It Seems to Me . . . was the byline of Heywood Broun’s column in The World.

I finished writing my new Dorothy Parker Mystery, A Moveable Feast of Murder, the other day, and I have to admit that I feel a little bit let down after the intense surge these past weeks in completing the text.  Of course there’s a lot left to do, but the book is in the hands of my copyeditor, Shelley, now, and my designer, Eric, is working on the cover art before he gets the edited text for typesetting.  He takes the final steps in the production of the softcover version and the creation of e-book files for all the various e-reading devises out there, so I am sort of hanging around like a woman in her ninth month of pregnancy. Just waiting around.

So I do the little bits, like writing the captions for the photos that will enhance the book, and thinking about where they will be placed in the book, and I have to write a blurb to use on the back cover and in the press releases and for promotional purposes.  I re-write the afterword and the acknowledgements pages, too.  And yes, my blog, which I have neglected because I’ve been so wrapped up in my novel that I can’t think about the distraction of writing a blog. 

And then I think: Oh, maybe I should go back and add this or that, or re-write that or this, but I know that if I were to keep doing that I would drive myself crazy and eventually ruin the book that was such fun—really a joy—to write.  Understand that I take pains to get everything right, and I rewrite constantly, but there is a point where you can lose the spontaneity that makes my books fun for the reader.

I think what happens is that when I am writing I become so involved in the story and my characters and what they are experiencing that by the time I get half-way through, I am in that world with them, and by the end I am loath to leave them behind. 

Writers don’t just sit and write all day.  I spend the majority of my “writing” walking around, doing errands, continuing research, reading, thinking, thinking and doing more thinking.  Then I sit down, write what is bursting to come out of my head, and then, like Hemingway used to do, I walk away from the keyboard knowing that I have left a little bit of what’s in me unwritten; I never leave the well completely dry.  I am primed to have a reserve in my head, so that the next day, after more walking around, doing errands, and thinking, I will be overflowing, and the urge to empty what’s in my mind onto the paper will return yet again.  Where Hemingway walked the quai de Montebello and the Luxembourg Gardens and stopped for a café crème at La Closerie des Lilas after a good morning of writing, I walk down the main street of my nineteenth century small town, U.S.A., stop for coffee and a chat with friends at Rockhill Café, and walk through Sheppard’s Park along Lake George.

But for now my characters are silent, at least until I decide to make them move and talk and inhale and exhale a new story in next book in the Dorothy Parker Mystery series.  It sounds crazy, I know, but I miss them a little, the real-life people I write about as well as the ones who materialize on the page.  I had such a grand time with them on the ship crossing to France, and so much adventure and laughter and mayhem in Paris while there in 1926—me and Dorothy and Mr. Benchley and Hemingway (He lets me call him Hem) and Scott and his nutty and sad wife, Zelda, and the Murphys, Sara and Gerald (God! How I love that couple!) and of course Aleck Woollcott and Harpo Marx . . . . Anyway, I was there, with them in the Paris in my head back in 1926.  I lived with them there for many months of research, planning, plotting and the best part, the two and a half months of writing what they said and did.  Read what I did with them all in June.

Until next time,

Agata

 

It  Seems To Me . . . was the byline of Heywood Broun’s
column in The World.

What I have to do, before, during and after for writing Dorothy’s Paris Adventure

Re-read The Sun Also Rises and A Moveable Feast and the early years of Hemingway bios. Why not, A Paris Wife? The wonderful Sara and Gerald Murphy biography, Everybody Was So Young, and then the book that was modeled after them, Fitzgerald’s, Tender is the Night. And there are the other books about Paris in the 20s like, The Crazy Years. If I have to, I’ll even read Gertrude Stein’s stuff—if I have to. Oh, and very important, talk to author Anatole Konstantin (A Red Boyhood, Amazon.com), and re-read his lecture series, The Rise and Fall of the Soviet Empire.

Write the chapter.

As I have collected many little books over the years, including tourist city guides to Paris printed in 1926, study map of 5th and 6th Arrondissement to see the relation and distances between landmarks my characters will walk.

Check astronomical websites for moon and star conjunctions during SS Roosevelt’s February  crossing to France.

Email the wonderfully helpful Virtual Ocean Liner Facebook page for more info on SS Roosevelt. Email request from SSHSA (Steam Ship Historical Society of America) about particulars of ship.

Go to tai chi class

Email requests to NRHS (National Railroad Historical Society) for detailed info on Cherbourg boat train to Paris.

Email my writer friend, Michael Mayer (Time Trippers, check him out at Amazon.com), for more info through his sources on train schedules, hotel prices, exchange rates, etc. Thank you, Michael! And thanks for the Benchley articles for my book, too.

As on-line research can be limited, go to the library to research the captain of the SS Roosevelt, and hope to make certain connections, and wow! A discovery! While there, research poisons.

Research Paris fashion for 1926. Café life, economy, nightlife and sanitation, Paris sewer system.

Write the chapter.

Cross-check where real-life characters actually were, or could have been, on certain dates.

Find detailed info on the ritual methods of Absinthe drink preparation.

Spend a few hours looking through thousands of public domain photograph jpegs to include in my book, and try to trace to a source those which are ambiguously attributed.

Try to identify the face—“who the hell is that man sitting next to Hemingway?” second from right—by writing to people who might actually know!  Now, I believe the caption on this photo was incorrect.  I believe it is Harold Loeb  sitting between Hemingway and his wife,  Hadley.  So then, WHO IS THE MAN SEATED FAR LEFT ?  This is Maddening! Please comment below with your anwers or guesses. I need a facial recognition program, the kind the police use.

Go to tai chi class.  I really need it!

I’m not finished yet, because research is ongoing. And the Paris sequence has to be reviewed by my friend Jeannette, who will deal with interpreting my English into colloquial French where needed. Thank God for her help!

On my end, before going off to my editor, Shelley, I must check usage to make sure no modern terms slip into the manuscript.

Write the chapter!

Go to tai chi class.

Until next time,

Agata

 

It Seems to Me . . . was the byline of Heywood Broun’s
column in The World

I enjoy checking out antique and thrift shops, and some time ago I purchased a box of handkerchiefs for a dollar.   There were a variety of lovely Madeira linens in the box, a real collection from days gone by, some with hand crochet edging, embroidered embellishments and bright colorful prints.  It brought to mind the exquisite silk one I carried decades ago on my wedding day: an elaborately embroidered white crane in flight against an ecru field.  I found that lovely piece of art in a thrift shop, too, and carried it on my son’s wedding day to catch my tears.  After all, tissues just don’t cut it alongside formalwear.

Back in the 1920s, Dorothy Parker, too, carried handkerchiefs, and if she didn’t have one conveniently tucked in her sleeve, Mr. Benchley would have provided one of his own, thank goodness, because although she was a very funny person who made people laugh, she was a real crier.  Such is the case with humorist types.  Laughing through her tears.   Men weren’t dressed without one handy in their trouser pocket.  One rarely sees them anymore, except the decorative triangle peeking out of a gentleman’s suit jacket, or hidden in the depths of a nonagenarian’s handbag.

I remember those little packets of tissues when they came out.  The kind wrapped in cellophane which was slit along the top.  We still have them, but they always seem to get linty and nasty down there in my purse after getting shifted around for  a couple of years, and not conducive for use anywhere near the face.  And God forbid you forget there’s one lurking in a cardigan pocket  thrown in the wash.  Quell mess!  Of course, tissues are necessary, especially when you have a head cold.  I can’t deal with wet, mucus laden fabric hardening to the consistency of bark in my laundry hamper.  But, on an ordinary day, handkerchiefs are quite nice just to have along during my day.  Gives you a sense of security.  And let’s face it, ladies, if you want to draw the attention of that attractive man you are passing by in the street, I doubt he’d bother to pick up the crumpled tissue you drop on the sidewalk in order to affect an introduction in the same way he’d be encouraged to retrieve a lovely silk handkerchief.  Handkerchiefs were rarely used for nose-blowing, but mostly for wiping away tears, whereas tissues, well, who knows where they’ve been?

Until next time,

Agata

It Seems to Me . . . . was the byline of Heywood Broun’s
column in The World

I have been a bad girl.  I haven’t posted a blog in weeks!

Well, I’ve been busy, reading, researching and reading and researching some more for my next book in my Dorothy Parker Mystery Series.  Number Five. This should be a wonderful adventure, based on real events in the life of Dorothy Parker during the winter of 1926.  And, I have to say that all the reading and researching has really paid off.  Because I’ve discovered–or you might say, re-discovered, events that have long been forgotten, and were only unveiled by my  accidental trip over one fact that led me to another and another.  So, in this coming book I will be resurrecting a real-life character to join the mix of fun and intrigue, a person never linked to Parker and her partner in crime, Robert Benchley, by any biographer or documentation.  This new person plays perfectly into the dynamics of my main characters, and after eighty-six years, he will  be remembered and acclaimed once again.

Research can be lots of fun, and very seductive.  It’s hard to stop!  I have learned, as many writers can attest for their own methods, that most research is best done while you are writing your book.  But, as Dorothy and Mr. Benchley will be sailing the Atlantic to Paris with their new friend, Ernest Hemingway, I absolutely needed to re-read all of his early books.  Twice.  And, I’m sorry to say, I am not a fan.  But, I better understand the man and his work.  And there are peripheral characters entering into Dorothy’s life, people whom I know and love, and who will be appearing in this new book, as they did in reality, and a lot of re-reading had to be done by and about them!  Even if I don’t use ten percent of what I have learned, the knowledge will bleed through the pages to the reader, because I am invariably transported back in time while I write, and although my mystery plot is fiction, the rest is history, and I have to know what I’m talking about.  Hemingway agreed with me in this in that, what you leave out of a book is as important as what you leave in.  Clarity.  It’s all about clarity.  I do my best to encompass the atmosphere, the reality of my characters’ lives while building my stories.

All I will say now about this new book is that, if you liked Midnight in Paris and The Artist, you’ll probably enjoy the this novel.

So, expect a June, 2012 release of my fifth Dorothy Parker Mystery.

Until next time,

Agata

It Seems to Me . . . was the byline of Heywood Broun’s
column in The World

Season’s Greetings!  

Read a holiday excerpt from Chasing the Devil:

As it was the Saturday of a holiday weekend the stores were mobbed with out-of-towners fromthe suburbs getting a jump on their holiday shopping. The store windows were decorated with fairyland and winter-countryside scenes with mechanically driven figures of ice skaters circling a frozen pond, dogs romping about, horse-drawn sleighs winding along snow-covered lanes, children sledding down hills before forests of snow-blanketed evergreens. There was a wonderful Santa’s Workshop, a window bright with elves at workbenches, hammering and wrenching together the body parts of toy soldiers, jack-in-the-boxes, and life-sized dolls. A family decorating a sparkling lit tree with scores of brightly wrapped presents at its base; the father on a tall ladder, shining star in hand at the tree’s top, mother adding tinsel, daughter placing an ornament on a lower branch, son peeking at a gift box through a tear in the paper (reading American BB gun), small dog pulling the seat of the son’s pants between his teeth, tail wagging. A happy change from the usual fare of slinky manikins draped in fashionable attire.

Runny noses and sticky fingers pressed against plate glass with wide-eyed wonder as the holiday music played and the sleigh bells jingled along carrying the beat. Shoppers, laden with stacks of boxes, maneuvered through revolving doors, in and out of taxis, onto and off of streetcars, dodging the perils of traffic and the sea of humanity. Furs flying open, hats pushed back, gloves dropped, scarves pocketed, knee socks slipping to ankles. Then, time to take a break at Schrafft’s.

Inside the stores, too, were the wonderlands: thousands of icicles draped down from the ceilings,tinsel-like snowflakes bobbing above the expansive floors; silver and white and gold and sparkle everywhere. The countertops offered an array of glittering goods, jewelry, perfumes, holiday accessories, feathered and bejeweled chapeaus, delectable candies—marzipan stacked into images of Christmas trees—candy canes galore! The stores were glowingly lit, inside and out, lending an atmosphere of warmth and cheer.

Between the two stores, I purchased a bright silk-screened shawl for Neysa, a sky-blue Chinese tunic embroidered with a flying crane for Tallulah, a luxurious cashmere scarf for Mr. Benchley, a Russian Cossack hat of Persian Lamb for Aleck, gloves for FPA, ties for Sherry, Marc, and Bunny Wilson, a deluxe box of Belgium chocolates to be sent off immediately with my note of thanks for Thanksgiving dinner to Edna, and, while she was busy in the hosiery department, a stunning little jet-beaded evening bag for Jane. For Ross, a tortoise-shell-and-silver pocket comb, four pairs of men’s stockings in primary colors embroidered with reindeers for the Marx Brothers, several exquisite, finely embroidered silk handkerchiefs for women friends to keep on hand (excuse the pun) for any lady I may have forgotten, and six boxes of Cuban cigars for any gent I may have overlooked. All in all, I’d done most of my Christmas shopping in one very productive afternoon.

Jane caught up with me as I was just settling the bill at Lord & Taylor’s. She was a sight. Actually, I couldn’t really see her at all, just the tam of her jaunty little red hat and the bow on her pumps, but I recognized the voice that addressed me from behind a stack of precariously balanced boxes. I removed the top two silver-foil-wrapped packages and looked into two very large brown eyes, the color of fine cognac.

“You’ve done no shopping?” she said in amazement.

I thought that if I relieved her of the remainder of the load, she might sink to the floor, for her look of sheer exhaustion.

“Au contraire. I’ve had everything sent to the apartment, or I’d have needed a cart to see them

home.”

“That I should be so wise,” she said, as I helped her carry her load out onto the street. It was after fiveo’clock, and the chances of getting a cab were growing slimmer by the minute, and as Woodrow Wilson was at home, the odds were really against us.

We decided to walk the seven blocks uptown to my apartment at the Gonk, and to rest with a drink or two before going on to dinner.

I don’t know what made this season bearable, except for the fact that Aleck and Mr. Benchley were unusually attentive. Even Edna did not grate on my nerves when she’d appear at luncheon several times a week, now that her Showboat was finished.  I sought distractions, if only to quell the underlying sense of menace haunting me since Father Michael’s murder.

Jane and I lunched and Tallulah, who also was alone, was always game for an afternoon cocktail or a steak at our favorite speakeasy, Tony Soma’s.  I suppose they remembered the events of last season when Eddie and I parted ways and a failed affair with a newspaper reporter sent me on the skids to land in the hospital by way of my foolish attempt at ending my life. I’d forgotten that an affair is just that, a single event with a start and end time. Silly me.  I didn’t think anybody’d really care if I popped off. I thought they just wanted me around to provide the entertainment, as I’m always good for a fast and clever retort to brighten any conversation. My wit has made me famous; my wit has brought me into the sphere of the geniuses of my generation, but I don’t know that I belong in such a world. I have to work so hard to be witty. Yet, it’s all I know.  My acid tongue has cost me friends, too, because sometimes I don’t know when to keep my mouth shut. I almost believe it when I say I don’t care what people think. I don’t know that I’m so very droll, so very sophisticated. It’s hard to be amusing, to keep up the pretense of being anything very special.

Most of the Round Tablers are alone in this city. It’s a tough place to make a success. Most have no family close by. And the understanding we all possess is that you’re only as good as your last show, or book, or joke. Too soon you can become yesterday’s news, and we all want to forget yesterday in hopes of a better tomorrow. So we live for the moment: fast and furious.

But I do have friends, I learned, and this season they made sure I was not lonely. And as Christmas approached I joined into the spirit of the holidays.

Mr. Benchley arrived at my rooms on Christmas Eve morning carrying a large box covered in red foil and brandishing a huge green satin bow. Woodrow Wilson barked furiously at the foreign object blocking Mr. Benchley’s face, and stopped only when he had placed it down on the edge of my desk.  He bade me turn away and cover my eyes.

“The ones in back of my head?”

“Don’t be ridiculous, Mrs. Parker,” he said as he pulled off the ribbon and lifted the lid. I admit that I began whining a bit, from impatient excitement, and Woodrow responded to my angst with several whimpers of his own, as we heard Mr. Benchley scuffling around.

“You and the President ought to start a singing act. Vaudeville is dying, and you two can quickly put it out of its misery.”

I’d no time for a comeback for the sound of strange and intermittent screeches that alternated with bars of music and voices. As I turned, Mr. Benchley stood back with a look of satisfaction as the Coon- Sanders Nighthawks Orchestra piped out “Yes, Sir, That’s My Baby.”

A radio!

“It’s grand!” was all I could say, admiring the cathedral-shaped box. I gave Fred a hug and Woodrow pulled at his cuff.

Mr. Benchley leaned over to pat my pup and then reached into his pocket from where he withdrew a steak bone wrapped in white paper. “You don’t think I’d arrive without your treat?” Woodrow made a fast exit to the bedroom with his treasure.

As it was Christmas Eve, Mr. Benchley would take the train home in an hour to spend the holidays with Gertrude and the children. He was concerned about me and Aleck alone in the city, inviting us to his home for the holiday. But Aleck and I decided  to remain in town.  Aleck has a standing invitation for Christmas Eve dinner with Edna. I’ll spend the eve with Jane and Ross, and on Christmas Day I’ll join Aleck for what always proves to be a sumptuous dinner at George and Bea Kaufman’s. It was decided that we would begin our inquiries once again into the deaths of the priests immediately following Christmas Day.

It had been a smallish group at luncheon these past weeks. George S., Irving, and Harpo and his Brothers were busy with their show, The Cocoanuts;  George Gershwin had an opening on the thirtieth for Song of the Flame, and Ira was busy with lyric writing, too, for next season’s show.  Alfred Lunt and Lynn Fontanne were out of town for tryouts, and Ross had a deadline for his failing magazine, The New Yorker . I suspect the tourists were disappointed when popping their heads into the Rose Room hoping to see a Marx Brother or two, or a glamorous Lunt or two. What they got was Aleck, Mr. Benchley, and me along with a scattering of newspapermen they might recognize by their bylines, if not their pictures.

Christmas spent with Aleck, Jane, and Ross warmed the frigid days. Snow fell on Christmas Eve, and by morning several inches lay over the cityscape like a fresh start on canvas.

To all my friends, I hope your lives are happy, healthy and prosperous in the coming New Year!

Agata

It Seems to Me . . . was the byline of Heywood Broun’s
column in The World.

So here we all are once again, meeting and lunching in reunion–but this time at The Algonquin!

What a fabulous bunch of old friends.  And the good thing is that our Performing Arts High School Class of ’67 graduates who want to do this are not about to let anyone slip away again for decades.  Nope, whenever possible–because life is never predictable–we intend to continue with our regular luncheons.  To once again be in the company of friends who were so much a part of our lives is a very wonderful thing.  It’s amazing how easy it is to just pick-up where we left off all those years ago, and to discover in  each other the incredible people we have each become.  We were all there and played a part in each other’s development during the unique experience of our very special school years.  I love these people who were once the children of my childhood.  I am lucky to have them back in my life, now.  Don’t we look happy in each other’s company?    Spring.  In the spring we will celebrate forty-five years?  Don’t we look great?

Until next time,

Agata

It Seems to Me . . . was the byline of Heywood Broun’s column
in The World.

It’s here!  Death Rides the Midnight Owl is published and available for sale!  Check out all the books on the Book Page on the right of your screen.  Read a preview, and order the softcover or ebook on the Products Page.  And so, my vision, my story, my characters live on in the adventures of my mystery series—the original mystery series starring Dorothy Parker and her friends, the famous members of the Algonquin Round Table.

Yes, there is a knock-off series, but my series is the true and original reflection of my vision, a vision manifested in the product that I present to the public, and I have dared to tell the stories in the first person voice of Dorothy Parker herself.  I think she’d be pleased.  I do try to show her humanity, because she was not simply the author of clever, tossed-off quips that initially made her famous, or for her humorous poetry.  She was a complex, wonderful and highly moral human being, so she deserves my care in representing her spirit.  And so, my books must show respect.

A book should be a beautiful thing, from cover to cover, inside and out, from the design, style, and the guts, nothing cheap about it.  Attention is paid to everything: the choice of every word, picking out every one of the forty photos and illustrations scattered throughout the text from thousands.  Even the choice of the font, which is a special one—Hoefler Text, chosen to be kind on the eyes, classically elegant against a cream paper, and appropriate for the voice of Dorothy Parker for a book written in the 1920s. And the paper!  It has weight, and not what you’d find in most cheap paperback editions.  Yes, my books are softcover because I want to make them affordable, but not cheap.  And when I hold the lovely reflection of my work, I see that it is a good thing, as Martha Stewart might say.

I think that when you write a fiction novel where the action takes place during a specific period in the past, it is important to depict the mood of the times, the influences on the characters’ lives, but without making it a main character, just a secondary character.  It shouldn’t divert the reader away from the action, and those of you who have read my series know that the action in my stories flows rapidly, and that’s where the fun is.  But I want the reader to be transported back in time when they open my books, so that for a few hours they are on a ride in a time machine.  Again, I choose carefully.

So I have produced a book—manifested by my trusty team.  I hope you enjoy these journeys through the New York City of the 1920s—Dorothy Parker’s world—during a time when a great city was being built, speakeasies were the places to imbibe and socialize with your friends, the Broadway Theatre was enjoying its heyday, women struggled to find their places in new, liberated roles in our society, and sex became an acceptable topic of discussion at fashionable cocktail parties.  Enjoy the books.  After all, I write them for you!

Until next time,

Agata

It Seems to Me . . .  was the byline of Heywood Broun’s column in The World.

In a few days, my new book, the fourth Dorothy Parker Mystery, Death Rides the Midnight Owl, will be published. The final weeks before each book is readied for release are times of great expectation and great fun! The story that I have kept to myself for many months has been read by my editor, Shelley—copyedited and historically fact checked—and by my designer, Eric, who typesets, designs the covers, converts the dozens of photos and illustrations in each book, creates the ebook files, and generally “puts” the book on the market in all the various venues. With the addition of a couple of trusted family members and friends who have a first read, I will sometimes get a suggestion or two—usually to include a small bit here or there for clarification or to embellish a point. Although I always go with my gut when it comes to content and scene structure—I write my novels as if they were screenplays, with the addition of Dorothy Parker’s interior dialogue, and the unfolding of a story must be tempered with the building of characterizations, and other narrative—I consider these ideas carefully, because they come from people I trust, so I know they are thinking in my best interest, to make my work shine. Because each novel stands alone, and my books do not necessarily have to be read in order of publication, I must introduce my real life characters in each book. That means devising a dozen descriptions of Dorothy Parker, Robert Benchley, Aleck Woollcott, Jane Grant and Harold Ross, Tallulah Bankhead, and the other half-dozen Round Table members who regularly show up in my books, in a new and interesting way. When I am uncertain about the inclusion of something—a sentence, a paragraph—I will ask Shelley if I should omit the section, after highlighting it in red. I do this rarely, but I do ask. As an avid reader, I kind of know how boring it can be for a reader of a series to have to go over the same material written in previous books. Also, I try never to refer to the murder cases occurring in other books, possibly not yet read by my readers. It only serves to pull the action away from the immediate action of the current book.

Talk about immediate: I felt there was just something, well, lacking and dull about this book’s title. It was Shelley’s suggestion to change the title from Death on the Midnight Owl to the more active and immediate, Death Rides the Midnight Owl. Why didn’t I think of that??? Thank you, Shelley! Eric suggested adding a little something about a major fictional character appearing in Mystic Mah Jong. I thought about it, and knew he was right, so without diverting or slowing the action, I was able to devise a satisfying solution with the addition of one short, but telling, paragraph at story’s end. I am happy to say that, although big macho-man that he is, Eric was teary-eyed when he read it. Thank you, Eric.

I have been fortunate to have two wonderful people who work hard to help give my work a polished finish. They are experts in their fields, and we have a mutual admiration society going, which is very satisfying. And recently, I have met a wonderful artist, Rob Smith Jr., who is a great fan of Parker and Benchley and the members of the Algonquin Round Table. I met him when I asked permission to include a marvelous illustration I found in an on-line search of Heywood Broun photos. I visited his website (included below) and was amazed at the man’s artistic diversity. He is an illustrator, newspaper cartoonist, embracing varying styles to suit any situation. We chatted on the telephone, discovered we were of like mind about a lot of things, and I hope to have his marvelous illustrations grace the pages of my future books. Check out his masterful artwork at his website: www.robsmithjr.com.

For now, I will send out my press releases, continue the ongoing marketing I do most days on-line, and publish my blogs, because although the book is now a material reality, available for readers to enjoy, the public must know about it. And of course, there is the fifth book to research and write, and so the process begins all over again.

Lest we forget, today is the anniversary of Robert Benchley’s death. Below I have republished a visit to his grave on Nantucket two years ago. Goodnight, sweet prince!

“Oh, no!” I whined. “I left my change purse back at the house.”

My friend, Lisa’s, eyes widened as she patted imaginary pockets at the hips of her shorts. “All I have are twenties,” she said, pulling out a neatly tucked wad of cash from her bra.

“All I need is a penny,” I said. “Last time I left a penny, tails-up—you know, like a toast—‘bottoms up’?”

“But, a penny facing heads-down is bad luck.”

“Well, yeah, when you see one tossed on the sidewalk, sure, if you believe that crap! But I always pick it up, anyway. How else am I going to make my fortune? You know what they say: ‘every penny counts’!”

“I think it’s, ‘A penny saved is a penny earned’.

“All right smarty-pants: that is the correct cliché.”

“Well, that explains it,” said my friend, nodding with a tight-lipped, ‘I told you so’ expression.

“Whattayamean? Explains what?”

“All the nasty things that’ve been happening to you.”

“The Universe is simply testing me,” I said, discounting the Doomsday prophesy. “Last time I was here, back in October, when I finally found the grave, people had left stones atop the tombstone—”

She interrupted me. “So why’d you leave a penny, then? Why not a rock?”

“Couldn’t find a rock—not a stone, not a pebble—anywhere around! They were all on the tombstone. Had I a chisel, I might’ve knocked out a chip off that boulder over there, but it came to me in a flash—like a gift from heaven! Like a Benchley pun. I had a penny in my pocket, and what is more appropriate a celebratory toast than saying, ‘Bottoms up!’”

“Should’ve brought flowers…”

“I think he’s allergic.”

“Think it matters now?”

“There were some hydrangeas blooming back up the road…”

“Look, I don’t think we want to get arrested—”

Now this is part of the story of my visit to Robert Benchley’s grave in Nantucket that you may find hard to believe, but I take an oath on all things good and true that my friend, Lisa, stopped in her tracks on the side of the road we were walking along, leaned down and picked up a quarter that had fallen from somewhere, heads-up. This is true; you think that these things are made up, as it strains credulity, but it is the truth.

“Oh, my God!” I said, as she picked up the coin. “Well, that proves Divine Intervention!”

“Shouldn’t that be saved for floods, famine and blight?”

“Well, it goes to show that Mr. Benchley doesn’t come cheap. He’s raised the ante to twenty-five cents!”

“Anything you say…” said Lisa, as if humoring a crazy woman.

We walked up the slight incline from off the road to the family plot. I perused the top of the tombstone for my penny left half a year ago amongst the dozen or more stones. “It’s gone! My penny is gone,” I announced, feeling violated.

“The one you left there, tails up?” asked my friend, as she moved back a distance to take a photo of me with my camera. “Someone building their fortune, I suppose…”

“Grave robbers!”

“Well, if it’s any comfort, Agata, I told you before, picking up a penny that’s tails-up is bad luck.”

As I placed the quarter heads-down in the gravestone, I smiled wickedly. “So it is,” I said as Lisa snapped a photo. “So it is.”

It Seems to Me . . . was the byline of Heywood Broun’s column in The World.

I spend most of my time writing each book in my head.  That is to say, the effort spent in thinking about my story is the majority of the work that I do before I ever sit down to write my opening sentence.  This may take months of just sitting, walking, showering, or driving around while the various elements of my story orbit around inside my head.  I’ll do a bit of preliminary research on a topic or a theme.  This stirs my interest in the history of the times I am about to write about.  But generally, for the first weeks and months, I just think.  I am a Rodin “Thinker”, staring out into space like a zombie.  Then, I just feel the tension–a sort of anxiety, the impatience rising within me, like a physical squeeze.  I’ve decided my approach by now, and I know what I will accomplish to grab my audience with the first words and scene.  All of my books are a kind visual media in the sense that I write as if I am writing a stage play or screenplay.  And with the addition of the internal thoughts and attitudes of Dorothy Parker’s life, I kind of create a 3D film.  But I write with a definite visual approach and my structure is always influenced by the ancient Greek theatrical guidelines for tragedy and comedy.  I was an actress, so the form is in my blood.

I am often amazed at the creative process.  To tell you the truth, although there are times when I am struggling against the constricts of plot lines I may find myself entangled within, I more often find myself writing the words that seem to come out from the blue, travel down through my fingers and onto the keyboard.  I wonder for a moment, where am I going with this?  What am I writing myself into? And then it dawns on me:  By some kind of magic or blessing, I’ve just been given all I need for my characters to proceed towards the solution of the mystery in a unique and interesting way!

Although I write my novels with a sense of time and place, my research ongoing (before and during the writing of each book), the central characters sketched out, the modus operandi, a few venues at which the plot may unravel, and the historical influences upon the consciousnesses of the everybody involved, I keep things loose. I might create a storyboard with post-it notes for complicated main plot and sub-plot lines.  But, I often tear off the notes or rearrange them or put away the storyboard completely.  I don’t want to be too tied down to previous ideas that might hem me in, because that limits my fun and spontaneity.  In this way, I can draw from instances depicted casually, as occurs in real life, to advance my plot, to aid me in dropping in my clues and red herrings.  And when inspiration strikes,  WOW!

Such was the case while writing my new book, Death Rides the Midnight Owl.  As I began writing a Round Table luncheon scene in which I had simply intended to advance the plot,  I found myself typing what I thought was an introductory line of dialogue spoken by Harpo Marx.  I wanted to bring him into the action, but had not decided just how he would play a part in the book.  For some unexplained reason, I wrote that Harpo snatched a half-eaten carrot off of Dorothy’s plate.  Dorothy’s response led to Harpo’s, and Eureka!  The book’s direction and climax  unraveled before me–the venue, the action and the fun.

It is like that sometimes.  When you least expect it, “the gift” just drops down before you, proving once again that creativity is essentially Divine.

Until next time,

Agata

It Seems to Me . . . was the byline of Heywood Broun’s column in The World

In a couple of weeks my new Dorothy Parker Mystery, Death Rides the Midnight Owl, will be available for purchase, and it’s been a fun ride, all right, chasing murderers by trains, fast cars and on horseback.

I find so much joy in crafting my adventures with Dottie, Mr. Benchley, the Marx Brothers and the rest of the gang of the Algonquin Round Table. In a series of three posts, I will tell you more about my own creative process and the actual production of the book—the text, the design, the artwork, the physical end result of my many months of writing. Today, I will share a little about the beginning of the process. I’ve not spoken about it before. Artists don’t often like to discuss these things. There is an underlying fear that they may lose the illusive “magic” of their art, that their personal muses will feel betrayed and then abandon them, or some such nonsense. It’s true that talking about how one finds inspiration can inhibit one’s free flow of expression. Over-analysis is not a good thing, because there is the danger of falling into the dreaded “formula hole”. Lots of series suffer from this. Often, by the time the fourth or fifth novel in a series gets written, the work has lost its freshness, and is tiresome to write and for the audience to read. If the time comes when I feel that happening I will end the series.

On structure of my books: As each novel focuses on a particular year in the life of Parker and her friends, I choose a particular event, be it political or societal,  occurring during that time, and I like to use the pervading feelings, and the reactions to those events in the lives of my characters as the broad backdrop of the book. For instance, during 1925, Clarence Darrow had just defended the young teacher in the Scopes Trial, and Ku Klux Klan membership was three million strong and active. I use the national climate to underscore the plot for Chasing the Devil. In Mystic Mah Jong, you will become immersed in the metamorphosis of women in society, and people’s interest in the paranormal. The Broadway Murders brings the Jazz Age, the Harlem Renaissance, and the heyday of Broadway Theatre into the plot. My new book, Death Rides the Midnight Owl, takes place during the summer of 1927, and because Dorothy Parker voiced her protest during the last appeals to save the lives of the condemned Sacco and Vanzetti, the anarchist movement is featured through various characters in the telling of the story. And, because I write my stories in the first person, in Dorothy Parker’s voice, I am able to use these influences as a sort of sub-plot, and a means by which Dottie can express, through me, of course, her opinions and attitudes about the news of her day. With this kind of layering of fact, the inclusion of the building of a city, the national mood and world view, I can give the reader a very real vision of what it was like to live in New York City during the Roaring Twenties. I try to do this inconspicuously. I’m not, after all, writing a history, I’m writing a humorous mystery! Without the grounding depiction of the world as it was, a humorous series, such as mine, can fall flat.  And in order to truly understand the very real people about whom I write, one has to understand the times they lived in.

Like a comedian delivering his stand-up routine, a writer has to know how best to phrase “the joke”, have intuitive timing, and the ability to hear exactly when the laughter has waned before beginning the next round of jokes. In comedy, in film and theatre scripts, timing is everything. So it is in novel writing. In serious works of fiction, there needs to be some comic relief; when writing comedy, there must be an underlying serious drama to bring humanity to the humor. I try to bring humanity to the manic lives of my characters and their escapades. Dorothy Parker, Robert Benchley and their friends, were human beings, after all, and I try to write with respect for their spirits.

Feel free to join in a live chat, or leave a message or a question, and I will get right back to you!

Next time I will talk about inspiration in Part Two, My Muse and I.

Until next time,

Agata