Book 3 and the torus vortex

Book 3 and the Torus Vortex

I was listening to the podcast Harry Potter as a Sacred Text while walking my puppy, Charlie the other day, and Vanessa Zoltan and Casper Ter Kuile made an interesting comment about The Prisoner of Azkaban (HP book number 3) as they delved into the final discussions / wrap up of the the book. 

If you haven't started listening to Harry Potter as a Sacred Text, and you're a fan of the Harry Potter books, please go and start listening to the podcast right now. Don't even bother coming back to read this blog until after you've started listening to the podcast. Don't bother to eat. Don't sleep. Don't stop at Go and collect $200. Go. Right. Now. and Listen.

It's amazing.

Soooo, back to the podcast, and their review of book number 3, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, both Vanessa and Casper seemed to dislike the book as much as they like the first two books.

Vanessa and Casper discuss the importance of having a focus in a book. They describe book number three in the Harry Potter series as feeling unrooted, with a lack of focus -- because so many different characters have so many different energies focused on so many different things. 

"Hermione with her academic achievement, Lupin trying to look after Harry and reorient himself within the Hogwarts system, Snape trying to get revenge, Dumbledore is, like, MIA and then returns suddenly, Trelawny is having predictions, the Weasleys are basically not in this book. Where is Ginny? We like found her? And then she's like not in this book."*

Vanessa and Casper argued that the book almost felt as if the book seemed to miss something. That the stakes felt too small or too low and that something felt narratively missing when the book's focus wasn't on Voldemort.

By no means would I ever compare my books to the Harry Potter book series, but the structure concerns, to me, are relatable and are something I'd like to address.

In my own Book 3, I have the victims, the killer, and Jack Diamond all having their own perspective to a shooting that occurs on a pedestrian bridge here in Portland. By having so very many different things going on, I could have a very real problem -- lack of focus.

BUT

If I were to make the event -- the shooting on the bridge -- as the focus of the entire story, with each chapter unraveling the events through the lens of: each of the people who were on the bridge, or near the bridge, or a part of the shooting that occurs upon the bridge, or first responders to the events that occur upon the bridge -- that could keep the story focused.

STAY FOCUSED ON THE SHOOTING ON THE BRIDGE

Instead of envisioning the story as a snail shell, perhaps it is more like a yoyo, the events slowly unfolding bit by bit as the yoyo heads toward the depth of its trajectory, and then the shocking shootings create the jerk that is sufficient to lead the story back toward its conclusion.

Or, perhaps the story is more like a torus vortex or a tube torus, with each circular piece representing the different people who are involved in the incident, and the incident (the shooting on the bridge) itself being at the center of the entire book.

source

It seems to me that as long as I keep the shooting as the focus of the story -- the people who are on or near the bridge, the shooter, the victims who are shot, and the peace officers and first responders who come to rescue the victims and reduce and remove the threat of the shooter, the story should continue to have the proper focus.

I love this idea.

It is beautiful in its complexity.

Not once, ever, in my entire life, did I ever think that writers put so much thought into how their stories should be plotted out to best serve the readers, and to best make the story an effective, interesting, complicated but lovely book to read. But here I am, before I even truly begin, trying to plot out how this book is going to work before I start writing it, so that it will end up being structured like a torus vortex.

Did I mention how much I love this idea?

* * * * *

Citations:
* Zoltan, V. and Ter Kuile, C. (2017, September 5). Wrap-Up: Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. Harry Potter and the Sacred Text podcast.

* * * * *

I not only bake and cook, I write murder mysteries too!

Both books are available in paperback and kindle versions

Diamonds for Diamond 
(Book 1 in the Jack Diamond Mystery series)
and
No One Noticed

(Book 2 in the Jack Diamond Mystery Series)

* * * * *

Plotting out book 3

Plotting out Book 3

So here I am, once again, sitting down at the computer, trying to figure out how to plot out the complexities of Book 3, the book that has not yet been named.

For those of you who want to know where I was, back at the beginning of January, start here: And so it begins. It's my blog entry about some of the complexities that go into my thought processes when I plan out a book.

What it doesn't say, is that -- like most people -- I have to juggle writing with life. And life has been consistently getting in my way of writing. 

I struggle with that.

When I was a college professor, I went to work each and every day. I spent hours on my commute. I spent hours teaching. I spent hours with students during 'office hours.' I spent too many hours grading. And I loved each and every minute of it.

Now that I work from home, it is a much bigger struggle to say no to other people. Someone needs a ride to the airport. Or to the doctor. Someone else wants to have lunch, and maybe go shopping. Someone else needs something from the store. The groceries need to be purchased, the bills need to get paid, the laundry needs to get done, and someone has *got* to clean up the dog poo and the clean out the litter boxes. 

And when the hubster and the kiddos are at work and at school it is infinitely easier to ask the one person who is at home to do those things. So much harder to ask someone to do something if they are in a physically different location.

The invisible woman who juggles work with home life and struggles to find her own identity in the midst of caring for her work needs, her home life needs, her family's needs, her own needs.

And so now it is March and I have not worked on my book. It has festered in my head. It festers still.

I am struggling with the structure of this next book, and think I've decided on a snail shell. 

Yes, you read that right. A snail shell.

I believe I am going to tell the story from several different perspectives, hour by hour, building upon the people's version of the story, wrapping and coiling the story around until the grand event. And then I'll uncoil the story and unwrap it around as it races to the end and finishes in a grand flurry.

To me, that's like a snail shell.

To some of you, you may think, "mmmmkay. She's lost her nutter."

Well, maybe I have.

And maybe that's okay.

Sometimes I think you have to be a bit mad in order to be a murder mystery writer. My sick and twisted mind, all dark and twisty, is exactly the perfect kind of mind that this type of story telling needs.

And it's the kind of mind my hubster loves and adores, 
so that's just an added bonus.

* * * * *

Follow me on Instagram! @kaysmithbooks

* * * * *

I not only bake and cook, I write murder mysteries too!

Both books are available in paperback and kindle versions

Diamonds for Diamond 
(Book 1 in the Jack Diamond Mystery series)
and
No One Noticed

(Book 2 in the Jack Diamond Mystery Series)

* * * * *

Where do my writing ideas come from?

So where do my writing ideas come from?

Over the years, so many people have asked me this question.

Where do my writing ideas come from?

Well, like me, the answer is rather complicated.

The first novel I ever wrote was a story that had been rambling about in my head for so long I honestly don't remember where it came from. I will rewrite it some day. It's a lovely love story that took place long before cell phones and texting, when people got mail and love letters were a thing.

It never occurred to me to ask if other people have dreams about book plots. Maybe they do, maybe it's just me. But sometimes, my dreams bring me book ideas.

And when the book ideas come in my dreams, wowie, do they zing me.

Jack Diamond, my main character for Diamonds for Diamond and No One Noticed came from a dream.

I was in the middle of writing my first novel, and I started writing a scene about the main character making cookies in his kitchen. I finished writing the entire scene before I realized that wasn't Scott, the main character of the novel, but rather some other random guy.

Many moons later when I was hashing over murder mystery plot ideas with my husband, I felt mildly frustrated because I couldn't figure out who the main character was. I couldn't envision him. I didn't want to create a guy out of nothing. I wanted him to BE someone.

And then I remembered the scene about the 'fake' Scott baking cookies in the kitchen, and it all came flooding in to me.

I remembered the scene vividly.

I could see what he was wearing. I could picture the entire kitchen. And just like that, I was inside his house. I took a few steps backward, and I saw his dining room, his living room, the front door. I watched as he sat on the couch teaching a little girl, maybe 6? or 7? how to play chess. I watched him get up and go into the back of the house, passing the laundry room and the guest bathroom. I watched him go into his bedroom and off to change his clothes. I saw the french doors leading to his back garden, and realized that his grandmother taught him how to garden. That she, in fact, had raised him. I felt a million of his memories come flashing into my memories, like a USB had been plugged into my circuitry and now I knew who this man had the potential to be.

My husband may have named him (after a real man who worked with him on the real MCSO Dive Rescue and Recovery Team), but Jack Diamond in my books is a completely different person, downloaded from my imagination.

Since then, several other scenes from various bits and pieces of book ideas have periodically popped into my thoughts.

Once, not long after visiting my family and friends in Alaska, I had a very short, very vivid dream for a romance novel -- start to finish -- that took place in Valdez, Alaska. I've never been to Valdez. But evidently I'll need to head over there some day. The dream was unbelievably realistic, with an absurd amount of details considering the whole thing took place in under three minutes of sleep.

Then, last night, I had a doozy. Truly, a gift of a dream.

This time, the dream manifested out of actual events (in actuality I was looking over the doctor's shoulder, watching the fascinating results of a someone else's echocardiogram) -- but in the dream, I was looking over the surgeon's shoulder, looking at someone's cataract on an enormous screen.

The remainder of the dream was completely unrelated. As I watched the dream unfold, I found myself fascinated by the amount of details I had been able to obtain from the characters.

I rolled over in bed, grabbed my phone, and started typing down the details. I think at one point after I had written down as much of the dream as I could remember, I must have fallen back asleep a little bit, because more of the dream kept coming. I typed along as the dream was coming to me, jotting down detailed notes of the whole thing. Like sleep walking, only typing. Sleep typing? I typed down where we were, who his family was, who else was there, conversations. Feelings. Emotions. Scars. Memories.

To me, these dreams are almost like alternate realities. As if in some alternate universe these events actually took place. I remember the dream as if it's a memory of my own experience. The aches, the hurts, the feelings are all mine, but the story is theirs.

I have learned a process of writing that works effectively for me. I plot out the whole book, from start to mostly finish, jotting down itsy bitsy pieces of notes for each chapter. Something like, "Claire meets Jack at the restaurant and gives him the envelope full of photos." Just enough of a note to trigger the idea of what has to happen in that chapter. When you're writing a murder mystery, it's important to plot out what happens when, who dies when, who figures out what at which point, and so on. Lay out the clues. Fill out the timing. Get things right.

And then when I sit down to write, after looking at my note, I simply start typing. And the next thing I know, it's like watching a movie unfold. I watch what happens. Who is there? What does the place smell like? What are they eating? What are they talking about? Is she happy? What did she choose to wear today? What does her perfume smell like? Is she upset? I can scan the whole scene in my mind, taking it all in, trying to get it all down in writing so that the reader can be sitting beside the characters, listening to their conversation, nibbling on their french fries while sipping at an iced tea, a virtual fly on the wall.

Writing just comes to me, pouring out of my fingers. Things happen to my characters that I had no idea was going to happen. People die. Sometimes they buy thoughtful presents that I would never have thought of. It astounds me when people say something like, "But you wrote it.  It came from you. So you thought of this." Yes, I suppose that's true. But to me? It feels like the characters came up with the ideas all on their own. They did what they did. They said what they said. They made their choice, did their deeds, suffer the consequences. I'm just the writer who translates their actions onto paper.

And now, as I'm rambling on forever and a day, I am realizing I have a new struggle. Do I write the story from my dream into a more cohesive story? Do I take time away from Jack Diamond and his adventures to write a romance? Or do I take a few notes, save the paragraphs, and hope that when at some point I'm done writing Jack Diamond books and am ready to switch gears, I can rekindle this memory of this amazing dream, and write this romance that haunts me still, fourteen hours later?

These are good questions.

* * * * *

* * * * *

I not only bake and cook, I write murder mysteries too!

Both books are available in paperback and kindle versions

Diamonds for Diamond 
(Book 1 in the Jack Diamond Mystery series)
and
No One Noticed

(Book 2 in the Jack Diamond Mystery Series)

* * * * *

And so it begins.

So much happens after you finish a book.

Exhaustion. Elation. The myriad book sales and signings. The perma-grin.

And then comes the frantic running about as if you're a chicken with your head chopped off, trying desperately to catch up on life that you completely ignored while you were finishing up with your latest book.

I have more than a dozen blog entries I started and stopped because I ran out of time. Food recipes. Dessert recipes. Photos of the gajillion pieces of candies and cookies and fudge that I made for the folks at the hubster's work. Pics of gingerbread houses of yore. Writing challenges I thought about while basking in the afterglow of having finished book number two.

Hopefully I'll get around to posting them.

But for now, I thought I'd say hi.

Tell you that I'm officially sitting down to start writing number three.

Even though there is still so very much to do with the rest of life.

And it's not as if I actually just sit down and start writing. The planning takes forever and a day. I learned that the hard way when writing book number 0 (the one that is stuffed inside a drawer somewhere collecting dust, no where near being publishable until it is completely rewritten). Planning a murder mystery is insanely challenging. Trying to figure out how the person died, when the people discover the body, who did it. What clues are placed behind. When are those clues discovered. It all takes coordination and planning and thoughtful, careful, deliberate thought.

And now I face a new challenge.

I have two books from the Jack Diamond mysteries published and out there (yay!). But both of those books take place over a period of time. That actual amount of time is never really discussed -- in either book. The first book was written with the strategy that the reader should begin slowly, learning about the case, and then as the bodies begin to pile up and the killer begins to notice Jack Diamond, the pace of the book picks up. As you read further and further into the book, the chapters become shorter and shorter and the book takes on a rather frantic race toward the finish line.

The second book really focused on character development: getting to know the main characters better, diving into their histories a little bit while trying to solve a mystery. Instead of having just one point of view (that of Jack Diamond), this book has three different viewpoints. Jack Diamond, the detective, Marjorie Goverman, the victim, and the killer each get their own chapters with their own points of view throughout the book. By presenting the story with the three variant points of view, the story moved along, keeping the readers on their toes. The final revelation then is created by the merging of the three points of view. From the time the victim disappeared to the time Jack Diamond solves the mystery, several months have passed.

But book number three is another kettle of fish. Instead of days or weeks or months going by in an investigation, the events of book number three take place over the course of hours.

This timeline thus creates myriad problems.

Should this book, like the last, have multiple points of view? For example, do I tell the same story 10 times from 10 different points of view from each of the 10 families who are involved in the story? (I am making the number 10 up here, just for the purpose of this argument. I actually don't know how many points of view there will be.)

Should this book be told solely from the point of view of Jack Diamond?

Should this book be told from the point of view of the victims? Or of the killer?

And if the book is written from someone else's point of view, will my readers still want to read it? Or do readers like to read more of the same. 

The same the same the same but different.

How many people are going to die?

If I have 10 people die, what are their names? Who are these people? What were they doing? Will they be missed? How will they die? Who are the survivors? Who are the heroes? Who is the bad guy? And why did he lose his nutter on the bridge and kill a whole mess o'people?!

Will the book spread out for more than the length of the day of the event? or just for a few hours?

If the book is only one day in length, will each chapter feel sluggish?

Or will it feel too frantic?

Should I break the book out into hours? Like the tv show 24? Should it be broken out by victim? Should it be broken down by going backwards, trying to piece together how everything unfolded? Should it be mixed up completely? Like the book The Time Traveler's Wife? I loved that book. Not as big of a fan of the movie, but the book? It was amazing. So many questions about how to put together this tragedy.

I do believe that it's a completely bizarre thing that I sit around plotting random murders. I think of places to bury victims. I think of different ways people can die. I don't want anything too bizarre. I tend to prefer more run of the mill, ordinary deaths, but with interesting REASONS for why someone died or why someone chose to end someone else's life. And, just so you know, I don't spend all my time on these thoughts. I truly only touch upon them when a new book is starting to sprout inside my mind. Or when I visit a unique and interesting place. Or when I watch a movie or read a book that made me ponder.

I think about my slightly sick and twisted mind that makes me want to write about murder mysteries. I love solving puzzles. I love figuring things out. It's ever so much harder to write a book with a surprise ending than it is to read one. I yearn for the day that I can truly surprise my readers (or myself, for that matter), with an unexpected ending.

So as I sit here, staring at "Insert Cool Title Here," these are just a few things that I will be thinking about over the next little while.

It's time to plot things out.

Make a plan.

Do some research.

It may actually be quite some time before a single word gets written of this book. But for now, it's all about the planning.

So while you're sitting there, sipping your coffee, eating that big ol' piece of chocolate cake with chocolate fudge frosting and cursing New Year's Resolutions, or while you're running on your treadmill thinking whoo hoo, I got this! Just know that I will be sitting over here, listening to my puppy snore, plotting the hypothetical deaths of a whole mess of people and keeping my fingers crossed for snow.

* * * * *

I not only bake and cook, I write murder mysteries too!

Both books are available in paperback and kindle versions

Diamonds for Diamond 
(Book 1 in the Jack Diamond Mystery series)
and
No One Noticed

(Book 2 in the Jack Diamond Mystery Series)

Underwater crime scene investigations

No One Noticed

by Kay Nimitz Smith

Book 2 in the Jack Diamond Mystery Series

now available on Amazon!!

Book 2

Someone asked another intriguing question this week 

and I thought I'd share the answer.

How does underwater crime scene investigations and scuba diving

 play a role in your new book?

That's a great question!

For those of you who have read my first book, Diamonds for Diamond, you'll remember that our protagonist, Jack Diamond, is a detective for the Multnomah County Sheriff's Office (MCSO). He is *ALSO* the head of the MCSO's Dive Rescue and Recovery Team.

And before I go any further, yes, in real life the MCSO has a Dive Rescue and Recovery Team. Yes, the folks who dive for them are amazing. They do great work!! Sometimes they're saving lives, other times they're doing underwater crime scene investigations, recovering weapons, evidence, cars, and dead bodies as the needs arise.

So, back to Jack Diamond.

In my first book, Diamonds for Diamond, a serial killer is on the loose, dumping his dead bodies in various bodies of water throughout the Portland, Oregon metropolitan area. Jack Diamond and his team perform underwater crime scene investigations, scuba diving in the black water conditions of the Columbia River, the Willamette River, and other bodies of water, to recover the victims' bodies and various evidence associated with those crimes.

Jack and his MCSO Dive Rescue and Recovery team are back into action throughout the book No One Noticed. And although the scuba diving and under water crime scene investigations play a smaller role in this book, there are several intriguing scenes throughout the book involving underwater crime scene investigations.

I have done extensive research regarding these crime scene investigations. All my underwater scenes have been thoroughly "vetted" by a specialist who used to perform those types of blackwater scuba diving investigations. And although I have yet to go scuba diving myself, I finally got my first official snorkeling experience in the Indian Ocean just a few weeks ago. The visibility in the waters around Lembongan Island is a gajillion times better than that of the Columbia River, but hey, it's a start!!

Here is a picture of my favorite scuba diver (and underwater crime scene specialist) off the coast of Menjangan Island a few weeks ago (October, 2019):

And here is a picture of my favorite scuba diver under the Columbia River:

hahahahahaha

So it's not really a picture of him under the Columbia River. The water isn't that clear. I could never have been able to get such a great picture. Seriously. Visibility is less than a foot. No bueno for pictures. Or visibility. And the lack of visibility makes it exceptionally difficult and challenging for his team to do underwater crime scene investigations. But they do. Mostly by feel. 

And they're awesome.

Can you imagine how incredibly challenging it must be to locate a dead body, under water, without visibility?!? They use these incredible search patterns, lead lines, under water communications gear; they try to avoid kicking up the silt, and they feel around, hoping (and sometimes not hoping) to find something. 

One time my most favorite scuba diver described a search in which he was seeing absolutely nothing under the water, and he felt something. Something suspiciously like a bone. A vertebrae. He knew it felt human. He'd found cow bones before, but they're bigger. So he popped it into his pouch and kept on looking, because that's not what he had been searching for. Turns out they believe the neck bone was the bone of a human skeleton from many years before that they believe had floated downstream from an ancient Native American burial ground located near the Columbia river.

He has also told me stories about finding something rather gruesome through his scuba gloves, but not knowing exactly what it was until he took a steadying breath and brought the item right up next to his face to find out what it was. Sounds down right gruesome to me!! What a horror nightmare.

I am equally fascinated by the thought of his team recovering bodies that have been in the water a very long time, relieved that their families can have closure and being able to bury their loved ones; and sheer mortification and horror at the idea that water critters have nibbled upon these bodies, which is great for the ecosystem, but rather terrifying for the poor soul who has to try to scoop the water logged body into a body bag, hoping not to lose a toe bone that is apt to float away.

So yes. Underwater crime scene investigations. I write about them in my books. I find them fascinating. And unique. And a whole realm of crime scene investigations that are rarely, if ever, discussed in murder mystery books. 

So there you have it.

If all y'all have more questions, please don't hesitate to post them. 

I'll answer them along the way!

Meanwhile, please go and buy my book.

And then leave lots of great feedback!! 

No One Noticed

(Book 2 in the Jack Diamond Mystery series)

Here is a closer look at the entire book cover for book 2,
for those of you who are interested:

* * * * *

Buy my books!

Both books are available in paperback and kindle versions

Diamonds for Diamond 
(Book 1 in the Jack Diamond Mystery series)
and
No One Noticed

(Book 2 in the Jack Diamond Mystery Series)