Hooray! I so agree. And abandoning the book can be totally private. Wish the same held for some of the awful movies, plays, performances I've sat through. Walking out is so embarrassing.

Makes sense to me as it is, Lynne (I love lawyer jokes). My next door neighbour BTW is another Lynne. Eats, Shoots and Leaves is on my reference shelf--wonderful book. Hope she has second thoughts about fighting the good punctuation fight. Meaning changes aside, punctuation marks are a boon to the reader. Check Alice Munro's writing--no problem reading that either silently or out loud. Now try some of the modern run-on style. You will either run out of breath or struggle to hold the thread.

So long as you can still recite the names of Disney's seven dwarfs you are okay (Mordecai Richler). Totally agree with you re novels and short stories--different leagues for sure in the effort department. Enjoyed your post. Hope you do more.

"To thine own self be true..." eh? I'm waiting for the swelled head phase. Would be nice for a little while anyway. Enjoyed your post. Well done.

Include me as well in the "Is this any good or am I wasting my time?" group. That thought has such a pernicious effect: a peculiar ennui and a tendency to procrastinate that puts THE END so far away. I suggest that those "fresh eyes" at an earlier stage, particularly in novel writing, might be the way to go; get the fire going again.

That last paragraph made me LOL. Saw the same scenario recently at a coffee shop with four twenty-some year old women sitting in a booth all texting. I waited for one of them to look up and verbally share something of note in the text but it never happened. Could they have been texting one another? Brave New World indeed. The only good of this that I can think of is remembering my own daughter's sleepovers and the din of giggling, gabbing teenagers. Texting, at least, is quiet.

Excellent post--a stimulus for us in the trenches to keep writing and submitting.

My wife and I are great fans of British crime series on TV but the number of bodies, especially in sleepy Midsomer, is challenging credibility, I agree. But somehow, Morris and even Lewis don't create the same feeling even with the constant Oxford setting. Perhaps it's the knowledge that the student population changes on a regular basis. And Agatha, bless her, moves Poirot right out of the country from time to time. We started with Poirot and he continues to be our favourite (Foyle's War aside).

Thank goodness there are still readers out there like you. That's exactly what I like to read (and write)as well. There is enough sick reality on the TV news, in my opinion. Choosing it for reading pleasure? Not my cup of tea (I am also a fan of classic British mystery dramas on PBS).

I agree, too, BUT why not add that one sentence to the form rejection letter that says why the piece was turned down? Is it to discourage an author from submitting anything else? Was the work that bad? There is the rare editor, however, who disobeys the "rules of engagement." I've just had a short story rejected by an e-magazine with the usual "not right for us" but following was a simple sentence "I thought the story took too long in preparing the neighbour's death." I hope he doesn't get fired, because I plan to submit other work to him. He's given me something to go on. A free edit--gold.

Spent Christmas in Ottawa last year and observed the new generation (my grandchildren) first hand. The three-year-old was having his rationed time on the family Mac trying out new kids' interactive games (he manages the mouse like a pro). All at once, in an apparent panic, he called over his seven-year-old sister. "There's no menu! Where's the menu! I need a menu!" At that moment, I aged ten years, I swear.

Your latest post is so me right now--two novels ready to go, edited to the hilt, same good vibes from readers I trust, published a number of times and yet, like you, I'm feeling a creeping ennui. Rejections, I can still handle, but it's the zero responses from acquisition editors that gall me. What does it take to not instantly hit the delete button or toss my snail mail query directly into the trash bucket? I realize that the supply-demand ratio is astronomical but I don't find that an acceptable excuse for rudeness. The considerable effort that goes into every writer's creation, in my opinion, deserves at least a modicum of respect. So there, from a grumpy old man, who has just checked his skin and finds that it is getting thinner--alarmingly so.

Take your ear plugs to the latest James Bond movie, too, Lynne. Don't know what it is: smaller theatres, half empty house or care less projectionists (or whatever they are called these days)but the sound settings are painful to me and I am partially deaf. How people, especially the young, with normal hearing can abide that din, Lord only knows. Spoiled an otherwise good Bond flick.

It's what we look for as mystery readers (and try to produce as writers): a can't-put-it-down, want more kind of novel. Seeing our favourite sleuth's name on a new book's jacket (and author's name, of course)is a real draw--almost a guarantee that it will be as absorbing a read as the last one. I think it is the brave writer who abandons a successful series and strikes out in an entirely new direction. A challenge to be sure, but will readers follow? They will if you are a Reginald Hill. How about The Woodcutter? Didn't need Dalziel or Pascoe.

Problem is: reviewers are largely perceived by much of the general public as all-knowing individuals when deciding what is good reading/theatre/music/dance/art material(If they don't like it, I probably won't either sort of thing). And if the reader buys the book or attends the play, etc. despite a negative review, those flaws are in his/her mind like a bad itch. I'm reminded of a famous short story (author of which I can't remember) in which a beautiful woman in conversation laments on her "awful red hands." Thereafter, her beauty disappears in the eyes of the listener and only those awful red hands command his attention.

Interesting comments recently from my sister, a voracious reader, who had just read my latest novel through for a second time (must have run out of reading material) and in a tone of some surprise said, "You actually write well." She admitted that the first time through any mystery novel, the plot holds all of her focus (how's this going to end sort of thing)and not the quality of the writing. Perhaps that's why Fay Weldon has been so successful. The plot's the thing, eh? (as we Canadians say).

Hard to believe authors really do that, although I guess with ranks of thousands to millions of us, some rotten apples are inevitable. In fact, rot seems to be more and more a factor in the whole cyber world these days. Word of mouth still has some honesty I think. If you tout a book to your friends, it had better be good--a slow but ethical way to get your book promoted--a method shunned, I suspect, by the authors you describe above. How about some words re independent book reviewers--on-line or conventional press? I like your tell-it-like-it-is style.

I know what you mean. In my first novel, a minor character (thank goodness)changed from Iris to Mary in less than one page! Unfortunately, the change was over leaf and missed by me (a hundred plus times), my editor and the copy editor. Oddly enough, not a single reader reported the glitch. I think that's what saves us all--the readers are so into the story that they just skip over all these errors.

Couldn't agree with you more. Launched all of mine at our local theatre centre and a good time was had by all. My publisher did kick in money for it but I'd have put the thing on myself anyway. Nothing like friends and neighbours to heighten the glow. Got sales going, too.

Amen, Chris (and welcome, too). You might also add the glut of indie reviewers to the poor reader's quandary. An interesting blog post might be a way through all this glut for the book buyers who are on tight budgets these days.

Rejections: a sensitive topic indeed; "sensitive" being the key word. Without this quality I doubt that one can be a writer; at least a fiction writer. To not take rejections personally, I think is impossible for a writer of any experience. I did have to reach the end almost of your post to find it--"maybe it's time to draw the line...." I know the feeling. After months and months of making one's novel the best one can, a rejection stings and a stimulus to slog on vanishes. And how does one make it better (see above)? Outside advice surely and best of all for me would be just a few words by the acquisitions editor as to what turned her/him off. You were most fortunate to get the rejection you did: something to encourage and build on. This is rare. In fact, in my considerable rejection experience, it's non-existant. Form letters all. Perhaps my work didn't merit anything more. See? There is that sensitivity thing again.

Does this mean that when company arrives I can stop hiding my latest mystery read under a copy of the Satanic Verses on the coffee table? Jet lag, btw, is always worse going west to east I find.

As one of the "two or three" of your regular readers, I wish you a great holiday. Sounds like you are due for one. Let someone else take your place in front of the bulldozer.

Why torture yourself if you don't have to? Pass on the work (sub-genres)that isn't your cup of tea. One of the stimuli for writing crime novels is the diversity of reader taste and the number of sub-genres in which to fit. I love Ruth Birmingham novels; hate Jeffrey Deaver. Weird? Maybe, but there's money to be made in the Birmingham mode. Still lots of us out there who are turned off by sadism and angst-ridden protagonists. Publishing is all about making money is it not? Good business to cover the whole market unbiased, I would think. Glad I'm not an editor.

I enjoy conferences; even helped organize a few. Aside from the fun and writing tips I get, I like the contact with so many fellow authors. True, some have very large egos and play the grand role, but most are everyday folk like me. It offsets the depression I experience when I go into a book store and see miles of books in my genre. Small frog; big pond for sure. But it's nice to know that the pond is largely populated by people with whom I can identify. Keeps me writing.