ENGLISH 4006: WRITING THE (MYSTERY) NOVEL
Fall 2001

Malcolm will be teaching the fiction writing workshop again at Louisiana State University this fall (2001). The course will, of course, focus on writing the mystery novel. The course syllabus is now available. For more information, e-mail Malcolm.

MYSTERY WRITERS OF AMERICA BEST NOVEL CONTEST

As you know, each year Mystery Writers of America awards the Edgar Allan Poe statuette for the best mystery in a number of categories, from best novel to best short story. This year, I'm on the panel of judges and the experience is an eye-opener. By the end of the year we're expected to have around 300 books, which means I, personally, will have read about 200 of them. There's no better way to learn what's popular and what's selling. At the same time, though, it's depressing to see how many really good writers there are out there! You wonder how you can ever compete. And then you wonder how you can ever choose!

ASSASSIN'S BLOOD

A recent newspaper reviewer wrote that I had trouble depicting male-female relationships because I'd let Alan almost have an affair with Cyn in ASSASSIN'S BLOOD, while Pepper was in Mexico. The reviewer's comment was that even though Alan resisted, he shouldn't even have thought of having an affair with another woman. Interesting comment. The reviewer couldn't know that ASSASSIN'S BLOOD was written years ago, before the series sold and before I invented Pepper. In that earlier version (since Pepper didn't exist), Alan did have an affair with Cyn. But, since I considered the story a pretty good one, once the series got rolling (with Pepper in it), I didn't want to throw away a perfectly good manuscript, so I decided to send Pepper off for a while (perfectly reasonable, since archaeologists are always going away for months on end) and have Alan almost succumb to temptation. Clearly, almost was still too close for that reviewer!

FRENCHMAN'S BLOOD

At last an explanation from Amazon.com as to why this never-published manuscript is shown on their list as having outsold some of my out-of-print books. It's because they base sales ranking on orders, not sales. So some of you-you know who you are, because your order never arrived!-tried to order this book. Well, maybe with electronic publishing there's hope for it yet!

PAST DYING

Another Amazon.com story: This title (Pub. date September 2000) was listed by them as THE ALAMO FACTOR, a name which I had only suggested to my editor! The editor must have used the title in some kind of pre-publication list sent to Amazon. Can't figure any other way. Imagine my surprise when I saw the book listed under a discarded title but with the picture of the book cover having the right title! A Bronx cheer for for Amazon.com! (Actually, I liked ALAMO FACTOR, because the book has a lot to do with James Bowie, but my editor thought it sounded too much like a spy title).

IBERVILLE'S TRIP

Some of you may know that the French Canadian, Pierre LeMoyne, Sieur d' Iberville was one of the first white men to explore Louisiana. He did this in 1699, coming up the Mississippi River in longboats, from a ship anchored in the Gulf near Biloxi. When he reached about where the Red River comes into the Mississippi, he and his men turned around and when they got to just south of Baton Rouge, the Indians told him there was a short cut to the Gulf, via a bayou. So he sent most of his men on down the Mississippi in the longboats and, using some birch bark canoes they'd brought, followed this bayou (Bayou Manchac) all the way to where it empties into Lake Maurepas. He then crossed Lakes Maurepas and Pontchartrain and emerged in the Gulf, where he found his ship. Quite a feat for a man with no GPS and no way to reckon longitude.

Last March, on the 300th anniversary of his jaunt, several of us tried to follow his path. Other than the fact that we swamped in Lake Maurepas due to rough water, we learned something else interesting: Iberville, in his journal, never says which side of Lake Pontchartrain he followed. We figured, after much calculation, it had to be the north side, because if he'd followed the south shore, it would have taken a lot longer. And he surely didn't go straight out into that lake. There's a hint that he had some pirates in his crew, or at least people with some previous experience in the Caribbean, and I know one researcher who thinks Iberville may have had Spanish maps. Do you see where this is leading? What if Alan set out to find a Spanish map…

MERIWETHER MURDER

Recently, MERIWETHER MURDER was reviewed in WE PROCEEDED ON, the journal of the Lewis and Clark Trail Foundation. The review was a positive on, though the reviewer justifiably caught me up in a few minor errors and inconsistencies. It's hell to have to rewrite and rewrite and add sections, delete sections, and sometimes you can't keep up with what's in and what's out—my editor had me rewrite the book about four times! Then he left for another publishing company. My new editor read it and said of Alan's consummation with Pepper, "Well, do they or don't they?" Seems I'd left in an early—ummm, how shall I put this delicately—scene...and then later on had Alan mooning about how he was going to get Pepper to…well, you know. It was a real eye-opener for someone who's interested in primary historical sources: Now I understand how historical documents that have been copied and recopied many times come to have contradictions and inconsistencies in them.