Peg Herring, Mystery Author

I'm in the enviable position of having a surfeit of good books. The Distant Hours by Kate Morton: about a third through it. The Summer Before the War by Helen Simonson: halfway. Sparrow Migrations by Cari Noga: three-quarters done. Murder at the Brightwell by Ashley Weaver: just started but already loving it. As you might guess, I have books in different rooms and read them in snatches. All but Sparrow Migrations are historical. Only Murder at the Brightwell is a mystery, though Morton's books have a discovery aspect that adds mystery to them. All are hard-to-put-down types, and it's rare that I have four at once that call to me when I'm not reading. (I also have a book on my phone, but it's only mildly interesting, so that reading progresses in spurts of boredom as I wait for John to take care of things I can't because of this silly foot (which is healing nicely). Sadly, I have an edit to do on my own stuff, so all my reading for fun will have to wai

Not me. My hero, Dorothy Parker I posted on Facebook the other day that each book I write comes to the point where I'd like to tell the reader, "I've brought you this far, now you finish it!" I was surprised to read in the responses I got that it's been done. Can't imagine reading a whole book and being left in the lurch like that. As one respondent pointed out, "As the author, you know the characters better than anyone else. You have to tell us what happens to them." Yes, it's the author's responsibility to sort out the mess she's created. Still: 1) I'm tired of them at that point. Like one's children, an author loves her characters, but there are times when she'd like to love them from a galaxy far, far away. 2) Some readers won't be satisfied. I've heard from some who wanted more romance (okay, sex) between the characters to end the book. One reader complained that a certain character would never have given

"But can't you see how wrong you are?" Centuries ago, when I was in high school, I took up argumentation. I joined the debate team because my sister had done well there, and because the coach cornered me in the hallway and asked me to. I loved it. Research, constructing cases, looking for weaknesses in the arguments of others, and organizing information so I could get at it easily. It might not sound like everyone's cup of tea, but it was certainly mine. I ended up ranked in the state and got a scholarship to college. Debating in college was even more fun. The competition was tough, but we traveled to places I'd only read about and formed a close-knit group that loved to--you guessed it--argue. Play with language. One-up each other. Argue some more. Debate is formal argument , and it doesn't bear much resemblance to the real-life version. One can try tossing out lies and false evidence, but the other team is likely to call her on it. [Great example: we

I could give a long and not very interesting explanation of why I have an overload of print books in my office, but I won't bore you with that. Let's get to the sale: I'm offering some of my older books at discounted prices. If you're interested in them for yourself or for gifts, this is a great time to get them. No booksellers between you and me, although I do have to charge an extra $5.00 for postage if you want them mailed to you. If you live in northern Lower Michigan, we can arrange to meet somewhere and save you a few bucks. You can find out more about the books here or on Amazon (where they know everything!) If you're interested, email me at pegfish@yahoo.com and we'll get this done. +

I heard about an e-book program for libraries called Biblioboard. Books are offered there through your local library, so you can borrow e-books just like you borrow print books. The authors don't get paid. It's a way of getting people acquainted with your work so that (maybe) they'll buy at some point. I got notification that some of my books are now available there, but when I tried to look, I had to choose a library. Our local wasn't listed and I'm not a member of any other library systerm, so I can't look to see what's there. I think it might be the Maggie Pill books, the Sleuth Sisters. If anyone knows about this program or is part of it, I'd appreciate hearing which books of mine are available.

It's a question I get quite often, and sadly, the most correct answer is, "I don't know." With my first book, back in 2008, I really had no idea how well it was selling for almost two years, and even then the numbers I was given didn't mean much because I knew so little. Publishers pay an advance on a book when they offer a contract. The author gets "paid" in that way, except then the publisher holds that much money back from royalties as the book sells. If an author gets $100,000 (don't I wish), the book has to earn that much back for the publisher before she gets more money (It's called "selling through"). Add to that the fact that bookstores stock books with the understanding they can return them if they don't sell within a given time. That means a publisher can't count a sale as a sale until they get the returned books and subtract them from what really sold. (Confused yet? That's the current state of publishing.)

Yesterday I got a draft of an article someone plans to publish about me in a collection listing contemporary authors. Of course it's flattering to be included, but other emotions arise as well. First, curiosity. How did they find all this stuff about me? Some of it's correct, some is outdated, some is just plain wrong (when was I ever an editor?). Some I can't figure out: how did they find out that my dad sold used cars and my mom taught school? Second, doubt. How well do the parts balance? The article seems to dwell on my play-writing, which was actually a pretty short part of my career. It did come first, but I soon realized I wanted to write novels and moved in that direction And finally, uncertainty. What does it all add up to? Well, they left out a lot, so I plan to submit some additional information, but it's kind of nice to see it all up there and read what reviewers have said about my work. (I try not to read reviews, being overly critical of myself anyway