Author Archives: Carolyn

Quake Anniversary: December 16, 1811

Carolyn Mulford Posted on by

The first quake rousted from bed most people within 50 miles of New Madrid and ended the French community’s Sunday dance. While residents of the diverse Mississippi river port fled from their shaking or collapsing houses, people as far away as Quebec, Washington, D.C., and Savannah felt the earthquake’s reach.

December 16, 1811, marked the beginning of a series of three powerful quakes, more than a dozen major aftershocks, and, by the Ides of March 1812, almost 1,900 tremors. With the epicenter near southeast Missouri and northeast Arkansas, the quakes terrified residents in these and bordering states.

In New Madrid, brick homes and chimneys crumbled. Log homes fared better, but many caught fire. Giant trees split up the middle. Sand boils erupted. Ravines appeared. Lakes formed and drained. Furrows resembling giant waves disturbed the fields. A stench rose from the eruption of rotted vegetation and gases.

The river became deadly. It ran backwards, carrying flatboats upstream or capsizing them. Oceanic waves swamped canoes. Falls formed. Giant trees from the banks and dead ones dislodged from the river floor clogged the water. The water rose like a tide at night, forcing boaters to cut their moorings to avoid being dragged under.

The striking facts of this frontier tragedy led me to write a novel, Thunder Beneath My Feet, about how six young people worked together to survive.

Few Americans will note the quakes’ anniversary—or realize they will come again.

—Carolyn Mulford

Giveaway of Show Me the Gold

Carolyn Mulford Posted on by

Even if you’ve already read Show Me the Gold in hardback, you may want to sign up for a chance to win an autographed copy of the new paperback edition on Goodreads.com. A book makes a good Christmas gift.

To enter the giveaway, go to https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/22945313-show-me-the-gold-3. smtg-box-img_0326

Gold is the third book in the series, the story that starts with Phoenix and Annalynn staking out a country graveyard to catch vandals. By the end of the first chapter, the women take part in a shootout with bank robbers holed up in an abandoned farmhouse. You can read the first chapter on my Show Me Mysteries page.

The paperback edition is a Worldwide Mystery selection for December. It’s sold only from the Harlequin website: http://www.harlequin.com/storeitem.html?iid=68332.

—Carolyn Mulford

Preview of Book 5: The Sinister Snowman

Carolyn Mulford Posted on by

This week I proofed the galleys of Show Me the Sinister Snowman, the fifth in my series. That prompted me to add a page for the book under Show Me Mysteries and post the first chapter.

This book starts right after Annalynn Carr Keyser completes her extended appointment as acting sheriff of Vandiver County, Missouri. She and former covert operative Phoenix Smith expect to build up their new Coping After Crime foundation, which Phoenix created to give Annalynn a job while she prepares to run for the U.S. House of Representatives.

Phoenix intends to leave the boring applications for assistance to Annalynn, but Phoenix goes into high gear to help a young woman hiding from her abusive husband.

To complicate matters, Phoenix must play deputy again when Achilles, her K-9 dropout, sniffs out a murder weapon at the scene of a congressman’s “accidental” death. She suspects either a corrupt political insider or the young wife’s jealous husband caused this death.

The investigation compels Phoenix to go with Annalynn, who hopes to run for the vacant House seat, to a political gathering at the late congressman’s isolated ante-bellum mansion. A blizzard traps the women there with a bevy of suspects.

Advance reader copies will go to reviewers soon. Cave Hollow Press, which took over the series after Five Star dropped its mystery line, will release Show Me the Sinister Snowman next spring.

—Carolyn Mulford

Show Me the Gold Now in Paperback

Carolyn Mulford Posted on by

To help you with your holiday shopping, Harlequin Worldwide Mystery has released the paperback edition of Show Me the Gold for sale on its direct-to-consumer website, http://www.harlequin.com/storeitem.html?iid=68332.

The third book in the series, Gold literally starts with a bang and presents new personal problems for Phoenix. Reviewer P. J. Coldren wrote, “There are several sub-plots to hold the reader’s attention; this is one of the hallmarks of a seasoned mystery writer. Nobody’s life has only one thing going on in it at any given time. People in mystery novels need to have more in their life than a mystery to solve. The setting is rural Missouri, although any rural community would probably work just as well. There is enough back story to move the reader along, and yet not quite enough—this makes most readers want to go back and read the first two in the series.”

Here’s how HWM describes the plot on the back cover.

 

UNDER SUSPICION 

Former CIA agent Phoenix Smith is on a stakeout with acting Laycock, Missouri, sheriff Annalynn Keyser, when Keyser is called to a neighboring county. A gang of bank robbers are holed up in an abandoned farmhouse and the local cops need all hands on deck. After a harrowing shootout, a man is dead, another wounded, and the FBI thinks Phoenix—the only one with a gun but no badge—took off with a fortune in gold bullion.

Three members of the notorious Cantree clan were wanted for a previous bank heist in Ohio. Now the lone survivor is out for revenge. As Phoenix fights to clear her name, an old friend solicits her help in a shocking case of elder neglect. Can Phoenix stop the abuse, find the precious South African coins, and elude a stone-cold killer who’s got one last bullet with Phoenix’s name on it?

 

HWM also offers the paperback edition of the second book, Show Me the Deadly Deer, at harlequin.com. The hardcover editions of all four books (published by Five Star/Gale, Cengage) remain available.

—Carolyn Mulford

Judy Hogan Makes Community a Character

Carolyn Mulford Posted on by

A mystery series must have a strong protagonist. For Judy Hogan’s Penny Weaver series, that’s a middle-aged poet/teacher and activist who marries a Welsh police officer and moves back and forth between a Welsh village and rural North Carolina.

In the latest book, Nuclear Apples?, Penny remains the point-of-view character, but the real protagonist is the diverse community of activists fighting dangerous practices in a local nuclear power plant.

nuclear-apples-front-cover-jpg-lo-res-5-18-16

Almost anyone who has taught has seen a class take on a collective personality without submerging the individuals. The author shows this same collective personality in her activists, who include a toddler eager to break all his parent’s rules on healthy eating, teenagers finding love in an apple orchard, and an ingenious deputy determined to protect the activists during demonstrations.

The collective and individual personalities stand out in scenes in which they gather to plan—and to eat. Writing a scene that the reader follows without pause is easy when you have only two or three people. Portraying a group of people sharing a meal takes considerable skill. Picture those grand Downton Abbey meals where the camera shows a wide shot and then focuses on speakers in turn in a seamless scene. The author accomplishes the same feat without visual aids.

She gives a cast list at the beginning, and I groaned in anticipation of having to refer back to it to keep so many people straight. To my surprise, I didn’t. Several times I had to stop to think which wife went with which husband, and I lost track of who was older or younger and who was black or white. But that’s part of the point. It doesn’t matter.

The most memorable interactions are those between family members caught up in personal crises as they link lives to fight for the community. Penny stays in the middle of it all.

Nuclear Apples? is available in Kindle and print editions.

—Carolyn Mulford

What Makes a Mystery Memorable

Carolyn Mulford Posted on by

What are your favorite mystery series and why?

I posed that question on Facebook and a Sisters in Crime list to confirm my own observations and help me prepare a session on writing a mystery series. Eighteen mystery lovers responded, most women and most naming two or three favorite writers or series. Few of them said why.

One who did was author Eleanor Cawood Jones. She wrote, “I look for in-depth characters and amazing settings. Carolyn Hart’s Henrie O, Blaize Clements’ catsitter mysteries, Mary Daheim’s Alpine, Susan Wittig Albert’s China Bayles series. The lead characters in each of those have a past and a story to tell. Maybe even a dark story.”

Author Grace Topping also stressed the importance of character, saying, “My favorites are Jacqueline Winspear’s Maisie Dobbs series and Anne Perry’s William Monk series. I particularly like these two series because of the depth of the characters and the wisdom that each of the authors imparts.”

Beth Schmelzer reads for various qualities. She likes the humor in books by Marcia Talley and Elaine Viets, the fast-paced plots and fascinating dialogue in both of Hank Ryan’s series, the relationships and frightening plots in Julie Spenser-Flemings’ books, and “the twists of a dog narrating” in Spenser Quinn’s Chet and Bernie series. Beth also named a series I want to explore: “Arianna Franklin’s unique protagonist who solves crimes in Great Britain with the knowledge of forensics in the time of the Crusades when women weren’t allowed to be doctors, nor did they receive respect.”

One of the most frequently mentioned characters, of course, was Sherlock Holmes. Author KB Inglee spoke for many: “I discovered Sherlock Holmes when I was in High School, and can’t get enough. I watch every remake and take off I can find.”

Another writer, Nancy Eady, said, “Sherlock Holmes runs neck and neck with P.D. James’ Adam Dalgliesh novels. P.D. James has a lot more substance and depth in her novels but Sherlock simply rocks!” Nancy’s all-time favorite, however, is Nero Wolfe.

Writer Carrie Koepke reported that her teenage daughter loves Sherlock, but Carrie said, “I get lost in Ruth Rendell—the way she tackles the mental side of her stories is fascinating.”

Among the other series mentioned were Louise Penny’s Armand Gamache, Donna Leon’s Guido Brunetti, Elizabeth Peters’ Jacquelyn Kirby, Margaret Maron’s Bootlegger’s Daughter, Dick Frances’ horse racing, Dorothy Gilliam’s Mrs. Pollifax, Lillian Jackson Braun’s The Cat Who, Anne George’s Southern Sisters, Ann B. Ross’ Miss Julia, and Laura Joh Rowland’s samurai-era Japan.

Other authors included Marjorie Allingham, Dorothy Sayers, Sarah Caudwell, Dennis Lehane, Janet Evanovich, Dorothy Cannell, Dianna Mott Davidson, and Deborah Crombie. Oddly enough, no one brought up Agatha Christie.

This short list undoubtedly includes and excludes authors that would appear on a scientifically balanced survey—and on my own list. High on it are Elizabeth Peters’ Amelia Peabody, J. A. Vance’s Joanna Brady, Tony Hillerman’s Navajo series, Carolyn Hart’s Death on Demand, Joan Hess’s Maggody and Claire Malloy, William Kent Krueger’s Cork O’Connor, and Sara Paretsky’s V. I. Warshawski. These present great characters, fascinating settings, and good writing.

You’re welcome to chime in with your own favorites and reasons for liking them.

I’ll talk about five reasons readers like mystery series in my presentation September 23, but the most important one is compelling characters, ones we want to visit again much as we do good friends.

—Carolyn Mulford

Monitoring the New Madrid Seismic Zone

Carolyn Mulford Posted on by

The New Madrid Seismic Zone remains one of the most active in the United States, averaging approximately 200 quakes measured at 1.5 or more each year. Scientists say the chance of an earthquake measuring 7 or more in the next 50 years is 7-10%. The chance of an earthquake measuring 6 or greater in that time is three to four times higher.

If you’re nervous about that next big one, or just curious, you can monitor what’s happening in the NMSZ each day at http://www.new-madrid.mo.us/index.aspx?NID=105. This New Madrid site gives you monthly summaries of the time, measurement, location, and hypocentral depth of the quakes.

Five micro quakes (ranging from .9 to 1.3) occurred during the first four days of September, three of them 6.8 miles SSW of New Madrid. The other two were near Lilbourn, MO, and Ridgely, TN.

Several quakes in August were more powerful. They included a 2.5 event 4.35 miles NW of Tiptonville, TN (near Reelfoot Lake), a 2.4 event 8 miles WSW of Albion, IL, and  a 2.4 event 4.8 miles ESE of Manila, AR.

No one seems to know when the big one(s) will come, but apparently the little ones never stop.

—Carolyn Mulford

Reelfoot Lake: The Quakes’ Beautiful Creation

Carolyn Mulford Posted on by

The powerful New Madrid earthquakes produced much ugliness 200 years ago. River bluffs collapsed. Wave-shaped furrows covered acres of prairie. Sand boils shot rotted vegetation into the air.

But the quakes also created beauty. They turned a large swampy area in the northwest corner of Tennessee into what today is the eye-pleasing and spirit-soothing15,000-acre Reelfoot Lake. It formed when the ground sank, creating a bowl that retained flood water when the Mississippi ran backward.

Bald cypress on the shore of Reelfoot Lake

Bald cypress on the shore of Reelfoot Lake

 

This week I detoured on my drive home from Killer Nashville to visit the Reelfoot Lake State Park near Tiptonville. The shallow lake, a major stop on birds’ migratory routes, lies roughly 20 miles southwest of New Madrid as the crow flies, and a great deal farther as a car goes.

It’s well worth a short detour if you do nothing but stop at the visitors center just outside of Tiptonville and walk on the boardwalk at the edge of and alongside the lake. I was so captivated that I took about 50 pictures in this one small area.

First I lingered over wetlands with dense vegetation, including flowers. Seeming almost tropical, this surely resembles the swamp (drained long ago) New Madrid residents fled through when the earthquakes hit in late 1811 and early 1812.

Dense growth in the wetlands by Reelfoot Lake

Dense growth in the wetlands by Reelfoot Lake

On the lake’s shore, bald cypress trees grow out of the water. Sun filters through them to light cypress knees and small turtles lazing. Such sights refresh the soul.

Guided boat tours of the lake leave from the boardwalk, and rangers answer questions in the visitors center. There a small but satisfying museum features local history (the quakes, settlement, night riders), Native American artifacts (pottery and arrowheads), live animals (fish, snakes, birds), and such local specialties as a stump jumper (a canoe suited to passing through and over submerged trees and cypress knees).

One display appears at first glance to be a modern abstract painting. It actually shows, in coded colors, the curvy routes that the Mississippi followed through the area over the centuries before the lake’s formation. You can buy a copy in the gift shop.

I drove the 20 miles or so around the lake, taking a side road into the National Wildlife Refuge. There the swamp looks formidable. At the end of the narrow road, waterlilies bloom in the lake.

The swamp in the National Wildlife Refuge at Reelfoot Lake

The swamp in the National Wildlife Refuge at Reelfoot Lake

 

Even disasters sometimes create beauty.

To find out more about the park, visit http://www.tnstateparks.com.

—Carolyn Mulford

Book 5 Finds New Home

Carolyn Mulford Posted on by

The fifth book in my Show Me series has found a new home after being orphaned. Cave Hollow Press, an eclectic small publisher, will release Show Me the Sinister Snowman next spring.

In this book, former CIA operative Phoenix Smith must play deputy again when Achilles, her K-9 dropout, sniffs out a murder weapon at the scene of a congressman’s “accidental” death. Who tried to hide a homicide? She suspects either a corrupt political insider or an enraged abusive husband and puts herself at risk to prevent more murders. Phoenix goes with her friend Annalynn, an aspiring U.S. House candidate, to a political gathering at the late congressman’s isolated antebellum mansion. A blizzard traps them there with multiple suspects inside and a sinister snowman outside.

Going to a new publisher wasn’t a frivolous decision. Midway through 2015 I became aware Five Star, which published the first four books, had serious problems. With little advance notice, the parent company delayed the release of mysteries (Show Me the Ashes from December to March) and stopped issuing contracts. In January 2016, authors received notice that only those manuscripts already under contract would be published before the mystery line died.

Publishers usually don’t want to take on a series when they don’t own the rights to the preceding books. A dozen or so Five Star authors decided to self-publish their completed manuscripts, preferring hiring editors, designers, etc. to searching for a new publisher. From what I’ve heard, most writers focused on a new mystery series or another series coming from a different publisher.

I submitted my manuscript to the good editors of Cave Hollow Press, which published The Feedsack Dress in 2007. Show Me the Sinister Snowman has begun the long process of becoming a book.

Meanwhile I’m working on a new series and considering some short stories (maybe one told from Achilles’ point of view?) and novellas featuring Phoenix and friends.

—Carolyn Mulford

Reviewers Recommend Novel for All Ages

Carolyn Mulford Posted on by

Who are the readers for Thunder Beneath My Feet? Reviewers have recommended it for tweens through adults. Just what I wanted to hear.

When I planned a story set during the New Madrid earthquakes of 1811-1812, I chose to tell it through the eyes of a teenage girl who must grow up overnight and make judgment calls few adults face. I pictured readers as young as fourth graders and expected most to be sixth to eighth graders. I hoped anyone who likes history would enjoy watching the major characters, who range in age from ten to mid twenties, deal with danger and individual and cultural differences.

Below are excerpts from three recent reviews.

The Historical Novels Review, Issue 77, August 2016 (https://historicalnovelsociety.org/reviews/thunder-beneath-my-feet/): “Thunder Beneath My Feet is a charming novel with a strong historical setting. The landscape, characters, and manners of speech all set the tone perfectly.  … the story is made intriguing by its diverse characters and well-visualized time period.

“I would recommend this book to my daughter, particularly when she learns about pioneer life in school. I must admit that I had no idea about these events! The story is meticulously researched and will entertain (and educate!) readers from tweens to adults.”

Boundless Book Reviews, June 30, 2016 (bit.ly/29dEjKF): “This suspenseful drama hooked me from the first page and I read it within two days, I just could not put it down. I highly recommend Thunder Beneath My Feet; this is one of those rare books everyone can enjoy. I absolutely loved it and give it 5 Boundless Stars.”

Missouri Life, August-September 2016: “If you’re a fan of the Titanic movie, then you will love Carolyn Mulford’s fictional story of a tragedy that struck Missouri 205 years ago.”

—Carolyn Mulford

Killing Chickens

Carolyn Mulford Posted on by

I wrote The Feedsack Dress to portray life as the era of the unmechanized, pre-electricity family farm ended. Readers view late 1949 through the eyes of a 13-year-old farm girl called Gail. Like the nation, she is making a major transition, in her case from the small one-room school to the much larger junior high in town and from the homemade feedsack dress to ready-made clothing.

Saturday the Sullivan County (MO) Historical Society invited me to help celebrate a special exhibit of clothing made from patterned cotton sacks. I read a scene in which Gail and her mother perform a then familiar and unforgettable chore: chasing down, killing, and plucking chickens to fry.

Gail’s mother, like mine, used the chop and toss method. She held the chicken down on a stump, cut off the head with a hatchet, and threw the blood-spurting chicken a few feet away to jerk around until the heart stopped. Then Gail picked it up by the legs, dunked it in a bucket of hot water, and held the carcass at arm’s length to pull out the stinking feathers.

Several women shared some of their childhood memories, including the following.

*** One’s mother killed a chicken by putting a sharp-edged coffee can over the head and stepping on it.

*** A common killing technique was holding the chicken by the head and swinging it round and round until either the head came off or the neck was wrung.

*** One person always put the chicken’s neck between two nails driven into a board to hold the head in place for the hatchet.

*** Some people hung a beheaded chicken from the clothesline while the blood ran out.

*** Another mother refused to kill a chicken. The father always did it.

*** A nauseating odor greeted you when you cut open the chicken and disemboweled it.

*** The rural letter carrier delivered big boxes of baby chicks in the spring. By mid summer, families ate fried chicken several times a week.

*** Strong odors, including from the necessary place (outdoor toilet) and cow manure, were more common and less remarked upon then. One woman recalled milking a cow by hand each morning and sometimes going straight from the barn to catch the school bus.

*** The sacks in which you bought sugar or flour were a finer weave than those in which you bought chicken feed. Underwear made from coarse feedsacks was scratchy.

*** All of us farm girls learned to drive a tractor—often having to stand on the clutch or brake to make it work—years before we drove a car.

*** In the 1930s and 1940s, almost everyone used feedsacks to make clothing, tea towels, and quilts.

Most farmers had a small flock of hens up into the 1950s. They provided fresh eggs to eat and to sell, meat to fry in the summer and bake or stew in the winter, and chores for kids all year round. As a fringe benefit, the feed came in pretty sacks now treasured by collectors and quilters.

—Carolyn Mulford

Double Book Launch May 21

Carolyn Mulford Posted on by

A few years ago I was discouraged because I couldn’t find a publisher for my mystery series. I decided to take a break and write the kind of a book I loved as a kid, a historical novel.

I considered several ideas, including a book on the Civil War in Missouri, but that depressed me. I chose to write fiction about a topic I’d written about as nonfiction, the New Madrid earthquakes of 1811-1812. I loved writing the book, Thunder Beneath My Feet, but no one rushed to publish it.

Then I sold Show Me the Murder, the first of my mystery series. I put aside marketing my historical novel. I sold three other mysteries before I went back to my middle grade/young adult novel and found a publisher.

Tomorrow Columbia (MO) Books will host a joint book launch for Thunder Beneath My Feet and Show Me the Ashes, my tenth and eleventh books.

If you’re in or near Columbia, drop by Columbia Books (1907 East Gordon) at 2 p.m., Saturday, May 21, for a short talk/readings, refreshments, and conversation amid new and antiquarian books.

—Carolyn Mulford