Which Of Your Books Is Your Favorite

I'm in the process of relocating my web site, which is going to take a little while. In the meantime, I'll put any announcements regarding my new book, A PERILOUS CONCEPTION, into these weekly blog posts.

My author copies for APC arrived this past week, and as always, I smiled as I looked at the lovely dust jacket the Poisoned Pen folks designed for the book. Some things never get old.

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People often ask me which of my books is my favorite, then add, "I bet it's like asking which of your kids is your favorite."

Well, sort of. I like at least some things in all my books, and I don't dislike any of them. But no way can I select a favorite.

THE MUSIC BOX MURDERS, as my first mystery novel, will always be special on that basis alone. And its successor, SCAMMING THE BIRDMAN, a caper, not only was great fun to write, but Dick Lochte's comment in the LA Times - "Donald Westlake is the reigning master of this type of fiction. Karp isn't quite in his league, but his ending is one that's worthy of Westlake and then some." - was damn sweet icing on the cake. The third in the Music Box Series, THE MIDNIGHT SPECIAL, was satisfying, in that I felt I took a good step forward in exploring the disabilities and anxieties a person inevitably encounters in the process of growing old.

My medical-ethics standalone, FIRST, DO NO HARM, got the best reviews and sold more copies than any of my books. Hard not to love a success like that. But even more pleasing was the fact that I'd finally written a story I'd been incubating since I was a young boy, and had been working on for some twenty years.

The books in my ragtime historical trilogy were thoroughly enjoyable to research and write, allowing me as they did to enter a subculture new to me, and to play with the ideas of birth, aging, death, and renaissance, both literally and metaphorically. As a group and individually, I'm very happy with the way they turned out.

And now we come to the one book I can exclude, where the analogy of books to children breaks down entirely. Who ever turns thumbs-down or even thumbs-neutral on their newborn baby? But a current release is never a contender for favorite. It always seems full of sharp, jagged edges that could make me bleed if I were to expose myself to them. I've learned, though, to give a new book a little time. With distance, and the intervention of a newer story, the nasty points in a book smooth out, and I come to think, well, maybe it's not so bad after all. Let a year or two pass, then ask me how I like A PERILOUS CONCEPTION. But for now, I'll leave the covers closed and just admire the lovely dust jacket.

The Word Thief

My wife is forever warning people to watch what they say in my presence, lest their words end up in one of my books. Fiction writers can be - and are - shameless about stealing comments, gestures, appearances, tics, anything that will help move a story along. But until today, I'd never realized how deeply this trait is ingrained.

After last week's blog about Building Brands, I decided to provide my own antidote by writing about my literary hero, the late John Jerome. In the September 29, 2002 New York Times Book Review, Bruce McCall labeled him "hands down...the most successful writer I've ever known." Jerome wrote eleven books, none of which came close to being a best seller. For Jerome, the writing was its own reward, preferable to money or fame. He "inquired into the uncommonness of common things," McCall wrote. "He believed he was mining worthy insights." After having read Jerome's book, ON TURNING SIXTY-FIVE, I'll testify to the worthiness of his insights. I recommend the work to anyone of any age.

According to McCall, Jerome "was up and at the keyboard before sunrise every morning, as close to 365 days a year as he could manage, fashioning his daily thousand or more words of meticulous prose, writing away the years as if he were being paid a thousand dollars an hour." McCall also noted, "He would have made a lousy celebrity in any event. He never met a cocktail party he couldn't bolt in a minute, hated public speaking, cultivated no connections." Not that he was anti-social - he had many friends, and was active daily outside his writing room. But as McCall put it, he "was in the best sense, an old-fashioned kind of writer, inspired by solitude, soothed by privacy, a respecter of craft who couldn't cut a corner or miss a deadline or tolerate a typo." My kind of guy.

But as I read through the article to refresh my memory, I stopped cold as I came across Jerome's maxim: "Use it up, wear it out, make it do or do without." All I could do was laugh. That quote appeared word-for-word in my own book, THE KING OF RAGTIME, in the mouth of Eleanor Stark, to describe her father, John Stark, Scott Joplin's publisher, to a T. I wrote that book in 2007-2008, five-plus years after the publication of Bruce McCall's article, and when Eleanor Stark's comment popped up on my computer screen, I had no idea where she'd gotten it from. Guilty as charged! Watch what you say around me.

My Ragtime Historical-Mystery Trilogy Is Honored

      As am I.
      The Friends of the Crowell Library in San Marino, CA host a yearly One Book/One City Festival, where a particular book is selected, every reader in the city is encouraged to read it, events are planned around the major theme(s) of the book, and the author visits the city and gives a talk. This year's honoree was T. Jefferson Parker, for IRON RIVER.
      Next year, the committee has renamed the Festival OB/OCx3, to select the three books (THE RAGTIME KID, THE KING OF RAGTIME, and THE RAGTIME FOOL) of my trilogy for their community read. During March and April 2011, the library will sponsor programs on music (especially ragtime) and concerts, and I'll talk to the readers on April 28, at 7pm, then sign books. Pretty cool.

Rich Egan's Missouri Ragtime

When I go to bookshops to talk about THE RAGTIME KID and THE KING OF RAGTIME, people ask me whether they can buy CDs so they can actually hear the music I've been referring to. Usually, I give them the names of a recording or two of classical ragtime, music by Scott Joplin, Joe Lamb, and James Scott. Great music, but there's more to ragtime, and it's readily available.
Scott Joplin's goal was to transform the rough-and-ready folk ragtime music of the 1890s and earlier into a classical form, to be played strictly as written, preferably in a concert hall, rather than in a bar or a brothel. But the prototype also developed along other lines, the most prominent of which is usually called Missouri, or midwestern, ragtime, a more boisterous music, but with a prominent days-gone-by feeling.
Richard Egan of St. Louis is a pianist-composer-historian whose playing taps heavily into the nostalgic mode. Rich has two CDs available: FROM THE LAND OF RAGTIME (Piano Joys#PJ006) and LOWLAND FOREST (Piano Joys#PJ023). Listen to them, and you'll come away with a comprehensive feel for ragtime music today.
Just about everyone has heard Scott Joplin's "Maple Leaf Rag," and "The Entertainer," but on the Lowlands Forest disc, Rich plays four lesser-known Joplin pieces, "The Sycamore," "Eugenia," "The Rosebud March," and "Pleasant Moments," and one by James Scott, "Sunburst Rag." You'll also hear midwestern/southern/country rags from a hundred years ago, such as Charles Hunter's "Tickled to Death," and modern pieces in that mode by Tom Shea (a wonderful player-composer who died far too young in 1982), David Thomas Roberts, and Rich himself. There are a few pieces by Brun Campbell, The Ragtime Kid; if you don't want your feet to tap when Rich plays Brun's tunes,  you'll have to tie them down. Then there are the outright barnburners, like "Old Dan Tucker/Bingo" and "You've Been A Good Old Wagon But You've Done Broke Down," which will take root in your brain and not give you respite for days - not that you'd want it to. And  if you think nostalgia ain't what it used to be, take a listen to Rich's rendition of "Slippery Elm Rag."
Rich Egan's playing is the antithesis of the old pizza parlor style: gussy it up and bang it out. This guy is sensitive to every emotional component of ragtime, and is in every sense an interpreter of the music. Give him a listen. You won't be sorry.

A Little Reflected Glory

        I just got word that Mirron Willis' reading of The King of Ragtime for Blackstone Audiobooks received AudioFile Magazine's Earphones Award, and I'm happy to bask in the reflection of Mr. Willis' glory.  The review said, in part, "Mirron Willis gives a virtuoso performance in Larry Karp's second immersion in the syncopated rhythms of ragtime...Willis never strikes a false note in Karp's well-researched period mystery. He fashions living human beings of all colors, textures, and dispositions with only his smooth, sultry voice.
     Here's a link to the entire review.  http://www.audiofilemagazine.com/reviews/showreview_pub.cfm?Num=40367
     Thanks, AudioFile.  Thanks, Mr. Willis.

A Blast at Seattle Mystery Bookshop

     It's always a pleasure to start off events for a new book at Seattle Mystery Bookshop.  This is a quintessential independent mystery bookstore with the motto, "For mystery lovers who know what they want, and for those who haven't a clue."  They ain't whistlin' Dixie.
     For the debut signing of The King of Ragtime, I had a good time catching up with the old friends who showed up, and talking about mysteries to a bunch of new readers.
     Signed, dated copies of The King of Ragtime remain available (SMB, 117 Cherry St, Seattle; 206-587-5737, or staff@seattlemystery.com)