To Market, To Market — Farmers Markets by novelist Leslie Budewitz

SUSAN ELIA MACNEAL: Lovely readers, do you love a farmers market? I do (hello Grand Army Plaza Greenmarket with your homemade doughnuts and hot-spiced apple cider) — and so does today's guest, double Agatha award-winning novelist Leslie Budewitz. 

She's the author of The Food Lovers' Village series; however, her newest novel, ASSAULT AND PEPPER, coming March 3 from Berkley Prime Crime is the first in her latest, the Spice Shop Series. And its setting is a farmers market — THE farmers market — Seattle's Pike Place Market. Here's a taste:

Just a pinch of murder... After the year from you-know-what, Pepper Reece finds a new zest for life running a busy spice shop in Seattle’s Pike Place Market. Her aromatic creations are a hit and everyone loves her refreshing spice tea. Pepper is convinced she can handle any kind of salty customer—until a murder ends up in the mix.

And here's Leslie on Seattle's Pike Place Market as well as the legendary markets of France — take it away Leslie!

LESLIE BUDEWITZ: Does anyone not love a farmer’s market? The Pike Place Market in Seattle originated in 1907 when the city council created a market for farmers to sell directly to “housewives.” On the first day, THE farmers ran out of produce before they got their trucks unloaded.

I fell in love with the Market as a college student in the late 1970s, not long after it was saved from the wrecking ball of “urban removal.” Later, as a young lawyer working downtown, I ate my way through the Market several days a week. I’d start at the front entrance with a slice of pizza from DeLaurenti’s walk-up window, browsing the covers of the magazines at the First & Pike Newsstand— eyes only until my hands were clean! I’d sip a sample cup of tea at Market Spice while watching the fishmongers throw salmon and amuse the crowd with their comedy routine, pick my produce and cheese for the week, and end with dessert—a hazelnut sable from Le Panier, the French bakery, or a Nanaimo bar from a now-departed shop in the warren off Post Alley.

A few years ago, Mr. Right and I spent a month in France. We loved everything about it, including the markets, small, medium, and large. Our first was in Arles, a city with Roman roots and medieval history, once home to Van Gogh and Cezanne. At the Arles Wednesday market, you can buy everything from herbs and spices to sausages to sunglasses and goats.

The next Sunday, we found ourselves in Isle-sur-la-Sorgue, a magical town. Once again, produce, cheese, and sausage were king, but here too were tables of antique monogrammed linens, silver cutlery, and other French treasures. Accordian music. Duck sausage. (We ate a lot of duck in France. We fed a lot of ducks, too, to make up for it.) Ravioli made before our eyes. The produce seller who asked when we intended to eat the cantaloup—and rejected three before finding one he promised would be ripe the next day. And he was right, bien sûr! 

Roussillon is not a historic market town, but no matter: the butcher, baker, cheesemonger, and a few produce sellers crammed into the village’s single parking lot on Saturday morning, beside a beekeeper, a soap maker, and handful of artists. Best macarons of the trip.

Back in Paris, the Sunday Market on Boulevard Richard Lenoir, directly behind our hotel, left us speechless. Food lovers’ heaven. Vats of olives, baskets of mushrooms we couldn’t identify, bread so beautiful it made our eyes water. We wandered the blocks, eavesdropping on the Parisians as they filled their baskets and rolling carts for the next few days, and bought a picnic for our last evening on the banks of the Seine.

Markets are inherently festive. They fire up our senses and spark our imaginations. They make us hungry—and offer us everything from fresh-roasted peanuts to fresh-baked piroshky. And they bring us back, again and again, to see what’s old and new.

SUSAN ELIA MACNEAL: What about you, Readers? Do you have a favorite farmers’ market or a memory of one? Leslie is giving a copy of ASSAULT AND PEPPER and a bag of Market Spice Tea from Seattle to one lucky reader!

The first author to win Agatha Awards for both fiction and nonfiction, Leslie Budewitz lives in NW Montana with her husband, a musician and doctor of natural medicine, and their Burmese cat, a book cover model and avid birdwatcher. For more tales of life in the Great Northwest, visit her website.

Kendel Lynn: Making Genuine Connections

SUSAN ELIA MACNEAL: Welcome Kendel Lynn and congrats on that Agatha Award Nomination for Best First Novel for BOARD STIFF! And also on the publication of the sequel, WHACK JOB. The pub date was May 13, so it made its debut at Malice Domestic along with Kendal — a usually solitary writer who had reservations about spending so much time with people.


But at Malice, they're Mystery People — they're "our" people. 

(My favorite quote of Kendel's from this post is: "a good friend is someone who will help you move, a great friend is someone who will help you move the body." Amen, right? And can we get this on a tee-shirt and/or a coffee mug?)

And now here's Kendel, talking about Malice, comfort zones, and friends.

KENDEL LYNN: Returning from a weekend 
at Malice Domestic, I’m afloat with memories, 
inspiration, and a book filled with notes to self. I think I’m like most writers in that I’m more comfortable spending my time tucked up in my room, snuggled in pjs, reading, writing, watching tv, staring at the ceiling – anything other than three solid days networking with semi-strangers. And by solid, I mean from a 7:30 a.m. breakfast until swigging the last cocktail near midnight. Three. Days. Straight.

But there’s something magical and lovely  and personal about connecting with your own people. The ones who also would rather be tucked away in a corner. And that’s why we do it. Why we take the risk, push ourselves outside our comfort zone, stretch our social abilities. Because these connections matter.

After a hard day of mean girls in high school, a friend’s mother gave me a snippet of wisdom I’ve carried with me to this day: not everyone will like you. How liberating! To know that on my very best day, with my very best self, some people just won’t like me. And vice versa. That girl at school who every single person likes and I can’t stand, it’s okay. Not everyone will like her, either. I was probably the lone holdout.

The point: You don’t need everyone to like you, because not everyone will. You just need to be yourself. Be genuine, and you’ll end up connecting with those who “get” you. Your humor, your writing style, your totally adorable orange shoes.

In this time of cyberspace domination, it’s easy to connect with online. But connections become so much more meaningful when we spend time face to face. A hug, a laugh, a disappointment, a hot beverage. Those moments elevate a connection to a friendship. 

Most will be of the share a comfortable meal sort, some will be of the stay up late and swap stories sort, and maybe you’ll find that rarest of sorts, the one who knows the story of your divorce or who helped you break into a closed amusement park so you could get a picture of the very spot where you met one of your first loves. 

As was shared at Malice: a good friend is someone who will help you move, a great friend is someone who will help you move the body.

I made some of my strongest connections because of Sisters in Crime, 
specifically the Guppies. I reached out five years ago to the group and asked if anyone would read my first chapter and offer suggestions/ feedback. I was nervous to put myself out there, but I did it anyway. 

I received over fifteen responses, including one from Jungle Reds very own Hank Phillippi Ryan, who emailed me to ask for my phone number. She called with encouragement and advice and I’ll remember that day forever. 

Another connection: I met my closest, dearest, move the body bff, Diane Vallere, who still inspires me and impresses me and amazes me. Those fifteen generous Guppy connections helped strengthen my debut mystery, BOARD STIFF, which was an Agatha Award nominee for Best First Novel this past weekend (like how I worked that in?). 

Another note to self: A thank you to Grace Topping. She introduced herself to me at Malice as one of those fifteen readers. She again congratulated me after the banquet, even though I didn’t take home the teapot. I enjoyed spending time with her and was able to thank her in person (and then let her know that maybe next time when critiquing, she should do a better job…)

So my advice: Make the connection, and then meet the person. I’m grateful for my connections and for my friendships. I go into this knowing that not everyone will like me. And I’m okay with that. I don’t want to miss a chance at a genuine connection by trying to be something I’m not. I try to be kind, be friendly, but most of all, be myself.  




SUSAN ELIA MACNEAL: Reds and lovely readers — do you go to conventions? 

Do you like meeting people and making new friends — or would you rather be reading at home in your PJs? (No judgement here...) 

Is it hard to do and then you're glad you did it afterward (raises hand) or is it something you look forward to and relish?

And, in big crowds, how do you make genuine connections?

About Kendel Lynn:

Combining my fifteen years of entrepreneurial savvy with my ten years of designing, writing, and editorial experience, I launched Henery Press, an independent publishing house for mysteries — and I’m loving it!  I’m a girl blessed.

My debut novel, Board Stiff (Henery Press, April 2013), won several literary competitions, including the Zola Award for Mystery/Suspense. For a sneak peek into Elliott Lisbon, my not-quite-so-amateur sleuth, check out the prequel novella, Switch Back in Other People’s Baggage, where she encounters murder and mayhem in the land of Texas barbecue.

Read more about Kendel Lynn at her website, follow her on Twitter, and add her on Facebook.

What We're Writing--In which Hank takes a step forward

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN:  Imaginary transcript of an actual conversation:

HANK: This is never going to work. I’m not kidding. This is the worst thing ever.

HUSBAND JONATHAN: Honey, you always say that. And the books are always wonderful.

HANK: Well, thanks, but this could be the time it actually doesn’t work.

Jonathan: You always say, that, too.

Hank: (considering) I do? (considering again) But this could be the time it actually doesn’t work. I mean, there’s got to be a time that it doesn’t, and it could be this is it.

Jonathan: You always say that, too.

HANK: And he’s right, I know I do, thanks to my Sue Grafton-inspired writing diary. On January 27, 2012, I wrote in that diary: “I GOT NOTHIN’” (Yes, in all caps.)

And nine months later I had THE WRONG GIRL. (An Agatha and LCC nominee!) So, yeah, proof I was wrong. I love to be wrong.

In January 2013, I wrote in the diary:  “What if I can’t do this?”

Nine months later, I had TRUTH BE TOLD. (Which I LOVE. And which will be out September 30! I am sure, ahem, you will hear more about this...)

Now, in January 2014, I am 15 pages (hurray hurray hurray!) into WHAT YOU SEE.

 I am trying to balance my terror and my excitement, trying to balance my eagerness to see find the story in this book with my absolute knowledge that I have NO IDEA what happens. Pantser city.

Now, I would never do this, usually, but we are all in this together. So here is a true first draft—no, this isn’t even a first daft. It is the crazy banged out work of a person who is just trying to get the words on the page.

 I will fix it later. And nine months from now, we can talk about it again. 

As for now, Reds:  Can you picture his scene?  Hmmm...I haven’t really described anyone. Do I need the word  "replied"? I don't think I need "replied." “Absurdly?”  How should I replace “visitor magnet”?  “Red and white” seems too easy.

Who knows how much of this part of WHAT YOU SEE—if any!--will be the same, nine months from now.  But that’s the exciting part.

  

                                                      Chapter  1

“Somebody saw something. And most of them took pictures of it.”  Detective Jake Brogan watched the uniforms try to corral the chaos of tourists and brown-bag toting Bostonians as two crime scene units unspooled parallel rolls of yellow tape.  Sirens wailed as three EMTs leaped out of their red and white ambulance, the beeping walk signal insisted clustering pedestrians should cross Congress Street, angry drivers honked their disapproval as newbie police cadets in orange webbing signaled them to stop.

Jake had heard screams through the plate glass front window of the Bell in Hand, left his carry-out roast beef sub on the counter, ran half a block. Found this.  Lunch hour, now placed on hold by murder.  

 “Wall-to-wall spectators, the good news and the bad news.”  Paul DeLuca replied, shaded his eyes with one hand. Scanned the shoulder-to-shoulder circle of onlookers. The two detectives, partners four years now, had split up to grab lunch, D opting for the corner Dunkins. DeLuca still held his iced coffee, third of the day. “Who called 911? Anybody run?”

“What we’re about to find out,” Jake said. “Most cases we catch, nobody saw anything. Here’s the opposite. Almost too many witnesses. That’s a new one.”  

In the center of the sidewalk, in the noontime shadow of the burnished bronze knee of the Mayor Curley statue, some poor soul in a white t-shirt lay face down, his running shoes splayed, a navy blue Sox cap teetering on the concrete, the hilt of a knife protruding absurdly between his shoulder blades.

The medical examiner had radioed Jake she was minutes away. They’d need to dispatch the cleanup team, too. With the fourth of July a month away, the new mayor would go ballistic over the growing puddle of red now staining this concrete pathway along the visitor-magnet Freedom Trail.  So much for the beginning of tourist season.

Across the street, the teeming marketplace behind Faneuil Hall, persistent vendors pushing Sam Adams tri-corns and Boston Strong t-shirts and cheap plastic lobster souvenirs. The visitors who had been unlucky enough to witness this noontime stabbing had just received a souvenir they might want to forget. But not until Jake picked their brains. And their cell phones. 

 “I want names. I want addresses. I want their phones and I want their cameras.” From moment one, Jake knew this would be a mess. Some of these people would lie, some would make stuff up, some would see things that never existed, some would have something to hide. Some would run. Complicating it all, he and DeLuca technically needed a warrant to seize property against a person’s will. If these onlookers knew the law, and gave them grief about it, it’d be even more of a shitshow.  He pointed his partner toward the cadets. “D, you wrangle the new kids. Tell ‘em, don’t let anyone leave.”

“Where’re we gonna put ‘em all?” DeLuca sucked a hit of coffee through a clear straw.  “The Garden? Maybe they can watch Disney on Ice while we get their deets.” 

DeLuca had a point, and even the bleachers of nearby Boston Garden sports arena were not the solution. How could Jake keep fifty or so witnesses, from little kids to one guy in a wheelchair, essentially in custody while a group of inexperienced cadets tried to collect personal information and possessions?  If they’d gone to lunch at Santarpio’s over in Eastie, where Jake had suggested, dispatch might have sent someone else to handle this.

HANK:  SO?  Reds? Does this have possibilities?

Malice Quiz!

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: Is there something still on your to-do list? Like maybe--register for Malice Domestic?  If you love traditional mysteries, this is the place to be the first weekend in May in Washington, DC!

And do you know our stuff?

Here's a quick Malice quiz: who was the first Malice Domestic Guest of Honor?

And who is this year's?

While you're racking your brains, remember: according to the Malice gurus: 

If you haven't registered yet, the rates go up on January 1, 2014. Also, those who register by the 12/31/13 deadline will receive an Agatha Nomination Ballot in early January. Register online here!

Phyllis A Whitney  first Malice GOH

And here's the first GOH:  recognize Phyllis A. Whitney ? In the 1960's, says her bio, "with 37 books in print, she was hailed by Time Magazine as the only American in her field with a major reputation equal to those of Britain's Mary Stewart and Victoria Holt."


And following in her august footsteps, this year's GOH Kathy Lynn Emerson. 

Kathy Lynn Emerson! Guest of  Honor

And following in HER footsteps, through the three days of festivities, are pals and authors and fans and readers and mystery lovers--like

 Annette Dashofy, who says:

"I'll be attending Malice Domestic this year for the first time as a published author! It will also be my first conference after my book, Circle of Influence, comes out!" 

Marilyn Levinson, who says (appropriately, right?)

"I'll be selling copies of my new mystery, Murder a la Christie." 

Multiple Agatha nominee Sheila Connolly says:

Table 10!

 "The best part is the people.  Writers, readers, fans, coordinators--they're the most welcoming group I've every encountered at a conference.  If you're a first-timer?  No problem: we'll take you under our wing and introduce you to everybody. (Oh, of course I'll be there!)"

Here's a big shout-out to table 10!  You can see by the wine and the smiles we had a wonderful time at the banquet. But who else will be there this year?

Wow--look at this lineup from the Malice Banquet 2008!

Kaye George/Janet Cantrell! Who says  "it's my favorite gathering of mystery writers and fans! I've been

going for several years now, have been rewarded with some nominations,

and wouldn't miss it for the world.

And the fab and (USA Today best-selling!) Susan Boyer says:

"I’ll be there with bells on—perhaps literally. I love Malice Domestic. It’s practically a family reunion. I can’t wait!"

And yay for Henery Press! Lots of authors from the Hen House  (Like Susan Boyer, and Gigi Pandian, and LynnDee Walker, and Diane Vallere) will be there.  What a terrific group..check out their books here...and then come meet them in person!

Hank with Margaret Maron in 2008! 

Karen Pullen says:
"I have three reasons for attending Malice: (1) to support Ruth Moose, a member of our Triangle SinC chapter, whose cozy Doin' It at the Dixie Dew won the Malice Domestic last year and will be published by St. Martin's in April (2) to brag about our chapter's anthology, Carolina Crimes: 19 Tales of Lust, Love, and Longing, which hopefully will be available by May, and (3) to enjoy the camaraderie, panels, and general all-around fun of Malice! (Plus I really enjoy the train ride from Raleigh to DC.)"

You''ll meet Jim Jackson, who says:

"I'll be attending Malice this year because Jan and I had such fun last year meeting everyone and to celebrate my 2013 debut novel, BAD POLICY and its sequel this year, CABIN FEVER."

And  Debra H. Goldstein who says she's going: 

"For the pure joy of interacting with fans and other authors."  

 Barb Schlicting says:

"‪This is my first time attending Malice, and I'm really excited.  To get to meet other gups plus be around all these other writers and readers, I'm sure that I'll feel as if I died and went to heaven.  It will be magnificent!"

And lots of first-timers--who instantly get swooped up into the fun, like Guppy President Michele Drier--who'll finally get to meet some of her fishies in person! 

Michele says: "I'm coming to Malice--my first time!--and I'm excited. Getting to meet

all the folks I think of as friends I haven't met yet!

 

Erika Chase says: "I'm going to Malice because it's the place to be if you love cozies! I love writing them and I so love reading them. Love to meet writers and readers, renew friendships and make new ones. It all happens at Malice Domestic."

Terrie Farley Moran is going to Malice Domestic 26 to visit with old friends and make some new friends.  She looks forward to the Friday night social and to learning about writers and series that she may have overlooked.

‪KB Inglee says: "I haven't been for years. Last time I went as a fan, this time as a writer!"

Remember when there was a hat parade? Here's Liz Zelvin's memorable cha-Poe! (What year was this, LIz?)

And Leslie Budewitz--who won the non-fiction Agatha--is now bringing her first mystery to Malice! "Because it’s such a great party – with exactly my kind of readers and writers!"  


So who else will be there?  What are you looking forward to? And what advice do you have for first timers?

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And--don't forget, the Malice-mavens say:

Ads for the program book are also available for purchase in our store.

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