Guest Post: A Little Fun, A Little Promotion And A Desirable But Unlikely P.I. Partnership

By Fran Moreland Johns

If it hadn’t been for Deets and Nick, I’d have been a goner. I was just flat out lucky that the two top sleuths in the U.S. had been having drinks at San Francisco’s Boom Boom Room just across the street. Whew.

I had been having a latte myself, around the corner at Starbucks, but as I walked around the corner headed home I was invited to stop in for a visit with the rock group in town for a gig at The Fillmore. They were in one of those giant, luxury buses that take up half the block parking in front of the building. But just as the band members were helping me up the step a couple of bad guys came dashing out of the Payday Loans place, guns drawn, making a dash for the getaway car right behind us. I was directly in their way, and clearly they were going to mow me down. I was VERY glad to see Deets Shanahan strolling up, pulling a revolver from the waistband of his scruffy jeans, and Nick Charles right beside him, extracting a chic little handgun from his blazer. Deets and Nick were casually blasting the bad guys’ feet out from under them when I woke up.

OK, it was only a dream – and I was more than a little bummed to wake up before I saw the inside of the bus, which is a serious wide-awake dream of mine – but it makes perfectly good sense.

Deets Shanahan, my favorite P.I. of all time, is now back in trade paperback and e-readers (start with Stone Veil and just try to quit before you’ve read every one. Can’t be done.) And Nick is back in town with his ace comedienne wife Nora, thanks to Emily Leider’s exhaustively researched and delightfully readable new biography, Myrna Loy – The Only Good Girl in Hollywood.

Deets and Nick would get along just fine, probably even in the Boom Boom Room. They might be different in decades, dress codes and locales, but they’re similar in cool when it comes time to get the bad guy. Deets’ Maureen would, furthermore, get along famously with Nora.

Happily for readers of great tales everywhere, the Shanahan series and Myrna Loy – The Only Good Girl in Hollywood are here for the reading. Happily for anyone who can make it to the Jewish Community Center on February 21, Leider will be presenting “Nick and Nora’s San Francisco,” presented by the San Francisco Historical Society and Museum at 7:00 PM. (Info Below)

It’s the stuff of dreams.

Disclosure: As you can readily guess, Fran Moreland Johns is a good and supportive friend as well as a talented writer. She is the author of Dying Unafraid (Synergistic Press), a nonfiction book telling of people who did just that, and of essays, articles, columns and short stories published since the 1950s. A real hit at cocktail parties, she’s now gone from death-&-dying to abortion, currently finishing a book on abortion before & after Roe v Wade. She works for arts, interfaith and end-of-life causes, and blogs about them (and other subjects) on Red Room, Open Salon and Boomers and Beyond.

Opinion — Dog Day Years, Me And The Cajun Cur

In all the mysteries I’ve written, only two of the characters are real. Some are an amalgam of people; but usually even if I intend to steal the soul of a living being as grist for the mill, the characters take over and, in the end, they possess only the slightest traces of the original DNA.

The two who are real appear in the Shanahan mysteries. Einstein the cat, whom I’ve mentioned before and Casey, the dog. Neither of them solves murders, nor do they talk. They do not engage in super heroics. They are who they are. They keep the old private eye company. (And he is not me — I am not him?.) I mentioned Einstein in an earlier post along with his alleged murderous past. This post, though, is about Casey, who has been in all ten Shanahan mystery novels. Everything I’ve ever said about him is, or could easily be, true.

Casey and I became close friends and housemates. We got along very well after an initial period of adjustment. He arrived one early spring morning. It was Saint Patrick’s Day. The strange, not quite fully–grown, spotted and flecked dog sat in a patch of sun on my lawn. A good friend had arrived days earlier to spend the summer at my place to rest from his world travels and create art. We noticed the dog as we left to pick up some groceries, figuring he belonged to someone in the neighborhood and that he would have moved on by the time we came back. We were gone a couple of hours. He was still there when we returned. And he was still there as the afternoon rolled into evening and the spot of sun where he rested was gone.

We approached to make sure he was all right. He looked up calmly as if he was expecting us. All he had to do was wait and we would come around.

“I’ll get him some water,” my friend said. The dog, incidentally without a collar or tags, was all right. He was alert and friendly. He followed us through the gate into the inner yard. That, of course, was the beginning of the occupation — a sort of houseguest who never left, who never intended to leave. The dog, later named Casey, had determined — probably well before we did — that he was home.

His meeting with Einstein, who had been with me at least ten years by then, wasn’t as bad as it could have been. After the cat provided a few uppercuts to the curious dog’s jaw, Casey gave Einstein the respect and distance the cat thought was appropriate. As the days progressed, it was clear that the dog was house-trained and that he was an incredible infielder, snagging rough hops of the tennis ball with incredible ease and bringing the ball back to me again and again, for as long as I cared to throw it.

I took him to the vet, where he was given various shots and a good health report. What kind of dog was he, I asked the vet. “Some kind of hound, I’d guess,” he said. There was a hunting dog look to him. A Blue Tick Hound, I thought, but Casey seemed stouter and sturdier. His ears were shorter. His coloring was also puzzling. He didn’t just have spots, but big patches of color and tiny flecks all in brown-gold, black, gray, and white, all irregularly placed on his 65-pound frame. The idea that he was a hound mix seemed right. I found out he howled like a hound when sirens were near. With the proper coaxing he and I would sing a duet. It was the Casey who had to be coaxed. There was no “America’s Got Talent” then. Otherwise we would have been that homely couple singing “Fly Me to the Moon.”

What isn’t always understood by those who live without a close relationship to other species is that we humans are not the only beings with complicated natures. At the other extreme, my older brother believes that animals are superior to humans. I disagree. I pretty much think that we are all equal. That doesn’t mean we are the same. I cannot discern thousands of different smells and even if I could I doubt if I could make sense of them. I can’t catch a tennis ball in my mouth. On the other hand, I can open a can of dog food. Opposable thumbs. And while this may disturb dog lovers, in truth I’ve met dogs I don’t like, just as I’ve met humans I could do without. And there are dogs and humans here and there who have taken an immediate dislike to me.

But Casey and I got along very well pretty much from the beginning.

He had a sense of humor. Many times he would hang around while I dressed in the morning. And quite often, waiting until I was balancing on one leg to put my pants on, he would give me a forceful nudge. I swear I could see him smile as I toppled.

He hated baths. I would have to pick him up, his back to my chest and my arms wrapped around his chest. As we approached the bathroom doorway, he would push his legs straight out, paws on the doorframe, preventing me from getting him through. I eventually won the struggle. Afterward, he seemed to appreciate it.

He was jealous. Attempting to nudge Einstein off my lap usually met with severe resistance from the cat. That didn’t keep him from trying. And I was not permitted to pet other dogs. If I did I put their health and safety in jeopardy.

He was also sneaky. In the early days, not wanting to keep him all cramped up inside during the summer while I was at work, I’d leave him outside during the daylight hours. He always had water and there were plenty of trees to get shade or shelter. I thought I was doing him a favor. I had no idea how big a favor it was.

One day I got a call at work. It was from the vet. Casey was seen racing around on the Butler University campus a few blocks away from where we lived. Someone had taken the trouble to retrieve the doctor’s number from the dog tags and reported Casey’s no doubt carefree excursion. I excused myself from work and drove to Butler. I spent hours trying to find Casey, driving around the neighborhood. No luck. When I got back to the house, there was Casey, inside the fence, wagging his tail enthusiastically, welcoming me home just as he always did. The gate was shut. All was normal.

What I didn’t know was that Casey was a climber. He climbed the fence every day after I left for work, wandered around the neighborhood, and returned home before I did, always showing his happiness at my arrival.

Casey and Einstein moved to San Francisco with me. We moved into a small apartment. Casey’s wandering days were over. It wasn’t just the adjustment to urban living. He was getting older. Even before we moved, the green, smelly tennis ball — one he could find in a blizzard — had lost its allure. Now, as a city dweller, taking Casey for a walk became a regular routine. One day we passed a man sitting out on the steps in front of his house.

“You got yourself a Catahoula,” the man said. He had an accent that I couldn’t identify. It sounded like a cross between Brooklyn and the Deep South.

“A what?” I asked. I had no idea what he meant.

“Catahoula. Your dog is a Catahoula.”

I nodded and Casey and I kept walking. I was pretty sure the man was about to spin a tall and perhaps long tale about cats and hulas. Usually I listen, but I must have been in a hurry. I moved on.

The name “Catahoula” stuck in my brain. I still suspected it was a joke, but during a trip to the bookstore I came across a huge book about dogs. It boasted that it was the most comprehensive book of breeds ever published. I thumbed through it. And there was Casey. A Catahoula, also called a “leopard dog.” The breed, as it turns out, is the state dog of Louisiana.

Casey never lorded his newly found proper breeding over me. He remained humble. If he had ever been too uppity, I would have reminded him that he was a “cur” after all, not even a hound. But the Catahoula was recognized as a breed, one favored as a hunting companion by Jim Bowie, who lived in Louisiana’s Catahoula Parish, and Teddy Roosevelt, when he went after wild boar. The point is that Casey and I remained great friends throughout our ten years plus of living together. Our worlds overlapped easily. Though, it was obvious to me that from time to time, Casey lived in a world very different from mine, or any human’s. I doubt if we’ll ever know exactly what that world is like.

However there is a book I’d like to recommend to dog lovers. Author Alexandra Horowitz wrote a fantastic attempt at knowing: Inside Of A Dog, What Dogs See, Smell and Know. It’s well worth reading if you want to know more about your dog’s mind.

PHOTO CAPTIONS: (top) Casey the Catahoula in front of the house he chose to live in. (bottom) A highly recommended book about the mind of dogs

Opinion — Standing Naked In Front Of My Clothes

Writers are not supposed to talk about what we are writing while we are writing it. It is considered by some to be a jinx. As I wait for word from my publisher on whether they want the third in my San Francisco mystery series, and after a debate with myself about continuing the Indianapolis Shanahan series beyond its current ten books, I’ve decided to start the eleventh because there is a story that wants to be told. I have no clue whether I will finish it or if I do, whether it will be published. The upheaval in the publishing community has upheaved us all.

The subject for the new Shanahan seems right for a mystery involving the aging private eye, Deets Shanahan — Alzheimers. It is — as the disease has been described — “the longest goodbye.” What happens is that people with Alzheimers forget. If we humans are merely a collection of our memories, and not much else, as some believe, then Alzheimers may sadly be the most poetic of deaths. Our memories are disassembled, little by little. We forget what happened a minute ago, then what happened yesterday and eventually, if we don’t die of something else along the way, we forget how to breathe.

When I was in college so many years ago, I changed the focus of my studies, as I did later with careers, many times. I was interested in theatre, then journalism. At one point, I went off on another tangent, briefly, to religious studies. I remember failing Buddhism. I believed then as I do now that the more you say about it, the less you understand it. Taking this position in his course didn’t impress the professor. Hinduism is something else. It is a very accommodating philosophy, worthy, if not demanding, many words. All roads lead to Nirvana. One could be an ascetic or a hedonist and still find his or her way. The whole idea appealed to my independent nature. But now I am digressing, not necessarily inappropriately, though.

There are two other thoughts from those years and those studies. One was a phrase neti neti, which I believe translates to “not this, not this,” or slightly more loosely, “not this, not that,” meaning you keep searching for the TRUTH and discover that whatever you find isn’t it. The theory works no matter what path you’re on. Again, a digression, but not completely irrelevant.

The other thing I remember from studying the Hindu philosophy back then was a story about finding truth, liberation or the divine, whatever you choose to call it. It was about a man who thought he saw a snake, when, in fact as he realizes later, what he actually saw was a rope. If he could have seen what truly is, he would see that it wasn’t a rope either. Ultimate reality is like that, the story suggests. We think we see things as they are. We don’t. What is really there is neither a snake nor a rope, neither this nor that, but something we have mistaken in a similar way. It remains, for most of us, a mystery.

There is a scene in the early pages of the working Shanahan manuscript. An elderly Alzheimers patient sees and is terrified by a leopard she believes will attack her. It is an image on the wall formed by daylight drifting down from the skylights, through the trees. The leaves create the leopard’s spots and the slightest breeze gives the appearance of the predator moving.

I live alone. On Halloween day, oddly enough, I stepped out of my shower and, after drying off, went naked into the hall. What I caught in a flash of the eye was terrifying. — a stranger lurking there. It turned out to be a clothes rack. But what was it, really? Apparently I haven’t gotten very far in my search for truth. I’m still seeing snakes instead of ropes.

You’d think as I get nearer and nearer to 70 that I’d be done with such things as scaring myself to death but no…I never seem to be done with anything, including the Shanahans. He will have another death to investigate, this one much closer to his own. Perhaps the story will teach me something.

CAPTION: The Stranger in the Hall, originally posted on my Facebook Page a couple of months ago.

Blatant Promotion, The God Squad, Back To The Fundamentals — Book Number Four: Concrete Pillow

This is the fourth and last post on the early Deets Shanahan mysteries, just now reissued in trade paperback and e-book formats.

At the moment much is being made of what is being called “rural noir” — tough stories that grow out of isolated and insular areas of our country. Concrete Pillow, largely set in rural Southern Indiana, may be among those mysteries that investigated the territory several years ago without knowing there would eventually be a name for it. Certainly, there is a mix of backwoods living, fundamentalist religion and basketball that speaks to this regional setting. Essentially, this book is about family. Not just the hardheaded, superstitious and deadly Lindstroms who occupy the core of the story, Concrete Pillow also puts Shanahan face to face with his own family, his own past and a son he had ignored. Even the 70-year-old private eye has to face a world he helped create.

In some ways, this book is the end of the beginning of the Shanahan novels. Book Five, the now out-of-print, Nickel-Plated Soul, is the beginning of the middle Shanahans, where Shanahan enters the broader world with newfound friends and colleagues. With Concrete Pillow, the stage is set for the next six Shanahan mysteries.

What the story is about:

Young Luke Lindstrom was an all-star high school basketball player. So were his brothers. But something strange was happening. One brother committed suicide, another suffered a near fatal accident. When the third met his death, Shanahan knew there was more going on than a string of bad luck. Even though the last thing Shanahan wanted to do was work for a heroin addict, there was something likable about Luke and something absolutely weird happening to his seriously, perhaps criminally dysfunctional family.

What the reviewers said at the time:

“… a serious examination of family relationships.” — Booklist

“(The Concrete Pillow) is a great mystery with endless twists and turns.” — South Bend Tribune

“Shanahan is a terrific character, feisty, even noble.” — Publishers Weekly

"Tierney fleshes out his characters well, with the curmudgeonly Shanahan at the fore. The author has a knack for the cleverly turned phrase and deft imagery." — The Indianapolis Star

“Tierney writes with great skill and compassion.” (Five Stars) — Deadly Pleasures

“Interesting people, a solid mystery, and poignantly loopy domestic complications.” — Kirkus Reviews

Blatant Promotion, Down For The Count — Book Number Three: Iron Glove

This is the third in a series of Monday posts about the four early Deets Shanahan mysteries — “From the Beginning” — just now reissued in trade paperback and e-book formats.

Being a writer is, in some ways, like being a parent. We’re not supposed to have favorites. But I do. And Iron Glove is one of them. I’m not entirely sure why. I think this is the book where I began to appreciate just how much all of the characters take on lives of their own. One character in particular refused to be the man I wanted him to be and his character turned out to forcefully shape the story. It was also the first time I took Shanahan out of his city and the familiar environment in which he found comfort and confidence. It was, for me, a great way to dig more deeply into who he is and what drives him as a private investigator. There is a sense of character evolution from one book to the next. The recurring characters learn from life experiences. While each book is self-contained in terms of plot, reading them from the beginning provides an added dimension — the arc of Shanahan’s life. One way to look at them is that the books that feature him are chapters in one very long book. We are numbering them for those who want to keep them in order.

What the story is about:

Iron Glove is about a woman, found naked and floating in a small lake. She was the wife of an Indiana senator and half of Washington's “golden couple.” Within hours of finding her body in a canal, police arrest a young Latino boxer believed to be her lover. He has motive, means and opportunity. Another dead body later — along with some answers that seem too pat for the P.I. — Shanahan dives into the dirty side of politics, the dark side of passion, and the hideous secrets the killer is desperate to hide.

What the reviewers said at the time:

"Tierney's 'Deets' Shanahan series offers characters of depth and sensuality, and well-placed swipes of razor-sharp humor." — Publishers Weekly (starred review)

“A fine book about Washington politics, international art swindles, murder, mayhem, and a deep dark secret.” — South Bend Tribune

"A series packed with new angles and delights." — Booklist

"Keeps the reader intrigued with (Shanahan's) cogent observations of human nature and his interaction with police officers, his mistress and the various other characters Tierney draws so well." — Indianapolis Star

Blatant Promotion — The Kids Are Not All Right, Book Number Two, Steel Web

This is the second of four posts about the early Deets Shanahan mysteries — From the Beginning — just now reissued in trade paperback and e-book formats.

When I wrote the first Shanahan, Stone Veil, I had no idea that it was the beginning of a series. I wrote the first novel simply to submit to a competition. As it turned out the book was a finalist in that competition, was nominated for a prestigious award, was optioned for a movie, and received really good reviews.

The publisher, St Martin’s Press, encouraged me to write another novel featuring Deets Shanahan. This time, I wanted to play up the age issue. I placed the elderly detective in a situation where he would have to interact with a couple of kids. It turned out Steel Web was not only fun to write, but as I wrote it I began to realize the series wouldn’t require me to be a slave to a formulaic, repetitive task. This was my biggest fear.

Instead, I was able to develop the main character and, not incidentally, create an evolving, rich relationship between the P.I. and the woman in his life. Over the life of the series, many wonderful characters have come and gone and many have stayed — and grown as well. These characters are not part of a formula. Their very different natures determine the arc of the story. Second novels are often a disappointment. This one stayed strong.

What the story is about:

Two sixteen-year-old boys break into a house looking for small change. Instead they find more money than they ever dreamed possible. Unfortunately, they also discover the blood-spattered body of an undercover cop. The kids make a big mistake. They take the money. With fingerprints all over the victim and blood on their shoes they give the prosecution an airtight case against them. Enter Shanahan who uncovers a few secrets among the rich and powerful that might give the defendants a chance to escape the death penalty.

What the reviewers said at the time:

"An extremely intelligent, masterfully plotted novel with extraordinary characters, carefully crafted and finely polished. Don't overlook it." — Booklist

"The Steel Web is a thoroughly enjoyable mystery." — Mystery News

"Fast-paced, wryly told, and evenly balanced — solid detection combined with warm, empathetic characterization." — Kirkus Reviews

Blatant Promotion, From The Beginning — Book Number One: Stone Veil

This is the first of four posts about the early Deets Shanahan mysteries, just now reissued in trade paperback and e-book formats.

Dietrich Shanahan was born late in life — mine and his. I had this notion that if I created an older private eye and set him in a city like Indianapolis that I was being original. As it turned out, I wasn’t original at all. There were other, older PIs plying the gumshoe trade and lauded mystery writer Michael Z. Lewin, who pioneered the idea of regional private eyes, set his Albert Samson private series in Indianapolis years before. However, the dogged, curmudgeonly Deets Shanahan made it anyway. Stone Veil is his very first case. And in this premiere, the reader meets many of the characters who appear throughout the ten Shanahan novels.

What the story is about:

The sixty-nine-year-old semi-retired private detective reluctantly takes the case of Mrs. William B. Stone who seems to have lost track of her husband. Shanahan, who finds his once lonely life complicated by an attractive younger woman, nevertheless finds his client's husband almost immediately. But the job isn't over. The problem is the man is dead and buried in his own back yard. Who did it and why leads the detective to the city's meaner streets where the veil of secrecy is finally lifted.

What the reviewers said at the time:

“Intricate, lusty, funny, moving adventure about believably vulnerable characters.” — Publishers Weekly

"The interest in this fine novel lies.in its characters, especially the appealing Shanahan, keenly aware of death's proximity as he re-engages with life." — Houston Post

"The pragmatic investigator makes a good first impression." — The New York Times

UPDATE: At the moment, Stone Veil is available in trade paperback from Amazon and in ebook on Nook from Barnes & Noble. Kindle and i-Book versions coming soon.

Blatant Promotion — The Rebirth and Design of the Deets Shanahan Series

The first Deets Shanahan novel, the Stone Veil, had a great launch back in 1990. The New York Times said the “pragmatic investigator makes a good first impression.” The book was a finalist in a national best first novel competition and was nominated for a Shamus Award by the Private Eye Writers of America. The hardback went into a second printing and was optioned for a movie.

Yet, the Stone Veil was never released in paperback, never hit the mass market.

Time went on. So did Shanahan though the series — after a considerable sabbatical after Book Four — switched from a New York publisher to one in London for Book Five. That same publisher, Severn House, has published the Shanahans since then, including Bullet Beach, the tenth in the series, earlier this year. The publication of the hardback was followed by trade paperback and e-book editions. But what about the beginning? What about those early Shanahans? A couple of them had paperback incarnations — one in Italian. That one made me a millionaire (in lire). But they have been out-of-print for years.

Working with designers Dennis Gallagher and John Sullivan at Visual Strategies in their studio in San Francisco’s legendary North Beach, we decided to get not just the first book back in print and on e-book, we decided to reissue the first four cases, which includes Steel Web, Iron Glove and Concrete Pillow, none available in e-book until now. To do this I formed a new publishing company, Life Death and Fog Books, and the designers recreated these books inside and out. As we did, we decided to go against conventional publishing wisdom and not only release all four of the early Shanahans at once, but number them.

The modest marketing campaign will emphasize the notion of reading the Shanahan series “from the beginning.” The reason, frustrating to readers, that publishers prefer not to let you in on which books came first, second, and so on, is that if book three is the only one on the shelf, the reader might pass it up in order to read them in order. They do this even though usually, as is the case with the Shanahans, one can read them and enjoy them out of order. What a reader might miss, though, are subtle changes in the backstory. However, with much of the ordering coming off the Internet one way or another, all the books are always available? Why not let the readers control what they read and when? So we made it easy.

We’re also sending Deets Shanahan out into the broader reader public by making the books available and affordable in both print and electronic formats. Start with Book One, the Stone Veil, a book Publishers Weekly called, “Intricate, lusty, funny, moving adventure about believably vulnerable characters,” and read all four of the early Shanahans, from the beginning.

Update: At this moment, ebooks are available at Barnes & Noble and Amazon, which has the trade paperback as well. Soon to be available from iBook.