Find My Friends: It's More than an App

“It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a mystery writer in possession of a good idea, must be in want of a friend or two.” – Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice, the first line, a little adapted. 

With the Left Coast Crime mystery conference coming up in February, author friends are beginning to make plans -- for coffee, for dinners, for co-hosting banquet tables. When I think back to the very first LCC I went to, when I hardly knew anyone, something inside my ribs goes soft. For one of the great untold secrets about being a writer is the people you meet who help you along the way.

Tonight I'm going to a friend's house to do a book club for my 2019 novel, A Trace of Deceit, about a young woman artist in London, in 1875. And I think about how this novel would have been a misinformed disaster, full of what I thought I knew about art, except that I had two artist friends, who, when I asked, generously opened their hearts and minds to me. 

Inevitably a novel comes together like a stew, with ingredients from all different shelves in the kitchen.

For this book, set in the 1870s London art and auction world, Ingredient #1 was my experience working at Christie’s auction house in New York, in the scandal-filled 1990s.  

Ingredient #2 was the true story of the Pantechnicon, a warehouse where the wealthy of London stored their art and household valuables. It burned down in February 1874, destroying millions of pounds worth of irreplaceable masterworks and antiques.

Ingredient #3 was a painting worth stealing. I chose one of François Boucher’s paintings of Madame de Pompadour, the official chief mistress of King Louis XV from 1745 to 1751. 

Ingredient #4 were the biographies of two brilliant Victorian women artists—Evelyn de Morgan (https://www.demorgan.org.uk/discover/the-de-morgans/evelyn-de-morgan/) and Kate Greenaway (https://www.societyillustrators.org/kate-greenaway)—who attended the Slade School of Art in London in the 1870s. Their experiences served as a pattern for my heroine, Annabel Rowe, a student at the Slade School in 1875. (Here, a photo of an early class.)

But for the way Annabel thinks and speaks, for the metaphors she uses, for the way she looks at her world and describes it in words, I knew I needed to find an artist with a beating heart.

Fortunately, I have two longtime friends in Phoenix who are artists. One of them, Heidi Dauphin, has been a friend and fellow hiker since she arrived in Phoenix over twenty years ago. She works primarily in handmade ceramic tile, and her public art is scattered around town, including at the Heard Museum; neighborhoods in Avondale, Goodyear, and Tempe; the Valley Metro Light Rail TPSS building at Glendale and 19th Avenue; the Pinnacle Peak Water Reservoir in Phoenix, and elsewhere. Currently the Exhibition Manager at the Shemer Art Center in Phoenix, Heidi arranges and installs all the exhibitions and select the jurors for their juried shows. Find her on instagram @heididauphin and on her website www.heididauphin.com.

My other friend, Hallie Mueller, is the head art teacher at Phoenix Country Day School. She came to Arizona when she was 21 and was captivated by the desert landscape, which inspired her expansive, vivid paintings. Some years ago, while rock climbing, she fell 60 feet off a cliff, sustaining injuries that she has recovered from, but which transformed her art and her approach to life and creativity. You can find her paintings and more information at www.halliemueller.com. These two friends guided me while I developed the character of Annabel into a living, breathing painter, with an artist’s sensibility. Most of my conversations with Heidi took place on hiking trails over many years, as I learned about her time as an undergraduate and a graduate student, how she worked in the studio, and how she developed her craft. Her reflections and insights provided the broad strokes, the underpainting of my portrait of Annabel Rowe.

The details for that portrait came one night over a long dinner with Hallie. I still have my scribbled notes from that meeting, dated 2/25/19. I asked the basic, first question: “How does Annabel think about a painting?”

Hallie began by talking about compositional options—overlap, cropping, size variation and distance, angles, and foreshortening. She explained that there is a focal point, which is the thing that first grabs attention; then visual pathways, implied lines that you can create, for example, through repetition of a color that can lead the eye around the canvas. Shapes can function as arrows, as can the direction of the gazes of people in the picture. Where they are looking matters. (I found myself thinking … hm, this holds true in novels, too.) She walked me through oil painting, underpainting, and glazes; tightness (say, Titian) versus looseness (the Impressionists). She explained the importance of the “light source” and illumination; think of Caravaggio’s windows. And she explained that with colors, there are different degrees of saturation, and they aren’t really “fixed”; for example, browns change depending on what they are next to. Oils come in tubes; a flat brush will give you sharp edges whereas a bright brush, with the oval top, is good for blending; a round brush and fan brush will give you still different effects. As for smells? Linseed oil, which makes paint less viscous; Damar varnish, which adds gloss and enriches darks; turpentine, which weakens the integrity of paint. There was more, but this gives you an idea.

When I finished the book, there were three significant scenes where Annabel paints or reads a painting. I talked them through with Heidi and sent them to Hallie to read. I received comments from readers who wrote to me, “I’m an artist, and you got it right.”

If I got it right, it's because I got my friends. 

Writers -- have you ever collaborated in your creative work?

DOGS OF OVIEDO

 

Terrier on the Terrace

If you follow my Instagram account, you know I have a series, “Dogs of Oviedo.” The reason behind this is that dogs are a major part of the social fabric of Ovitense life. Dogs outnumber kids under 15 in Oviedo by a ratio of 3:2.5. Because Oviedo is a small, walking city, dogs are out walking with their humans everywhere (very unusual to see a dog in a car, like in the US), sometimes two or three dogs to one human. Often, dogs, especially the lap variety, join humans at the café table. I've also seen strangers stop to pet their respective canines, which might also prompt the dogs to introduce themselves to each other.

Chow Chow Chariot

Various conveyances can be used to carry dogs, such as the backpack shown above or a stroller.

Of course, dogs have their favorite toys.

Pomeranian Pride

During the winter, humans dress their canines up in sharp outfits, and matching ones if there are two.

Oviedo Rain-Ready (Rat Terriers)

Here's a typically joyous Golden Retriever playing in the dog enclosure in San Francisco Park. I tell you, I have never seen so many happy dogs!

I snapped these Spanish galgos (resembling English Greyhounds but not) who could well have been on their way to a black-tie event. [By the way, "galgo" is not capitalized--Spanish rules: I didn't make them.)

Graceful galgos

You might be forgiven for mistaking this for a St.Bernard, which gentle breed the movie "Cujo" gave a bad name (less so the novel), but this is a Bernese Mountain Dog, another big, gentle canine.

Finally, a young, beautiful Dalmatian I snapped at the mall.

A small disclaimer, though. What I’m seeing in Oviedo is the good half of the story. Terrace dogs are the visible winners: cared for, groomed, and fully integrated into urban life. That skews perception. The other half exists mostly out of sight—in protectoras, in rural areas, in the long afterlife of abandoned working dogs like galgos and podencos. Oviedo may be gentler than many places, but this is a curated slice of reality, not the whole picture.

Self-expression Aide

 Annamaria on Monday

My topic today was to have been angels.  But I know that I am am going to learn more this coming week about the angels I want to introduce you to.  I didn't want to go AWOL, so I offer you a tool I have posted here before - an easy way to wax eloquent to your politically like-minded friends.  Just make up a three digit number and string together the words so chosen from these columns.  

You can use the target persons' birthday:

2.20

Or the area code of his home.

Mar-a-lago, 561

Actually, area codes work quite well for state capitals:

518

850

And even better, the number of members of legislative bodies:

Total-435

Total Republicans-211

Total Members-650

Have fun!  See ya' next week.  

What Is Greece's Play in the The World We're Living In?

Xenia Kounalaki

Saturday–Jeff

For those of you interested in how Greece–a country of 10 million souls that faces persistent aggressive claims to its land and resources by its neighbor of 88 million (Turkey)–is responding to what's captivating international headlines, this past week's article in Greece's paper of record, Kathimerini, by long time columnist Xenia Kounalaki, may help you find an answer for yourself. 

It's titled, "The Greek 'cheerleaders' of Trumpism."

The Greek government has many opinions on the issue of Venezuela. Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis believes that the US operation to arrest Nicolas Maduro was carried out because President Donald Trump is intolerant of authoritarian regimes and wants to restore democratic order.

Along the same lines, Health Minister Adonis Georgiadis commented, “Let’s let the people of Venezuela enjoy their first moments of freedom after so many years of a leftist junta and wish them a great, bright democratic future!” He even compared the situation in Venezuela to the 1967-1974 dictatorship in Greece.

Following closely, Immigration Minister Thanos Plevris believes that the American president’s goal is not “to seize territory or change a legally elected government,” but “to arrest a criminal because of the drug trafficking he is carrying out in America.”

“A communist dictator, who had transformed his country’s economy into a drug trafficking center, is no longer in power,” is the assessment of New Democracy lawmaker Makis Voridis, who combines the two aforementioned positions: that the US is fighting a two-pronged battle, against drugs and authoritarianism. The refrain, however, is common: “There is no question of international law” or, as the prime minister put it, “this is not the time.”

And yet it is probably precisely the time to raise the issue of international legitimacy, because after Venezuela, Greenland is next. The major European countries rushed to stand by its side, but they did not ask Greece, because, on the one hand, it is a small country, and on the other, it does not seem to be troubled by America’s aggressive foreign policy. No European country has so far demonstrated particular bravery or willingness to question Trump. But there is great distance between their stance and half the Greek cabinet being more Catholic than the pope.

 “It’s one thing to be restrained and play the game we should – and you see that all Europeans are in a difficult position – and another to applaud,” admitted New Democrat MP Dimitris Kairidis. Indeed, because “karma is a bitch.” Trump, as we all know, has good relations with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. If Turkey offers Trump interesting quid pro quos, he could sacrifice his “cheerleaders” in Athens overnight. And what will they invoke then? International legitimacy?

 –Jeff

 Jeff’s Events (still in formation)

2026

All Live Events

 

Saturday, February 7, 3:00 p.m. CT
Murder By The Book
Author Speaking and Signing
Houston, TX

 

Wednesday, February 11, 6:00 p.m. ET
Mysterious Bookshop
Author Speaking and Signing
New York, NY

  

Thursday, March 26, 7:00 p.m. MT
The Poisoned Pen Bookstore
Author Speaking and Signing
Scottsdale, AZ

 

Friday, April 10, 6:30 p.m.
Mystery Lovers Bookshop
Author Speaking and Signing
Pittsburgh, PA

Exceptionalism

 

Michael - Alternate Thursdays

Throughout recorded history – and almost certainly from way before that – exceptionalism has been a mantra of different groups and espoused by members of that group, arguing that their group is the best in the world and the best ever. It has been at a world level, a species level, a race level, a gender level, a language level, a country level. Almost invariably time, evidence, and impartial research has shown that any particular exceptionalism is wrong

World Logic Day?

At a species level we were told that mankind was created differently and placed in dominion over the other creatures. Painstaking and careful work by paleontologists has shown that is not the case. We evolved as they did and from them. To argue against that requires either a laughable conspiracy theory or the belief that the devil (?) has been doing the rounds secreting fake evolutionary evidence around the world in unlikely places. Why is anyone’s guess. (Yesterday was apparently World Logic Day according to UNESCO. Our local newspaper commented that not everyone celebrates this particular day.)

Hawaiian Crow using a tool

Anyway, we are, of course, exceptional in comparison with other animals. For example, we are the only creatures on the planet with consciousness. Are we? Not so fast. Firstly, we don’t even quite agree on what consciousness actually is. It may be a construct the brain uses as a protocol for governing itself and the body. If so, it’s likely to be widespread. Secondly, there is now a widespread belief among scientists that certain animals do have it including some birds, invertebrates such as octopuses, and – recently – even a type of spider may qualify.

But they don’t have souls. Well, that one’s hard to argue since we don’t know if we have them either.

Leaving aside the other animals, our species is clearly superior to the homo species that preceded us. Are we? We are different from them (that’s what being a different species means), but the implication of exceptionalism is that modern humans are better. How much better are we?

Arrowheads

Go back 50,000 years. A discovery from South Africa published this year establishes that San people from 60,000 years ago already knew how to use poisons to kill, or at least slow down, prey animals. Small arrowheads excavated from a cave in Kwa-Zulu Natal at a level dated to that period, contained micro quantities of the poison from the plant colloquially known as “Bushman’s poison bulb,” the same poison source used by the San people of the area in modern times. So how different were these people from us? They thought, they planned, they gathered and transmitted knowledge.

Go back 100,000 years. Last year saw the discovery that homo sapiens and homo neanderthalensis not only interbred (we all share their gene pool), but that they probably kissed our species and conversely. This was established by genetically identifying species-specific oral microbe genes in fossil remains. In fact, some scientists believe that Neanderthals and humans were, in fact, just subspecies.

Path to the Dinaledi Chamber
In the dark...

If that’s still too close to us in terms of time, head back a quarter of a million years to Homo Naledi, who buried their dead at the Naledi cave in South Africa (something we previously believed only modern humans do). It wasn’t easy. They had to descend in the pitch dark through inaccessible caves to reach the funeral cave. Was it out of respect? That they didn’t want scavengers eating their dead? Or did they even have a belief in some sort of spirit or afterlife? Either way, it sounds very conscious, very human.

Coming back to a few hundred years ago, the belief was that the sun and the stars moved around the Earth – that the Earth, being the best, had to be the center of the universe.. Complex models were invented to show how that could work. None of them fit the data once astronomical measurements became less crude. Galileo, of course, deduced a much simpler model where the Earth moved around the sun, and that did work. But it spoilt the exceptionalism. It wasn’t popular, and neither was he.

Now we wonder – we no longer accept it as impossible – if there is life on other planets. We may never know. The exceptionalist argument is that for the universe Earth is the Goldilocks planet where everything is exactly right. However, there are a lot of stars out there, and we now know that a lot of them have planets. Maybe some of them have the right conditions for some form of life in those physical conditions. We may not even recognize it as life. I wouldn’t bet against it. And we may never know.

So, then, could we entertain the possibility that our species, race, culture, group, language, country, gender, whatever, is not exceptional in the sense of being the best? That there may be no good-better-best ordering at all. Maybe it’s enough that it’s wonderfully exceptional in the sense of being different.

Minnesota Is Not Afraid

 Sujata Massey

I’m writing to you from St. Paul, Minnesota, where many roads are ice rinks and frozen snowbanks are as hard as stone. I came for a few days to visit my parents and sisters.January always means bringing warm boots, a down coat, and a thick wool hat and gloves. And now: my US passport. 

The reason I’m carrying my document everywhere isn’t because I’m paranoid.  It’s because the Supreme Court gave the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) authority to racial profile: that is, to stop and detain people based on their skin color. For a brown person like me, it's not a joke. If I'm on a street by myself and the wrong car comes up, just telling them I'm a US citizen isn't enough. So many citizens have had lengthy detainments; and others have never come back home. 

In the Twin Cities of Saint Paul and Minneapolis, a massive deportation effort named “Operation Metro Stop” is underway. More than 2000 ICE and Border Patrol agents are driving through business and residential neighborhoods, lingering to look at people both on foot and inside cars. Beating up and pepper spraying victims is common: not only for people they hope to throw into the van, but the neighbors and bystanders who step in to observe whether they have warrants and can legally take people. They are using license plate information to get the names and addresses of people participating in protests, and then following these people and speaking to them by name to intimidate them. This is the terrible new change that's happened in the last few weeks: ICE is violently and psychologically retaliating against peaceful protestors.The Trump government’s goal is to punish Minnesota, and use the wide publicity of the harm they’re doing to frighten sympathizers around the country and suppress political resistance.

Most people have already heard about the shooting death of American citizen and mother Renee Good by ICE agent Jonathan Ross in Minneapolis on Wednesday, Jan 7. Good had only come to a scene where ICE cars were because she’d heard that ICE was hassling people and observers were needed. Kristi Noem, the head of Homeland Security, described the officer as being subject to ‘domestic terrorism’ and falsely stated that Good was an aggressor. But she never got out of the car. The truth was that her last words alive, recorded on Ross’s cellphone, were: “Dude, I’m not mad at you.” And his words, after shooting her three times in the face, were “Fucking bitch.” 

As I’ve said, the Good shooting, just like many other actions against the community observers, are meant as a warning to people not to interfere with ICE abductions. The agents are clearly distressed by the many times they’re missing making arrests because of the tremendous support Minnesotans are showing for each other. 

"We are Not Afraid!" is the defiant cry people chant at the men and women with guns in their hands and bandannas masking their faces. I am honking my heart out as I drive past each group. “Thank you!” I occasionally yell from my window, and the call comes back: “You’re welcome!”

More urgently, Twin Cities residents are making whistles with 3-D printers and distributing them widely to the population. They blow their whistles to signal that ICE is in the area, leading the vulnerable to take cover and the observers to get boots on the ground. And while ICE is going door-to-door asking people to report to them which houses have immigrants living in them, other neighbors are giving their phone numbers to such families for help in crisis. There is no rioting; there is no violent interference with ICE. It’s peaceful support, absolutely covered by existing law. Yet many protestors are being held in ICE jails for a day, during which time they are subject to extreme interrogations and offers of money in exchange for names of other protestors. What does this remind you of?

The valiant resistance is appearing from all sides. Minneapolis’s Native American community is sending its trained volunteer network to patrol streets and assist in protection. They’ve also have turned a community/arts center into 24-hour safe haven for observers and community members needing a place to sleep and eat. 

It may seem surprising that this particular state in the upper Midwest has turned out to be a place where people care so deeply about neighbors who are relative newcomers.

I think the answer is tied into to the history and nature of Minnesota. Ever since Native Americans were forced out of the area in the 19^th century, Minnesota became a place for transplants—and this history goes back only a few generations. Some people rode in covered wagons from other states, and foreign immigrants sailed directly from Europe, especially Germany and Scandinavia. African Americans have been here since the pioneer era and the Civil War. The Twin Cities were further integrated in the 20^th century, during the Great Migration from Southern states. I recall that back in the 80s, it was common to see mixed race couples going out together in Minneapolis—something that could be dicey in many other parts of the country.  During this same decade, the state gained Hmong, Somali, South Asian and Latino immigrants. Minnesota had plenty of job possibilities, and local government leaders were willing to set up bilingual schools and daycare options. The philosophy was that giving people a chance to get an education and job would lead to economic success for everyone. 

Another unusual regional feature that influences Minnesotans is a strong sense of obligation to help people caught out in the elements who seem to be in trouble. Minnesota has the coldest winters in the continental US. This fact, over the generations, has shaped an awareness of the potentially fatal risks people face out on the street in the snow. To this day, you are cozy at home, but you can see a car stuck in the street in front of your house, you are expected to zip up your parka put and get out to help them. This was explained to me during my first winter as an adult homeowner in Minneapolis—even though it was already the age of cellphones and emergency car services. If it's your street--you keep the people on it safe.. 

Minnesota's Attorney General Keith Ellison has filed a lawsuit against the Trump Administration for Operation Metro Stop, just as several other states have done. Regardless of this, ICE will certainly keep on assaulting Minnesotans. It must be hard for them to understand that the more tyrranical they are, they will only inspire larger numbers to step in to fill the shoes of those they've taken away.

New Stuff & Re-Newing Stuff

Ovidia--every other Tuesday

We celebrated the first work week of the Western new year by going back to one of our neighbourhood kopitiams (literally 'coffee shop' but more a collection of food stalls) which had been closed for renovations for some time.
We really like how it looks and feels now. Everything's brighter and cleaner and the ceiling even looks higher though I don't know how they could have managed this.
Plus we've just received our CDC vouchers (digital vouchers from the government to be used on food and household costs)

Here's what I spent mine on... $5 crispy noodles and a water chestnut drink! (Block 289 Bukit Batok St 25 in case you're in the area!)

It's almost worth the months of construction work that's going on. Which is something to remember now that our condo's currently in the middle of the government-mandated cycle of re-painting, re-grouting and re-tiling, meaning temporary barriers, exposed wiring, dust everywhere. It looks worse before it looks better. It always does.

But it's something you get used to if you live in Singapore. Something around you is always in the process of getting dug up, torn down or upgraded.
Residential blocks get upgraded. Schools, libraries, hawker centres are closed and reopened looking shinier and smelling cleaner.

But sometimes even this isn't enough. We tried to help with a neighbour's tripped circuit the other night--after ruling out all the visible appliances, we had to conclude the issue was somewhere behind the walls where aesthetically concealed wiring had fused.
That's the problem with things that look good--you can't tell when things are going wrong and everything looks fine—until it suddenly isn’t.
(They're getting an electrician in--it's hard to find one free now because they're always busiest before Chinese New Year. I stopped by a van in the car park to say 'you're blocking my car,' but before I could ask him to move up a little the driver handed me a card and said 'no more booking until after New Year'. The poor guy looked exhausted. I took the card and gave him a packet drink and yes, he moved the van.)

Of course we're also practical people here. You can see it in how fast Christmas disappears and Chinese new Year appears--the lights strung across building fronts and along roads are the same LED lights, but the little green Christmas trees have been replaced by little red lanterns and the 'reindeer' have lost their horns and become horses...

I like this season--it's cooler now across than the rest of the year. But it also feels like we're caught between the Western vs Chinese New Year.

In anticipation of the Year of the Horse, I've been clearing cupboards, repotting plants, cleaning out the turtle pond and fish tank filters--here's a look at the underside of some of the water plants. I'd not realised till now how pretty and delicate their roots are--

I've also been thinking that the whole thing about clearing stuff up regularly/ before New Year is about stagnant energy trapped in stagnant spaces and how entropy works on everything, from stuff we don't touch or look at to parts of our bodies and minds. I have so many books, projects and ideas that I don't want to work on yet am not ready to let go of!

But I will.

And I've been pushed to relook at some old things recently, thanks to external factors--

This month, The Mushroom Tree Mystery is a Kindle Monthly Deal at $0.99 on Amazon US.

And the television series Aunty Lee’s Deadly Delights, based on my Aunty Lee mysteries, premieres on MeWatch on January 19.

Entropy never ends. But there's always the hope of rebirth and renewal!

The Duomo of Siena

Annamaria on Monday

First a little background from Wikipedia: Stendhal syndrome is a psychosomatic condition involving rapid heartbeat, confusion, hallucinations, and other phenomena and even fainting is allegedly occurring when individuals become exposed to objects, artwork, or phenomena of great beauty. The affliction is named after the 19th century French author Stendhal, who described his experiences with the phenomenon during his 1817 visit to Florence, Italy, in his book Naples and Florence: a journey from Milan to Reggio.

I have only experienced Stendhal syndrome once. I did not pass out, but I had pretty much all the other symptoms. That was around 30 years ago when I first visited the Duomo of Siena, pictured above. It wasn't its gorgeous façade that got to me. And I want you to know that before I first visited Siena I had seen many, many of the most beautiful churches on the planet.  They were and are spectacularly beautiful. But none of them surprised and thrilled me as the masterpiece I revisited a second time a few days ago.

The many pictures below do not at all convey the experience of standing in that place and being surrounded by its highly unusual and incredible gorgeousness.

The floor has been recently restored, and as you will see below, the images are now protected. Visitors there can no longer walk on splendid works of art.\

The Manger seem was still in place.

I apologize for the random way the photos are arranged.  No matter how hared I tried, I could not get them to line up in a more logical way.  In fact the last one should be first.  But as we know in these challenging times, the first should be last, and the last should be first.