Mindy Quigley

Tag: writing

  • Most Likely to Succeed… in Murder

    With the launch of my latest Deep Dish Mystery, Sleep in Heavenly Pizza, I’ve been getting ready to trot out Ye Olde Dog and Pony Show once again. I’ve observed previously that being a professional writer is essentially running a small business. Things like creating social media content, preparing for events, doing my taxes, and tending to relationships with booksellers, editors, bloggers, and readers—are necessary parts of the job. A lot of writers especially hate the task of pimping a new release, figuring out ways to get it on readers’ radar screens without looking like a shameless huckster.

    I get it. For some writers, doing publicity smacks of lacking writerly integrity. Surely, James Joyce would never do an Instagram reel where he pretended to be several different varieties of cheese??? For many others, promoting your work feels too much like promoting yourself, which can be a terrifying prospect. Writers are often sensitive, introspective, and introverted, qualities that are at odds with the demands of publicity.

    Can I tell you something?

    <<looks from side to side>>

    <<lowers voice>>

    I actually like doing publicity.

    Yes, sometimes promotion feels like time stolen from the actual writing. But mostly, I regard it as a welcome break, a chance to build my creative muscles in a different way. Plus, as my sisters will surely aver, I’ve always been an attention-hogging ham (aka middle child) and almost nothing embarrasses me. Thus, I will gladly enlist every resource at my disposal in the service of getting the word out. Puppies, adorable children–it’s all fair game.

    All this is to say that I was delighted to appear recently on the Midwest Writers Room podcast for an episode of Chapter Break and do funny character voices. I hope you enjoy it!

    I also had the pleasure of being featured on Fresh Fiction’s “Character Most Likely To…” segment.

    Here’s a little taste of that. You can click the link above to read more.

    Most likely to be an agent of chaos?

    Butterball the cat! This chonky orange mischief-maker is a staple in every book. Whether he’s knocking over crucial evidence in SIX FEET DEEP DISH or unexpectedly leading the way to a clue in ASHES TO ASHES, CRUST TO CRUST, Butterball’s accidental heroism is legendary. Just don’t be fooled—his real priorities are snacks and snuggles, solving murders is just a side gig.

    Thanks for reading. Now it’s time for me to harness the dogs and ponies (and adorable children), because we’ve got more shillin’ to do!

  • Feral cats, kosher wine, and other terrifying topics

    Feral cats, kosher wine, and other terrifying topics

    I was interviewed a few weeks ago for writer Tara Laskowski’s blog. In addition to being quick-witted and kind-hearted, Tara is also a master of twisty suspense.  Her novels include The Weekend Retreat and The Mother Next Door,  which the NYT Book Review called a “polished and entertaining read.” As it happens, Tara herself is also polished and entertaining. She’s won the Agatha Award, the Macavity Award, and the Anthony Award and has been a finalist for a butt-ton of other fancy awards. 

    And now, on to the interview!

    Tara: What is your greatest fear as a writer?

    Me: Where to start? That everyone will hate my books. That I’ll become mentally or physically ill and not be able to meet my deadline. That I’ll forget how to write. That I’ll write something that pisses people off and then they’ll hate me. That I’ll be a failure and have wasted my life pursuing this dream. That I’ll be a success and not know how to handle it. That the mild arthritis in my fingers will become debilitating and I won’t be able to type my books. That my poor eyesight will become even worse and I won’t be able to see the computer screen. That I’ll make a stupid mistake in a book and no one at the press will catch it and it’ll go to print that way and everyone will think I’m dumb and careless. That my writing peers will hate my books. That readers will hate my books. That my family will hate my books. That I’ll die alone and stray cats will gnaw at my decaying corpse for weeks before someone calls the cops about a suspicious stench and they come and shovel what remains of me into a five-gallon bucket. Wait, what was the question again? 

    Tara: What’s your favorite horror movie or television series?

    Me: When I was younger, I was obsessed with Dark Shadows. Maybe that’s more of a gothic romance than a pure horror show, though? Anyway it’s got sexy vampires and a governess-wealthy dude romance à la Jane Eyre, and a dual timeline sitch that’s akin to Outlander. BUT DID I MENTION THE SEXY VAMPIRES?

    To find out my plans for world domination and learn why I’m careful what I say into a mirror, read the rest of the interview on Tara Laskowski’s “What Scares You” blog!

    What Scares You, Mindy Quigley?

  • Hooray! It’s time for my semi-annual existential crisis!

    Hooray! It’s time for my semi-annual existential crisis!

    If you write for a traditional publisher, you get paid twice a year. That payment covers a period that’s up to twelve months prior to the date of the check. The sales are lumped together in various line items, some illuminating (e.g. Canadian e-book sales), some… less so (I’m looking at you “Additional Earnings” line item).

    So yeah, you may be wondering what LSD-dosing psychopath invented such an arcane business model. And you may find yourself asking why any self-respecting literary artiste such as moi would put herself through it all. Maybe for the fame and fortune?

    BAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! <<wipes tears>> BAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

    Yeah, no.

    Overall, there’s almost no way to track whether a specific promotion/appearance/snippet of media coverage had a measurable effect on sales.*

    *Unless you obsessively track your Amazon rankings and Nielsen Bookscan numbers and try to extrapolate your weekly sales numbers from there. Which I for sure don’t do on a regular basis. ‘Cuz that would be batshit crazy. <<deletes browser history>> 😬

    I, like most of my writerly brethren, have zero job security and little understanding of how to make this modestly-profitable hobby/poorly-remunerated career work for me. I end up saying “yes” to almost every marketing opportunity, constantly afraid that I’m not doing enough, that my next project will implode like a billionaires’ submarine. Thus, over the past few years, I’ve found myself running on a relentless hamster wheel of social media posts, guest blogs, newsletter articles, giveaways, and appearances, trying to find success. I live in fear that the Spigot of Modest Recognition could, without warning, stop dribbling out the little droplets of validation that sustain me.

    And that’s because I’m lucky enough to be afforded those opportunities. I have a series of mass market paperbacks with a Big Five publisher. They sell, if not like hotcakes, at least like very warm cakes. I’m well aware that not every writer is so fortunate. So I also get to feel guilty for being ungrateful! Yay! The shame cherry on my fear sundae!

    For several years, I’ve been burning the candle at both ends, trying to justify this career choice. And, inevitably, I have a mini-existential crisis whenever a new book comes out or a major deadline looms or my royalty check comes in lower than I expected it to. I’ve been living in a constant state of low-grade existential panic.

    A few things have happened over the past couple months that caused me to start to recalibrate. My beloved grandmother, the bedrock of our family, died. My entire nuclear family got sick, some of us more than once. My aunt was struck by a car and nearly killed on the front steps of the post office. (Yes, you read that right. A car went out of control and up a flight of stairs.) I’m realizing that all the career-related, mini existential crises were just a prelude to the real deal.

    It got me asking myself why I do this writing thing. Here’s what I came up with:

    A “pizza” the gift box my friend Desiree sent to me.

    This little pizza friend was part of a cheer-up gift box my friend Desiree Di Fabio sent to me recently. Desiree and I, along with fellow mystery writer Korina Moss, bonded over cheese fondue during last year’s Mechanicsburg Mystery Book Fete. I’d never met Desiree before that event, but we had an instant connection. That happens a lot in the mystery writing world. You’ve spent your whole life searching and suddenly HERE ARE YOUR PEOPLE.

    Maybe in school, you were the only weird kid reading a book during outdoor recess. Maybe, while your high school classmates were out doing whatever normal high schoolers do (drugs, probably? IDK), you were that nerdy teenager the public librarians all knew by name. Maybe you were that oddball who spent decades wondering if other people thought about death as much as you do. Welcome, my friend. The world of crime fiction is your happy place.

    My life is infinitely richer because I have written and published my books and stories. The community of readers and writers I am a part of is wonderful. Telling stories is a joy and a privilege. Through this work, I learn so much about myself and what it means to be human. Also, I FREAKING LOVE WORDS. They are so powerful.

    I’m still in the midst of a pretty rough season of life. But when I look at this fuzzy little pizza, I’m reminded of the joys of my life as a writer. Joys that cannot be quantified on any bestseller list or with a six-figure check. Pleasures that defy external metrics. When it comes to a full creative life and sustaining personal relationships, I am very rich indeed.

  • I, for sure, never made a chinchilla live in a Barbie camper van.

    Earlier this week, I had the pleasure of being interviewed by CanvasRebel Magazine. Read below for my take on Eighties parenting, Norman Lear, and writing lessons learned (and unlearned)….

    CR: Mindy, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. Do you think your parents have had a meaningful impact on you and your journey?

    MQ: My childhood spanned the 80s and 90s, when benign neglect was the dominant parenting style. My mom and dad didn’t micromanage my schoolwork or bog me down with organized extra-curriculars. For a good portion of my childhood, they probably didn’t even know where I was.*

    That parenting style freed me to read and watch TV for countless hours every day, unfettered by parental expectations. The fact that they worked the kinds of jobs people without college degrees tend to work—secretary, restaurant server, auto parts store manager, etc.—was also a blessing. When it came time for me to get a job, I chose work that interested me, with no fear that my parents would judge my choices and no expectation of making giant sums of money.

    *Definitely not climbing into that broken storm drain by Jenny’s house! Nor “borrowing” Christine’s brother’s chinchilla and trying to make it live in a Barbie camper van! Those things for sure didn’t happen.

    Read the rest of the interview on the CanvasRebel website…

  • Made you LOL!

    Made you LOL!

    My favorite kind of reader feedback is when someone tells me they laughed out loud at something I wrote and scared their dog/spit their soda/made fellow passengers on the subway doubt their sanity.

    LOLs are my love language.

    So I was especially heartened when Holly Adams, the awesomely talented narrator of my Mount Moriah Mysteries and my Deep Dish Mysteries, sent me this outtake of her recording a scene from Ashes to Ashes, Crust to Crust.

    For reference, the dialogue in question involves sous chef Sonya talking to her uncle Avi, an attorney who has come to Geneva Bay to help a friend caught in a sticky situation with the local police. The scene is supposed to read as written below.

    “Why did you let her talk?” Sonya said. “You named your dog Miranda, for God’s sake. The only dog in existence named after a constitutional procedure. You always told me not to answer questions if I ever got arrested.”

    Avi threw up his hands. “So I’m supposed to tackle your lady friend and stuff a gag in her mouth? I told her to shut her yapper. She didn’t listen to me. Just like your Aunt Ruthie, or little Miranda for that matter. She ate a full tube of your aunt’s red lipstick, did your mom tell you? Now I gotta buy new carpet for the rumpus room.”

    Ashes to Ashes, Crust to Crust

    I admit that I, too, sometimes get a giggle out of my characters. The reaction is weirdly detached. I don’t feel like I’m chuckling at my own cleverness or patting myself on the back. I’m laughing at this hilarious group of people who happen to be fictional and live inside my head.

    My husband walked by my office one day and caught me in the act–alone, laughing at my computer screen. “You won’t believe what Butterball did!” I said, pointing to the Word document. When I set out to write that scene, I had a vague idea of where it was going, but I had no inkling that Butterball the cat, out of nowhere, would decide to pull off some guffaw-worthy acrobatic antics. That scene is near the end of book three in the series, Public Anchovy Number One, which hits bookstore shelves on December 26th. Hope you’ll find it as LOL-able reading as I did writing.

  • Don’t hold your breath.

    A few weeks ago, I lost the ability to breathe. Usually, I think about breathing about as often as I think about making my hair grow or making my blood circulate through my body. Which is to say, never. Breathing is supposed to be part of a body’s standard operating system. Like how when you buy a car, you shouldn’t have to specify that you want one that includes wheels. However, for days on end, I found myself yawning uncontrollably and struggling to take deep breaths. The yawning may have something to do with me having a toddler who currently likes to ninja into my room in the middle of the night and wake me up with a horror movie whisper of, “I need a pee.” But the fact that the yawning was coupled with other physical manifestations of stress made me suspicious that this was about more than what was happening in the “wee” hours.

    My subconscious, as usual, was alerting me to an inner issue with all the subtlety of a submarine klaxon. I called my therapist.

    Me: So, I think I’m stressed about something, but I can’t figure out what it is.

    Her: Tell me what’s going on in your life.

    Me: Everything’s good. Kids are healthy, parents and extended family are vaccinated, work is great. I’m waiting for some feedback on writing stuff, <<briefly ceases to breathe>> but… it’s… fine….

    My therapist is wonderful, but even if she had the intuition and listening skills of a pickled beet, she would probably have picked up on the fact that my issue related to writing.

    As I began to talk more about that aspect of my life, it became obvious that I hadn’t acknowledged that it was causing me stress. On the surface, things are great. I’ve got a sweet three-book deal from a great publisher, and I’m working with a fabulous agent and editor. Out of nowhere, I got a cool opportunity to pitch for another writing contract. Everything’s coming up Mindy!

    However, my first book has been with the editor for months, due to a combination of my delivering the manuscript months ahead of deadline (overachiever alert!) and her heavy workload. I have no idea if she likes it, hates it, or is using it to line the bottom of her parakeet cage. I have a book contract, but no physical book yet. The other cool new writing opportunity involves a head-first leap into the unknown, with absolutely no guarantee of a soft landing. I literally have no idea if I’ll hear back about it tomorrow or in six months or possibly never. For all I know, that pitch is currently being ground up and used to make Grape Nuts. (Assuming Grape Nuts aren’t just grown in a Russian lab??)

    If you’ve ever sent off a query letter to an agent, you’ll know that the publishing business is glacial. I had a friend who got a manuscript rejection from a literary agent after almost two years. After she’d already self-published her novel and started working on the sequel.

    Like most people, I really hate uncertainty. My therapist helped me realize that the long periods of dead air were playing into my imposter syndrome and insecurity in a big way. Because my Deep Dish Murder series came about during the pandemic–literally I got the offer on March 9, 2020–I’ve never even met my agent or my editor in person. I barely know them. I don’t know what’s normal in this business. And this has allowed me to project every fear that has ever sashayed across my brain into that absence. Take that stress salad and sprinkle on the uncertainty of a global pandemic. I totes get how Schrödinger’s cat felt. Like, has anyone read what I wrote? Do I have a literary career? How did I get inside this box? Why am I a cat? Do I even FREAKING EXIST?!

    Putting a framework around my hyperventilation has helped tremendously (thanks, therapist!) and I’m happy to say that my breathing has mostly regained its default autopilot setting. This is crucial, and not only for the obvious reason of breathing being an essential function of a living mammal. If I’m going to make it as a writer, I’m going to need to learn how to hold my breath and wait.

  • “You never know when your pizza cat mystery will come along.”

    I do not recommend trying to become a writer.

    In fact, I’m not even sure I know what “becoming a writer” is. When I published the first Lindsay Harding novel, did that make me a writer? Or was it the brief and shining moment when the first book climbed to the top of Amazon’s cozy mystery rankings for a couple of days? Or when I got my first royalty check? Maybe it was when I won my first writing contest. Does the fact of having published three novels and half a dozen short stories mean that I’ve permanently achieved writerdom? Or if I cease to publish but still write, do I remain a writer?

    These questions plagued me toward the end of 2018. (Remember 2018, when existential angst could involve mundane things like career aspirations?) I’d decided that 2019 was going to be a decisive year for my writing. I vowed to “become a writer” by age 40. Despite my progress toward that goal, by October 2019 my 41st birthday loomed, and I still felt like an impostor. After a few decent earnings years, my royalty income had dwindled to pocket change. I’d finished a manuscript for my middle-grade adventure novel, MINERVA MURGATROYD AND THE VERY OLD BOY, but after several near misses, I was unable to find representation for it. I blew out the candles on my 41st birthday with a heavy heart. Forty had come and gone with no real progress toward my writing goal. My day job had ramped up and I felt pressure to follow the steady paycheck and turn my back on my writing hobby.

    And then, two days after my 41st birthday, I got a message from Lyndee Walker, a bestselling mystery novelist I’d met at a few conferences over the years. Lyndee had heard from her agent that St. Martin’s press was looking to develop a new mystery series. She didn’t have time to pitch for it herself, but she remembered me and thought I might be a good fit for the project. All she knew was that it was on the very cozy end of the mystery spectrum–it needed to be set in a pizza restaurant and to prominently feature a cat. The marketing folks had already road tested the concept and found that “Pizza Cat Mystery” was a niche that needed to be filled. Now, they just needed to find a writer who could pull the project off.

    When I told my sister about this unexpected opportunity, she reminded me how only weeks earlier, I’d decided to throw in the towel on my writing dreams. “You never know when your pizza cat mystery will come along,” has since become our family’s version of “Persistence pays off.”

    Fast forward to March of this year. After a couple of setbacks, including the departure of a key editor at the press, I was offered a three-book deal for a new series set in a deep-dish pizza restaurant. The first book, tentatively titled SIX FEET DEEP DISH, is set to come out in Summer 2022.

    The advance still doesn’t justify giving up my day job and becoming a full-time writer, but it’s a respectable supplement to our family’s income that might allow us to redo our tacky master bathroom next year.

    So am I a writer now? <<shrugs>> Ask me when I’m 50.

  • Short, dark and than some

    My short story “Taming the Tiger” will be published in the collection, The Beat of Black Wings: Crime Fiction Inspired by the Songs of Joni Mitchell, later this spring by Untreed Reads. I wrote the story more than a year ago, so it was a little jarring to look back through it as it’s being prepared for publication and realize how dark it is. There is a sinister love triangle, a twisted power struggle, and a Talented Mr. Ripley-style murder. This isn’t the first time I’ve written dark short fiction. In fact, when I started thinking about it, all of my short stories, both published and unpublished, explore disquieting themes and paint bleak pictures of humans and their motivations.

    All of this got me wondering: just what kind of monster am I?!

    It’s probably common for people to assume that writers match their writing. Ernest Hemingway, whose books center on dashing, macho men battling their inner demons, was a dashing, macho man, battling inner demons. F. Scott Fitzgerald was a Gatsby-like party boy. When asked where his dark inspirations stemmed from, Stephen King had this answer: “People think I must be a strange person. This is not correct. I have the heart of a small boy. It’s in a jar on my desk.” (For the record, King isn’t quite the sicko his books would make him appear, but he was a raging alcoholic for decades, and even now he’s known for being quirky and elusive).

    In my case, though, the darkness of my imaginary worlds doesn’t match up with my personality. I’m generally jolly and usually upbeat. I like wiener dog races and the color yellow and pictures of newborn babies wearing giant hair bows. My childhood had the usual share of minor traumas, but I grew up surrounded by loving family members. So why, when I sit down at a computer, does blood and fire pour out of my fingertips?

    My fellow mystery writer and good friend, Tracee DeHahn, and I were talking about this phenomenon recently. She, too, is a uniformly upbeat person who comes from a stable background. We’re both relatively new to the world of mystery writing and have been wowed by the kindness and affability of the mystery authors we meet. Seriously, Malice Domestic, the annual gathering of writers who spend their days mentally murdering people, is filled with folks who are, on the whole, kinder than your average church bake sale committee (though, it has to be said, much, much raunchier).

    My theory is that for many writers, the page is a safe place to process negative emotions. For me at least, fiction is like an external hard drive to store my darkness. Even cheerful people like me have heaps and heaps of bad thoughts that need to find expression.

    Maybe I particularly like to visit those dark places in short fiction because it seems to allow me just enough time to explore those themes without absorbing them. Short fiction is a long weekend in the Land of Id — the raw, exposed, and sometimes downright yucky swamp in my emotional landscape. Visiting Id-Land allows me to appreciate life back at my emotional dwelling place: Giant Baby Bow Town.

     

  • Underneath it all

    I’ve been tinkering with a new story lately and I was reminded of a phrase that’s always driven me batty: s/he is “a good person underneath it all.”

    The story I’m writing is written from first person point of view, a perspective I haven’t used in awhile. Being inside your character’s head can allow a little more scope for introspection and give space for your character to explain his or her actions to the reader. As I was creating my protagonist, it struck me just how unlike real life that is. What a luxury to be able to do something crappy and then be able to spend a few paragraphs explaining your underlying motivations, limitations, and experiences!

    As a society, we rarely afford one another this luxury. Say some NASCAR wannabe cuts me off on the highway and causes me to swerve. Perhaps I’m feeling generous enough to sketch out an appropriate justification and backstory for her — maybe she was rushing to her child’s school because she got a call from the nurse? maybe she’s a doctor who’s just been called in to consult on a critical patient?

    But nine times out of ten, I’m going to flip that crazy driver the bird, mentally or verbally. (Sorry, kids in the backseat. Don’t repeat what Mommy just said at daycare.) Maybe then the cycle of judgement continues. Another driver who missed seeing the near-accident happens to drive past my car a moment later. They’ll see me swerve, and then pass me as I’m red-faced and screaming, with my wide-eyed kiddos in the backseat, trying to process the colorful vocabulary they just learned.  Neither crazy NASCAR driver nor I will have a chance to hand out explanatory pamphlets to justify our actions.

    What I’m getting at is that life is basically one big series of stories written in third-person limited point of view. For the most part, your character (Let’s call her You) is essentially the sum of You’s actions.

    The phrase “good person underneath it all” is often rolled out as a sad platitude by kindly former neighbors or classmates after someone does something heinous. It’s like an atomic “bless your heart” — a way of reminding ourselves that even villains have backstories. The underneath it all idea represents a perennial strain of moral philosophy. Just think of the schism between Catholics and Protestants over whether a soul can get to Heaven by faith alone, or whether good works are also needed. Even though I was raised Baptist, I always found myself on #TeamCatholic for this one. It seemed extraordinarily unfair that some absolute stinker who repented in his very last breath would have access to the same harp-strumming, blissful afterlife as, say, Mister Rogers.

    Even though I have some definite ideas about this, even I have to admit that my Actions = Character argument has some limitations. Most of the time, bad actions are made more likely by circumstances. It’s easier to be generous if you’re not starving. It’s pretty damn hard to give love if you’ve never received it. I also have to find a moral space for things like mental and physical illness. If a bipolar friend flakes on me because she’s going through a manic episode, that doesn’t make me think she’s a fundamentally bad person.

    Still, I maintain that the best path is to recognize that our interior lives are, a majority of the time, inaccessible to our fellow humans. So even if we have Darth Vader-worthy origin stories to explain how we went over to the Dark Side, as much as this dumb old world will allow, let’s try to stay on the sunny side. Smile. Give a compliment. Give a hug. Unless you carry around a stack of explanatory pamphlets, you’re stuck as a third person kind of person.