The Smell--part deux

Those who know my books know that I don't write horror--just good historical mysteries, some with a touch of humor and romance. However I'm now in the middle of a horror story... bring in scary music.

It's called The Smell from the Purse. (raise level of scary music)

Two weeks ago I was in Morocco and they specialize in the loveliest leather you've ever seen--bright colored slippers and purses--hot pink, orange, lime green, turquoise. So I had to have one, even though I had been to the tannery and seen and smelled the process. Can you believe that the pelts are cleaned in vats of lye and pigeon droppings? I'm not making this up. There is an actual profession of keeping pigeons for their droppings in Morocco. And the bag smells as if it had spent its early life in such an environment.

And it wasn't as if I hadn't been warned. My friend Katherine Neville (she of those wonderful books The Eight and The Fire) knows Morocco well. The leather will smell, she told me. But did I listen? Noooo.  I saw this really cute purse, in this years bright orange and I bargained for it. It was only when I had it back in the hotel room that I noticed the lingering odour. So I sealed it in a plastic bag until I got home.

Then I asked for help on Twitter and Facebook. Got lots of wonderful advice--crumpled newspaper, baking soda, kitty litter, leaving out in the sun... all seem to be working. But I think the best tip was from a friend on the trip. He said "spray it with your favorite perfume so that if you smell anything, it will be that."  So I'm about to decide whether it should be L'air du Temps or Fidgi or Anais Anais  ... you see I have old fashioned taste in perfumes.  I'll let you know whether this works or not. I'm determined not to throw the purse away.

The End is in Sight

Today I hope to write those fabulous words THE END on my next Lady Georgie mystery. Of course it will not be the end. It will be the end of the first draft, to be followed by intense revision which includes reading out loud (boy, don't those clumsy sentenses and repeated words jump off the page) having trusted readers read it, enduring a battle with my husband as he does a line by line edit and tries to make me change things I don't want to change... and finally the rewrite and off to the publisher, hopefully within the next three weeks.

But once I've got that first draft down the load becomes lighter. I know the story is there. It just needs a little tweeking--rather like a dressmaker who does the final fitting with some small nips and tucks to make it perfect. And it's been such a fun story--most of it taking place in Nice (where I did all that gruelling research under a hot Mediterranean sun), and it involves a stolen royal necklace, a handsome marquis who may or may not take the place of Darcy, naughty parties and various bodies. Oh, and Coco Chanel. What more could anyone want. Great food, fine wines, lovely fashions, sex and violence. it's bound to be a hit, isn't it?

The TwentyFirst Century Writers Life

I'm a writer--and what I want to do is sit at my desk and write books. But I'm just back from vacation and the next two months have a schedule that would make the queen of England turn pale. Because these days writing is only half of an author's life. The other half involves selling the books.
Now you might naively think that selling the books is the job of the publisher and bookseller. Unfortunately it's also become a requirement of the author. When you have time check out my schedule at http://www.rhysbowen.com/ and click on Events. See what I mean?

I have two white boards next to my desk which started off as tools for me to jot down ideas and plot points as I wrote. They have been taken over as to-do lists. What I see before me at the moment is:
send out paper invitations to 50 people for launch party
send out email invites next week to about another hundred
make sure store has specially requested advance copies Royal Blood for event at Festival of Wales
coordinate with friend who want to fit in lunch at Festival of Wales in Portland
Coordinate with man who wants to fit in Welsh Society after event in Kansas City
Hair appointment before launch party.
Get handouts printed for fall events.
Arrange prizes for various events (vampire themed?)
2 guest blogs, 2 interviews, one radio as of now.
This doesn't include daily Facebook and Twitter stuff and regular fan letters.
And this is before I am on the road and doing pretty much an event a night for the month of September.

You might tell me that all this is my choice, and in a way that's true. There are some writers who never leave home, who hate to travel and hate meeting people. Some of them do pretty well. However when one is not Sue Grafton or Janet Evanovich the object is to try and make some of those bestseller lists so that the publisher sits up and takes notice. And unless that publisher is prepared to spend a hundred thousand or so on publicity the only way to be noticed is by personal contact and word of mouth. Someone finds my book, reads it and recommends it to a friend. It's building readers one at a time and it takes a lot of effort.

However in today's brutal world of publishing writers whose readership is not constantly growing find themselves axed. Besides, I have to confess that the personal contact with readers is one of the things I have come to cherish. To be in a strange city and have someone come up to me with all my books and ask if I mind signing the whole lot--well, that is special. When someone tells me that my book just got them through a difficult time, it makes the getting up at 4 a.m. to catch the 6 a.m. flight worthwile.

Once September starts I'll try to blog daily about my travels and I look foward to meeting many of you.

Recharging the Well

I'm heading to London today for a really BIG event: a reunion with 25 college sisters, some of whom I haven't seen for over 40 years. We are celebrating the arrival of the day we met, long ago in the sixties. We have arraged to stay in our old college dorms, we're eating one night in a local chinese restaurant (because going out for chinese food was about the only thing we could afford those days\) and we have a caterer coming in for the big meal on Saturday night. I'm currently staying with my two best friends from college and we've had some fabulous build-up days together but this morning we ste off with anticipation of two days of fun, food, drink and much laughter.

I've been away for six weeks and I'm finally ready to go home. I have the last third of a book to finish and my batteries have been recharged so that I think I can breeze through it.. Sometimes it takes foreign experiences, new lifestyles to take me out of myself enough that things become clear and I'm ready to go on.

I have two weeks after I get home before the chaos starts for the launch of Royal Blood and I'm zooming all over the country again. I don't think I'll finish the book in that time but I'd like to get a big chunk done so that the end is in sight.

I'll be putting up my fall schedule on my website next week, so look for where I' m going to be speaking.