My writing process by Joan Havelange.

 

Visit Canadian Historical Mysteries Saskatchewan Page for Purchase Information

I’ve written five cozy mysteries, ‘Wayward Shot,’ ‘Death and Denial,’ ‘The Trouble with Funerals,’ ‘The Suspects,’ ‘Murder Exit Stage Right.’ And one thriller, ‘Moving is Murder.’ My newest novel is a historical mystery. BWL Inc. is publishing a historical mystery for each province and territory. My historical mystery, ‘The Séance Murders,’ is set in Saskatchewan in the 1900’s.

I find each genre requires a different approach. Cozy Mysteries is a whodunit without the blood, guts, gore or sex. I love this genre. It’s the puzzle that always intrigues me in a mystery. My protagonist must sort through clues to find the killer in my whodunit mysteries. Oddball characters and humour play a part. Some of my stories take place in the fictional town of Glenhaven. I have a notebook. (I could use a file on my laptop. But I find my notebook works just fine.) In my notebook, I have a list of the citizens of Glenhaven and their characteristics. And, of course, what the town looks like. If you are writing a series, you must be consistent with the descriptions. And, of course, descriptions of my protagonists, Mabel and Violet.

Not all of my cozy mysteries take place in the fictional town of Glenhaven. I take Mabel and Violet on travel adventures to places I’ve been. ‘Death and Denial,’ and ‘The Suspects.’ This also requires a different approach. New characters and descriptions of the country they are visiting. I need to give the reader a taste of what my protagonist sees without making it a travel log. But the mystery needs to be front and centre.

Writing a thriller is a unique challenge. I enjoyed writing it, and I might write another. In a cozy, you don’t know who the villain is. In my thriller, ‘Moving is Murder,’ the challenge is to put the protagonist, Linda, in danger. The villain had to be smart, and she had to outwit the killer. The pace has to build, and will she or won’t she survive?

My newest novel,’ The Séance Murders,’ a historical mystery, has been my greatest challenge. The murder plot at a séance was the easy part. The hard part was the research. I needed to know what Regina, a pioneer city on the prairies, in 1908 was like? What were the customs and the dress of the people in that era? The Regina and Saskatchewan historical clubs helped me. And the newspaper archives were an immense help. But just like travel mysteries, a historical mystery is meant to give the reader a feel for the era. But it is not a history book. The murder mystery is front and centre.

The Séance Murders:

1908: Regina, Saskatchewan, the railroad hub of the prairies, is booming. The foxtrot is the latest craze hitting the dance halls, and silent movies are all the rage. But it’s the newest fad, séances, that intrigues Myrtle Vanhoff.

Myrtle is tired of the constraints put on her by her father, Reginald Vanhoff, a lumber baron, and her mother, Amelia. Her mother is determined to make her and her daughter’s mark on Regina’s burgeoning social scene. But Myrtle has other ideas. On a lark, the rebellious young woman convinces her twin brother, Leopold, to attend Madame Scarlatta’s notorious séances. They find more than restless spirits. Someone murders a bereaved patron while everyone at the table is holding hands. Myrtle and Leopold are determined to find out who and how. A Regina police sergeant is appalled at Myrtle’s unladylike interest in the murders. But Jonathan Chapman of the Royal North-West Mounted Police is intrigued. Jonathan joins Myrtle and Leopold in their search for the murderer. When Myrtle gets too close to the truth, the murderer targets her as the next victim.

Canadian Authors by Joan Donaldson-Yarmey

 

https://books2read.com/Sleuthing-the-Klondike

 Canadian Authors

I am a proud Canadian author of over twenty fiction and non-fiction books in my long writing career. But I am just one of thousands of published writers from this huge country. Canada has had a long and illustrious history of producing world renowned authors and books going all the way back to the 18^th century.

     Frances Moore was born in England in 1724. She was a well-known poet and playwright in England before she and her husband, Reverend John Brooke moved to Quebec City in 1763, for John to take up the post of army chaplain. During her time there Frances wrote The History of Emily Montague, a love story set in the newly formed Quebec province. The story is told through the voices of her characters by way of personal letters between the two. This is known as the epistolary (of letters) type of writing and it was popular during the1700s in Europe. The Brookes’ returned to England in 1768 and the novel was published in 1769 by the London bookseller, James Dodsley. The History of Emily Montague was the first novel written in what is now Canada and the first with a Canadian setting. Frances died in 1789.

 The following gives a brief history of two authors from the province of Newfoundland/Labrador.

Margaret Iris Duley was born on September 27, 1894, in St. John’s, in the colony of Newfoundland (Newfoundland didn’t become a province of Canada until 1949). Her father, Thomas Duley, had emigrated from Birmingham, England, while her mother, Tryphena Soper was born in Carbonear, NFL. Margaret graduated from the Methodist College in St. John’s in 1910, and in 1911 she and her family went to England for a relative’s wedding. She decided to stay and study drama and elocution (distinct pronunciation and articulation of speech) at the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art. Unfortunately, she had to return home when WWI broke out in Europe.

 

     Duley worked at the Women’s Patriotic Association to raise money and supplies for the Royal Newfoundland Regiment. Her older brother was injured during the war and her younger brother was killed.

 

     Duley’s father died in 1920 and left her an income of $250 a year. This allowed her some freedom and she joined the Ladies Reading Room and the Current Events Club. This club produced many leaders of the Newfoundland women’s suffrage movement. She was also a supporter of the Women’s Franchise League who petitioned island-wide for women to vote. The Newfoundland government passed a suffrage bill in March 1925, allowing women to vote at age 25, men at 21. In the 1928 general election, 90 per cent of women eligible to vote cast a ballot.

 

     In 1928, during a boat trip to the Labrador coast with her brother, a seagull with eyes like yellow ice hovered in front of Margaret. She used this fierce, yellow-eyed image in her first book titled, The Eyes of the Gull. It is the story of a thirty-year-old woman who wants to escape her outport life and leave an overpowering mother.

 

     Margaret’s second novel, Cold Pastoral, was published in 1939. It is about an orphaned young girl who is adopted into a wealthy family in St. John’s and is loosely based on a real case of a child lost in the woods.

 

     During WWII Margaret worked for the Women’s Patriotic Association and the St. John’s Ambulance. Later she because the Public Relations Officer for the Red Cross and started writing newspaper articles. In her third novel, Highway to Valour (1941), Margaret used the 1929 tidal wave that struck the Burin Peninsula as a backdrop for the life of the young heroine. Her fourth book Novelty on Earth was published in 1942 and the Caribou Hut (1949) was based on her volunteer work at the Caribou Hut, a hostel for returning servicemen. All her novels had a strong female characters.

 

     During this time she also did interviews and broadcast talks on CJON, a local radio station. The station sent her to England in 1952 to transmit stories on the coronation of Queen Elizabeth.

Margaret developed Parkinson’s disease and her health started to decline in 1955. She was unable to hold a pen by 1959 and moved in with her sister-in-law. She lived with her until her death on March 22, 1968, at the age of seventy-three.

 

     Margaret Iris Duley is considered Newfoundland’s first novelist (female or male) and was the first Newfoundland writer to gain an international audience. She was loved in England and the United States for her novels, yet belittled at home for her outspoken views on women’s rights and her novels’ bold portrayal of the female perspective. Her niece, author Margot Duley, described her as a free thinking, free spirited, outspoken and charismatic personality in a society where this was not encouraged.

      

     A Parks Canada historic plaque dedicated to Margaret Iris Duley is attached to the Education Building on the campus of the Memorial University in St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador. Her home at 51 Rennies Mill Road is part of a Women’s History Walking Tour of St. John’s. She was designated a National Historic Person by Parks Canada in September, 2007.

 

Edwin John Dove Pratt was born on February 4, 1882 in Western Bay, in the colony of Newfoundland (Newfoundland didn’t become a province of Canada until 1949). His father was a Methodist Minister and was posted to many different communities so Edwin moved around a lot during his childhood. He graduated from Newfoundland’s Methodist College in St. John’s in 1901. Three years later he became a candidate for the Methodist ministry and served a three-year probation before entering Victoria College at the University of Toronto.

     E.J. Pratt’s first published poem, A Poem on the May Examinations, was printed in Acta Victoriana in 1909. He received his Bachelor of Arts in 1911 and his Bachelor of Divinity in 1913. He was ordained as a minister and served as an Assistant Minister in Streetsville, Ontario and joined the University of Toronto as a lecturer in psychology. He also continued to take classes and earned his PhD in 1917. He self-published a long poem, Rachel: A Sea Story of Newfoundland that same year. Edwin married Viola Whitney whom he had met at Victoria College in 1918. His first traditionally published works, a poetry collection called Newfoundland Verse came out in 1923. He also published a number of reviews and articles over the years plus eighteen more books of poetry.

     Edwin Pratt started the Canadian Poetry Magazine in 1935 and was its editor for the next eight years. He won the Governor General’s Award for poetry three times, was appointed Companion of the Order of St. Michael and St George, and awarded the Canada Council Medal for distinction in literature in 1961. He died April 26, 1962 at the age of eight-two.

 

Journeys by Victoria Chatham

AVAILABLE HERE

I have a cousin in Australia who loves to travel. She and her husband are currently in Vietnam, and the photographs she shares on Facebook are stunning. My daughter and her husband also love to travel. I have lost track of all the countries they have visited, which included Vietnam. I’ve been to Spain (several times) and have visited New Zealand, Mexico, parts of the USA, Western Canada, and much of the UK.

The harbour, St. Ives, Cornwall, UK.

Journeys are a bit like reading or writing a book. A is the beginning, and Z is the end, with all sorts of interesting bits between them. In the case of reading a book, I, as a reader, want to be swept along in a romance, intrigued by a mystery, drawn into the details of a historical novel, and entertained. I know by Page 5 if this is a book I will continue to read or put aside. If I keep reading to the end, I’ll know if that’s it or if it’s a book I’ll keep and read again.

The Kelpies, Falkirk, Scotland

Writing any book is a journey, and to all who complete a book, thank you and well done. So many begin the journey and then, for whatever reason, fall by the wayside and never complete it. Some plain run out of steam, having lost their way in their plot. Others don’t realize how hard it can be to write a complete book with all the elements involved. At times, it seems like a juggling act of keeping characters, settings, plots, secondary characters, and sub-plots in the air.

While some writers are naturally gifted, others must work at learning the craft of writing, which sometimes seems like a never-ending journey. What is the Oxford comma? Should I use colons and/or semi-colons in my text? What is a mixed metaphor or a simile, and do dangling modifiers matter? Yes, they all do if you want to make your text smooth and not jolt your reader out of the story.

A fascination for the Regency era set me on my writing journey. A love for the elegance of Edwardian ladies’ fashions prompted me to set up a series of books in that era. I’ve written contemporary Western romance and will soon begin a new writing journey with cozy mysteries.

A Regency Lady's Bonnet

Much like the conundrum of an author using their real name for one genre and having a pen name for another, there is the thought that if an author starts out in one genre and changes to another, they could lose readers. The other side of that coin is that an author could also engage a new set of readers. It is all down to personal choice. I don’t read all one genre but like to mix it up depending on why I am reading. It could be a romance today and a thriller tomorrow. Likewise, much as I have enjoyed writing historical romances, I have also enjoyed writing contemporary Western romances. We’ll see where the cozy mysteries take me, but I believe my tagline, History, Mystery, and Love, covers each of those genres.

Victoria Chatham

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NB: All images are from the author's personal collection.

Staring at the wall

 Having had numerous book, plot, and writing discussions with Lynn Folsted, my physical therapist during my recovery from back surgery, I wasn't surprised when she sent me an interesting quote.

"Many people hear voices when no one is there. Some of them are called 'mad' and are shut up in rooms where they stare at the walls all day. Others are called 'writers' and they do pretty much the same thing." - Ray Bradbury

I forwarded that quote to several writer friends who universally responded, "Amen!". Writing a book is a marathon that involves hours, days, weeks, and months of staring at a wall while listening to the voices of your characters. Yes, my characters have voices. Each of them is an individual, with a backstory and personal history that makes their voice unique. They "speak" as I write dialogue, often taking me places not included in my rough outline. They sometimes roust me from bed, demanding that I record their thoughts before those ideas are lost with the sunrise.

In general, a writer's life is solitary and remote from the outside world. Characters who never existed, do things that never happened, in places you won't find on any map. The whole story exists only in the writer's mind and on the pages we write. Our goal is to engage the readers, and transport them to our fictional places, and intrigue them with our fantasies. I use the names of "real" towns, counties, restaurants, in my books. Although the names are real, the places are pure fiction, and the events have never occurred anywhere except in my mind. 

I met a panel discussion moderator at the Left Coast Crime mystery convention. She hadn't previously attended any events like that convention and was in awe of the writers and readers. Being an introvert, as many authors tend to be, she had been reluctant to put herself into a setting with hundreds of people who wanted to ask her about her books, characters, and writing process. Smiling, she said to me, "I've found my tribe." Yes, there we were, among four hundred "book people", all talking about books, and meeting readers who were in love with our fictional characters and stories. 

To be honest, it's humbling to speak with a reader who enjoyed one of my stories. Having created the characters, story, and places "in a vacuum", it's reassuring to hear someone say, "I love CJ and Pam. Their banter is so real".  Having spent months staring at the wall (or computer screen), I hope that what I've written resonates with the readers, but I really don't know until I hear it from you. I get some feedback from beta readers and my editor, but until they read the manuscript, I'm staring at the wall, with an image of a rural location and unfolding events rolling out like the scene of a movie in my mind.

It's not nearly as exciting or enchanting as it might seem. On the other hand, there are times when the scene unfolds so fast that my fingers can't keep up with the dialogue and events. I hope that I'm writing something special, but until someone reads it, I'm never entirely sure.

Check out the latest Pine County Mystery, "Conflict of Interest". The Pine County Sheriff's Department is called in to investigate a murder in nearby Kanabec County when it's discovered that the victim is the missing girlfriend of the (fictional) county attorney's son. I spoke with the Kanabec County Attorney, who thought the premise was amusing and very close to current events. She suggested including a "current" premise, involving computers. I didn't tell her that was exactly where this story originated.

Check out my books at Hovey, Dean Pine County series - BWL Publishing Inc. (bookswelove.net)

https://www.amazon.com/Conflict-Interest/dp/B0D15858V6

Will a German Soldier Defy his Own Country? And Commit Sabotage? by Diane Scott Lewis

 

Click here to purchase.

Winner of Best Historical for 2023

How do I make a German officer during WWII sympathetic?

I make him a real person caught in a terrible war. He loathes Hitler's increasing madness. But how does he commit sabotage and escape the regime? Falling in love with an Englishwoman complicates his plans.

August von Gottlieb was nearly killed during Hitler's purge of enemies, when he tried to warn friends of the coming danger. While he healed, still in the army, his wife was diagnosed with cancer. He had children to feed and doctor's bills to pay. He rose in the ranks, and saw more and more of what a horrible madman Hitler was.

Now a widower and stationed in France, he's in charge of the southern region of Brittany. August tries to keep order, waiting for the secret war machine on its way to his port. A machine he hopes to destroy. The war can't go on like this with the slaughter of innocents.

An Englishwoman, with her own tragic past, is also trapped in this chaos, unable to return home after the German invasion. Norah must confront August to free her young cousin from arrest. He now watches her sketching birds in the woods. Is she a spy?

He requests she sketch his picture to find out more about her. The money he offers is too good for her to pass up. They come to know one another and an attraction neither of them wants develops.

A forbidden affair will turn Norah into a pariah, but her love for August, and knowing he's a decent man, keeps her steadfast.

The war machine is coming. August must finalize his plans, and find a way to slip off to Switzerland with Norah as his superiors breathe down his neck.

"A formidable and unforgettable tale of bravery, betrayal, and profound love. Where secrets and impossible choices can mean the difference between life and death. Truly a heart-wrenching and heart-pounding love story set amidst the chaos of war." History and Women

 Diane lives with one naughty dachshund in Western Pennsylvania