Twelve years ago the Chicago Reader (backwards R) printed one of my stories in their fiction issue. It’s one of the stories I started developing during a class with Tara Ison at Northwestern and finished several years later. Tara, by the way, has a great story in the latest issue of Litbop. litbop.com I love writing short stories, but I no longer spend that much time on them. Either I’ve improved or I’ve gotten lazy. Maybe both. Anyway, I like this story, so here it is. https://chicagoreader.com/arts-culture/fiction-issue-2012-the-gentle-grift/
I was stretched out on the couch, watching my favorite Christmas movie (Come out to the coast. We’ll get together, have a few laughs.) and feeling sorry for myself, when Ellen shouted from the kitchen, “Your friend’s here. He’s in the backyard eating the last leaves off my redbud tree. There’s lettuce and, I think, a few apples in the crisper drawer.” I pulled on my shoes, filled a big mixing bowl with greens, and went out to greet him. He was munching on a leaf and had a Jamaican knit tam pulled down over one antler. He finished chewing and grinned. “Ai king. Everyting kriss?” “I take it you vacationed in Jamaica this year.” “Yep. And it was great. I got to walk on beautiful white sand beaches unmolested by gawking humans. When I did go into town, I met a bunch of very chill people. We partied a little. Had a little smoke. They were vegetarians, so they always had good food.” He shook his antlers. “They gave me this hat.” I set the bowl down on the patio table and pulled up a chair. “It’s good to see you,” I said. “Are you going to make the run this year? Last year, you were convinced we humans are a pretty miserable species and not worth the effort.” “Do you watch the news? Yeah, you humans are terrible, but I made the run last year, and I’m on my way to do it again. It’s not the children’s fault.” The sun was shining, but the air was cold enough for me to see my breath. I excused myself and went in to get a coat and hat. Ellen was waiting for me in the kitchen. “I made you guys some eggnog,” she said and handed me a pitcher, a glass, and a shallow bowl. “Is there anything in it? I was going to grab a bottle of wine.” “Two kinds of brandy and some rum. Think that’ll hold you?” She tucked a bottle of nutmeg into my coat pocket and pushed me out the door. I fixed our drinks and settled back on the chair. Rudolph lapped up half his bowl, then bent his head down to nudge my shoulder with his muzzle. “You don’t look so good,” he said. “You feeling all right?” “Just having a rough day.” He sniffed the air, lightly, then stuck his nose on my neck and took a deeper breath. “Bullshit, bro. I can smell the sickness on you. What’s going on?” I sighed. “I haven’t talked about it much. But I’ve spent the past year doing immunotherapy to try and get some cancer under control.” His eyes got big, and the lines on his forehead deepened. Reindeer may not have an extensive range of expressions, but he definitely looked concerned. “I’m sorry, man. Tell me about it.” “Melanoma. I had surgery to remove the lump and a lymph node in my neck before Christmas last year. Since then, I’ve gone to the hospital every six weeks for infusions of a drug called pembrolizumab. It’s an antibody that’s supposed to help my immune system find and kill cancer cells. The drug has some pretty heavy side effects. Not as bad as regular chemo, but I’m always fatigued, my body’s covered with an itchy rash, and my intestines are a wreck. Every day, I have to spend hours on the crapper.” I drained my glass and poured us both a refill. “But hey, I recently had my first annual, full-body PETscan, and it came back clean. I’m in remission. Cancer no mo. I’m just tired of being so tired all the time.“ I smiled. “But I’m happy to see you. I don’t know if I’ve told you, but your visits mean a lot to me.” “They mean a lot to me too. I wish I’d known about your cancer sooner. I would have stopped in before going to Jamaica. You got a lot of support from family and friends though, right?” “I did. Ellen’s been great. Some family and friends have been more supportive than others, but that’s to be expected. And I didn’t exactly advertise it. I didn’t mention it on social media until I went into remission.” I pulled my hat down over my ears and sipped my eggnog. Rudolph munched on his greens, but he kept looking at me over the bowl, like he expected me to say something else. “What?” I asked. “You sound a little resentful. No one can read your mind. If you want people to reach out, you have to let them know what’s going on.” “I know. And I really didn’t want sympathy or attention. There seems to be an embrace of victimhood in society lately. People are scoring ‘likes’ for being part of a stigmatized group or experiencing a traumatic event. I’m trying to be a little more stoic. Like Epictetus said, ‘Amor fati.’ Love your fate. This year has been a learning experience. I’m trying to appreciate it.” “You sound a little judgmental. Didn’t the Stoics also say to be hard on yourself but easy on others? Maybe the people ‘scoring likes’ just don’t want to feel alone. Maybe that’s part of what you’re feeling, too.” “Maybe. How do you know about Stoic philosophy?” “What? Because I’m not a human, I’m not educated? I learned to read in reindeer school. I’ve been to every country on the planet. I speak twelve different human languages and twenty-seven animal languages, including some bird languages, which are particularly difficult because they have two larynx. I—“ “Okay. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to insult you.” He shook his head. “Humans. You know, you’re not as smart as you think you are.” “Agreed. So, reindeer school, eh? Is that where the famous ‘reindeer games’ in the song comes from?” “No. I don’t think most humans know what the games are. The song doesn’t explain it. The reindeer games are primarily designed to establish a hierarchy among the bucks. The does basically run things. They stick together, partying, taking care of the fawns, and making the rules for us bucks. That’s why Clarice doesn’t come along on my yearly getaways. She’s hanging with her BFFs. Anyway, the games are mostly a lot of posturing and head butting. It’s fun, but it’s mostly for the young bucks. Funny, but now that they want me to join in, I don’t feel the need to.” “Reindeer society sounds a lot like Barbieland. Did you see the Barbie movie?” He snorted. “Oh yeah. I have no trouble getting into movie theaters. No. I didn’t see it, but I’ve heard about it. Girl dolls vs bro culture, and one of them decides it’s worth all the mess and trouble to turn into a human.” “Sort of. It’s a more complex story than that, but, yeah, you’ve got the gist.” “I also heard that a lot of people hated it.” “I saw it twice and loved it. Sure, it makes fun of bro culture, but it was hilarious. Hell, if you can’t laugh at yourself—” I stopped and took a long pull on my drink. Ellen had, indeed, spiked the nog, and I was feeling it. Rudolph was looking at me with, what I assume is, the reindeer equivalent of a grin. “What now?” “You’re a little drunk, aren’t you bro.” “Maybe,” I said. “You?” “A little.” “I just had a thought. A couple of friends I told about my cancer never once called or texted to ask how I was doing, but you know who reached out pretty often? My bros. Guys I get together with to talk about martial arts, and movies, and politics.” I laughed and took another slug of the nog. “And we butt heads and posture just like you bucks. Bro culture may be silly and insular, but I guess it’s the way men show they care about one another.” Rudolph nodded toward his empty bowl, and I poured us each a little more. “I had a thought, too,” he said. “You mentioned your affinity for Stoic philosophy. What about ‘memento mori?’” “Remember death?” “Yep. Cancer is a good teacher. Carry death on your shoulder, and it’ll help you appreciate the life you have left.” He looked up at the darkening sky. “Speaking of death, I probably ought to get a move on. We need to practice maneuvers if we’re going to fly through the war zones.” I sat up straight, suddenly sober. I shivered, but not from the cold. “You’re not going to Ukraine are you? Israel? Gaza?” “And Yemen, Congo, the Sahel—thousands—tens of thousands of children have been killed or maimed this year. Stupid humans with your stupid fucking ridiculous wars!” He spat and pawed the ground, cracking a patio block with his hoof. “Anyway, Santa figures the surviving kids could use a little something. I wish we could deliver hope instead of toys, but—” He lowered his head and mumbled, “Don’t worry about me. We’ll shrink down. Fly under the radar. Magic dust, you know. We’ve been doing it for years.” He shook his antlers and the Jamaican tam flipped off and landed in my lap. “Hang on to this for me. I’ll come back for it next year.” I stood up and wrapped my arms around his neck. He pulled me close with his muzzle. The glow from his nose washed over us and brightened our little corner of the yard. We stood like that for a minute, and then he pulled back and looked at me with his big reindeer eyes. “I’ve gotta get going. Tell Ellen I said thanks for the snack. Remember, memento mori.” “Be careful, brother,” I said. “Fly safe.” I stood back to give him a little takeoff room. He took a short run and leapt into the air, easily sailing over the hedge. He made one circle over the alley and swooped low so I could hear his parting shout. This time, it sounded angry. Like he was talking to all the child killers around the world when he roared, “Yippee ki-yay, motherfuckers!”
In a time long ago and far away, my father, Walter Chapman, contracted ALS. It devastated him. And my mother. The progression was fairly long, and it took him several years to die. During the height of his debilitation, my dear friend Dave Hosteland and I took Dad fishing. We didn’t catch anything, but we had a great trip—special, in different ways, to all three of us. After my father’s death, I wrote a piece of fiction to help me process the experience. The events are all true, but I invented the characters in order to add a little humor and atmosphere. Thinking today about events in my life for which I’m grateful, this popped into my mind. As the Stoics says, “amor fati.” Here’s the story— https://hekint.org/2017/03/04/fish-story/
This bit originally appeared in the Blackbird Writers blog. The birds are a group of fiction fashioners whose books run the gamut from sweet to thrilling. Check ’em out.
I’ve been thinking a lot about dialog lately. The project I’m working on is very dialog heavy, and as I write, I’m saying the lines in my head with, what I imagine are, the accents and inflections the characters would use. Sometimes while writing, I’ll go back a few pages and read the dialog aloud. Of course, this doesn’t guarantee that readers will hear the dialog the way I do, but it helps me hear when something’s off. My wife is used to hearing me read aloud, but our dog, Hendrix, still looks up to see if a treat or toy is involved. When none is forthcoming, he stalks off in disgust.
Vocalizing dialog always makes me think of audiobooks. Over the past three years, the audiobook market has exploded. Lots of folks are too busy to read, and listening to books and podcasts in the car or at the gym is a great way to multitask. You just have to be careful not to drive into a building or drop a weight on your foot. But with an audiobook, the text is only part of the experience. Having the right narrator is almost as important. A flat read (like an AI-generated voice) can kill a story, and an over-the-top read will make even the most serious passages sound silly and cartoonish. Two of my favorite narrators for detective/crime fiction are Peter Francis James and Scott Brick. Both actors are able to portray a story’s characters with subtle depth. My short story collection is the only one of my books currently available as an audiobook. I can’t recommend it. I did half of the narration myself, and believe me, I ain’t a good narrator.
Another thing that can kill a story is the misuse, or overuse, of colloquialisms. This is particularly evident when authors who are unfamiliar with a culture saturate dialog with phrases they think will sound authentic. Rather than verisimilitude, the result is a story that sounds phony. This is particularly evident when the words are being read aloud, y’all.
Back when I was teaching writing classes at Malcolm X College, I would occasionally assign an eavesdropping exercise. We’d all take our pads and pens to the cafeteria and sit near a table of students who were engaged in lunchtime conversations. I would explain the fine art of being sneaky beforehand, so we were only caught eavesdropping a couple of times. What we came away with was always fascinating. And frightening. I learned some new swear words, which surprised me because I’m not exactly an amateur in the field.
The first thing you realize when trying to translate eavesdropped dialog into fictional dialog is that there’s a lot of extraneous verbiage to cut—er, um, etc., along with the boring bits, like greetings, that precede an actual exchange of ideas and information. One of my favorite overheard conversations went something like this—
Man 1: “I thought it would be a fun trip, but no. Nuh uh. Not.”
Man 2: “What happened?”
Man 1: “A lot of nothing. I thought it would be romantic to walk together on the beach. You know, holding hands and stuff.”
Man 2: “So?”
Man 1: “She’s afraid of birds. I had to stay ten feet ahead of her, shooing the birds away as we walked.”
Man 2: Shakes head.
Some day I’ll use this in a story. It’s gold, Jerry. Gold!
If you’re ever looking for dialog to attribute to a character who’s despicable, morally bankrupt, and cruel, look no further than social media. Not the posts. Scroll down to the comments. Intellectually small people with low self-esteem and poor reasoning skills populate the comments section, and they delight in the opportunity to be cruel from the safety of their keyboards. These “discussions” are a treasure trove for writers. Don’t linger there too long though, or you may come to the opinion that we should embrace global climate change as the earth’s way to cleanse itself of the pestilence of humanity. My wife can usually tell when I’ve spent too much time down the rabbit hole. Then she’ll repeat the lines of dialog I’ve come to cherish: “Put your phone down and get the dog’s leash and a tennis ball. We’re going to the park.”
The amazing Valerie Biel invited me to write a little something for her blog. Advice for prepublished writers or some such thing. Anyway, here it is. When you,re done, head over to https://valeriebiel.com to check out her other content.
Like many writers, I started as a reader. At some point I learned to be a critical reader, drawn to books that were both interesting and well written. When I decided to write my own stories, I figured I oughta learn how ta write gooder, so I did three things: I analyzed the writing I admired. I went back to school to learn the rules of storytelling (earning a Master’s Degree in the process), and I joined a critique group with writers I trusted to hurt my feelings. Then I honed my new skills by writing dozens of short stories. Most of them went into the crap file, but several were published in literary journals, and three sold to Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine. Now I was ready for the big time—writing and selling a novel. I did exhaustive research for the historical and technical details I wanted to use to tell the story. I mixed outlining with spontaneous writing (pantsing). I designed an interesting three-tiered plot device. I sought feedback from Beta readers. I wrote draft after draft. Finally, I had a marketable novel, and I was ready to shop for an agent and/or publisher. I’d been at it a long time. I was proud of the hard work I’d put in. Now I just had to decide to whom I would gift this gem. So what advice would I give to my pre-published self? Slow down, pally.
Back then; I had no clue what the publishing world was like. Rejections from agents and publishers flooded my Inbox, and every one of them stung. Most were form rejections, but the few that explained the whys made it clear that there are a lot of roadblocks in publishing. Some agents weren’t interested in taking a chance on a new novelist. Of the agents that were open to new writers, many wanted them to be from specific societal demographics. Some wanted books that were exactly like books that had sold well, but were just different enough. Huh? A few small press publishers said they wanted authors with an established social media following. That first novel, “A Trace of Gold” (originally titled “Bright and Yellow, Hard and Cold”) takes place both in present-day Chicago and the Chicago of 1930s gangsters and gun molls, weaving two stories into a whole. One publisher told me this would just confuse people. I guess he thought readers weren’t very smart.
I couldn’t believe it. All my brilliant efforts to arrange twenty-six little glyphs into an exciting and insightful tale was just sitting, dormant, on my hard drive alongside tax documents and pictures of my dog. Sooooooo, I jumped at the first publisher who offered me a contract.
A very nice woman ran this small indie company. She had a backlist of historical mysteries and cozies. And she really liked my novel. I didn’t ask myself if I thought she was the right publisher for my book. I didn’t ask her what her marketing strategies were, though it wouldn’t have mattered if I had. I didn’t know anything about selling books. I just thought if it was in a bookstore, people would see it, and some of them would buy it. And I thought libraries would be clamoring to add it to their collections. My publisher arranged for a book signing at a local Chicago bookstore, and, for some reason, we did a signing in a suburban furniture store that had a small book department attached to it. She had a table at a couple of summer book fairs. To her credit, she got the book several really good reviews in the trades. She also got me an interview on public television during one of their mystery marathons. It was fun, but I don’t think it sold many books. The one thing she couldn’t do was get the book into bookstores or libraries.
I started reading articles on book marketing. I sent postcards to libraries all over the world and managed to get over a couple hundred librarians (my heroes) to order a copy. I hired a well-known publicist to get online reviews. He charged me two thousand dollars up front and got only one review, and that was from a woman who also reviewed dish soap and cosmetics on her website. I ran a Goodreads giveaway and gave away some books. That didn’t seem to move the needle either. I did an interview with a college radio station. The only time “A Trace of Gold” ever got into a Barnes and Noble or a Borders Books (remember them?) was when I talked my bookseller friends into ordering it, and then they would order too many, and my publisher would have to pay for the returns. Returns make publishers unhappy.
That first novel didn’t earn much money, but a couple thousand people have read it. One thing the book accomplished was to open my eyes to a few important truths about writing and publishing. First, the path to getting your book in front of readers is as complicated and time consuming as writing it, so learn as much as you can about the process. Learn what agents want (and don’t want) in a query. There’s plenty of information available about that. Short, to the point, and professional is a good way to formulate your query. No weird typefaces, hyperbolic claims (This book will make us both rich!), or gifts in the mail. Agents hate having to call the bomb squad to check out suspicious packages. Learn which agents represent books like yours. “Poets & Writers” and “Writers Digest” magazines publish interviews with agents. Websites like Duotrope and Publisher’s Marketplace are chock full of information. If you decide to go with a small press or an indie publisher, find out up front what their track record is and talk to them about their marketing plan. The same is true if you decide to hire a marketing professional. There are a lot of “professionals” who have discovered writers are an easy mark, er, I mean income source. The same is true in the world of self-publishing. I retained the rights to my first book and now self-publish both my own books and the annual arts magazine I edit, “Litbop.” In order to produce a professional-looking product, self-publishers need editing, design, and marketing skills. There are companies, contractors, and freelancers galore who offer these services. Many are legit but some are not, so do your homework. One obvious information resource is Valerie Biel’s Lost Lake Press (hint, hint).
The most important thing I would tell my pre-published self is to savor the writing process. Writing is a deeply personal activity that often involves a good bit of introspection. We writers tend to imbue our characters with our own traits, philosophies, and personal histories. In learning this craft, I’ve grown as an artist and as a person. It may be a corny cliché, but the real value in writing isn’t the destination; it’s the journey.
Ellen and I recently saw the Barbie movie (more on that another time), and some of the comments I’ve seen online reminded me of this piece I posted a year ago on the Blackbird Writers website.
Do artists have a responsibility to speak to the human condition? Lin-Manuel Miranda thinks so. In his December 2019 article in The Atlantic he writes, “Art lives in the world, and we exist in the world, and we cannot create honest work about the world in which we live without reflecting it.” He goes on to use The Sound of Music as an example. The story of the singing von Trapp family, he points out, isn’t so much do re me as it is an indictment of fascism.
Toni Morrison takes the idea a step further. In a 2008 feature in Poets and Writers magazine she calls out her fellow authors. “Are you really telling me that Shakespeare and Aeschylus weren’t writing about kings? All good art is political! There is none that isn’t. And the ones that try hard not to be political are political by saying, ‘We love the status quo.’”
Are Miranda and Morrison right? And what do we mean when we say something is “political.” Is politics merely voting every few years for the yutz who might inflict the least amount of harm on the world? Is it community involvement? Is it culture? At a time when people are voting for or against book bans, censorship, teaching uncomfortable histories, and recognizing issues of sex and gender, I’d say that culture is as political as it’s ever been.
Are stories in the detective canon political? Sherlock Holmes? Phillip Marlowe? Maybe. Conan Doyle’s and Chandler’s sleuths often traveled between the classes, touching on the economic disparities of their times. Or, as Freud may have said, “Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.”
There are, of course, plenty of people who don’t want artists to comment on politics or culture. In 2003, the country group Dixie Chicks voiced their opposition to the U.S. invasion of Iraq and were told, ironically, to “Shut up and sing.”
So what, if any, responsibility does the artist have to acknowledge the political in our lives? One of my favorite authors, Kurt Vonnegut, is famous for infusing his fiction with criticism of humankind. He doesn’t charge his fellow authors with this responsibility, but, as a witness to, and survivor of, the firebombing of Dresden in World War II, felt it was his personal duty. In a 1973 interview in Playboy magazine he states, “Mainly, I think (writers) should be—and biologically have to be—agents of change.” He would have agreed with Spider-man creator Stan Lee that, “With great power comes great responsibility.”
But what makes us purveyors of little amusements think our opinions are worth foisting on our readers? Most of us aren’t political scientists or economists. We’ve simply learned to arrange groups of letters in ways that tell stories. Isn’t it hard enough to keep an audience interested for two or three hundred pages? My own writings are attempts to entertain, infused with small takes on subjects like bigotry, class, and greed. Putting up with a little pontification is the price (along with a few bucks) my readers have to pay. I often wonder if these are the parts where they skip ahead. ;^)
Now is your chance to get my entire ebook collection for FREE at @Smashwords as part of their Annual Summer/Winter Sale! Find my books and many more at https://www.smashwords.com/profile/view/TimChapman all month!
“Law is man’s attempt to civilize society. Science is man’s attempt to reveal truth. Forensic science, then, is the intersection of civilization and truth.” —Sean McKinney: “A Trace of Gold”
A lofty sentiment from my fictional forensic scientist, but the reality in both fiction and life is closer to the philosophy of Heraclitus (or Patti Smith) who said the only constant is change. Forensic science in the late nineteenth century saw the introduction of techniques like Bertillon’s anthropometry—identifying a person through a series of physical measurements—an inexact method that resulted in numerous misidentifications. Anthropometry was soon replaced by fingerprint comparison. Over the years a number of analytical techniques have come and gone, some replaced with more accurate tests, and some discredited altogether.
Forensic analysis of physical evidence is primarily based on the comparison of a known to an unknown. We look for patterns that are similar, allowing us to make “reasonable” assumptions about the role the evidence played in a crime. Pattern comparison standards have evolved over time with technologies that are more discriminative.
Types of evidence include serological (blood, saliva, semen), trace evidence (hairs, fibers, glass, paint, gunshot residue), visual comparisons (fingerprints, foot and tire prints, tool marks, fired evidence, fracture matches), etc. Many of these disciplines have changed over the years and new ones have been added, such as the analysis of digital evidence like photo, video, and audio forgeries. Most use some sort of pattern comparison, whether it’s a visual comparison of the striations on a fired bullet or DNA profiles from two samples of body fluids.
DNA Comes In
I can’t overstate the impact the introduction of DNA analysis in the 1980s/90s has made on the field. Previous serological comparisons like blood type or secretor status are now obsolete. DNA evidence has been instrumental in exonerating persons who were wrongly convicted of crimes they didn’t commit. But its statistical models have upset the apple cart for a whole host of techniques.
In 2009, the National Academy of Sciences released a report calling into question analytical techniques without the kind of specificity that’s attributed to DNA analysis. The effect of that report was to send a shockwave through the legal and scientific communities. Some of the changes it produced were long overdue; for example, the elimination of visual comparisons of hair evidence. But it also paved the way for defense attorneys to challenge the accuracy of other types of analysis, even fingerprint comparisons.
Other Evidence
The problem with relying on DNA analysis to the exclusion of other techniques is that it ignores their use as investigative tools. The presence of gunshot residue on a person doesn’t tell us whether or not a suspect fired a gun. Its value in the courtroom is often overstated by both the prosecution and the defense. But it can tell investigators that a person either “discharged a firearm, was in the vicinity when a firearm was discharged, or came in contact with a surface on which there was gunshot residue.” This information is often sufficient to place someone at the scene of a crime, giving detectives a reason to look at that person more closely. Gunshot residue analysis itself has evolved significantly. The dermal nitrate or paraffin test was replaced with atomic absorption analysis, which has mostly given way to the scanning electron microscope coupled with an X-ray spectrometer.
Two of my favorite television fictional detectives are Homer Jackson on “Ripper Street” and the modern version of Sherlock Holmes on “Elementary.” Homer Jackson is a drunk, an opium smoker, and a doctor who aids the Whitechapel police as they investigate crime in 1890s London. The writers do a good job of giving him analytical expertise that could (maybe) have been possible at the time. Jonny Lee Miller’s modern-day Sherlock uses all the investigative techniques we’d expect from Holmes and adds twenty-first century technology to the mix.
Forensic scientists don’t solve crimes. They associate evidence with persons or events. Due to advancements in technologies and continued research, the analytical techniques they use are always subject to change. Forensic science in fiction reflects the period the characters “live” in, but those fictional characters can also evolve, reflecting advancements in the science. Nevertheless, I believe this statement by the original Sherlock Holmes will endure: “You know my method. It is founded on the observation of trifles.”
I have four paintings in this sale at Palette & Chisel. Stop by the awesome 1012 N. Dearborn mansion next Saturday, to support a Chicago arts institution.
