Murder She Writes

*Due to deadlines and life interruptus we interrupt the regularly scheduled character development and plotting of our progressive story until further notice.*
With that, I thought I’d tackle a subject near and dear to all readers and writer’s hearts.
Plagiarism. The stealing of words or ideas?
According to the British courts and if you’re Dan Brown it is not swiping an idea.
Methinks I agree. Throw a concept and idea at ten authors and in the end you’ll have ten completely different stories.
But, if one of these authors should steal the words from one of the other authors and the passages read the same, zen vee have a problem.
The publishing world has been wrought with turmoil these last few months. We’ve had the Frey fray. This guy didn’t steal anything he bald faced lied. As far as I know his book is still on the shelves and the NY Times list.
Dan Brown’s DI VINCI code as we all know is chasing Harry Potter on the gazillion sales list. But as stated above the courts foundd in his favor, and I’m glad for that. But his accusers, the authors of HOLY BLOOD, are laughing all of the way to the bank. Although I did hear they have to pay court costs.
But this latest incident with Viswanathan taking McCafferty’s words verbatim has me more than a little rankled. I remember a few years ago when a very well know author, I think her initials are JD, borrowed a few of Nora Roberts words and all hell broke lose. This latest borrowing is worse. Much worse.
The Harvard Crimson has a few examples up and the similarities are not only glaring but in most of the passages highlighted the theft of words is brazen.
There has been much conversation regarding the severity of Viswanathan’s plagiarism. Go check it out yourself. http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=512965
What I want to know is how the publisher after finding out, kept the books on the shelf so long. As I understand now they are all being removed. Viswananthan has apologized for any inadvertent similarities. What do you all think? Inadvertent or intentional? And more importantly, how do you feel about all of this literary chicanery?
Are the publishers accountable or does it come down to the author? Is an apology enough?
Inquiring minds want to know.

. . . one of us.

That’s right, one of the women at Murder She Writes is the dastardly villain.

We’re on a boat. Why? Maybe it’s a murder mystery cruise. And Carson is there for any number of reasons . . . probably nothing to do with the murder. But he’s the only one who can solve it because everyone is a suspect, particularly the five women who had the means to kill . . . who?

The most important clue about a killer is the victim. Who was killed? Where? How? No throwing overboard, that’s no fair, we need a body.

Was it Natalie? She just landed two multi-book deals, she’s on top of the world . . . but the stress of the deadline might make her crack . . .

Or Karin. Maybe she has a deep, dark secret that the victim was about to spill all over the front page of Cosmo.

Deb, the quiet one. No one suspects that in her heart lurks revenge, waiting for just the right opportunity . . .

And Jen seems like such fun, no one with a terrific sense of humor could possibly knock off a competitor.

Or moi. Allison. Average mom of five? Or maybe Lois Winston is right, and she’s cloned. Or worse, a schizophrenic.

So first, the victim. Who is killed? What were they doing on the cruise? Did they work there? The captain? Were they a guest? A fellow author? An agent? An editor? An editor turned agent? A spouse?

If you’ve been lurking, come on down and tell us who you think the victim is and give us some of their backstory. Where they’re from, why they’re there, what they fear.

Also, the heroine isn’t quite full-developed yet. Do we have a name? A description? Where is she from? Why is she on the ship? Is SHE a mystery author? Hmmm . . . maybe she wants to solve the crime and bumps into Carson one too many times. What would an ex-military, dishonorably charged tough guy who isn’t supposed to be on the ship — and certainly doesn’t want to be solving this crime — do with an amateur sleuth?

Or maybe she’s undercover as well, but for a completely different reason. Maybe they already know each other. Maybe she doesn’t trust Carson. Maybe she thinks he’s here from some nefarious reason.

So we can get this story rolling, we need a victim, and more about the heroine. What do you think about them?

All right, we’ve got our man, Carson, and his boat, and now we’re looking for the heroine and the conflict. Hmm, let’s see– Sometimes asking ‘what if’ questions helps me get past the boundaries of an initial story idea…

–What if Carson’s dishonorable discharge had something to do with him having an affair with a woman officer. That could be the cause of his aloofness toward woman, especially hard-headed, strong women. (He wouldn’t be interested in the wimpy kind, anyway.)

–What if Carson’s military training was in the Seals—special ops?

–What if the heroine was a heart surgeon in Key West with a terminally ill patient, a baby, needing a heart transplant.—a heart suddenly becomes available, but it’s in the Bahamas. (or some other island, closer.) It can’t be flown to her because all air transportation has been halted due to an eminent Category 4 hurricane.

–What if the only way for her to get the heart was by boat? What if she goes to the marina, looking for a fast boat, experienced captain. They can make it to this island before the storm but chances that they make it back to Key West before the storm hits are low. Guess who’s the only man brave enough to take on this mission? Our man, Carson. But, knowing the danger, he wants to go alone.

–What if the physician insists she come along? What if, on their return trip, amidst hurricane hoopla, Carson nearly dies? What if they nearly lose the heart to wind and waves?

If we go with the cruise ship P.I. angle, what if the heroine is the captain of a cruise ship, and she returns to port because one of her passengers winds up missing, two days after the liner left port?

–What if Carson has a niece (brother’s daughter-senior in high school), who is going on a cruise along with a large group of graduating seniors, and Carson’s brother has asked him to go along for added protection.

–What if his niece winds up missing two days into the cruise, and it’s up to him and the she-captain to find her?

So what’s this broad look like, anyway? Just how brassy is she? Whadda ya think?

Okay, apparently our hero’s name is Carson, he’s ex-military, dishonorably discharged, living in Key West. He has his own boat, and he makes ends meet…..

1) Taking Tourists out on charter tours?

2) Running a little bar that caters to the tourist trade?

3) Doing private investigations for the cruise ships that travel through (including some occasional slightly dirty things that other PIs wouldn’t want to handle)?

4) Your suggestion here?

Carson is rough and tumble, walking the tightrope between legal and illegal, and not afraid of the gray areas and dark spots other people avoid like the plague. Sounds like Carson has been there, so he gets it.

His only use for women is for pleasure, and he doesn’t bond easily. It’s going to take someone really different, really special–and possibly a little rough-edged herself–to make Carson different.

What about her? Who is she? And what is the conflict?

1) Drug smugglers who want to rent his boat, and find out they’ve picked the wrong sucker to try to punch? (Kinda done)

2) Human trade smugglers? White slavery?

3) A dead body on a cruise ship that officials are trying to “quietly” smuggle out, only to have it hit the news? It’s bird flu! Key West is shut down! The CDC is called in, and everyone needs masks, and Carson is forced to save the world…. Er, uh, sorry. Got a little carried away. But maybe something like that. Something that requires his special ops skills. Maybe a threat to world safety?

SO let’s talk. Who is the heroine, and what is the conflict?

Our Murder She Writes readers are coming up with some great ideas of the hero of our story. My favorite? Dangerously Sensual! I get the impression we’re leaning toward a man who is strong and capable, but doesn’t need to brag or flex, he simply steps in when the need arises–does that sound right?

Literal. Well, men are! That’s a good one too. Now can he be intuitive too? (Hey, guys, this our story, so heck yeah, we can do it!)

He needs a sense of humor, maybe he works in a job that he’s overqualified for; is undercover in, or is there for his own personal reasons.

How am I doing so far?

Now let’s talk about stats: Name, actual job, physical description. And don’t think I won’t recognize any of you trying to sneak in Roarke! I’d know him anywhere! And remember, the last thing we want to do is make Eve mad, she’s scary!

Then lets work on Goal Motivation and Conflict. What are goals and motivation driving our hero, and what are the conflicts, roadblocks, etc in his way? Don’t forget, we have to kill someone off too. How will that factor into the hero’s goals, motivations and conflicts? For example, if our hero was in prison for manslaughter, and he finds an obviously murdered person by his cleaning supplies if he’s a janitor (because that’s the only job he could get after being wrongfully convicted) who are the police going to suspect?

Let’s have fun! This isn’t a literary project, this is a Murder She Writes story to entertain!

We’re going to write a book. Yes, we’re WE + ARE = Us (yes, you, the person reading this right now!). This project will take a village. From beginning to end, and after we wrap, a title.
Let me clarify for those of you scratching your head and asking, “What did Karin put in her pipe and smoke today?” We ladies here at MSW have decided that with our reader’s help we’re gonna write a progressive murder mystery story. But to get started we need a few main characters. My initial response to that is we need a hero and a heroine with some serious GMC’s. But I write romance so that is not written in stone.
So, beginning Monday we’ll be creating our characters .We’ll move on to setting, then plot. Once all of those things are determined each MSW chicky will post her story for the day. I can guarantee as each one us write our part there will be more than a few wild, zany and (since I’m part of the equation), sexy turns.
So, let’s begin with our male protag. Who is he? What does he do? What are his issues, and what makes him do the things he does?
Everyone chime in with their ideas and we’ll compile them and come up with a composite. Then we’ll be off to the main female protag and our villain!
So ladies and gents your ideas please! And please be as off the wall as you want. This is going to be fun!

A couple months ago I wrote about “hooking” . . . how the first line or paragraph is crucial.

But what about cliffhangers? How the author ends a chapter or keeps the story moving with a series of ups and downs so that you 1) don’t want to put down the book, and 2) if you have to put down the book, you can’t wait to pick it up again.

I think the first part of creating that “I can’t wait to pick up this book again” is the characters–you feel like you know them, you want to find out what happens to them. But more important, you care what happens to them. If you didn’t care, you wouldn’t be that interested in reading the whole book. Plot twists don’t create cliffhangers alone; you need that character connection.

There’s been an on-again/off-again debate, mostly in unpublished circles, about chapter length. Some people insist chapters should be roughly of uniform length (and I think some of the Harlequin lines strongly push for this); some insist chapters should be short to “speed up” the pacing. Others argue they should be long so the reader has fewer opportunities to put down the book.

I disagree with all of the above. I think chapters should be as long or as short as they need to be. I don’t “plan” out my chapters. I don’t think, “Oh, this chapter is only eight pages, I’ll combine it with another so I get roughly 20 pages.” My chapters end where they end, which is basically (for me) a change of time or setting, a revelation, or a mini-climax.

If at the end of every chapter you use the mini-climax, it loses it’s impact. At the same time, if you always end with a change of time, the book will feel slower.

But whatever device is used, the most important thing is to give the readers something to want to read on, and I think the best way is to open up a question.

The mini-climax, or traditional “cliffhanger,” has the obvious question: what’s going to happen next? Are they going to defuse the bomb? But there are lots of other ways to open up questions to keep the reader interested in the story.

In THE PREY, chapter one is about the heroine Rowan learning that someone has been murdered in the same manner and style as in one of her novels. She could react in a variety of different ways. She’s angry and scared. At the beginning of the chapter, the reader (and Rowan) has several questions: First, why are the reporters on her doorstep? Answer: to ask her about the death of this woman she doesn’t know. Why? Oh, she realizes it’s just like her book. When are the police going to talk to her? They arrive. They ask a bunch of questions, some that get answered, some that don’t. The big question: who did it? is still unanswered, but we’ve satisfied the reader’s curiosity by giving some answers.

Now the ending of chapter one:

Rowan had learned again that death was inequitable and brutal. It cut a path of misery in the hearts of everyone it touched. And death wasn’t blind. It saw the pain, the heartache, and grew stronger.

It had started when she was ten, and it seemed it would never end.

Which opens up the big question: what happened when Rowan was ten?

I don’t wait until the end of the book to answer that question, but it’s not answered in chapter two, either. That’s a cliffhanger, and the reader (hopefully!) wants to find out the answer.

Pacing is all about curiosity. If the reader is curious about what is going to happen, they’ll keep reading. But if you don’t answer some questions, the reader gets frustrated because they want their curiousity satisfied. So the best “rule-of-thumb” (and I use “rule” loosely because I don’t like rules) is that for every question posed, answer a question. Give a little, take a little.

Some examples of great first chapter “cliffhangers” that, for me, makes me want to turn to chapter two:

Lisa Gardner’s breakout book, THE PERFECT HUSBAND. Tess wants to hire a former mercenary J.T. to train her to protect herself against her husband. J.T. is drunk and belligerent and he doesn’t like intruders and is counting to five:

Her face grew red. Frustration animated her body, bringing up her chin, sparking her eyes. For a moment, she was actually pretty. “I’m not leaving!” she yelled. “Goddammit, I have no place else to go. If you’d just stop feeling sorry for yourself long enough to listen–”

“Five.”

“I won’t leave. I can’t.”

“Suit yourself.” J.T. shrugged. He placed the empty margarita glass on the table. Then, and naked as the day he was born, all one hundred and eighty pounds of muscle and sinew, he advanced.”

Gardner uses a standard cliffhanger, and chapter two opens to the continuation of the same scene. But we’re instantly drawn into the dynamics of these two characters and how the scene is going to play out. Definitely turning to chapter two!

In THE HARBOR, Carla Neggers uses depth of characterization to make you care–and ask questions. Zoe calls her sister Christina to say she’s coming home, leaving behind her career plans, but you know there’s something more.

But Christina managed a laugh, although Zoe felt only marginally better when she hung up. She didn’t have a lot of stuff. She’d never owned much. It wouldn’t take her a half hour to pack–it’s take her fifteen minutes.

We want to know why she travels light, why she doesn’t have a lot of stuff, why she wants to come home. All questions that need answers. Chapter two starts off in a completely different place and POV.

Kay Hooper is a brilliant romantic suspense writer. In WHISPER OF EVIL, we have Nell coming home for her father’s funeral, though she’d left town years ago with secrets. She’s getting a headache, which we learn over the chapter is not an ordinary headache.

She barely made it, dumping her luggage in the foyer and locking the front door before moving unsteadily back to the kitchen. She fumbled through the bags for the few perishables that needed to go into the refrigerator, fighting the dizziness grimly even as she told herself she should at least find a chair before–

Blackness washed over her, and Nell crumpled silently to the dusty tile floor.

Yowsa! Definitely want to read more. In three sentences we learn so much. This has happened before. She knows it. She wants to put away the perishables, why? It implies she knows she can be unconscious for a long time. The entire chapter has a sense of growing urgency as she knows what the pain she’s feeling will lead to, even if we don’t quite know. And we want to know! Perfect set up, both with characterization and action.

Now pull the last book you absolutely loved off your shelf, or maybe a book you haven’t read yet. Read the last page of chapter one. What kind of feeling does it leave you with? Do you want to read more? Do you have questions?

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I’m a one purse at a time kind of woman. In other words, I don’t have a handbag to go with every outfit. The ones I get are typically multifunctional and fit just about any occasion. Well, except formal affairs. For those, I rummage through the forty plus bags in my sister’s closet and borrow one. Anyway, a few years ago I figured it was time for a purse makeover. I bought a small one, hoping to keep the ‘stuff’ I usually carry around to a minimum. Bad idea. In a matter of two weeks, the doggone thing was overflowing, and one of the straps broke in the middle of a grocery store, spilling mentionable and unmentionable contents all over the floor. It was a classic case of shoving ten pounds of crap in a five pound bag. I should have left well enough alone.

I view synopses the same way. Here you have a perfectly good book, and someone wants you to cram all those words, feelings, characters, and plots, into a five page summary. Argg! I hate ‘em! It’s tough enough sweating through each chapter of a book, wanting to make every scene as vivid and three dimensional as possible. How in the hell is anyone supposed to create the same effect in five short pages?

The bottom line is—you can’t. But what you can create, if the synopsis is done correctly, is intrigue. Or so I’m told. Mine have a tendency to read like a crack-addict’s steno notes. Short blasts of info that have little sequential order or logic. When I’m writing a book, I’ll do one major rewrite, then a polish before sending it off to my editor. For a synopsis, I have to do fifty-seven gazillion rewrites for it to even start making sense. Why do you think that is? I’m supposed to be a writer for heaven’s sake. You’d think I’d be able to handle a few measly pages.

Maybe it’s a psychological thing. An underlying, suppressed abhorrence for shoving ten pounds of crap in a five pound bag, spawned from the memory of that busted purse—tampons rolling across aisle 5, right up to the Frosted Flakes and that guy with the wobbly-wheeled grocery cart. Rolaids, an empty bottle of antibiotics, hair scrungies, six-year-old gas receipts, a three-year-old slice of Doublemint gum—out of the wrapper—and enough change to support Laundromats all across America, all of it tumbling over, under, and around bins, baskets, and curious onlookers.

Uh, yeah, that’s gotta be it . . .