Mysterious Matters: Mystery Publishing Demystified

Advice for the Young at Heart

(With apologies to that much-underrated 80s group, A Flock of Seagulls, for using one of their song titles as the title of this posting)

A couple of weeks ago I mentioned in passing that an intern at our company asked me to give her my best piece of advice as an editor.  Using my own post as inspiration (not at all self-centered, eh?), I thought I would ask that same question around the office and share my findings. 

ADVICE FROM EDITOR #1: Make sure you get the right books into the right reviewers' hands, and keep them out of the hands of people who don't like that sub-genre.  Explanation, more info, etc.:  It is always a good idea to read a reviewers' other work before deciding whether to send that person a review copy.  Editors must have a realistic sense of the objective pros and cons of the books they publish and must accept that reviewers are a very diverse lot who can't always be expected to give all books a fair shake.  

ADVICE FROM EDITOR #2:  If you want to get published in the commercial fiction market, you should write for readers, not for yourself.  Explanation, more info, etc.: What you want to do as a writer is more or less irrelevant.  A book is a commercial product that readers choose to purchase from their limited disposable income.  There is a huge amount of competition, so you have to deliver a product that people want to buy.  While we respect your goals as a writer, what the public wants is more important to us.

ADVICE FROM EDITOR #3:  You have to know when to give up on a manuscript.  Explanation, more info, etc.:  Attempting for years to get a specific manuscript published isn't likely to work.  Manuscripts have a shelf life, and they start feeling old very quickly.  Maybe your character works but your story doesn't, or maybe your character just doesn't work.  You have to be willing to abandon characters you may have grown to love.

ADVICE FROM PUBLICIST #1: Whether you realize it or not, you are a public figure.  Act accordingly.  In other words, always behave as if you are already famous.  Explanation, more info, etc.:  Bad behavior may not be commented upon directly, but it is always noticed, and a subtle revenge (in the form of unsold books) may be enacted.  Be gracious, be kind, be polite.  Don't be aggressive, obnoxious, or conceited. 

ADVICE FROM PUBLICIST #2: Don't ever have the attitude that people should like and want to buy your books.  Explanation, more info, etc.: Humility goes a long way in this business.  The best combination is a quiet self-confidence + the ability to know when to keep your mouth shut.

ADVICE FROM COVER DESIGNER:  Sorry, but you don't know the first thing about typography, art, and design.  Please don't act as if you do.  Explanation, info, etc.: 99% of the time, she's right.  This is a perpetual struggle--authors want to design their own covers, use their own photos, etc., and most of the time the results would be horrific. 

ADVICE FROM PRODUCTION/PROJECT EDITOR: Page proof is not the time to rewrite your book or make major changes.  Explanation, info, etc.:  Making changes in the proof stage takes not only a lot of time but also costs a lot of money.  Many writers don't realize the ramifications for page make-up when they start making wholesale changes.

ADVICE FROM ROYALTY/BUSINESS MANAGER:  We're not trying to cheat you.  We're really not.  Explanation, info, etc.:  Many books are sold at massive discounts, and let's not forget about returns, too.  (Some contracts write returns provisions into them.)  And the number of free copies that we give away--which then find their way onto the Internet for sale--is much higher than you think.  We can't pay royalties on copies we have given away.

ADVICE FROM LIBRARY/SPECIAL SALES MANAGER:  Think about how your book would be received at your local library, or if you'd be likely to pick it up at the "New Arrivals" shelf.  Library patrons are the world's most voracious readers.  If you can't appeal to them, your odds for success in the larger market are quite limited. 

10 Characters to Put Out to Pasture

The challenge in genre fiction is always to balance the tried and true (including "stock figures") with the new, interesting, or exciting.  Too much tried and true = boring and formulaic; too much new, interesting, or exciting = nerve-wracking to publishers, who can't easily classify it and/or don't dare push the envelope too much for fear of unsold books sitting in the warehouse and getting remaindered or destroyed.

While I recognize that certain types of characters are a staple of our genre (sassy heroine, sexy-and-stoic noncommunicative cop), it seems that a lot of the manuscripts I've been reading lately -- as well as published works -- are using the same characters over and over again, and I'm getting a bit tired of them.  So, herewith, the top 10 characters I'd like to see retired.

1. The pill-popping, alcoholic, cold society woman.  Yes, it's an easy stereotype because there are a lot of them in reality.  (I see them not infrequently in life.)  But aren't there any society matrons who don't drink a fifth of gin each day, who don't treat their daughters cruelly, and don't spread vicious gossip? 

2. The overly garrulous neighbor.  This character is the lazy novelist's dream come true.  He or she, by virtue of being a true busybody, gives the investigator a true information dump, making the sleuth's job much, much easier.  I like my P.I.'s to have to work a little harder for their information.

3. The bitchy teenage girl.  Somehow our society seems to have fallen in love with the positively evil alpha high school girl who ruins the reputations of rivals and leads smear campaigns against those who look at her the wrong way.  While my own daughter certainly had her moments of ill temper as a teenager, neither she nor her friends ever behaved remotely like a character in Mean Girls.  I really think the proliferation of this type of character is doing young women a disservice.

4. The sleazy male boss.  Men have made some progress since 1952.  Not all of us look on our female employees as idiotic incompetents who would still make good bedmates.  Certainly there are ways of doing a Machiavellian, selfish boss other than as a sexist slimeball?

5. The precocious and wise-beyond-his-or-her years niece or nephew.  A niece or nephew lets our ferociously independent hero(ine) have some unqualified love in his/her life.  I don't mind a younger person who teaches the narrator a thing or two about how to lighten up, but sapient life lessons springing from the lips of unformed 17-year-olds make my eyes roll back in my head.

6. The cub reporter and her hard-as-nails-but-secretly-sensitive editor.  Yes, the newsroom is a frenetic place, and yes, editors tend to be hard on younger staff.  But can't a newspaper editor occasionally NOT be blustery and foul-mouthed?  And can't a young reporter be anything beyond willful and stubborn?  (With all the problems today's newspapers are facing, it will be interesting to see the next generation of reporters.) 

7. The snobbish matriarch fiercely protecting family secrets.  Poor Grandma or Great Great Aunt Harriet, that ice princess confined to a wheelchair in her attic bedroom, secretly pulling the strings and manipulating everyone in the house to continue the family fortune or prevent a family scandal.  How does she manage to be such a master puppeteer and a helpless invalid at the same time?  The answer, in a phrase: force of will.

8. The cocky dude whom the heroine falls for, despite his arrogance.  Yes, of course it happens all the time...women being attracted to real jerks who happen to be good looking.   Just once I'd like to see a heroine really, truly turned off by this behavior, to truly NOT be secretly attracted to the guy, or to NOT have the outer dislike covering a smoldering hidden passion.

9. The wisecracking detective.  No one, and I do mean NO ONE, can come up with an endless series of hilarious yet perceptive one-liners on his or her feet.  I always think a good sense of humor is a true sign of intelligence, but some detectives seem to have Jay Leno's staff writing their lines.   This can really irritate me when I am not in the mood.

10. The town crazy.  Would that all the mentally ill could be as perceptive in their insanity as the town crazy, who behaves in bizarre ways but always manages to be in the right place at the right time, to learn the citizens' secrets and be a witness to murders, infidelities, and all manner of other unsavory behavior!  But what can be the secret to unlocking the code behind the crazy person's rantings and ravings?  Could it be that she lost her beloved pet kitten at age 6 and was never the same afterwards?  Did his wife leave him after his tour in Vietnam?  Or is there some other key that will unlock his or her secrets, and get him/her to reveal all that s/he has witnessed, and thereby provide the final clue to solve the crime?

The Mystery Reader's Bill of Rights

There's a famous list of the "rules" promulgated by the Detection Club in the 1920s, aimed at giving the mystery novelists of the time a set of guidelines for fair play.  Certainly scholars of the language, as well as sociologists, could have a field day with some of the rules, including "No Chinaman must figure into the story."  The original rules, written by Richard Knox in 1929,  also prevented things like unexpected indentical twins and multiple secret passages from playing too large a role.  You can see this list here.

I would like to add my own set of corollaries to Knox's guidelines.  So many people ask me, "What exactly do you look for in a manuscript?  What is the magic formula?"  The simple answer is that there's no simple answer, but one thing is certain: While reading a manuscript, I think not only about how much I am enjoying but also about how much Readers, Mystery Lovers, and Non-Mystery Lovers will enjoy it.  (There's no greater compliment for most mystery novelists to hear than, "Oh, I don't usually read mysteries, but I loved yours.")  To this end, I present: 

Agatho's Bill of Rights for Mystery Readers

Mystery readers have the following inalienable rights:

1. The right to be entertained.  Reading a mystery should never be a chore.  Even if it's dark or somber, it should hold your interest and inspire you to keep reading.

2. The right to have their intelligence engaged, not insulted.  A mystery is at its heart a puzzle, a problem looking for a solution.  A mystery should engage your brain and make you think, but allow you to go along for the ride if you don't want to make the effort.  The limits of suspension of disbelief must be respected; characters who behave in ridiculous ways to keep a plot moving insult readers by making them complicit in something inane, poorly written, or ill-conceived.

3. The right to be tricked.  Readers have a right to fair play, but more than that they have the right to expect that the writer is more clever than they are.  Readers want to and loved to be tricked, and the best tricksters are usually held in the highest esteem.

4. The right to demand value for their money.   Like housekeepers and landscapers, novelists perform a service.  Mystery readers have the right to demand that writers and series remain fresh and/or offer the same results they have come to expect.   A mystery novel is a product; the reader has the right to demand a high level of utility/enjoyability from that product.

5. The right to choose what they like and what they don't.  Many mystery readers know what they enjoy reading and what they dislike.  It's not our job to try to convince them they are wrong.  If we publish books they want to read, they will buy them and read them.  If they don't like the books we've published, it is our fault, not theirs.

6. The right to originality. While most mysteries are written to a time-honored formula, the reader has the right to something different or intriguing amid the murder and mayhem.  Perhaps the difference is structural, perhaps something about the characters or setting.    The reader has the right to feel that the author has done something more than go through the motions of compiling a bunch of genre expectations and shuffling them together.

7. The right to be heard: to talk and write about mysteries they've read without fear of censure.  The Internet is full of stories and postings (I see them everyday) of readers writing their opinions about mysteries they've read, both good and bad.  There is a tendency for many to dismiss negative discussion as cruel, especially by authors themselves, who cannot bear to hear their work criticized.  Readers have the right to discuss any and all work, in any forum, in a respectful way, without having writers or agents responding to them in a nasty way.

8. The right to brevity.  Good books need not be long, and they certainly need not be padded to justify a cover price.  The best mysteries accomplish a great deal in 300 pages.  Substantially higher page counts slow everyone, and everything, down.  (The exception, of course, is those readers who love a big, substantial doorstop in the winter, or any other time of year.)

9. The right to a cover that reflects the book's contents. Many of today's covers are slick marketing pieces, but it's sort of shocking to see how many of them have no bearing on the book's contents, which (to my mind) is the equivalent of false advertising.  

10. The right to be treated as the sophisticated grown-ups that they are.  Some of the most popular television shows (such as Cheers, Moonlighting, and The Simpsons) have always taken as their operating assumption that the average TV viewer is intelligent--not a moron.  People can handle complexity, and as publishers we should encourage (and publish) writers who take chances and try something new, not complain that there's not a "ready made" market for such a character or situation.  Of course, we need book clubs, distributors, and booksellers to agree with all this as well.       

Today's Filthy Word: Hunch

The day before Thanksgiving is not really a good one to go on a tirade.  And yet my poor assistant (who, mark my words, will some day be a superb editor) just had to listen to me rant and rave about a manuscript that was absolutely stellar for its first 175 pages, and then went downhill rapidly, horrifically, and tragically.  Why?

Because a very suspenseful mystery story -- unique, intriguingly told, peopled with quirky and enigmatic characters -- turned into a completely banal detective story in which the protagonist began following her "hunches."

I think I've written in the past about my belief that writers can do anything as long as they do them well.  But I'm going to make an exception in the case of hunches. 

"Hunches" on which a plot turns, or on which the resolution of the mystery depends, are quite simply the result of poor, lazy writing.  Period.

This is one of those areas where reality and fiction diverge. I think it's true that, in life, regular people as well as cops have hunches/intuitions/whatever you want to call them about a situation, and the hunch may be quite accurate.  Perhaps a wife has a hunch that her husband is committing infidelities, or a boss has a hunch that an employee is embezzling.  A cop may feel in his/her gut that a witness is lying or covering up for someone.  I have hunches of my own all the time, and some of them do turn out to be pretty accurate.

But in too many mysteries, hunches are a crutch, a magical plot device that helps a lazy writer continue to move a story along.  A good hunch simply eliminates all the hard work of plotting, laying clues, and placing red herrings.  The story seems to have hit a dead end, and you still have 100 pages to write?  Throw in a hunch and, shazam!  The story is moving again.

I don't want to imply that intuition or hunches have no place in mystery fiction.  My point is that I want these hunches fully explained or rationalized based on experience or research.  For example, there is a good deal of research into the body language and communication style of liars: They fiddle with a piece of paper, they evade questions, they speak more hesitatingly than they do while speaking the truth.  To go back to my earlier examples: The wife who suspects her husband of cheating probably has seen subtle evidence to back her hunch: he comes home late, has unexplained charges on his credit card bill, and so forth.  The employer suspects the employee of embezzling because it follows a pattern he's seen in the past: The embezzler works later than everyone else, is at the office first thing in the morning, and never takes a vacation.

So when I'm reading a manucript, I want to know exactly what informs these "hunches" that cause the P.I to veer off wildly in a different direction.  What evidence does the sleuth have (based on experience, or background, or discussions with colleagues) to change her thinking so drastically?  I'm quite happy to let the basis for the hunch be explained a bit later on, after some brilliant sleuthing has been done, as long as the explanation is in there somewhere.  But please!  None of these amazingly accurate hunches that come out of nowhere, formed like Athena fully sprung from the head of Zeus with no explanation regarding the conception.

Approach, then Retreat

I don't write a lot here on Mysterious Matters about conventions and cons.  The truth is, I love them but don't get to as many of them as I would like to.  And their organizers are the unsung heroes of our genre, so three cheers to them, and thanks from all of us.

Some things I love about conventions:

• Talking to readers

• Attending, or participating in, panels

• Scouring the book room to scope out the competition and see who's doing interesting things

• Being impressed enough by a writer, or by word of mouth about a book, that I want to buy it and read it before I leave

The primary thing I don't like about conventions -- and this is a fairly recent phenomenon -- is the large and growing number of writers who look on the convention solely as a publicity device, a way to sell books.  Don't get me wrong--book sales are a wonderful thing, and I'm all for them.  But I do find a large number of writers who get into relentless "book hawking" mode, who talk about themselves and their work endlessly, and that does rather bore me after a while. 

When I attend conventions in my role as editor, I often feel like the king of the prom, the captain of the football team, the romantic lead in a big-budget film, etc.  Now, I am human enough to admit that this is not an unpleasant feeling at all.  The reason is simple, of course:  I'm in the position of being able to publish the books of aspiring writers, which makes me a popular guy. 

But it's an awkward popularity, as I see people really struggling with how to treat me.  Should I be approached as an everyday guy, one with whom a casual chat is possible?  Or should I be treated as royalty--as he who holds the keys to the kingdom and dispenses favors to those who curry my pleasure?  Should you appear confident or humble, or some hard-to-find combination thereof? 

So, herewith--for those who care--some tips on how to treat Agatho at conventions.  As always, I am only one man, so take these points cum grano salis.

1. If you are a non-writing reader or fan, I would love to chat with you.  Please don't feel you have to be brilliant.  I want to hear what you like, what you don't, what turns you on, what turns you off.  It's more than fine to ask me about what I do for a living and how I do it.  If you want a specific type of book or protagonist and can't find what you want, tell me about it--maybe there's a trend I should be aware of.  If you've seen a cover that you loved, or one you hated, I want to hear about it.  I want to know why you love that particular writer or series so much, or why you think that latest best-seller is so overrated. 

2. If you are an aspiring writer, it is fine to pitch a work to me.  That is my job: hearing pitches and reading manuscripts, and I love doing it.  It would be nice if you would ask if I have a few minutes to talk at some point rather than collaring me as I'm on my way to a session or otherwise indisposed in the men's room.  Just introduce yourself and be upfront about what your goals are.  When we do meet, try to tell me about your book in two minutes or less.  Ultimately I want to know what the "one-sentence sell" is and how it's going to be unique or interesting.  When I'm honest with you, don't get upset or mad, and please don't cry.

3. Try not to be nervous--I am not there to judge you, though it is my job to critique your work if you put yourself in a position of having me do so.  Also, it's best to engage in conversation/dialogue with me rather than argue.  If I say, "I think there are too many books featuring newspaper reporters as sleuths," you can say, "Oh, but mine is really smart and witty"--which is a BAD response-- or you can say, "I know the newspaper industry so well, I wonder if there's a way to recast the setting or protagonist in a way that makes her more unique."  At which point I might say, "Well, you're right--the genre has a lot of basic reporters-turned-sleuths, but I can't recall a book in which the Obituary Editor is the P.I." 

4. Once we have met, it is fine to say hello to me again.  This is really a tricky area for some people.  Some folks are so afraid of lending the impression that they're trying to monopolize my time that we'll talk for five minutes on Monday, and then they'll avoid me for the next three days.  Others decide to get on my good side, and I find myself seated next to them at one panel after another.  Flirtation can be fun, but I do wear a wedding ring and too much flirting makes me think that you are willing to do just about anything to get published....

5. Don't be offended if I am cordial but not extravagant with friendliness.  The truth is, I really cannot bond with you too closely...it makes things more difficult.  I'm in the position of having to reject 97% of what comes my way, and it's going to be much harder for me to do my job with an appropriately critical eye if I really like you, or know your life story, and so forth.  So we editors do keep a sort of invisible barrier, but it's for our own protection.  Also, do remember too that, though we love our jobs and the genre, often we are at the convention in a professional capacity; and we have to draw a dividing line between our work and private lives.

6. At lunches and dinners, I sometimes find myself pontificating to a rapt group of people who stare at me while I talk.  I really don't like to do this, but sometimes I find myself feeling as though I must share my "wisdom" with a group of people, which leads me to lecture...and of course everyone listens, because they want to learn, or want to be published, or want to be polite.  And, of course, my opinions are only those of one man, so afterwards I often feel guilty for presenting my point of view as gospel truth (which I'm sure is what I do here on Mysterious Matters from time to time....)  My point is: You can make me feel a lot more like a part of the group by treating me as a dinner companion rather than a Publisher.  I love gossip, and current events, and even a good dirty joke every now and again.  So let's try to discuss those topics, too, where I can do as much listening as I do talking.

7. I love taking part in conversations about deeper matters in the genre--the evolution of the protagonist, what is "fair" vs. "unfair" in points of view and plotting, the role of (a)(im)morality in the mystery, and so forth.  Sometimes I find the conversations to get a bit shallow, and I'm always impressed when I meet people who have read deeply in the genre and have formulated opinions and ideas.  I've often wanted to suggest this sort of thing to convention coordinators: That there be half-hour sessions with a leader who asks a question of all the people in the room, and then moderates the conversation so that all people (not just panelists at the front of the room) have a chance to be heard.  Mystery readers have thought deeply about their genre, I think, and I love to hear what they say about it.

8. There are some things you should NOT do.  I make no secret of the fact that I work for an independent press.  It's not really nice to say to me, dismissively, "Oh, never heard of it."  It's also not nice to get all excited at the thought of meeting an editor, and then watching your smile deflate as it dawns on you that I don't work for Random House.  I'm not overly fond of sour grapes, either--I've had comments where people have come up to me and said, "Well, just wanted you to know that you rejected my book last year, but St. Martin's picked it up," then turned heel and walked away triumphantly, as if to say, "Well, a-hole, I just told you a thing or two." Try not to ask me questions about money--it really is a difficult topic and it's so hard to talk about in the abstract.  Please don't ask for my email address, either.  Many of us live in fear that the world at large will get our email addresses, and we'll be inundated with unwanted queries in our IN boxes, which are overflowing enough as it is.  If I want to give you my email address, I'll do so (probably by giving you my card). 

9. The single most impressive thing you can do after a pitch is to ask, "Do you have any advice for me?"  It shows me that you're open to feedback, and you can even ask follow-up questions.  (I'm pretty sure agents feel the same way.  If any agents are reading this blog and would like to offer further advice on approaching them, please write a Comment or direct readers to your URL.)

 10. In general, try to remember that I am a person too, and I don't mind being asked about my interests, what I like to read, what my hobbies are, and so forth. 

Until next time,

Agatho

The Cardinal Sins

Looking at the site meter on this blog, I noticed that I tend to get the most readers, and the most email, when I write about my annoyances and pet peeves.  How perverse!  But maybe it isn't, and the phenomenon has given me some insight, perhaps, into how consumers think.  There's a fairly popular TV show titled "What Not to Wear," and I understand that people (my wife and daughter included) love it.  And I think I know why:  perhaps dressing well is as much about knowing what NOT to do, as it is about knowing what TO do.  And maybe the same goes for writing mystery novels: Knowing what you SHOULDN'T DO is as important as knowing what you SHOULD do.  I also get the feeling that when I write about the crazy or ineffective things writers have done, I devolve more into the realm of gossip, which is always going to be more interesting than spouting the conventional wisdom (tell a great story, have interesting characters, make sure there's plenty of conflict, etc.).  I love gossip myself, so why not spread some here on Mysterious Matters?

(Side note: If I were a nonfiction editor, I think I might be tempted to sign a series of books a la the Dummies series: "What NOT to do when Dating," "What NOT to Cook for a Party," "What NOT to do when planning a wedding," "What NOT to do on the Job," etc.)

So, in honor of celebrating all those bad things you should NOT do when writing a mystery novel, I present my list of "The Cardinal Sins," those things that cause me to consign a manuscript with great enthusiasm to my recycling bin.

1.SLOW PACING IN CHAPTER 1.  I find that a surprising number of writers decide that their manuscript should have a slowly building sense of menace.  This usually means beginning with a slow, deliberate first chapter, in which the story is set up or the main character is introduced.  The protagonist's every move, every thought, is described in excruciating detail, with the goal of introducing a sense of unease or dread in the reader.  Unfortunately, most of what ends up being introduced is a sense of boredom.  I really do need to see your book take off like racehorses at the Kentucky Derby.  There is absolutely nothing wrong with action in the first chapter; and of course action can be combined with an interesting character twist. 

2. HIGHLY DESCRIPTIVE LANGUAGE.  For me, paragraphs of descriptive detail are (or should be) the realm of literary fiction.  Perhaps I don't have much imagination for this sort of thing, but lengthy descriptions always slow things down for me, often to a crawl.  I enjoy a manuscript where people, landscapes, settings, furnishings, etc., are described with broad and effective brushstrokes, with the detail coming in only when necessary.  Actually, I think it's quite important that a mystery novelist know when a high level of description is helpful/necessary, and when it isn't.  It's usually necessary when writing about elements that are key to the mystery: the intricate details of that painting that's been stolen from the museum, the details of that Moroccan carving knife found in the victim's back, the layout of the room where the killing took place.  It isn't necessary, usually, to go into lavish detail about every square inch of the characters' physical appearance, or the color of the curtains, or the breathtaking view across the lake.  (Something about lake views sends writers into paroxysms of description.  I love a lake, but really--if you've seen one lake, haven't you seen them all?)

3. WATCHING THE KILLER SETTING UP THE KILL. I admit that these sorts of openings used to be effective...We readers watch the psycho setting up the trap, or lying in wait, for the victim.  It's been done a million times now, in books, and movies, and TV shows, and at this point I feel like it's nothing more than a cheap trick.  True, it can be effective...no denying that.  But when a book opens this way, my automatic assumption is that the writer cannot be very original, and that the manuscript is unlikely to offer me anything I haven't seen before. 

4. FAILING TO CONVEY ANY SENSE OF MYSTERY.  You'd be amazed at how often this happens: You read through Chapter 1, and perhaps even Chapter 2 and 3, and you think: "Where's the mystery?"  The writer is so busy setting up everything up that s/he fails to position the story as a mystery/suspense novel.  So many manuscripts I get have a workaday feeling, with the Sleuth (amateur or otherwise) getting out of bed, or going about his business, that I often get the feeling that I am reading Ladies' Home Journal.  A good mystery is not about the mundane: it is about an initiating event that is deeply dissonant, odd, or unexpected.  It really is essential to me that a first chapter make me ask some sort of probing question:  What just happened?  Why is she behaving so oddly?  Why would this dog lover be abandoning her dog at the local pound?  Wanting an answer to those questions is what will keep me reading. 

5. WORKING TOO HARD.  Writing a good mystery is hard work, but the best practitioners make it look easy.  I'm sad to report that I get a lot of manuscripts where the effort really shows, but not in a good way.  Most of the time this takes the form of a writer trying desperately to make the protagonist likable.  I remember meeting an aspiring author at a recent convention who said to me, "I want readers to think of my protag as their best friend."  And sure enough her protag (first-person narrative) was a paragon of virtue: friendly, funny, warm, delightful, and about as realistic as gremlins and golems.  Now I don't deny that we want and need some likable heroes and heroines, but they do need to have at least a flaw or two.  I think a lot of writers are really afraid to take their protagonists to dark places, to have them do things that are quasi-immoral, to really make them struggle with something.  I have also grown weary of those self-consciously wacky or "humorous" protags who work hard to make the reader laugh.  Too many wisecracks in Chapter 1 leave me with the feeling that I'm about to experience an evening in the Catskills of the 1940s, so I find myself withdrawing from the manuscript and setting it aside. 

Insert [Self] Here

When I occasionally attend conventions and/or talk with writers at them, I often give them what I call the Golden Rule of Writing Fiction: Stop thinking about yourself, and start thinking about your reader. 

Writers are often introspective people who take their own experiences as a jumping-off point for a book.  That is fine.  But good fiction should not parallel the daily life of the novelist.  Why not?  In a word, this approach is boring 99% of the time.  In the business, we often call a writer-not-very-cleverly-disguised-as-protagonist a "self-insertion."  The only time I can really think of a self-insertion working to the benefit of a book is Stephen King's Misery.

Good mysteries are metafiction.  They strip away the mundane routines of everyday life and turn it into something exciting, puzzling, and intriguing.  They generally are not a psychotherapy session writ large.  A journal is the place for a writer to work out his or her issues, not a mystery novel.  Why?  Because your readers don't want to hear about your problems.  They have problems of their own, and whether they are consciously aware of this or not, they pick up a novel because it creates a barrier between the real world and a fictional world to which they can escape.   They look for books by writers who can create an alternate world that's somewhat modeled on our own but obeys a set of rules found only in novels, where investigations are compressed into a one-week period, that sexy detective goes from nemesis to lover in the space of three days, and a protagonist manages to learn a very specific lesson and "evolve" by the end of the book. 

If readers wanted to pick up the true story of a person hitting the skids and working out his or her issues, they'll read Augusten Burroughs or James Frey, or any other work marketed as a "true story."  But of course the autobiographies of Frey and Burroughs--like so many, perhaps all, others--are fictionalized to a greater or lesser extent.  This is why so many of us in the industry shook our heads in disgust at Oprah's rants regarding Frey's fictionalizing.  Someday Oprah will publish her own autobiography, and I will be surprised beyond belief if it is not, in the immortal words of Bart Simpson, "self-serving, with many glaring omissions."  Frey was smart enough to understand where his own storyline became dull, so he made up for it.  That's what fiction allows you to do--to keep "life" interesting from the first page through the last.  (And as for why publishers are shelling out big bucks for stories like Frey's--that is a whole 'nother issue....)

I always get a bit of a creepy feeling when I get one of those unprocessed, unconsidered autobiographical manuscripts.  Within five pages I think, "OK, here's a story about a man whose wife has just died and who is feeling alone.  The writer is a man whose wife has just died and who is feeling alone."  Or "Here's the story of a detective who has struggled with depression and men.  The writer is a woman who has struggled with depression and women."  The problem with these stories is how unfiltered they are, how weighted down they feel right from the beginning. 

Can personal experience be used to enrich a manuscript?  Absolutely.  But the best writers reconfigure that experience, transforming it into something more narratively rich and telescoping it into 70,000 words with a beginning, middle, and end.   They look at their experience, re-envision it in fictional terms, reconceiving it to make it better fit the conventions, and think about the reader's experience of the printed book--and they do very much what James Frey did.  This is why, when you meet the best-selling writers at conventions or at book signings, you see just a bit of their hero or heroine in them, but you still walk away thinking, "Interesting.  Sue Grafton isn't Kinsey Millhone, after all.  And Harlan Coben isn't Myron Bolitar.  How did that happen?"

Step into a World

This has been a pretty good week for manuscripts and queries.  Some quite interesting things have come my way, which is always exciting.

I've written in the past about those qualities that turn me off to a manuscript, but I've been giving some thought to the things that turn me on.  Of course, good writing, good characters, and a strong plot must be taken as a given.  Beyond that, what grabs my attention?

1. Stepping into a world.  I like a book that creates and sustains a world.  Each genre has a sort of metafictional world of its own, and mystery lends itself to many different world types, from the cozy village to the hardboiled world of the Big City.  I like to be enmeshed in that world from the first paragraph of the book.  I think this may be part of the reason that job or hobby-based mysteries are so successful--the reader is taken into the world of, say, the antiques dealer, the Civil War reconstructionist, the professional ballet dancer, and so forth.  The ironic thing, of course, is that most antiques dealers probably wouldn't say their lives are more exciting than those of the average person, nor would the average ballerina.  The creation of those worlds makes them seem more glamorous, more exciting, more mysterious than they probably are. (For example, how much excitement can ballerinas experience when they are practicing 12 hours a day, eating sparsely, and exhausted at the end of the day?) 

2. Feeling a sense of unease.  My heart always starts to race a little bit when I am confronted by something peculiar on the first page of a manuscript.  I don't mean something disturbing, perverted, or psychotic, but rather a scene where something very unexpected is happening.  Take this first line from The Listening Walls, by Margaret Millar:  "From her resting place in the broom closet Consuela could hear the two American ladies in 404 arguing."  Huh?  Exactly.  Why, exactly, is Consuela resting in the broom closet of a hotel?  We've all been to hotels, all seen the same things, but Millar arrests our attention immediately with something that obviously can go on in a hotel but that none of us ever think of.

3. Setting sail on a raging river.  A mystery/suspense novel is nothing without an exciting plot that grabs your attention and doesn't let go.  A first chapter that has us off and running, with action happening immediately--and no backstory to drag down the pace--makes me want to keep reading, to sail that raging river all the way to its end.  Ponderous thoughts and philosophizing don't grab my interest on page one, though certainly it's a good idea for the lead to have some deeper thoughts somewhere in the book.

 4. Wondering what the hell just happened. So, I've just read Chapter 1, and the protagonist has done something that makes no sense.  Maybe she's just planted a bomb in her daughter's car, or he's traded his wife's acetaminophen for ibuprofen.  Why would any mother want to blow up her own daughter?  What difference does it make whether the wife takes Tylenol or Advil?  If I'm asking questions like this in frustration, it means the manuscript has hooked me.  I don't always need to know what's going on--in fact, I love to be confused.  Note, though, that I want to be confused by the brilliance of the plot, not by a writer who hasn't done a good enough job of establishing place, setting, or character.

5. Feeling as though I have been tricked.  Any writer who can fool me has my respect, and that goes a long way in buying a manuscript.   Sometimes I see what the writer is doing.  "Aha!" I think.  "Look at how cleverly the writer is not mentioning an important detail.  So, she thinks she can get away with making me think the character is walking a dog when she is actually walking a cat.  She has obviously called attention to that obelisk looming in the distance for some reason that will become clear, but how on earth did that English village end up with an obelisk?"  I'm good at seeing tricks, but that doesn't mean I don't love them.  The best mystery writers are tricksters of the highest order.  I love it when the tricks work--and I love them even more when they work on me. 

6. Wanting to cheat.  I'm from a traditional school that believes that reading ahead to the last chapter of a book is a cardinal sin.  But if you've driven me mad with the desire to know, and I am tempted to peek at the end because I can't take the suspense any longer...congratulations.  You will most likely have a contract in your hands sometime soon.

Ten Dirty Words

Though we shred all rejected materials, we do keep track of submissions in a database.  This has proven useful to us in a number of ways.  It's especially helpful in terms of jogging our memories and cross-checking to see if any of us have previously seen a writer's work.  We don't keep extensive notes, just author/title, a brief description of the book, and our no-holds-barred thoughts on the manuscript or proposal.

In looking at the database earlier this week, I noticed that we tend to use the same words quite often--and that these words can be packed with meaning.  We usually won't use these words in a rejection letter (we try to be respectful), but these seem to me to be the 10 worst words we can use to describe a manuscript:

1. PRETENTIOUS.  This is the worst of them all.  "Pretentious" means the writer has an unrealistic sense of self and/or the work.  However, there's a big difference between "ambitious but flawed" and pretentious.  The former usually connotes a terrific grand concept that doesn't quite come together.  The latter means "overly, and unjustifiably, impressed with oneself."

2. DERIVATIVE.  At best this means startingly unoriginal; at worst it means "copycat."  We do recognize that writers need to find ways to grab an agent's or editor's attention, and there certainly is a market for books that mimic bestsellers.  However, at the end of the day I believe that orginality always wins out. 

3. SELF-INDULGENT.  A self-indulgent manuscript is one that the author has been unable to edit or revise with an objective eye--a book that indulges the writer's tendency to go on at length without regard to the reader.  Such tendencies can be curbed with practice, and of course established authors can get away with such sins much more easily than aspiring novelists.  A self-indulgent writer signals editors that they care much more about "getting published" than they do about selling books.  And who needs that?

4. SLOW.  There's a lot to be said for a brooding, carefully plotted building of suspense.  But one of the worst sins in a mystery is a plodding plot, one that moves at a snail's pace or takes forever to get started.  We need to be hooked in the first two pages--or, better yet, the first sentence and paragraph.  Give me a gimmicky opening over tortuous backstory and endless detail any day of the week.

5. FORCED.  I usually use this word to describe manuscripts that set out to be "funny."  I can almost guarantee you that if you laugh a lot at your own jokes, you're not funny.  One of my very favorite writers (and one of my all-time favorite finds) manages to combine some really intense psychological portraits with incredibly sharp humor.  Yet I'd never describe his books as "humorous" as "funny," though the reviews often point out how satirically on-target they are.  He's not trying to be funny.  He is funny. 

6. HO-HUM.  A ho-hum manuscript might actually be a good book if you were stranded on a deserted island with nothing to read but pulp fiction.  It has all the right elements but doesn't manage to rise above the everyday formula.  Sadly, a competent, ho-hum  manuscript won't make it in this cutthroat era.  If we can't get excited about it, we're not going to be able to get readers excited about it, either.

7. INANE.  I don't mind a wild plot.  In fact, I sometimes love them, as in those over-the-top capers that I find absolutely wonderful on airplanes.  I can get past some pretty big plot contrivances, but when characters do ridiculous things, the manuscript moves into the "inane" category, and I run for the hills.

8. DEPRESSING.  I like characters to have conflicts that need to be resolved, but I don't like depressing mysteries peopled by depressed characters.  This may be (read: is) my personal taste, but I don't think the typical mystery reader wants to spend time around dystonic individuals, particularly alcoholics and drug addicts.  I sometimes think that such depressed characters are the creation of writers with "literary" ambitions, and that the works are published by editors and/or houses that like to see themselves as the oh-so-serious keepers of Contemporary Fiction.  I have no such ambition.  I want to enjoy reading the book, not congratulate myself for having gotten through it. 

9. AMORAL.  This one is a real problem with me.  I don't think of myself as a prig, but I like a book to have a moral center.  I sometimes feel that some of today's thrillers cast the villains almost as heroes, asking the reader to sympathize with them or even root for them.  The very worst offender in history, I believe, is Thomas Harris' Hannibal, which basically pits two digusting psychopaths against each other and asks the reader to sympathize with one of them (Hannibal Lecter himself).  I actually feel like a creep for having read it until the end, when I should have tossed it into the garbage pail.

10. DULL.  Frankly, I use this adjective most often with regard to setting.  Please do not be offended by this, but not all settings are created equal.  The fact that a writer lives in a certain city or state does not automatically make that city or state a good place in which to set a novel. 

All of this said, I do like to keep Mysterious Matters mostly positive, so let me end with a few words of encouragement.

There are certain words that we don't throw around easily.  That is, when we say them, we usually mean them.  If we say that a manuscript is well-written, we really do think it's written well.  A word that I like to use when I've take a fancy to some part of the manuscript is clever (and I think that being clever is probably one of the most important characteristics a mystery writer must have).  Finally, if I say that I will be glad to consider future submissions, this means that I think you have what it takes to get published, even if your current work isn't right for me at this time.

Backstory: Boon or Bane?

What is the role of backstory in a mystery novel?

I suppose it depends on how you define backstory.  In one sense, it's essential.  In the traditional murder mystery, the death happens early in the narrative, so the rest of the book is in essence an inquiry into the past, into those events that led up to the killing.  The reasons or motives for the murder may lie in the recent or distant past.  (For a superb example of a motive from long ago, see Stanley Ellin's Very Old Money.)  While looking for the murderer today, the sleuth must uncover the victim's past, as well as the stories and secrets of the suspects.

But there's another way of looking at backstory, too--it's the protagonist's life history, how s/he got to where s/he is today.  All adult mystery novels start in medias res, which means that the protagonist (often a first-person narrator) is an adult with a past.  Many writers use backstory to give psychological depth to the main character and/or to make the plot more credible or believable.  This is the proper use of backstory--provided that it is doled out little by little throughout the book.  A protagonist should not be an open book (pardon the pun) from page 1.  There has to be a little bit of mystery about him, about what makes him tick and why.  By the end of the book, we should know the full story (or at least much of it, given the need for series characters to develop and grow over a series of books).

This is why I get frustrated by manuscripts (and published books) that feel the need to tell me the protagonist's entire history in the first 50 pages.  This doesn't work for a lot of reasons.  First, a mystery is not an autobiography.  A strong lead character is essential, of course.  But people read mystery fiction for stories and plots as much as for character, and beginning a book with extensive backstory delays your main story.  Second, extensive backstory kills any momentum the narrative may have built up, destroying the suspense.  Think about it this way:  When you meet someone at a cocktail party, don't you run for your life when he starts to tell you his entire life story?  You're concerned with the here and now, not with the name of his first-grade teacher.  The more you get to know him, the more interested you are in hearing more about him--as long as he has not bored you silly.  That's when bits and pieces of the past become more intriguing.

I think there are a lot of dividing lines between those who will have their manuscripts published, and those who will not.  The ability to handle backstory properly is close to the top of my list.  When I get extensive backstory beginning on page 10 of a manuscript, the odds are very strong that the book won't make the cut.  For an interesting look at backstory being done well, try Louise Ure's The Fault Tree, which features a blind narrator who lost her sight as an adult.  The book does have a few problems, but the handling of the backstory is flawless.