Turkey Day is right around the corner. Can you believe how fast 2007 has raced by?
October was a busy month for Evelyn David with many library visits. November started with an appearance by the Southern Half of Evelyn David at the Red Dirt Book Festival in Shawnee, Oklahoma on November 2nd & 3rd and the Northern Half's speech on November 3, at the American Association of University Women Book and Author Luncheon in Fairfax, Virginia.
This month's winner of a Whiskey coffee mug is Robin B. of San Antonio, Texas. Please encourage family and friends to subscribe and be eligible for our monthly prize drawing.
Giving Thanks
After we made the decision to write a mystery together, we got to know each other really well. Not the facts you put in a
biography, but the habits that control your overall outlook on life, how you work and play with others, and how you deal with rejection.
Try to imagine building a large dollhouse from scratch. No kit. No diagrams or written instructions. No materials on hand. You've just decided to build a dollhouse because you've always liked dollhouses. Then imagine building it with another person. Someone you've never met. Someone you don't see or hear -someone you just pass notes to through a black curtain.
Writing Murder Off the Books was a little like building that dollhouse. We had to develop "architectural drawings" for our book that gave us a plan for construction. The blueprints weren't inked in when we first broke ground on our mystery. We knew we had to be flexible, ready to improvise if the terrain was unyielding. We did it one piece after another, sometimes surprising each other with hidden rooms and extra windows and a helipad on the roof. That was scrapped, along with a few other blunders.
But we got better over the course of that year. Made fewer writing mistakes. Learned to give and take constructive criticism and sincere compliments. Focused on not panicking when the walls of our dollhouse house came crashing down or the roof was blown off. We also discovered that we shouldn't be afraid to try something new - we could always remodel. And we did. Many, many times. Sometimes with scissors and superglue. Sometimes with a sledgehammer.
The theme of this newsletter is "Giving Thanks." It was supposed to be about the best parts of a mystery - what works, what everyone needs in order to write a great whodunit. But what we've learned while writing a book is so much more than just figuring out a plot, developing characters, or correctly placing commas. We've learned to work together to create something special from blank pages. We've learned to trust the other's judgment, as well as our own. We've learned that no matter how bad today has been, tomorrow could be worse. Just kidding. Well, not really.
We've also learned that no disastrous moment, no printing catastrophe, no unexplainable rejection, can't be improved with a joke.
So, what are we thankful for?
Friendship.
Family.
Humor.
The chance to pursue a dream and have fun while
doing it.
What are you thankful for?
Evelyn David
