Bouchercon & Good News
Okay. I've had a full week to recover from Bouchercon '08. Had a wonderful time there. Made some great new friends, including Sara J. Henry, Larry "Wag the Dog" Beinhart and Austin Camacho, and caught up with some wonderful others, including Lukas Ortiz, Philip Spitzer, Lee Child, and Jason Starr. Wonderful people, incredible talents.
Then, after three and half days of non-stop indulgence in the world of mystery writing, I came home and collapsed. Just packed it in and slept like a baby.
Now, I'm back at work on my book, feeling both inspired and overwhelmed by the wealth of talented people I met in Baltimore.
One of the things I missed in Baltimore was the Internet. Yes, I took my laptop, but I had to lug it downstairs to the lobby to get Internet service. Most of the time, I didn't bother, only when I had to keep up with emails. It was actually okay. I am not an email junkie.
But I am an Internet junkie -- and worse, a New York Times addict.
While I was at Bouchercon, I couldn't indulge in one of my worst addictions -- reading the bad news on the New York Times website. For the past two months, ever since the stock market started going crazy, I've been reading the site obsessively. Not good.
That addiction got a forced interruption while I was in Baltimore, but it started up again as soon as I returned home and was awake enough to turn on my computer.
This morning, I decided, Enough! Read some good news for once. Or twice. Or maybe even three times a day. Let yourself be overwhelmed by some good news for a change.
Good news? Does such a thing exist?
Well, of course it does. It must.
Seek and ye shall find.
That's what the Good Book says, so I went seeking and I found.
A quick search with Google turned up a couple of valid websites that specialize in good news. I'm sure there are more. I just don't have time to look for them right now. One of them is the Good News Network. The other is the Good News Daily.
I haven't had time to explore them, but they looked positive. Of course, none of the stories seemed to be as BIG as the horrific stories one reads on the "A" pages of today's major newspapers, but that's okay. It's not the single story that gets me down; it's the accumulated weight of reading so many of them, and reading them constantly So I figure that an accumulation of good news stories will work the same way.
It occurs to me that this sounds ironic: a mystery writer, someone who spends a good deal of her time plotting ways to commit crimes, is tired of bad news and wants a pick me up. Yeah, maybe it does sound ironic. But it isn't, not really. Crime fiction is actually not about crime; it's about the restoration of balance, of justice, even. That's probably not true for everyone, but for many of us that's exactly what it's about. We read -- or write -- about incidents in which those who do wrong get their comeuppance and in which victims and their families are either made whole again or at least, at the very least, are strengthened and come out as survivors.
In order to write those kinds of stories, I need to believe in positive outcomes myself. I must say I've never been the most optimistic person, but today's constant stream of bad news is too much even for my pessimistic tendencies. So yes, I've gone looking for the good. And I'm going to fasten on to it. And I hope you will, too. I hope that you'll make a conscious effort to look for what's working in this world and be inspired by it. I know I will.
Then, after three and half days of non-stop indulgence in the world of mystery writing, I came home and collapsed. Just packed it in and slept like a baby.
Now, I'm back at work on my book, feeling both inspired and overwhelmed by the wealth of talented people I met in Baltimore.
One of the things I missed in Baltimore was the Internet. Yes, I took my laptop, but I had to lug it downstairs to the lobby to get Internet service. Most of the time, I didn't bother, only when I had to keep up with emails. It was actually okay. I am not an email junkie.
But I am an Internet junkie -- and worse, a New York Times addict.
While I was at Bouchercon, I couldn't indulge in one of my worst addictions -- reading the bad news on the New York Times website. For the past two months, ever since the stock market started going crazy, I've been reading the site obsessively. Not good.
That addiction got a forced interruption while I was in Baltimore, but it started up again as soon as I returned home and was awake enough to turn on my computer.
This morning, I decided, Enough! Read some good news for once. Or twice. Or maybe even three times a day. Let yourself be overwhelmed by some good news for a change.
Good news? Does such a thing exist?
Well, of course it does. It must.
Seek and ye shall find.
That's what the Good Book says, so I went seeking and I found.
A quick search with Google turned up a couple of valid websites that specialize in good news. I'm sure there are more. I just don't have time to look for them right now. One of them is the Good News Network. The other is the Good News Daily.
I haven't had time to explore them, but they looked positive. Of course, none of the stories seemed to be as BIG as the horrific stories one reads on the "A" pages of today's major newspapers, but that's okay. It's not the single story that gets me down; it's the accumulated weight of reading so many of them, and reading them constantly So I figure that an accumulation of good news stories will work the same way.
It occurs to me that this sounds ironic: a mystery writer, someone who spends a good deal of her time plotting ways to commit crimes, is tired of bad news and wants a pick me up. Yeah, maybe it does sound ironic. But it isn't, not really. Crime fiction is actually not about crime; it's about the restoration of balance, of justice, even. That's probably not true for everyone, but for many of us that's exactly what it's about. We read -- or write -- about incidents in which those who do wrong get their comeuppance and in which victims and their families are either made whole again or at least, at the very least, are strengthened and come out as survivors.
In order to write those kinds of stories, I need to believe in positive outcomes myself. I must say I've never been the most optimistic person, but today's constant stream of bad news is too much even for my pessimistic tendencies. So yes, I've gone looking for the good. And I'm going to fasten on to it. And I hope you will, too. I hope that you'll make a conscious effort to look for what's working in this world and be inspired by it. I know I will.
2 comments:
Persia, I have to say that chatting with you was a highlight of my time at Bouchercon, and that Hannibal Jones regrets being born too late to meet Lanie Price. Keep writing!
Thanks Austin! It was a pleasure and an honor to meet you, too.
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