Wandering in Montreal. June 2013

Chicago Weekend. May, 2013

LIFE (Learning is Forever) in the Windy City. May 9^th to 13^th, 2013. With Pauwels Travel

Chicago is a wealth of magnificent architecture, indoor and outdoor art, jazz and excitement. Interesting galleries and museums abound. The open parkland of the waterfront stretching for miles is itself a work of art, a vision that was sustained from the early 1900s by planners through many changes in politicians.

Our first taste came on the bus trip to Chicago when we stopped for a tour of architect Frank Lloyd Wright’s Meyer May House in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Moving on in a downpour that we’d thus far avoided, we found the windy city wet and cold. Fortunately the weather improved for the day in Oak Park where the focus was once again the work of Wright, including his house and studio. Many of the houses in the area, which we saw on a neighbourhood walk, were designed by him in his unique prairie style.

Our hotel, the Palmer House, with its high interior domed lobby, is a jewel situated in the Loop, an area defined by the elevated transit that surrounds the downtown area. We could walk from there in our free time to many of the city’s highlights. Millenium Park, another visionary creation of this city where outdoor art intrigues, was just a few blocks away. As was the Art Institute of Chicago.

On such a short trip, one can only scratch the surface, but with our architectural tour from a river cruise of the many styles of buildings to walking in Millenium Park, to visiting the Art Institute, a jazz club, the top of the Hancock Tower and a city tour that included Wrigley Field, we had a stimulating introduction to a major cultural centre built where the Chicago River entered Lake Michigan and now flows inland at the behest of those who did not want the sewage to contaminate their drinking water.

 Oh yes, and the food was good, too! And the camaraderie.

Life of a Writer. 18. Goofing Off

And eating dessert! It tasted wonderful, but it was the presentation. Quickly demolished. Conversation was great. Now  to work. Or to sleep.

Life of a Writer. #17. Writing a Mystery. Progress Report.

Mystery:  Body Found in Basement Washroom of Church
Detective: Alistair Cosser
Identity of Victim: Unknown initially
Suspects: Hard to know until ID established
Location: Downtown Toronto
Time Frame: Mid 1990s?

First paragraphs:

 THE WHITE RIBBON MAN

Part One

Mid November

It was a gray Sunday in the middle of November when there had been no snow yet, but it was in the air and Alistair Cosser had hoped to have a quiet day enjoying the last of what had been an unusually spectacular fall season. Instead here he was showing his card with his name, Detective Sergeant Alistair Cosser, rank, telephone and badge numbers on it to the priest of the Church of the Holy Trinity in downtown Toronto.

“You’re the minister?” he said.

The first police officer on the scene had ensured that the steps from the main floor of the church to the basement were barricaded. Because there was a body in the washroom there, he had followed protocol and called a detective to take over. When the detective had arrived, he had very quickly assessed the situation and called homicide. This was when Cosser had come in, a man of medium height with brown hair with a slight wave in it. His fair reddish skin suggested in his youth he probably had freckles and a short tree trunk of a neck seemed almost to sit on top of his shoulders. He had immediately been briefed by the detective who had also made known to him that the man approaching them at that moment was the minister.

The priest now looked up from the card. “Yes. I’m the incumbent here,” he said as if he perhaps doubted the designation himself. “David Stinson.”

Alistair nodded, thinking this man the unlikeliest image of a minister he had ever encountered. Dressed in blue jeans with a fringe of unshaven hair on his face, it would have been  difficult to figure out his role here without asking. What Cosser did know was that this man had called 911 because of the discovery of the body of a woman on the church’s premises. He thought that if this were a murder, which could not be concluded until he had a handle on the case, it would be the forty-seventh in Toronto for the year. That was the average number for mid-November, but it did not make Alistair feel better because he knew only too well that every death had tentacles that reached into families and communities. And that until the police figured out who this woman was and what had happened to her, everyone would be on edge.

 “How many people have keys to the church?” the detective asked.

“I do. The caretaker. The wardens,” the priest replied.

“How many wardens are there?”

“Two.”

“I’ll need their names.”

“Yes, of course. Only one of them is here this morning. The woman over there with red hair. Her name is Linda O’Reilly.”

Alistair nodded again. He was not a tall man, probably not more than five feet nine or ten. His ruddy cheeks suggested he enjoyed his liquor, but it was also part of having fair skin. His eyes were alert, darting around the room as he talked. Now they fastened on Linda O’Reilly and another woman, standing close together, neither saying a word.

“The woman with Linda is the person who discovered the body. I think she’s still in shock,” David Stinson said. “I don’t know her. She probably came over from the Eaton Centre to use the washroom. People do. If the church is open.”

 The church was a tall Gothic revival structure, its gray presence still imposing even though towered over by the Eaton Centre and a nearby hotel that acted as if they were the thick walls one might find around an ancient castle. When first on the drawing board, the developer had intended to demolish the church, but the uproar that created had led to a modified design that included it instead.

“I’ll talk to them first,” Alistair said. “And the other warden?”

 

Life of a Writer. #16. Reading mysteries!

Well, yes, you'd think to read mysteries would make sense in that I'm writing one. Or for many writers, it would be the time to stop reading the work of others so that one could concentrate and focus on their own book. I go back and forth between the two, either immersing myself in the work of a specific writer and trying to figure out not the solution to the particular mystery, but the techniques the writer has used to write it. Or I am writing and suddenly something flows because I think I have picked up a clue in the latest read, perhaps about structure. Or about character. Or perhaps something about police protocol.

In any case, the two writers I am reading at the moment are Donna Leon with her series set in Venice with Commissario Guido  Brunetti as the police investigator. One comes to like Guido and his family, to appreciate his perceptions of Venetian society, the Mafia, art. To enjoy his relationships with the various members of his family. I am also getting to know Charlie Salter in the mystery series of Eric Wright, an English born Toronto author. I confess I thought writing a mystery would be simpler than it is, knowing I had written other types of novels. But although one needs to develop a plot in any novel (or in most other than totally experimental ones), that aspect in a mystery is paramount. And certain aspects have to present themselves fairly quickly, almost as if a convention demands it. There must be a crime, usually a murder. Or more than one crime. There must be a victim or victims. Potential suspects. And a central character, likely the detective.

All of this probably appears fairly obvious, but although I might be able to analyze a mystery, I have not been able yet to create enough suspense at the beginning to sustain interest. Nor to find that I focus soon enough (whatever that is!) on a central character who will carry the weight of most of the plot. Only gradually have I recognized the need to make my detective, Alistair Cosser, the central character. So I have introduced him in the first chapter in my latest revision. I no longer have a prologue. And I am trying to figure out how to include the characters I was developing and not lose their unique perspectives while Alistair's point of view (pov) predominates. An ongoing challenge.

For now, I will only say...stay tuned! More to follow.

Life of a Writer: #15. Exploring Sedona, Arizona

So, another adventure, another journey, this time to the beautiful city of Sedona in the red rock peaks of Arizona. I went with a friend, Sally, to a Road Scholar program in this location. We spent our nights in the same place and went for trips and/or lectures each day to learn about the geology of the area, the culture of the Hopi, and took also a spectacular ride on the Verde Canyon Railroad. The highlight was naturally enough a trip to the Grand Canyon. How exciting to see such spectacular scenery again so soon after my journey to Morocco.

Life of a Writer. #14. Writer as Reader (continued). Sweet Tooth.

The latest book I've read was Ian McEwan's Sweet Tooth.  It seemed a peculiar title for an Ian McEwan book, but then the vast array of topics he has taken on is amazing. So why not something about my own struggle with a sweet tooth. Mine, of course, is mundane and refers only to the fact that if there is dessert or candy or something sweet around, I will eat it. The rationale is that if I get rid of it, no matter how much there is, it will be gone. Then it won't be able to tempt me. Yes, really! I used to think it wasn't such a bad thing, nothing like drug or alcohol addiction. Or smoking. But what a delusion, sugar being one of the main culprits in many diseases. So, I don't buy sweets and if I have them when I'm out, I am able to stick to one serving. 

You weren't interested in that diversion, I'm sure, so back to the book. It was the title that had me take a sidetrack. Maybe it will have that effect on you also.  Until you find yourself caught up in McEwan's literate prose and clever plotting, in the foibles of his characters. And the actual meaning of Sweet Tooth, a code name at M15 for an intelligence project given to the main character to carry out. The novel is told from her point of view, a young woman who seems to walk into situations rather than go looking for them. I was intrigued and kept reading, which you will also have to do to discover the intricate plotting and conclusion in another display of exquisite writing by McEwan. Yes, another good read. Another coup for McEwan who never ceases to amaze with his versatility.

Even so, I found the book just a bit too clever in a way that seems to create distance from the characters rather than a sense of compassion for them.  But that's me! Draw your own conclusions.