What Would Mary Write: 2016 Mary Higgins Clark Award nominees

 HALLIE EPHRON: I’ve been surprised to discover that authors, myself included, often don't know what kind of book they're writing. It came as a surprise to me that mine were in the spirit of novels by Mary Higgins Clark, “Queen of Suspense.” But after my first totally unexpected nomination for the Mary Higgins Clark Award, I’ve embraced MHC and consciously evaluate every 4-letter word that tries to sneak into my book, asking myself What Would Mary Write?

NIGHT NIGHT, SLEEP TIGHT is my fourth suspense novel nominated for the award (which btw Hank's THE OTHER WOMAN won), and I am in awe of the nominating committee because I have read the other four nominated books and it's stiff competition.

Here are the criteria for the award, supposedly spelled out by Mary herself:

• The protagonist is a nice young woman whose life is suddenly invaded.
• She’s self-made and independent, with primarily good family relationships.
• She has an interesting job.
• She is not looking for trouble–she is doing exactly what she should be doing and something cuts across her bow.
• She solves her problem by her own courage and intelligence.
• The story has no on-scene violence.
• The story has no strong four-letter words or explicit sex scenes.

Today I’ve invited my fellow nominees, a spectacular group of like-minded writers of creepy (but not icky, per MHC) suspense novels to share with you their own feelings about the nomination.

CATRIONA McPHERSON: You could have fanned me flat with a flapjack when I saw THE CHILD GARDEN short-listed for the Mary Higgins Clark award. As well as the unbelievable honour of it, the book has quite a few f-bombs and – I thought – fell way short of the “primarily good family relationships” that Mary’s books celebrate (and are hard to write well).

I think I worked it out, though. While Stig swears like a squaddie, Gloria, the heroine, hates it and nags him. So the reader gets to nod along with her. Also, while Glo’s relationships with her mum and sister are atrocious, she adores her son and is a wonderful mother to him. So her primary family relationship is great one. That’s my theory anyway. When the judges reveal their identities at the Edgars I’m going to ask. Until then, I’m just beaming.

SUSANNA CALKINS:  When I first began to write my Lucy Campion mysteries—historical mysteries set in 17^th century England—I had to make a decision about how dark or violent I was willing to go. After all, my stories are set in a period where people’s lives were—according to philosopher Thomas Hobbes—“nasty, brutish and short.” But I deliberately put my protagonist Lucy Campion, a chambermaid turned printer’s-apprentice, in households where she was protected and even educated, as women of her station often were not.

While I frequently allude to the violence around her—death, misfortune and of course murder—I’m more interested in the impact of violence on the community, not the violence itself. So, while I did not consciously seek to follow the criteria for the Mary Higgins Clark award, I’m honored that THE MASQUE OF A MURDERER is included among this year’s nominees. 

FRANCES BRODY: Now that you mention it, Hallie, I see connections. Mary Higgins Clark develops the classic theme of a woman in distress: a likable young woman whose life is turned upside down. In A WOMAN UNKNOWN, Deirdre Fitzpatrick needs to earn money to care for her sick mother. Philippa Runcie wants to escape her faithless marriage. Kate Shackleton, widowed detective, seeks truth and rights wrongs. MHC takes inspiration from real life events. The title for A Woman Unknown jumped at me from a social commentary on the period between the two world wars, a time when women’s lives changed dramatically.

LORI RADER-DAY: Just before my first novel THE BLACK HOUR was published, I went through the full manuscript and checked every f-bomb like a loose tooth. Could it be pulled? I imagined my parents reading it; my dad had already announced my forthcoming book to his church group. I was prepared to leave the words in—I enjoy a fine word bomb in real life as much as anyone—but I found that none of them were essential.

They came out. And then when that book was nominated for the Mary Higgins Clark Award, I felt vindicated. LITTLE PRETTY THINGS got the same treatment. I’m not anti-That Word, even now, but like every other word in a manuscript, it has to pull its own weight. Mary Higgins Clark is the better angel of my editing process, helping me watch my saucy mouth.

HALLIE: My favorite criterion: She solves her problem by her own courage and intelligence. I'm 100% onboard. Not so much on good family relationships. My protagonist's are often complicated by things like alcoholism. Explicit sex and graphic violence are easy for me to leave out, and four-letter words have always felt like lazy witing. Unless (BIG exception) it’s in dialogue. Then if there’s a character who cusses, and that’s just who she is, I need to put her on the page and let her cuss. Sorry. Mary.

Reds and readers, where do you draw the line with sex and violence and 4-letter words? Extra points to anyone who knows what squaddie means.

KILLER TAKEOUT is here! @LucyBurdette

 
HALLIE EPHRON: A few weeks ago I visited Lucy in Key West (and yes, I felt as if I was walking around in Hayley Snow’s shoes with the cat man and Lorenzo the Tarot card reader) and a mutual friend who’s not a fiction writer asked a question that stopped both Lucy and me in our tracks: Why do you write? 

Lucy’s answer tells you as much about her as it does about her series. Today, as her fabulous new Key West Food Critic mystery, KILLER TAKEOUT, hits bookstore shelves, I’m posing the question to her again. Why DO you write, and why this series?

LUCY BURDETTE: To put this question in context, Hallie and I had confirmed with our friend Pat that earning big bucks was NOT the reason we write! (Though I am open to that in the future, should the universe be listening.) But a million other thoughts came to mind…

First, I write because I can't imagine not writing! What would I do with the ideas that crash into my mind at all hours of the day and night? And more seriously, how would I spend my time if I wasn't doing this thing that I love?  
And there are so many gratifying moments. Like the morning when a lousy collection of words get shaped into a decently told story. And typing THE END, that's definitely a top moment LOL. Then seeing the book in a store or library. And struggling with a plot thread that won't seem to resolve and suddenly coming upon the answer as I walk the dog or talk it over with a friend. 

Speaking of friends, I love the colony of writer and reader friends that I've gotten to know since I began writing (that's you guys!) I love the support and enthusiasm and and affection, and the way mystery writers assume they they will pay it forward. And there's nothing like fan mail from a reader who totally understands my characters. Or a review that nails themes that I didn't consciously plan for.

Lucy with Dominique the Cat Man

HALLIE: One of my favorite things about your series is Key West. The Place. There’s nowhere else quite like it, and your delight in it is infectious. It’s sweet, silly, outrageous, beautiful… And when I visited there I wasn’t surprised to find it exactly the way you describe it. The food. The people. The sunsets.

 

LUCY: I love being able to share with readers the quirky island of Key West that I've grown to love over the past ten years.

HALLIE: And it feels as if you’ve tapped into a particularly deep well when it comes to these characters.

Lorenzo at work

LUCY: Thanks for that! Some people have asked whether it isn't boring to write a series--or if not dull, at least harder then starting fresh.  

But I'm crazy about writing series because in each book, the shape of the characters and their backgrounds deepens. And I enjoy imagining how difficult events will affect their lives going forward, and how they work out old dramas in new and better ways. And I love being surprised. In the first book, An Appetite for Murder, I didn't spend much time imagining Hayley Snow's neighbor at Houseboat Row, Miss Gloria. But now she's become the character that I hear most about from my fans, except of course for Lorenzo the Tarot card reader.

HALLIE: Before we let you go, can you share one new thing - a place or a character or a twist in a character’s life — that snuck its way into this book when you weren’t looking?

LUCY: I have to say I'm so pleased with the way Hayley has grown up. Some of the earliest reviews pegged her as ditzy and possibly shallow. But she has absolutely learned from her mistakes and become a loyal friend who is no longer motivated by jumping into the arms of the first guy to show some interest. (You'll see what I mean:), I hope!)

Thanks for reading! KILLER TAKEOUT is available wherever books are sold! Writer Reds, why do you write? Reader reds, what makes you want to spend time with a new book?

This is your BRAIN on GPS...

HALLIE EPHRON: Confession: I used to be able to read a map. I could hold it out in front of me and say, "Here's me!" And "Here's where I want to go." And I'd be right and I could get there.

For long drives to places I'd never been, I'd print out directions. If my husband were traveling with me, he’d read the directions and I’d yell back at him, things like “What do you mean, turn right? That’s not a street…” Or if I were traveling alone I'd try to juggle the map and steer, very challenging in the daytime and nearly impossible at night.

I usually got there and often it was not pretty, but at least I had some sense of the path I’d taken to get there could usually retrace my steps without a hitch. Bonus points: the map in my head of known geography grew each time I ventured out as new, heretofore unknown geographies connected to known.

Now I rely on my GPS and follow its instructions, my sense of where I am has been reduced to the size of that tiny screen. I use my GPS driving. I use it walking. I follow where it tells me to go even when the directions are plainly wrong (easy to do in Los Angeles, for instance, where several streets by the same name, and unless you know the zip code you’re in trouble.) Nothing makes me more relaxed than knowing if I go wrong it will tell me, in the calmest possible tone of voice, "Turn around when possible."

Having a GPS has elevated taking long cuts to an art. Recently my husband I let it to guide us out of a mall parking lot to the local highway -- a distance of .4 miles which took us 5 minutes with a leisurely detour through the surrounding suburb. Zen. As long as my GPS doesn't crap out and then I am well and truly lost.

Do you use a GPS, and has your mental map of the world around you atrophied?

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: Love love love it. Usually.  When I am going to an event, at night, in an unfamiliar place, it is such a lifesaver. And it's made me realize how much of my energy in the past  was used thinking "what if I get LOST?!)  We have WAZE, which is miraculous, because it "knows" the traffic based on reports from other drivers. So sometimes WAZE will send us a way the we know is not the way we would have chosen--but "WAZE KNOWS!" I always say. And it really works.

GPS does take away the necessity to know where you are in the universe--because context really doesn't matter, it's just distance to destination. So if we are driving to Pick-a-town, we may have no idea if that's north, south, whatever.  And our  mental picture of our journey is blank.

Another downside: when a cab or Uber driver is using it to go somewhere--and they clearly have no idea where they're going. My favorite is when the Uber driver calls me on the phone and says--I'm outside your house, where are you?

And I say--No you're not, I'm looking out the window and I can't see you.

And the driver says: Well, GPS says I am at your house!
As if that's gospel!

We call our GPS "Jeeps." And bottom line--I am grateful for her every day.

SUSAN ELIA MACNEAL: We live in New York City and don't own a car. So, no GPS. When we travel and drive, we use some kind of app on the phone which acts as a GPS.

HALLIE: Last time I was in NY I tried to use the GPS on my phone to get from the subway to a restaurant near Broadway/Lafayette. Such a confusing part of the city. The GPS scrambled my brain and I had to ask a woman passerby if I was walking North. She laughed and said she has the same problem, turned me around, and sent me on my way.

LUCY BURDETTE: We have a very old version of a GPS in the car. I have been known to yell at John: "Are you going to listen to that bitch, or are you going to listen to your wife?"
Rhetorical question of course. I still love maps and like to see where I am visually and where I'm going. But we often use the maps app on the iPhone to check on traffic and get to a specific destination. I don't miss having to print out those turn by turn directions and madly scramble to read them while driving. So I'm a hybrid I guess. And losing the ability to read a map reminds me of how kids aren't taught cursive in school any more. Sigh.

JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING: Oh, Lucy, I love that. Maybe you should get one with a male voice so it doesn't sound like John is being lured by some dame!

My sister Barb is the first person I knew who got a GPS, back when they were still very high-tech. She lives in the DC area and was always driving her two active boys all over the region for meets and lessons, not to mention her own volunteer activities. Problem was, she's terrible at navigation, and was always calling her husband Dan at work asking for directions. Remember OnStar? She had DanStar. So he got her a GPS unit for Christmas, along with a Bluetooth ear bud so she could hear it no matter how noisy the boys were. She used to say, "I just go where the voices in my head tell me."I don't have GPS, in part because I'm a Luddite, as I've mentioned before, and in part because ninety per cent of my driving is in southern Maine, where I've lived for almost twenty-nine years. Like New York City, the rural roadscape doesn't change much, and as long as you can remember local landmarks, you're fine. Ross and I have actually given each other directions that include phrases like, "Turn onto the street where the Boy's girlfriend used to live" and "First right after that spot where that old deserted house got torn down."

When traveling, I like maps and directions. Just as Hallie says, the map in my mind expands every time I drive someplace new. Despite being a scatterbrain, I'm an excellent navigator, and I usually find it relatively easy to arrive at my destination, Except Hank's house. Hank, your place is like a house in a fairy tale - impossible to find unless you've been guided there by its owner.

DEBORAH CROMBIE: I'm a multi-user. I have GPS in my car, Google Maps on my phone--and, Hank, we have WAZE! But I love maps, and I never quite trust the GPS. Supposedly, people have even driven off cliffs while mindlessly obeying...  I was driving across Iowa and Nebraska on a book tour quite a few years ago, and GPS in the rent car kept telling me to turn off the highway in the middle of nowhere. I spent two days yelling, "No, I'm not getting off in the middle of a ****** cornfield, you maniac!"

I also think it's very scary that people are loosing any sense of geographical orientation. Another little brain part atrophied.

RHYS BOWEN: My IPhone is my best friend. And it talks to me in cultured British tones. I find these days that I don't bother to look up directions in advance. Just speak the address and off we go. The only time that didn't work was when I was at a conference in a strange city and followed directions to my publisher's party. It kept telling me that I had arrived but I couldn't see it. Finally I found out it was on the 20th floor! It has no direction for UP!

I also have navigation in my car which is useful to get a broader picture of where we are going. However, I am married to someone who does not trust GPS. We were driving through Phoenix once, where all streets are parallel. The GPS said, "Take Bell Road" but he wanted to take Greenway. So the GPS said "Recalculating. Take next right on 38th Street. Recalculating. Take next right on 37th Street. Recalculating...." You get the gist. Finally I exploded and said "Turn the damned thing off."  "She's got to learn," he said. "She's a bloody computer!" I yelled.

So there are those who are never destined to belong to the 21st Century!


HALLIE: So today's burning question: Is your GPS your BFF or is it atrophying the part of your brain that knows which end is UP?