid he’s lost the momentum that carried him across the country and he doesn’t know if he’ll be able to get it back. There’s a line in this passage that has always stuck with me: “Somewhere along the line the pearl would be handed to me.” The pearl in this case is “girls, visions, everything” but it’s clearly a metaphor for something that you seek that can only be found by seeking it. That’s what this story has become for me.
As some of you know, I started a second, secret newsletter called Orca Alert! That goes out every Sunday. It’s a short roundup of links to essays, articles, interviews and stories that for the most part are NOT about the news cycle or the discourse or whomever the main character of the internet is that particular day. It’s focused on the arts, culture, and science, i.e. stuff you may have missed while avoiding all the other crap that clamors for your attention. It’s a little thing and I don’t spend a ton of time on it but it does generate some interesting conversations. It also helps to de-clutter this space form superfluous links, which most of you don’t click on away. But if you are interested in that sort of thing and you are also interested in Message from the Underworld, then consider becoming a paying subscriber, which is currently the only way to get Orca Alert!
Thank you and be safe out there.
Thanks again Jim!! 🤗❤️
Sounds like you’re onto something with this writing streak! Next year, Bouchercon in San Diego! It will be my first!