Trying to Learn to Learn like AI Learns

Ovidia--Every other Tuesday

I've always found it difficult learning things that intimidate me--and it doesn't help that most things I don't understand do intimidate me. And one of the things I find most intimidating these days is AI.

After all I come from the generation that learned to write with pencils and erasers, not to mention grinding our own ink sticks in ink stones for ink to use in our Chinese calligraphy!

I liked the grinding of ink (you put water in the ink well, then rubbed the ink stick round and round till the ink was dark enough) a deliciously messy business.

I used to experiment with grinding other things--chalk, charcoal, black rock sugar--to see what colours I could get. But ink sticks were always the best.
Much later I learned more about how those ink sticks were made--the ones we used in school were most likely made of pine ashes, or the coarse leftovers after the refined pine soot was taken to make ink sticks for professional artists and calligraphers.
This pine ash was probably mixed with fish oils and kneaded, pounded and stretched (like dough being prepared for noodles or steamed buns) before being pressed into moulds and dried.

As one of the four Scholars' Treasures (the others being paper, brush and inkstone) we were told to treat our humble ink sticks with respect, however poor our calligraphy was!

My calligraphy was very poor though I loved playing with the brushes. I think much of the problem was, I didn't know what we were aiming to achieve when we were told to practice strokes over and over.
But when you were done and could play before washing up, it was huge fun drawing characters on old newspapers and trying to grind ink to match the same degree of blackness you'd previously used (difficult, because ink always dries a little lighter)
I drew my first stories on paper, because I'd seen comics and picture books. Then later, when I started reading books, I taught myself to type and typed and bound (and illustrated) my stories that way.

Learning to touch type was difficult. And then later, learning to use my first computer wasn't easy either.

And then even after that, learning to use a dial up modem, learning to move on from the dial up modem...

But I realise that the steepest learning curves, the ones that caused most struggle and frustration, were ultimately the most rewarding.

For instance, now I love using Scrivener but there was a time when I felt that if I had to write with it, I would never write again.

Anyway all that has brought me round to thinking I should find out more about using AI.
The Hollywood Writers won us the ruling that writers can use tools like ChatGPT as a tool but studios cannot oblige them to work on AI generated material.

But what I want to learn from AI is how it learns from everything fed into it without worrying whether it's worthy to use it or not.
I've already played around with Procreate (that's how I made the inkstone and ink stick drawing above) but I wanted to step out of my comfort zone--like playing with sound and video.
So I tried to learn by making something from AI tools I found online--Suno, Udio and iMovie-- and made a Murder Is Everywhere scroll ditty. The problem is, it doesn't play in preview so I have no idea whether it's going to work or not till after I post it!
(I'm logging it as Attempt 1. However it turns out, I'll try again after learning more--given how many times I've failed on these so far, one of these programmes might be my next Scrivener!)

In Lieu of Blogging

 Annamaria Behind Schedule 

Ordinarily, I spend a major portion of my Sunday writing a blog. This is something I am glad to do, because I like the short essay form, I get to express my point of view on a lot of different topics, and when appropriate, I can draw attention to my published work. Yesterday, rather than writing a post for this Monday, I took myself off and had a wonderful time doing something else. 

My beloved Hudson Valley Shakespeare Festival, this year, is proud to present the world premiere of Agatha Christie's The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, adapted by Heidi Armbruster.  It seemed as if two of my passions - crime writing and theater - were converging.  How much fun would it be to gather up a group of my fellow Mystery Writers of America - New York Chapter to go upstate and see the play together.  

And so we did.

Some of us picnicked together before the show:

We toasted crime fiction "on the page and on the stage!" 

While gazing at an unparalleled view of the magestic Huson River from the picnicking area:

 We then went to the performance tent for the show:

And afterwards, we had our picture taken with the great Kurt Rhoads, who played the whole world's favorite Belgian detective!

What fun! And you can enjoy it too:

The experience is worth coming a distance to enjoy!  It's an easy day trip from NYC!

Just fifty miles from Times Square!

Just go to www.HVShakespeare.org

Getting under the skin of my setting - Guest post Cathy Ace

It's a great pleasure to welcome Cathy Ace to Murder Is Everywhere. I met Cathy at Crimefest where she was a guest of honor and also on a panel I moderated. The latter meant that I had the pleasure of reading a couple of her books. The intriguing plot and appealing series characters of the WISE enquiry agency, and the equally intriguing Cait Morgan mystery, The Corpse with the Opal Fingers set in Australia, made me an instant fan. The characters ring true, the mysteries are twisty, the settings fascinating. What more could you ask for? Well, yes, Cathy is also a delightful person.

Cathy was born in Swansea, Wales, then immigrated to British Columbia, Canada. She’s been shortlisted for and won the prestigious Canadian Bony Blithe Award and her work has been shortlisted for a variety of other prizes as well.

Here Cathy tells us why setting is so important to her.

Hello there folks – thanks for inviting me to visit. I suspect I’ve been asked to write about murder being "everywhere" because both mystery series I write are set in quite "different" places: my WISE Enquiries Agency Mysteries are set in Wales (where I was born and raised – I migrated to Canada when I was 40), and my Cait Morgan Mysteries are – literally – set around the world. Well, no, that’s not quite true, because there’ve only been 13 books in that series to date, so I haven’t managed to take Cait to every place in the world where she’ll have the chance to trip over a corpse…yet.

 That said, I do enjoy the fact that each book takes Cait to a new location…which means lots of travel to do the research, right? Again, not quite true. When I started writing the Cait books (the first was published in 2012) I decided to take her traveling because that’s what I’d spent most of my life doing…for business and pleasure. As I travelled, I lapped up the opportunity to find out about the places I was visiting – their history, architecture, art, and food (yes, yes…and drink, too!). And, as I came to know places well through multiple visits (I’ve only written books set in places where I’ve lived, or worked, or have visited on many occasions), I wanted to share my passion for those places with my readers.

 For example, in The Corpse with the Silver Tongue (the first Cait Morgan Mystery) the setting is Nice, on the Côte d'Azur, and the specific location is the Hotel du Belle France – a swish apartment building set on the hillside in Cimiez overlooking Vieux Nice and the Baie des Anges built in the Belle Epoque style as a grand hotel, as the name implies. This is based upon a real building I know well: two friends, who I met when I used to live in Nice for a few months each year, allowed me to use their apartment as the setting for the murder which happens on the first page of the book, but they thought the syndic wouldn’t be too pleased if I used the real name…hence a name change. That said, if you wanted to find the building’s real identity it wouldn’t be terribly difficult because it really was used during the Vichy years – I’ve even seen photographs of massive swastika banners flying from my friends’ balcony, where I’ve spent many a happy evening…which I understand might seem a strange thing to say, but it was also one of the seeds of an idea that came into play when I wrote the book.

 

"That" balcony

This also highlights another aspect of how I like to write: I don’t just want to “use” a setting as it is today. Nope. I enjoy peeling back the layers of history to maybe illuminate the motivation for a crime, or at least to add dimension to the backstories of the suspects and/or the victim/s. What do I mean? We all know places with inhabitants whose multi-generational roots are utterly intertwined with its history – they have, literally, made it what it is; then there are “newcomers” who might have “only” been there for several decades…so they’re of the place, but the blood and bones of their predecessors aren’t ground into the soil. Then there are those who have recently arrived, choosing to live there because it’s so “perfect”…then they try to change it to be “even more perfect” (from their point of view, of course). Finally, there are the true visitors – those who are coming to see, feel, and experience a place, then move on. Cait Morgan – my Welsh Canadian (like me) professor of criminal psychology and her partner in life and crime Bud Anderson – a retired homicide cop from Vancouver of Swedish heritage (not at all like my husband), are always in this latter group…“just passing through”…until they’re stopped in their tracks by the discovery of a corpse, which inevitably leads to them investigating, and the whole thing unravelling in the manner of a Christie-esque traditional puzzle-plot mystery…including the final ta-daa reveal of the killer/s. (Yes – I love the shape of those books.)

 

Cathy enjoying "That" balcony

And the place? It’s always the glue that holds the entire story together: in Cait’s first case, the Roman, Belle Epoque, and World War Two history, and the modern-day life of Nice, are all integral to the plot. Indeed, The Corpse with the Silver Tongue could not have been set anywhere else in the world; something which was, and always is, my aim. So, if you really enjoy armchair travel – with a puzzling mystery to solve too – maybe I can tempt you to travel with Cait Morgan not just to France, but also to Canada, Mexico, Las Vegas, Wales, on a Hawaiian cruise, to Amsterdam, Budapest, Jamaica, Cait’s own home in BC (yes, it’s a LOT like mine!), England, Arizona, and Australia (book 14’s location will be announced later this year)…all without needing a passport!

 

Temptation to "visit" the south of France

As an added incentive, The Corpse with the Silver Tongue will be coming to TV soon, thanks to production company Free@LastTV (Agatha Raisin), with the wonderful Eve Myles (Keeping Faith, Torchwood, We Hunt Together) portraying Cait Morgan, so get ahead of the curve now…yes, that’s a bit of shameless self promotion, but – in my defense – the invitation to be a guest blogger said I could do a bit of that – thank you.

 

Eve Myles will portray Cait Morgan on the screen

LINKS:

 Cathy Ace FB: https://www.facebook.com/Cathy-Ace-Author-318388861616661

Cathy Ace website: http://www.cathyace.com/

Cathy Ace Twitter: https://twitter.com/AceCathy

Cathy Ace Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/cathyace1/

The Corpse with the Silver Tongue https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07W4LLSBP

How To Make Mykonos Simple Again?

 

Jeff––Saturday

 

Some claim that tourism-focused magazines exist only to glorify their subject locales and please their advertisers. To their critics it’s all ultra-high-quality photography, glitzy design, and little else.  To those I say this: read Mykonos Confidential magazine—available both in print and on-line.

 

Yes, it bills itself as “MYKONOS CONFIDENTIAL Luxury Magazine,” and most certainly aims for its summertime annual magazine to catch the eyes and imaginations of tourists who either are mega-rich or would like to experience the vibe of hanging out in their playground.

 

That said, I’m well into my third decade of being asked to write an essay for MC telling it like it is—or at least as I see it—and never have I had a word changed or position challenged.  Nor am I alone in that experience. Many others have shared the same editorial freedom and encouragement to say what they believe is right for the island.   

 

Here’s my essay in the just published 2024 edition of MC. It’s titled, “A Not So Simple Answer” in response to a question MC sees as haunting modern Mykonos.  

 

Mykonos Confidential never fails to amaze me at how its editorial finger rests firmly on the pulse of Mykonos’ greatest challenges. I’m into my third decade of being honored by MC for my opinion on top-of-mind subjects dear to all who care for our island. This year’s topic is no different, for it seeks an answer to this straightforward question:

 

“How to make Mykonos simple again?”

 

“Simple” is a word fraught with implications.  If it means returning to past days when everything was cheap, and Mykonians were among the poorest folk in Greece, fuhgeddaboudit. 

 

So, what can be done in answer to MC’s question?

 

Plenty, if you’re willing to jump into the fray. To start, allow me to introduce non-Harry Potter fans to mandragora (aka mandrake) a Mediterranean hallucinogenic plant known for its roots’ uncanny resemblance to a complete human being.

 

I’m not suggesting those wishing for old Mykonos need turn to drugs; only that there are consequences to such a granted wish.

  

This exchange between Hogwarths Professor Pomona Sprout and the precocious Hermione Granger demonstrates my point:

 

 

Pomona Sprout: "We'll be repotting Mandrakes today. Now, who can tell me the properties of the Mandrake?"

 

Hermione Granger: "Mandrake, or Mandragora, is a powerful restorative. It is used to return people who have been transfigured or cursed to their original state."

 

Pomona Sprout: "Excellent. Ten points to Gryffindor. The Mandrake forms an essential part of most antidotes. It is also, however, dangerous. Who can tell me why?"

 

Hermione Granger: "The cry of the Mandrake is fatal to anyone who hears it."

 

For those seeing Mykonos in need of “a powerful restorative,” beware of the fatal cry it may unleash.

 

To be clear, Mykonos remains a magical place. First time visitors are enthralled by its beauty. Not so much by its prices, but certainly by its action. Yes, prices are through the roof virtually everywhere for everything.  But if folks keep paying those prices, that will not change. What incentive is there for a proprietor to do otherwise? Thinking differently is akin to tilting at windmills…when they’re not surrounded by tourists.

 

Frankly, I doubt new visitors are looking for simple as much as for excitement and an experience far different from any they can find at home.  The irony undoubtedly is, weren’t we looking for the same when we discovered Mykonos? And if today’s newcomers return, they’ll likely remember today’s visit as their simpler times on Mykonos.

 

That’s not to say change isn’t in order. For example, I took a late afternoon drive to a highly popular beach I’d not visited since before Covid days.  That trip brought home that the caïque has been irreversibly replaced by the concrete mixer as a symbol of Mykonos.

 

And then there are the crowds. It’s claimed that on any given tourist season day at least 100,000 tourists are on Mykonos. That’s an interesting number because since hotel rooms are reported to number 20,000, where do the remaining 80,000 visitors stay each night? No doubt somewhere taxing the island’s already strained water, sewage, garbage, police, and housing needs. Though some may sleep on boats, the likely answer is B&B and villa rentals; in the process contributing 15,000 vehicles (including black vans) to already congested roads. For those who instead choose to walk along the island’s roads and highways, I hold them in my prayers.

 

Let’s start from this undeniable proposition: Tourism is Mykonos’ life’s blood.  Its harbor and international airport are major transportation links to the northern Cyclades and beyond.  Despite how many complain about the number of cruise ships and flights, those who depend upon volume for their livelihood will battle to protect their interests, offering in testament to their faith in numbers, the ever-increasing presence of international brand name shops along Χώρα main streets.  

 

Irreversible change is here. We must learn to live with it while vigorously preserving what remains of a treasured past. What that requires is simple: Strong Government Management.

 

Management that will fairly tax all who profit from the island’s growth and magical draw, be they tourist or service provider, and apply those sums to rethink, rebuild, and expand the island’s infrastructure in a manner showing reverence for Mykonos’ storied past.  Not repudiation.

 

That’s my simple answer.  For a more nuanced one, ask Mandrake.

 

 

––Jeff

 

Jeff’s Event Schedule

 

Bouchercon 2024, Nashville TN

Gaylord Opryland Resort & Convention Center

 

Thursday, August 29, 2024 @ 9:30-10:20 AM

Room: Canal E

Solving Crimes in Foreign Settings

 

Jeffrey Siger

Mary Monnin             

Smita Harish Jain       

Ragnar Jonasson         

Pip Drysdale

Mark Coggins - moderator       

 

Friday, August 30, 2024 @ 8:00-8:30 AM

Room: Canal CD

Megan Abbott

Lisa Black

Julie Carrick Dalton

Michael Bennett

Jeffrey Siger

Stanley Trollip - moderator

 

Is it in their blood?

                                         

                                                       Thompson and Venables

In 1968 Mary Bell killed Martin Brown and Brian Howe. In 1993 Robert Thomson and Jon Venables killed James Bulger who was only 2 years old at the time. The murderers in the above cases were all under 12 years old. 

It's fair to say that the perpetrators of these crimes had upbringings that were far from ideal. They are all examples of why sociologists believe that parenting, a family, a sense of belonging and examples of the 'good moral compass' will tend to keep children on the right side of the tracks. That’s a generalisation, but one that is often true.

Much has been said about the murders and the tragic victims, but I do confess to be interested in what happened to the children who committed the crimes. Given the chance of a clean slate, what happened to them.

                                        

                                                              Mary Bell

Mary Bell was released in her early 20s. She's married and she has children, and probably grandchildren and has never committed another crime. Neither has Robert Thompson. He has been free since 2001, he lives a quiet life and is reported as being well integrated into the community he lives in.  

Jon Venables has taken a slightly different path, found with child pornography on his computer and is now re-incarcerated. His parole hearing ended in refusal.

The paperback of my book, In Her Blood, is published on the 1^st August and is not the first novel to explore what happens to children who have killed children and have then grown up, received therapy and molded their personalities into that of a responsible adult. 

I suppose we are interested in nature versus nurture. Can they be 'cured' or is it in their blood?  

And the book looks at the success of that in the context of the power of social media and how easy it is to track people down nowadays. 

Obviously In Her Blood is a total work of fiction. The initial crime that brings her to the attention of the authorities happens in the family house during a great storm. The neighbour's children and the children of the house are put together in a safe bedroom as they seriously suspect part of the roof of the semi detached building is going to be blown off. In the morning, one of the children, the baby who was screaming all night is found dead and the blame for that is put at the feet of Gillian, the eldest children present. Maybe 8 years old at the time.

And then, two years later, there’s an incident where the kids are playing on the train track on the main  line from Glasgow to Oban and this time the authorities are a wee bit more severe on her as there's the eye witness testimony to who shoved who. When she’s released, she is given a flat in England and obviously told to never tell anybody of her true identity.

As realised child killers do in real life, she was living in witness protection conditions. 

When I was writing it, I remember always being quite empathetic towards adult Gillian, a  young women who makes herself unapproachable and she comes across as a rather horrible human being. But it doesn’t take a psychologist to see the damage behind that. 

Of course there are others out to take revenge and see such actions as justified. 

                                                    

There’s understandable moral outrage when a child kills a child. But the killers themselves are, after all children with immature brains by definition and maybe it's society that feels the outrage the most as these things just should not happen. Yet they do.

                                                             

In the book Gillian inevitably becomes the hunted on social media  as somebody has worked out exactly who she is. So, as the authorities are now failing to protect her, she goes back to the one place she feels safe.

She goes home.

Right back into the lions den.

 And the book starts off with a body falling off the Connel Bridge near Oban and is caught in the falls of Lora underneath. The body of course turns out to be that of a child psychologist who was looking into the past of Gillian as one of the subjects of a book he was writing, and he found out things nobody ever expected to find.

                                                             

Writing it, the narrative took the turn that the locals in the small village where Gillian was born are rather protective of her. They had known her since she was a baby, knew her mum and dad, and maybe have a bigger picture of the tragic events that took place.

Even fictionally, writing a child killer seemed to carry a heavier weight of responsibility. I was glad that my fictional detective has a daughter roughly the same age as Gillian, and took a 'but there for the Grace of God' approach to the media storm around the case.

But in the end Gillian, as a character, grew into a young woman of responsibility with good social values. I think she also swears more than any other character I've ever written.

 

The Popcorn and the Pen

Wendall -- every other Thursday

Before I was a novelist, I was a screenwriter. I still teach screenwriting in the Graduate Film School at UCLA, so I still think about movies. A lot. Lately, I’ve been thinking about how all those hours watching every thing from The Wizard of Oz to The Verdict to Parasite have helped—and shaped—me as a mystery author. 

 

 

My Cyd Redondo series started out as a script—my homage to the film Romancing the Stone—and eventually turned into Lost Luggage. 

 

 

During my first draft, I stumbled onto Stephen King’s On Writing, which insisted authors “. . . must do two things above all other: read a lot and write a lot.” 

 

 

I loved that advice, because it rationalized the pleasure and purpose I felt adding to my TBR pile. I’m no Stephen King, and movies and books are very different animals, but here are three reasons you can rationalize heading back into a dark cinema or picking up your remote as part of your ongoing education as an author.

 

# 1 CHARACTER BEHAVIOR

 

Over fifty percent of genre and commercial novels are written in the first person. Even in second or third person, novelists are allowed, and even encouraged, to describe what their characters are thinking and feeling. Screenwriters are not. Barring a constant voice over, a script must externalize thoughts, feelings, and backstory into concrete moments you can see or hear onscreen. Doing this well can be the hardest thing about film writing.

 

 

Luckily for us, screenwriters have actors to manifest these gestures, behaviors, and dialogue, so we can learn from them. In films, we can watch unspoken moments of commitment (Sally Field raising her “Union” sign in Norma Rae or Ingrid Bergman palming her Nazi husband’s key in Notorious), unrequited love (John Cusack holding up his boom box in Say Anything), friendship and compassion (Mahershala Ali teaching “Little” to swim in Moonlight), or the nervousness of attraction (Paul Giamatti babbling about Pinot in Sideways). 

 

 

Breaking down what actors do in a scene—underneath and between the words—can inspire more use of action, variety, and subtext in our own fiction writing.

 

Sometimes we forget that always having access to a character’s inner thoughts can create stasis, particularly if the character is always telling the truth. A steady stream of truth might be a relief in real life, but in fiction, it can lack modulation and suspense. If you can let some of your characters’ internal thoughts hide in behavior and subtext, the truth—when it appears—can be twice as shocking, heart-wrenching, hilarious, or powerful.

 

# 2 THE VALUE OF SEQUENCES

 

Often what we remember about a film or show we love is actually a sequence—the bicycle chase in E.T., the christening/massacre in The Godfather, the wedding dress store/food poisoning sequence in Bridesmaids, or the opening Winnebago/underwear sequence in Breaking Bad.

 

 

Sequences—a series of scenes arranged around a central idea, location, or event—become “mini movies,” held together by repeated phrases, objects, characters, and backgrounds. They give us ups and downs, crises and resolutions, in the midst of the larger experience of the film. Most of us make a real effort to end a chapter on a cliffhanger or a great line. But how much do we really think about the interior construction of the chapter, all the reversals and connective tissue that come before that payoff? Sequences and chapters aren’t the same things, but the principals behind these “mini movies” can improve the pacing and the impact of your chapters as well as your overall book.

 

 

One of the most important elements of screenplay structure and of sequence writing is the Midpoint. In a script, the Midpoint destroys a character’s initial plan for dealing with their problem and necessitates a different approach or focus. Structurally, this energizes the story and re-engages the audience. Sequences work the same way.

 

There’s a famous one in Bringing Up Baby, which begins with Cary Grant’s entrance in a top hat and ends with his walking out attached to Katherine Hepburn. It’s a masterclass in sequence writing. The piece is held together by the recurring use of the top hat, olives, handbags, and pratfalls. But it’s most impressive for its Midpoint, in which a psychiatrist informs Hepburn that “the love impulse in man frequently reveals itself in terms of conflict,” turning her irritation with Grant into a romantic obsession. The power struggles between them from that point on escalate the comedy and lead to the climactic decision which ends the sequence.

 

 

To see whether you’re getting the most out of your chapter structure, you might pay attention to the sequences in Three Days of the Condor, The Shape of Water, Sicario, Four Weddings and a Funeral, Get Out, Parasite, or your favorite film, to see how great screenwriters use this principle to their advantage.

 

# 3 CLEAR, IMPACTFUL ENDINGS:

 

An executive at Disney maintains the last ten minutes of any film are the most important. No matter how good the rest of the movie is, if the ending is unsatisfying, that’s what the viewers remember and talk about. Fiction may be more forgiving, but I do think great films can teach us not to linger too long after the central question of the story’s been answered, to go out “with a bang, not a whimper.” 

 

 

Whether the ending is a freeze-frame image of the characters’ final, climactic decision in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid or Thelma and Louise, a single, memorable line after the heartbreaking goodbye in Casablanca, Roy Scheider and Richard Dreyfuss paddling home once the shark is dead in Jaws, or one heartwrenching look between teacher and student at the end of the defiant drum solo in Whiplash, films teach us to deliver an ending the whole story has been working towards, and not to diminish that moment by hanging around too long to wrap things up.

 

 

So, go ahead and watch your favorite movie. It might be the stuff novels are made of. 

 

---Wendall