A Brush with Greatness by Jenn McKinlay

Firstly, Happy Veterans Day! To all those who've served, we thank you for your service and your sacrifice.

JENN McKINLAY: The only Malice Domestic conference I've ever been to was in 2012. It's very difficult to get to Bethesda from Phoenix - two flights and a train - but on that particular year, Elizabeth Peters, aka Barbara Mertz, was going to be there and I knew if I was ever going to meet my childhood idol, this was it. 

Elizabeth Peters, aka Barbara Mertz

There were several events, all of which were standing room only crowds. Ms. Mertz was everything I thought she'd be and more - smart, funny, kind, and with a wicked twinkle in her eye. I was thrilled just to be in the same room with her. When she left, being assisted by an escort, she walked right by my table. 
This was my moment! I sprang out of my seat and accosted her -- as one does -- and she didn't rear back in horror but instead smiled at me as I stood there incapable of saying a word. Me. Without speech. Inconceivable! 

Finally, I choked out a "thank you" and she looked at me, opened her arms for a hug and said, "No, thank you."
At which I cried all over her, like a big dope. So that was my moment with the author without whose work I likely  
never would have become a writer.

So, how about you, Reds? What was your brush with author greatness?

RHYS BOWEN: I’m always rather embarrassed when a fan comes up to me and does the whole fangirl thing. I’ve had one woman rush away and burst into tears (am I that scary?).  But then one day at a conference I found myself sitting at the signing table next to Tony Hillerman. And I’m screaming to myself “I’m sitting next to Tony Hillerman!” And I turn to him and gush “I love your books!”  I wish I could have told him that I only started writing mysteries because of him, but I could hardly get out those four words. So we all have our fangirl moments.

HALLIE EPHRON: The most ‘in awe’ I’ve ever been was when I ended up seated beside Jane Smiley at an event in Steinbeck country in California. I’d just read MOO and A THOUSAND ACRES and been blown away. All I remember is she was very nice and SERIOUSLY tall. Also at the table was Karen Joy Fowler, assuming I'm not mixing up my events. I’d read her amazing mystery novel, Wit’s End. I wanted to slow down time.

Jane Smiley

JENN: Tall girls rule, just sayin'

Lucy with Ann Cleeves 

LUCY BURDETTE: I have fawned over too many people to mention, I am definitely fan girl material. Maybe the first time was Diane Mott Davidson and was she at Malice? I remember that she signed the book I bought to both my sister and to me. The first Bouchercon I ever attended, where I knew absolutely no one and was totally petrified and deeply unpublished, I had a lovely chat with Stephen White. Do you remember his series about a psychologist detective in Boulder Colorado? Love that character! And Michael Connelly more than once... You know what also was very cool was having Margaret Maron moderate the best first novel panel at malice domestic. Remember that Julia?? She was wonderful.  

JENN: I just got this pic of Lucy with Ann Cleeves from the new England Crime Bake this weekend. She really is a fangirl!

JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING: Lucy, meeting Margaret Maron at the Malice Domestic where you and I were Best First nominees was my fangirl moment. She was one of my writing idols, and one of two authors whose work seriously influenced my own when I was starting out (the other being Archer Mayor.) It was SUCH a thrill having her moderate the panel we were on, but I'm not sure I even spoke to her privately, then. I didn't want to pester the great woman.

Then, that evening, I was sitting in the bar (as one does) and she came by, squeezed my shoulder, and said, "I really loved your book." I can't recall what I said - probably something like "A buh bub a bubba uh." When we went up to our hotel room that evening, I told Ross, "Don't touch that shoulder. That's Margaret Maron's shoulder." 

Photo from stacybuckeye.com

I got a chance to make it up in a more eloquent way, however, in 2012, when I was invited to contribute to Books To Die For – The World’s Greatest Mystery Writers on the World’s Greatest Mystery Novels. I wrote an appreciation of Bootlegger's Daughter. I still haven't nerved myself to ask her to sign it, though.

Hank with Sue Grafton

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: Yikes, I just got back from Bouchercon, when I interviewed James Patterson. And I have to say, he was adorable. Charming, funny, brash, and generous--and a real troublemaker---in a good way. Everyone adored him. I've interviewed Dan Brown, also terrific, engaging and quite brilliant. But in my writer/reader heart? Once I was signing next to Jane Langton. I almost could not breathe, she made such a difference in my life with her A Diamond in the Window. But the best of the best may have been at Crimebake in..2009? When I felt a tap on my shoulder, turned around, and there was SUE GRAFTON holding Prime Time--and asking for MY autograph! Can you even imagine? I was so lucky that someone got a photo of that moment--and here it is. It still makes me smile.  

DEBORAH CROMBIE:  At what I think must have been my very first Malice, my then-editor introduced me to Reginald Hill (She edited the US versions of his books.) All I could manage to squeak out was, "I love your books, Mr. Hill," and I'm sure I must have sounded like a complete dope. But he is still one of the writers I most admire, and I'm glad I had the opportunity to meet him.

And then there was P.D. James, who I had the honor to share a program with at St. Hilda's mystery conference in Oxford. I acquitted myself a bit better, but she was so sharp and witty and I was undoubtedly the gauche American.  She was also, however, unfailingly gracious and didn't make me feel too big an idiot. What an icon she was.

(Jenn, I was also a huge fan of Barbara Mertz in all her guises, and I LOVE that photo of her.)

JENN: Hank I was a huge fan of Jane Langton as a kid and A Diamond in the Window was FANTASTIC!

So, what about you, Readers, what are your crazy fan moments?

The Ultimate Armchair Adventure

DEBORAH CROMBIE: Okay, enough about Paris. (Well, really, there's no such thing as enough about Paris...) But I want to talk about the places you would NEVER actually go, the thing you would NEVER do,  the adventure that weirdly and inexplicable fascinates you.

Mine is Everest.

I'm not even a hiker, much less a climber. And I'm not that crazy about mountains, as far as scenery goes. (Give me rolling English countryside, or Scottish moors, or beaches and tropical islands.) I can remember reading about Edmund Hillary's expedition when I was child and trying to imagine what it would have been like to climb the world's highest mountain. But the bug really bit me when I read Jon Krakauer's 1999 account of the 1996 ill-fated Everest expedition, INTO THIN AIR.  It is still my favorite non-fiction book. (In 1999, Krakauer received an Academy Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, which honors writers of exceptional accomplishment.) Readers, if you haven't read this book, put it on your list!

 
I've since read other books about Everest (Will North's THE GHOSTS OF EVEREST, about Hillary's expedition, is waiting on my bedside table) and seen most of the movies about Everest climbs. I was disappointed with EVEREST (2015) the dramatized account of the 1996 expedition. I think they were trying to be more realistic, but there are a lot of climbers in climbing suits (I couldn't keep up with who was wearing which color) and goggles and face masks, which made them indistinguishable, and the only dialog (mumble mumble) I could understand was at base camp. It's hard to identify with the characters when you can't tell who they are! However, the scenery is spectacular, but I'd read Krakauer's book first.

How about you, REDS?  What's your ultimate armchair adventure?

SUSAN ELIA MACNEAL: Oh my goodness! Miss Edna was obsessed, OBSESSED, with Everest. I watched so many documentaries and read so many books about it with her, it's not even funny. And, Debs, we both loved INTO THIN AIR, too.

I was disappointed with the movie, Everest, as well -- I wish they had picked one character and stuck with him or her — it felt a bit all over the place and I also had issues understanding the dialogue.

So basically for armchair travel, for me it's also mountains, plus anywhere in the jungle—too hot, too humid, too many bugs. And, really, anywhere without indoor plumbing I'd just as well rather read about than experience. Which includes much historical fiction. People are always saying, "Oh, it would be so romantic to live in fill-in-the-blank era," and I always think about the lack of sanitary facilities and modern medicine...

HALLIE EPHRON: I am so sad that it looks as if I won't get to Egypt or Turkey, not with so much unrest in the world. I'll have to travel by book. Like Susan, mountains and jungles will have to be via armchair. A magical place we were at a magical time was Prague just a few months before the Velvet Revolution. It was so beautiful and so alien at the same time. Restaurants where nothing on the menu was actually served; stores where all the merchandise was in locked cabinets; where buying anything (things like bananas from a street vendor, waffles from a window that mysteriously opened onto a sidewalk...) involved waiting in a long line.

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: I want to live in Oxford, and hang around with Morse. And Lord Wimsey. That would be an adventure, right?  But I'd have loved to be on a glamorous first-class high-society cruise across the Atlantic, or the New York night club scene in the 20s or 30s. But--you know. Briefly.
Usually when I read about "adventures," I think, whew. SO glad I can read about this and not have to do it.


DEBS: Oh, Hallie, yes, Egypt. Me, too. My grandmother and I read everything about Egypt. She was fascinated by it, like Miss Edna with Everest. Then I discovered Elizabeth Peter's Amelia Peabody and I don't even want to admit how many times I've read all those books. My mom loved them, too. I always thought I'd go to Egypt, but now, not so much. So I guess that falls into the "under different circumstances" category, rather than in the "never in a million years" group. Kenya, too, was always a dream, but maybe someday...
 
READERS, what fascinates you that you would never in a million years actually do?

PS The winner of Mark Pryor's The Paris Librarian is Ann in Rochester! Ann, you do know the drill:-) And congrats!