MYSTERY ON THE MENU – 2012
On January 28, one hundred, eighty devoted mystery fans attended the 8th Annual "Mystery on the Menu" Luncheon, an event featuring fifteen award-winning authors, writing cozy, hard-boiled, paranormal, legal-thriller, noir, and humorous crime fiction.
Hosted by the Friends of the Cerritos Library, the gathering took place in the Skyline Room of the magnificent Cerritos Library. (If you've never been there you don't know what you are missing!)
In the lobby, the Mysterious Galaxy Bookstore was kept busy throughout the event, selling the newest offerings as well as many of the authors' previous series books.
Beautifully decorated tables, each seating an author and ten guests, filled the Skyline Room to overflowing. Whether you sat with a favorite author or at the table of one you'd never read, an eager exchange of greetings, questions, and answers set up a happy buzz in the room. Hostesses urged early shoppers to take their seats as the program began and then thoroughly welcomed all in attendance.
A scrumptious meal added to the festive mood: tender brie/cranberry stuffed chicken breasts, pilaf, haricot verts with onions and almonds, and strawberry-lace tossed salad. A decadent vanilla and chocolate cookie and nuts ice cream dessert topped the lunch like a satisfying denouement in an Agatha Christie novel.
The fifteen authors were divided into three panels, with one author acting as moderator in each. Many topics were addressed and then guests had a chance to ask that burning question they'd always wanted to know.
FIRST PANEL
Sheldon Siegel moderated the first panel, consisting of Cara Black, Denise Hamilton, Darrell James and Simon Wood. His first question asked how these writers went from their other "career" to becoming an author. His own corporate law practice had him rubbing elbows with criminal defense lawyers... and the rest is history.
Cara Black's early years in a French Catholic school and then teaching in a Jewish preschool, finally opened a way for her to write a friend's tragic story that had roots in the Nazi occupation of Paris.
British ex-pat Simon Wood, an engineer and race car driver, said when the Immigration & Naturalization Service refused to grant him a work permit for 18 months, what else could he do here but write?
Darrell James credited his propensity to be a dreamer and his wife's urging him to follow his dreams.
Denise Hamilton's 10 years as a journalist for the LA Times had her yearning to flesh out (fictionally) some of the dark stories she reported on.
Siegel's next question asked each author to give a blurb about their latest book. Pencils appeared at tables as new titles were noted.
The proliferation of political scandals prompted Denise Hamilton's "Damage Control." Cara Black's work in progress blossomed from the comment, "No one ever dies in Chinatown."
Darrell James' newest short story will appear in the Lee Child anthology, Simon Wood is working on "Bumper" about what happens when you're in a collision with a mobster's car, and Sheldon Siegel's next is a stand-alone set in Chicago, with "lots of car chases and explosions."
SECOND PANEL
The second panel was moderated by Pamela Samuels-Young. She asked her authors why they became an author, what their writing process was, how they handled rejections, and what advice they would give aspiring authors.
Kate Carlisle outlines extensively. She is also a part of a brainstorming group that meets several times a year in Las Vegas ("Ya gotta have distractions!"). She comes from that with a 25 page synopsis for a new book. She writes her mystery or romance novels all day, six days a week, and advises new writers to seek an agent that's right for them.
Jenn McKinlay used to begin without an outline, "But my stories meandered." Now she uses a 12 page outline, but confesses to occasionally "rethinking" a character or plot line. Her advice? "Marry someone (like her husband Chris) who encourages you and doesn't let you quit." Also, the very basic, "write the book you want to read...and keep doing it."
Matt Richtel kept the audience "in stitches" and "on the edge of their seats" with his humorous, suspenseful answers. His first book-writing attempt had him creating a scene (a woman's hand handing a man a note, an explosion, and the realization the handwriting was by a girlfriend he thought dead), and then having to finish the book because he "had to see what happened!" The "buddy story" he's currently writing about a man and a grandmother with Alzheimer's and a deadly secret locked in her brain, had the audience opening their wallets to buy it already.
Steve Scarborough confessed it was not easy to write humor. Editors sometimes don't "get it" and want you to rewrite. "How do you rewrite a joke?" As a retired forensic scientist who worked with the (real) Las Vegas CSI, he saw a lot of different ways people solved crimes. It stirred him to write mysteries. "And you WILL get rejections. You have to have a very thick skin."
Legal-thriller author, Pamela Samuels-Young followed the advice in a writing class to outline one of her favorite books because "structure makes a difference." She outlined The Firm by John Grisham, and was on her way. She also told how a copy clerk in a Staple's store risked her job because she couldn't stop reading Pamela's manuscript that she was copying. "I floated out of that store."
THIRD PANEL
Sue Ann Jaffarian moderated the third panel and began by asking her four ladies to give an "elevator pitch" about their newest or favorite book. Most gave very entertaining and informative pitches, but ... they were more like "here, sip a cup of Starbucks while I tell you about my book" pitches.
She also asked what "hook" they used to catch and hold a publisher as well as readers, if they had acquired any "bad habits" since becoming a writer (hers was audibly talking to herself, even at work), and how to handle bad reviews.
To Avery Aames (aka Daryl Wood Gerber) "cheese" is her hook. Began on spec as a "work for hire" her mystery series set in a cheese shop, as well as the recipes on her website, have captured all the right attention. Bad habits? Besides eating a lot of.... chocolate, she is always thinking of ways to kill people.
The "spooky" hook for Carol Costa's paranormal series (a widow solves mysteries with help from her husband's ghost) is in her confession of having had real paranormal experiences to base them on. Eeek! Her journalism background inspired her to write the Dana Sloan investigative reporter series.
Betty Hechtman confesses she has become a "yarn-a-holic." "I can't stop buying yarn wherever I go." Of course this goes along with her "Molly Pink and the Tarzana Hookers" series. (Crochet, not, the other kind of hookers.) As for handling bad reviews? "I stopped reading all reviews."
Although Linda O. Johnston writes cozy mysteries, she also writes Romance (the regular, suspense/intrigue, and paranormal kinds), and Time Travel. In most of them it's the animals that are the hook. "They are my passion," she confesses.
In "real life" Linda is a "Pet Adoption Counselor" at an animal rescue shelter.
Besides the wonderful door prizes (many gift cards to restaurants and book sellers) the Friends of the Cerritos Library invited everyone to attend next year's event. And as a clever "hook" they passed around printed invitations.
"Save the Date: January 26, 2013."
A final chance to buy books and have authors sign them concluded the event and sent attendees away loaded for hours/days of mystery reading.
http://ci.cerritos.ca.us/library
The Chiro Gal & The Vitamin Guy
GLENDALE CHIRO CARE
Garry Sztanski began his 30-year career working in health food stores such as Quinn's Health Foods in West Hollywood, and Great Earth Vitamins, consulting, merchandising, and giving lectures and seminars on healthy eating.
GLENDALE CHIRO CARE
Six Sisters in Crime writers (and their significant others) were entertained and motivated by the Theatre 40 Production of “The Manor,” a mystery play inspired by true events in the history of the infamous Greystone Mansion.
Assembled first in the Living Room where characters and plot lines were introduced, the 75 guests were then divided into three groups and led by serving staff into various rooms of the mansion. 
Our group, led by the mute maid, entered a Bedroom, where we observed a nervous bride and her young husband (having slipped away from their wedding reception) about to perform the nuptial act. (Thankfully the disapproving mother-in-law called her son back to his guests.)
After an intermission of refreshments in the Breakfast Room, we took up the story ten years later, in a series of rapid, tense scenes played out in several places, including the marble staircase where we witnessed two savage deaths. 
