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 Spring, 2008 - Vol. 6, Number 1
ALL POINTS BULLETIN
By Carl Brookins
If you take a gander at the set of upcoming events and look back at the past five years or so of Crime Wave activities you may note a tendency or two. We make appearances at a lot of libraries. And a good many of those libraries are in small and medium-sized communities. That's deliberate. Folks in what is sometimes called "fly-over land" read mysteries too. They enjoy meeting and getting to know mystery authors and we know this to be true because we always have enthusiastic and appreciative audiences.
Librarians are always very helpful and important to every community. Last year Ellen designed a nice brochure explaining our services. We mailed that brochure to several hundred libraries in the Midwest and the resulting number of requests for visits has been almost overwhelming. In fact, in order to preserve our writing and family time we've had to be careful not to overcommit ourselves.
We greatly appreciate this kind of interest. So I'm taking this opportunity, on behalf of the Minnesota Crime Wave, to publicly thank all the hardworking librarians and all the friends of libraries whom we've met and worked with over the past years and will meet in the near future. But not just for their support of we three mystery authors, but for their continued efforts on behalf of all kinds of reading and all the other services they provide to the communities in which these librarians live and work.
What better time, than, at the beginning of a new year to tip our hats to librarians everywhere and offer a hearty thank you!
MINNESOTA'S NEWEST: JESS LOUREY
By Kent Krueger
![[photo]](images/jesslourey.jpg) In 2007 a sprightly new face appeared on the mystery writing scene in Minnesota. In a state whose ranks were already packed with fine mystery writers, we all pretty much figured we needed another one about as much as we needed an extra blizzard every winter. But Jess Lourey was different. Funny, profane, and offering a heroine—Mira James—who was resolutely human, she brought a welcome burst of sunshine to an often dark and dour landscape.
Beginning with her first book, June Bug, and continuing
through her fourth and most recent offering, Knee High
by the Fourth of July, she's made readers both laugh and gasp at the goings-on in the small town of Battle Lake, Minnesota. Here's her response to some of the questions The Crime Wave threw at her.
Kent: You've set your mysteries in a small, west-central Minnesota town called Battle Lake. There's a real west-central Minnesota town called Battle Lake. Same town?
Jess: The fictional Battle Lake and the real Battle Lake have much in common, not the least of which is their location on the Minnesota map, their quirky residents, and their overall obsession with fish, fiberglass statues, and fish. The only qualitative difference is that the fictional Battle Lake has a library, and all the characters there are made up.
I have had a couple Battle Lake-ians ask me how I could get away with writing about the former mayor like that, or the police chief, or the guy who lives in the blue house on Elm Street. Because I know nothing about the mayor, or the police chief, or the guy who lives in the blue house on Elm Street, I think what they're responding to is the archetypal small town qualities of the characters, and I take that as a compliment.
Kent: Mira James is a woman in search of many things, not the least of which is a normal relationship with a man. Her quest for romance has often gone awry and provided readers with some hilarious moments. Any truth in any of Mira's escapades? Where do you find inspiration for the mishaps?
Jess: Mira's escapades are 34% the product of my wicked imagination, 33% inspiration provided by the relationships of friends and family and other outside influences, and 33% ripped from the headlines of my own life. For example, I force myself to try online dating every spring, and every time I do it, I somehow end up with the guy who reveals on our second date that he was actually born a woman, and can he share some hairstyling tips with me.
Because readers have identified with Mira, I hope, and see her as the type of character who has these ridiculous encounters in her life, a toned-down version of what really happened to me works for her.
Kent: How much of Mira is a reflection of the author?
Jess: Our protagonist is never us, because we would never be that honest, or brave, or passionate, or horrible. The other side of the coin, however, is that our protagonist is more us than we could ever be because s/he is entirely our own creation, with all our fears and hopes amplified for the world to see.
When you write a book, even if it's a humorous mystery like I write, you lay yourself bare, and it feels necessary sometimes to hide behind the fact that we are not our protagonists, even though that's not the whole truth. That's why I like how you phrased this question—I am not my protagonist, but she is a reflection of me. Actually, all the characters in my books are a reflection of me because, if nothing else, I thought they were worth including.
Kent: The connection of the titles—all with a relationship to a particular month—is a clever idea. How'd you happen upon it?
Jess: I took a survey of what was out there—the numbers and the letters were taken, somebody else had the astrological signs, there was a herbal series and a color series, what's left for me? Months. I had the titles May Day and June Bug chosen before I wrote the first word of either book.
Though I initially chose it because I liked the gimmick, it's turned out to be a good way to create a plot arc because you're following the characters through a real-time year, with each book focusing on some mystery they need to solve that month.
Kent: Tell us a little about your journey to publication.
Jess: My journey to publication is painful, so I'll keep it short. May
Day was rejected over 400 times before it found an agent, and then another dozen times before it found a publisher. I didn't give up, and now I'm being interviewed by one of my favorite authors. Life is funny, isn't it?
Kent: You've taught writing at the collegiate level. Does your sensibility as a teacher spill over into your work as an author?
Jess: I don't find my teaching spilling over into my writing as much as I find my writing spilling over into my teaching. My writing makes me more reflective, more able to see the big picture, and more patient with human mistakes. The exception is that I do use my writing as therapy to "fix" bad students. Those who are whiny and entitled often find themselves as awful characters in future novels, but all mystery writers work through their stress that way, right?
Kent: Minnesota is a hotbed of fine crime writers. Any idea what it is about this state that generates so much mayhem between the pages?
Jess: Initially, I think it was long winters with poor TV reception. You either learned to ice fish, took up quilting, picked up a pen, or started collecting human skulls in the pig barn. Now, I think it's just peer pressure.
Kent: You have another book in the series coming out next year called August Moon, then what's on your agenda? Do you intend to stay with the Murder by the Month series?
Jess: I intend to write twelve books in the Murder by Month series. In fact, I have September Mourn all planned out. Battle Lake has provided more Princess Kays of the Milky Way than any other town in Minnesota. Why not kill one of them off—a really evil one, a Milk Dud, really—at the State Fair, while she's getting her head carved in butter? It'll be a "locked butter-head-carving-room mystery." Classic.
Before I write that book, though, I have to clean out another story that's been knocking around my head for a year. This one will be mainstream fiction, and so a departure from my mysteries. I'm tentatively calling it "Rosebud", and it's the story of a Lakota girl forced into a boarding school in 1920s South Dakota. I'm fascinated and horrified by the history of the time, and the way education was used as a blunt weapon. The people who promoted and participated in mandatory off-reservation boarding schools either thought they were helping Native Americans to acclimate to the "civilization" of the country or thought that they were just following orders, and that banality of evil is a theme I'd like to explore more deeply.
I find myself spending many hours a week researching the history of Indian boarding schools, particularly reading firsthand accounts by students who were there. It's important to me that I get the story right.
Kent: Is there anything you'd like to share with readers that's not general knowledge? Anything you'd like finally to come clean about?
Jess: I want a tattoo, but don't have any because I haven't found anything I'd like as much when I'm 87 with flappy skin as I do when I'm 37 with mostly not-flappy skin. Send any tattoo suggestions and Murder by Month title ideas to me at jesslourey@yahoo.com. Thanks for the interview.
LATE BREAKING NEWS!
William Kent Krueger's Thunder Bay has been
nominated for the Minnesota Book Award and for the Dilys Award.
Read back issues:
Winter, 2002 - Vol. 1, Number 1
Spring, 2002 - Vol. 1, Number 2
Fall, 2002 - Vol. 1, Number 3
Winter, 2003 - Vol. 2, Number 1
Spring, 2003 - Vol. 2, Number 2
Fall, 2003 - Vol. 2, Number 3
Spring, 2004 - Vol. 3, Number 1
Fall, 2004 - Vol. 3, Number 2
Spring, 2005 - Vol. 3, Number 3
Fall, 2005 - Vol. 3, Number 4
Spring, 2006 - Vol. 4, Number 1
Fall, 2006 - Vol. 4, Number 2
Spring, 2007 - Vol. 5, Number 1
Spring, 2008 - Vol. 6, Number 1
Fall, 2008 - Vol. 6, Number 2 |
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