A Week for Winkler and Nowak

Life is still not running smoothly for either Lisa Nowak or Mary Winkler.  Some would call it poetic justice.

Lisa Nowak, the astronaut who shocked the world in February 2007, by traveling half-way across the continent to confront her love rival, Colleen Shipman,(above) was originally charged with attempted murder and abduction.  She lost her job as an astronaut but in the criminal courts ended up with a slap on the wrist.  She petitioned the court for an early release from probation.

Colleen wrote to the judge urging him to deny the request.  "I believe Captain Nowak's request to be quite arrogant considering the premeditated and malicious nature of her crime."


Colleen and the third member of the love triangle, Bill Oefelein, plan to marry sometime this year and are especially concerned that Nowak might do something crazy again.


The judge decided to maintain probation but he dropped it to an administrative level, meaning that she does not have to report regularly to her probation officer for the last six months of her sentence.  She continues, however, to be forbidden from traveling to Alaska or California or from making contact with Colleen or Bill.

*

Mary Winkler shot her sleeping husband in the back in Selmer, Tennessee.  This preacher's wife had to serve only 67 days after her conviction.  Now, it seems she's encountered some very unfortunate karma.  She regained custody on her daughters in 2008 and had settled with them in a rental home with lots of acreage.  She decided she wanted to be a nurse.

But after being accepted to nursing school in the fall, Mary fell seriously ill.  At first, a stroke was suspected.  Now she has received a diagnosis of multiple sclerosis.  Her serious aspiration problems with this disease left her unable to care for her children for three months earlier this year.

 
And, of course, Matthew Winkler's long-suffering parents stepped into the breach again and cared for their granddaughters until Mary could get back on her feet.  Those three girls are fortunate to have grandparents who look past the woman who murdered their son and give them the love and care they need.

Little Weird Things on Ordinary Days

The temperature was in the 80's.  Small, light clouds drifted across the sky.  And tiny white flakes fell through the air.

What?

It looked like a micro-snowfall. That, I knew, was impossible.

Am I seeing things?  Hallucinating?  Losing my fragile grip on reality?  No, as you can see, the leaf bears witness, there was something falling down.

Pollen?  It certainly is prime season for it here in South Texas--I'd been sneezing for weeks.  It just didn't look like pollen though.

My fourth thought: the ash clouds from the volcano in Iceland.  No.  They were falling in Europe--not here.  But I reached out and touched a piece of white on a leaf.  It felt like and fell apart like ash. 

Ash?

I sniffed the air but smelled no smoke.  I looked up to my roof and saw the white drifting down on to the shingles.  I saw it on my stone patio.  I looked in the front yard.  It was falling there, too.

I called my husband Wayne who works at KNBT-FM, the local radio station.  He had no clue so turned to newsman David Ferguson.  "What's with the white ash falling from the sky?"

"Yes, white ash is falling from the sky," David said with a laugh.

"Why?"

"Don't know," David said, "but it's all over the police scanner."

David then investigated the weird phenomenon.  Apparently, there was a controlled burn up on Loop 337--too far away for me to smell but close enough to make its presence known.

*

One night last week, we watched Garden of Death, an episode of Midsomer Murder on a Netflix DVD.  In it, someone entered a woman's garden cut the heads off of all her flowers and arranged them into the classic shape of a chalk-marked body. 

The next morning, without giving the show a thought, I went out and thoroughly dead-headed our red Knock-out rose.  That afternoon, Wayne went out in the garden and froze.  All the blooms were gone.  His mind instantly flew to the episode we'd just watched.  He scanned the garden looking for anything odd.  I joined him outside.  He turned a bewildered face to me.  "Did you dead-head the roses?"

I instantly realized why that freaked him out, laughed and walked away.  I had to wonder, though, was it merely coincidence or was my subconcious being wicked.

*

I can't remember where I ran across the name "Chillicothe" the other morning.  But when I did, I noticed it as I do with some unfamiliar words.  I rolled the sound of it over my tongue.  I noticed how it was spelled.  I mentally filed it away.

That afternoon, Wayne's mother gave him a call.  I sat near him busy on my laptop while he talked.  He turned to me and said, "Can you go to Google and see if there is a town named Chillicothe in New York State?"

I knew how to spell it without a thought and had already entered the search by the time he'd passed along the spelling of the name from his mother.  "No," I said, "There's a Chillicothe in Texas, one in Ohio, a Chillicothe in Missouri and another in Illinois.  Don't see any in New York.  Why did you ask?"

He then told me about his mother's dream about travelling from Utica, New York, to Chillicothe but she'd never heard of the place.  I said, "I have.  This morning.  That's how I knew how to spell it."

Yeah, that is weird.

*

I think there are probably weird things like these in every day but we're too busy moving through life to notice them.  I'm always pleased when I do.

I just looked up "weird things" in Google images.  Now that was really weird--a lot weirder than anything that has happened to me.  Maybe my life is a bit too tame.

From Nuts to Nuttier and Back Again

I've just made my book project transition--finishing one manuscript and panicking until I could get going on the next one.  If you're a writer, you'll understand this phase.  If you're not, you'll think that I am just plain nuts.  And others are thinking: "Nutty writer?  Isn't that an oxymoron?" 


I won't argue with you.  I can't--not when I look around my office and spot Harley the Pet Monster sporting a Forensic Files cap and a Hulk Hogan t-shirt sitting on the air of my easy chair.  It once belonged to my daughter and went everywhere we went--including church and the grocery store.  Now, he watches over me. 


On Monday, May 3, I finished TWISTED REASON, the fourth book in the Lucinda Pierce mystery series, and sent it in to my editor.  When I pressed that "send" button, I was very pleased with what I'd written.  I thought it was my best fiction ever.  Within twenty-fours, I was convinced that the same manuscript was a pile of unadulterated crap.  I spent days bouncing back and forth between these two extremes until I heard from my agent this past Tuesday.  And she liked it.


Happy dance commenced instantly.  When you read someone's opinion of your book and it contains words like "compelling," "solid," and "satisfying," life is good.  I haven't heard from my editor yet and I'm a bit anxious about hearing her opinion, but I'm resting a little easier after getting some positive feedback.

Now, I've switched from writing fiction to writing another true crime book--my eleventh, which I must admit I find hard to believe.  This one is about Raynella Dossett Leath, a woman with two deceased husbands who lived in the Knoxville, Tennessee area.

When her second husband, David Leath (above left), died, Raynella claimed he committed suicide.  However, a forensic examination of the evidence found that three bullets were fired from the gun--and the second one was instantly fatal.  David Leath's death was not a suicide and his wife was charged with his murder.  She was convicted in January.

The charges in the death of her second husband raised questions about the demise of her first spouse, Ed Dossett (above right), the Knox County Prosecutor.  His death was caused by a cattle stampede.  A fresh look at the evidence created doubts about that conclusion.  Ed Dossett had so much morphine in his system, there's no way he could have walked out to the cattle yard unassisted.  Investigators concluded that someone had to have taken Ed out there and put him in harm's way.  Raynella was charged with his murder.  At this point, no date has been set for her trial in that case.


Now, I'm doing interviews, looking for anyone who knew Raynella, Ed Dossett or David Leath.  If you have a connection to any of those three people, I'd love to talk to you.  Just send an email to diane@dianefanning.com

Featured Guest: Cindy Bradford

Please welcome my first guest blogger, Cindy Bradford, to Writing is a Crime.  She is writing today about her new book, Promises Kept. The story of an unforgettable young woman named Faith, whose life journey is filled with uncertainty and a search for people and answers that others take for granted. Compassionate and courageous, she never gives up, showing strength and character beyond her years. It is also the story about the power of the human spirit, of family, friends and love.
Leave a comment on this post or on any other post in Cindy's virtual tour and you'll be entered into a contest to win a free copy of the first book in the series, Keeping Faith.



by Cindy Bradford

It is almost impossible to separate Promises Kept and my first book, Keeping Faith because everything is so interwoven. Each novel, however, is an entirely different story, although two of the most important characters, Faith and her father Patrick, are strong in both. Faith was such an easy character to develop because I have known a hundred Faiths. She simply evolved from her East Texas setting, and was actually the catalyst for Keeping Faith. Patrick is more complex as a person so his character was equally difficult to develop.

The title of the first book took its name from Faith’s character although it was somewhat a double entendre because the name of the book could also be interpreted as referring to Patrick’s faith. Whatever symbolism the reader chooses, Faith is part of the bigger picture. She is and was the glue that held Patrick, Sue, and Alice together over time and place.

So why was Faith easy to portray and others more difficult to develop? There was no single person in my background named or identified as Faith. Instead, she represents so many East Texas women who are strong and determined and sometimes even aggressive. So often, females from small, rural settings are seen as needy and weak. I wanted to change that image with Faith because many of the women I have known from that part of the world are anything but. They are perfect examples of steel magnolias. Perhaps, that characteristic was innate in Faith; maybe it was strengthened by her adversities; the reader can decide.

Several of you have told me you didn’t like Patrick at first, but grew to like him. Congratulations, you took the hook. That is exactly what I wanted to happen. Actually, I didn’t even like him at first so what could I expect you to do differently?

The guy had major flaws, but don’t we all? His just hit at the core of our sensibilities, and because of that, we didn’t want to like him. He was reckless and self-centered and immature, although he would have argued with that. But as he aged a little, we all grew to appreciate his failures and why he was the way he was. After all, that is what Keeping Faith was all about—how the actions of one person, in this case, the cowardly, sick priest, can intervene negatively in a normal life and basically change it forever.

As you know from reading the newspapers in recent years, there have been many “Patricks”; the victims of others who took advantage of the innocent. I realized in reading some of these news articles that when we don’t put a face with a victim, it usually doesn’t have as great an impact. If we know the person, then our reactions are different. It doesn’t mean we don’t sympathize or even empathize, but it generally isn’t at the high level it should be. So I wanted you to get to know Patrick, to visualize him, to see the boy and then the man.

The first Patrick was just an innocent kid, who you probably wouldn’t have noticed in a room of 10 year olds, except for his striking blue eyes that almost took you off guard, wondering what was behind their brilliance. Certainly he wasn’t the cutest kid in the room—that would probably be reserved for the blond or dark haired kid. Instead, Patrick was a gangly red head with a mischievous, captivating personality. As his first grade teacher, you might have recognized him as a disorganized, carefree little guy who would rather pick up a frog than a book. If you had been his fifth grade teacher, you might have noticed a more circumspect boy whose thoughts where somewhere far away, but you wouldn’t be able to put your finger on the reason. That was the character I wanted to build upon. Where it went from there was up to fate for him and imagination for the reader.

Although Promises Kept, the second book, can stand on its own, one must read the first book, Keeping Faith, to fully appreciate Patrick as a main character.

Cindy Bradford, Ph.D., is also the author of Keeping Faith and Promises Kept. She lives at South Padre Island, Texas, and spends several months a year in Ruidoso, New Mexico. She is a retired public school educator and university professor. She often incorporates her knowledge of wine into her writings and shares the beautiful places she has visited with her readers.

The Difference between Fiction and Non-Fiction

At some point in the past, I printed out a quotation from Bryan Burrough wrote in the New York Times about the difference between writing fiction and non fiction.  I don't remember when I did it but it wound up buried under my current book project.  I uncovered it and read it again. 
I'm sharing it with you because I'd like to hear what you think about what Burroughs wrote.

"If one compares a book to a house, the primary difference between the novelist and the nonfiction author is that novelists can build the most glorious mansion with nothing but their minds.  With apologies to writers like Tom Clancy and Tom Wolfe, who actively research their books, a novel, for the most part, is just a dream on a page.  The non-fiction author, however, must build his house by tramping into the woods of society day after day, rooting through the underbrush for the right wood; then he must fell the trees, haul them back to his site and assemble his dwelling log by log, nail by nail, all the while keeping in mind that if one plank is out of place, someone will howl.

"Fiction is an art.  Nonfiction is construction."

I thought Burrough stated it quite well.  Can you think of any other analogies?