Thoughts
I write a lot. Essays. Articles. Blog posts. All of them sharing what I’m thinking about. Maybe you think about these things, too.
The Loneliness Crisis: Words to the Rescue
I feel I’m leaving friends, or acquaintances, or a whole community behind when I close the book. How on earth could I ever be lonely?
Enough is Enough
For us in the West, “enough” often means “not quite what I want, but it will do.” But what if enough were actually—enough?
The Story of My Stories
And I realized something I may have known before, but certainly never articulated: that for me, the plot is the last thing I worry about. (Strange admission for a mystery writer to make!).
Real or Robot? Who Can Tell?
Ludwig Wittgenstein says that we form language as part of human activity, and that we then shape that activity through language. But both parts are necessary; and, so far, AI can’t manage the “human activity” part of the equation.
Why We Write in Dark Times
Art is never neutral—it holds power, shapes culture, and carries history. Keep making it. Keep making light.
In Times of Darkness, Artists Make Light
This country and this world need the light now more than ever. Together, we can find it, and nurture it, and embody it.
How Many Times Can (Should) You Tweak Your Work?
Do you edit as you go, or are you more disciplined than I am and step away from it?
Different Times Call for Different Reading
We have to find ways to stay human, to stay interested, to stay caring. We must continue to nourish our minds and our spirits.
Can you see the light?
I’m not a visual artist, but I live among them. And I saw how, historically, this place has attracted painters for over a century and a half. Made it into an art colony. Nurtured talent that exploded all over the world.
The Power of Dame Emily’s Ten-Minute Rule
It's such a small thing, but it has made a tremendous difference in both my productivity and also my—okay, I’ll say it, mental health.
Do You Care? Here’s How
But, importantly, they do not make any of those feelings or situations about you: they create a reality in which you are part of the characters’ lives, emotions, and cares.
Why do the Arts Matter?
In ancient Greece, art and music were deemed the only channels to communicate with the gods. I think they were on to something.
Moving Beyond Disaster-Think
Our new role: conservationists of the paintings and symphonies and books and performances that express humanity’s greatest ideas and emotions, protecting the ones that exist and creating more, no matter what the difficulty, no matter if it breaks our hearts.
The Morality of Crime Fiction
Moral crime fiction, on the other hand, is steeped in reality. It holds up a mirror to the reader and posits that under the right circumstances, we could all be a victim—or a killer.
Good-bye to a storyteller
Best known for a crime fiction series with supernatural elements set in the Welsh borders, he wrote what I think of as multidimensional stories—stories you can read and enjoy on a superficial level, but which can also draw you in deeper to consider your own beliefs and values.
What happens when you get a bad review?
Every book, at one time or another, gets a bad review.
Why not read a classic mystery?
You’ve probably heard me talking about the “golden age of mystery fiction.” So… what exactly am I talking about?
Be afraid… be very afraid!
Stories are never about what they’re about: they always allow the space for us to bring our own emotions and experience — and, here, fears — into the mix.
When the Beginning isn’t the Beginning
Even as we tend to identify with the detective in a mystery, there’s also a part of each of us that also understands the fear or need that drove the killer to act, to protect themselves in the only way they saw possible.