  Mystery
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There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you.
~~Maya Angelou
A writer is like a bag lady going through life with a sack and a pointed stick collecting stuff.
~~Tony Hillerman
If you stuff yourself full of poems, essays, plays, stories, novels, films, comic strips, magazines, music, you automatically explode every morning like Old Faithful. I have never had a dry spell in my life, mainly because I feed myself well, to the point of bursting. I wake early and hear my morning voices leaping around in my head like jumping beans. I get out of bed to trap them before they escape.
~~ Ray Bradbury
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Remember the substitute teacher when you were in elementary and high school? Today, I am the substitute Mystery Newsletter for SHERRI GIBSON  who is in the hospital, battling pneumonia. Often, the substitute teacher, called on at the last moment, didn't seem to have a good understanding of the everyday workings of the classroom. I am much like the old substitute, for the mystery genre is out of my comfort zone. So, to complete this newsletter, I needed to do one of my favorite things – research. I find that I gain much knowledge and insight through research.
Because I know very little about writing in the mystery genre, I sought to find someone who does and came across an author familiar to mystery writers and readers – Tony Hillerman.
Anthony (Tony) Hillerman was born at Sacred Heart, Oklahoma in 1925 and was one of three children raised on a farm during the Dust Bowl and the Great Depression. From 1930 to 1938, he became one of several farm boys to attend St. Mary's Academy, a boarding school for Native American girls. Pottawatomie Indians were his compatriots in baseball and cotton chopping -- ordinary farm kids just like him. Not until he was home on leave from World War II did he come across Native Americans who seemed at all different. Driving a truck cross country to earn money, he encountered Navajos (the Dineh), who were engaged in a ritual curing ceremony on the reservation in northwestern New Mexico. Hillerman was fascinated. The experience created a lasting impression of a generous, deeply religious, and hospitable people whose approach to life he valued.
After completing his stint as a combat soldier in the Army, during which he earned the Silver Star, the Bronze Star with Oak Leaf Cluster, and the Purple Heart, Hillerman returned to his home state to attend the University of Oklahoma, receiving a Bachelor's degree in 1948. That same year he married Marie Unzner, with whom he reared five children.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/mystery/american/navajoland/abouthillerman.html
I found in researching Tony Hillerman that I share two things in life with him. Like Tony Hillerman, I have a deep respect for the Native American culture; though not Native American, I have written both poems and short stories about their cultures. My latest Native American poem is about the Long Walk of the Navajos. The other thing I share with Mr. Hillerman is that my wife encouraged me to pursue writing.
After college, Tony Hillerman became a journalist for an Oklahoma newspaper and had to work hard to support his five children, but he never gave up on his dream to write a novel. I started writing short stories, collecting those painful rejection slips, and dreaming about writing the Great American Novel.
From 1967 to 1970 he worked nights and weekends to complete his first novel, "The Blessing Way," featuring Lieutenant Joe Leaphorn. Upon reading the draft, Elmo famously counseled Hillerman to "get rid of the Indian stuff." But Hillerman felt the Navajo Nation and culture were the most worthwhile parts of the manuscript, so he sent the book off to Harper & Row editor Joan Kahn, who'd been quoted in Writer magazine saying that she liked mysteries more involved with character and culture. True to her word, she liked the book enough to publish it in 1971.
Tony Hillerman retired in 1985, but the books kept coming, more than 20 at last count, including 15 in his legendary mystery series featuring Lieutenant Joe Leaphorn and Officer Jim Chee. While the "rez" is only about the size of West Virginia, Hillerman's two Navajo cops have found plenty to keep them busy over the past 30 years. Laced with references to Native religion and culture, each book reveals a different aspect of life in high desert Indian Country, where Native culture and mainstream American society intersect. Throw a murder into the mix, and you've got the makings of one of the most successful mystery careers in America.
Although the tribe has named him a Special Friend of the Dineh for his accurate portrayals of Navajo life, Hillerman still worries about getting it wrong. He reads copiously and runs his manuscripts by Navajo friends to check not only for accuracy, but for believability as well. He even had a Navajo English class in Shiprock consider a subplot he was planning to see if it would work. When the students said no, he junked it.
"For me, studying the [Navajo] has been absolutely fascinating," Hillerman told Publishers Weekly, "and I think it's important to show [my readers that] aspects of ancient Indian ways are still very much alive and are highly germane."
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/mystery/american/navajoland/abouthillerman.html
As writers, we can gain much encouragement and inspiration from the experiences of Tony Hillerman. As an author, he offers suggestions and inspiration for writing and writers:
(1) An author knows his landscape best; he can stand around, smell the wind, get a feel for his place.
(2) I always try to make the setting fit the story I have in mind.
(3) I am 82 years old. I imagine that I will keep on writing as long as anyone wants to keep reading.
(4) I know what I write about seems exotic to a lot of people, but not for me. I pulled up to an old trading post and saw a few elderly Navajos sitting on a bench. I felt right at home.
(5) I try to make my books reflect humanity as I see it.
(6) You try to create characters who invite a strong reaction from readers, whether pity, contempt, empathy, whatever.
(7) You write for two people, yourself and your audience, who are usually better educated and at least as smart.
(8) How can you stop writing?
http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/t/tony_hillerman.html
http://www.focusdep.com/quotes/authors/Tony/Hillerman/start/0/
Admittedly, I have not read a Tony Hillerman mystery novel, but after researching for this newsletter I know that I am compelled to read one in the very near future. I believe I will also take his invaluable advice to heart.
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Mystery Short Stories:
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An essay about the Navajos:
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Because this is my first as guest editor of the Mystery Newsletter, I have no feedback for this section, but I would greatly appreciate your feedback to this newsletter.
Thank you
kansaspoet
Larry
"guest editor"
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Mystery: January 02, 2008 Issue [#2154]
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