2008: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

It's been a tempestuous year in more ways than one. We were battered by gas prices, election ads, and Hurricane Ike. We said goodbye to Studs Terkel, Sydney Pollack, Arthur C. Clark, Michael Crichton, and Eartha Kitt. (Not to mention these poor turkeys.) The publishing industry experienced some high highs (as a thousand Schnauzer puppies were named Brunonia) and some low lows (as Borders and B&N teeter on the edge of the cosmic bargain bin), and here in Blog Vegas, Colleen and I attempted to make sense of it all. A year-end inventory of the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly always helps put things in perspective. So how was your year? We'd love to hear from you, celebrate your accomplishments, commiserate your losses, and/or share your outrage. Pop us an email or post a comment.

Here's my list:

The Good
Ghostworld was a trip this year. In April, I went to LA to meet with ridiculously multi-talented Kristin Chenoweth, who'd just finished doing a revival of "The Apple Tree" on Broadway. We clicked immediately. She's delightful. Huge heart, head on straight, and a laugh riot. While I was in New York doing the book nanny thing, my ed at Random House emailed me the new paperback cover of a project I worked on last year, Rue McClanahan's My First Five Husbands. I instantly recognized the photo of Rue from the original production of "The Apple Tree" back in the 1960s. Seemed like a good omen, and as it turned out, Kristin's project was a blast -- fabulous story, fun fun fun fun research, terrific editor, intensely educational legal review. Unexpected perks of the gig included becoming friends with Kristin's wonderful mom, Junie and best bud Denny, getting to hang out on the set of create-o-palooza "Pushing Daisies", and making the acquaintance of K Chen's famously on again/off again paramour, the brilliant Aaron Sorkin. He generously contributed a short chapter to the book and (totally above and beyond the call of menschly duty) spent time educating me on the screen trade and dialogueing about political, historical, and literary shoes, ships, and ceiling wax.

K Chen's memoir A Little Bit Wicked (think Anne of Green Gables meets Sex and the City) is due out from S&S in April. It's too early to talk about my next ghost gig, but I'm fully engaged, up to my neck in research, and loving it.

It was a great reading year, too. I stepped away from the sort of books I usually consume and worked through about a dozen screenplays. Aaron gave me a list and said, "Read these if you're interested in being lured over to the dark side. I think it's something you'd be good at." Too early to tell if he was right, but reading screenplays is an excellent way to study dialogue. I also delved into the seriously thinky thoughts of Clarence Darrow, Truman Capote, Aristotle, Plato, and some of the philosophical works I way didn't get but read when I was in college so I'd fit in with the hipsters at the Wunder Bar. I read only about a dozen novels this year. Mostly crime suspense thriller lawyer type stuff mixed with complete non sequiturs to cleanse the palate. Two freaky delicious diversions I particularly loved: The Annotated Nose by Marc Estrin and House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski.

The Bad
Last year, I declared my intent to separate my fiction and nonfiction identities and publish novels under a nom de plume from now on. It hadn't occurred to me that launching that fiction persona's career would be every bit as challenging as launching my own career twelve years ago. Progress is slow, but that's okay; my fiction life is a wheatfield, not a factory. The toughest thing about my professional year was making the decision to change agents. Again. This is always a stressful process that sucks a ton of time and energy away from writing, but I ended up with a fantastic agent who will hopefully never never ever retire, catch the flu or get hit by a bicycle messenger.

The Ugly
Being without power for almost three weeks after Hurricane Ike derailed both my WIP and my gym habit. We lost trees, fencing, and shingles (not to mention most of the skin off our knuckles during lumberjacking and clean up) but I did enjoy doing a guerrilla bookmobile for the neighborhood kids, and I was surprised and touched by all the lovely email and comments about that.

All in all, my year was a lot like a spaghetti Western. Hard labor in the hot sun, stunning reversals, agonizingly slow periods interspersed with mood music and dramatic posturing, stunning scenery, and over-the-top characters. In the end, Clint Eastwood speaks the words I'll take with me into 2009: "There's two kinds of people in the world, my friend. Those with loaded guns and those who dig."

I dig.

A Season for Story

With so many distractions -- many of them wonderful -- it's a tough season for writing but a terrific one for story. With a pile of exciting new books to read, the discovery of a great, undiscovered series (Showtime's DEXTER, which I'm loving) to watch on DVD, and a slew of promising-looking award contendah movies I'm dying to see (DOUBT, BENJAMIN BUTTON, SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE, and then some), it's tempting to want to slip away from the work-in-progress and fill my head with others' stories.

Not only that, but there's the distraction of real characters, real stories crowding into the writer's life during the holiday season. Visits to and from family, children returning to the nest, friends dropping by. Life bustling all around me, refilling my well against the coming drought of solitude, when everything falls quiet.

So for now, I work when I can to keep my eye on the thread of the story I'm unravelling. But I can't begrudge the real and the fictional stories of this season, the straw I'll attempt to spin into gold in more productive months.

Holiday hangover (Ring out wild bells!)

The Girard High School Bell Choir lifts our thoughts heavenward...

Mary Christmas

Alma Redemptóris Mater, quae pérvia caeli
porta manes, et stella maris, succúrre cadénti,
súrgere qui curat, pópulo; tu quae genuísti,
natúra miránte, tuum sanctum Genitórem,
Virgo prius ac postérius, Gabriélis ab ore
sumens illud Ave, peccatórum miserére.
Left, Botticelli's "Madonna of the Book". Below, Goldberg's Madonna of the hip.

What Makes This Writer Jolly

Santa may get his jollies out of Mrs. Claus (with her little fur tassels) and cookies and milk. Okay, all that AND bringing big smiles to good girls and boys, not to mention being beloved by millions.

But what's it take to make a writer jolly? Here's my list of those year-round gifts for which I'm most grateful. Feel free to add some of your own.

1. Peace on Earth, or at least my little corner. A drama-free marriage and family life enhances productivity like nothing else I know.

2. Three wise friends, minimum. Who needs myrrh and incense when you can have the counsel, support, and camaraderie of writing pals and critique buddies? I'm happy to say I've exceeded the minimum many times over.

3. A Star in the East, to light my path and harness my creativity. My star -- my agent -- helps me keep my course and occasionally saves me from myself (or at least my more hare-brained ideas.)

4. The elves, God love 'em, to help with the hard, detailed, and (yes, Virginia) magical work of making a manuscript into a book and getting it into the hands of readers. These valued allies (the Fellowship of the Book) range from editors to copy editors to members of the art department, those in sales, and all the wonderful booksellers and librarians.

5. A few good reindeer games, to remind me that writing's *supposed* to be fun.

6. The open-mindedness to take whatever lumps of coal this business slips inside my stocking and use them to stoke my creative fires instead of burning out my will to work.

7. A grain of salt to balance out the sugar in whatever Christmas cookies come my way in the form of honors.

8. Lots and lots of Carols. And Lindas and Susans and Annes and Kathys and readers by any other name. May I never lose sight of the fact that they're out there, plunking down their hard-earned money for the chance to read my stories. May I never indulge myself at their expense and lose the faith entrusted to me.

Thanks to each and every one of you, and to those of you who stop by the blog and share my journey as well as Joni's. I'll be taking a few days away from the desk, but I wish all of you the merriest of Christmases and the happiest and most productive of New Years.

My attorney has read WAY too many book contracts this year...

Cracking me up today is this from my terrific taxmistress:

"The Night Before Christmas"...in Legalese
(Author unknown)

Whereas, on or about the night prior to Christmas, there did occur at a certain improved piece of real property (hereinafter "the House") a general lack of stirring by all creatures therein, including, but not limited to a mouse.

A variety of foot apparel, e.g., stocking, socks, etc., had been affixed by and around the chimney in said House in the hope and/or belief that St. Nick a/k/a/ St. Nicholas a/k/a/ Santa Claus (hereinafter "Claus") would arrive at sometime thereafter. The minor residents, i.e. the children, of the aforementioned House were located in their individual beds and were engaged in nocturnal hallucinations, i.e. dreams, wherein vision of confectionery treats, including, but not limited to, candies, nuts and/or sugar plums, did dance, cavort and otherwise appear in said dreams.

Whereupon the party of the first part (sometimes hereinafter referred to as ("I"), being the joint-owner in fee simple of the House with the party of the second part (hereinafter "Mamma"), and said Mamma had retired for a sustained period of sleep. (At such time, the parties were clad in various forms of headgear, e.g., kerchief and cap.

Suddenly, and without prior notice or warning, there did occur upon the unimproved real property adjacent and appurtenant to said House, i.e., the lawn, a certain disruption of unknown nature, cause and/or circumstance. The party of the first part did immediately rush to a window in the House to investigate the cause of such disturbance.

At that time, the party of the first part did observe, with some degree of wonder and/or disbelief, a miniature sleigh (hereinafter "the Vehicle") being pulled and/or drawn very rapidly through the air by approximately eight (8) reindeer. The driver of the Vehicle appeared to be and in fact was, the previously referenced Claus.

Said Claus was providing specific direction, instruction and guidance to the approximately eight (8) reindeer and specifically identified the animal co-conspirators by name: Dasher, Dancer, Prancer, Vixen, Comet, Cupid, Donner and Blitzen (hereinafter "the Deer"). (Upon information and belief, it is further asserted that an additional co- conspirator named "Rudolph" may have been involved.)

The party of the first part witnessed Claus, the Vehicle and the Deer intentionally and willfully trespass upon the roofs of several residences located adjacent to and in the vicinity of the House, and noted that the Vehicle was heavily laden with packages, toys and other items of unknown origin or nature. Suddenly, without prior invitation or permission, either express or implied, the Vehicle arrived at the House, and Claus entered said House via the chimney.

Said Claus was clad in a red fur suit, which was partially covered with residue from the chimney, and he carried a large sack containing a portion of the aforementioned packages, toys, and other unknown items. He was smoking what appeared to be tobacco in a small pipe in blatant violation of local ordinances and health regulations.

Claus did not speak, but immediately began to fill the stocking of the minor children, which hung adjacent to the chimney, with toys and other small gifts. (Said items did not, however, constitute "gifts" to said minor pursuant to the applicable provisions of the U.S. Tax Code.)

Upon completion of such task, Claus touched the side of his nose and flew, rose and/or ascended up the chimney of the House to the roof where the Vehicle and Deer waited and/or served as "lookouts." Claus immediately departed for an unknown destination.

However, prior to the departure of the Vehicle, Deer and Claus from said House, the party of the first part did hear Claus state and/or exclaim: "Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night!" Or words to that effect

.

The Passion Principle

Many times, I've heard readers and booksellers saying they seek out debut authors regularly. Though I often find debut offerings a little on the rough side when it comes to craft, there's no denying the power of a passion so deeply felt, it moves the author to bruisingly, repeatedly slam him/herself headfirst against the Walls of Publishing to break through.

I recently finished reading a first book, Kerry Max Cook's amazing Chasing Justice: The Story of Freeing Myself After Two Decades on Death Row for a Crime I Didn't Commit. It's heartbreaking, infuriating, and inspiring by turns as it discusses a horrendous case of railroading in Texas, along with the sisyphean labor of climbing up from the abyss.

At first, I had a little trouble with the writing, particularly the dialogue, but Cook's very personal relationship with his story, the fire of his belief in it shines through so clearly, I soon found myself sucked in (and highly recommend the book). It served as a reminder that all the practiced wordsmithing in the world can't begin to trump a true passion for one's subject matter.

Which brings me to my resolution for the coming year. I mean to believe in every story so strongly that I hold back nothing whatsoever. I want to throw myself headlong into the characters and plot and setting, live my invented world until I dream it, and never give a second thought to embarrassing myself

Before, I've shared my "Write Fearlessly" mantra. This year, I want to be certain to add a healthy dash of passion to the mix, to recall the thrill I felt ten years ago, just before the publication of my first novel and to rekindle that enthusiasm in the writing act itself.

Because I never want to be one of those authors in whom readers lose faith, one of the ones where they say, "Oh, she used to be so good, but lately..." I never want to let fear shackle my imagination, or overly-rational attempts to cash in on some trend.

So what about you? What are your writing resolutions for 2009? And do you have any tricks to share for keeping passion in your process?

Stuck like a dope on a thing called hope

Last year, Colleen and I both posted year end wraps up for 2007, and I’m thinking if we do it again this year, then next year we’ll be able to call it a tradition, so look for a summation of “the good, the bad, and the ugly” later this week.

Looking back on what I wrote last year, I laughed out loud. You’ve heard the old saying, “We make plans; God says ‘Ha!’” This was all about that. As is almost always the case, my optimistic forecast for the coming year was less than accurate. As I read my gung-ho resolutions for the wide-open territory of 2008, I wondered for more than a moment what is wrong with me. How could I continue to be such a cock-eyed optimist when things so seldom go according to my plans? Why do I continue to believe the best about people when people often abide by definitions of “right” and “truth” and “friend” that vary widely from mine. Am I in denial? Or delusional? Or just plain dumb?

Novelist James Branch Cabell wrote in The Silver Stallion, “The optimist proclaims we live in the best of all possible worlds; and the pessimist fears this is true.” I'm somewhere in the middle, but tend to swing hopeful. It’s not that I’ve failed to learn harsh lessons about the publishing business; it’s that I’ve succeeded in learning lessons about a benevolent universe, a loving God whose hand is on me, and the topsy-turvy way things always seem to work out. And it’s not dumb luck. Antonio Gamsci said in his Letters from Prison, “I’m a pessimist because of intelligence, but an optimist because of will.”

Bottom lining it, optimism is born of gratitude, and gratitude is a conscious choice, an act of will.

Keep talkin' that happy talk.

Saturday morning video: William Shatner in "It seemed like a good idea at the production meeting..."

So what lesson may we as writers extrapolate?

1) Stick with what you do best.

2) Don't let yourself get talked into a project you know is not for you.

3) If you're going to go down in flames, go down boldly. And with a sense of humor.

The tough get going! (Three things to keep in mind as you forge fearlessly into the New Year)

Seems like every conversation I have with a publishing industry colleague these days -- my agent, editors, a PR diva, fellow writers -- there's one common thread: deep abiding fear. The book business is difficult in the best of circumstances, and when the economy goes south, we're among those who feel the first (and the worst) effects. Anybody who isn't deeply concerned right now is not paying attention.

Last time I felt this vibe ribble through the book world was after 9/11. I'd just had a book come out in February of 2001; Bald in the Land of Big Hair was my third book to be published, but it was my first with a big NY house, and because the subject matter was so personal (it's a memoir about how my cancer experience led me to become a writer) I was strongly emotionally invested in the project. Harper Collins sent me on my first real book tour that spring, the publicity echo pinged and picked up speed through the summer as one terrific review after another popped up and book clubs started reading and recommending the book. As autumn approached, speaking gigs started falling into place. I was thrilled. My editor was optimistic (which is as thrilled as most editors ever get). I'd gotten a respectable advance for the book, so 2001 was the first year I was able to say that I earned more as an author than I would have as a secretary. And since the book had earned out in subrights prior to pub, I was confident I'd be able to say the same in 2002. I'd be able to say that I'd made a living writing.

I was scheduled to speak at a fundraiser in NYC the first week of October, and the first inkling I had that something was terribly wrong on that terrible September morning was an email from the event coordinator.

"Did you get my last message? Our power is being weird. I think there's a fire or something up the street." And a few minutes later, she wrote: "Something is seriously happening. Plane crash at the World Trade Center. I think our venue might be affected. I'll let you know of any change in schedule." Over the next several hours, I received a series of bizarre messages from her as she made her way home on foot through the chaos and smoke. "I think we should definitely do book sales during the break right after you speak. I'll have staff on hand to help. This is really bad here. Hard to breath but we had to run for a while." Late that night, she emailed me one last time: "I think we will have to cancel the event. People were falling."

Of course, the event was cancelled, but they'd provided me with a nonrefundable plane ticket, so a few weeks later, I went to NY anyway, walked around town, visited a few people I know. My editor was working from her place upstate, but I had lunch with the woman who'd handled PR for my memoir.

"Everything is at a standstill," she said. "It's unbelievably bad luck for anyone with a book coming out this year. At least you had a chance to get out there as much as you did."

New York was paralyzed for several weeks and traumatized for a lot longer. Sales curdled nationwide, and the market was utterly unreadable. What -- if anything -- did people want to read now? Many books were postponed or cancelled. Advances sucked. There were cutbacks and layoffs at all the big houses and frozen silence from some of the small ones. I can only imagine what was going on at the query stage, but I'd be willing to bet it was Zoloft-waiting-to-happen because I was sitting there with an agent and a strong senior editor advocate at a major house, and couldn't coax a spark for my next book. I pitched several novel ideas and was shot down. I pitched three nonfiction ideas and was shot down. Each of the proposals took a month or two to write, so we were now well into 2002, and I had nothing in the pipeline.

Deep. Abiding. Fear.

Thinking about it this week, I identified three things I could take from all that and apply to what's happening now.

1) Maintain a connection to the real world.
As the event planner (whose name I can't recall for the life of me, but bless her heart) made her way through that day, she kept reaching out to me, a virtual stranger. Why? I wondered at the time, but now I think she needed to connect to someone in a calmer, safer place. That event was all we had in common, but it was something solid, a neatly filled square on her calendar, a better day just one page away. "If you can keep your head when all those about you are losing theirs," Kipling wrote, but maybe the reverse is equally helpful: if you lose your head, best to have those about you keeping theirs. After I got The Call from my agent about BLBH getting sold, I ran up the street to meet my friend GayLynn for our daily dog walk.

"My book was picked up by Harper Collins!" I shrieked.

"Oh, my gosh!" GayLynn enthused. "Will he be able to help you get it published?"

I hold that moment in my heart as a cherished reminder that there is a whole big world out there, and it does not revolve around this business. It keeps on rolling, and so shall we all. One of the healthiest elements of my writing life is that I am married to an airline mechanic who reminds me daily that flight is about physics, not fancy.

2) Be patient. What goes up must come down and vice versa.
The publishing industry is cyclical. That's just the nature of the beast. I think it's a testament to the resilient spirit of people who love and believe in books. Things get bollixed for one reason or another, and you hear a lot of doomsaying, but you also hear the war stories of the past. You hear about innovations that were birthed by bad times, fresh energy that came out of adversity. Talk to the writers around you. How did they survive the swampy markets that followed 9/11? Or the Doldrums of the late 80s? Or the Great Upheaval of blah blah blah. The names, dates, and particulars change, but trust me, there's nothing new going on here. This business is a roller coaster. We accept that going in and make the decision daily to take the ride. Yes, we're speeding face-first toward the earth right now, but rest assured, there is a loop-dee-loop ahead.

When I was researching a memoir for Linda Armstrong Kelly, the mom of Tour de France champ Lance Armstrong, she showed me an unforgettable video from the 2003 Tour. Lance was not having a great race that year. As he rode the Luz Ariden stage, a little girl on the side of the road was swinging a musette -- a little yellow souvenir bag on a long strap. As Lance flashed by, his handlebar snagged the strap. Instant face plant. He hit the asphalt like a hard sleet. When he got up, he was roaring like an animal. (That poor little French girl; she must have peed her pantalon.) Bloodied and braying, his competitors streaming past him, he wrangled the chain back on his bike and -- well, you know the rest. If there ever was an icon for "When the going gets tough, the tough get going," it's this guy. He chose a life comprised of hills and valleys. So did we. May your adrenaline flow like Asti Spumante!

3) To thine own self be true.
Back in 2002, rather than try to come up with a project that would please the people around me, I opted to stop pitching book ideas for a while. On my editor's advice, I started writing a syndicated weekly column that kept me productive, generated a small but steady income, and got my name out there. In 2003, I did my first ghostwriting gig, which was a lot of fun. Meanwhile, I quietly worked on the novel I wanted to write. When I presented the manuscript to my editor at Harper Collins in 2004, it was a polished novel, not a nebulous idea coming at her in a storm of desperate spitballs. I'd written the book I wanted to write, the market had recovered, and HC offered me a respectable advance.

A while back, Colleen posted about the human need to bring order to chaos and why that will never work in the publishing world. Doing work you love and believe in must be your prime directive at all times. During tough times, everyone from your agent to the pizza delivery dude has advice on what you should be writing, who's really selling, where it's all going. If you try to go where you think the money is, I promise, you will succeed only in making yourself crazy. Chances are, there won't be any money, and if there's not, you have to come away from a project having gotten something else from it. Joy. Learning. The satisfaction of freely speaking your mind. Once you've gotten a taste of writing for a living, it's incredibly hard to rise above the money and write for the pure pleasure of writing, but if that spirit has been bled from your work, the work is doomed. Even if it sells, the money will never feel like enough.

The downtrend in the publishing industry and the economy in general do make it exponentially tougher to sell your book right now. But your goal is not to sell a book; your goal is to be happy. If writing makes you happy, write without fear. The rest, to a certain degree, is all tumbling dice. As it turned out, the five years following that last bombastically bad downturn in the publishing biz were the most financially successful years of my career. All I can do now is take what I've learned, work as hard and as true as I can, and hope that more bad luck will come my way.

BtO on the Road

Thought I'd let you know about a couple of appearances Joni and I are doing in the Houston area in the coming months. Follow the links for more information. Both groups welcome visitors, but you must sign up ahead for the West Houston RWA meeting. (See site for details.)

Saturday, January 3rd
Northwest Houston Romance Writers of America meeting

"Critique Group Confidential" Critique partners Colleen Thompson, Joni Rodgers, and T.J. Bennett discuss how to find, form, or reform a productive, positive, and successful critique group that will take your career to the next level.

Saturday, February 14th
West Houston Romance Writers of AmericaEmily Awards Meeting

Fat Nude Writing: Find your Raw Voice and Revel in It! (AM session)
Critically acclaimed novelist and NYT bestselling memoirist Joni Rodgers speaks about stripping away self-doubt, plumping up authentic voice, and producing work that is both personally fulfilling and market friendly. Illustrating with her own adventures in the industry (starting with The Worst Possible Way to Become a Published Author and moving on to Don’t Hate Me Because I’m Beautiful—Hate Me Because I Get Paid!), Joni shares what she’s learned and inspires you to explore the art, craft, and business of writing with lots of laughter along the way.

Boxing the Octopus: Eight Strategies for Mastering the Many-Tentacled Beast that is the Writing Life (PM Session)
Literary working girls Colleen Thompson and Joni Rodgers go live with some of the lessons and laughter found on the BtO blog, offering thinky thoughts and hard-learned advice, plus plenty of Q&A on balancing the eight challenges that can punch a writer’s lights out:

Building the Book
Managing Research
Critique Group Dynamics
Querying
Agent Relations
Publishing Process
Getting Paid
Artistic Being and Wellbeing

I hope you'll come and join us!

Anne Tyler on psychic space

Friday, I posted what I thought would be the first half of one of my little parables, thinky thoughts on life and art, and I thought I knew exactly what I wanted to say in Part 2. Four days later, it's proving elusive, and I know myself well enough to let it ride until it clicks, and that probably won't happen until I have the house to myself again. My kids are both at home this week, and while they're both busy with their own stuff, something about having them here puts me in a different state of brain. I'm Mom first, author in between. Reminded me of something I read and tucked in my quote bank.

Anne Tyler: "I can never tell ahead of time which book will give me trouble - some balk every step of the way, others seem to write themselves - but certainly the mechanics of writing, finding the time and the psychic space,are easier now that my children are grown."

That phrase "psychic space" stayed with me. It's not office space, quiet time, or actual opportunity. It's mental real estate, a frame of mind.

The Coolest Part of Being a Writer

Most writers are inquisitive sorts, the kind who as children wore out adults by asking endless questions, annoyed (and occasionally outraged) Sunday school teachers with paradoxical what-ifs, and Hoovered up every factoid from the school and public library, then bugged the librarians (remember when they used to know *everything*?) with still more curiosity.

So it should come as no surprise that so many of us enjoy the bejeebers out of playing the writer card. You know, the one that gives us carte blanche to ask a million nosy questions in the name of research. And amazingly, people are rarely annoyed by this. Most experts have a passion for their own interests, and having long since bored their personal circle of family and friends into insensibility, are absolutely *thrilled* when some writer writes, phones, or e-mails and asks to pick their brains. Sometimes, in the course of asking one minor question for a smallish detail in one's novel, the writer will end up having to listen to years' worth of dammed up anecdotes and lectures.

But no problem. We're fascinated, captured by the speaker's enthusiasm for his/her subject. I once spent three hours on the phone (long distance, daylight hours, huge phone bill) with an elderly gentleman who was telling me about all sorts of cool arcania about Civil War-era steamboats on the Mississippi River. After while, I began to imagine that this guy had been hanging on by his toenails, actually staying alive just for the day when someone would call and ask about his lifelong passion. Little of what he told me ended up on the pages of the book I was researching at the time, but one of the more obscure details stuck with me... and eventually spawning its own book some time later. (In case you're curious, my two Civil War-era steamboat disaster-related Zebra Historical Romances, Against the Odds and Trust to Chance, were written under my Gwyneth Atlee pseudonym in 2001.)

And that's the way of expert interviews, just as it's the way of long stretches of browsing through dusty shelves of research books. You never know what gems you'll happen upon during your investigation. Writer who rely solely on Internet search engines often miss the joy of incidental discoveries.

As well, they miss one of the coolest aspects of the writing life.

So what's been the most fascinating incidental or accidental discovery you've made while doing research? Who have been some of the most interesting people you've encountered?