And, For the Grand Finale...

JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING: Close to 20 million people watched the finale of Game of Thrones and at least that many more who followed along casually had heard every detail of the conclusion to the eight-year saga by breakfast on Monday. Indeed, it was hard to avoid as people rioted in the streets took to Twitter and Facebook to express their amazement, agreement dismay or disgust. I don't want to rehash the many arguments about whether the ending was fitting or not (it wasn't; Sansa + Tyrion should have jointly ruled the kingdoms, Jon Snow should have been King in the North and Brienne and Tormund should have ridden off to adventures together) but it did put me in mind of some of the memorable series conclusions I've seen over the years, and how satisfying - or jaw gaping - they were.

First off, I have to acknowledge there are many, many TV series that never got a finale on the small screen because they were prematurely, unjustly yanked. (The other two of you in the US who watched Flash Forward will know what I'm talking about. Back in the sixties and seventies, even shows that knew they were ending  rarely capped the series - production companies had their eyes on valuable syndication rights, and didn't want to lose future audiences who, it was thought, wouldn't tune in if they knew how everything ended. (A similar theory still circulates in the publishing world: editors will tell you not to kill the main series characters off at the end for fear later readers won't start reading the beginning.

But starting in the eighties and increasing exponentially in the nineties, companies began tying a bow on their popular TV shows. Part of it was economic, as always - even flagging shows could pull a startling number of eyeballs for a last hurrah. For some series, everything was pulled together in a bittersweet and satisfying way that left you with a glow of contentment. For others, viewers found themselves saying, "What the @#$%did I just see?" after the closing credits.  Let's look at a few I remember:

1. M*A*S*H: After a run three and a half times longer than the actual Korean War, the doctors and staff of the MASH unit were discharged. Everyone who had ever been on the show appeared (at least in a photograph) and I sobbed my way through the entire second hour, not so much because I was going to miss Alan Alda, but because I used to watch it with my Mom and Grandma at Grandma's house and I was seeing the finale in my slightly crummy student apartment and I was never going to be a little kid perched on Grandma's enormous divan again.


You may have experienced this finale differently.

2. Mad Men: This was definitely a "What the heck?" ending. Don discovers EST? Did Don write the famous Coke song? The acme of Sally Draper's character arc is that she's cooking and cleaning and taking care of her younger brothers? (that really cheesed me off.) On the other hand, I really love the Coke song because it reminds me of my tween years, so overall, I gave this a thumbs up.


I promise not every episode will be viewed through the lens of how it made me feel about my childhood.

3. Quantum Leap. I sobbed at this one, too. After all his humane, wise, helpful adventures, Sam doesn't get to go home? He never goes home?!? But Dean Stockwell is still alive, thank God, so there's still a chance of a follow-up movie. We should start a write-in campaign. I hear Netflix is looking for projects.


Fun fact: I'm pretty sure my son was conceived the night this episode aired. Seeking comfort in adversity and all that. 

4. Newhart: The best absurdist ending ever pulled off in theater, TV or the cinema. After eight years of wacky adventures in a Vermont Inn (oh, how I loved Larry, Daryl and Daryl!) in the show's finale, Bob wakes up... in his New York apartment, sleeping next to his wife, Suzanne Pleshette. Bob's deadpan confusion, Suzanne's tolerant "All right, Bob," and the audience's enormous affection for The Bob Newhart Show makes this a slam-dunk.


5. St. Elsewhere: It's not an easy trick to pull, however, as shown in the baffling discovery that six years of drama, black humor and angst at the run-down Boston hospital actually all took place in the mind of an autistic kid holding a snow globe. Author John Scalzi has an excellent observation that the failure mode of clever is "asshole": this finale is living proof. It's a good thing this happened before the age of the internet, or the writers would have been hounded off social media for life.


6. The Sopranos: Love it or hate it, the ending of this ground-breaking crime show/family drama was singular and memorable, not so much for the way it completed hanging plot lines - it sort of did and sort of didn't -but for the last four minutes. Three of the four members of the Soprano family are sitting in a diner booth. The camera widens so we see a man walk into the restrooms. Two big guys approach the jukebox. The dialog is banal and the music is anything except suspenseful, but the tension is almost unbearable. The daughter, running late, crosses the road. We hear a ting as the diner door opens and...slam to black. 

The way writer/director David Chase set the scene is purely cinematic, but the ambiguous ending is very novelistic to me. A tricky choice that had lots of fans yelling, but it worked as art.

All right, dear readers, it's your turn. What are your favorite or infamous series finales?

Are we still Mad for Don Draper?

ROSEMARY HARRIS: Chiseled jaw. Check.Ferocious libido. Check. Man of few words. Check. And he smokes and drinks with reckless abandon, which, in a fictional character, can be pretty darn sexy. What's not to like about Don Draper (aka Dick Whitman)the tortured soul at the heart of Mad Men?

I came for the clothes but stayed for the characters. (I suppose the same could be said of my addiction to Downton Abbey, which btw got me a nod from the folks at downtonabbeyaddicts.com this week.) Those dresses, those hats. And Joan, who is every full-figured gal's poster girl. But Mad Men belongs to Don.

At first, I shared his Something Happened/Man in the Gray Flannel suit pain. I understood his deception and saw how he got caught up in living a lie. He was hot, he was brilliant and he didn't play by anyone else's rules.

But has he turned into a little bit of a jerk? Why did he ever marry Zou Bisou Bisou? And now that he has,despite his declarations to Pete and anyone else who'll listen as to how much he's changed, why is he treating her like just another hookup? Does anyone else think he should have stayed with the big blonde whose name I've forgotten?

On another note how much do you love not-so-little-anymore Sally? Is she getting an education this season, or what?

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: I sang Zou Bisou Bisou for DAYS after that episode. Not as well as ..what's her name? But it was SUCH a disturbing scene.
http://youtu.be/pyy8roNU060

Now they're making her a brilliant ad person and a team player, which is fun.) Yeah, I agree, I liked Don at the beginning, when he was mostly..smart. And creative. Then they made him downright creepy and even abusive.
Sally is my candidate for serial killer--selfish and calculating and self-centered. Lies at the drop of a...babysitter. Didn't you love that she said the sitter (Who is she again?) tripped over her brother's toy--when it was really over Sally's phone cord?
Finally--the conversation between Peggy and her mother when she announced she and the beau were going to live together--perfect! I had EXACTLY the same conversation. Word. For. Word.

JAN BROGAN: Wow, Hank, you sang that song for days?  It made me wildly uncomfortable, I felt so embarrassed for poor Megan. But I still root for Betty, which I can't understand because she is so unlikeable.

I actually think Don Draper is improving because he's trying to stay faithful to Megan. At this point in the series, I think he's  truly falling for her and that she is going to dump him as she becomes liberated with the changing times.  But I may be deceiving myself. I saw an interview with Jon Hamm and the cast on Charlie Rose where Jon said the biggest viewer misconception about Don Draper was that "he has redeeming characteristics."  In essence, Jon said, viewers keep ascribing better motives to Don than he really has. (Maybe because he is so good looking? Or because he is the protagonist?)  So that should take us on a wild ride this season.
And I think we should give Sally a break. She's been through a lot and oh, with that mother of hers.  What creeps me out most is her relationship with that kid from the neighborhood. And where is he living now when we see him on the end of that phone? Reform school?

ROSEMARY: That kid is SO CREEPY! He's even hard to look at. If Hank thinks Sally is a potential serial killer (I thought future bra-burner) what does she think of weirdo boy? I see the creator of a Phone Sex empire. Babysitter is Betty's mother-in-law!

HALLIE EPHRON: (Fingers in my ears, humming!) ACK! I have not seen the new episodes! Waiting, waiting -- I get the episodes off Netflix after the season ends and can hardly wait!
But I have to say I never "liked" DD. He's a consummate narcissist, cold, only interested in the quest. And for me the draws of the show are the women, most especially Christina Hendricks/Joan and Elisabeth Moss/Peggy, surviving in a man's world. Yes, and "poor little Sally" who gives as good as she gets--anyone remember The Bad Seed with Patty McCormack? But with parents like that, she's learned from the pros.

ROSEMARY: Hallie don't read this......Have to say I'm curious as to whether or not Skinny Betty will make an appearance this season. Don't especially like (or get the attraction of) Henry but he earned points for telling Chubby Betty she was beautiful.

What do the rest of you think? And pass me that shaker of martinis....

Get this party started!

ROSEMARY HARRIS: Truth be told this party has been warming up since last Tuesday at the Mysterious Bookshop in New York where the launch party for MWA's latest anthology was held. Vengeance, edited by Lee Child, features stories by Michael Connelly, Karin Slaughter, Dennis Lehane, Zoe Sharp, Alafair Burke and a dozen others.

Next up was the Edgars Agents and editors party on Wednesday where Reds Lucy and Ro helped celebrate Hallie's second Mary Higgins Clark nomination. Thursday Edgar Judge Ro got to strut her stuff in a Mad Men style dress at the annual Edgars banquet (that's me with Meredith Cole, Erin Weston and Raven winner Molly Weston waiting for our limo!)- a list of all of the Edgar winners here http://theedgars.com/nominees.html
...and on Friday a trio of JRs headed south for Malice Domestic.

LUCY BURDETTE: We are delighted to report that our own Red, Rhys Bowen, won the Agatha teapot for best historical mystery, Naughty in Nice, Lucy (aka Roberta Isleib) did not come home with a teapot but was thrilled to be nominated for best short story!


HANK PHLLIPPI RYAN: Yay, Rhys! And Roberta, too--that's fantastic! (Oooh, and I'm nominated for three Emmys! For investigative reporting.) Party on!

ROSEMARY: Are you in party mode yet? Well, if you didn't make any of those events, this week on JR we're continuing the celebration by sharing our swag from those parties and hosting our own virtual Cinco de Mayo party on Saturday. Every day this week three lucky commenters will win books and bags from this season's mystery parties.

What's up this week?Tuesday - My trip to Highclere Castle, the real Downton Abbey
Wednesday - a visit from novelist Daniel Judson, who will share information on his latest cutting edge publishing venture with Amazon
Thursday - The Return of Kale (you know how the JRs love food!)
Friday - your official invitation to the Cinco de Mayo party
Saturday - Party On! Best outfit wins a bag of books
Sunday - Do we still love Don Draper?

So in honor of the release of Vengeance - tell us what you'd do - big, small, real or (hopefully) fiction - to get back at someone who did you wrong!

Three winners will receive copies of the book.

(Monday through Friday winners announced on Saturday, Saturday's winners announced on Sunday.)

Blogging in the City

JAN BROGAN: Here at Jungle Red, we promote writers.  Ourselves. Other mystery authors. Friends. Friends of friends. Anyone we just happen to think is interesting. I'm pushing the envelope a little today. I'm promoting my son.  

You've heard me hear talk /write about him as Spike, which is what we've called him since birth, but he writes under his actual given name, Frank Santo.

Spike/Frank lives in Brooklyn and blogs about the literary world  for PageViews, which is a new initiative by the New York Daily News. The blog, which I actually read even when my son isn't posting, isn't what you think of when you think of the New York Daily News.  Less Daily News, more New York. It's sophisticated, edgy, witty, and controversial as it covers everything from the publishing world's latest phenom to Sunday's episode about Madmen ( and exactly which serial murderer were they all talking about anyway.)

Editor Alexander Nazaryan started the blog in December with the goal of being the "best source for cultural and literary reporting on the web," and while he says it's not there yet, the blog has been getting a lot of attention.  Frank (I'm having a really hard time calling him that) started there in February, and I'm not just bragging when I say he's had great success in only two months. (okay, maybe I am bragging just a little.)

What do I mean by success? Two weeks ago, he found himself quoted in People Magazine.  His blog about literary speed dating was tweeted across the universe and got picked up by the Paris Review.  His review of Fifty Shades of Gray made its way to Jezebel before it hit People.  And last week, a post he did about the Rolling Stone expose on Dartmouth hazing went viral and got more than one thousand Facebook recommends. (the counter stops when you hit 1K)

So please welcome Frank Santo to Jungle Red.

JAN BROGAN: Tell us about Page Views:  

FRANK SANTO: I’m not really sure what the overall concept of the blog is other than that I hope it is a place that fosters intelligent discussion about culture and has its own unique voice.The key to its success is probably consistency, we have at least three posts a day, and its becoming a daily destination for people interested in the literary world (whatever that is).

JAN:  Your editor puts says the concept is to have a blog about book and culture that was both sophisticated and could laugh at itself.  And I'd say you definitely laugh at yourself when you explain in your  review of Fifty Shades of Gray by E.L. James, just how excruciatingly uncomfortable it was to be reading that book as a young male on a crowded New York subway.  But the review was also interesting because it was the male perspective of a book about female fantasy.  How difficult was it to write that review and how shocked were you to find it quoted in People Magazine? 

FRANK: Well it wasn’t as difficult to review that book as it was to read it. It was hard coming up with a way to review the book that would be more interesting than “this book is really tedious, don’t read it.” So pretty much the only unique angle I could take was to write it from a male perspective. I was pretty shocked to see my name in People Magazine. I think it was because I said 50 Shades was pornography. 

http://www.nydailynews.com/blogs/pageviews/2012/03/its-all-porn-to-me-one-mans-review-of-50-shades-of-grey


JAN: His review was kinder than his answer would indicate, but let's say I'm still not going out to buy the book.  Back to the interview, what did you learn about your experience going undercover at a literary speed dating event?

FRANK: I learned that literary speed dating is goofy in a fun way. Everyone there was in it for the story, which was kind of nice. I think people liked it because it would have been easy for me to make fun of all of those speed-daters, but instead I kind of connected with them. They were just people seeking out a good time, like most of us.Waiting-for-a-stranger-to-roll-her-eyes-my-adventures-in-literary-speed-dating

JAN: As a Dartmouth alumni,  you took issue with Janet Rietman's expose in Rolling Stone, but not in support of fraternity life. I was really proud because you stuck up for all the students at Dartmouth trying to make it a better place, but tell us about how you approached your rebuttal piece and the reaction it's had.

FRANK: I just think Rietman relied on a false characterization of Dartmouth students in order to drum up populist outrage.  Hazing and fraternities are unneccesarry, but they aren’t the result of some kind of elitist conspiracy.  It happens at plenty of non-elite schools, so her whole 1 percent  vs 99 percent  angle was contrived. I don’t put a lot of stock in the positive reaction my post received  because it was mostly Dartmouth people who liked it, and they’re obviously going to be biased. But it was nice to have people say it meant a lot to them though.

http://www.nydailynews.com/blogs/pageviews/2012/04/confessions-of-an-actual-dartmouth-student-rolling-stone-vomits-all-over-ivy-leagu

JAN: One of the best things about the Pageviews blog are the creative story ideas. Short pieces about what we happen to be wondering about at the exact moment we are wondering. Where do the assignments come from?



FRANK:  My editor is the one who comes up with most of the assignments. He has a great feel for what kind of things will get picked up by bigger websites and re-broadcast across the Internet. I'm just trying to learn as much as I can, see where the assignments take me. It's been a lot of fun so far.

JAN: What has been your favorite blog assignment so far?


FRANK: Probably the post I wrote about an art and music program for the kids at the Homeless Shelter, where I volunteer one night a week. I had the most invested in that story because I knew all the kids I was writing about and the organization I was profiling means a lot to me,That's not the kind of post that goes viral, but it gave me a lot of satisfaction.

http://www.nydailynews.com/blogs/pageviews/2012/03/art-start-showcases-talent-of-at-risk-youths

JAN: Frank/Spike has a day job and no access to the computer until after 4 pm, but he'll check in then to answer any questions you might have.


In the meantime, if you want to find out which Springfield they really meant when they wrote the Simpsons, check out: 

http://www.nydailynews.com/blogs/pageviews/2012/04/springfield

And come back tomorrow, when I have Jodi R. R. Smith, author of The Etiquette Book, give us tips on how to network at mystery or any other convention.

SMOKE-FREE FICTION

DEBORAH CROMBIE: Whenever I go to England, I realize I live a very insulated, smoke-free life at home in Texas. I am a non-smoker. No one smokes in my family (my husband quit a year ago, thank goodness, and even when he smoked, he never smoked in the house, in the car, or in public places.) No one is ever allowed, on pain of death, to smoke in my car, and when I go out it's usually to smoke-free shops and restaurants.

So it's always a bit of shock to be thrown into the midst of very public London, where people smoke on the streets, and there is a whole new culture of pavement-smoking outside restaurants, pubs, and clubs. Suddenly I have to remind myself that at least some characters in my books should smoke. This is not so much a matter of approval or disapproval, but simply that as a non-smoker, smoking doesn't occur to me.

While certainly bad for one's health, smoking has always provided a nice "bit of business", both on the page and screen. It's something for your characters to do while they have a conversation (other than drink endless cups of tea.) It can convey an emotional state such as agitation or nonchalance, or give subtle insights into character (I've loved Sergeant Hathaway's attempts to give up smoking in the recent episodes of Lewis), class, or background. (Think James Bond here...) Camel or Silk Cut? Does the smoker carelessly put out the stubs in old cups of coffee, or tamp them out and tuck them away in a plastic baggie?

And with many of the popular retro shows like Mad Men, or The Hour (I've yet to see if they will smoke on Pan Am, but am horrified to remember that people actually used to smoke on airplanes!) smoking is once again being shown in a glamorous light (excuse the pun.)

As a reader, I like to play a little guessing game about whether or not the writer is a smoker--if almost every character in a novel smokes, I'm inclined to think the writer (I could name a few) does, too. But at the moment, I'm halfway through Felix Francis's new novel, Gamble, and I've just realized that not a single character has been seen smoking. I'd be willing to bet (excuse another pun) that Felix Francis does not.

So what about you, Jungle Reds? Do your characters indulge? And should they?


JAN BROGAN: I think the characters should smoke if you think that's part of who they are. I had a teenager in Teaser smoking because I thought that's what she'd be doing and I wanted my reporter Hallie Ahern to show she had good getting-people-to-talk skills by allowing the young girl to smoke in her car even though it was driving her out of her mind.

I'm thinking of setting my next novel in southern France, where at least half the French characters must smoke.

DEBS: Yes, the French and the Italians are all big smokers, but the red wine and olive oil probably keep them from getting cancer . . .

HALLIE EPHRON: I'm writing a novel in which the main character's dysfunctional alcoholic mother smokes. As Jan says, it's essential to the character.

It's pretty astounding how much public has changed about smoking. My husband brought home a "Rugged Men" magazine from the 50s. It's a real period piece, soft porn and enlightening article, like "Let's Get Rid of the Girls Who Shake Their Cans" by Dunwoodie Hall. In it there's an article that dismisses the "health scares" of smoking and concludes, "Thus, it can literally be said, 'Smoke--And live longer!'"

ROSEMARY HARRIS: I've had a few characters smoke, but no main characters. If they're going to die, I'd rather kill them off in my own way.

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: Huh!Not to give anything way, but you've made me realize that the people in my books who smoke--are the bad guys!

(I tried smoking in college. Once. ONCE! My best friend Hallie (a different Hallie!) and I shopped for the coolest package. Montclair, navy blue with a gold crest. I took one puff at age 17, choked, tipped over the ashtray onto my bedspread, burned a hole in the blanket and that was the end of that.)

The good part about people smoking in books--it give them something to do, you know? And it can be very dramatic, a la Bette Davis.

JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING: I've just realized that I've had exactly one smoker in my books - and that was because it was necessary for the plot. I'm like you, Deb, never smoked, no one in my family or circle of friends smoke, so it rarely crosses my mind. Since smokers tend to fall into a few distinct groups nowadays, I think having a cigarette-user makes more of a statement about the character than it once might have. We have the 80-year-old Dan Drapers and Joan Holloways who haven't died off yet. Young people still light up for the same reasons they always did - smoking is way down in high schools but on the upswing on college campuses. And increasingly cigarette smoking is a class marker, with a sharp divide in smoking rates between socioeconomic and education levels.

This has definitely given me food for thought! I'm going to go back over my current work-in-progress and see who might profitably be made a nicotine fiend.

DEBS: Interesting, Julia. Yes, there are beginning to be class issues associated with smoking, but one can't make blanket assumptions. My husband fought a forty-year battle with nicotine addiction--and I do mean BATTLE. We learned some very interesting things when he was finally able to quit (we certainly hope for good.) One is that there are take-it-or-leave-it smokers. I was one. I smoked in my teens and gave it up at twenty without a bit of bother. And there are some for whom nicotine addiction is worse, and harder to kick, than heroin. It apparently has to do with the difference in the chemical receptors in people's brains. The same seems to be true for alcohol addiction, except that the take-it-or-leave-it percentage is much greater for alcohol than for nicotine. It's much, much easier to be a social or occasional drinker than an occasional smoker.

So all food for thought, and for creating interesting characters.