One Woman Crime Wave

.99c Special Continues

2012-02-13T13:16:00.001-08:00

Amazon is still offering In the Shadow of the Glacier on Kindle for only .99. I thought the special was running just to the end of January, but whatever...

So, if you haven't read the Constable Molly Smith series yet, here's your chance to give it a try. In the Shadow of the Glacier is the first book in the series. Click here for Kindle.

The second book is titled Valley of the Lost and I had a really nice trailer made for that book. Here's the link to the trailer for Valley of the Lost. I'd forgotten how good it is.

Klondike Friday: Women in the Klondike

2012-02-10T03:00:00.000-08:00

With the publication of Gold Mountain, the third book in the Klondike Gold Rush series only two months away, I’m mentally back in the Klondike.

Today, I’m going to recommend some books that I used as research for the history of the time. The definitive book on the subject is Pierre Berton’s Klondike: The Last Great Gold Rush. A highly readable popular-history book, it’s well worth starting your historical investigation with. One thing about Berton though, is that he does gloss over women’s participation. (Hardly the first historical record to do so). It’s estimated that about one-sixth of the people who went to the Klondike were women. And not just prostitutes and dance hall owners either. But businesswomen, shopkeepers, nurses, nuns, newspaper reporters, wives and mothers. They carried their babies up the Chilkoot trail or lugged pregnant bellies and tried to make homes out of the wilderness and created successful (or not-so-successful) businesses. They supported themselves, or they supported their families.

Charlotte Gray’s book: Gold Diggers: Striking it Rich in the Klondike, examines, among others, Belinda Mulrooney, prominent businesswoman.

I’d recommend Also Gamblers and Dreamers: Women, Men,, and Community in the Klondike. by Charlene Porsild

And Goodtime Girls of the Alaska-Yukon Gold Rush by Lael Morgan for a peek into the demimonde.

And now, a word from our sponsor: Pre-orders are important to build interest in a book (and usually at a reduced price) Gold Mountain is available for Pre-Order at a reduced price.

From Amazon.ca, From Amazon.com, From Chapters/Indigo. Also your favourite independent bookstore.

Vacation time

2012-01-26T13:18:00.001-08:00

I'm back from a fabulous two weeks in Turks and Caicos. Wonderful place. Words are not necessary.

Cutest Picture Ever?

2012-01-13T11:12:00.000-08:00

I'm starting the sixth Smith and Winters book, still untitled. A woman is out walking her dog on Christmas morning. A shot rings out...

Norman, the police dog is called in and gets the scent. The chase is on.

To refresh my memory, I went to the RCMP police dog web page just to click on some pictures and read a bit about raising and training of these dogs.

And I found this:

A Winter Kill

2012-01-03T15:34:00.000-08:00

In April, Rapid Reads will be releasing my new book for reluctant readers. It's titled A Winter Kill, and like all Rapid Read books you don't have to be a reluctant reader to enjoy it. It's short, fast paced, and I hope suspenseful.

Nicole Patterson is a young, green and very eager probationary constable with the Ontario Provincial Police. Although she spends much of her time breaking up bar ﬁghts, giving out trafﬁc tickets and ﬁnding lost kids, she dreams of one day becoming a detective. Late one bitterly cold winter night, she comes across the body of a young woman lying on the edge of a snow-covered ﬁeld on the outskirts of town. The girl appears to have been strangled. Nicole recognizes the victim as a local high school student with a somewhat sullied reputation, the daughter of the town drunk. Though both under-qualiﬁed and unauthorized, Nicole feels compelled to throw herself into the murder investigation. Was the murdered girl really as promiscuous as her classmates described or the victim of bullying? What was her relationship with the star of the football team? And what is the signiﬁcance of the ring with the large blue stone found near her body? Is Nicole Patterson herself heading for trouble by pretending to be a detective?

If you're interested in this and the other books from Rapid Reads, click here for the catalogue.

To pre-order A Winter Kill from Amazon.ca, click here.Most bookstores, online and physical, will be happy to place a pre-order for you.

Safari 2011

2011-12-20T05:19:00.000-08:00

Herewith, some pictures from my safari in Kenya. We had an unbelievable time – I think it was the best vacation I’ve ever had.

We stayed at Kicheche Camps in Laikipia and Masai Mara. The trip was arranged by Karen Oliver at Uniglobe Glen Abbey Travel in Oakville (http://uniglobeglenabbey.com/) and we were assisted on the ground by Kennsington Tours. (http://www.kensingtontours.com)

The game parks were amazing; we saw absolutely everything we wanted to see (lions, leopard, cheetah, elephants, graph, hippo, rhino, and millions of zebra, gazelle, and impala). We saw an impala being born and a lion dragging home her kill. We saw hippos fighting, enough to draw blood, and lions mating. There were no crowds at all, which impressed me no end, and most days we didn’t see one other group of tourists all day. (When we got stuck at one point, there was no point in waiting for a passer-by to come to our aid). The camps were luxurious, the food fabulous, the hosts charming, the guides super-efficient.

Here is a variation of the trip we took: highly recommended. http://www.kicheche.com/camps-bush-rates-Kicheche-Conservancy.shtm

Klondike Friday. Juba, South Sudan: 2011; Dawson City, Yukon: 1898

2011-12-02T00:26:00.000-08:00

Juba, South Sudan: 2011; Dawson City, Yukon: 1898
While I’ve been spending the last few weeks visiting my daughter in Juba, South Sudan, I’ve been working on Gold Web, the fourth Klondike Gold Rush mystery novel.

Seems like Juba would hardly be an inspiration, doesn’t it?

But the two places are surprisingly similar.

Take the streets. In Dawson the town flooded so much in the spring of 1897 that the Mounties needed a canoe to get from one building to another across the parade square. The town was built on a flood plain at the joining to two rivers. When it rained the streets turned into muddy passages so deep that the mud might come up to the top of a waggon wheel or to a horse’s knees. In Juba, the streets are mostly unpaved, and unmaintained. Potholes the size of a small car, open manholes, rocks and garbage and debris. I haven’t been here in the rainy season, but I shudder to contemplate.

The people. People from all over the world poured into the Klondike in search of fortune. Most of them were ill-equipped, to say the least, to live in an arctic mining town. The only ones who really made money were those who ‘mined the miners’: dance hall owners, shop owners, etc.

People from all over the world are here in Juba: aid workers from NGOs and foreign governments; people from other African countries setting up business large and small. Kenyans seem to have a monopoly on the car rental and taxi businesses, Eritreans on water delivery; Turks are building the new road to Umulei; Ugandan and Kenyan women staff restaurants and bars. White 4*4s stamped UN fill the streets along with most of the major NGOs. I have met people from Canada, UK, US, Holland, Botswana, Kenya, Germany, Ethiopia, France, South Africa, Sweden, Australia. Most of whom seem to get along in a joyous muddle.
The City. The Klondike was a rough and tumble mining town carved out of the sub-arctic wilderness. People lived in shacks made out of green wood or in canvas tents (in the winter!) and what buildings there were, were constructed with more speed than skill. This city isn’t much different. It was just a garrison town for the Northern forces for the years of the civil war. Only with the CPA in 2005 and the subsequent independence did the city start to grow. And growing it is. Construction is everywhere. Housing is a problem as people are pouring in, not only from other countries as mentioned above to take advantage of the new economic opportunities, but from the countryside. Most housing is still in tin shacks or traditional mud huts.

Environment. Cough. Hack. In Dawson sawdust covered everything, all the time. They were cutting down the forest as fast as possible and turning all that wood into boats and buildings and firewood. In Juba at this time of year not only is dust everywhere, but the farmers are burning their fields and smoke is thick in town. Neither were places for people with breathing difficulties. In Dawson there was one or two public toilets (depending on my sources) for a city of 30,000. No plumbing, no electricity, no telephone (They got electricity and telephone in 1899). In Juba, I don’t know how many public toilets there are but I’ve learned not to leave home without using one. The ‘western’ style houses have private garbage disposal and sanitation removal: the shanties, nope. What do you do without garbage collection or running water? Think about it.

The Wildlife: Zip. Nada. What else happens when the wilderness is destroyed and the people move in.

The future. There was no future for Dawson City. The gold rush ended abruptly in the summer of 1899 and everyone fled for other prospects. The era of the great gold rushes was over: most mining would be done by companies now, with industrial equipment and scientific innovations. By the early 20th century the city was pretty much a ghost town. It’s revived today, but the population is about 8,000 (it had been 30,000 in summer 1898) and it’s mostly a tourist town, reliving its glory days.

For Juba? There are difficulties to be sure: Crime is on the increase; war with the North still threatens; there are ethic and regional disputes. But everyone is optimistic and the energy is fantastic. I’m looking forward to coming back in a year or two and seeing how it’s progressed.

Land of the Giants

2011-11-28T06:10:00.000-08:00

Juba, South Sudan.

The people here are TALL. Wow. Many of the South Sudanese are from the Dinka tribe, which is famous for the height of their people. It’s not uncommon to see people 6’5 and above on the streets. And that includes the women! There is a shoe market near where I walk most days, and the size of some of the shoes!

Generally they are also thin, with long, long arms and legs and necks. South Sudanese are, generally speaking, very black. As in black, not dark brown.

I wish I had some pictures to show you, but I really can’t take pictures of people on the street.

My daughter went to an official event recently and had her picture taken with a couple of dignitaries. She is a normal sized Canadian woman and looks like a little child standing with them.

It is the dry season now, and dry is the operative word. As there are so many unpaved roads the dust is incredible. It’s a reddish dust. I have developed a very bad cough which I suspect is because of the dust and the smog. As in any third world city, the environmental standards are not, shall we say, quite what I am used to. It is also the custom to burn off the fields in the dry season and ash is falling from the sky. \

Saturday I went to the town of Nimulai on the Ugandan border with a group of my daughter’s friends. The intent of the trip was to visit the National Park. Unfortunately we didn’t see any wildlife, but the trip was very interesting and we had a great hike to see the cataracts on the Nile. At one point we were very high up looking down over the plains and the Nile meandering into the distance.

En route to the cataracts we passed a UN police vehicle driven by an RCMP officer on temporary duty with the UN. They invited us to the UN compound for a cold drink before heading back, and I took the opportunity to pounce on him for information about his job here.
Fodder, I hope, for a story soon.

The road to Nimulai is being paved and parts of it were in very good condition. Parts, shall we say, were not. And the dust was incredible. At times we couldn’t see the car in front of us. Not a safe road either, as overloaded buses to and from Uganda kept passing us , on the left, when visibility was about 10 feet.

We passed some de-mining camps and work areas. A reminder of what this country is coming out of.

The International community here is very vibrant and friendly and the social life is great. My daughter had a dinner party on Friday evening. Sunday we had TWO social engagements. A lunch party to meet the new Dutch Ambassador, and then a BBQ dinner. Interestingly, the International community also consists of Africans from other African countries. The BBQ was at the home of a Kenyan woman who runs a car rental agency (car rental in some cases includes drivers) and her Canadian partner. A fun day.

To complicate things: imagine trying to find a house you have not been to before in a city with no street name signs our house numbers. Can be tricky.

There are no districts in Juba. Meaning no suburb for the nice houses and shantytowns on the outskirts. Everything is jumbled in together. It did seem odd to be at the lunch party in a lovely cool house full of Dutch furniture and art, drinking nice wine and eating excellent food and talking about Holland and International politics and then step out the gate into a street that is a dusty track filled with garbage where the neighbours live in mud or thatch shacks and little children run through the streets with feral dogs and goats.

Kayaking the White Nile and Falling Mangos

2011-11-21T07:15:00.000-08:00

Saturday, I had the extraordinary opportunity to kayak down the White Nile. A friend of my daughter brought an inflatable kayak to South Sudan. My daughter drove us into the countryside, to a nice quiet spot at the banks of the While Nile and we loaded up and took off. The current is very strong and it was work to get across the river to a quiet channel, from then on I lay back and let my guide and the current do the rest. It is not as lush and tropical here as I might have expected, largely because it’s the dry season. But the mango trees are large and green and papyrus grows along the banks.

Children were getting water and people crossing in boats carved out of tree trunks, either poling across or using shovels as paddles. We saw plenty of birds – no crocodiles though.
When we approached town (and the only bridge for the next 1200 KMs) we stopped at a restaurant for a beer. Then on for another while to where my daughter waited for us quite near to her house.

A really lovely outing.

I took this picture of a ladder at a construction site. I wonder what the WCB would have to say about that.

I’m writing this at a compound on the banks of the Nile on Sunday, just relaxing and having a drink and reading (Pirate King by Laurie R. King, if you’re interested). The mango trees are ripe and children are collecting the fruit. A sudden wind just came up and the mangos are dropping to the ground, and the umbrella tops, and the roof of the bar hut like explosives. At first we thought the children were running in fear, but nope they’re busy collecting the fruit. The cooks came hurrying out of the kitchen as well, armed with buckets.

I think Mango salsa is on the menu for tonight.

Incidentally the compound I’m reading in right now is where George Clooney stays when he’s here on humanitarian aid missions. No George sighting as of yet; I’ll keep my eyes open.

I checked with my housesitter yesterday. She tells me it’s turned quite cold in Ontario. Nice to be basking in the heat here in South Sudan on the banks of the While Nile.

Out for a Walk

2011-11-17T05:10:00.000-08:00

I’ve ventured out on the city streets for a walk. This doesn’t sound like anything terribly exciting, but it’s rather daunting. First, there are no street signs. If I get lost, I might well never get back. Fortunately downtown Juba is a grid pattern. So if I walk as long as I want, turn left, go one block, turn left, I will get back to Caroline’s street which is conveniently at the bottom of the grid.

I don’t have many pictures to show you, although I’ll try to get some. The big issue about taking pictures is the security forces. DO NOT, I have been told, take your camera out if any police or soldiers are around. You cannot take pictures of infrastructure or strategic places and they will decide what counts as strategic. Definitely do not take pictures of cattle pens! I won’t take my camera with me when I’m walking alone. If I get into trouble, I want someone to be with me.

When I go for a walk, I quite likely do not see a single other white person. Yet no one bothers me: no one stares at me, little kids do not ask for money (although they might well say Hello), street vendors don’t even beg me to sample their wares. Everyone just goes about their business regardless of this rather clueless blond woman in their midst.
The streets are absolutely packed. There are a few dirt patches that might count as a sidewalk but in most cases you walk in the road, trying very hard to stick to the side without stepping into the open ditch. Trucks, 4*4s , cars, scooters they call boda bodas, motorbikes. No street signs, no traffic lights, just a mad scramble as everyone hits the intersection (including the aforementioned white pedestrian) at the same time. The odd goat, chicken or dog as well.

There are tons of NGO and foreign government aid organizations here. Plenty of
mud-spattered white 4*4s on the street with UN stamped on the side. Many aid-organization trucks have signs in the window with a machine gun and a red line through it. No arms. I’ll try to get a picture. My daughter’s primary focus is health – a major challenge in a county with no hospitals. Her colleague works in food security, which I find really interesting.
Went to the market with Caroline after work. It’s just a short walk from her house. As you might expect, the market is mostly women with goods (mainly fruit and vegetables) laid out on a blanket in front of them. We bought tomatoes, avocados, cucumber, tiny bananas, and a papaya.

I don’t think there is anything better in this world than a big African avocado, unless it’s a personally picked cherry tomato. The Mexican avocados you get in Canada? Don’t even begin to compare.

I am told that almost all of the food for sale is trucked in from Kenya or Uganda. After twenty years of war, the infrastructure of South Sudan is just about non-existent and there is nothing in the way of commercial agriculture.

A county with a lot of challenges., But from what little bit I’ve seen, they have the people to match.

Not just Another Day in South Sudan.

2011-11-16T02:26:00.000-08:00

It was my birthday!

I am writing this in the restaurant next to my daughter’s house so I can use the Internet. For the astronomical price of 100 S. pounds (about $33) I get 12 hours of time. The Internet isn’t working in my daughter’s house and even she has to come here if she needs to check her mail when not in the office.

Or when the power in the office is off and she has to work in the restaurant. Electricity in Juba goes out regularly for several hours. They have generators, but the office generator ran out of gas yesterday. Problems problems.

It’s nice, though, sitting here in the bar. The staff are so friendly. Everyone seems to like my daughter and was quite excited to hear that I am her mother. They said they didn’t believe it, but I’m sure they were being nice. There’s a difference also, I guess, between me and a woman of my age who has worked in the fields in the hot sun every day and lived in a mud hut and had 12 children.

The street pictures were taken as I stood at the gate to my daughter’s house. Not exactly the leafy suburb of colonial dreams.

We went to Da Vinci’s, a restaurant on the Nile, last night for my birthday with some of Caroline’s friends. As we arrived the wind came up – what they call a black storm. And what a wind. We dodged mangos falling from trees on the run from the car. The wind blew and waiters were running after napkins and bringing in cushions. Caroline had planned on us having a table on a raft on the river. That plan was quickly shelved but we had a lovely table inside – inside meaning a thatch roof overhead, there are no walls. We’d sat down, taken a few pictures, when the wind and the rain were over. Five minutes later – calm and peaceful. I had grilled Nile perch and it was very good. Two small desserts were presented to the table with a candle in each and Happy Birthday Vicki written in something pink on the plate. I blew out the candles, and up they popped again. Trick candles.

The Nile is very brown and muddy here and very fast moving. On Sunday I’m going – Kayaking! On the Nile! That will be an experience.

Vicki

Here I am in South Sudan

2011-11-14T23:57:00.000-08:00

Juba, South Sudan. The World’s Newest County.

I am now in Juba, capital of the brand new county of South Sudan. I have been to Africa many times before, but even for me Juba is a real eye opener.

This is not the Africa of luxury game resorts, sundowners around the pool, leafy suburbs. This Africa is harsh, friendly, raw and new. South Sudan got its independence in July from Sudan after a long and brutal civil war. The county is essentially starting from scratch and there are a lot of people here determined to see it succeed.

Juba, the capital, has pretty much nothing in the way of buildings higher than two stories, or buildings at all, come to think of it. Lots of tin or mud shacks. There are no Western amenities here. I haven’t seen a McDonalds or a Quality Inn. In fact, come to think of it, I haven’t seen a single recognizable Western brand at all. The roads in the center of the city are paved, but a chaos of scooters, cars, trucks, 4 wheel drive, bicycles, pedestrians, goats and chickens and the odd big-horned cow. Bad enough, but my daughter drives a right-hand drive car – on right hand drive roads! (Neighbouring Kenya is left-hand drive, but South Sudan is right).

I was exceptionally lucky to be allowed to accompany my daughter out in the field. We left Sunday afternoon in a convoy of two 4*4s to the town of Yei. (Pronounced YEAH) where we were to meet community health workers. Malaria is the number one killer of children under 5 and my daughter was taken to see promising initiative of local villagers who are trained to recognize and treat malaria. They are hoping to expand the initiative to include other diseases.

Go a few kilometers from Juba city centre and the pavement ends. Think you’ve driven on unpaved roads? Think again. On Sunday we drove the approx.. 160 KM (about 100 miles) from Juba to Yei. It took 4.5 hours. And was I tried – it’s tough just holding on! I announced that I’d like to stop at the next Tim Hortons. Ha Ha. There ain’t nothing in the way of facilities – not even a bathroom never mind a coffee shop. Nevertheless in Yei we went to dinner at an acceptable restaurant and the guest house we stayed at was clean and comfortable although basic.

It is surprisingly dry here in Juba, but at Yei it is much greener and lusher.
Monday we left the main road at Yei to head into the bush. Good thing we were in 4*4s. Nothing else would have made it. At times the water was up to the top of the vehicle’s tires. The reason they have to travel in convoy – so one truck can pull another out if necessary.

I greatly enjoyed the visit to the village (a collection of mud and straw huts in the midst of a very prosperous looking corn field) to meet the village health worker. We then went to the medical clinic. Basic is the word, but it was very busy with women and their babies. They are trying hard to deliver antenatal care and assisted childbirth as well as basic health care for children. Not easy in the bush. A baby goat wandered in to check us out.
Then it was the loooong drive back to Juba – more bumping and holding on. We went to a small farewell dinner for a colleague of my daughter.

Today is my birthday! We’re going to dinner at a restaurant overlooking the Nile. I’m quite excited; I haven’t seen the Nile yet.

Finding Time to Write

2011-11-09T00:00:00.000-08:00

Today, I'm very pleased to have my good friend (and wonderful crime writer) Rick Blechta guest at One Woman Crime Wave. Please welcome Rick

Writing is obviously something that’s very difficult to do to a schedule. When the muse speaks, you’d better be listening and have your pen (virtual or not) in your hand. Trouble is most of us have day jobs, have other important things to do with our lives, and our writing time comes very dearly bought. So when you do have time to sit down and exercise that writing muscle in your head, you want to make the most of that time. Here are a few hard-earned tips to help.

1. Tell people that when the door to your “writing room” is shut, you do not want to be disturbed – unless the world is coming to an end or the Publisher’s Clearing House people are at your door with that million dollar cheque. It’s easy for others to think, Oh, he’s just writing. I only need to disturb him for a moment to ask what he wants for dinner. Even a small interruption can completely destroy a writer’s train of thought. If those around you don’t get the message easily, put a sign on your door saying, “Do NOT disturb!!! I will be done working at [insert time here] and will speak to you then”. Ever wonder why so many successful writers have little shacks at the bottom of their gardens or cabins in the woods where they disappear to? Keep writing.

2. Don’t answer the phone. Same reason as #1. If it’s important, they’ll either leave a message or call back. Keep writing.

3. Whatever you do, don’t check your email, don’t even have your browser turned on. If you’re like me, you don’t have several computers, but I do know writers who have bought a cheap second one that they use for writing. It’s not connected to the Internet and it’s strictly used for writing. It is tempting when writing to check a quick fact by browsing the Internet for the info. Unless you’re made of really strong stuff, I guarantee you won’t look up just your quick fact, you’ll check a sports score or glance at your Facebook page to see if someone has poked you (what is poking anyway?). Let’s face it, you can always look things up later, be it how to spell a word or the reasons why World War One took so long to end. You’re writing, right? Research can be done anytime. Keep writing.

4. Don’t go back to fix what you’ve just written. You may know that last sentence was a complete dog, but it’s the information you want to get down, the flow you want to develop and maintain. When you’re on a roll, just keep going. I try to not even correct mistyped words or add missing punctuation. If you noticed it now, you’ll notice it later, and it can be fixed then. Keep writing.

5. Write to the bitter end. You probably know from the start of your session, how much time you have to work. Even if you reach the end of a chapter close to the end of your session, keep writing until you’ve reached your time limit. Quite often it will help your next day’s work because it will be clearer where you wanted to go next. In short, writing requires discipline. There are a lot of unsuccessful writers out there who never grasped that point. They might even be very talented, but you know what they say about talent. It’s easy to just waste valuable time, make up excuses to yourself,let other people get in your way, but the writers who complete novels are the ones who sit down and do it.

Rick Blechta is the author of seven crime novels, the most recent of which is Orchestrated Murder, part of Orca Book Publishers Rapid Reads line. This novella is aimed at those with poor reading skills, but it’s also a compelling quick read for anyone. Next fall, Dundurn Press will be publishing The Fallen One, a full-length novel about an opera singer who just might be seeing dead people. His novel, Cemetery of the Nameless, was a finalist for the Arthur Ellis Best Novel award in 2005.For more information, visit his website: www.rickblechta.com

Klondike Friday: Photography

2011-11-04T03:00:00.000-07:00

The book I am working on right now, Gold Web, will be the fourth in the Klondike Gold Rush series (following Gold Mountain, April 2012). In this book a photographer arrives in town to set up a business. Angus, being a keen and intelligent young lad, takes a job excorting her around town. Naturally I wanted to be able to describe the equipment and the process of taking a photograph in the day.

I contacted Jared Case at the George Eastman Museum of Photography in Rochester, NY. Jared arranged a tour of the facilities for me and a meeting with a couple of the experts on 19th century photography. It was a fascinating day.

One of the reasons the Klondike Gold Rush is so historically famous, is that it occured at the beginning of common photography. The camera and all it's equipment was becoming small enough and light enough that it could be taken outside of the studio to photograph people on the street or going about their business. By 1898 there was even a camera for hobbists. It was the Brownie, invented by the abovementioned Mr. Eastman. You took your pictures and mailed the entire camera to the Kodak offices. They developed it and sent back the pictures and a new camera.

Photography was still a clumsy business though, and it was likely my photographer would have used dry plates, rather than film. The dry plate had two sides, so one could snap two photographs before having to change plates. Light was a problem - and most pictures had to be taken in the sunlight or in a very well illuminated room. Otherwise, the photographer required a bowl of magnesium, lit to provide a sudden flash.

In the book, Angus is totally captivated by the new art of photography. What wonders it will show. Corporal Sterling thinks science has a place in the future of policing. Fiona, on the other hand, is most concerned about protecting her privacy. There are still people searching for her, you know.

Here are some pictures I took with my own camera at the museum.

Now On Kindle: Among the Departed

2011-11-02T05:09:00.000-07:00

At long last Among the Departed is available for your Kindle. At only $6.99 What a bargin. I actually stumbled across it when searching for something else. My name is spelled wrong - sigh - so it doesn't link up with the other versions of ATD. Anyway, click here.

And remember - it has been out for some time for Nook and Sony.

Klondike Friday: Sex and Sin in the Klondike

2011-10-20T13:41:00.000-07:00

Dawson City in 1897-98 Yukon might have been a freewheeling town, full of open prostitution, legalized gambling, and saloons that stayed open twenty four hours a day, but somethings remained completely traditional
In the Yukon as in the rest of Europe and North America at the time, there was a very strict social strata, particularly as it affected women.
Married women occupied the top rung of respectability. Some of that respectability varied of course according to the status of their husband. Then came the few businesswomen. Whether wealthy business owners such as Belinda Mulrooney or a dressmaker or the proprietor of a hat shop. Nurses and teacher s would have fallen into this category.

Then we hit what was known as the demimonde. And the majority of gold rush women who made their living ‘mining the miners’. The top of those ranks were the headliners in the dancehalls. These women could make a lot of money, but it was an expensive occupation – they provided their own stage costumes and were expected to change them often. The next tier was the chorus dancers. Not headliners but still stage performers. The rung below – percentage girls. These were the women who moved in after the stage show was over to dance with the men for the legendary dollar a dance. One dollar got some lonely sourdough or cheechako a one minute turn around the dance hall and then he could expect his lady to drag him off to the bar to buy a drink – included in the dance price. They got 25 cents out of every dollar dance. Most of these women simply wore their street clothes to work. They would have worked hard too – from midnight to six or eight am six days a week, dancing constantly.

Let’s keep going down. The few independent prostitutes, some of whom ran their business under the guise of a cigar store and the employees of the better class brothels. Below them, the cheaper brothels, and then at the very bottom, the women who worked out of the cribs on Paradise Alley. Many of these poor women didn’t earn much, if anything, at all. First they had to pay for their transportation to the Klondike, then the rent on their cribs, and pay off pimps.

Information on social strata found in Gamblers and Dreamers by Charlene Porsild.

New Releases

2011-10-13T09:05:00.000-07:00

Poisoned Pen Press is going to re-release my first two books from them, Scare the Light Away, and Burden of Memory, this spring. I'm really pleased. That means that they think the books deserve a second go around. As well as new covers, they will be featured in the press's catelogue. Here's a first glimpse of the propsed new covers. These are still in development, so might not be the finished product. Let me know what you think.

And, if you haven't read Scare the Light Away and/or Burden of Memory you don't need to wait until spring. They are in print and widely availabe. Including in all electronic formats.

Many indepentent bookstores are now selling e-books. Why not see if your favourite store has them?
Kindle
Kobo
Sony
Nook

Klondike Friday: Mud

2011-10-06T14:26:00.000-07:00

I sometime thought that in later years, if I should be so lucky, the thing I would remember most about Dawson, in this summer of 1898, was the mud. The town had been built with no thought for anything other than access to the gold fields. Inconveniences such as being located on a floodplain, on the flats beside one river and at the mouth of another, right at the spot where the rivers would jam during spring break-up, were inconsequential in light of the town’s desperate need to be at the road to the Creeks where lumps of gold waited to be found.
-Fiona MacGillivray, Gold Fever (Dundurn Press).

Mud.

And a lot of it. Dawson City was built where the Klondike River flows into the Yukon River. A good location for a town, near a waterway, close to the gold fields. But it was also a floodplain. When the ice broke up on the river in May of 1898, the newly arrived townsfolk discovered just what a poor choice of site it was. There are pictures of the Mounties crossing from one building in Fort Herchmer to another in a canoe (sorry can’t find such a picture today, I’ll keep an eye out for it ).

Every tree for miles around had been hacked down for lumber, firewood, and to make room for houses. All that water had nothing stopping it.

The streets were, literally seas of mud. The mud could be as high as a horse’s knees. Duckboards were laid across the streets so people could get across. And mud, as we all know, breeds insects and disease. Never mind what it must have been like trying to keep the floors clean!

In Depth Interview with Fiona MacGillivray

2011-09-29T19:05:00.001-07:00

Fiona has been interviewed extensively over at the Historical Mystery Blog. See what she has to say about her life and times. Click here.

Klondike Friday: The Beginning of the NWMP

2011-09-23T08:58:00.000-07:00

In my research on the North-West Mounted Police for the Klondike Gold Rush series, I recently bought an out of print book titled Dickens of the Mounted by Eric Nicol (who sadly passed away earlier this year at the age of 91). The book is fiction, but based on fact. Francis Dickens, son of Charles, was an Inspector in the NWMP for twelve years. Francis himself died in 1886 just a short while after leaving the police.

The book is very Flashman-esque. It takes what little is known about the real life of Dickens and proposes to be a book of letters he wrote back to England during his time in the NWMP.

His career was, shall we say, less than stellar and apparently his lasting contribution to Canadian history was that from then on the officer corps of the NWMP showed a ‘growing antipathy… towards Englishmen.’

The book is hilarious in places, poignant in others (Francis lived in his father’s shadow his entire life) and most importantly, in my opinion, a darn good historical read.

Francis Dickens joined the NWMP in 1874 (he secured his position as a Sub-Inspector through family connections while still in England – he had never been a police officer). He was slightly too late to take part in the Great March West which left in July. Dickens followed by train. There being at the time no Canadian train route, he had to go through the U.S. to St. Paul and then by stagecoach to Winnipeg.

The March West of the NWMP is one of the key pivotal points in the creation of Canada west of Winnipeg and in the creation of the Canadian identity (the police were sent to bring law and government to Indian lands, not the Army.) It is, naturally, almost completely unknown to any but the keenest follower of Canadian history.

Although Francis Dickens was too late for the March, he soon caught up and spent the remainder of his career in such outposts as Fort Pitt, Fort Walsh, and Fort MacLeod. (In Alberta, where I visited the historical NWMP fort in the spring). He was there for treaty negotiations with the Blackfoot, dealings with Sitting Bull after he and his people came to Canada following the Little Big Horn, met Louis Riel, and fought the rebels in the North West Rebellion.

In the book, he meets and comments on Sam Steele, James Walsh, Sitting Bull, Louis Riel and many other historic characters. Sam Steele, incidentally, was an important player in the Klondike Gold Rush being the NWMP commissioner at that time. One of the towering figures of Canadian history, he is (of course) almost completely unknown.

A laugh out loud incident happens in the book when Dickens meets the Governor General (and son-in-law of Queen Victoria) and the GG wants to speak to him privately once he realizes Francis is the son of Charles Dickens.
“I wonder, Inspector Dickens, whether you can recommend a good publisher back home?”
“A publisher, Your Excellency?”
“Yes. You see, I do a bit of writing myself.”

I have long believed that the best way of teaching history is through historical fiction. Most writers of historical fiction work hard to keep the facts accurate and the setting and tone of the times dead on. But they present the history in a lively, exciting fashion, rather than the boring recitation of facts as it’s presented in most schools. If you want to learn more about the beginnings of the NWMP you could do a lot worse than look for a copy of Dickens of the Mounted.

The book cover shown above is an actual photo of Francis Dickens from the Public Archives of Canada. The Indian is Sitting Bull.

P.S. I am a huge Flashman fan, and the cad himself makes a brief appearance in Dickens of the Mounted, shortly after his adventures with Custer.

Klondike Friday: Law and Order (Sometimes)

2011-09-16T05:00:00.000-07:00

In Gold Mountain, the third in the Klondike Gold Rush Series, due out next April from Dundrun Press, there are some flashbacks to when Fiona and Angus first arrived in Skagway, Alaska in August of 1897. Fiona’s on the run from the law in Toronto. She has no intention of going on the difficult trip to Dawson, and thinks it might be a nice idea to set up a theatre in Skagway, something for the entertainment of all the eager prospectors sure to follow.

Then she has an encounter with the legendary outlaw Randolph Jefferson Smith, and decides it expedient to take her prospects across the border into Canada and then to Dawson City.

Smith (aka Soapy) is a real historical character and I did a fair amount to research into him for his small part in this book. There was pretty much nothing in Skagway before July of 1897, when news of the gold strike hit the cities of the south and tens of thousands of people headed north. Skagway, and nearby Dyea, were the jumping-off points for the interior. Passengers travelled by ship from Seattle, San Francisco, Vancouver or Victoria and disembarked at Skagway or Dyea to head overland into Canada.

The aforementioned Mr. Smith, who got his nickname from a confidence game involving a bar of soap, was one of the first on the scene. Seeing an opportunity, he quickly took over the town, and ruled Skagway for the next year.

What little there was in the way of law and order, looked the other way. (The Marshall was in Smith’s pocket.)

Smith was killed in July of 1898 in a shootout on the Skagway waterfront. His killer died of his own wounds a few days later. The picture of Smith on the horse was taken was he was the Grand Marshall of the July 4th parade, but a few days before his death.

Meanwhile, at the top of the Chilkoot Trail, at the Canadian border, the North-West Mounted Police kept a Maxim Machine Gun with the express purpose of keeping Soapy and his gang out of Canada.

Many an American was not impressed to arrive in Canada and find that there were rules and the law was enforced. For example, the NWMP inspected all boats leaving Lake Bennett for sea-worthiness, and insisted that women and children get out and walk around the rapids. In town they kept an eye on the gambling halls and cribs, enforced Sunday closing, and banned firearms from town and the Creeks.

And created a very Canadian version of the not-so-wild west.

The picture to the right is of Sir Sam Steele, who in typical Canadian fashion, gets far less recognition than he deserves.

Day of the Triffids

2011-09-03T07:23:00.000-07:00

I've always thought the sure sign of mega-success would be to have one word or one phrase from your work so well known that all anyone has to do is say it, and everyone knows what you're talking about. Such as a huge, tall plant. A triffid. You know what that means. Here's my own visit to the Day of the Triffids.

This picture was taken in the farmer's field beside my house. Today is the Labour Day weekend, a popular time for tourists where I live. All day cars have been pulling up and people getting out and taking pictures.

One of my friends said that she wouldn't be surprised if I woke up one moring to find the plants surrounding the house.

Klondike Friday: A Day Off

2011-09-02T06:58:00.001-07:00

I'm taking a day off today. Yup, a holiday. Normally, when I'm at home I write every day until about noon or one-ish. Yesterday I realzied that summer is ending, I have a fridge full of blueberries, a counter-top covered in tomatoes, and almost nothing made for the freezer. I have books to read and a swimming pool to enjoy while I still can. So I'll take a day off.

But wait - the last-minuite edits for Gold Mountain are due today. I can do those quickly. And it's Klondike Friday!

Sunday was the Lord's Day in the Yukon. Everything was shut down, the bars, the dancehalls, the shops. People could be (and were) fined for chopping wood for their own stoves on a Sunday. So consider this my version of Sunday, and that's the end of Klondike Friday for this week!

One more thing - the release date of Gold Mountain has been moved up to April.

Klondike Friday: Gotta Spend it.

2011-08-26T06:06:00.000-07:00

When I sent the manuscript for the first book in the Klondike Gold Rush series, Gold Digger, into my editor she returned it questioning every instance in which I’d specified the amount of money flowing.

Yup, I said, they really did spend money in those quantities.

Very few people made much money in the rush: of all those tens of thousands of people who set off for the Klondike, almost all of them were too late. By the time they heard the news, headed to Seattle or San Francisco or Vancouver, bought the required one ton of possessions, got on a boat to Skagway or Dyea, carried all their things over the passes and into Canada, made a boat and braved the rapids on the Yukon River, and finally arrived in Dawson… all the claims were taken.

There were a few exceptions of prospectors who got lucky, but generally speaking the only ones who truly stuck it rich were already in the area when the initial strike was made.

Aside, that is, from those who mined the miners – the bartenders and dance hall girls and far-sighted shopkeepers.

Yet for those who did strike it rich it was a time of almost unimaginable indulgence. Any luxury available in the South – champagne, oysters, pâté, silk dresses, ostrich plume hats, not to mention real luxuries like fresh eggs! could be had for the right price.

Men dropped ten thousand dollars in a night at the gambling tables (in 1898 dollars!), threw nuggets at the feet of their favourite dance hall performer, bought drinks for all and sundry. A dancer known as Diamond Tooth Gertie (incidentally, you can visit Diamond Tooth Gertie’s in Dawson today) reportedly said, “The poor ginks have just gotta spent it, they’re that scared they’ll die before they have it all out of the ground.”

Win a signed copy of Among the Departed

2011-08-24T14:55:00.000-07:00

Haven't read Among the Departed, the fifth in the Constable Molly Smith series? Well, hasten over to Dru's fabulous blog and read all about a Day in the Life of Constable Molly Smith, and you can enter your name to win a signed hardcover book. http://notesfromme.wordpress.com/2011/08/24/a-day-in-the-life-of-molly-smith-by-vicki-delany/

Klondike Friday – An Armada

2011-08-19T05:47:00.000-07:00

It’s well known that the route to the Klondike in 1897-98 was nothing if not difficult. The photographs of a line of men and sometimes women climbing steadily up the Chilkoot trail, carrying a portion of their one ton of goods on their backs, is iconic. So iconic it’s featured on Alaska licence plates. (I’ve always thought it a bit ironic that the Alaska licence plate proudly features people LEAVING Alaska).
But lesser known perhaps is what those would-be prospectors faced once they reached the summit. Could they take a rest and congratulate themselves on making it? Was it smooth sailing the rest of the way? A gentle stroll down the mountainside followed by a leisurely cruise?

Not exactly.

Because once they reached the summit, and were inspected by the Mounties posted there and allowed to go forward, there was, of course, nothing until they got to Dawson City. Eight Hundred kilometres of nothing.

The only way to get to Dawson from here was by water, up the Yukon River. As there wasn’t exactly a port at the lakes, they had to build their own boats – and then navigate a river full of rapids through the wilderness.

And build boats they did, out of green wood they hacked out of the wilderness forest themselves. And not a canoe, but something that would transport all of their party and everyone’s ton of goods. While they waited the winter out on the shores of Lake Bennett for the river ice to break up. One day ice clogged the waterway, the next day it did not. And the armada set off. Just imagine a wilderness river, barely disturbed by so much as a paddle in all the years of its existence. Suddenly tens, then hundreds, of craft arrive. Canoes and rowboats, scows and barges, rafts that were living trees a few days before. Billowing with sails made out of the sides of tents or tarpaulins.

As this was Canada, and not the ‘wild west’ the Mounties kept an eye on the proceedings, they inspected the boats for some minimal degree of seaworthiness, and those they feared not capable of operating their craft were ordered to learn water skills first. At various points where the rapids were strong the police ordered women and children out of the boats to walk around.

Many boats and many possessions and even some lives were lost on the river. Imagine carrying all that stuff up the Chilkoot trail and over the summit only to watch it sink to the bottom of the mighty river.

Klondike Fridays: A newspaper story run amok.

2011-08-12T03:00:00.000-07:00

The Promised Land. Not.

In her book Gold Diggers (a non-fiction account of the Klondike Gold Rush) Charlotte Gray points out that the rush was largely a journalistic or media event.

That there was gold in the Yukon was not exactly a big secret. People had been mining there and finding gold for more than twenty years. So what happened in 1897 that set off a world wide rush that saw tens of thousands, probably hundreds of thousands, of people from all parts of the world packing up all their worldly belongings and rushing into the wilderness?

Media.

There was a severe depression going on in the United States. When word arrived that a ship was heading to Seattle, carrying gold and now-rich gold miners, the newspapers, particularly the Seattle Post-Intelligencer and Seattle Times, saw the opportunity to pump up the business prospects of Seattle. And they played it up for all it was worth. They made the arrival of the Portland in July 16, 1897 into a media event of unprecedented proportions. Other papers, of course, picked it up, and the news spread to a highly receptive audience like wildfire.

The amount of gold in that first shipment wasn’t really all that impressive. The papers reported it in weight – which did sound pretty good – rather than value – nothing too special.

Once the story had legs, as they say in the newspaper biz, everyone else was jumping on the bandwagon. Outfitting shops sprouted overnight, stores put ads in newspapers and hung signs and banners, books and maps were printed by the boatload, and everyone with a boat rushed to the docks to provide transportation. That the books and maps were likely to be laughably inaccurate, and the goods one supposedly needed wouldn’t do much other than take money from a wanna-be prospector’s pocket, was of no relevance. People needed to believe and other people were happy to take advantage of that need.

Unfortunately for the tens of thousands who made it to the Klondike, the reality was a lot different. There wasn't gold lying on the ground waiting to be swept up, and the profitable mines were already owned by those who’d been in the area when the strike happened.

The only real money to be made was in the shops or the saloons and dance halls.

Enter Fiona MacGillivray.

Scene of the Crime - Sat. August 13th

2011-08-07T16:19:00.001-07:00

Colour me excited! Scene of the Crime is on Saturday. One of my very favourite weekends of the whole year.

And you're invited!

Scene of the Crime is the annual mystery lovers festival held on Wolfe Island, Ontario. It's a celebration of crime writing and crime reading and crime authors and crime readers. This year the Grant Allen award winner for contributions to Canadian crime writing is Maureen Jennings, who should need no introduction. We're thrilled that she's joining us just days after the release of the first book in her new series set in England in WWII. It's called Season of Darkness and I was lucky enough to get an early copy so I can lead the afternoon panel discussion. It's a great book and an exciting new venture for the popular Maureen.

The other guest authors are C.B. Forrest, Elizabeth J. Duncan, Howard Shrier, and R.J. Harlick, wonderful authors all. The guest lecture will be given by Staff Sergeant Kristina Patterson of the Belleville Police Service on Tactical Survival.

If you haven't sent in your registration, here are the "Walk On" rates: $70.00 if we can still seat you for meals; $50.00 if we can't (there are other places to eat). Just be sure you're on the 9:30 ferry leaving from Kingston.

I will be giving the optional extra workshop this year, and it's on Writing Believable Antagonists. If you'd like to take the workshop, please check if there is still space available.

For all the details including ferry schedule have a look here: www.sceneofthecrime.ca

Klondike Fridays

2011-08-06T07:36:00.000-07:00

Time to head back to the wild days of the Klondike Gold Rush. And wild days they were.

Gold Mountain is on schedule for a May 2012 release and I am sitting down this morning to begin plotting out the next Klondike Gold Rush book. No title as of yet, but ideas are simmering. Last night when I pulled out my history books to start getting back into the sense of the time period, I thought it might be fun over the next year to post things of interest on this blog, for anyone wanting to know more about the background to the books. I’ll try to keep to a regular schedule of Klondike Fridays. Yes, yes, today is Saturday, but I only thought of the idea last night.

One of the reasons the Klondike Gold Rush is so well known (and so darned easy to research) is that it was not only the last great gold rush, but it was also the only one to be captured extensively on film.

You all know those iconic images of the lines of packers trudging up a 45 degree slope in the snow.

In the 1890s, the camera and all necessary supplies for it had become small enough that photographers were able to get out of their studios and stiffly posed portraits and take their camera not only into the streets but also the mountains and the gold fields and peoples’ homes. Thus we have a fully documented photographic record of the period.

Some were professional photographers, perhaps the best known of which was Eric A Hegg, who opened a studio in Dawson City and made a living taking photographs of Klondike scenes to sell in an early version of the postcard. There were many amateurs as well, people who loved their cameras and the new art of photographer such as George Hicks. The White Pass & Yukon Route company employed a full time photographer, Harry Barley, to keep company owners and shareholders informed about the progress of the railway.

One of the books I rely most on for my research is The Klondike Quest: A Photographic Essay 1897-1899 by Pierre Berton. It’s a big beautiful book packed with wonderful photos of the amazing people who made the great journey to the promised land.

That the promised land didn’t turn out to be quite so promising will be the subject of my next posting.

Vicki Delany's Summer Newsletter

2011-08-03T12:37:00.000-07:00

I send a newsletter out quarterly, just updating friends, family, and readers on where I've been and will be and what's happening in my little part of the book world. The summer newsletter went out this afternoon. If you'd like a copy, but are not on my mailing list, please let me know. I guarantee that I will not sell your e-mail address to anyone! No matter how much they beg.

The Modern Gothic Novel

2011-07-28T06:41:00.000-07:00

As followers of this blog (thanks!) know, I’m taking a break from the Constable Molly Smith series to write a new standalone novel for Poisoned Pen Press.

My first two books for PPP were standalones, Scare the Light Away and Burden of Memory. I wrote the type of books I like to read, specifically the traditional British gothic, full of family secrets.

Who knew (not me!) that the gothic is back and as popular as ever, now in modern dress. Rather than poverty-stricken (yet well-bred) governesses banished to bleak Scottish castles, we might have Australian women travelling to English villages to discover the truth of their past (Kate Morton’s The Forgotten Garden) or a new teacher at an private school in New York fearing that something is moving in the woods (Carol Goodman’s Arcadia Falls).

In the afterword to The House at Riverton, Kate Morton describes the Gothic: The haunting of the present by the past; the insistence of family secrets; return of the repressed; the centrality of inheritance (material, psychological and physical); haunted houses (particularly haunting of a metaphorical nature; suspicion concerning new technology and changing methods; the entrapment of women (whether physical or social) and associated claustrophobia; character doubling; the unreliability of memory and the partial nature of history; mysteries and the unseen; confessional narrative; and embedded texts.

Burden of Memory and Scare the Light Away follow the gothic tradition of family secrets, haunted houses (in one case physical in one just metaphorical), entrapment of women into assumed roles, partial nature of history, and most certainly embedded texts. Burden of Memory, perhapss the most truly gothic of the two, concerns an elderly woman who hires a biographer to help her write her memories of her time as a Nursing Sister in the Army in WWII. The biographer arrives at the old family cottage (i.e. Estate) on Lake Muskoka to find a tough old lady who’d fought her father’s expectations in order to lead her life her way, a large extended family full of secrets, and something moving in the woods (or is there?).

In Scare the Light Away, also set in in the Near-North of Ontario, the protagonist comes home for the first time in thirty years for her mother's funeral and discovers her mother’s diaries and the secrets therein. In both novels, of course, there is a modern mystery as well.

The new book, More than Sorrow (release date Sept. 2011) is with my critique friends now. I’ll be telling you more about it later, but in the meantime here are some links if you’d like to find out more about Burden of Memory and Scare the Light Away. Both are available on Kindle, Sony e-reader, and Nook as well as still in print.

Kindle: Scare the Light Away. Burden of Memory.

Nook: Burden of Memory, Scare the Light Away

Sony e-reader: Scare the Light Away , Burden of Memory.

If you pefer to buy from your local independent bookstore, many still have the books in stock (try Posioned Pen, Mystery Lovers, Aunt Agatha's, Books and Company or Novel Idea) or can order them for you.

Spoilerville!

2011-07-17T10:41:00.000-07:00

One of my favourite mystery writers, Jan Burke, has created a great new web page called Spoilerville. It's simply a place where people can gather to discuss a book with other readers and the author. Four of my books are up, two from the Constable Molly Smityh series, one from the Klondike Gold Rush, and one of the standalones. Pop over and say Hi, and lets talk books. You'll find many of your other favourite mystery writers there too.

http://spoilerville.com/2011/07/17/among-the-departed-by-vicki-delany/
http://spoilerville.com/2011/07/17/burden-of-memory-by-vicki-delany/
http://spoilerville.com/2011/07/17/in-the-shadow-of-the-glacier-by-vicki-delany/
http://spoilerville.com/2011/07/17/gold-fever-by-vicki-delany/

Poisoned Pen Press Authors Blog

2011-07-03T06:13:00.000-07:00

Because I don't have enough to do, I decided it was time for a blog strictly for Poisoned Pen Press authors. We're a varied bunch in terms not only of personalities and locations but in the type of books we write. And I figured that people who like one Poisoned Pen author might find another worth looking into. So, a blog looked like the way to go. The Press was happy to have a blog as part of their web page, I put out the call for volunteers and presto - we're off to the races. We had more people wanting to participate than we could accomodate in our monthly rotation, so even have a waiting list. The authors have a set day of the month in which to post, so there will be something new every day of the month. My day is the first. Here's a link to my blog which ran on Friday on When Life Immitates Art. And here's the link to the blog page. (Note that to leave a comment or to read comments you have to click on the post itself and open it in a new page - somewhat awkward.)

Canadian Bookshelf

2011-06-29T09:32:00.000-07:00

Here's a great new web site I've just discovered. It's called Canadian Bookshelf and has been put together by the Canadian Publishers Association. A wonderful resource on what's what in Canadian published books. It's still a beta site and there are a few glitches (I've tried to tag my books with but it keeps giving me an error).

My main publisher is Poisoned Pen Press which is not a Canadian publisher, so although the books are distributed in Canada they are not published in Canada thus don't show up on the Canadian bookshelf.

But I'm okay with that.

Hopefully people can find out about my Klondike books and a bit more about me and then look futher.

And I'm pleased that someone is doing something to help out Canadian books. Check it out
http://canadianbookshelf.com/

Writing the Climax

2011-06-25T14:38:00.000-07:00

I'm in the midst of writing the climax of my new standalone for Poisoned Pen Press. Tetative title: Walls of Glass.

It's not easy. In this book I want an action-packed ending. But the heroine isn't a cop or a soldier or a judo master. She's an ordinary woman, with serious brain trauma, up against two big men, one with a knife and one with a Glock. How to get her out of this predicament believabily is the question.

Believability counts. For some reason writers seem to be able to get away with total fabrication in movies in a way that we can't in crime fiction. In a movie, she'd step forward, grap his wrist, and flip him onto his back. Or she'd leap into the air and use both feet to strike him in the chest so he falls, unconscious, to the ground. Perhaps she'd have a knife concealed on her body (don't we all walk around the house like that?) and throw it from the far side of the room to fasten his hand to the wall?

None of that is going to work in this book. One thing she has on her side is that she has a child to protect. I do believe that people can find hidden strength when someone they love is in danger.

There has to be a certain amount of luck involved. One of the men turns away at the wrong (for him) time, or steps in the wrong (for him) place? Perhaps a falling out among thieves? Or an intervention by another person. Nope, don't want the big strong man coming to her rescue. The gun jams? Why not?

This requires a lot of thought. In my head I have to position the characters, move them around the space. Know where they're looking when they speak, know where they're standing at just the right time. I am not particuarly quick-witted, nor am I fast and agile, but my character has to be to save herself, so I have to think like I'm smart and fit.

Let me pour another glass of wine and think smart and fit.

Okay, she got lucky and the knife guy is out of action. Now there's the guy with the gun to deal with. Hum...

Is that a siren I hear in the distance?

No, cop outs now, Vicki. Stay focused. You can do this. She can do this.

Stay tuned.

A Joy to be Home

2011-06-15T06:53:00.000-07:00

I'm home. Hurrah! The trip was great but it is so nice to be home. I wouldn't normally go on a long trip in Spring but my cross-Canada book tour for Among the Departed was planned around Bloody Words in Victoria so I had little choice. When I left, the garden was a bunch of stubby hosta tips poking out of the cold ground. Now it's a riot of peonies and iris and the hosta are HUGE. I won't get my vegetable garden in this year - it's getting too late and my priority will be the annuals and cleaning up the perennial gardean and the weeds that have had their way with the edges of the lawn. Fortunately a neighbouring boy came regularly to cut the grass.

I have lost six weeks of writing time. I don't write when travelling, but i did do a lot of thinking about the new standalone and am really eager to dive right in. I find that I am able to do edits when in cheap motel rooms, so was able to get the editor's suggestions incorporated into Gold Mountain (coming March 2012).

Good thing I like to drive - I put in over 10,000 Kms on the car in five weeks.

Art in Nelson, B.C.

2011-05-25T09:19:00.000-07:00

I've arrived in Nelson for a week.

I have a few book events (http://booktour.com/author/vicki_delany) but am mostly here to soak up the atmosphere. Like the pew auction to benefit Grans for Grans, an organization in support of the Stephen Lewis Foundation. Several promient Nelson artists (including my good friend Carol Reynolds) were given a pew bench from an old church and told to have at it. The art work they created will be auctioned off on Saturday.

Carol broke the pew in two to makea garden bench and a chair, and created a painting on each back section - ie four full paintings - of a birch forest. It's beautiful. A woodworker took his pew and created a desk and a metal worker made an enormous and elaborate swing set.

Several youth from the Youth Centre got chairs and created art work from their chairs. The chairs will be auctioned as well.

Over at the Oxygen Art Centre there's another art auction this week to benefit the centre to which Carol donated a painting.

There's always something fun and interesting and community minded going on in Nelson, B.C.

To see more of Carol's art (such as the painting above): http://www.carolreynoldsart.com

Some pictures from the road

2011-05-21T17:50:00.000-07:00

I'm spending tonight in Pincher Creek, Alberta. I loooove Pincher Creek. It's a tiny little town with nothing of merit except that it sits right at the end of the prairie and the beginning of the Rocky Mountains. So, if you look east you see flat open prairie. Turn around and face west and it's towering mountains. Tomorrow I pass into the mountains, which is one of my very favourite moments in all the world.

It's been a wonderful trip so far. A great combination of work (booksignings) and fun (touristing). Here are some pictures of the Alberta Badlands, the Royal Turrell Museum in Drumheller, Alberta, and just driving across the praries. Oh, and of a NWMP Sergeant in full regimental dress uniform as displayed at the NWMP Museum in Fort McLeod.

Visiting the RCMP heritage centre

2011-05-17T16:09:00.000-07:00

Even when we writers are on vacation, we're working. I'm between engagements in Winnipeg and Saskatoon and have come to Regina for a couple of days for sightseeing and relaxing. On my way to the museums this morning, I stopped at a Chapters store for a drive-by. Just popped in, announced myself, and asked if they'd like me to sign books. It's always fun. The store staff are delighted to meet you, and happy to let you sign books. Helps give the books a bit more visibility with a signed by author sticker and a bookmark poking out of the top.

Then I went on to the Royal Saskatchewan Museum, which is small but very very good. They have great exibits on the geography of the province and the lives of the First Nations peoples. Plus the museum is in a beautiful garden setting by the river.

I spent the afternoon at the RCMP Heritage Centre, which is a museum for the history of the RCMP. As you know (I hope) Corporal Richard Sterling in the Gold Rush books is with the NWMP and Constable Adam Tocek of the Molly Smith books is with the RCMP. The history of the NWMP in particular, how they peacefully opened the west, is fascinating.

I bought a couple of items in the shop, things to bring with me next year to Left Coast Crime or Malice Domestic if I host a table. I think you'll like them.

A reminder: I'll be speaking at McNally Robinson in Saskatoon on Thursday at 7:30 PM. It should be a fun evening, so I hope to see you all there.

Do you like to read a series in order?

2011-05-15T16:20:00.000-07:00

Today I was the guest at Whodunit mystery bookstore in Winnipeg. It's a fabulous little store and Jack and Wendy, the owners, are just full of knowledge about mystery books, past and present. Despite the fact that today was the first nice day after weeks of cold rain a nice number of folks came out to eat cupcakes, drink tea and talk books with me. We got onto the subject of series books. I tell readers that you don't HAVE to read the Constable Molly Smith books in order, because each plotline begins and ends in one book, but if you like character development, then you might want to start with the first. Which in this case is In the Shadow of the Glacier. The Klondike books can be read in any order as they take place within a very narrow time frame.

Jack, the owner of Whodunit, and a man who has read just about everything, was most insistent that he strongly disapproves of books that require the reader to have read something else first. Every book should stand and fall strictly on it's own merits. An interesting point, I thought. Today's readers, I think, do like character development in a series. They like to follow the main characters as people come and go in their lives. Can that be overdone? Can you give so much character development that you end up spoiling a latter book for someone who hasn't read an earlier one?

I think in particualar of Susan Hill's Simon Seralllier series, unquestionly one of my favourites. You have to read those books in order, particuarly the first three. I did read the second book first, and when I read the first one I knew what was coming and so the shocking ending was no shock at all.

Then there is Steig Larsson's series. If you haven't read the first and second, don't even bother picking up the third.

Contrast this with Peter Robinson's Inspector Banks novels in which Banks grows and changes and his life changes but it is done so slowly that the order of the books really doesn't seem to matter. At least in my humble opinion.

I'd love to know what you think? Do you want a series that has to be read in order? Or, like Jake, does it annoy you?

Win a Box of Chocolates with Among the Departed

2011-05-11T17:10:00.000-07:00

My Facebook friend Martha is very kindly having a contest for readers of Among the Departed. You could win a box of chocolates from Martha and a signed bookmark from me by answering the following question: There is an inside joke in Among the Departed. When John Winters comes home at the end of the book he finds his wife Eliza reading. Can you tell what she's reading, and why it's an inside joke? If you know, you can friend Martha on Facebook and send her the answer. And then you win! First ten correct answers win. Her name (so you can friend her) is Martha Paley Francescato. Enjoy your chocolates.

Wolfe Island Scene of the Crime Festival

2011-05-07T10:40:00.000-07:00

I am on the board of the Wolfe Island Scene of the Crime Festival and am just in from a board meeting. It's looking like we're going to have another fantastic year. The festival is held every August on beautiful Wolfe Island, Ontario. The Island is about a 1/2 hour ferry ride (and free!) from Kingston, Ontario. There is also a ferry running from Cape Vincent, New York. One of the features of the festival is the annual short story contest. There's less than a month left to enter, so if you are considering it, don't leave it much longer. Contest closes on June 1st. All details of the contest are up on the web page. www.sceneofthecrime.ca. You don't have to attend the festival to submit a story to the contest, but you do have to be Canadian and you do have to be unpublished.

This year's festival is on Saturday August 13th. Registration includes author readings, panel discussions, guest lecture and THREE meals including our famous church supper. Can't be beat. Www.sceneofthecrime.ca. We're on facebook, to get updates just look for Scene of the Crime and friend us.

Fun with Blog Posts

2011-05-06T07:18:00.000-07:00

As I mentioned yesterday, I do enjoy doing guest blogging slots. There are some that are particuarly fun to do. I had two of those this week, when the blog-owner asked one specific question. That caused me to think outside the box, as they say, and look at things from a completely different point-of-view. First I was asked to cast a movie of Among the Departed. Hard for me to do as I don't watch TV and rarely go to movies but I consulted far and wide and came up with a good list, I think. And then there was the page 69 test. Turn to page 69 and talk about what that page reveals about the book. More challenging than you might think.

My book: The Movie: Click here.

Page 60 Test: Click Here

Among the Departed Blog Tour

2011-05-05T07:19:00.000-07:00

I love doing guest blog posts and the release of a new book is the best time to do them. Here are some links to the things I've written about lately.

Jungle Red Writers on the Appeal of the Villiage Mystery: click here

Omnimystery on Standalone vs. series: Click here

Mystery Maven Canada on Writing What you want to Know: Click here.

Crime Writers of Canada on Writing the Villain: Click Here

Remember that all authors love comments on their postings. Agree/Disagree? I do want to know.

Stay tuned for a few more as the month continues.

Home from Malice Domestic and Festival of Mystery with a free offer

2011-05-04T08:39:00.000-07:00

I had an absolutely wonderful book tour. North Carolina with Molly Weston was a blast. Fun and friends and good food and lots of book sales. I even ate grits for the first time Just loved them in the shrimp and grits (see picture).

It was great getting to know Elizabeth Duncan better. A lovely woman and great writer.

I took lots of pictures for this blog – and left the camera in Mary Jane Maffini’s car. I’ll get it back, I hope, on Monday at our book launch in Ottawa, and will post pictures later. Speaking of Mary Jane, sometimes we laughed until the tears ran and our sides ached. At one point I actually couldn’t see. Good thing I wasn’t the one driving.

We then went to Malice Domestic, where Mary Jane won an Agatha Award for best short story. Yeah!!!! Then on to Oakmont PA for the festival of mystery. Who knew (not me) that I was just down the row from an elusive writer named K.C Constantine who never appears in public. Here’s a pic (courtesy of Janet Rudolph) of K.C. I am standing in the background in a grey sweater. The other picture of me in the hat was taken by Louise Penny.

Home now for a short rest before the big book tour to B.C.

A reminder that Among the Departed was released yesterday. It is available everywhere in hardcover and trade paperback. Also large print and audio version. There has been a delay with Kindle and I am hoping it will be out soon.

Free Offer: If you would like a signed bookplate or a postcard for Among the Departed or one of my bookmarks, please send me an email to vicki at vickidelany dot com. I'll pay the postage!

Among the Departed: Two chapters

2011-04-27T10:08:00.000-07:00

The prologue and first chapter of Among the Departed are now up on my web page, for those of you interested in a sneek peek. The book will be released on May 3rd, but it is already up on Amazon.com. Here are the various links: www.vickidelany.com
Amazon.com
Amazon.ca
Chapters.ca
The book is also available through your local independent bookstore and other chains and other online booksellers.

At Cary Library

2011-04-26T11:05:00.000-07:00

We had a great event last night at the Page-Walker House, hosted by the Cary Library and sponsored by the Canadian Consulate in Raleigh. Here we are. Mary Jane Maffini, Karen Kiley from the Library, Vicki Delany, Elizabeth Duncan.

Elizabeth is blogging about the trip so I don't have to! Check it out. Nice pictures too at http://elizabethjduncan.wordpress.com/

Pictures from the Road

2011-04-24T13:31:00.000-07:00

Notes from the Road

2011-04-21T05:20:00.000-07:00

Mary Jane, Elizabeth and I have safely made it to day 2 of the big trip. And we're still talking. Still laughing actually. We started off in cold, torrential rain that lasted into Pennsylvania. But then the clouds lifted and the temperature warmed and we could see green, green grass and trees with leaves! Whoo Hoo! We spent the night in Ghettysburg and are breakfasting now. Each hunched over our respective laptops. A writer's work is never done.

We have lots of time today to get to North Carolina, so plan to visit some of the sights in Gettysburg for a quick peek before continuing further south.

Pictures to follow.

The Witch of Babylon

2011-04-14T06:09:00.000-07:00

It's quite a month for great Canadian crime, and I'm really pleased that my very good friend Dorothy McIntosh is about to publish her first novel, the Witch of Babylon from Pengunin Canada. I need say nothing about it (except that you'll love it) because I can direct you to this fabulous web page. http://www.babylontrilogy.com/

The Busy Woman's Guide to Murder

2011-04-08T10:15:00.001-07:00

Great title! That's the name of the newest book from Mary Jane Maffini one of Canada's best known crime writers. The book was released just this week by Berkely Prime Crime.

The Charlotte Adams adventures take place in New York State, about two hours north of NYC, and feature a thirtyish professional organizer, reconnecting with her friends and getting her life and business together in a community in the Hudson Valley. Of course, she is slightly distracted as the bodies pile up, but she's equal to the task. The fifth Charlotte Adams Mystery The Busy Woman's Guide to Murder hits the shelves on April 5th. No extra charge for the organizing tips, which you are free to use or ignore.

Now, as it happens, Mary Jane will be joining Elizabeth Duncan and me for a tour to North Carolina later this month. So if you're planning to come out and meet us, why not bring along a copy of The Busy Woman... for MJ to sign for you. To learn more, here's the web page for Mary Jane.

www.maryjanemaffini.ca

More pics

2011-04-03T05:05:00.001-07:00

Here's my mom at the Desert Botanical Gardens in Phoenix.

Vicki In Arizona

2011-04-02T17:09:00.000-07:00

We had a wonderful visit to the Poisoned Pen bookstore and to the Velma Teague Library in Glendale (where, rumor has it they have a hockey team. Hard to imagine). In our free time we visited the Desert Botanical Gardens which I never get enough of. Here's some pics. Next stop - North Carolina!

Sorry, Blogger seems to be not working properly. I can't add any more pictures. I'll try again later.

Fun on the road

2011-03-30T11:05:00.001-07:00

I'm in Scottsdale right now. Relaxing on the lounge chair in our hotel garden room. Lovely. Left Coast Crime was just great. Really well organized and in a spectacular setting to boot. The La Fonda Hotel is a historic old hotel and was a wonderful place for the conference even if it was difficult to find some of the rooms at times. We arrived a day early and went to Taos which was just fabulous. Loved poking around Santa Fe and buying jewellry and eating great meals.

Then it was on to Phoenix. We decided to drive rather than fly and see the sites. What there is of them. We spent the night in Holbrook, Arizona "the town too tough for women and churches." About all I can say if the women left Holbrook it was because it's so darned boring. We had an expensive, yet dreadful dinner, and stayed in a second-rate hotel. Oh, well, all part of the experience. The next day we stopped at a state park outside of Winslow and had a wonderful tour of the ruins. You know what Winslow, Arizona is famous for, right? Take it easy.

In Scottsdale we're staying at the Hotel Valley Ho, which is definately not second-rate. It's more like a resort than a city hotel. We've been relaxing around the pool with rum and pineapple drinks.

Last night I was at the Poisoned Pen with R.J. Harlick and Wayne Arthurson for a enjoyable discussion with Barbara Peters and this afternoon we're off to Glendale to the Velma Teague Library to visit with Lesa Holstine and tonight I'm speaking to the Scottsdale Society of Women Writers at the Chaparell Suites hotel.

As a reminder: The Poisoned Pen got copies of Among the Departed five weeks before release date. So if you want a signed copy: sales@poisonedpen.com

Spring Travels

2011-03-17T07:10:00.000-07:00

One of the things I like best about being a writer is the travel. I love to go to new places to attend conferences and meet readers and fellow-authors and to go back to the places that I’ve enjoyed before.

This spring I have quite a bit of both lined up. I have a couple of people coming to house sit when I’m away, so hopefully there won’t be too, too much gardening for me when I finally settle back down.

I’ll be in New Mexico next week for Left Coast Crime. I’ve never been to New Mexico, but I’ve always wanted to and when I heard that one of my favourite conferences was going to be held in Santa Fe I jumped at the chance.

And, as long as I’m in New Mexico, might as well pop over to Scottsdale to visit the Poisoned Pen. I’ll be there, along with Canadian writers R.J. Harlick and Wayne Arthurson, on Tuesday March 29. The next day, Wednesday, R.J. and I are going to be visiting Lesa Holstine at the Teague Library in Glendale. I always love getting together with Lesa and talking books.

That evening I have the honour to be the guest speaker at the monthly meeting of the Scottsdale Society of Women Writers. I’ll be talking about the Simple Writer’s Life and how I’ve achieved it. (That’s the simple life of a writer, not the life of a simple writer).

I’ll barely be back from the South West when it’s time to get on the road again to join Mary Jane Maffini and Elizabeth Duncan in a road trip to North Carolina, to Maryland for Malice Domestic, and Pittsburgh for the Festival of Mystery which is definitely a must-do for me every year.

Back to Ontario with scarcely enough time to get the new house-sitter settled in, wash some laundry, and then I’m going to Ottawa for the launch party of Among the Departed on Monday May 9th and from there it’s points west ending in Victoria for Bloody Words.

All the details of my stops are on Book Tour, so if you’re in the neighbourhood, be sure and drop in and say hi.

Murder at Lost Dog Lake by Vicki Delany

2011-03-07T17:49:00.000-08:00

Have a Kindle or other e-reader? I've taken an old book of mine titled Murder at Lost Dog Lake and converted it to Kindle. Then I put it up on Amazon and am offering it for $2.99. I wanted to charge .99 but they wouldn't allow that. Here's the blurb:

2004 EPPIE finalist for best mystery.

Leanne Aimes, ex-cop, bitter single mother, private investigator, really needs a vacation. And the wilderness of Algonquin Park seems like just the place where she can relax and forget her troubles. A guided canoe trip is exactly what she needs. But it isn't long before her companions beginning fighting amongst themselves. When a storm of unprecedented ferocity descends, the group is trapped on a remote island in the center of Lost Dog Lake. And Leanne comes to realize that someone in their small group is a murderer.

"A delightful read with a twist ending. A story that will hold your interest and one with lots of surprises. ... the reader feels like they are a third party in a two-man canoe. All you need is an oar." Anne K. Edwards, Blether Book Reviews.

Click here to order for Kindle: Amazon. If you like the book, I'd appreciate a quick review on Amazon. It will be available for Smashwords, Sony, and Kobo in the next day or so.

Vicki Delany's Spring Book Tour

2011-03-07T12:05:00.000-08:00

I've posted the details of my events this spring at Booktour. Take a peek and come out to chat if you're going to be in the area. In March it's Santa Fe for Left Coast Crime and then onto Phoenix and Scottsdale. I'll be at Poisoned Pen and at Teague Libary with Robin Harlick. Then in April it's North Carolina with Mary Jane Maffini and Elizabeth Duncan and then Malice Domestic and Festival of Mystery. And in May I'm off on a cross-Canada tour ending in Victoria for Bloody Words. www.booktour.com/authors/vicki_delany . I have a feeling that I'm going to have a very neglected garden this year.

Police Training

2011-03-03T05:49:00.000-08:00

I spent two days this week at police in-service training school. Really interesting stuff. They were doing vehicle stops, high risk takedowns, and Immediate Rapid Deployment in a high-target envirement. All I do is watch, and try to stay out of the way. I don't even get to play the victim. I learned so much and its highly unlikey much of this stuff will find its way into the Constable Molly Smith books. I don't write techno thrillers, so I'm not really interesting in putting weaponry and tactics into these books. But I am interested in how the police officers must be feeling as they enter, say, a school occupied by a shooter. Are they scared? Focused? Determined? I want to know how they work as a team and they co-ordinate amongst themselves. That might well find it's way into Molly Smith and John Winters lives some day.

They also viewed video taken of traffic stops that turned bad. We saw a couple of officers, and cars, taken out by traffic speeding by on the highway. Not nice at all. So here's a tip for all you drivers out there: If you see those flashing red and blue lights up ahead pulled over to the side of the highway - move over. Please.

Among the Departed - First chapter and pre-ordering

2011-02-18T08:07:00.001-08:00

I've put the prologue to Among the Departed up on the web page (www.vickidelany.com) along with pre-order information. The book will be released on May 3rd. Poisoned Pen Press has made the ARC available to bloggers, reviewers, bookstore owners, librarians etc at Net Galley. So if you are in that exhaulted company and would like to review Among the Departed, please go click here. Kirkus has reviewed it, and this is what they have to say.

Delany (Negative Image, 2010, etc.) invigorates the cozy genre with an unsparing look at love in all its variations, including coming to terms with it the second time around.

Three days left to vote for Negative Image

2011-02-11T05:41:00.000-08:00

This is sure exciting. Voting is open until Sunday. Negative Image is up for best mystery/thriller/horror. I really need your vote. It's fast and easy and there is no sign in. Just scroll down to Mystery/thriller/horror. Click the button above Negative Image and then click VOTE. Here's the link: http://www.cbc.ca/books/bookclub/2011/02/the-first-round-of-bookies-voting-begins.html

A reminder that the first two chapters are on my web page. www.vickidelany.com

Can I have your vote?

2011-02-07T07:31:00.000-08:00

I was thrilled to discover that Negative Image is one of the five finalists for a CBC bookies award for excellence in genre fiction. You might have heard of some of the other finalists, The Girl WHo Kicked the Hornets's Nest anyone? Well the final voting is open to the public, and if you liked Negative Image I'd just love it if you could give me a vote. You don't have to be Canadian. You don't even have to watch or listen to the CBC. Here's the link where you can see the other finalists and vote. Click Here

Rapid Reads - a new book

2011-01-28T08:21:00.000-08:00

I am very excited about a new book I am about to begin. I've been offered a contract by Orca Publishers to contribute a book to their new Rapid Reads series. The premise behind Rapid Reads is that if people are saying they have busy lives and don't have time to read - then give them something they can read in the time they have. The books are short, but don't let that fool you. I've read a couple and they're fast paced, suspenseful and action-packed. Perfect for someone who doesn't read a lot, but needs something to do when on a short plane ride or an hour long commute by train. And they're adult books. With adult themes and adult language.

The tentative title of the book will be The Player. It's about a young policewoman in Prince Edward County, Ontario. I don't have a release date yet, but you can be sure I'll let you know when I do. Here's the link: http://rapidreads.ca/

My Seat: A Short Story

2011-01-23T10:51:00.001-08:00

My Seat
By Vicki Delany

I have my own seat on the train.

Every morning, Monday to Friday, rain or shine, I catch the 6:53 GO Train into Toronto. I always get on (via the rear door) the car that stops by the old maple tree and rush up the stairs. I sit in the second group of four seats, on the left, by the window, facing forward.

Every morning for almost ten years now, I have sat in that seat on the 6:53. Oh, there have been days I have missed. Sometimes I will have an early appointment or I sleep in and get a later train. Some stormy winter days, the train is overfull with car-drivers who have wimped out due to the weather and on the stop before mine they have carelessly taken my seat. But I don't mind, I can share, as long as it doesn't happen too often.

I know my fellow passengers well, although I have never spoken to any of them. It would never do, to actually speak to a stranger on the train. No one does. It would break our urban resolve, the shell of contempt for mere mortals in which we surround ourselves. On the rare occasion that two friends board the train together, or meet by accident, their conversation echoes throughout the silent coach, and I can tell that all the regulars are just as annoyed as I. Who wants to listen to the mindless chatter of inconsequential strangers when there are newspapers to read, papers to review, books to return to, thoughts to think?

Nevertheless I feel as if we are old friends. There is The Lawyer - crisp, reserved, immersed in his morning paper. Whether or not he really is a lawyer, of course I have absolutely no idea. The Sad Lady - who sits and stares blankly out of the train window every morning; on occasion I have even seen a tear slip quietly down her cheek. The Mouse - tiny, inconsequential thing, trying to make herself as invisible as possible. Thin brown hair cut into a page-boy, brown eyes, brown twin-set; although once in a long while she will go wild and appear in public in a daring suit of grey or navy blue. Tubs and Tubless – he, a giant of a man, huge fleshy face, giant beer belly, hips overflowing into the seat beside him, always accompanied by the tiniest woman I have ever seen. If not for her lined, worn face and grey hair you would swear she was only a child. I have never, in ten years of travelling the train, seen Tubs without Tubless. They must take their vacation and sick time together.

Once, out for my daily walk at lunchtime, I passed The Lawyer on the street. I almost cried out "Hi, how are you!" I caught myself just in time.

Ten years ago I, like many of you, was a car-driver. I also clambered into my car every morning to brave the rush of traffic, to take my life into my hands on the highways. But unlike many others I faced only a short - a very short - drive into work. That is why many of my friends were perplexed when I decided to accept a transfer into the city.

“You'll regret it,” they all said. “You'll hate the daily grind on the train.” The droolers and bobbers they called train passengers. “You'll be sorry.”

But I wasn't. Not for a minute. For on the train, I am alone; I am left entirely to myself. No one asks me for anything, no one ever disturbs my reading or my contemplation of life. My friends, the Lawyer and the Mouse and all the rest, don't want a single thing from me, except that I also leave them alone.

I get up in the morning and the rush is on. Shower, makeup, iron the shirt I forgot to iron yesterday. Make the breakfast, children out of bed. Mommy, I have to have 50 cookies for the class today. I have to, I have to, I have to. Mother, I need $10 for the book I lost, or I won't get my report card. You do remember, honey, that twenty of my closest business associates are coming for dinner tonight; have something really special, okay? My entire career depends upon impressing the boss tonight.

Every morning a desperate rush to get everyone to where they have to be. Then.... bliss. Quiet, relaxation, peace for a whole half an hour.

But last Monday morning, when I returned from my vacation, there he was, sitting in my seat. Well, I didn't mind, not really. Sometimes a newcomer will appear on the train. It always takes them a few weeks to find a seat in which they’re comfortable. But the next day he was there again, not looking at all uncomfortable. Which is more than you could say about me. I was starting to feel distinctly irritated.

Now some of you may be wondering what was the big deal. Surely, I could find another seat. And indeed, you are right, I could find another seat. But I wanted my seat. If your house burned down, would you say, Oh well, I can find another? If your child were kidnapped, would you take someone else’s?

For three days, I tolerated the stranger in my seat. On the fourth day, I realised that I would have to take action. I plopped myself down on the seat opposite the chair-napper. I was now seated backwards, I detest sitting backwards: to see where you have been rather than where you are going.

I shifted in my seat constantly, I crossed and uncrossed my legs, muttering, "Excuse Me" if I "accidentally" kicked him in the ankle. I stared at him intently, and quickly averted my glance whenever he chanced to look up. I stretched out my neck and peered over my glasses to read the headlines on the back of his newspaper. When I rose to leave I even managed to swing my purse with enough force to knock the paper out of his hands. I mumbled “Sorry” as I made my escape.

I got off the train with a feeling of great satisfaction. I was confident that my seat would be empty the next day.

But it was not to be. To my horror, there he was again. As large as life, sprawled contentedly in place, briefcase stowed under the seat, newspaper already unfolded. Desperate measures were called for. I would have to break the ultimate taboo in commuter train travel. With steely determination and iron resolve I began.

"Do you take this train every day? I do, I always take the 6:53, I find the later trains much too crowded, don't you? And it is usually easy to find a good parking spot close to the platform. I work at a bank, so my office is quite near to the station. Just a nice five-minute walk. Is your office nearby? Where do you work? Goodness me, what has the prime minister done now, you don't mind if I read just the front page of your paper do you? Thank you ever so much, it is so important to stay informed, wouldn't you agree?"

We rolled on through the countryside and into the suburbs. The tidy tree-lined streets began to give way to railway yards and factories. Still I droned on. I was a desperate woman.

At last the endless journey was over. "Soooo pleasant talking to you," I trilled as I stumbled to my feet, overbalancing and steadying myself against his chest. "I do so look forward to talking to you again on Monday".

You can imagine my dismay when on Monday morning I found him ensconced yet again in my seat.

I sat down with a disgusted "thud" and glared at the seat-stealer. He continued reading his newspaper and took no notice of my indignant stares.

I simply did not have the spirit to repeat my display of last week. I had felt like such a total fool, babbling away endlessly, disturbing everyone else's journey.

This was just too, too much.

I stared out of the window and considered my options. They were few. I could find another seat; that would be admitting defeat. I could continue to attempt to make the trip so uncomfortable for the fellow that he would finally move; but that plan had failed miserably so far, I had no reason to believe I would succeed in future.

Or I could drive him away. Permanently.

As I have said previously, I was a desperate woman. But how desperate? I stared at my reflection in the train window.

Perhaps, I thought, I will merely keep my options open. I could follow him and see where he went, what he did with the rest of the day. A good plan. I nodded with satisfaction, my reflection nodded back. I would merely follow him and take advantage of any situation that came up.

As we disembarked and slowly made our way along the platform, I kept my eyes on my quarry. It was easy to keep up with him in crowded Union Station but once he broke free of the throng it was difficult to stay close.

We emerged into the dim light of early morning, swept along by the crowds of commuters. I followed him up Bay Street, for quite some time. He was certainly a fast walker and I was getting short of breath trying to keep up (unobtrusively, of course).

I swear - I had no intention of actually harming the poor man. I had no intentions at all, really. But I saw my chance and took it without properly thinking things through. Temporary insanity you might call it.

We were at a busy intersection, part of a swarm waiting for a green light. Traffic was very heavy in both directions. He stood directly on the curb, almost leaning out in his impatience to cross. I slipped through the waiting crowd and stood just behind him, hemmed in on all sides. A taxi roared around the corner (travelling much too fast). I acted without thinking, totally on impulse. The very moment the taxi reached our corner, I stepped forward and administered a firm push to the small of my enemy’s back.

He grunted in surprise and pitched forward. Then all else was drowned out by the frantic squeal of brakes, a dull sickening thud, and the screams of passers-by.

In the confusion, I slipped out of the melee and walked away.
My mind was in turmoil at the shock of how quickly things had happened, but I forced myself to think calmly. He had his back to me; he never actually saw me since we left the train. No one else would be able to identify me - everyone is anonymous in the city. Most importantly I had no connection to him at all. We merely engaged in light conversation one morning on the train. I was safe.

Confident in my assessment I continued on to my office, arriving a bit late but once again in total control.

Next morning, I happily assumed my proper place on the train. It felt so good to be back where I belonged. I arranged my briefcase under my seat after removing my book and settled in for a comfortable journey.

I was not entirely surprised to see two police officers board the train. They moved amongst the passengers solemnly, pausing at each one to show them a picture and speak briefly in low tones, which did not carry. I assumed that the photograph must be of the "accident" victim, but it did seem like rather a lot of trouble to go to for one little pedestrian mishap.

I assumed an air of nonchalance, balanced with mild interest. Like the other passengers, I continued to study my novel, while at the same time casting curious glances at the police from beneath lowered eyelids.

Soon they stopped beside the Mouse. She nodded energetically at the picture and pointed towards me. I noticed that they talked with her much longer than with any of the other passengers.

My heart began to beat faster and my mouth grew dry. No need to worry, I reminded myself. No one saw me at the "accident" scene. No one would understand my motive.

Eventually it was my turn. The two officers stopped beside my chair.

"Excuse me, Ma'am."

I looked up, "Yes, officer, can I help you?"

The one who spoke was a young woman, crisp and efficient. Her dark hair was carefully secured into a neat French braid, not a hair out of place. Her partner was a man in his late 50s, teetering on the edge of retirement.

"Have you seen this man before?" the female officer held the photograph up.

I studied it carefully. No point in lying. I could almost feel the concentration of the people in the seats around us as they struggled to hear every word. "Yes, I think so. I think I’ve seen him on this train. But I can't be sure. One rarely notices anyone on the train."

I laughed lightly. I was pleased with my performance so far. "What has he done?" I knew from reading mystery novels that I should appear to be curious.

"He was killed yesterday. Pushed in front of a car."

I gasped slightly. "How horrible".

"Well, thank you for your time." She stepped away as if to move on, but the man was still looking at me.

"You ride this train often?" he said.

"Yes," I said, "almost everyday."

"Always sit in this particular car?"

"Always."

"Always sit in this seat?"

"Always," I said firmly. I caught myself and added quickly, "Well, usually, I mean, that is sometimes, not always."

He nodded. I shifted in my seat. I didn't like the way he was looking at me.

"I take the GO Train every day," he said. "For more than 25 years I've been taking the same train, sitting in the same place every day. I have my own seat on the train."

(Published in Bloody Words: The Anthology, Baskerville Press, 2003)

Among the Departed

2011-01-18T10:03:00.000-08:00

Here it is. The cover for Among the Departed. This is the fifth in the Constable Molly Smith series. It will be out on May 3rd. Let me know what you think of it.

New Floors!

2011-01-14T09:32:00.000-08:00

I've just had my floors in the downstairs done and they look FABULOUS. My house is circa 1880. It had carpeting throughout and I have been wanting wood floors. I decided to have all the carpeting pulled up and see what's undernetah. Best case would be useable original flooring.Worst case would be getting all new hardwood installed.

Best case! He'd pulled up the carpet, the undercarpet, the linoleum, the plywood, more linoleum, and a thick layer of paper, to reveal wide-plank floors in good condition. To our surprise, the living room and dining room are different. Pine in the dining room and western red cedar in the living room. The living room floor was in such good shape it looks as if they laid linoleum almost immediately. There was a thin one-coat layer of paint in the living room and no paint on the dining room floors. This is a good thing. It was all polished and sanded and looks just glorious.

I've posted pictures on Facebook. Here's the link. http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=6307101&l=aa50029a7d&id=551036711

My reading

2011-01-10T12:19:00.000-08:00

I don't often read crime non-fiction. I read mostly crime fiction, and some non-fiction.

When it comes to non-fiction I've been reading things to do with the politics of food (Locavore, Omnivore's Dilemma, Food Rules) and books that look at history to try to figure out where we are heading (Collapse, Empires of Food).

But this week I’ve left my comfort zone and am reading On the Farm, by Stevie Cameron. This is the story of Robert William Pickton, Canada most prolific (so far) serial killer. Pickton preyed on the down and out women of Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside for years while the police largely did nothing.

His victims were throwaway women.

It’s tough reading but stuff worth knowing, I think. I summarize my thoughts, in particular how it relates to my current interest, trafficking of women and children into the sex trade, today at Type M.

Canadian eh? Not for the Ottawa Citizen.

2011-01-02T09:48:00.000-08:00

Are you Canadian? Do you like Canadian crime novels? Do you like to read novels set in Canada?

Well if so, don't bother to check with the Ottawa Citizen to see what the best mysteries of the year were. The Ottawa crime writing scene has to be the most vibrant in Canada which is a pretty darn vibrant scene itself. So where did the citizen go to get a year-end-round up? To a U.S. wire service. There isn't a single book set in Canada on their list or a book by a strictly Canadian publisher. Of course not, the U.S. reviewer probably isn't exposed to them.

Does the Ottawa Citizen think that Ottawains don't care about Canadian books? Maybe they don't, after all it isn't as if they can tell what Canadian books are out there by reading the Citizen, is it?

We're not asking for special treatment here and we're not asking for anyone to like our books BECAUSE they are Canadian. But we would like to be reviewed by people where we live and where we set our books and might have actually come across the books in their local bookstore. Is that too much to ask?

A new year and a very crowded computer

2011-01-01T12:33:00.000-08:00

Happy new year to everyone. I appreciate you stopping by at this blog and reading what I have to say. Here’s hoping for a healthy and happy 2011 and piles of excellent books.

On the first day of the year, this is what I have on my plate.

1) Finish Gold Mountain the third Klondike Mystery which is currently with my critique group members. Should require nothing more than some cosmetic changes so won’t be much more than a week or two of work. Publication is scheduled for Fall.
2) Begin work on the new contract I have for a Rapid Reads book, for a book titled The Players, deadline June 1. (I’ll be talking more about this project as I get into it). This will be a very short book, but I expect to spend quite a bit of time on it as it’s whole new direction for my writing.
3) Start a new book for Poisoned Pen Press. I’m taking a break from Molly Smith and want to write a standalone. This one will be set in Prince Edward County where I now live and will have flashbacks to the Loyalists who settled here at the end of the American Revolution. Aiming for Oct/Nov finish.
4) Revise Child of Mine, a standalone that is currently with my agent. Based on feedback from editors she’s sent it to, we decided that a major rewrite is required. I’ve done so, and it is now with a friend for her comments and suggestions.
5) Trips to Birmingham Alabama in February for Murder in the Magic City and Murder on the Menu; Ann Arbor, Michigan in mid-February for a visit to Aunt Agatha’s bookshop (on a panel with Barbara D’Amato, one of my inspirations!) ; Left Coast Crime in Santa Fe and the Poisoned Pen and Scottsdale Woman Writers Association talk in March; Tour with Mary Jane Maffini and Elizabeth Duncan to North Carolina in April; Malice Domestic in April; Bloody Words in Victoria in June, probably preceded by a visit to Nelson en route.
6) Release of Among the Departed, the fifth Constable Molly Smith book, May 3rd.

I guess that’s enough for now.

And a Happy New Year

2010-12-31T14:02:00.001-08:00

My children and other family members have all left, back to their own homes and lives. I'll be alone for New Year's Eve but that's never a problem for me. I'll nibble on cheese and baguette and drink champagne and look foward to a brand new year. Here's to 2011 and may it be a good one for you and yours and provide you with plenty of good books! Happy New Year.

Merry Christmas

2010-12-24T07:17:00.000-08:00

If you celebrate Christmas I hope you have a good one. And a very happy New Year to everyone. My family is all here, friends came over last night for games, the turkey will soon be in the oven, the mince tarts are made (and mostly eaten). For a change we're having our big Christmas dinner tonight (Christmas Eve) becuase Daughter #3 has to work first thing on Boxing Day so will be leaving early on Christmas evening. As well as having all of my children here, I had a couple of great Christmas presents already. A contract with Orca Book`s Rapid Reads programme to write a short easy-read adult book. Ì`m very excited about it, because it will take my writing in new directions. (Fear not, I`ll still be publishing with Poisoned Pen and with Rendezvous Crime). A great article in the London (Ontario) Free Press today that has the headline, I`ts a crime not to read Delany and my children and my mom are all sitting aorund reading ARCs of Among the Departed.

Life is good here at Chez Delany and I most certainly hope it is in your home also. Merry Christmas and may you have much happy reading in 2011.

Trying to Find Winter of Secrets

2010-12-17T05:45:00.000-08:00

Listen to any writer these days and they'll be complaining at how in the modern publishing business it isn't enough that the writer write the darn book, they have to then be the promoter, the marketer, the sales person. All of which is, of course, extremely time consuming.

Case in point: I recently discovered that the paperback edition of Winter of Secrets has disappeared from Amazon.com. The book is out in paperback, it is in stock at Amazon, but it isn't on my author page or on the list of editions of Winter of Secrets. The reader has to go to some considerable trouble to find it. And I don't want them to have to do that.

Back and forths between me and the publisher and her and Amazon is generating a lot of bites and bytes but no improvement.

These days, Winter of Secrets is showing up on a lot of lists of Christmas mysteries and there is a big review set to come out in a California magazine, so I would like people to be able to find it quickly and easily. Right now, the best I can do is provide the exact link: http://www.amazon.com/Winter-Secrets-Constable-Molly-Smith/dp/1590587812/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1292593844&sr=8-2

The book, BTW, is easily findable at BN.com, Amazon.ca, Chapters.ca and other sources.

The Nutcracker and Me

2010-12-12T05:51:00.000-08:00

Last night I performed in the Nutcracker. Yes, performed. As in on stage. In front of the audience. Now before you check my photo, no I didn't actually dance. I was invited by the Quinte Ballet School to be the guest celebrity at last night's performance in Oshawa. My role was to read a story at the beginning to my 'daughter' that would introduce the ballet. I was on stage for about two minutes tops. But it was so much fun. I loved going to a rehearsal and seeing those wonderful young people practice. I loved being backstage watching the excitement build. And, ham that I am, I loved having my own small part.

Unfortunately I don't have any photos as photography was not allowed and I was just wearing my own clothes so not much point in taking a picture off stage. However there was a photographer backstage, and I will try to get a copy of the pictures with me in them and some others to post here.

I snuck into the theatre after to watch the performance and just loved it. I can't say I've ever been to a ballet before. I'd love to go again. The costumes were just fabulous and the dancing superb. These students were on the verge of adulthood and going professional and the quailty showed. (Plus, of course the beginning students had small parts - so cute).

Earlier in the day I had a hugely successful booksigning at Books and Company, the Independent bookstore in Picton, Ontario. It's nice to live in a small community and to feel part of the community. One lovely woman said "I love you!" to which I replied, "Oh. I love you to." She'd read all my books and didn't even have to buy Negative Image because she had it already.

So all in all, a very nice day. But I'm glad the book tour is now over and I can try to remember that I am supposed to be a writer - not just a book promoter.

Silence of the Mid-List

2010-12-06T12:00:00.000-08:00

Thinking about big chain stores and the detremental effect they can have, even unintentionally, on small companies I wrote about the issue of product placement for Type M for Murder. What do chocolate bars and bestsellers have in common? Quite a lot, it would seem. Click here.

Update to Below Post

2010-12-05T14:18:00.000-08:00

Further to my post about the warehousing of new Canadian crime novels, Barbara Fradkin and C.B. Forrest wrote directly to the CEO of the bookstore company and, to everyone's considerable surprise, got a reply in an hour. They promise to rectify the situation immediately. That's just great, and we're really pleased. Now lets see how long it takes for the books to arrive.

Book tour almost finished, and a plea for Canadian crime writers

2010-12-04T18:52:00.000-08:00

Two things to write about today. First, I'm finished with my marathon of booksignings at Chapters/Indigo stores. Shoes off, wine glass in hand. I had fun, met a lot of eager readers, sold tons of books. Many many thanks to those of you who came out to meet me or ran into me accidently. When I'm doing a signing, I'm kinda hard to miss. I'm in your face, but I hope in a friendly cheerful way.

Next weekend it's my two favourite stores: Books and Company in Picton and Novel Idea in Kingston.

My signings were great, as I say, and as always the staff at Chapters/Indigo were so welcoming and friendly, that I just hate to say but.. And then go on with a complaint.

Now this complaint has nothing to do with me, or with the fabulous sales staff at Chapters/Indigo but I've found out that several of the very best Canadian mystery writers who have new fall books are not getting their books in the stores. Come on guys, the books have been printed and shipped. And are now stitting in the Indigo warehouse. Where they have been since OCTOBER! While the shopping season passes them by. Barbara Fradkin is among the very top of Canadian mystery writers. I bought her newest, Beautiful Lie the Dead at an Indy weeks ago (Great book!). C.B. Forrest wrote one of the best books I read this year (Weight of Stones) and I am so looking forward to the new one, Slow Recoil. It will, apparently, be a slow day when I can buy the book in Canada's one big chain bookstore.

If you're a fan of great Canadian mysteries it seems that in some cases the store that has about 90% of the market can't serve you. Oh, but if you want to read the latest Sarah Palin, it's in stock.

Please ask your local big book store where these books are or shop at an independent.

Revision

2010-11-21T06:28:00.000-08:00

I am not much of on for doing major revisions. Once I have finished a book I can make changes, for sure, add bits tighten up plot lines, drop a couple of red herrings, maybe strengthen a characters motivation or even add a minor sub plot.
But doing a major revision is something that strikes terror into my feeble heart.

My agent and I have decided that a standalone novel titled Child of Mine needs a substantial shift. I did not write this book to be a mystery, but a suspense. There is no mystery about who done what and why. The bad guy has a point-of-view throughout the book as he plots his evil ways. Hiss boo. The suspense is intended to be whether or not our heroine figures him out in time.

The response we got from the publishers she submitted it to was that they felt this didn’t work. They want a more traditional mystery with a whodunit element and a surprising reveal at the end.

Now, I’m not one to stand on my art and insist that my vision can not be tampered with. Tamper away!

I’m a bit nervous about doing it, as I said major rewrites are not something I’ve attempted before. But I’ll give it a go. It might work, it might not.

But if I don’t try, guaranteed it won’t work.

In Store booksignings and me

2010-11-18T08:45:00.000-08:00

A lot of authors hate nothing more than the dreaded booksigning.

Being a writer is an introverted profession, perfectly suited for those who like to sit in their study, surrounded by papers, typing away. They might come up for air once or twice a day, and blink nervously to notice that the sun is out or that the rain is pouring off the trees, and get up to fix something to eat. Then it’s back to the keyboard, dripping bagel crumbs into the keys.

And then, once the book is finished and published, it’s time to promote it.

A seemingly endless round of visits to boookstores and libraries and book clubs. Where you meet with people and smile and chat happily about your book.
It seems unfair somehow: I know writers for whom the whole meet-the-public thing is a nightmare. Some writers just can’t do it. Their sales suffer accordingly.

For some reason, unknown to me, I love it. And I am pretty good at it. Sure, sometimes you feel like a total smuck standing there with a stupid smile on your face while everyone rushes past, eyes averted. And you meet some pretty rude people.

But all-in-all you meet a lot of interesting people who love books and would just LOVE to give yours a try or think it would be PERFECT for Great-Aunt-Alice’s Christmas present.

I am very very good at in-store signings. Don’t take my word for it – I’ve been told several times that I am the best author they’ve ever had in. No kidding. One bookseller told me I could give classes in how to do it.

It’s not rocket science – all you have to do is engage the potential readers. Smile, say Hi, ask an opening question and if the response to that is good, then ask if you can tell them about your books. You definitely need something to hand them – bookmark, postcard, flyer - not only does it begin a relationship, but if they really are too busy right now you want them to have something to remind them to come back, don’t you?

My number one rule for bookstore signings: NEVER NEVER sit down. It creates a distance between you and the potential buyer and restricts your ability to move around the store or the immediate area.

We all have different ways of approaching this. Just a couple of tips about what works for me.

Want to see me in action? http://booktour.com/author/3883.

Technology - the good and the bad

2010-11-10T05:47:00.000-08:00

I spilled coffee into my laptop a couple of days ago. Modern electronics don't much care for water, and that was the end of that computer. Thank heavens I bought a Netbook last month to use when travelling and thank heavens I loaded all my current projects onto it to take to Las Vegas. So I was cursing and swearing about modern technology that has us so dependent. I pretty much live my life on the computer - not only my writing, but all my guest blog postings, I organize my book tour, I communicate with friends and family, look at pictures of my vacation. I even went onto Facebook to ask advice about getting a new computer.

Yup, we're tied to the darn things and those ties are getting tighter and tighter.

And this from someone who doesn't even have an iPhone or any other iDevice. I just have a common-or-garden cell phone. In Vegas in my group of 14 (11 Delanys) I was the only one with an ordinary phone.

And then last night the other side of the technology revolution hit me. I looked at the fridge, saw my notice to get my car licence sticker renewed, and hit myself on the head. When was I going to get the time to have that done? Then I saw the instructions to do it online.

And so I did - took two minutes tops.

It's a crazy world to be sure.

Blog tour and real tour

2010-11-05T13:19:00.000-07:00

I'm in the midst of a blog tour for Negative Image. It's been a lot of work, but also fun. I'm posting the links on the left side of this page. I'm starting off on my big bookstore tour tomorrow. I'll be all over Eastern Ontario and the GTA. The schedule is here: booktour.com. So please come out if you can.

Louise Penny's guest at Lipstick Cronicles

2010-10-24T05:15:00.000-07:00

I was delighted to be asked by my friend Louise Penny to be the guest blogger at her group blog, The Lipstick Cronicles. I wrote about my adventures with the police. I've written some of it here before, but I trust you'll find some of the article new and interesting.

Amazon has jumped the gun on Negative Image

2010-10-23T13:57:00.000-07:00

The official release date of Negative Image is November 2nd. But Amazon (both .com and .ca) and BN.com have jumped the gun and the book is now available from those sources. So, if those are your choice of store hurry on over and grab a copy.

Amazon.com, Amazon.ca, BN.COM And, don't forget, Kindle

What would you do if you believe the person you trust most in the world has betrayed you? What would you do if you discover that the person you trust most in the world believes you capable of betrayal?
Negative Image by Vicki Delany

Much excitement

2010-10-21T06:41:00.000-07:00

Well that was an interesting start to the day. I got up bright and early this morning because I am trying to get Gold Mountain finished by the end of October when I will be too busy with booksignings for Negative Image to get much done. I usually spend all morning in my pyjamas, but today I had a shower and dressed before coming downstairs. I made my coffee, booted up my computer, read about one e-mail message when there was an enormous THUMP from outside the house. I looked outside to see - a car in the lawn. Not just on the lawn, but down the hill and wrapped around the hydro pole. A woman was trapped inside. It was quite the scene as firefighters, paramedics, police arrived. They had to cut the car apart to get to her, get her neck stabilized and boarded to get her out of the car. The woman is probably going to be okay, but she was so shook up. (No kidding). Nice touch when someone said, "The gas tank is leaking". Anyway, the woman was taken to hospital, the car dragged out of the ditch and taken away, and everyone packed up and left. Here is a couple of pics.

The best interview ever

2010-10-16T05:34:00.000-07:00

How to ensure you get the best interview possible? Do it yourself. Vicki Delany asks me the tough insiteful questions today at Sea Minor by Nigel Bird. First question: Why does the phrase murder mystery make your hair stand on end?

http://nigelpbird.blogspot.com/2010/10/dancing-with-myself-vicky-delany.html?spref=tw

Signed copies of Negative Image

2010-10-12T05:54:00.000-07:00

Thanks very much to everyone who entered my contest. The response was just great. I’ve chosen and notified the two lucky winners. In the meantime, if you are a member of Goodreads, I’m having a giveaway there, so pop over and put your name down.

Today I’m off to Rochester, New York (International travel!) to sign copies of Negative Image for Poisoned Pen. These are books that have been sold (or hopefully, will be sold) as signed copies. All I will do is sign them, put them back in the box and mail them off. Going to the U.S. means that the books don’t have to go through customs twice.

As an added bonus, I get to see my good friends Charles and Rose Benoit. Charles is the author most recently of the huge new YA novel YOU. If you have a young adult on your gift list have a look: www.charlesbenoit.com

Contest Time! Win an ARC of Negative Image

2010-10-04T11:44:00.000-07:00

With just one month left to go until the release of Negative Image, the fourth book in the Constable Molly Smith series, I'd like to give away two Advance Reading Copies.

First, a word from our sponsor:

When his wife’s former fiancé is found dead of a single shot to the back of the head, Trafalgar police Sergeant John Winters is forced to make the most difficult decision of his life: loyalty to his job or to his wife. Meanwhile, tragedy strikes the heart of Constable Molly Smith’s family.

Now: go to my web page and read the first two chapters (link is posted on the main page) and send an e-mail to me at vicki @ vickidelany dot com telling me what colour are the eyes of the woman in the old photograph. I will draw two winners from the correct entries. Contest closes Monday October 11th. Bonus points for knowing what special day that is in Canada (although that won't help you win the contest).

Word on the Street

2010-09-29T09:24:00.000-07:00

I just love Word on the Street. Imagine, tens of thousands of people gathering to celebrate books. So many little kids as well. As I have done before this year I was in charge of the Crime Writers of Canada booth. I like the event, I like going, and I'm happy to be able to do something for the CWC. We had authors rotating all day, everyone from relative unknowns to a couple of big names. We had a huge basket of books donated by our members to raffle away and plenty of people signed up for Cool Canadian Crime, our newsletter. This picture is of Mel Bradshaw and me. Mel is a great writer and he is published by Rendezvous Crime, my Canadian publishers. The event is held in cities across Canada, alwasy on the last Sunday of September. Mark your calendars for next year.

Four Crime Writers and Nine Bottles of Wine

2010-09-24T04:47:00.001-07:00

The pictures pretty much say it all. Barbara Fradkin, Mary Jane Maffini and I ventured into the woods of Quebec for a couple of days at R.J.(Robin) Harlick’s cabin. Food, wine (and lots of it), laughs, dogs, walks, book talk, publishing-industry talk.

I’ve said before that what I like best about being a crime writer is the other crime writers. I have made so many great friends.
Weather was good except for a downpour the second morning. We were able to both sit outside for lunch, and have a fire in the fireplace in the morning and evenings.

Open Farms Prince Edward County

2010-09-19T15:30:00.000-07:00

I had just the best day today. As regular readers of my various blogs know, I am very interested in food and where it comes from and how it is produced. I worry about cruelty to animals and also about the sustainability of fossil-fuel based agriculture. (That steak you ate last night was almost certainly raised on corn fertilized with petrochemical products and it is quite possible your vegetables were shipped half-way around the world, or at least across the continent).

Today was a perfect early fall day here in Prince Edward County, Ontario. And it was the first year of Open Farms. What that means is that farms across the county (and other parts of Eastern Ontario) opened their doors to the public.

I visited a dairy goat farm (where I had to protect my T-shirt from nibbling goats) to see the goats that produce the milk that is used at the cheese factory about a half hour drive away.

At another farm, I ordered my Christmas Turkey after viewing the turkeys in their barn and bought two cartons of eggs produced by the chickens I’d watched scratching in the weeds and dirt.

I went to a very experimental organic farm where they produce all of their own electricity. So experimental, they have avocados and kumquats and papaya growing in a geodesic dome to see if they can be grown in Canada.

I also visited an 83 acre organic vegetable farm worked by a RETIRED couple on their own. (The retired bit blew my mind). Now part of that 83 acres is wetland and bush, but they probably have about 30 acres under cultivation. And they make maple syrup from the bush.

Perhaps the farm I enjoyed best was an animal farm very close to my house. A one-family operation, they raise turkey, meat chickens, laying hens, pigs, sheep, and cattle. They grow feed for their own animals and also have a sugar bush from which they make their own maple syrup. The turkeys and meat chickens are kept in cages out in the fields but the hens wander the property, scratching and pecking. Laying hens, the farmer told me, are smart enough to return to the safety of the coop before dark. Broilers and turkeys are not, so they have to be kept contained. Cows and sheep came up to investigate me when I approached the fence. The barn is open and cows and sheep come and go as they please. The pigs were in a pen, but they had plenty of room to run about (and they bolted when I arrived) and clean straw beds.

I am going to a friend’s cottage tomorrow for a couple of days with a group of good friends (R.J. Harlick, Barbara Frankin, and Mary Jane Maffini) and will arrive loaded down with greens, heirloom tomatoes, fresh eggs, goat’s cheese, yellow carrots, tiny colourful sweet peppers. And wine. Can’t forget good PEC wine.

They Spelled my Name Wrong !! - Negative Image for Kindle

2010-09-11T05:56:00.000-07:00

I have been wondering why the Kindle version of Negative Image isn't showing up on Amazon.com. Not wondering too hard mind, as I assumed it wasn't ready yet. Fortunately I found it today following a link from someone else. My name is spelled wrong. Thus if you search on "Vicki Delany" you don't find it. If you search on "Negative Image" it brings up the hardcover and then you can search the various other versions of the book. But no Kindle. Anyway, here it is. For some reason the book seems to have been released this week on Kindle, but the actual release date is Nov. 1st. I'm trying to find out what's happening.

Also, I'll take the opportunity to let you know that Negative Image will be released in paperback at the same time as the hardcover. Before the paperback didn't come out until the next book was released.

Creating a Book Cover

2010-09-09T05:54:00.000-07:00

I am very pleased that Francois Thisdale is going to do the book cover for Among the Departed. He has done all the other Smith and Winters covers and they look just great.

We were talking about the design (he kindly asks me what I’d like to see) and throwing around a few ideas. I suggested an old photograph for the foreground image, as the story is about a person who disappeared 15 years before. Then I wrote the piece on Monday about the police dog experience and included that photo and BINGO what a great image for the cover! It suits the story as well as Norman, the RCMP dog in the books, has an important part to play in the beginning. The dog in the picture BTW is just an Internet image, not any dog in particular.

(Reminder: Negative Image is the next book: November 2010. Among the Departed will be out in May 2011.)
Here’s a link to Francios’s web page where you can see the other sort of work he does. http://www.thisdale.com/

Four Cops, Two Paramedics, and One Crime Writer

2010-09-06T07:00:00.000-07:00

That's how many people it took to wake one man up to go to work. There is humour in the police officer's job. That's one thing I'm learning from the ride-alongs I've been on over the past two years. It's a tough, often unpleasant, job and they put their lives on the line every day. But boy, do they get a good laugh some times.

One time, the car I was in was called to a home where a man wasn't answering the door to his friend who had come to take him to work. It was the usual time and the usual routine, and the friend was worried because the man had a medical condition.

When we got there, the officer banged on the door, and bellowed, and peered in windows, and banged and bellowed again. He called for an ambulance. Reinforcements arrived. Someone crouched down and yelled into the cat door. (And took a sniff - ug). Eventually there were four cops, two paramedics, and one crime writer at the top of a rickety set of stairs leading to the upstairs apartment. Permission to knock down the door was given, the door was kicked in, and everyone rushed in. Save me, who hung behind not wanting to see anything ucky. Then I heard a shout, "XX, what are you doing in bed. Aren't you going to work?" Yup, the guy was tucked up in bed. Didn't feel like going to work, didn't bother phoning in, and didn't particularly want to get up and open the door.

Out we all trooped, one crime writer, two paramedics, four cops, leaving XX in bed and a broken door.

Police Dog – theory AND practice

2010-09-01T08:18:00.000-07:00

As I wrote yesterday, I met with the police dog handler for a city near where I live. We went to a coffee shop and he was nice enough to give me an hour of his time talking about his job, the training, the dog, and telling some good stories.

I try really hard in my B.C. police procedural series to get the policing right, but I don’t have any experience in law enforcement at all. I don’t trust TV or movies, and I can’t rely on the vast majority of books, which are British or American, to tell me how Canadian police operate. So I reply on real police officers to tell me.
They have been very, very generous with their time.

Anyway, back to yesterday. The main thing the police dog does is track. Track the path of a lost child or Alzheimer patient, search for a suspect who has fled the scene – on foot obviously. The training to get the dog to do that, and to stay on course once found and not be distracted is considerable. For both handler and dog, I might mention.

After learning all about the theory and training of police dogs, I went home. That evening by pure co-incidence, I had been invited for a ride-along by another police force. AND THE DOG WAS CALLED OUT.

Cool! The office shed at a salvage yard had been broken into. The dog arrived, with tactical support as is the norm. Because the dog is intent on the trail, and the handler is totally focused on the dog, they need someone to protect them if such is needed.

The patrol car I was riding in was assigned to set the perimeter. The point is to try to contain the suspect so that the dog can catch up to them. Set the parameter too narrow, and the suspect might be outside of it before it’s in place; set it too wide and the dog has too big of a trail to follow. So we sat in the woods, lights flashing red (you want the suspect to know you’re there and be frightened – creates a better scent) and watched as the dog and officers came out of the woods following the trail.

I’m sorry to say that the dog lost the trail but I was just thrilled to be able to watch him in action.

It was a good night. I can say that the curse of BatVicki has been broken. And as an added extra: A great scene just popped into my head. Want to see something spooky? Try a scrap yard at night. Throw in some swirling mist – and voila.

Working with Police Dogs

2010-08-31T05:58:00.001-07:00

Quick blog post before I head out for the day.

Lovely end of summer week. Hot and sunny. I love closing off the summer this way, with one last blast.

I have a meeting this morning with a police dog handler. Hopefully I can get the inside scoop on working with dog. With all the help I’ve had from various police officers, I’ve had trouble really getting familiar with the dog-thing. In the Molly Smith books one of the characters is a police dog handler for the RCMP. I’ve had to skirt over that a bit, because I didn’t have a feel for the relationship between human and dog. I’m really looking forward to my morning chat!

Then this evening, I’m off for a ride-along with the O.P.P. Will this be another night for BatVicki? When the criminal elements flee in terror at word of her approach.

Which seems to be the norm when I’m riding-along. The police end up apologizing for how quiet it has been.

I’ll report in tomorrow.

The Agony of Waiting

2010-08-25T14:37:00.000-07:00

You work on a book for months, years for some people. You have friends and critiquers read it, you revise it. You send it to your editor. She makes suggestions. You revise it. Then it's finished and put in the queue for publication. And you wait. For a whole year. Sometimes you even wonder if that book was a figment of your imagination. Finally, release date approaches. Then you get the first review.

There is something pretty nerve-wracking about reading that first review. Will they say it's at least okay, or will they say it's the worst piece of dreck ever written?

Reviews, to be honest, come and go. I've had good ones, including a starred review by PW for Winter of Secrets, and I've had some not-so-good. I had one where I wondered if the reviewer had mistaken me for someone who stole her boyfriend back in highschool, it was so viciously personal. So I know not to take them toooooo much to heart. But that first review... Gulp.

The online review site Paperback Dolls loved Negative Image, I'm relieved to say. Here's what they had to say in a very well written review that manages to be comprehensive without giving away any plot points. http://paperbackdolls.blogspot.com/2010/08/arc-review-negative-image-by-vicki.html

Woodpile

2010-08-24T15:20:00.000-07:00

If you've been wondering what I've been up to for the last little while, these before and after pictures should explain. I've been in the woodpile. I had two cords delivered. The person who was supposed to help couldn't make it, so I stacked it all myself. I decided it would be best to spend one hour a day shifting wood. That way I wouldn't strain myself and I also wouldn't keep putting it off. I am rather proud of myself, if I do say so myself. My ex-husband suggested I use the money I saved by not paying the helper to buy a good bottle of wine. If you need me, you can find me out on the deck, with my feet up, book in hand, wine close by.

My good friend Anthony Bidulka, author of the wonderful Russell Quant series, says that getting wood in is a very positive thing. We are planning ahead, preparing for the future in a practical way.

More this and that

2010-08-11T10:48:00.001-07:00

In my list of blogging recently I forgot my six word post for Jen's Book Thoughts. Yep, my life in six words. Not easy.

http://jensbookthoughts.blogspot.com/search/label/Six-word%20Memoirs

Bit of this and a bit of that

2010-08-11T05:58:00.000-07:00

I’ve been busy getting my fall book tour organized and am just about done. I’m mostly going to be in Southern Ontario at Chapters/Indigo stores. If you know of a store that might like to have me, please send me a note and let me know.

Busy blogging week. I was at Mystery Kitchen (http://mysterykitchen.blogspot.com) with my blueberry pudding cake recipe, at Fatal Foodies (http://fatalfoodies.blogspot.com) to talk about how badly my tomatoes are doing this year (Is it a lack of bees and someone suggested?) and for a change of pace at my regular Monday spot at Type M for Murder (http://typem4murder.blogspot.com) talking about Conrad Black and the prison-industrial complex and Linwood Barclay and invisible criminals.

Friday it’s off to Scene of the Crime Festival on Wolfe Island (www.sceneofthecrime.ca). Can’t wait, it’s going to be just great.

Also talked with the publisher at Rendezvous Crime and Gold Mountain will be released in Fall 2011. Don’t have a date yet for Among the Departed.

Hope to see you on Wolfe Island.

Planning the book tour.

2010-08-06T13:05:00.000-07:00

I love going on book tour. I love standing in bookstores trying to get people interested in my books (really). I love meeting people and talking about books (mostly mine). I also love to travel and I like to drive. And I love going back to stores where they know me and like me!

On the other hand I absolutely hate organizing the book tour. E-Mails, phone calls. Follow up e-mails. Follow-up phone calls. Balancing dates and locations. Ug.

Anyway, can't be helped. Right now I am signing up stores for November/December for Negative Image which comes out Nov. 1st. I'll be doing mostly stores in south-eastern Ontario, where I live, with a visit to Oakville/Burlington/West Toronto and one to Montreal for an event called Fusion Fiction, which sounds like fun.

The big trips will come next year. Today I registered for both Left Coast Crime in Sante Fe and Bloody Words in Victoria. Both of which should be just great.

If you know of a store or library or festival that might like to have me, please do pass the info on. I'll go almost anywhere.

Short film from Bloody Words

2010-07-26T05:57:00.000-07:00

Spencer Barclay (son on Linwood) filmed this year's Bloody Words conference and has put together a great four minute film of the highlights and an introduction by the founder of the conference, Caro Soles. You'll spot some well-known writers. Have a look, perhaps it will entice you into coming next year to Victoria, B.C.

I incidently, am changing into my Constable Molly Smith persona at 44 seconds; giving the Boney Pete Award for best short story at the 1.33 minute mark, and attempting to spar with a policewoman, and not looking too sure about it, at the 3.23mintue mark.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eZveBVAf1Lk

The photograph above is by Iden Ford, husband of Maureen Jennings.

When books start piling up on top of each other.

2010-07-25T09:30:00.000-07:00

As you probably know the publishing industry works long ahead of time. Today I have finished the Molly Smith book #5, Among the Departed. It is scheduled for publication Fall 2011. I will be sending the manuscript off to Poisoned Pen tomorrow, and I am sure there will be editorial comments and changes, but for now - fini.

Negative Image, the fourth book in the series will be out on Nov. 1, 2010. Meanwhile the latest book on the shelves (in the Molly Smith series) is last year’s Winter of Secrets.

Which means that I have finished two more books and am still out promoting Winter of Secrets. Sometimes I can hardly remember what happened in that book. It’s hard not to give away spoilers, too, because I just assume everyone knows what happens in Negative Image. Although the mystery or the adventure in each book is completely separate from the others, the characters lives do move forward and things change.

Of course to add to the mix, I also write the Klondike Gold Rush series, of which book #3, Gold Mountain, is underway (publication late 2011). And I have written the first in a new series that is now with my agent.

Fortunately I don’t get the different series or the standalones mixed up. The styles are very different, as are the locations.

Here is a first look at the cover for Negative Image. Hope you like it.