Happy Wednesday, Booklovers!
Welcome to this week's Coffee Chat. My guest is Dee McKinney, author of more than a dozen published short stories.
Nice to have you join us, Dee. What may I get you to drink?
DM: I am a coffee freak. My favorite coffees are Kenya AA and Kona, and I drink them with Turbinado sugar and hazelnut-chocolate creamer. You can put three different types of coffee in front of me, and I have a pretty good chance of telling you what brews they are (i.e. South American vs. Ethiopian vs. that swill people call decaf).
Ally: My magic pot loves a challenge, so I'll be right back with a mug I guarantee you'll love. While I'm gone, please introduce yourself to readers.
Welcome to this week's Coffee Chat. My guest is Dee McKinney, author of more than a dozen published short stories.
Nice to have you join us, Dee. What may I get you to drink?
DM: I am a coffee freak. My favorite coffees are Kenya AA and Kona, and I drink them with Turbinado sugar and hazelnut-chocolate creamer. You can put three different types of coffee in front of me, and I have a pretty good chance of telling you what brews they are (i.e. South American vs. Ethiopian vs. that swill people call decaf).
Ally: My magic pot loves a challenge, so I'll be right back with a mug I guarantee you'll love. While I'm gone, please introduce yourself to readers.
Bio:
I’m originally from Asheville in western North Carolina, but I’ve spent most of my adult life studying or working here in rural Georgia. I’m a professor of history at a small public college where I teach world civ and the history of science, so the skills of historical research for my writing are conveniently built in from my formal education.
From 1994 – 2004, I sold 15 pieces of short fiction (2000 words to 30K words) to the now-defunct White Wolf publishing company in Atlanta; those were all horror pieces, generally about werewolves and their non-shapeshifting family members, but I sometimes branched out to include magicians or faeries. Last year, one of my short stories appeared in Day of the Dark, an eclipse anthology edited by Kaye George, featuring characters from my second novel.
Something unique/unusual that isn't in my regular bio: "When dating my husband, a wildlife biologist, he invited me to a necropsy (yes, that’s like an autopsy, just on an animal). This was a large deer who’d died from a parasitic infection, though at the time, the suspected cause of death was hemorrhagic disease. I found it fascinating how the vet in charge treated it much like an ME would in the “human” world. I thought I’d be queasy, but you learn to breathe through it, and honestly, it wasn’t that bad. The veterinarian doing the work was amazing—she had the body sliced and diced in what seemed like five minutes, with precision. We attendees all looked at the evidence, and yep, parasites."
Author contacts:
On Twitter, I’m @atropos42. You can also reach me via my Goodreads blog page: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/172149.Dee_McKinney/blog
I’m originally from Asheville in western North Carolina, but I’ve spent most of my adult life studying or working here in rural Georgia. I’m a professor of history at a small public college where I teach world civ and the history of science, so the skills of historical research for my writing are conveniently built in from my formal education.
From 1994 – 2004, I sold 15 pieces of short fiction (2000 words to 30K words) to the now-defunct White Wolf publishing company in Atlanta; those were all horror pieces, generally about werewolves and their non-shapeshifting family members, but I sometimes branched out to include magicians or faeries. Last year, one of my short stories appeared in Day of the Dark, an eclipse anthology edited by Kaye George, featuring characters from my second novel.
Something unique/unusual that isn't in my regular bio: "When dating my husband, a wildlife biologist, he invited me to a necropsy (yes, that’s like an autopsy, just on an animal). This was a large deer who’d died from a parasitic infection, though at the time, the suspected cause of death was hemorrhagic disease. I found it fascinating how the vet in charge treated it much like an ME would in the “human” world. I thought I’d be queasy, but you learn to breathe through it, and honestly, it wasn’t that bad. The veterinarian doing the work was amazing—she had the body sliced and diced in what seemed like five minutes, with precision. We attendees all looked at the evidence, and yep, parasites."
Author contacts:
On Twitter, I’m @atropos42. You can also reach me via my Goodreads blog page: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/172149.Dee_McKinney/blog
INTERVIEW:
Ally: Tell us what type of stories you write.
DM: I write in a cross-genre medium—of the two novels I’ve completed (and hope to add to my list of publications), one is historical mystery/horror (some might call it dreadpunk) set just before the outbreak of World War I, called The Death Apprentice of Meng-Po. The other is an urban paranormal/mystery, present day. It’s this second one, A Discord of Ghosts, I’ve queried most, and I’ve started two sequels to it that haven’t had much attention from me in a while. My third novel, which I’m writing currently, is a 1980s Appalachian paranormal/mystery with a whisper of romance.
I think my books and short stories would get a PG rating in the romance department—there’s some kissing; a few times, characters wake up in bed with someone else or feel sexual attraction. I don’t write out “the action.” I love reading romance for fun, and I respect authors who write it well. It’s just not my gift.
Ally: What has been your publication journey, including bumps and missteps?
DM: So, when I sold my first short story back in 1994, it was a fluke of a chance. A friend from a writing group knew someone who knew someone who passed on the initial draft I’d shared with my friend to an editor assembling a paranormal anthology. I had no idea she did this until the editor running the anthology called me up on the phone (email was just taking off then, and only rich people had cell phones) and talked to me about signing a contract for the story. I was floored. It was only about $60, but that meant a lot of groceries for a grad student in the early 1990s! He recommended me to a couple of other editors, and I wrote short stories of various lengths for White Wolf, one really a novella, and poof, I was published, making enough money to pay for much of grad school in the process, since my teaching assistantship barely covered living expenses. I also had a great experience working last year with Kaye George on Day of the Dark. I took a chance on sending her a piece using characters from the novel I was shopping around and was thrilled that Kaye included “An Eclipse of Hearts.”
I have to admit, though, that selling a novel has proved much harder than I’d anticipated. I’ve gotten a couple of “you were so close to making a deal!” experiences that have, to be frank, left me kind of weary. What I’ve learned is that you give yourself a mental break…and then you go back to the keyboard and keep writing. I think the biggest lesson I’ve learned is that the revise and resubmit process (R&R) is where writers want to tread with caution. It’s a good chance to get professional advice, adding some extra polish to your writing. However, it can also be a let-down when things don’t work out. I think my advice to those who get an R&R is just keep communications as clear as possible during the process.
One reason I love short stories is you have finite time and space for everything—the action must start right away, you stuff in the character’s background as you weave the tale, and you can’t waste a single word. I think “An Eclipse of Hearts” was around 4000 words. So, you think a lot about what sort of “bang” starts the story. There, it was a birth. Other short stories I’ve sold began with a man reading his wife’s obituary after he’d ordered a hit on her and the human sister of a werewolf fretting over how her much-loved brother would survive the next full moon.
Ally: Pick one of your main characters, and tell us about him or her.
DM: Dr. Enid Seward is the main protagonist in A Discord of Ghosts and in the Day of the Dark short story, “An Eclipse of Hearts.” She’s the great-grand-daughter of Dr. John (Jack) Seward from Dracula. He’s sort of a minor character, compared to Van Helsing and Mina Harker, but Jack Seward and his addictions and theorizing about Lucy Westenra and what could be going on with her peculiar illness fascinated me. I also love Bram Stoker’s epistolary style and used elements of it, old writings from Jack that Enid reads, as a way of discovering hints about the antagonist in the present-day mystery. Caveat: Dracula will never make an appearance in the Enid Seward books. I learned from the last pages of Dracula that Jack went on to marry and have a family. Well, what sort of family and life could this man have after all he’d seen? I figured he’d be a mental mess, and maybe that something having to do with the Dracula legends or the paranormal still haunted his family.
That’s what prompted me to create Enid (who is named after Enid Bagnold, author of National Velvet, by the way). Our workaholic heroine is 37 with dark brown curly hair and hazel-green eyes. The “surprise” baby of older parents, she attended the University of British Columbia, earning both a bachelor’s degree and an MD; she did her residency in pediatrics and has an enduring fondness for children, even though she currently works as an organ transport specialist. (Why? You’ll have to read the book).
Enid doesn’t think too much about clothes, much less what color they are, but one tool I use for my writing is creating Pinterest boards for my stories and characters. I’m a visual person, and Pinterest is something I work with every day. If you look at Enid’s board, you’ll see lots of jeans, sweaters, and walking boots. She likes greens and blues, if forced to choose, but the job is the thing. Enid certainly doesn’t win lots of money from donors for the hospital where she works in Burnaby BC, thanks to her lackluster appearance, but her colleagues are in awe of her single-mindedness and energy. Another protagonist often refers to her as a “terrier after a rat” when she’s on a case. Enid’s fine with that description. She likes animals but realizes she doesn’t have time in her life for a pet…or a boyfriend, at least not yet.
Ally: Have you thought about one of your books or stories being made into a movie? Who would play the parts?
DM: Oh, I do this all the time! My top three pics for Enid would be Rose Byrne, Katheryn Winnick (my current fave), or Eliza Dushku. For Enid’s mentor, Allie Davies, who is part First Nations, Carmen Moore would be amazing, though she’s about 15 years younger than Allie. The naïve but clever RCMP constable Liam Edgefield is actually a harder pick, but Lucas Till has the right look. (I’m a huge X-Men fan, too, from back in the 1980s before they were well known).
Ally: How much research do you do? How? Where?
DM: Gobs. Maybe I go down the rabbit hole too much. I use the Internet, like most people, but I’m also into hands-on research. For example, I mixed up some red Jello and put it in Ziploc bags to experiment with blood spatter analysis from gunshot wounds. I wanted my descriptions to be accurate. In A Discord of Ghosts, one of the antagonists prepares a quick organ preservation solution from items found at a typical drug store; I did, too, just to see if it could be done. I’m also fond of hard-copy books for research, so my writing shelf is full of maps and science texts for reference. I’m likewise lucky enough to be able to consult with colleagues in science, math, and nursing if I need particular details. My son is a pre-med major, and I get a lot of eyerolls when asking questions about human anatomy, but he also enjoys reading my stories.
Ally: What is your current career path?
DM: So, I’ve not yet been successful with the publication of my novels—but I’ve had some serious bites, including a lengthy R&R. I want to write full time; that’s apparently not in the cards at the moment.
My current project is the aforementioned Appalachian paranormal mystery, The Tree with Two Sides. I started it in a Sisters in Crime writing class, and it’s going well. I think because it’s set in the 1980s, the exact time and place I grew up, I “feel” it deeply. I also like that this takes place before Silence of the Lambs, and I don’t have to worry quite as much about the CSI effect. The main character, Sheriff Jo Hughes, relies on good police work and common sense to figure out who killed her cousin and torched the family land, which is sort of refreshing.
Ally: Let's try some quick answer questions to wind up the interview:
Ally: Tell us what type of stories you write.
DM: I write in a cross-genre medium—of the two novels I’ve completed (and hope to add to my list of publications), one is historical mystery/horror (some might call it dreadpunk) set just before the outbreak of World War I, called The Death Apprentice of Meng-Po. The other is an urban paranormal/mystery, present day. It’s this second one, A Discord of Ghosts, I’ve queried most, and I’ve started two sequels to it that haven’t had much attention from me in a while. My third novel, which I’m writing currently, is a 1980s Appalachian paranormal/mystery with a whisper of romance.
I think my books and short stories would get a PG rating in the romance department—there’s some kissing; a few times, characters wake up in bed with someone else or feel sexual attraction. I don’t write out “the action.” I love reading romance for fun, and I respect authors who write it well. It’s just not my gift.
Ally: What has been your publication journey, including bumps and missteps?
DM: So, when I sold my first short story back in 1994, it was a fluke of a chance. A friend from a writing group knew someone who knew someone who passed on the initial draft I’d shared with my friend to an editor assembling a paranormal anthology. I had no idea she did this until the editor running the anthology called me up on the phone (email was just taking off then, and only rich people had cell phones) and talked to me about signing a contract for the story. I was floored. It was only about $60, but that meant a lot of groceries for a grad student in the early 1990s! He recommended me to a couple of other editors, and I wrote short stories of various lengths for White Wolf, one really a novella, and poof, I was published, making enough money to pay for much of grad school in the process, since my teaching assistantship barely covered living expenses. I also had a great experience working last year with Kaye George on Day of the Dark. I took a chance on sending her a piece using characters from the novel I was shopping around and was thrilled that Kaye included “An Eclipse of Hearts.”
I have to admit, though, that selling a novel has proved much harder than I’d anticipated. I’ve gotten a couple of “you were so close to making a deal!” experiences that have, to be frank, left me kind of weary. What I’ve learned is that you give yourself a mental break…and then you go back to the keyboard and keep writing. I think the biggest lesson I’ve learned is that the revise and resubmit process (R&R) is where writers want to tread with caution. It’s a good chance to get professional advice, adding some extra polish to your writing. However, it can also be a let-down when things don’t work out. I think my advice to those who get an R&R is just keep communications as clear as possible during the process.
One reason I love short stories is you have finite time and space for everything—the action must start right away, you stuff in the character’s background as you weave the tale, and you can’t waste a single word. I think “An Eclipse of Hearts” was around 4000 words. So, you think a lot about what sort of “bang” starts the story. There, it was a birth. Other short stories I’ve sold began with a man reading his wife’s obituary after he’d ordered a hit on her and the human sister of a werewolf fretting over how her much-loved brother would survive the next full moon.
Ally: Pick one of your main characters, and tell us about him or her.
DM: Dr. Enid Seward is the main protagonist in A Discord of Ghosts and in the Day of the Dark short story, “An Eclipse of Hearts.” She’s the great-grand-daughter of Dr. John (Jack) Seward from Dracula. He’s sort of a minor character, compared to Van Helsing and Mina Harker, but Jack Seward and his addictions and theorizing about Lucy Westenra and what could be going on with her peculiar illness fascinated me. I also love Bram Stoker’s epistolary style and used elements of it, old writings from Jack that Enid reads, as a way of discovering hints about the antagonist in the present-day mystery. Caveat: Dracula will never make an appearance in the Enid Seward books. I learned from the last pages of Dracula that Jack went on to marry and have a family. Well, what sort of family and life could this man have after all he’d seen? I figured he’d be a mental mess, and maybe that something having to do with the Dracula legends or the paranormal still haunted his family.
That’s what prompted me to create Enid (who is named after Enid Bagnold, author of National Velvet, by the way). Our workaholic heroine is 37 with dark brown curly hair and hazel-green eyes. The “surprise” baby of older parents, she attended the University of British Columbia, earning both a bachelor’s degree and an MD; she did her residency in pediatrics and has an enduring fondness for children, even though she currently works as an organ transport specialist. (Why? You’ll have to read the book).
Enid doesn’t think too much about clothes, much less what color they are, but one tool I use for my writing is creating Pinterest boards for my stories and characters. I’m a visual person, and Pinterest is something I work with every day. If you look at Enid’s board, you’ll see lots of jeans, sweaters, and walking boots. She likes greens and blues, if forced to choose, but the job is the thing. Enid certainly doesn’t win lots of money from donors for the hospital where she works in Burnaby BC, thanks to her lackluster appearance, but her colleagues are in awe of her single-mindedness and energy. Another protagonist often refers to her as a “terrier after a rat” when she’s on a case. Enid’s fine with that description. She likes animals but realizes she doesn’t have time in her life for a pet…or a boyfriend, at least not yet.
Ally: Have you thought about one of your books or stories being made into a movie? Who would play the parts?
DM: Oh, I do this all the time! My top three pics for Enid would be Rose Byrne, Katheryn Winnick (my current fave), or Eliza Dushku. For Enid’s mentor, Allie Davies, who is part First Nations, Carmen Moore would be amazing, though she’s about 15 years younger than Allie. The naïve but clever RCMP constable Liam Edgefield is actually a harder pick, but Lucas Till has the right look. (I’m a huge X-Men fan, too, from back in the 1980s before they were well known).
Ally: How much research do you do? How? Where?
DM: Gobs. Maybe I go down the rabbit hole too much. I use the Internet, like most people, but I’m also into hands-on research. For example, I mixed up some red Jello and put it in Ziploc bags to experiment with blood spatter analysis from gunshot wounds. I wanted my descriptions to be accurate. In A Discord of Ghosts, one of the antagonists prepares a quick organ preservation solution from items found at a typical drug store; I did, too, just to see if it could be done. I’m also fond of hard-copy books for research, so my writing shelf is full of maps and science texts for reference. I’m likewise lucky enough to be able to consult with colleagues in science, math, and nursing if I need particular details. My son is a pre-med major, and I get a lot of eyerolls when asking questions about human anatomy, but he also enjoys reading my stories.
Ally: What is your current career path?
DM: So, I’ve not yet been successful with the publication of my novels—but I’ve had some serious bites, including a lengthy R&R. I want to write full time; that’s apparently not in the cards at the moment.
My current project is the aforementioned Appalachian paranormal mystery, The Tree with Two Sides. I started it in a Sisters in Crime writing class, and it’s going well. I think because it’s set in the 1980s, the exact time and place I grew up, I “feel” it deeply. I also like that this takes place before Silence of the Lambs, and I don’t have to worry quite as much about the CSI effect. The main character, Sheriff Jo Hughes, relies on good police work and common sense to figure out who killed her cousin and torched the family land, which is sort of refreshing.
Ally: Let's try some quick answer questions to wind up the interview:
- a. a book you're currently reading: I just finished Scythe and Thunderhead, the first two books in a series by Neal Shusterman. I loved them and can’t wait for the next release, The Toll, next year. I’m also a fan of Samantha Shannon’s The Bone Season series.
- b. an item on your bucket list: Learning Russian. I’m quite impressed with the Ekaterina television series about Catherine the Great. I’d love to know what they’re saying without the subtitles.
- c. Do you believe in love at first sight? No, not at all. I must be like the most unromantic person you’ve ever interviewed (laughter). I believe love starts slowly, and a tiny spark of interest grows into deep friendship before “love” even enters the picture. Once it’s rooted, it’s hard to stop. That’s the beauty of it.
- d. What comes to your first - character or plot? Character. I have a long daily commute, about 45 minutes each way, and I think about my writing during this time. Sometimes, a person I meet inspires me; other days, it’s a photo or an image, and stuff just starts piling up about who the character is or what he’s doing.
- e. typical breakfast: We have a long-standing family tradition of big weekend breakfasts, with homemade scones, omelettes, bacon, sausages, fried toast (yes, in a cast-iron skillet, soaked in butter, yummo), pancakes, you name it. There is, of course, fresh-brewed coffee. Tons of it.
Day of the Dark: Stories of Eclipse
Edited by Kaye George
A recipe for disaster: take one total solar eclipse, add two dozen spine-chilling mysteries, and shake the reader until the world ends in Day of the Dark!
*AN ECLIPSE OF HEARTS, by Dee McKinney*
DARK SIDE OF THE LIGHT, by Carol L. Wright
CHASING THE MOON, by Leslie Wheeler
THE PATH OF TOTALITY, by Katherine Tomlinson
BLOOD MOON, by Paul D. Marks
TORGNYR THE BASTARD, by Suzanne Berube Rorhus
THE BAKER'S BOY, by Nupur Tustin
BLACK MONDAY, by Cheri Vause
I'LL BE A SUNBEAM, by M.K. Waller
OCEAN'S FIFTY, by Laura Oles
THE DEVIL'S STANDTABLE, by Melissa H. Blaine
DATE NIGHT, by Cari Dubiel
AWAITING THE HOUR, by Joseph S. Walker
A GOLDEN ECLIPSE, by Debra H. Goldstein
PICTURE PERFECT, by LD Masterson
THE DARKEST HOUR, by Kaye George
BABY KILLER, by Margaret S. Hamilton
FLYING GIRL, by Toni Goodyear
TO THE MOON AND BACK, by Kristin Kisska
RAYS OF HOPE, by Harriette Sackler
WOMEN'S WORK, by KB Inglee
OPEN HOUSE, by Bridges DelPonte
RELATIVELY ANNOYING, by John Clark
ASCENSION INTO DARKNESS, by Christine Hammar
Buy Links:
Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Day-Dark-Stories-Harriette-Sackler-ebook/dp/B073YDGSL5
B&N: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/day-of-the-dark-harriette-sackler/1126811602?ean=9781479427871
Kobo: https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/day-of-the-dark-stories-of-eclipse
GooglePlay:
https://play.google.com/store/books/details/Harriette_Sackler_Day_of_the_Dark_Stories_of_Eclip?id=sdksDwAAQBAJ
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