By Guest Blogger Roberta Isleib

There's an awful lot of griping going on among writers about the publishing industry lately, and I admit I've contributed my share. Did you see the recent New York Times article reporting that because no one knows how to predict what sells, the folks in charge guess madly (sometimes by attending to a sizzle in their spines) and pay enormous advances to a few lucky writers? And what about the decline of book review sections in newspapers? Or the sudden…

I will be taking a break from my intermittent comments for a while. My day job is about to take over my life. For the next few weeks I am prepping 45 summer workers for 8 to 10 week jobs. It is one of my favorite times of the year. All potential-no regrets, but it sucks the creative juices out of me. I hope you all have a great Memorial Day weekend. As a slightly conflicted, liberal who has worked for the military-industrial complex, I leave you with Churchill's, "Never give in; never,…

This is a fascinating book even if you only look at it from the point of view of how it fits in with Robotham's other 2 books. His first was THE SUSPECT where the central character was psychologist Joseph O'Loughlin. In a sense the second book, LOST (also published as THE DROWNING MAN) was a sequel to SUSPECT, with the same two main characters, Vincent Ruiz and psychologist Joe O'Loughlin. Whereas SUSPECT focussed on O'Loughlin's predicament, LOST focusses on Ruiz.

Now in THE NIGHT…

I wrote about this on Crimespree Cinema, but am tossing out here as well.

On Good Morning America, Paul Newman said:

"I'm not able to work anymore as an actor at the level I would want to."



"You start to lose your memory, your confidence, your invention. So that's pretty much a closed book for me."

This reduces me to a sniveling little boy.…

Today, I have been very "Surrey". Played golf this morning - much better than last week, thank the Lord (I couldn't have stood the shame ...) and I even sunk a hugely long putt to get four - hurrah! I know that won't mean anything if you don't play golf but, believe me, it's pretty hot! And I beat Marian, aha!, so honour has been satisfied. Not that I'm a competitive stressed-out bitch at all of course ...



Back home for my haircut, and Lynda arrived early, just as I was considering…

Yikes, this is almost as hard as writing the book was. I'm a first time writer, my book Pushing Up Daisies (St Martins 2008) is a funny (as in Carl Hiassen funny, she says modestly) mystery set in the suburbs. It's the first in a series with garden themes.

Gardeners have to be patient so I was well prepared for the publishing process. The writing took about 18 months, the publishing - going on 3 years. Finding an agent was the biggest hurdle. Advice to fledgling writers - don't give…

Two of the last three books that I have read "The Road" and "No Country for Old Men." And they are probably THE two best books I have read in the last twenty years.

The style is unique, but well planned. The text conversational complete with some phonetic spelling,…

Posted by Deann Dweeney

If you didn't notice yet, names in this blog have been changed to protect the innocent. That would be moi. Prior to this last Tuesday evening, my only enounters with the police have been to research my books ... oh, and I tend to drive my car like I just stole it. But let's not go there. Let's get right to the story.

I meet with my writing…

The Safest Place on Earth

http://thrillingdetective.com/fiction/05_01_04.html

The Best Tip Ever

http://www.geocities.com/whitefedora/tip.html

Ceiling…

I'm wrestling with demons. This novel I'm working on has brought me to a very dark place that troubles me. The angry heroin addict with a thing for his sister, the childless woman whose grip on reality is tenuous at best, the twin succubi, the faded rock star who slides, effortlessly, into murderous madness: Where do they come from? Certainly they come from inside of me, yet they are not me. Or are they? I hate them and love them in the same way I alternately hate and…

Some weeks back, I guest-blogged on another site about a concept known as spontaneous generation—the likelihood of people exposed to the same mass media stimuli coming up with the same idea. This theory can explain why two movies with the same premise can be released by two different studios at virtually the same time. Armageddon and Deep Impact, for…

Sometimes I feel like Homer Simpson. I forgot what I'm doing or what I'm thinking as fast as I'm doing it. I'll walk into the kitchen and wonder what the hell I'm doing there. Then I have to smack myself in the head and go "D'oh!"

I had a "D'oh!" moment this morning. I hadn't realized my friend Deb Baker had a book out this month. It's the second in her Yooper…

Got into town early today and posted the first completed version of The Gifting, plus synopsis (hurrah! hurrah!) to The Literary Consultancy (http://www.literaryconsultancy.co.uk), where it can fester away for a while waiting for a report to be done. It's such a relief to get it away onto the next part of its journey. Which is ironic really, as Simon does a great deal of journeying of his…