mastodon 4.6.8A Massachusetts writer, artist, gardener. Trying to return my front lawn to nature. Retired as of May 31, 2024 after working for 50 years, the last 28 years employed by my hometown as the head of its Office of Tourism, and an earlier 22 years working in graphic design, writing, editing, and publishing. Writing a mystery novel. Started talking to crows.
#writing #illustration #cozymystery #mysterywriter #Fairhaven #Massachusetts #SouthcoastMA #nativeplants #AmericanCrows
I'm sure others can relate. At least I hope so.
I just spent about an hour and a half of researching, reading and then watching two videos on sheep shearing in order to write a single sentence in my WIP . . .
#writing #WritersCoffeeClub #WordWeavers #PennedPossibilities #ScribesAndMakers
#ScribesAndMakers 20 April: Have you ever read or performed your work in front of an audience?
Yes. Many years ago I performed in a couple of short children's plays I wrote.
During the second half of my working life, 28 years, I was Tourism Director for my town and created several historical walking tours and programs that I delivered weekly or monthly from spring to fall. Most recently was a program at the historical Fort Phoenix, the fun, entertaining, and educational "Pirates & Privateers" presentation. The script of the program included stories about the fort, local privateering during the Revolution, and life during the 1770s. It was held every Friday morning, weather permitting, in June, July, August, and September from 2016 through 2025.
The photo is my adult child and me portraying Caleb the powder monkey and Greybeard, a privateer during the Revolutionary War.
#Fairhaven #Massachusetts #AmericanRevolution #FortPhoenix #Reenacting
Town widening and cleanup of my street in #Fairhaven #Massachusetts late this afternoon, four days after #Blizzard2026. This one pile of snow at the foot of our driveway filled a whole dump truck. #Dog for scale.
#ScribesAndMakers 17/04: What's something you've learned in recent research?
So many things. Few of them will actually end up in the story, but recently I've watched how sheep are shorn. What crops would be growing in the fields at the beginning of May? And I've learning more about how people came by their alcoholic beverages a few centuries go, including exactly who was drinking what where and how it was made, including home brewing and distilling. Lots of etymology of words and expressions to check historical accuracy.
My story is set in a fictional, historical "fairytale" location, but it's grounded in reality.
#ScribesAndMakers Apr 15: What's a smell that has featured in your work?
One is the fragrance of the shaving lotion that Jack and his father make from rum and the leaves of a tree that grows in the southern islands.
The other I'm not telling because it is a clue to the identity of a murderer.
#ScribesAndMakers 4. How do you answer if someone asks you what you do? Is your answer different in person than it is online?
I'm retired. Generally I walk the dog, garden with native plants in my backyard, and write.
Same answer to anyone.
#WordWeavers 16. If your MC lived in our world, would they have good financial credit?
Jack and Jill are teenagers in a time when bartering and self reliance are as important as cash transactions. All of which are undertaken, for the most part, by their parents. Jack has a bit of cash he can spend for himself at the market fayre, but neither MC has the need to buy on credit.
Neither is old enough to engage in most kinds of credit transactions in our world.
#WritersCoffeeClub
22nd Mar 2026. How do you organize your notes?
Haphazardly.
#PennedPossibilities 991: "Tell us about your WIP. What is the genre or genres?"
It is a #Mystery, (or #CozyMystery ) but the setting is an historical fairytale village and some of the characters are from traditional fairy tales and nursery rhymes, so there are elements of fantasy and history. It's written for all ages, but with the MCs being teenagers and the general subject matter, some might classify it as "Tween," "Teen," or some other youngish category.
#WordWeavers Mar 14: Is selling your work for money important to you when you write?
I was working in the art department for a small chain of weekly newspapers when I proposed a fictional column about the residents of a New England seaside town like the ones in our circulation area. (It was the 1980s, and I was inspired by Garrison Keillor's Lake Wobegon monologues on the radio.) I did not get extra pay for writing the column every week, but the fact that two very well respected editors chose to run it in their papers was enough for me.
#WritersCoffeeClub Apr 16
Must writing always be in complete sentences? Unusual syntax?
Much to learn, you still have.
#WordWeavers April 15. Is your antagonist more optimistic or pessimistic? Why?
Pessimistic and very fearful because he feels people of the kingdom are being handed over to the devil by powerful and evil women like the one who killed his mother.
#ScribesAndMakers 14/4: What's something that's going well with your creativity this month?
I finished a couple of non-creative projects that hung deadlines over my head, so I had more time and mental energy for creativity.
#ScribesAndMakers Mar-24: "Do you have a sewing kit in your home?"
We have sewing kits, sewing boxes, sewing baskets, a sewing machine. Both my wife and I have made hand stitched garments we've worn during our years of 1770s reenacting. I have made shirts, a haversack, pouches, costume pieces, a Father Christmas robe, hand puppets. My wife hand stitched a complete colonial gown and stays. Our adult child has made cosplay outfits and does needlepoint.
#WritersCoffeeClub Who is your ideal reader?
Most likely a reader of cozy mysteries.
#WordWeavers Apr 2
Do you use any special means to get to know your characters? E.g. character sheets, prequels, interviews, etc.
Generally, if a character has any "speaking part" in the story, I pretty much know who they are in a very general way.
For Main Characters I create biographical sketches that include things about their background and key details important to the story. I generally give them a birth date, so I can keep track of their ages--Jack was 12 years old when Hansel and Gretel moved to the village with their father; Hansel was 14; Gretel was 8.
#WordWeavers April 17. How far beyond the local home of your MC does your story extend?
The events in this story take place within about a 30 mile radius of the village of Trafton-on-Herring, where the two MCs live.
#WordWeavers 3/3: Introduce your MC without telling us their age, gender, job, and who they are to others (e.g. friend, parent etc.).
Whether they are known or unknown, age, gender, job, and relationships with others are important defining components of characters, without which all I can say about the two MCs is that they are humans living in a small village where some believe in magic and mythical creatures, others do not, and a few grandmothers are rumored to have been killed by the Big Bad Wolf. The two MCs work together to try to solve those crimes.
#WordWeavers Apr 1 - Your opinion on April Fool's Day & do you incorporate the day into your work?
It's foolish . . . and it is not included in my WIP, though other celebrated dates are important to the plot.
#ScribesAndMakers 1. How many creative projects do you have going right now?
One in the planning stages, three with actions being taken, one on hold indefinitely.
Planning some native plant landscaping arrangements for a friend's yard.
Collecting materials for a gardening project at home.
Designing/drawing a logo for my wife's new business venture.
Writing my WIP.
There is also a Work Not Progressing (60,000+ words) in a file that has not been opened in a year.
#ScribesAndMakers Mar 8
Is there a country other than your own that influences your creativity?
Most of my writing has been influence by the place where I live, but my current WIP, set in a make believe "fairytale" place, is influenced by Middle Earth, the UK, and other European fairytale settings. I've never traveled to those places except through books, though.
#PennedPossibilities 985 — How long have you been writing or when did you start?
At least 60 years. I contributed jokes and cartoons to the third grade classroom newspaper.
#WritersCoffeeClub 13th of April: What do you borrow from other fiction (or nonfiction) genres?
The "elevator pitch" for my WIP is this:
"Grandmothers are found dead in their cottages in the woods, and the culprit is not the Big Bad Wolf. Jack Barber and Jill Marsh—yes, that Jack and Jill—face an uphill challenge, trying to piece together the solution to the murderous spree in a land where life had always been like a fairytale."
So, in addition to creating new characters and plots, I'm borrowing existing characters and general situations from fairytales and nursery rhymes to write a mystery novel.
While I'm not directly "borrowing" anything else, I've done lots of research on many different subjects to create a realistic world and time period in which the story takes place.
#PennedPossibilities 984 — Where does your MC feel the safest? Is there a particular person or object that helps them feel safe?
Even though Jack tripped and sent them both tumbling down a hill when Jill was five years old and he was seven, Jill feels safest with Jack now that they are in their teens.
At the age of seventeen, when the uncertain future of adult responsibility looms like an approaching thunderhead, Jack feels safest in the back yard of the house he grew up in, under the big oak tree with a book--unless there is, in fact, an approaching thunderhead, at which time he and the book are better off in the root cellar.
#writersCoffeeClub 4 Apr: Do you switch between present and past tense? How do you make it work?
The story is told in past tense. To me that's how telling a story works.
#WordWeavers for 9th March, 2026
If you need to share an important piece of history/lore, what’s your approach that avoids infodumping?
My WIP includes some retellings of what "actually happened" in certain fairytale stories. Since I'm writing a mystery, these tales are recounted with dialog, witness interviews, and characters interjecting comments and questions during the storytelling.
#WordWeavers March4. When was the last time your MC lied? Why?
Neither Jill nor Jack has lied in my WIP.
There are things they have not said--for example Jill has never shared with Jack the genealogical lore that on the Henson side of the family her great-great grandfather is rumored to have been bewitched into a frog and was returned to human form by a kiss from her great-great grandmother. Jack has not told anyone that despite his longtime devotion to Jill, he is somewhat attracted to gossipy, flirty Kitty Fisher.
But no lying.
Hard to find food with 30 inches of snow on the ground, but the peanut spotter was ready!
#WordWeavers 20 March: How much romance is there in your story?
The WIP is a murder mystery, but there is a subplot looking at Jack and Jill's relationship.
#PennedPossibilities 960 — Describe the longest romantic relationship your MC has ever had. (If they’ve had one.)
It's not clear how romantic it is, but Jack met his closest companion about ten years ago when, at age seven, he offered to help five year old Jill fetch a pail of water from a well at the top of a hill. There was a mishap, but Jill assured Jack nobody would ever remember that story.
#WordWeavers Apr 20: What is your MC’s relationship to obtaining and preparing food?
Jill grew up helping her mother at the hearth, so knows how most common foods are prepared. She helps planting and harvesting in the garden, collects eggs, and can slaughter and dress a chicken if needs must.
Jack and his father buy provisions from the weekly markets and transport them home. Jack unloads the goods and puts them away in their storage places. With his friend Tommy, who works for Farmer Duff, he has helped with smoking hams and bacon and making sausages in return for getting a share for his family. His mother prepares most of daily food, baking and preserving.
More small-town politics in Potter's Point. What else is new? This month's report can be read for free on Substack by following the link.
#WritersCoffeeClub #WordWeavers #Writing #Writingcommunity #ScribesAndMakers