Well, for startes, she created a memorable hero, Stella Haredsty, then endowed her with admiraable traits: Stella is tough as a titanium nail, she’s brave, and she’s determined. Add to this a sense of humor and insight into human behavior, and you have an outstanding lead character.  The supporting cast ain’t bad either.  And although the cast is large, I was always sure who was who.

Then there’s the sense of place. I get the feeling Ms Littlefield really knows the town she;’s writing about, and the people who live there. My only complaint is that the book is ending.  Ah well, there’s more in this series, which I plan to read as soon as possible.

Okay, I confess: I was part of an improve story group, organized by Gelati’s Scoop, an exceptional blog by Giovanni Gelati.

I met Giovanni through the internet, and he liked STEAL THE SHOW. When he contacted me about this new venture, I was intrigued. Here’s how it works:

Someone (in this case me) starts the story with three words supplied by Giovanni.In this case, my three words were: Bar, Dumpster, Library.I had about 90 minutes to write 1000-1500 words, then pass it along to the next sucker – oops, I mean writer.

By noontime the story is finished.The Scoop gets other writers to read it and the authors have a chance to talk on his blogspot radio station.

So, how did I do this? Well, I felt comfortable with these words, maybe a little too easy, I thought.One thing – I’m playing with a new mystery novel, and part of it deals with the main character coming into a strange town. I wanted to use that same idea for this short story.

Have you ever driven across Texas?It is an enormous state, and depending on your route, could easily take you 24 hours to cross.I’ve made this drive at least 6 times, maybe a dozen, and in all kinds of weather. I guess in a state that big, you expect just about anything, including hail the size of footballs (it is Texas, of course).

Once, when I was new in the film business, I had to drive a van packed with lights and camera gear from LA to North Carolina.I got stranded in Texas, the roads were washed out by flooding.The highway patrol made us turn around, so I had a few hours to kill in this little town, the name of which escapes me.But I liked the idea of being forced to stay in one place, to feel as though nature were pressing in, keeping you constrained.So I did a little research and found that Burnet County has been flooded a number of times.

A bit more digging told me that the people in Burnet pronounce the name “burn it.”Too good to pass up, right?In fact, I titled the piece BURN IT (hey, I was the first person to write, so I get the name the story, okay?)

By the time you read this blog it will be available as a Kindle and Smashwords download. Drop me a line and let me know what you think.  If you like it, thanks Gelati’s Scoop.

I love jazz.

From Dixieland to Django to Miles and Monk, from Coltrane and Bill Evans to Herbie and Chick, I love it all.  As a kid I found a stack of 78s my dad had purchased. I heard Count Basie, Lester Young, Louis Armstrong, and even Big Bill Broonzy sing about movin’ to the outskirts of town.

Yeah, I listened to jazz as a child, a young adult, and right now while writing this blog. When I was writing DRINK THE TEA, I discovered something: that jazz and detective novels have a lot in common.

You could be reading “Hard Revolution,” a Derek Strange novel by George Pelecanos. Or Chandler’s “The Big Sleep.” Or Hammett or Willeford or Lawrence Block.

The “who” of what you’re reading doesn’t matter.

What matters is the “how.”

The delivery system.

I’m talking about an American invention – the private eye story, and how it gets written.  Baltimore is the birthplace of Hammett, and also a lad named Poe. In 1841 Poe dreamed up the first private eye in his “Murders in the Rue Morgue.” Creating the first detective story is kind of like creating a new kind of musical instrument.

But the history doesn’t matter as much as the form, the delivery system. How do the books get written? And the form is jazz.   I’ve only been on book tours a short time, yet many folks seem interested in how I wrote DRINK THE TEA. The process. Did I use an outline? That gets asked a lot. And I always give the same answer — no.

I think outlines are great, I just stink at making them. And the writers I named above have written books without outlines.

How is that possible? Because telling a story is a way of thinking. And the more you do it, the better at it you get.

Now think about this: jazz is an American art form. For years it was our only music that didn’t stem from European traditions. And jazz is spontaneous.  Jazz is improv. Jazz is creation in real time. Jazz is extemporaneous.

Jazz is.

And that is why I listed the writers above — these guys improv their way through the telling of their story.

Chandler freely admittedly that plot was not his strongest point. In THE BIG SLEEP he never names Owen Taylor’s killer. And Chandler gives all of us writers an invaluable tool: if a scene starts to drag, have a guy walk in holding a gun.

The great private eye writers improv their way through the telling of their story. And that’s why detective stories are a kind of jazz. Because jazz and the detective story are both American art forms, and both improvisational.

Now, in a song you have chord structure, harmonic melody.   These are like the rules of the song. And just as you need to know the rules of a playground to ave a good time there, the musician needs to know the limits. Even if s/he intends to overstep the limits, it’s good to know what they are.

A detective novel is part of the mystery genre. It too has rules. You break them at your peril.  What are the rules? Not that many. There’s a crime, perhaps a murder. The detective gathers clues and speaks to suspects. By the end the blame is placed on the guilty party.

There are endless variations, but those are the basic expectations of anyone who reads the genre. Like jazz, the detective novel is a fun place to play. It’s fun to make things up as you go along.

And it’s good to know the rules.

She was in the “rapid response” team of Washington Hospital Center, and they did a great job of keeping her alive.

This is after two days of ER treatment.  My mom is strong enough to survive even that!

They had her in a room with three other patients, and there was a guy next to her who was having trouble.  My mom was asleep, she had been woken every two hours by the nursing staff, taking her vital signs and asking penetrating questions like do you know what day it s? (Correct answer: No, and at three in the morning I don’t give a good goddam.)

So she’s finally asleep, I’m sitting beside her, and they lift the guy next door off his bed, which triggers the bed alarm (no one though to disconnect it first) and my mom wakes up, looks around, sees me and says, “This isn’t exactly the Ritz, is it?”

“No, I say.

She chin-points to the source of the alarm .  “And how about that wake-up call?”

Not much, I admit.  But I do think my mom’s amazing.

I wanted to play bass in Frank Zappa’s band, but felt I could never be that good.  But I did love to play jazz and rock, and I think every single person in my dorm, if they had one jazz album, had Swiss Movement.

This album was recorded live at the Montreux Jazz Festival, and the song “Compared to What” became a kind of anthem for us kids in the mid-1970′s.

Last week was the birthday of Eddie Harris, and it brought back all kinds of memories for me to hear that music once more.  And that made me think of memory cues, how sights and smells and sounds can trigger our thoughts and jog our brains until we are in the dorm room once more, on the 11th floor, looking out at the flat wasteland that was just south of downtown LA, and wondering where life would take us.

How about you?  What acts as a trigger for your memory?

Guest-Blogging Tour

July 1

Barnes & Noble Mystery Book Club

www.bn.com

July 3

Junglered

www.jungleredwriters.com

July 5

Allison Leotta

www.allisonleotta.com/blog

July 7

International Thriller Writers

thethrillbegins.blogspot.com

July 8

Murderati

www.murderati.com

July 9

Gelati’s Scoop

http://www.gelatisscoop.blogspot.com

July 11

Spinetingler

www.spinetinglermag.com

July 13

Lesa’s Book Critiques

lesasbookcritiques.blogspot.com

July 14

Criminal Minds

7criminalminds.blogspot.com

July 15

Page 69

page69test.blogspot.com

July 18

Jen’s Book Thoughts

www.jensbookthoughts.com

July 20

The Rap Sheet

http://therapsheet.blogspot.com/

July 22

Writers Read

whatarewritersreading.blogspot.com

July 31

The Lipstick Chronicles

thelipstickchronicles.typepad.com