Sneezing and Sniffling--What Do YOU Do?

UPDATED Monday morning: How GREAT was it to see Olivia Colman win for best actress? (See below for my Broadchurch "discovery." WOW. (Though I feel bad for the amazing Glenn Close.)
And can we talk about that SONG?? What do you think?

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: It's almost over. ALMOST over.  It's almost gone now, but  it started one day last week. At first, I was completely fine. And then, wham. A sniffle. A tiny sniffle. I ignored it. Of course.  I don't have time to be sick! 

This is not me. 

And then, ker-CHOO. Then: ker-CHOO ker-CHOO ker-CHOO. My head hurt, I was sniffing and sneezing and snorking and generally being disgusting. I tried to convince myself that it was an allergy, so I took every allergy medication known to humankind, but they did not work. 

Then I had to admit--it's a cold. Oh. NO. What do I usually do for a cold? I could NOT remember.  It was as if I'd never had one before, I was baffled and confused. Because, of course I had a cold,  SO frustrating, and that makes it impossible to think. 

 I rattled around through the medicine cabinet and pawed though the bathroom drawers and scouted the linen closet to see what there was, and found this array of half-used over the counter stuff. SOMETHING had to work, right? SOMETHING?  You can't just have a thing that you can't cure. 

I didn't really have a cough or a sore throat, so all the cough stuff I rejected. And no fever.  So I took a little of one, then four hours later, a little of the other. It was probably expired, but I don't believe they really expire.  I looked up on Google: can you take Allegra and Tylenol at the same time? (Apparently you can.)

Just sniffles and sneezes, SO annoying, I couldn't even finish a whole sentence without sneezing

(And I read somewhere that if you think you're going to sneeze, you can stop it by quickly saying "pickle." You can imagine how intelligent I sounded during the time I was trying that.)

Plus, I was walking around carrying whole boxes of tissues and leaving little shards in my wake. I took a hot shower. Sinus rinse. Water water water, and sleep. 

I pretended I was fine, to see if that would work, but it usually didn't.  Praise the writing gods I had no book or personal events. (Because nothing worse than having a sick person go out in public, right?)  Soup, and oscillococcinum and nose spray.

Ka-CHOO!

(The only good thing was that I found Broadchurch, which I watched, endlessly, blanketed on a big chair with glazed eyes and cups of tea. But how did I miss that? It's fabulous.)



I counted the hours until I could take Nyquil . But after about day three, I felt like my whole body was full of medicine, and I was spacy and goofy and hyper-medicated so I stopped taking everything.

Ahhh. What cold-eradicating hints do you have I can use next time? Have you had this scourge this season?

JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING: Oh, God, I had the cold that would not end earlier this winter.I was hacking and horking for THREE WEEKS. It was the worst. 

Honestly, my number-one treatment is the one hardest for adults to do: go to bed! I'm convinced resting your poor, beleaguered  body is the most effective way to shorten your cold. Look at children: when they're sick, they fall like stunned sheep. They sleep, and sleep, and sleep. Every parent knows you can tell your child is getting well when he or she actually starts to move around again. 
 But it's so difficult for grown-ups. We're all convinced the world will end if we don't get to work. (Leaving aside the unfortunate workers who MUST show up, sick or well, or face docking their pay or losing their jobs because we don't have a sane sick policy in this country.) 

So we slog into the office and spread our illnesses around to our grateful coworkers, and the cold lasts a week longer

than it might have.

LUCY BURDETTE: John is now going through this exact sequence – thinking he must have an allergy! Hoping hoping fingers crossed that it isn’t a dreaded cold. I think Julia is right, the smartest thing is going to bed or sitting in front of the TV as Hank did. Otherwise everyone else in the world gets the darned germs. 

Not so sure there’s anything that can be done to avoid this completely, but I am hooked on something my naturopath suggested. It’s a combination of mushrooms called Immune Renew that boosts the immune system. You take them when you’re either around sick people, or when you feel the earliest signs of a cold. I swear I’ve beaten a few back this winter…

DEBORAH CROMBIE: Oh, poor Hank. I had it at Christmas (the worst!) and it lasted for three weeks, then again the first of this month. My not-terribly-effective remedies are to start taking cough syrup right away, the kind that has Mucinex in it, and to use saline nasal spray to flush out the congestion. 

Colds are just miserable, and the fuzzy-headedness makes accomplishing anything almost impossible. I really think the best thing to do is to rest as much as possible, stay home (don't spread it!), drink lots of liquids and watch TV.

 Rick had it too--he swears hot and sour soup got him over the hump. I'll go with that, and try Lucy's remedy, too! And crossing fingers that twice is enough for one winter!

HALLIE EPHRON: I had that cold for two weeks - started and I thought it was an allergy! Then it hung around and hung around, sneezing and clogging my head so I couldn't breathe. Coughing and hacking. I am finally over it now. I'm limited in what over-the-counter drugs I can take because of meds that I take regularly, so I try to make due with plenty of liquids and sleep. Oh, and I try to sleep slightly sitting up -- it helps with breathing.

I was lucky this came at a time when I didn't have any commitments to speak because I sounded like a frog and would have infected the audience. Yes, Debs, ONCE is plenty for one winter. And spring.

RHYS BOWEN: I hardly dare to write this because it will probably jinx things but so far the dreaded cold has escaped us. This must be because moving house has required such physical labor and stress that no self respecting cold would want to hang around. First we carried across box after box of stuff before the move. Then We assembled new furniture, hung pictures on high walls, dug out plants, put up hooks etc etc. And these are things that the parade of contractors, electricians, landscapers etc didn't do!

But my go-to recipe for a cold is to make soup of a whole chicken with lots of onions and garlic. Also drink hot lemon and honey with some rum. The more rum the better you'll feel! And Cold Ease works if you take it soon enough. Also when you tell yourself firmly you have no time to be sick. That works too!

JENN McKINLAY: So far so good here. Of course, Hooligan 1 was felled with a fever this morning and stayed home from school and work. I refuse to go near him unless I am masked and gloved - kidding! - bit I did do a copious amount of hand washing every time I brought him medicine or soup or whatever. I'm pretty sturdy and rarely get sick. *knocks wood* 

When I do, I put myself on a strict schedule of Dayquil/Nyquil until the ick passes. When I was in college I was convinced that shots of whiskey cured the common cold. Not sure it cured it so much as made it bearable.

Riiiight.

HANK: Ker-Choo! And how about this photo--supposedly a "woman with a cold." I have NEVER looked anywhere near that good with a cold. I would call this: model with a tissue. 
How about you, Reds and readers? have you been felled by the cold bug this season? What are your tricks for fighting back? 

Seven Sinister Sisters Talking Titles!

Jenn McKinlay: I am thrilled to be hosting seven fabulous mystery authors here today to talk about one of my favorite book topics: 

Titles! Let her rip, ladies...

Thanks so much to Jenn McKinlay and all the terrific Jungle Red Writers for hosting the Seven Sinister Sisters on our grand blog tour! We are seven mystery authors, all members of Sisters in Crime, with new books launching between now and April.

  

Our question for today: How do you choose the titles for your books?

“Titles are tough,” says Cathy Perkins. “You’re trying to capture the tone of the book as well as the key plot element, while selecting a title that hasn't been used a dozen times by other authors. Whew—no pressure! Then, to make it more fun (and complicated), there’s the series aspect to consider. The second book in the Holly Price series releases later this spring. My team wrestled with whether to go with the “So About...” or “... the Money” title continuity. While everybody loved “So About” because it was different, it made the titles awkward. So About the Truck? Eh, no. So About the Family? Not working for me. I’m happy to announce the next Holly Price novel is titled In It For the Money.”

Shawn McGuire agrees: “Titles are so hard!! Sometimes they come from a line within the story. That’s easy. With the Whispering Pines series, the further into the first story (Family Secrets) I got, I realized a lot of the story was about the main character’s family and another family in the village, so that title made sense. By the end of that first book, I realized there were a lot more secrets yet to be uncovered; therefore Kept Secrets and Original Secrets followed. I still haven’t found them all, so the other books in the series will also have “secrets” in the title.”

  

According to Sue Star, however, “The titles choose me. I started with a light-toned mystery about martial arts, and the first book of the series became Murder in the Dojo. In the second book I wanted to explore some troubling concepts of attitude that sometimes crop up in my high-altitude setting: Murder with Altitude. Then Colorado legalized recreational marijuana, and my editor handed me the title of the next book: Murder for a Cash Crop. My friends and family, who claim that I am obsessed with moose, gave me the title of the current book, Murder by Moose. I wonder what title will choose me next?”

  

“For all my books,” Becky Clark says, “I start with titles. I’ll have a basic idea of the series concept and several plot ideas, but if I can’t come up with at least four good titles that work on the theme, I don’t pursue it. I like writing cozy series and I know the titles for those need to be punny and clever. In the Mystery Writer’s Mysteries, I have Fiction Can Be Murder, Foul Play on Words, Kill Your Darlings, and some others. Fingers crossed my publisher likes them too!”

  

But for Pat Hale, “the titles come to me at some point during the writing, most often when I’m not thinking about it. For the first book in this series, The Church of the Holy Child, the church is at the crux of the conflict. It’s also a slight play on words in that, the serial killer believes their mission is in the best interest of the children. Durable Goods, the second book, is about the sex-trade industry where women are treated like merchandise and yet their spirits endure. Whether they escape their captors or not, their emotional strength cannot be ignored.”

“The best titles tell a miniature story in two to five words,” according to Leslie Karst. “Other than your cover art, the title is all you have going to encourage that reader to pick up your book in that store, turn it over to read the back and, hopefully, even crack the spine and take a peek inside. My titles have two primary roles to play. They must convey that they are murder mysteries and also that they concern food. But the titles also hint at the fact that each book concerns one of the five senses. Hence, Dying for a TASTE (food/taste); A MEASURE of Murder (music/hearing); and Death AL FRESCO (painting/vision).

And then there’s Edith Maxwell’s option of getting help from others: “My cozy mysteries from Kensington feature puns in the titles—and I stink at punning. So I outsource them! The Sisters in Crime Guppies chapter, a childhood friend (whom I’ve rediscovered on Facebook), and fans all contribute great title ideas when I ask: Farmed and Dangerous, When the Grits Hit the Fan, Mulch Ado About Murder, and the latest, Biscuits and Slashed Browns—all courtesy of friends. For my historical mysteries, Midnight Ink changed the first two titles and I’m happy with their choices: Delivering the Truth and Called to Justice. The April book's title—Turning the Tide—was mine, and I’m delighted they liked it.”

  

So now it’s your turn: How important are titles in your decision to read a book? What sort of title will compel you pick up that book in a store (or make you shun it like the plague)?

  

And to celebrate our new releases, the Seven Sinister Sisters are having a giveaway! Seven lucky winners will receive an ebook from one of us. One GRAND PRIZE winner will receive a signed copy from each of us! Enter to win by leaving a comment below.

Our tour runs from January 6th to April 30th and we’re answering a different question at each blog. Leave a comment at each blog for more entries! We’ll draw the winners from all the combined comments at the end of our tour.

If the grand prize winner is out of the United States, we'll send an Amazon gift card for the equivalent amount.

Watch our Facebook page http://www.facebook.com/sevensinistersisters for the next stop on the tour.

  

http://www.patriciahale.org

http://www.edithmaxwell.com

http://www.lesliekarstauthor.com

http://www.cperkinswrites.com

http://www.shawn-mcguire.com

http://www.rebeccawriter.blogspot.com

http://www.BeckyClarkBooks.com

Can YOU Fold A Fitted Sheet?

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: I did something the other day that made me laugh. I recommended a detergent. I never thought I'd see the day when I got excited about laundry. 

Laundry has fallen to me in our family. For a while I waited until it was absolutely an emergency, then did like five million loads. (Remember, there's only Jonathan and me. But the laundry piles up like crazy.)

Now I am in the do-it-once-a-week mode, which is only three loads. Whites, colors, and the other stuff that I don't know what is.

At one point in my life, I had a person who did the laundry.  It was heaven. I loved her. She ironed the sheets. She ironed my white t-shirts.

You'd think it wouldn't make a difference, but wow. It does. And then--
She moved to Florida.

When we were in Italy, I bought gorgeous gorgeous towels at Frette. I had them shipped home, then I washed them. They shrank into wizened twisty out of shape un-towel-like things. I called the Frette store in Boston, and explained my distress and dilemma.

Oh, the salesclerk told me. You have to IRON Frette towels.

Yeah. Like I'm gonna do that.

But I do love folding laundry, it's so soothing and so rewarding. You start out with a random basket of stuff, and then up with nice folded organized nice-smelling clothing. A big sense of accomplishment. Especially when I can fold a fitted sheet so it's not all puffy and weird. Which is--sometimes.

(There's a video about sheet-folding secrets, which I'll try to find.)

How do you all feel about laundry?   

HALLIE EPHRON: What I feel about laundry is probably unprintable. I haven't got the patience to fold, though I do love the results.

Fortunately early on I had the good fortune to turn my husband's underwear pink. Then a black crayon found its way into the dryer and, well, another mess. So he does all the laundry except for mine which he lets me turn any color I like.

Iron towels? You gotta be kidding.

INGRID THOFT: I don’t have strong feelings about laundry, but my husband does, which is why I’m the laundress of the house.  He doesn’t mind getting it in and out of the machine, but folding it is a skill he claims he can’t master.  This, from a software engineer, but he gets a pass because he does plenty of other things around the house.

 When I do laundry, I always think about my mom, sisters, and friends who do laundry for a household of more than two people.  How do they have time for all the other chores of life?  I feel like I spend too much time doing our everyday laundry, which is then doubled by our workout clothes.  I can’t imagine keeping multiple people in clean clothes.

As for ironing, my mom visited a couple of years ago and asked to use my iron.  When she was done, she said, “You haven’t ironed since you moved here?” I scoffed.  Of course, I’ve ironed.  “And you resealed the iron in the box with shrink wrap?” she wondered.  Oh, that.  Maybe I haven’t ironed in a while!

JENN MCKINLAY: Laundry has caused a weird division of labor in our house. When I was home and the hooligans were half-sized, I did ALL the laundry, most of the cleaning and cooking. Then when the writing took off even though I was home, I simply didn't have time to maintain it all so now all the household chores are shared. As for the laundry, Hub does our clothes, the Hooligans do their own clothes, and I do the odds and ends (sheets and towels). I don't iron them. I sort of wish I did iron them because I actually enjoy ironing - don't judge me! - and I bet the sheets and towels would be amazing with a good steamed press. Alas, no time.

HANK: I love it, too. I just don't do it anymore.

JENN: I do sneak into the Hooligans' rooms and refold their laundry because they haven't quite mastered the folding yet and wrinkly clothes bug me. Shh, don't tell!

LUCY BURDETTE: I'm the laundress in our house too. It is a satisfying job, at least temporarily, until things get dirty again! Last fall I became disgusted with our yellowing whites, and Googled how to fix that without using chemicals. There was a complex recipe involving baking soda, Borax, and white vinegar (maybe some other things too.) I tried several loads and different recipes, but nothing worked. I think I'm going off to buy that stuff Hank suggested, chemicals be damned! Unless someone has the secret of those whiter whites??

PS: ironing piles up in our house until we absolutely have nothing to wear. Towels and sheets? Not in this lifetime!

RHYS BOWEN: A while ago I was doing a radio interview and the interviewer said," You seem to be a woman of many talents. What don't you do well?"  And I said, "Ironing."
My mother ironed sheets. She ironed my father's underpants.

And me, I only iron when absolutely necessary, as in twice a year. When John and I were engaged, in the first flush of love I offered to wash and iron his white uniform shirts (Qantas)
I returned them to him and he said,"The laundry does them better."
AND I have never ironed a shirt since!

But I don't mind the laundry these days. We have a super high tech washing machine that gets clothes wonderfully clean and uses little water. Only downside...it is so deep that I almost stand on my head and risk falling in to rescue that last sock.

And bedclothes? They come out of the dryer and straight back on the bed.  I can never understand the English insistence on drying everything on a clothes line in the fresh airs on it winds up stiff and rough. Drying with an English towel. Is like running an emery board over the body!

DEBORAH CROMBIE: My thoughts about folding laundry are surely as unprintable as Hallie's. Laundry is the bane of my existence! And there are only two of us! But I cannot keep up with it. Half the time the clean laundry is in a huge unfolded pile on the chair next to our dresser. I cannot fold anything to save my life, especially sheets. Rick is much better at it, if I can just get him to do it. He also irons much better than I do, from years of being a bachelor and having to iron his own work shirts. The funny thing is I actually like ironing. It's very relaxing. Maybe today I'll get to all those piled up pillow shams and tea towels that need a little pressing....

In my fantasy life, I would have ironed sheets. But I've never heard of ironing bath towels. I obviously do not move in the right circles!

JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING: I do the laundry for four, with help from the Smithie (usually) and Youngest (occasionally.) We have an electrical outlet issue where the dryer would hook up, so I line dry everything. I have an extendable line that spools out across the timber crossbeams in my thirty-foot-long family room, two lines outside for summer time, and an old-fashioned "clothes horse" that often goes in front of one of the wood stoves. Sometimes I dream about just chucking things into the dryer, but I do get to feel unsufferably smug about being so green.

With the four of us, plus towels, tablecloths, sheets and napkins, I normally do a load a day five or six days a week. Ironing? Usually at the last minute and only if it's something that can't be hidden beneath a jacket. I've been known to tell the girls, "Those wrinkles will fall right out from the heat of your body." We'll often wait until there are two or three baskets and then one of the girls and I will fold them while watching something on Netflix. That, to my mind, is the great thing about laundry-related chores: it's so easy to do them while listening to an audiobook or podcast or while watching TV.

HANK: How about you, Reds readers? Any laundry secrets? Do tell!  Do you care about having the whitest whites?  Do you just throw everything in together? Are you a hot-hot or a cold-cold?  Do you iron your sheets?  Can you fold a fitted sheet so it is not a puffy disaster? Tell all!


(photo credits: Inge Neilse, Katarzina Bialewicz, rotten cards, kzenon)

WHAT Am I DOING Here? Or: Let's Do Lunch

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: Want to have lunch with Jenny Milchman and me?Okay, you're invited. Really! See below for details, date and time--AND for some truly valuable insight. 

The Story Behind a Book Event or, Why Do Writers Do This Anyway?

(also known as, Hank & Jenny Do Lunch)

by Jenny Milchman

When you think about a book event, two scenarios are likely to come to mind. There’s the one where the writer arrives in a town car with her name in the rear window, gets whisked off to a lushly fitted out green room, only to be ushered onto a stage before a vast, applauding crowd. And then there’s the one where she sits at a folding table whose legs wobble, setting up stacks of her own books, and twiddling pens that feature the title of said book while customers come up and ask where the rest rooms are.

What? The first one’s never happened to you? Me either. But I’ve had elements, so I keep hoping. And I basically refuse to do the second by this point. It’s too humiliating. I never know where those darn rest rooms are.

Kidding. But not about the humiliation part.

It all raises the question of why writers do book events in the first place. Do they accomplish anything for our sales? Our careers? Our humanity?

I want to dispel a few myths about book events. But first, you might wonder why I feel in a position to do so. Well, it took me thirteen rejection-studded years to get published, and after it finally happened, I did the next logical thing. Rented out our house, traded in two cars for an SUV that could handle Denver in February, pulled the kids out of first and third grades to “car-school” them in the back seat, and hit the road on a 7 month, 35,000 mile book tour. So, I’ve done an event or two in my time.

One of the highlights was a talk with Red Wonder, Hank Phillippi Ryan, at the Cambridge Public Library. Watch this music video, and see if you can find the shot of Hank! She and I talked about books, and the industry, and how it may try to kill us, but in the end leaves us a whole lot stronger. Hey, we’re suspense writers. Death has to figure in somewhere.

Now for those myths.

Myth 1: Book events are about selling books.

Fact: Whether you sell two-hundred books or zero, you have met potential readers in a different, more meaningful way than happens on crowded online platforms. You’ve also encountered an influencer—the bookseller, librarian, or book club leader whose radar your work is now on.

Myth 2: You should read at book events.

Fact: Reading is the one thing I’ve heard over and over tends to bore attendees—and a bored attendee isn’t a good potential reader. Instead, teach something related to your book (a regional specialty, a craft, a foreign language, a lesson in CSI or genealogy—get creative). Discuss the fascinating road to getting published, or the more general accomplishment of achieving a dream. Hold a writing workshop if it fits the crowd. Tell your 10 Best & Worst moments as a writer. Make the whole event Q&A.

Myth 3: A low turnout event is a dud.

Fact: The great Louise Penny quipped, “The only thing worse than an event where no one shows up is one where one person comes.” And indeed it can feel awkward to perform a talk for an audience of one. So my answer is—don’t perform. Just…chat. Really connect to that person. Who knows who she knows, and besides, you may make a friend. At some of my sparsely attended events, one of the few people in the crowd was, respectively, a book reviewer for a major newspaper, a book club leader, and the president of the Friends of the Library Association.

SO: Let's do lunch! Seriously. This year, as part of my third “world’s longest book tour”, Hank and I get to meet again at a luncheon event hosted by former bookseller Joan Lang. The date is June 17^th, the time is noon. In Pembroke Mass. Have a look at the poster for the event, complete with contact info so you can join us. Hank and I would love to see Reds readers in the crowd!

In this life of events, I know it’s going to be another high point.

Jenny Milchman is the author of Cover of Snow, Ruin Falls, & As Night Falls, and the creator of really long book tours.

https://www.facebook.com/events/616830125136166/ 

HANK: SO? Can you come to lunch? CLICK HERE! We're cooking up all kinds of prizes and surprises--including mentoring, query advice, personal chapter critiques and of course, free books! 

And how do you feel about book tour?

It's Jungle Red Thank You Day!

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN:  Susan Elia MacNeal inspired me to this, she doesn’t know it, but she did. We were talking about the breathtakingly terrible events of last week—yes, other of the seemingly unending list of terrible events—but because it was journalists, it was…well, home.

Susan quoted Winston Churchill.  “These are stern times,” he said. And yes, they are.

And it made me wonder about legacy, and the tiny spit of time we each get, and  making sure we let people know things. I know Jungle Red is supposed to be fun and upbeat, and we are, so let’s...do this. 

Thomas Thornburg/Pike HIgh School 1967 

Tell us someone you want to make sure you thank.  Mom, of course, and Dad, goes without saying. But Mr. Thornburg, for instance, my high school English teacher who taught me about Shakespeare. And Alice Blitch, a college professor who took me aside and told me I was talented. She didn’t have to, you know? She just did.

Fred Heckman, the brusque-but-patient news director who hired 20 year old me, with zero experience, as a newbie radio reporter.

This is me on my very first day of work as a radio reporter at WIBC, circa 1971. You  can imagine how Fred felt about me, the very first female reporter at this station! But he taught me how to ask questions. 

My sister Nancy, who is always there. Red Hallie, who swooped me up in mystery world ten years ago, treated me like a real writer. And editor/author Paula Munier, do you know her? Nothing that’s happened to me would have happened without her. 

AnnLeslie Tuttle, editor at MIRA, who in 2005, said—can you rewrite your submission, same story but different sensibility? If you can, I’d love to publish PRIME TIME. And I did, and they did.

Oh, gosh, I could go on. My now-editor at Forge, Kristin Sevick, and agent Lisa Gallagher, and…Jonathan. SO patient! I wouldn’t put up with me, is all I can say.

Thank you thank you.

And here’s your bully pulpit. In these times of trouble, who deserves your thanks?

Julia's mom with Youngest and The Smithie

JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING: It sounds like an Academy Award speech, but first I need to thank my mother, Lois Fleming, who always made books more-than-plentiful for me, even when the money wasn't, and who taught me much of what I know about composition, and who thought I should be a writer before anyone else did, including myself.

All the SF fans at the long-defunct B5 Unrest who first got me interested in playing around with fiction, Lucy Zahray, aka "The Poison Lady, who recommended my manuscript to the legendary Ruth Cavin when I entered it into the Malice Domestic contest.

Meg Ruley! Love her. 

I'm incredibly grateful to my agent, Meg Ruley, who took me on when I was still in the middle of a three-book deal my first agent had negotiated! For those of you not in the publishing business, that meant she was supporting and advocating for me for several YEARS before she saw any income from my writing. Lots of want-to-be-writers ask, "Why should I give away 15% of my booksales?" The answer is: because an agent like Meg is worth a lot more than that.

And thanks also to Hank! We had a great time hanging around at the San Francisco Bouchercon, and after I got home to Maine, she sent me an email asking if I'd like to consider joining this blog group she was a part of... I said yes and have never regretted it!

HANK: Aw, I remember that! oxoo

HALLIE EPHRON: Hank, you are so generous giving credit. Thanks. And now turnabout is fair play and I thank the generous writers, especially Hank and Lucy and Paula Munier, who are there for me when I’ve written myself into another cul de sac or just feel mopey.

And thanks to… family.

For giving me my first break, my sister Nora who connected me with an editor at the Boston Globe when I’d written an op ed piece about leaving teaching. And my sister Delia who read my first attempts at storytelling and told me the bad news (it needed soooo much work) and the good (I had talent.) And my younger sister Amy who started writing long before I did and so I had to race to keep up. And my mother who blazed the trail for us all as women slash writers and in the process, exposed its pitfalls.

And my husband who rarely uttered the word *but* when I told him what I wanted to do next. And my fantastic daughters who are proof positive that I can do some things really really right, or at least be trusted not to gum up the works.

Hallie is second from right

Teachers: Mr. Gelms who taught journalism at Beverly High. And Barbara Ann Schenkel my 6th grade teacher. Both of them died before I got the chance to thank them properly. If there's a someone you want to thank, DO IT NOW!

HANK: Hallie, who's the guy on the right?? He was..framed.

SUSAN ELIA MACNEAL: Wow, I had no idea an email would turn into a post! Churchill actually edited "dark times" into "stern times." I do believe his word choice is important.

People to thank in my life? Mrs. Elizabeth Lewin, at the North Tonawanda Public Library, Iris Skoog of Nardin Academy, Father P.S. Naumann, SJ at Canisius High School, Susan Meyer of Wellesley College, Caitlin Sims, formerly of Dance Magazine. Idria Barone Knecht. 

Noel and Bear, circa 1998

My husband, Noel MacNeal, who didn't laugh when I said I wanted to write a novel and in fact supported me through all kinds of craziness and gifted me all of his Bear in the Big Blue House and Sesame International airline points to travel....

RHYS BOWEN: I'd like to thank all the little people......wait! I don't know any little people.  The ones to whom  I owe a lot are no longer with us. My grandmother and great aunt Min who raised me in my early years, surrounded me with love and taught me the art of story telling. My aunt Gwladys who whisked me away to strange and exotic places and gave me my love of travel.

Best photo EVER! Where is this, Rhys?

Then there are my college friends who have remained close until today. The many wonderful friends I have made in the mystery writing world. Dorothy Cannell who introduced me to my agent (also Meg Ruley) and the fantastic Meg herself. Having an agent and editor who wholeheartedly believe in me-i couldn't ask for more. 

John is seated, right, with adorable child on lap

And of course John who is my first, and most critical reader, who drove me coast to coast three times before any publisher sent me on a book tour, and my kids who keep my life sane and grounded , as in "can you watch the dog and do you have a sleeping bag we can borrow?" and my grandkids. There is no better feeling than having a small child running toward you, arms outstretched and face alight with joy.  I feel truly blessed.

LUCY BURDETTE: My family of course. My poor old dad supported everything I did, even though he could not fathom why in the world I was throwing away all those years of training as a psychologist for...writing mysteries. (I wasn't throwing them away, it turns out. The two careers dovetail brilliantly!) My sister Susan, who was the first writer in the family but consistently supports me nudging in alongside her. John, the best husband ever. How much harder it must be to be married to someone who pushes you away from your dreams instead of toward them!

Roberta and Mr. Dorhout

Mrs. Covey, my fifth grade teacher. Albert Dorhout, high school music teacher and Mr. Schneider, drama teacher, who both encouraged my enthusiasm for the subjects, in spite of a lack of native talent:). And Gabriel Asfar, my adviser in college, who was probably the first person to tell me I was a good writer.

DEBORAH CROMBIE: Oh, Hank, this was hard. My first thought was, "How can I choose?" But here's a stab at it: First, always, my maternal grandmother, Lillian Dozier, who taught me to read and to love reading, who shared my dreams and nurtured tiny sparks of ambition, and who told me many times that I could do whatever I set my sights on. My 3rd and 6th grade teacher, Mrs. Schwann, who was the truly inspirational teacher that every child should have (and who read us A Wrinkle in Time, chapter by chapter, when we were in 6th grade. If I hadn't already been hooked on books that would have done the trick.) My writer uncle, A.C. Greene, who

A.C. Greene

told an awkward fifteen-year-old that her poetry was not too bad, and who supported my writing wholeheartedly from then on. Howard McCarley, my biology professor and my mentor in college, who encouraged me despite my obvious mathematical defiencencies. Warren Norwood, writing teacher, friend, mentor, who gave me the confidence to finish that first novel and send it out into the world. Nancy Yost, my incomparable agent of more than twenty years!

And so many more! My parents, of course. Writing friends, family, husband who puts up with me--and my daughter, who shares with me every day the great gift of loving books.

HANK PHILLIPI RYAN: I love seeing all these names. They’re people most of us will never meet, or know, and yet, kind of like the Bridge of San Luis Rey, you know, at some place and time they crossed our lives and made a difference, and it’s good that we simply state their names. Our own “Honored” Roll! And it seems to be about giving confidence, right? And encouragement?

So, reds and readers, who are you thankful for? And has anyone—anyone special and life-changing—ever surprised you with their thanks? (Lucy, music? Susan, and Hallie specifics! Julia, what’s B5 Unrest?)