As president of Sisters in Crime LA, I wanted to take the opportunity to share with Kings River Life a little of what went on behind the scenes with the production of Angel City Beat, SinC LA’s newest anthology. One of my biggest honors is to help authors find a home for their work, and sometimes, that home has been our anthology.
In July, the Florida Gulf Coast Sisters in Crime released Paradise is Deadly, an anthology of 19 short stories from FLGC SinC member authors. Writers know all about following submission guidelines. We asked the Paradise is Deadly editors: What do you look for in a short story when making your selection?
Henry David Thoreau first coined the phrase 'make a long story short' in a letter back in the 1800s. He wrote: "Not that the story needs to be long, but it will take a long time to make it short."
As a novelist, short story writer, and teacher of the craft, I wholeheartedly agree. There is nothing short, simple, or quick about writing a short story. In fact, experience has taught me that the shorter the format, the harder it is to set the tone and capture the reader.
What do you do when again a gaggle of Canadian Sisters in Crime write the perfect mystery short the public has to read to believe? You put “em in a book, call it Crime Wave 2, and release it in time for the Halloween season. These sixteen authors have run the gambit with their work from poignant to extreme with protagonists that illustrate perfectly women of a certain age, temperament, relationship status, and mental stability along with varying their motivations from righting a wrong to balancing the scales to wielding a bit of comeuppance.
When the pandemic hit in 2020, one of the most mourned losses was in-person gatherings. In particular, the mystery writing community watched with regret as Left Coast Crime had to open and close the same day due to COVID restrictions. Then other much anticipated conferences had to cancel. It was bleak.
This week we have reviews of three Sisters in Crime anthologies-Deadly Southern Charm a Lethal Ladies Mystery anthology from Sisters in Crime Central Virginia Chapter edited by Mary Burton and Mary Miley, Fatally Haunted from the Los Angeles Sisters in Crime Chapter edited by Rachel Howzell Hall, Sheila Lowe, and Laurie Stevens, and Fishy Business: 22 Tales of Murder and Mayhem by the Rising Stars of Mystery the fifth Guppies Chapter anthology.
It’s confounding that all of your clothes have been pulled from your wardrobe and tossed into a stout oak barrel. And that your strop and shaving brush were thrown on top of them. You wonder for more than a moment…where is your razor?
The pedigree of Sisters in Crime reads like a Who's Who of mystery writing. The organization owes its roots to women writers known to most mystery fans, including Sara Paretsky, Dorothy Salisbury and Phyllis Whitney. The organization grew from a few outspoken female upstarts to become a force capable of influencing change in the mystery-publishing industry.
Beauty is only skin-deep, and that is never more apparent than in this impressive collection of short stories by the Los Angeles Chapter of Sisters in Crime. This biannual anthology takes readers on a tour that reveals the darkness hiding under the gorgeous veneer of Southern California, where illusions and play-acting are a way of life.
Mystery authors Catriona McPherson and Simon Wood will be speaking at the Fresno Chapter of Sisters In Crime on February 7, so we thought it would be fun to introduce you to Catriona through an interview. You can also check out a review of one of Simon's books we did in 2012, along with a fun video interview with Simon, here in KRL.
