"Simon writes with authority and affection..."

Happy! Oh, and the book? Pre-order it here.

New England Mobile Book Fair is saved! (maybe?)

Well, for the next two years anyway... plus, it's not too far from the great indie bookstore's current spot!

From the Boston Globe:

Owner Tom Lyons, who’d warned customers a few months ago he needed to downsize or close, has found a new space not far from the 32,000-square-foot warehouse space on Needham Street in Newton Highlands that has been home for 50 years.


Lyons says the New England Mobile Book Fair is moving just a few blocks away — to the Marshalls Plaza on Needham Street. He’s hoping to be open in the new space, which will be less than a quarter of the size of the old space, by mid-June.

read more here.

Amateur sleuths with spooky help...

Booklist is celebrating May is Mystery Month with a series of roundups, and my latest Dulcie Schwartz cozy, "Into the Grey," made it into this one on haunted mysteries.

Want to see who else made the cut? Click here.

"Some of my favorite things..."

"World Enough weaves together some of my favorite things: A good mystery, a flawed heroine regaining her mojo, and rock 'n' roll. Specifically, World Enougj is set in the Boston rock scene and alternative press scene in the mid-80's. Having been there, I can say that Clea Simon has done a beautiful job of evoking this time and place before Boston underwent a tech-fuelled makeover and when the Rat was the gloriously grubby place to be. Simon gracefully handles the transitions from past to present, as her heroine Tara Winton, a bored PR associate, tries to recapture the idealism and sense of community she knew back in her youth as a rock critic and club regular. Her obsession with the mysterious death of a musician from the old scene sends her down a rabbit hole where she finds that her memories of that time dont hold up to the reality her investigation uncovers.

Many fiction writers have tried and failed to credibly capture the rock and roll life on the page. Clea Simon, a former music reviewer herself, gets it exactly right."

Are you a Goodreads author? If so, you can read this review for yourself here. Another reason to join: WE ARE GOING TO BE DOING A GIVEAWAY SOON! Details to come!

A feel-good #FelineFriday story

Yay, Ringer! And thank you, Chloe! Click on the link for the feel-good #FelineFriday story about a cat who was trapped under the ruins of his family's house for two months – and the dog who found him. And, yes, the vet predicts a full recovery. Click here.

"Great story and eerily authentic..."

So says Tanya Donelly (of Throwing Muses/the Breeders/Belly fame) about my upcoming Boston rock noir, "World Enough." She should know – as a founding member of Throwing Muses, she was certainly around during the '80s club heyday that I've set the book in. Around ... but not necessarily in it. I remember the first time I heard the Muses. It was a weeknight at the Rat. A cassette tape of their songs had already started circulating, but nobody in Boston had heard them yet. The tape featured guitar noise and screamed vocals. On stage, they were dissonant and strange – not like most of the garage rock or punk bands playing then. A couple of people left, but two musicians I deeply respect (Johnny Angel, then of the Blackjacks, and Rich Gilbert, then of the Zulus, I think) were really listening. We came away impressed, but it took a while for the band to find its audience, as I recall. Now, of course, they're considered groundbreaking. Those first songs from that cassette, though, they are still some of my favorites... Thanks, Tanya!

Fate and the Pulpwood Queens

I'm a music fan. Huge one. Used to write about it (a time of my life that forms the basis for my upcoming mystery World Enough). And one of my favorites is Lucinda Williams. I was listening to her a lot over the last few weeks, in anticipation of her show at Berklee Performance Center (amazing, she played for two hours...). And having just been to the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival, I found myself singing along with "Lake Charles," about a mystery man who wants to return to the Louisiana city – but who is really from over the border in Nagocdoches, Texas. And in the midst of my singing and anticipation, I got a dream invitation. I have been invited to participate in the Pulpwood Queens Girlfriend Weekend next January - a wild blast of a book party that friends had told me about but that I'd never been to. And guess what? It's in Nagodoches!

Coincidence, or fate? Who cares, let's just sing along! (And maybe I'll see you in Texas?)


"He had a reason to get back to Lake Charles
He used to talk about it
He'd just go on and on
He always said Louisiana
Was where he felt at home
He was born in Nacogdoches
That's in East Texas
Not far from the border ...."

- Lucinda Williams, "Lake Charles"

But do cats love #FelineFriday?

This just in! Researchers at Oregon State University have proven that cats love people – many of them more than they love food, toys, or catnip! Well, we knew that, right? (I find it telling that this report was actually released while I was away on vacation - now I know what Musetta was trying to tell me as she mewed and rubbed against me on my return.) Read the full report here.

Revising

It's happened again, that thing where I wake up with a good idea for my work-in-progress. I rush to write it down, or to record it on my phone. And now I'm sitting down to weave it into this manuscript, which I hope will become the third Blackie & Care mystery.

So that's all good, right? Well, yes, except that I thought I had a finished manuscript. All the clues were laid, the action was written out, and I was even pretty happy with how I tied it all together. (If I re-read the climax and realize I'm holding my breath, I figure that's pretty good!) I'm supposed to be in the revising stage now. And this isn't even the first revision. I read the entire manuscript through last month, before taking a week of vacation. Now I'm reading it through on paper, supposedly just for things like awkward sentences or updated bits that somehow didn't make it in. I'm not supposed to be plotting at this point. But... writing is messy, I've found. And rewriting is an essential part of it. And so I'm working on this new twist, seeing if I can indeed fit it into the manuscript. And then, I guess, I'll be reading it through, one more time, before sending it in!

What is the Pulpwood Queens Girlfriend Weekend?

And why will I be flying off to Nacogdoches, Texas, in January? This Writer's Digest article explains more about the world's LARGEST book club – and the annual party that I am so looking forward to being part of! When else will I get to wear my cowboy boots AND a tiara?

Texas and tiaras!

WOOT! It's official! I'll be at the Pulpwood Queens Girlfriend Weekend in January! I have wanted to attend this wild and crazy book-club-cum-crazy-wild-party since I first heard about it (probably from the super-talented New York Times-bestselling author Caroline Leavitt, who has attended). Basically, it's a weekend-long fiesta of books, barbecue, and feather boas. And I'm only a small fry compared to some of the authors attending - this year, Randi Susan Myers, MJ Rose, and Alice Hoffman are topping the bill. Sounds like fun, doesn't it? Check it out - and consider signing up. I expect it to be a blast!

And I think this means that I get to add this to my page for "World Enough," too:

"A most unusual team..."

"A most unusual detection team..." begins this review of As Dark As My Fur in the Richmond Times-Dispatch. The piece goes on to praise the book's "combination of hard-boiled crime novel, feline fiction, corruption and even a touch of the supernatural." Why, thank you!

Thank you, Boston Public Library!

Seen in the wild!

"Daze of Futures Passed...."

“Music-scene insider Clea Simon’s WORLD ENOUGH shows how the daze of futures passed on the Boston rock underground reaches into the present to stir up darkness. Makes me want to get out my old Aught Nines vinyl.” –Milo Miles of NPR’s “Fresh Air with Terry Gross” Thank you!