Back to the Future

Posted on November 24, 2016 by jeffwidmer under Authors, Books, Creativity, e-books, Fiction, mystery, Novel, suspense, thriller, Writers, Writing

Working on Curb Appeal, the third novel in the CW McCoy series (after Peak Season and Tourist in Paradise), I realize that I write backwards.

In school, we learned to organize our material using an outline. I’ve adopted that technique to sort large amounts of material when writing nonfiction. The tool came in handy when I worked for Mack Trucks and had to find a lead buried in hours of interviews. I used a highlighter and flagged passages that were important to the telling of the story, writing subheads for those highlights and prioritizing them so they flowed in a logical way.

Digging out the nuggets from a pile of information seemed a more organic process than writing an outline. The process allowed the structure of the piece to grow from the material, the research and interviews from primary sources. But when it comes to fiction, I seem unable to follow that scholarly advice.

I write backwards.

Yes, I have a solid idea of the nature of the characters and the arc of the story, but I don’t know the exact scope and sequence of the work. I discover that as I write.

And then I write the outline. In fiction, it’s called a synopsis, a summary that’s written with the same flavor as the novel. It’s longer than a logline and shorter than a chapter-by-chapter description of character and action. But, like a GPS device, it can keep me on track.

Do you write forward or backwards?

The Candidate

Posted on November 2, 2016 by jeffwidmer under Advertising, Authors, Culture, Fiction, Marketing, mystery, Novel, PR, thriller

As an antidote to the election season, I’d like to share an excerpt from my new suspense/thriller, Mr. Magic. You can read the full-tilt lunacy of the role public relations plays in elections and other marketing campaigns at Amazon, iTunes, Barnes & Noble and Kobo, as well as bookstores everywhere.

Be sure to sign up for the Beyond the Book newsletter, at the bottom of this website’s homepage.

And now, Brinker, the defrocked journalist turned PR whiz, will demonstrate how sausage is made:

On a blustery day in early April, Mary Margaret Paulson stood in an open hanger with the snow swirling like dust devils and gazed at the adoring masses. She looked every bit the presidential candidate. Perfect cheekbones, glossy red lips and a bushel of rich brown hair. Long legs in a black pencil skirt, lacy blouse and a red power jacket with shoulders big enough to carry half the states to the nominating convention.

On the campaign trail she’d been called Chillbilly and Bible Spice for her passionate if uninformed defense of religious freedom. The media mocked her. The pundits hated her. But Brinker knew one thing that many had forgotten: the woman oozed sex from every pore, and men and women alike would sacrifice their firstborn to share the air with her.

The scene resembled a campaign rally. An American flag hung behind two corporate jets emblazoned with the cement company’s logo. Paulson stood on a wooden A-Treat box behind a lectern decorated with patriotic bunting and waved like the queen on parade. A crowd of at least a thousand swelled around her, a line of police officers in reflective vests keeping protesters and supporters on opposite sides of the concrete apron. Sitting in rows of folding chairs under space heaters were local and state dignitaries, representatives from the governor’s office, county council members and the mayors of every city within a fifty-mile radius. The rest of the rabble stood in the cold, their hats declaring allegiance to Garth Brooks, the Phillies and the NRA.

Brinker focused on Paulson’s speech. In an effort to cut costs, the cement company wanted to burn hazardous waste. Residents weren’t convinced by the company’s health studies, which showed emissions would remain below EPA thresholds. His position paper had dealt with the need to balance environmental protection with economic growth. He’d reduced it to three bullet points. Paulson hadn’t gotten through the first when she veered off-message like a bike that had lost its training wheels. She ranted about liberals and intellectuals, the elite and the effete, people who were ruining the country with their bleeding hearts and costly regulations, stifling growth and free enterprise and everything that made America great.

The crowd cheered and Brinker, the PR whiz who’d turned a serial killer into a national brand, started to worry that the stunt wouldn’t backfire, that it wouldn’t create the chaos that guaranteed national coverage. Then, from across the tarmac, he heard the sound of grinding gears and smelled the belch of diesel exhaust as an ancient blue school bus tottered around the corner of the hanger and four dozen Korean woman dressed in hot pink jumpsuits piled out, Buddha at the fore, the notes of Psy’s “Gangnam Style” throbbing from a speaker on the roof.

Buddha, AKA Benjamin Kwon, community organizer and ace travel agent who helped the pursued disappear from the grid. Handing signs to the women—he’d economized by printing both sides, “Feel the Burn” on the front and, on the back, “Burn, Baby, Burn”—he marched the women through the crowd, the Koreans forming a wall between supporters and protesters. As they twirled their signs and waved to the camera, Buddha broke away and headed for the perimeter.

Brinker sidled up to him. “How’s it going?”

“’Oppa oppa Gangnam style.’”

“You should run for office.”

Realizing that reinforcements had arrived, Paulson pointed at the ground with a sharply manicured finger and shouted, “This is it! Right here in little old Allentown, PA! The front lines of the battle, the home of concrete and steel that made this nation great!”

The crowd surged, one half cheering, the other half waving signs mounted on wooden stakes the size of baseball bats. Brinker could smell the blood lust as it raced through them, flaring nostrils, pumping muscles, raking their skin until they began to howl.

The handlers must have felt the massive animal coiling for a strike because two of them flanked the lectern as Paulson finished her speech with the pump of a fist and the cry of “Burn, baby, burn!”

The audience exploded, the police line collapsed. Protesters wielded their signs like clubs. Politicians ducked behind the flag. The cement company’s security force, standing respectfully at attention during the remarks, formed a firewall while the handlers hustled Paulson through the back of the hanger.

As police rushed in with batons, Buddha pulled Brinker to the sidelines. Above the roar of sirens, he said, “We have failed you, my friend.”

Brinker smiled as video crews captured the melee. “It’s all good.”

Atomic shuffle

Posted on October 19, 2016 by jeffwidmer under Advertising, Books, e-books, Fiction, mystery, Novel, PR, suspense, thriller

When we think of vacations, we think of the beach or the mountains, Europe or Mexico, a camper or cruise or condo. But if you’re a travel agent who specializes in helping the hunted drop off the grid, you might look to a few places that, while not off the beaten path, aren’t top destinations for the leisure class.

Think Chernobyl, Fukushima and a place that will keep radiating charm for centuries, Los Alamos and the neighboring town of Alamogordo, site of the Manhattan Project and the testing of the first atomic weapons.

At least that’s what the Korean expat Benjamin Kwon thinks when helping debtors, tax dodgers and advertising agency executives elude official scrutiny. Kwon , AKA the Buddha, does his vanish tricks in Mr. Magic, the second in the series of crime novels featuring a defrocked journalist turned PR whiz named Brinker, who made his debut last year in Mr. Mayhem.

What is it about those three sites that attracts the miscreants, misfits and marketing gurus? For Brinker and Buddha, two words: exclusion zone.

Established soon after the 1986 disaster, the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant Zone of Alienation is an evacuation area within a 30 km radius of the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant. Decades after the meltdown, residents have crept back into the area.

After the Tōhoku earthquake on March 11, 2011 and the ensuing tsunami, the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear meltdown made that region too hot to inhabit, yet people will always want a closer look at large-scale disaster.

Alamogordo is connected with the Trinity test, the first explosion of an atomic bomb, and the Los Alamos National Laboratory, the secret World War II facility that housed the Manhattan Project.

Dr. Beach isn’t naming any of those sites to his top 10 list of vacation destinations, but any place that’s off limits to the casual visitor might make a good place to hide.

That premise forms the backbone of Mr. Magic, a book that asks the question: how hard must a PR counselor work to spin a visit to a nuclear graveyard as adventure travel? For Brinker, that raises another question: how hard will his new boss at the ad agency press him to exile her rivals to these places?

Brinker will have to use all of the magic he can muster to keep himself from becoming the latest to disappear. You can read all about his struggle to give up sex, drugs and dirty tricks at Amazon, iTunes, Barnes & Noble, Kobo and jeffwidmer.com, as well as bookstores everywhere.

And be sure to sign up for the Beyond the Book newsletter, at the bottom of this website’s homepage.

The Buddha helps people disappear to places like Chernobyl in MR. MAGIC

Off the Grid

Posted on October 12, 2016 by jeffwidmer under Advertising, Books, e-books, Fiction, mystery, Novel, PR, thriller

Brinker has lost his magic. The agency’s CEO wants him to ace the competition. His former girlfriend wants him in detox. And as rival advertising executives disappear, an ambitious state trooper wants him in jail.

If this keeps up, the PR whiz who turned a serial killer into a national brand may have to vanish himself.

Throw in toxic waste, a nude car wash and a gun-toting presidential candidate and the czar of PR will have to spin some potent magic to escape the snare of sex, lies and greed that threatens to destroy his job, his sanity and the love of his life.

Brinker does so in Mr. Magic, the second in the series of crime novels starring the defrocked journalist. Mr. Magic plays out in the post-industrial snowbelt of Pennsylvania’s Lehigh Valley, an area I know well after working there in marketing for a decade. While Brinker vows to give up drugs and violence, he’s pulled into the netherworld of forced disappearances by a self-styled travel agent who helps clients vanish in places like Fukushima, Chernobyl and the deserts of the American Southwest.

Published by Allusion Books, the novel is the sequel to Mr. Mayhem. Both books are available through Amazon, iTunes, Barnes & Noble, Kobo and jeffwidmer.com, as well as bookstores everywhere. They join the the novels in the CW McCoy series, Peak Season and Tourist in Paradise, that play out in the tony beach towns of Southwest Florida.

And be sure to sign up for the Beyond the Book newsletter, at the bottom of this website’s homepage.

The nuclear reactors at Fukushima

Month of Magic

Posted on September 28, 2016 by jeffwidmer under Advertising, Books, e-books, Fiction, Marketing, mystery, Novel, PR, suspense, thriller, Writers

J.G. Ballard once said that the dystopian landscapes in his books reflect the character’s inner world as much as the outer one.

We’re more familiar with the opposite. Places affect how people feel and act. Think New York in the decade when the city cleaned up graffiti-defaced buildings, repaired windows and installed lighting as part of its crime-fighting strategy.

I’m interested in the collision of those two ideas. In writing fiction, I look for places that both create and reflect a mood. The post-industrial cities of Pennsylvania’s Lehigh Valley provide a wealth of locations that meet that criteria—the ruins of Bethlehem Steel, the abandoned quarries of the Slate Belt, the cement plants near Nazareth.

As you might expect if you read Mr. Mayhem, the novel’s main character, a disgraced journalist called Brinker, thrives in this dystopian world. In Brinker’s second outing, Mr. Magic, the PR whiz who turned a serial killer into a national brand has gone to work for the advertising agency from hell, where the owners have hired him to make the competition disappear.

The Lehigh Valley is the perfect backdrop for the ensuing struggle. From Soldiers and Sailors Monument in Allentown to the historic Moravian settlement in Bethlehem to Route 22 at rush hour, the Lehigh Valley provides both a canvas and a mirror for a character tormented by addiction and failure. (Alert readers will note that while Chernobyl is not a tourist stop in the Lehigh Valley, the location plays a role in the novel.)

Each day next month, I’ll post on social media images of those seminal locations, places that may have become part of your own inner landscape. How many do you recognize?

Corner of Walnut and Main streets in Bethlehem inspired offices of DAR Advertising & PR in MR. MAGIC

Interior of Crocodile Rock inspired underage pickup scene at Gator Club in MR. MAGIC

Across from DAR Advertising stands the majestic Hotel Bethlehem in MR. MAGIC

Carly has her heart set on converting the Moravian Waterworks to a theater in MR. MAGIC

In MR. MAGIC, remains of Bethlehem Steel play a role in ad agency’s downfall

Buddha helps people disappear to places like Chernobyl in MR. MAGIC

Soldiers and Sailors Monument in Allentown, site of the Hiroshima die-in

Vanishing Act

Posted on September 10, 2016 by jeffwidmer under Advertising, Books, e-books, Fiction, mystery, PR, thriller

What if everything you love could disappear in a minute . . . including you?

The defrocked journalist known as Brinker finds out in Mr. Magic, available now for preorder and Oct. 1 in print.

Discover the ebook on Amazon, iTunes, Barnes & Noble and Kobo. And catch Brinker’s debut in the deceptive world of PR in Mr. Mayhem.

Month of Mayhem

Posted on July 27, 2016 by jeffwidmer under Advertising, Audio, Authors, Books, Culture, e-books, Fiction, Marketing, mystery, Novel, PR, Social media, thriller, Writers, Writing

Next week kicks off a Month of Mayhem, with a look at the places that shaped Brinker’s story in his debut crime novel Mr. Mayhem—all in preparation for the return of the defrocked journalist and PR whiz this fall in the sequel, Mr. Magic.

Brinker returns a kinder, gentler guy who draws inspiration from his girlfriend Carly, a mate he calls The Buddha and the landscapes of the Greater Lehigh Valley. But in the meantime, he’s still stalking the Pocono Mountains of Pennsylvania.

Each day in August, visitors on social media view the scenes that inspired Brinker’s day job and his extracurricular work, as well as the ones that fueled his loves and addictions. Here’s a look at some of the sights that became models for the novel.

1959 Cadillac hearse used by Col. Mabry when the modern version breaks down.

Stroudsburg, Pa. funeral home that inspired Brinker’s workplace, Mabry & Sons.

The house on Sarah Street in Stroudsburg, Pa. where Eddie Maps allegedly killed his wife and daughter plays a seminal role in Mr. Mayhem.

Corner house in Stroudsburg, Pa. served as a model for the home of the first victim.

Brinker’s mascot, Pecan Man, haunts Mabry & Sons funeral home.

One of most famous taverns in the Burgs, Rudy’s served as model for Willy’s Tavern.

Infamous intersection at 7th & Main in Stroudsburg, Pa., host to politicians and fatal accidents.

The intersection at 7th & Main in Stroudsburg, Pa., plays host to politicians and other fatalities.

The Water Gap Trolley became the model vehicle for Brinker’s Magical Murder Tour.

Why we write

Posted on December 17, 2015 by jeffwidmer under Authors, Books, Commerce, Culture, e-books, Fiction, Novel, Writers, Writing

The chief benefit of publishing an e-book through Smashwords is the distribution channel–Barnes & Noble, Apple’s iBooks and indie e-book retailer Kobo. There’s one other feature writers might consider, an interview with the author. Here’s mine:

What motivated you to become an indie author?

After sending queries to 76 agents, I received a number of kind comments but no offers of representation. Then an indie author alerted me to Joanna Penn and The Creative Penn podcasts about the publishing industry. I found her rationale for going independent so compelling I decided to learn as much as I could. The materials on Smashwords were also a great help. In an increasingly DIY world, indie publishing makes a lot sense.

What is the greatest joy of writing for you?

The greatest joy of writing is the process, the act of writing. Something I think publishing is just an excuse to keep writing.

What do your fans mean to you?

Fans mean contact with people who share common interests and feelings. The feel of a book is so important, and so elusive, especially during the drafting phase, when the author is isolated from others. To hear that I’ve entertained or touched someone else . . . that’s the real joy of writing.

What are you working on now?

I’m writing the sequel to Peak Season, the second book in the CW McCoy series. It’s called Tourist in Paradise and starts with the premise that someone is trying to kill the tourism industry in Southwest Florida. I’m also working on the audiobook version of Mr. Mayhem, the first in the Brinker series of crime novels. It’s high-concept, the kind of treatment you’d expect to see on HBO or Amazon Prime.

Who are your favorite authors?

An eclectic group of crime novelists ranging from Raymond Chandler, Ken Bruen and Chelsea Cain (“One Kick) to Robert B. Parker, Sara Paretsky, Ruth Rendell and Tony Hillerman. I like the Anns–Anne Lamott, Annie Proulx, Anne Tyler and Anna Quindlen. I also like the romantics, Jennifer Crusie and Janet Evanovich, and British writers P.G. Wodehouse (Jeeves and Wooster) and John Mortimer (Rumpole of the Bailey).

What inspires you to get out of bed each day?

Another chance to create, to build new worlds and live inside them.

When you’re not writing, how do you spend your time?

Hiking, taking photos, reading, listening to classical music and NPR.

How do you discover the e-books you read?

I follow recommendations from fellow members of my writers’ groups.

Do you remember the first story you ever wrote?

No, but I remember a wonderful professor who rekindled my interest in fiction to such a degree that I wrote a book-length collection of short stories. Now that’s inspiration.

What is your writing process?

I try to write first thing in the morning and save marketing and social media for later in the day.

Do you remember the first story you ever read, and the impact it had on you?

I remember my parents reading to me, and since then, I’ve grown fond of spoken-word audio.

How do you approach cover design?

After design the cover of my first nonfiction book, The Spirit of Swiftwater, I wisely took the advice of a seasoned indie author and hired a professional to design the covers of Peak Season, Mr. Mayhem and Riding with the Blues. The designers have captured the tone of the work better than I ever could.

What are your five favorite books, and why?

Listening Woman by Tony Hillerman, Rumpole of the Bailey by John Mortimer, All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr, Good Night, Mr. Wodehouse by Faith Sullivan and Road Rage by Ruth Rendell. Let’s add a sixth: California Fire and Life by Don Winslow. All offer sensitive characters thrust into compelling situations.

What do you read for pleasure?

Standalone books like The Girl on the Train and series novels by Parker, Hillerman, Rendell, Grimes and the inimitable P.G. Wodehouse. (Who can top Jeeves and Wooster?)

What is your e-reading device of choice?

I have an iPad mini and a Kindle and I’m looking forward to buying an Android tablet in the near future.

What book marketing techniques have been most effective for you?

Social media and word of mouth, although I will send review copies to journalists and bloggers.

Describe your desk

My dining room table.

Where did you grow up, and how did this influence your writing?

I grew up in the Pocono Mountains of Pennsylvania, a once-rural area that attracted tourists to the clean mountain air. Perched on the border with New Jersey, it is now a bedroom community for New York. The area inspired a love of nature and a desire to experience the art and culture found in the city.

What’s the story behind your latest book?

After moving to Florida, I decided to revisit a lifelong interest in fiction. During a writing class, the instructor suggested we turn a short story into a news report and a news story into a piece of short fiction. As a working journalist, the first part felt easy. (I chose one of my favorites, a John Updike short story.) For the second part, I found an article about a fugitive financier that fascinated me and turned it into a short story. I liked the product and the process so much, I worked the character into the novel Peak Season and created someone worthy of challenging him, CW McCoy, a woman who had renounced violence . . . under the fugitive kidnaps her family.

For the second novel, Mr. Mayhem, I channeled some of the anger at literary rejection and cynicism about public relations and marketing in general.

When did you first start writing?

In elementary school.

What’s next for you?

The debut of Mr. Mayhem and the character of Brinker, a disgraced journalist doing PR for a funeral home and its trolley tour of murder sites in rural Pennsylvania. He hates the job, the place and himself. The tour business is dying. There aren’t enough murders to draw a crowd. An assassin would help. The audio version should be a killer.

A walk on the dark side with ‘Mr. Mayhem’

Posted on December 4, 2015 by jeffwidmer under Authors, Books, Creativity, Culture, e-books, Fiction, Novel, Writers, Writing

Sued by his publisher for libel, Brinker is reduced to promoting trolley tours of crime scenes. The tour business is dying. There aren’t enough murders to draw a crowd.

A good serial killer would help.

When his doctor asks for aid in euthanizing terminal patients, Brinker hires an assassin named Angel, who reigns chaos and fame on the sleepy resort town.

But as Angel’s demands soar with the body count, Brinker wonders whether he’ll become the latest addition to his own list.

For better or worse, Mr. Mayhem, the first in the Brinker series of crime thrillers, comes alive in this video.

[iframe id=”https://www.youtube.com/embed/uovYcBIkjME”%5D

Changing the view of black and blue

Posted on September 9, 2015 by jeffwidmer under Books, Culture, e-books, Education, Law Enforcement, Nonfiction, Writing

A police officer shoots an unarmed civilian. A criminal assassinates a deputy. People march, riot, while others call for peace. Across a widening divide, battle lines form. Black Lives Matter. Blue Lives Matter. In the middle, a sheriff suggests that all lives matter.

America is coming apart. America is coming together. The people we hire to protect us attack and are themselves attacked. Support erodes. Doubts replace trust. In an increasingly hostile environment, what can law enforcement do to help society regain its balance?

It can show the public how policing works, the dangers, the challenges, the limitations officers face. Two agencies in Sarasota County do that, the Sarasota Sheriff’s Office through its Citizens Law Enforcement Academy and the Sarasota Police Department through its Citizens’ Academy. I’ve attended both, riding with officers, conducting mock investigations, standing in the use-of-force simulator with a gun, a TASER and the feeling that life has spun out of control.

It’s an issue all of America faces, one that prompted me to write a book about the experience. The book is called Riding with the Blues, Behind the Badge with the Sarasota Police Department. It’s an attempt to find out what law enforcement does when the cameras aren’t rolling. Here’s the first chapter:

Chapter 1: Simulated Fear
My partner and I sweep into the office building, weapons held in firing position, stomachs bouncing like trampolines. There’s an active shooter in the building. People move in and out of the frame, a jumble of corridors and desks, the wounded lying on the floor, workers, police officers, some calling for help. We have no time.

A tall man with shoulders rounding a white polo shirt crosses between several desks and turns into an office. He raises his arm and fires. We edge closer. As the man backs out of the office he spots us and, half-turned, starts to raise his pistol. My partner and I yell “Police! Drop the weapon!” but he doesn’t and we fire, hitting him several times. As he goes down, silence crowds the air, and as we inch forward, a dark figure climbs from behind a desk.

Is he a shooter, a victim, a hostage? Is he armed? We’ve been briefed about the law, how shooting unarmed civilians can land us in jail, how hesitating may get us killed. As the man rises, we have a nanosecond to make a decision.

We freeze. He’s too far away to see his eyes but he’s got something in his hand, and we’re in the open, nothing between us but raw space. Crawling around the side of the desk, crouching in the corridor, the man raises a handgun and starts shooting. We return fire until he collapses. I have no idea if we’re hit, just that he’s not moving.

The officer behind the computer freezes the frame. On a screen larger than the biggest home theater, crosshairs dot the shooter’s chest, marking the places where we’ve landed rounds. As the adrenalin cools, we come back to a different reality.

In the dim light, everything looks gray, the walls, the carpet, even the screen. We’re standing in a classroom on the third floor of the Sarasota Police Department (SPD) in Sarasota, Florida, experiencing the use-of-force simulator as dozens of rookie officers have over the years. Only we’re not recruits. We are civilians enrolled in the SPD’s Citizens’ Academy, a twelve-week program designed to reveal the realities of police work and the people who live in the often closed world behind the badge.

The simulator is a humbling experience. It pinpoints our lack of training and resolve. It highlights the violence of our culture, and the risks that officers and civilians face in any encounter. This is the dark half of policing, the part we see in movies and on TV, always from the spectator side of the camera, the focus on how the situation looks, not how it feels. As we turn in our weapons and return to class, I recall the shooting of civilians by police in Ferguson, Baltimore, South Carolina. I think back to the first session of the Citizens’ Academy and the chief’s talk about community policing, the part about cooperation and understanding, about winning the hearts and minds of the citizens, and I wonder how the two halves fit.

Jeff Widmer

Author

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