 Probably more people will trickle in as it is, but it is so great to be back here in person at Big Stamp Cafe after our pandemic zoom phase of the salon. I'm Whitney Sherer, I'm one of the co-organizers with Amy Yellen and Anjuli Mitterduva, and also on the staff of the Robbins Library, which we're very thankful for their support and help. They're awesome, so welcome everybody. Great to see you. So tonight we are doing a kind of sort of October, Halloween-y themed-ish reading that we're calling Mysteries and Thrills, and we have three mystery slash thriller writers here tonight. Lynn Reeves Griffin, Stephanie Gale, and Edwin Hill, and we're so thrilled that they are joining us to read tonight. So it's great to see you. I have a little bit of housekeeping that I have to do before the reading starts. So first thing is to just tell you sort of the lay of the land of the salon if you haven't ever come before. So each, the salon takes place quarterly. Each reader reads for about 15 minutes, and it's a reading series with a twist. So the author has 15 minutes to do whatever they want, but they have to include a sensory element besides just language. So we've had people do pass around perfumes, we've had food, we've had all sorts of stuff, so it's always fun to get another side of the sensory experience during the reading. After the three authors read, we're going to do a Q&A with all three authors. We'll just have them come up on the stage. You can ask them any and all questions. We'll get a little bit of conversation started between them for probably another 15 minutes or so, and that's that. So I wanted to just give a huge shout out to Emily and the staff at Kickstand Cafe. They've been at home for the whole time that we've been doing this salon, which I think is seven years, right? Ultimately, she's not like, yeah. So we couldn't be more grateful to be able to use this beautiful and well-remaining wall space. So it's just, it's great. This is being filmed by ACMI, and it's going to be available online soon. It's usually within about a week or so probably. So we'll send out an email when that's online, and you can share it with friends and family. And let's see what else do I have to say. Oh, this program is supported in part by a brand from the Arlington Cultural Council, a local agency, which is supported by the Massachusetts Cultural Council, a state agency. The program takes place in the heart of the Arlington Cultural District, which was designated in 2017 by the Massachusetts Cultural Council. We have books for sale. We've got Dick Haley, the book seller in the back. The books are actually provided by the book rack, which is our local bookstore just up the street. So it's kind of a joint effort there. So please, if you haven't read these author's amazing books, please grab a copy. They're going to sign them at the end. They're all, they're all working books, and you cannot go wrong. And we have a couple other writerly events going on over the course of the next month, or we're in October, we're launching into November, which if you're a writer, you know, is then a RIMO. So there's always, or National Novel Writing Month. So there's always interesting stuff happening. The Ravens Library is going to be hosting a few writing events throughout the month. And one of them is actually a joint venture between the library and the Arlington Author's Salon. We are calling it, what are we calling it? Writing in Arlington. What are we calling it? Writer's Life. The Writer's Life. How could I forget? Arlington Edition. How could I forget? That seems a leading title. I don't know. But it's going to be a conversation between myself and Anjali. We're going to be talking about the writing life, the creative process, answering questions about local resources, the publishing landscape, all that sort of stuff. That's on November 17th at 7 p.m. at the Ravens Library. So there's going to be information on our website in the next couple of days about that event if you're interested in attending. And we have, there's another series that's going on right now that is being put together by an Arlington resident, Michelle Hoover, who probably a fair number of people know. She's an amazing writer, teacher. She now, her life is so fabulous. She splits her time between Arlington and Cyprus, which is like so cool. And she's doing this series called The 7 a.m. novelist where she's doing a conversation with a different writer every day at 7 a.m. before I think it's 50 days. And you can log out at 7 a.m. and get your butt in the chair and get some creative inspiration and then start your writing or reading day. Or I think you can watch it after the fact you have 7 a.m. is too early for you. So she, you can google 7 a.m. novelist and find her newsletter subscription super easily. And I would recommend that you check that out because it's excellent. Okay, so without further ado, I will introduce the first reader. And the first reader tonight is going to be Lynn Reeves Griffin. Lynn is an internationally recognized family counselor, public speaker, teacher and writer of fiction and nonfiction. Her work has appeared in parents, psychology today, Solstice literary magazine, Chautauqua Journal, craft literary, fiction writers review, brainchild and more. Writing as Lynn Griffin, she's the author of some family focused novels. One is Life Without Summer, See, Escape and Girls Sent Away. She also writes novels with domestic suspense as Lynn Reeves with the dangers of an ordinary night published by Kirk and Blaine Books in November 2021 and Dark Rivers to Cross coming in November 22. Very soon. For more about her work, you can visit her website at littlebrickin.com or you can ask for yourself a big one tonight. So Lynn, come on in. I'd like to be here. I do have a family counselor background and my heart is inaugurating and I thought that what I would do is share with readers and writers alike the sort of behind the scenes of this particular novel. And in this case, we're going to start backstage. Always a family counselor. Once upon a time, I was an actress and I really thought that that was my path, that I would go to my dream school, which was Bennington College, and I would become just so famous. But life had other plans for me. Back when I went to college, I was told that my choices were nurse, teacher, and or some kind of administrative business secretary type person. Now, I hope that I don't look very old to you. But the sad thing is that that wasn't very long ago, that those were sort of limited choices available. And so like a good girl, I chose the one that I thought would be best for me. And it started with nurse. And in my nursing career, I enjoyed it, but my heart was still backstage. Now, when you see this kind of adulation, it's very hard to get it up for a sort of team approach to a job. So I found myself struggling in my nursing career to find the place where my identity, as someone who was on stage, could come into full, you know, realization. And so I found myself finding my best connections one-on-one with people. And as I threw my years in nursing, found myself one-on-one with families mostly, I decided I'd go to school for education. So I did do that. But the heart of the actors is always there. And so I found a way to move my onstage persona to a different place, which was a lot of public speaking and some television. And I used my expertise as a nurse and as a family counselor to get back on that stage. But I found a way to get back on that stage in a way that was satisfying, but it didn't quite fulfill what I needed it to. So imagine as a novelist, there's this inspiration, there's this identity, and it isn't fully realized. It's sitting somewhere waiting to be paid attention to. And so for me, this is the first inspiration, the actress part of my life. And so then, along the way, I still kept acting. I still kept working on television. I really enjoyed these things. But they were still just another part of my life, very separate of the life that I was living professionally. And at the same time, I was building a family. And my husband and I moved to a seaside town called Cituit. So I'm about an hour from here. And it's a gorgeous place. And when you walk those beaches in every season, you get different inspiration. So that's what it looks like in summer. Here's what it starts looking like in fall and winter. And so as I walked to the beach and I started focusing on the landscape, and I started thinking about that lighthouse, and I kept walking to the end of that lane, I came upon a private part of my town that is not for public use. So it says no trespassing, danger, danger, do not go past this fence. So what do you think happened? So I kept walking. It's a place in my town called the Glades. And as I went into this place, I needed to know more. So one of the things that I did was I started doing my research. And the place kept speaking to me. And I came across this Robert Louis Stevens quote that I just adore. And it's really the beginning of where the inspiration actress plus the inspirational setting are starting to come to me as something else. And that's this wonderful quote, some places speak distinctly, certain daggards cry out for murder, certain old houses demand to be haunted, and certain coasts are set apart for shipwrecks. And now I'm starting to get a story in my mind. I'm thinking about the actress mean, I'm thinking about the seaside landscape. It's something's there, something's drawing my attention, but I'm not there yet. And so I keep doing my research. I find out that the Glades hotel is no longer a hotel, but it has a very interesting deep and dark history. And I start digging into it and a story begins to percolate. I realized that there is a naval observation tower out there, and these little tiny sort of cement block structures that are referred to by locals as the colleges. And again, inspiration, but still I'm not knowing where the story is quite yet. Then I get a job in the back bay of Boston at this school that used to be a theater. This is the Exeter Street Theater on Newbury Street and Exeter. And if you in the 70s or the 80s ever went in that theater, like baby for Rocky Horror Picture Show, does that ring any bells? This theater, and if we can have the next slide, maybe the next one, it has this theater in the building. So I'm doing, I'm working here and the place is speaking to me. And then I dig deeper and I was saying, I remember this was a theater when I was living in Boston in the 80s. I want to know more about it. So I did some research, I did some digging, finding out the theater and suddenly there's my story. So I decide to take that coastline that was speaking to me, that building, which was once a theater, and perfectly well be a performing arts high school for actresses that are striving to be famous. And I put those three things together and came up with the idea for The Dancers of the Northern Area. And I was so fortunate that my publisher has the beautiful cover, which is actually the back bay, it's a street in the back bay. So they really were getting how my inspiration came forward to this idea. And in our next one, I decided that I wanted to take this inspiration even further. So what I did was I researched and read dozens and dozens of plays. I brought some of them with me here today. But how can you go wrong with plays like The Swing of the Sea, or The Innocent One, or A Sea of White Horses? There's a line in The Dancers of the Northern Area Night where the protagonist says, my little boat of a heart is no match for his sea of white horses. And that comes directly from the conflict in this play. So what I decided to do was use my play inspiration to structure the novel. So the novel is actually chosen from 27 plays. They're a little bit of a highlights magazine or an Easter egg hunt where you can see them in the chapters. They are all the chapter titles are drawn from plays that are the inspiration for the story. And in a final word about this inspiration and idea for a novel is that the inspiration comes full circle. Because after the novel was published, I got my very first New York Times review and a couple of weeks after that review, I got a letter from a gentleman named Chad Beckwood. And he wrote to me and said, I saw the review and I'm a playwright. So I thought, oh, this novel sounds like it's right up my alley. So I went out and bought a copy and I read it. And when I got to the end of your novel where there's a list of plays that inspired you, one of them was mine. And he wanted to let me know that he had been having a terrible time of writer's block, but that after he read my novel and saw that I used his work as inspiration, that he got back to his desk. So inspiration can come from lots of places. It might even come to him this evening. So my message I think here is to just be open to that inspiration. Be patient until it all clicks together because a novel is many different component parts that find their way together. There's no just one inspiration for any piece of art. And I'd love to answer questions when the time comes about plays and structure and theater and all that kind of stuff. So thank you for listening. That was fabulous. I already have like six questions for you. And as thinking about that theater, the people who have been involved with Corrupt Street for a while might know that Corrupt Street's old space at 162 Winston has a secret hidden theater in the basement. It's also the Steinman piano building where apparently, I mean I don't know if this is a rumor or true, but Charles Dickens was supposed to have read on the stage, Henry is the coolest. Because writers like to trespass, all of my other staff there at the time, all of the staff who would like creep down there and I mean it's like crumbling. I mean it's really like you don't want to be down there, but we would go down there and then check it out. It's so popular that you just want to send it off. And you think of all the things that happened on that stage. I know. I know. I mean history. Oh right. So our next reader tonight is Stephanie Gayle. Stephanie is the twice Bushcart Prize nominated author of the Thomas Lynch Mystery series, which starts with vital threats. She is the immediate past president of Sisters in Prime. Stephanie co-created the Boston Reading series, Craft on Draft, which is fabulous and just such a great series. And she works at MIT in the finance department. She shares her home with her spouse and with the world's best funny bow. Welcome Stephanie. I'm regretting going second after Lynn because she was so sunny and inspirational. Strob in. It's going to get dark. So I'm Stephanie Gayle. I'd like to start with a sensory experience. I just want to check is everyone here global or at least has everyone here experienced snow and cold weather? Has anyone not experienced snow or cold weather? Let's go easy. Okay. If you're comfortable doing so, please close your eyes. And if that doesn't make you comfortable, just please very softly focus your gaze and open your nose so you're not actively looking at anything. So just either close your eyes or softly focus your gaze. All right. Now imagine you are outside on a road with no cars or buildings in sight. The sky is overcast, blocking the sun. And it is cold. It is seven degrees Fahrenheit. You have no hat, no gloves, no coat. On your feet are flip flops. A strong wind is blowing. It ruffles your hair and gets inside any space where you have exposed skin. When the wind, the real hill temperature is two degrees below zero. There is nothing to him to cover your software. Without opening your eyes, tell me how you feel. Cold? Anything else? Good. What parts of your body feel the most cold? Feet. Yeah. What might you do to try to work yourself up? Yep. Yep. Move those palms together. Dump up and down. Wiggle. Shake. Perfect. Okay. Now open your eyes and we focus your gaze. Feels nice and toasty in here, doesn't it? Okay. Now, why did I do that? Well, firstly, it's fun to ask people to do things and have them do it. Okay. Second, when I wrote Edel Fears, which is the second book in my Thomas Lynch mystery series, I knew that cold weather was going to be a vital component of the story. And usually stories about weather focus on things like tornadoes or earthquakes or hurricanes or monsoons, because those are inherently dramatic and they cause a lot of collateral damage. Now, I chose a blizzard, but not so much for the accumulation of snow, but because of the cold. And I chose it because when I wrote Edel Fears, I knew I wanted to write a story about a missing child. And I wanted that child to have a rare sensory and automatic neuropathy called congenital insensitivity to pain with anhydrosis or sepa, which is what I'm going to be calling it in the future because that other name is too much for math. Now, this is one of the weird instances where I'm like a very strange obsession that I had for many years actually paid off. Many years before this book even existed, I had read a newspaper article about a young boy who couldn't feel pain. And the idea of it just stuck with me. He couldn't feel pain. It's astonishing. He could break an ankle and keep walking on it, albeit not well, because what would stop the rest of us pain would not influence that. Now, that's where my obsession grew. Because we tend to think of pain as that. We don't like hurting. It sucks. But pain is your body's warning system. That's what keeps you from touching hot surfaces, or using a broken limb, or engaging in risky behavior that might cause you pain. And people with sepa don't have this warning. So they can injure themselves and not even know it. They have to be taught and re-taught what not to do. Don't grab a hot item off the stove. Don't jump off a bridge into rocky water because some older, cooler kids fear you too. And the kicker is that sepa, which is a rare hereditary condition, so both of your parents have to have the genetic mutation to cause it, sepa prevents people from regulating their body temperature. So in the old days, people with sepa used to often die from fevers, from seizures, because they didn't know enough to regulate their body temperature. The same thing that causes the problem with fevers also keeps you from regulating your body temperature in the colds, say during blizzard. So if they stay outdoors for too long, that is also very, very risky and potentially fatal. But maybe you can talk a little bit closer. Yeah, yeah. I'm not sure they take any fevers. Is that a no? Is that a no? Sorry about that. So now I'm going to read you a bit from the book where Chief Lynch is organizing a search for the missing boy. His name is Cody Perrand. He has gone missing during the blizzard outside his parents' house. It was a snow day. He was very excited. Yay, let's go outside. Cody has sepa, which is the condition I was telling you about. So the longer he is outdoors, the more likely it is that he could die. And this is why I love writing mysteries, because so much is at stake all the time. It's useful to know that half of the police station is out sick because it's winter. And this is for people who are masks. So this is taking place outside Cody's home. Chief Lynch is running the search. You'll see that that is not going well. The volunteers gave us trouble. Whole families appeared. Kids cried, I'll help find him. I told Officer Klein he should arrest the next parent who brought a child to help search. He wiped snowflakes from his cheeks and said, seriously? Mrs. Lutz, the dog lover who'd spotted Cody, told me, you should talk to Angela May. Did she see Cody? I asked. No, she's a psychic. She helped find my wedding ring last year and she found that Peterson's lost cat Marmalade. A psychic. Uh-huh. What was with these people? Mrs. Fran's sister Jessica showed up by example to math. She was younger and longer than her sister. Why haven't we started yet? She demanded. Time took away. Mr. Fran stomped his boots and said, ready yet? We assembled the volunteers into two person teams. One city, one cop. There were fewer cops, so two teams were compulsive neighbors. Ask them if they had everything they needed. Are we supposed to have walkie-talkies? Damn it, of course. The cities didn't have them. I told Klein to sort it out. The snow fell sideways, blown by a wind that made everyone shiver. Even big guys like me felt the chill. How could Cody survive this? He can't feel the cold. No pain was the superpower. One that could kill him. Yankiewicz and Robinson showed up last. Yankiewicz tugged on his ear flaps. Made me wish I had some. Chief? He seemed scared. I nearly fired him after he wrecked a patrol car. I'd taken him off the Meadowmaid duty and found something he could do. Restart our town's abandoned K-9 program. Mrs. Fran tugged to the front window curtain side, watching people pace the snowy road. I moved out of her sideline. I was thinking if it would help I could bring Skyler. Yankiewicz rocked on his heels. Made deep half-moons in the snow. He was a little heavy. A lot of my men were. She's my other dog. Trained in search and rescue. Skyler could find Cody. The snow might make it tough, but she can show us where he headed. A neighbor approached Mr. Waterson, former Army. He told me when he arrived. Chief, where are the water bottles? Water bottles? I repeated. You have to make sure our searchers stay hydrated. He looked around. Some of these folks need better gear. You included in this weather cotton kills. I'll get someone to catch water. Yankiewicz peered at my map. You need to have the area they're searching. He's a kid. He didn't walk six miles, not on this. Only have him search a quarter mile. It sounded too small. Most searches done in good weather. You don't run the survey bigger than this. So Yankiewicz knew about search and rescue. That made one of us. Go get the dog, I told him. Hey everybody, change plans, I called. The volunteers grumbled. Mr. Faran said we need to get out there now. I said we needed water, and a neighbor piped up. I've got a case in my garage. If someone comes with me, we can grab them. Mr. Faran stomped over. Why are you redoing the maps? I told him the search was too ambitious. What if Cody got that far? We need to be out there looking, not waiting for water. I said, if we don't find him, we'll widen the area. I need to consider everyone's safety. He muttered, idiot. I pretended not to hear. So as you can see, Chief Lynch has no experience organizing search and rescue. When you need to inject tension into a book, it's always a good idea to set your protagonists to challenge their likely to fail at. So now we're going to close our eyes, close again with a sensory experience. All you need to do is close your eyes or un-focus your gaze, and just sit quietly in your seats, and again imagine that you're on that cold, abandoned road in flip flops with no hat and no gloves. And imagine the cold, and raise your hand when you feel it, whether it's the cold biting your toes, or making your neck good goose bumps, or making your hands ape, or even hurting your teeth. When you feel the cold, raise your hand. The wind is blowing, snow begins to settle into the cracks of your samples. All right. Open your eyes, refocus your gaze, and understand this from now on. That pain, though imagined, is a gift, and you are stronger for it. So the next time you step your toe, or get a splinter, or are cursing the snow as it settles onto you while you're shullying out of your parking spot, be sure to say, thanks universe. Thank you for coming in. Thank you so much, Stephanie. That was so great. I love the idea of writing about a character where you're eliminating the senses, you know, having to imagine somebody who doesn't have access to all the same senses as you. That feels like such an interesting challenge as a writer. Our third and final reader of the night is Edwin Hill. Edwin Hill's critically acclaimed crime novels include The Standalone Thriller, The Secrets We Share, and three novels featuring Hester Thursky. He has been nominated for Edgar and Agatha Awards, featured in Us Magazine, received starred reviews in Publishers Weekly, Booklist, and Library Journal, and was recognized as one of six crime writers to watch in Mystery Scene Magazine. He lives in Roslandale, Massachusetts with his partner Michael and his favorite retriever, their lab, Edith Ann, who likes his first drafts enough to eat them. Learn more about him at www.skillsidewinhill.com. Thanks for having me today. I'm going to actually pass out these little chapsticks because they're my sensory thing. I thought I'd talk a little bit about the creative process that went into this book. One of the, when you write crime novels, one of the things, one of the benefits of writing crime novels, sometimes your publisher wants you write a book every single year. And of course, that's one of the challenges of being a crime writer as well. So I signed the contract for this book on, it was about, it was probably March 1st, 2020. And of course, you know, the whole world went to shit right after that. And so this is my, this is my pandemic novel. This is the novel that I wrote while we were all panicked. And it doesn't, it actually doesn't feature the pandemic. I tried to and I just couldn't go there. So one of the things that, like getting into a novel for me is always interesting. Every novel is really different, the process that I got through. With my editor, I have to, I write on spec, so I have to write out a proposal. I have to say what the book's going to be about. I have to write a big, long outline, give that to him. He sends it to his editorial board. They decide whether they want it or not. So I wrote this big, long proposal for a book about a school in New Hampshire, a couple that runs a private school in New Hampshire. And all sorts of hygis that happen at the private school. So I start writing that book. And I've worked on it for about three, four months. And then all of a sudden, the pandemic has happened. And like, I can't even go to New Hampshire. I can't, like I plan to go up to Exeter and look at the camp, you know, whatever. And I can't even leave the state to go up to New Hampshire to do that. So I'm like, okay, let's move the setting closer into Boston. And so, so then I call my editor and I say, okay, the school's out. And now it's going to be about a psychiatrist. A psychiatrist who spies on his clients. He says, okay, okay, I like that idea. And the psychiatrist has a brother who just got out of prison and two sisters. He's like, okay, I like that idea. And I was like, do you need a new outline? He says no. So I said, okay, I'm going to start writing now. The main district, so the main district was due on April 1, 2021. And so, you know, I write it, write it, keep writing and keep writing and keep writing. And so then I'm like, in January, it's due in April. And I'm like, this psychiatrist just isn't working. So, and neither is the brother who was in jail, who just got out of jail. So I'm just going to get rid of those two. And now it's going to be about these two sisters. And now it's about two sisters who have a secret from their, from their deep past. So I call though, I didn't quite know that yet. So I call the, I call my editor and I say, okay, so the psychiatrist has gone. We're not going to do the psychiatrist anymore. It's about two sisters. He says, what do they do? And I said, it's about two sisters. And they have, they have a secret. Okay. And he's like, what's the secret? It says, it's about two sisters. And he says, okay, can you write me some back cover copy? And I said, I'll get it to you soon. So now I'm like, I'm a total parent. And so it's January and it's like winter. And at the end of, at the end of December of 2020, we have this box of chocolates. And one of them said that it was almond. And I said, the only thing I want out of 2020 is for this to have marzipan in it. It didn't. I mean, that's like where we were in our lives at that point, right? And so I didn't even get my marzipan. I have no idea what this book is going to be about. And so it's January, I'm driving around, I'm like taking a van to go for a walk. And I'm like, driving down the street. I saw this light, like it's like, it's like the 10th light around. I'm like, really bad. And so there's a school over here. There's a private school over on this corner. And then over on this corner, there is this old abandoned factory. And I'm just sitting around thinking, God, I bet those kids are always going into that abandoned factory and getting in so much trouble. I bet those kids are always going into that abandoned factory and getting in so much trouble. I bet those kids are always going into it. So all of a sudden the novel literally just falls into place. And this heavy goes to what Lynn was saying about how suddenly all these pieces start coming together. So I kind of want to get to the sensory thing. One of the things I love in novels is when I, all my novels so far that I've written have been from multiple points of view, I love to look at how different people will see the same mundane object, the smell, the same scent. And they'll bring something different to that story. They'll see it in a different way. Someone will see it as something very, very, very kind, something wonderful. Someone else will see it as something threatening. And so in this novel, one thing that was really important in the, and I didn't know that it was there, was the scent of that chapstick, that sort of artificial orangey scent. And so I've written this, I've written a scene, there's a chapstick in it, whatever. And I was, I'm going to read that scene for you now. So the very beginning of the, very beginning of the book. This book, so this book is told from six points of view, but the two most important points of view are two sisters. It's told in, it's told in both in 1995 when they're 14 and 12, and then it's told in the present day when they're adults, they're in the 40s. And their names are Natalie, who's the 14-year-old, and Glenn, like Glenn Close, people get confused about that. Glenn is their sister who's 12. And so I'm just going to read a few pages. Natalie Cavanaugh had a secret, one that made her stomach hurt, and one that she had to keep to herself until she could figure out what to do next. She rested her head against the passenger side door of the Caprice classic station wagon, letting hot air blow over her. Her mother Ruth tapped a finger on the steering wheel and flew with Mac plate on the radio. From the back seat, Natalie's 12-year-old sister Glenn said, old people music, and call me old, Ruth Cavanaugh said. I'm going swimming if you get home, Glenn said, meaning she was hopping the fence to the next door neighbor's pool. Be sure they ask for us, Ruth said. It's an open invitation, Glenn said. Don't abuse it. Ruth turned into starling circle and down their driveway. The Cavanaugh's lived in a brand new development on the outskirts of Elmhurst, where acres of porous had been clear cut to build 15 houses, though so far only two were complete. The others lay frozen in various states of construction. At the very center of the circle, the Cavanaugh's, 14-year-old Natalie Glenn and their parents, Ruth and Allen, lived in a great colonial. Right next door, Dion Sykes and her two kids lived in a nearly identical house, the one with the pool. They all moved into the circle during the spring, expecting to hear construction. So far, they'd only heard each other. Ruth parked in front of the garage. Natalie swept damp banks from her forehead to the shimmering asphalt, where waves of heat lapped at her knees. Glenn shoved her. Natalie shoved back. Girls, Ruth said, let's get everything inside before it melts. Plastic grocery, grocery bags filled with the station wagon. Natalie grabbed two and dashed into the house through the living room, passed the burden same on the family room carpet into the kitchen. Her mother crammed ice cream and ground beef into the freezer. Your father's probably still asleep. Natalie's stomachache returned with a vengeance. Usually, after a night like last night, her father slept in the guest room. When he finally woke, he slumped at the kitchen counter and apologized for the bits of memory that came to him in flashes. The knife wound in his arm would crystallize those memories. Let's all be as quiet as we can, her mother added. I'll put things away, Natalie said. No, I'll put things away, Glenn said. You could turn anything into an argument. It's my turn. I'll put the groceries away, Ruth said. The two of you can out in the car. Race you, Glenn said. Natalie took off, slamming the door. Behind her, Glenn stumbled down the front stoop, losing ground. But when Natalie went to grab a bag of plastic hot-on and window print, and Glenn beat her inside, cheatered Natalie said. You're the one who slammed the door. If dad wakes up, we'll be sorry, Natalie said, her voice would whisper, the lie coming easily. You should be quiet, especially after last night. They deposited their bags on the Formica counter. Stay with me for a second, Glenn, Ruth said. Glenn's face flushed enough so that Natalie knew at once that her sister had done something she shouldn't have. Glenn was always getting in trouble, pushing boundaries while Natalie spent her life inside the lines, fascinated by her sister's bold infractions. Now she lingered to see what Nat Glenn had done, but Ruth said those bags won't walk themselves in from the car and waited for Natalie to leave. By the time she returned, with more groceries, whatever had happened between her mother and sister had already transpired. Natalie jumped her sister with her thumb, thumb, but Glenn shrugged. A moment later, their neighbor Diane Sykes snopped at the back door and let herself in. Cool party, she said. It'll be hotter than hell today. Ruth nodded. Get your suits, girls. Natalie and Glenn ran upstairs to the room. What did you do, Natalie, as Emily O'Bean, that Glenn said, as she chose a one-piece to cover the bruises. Natalie left her sister and hovered outside her father's office. On most mornings, even on a Saturday like this one, she'd hear the clack of her Evis typewriter behind the closed door. Anyone familiar with that? Today, she towed the door open, stacked some paper literally every surface. She slipped into the room, index cards were stacked on a tattooed bulletin board with characters meanings and plot points, tersely written rejection letters, paper at the back of the door. My wall was shamed. Alan Cowden unnamed it, especially on nights when he teetered on the precipice of modeling, when he tipped between Jofiel and Dandress. Alan called himself a writer, but mostly he taught English at the local community college. Suddenly, he didn't like to remember. Glenn had made him remember that last night. The door to Alan's office opened. Glenn stood in the hallway. You shouldn't be in there, Glenn said, as she applied lip gloss, ruined orange tube, but matched her ponytail. The scent of artificial citrus hung on the air. Where did you get that Natalie asked? It's my Glenn set, and I'll know if you use it. You stole it from the A&P. Did not. Glenn turned and ran downstairs. A moment later, Natalie heard a splash in the Sikes's pool. Are you coming, Ruth Cabana, showed her up the stairs? I'll meet you there, and Natalie showed her back. She changed her own bathing suit, unlike Glenn, she can wear a two piece. At the Sikes's house, Natalie's mother Diane Sikes sat in the shade of an umbrella. Natalie bounced off the board and into the air. Natalie would think about this moment for years to come, about these few seconds when she hovered in mid air, about the summer sun and the stench of sunscreen, and orange scented lip balm, and the stomach ache that wouldn't go away. All the players in one place, all up on her father. She lifted her knees to her chest and closed her eyes. She saw her mother lean toward Diane and whispered again, Natalie clenched beneath the pool's surface. Here in the world was quiet. Natalie held her breath till her lungs felt as though they would burst, knowing that as soon as she came up to take a breath, the day would return to focus. She couldn't have known that this would be the last time any of them would ever truly be happy, or that with the inner geek news trucks would line a Starland circle and her mother would be suspected of murder. She also couldn't have known that by this time next month Diane Sikes would be dead. When Natalie, what dad Natalie did know was that eventually she beat to tell the police where to find her father. Natalie's secret, the one that made her stomach hurt, was that she'd already seen him earlier this morning when she'd gone to retrieve the library book that Glenn had accidentally left out the night before. Alan Kavanaugh was in the woods, up beyond the road, through the clearing, behind the rotten undersplung, he lay face down dead, the back of his head crushed in, his blood splattered across the dry earth. So, the novel came together with the scent of orange in that passage, and it came together much later when I was writing a scene way at the end of the book, when two characters are, they're drinking, satting en blanc, which of course smells like citrus. I know a lot of people here are writers, but all of a sudden that sudden detail connected the entire novel together. It was like there was this bungee cord that went through the entire book, and everything sort of came together. So, that was my process with this one. Thank you. So, my takeaway is if you're stuck with your novel, you need to find an abandoned factory or theater or hotel, and then it will all suddenly start to exist. So, okay, so I think we're going to invite the three authors back up. Maybe you guys want to sit, I'll bring chairs up for you to take more sense. Is that a bit of a question? It usually comes out in the readings, but it's usually after a while somebody in the audience says, if you can tell us how you came up with the idea. And so, I'm curious if you feel like just a random coincidence or if you think that you're focused on sort of the mystery, somehow it makes the story more closely tied to the specific inspiration or the way that you look at the world, or kind of just escape to that. Yeah, I think for me, this is like novel four, and I've got novel five coming out. I've figured out that the shortcut, and there aren't that many, but there's one shortcut for me, and it's to really lean into that inspiration. Because I need something to propel me forward, and if I'm making a mistake, I'll figure that out. But at least if the inspiration is strong, then I know I'm at least starting from someplace. I'm not starting from, you know, possibilities. That's just me. It was really well put. I mean, one of the, I mean, every novel of mine hasn't been different as far as process has gone. And with that, this novel, I think my inspiration just disappeared, because it was just so weird to be working on something at that point. I took the idea that I rejected the psychiatrist that's why I said that's what my current novel's about. So, you know, it's like all ideas are kind of key. And that one was actually, this one has been easier, right, because I think I already had that inspiration to focus on. This is one of the rare ones where I knew what the inspiration was, and it tied to the story. I don't think that's been true for other novels. Certainly not a newspaper story that I've noodled on for years and years, and then used. So, this is kind of an exception for me. Any other questions? Made your deadline? She asked if I made my deadline. You know, I didn't make that deadline. I was like a wee wait. And the funny thing is, I have a deadline right now. Like, my novel's due on October 1st. If not, I'm turning it into tomorrow. Which for a writer is like making your deadline? I also have not. So, the novel I'm working on right now is like a rational one story. So, it's the same story told by six different characters. So, I did have to have an outline for that, because otherwise, I already went crazy writing it, but if I hadn't done something, it would have been really hard. But other, but other times I've just kind of winged it. Same. It depends on the story. I always write from multiple points of view, because being a family counselor, everything feels like it's about a relationship today. So, I have to have the different viewpoints. And so, that becomes very, very difficult to do if you don't have an outline. Though one time, I didn't have an outline, and I literally had to pull the whole thing apart, and then put the separate stories and justify how I was going to weave them back and forth. And it turns out I drove myself out of my mind, and they went back exactly the way that I am. And Stephanie laughed at this question. So, I want to know why you left. And I also follow up to that. It's like, I'm not a mystery writer, or a thriller writer. And so, to me, it seems like you have to have an outline. Like, how could you not? It's like the whole thing is just a little puzzle box. So, if you don't have one at the beginning, do you, at what point do you put one in? But first step. So, within the mystery community, there's a really sharp division between plotters and pancers. So, plotters outline, and pancers write about a seat of their pants. And most people are somewhere in the middle. Although, there are some people who write whole, like, scene, every scene, and then they go in and they expand on it. I don't. The first book in that series, I didn't know who did it till the end. And it was a blue group of women's pants open with that revelation. I was like, then I went back and I just, like, seated the clue. So, it actually isn't as awful as it sounds. My problem I find partly the incentive for me to write is to find out what the story is about. And if I know everything, key and crucial, I'm less interested to write it. It's also why I don't talk a whole lot when I'm first writing something. It's like, I kind of want to ruin the mystery. I've also tried writing outlines, have lost those outlines, found them later. They weren't helpful, but I've also deviated. So, I just, I generally know where it's going to start. I almost always know where it's going to end, what that resolution is going to be, and that I might know some key scenes in the middle. But I don't know everything. And for me, that's part of the joy. But I know that makes some people crazy. I feel like you have to plot at some point, right? So, you're talking about plotting once you've get more of a gestalt of what it's about, right? There has to be some plotting at some point to make sure that it's all working. But I'll sometimes know what's going to happen. I just don't know the choreography, right? So, I look at that a little bit differently. Like, I know some of the dynamics or some of the sketches of it, but I don't actually know how it's going to work. And there are times where I'm sitting there going, I know what's supposed to happen. I just don't know how I'm going to make that happen. And then that's when the discovery takes you in different directions and that's fine. There's one, the one trick that you do in this, or one can do in Mr. Norris, is to have a tiny little question that's posed at the beginning of the book that just kind of hangs there. And I like, it's this little scratch at the back of your reader's mind that they sort of remember the little thing that you, the little question that was posed, and you don't answer, it doesn't even come up again. You don't answer until the end of the novel. And it's really satisfying for your reader. And those are the ones that I love to sort of just discover during the writing process, the one I have written out, it's about a birthday, like that little scratch thing is about a birthday cake. And, but I do kind of, I do need to know who like the killer is. The one I've changed, I've changed it a few times. I think the viewpoint, whether it's first or third in the novel that I have coming out, I played around with a couple of scenes that are in second point of view, which was tricky, but I wanted them to have a lot of psychic distance, like almost as hazy what the heck is happening. So second person worked for that. But it's always really about intention. But, but the point of view piece is really fun when you do more than one. It's super hard to, but the fun of it is you really have to distinguish between them. They can't just sound like the same person. They have to uniquely have their own struggles. It's almost like mini novels, right? In the dangers of an ordinary night, it's three points of view. So it's three mini people's heartbeat. And you have to get that right. And that matters to me because just when I'm kind of tired of that person, I can go the next one and figure out how they go together. In the dangers of an ordinary night, they're all from what's called third limited, which is the camera angle is sort of inside the character, but there's a little bit of distance. You don't know, you get to know a little bit more about what's going on around you. Multiple person first? I've done it all the time. You know, I love first. I am as simple as the first person point of view. So look, Kyle's coming home. I love first. It's immediate. And if I have one talent in life, it's voice. Voice is actually something I'm good at. I have been running more in third person. I find it more challenging. But somehow in mysteries, it can be tricky with first, because you'll only have more persons point of view. And so how do you get that person information that they wouldn't have access to? It can be a little trickier sometimes. It's also a little trickier, but fun to show when that person isn't getting it, because they think they're getting it. And you have to kind of show that they're not in the other character's reactions, which can be a really fun thing to play with first. So my heart will always be with first person, but I have been reaching out to third. All of my points have been multiple point of view. This one that I'm working on right now is everyone's in the first person. So it's six points of view, everyone's from the first person point of view, which was really interesting to do. And they're very distinct. There's a 13-year-old. There's a serial killer. There's a lot of different points of views. That was really interesting. But otherwise, I've done limited third just like that. Get stuck. You know what do you do? Always get stuck. Never. I get stuck. I write every day, and I have a word count limit every day. So I always have to make whatever I've set my goal to be. And oftentimes, I don't keep everything that I wrote that day very often. And if I'm really, really stuck, I'll make my word count goal really achievable. So if I'm sort of like in a place where I'm feeling blocked, I'll make my word count goal be like 200 words, and I'll always try to beat it. But if I'm really like in a good rhythm, I'll get my word count goal. I'll make my word count goal like 2,000 so that I'm really... Do you have tricks for getting unstuck is more to the point, I think. Because the story doesn't always flow at your desire. It flows based on the story's desire. And what information you already have that's meaningful, and you might not have that information yet. So all the times I was walking the beach to the Glades, I knew, here's a murder year, right? But I don't know what it is yet. So my tricks are to stay with it, to take it on the walk, to imagine the what ifs, to say, well, what if this happened? No, I don't like that. What if this happened? Oh, that has promised. And so to play with the tricks of moving forward. So it's sort of semantics, but are you ever really stuck all the time? Are you really stuck? No. Because the process is to keep moving forward in whatever way you choose to do that. I think there are flavors of stuck. I don't want to write stuck. There's, oh my god, I wrote myself into a corner, and I actually don't know how to solve the problem I created for myself stuck, which is probably my least favorite form of stuck. Because you did the bad thing that caused the problem, and no one else can solve it but you. But that's actually not true. If you have a lot of writer facts, that's the time to talk to them and ask them, because sometimes the outside perspective is actually just like they'll tell you the obvious thing you weren't thinking of. If it is regular type of stuck, I do think that walking or showering, showering, I have some good ideas in the shower. I should never leave the shower. I think it's very pretty though, I think your problem food would be bad. Anyway, just imagine being a sandwich in the shower. So I think it depends on stuck. And then there's sometimes like, honestly, I did a talk on like the seven different types of I don't want to write, and then the solutions to them. And sometimes it's just like, you need to like decompress a little and maybe go like, look at something that isn't your computer or paper, look at nature, look at some beautiful art, or do something else that feeds your soul in a way that the writing isn't helping you with right now. Yeah. This is a book called stuck, where there's a little boy and he just keeps throwing things up in the tree. He gets his football or something stuck in the tree and then to get it down, he just keeps throwing all these things and you know, he throws a rake and then he throws a ladder and then he throws a quail and then he just keeps getting bigger and bigger, more and more ridiculous. And it's the writing process where you're like, I'll just throw a quail on this. Anyway, it's a great book. So I think this is an awesome place to end. I want to say thank you to everybody for coming. I want to say thank you to Kickstand for hosting and the Robbins Library for facilitating this. And huge thank you to our three authors for doing an amazing reading. I brought up an advanced copy of my next novel. So the first person who can tell me the highest peak in Northern Maine. There you go. Oh. Speaking of keeping informed, there's a mailing list of back book books. So if people want to sign up for a mailing list, know about future events, please sign your name. The next one is January 12th and books are back there too. So feel free to people and grab books and get the offers to sign them before the end of the day. Thanks everybody.