Posts by Laurie King
Parrots and Pirates
Because I have a couple extra ARCs of Pirate King, I’ll be giving one away this Saturday to someone who has sent in a submission to the Parrot King illustrated story contest. It’s a drawing, not a best-of prize, and since at the moment we only have four (if you mailed one and it’s not…
Read MoreMoors, royals, and—more pirates!
I, and Russell in her turn, found myself on the road to Cintra, where the Portuguese royal family lived, and the nobility’s castles sprang up like mushrooms. (“…then loaded upon a fleet of decorative if rickety wooden carts and aimed at the hill under whose side Cintra sheltered.”) Cintra itself is a highly decorative town,…
Read MoreMysterious California
I love libraries. I adore them, always and continuously. My abiding affection had a boost last night, with an event in the Sunnyvale (CA) library, where some of the staff remembered me as part of an event—oh, how many years ago could it have been? Thirteen? Fourteen?—with Sisters in Crime authors. This time it was…
Read MoreIn which we discover a castle
I arrived in Lisbon towards the end of March, when it was still half winter, (“I was thinking, perhaps, the botanical gardens?”) and set out to explore the city. Lisbon is built on hills—correction: Lisbon IS hills. Residents plan their routes not on direct point-to-point, but following the contours around, or taking one of the…
Read MoreThe case of the piratical poet
Very well: I had my place (Lisbon) and my local character—and what a character Fernando Pessoa turned out to be. (“a poetical individual. It being 1924, and the weedy, artistic look being all the fashion even in this distant enclave, there were several melancholics who fitted the description.”) First of all, as Mary Russell describes…
Read MoreIn which our heroine sets out for Lisbon
Sometimes, the story comes before the setting—that is, I decide to write a story set in a specific place (and if you’re one of those who wondered about the Japan adventure mentioned at the start of Locked Rooms, yes, I’m going to Japan for the research next year.) But other times the story shapes itself…
Read MoreBeekeeping for the non-technological
Having trouble downloading Beekeeping for Beginners? Sorry if I misled you as to the ease of this process, it was not deliberate. There is A Step Between. As I understand it, the story is sold in a whole bunch of places, some of which are already formatted for their proprietary readers (Kindle, Nook, Sony, etc.)…
Read MoreBeekeeping for Beginners, and other points of view
A few years ago, I started playing with ways to work bits of third-person viewpoints into what are otherwise memoirs. Those don’t actually fit, of course, since “I” have no way of knowing exactly what “he” is thinking, even if I’m standing next to…
Read MoreThe greatest trip, ever (5)
Meredith Taylor, in LewTrenchard, Devon: We then went on to the Church of St. Peter in Lew Trenchard just next door, which is small and lovely. W.S. Baring-Gould, grandson of SBG, compiled the first annotation of the complete Holmes that I ever owned. On his account I took a picture of the memorial plaque to…
Read MoreThe greatest trip…ever (4)
Meredith Taylor continues her description of an investigative trip to Dartmoor, in the footsteps of Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes. Lew Trenchard While talking to the staff ladies, a good question was answered: how can a hotel chain afford to have all these family portraits and beautiful furniture? Donna gave me the interesting solution: Dr.…
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