Saturday, October 15, 2022

What We're Writing Week - Julia looks for disasters

JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING: Like Debs, I'm also traveling today; not, sadly, to the UK, but to Washington DC to help out my sister. I was originally going to lend a hand to her booth at a street fair tomorrow; Barb is a Realtor and will be offering passers-by free photos of your dog with Snoopy. My sister is the sort of woman who owns a full sized Snoopy costume, as well as a Minion and a Gingy (from Shrek) costume. (She is, no lie, one of the most fun people on the planet.)

However, I'm also staying because her family has been under some sort of voodoo curse. Two weeks ago, Barb fell at a Ravens game she was attending with her oldest boy, badly bruised her face, broke two teeth (!) and concussed herself. Then, a week later, her middle son fell and busted his wrist in two places. So along with handing out real estate into and signing folks up for her mailing list, I'm going to be helping with housework and holding down the fort while her son is in surgery Monday.

This Series of Unfortunate Events - you'd hardly believe it in a novel - got me thinking about the role of disaster in fiction. One of the things I always do while planning elements of my next book is to ask myself, "What's the worst thing that can happen to this character?" Some times it's physical - a character breaks a leg in the middle of a murder investigation, or becomes addicted to amphetamines and sleeping pills. Some times, it's emotional - two people who can't be together fall in love. Some times it's taking a character who is perfectly competent in her sphere and dropping her into an environment she's utterly unprepared for. That's what I've done to Officer Hadley Knox, former California girl, in this excerpt from AT MIDNIGHT COMES THE CRY.

 

The next blaze was different; a straight peeled strip with a bit of bark dug out on either side, roughly cross-shaped. What did that mean? She bent over, shielding her face for a moment from the relentless snow, trying to slow her racing brain enough to picture the chief making the marks. It's the first one he made. They had come up the long, steep slope of giant pines and climbed over a stone lip. Van Alstyne had said something about marking the trail while Paul was writing directions on her arm. Which meant the edge was right in front of her, a stone's throw away.

She strode forward. If she could just get over that bluff and start heading down the mountain, the militia would have at least two directions they'd have to search. When she got to the bottom and turned onto the old creek bed, they'd have to split their search again. Every turning would force more choices for them, and less chance of being caught for her. Of course, there was the matter of her being able to tell east from west when she couldn't see more than a couple feet--

She stepping onto air.

She screamed, cartwheeling wildly, tipped forward and went down, back leg dragging behind her, thudding, rolling, pounding. She hit a massive tree with the force of a woodsman's axe, all the breath exploding out of her lungs. She lay there for a time, sucking in air and crying and hurting all over.

Eventually, she rolled to her stomach, got her knees and hands beneath her, and clambered to her feet. Her hat had flown off somewhere along the way, and when she carefully shrugged free of her backpack, saw she'd the two side pockets were empty. Her water bottle and the gun, gone.

Shit.

Dear readers, what are the in-novel disasters that stick out in your mind? 



 

65 comments:

  1. Poor Hadley! A bad fall, a militia tracking her, and her gun lost in the snow. This California girl can sympathize.

    And your poor sister and her son. I'm glad you'll be there to help her.

    I always go blank on that kind of question, so I'll enjoy others' contributions throughout the day. ;^)

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    1. Honestly, if someone asked me the same, I probably wouldn't be able to think of an example until 4pm while walking the dogs... :-)

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  3. Oh, my . . . I hope things get better for your sister and her family . . . they're lucky to have you.

    Poor Hadley . . . definitely a disaster for her. And now I can't wait to find out what happens next!

    Novel disasters . . . being stranded on Mars ["The Martian" by Andy Weir] . . . .

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    1. OMG, yes, Joan. Novel and SO well thought out that, even though the disaster happens very quickly, in both the book and movie, every aspect of it was plausible. Just...supremely unlucky.

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  4. Hope things go well for your sister and her family.
    Poor Hadley.

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    1. Thanks, Dru! She's feeling much better (and got in to get temporary caps right away, thank heavens. I think my nephew is mostly at the whining stage of recovery...

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  5. Best wishes for Barb and her son, and their speedy recovery.

    Hadley sure is in a pickle!

    A friend fell in her shower a couple months ago, hitting her face (still bruised), knocking out one tooth (the EMTs got it back in), and worst of all, breaking both ankles--one very badly. All her doctors, etc. keep asking her how she managed to do that, and Judy, who will be 76 in a couple weeks, tells them she was skydiving. She was in a rehab center for six weeks, and is now at home with full-time help because she cannot get out of bed alone.

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    1. How terrible Karen! At least she has a sense of humor...

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    2. She's a hoot. Still working every day, from bed!

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    3. Oh, how awful, but yes, I like her spirit! And wouldn't that be an interesting setting for a mystery/thriller - an older woman confined to bed with two broken ankles, and people she's never met before coming in to "help"...

      Sigh, this is why I'm never going to write anything that's NOT crime fiction. My mind always just goes there.

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  6. Gee, Julia, I am trying to remember if anyone tortures their characters like you do. Hmm. There are a couple of others, but it's close. How about having a baby in a NY subway bathroom?

    I hope your nephew's operation goes well and that your sister's family gets its good MOJO back. You are the best sister! I'd love to adopt you for the tough times! XXOO

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    1. LOL Judy, that was bad wasn't it?? I agree, Julia and her sister are lucky to have each other through thick and thin. That's such a gift! May we all have an angel like them.

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    2. Lucy and I should write a book, Judy. TORTURING CHARACTERS FOR FUN AND PROFIT. And I'm the slacker sister - it's Barb who glues the family together.

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  7. Oh dear, poor Hadley! I can't imagine how she is going to survive this!

    I feel so sad for your sister and nephew. What a series of calamities! Prayers for speedy recoveries. I fell a few weeks ago and had to have three stitches in my chin. It was no fun! I didn't lose teeth or have a concussion, though,phew.

    I guess the fictional disaster that sticks out in my mind is in the book With No One As Witness by Elizabeth George. I still haven't really forgiven the author, because she killed off one of the main characters. More recently, in Copper River, by William Kent Krueger, one of the bad guys dies of a cougar attack. That was a pretty satisfying scene.

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    1. I didn't immediately stop reading Elizabeth George after that book, but after a few more with additional instances of what felt to me like torturing the main characters -- mostly Barbara in the books that followed -- I did give up on her books. I like the characters too much to see them tormented in some new way with each new book. It particularly galled me how every time Barbara got some glimmer of happiness it was brutally yanked away.

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    2. I still read them, but it's not the same for me. I agree with you about Barbara having her hopes dashed, over and over again--it just seems too mean!

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    3. The same thing got me to stop reading Patricia Cornwell. She was literally torturing characters, and I couldn't forgive the gratuitous violence.

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    4. I also tried to keep reading the Elizabeth George books after that senseless murder but eventually gave up.

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    5. Karen: I, too, gave up on Patricia Cornwell. Too much violence. Horrid.

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    6. I agree with everyone's assessment. Karin Slaughter is another writer who, despite being terrifically talented, I can't read. It's just too much.

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    7. I have continued to read the Elizabeth George books. Lately the torture of her main characters has not had been as prominent. However, the subject of her most recent book while timely and relevant is hard to read, I put the book down. I will finish it, after a long break.

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    8. Flora here: Same for me with Patricia Cornwell eons ago. Elizabeth George--I care about the characters and find the recent books so bloated with subplot details that I can skim for the main characters, understand plot and denouement, and move on with my reading!

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    9. I stopped reading Patricia Cornwell years ago, partly because of the gratuitous violence and partly because her politics were coming through and were not to my taste.

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    10. Count me among the many who stopped reading Cornwell - if the book I'm reading makes me too frightened to go to sleep at night, it's not the book for me.

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  8. Yikes! Love this! You are amazing. The scariest disaster? How about the twilight zone episode where the last man on earth breaks his only reading glasses?

    And good luck on your rescue mission—you are a good good sister. Love to you all.

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    1. Hank, of all the weird and dreadful things that befall characters in the Twilight Zone, that has been the one that's stayed with me longest. Like, Martians can kill me, you can shrink me and stick me in a dollhouse, whatever. Just don't take away my ability to read!

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    2. Exactly!

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  9. Too many worries here about Hadley! Do we know when the book will be out? No pressure, just curious. I agree with everyone else, Julia, you are a terrific sister!

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    1. I'm lucky to have such a terrific sister, Judi. I don't know when the book will be out, mostly because I still haven't finished it! As soon as I do, I can assure you everyone at Jungle Reds will know.

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  10. Oh Hadley, no! Please get out of that pickle; you're a favourite of mine.

    Julia: Sending healing vibes to your sister and nephew; broken bones are no fun.

    My sister and I joke that she is more Nurse Ratchett while I am more Nurse (Sue) Barton. But it's more joke than truth.

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    1. LOL!! I love this blog! Amanda, I'll be laughing all day!!

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    2. Judy: Happy to have given you a chuckle -- and I'm delighted to think that you know who Sue Barton is. Do you? The whole series sits on my 'childhood shelf' and I regularly re-read it all the way through.

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    3. Loved Sue Barton! Now I'm going to have to see if I can find any of the series available. Cherry Ames, too.

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    4. One Halloween when I was really little, I had a Sue Barton costume! With a cape! Oh, my!

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  11. Yes, Julia! If we love our characters we must make them suffer! I remember finding out that Constance Evans was claustrophobic and saying “right, my boy, you’re going down a slate mine!”
    My very best to your sister and nephew. Rhys

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    1. I love the phrase, "finding out Constable Evans was claustrophobic..." because sometimes it happens like that!

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    2. Lee Child has been known to put Reacher into situations where he is just too big to fit, once a tunnel in a mountain where he actually freaked out and couldn't move, once underground in tunnels in a bomb shelter designed for children with a 4' ceiling. Yep. And he is a tough guy to torture!

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  12. Flora: Glad to hear your sister and nephew are moving towards healing--that's a lot to hit at once! And great that you can be there for them. You are a good sister!

    Alistair MacLean was a great one for dropping his characters into compounding disasters. Plane wreck? Wait, how about a plane wreck in the Arctic and none of the passengers are prepared for bad weather? Oh, and let's have one character be diabetic and, by the way, the pilot was murdered.

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    1. And I forgot to say: Good grief! Hadley, hang in there!!!!

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    2. Honestly, Flora, I like it like that. As MWA Grand Master Lawrence Block said, "Fiction is just one damn thing after another."

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  13. Hugs to your sister and nephew! Hope both have a speedy recovery. Are you making the appearance as Snoopy this year?

    I'll think of a disaster tonight as I'm drifting off to sleep! I honestly think I block the good ones. They are too traumatic.

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    1. Kait, I believe it will be my brother-in-law appearing as Snoopy, thank goodness. I'm tasked with handing out grab bags and taking down names for the mailing list. Oh, the glamorous life of the self-employed....

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  14. Not only a superb author, you are a great sister! -- Who gets to be Snoopy? and maybe wearing the costume to the boy's post op recovery will improve a mood? So disasters.. umm I think right now John D. MacDonald's Condominium. First published in 1977 it is an indictment of the land developers in Florida. In particular the land rapes of the barrier islands. It includes a harrowing section where a tropical storm then hurricane sweeps through Florida. It reads as if MacDonald was a time traveler. He saw this future.

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    1. MacDonald was brilliant, Coralee, and I suspect his prescience had to do with his greatest strength as a writer; he was a keen observer of the world around him.

      And I don't think Snoopy will add much cheer to the recovery room - my nephew is still in the, "Gawd, Mom, don't embarrass me!" stage.

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  15. Julia, I am so sorry about the unfortunate events. The silver lining is that despite your sister's fall, she is still alive. I had a similar fall last May and though I did not hit my head, I bruised my leg. I still have soft tissue damage. You are a good sister to help out! Who gets to be Snoopy? Hugs to your sister and nephew.

    Trying to remember disasters in novels. Often, I find that scenario in my crying novels. I call the Danielle Steel novels my crying novels because reading her novels always have me reaching for tissues as I am crying buckets!

    Diana

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    1. Diana, I have to confess I love novels where I feel like crying, especially if the heroine is SO misunderstood and taken for granted until JUST at the end it all falls right for her.

      I think Barb's husband will play Snoopy - the costume works best for a taller person!

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  16. That is a cursed week! Ugh, my sympathies to your sis and her fam. Love the snippet. I felt that tumble Hadley took all the way to my bones. Well done!

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  17. Hadley didn't take a tumble, Julia dropped her off a cliff;-)

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  18. Oohh! Now I need to know what happens next! (when is the book out?) I'm comforted by the fact that you (and we) love her too much to let fatal disasters happen. It's hard to read . . . and I'm glad my own personal disasters are milder. March, who organized all the storytelling cruises, said to expect some upsets (or stay home and sort socks), but she did say she'd like JUST ONCE for me to have a smooth trip to join them. Heh, they do make good stories afterward.

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    1. And that hits it right on the head, Mary - they do make good stories. Smooth sailing is lovely in real life, but it's a snoozefest in fiction.

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  19. Oh no, Hadley! A militia after her? In the wilderness? In a blinding snow? And she's fallen and lost her water and gun? My heart is in my throat just reading that excerpt. I'll probably need somebody to hold my hand for the rest of it. I do love Hadley and she's pretty sharp, so I hope she can out-smart the ugliness that's after her.

    Julia, your poor sister and nephew. Freakish accidents remind me of an ongoing thought I've had, a bit of a prayer, to please not let me die a freakish death. I'm glad Barb has you to come and help out. I imagine you and she will have plenty of laughs together in spite of the circumstances.

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  20. As Roseanne Roseannadanna said, "if it's not one thing it's another." Or as I say, when it rains it pours. Bleah. As I recall, in A Bitter Feast poor Duncan got T-boned, his car totaled, he was concussed, and he lost his phone. And I'm not going to list all the things you've done to poor Russ. You must really love him indeed! Pat D

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    1. How does the song go? You only hurt the one you love?

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  21. Calamities and catastrophes...it does seem as if they arrive in bunches. Poor Hadley! I once heard a 90-year-old friend asked what her advice was for longevity. Her response: Hold onto the railing.

    Simple. Effective. And sometimes it's not enough. Feels like last year was one of those "if it's not one thing it's another" years for a lot of us.

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    1. Hallie, that strikes me as extremely useful life advice.

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    2. That is completely perfect, Hallie. Truly.

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  22. I want this book, Julia!!! And I hope your sister and her family all heal quickly. But the book!!!

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  23. As others have said, Julia, you are a noble sister. And I can't wait to find out how Hadley got into this terrifying situation and how she'll get out of it. A book that piles disaster upon disaster but that I still recommend (and just finished) is Emma Donoghue's The Pull of the Stars, which takes place in Dublin during the Spanish flu in 1918. A young nurse is unexpected left in charge of a ward of heavily pregnant women with bad cases of influenza. I couldn't have imagined what horrors she ends up having to cope with, one after the other, but it seemed very realistic. And speaking of nurses, I also wanted to thank Kait for reminding me of Cherry Ames, Student Nurse. Haven't thought about those books in years.

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  24. Maybe not an "in novel" disaster but the premise of the whole novel.

    Seventeen by Hideo Yokoyama is based on his experience covering the 1985 crash of Japan Airlines Flight 123. Probably not the best airport read though.

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