Tag Archives: detective

May 29, 2018 · 11:00 am

“In a City of Magic . . .” by Thomas K. Carpenter

Thomas K. Carpenter writes in diverse genres including historical mystery. His short fiction appears in a variety of magazines including AHMM and EQMM, and he writes the Dashkova Memoirs series, the Digital Sea trilogy, and the GAMERS trilogy. Here he talks about his story “The Worth of Felines,” from the current May/June issue of AHMM.

Ancient Alexandria, the setting for the story “The Worth of Felines,” is a city of magic.

Not the kind of magic we might recognize from the latest Marvel movie, or the type that people believe can be summoned from spells and tomes, but the kind that today we call: technology. Alexandria was a strange intersection of knowledge and superstition. This dichotomy was never more present than in the temples of the city, which used technological wonders to provide “miracles” for their followers, so that they might prove their special relationship to the gods and separate their followers from their hard earned coinage.

One of the greatest purveyors of these miracles was Heron of Alexandria, the real life inventor from the story. He accomplished many technological feats during that time, including creating what could be called an early precursor to the steam engine, in service to these temples.

But Heron is not the central focus of the story. That honor goes to Magistrate Ovid, who unlike Heron, was not a real historical figure, though he owes his fictional existence to the inventor.

The original launching point for these stories was the Alexandrian Saga, a seven book series I published earlier in this decade about Heron and how his inventions might have changed the world under different circumstances. The first book, Fires of Alexandria, deals with the mystery of the burning of the Library of Alexandria, and the development of a primitive steam engine, which threatened the slave trade and made enemies for the inventor. Magistrate Ovid has only a bit part in this book, hardly more than an extra in the grand scheme of things.

The books follow how this spark might have changed ancient history forever, bringing about massive technological change, nearly two thousand years before the industrial revolution. But when I finished the seventh and final book (you can find them at all major retailers), I felt like I wasn’t done with Heron, or the city of ancient Alexandria. So I decided to write some smaller mysteries involving the inventor.

In the early stories, Heron is a Sherlockian figure, solving what appear to be intractable problems—in stunning fashion, no less. The magistrate merely provides a Watson to Heron’s Sherlock to hide the solving of the mystery until the last possible moment. They were fun, little mysteries, but ultimately derivative, failing to illustrate the full scope of the character, Heron of Alexandria, from the novels, or allowing Ovid a shred of humanity.

All that changed when I wrote The Curse of the Gorgon. Feeling limited by the structure I’d placed on myself, I decided to try something different, and allowed Magistrate Ovid to become the focus of this story. In Curse, Ovid must solve what appears to be a supernatural crime—the murder of an awful family by the mythical gorgon. While Heron makes a cameo, the story ultimately rests on Ovid’s shoulders and considerable girth.

Thus, the real Magistrate Ovid is born.

But his development wasn’t finished. I wrote a story for a workshop with Kris Rusch a number of years ago. That story was “The Trouble with Virgins.”

In it, Magistrate Ovid is confronted with an impossible situation involving a wealthy Alexandrian and his son, one that mirrors his own struggles with his father. This story was purchased by Janet Hutchings at EQMM in the Department of First Stories.

With a more flesh and blood Ovid, the stories came alive. In the latest AHMM, Magistrate Ovid must save his friend Heron from a Machiavellian rival in the story “The Worth of Felines,” and in a future issue of EQMM, Ovid explores the political implications of the Great Lighthouse in “The Lightness of Man.”

I’m not finished with Magistrate Ovid by any stretch. One of the fun parts about writing these stories, besides getting to explore the characters in more depth, is visiting ancient Alexandria and all her splendor. The story that I’m currently working on involves the Great Library herself. I’d tell you more but I don’t know what happens yet either!

1 Comment

Filed under How'd That Happen

Tagged as , , , , , , , , , ,

July 13, 2017 · 10:00 am

Staging a Mystery: Nero Wolfe Comes to the Midwest (by Linda Landrigan)

E.J. Subkoviak as Nero Wolfe; photo by Park Square Theatre.

Recently I had the pleasure of attending the premier of “Might as Well Be Dead,” a new play by AHMM contributor Joseph Goodrich. The play, produced by the Park Square Theatre in St. Paul, Minnesota, is an adaptation of the novel of the same name by Rex Stout.

Naturally, the story features Stout’s famous sleuths, the corpulent Nero Wolfe and his wise-cracking right-hand man, Archie Goodwin. We fans love these books for the lively writing, the bantering dialogue, and the vivid characters. I’m happy to say that Joe captured these dynamics nicely in his adaptation.

Adapting any novel-length work to the stage is necessarily an exercise in condensation, which Joe and the director, Peter Moore, handled beautifully. As Joe later explained, because the novel is so plot driven, it was essential that the story of the play “take off like a bullet,” and not flag from there.

This production featured a single main set—Nero Wolfe’s office—with side wings where a handful of off-site scenes were staged. On several occasions, characters addressed the audience directly, which also helped to keep things moving. In this production, most of the actors doubled up on roles, though I didn’t catch on to this until well into the second act. (I prefer to think of this as a tribute to the actors’ skills, rather than a comment on my observational skills.)

It’s interesting to note that the Park Square Theatre has a special group of supporters—the Mystery Writers Producers’ Club—who encourage and support the bringing of mystery plays to the stage.

I attended the play as part of a program organized by the Wolfe Pack, AHMM’s partner in sponsoring the Black Orchid Novella Award. Members from around the country converged for a fun weekend that also included the post performance party with the cast and crew, brunch the next day with the playwright, director, and members from the cast, and a book discussion. It was a terrific time-out to meet new friends who share a passion for the inimitable Nero Wolfe and Archie Goodwin.

1 Comment

Filed under Uncategorized

Tagged as , , , , , ,

February 21, 2017 · 10:04 am

Strength of Character (March/April 2017)

Crime is character building, at least in crime fiction, because it is characters, their dark psychologies and questionable motivations, that drive compelling stories—as the tales in this issue amply demonstrate.

What compels a model prisoner, in Tony Richards’s “Magpie Man,” to burst out of jail just before he is to be lawfully released? What motivates a desperate woman, in Dale Berry’s graphic story “Dead Air,” to strike up a conversation with a radio DJ? Why does a detective, in Wayne J. Gardiner’s “Bygones,” return home for the funeral of his high-school adversary?

Interpersonal entanglements complicate Charles John Harper’s police procedural “The Echoes.” A man seeking invisibility is driven from the dangerous shadows in Bob Tippee’s “Underground Above Ground.” Susan Oleksiw’s “How Do You Know What You Want” is a poignant story of a teen in foster care and the woman who tries to connect with her, and Martin Limón’s P.I. Il Yong pursues a case that takes him to the remote reaches of the Himalayas, where survival may depend on the uncertain kindness of othes, in “hominid.”

Social institutions and conventions are questioned in Alan E. Foulds’ “Razor’s Edge” when a reporter revisits a long-ago cold case, and in Mitch Alderman’s “Bleak Future” when P.I. Bubba Simms looks into extortion among central Florida’s genteel society. An old injustice gets a fresh look in “Rough-Hewn Retribution,” Nancy Pauline Simpson’s historical set in the early twentieth century South. A homicide detective and suspect match wits in the interview room in Chris Knopf’s “A Little Cariñoso.” And a land dispute is complicated—and deadly—in Gilbert M. Stack’s British historical whodunit “Greed.”

Watch out, these complicated characters will steal your attention—and perhaps your sympathy.

Leave a comment

Filed under Uncategorized

Tagged as , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

January 10, 2017 · 4:03 pm

How I Came to Write “The Hawaii Murder Case” by Terence Faherty

 

Terence Faherty is the author of The Quiet Woman as well as the Owen Keane and Scott Elliott mystery series. His recent short-story collection Tales of the Star Republic is available from Gisbourne Press. Here he talks about the inspiration behind and the writing of his story “The Hawaii Murder Case” from the January/February 2017 issue of AHMM.

My wife and I enjoy traveling, and I thought it would be fun to write a new short story for each place we visited. Instead of forcing a whodunit format on each locale, I decided to let the setting suggest the proper story to tell. For example, St. Simons Island, where we stayed in a creaking old carriage house, seemed like a good place for a ghost story. When we visited Scotland, we encountered the life and legend of Mary Queen of Scots everywhere we went, so I came up with a suspense story that used the famous queen.

But I was hoping for more inspiration than just what type of story to write. Years ago, I came across a writer’s block remedy. It consisted of a deck of cards that would randomly generate certain basics of a story, like setting, protagonist, and problem. Trying to weave together those random elements was supposed to stimulate creativity. I never used the card system, but it occurred to me that I could let our trips serve the same role. I began traveling with my notebook at the ready, so I could jot down random elements that I would later weave together in a story. I’m happy to report that the system worked. And it not only served as a creativity stimulus, it made each story a scrapbook of that particular vacation.

“The Hawaii Murder Case,” as the title reveals, was inspired by our vacation on Kawai. I came back with the following story elements. 1) During the trip, I was reading a Philo Vance mystery, The Kidnap Murder Case. 2) While we were standing at the edge of a remote waterfall, a branch the size of a suburban tree fell from the forest canopy and narrowly missed us. 3) To access the beach nearest our condo, we had to go up and down a long, steep stairway that was out of sight of anyone not on the stairway itself. 4) On the beach, we observed a May/December couple who barely spoke to one another. 5) Our condo building contained three units, all of which were owned by the same person and decorated identically.

From those major elements, and a dozen minor ones, I came up the story of a vacationer who is conked on the head by a falling tree branch and begins to take on the characteristics of the fictional detective he’s been reading about. There follows a sudden death, of course. I made it a comic mystery—told by the “famous” detective’s harried wife—because the crazy premise pointed that way and because I enjoy writing funny stories. They’re a nice break from the grim stuff. You can check out the results in Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine’s January/February double issue. And if you’re ever facing writer’s block, try the random detail remedy. I recommend trying it in Hawaii.

1 Comment

Filed under How'd That Happen

Tagged as , , , , , , , ,

October 25, 2016 · 3:59 pm

All Things About “Althing” by Stephen P. Kelner, Jr.

Massachusetts-based writer Stephen P. Kelner, Jr. is a management consultant and the author of Motivate Your Writing! (UPNE). His fiction appears in the Level Best anthology Undertow, featuring stories by New England crime writers. Here he talks about the history behind his story “Death at the Althing” from the November issue.

Vikings get a bad rap. The horned-helmet berserkers of cartoons bear little resemblance to the human beings of Nordic settlements between the 700s and 1066. The early descriptions of them as horrific attackers—“from the fury of the Northmen, God deliver us”—came from people who were not only victims, but, unusually for the time, literate. Imagine Twitter if only one party could type!

Most “Vikings” farmed, of course. History marks the Scandinavian people of this time out because they rapidly expanded into and colonized many areas—most of the modern UK and Ireland, Russia, France (Normandy is Old Norse for “North-Man-Town”—in other words, a Norse settlement), Greenland, and Iceland. Their explorations went even further: Norsemen composed the Varangian Guard of the Emperor in Constantinople. And, yes, many fought to achieve this dominance, but they also traded and settled to leave their profound impact on Europe.

Inspired by my Scandinavian blood, in college I discovered the richness of the Norse Sagas. They have been considered history, myth, and, since the discovery of the Newfoundland “Vinland” colonies, partway back to history again. They can give you a feeling for their culture, and make you confront assumptions in yours. Followers of the Old Norse religion believed they had a predestined fate, a “wyrd,” not unlike Calvinist beliefs of a later time, but reached very different conclusions on how to live your life. While some Calvinists were strict and dour, hoping that they would make it into heaven despite their sins, the Norse believed in living life to the utmost, because if your wyrd was written anyway, you might as well live large—a philosophy more “YOLO” than Puritan!

Iceland is home to some of the most famous sagas. Founded in the 900s mostly by Norwegians fleeing the unification efforts of King Olaf, Icelanders formed a surprisingly democratic state, where all landowners spoke their minds at the Althing—the “Everybody-meeting,” their “Congress,” and still the name of the Icelandic legislature. Admittedly, some of these debates and lawsuits devolved into combat; but they usually managed to work things out.

Like the sagas, myths and history blend in Iceland. To this day, you can see the rock where Grettir the Strong hid; discuss the misshapen skull of Egil the Seer; hear an Icelander describe an elf neighbor; or go to the site of the original Althing and the Law Rock where the Lawspeaker would recite one third of the laws each meeting.

For an amateur historian such as myself, it was tough tackling the academic literature. As a PhD in a different field, I understand that papers assume a common grounding possessed by any graduate student, but not me. At first, I read non-academic books and popular works to give me a basic view of the working society, roleplayers—guides for Icelandic garb, or even children’s books, if well researched. Why the latter? Because while an academic article might delve into the chemical formation of fabrics or distances a brooch may have traveled, an illustrated children’s book shows you what a person looks like wearing them, standing in their town.

I also visited places and things myself: a scaled-down replica of Leif Erikson’s ship came to Boston once for the millennium of his voyage, and I could discuss the realities of sailing with the crew. The Jorvik Viking Centre in York, UK—the heart of much Viking activity back in the day—is a wonderful resource to show you both how people lived and how modern archeology is done. (Hint: not like Indiana Jones.) I haven’t been able to go to Iceland myself, but Icelandair has a nonstop from Boston and specials, so someday . . .

As I dug into Old Norse and Icelandic culture, I found other startling differences. Most people have heard of “weregild,” money paid as partial compensation for an illegal death, e.g., murder. But did you know the weregild for a young woman equaled that of a adult male warrior? And the weregild for a woman who had given birth was more! This culture valued women, believing they had wisdom not accessible to men—sexist, yes, but at least both sides had special value. Again and again in the sagas, women initiated the events—whether negative or positive. (Sometimes as real-life warriors, too: Look up the formidable Freydis Eiriksdotter. But avoid for the negative stories propagated by early Christian missionaries making her “unwomanly” instead of courageous.)

The challenge of historical fiction is balancing today’s modern audience against yesterday’s realities to make it accurate yet understandable, sometimes despite assumptions that may shock today. Worse, we only know a fingernail fragment about these people, much written by the victims of Vikings, not by the Norse people themselves, and what we do have was not exactly annotated. For example, Viking-era storytellers loved using kennings—poetic metaphors for objects, many completely incomprehensible today. Things taken for granted then baffle us today—and no doubt vice versa, could we raise a few Viking shades to ask. Of course, this also makes it fun for writers and audiences: debunking a myth or two, illuminating what life might have been like, or drawing a conclusion obvious to an 10th century Icelander that pleasantly surprises the modern reader.

In this particular story, the characters obviously follow the classic “Holmes and Watson” pattern, with a Norse twist. Leipt-Egil and Thorbjorn not only represent Holmes’ brains and Watson’s heart, respectively, but also elements from Norse myth: the smart, tricky problem-solver (Loki) and the less-bright but strong, trustworthy one (Thor). At the same time, my characters are human beings, not mythic archetypes, each with their strengths and weaknesses. Thorbjorn is smarter than Egil, when it comes to people; Egil has strong feelings, but poorly expressed. They have histories and families, some of which may appear in later stories! And if you see them, trust me, they won’t have horns on their helmets.

Leave a comment

Filed under How'd That Happen

Tagged as , , , , , , ,