Author: Brad Johnson

When I think mystery, my mind initially goes to the procedurals I watched with my elders as a kid—shows like Cagney and Lacey or Murder, She Wrote. In those shows, the mystery was always a murder or other terrible crime, and it was always solved. Sometimes the solution was predictable, other times viewers were caught off-guard, in the end the “good guys” always won. Nowadays, “mystery” to me means something bigger—sometimes psychological, other times supernatural. Not all mysteries revolve around a corpse, and even if they do, characters may try to uncover a lot more than just the murderer. Sometimes those seeking to right wrongs are everyday citizens with no badge or prior training, just a strong will to do good and be better. And now, unlike in the Cagney and Lacey days, more and more mysteries are driven by Black, Indigenous, and POC protagonists.

When BIPOC characters are the stars of mystery and crime novels there’s no doubt we’ll be privy to the complexity of how race affects their quest for a solution. The layers of this make for stories of power, inequity, and frustrations ready to boil over. This list includes a sampling of BIPOC characters and authors with free rein to be flawed and functional in their pursuit of truth and justice. 

Blanche Passes Go by Barbara Neely

Rightly considered a pioneer for Black women in the crime/mystery genre, Neely died earlier this year at the age of 78. This is the last book in the series that began with Blanche on the Lam, published in 1992. Blanche White is a hard-working Black woman, raising a family and trying to find a place for herself. Unfortunately, everywhere she goes death seems to follow. Blanche uses her wit, intellect, and savvy to help solve these cases when authorities refuse to look beyond the surface. 

The Last Story of Mina Lee by Nancy Jooyoun Kim

Secrets are often central to many mysteries and they’re also at the forefront of instant New York Times bestseller Mina Lee. Dual perspectives allow readers to experience Mina Lee’s time in LA and her daughter Margot’s pursuit of the truth to find out how her mother died. 

A Spy in the Struggle by Aya de Leon

Lawyer Yolanda Vance becomes embroiled in espionage, activism, romance, and—you got it—a mysterious death that needs to be solved. De Leon’s spy thriller focuses on Vance’s rationale for wanting a comfortable life versus coming to terms with her own moral compass when working undercover for the FBI.   

Searching for Sylvie Lee by Jean Kwok

Doting eldest daughter Sylvie Lee visits a family member in the Netherlands and disappears. Bereft younger sister Amy seeks answers and through her journey unearths what her seemingly fearless sibling kept hidden from everyone. 

Winter Counts by David Heska Wanbli Weiden

No holds barred, cussing up a storm, and ready to knock some heads, enforcer Virgil Wounded Horse has a personal stake in finding out who’s distributing heroin on his reservation when his nephew is involved. Wounded Horse’s investigation reveals many shady dealings and disturbing alliances along the way. 

The Sea of Innocence by Kishwar Desai 

Investigator Simran Singh shows up for a third time in Desai’s Sea of Innocence. Of course a relaxing vacation becomes the landscape for a new crime Singh is forced to solve when a British teenager goes missing and a seedy underworld is revealed. Desai’s journalism and novels appear to take on similar focus when it comes to violence against women and holding patriarchal entities accountable.  

The Body Snatcher by Patricia Melo 

Sometimes mysteries also come in the form of wondering about the stability of one’s soul. Corruption and morality are at the heart of Melo’s Body Snatcher. For the protagonist (or antihero) to escape the turmoil he’s enmeshed in by chance and choice requires some contemplation of what one is willing to do to profit, if not survive. 

Bluebird, Bluebird by Attica Locke 

Locke’s work tackles regional resentment and the complications of being a Black law enforcer. Darren Mathews attempts to navigate his own personal turmoil with a marriage on the rocks, his estranged mother who always shows up at the wrong time, and professional backlash, all the while trying to solve the murder of a Black lawyer and white woman that are seemingly connected. 

The Only Good Indians by Stephen Graham Jones 

Horror, spirituality, and the supernatural come together in this exploration of revenge and obligation. The mystery here isn’t necessarily a “whodunit” so much as a “what happens next,” as several characters are haunted after a hunting trip on land designated for tribal elders. Graham Jones builds the tension through horrifying and realistic detail down to the hauntings and the mundanity of everyday life. 

Charcoal Joe by Walter Mosley 

No mystery/crime list is complete without the prolific Mosley—this year’s recipient of the National Book Foundation’s Lifetime Achievement Award. Charcoal Joe is the latest in Mosley’s well-known Easy Rawlins series taking place in 1968—the same year Martin Luther King Jr. was shot. Attempting to settle down after forming a new agency, Rawlins is once again thrust into a case he can’t refuse when a friend calls for help in exonerating his son from the murder of two white men at a highly racially charged time.

A Crack in the Wall by Claudia Piñeiro

Architect Pablo Simó is not living his best life. He doesn’t enjoy his job or his marriage and has an attraction to one of his co-workers. Another wrench is thrown into his soulless days when a young woman surfaces asking about someone who disappeared under suspicious circumstances, circumstances Pablo knows more about than he lets on.

The Missing American by Kwei Quartey 

Emma Djan’s hopes of advancing in the Ghanian police force fall through, so she tries the next best thing: a detective agency. Derek Tilson travels to Ghana to find his father who suddenly disappeared when visiting someone he met through the internet. Derek and Emma partner up to uncover the depths of internet scams and fetish priests and those who aren’t too keen on being investigated.

The post 12 Mystery Novels Featuring Black, Indigenous, and POC Protagonists appeared first on Electric Literature.

1

why did she instagram the insides of a dead dog
mixed with sod, under a tree, is this the end already or not yet?
all day my stomach storms with muddy gushes of sod.
my brain keeps mum. body collapses. at night, the bed under me caught on fire.

 

2

they say, after having a child, you should take some time to yourself,
and keep waiting for him.

then wait for him to start speaking,
after he has started speaking.

my son.

once, in the night, as I watched you sleep,
love gushed like muddy amniotic fluid
from the ceiling.

the world that awaits us –
stone-hard, lonely,
like an abandoned manufactory in the industrial park
with the giant of a wild burdock growing inside,
colonies of blind worms, rays
of black sun.

how I waited for you, my boy,
so that I can wait longer and longer.

often, startled by that thought of you inside me,
I loved from a distance.

 

3

a tongue lashes at its limits.
day three of a depressive episode.
dead mint and cold dill on the table.
berries have no taste.

a tongue won’t cross these limits.
it’s serious there. inside the limits
guys with machine guns walk around the clock.
alarm.

the world like warm boiled water
we have to take in small sips
when sick.
who likes that?

a filthy kitchen. fat inside and out.
even the faces of the sun that reach here
through the grape leaves by the window
speak of dysphoria.

stupidly, I sit and hiccup.

 

4

pregnant cows in the buzzing armor of botflies.
as a child, by the river, I was afraid to approach them,
but today in my dream I lie
next to a cow, sucking its warm milk,
at once milk turns sour in my mouth
not made for conversations, for kissing.

 

5

perhaps I have to try harder, be
more sensitive, stop being jealous, invent something new inside my dailiness,
be lazy less, because really with some things – it’s my own fault, my own failure –
this is how every woman thinks when he screams or, vice versa, is silent and leaves,
when he is upset and the space tightens, oppresses
or like he has no clue . . .

what is happening? in one episode the star
of patriarchy’s death went out. all as before:
a rain of tears. The TV’s blackhead gleams.
I watch and eat my fat.

 

6

fat hugs the body inside and out,
breasts like old buckets hang over a dark river
of madness. it’s summer. in summer
a body sweats and becomes sticky in twenty minutes, it’s scary
to allow a touch and to undress.
I eat rotting strawberries. I watch
the hearths of faces on the internet. in summer
thoughts shrink to the size of children’s swim trunks or socks,
clitoris swells more often.

we are together only yesterday and tomorrow,
but never today. your body like a cello
string. at night you put your hand
on the oily hearth of my face, on my stomach’s tumor,
you listen to the dull steps of a guilty heart. soon
together we will slurp blood with soviet spoons
barricaded behind a thunderstorm in sullen Galicia.

 

7

because loneliness is the soviet spoons in my grandmother’s creaky kitchen cabinet,
my favorite polka-dotted mug, the slaps delivered by my mother.

it is a rural discotheque on a workday – almost empty,
only ‘Solnyshko v rukakh’ and the old cars smelling of gas by the community center.

it is a blind eye of a rural bus station and dark-green hands of boreal grass,
it is a way back.

 

8

summer. in the banya: grandma and I. I play
with a little birch broom, playing a witch, pee
on a dirt floor.

her vulva resembles a wild grey rabbit –
large, a bit fat and grey
with long hanging ears. why?

‘I birthed many children
I scrub my heels with an old knife
I want to be alone, but have to
watch you.’

I leave the sauna and feel
the wind from the river embrace my red skin.
my dog’s name is Till Eulenspiegel.
I write letters to my future self:
‘Don’t live in the further on. Live here. Soon time will blow up our bodies.’

 

9

your body is a bow string. mine is all grandma’s jam and river slush.
my clitoris resembles the snout of an anteater, your thing is
made of warm marble in summer. when we are together – something’s off.
the world rests on this. and every day at home like sleepy flies
in the bushes of hogweed, we lay on white clusters of pillows,
read about the end of the world in long books and in the cursive of vascular networks.

 

10

sour soup in an old pot. glam poster-icon above the table.
cellulose sausage, pink like Mary’s eyes. wind
carries the angel of smog through the window. burning roses of factories.
laughter of the past in a grey sandbox. already outsiders, though still kids,
signed up for the slavistics club at the local community center, we took part
in the ‘solstice’ festival, took part
in the Bolotny protest, but kept to the margins, ignorant of the cause, not
knowing about Tiananmen, in the future or in the past we supported
the protests of long-haul truck-drivers, ourselves too, we rushed someplace in dark vans,
watered ourselves with red Krasnodar wine, swallowed fire in night parks, covered the asphalt
with a carpet of sunflower shellings, we also counted small change, also
used real mail.

 

11

sometimes it seems that my hands are swift tiny paws:
they launder, wash, cook, move things from place to place,
but there’s no place for the things. we live tightly.
the house is filled with things, like a nest of thrifty birds,
and when we get tired – we shriek and peck each other.
here, our son fell out
from the nest into a new game, into a complicated world.

paws live their own life: they write at night, on the toilet,
in the tram, in the hotel, in the middle of a street, even in bed. rush,
paws, so much to do.

and my head is like the head of a large restless bird moving left to right,
thinking of what to do and how to do it:
he’s hungry, I’m hungry, they are hungry.
almost the whole world is hungry. somewhere
there isn’t even water. we have to invent food and water
that would reach everyone from everywhere.

write, paw.

paws, perhaps, like a racoon’s –
swift, fidgety,
yet if someone comes and does
what father did, what boys did at school, and guys
from the neighborhood, total
strangers, drunk friends and poets, I know
I have claws, I’d say, razor-sharp,
they would tear his body, release his blood,
even if even if they’re scared. little paws.

I remember grandmother’s hands – hard like stones,
cracked from laundry and soap, like dried steppe clay,
also cracked – and pink pulp in the cracks, droplets of blood.
she sits on a low stool by the stove and caresses, comforts her own hands:
Just a bit longer and then I can sleep.

mama says: grandma needs a good hand cream, no,
she needs a different world
where grandfather doesn’t chase her with a dog’s chain across the garden,
where food and things create themselves,
a world of different labor.

caress me with stones, grandma,
lie next to me,

the way I lie right now next to my son,
and my hands are only my hands,
rumpling his hair,
moving time in any direction, in any order –
like magnets on the refrigerator.
in one direction, when all the nests of paper lampshades in our apartment block
light up simultaneously,
and the pots in the kitchen are whistling, wet
laundry dances, bread multiplies,
mama, once again
I want to eat your rough hand that caresses me.

 

12

white towers of beautiful cakes,
cool boots
from fashion magazines – all
of this like it’s not meant for us.

Lisa magazine recommends
getting enough sleep, following
the Mediterranean diet:
strange berries of olives, cheeses
with the aroma of socks (dad is laughing: ‘bullshit!’), monsters
of underwater depths: wow!

my body
is like a tattered women’s magazine
from the 2000s, you could leaf all you want
and be surprised, but how about
an empty page at the end . . .

and what about us?

crooked shitcakes of old cows
on the road, the cozy smell
from the bread factory,
the darkness of children’s heads
doused in camphor.

 

13

this mole under a breast, like a lost raisin,
I want to tear it off and eat it.

these cracks on the belly like trails through the taiga
hello, my son! I’ve reached you.

you were inside my belly, like in a small timeless bog,
and now we are walking towards the house
with bags full of berries.

at night on my thighs I’ll see
new berry juice.
is it the month that’s coming to an end or all time? in a dream
I walk, and behind me
a shapely army of pills,
menstrual pad trailblazers,
raging fat.

will there be knots on my fingers?
will the nets and snares on my legs
spread? when
will the traps of bones start clacking,
the boards of the back collapse,
when will time blow up the inflatable tubes
of eyelids?

 

14

your body, like the wide gates of an old town, welcomes me.
my body, like the long grocery lines of the past, moves slowly.

do you see how at night in the Carpathian mountains
the animal of the moon eats its own body,
spitting the bones into our window? a dream puts on a black hat,
loneliness wears a new jacket.

tea and wine widen the body. states exploit a body.
the state has long since ceased to be that sovereign’s body, many-headed inside,
it’s more like a street the morning after a protest, the ruins of shopwindow. you like it?
do you want to go back there?

in the Carpathian mountains the low drone of dead trembitas,
followed by a Huzul night song.

we animals, we herds of autonomy.

 

 

Photograph © Mary Gillham Archive Project

 

 

This translation by Valzhyna Mort is forthcoming in F Letter: New Russian Feminist Poetry, edited by Ainsley Morse, Eugene Ostashevsky and Galina Rymbu, from isolarii, fall 2020.

 

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Whether you’ve heard of it before or not, you’re using the concept of “register” in your writing.

Register is the level of formality in a piece of writing. It’s slightly different from what we might call tone or style.

You could see it as a sliding scale, from formal language (for example, a legal document) to informal language (for example, a text message to a friend).

Examples of formal register vs. informal register

For instance, compare the following two pieces of text:

“Access to our email services and to some areas of the Site is restricted to users who have registered their details with us. You must not use a false name or email or provide any false information nor impersonate another person when registering for use of the Site and our email services.”

(From The Telegraph’s Terms and Conditions)

“CONTENT COPYRIGHT WRITERS’ HQ ©. PLEASE DON’T USE OUR STUFF WITHOUT ASKING, BUT DO ASK AND WE’LL PROBABLY SAY YES BECAUSE WE’RE NICE LIKE THAT.”

(From the footer of Writers’ HQ’s website)

The first is in a formal register, with words like “impersonate.” The second is informal, with phrases like “we’re nice like that.” Note that both pieces of text have a similar context — they each instruct users on what they can and cannot do — but they’re written very differently.

Why register matters

There’s no “right” or “wrong” register — only the right (or wrong!) one for whatever you’re writing.

By being aware of register, and noticing how your choices of words, phrases and sentence structures tie in with register, you can adjust your writing as needed.

When you get it right, it feels good. Natural.

But the wrong level of formality can be jarring for the reader. It might even undermine their confidence in your ability to provide what they need.

Imagine, for instance, researching lawyers in your area. You find a website that’s written in informal, chatty language with lots of swearing. It might be a refreshing change and encourage you to hire the person…but chances are, it’ll put you off! You’re expecting a certain level of formality from this type of person or organization.

On the other hand, imagine you’re posting on Facebook to encourage other writers in your local area to meet up for coffee. If your post is formally worded, it may sound intimidating or off-putting, and not attract the right people.

How to adjust your register for different types of writing

Here are a few suggestions for what types of register to use in different writing scenarios.

Blog posts: Most blog readers are used to an informal, friendly, conversational style. If you run a corporate blog, however, it might be appropriate to write in a slightly more formal register.

Emails: Some of your emails will be more formal than others. If you already know a client fairly well, it might seem a bit distancing or cold to address them formally (“Dear Mr. Jones…”)

Copy for a client’s website: This could be at almost any level of formality. Look at other websites in their industry, and think about their own corporate style. Some companies are known for being unusually informal and this can work well, but only if it’s what your client wants!

Formal or legal agreements: These will almost certainly be written in formal language (though there’s no reason that can’t be in plain, straightforward English). You might want to use standard templates. Invoices could fall into this category.

As a writing exercise, it can be interesting to rework a piece at a different level of formality. For instance, you might draft quite formal copy for a client’s website or blog, and also present them with an example of how it could be more chatty.

What exactly does formal writing involve?

Good formal writing is not unnecessarily convoluted, and while it may use long, Latinate words, it doesn’t use them unnecessarily. It might, for instance, use a more technical or precise word where appropriate.

When you’re writing in a formal register, stick fairly rigidly to grammatical rules. For instance, it wouldn’t normally be appropriate to have extremely short paragraphs, or to start a sentence with “because” or “and.”

In an informal piece of writing, like a blog post or email, short paragraphs and sentences that begin with conjunctions can work well to keep the pace and hold the reader’s interest. You should still avoid embarrassing grammatical mistakes, though: remember, your writing needs to be clear and easy to read.

Don’t use slang terms in formal writing — they’re informal pretty much by definition! — and don’t swear. (The exception here is if you’re quoting someone. Then it’s fine to reproduce the words they used, though depending on where your piece will be published, you may need to asterisk out all or part of any particularly rude words.)

Online, you’ll find plenty of lists of formal versus informal words. I’d use these with some caution: Don’t feel that you have to constantly second-guess your word choices, and don’t use big words for the sake of it.

As I mentioned earlier, you’re probably using register without even thinking about it. From childhood, you’ll have adjusted the register of your spoken language to different situations (compare talking with your friends to talking to a teacher, for instance), and you’re probably adept at shifting between different registers in your writing, too.

Truly understanding register, though, can help you become more aware of the word choices you make, and more able to tweak and adjust as appropriate.

As you read different things today, perhaps blog posts, emails from big companies, emails from friends, newspaper articles and text messages, think about the register of each, and how appropriate (or not!) it is for the context.

This is an updated version of a story that was previously published. We update our posts as often as possible to ensure they’re useful for our readers.

Photo via Dean Drobot / Shutterstock 

The post Understanding Register, Why It Matters And How to Use It appeared first on The Write Life.

‘Emmonsail’s Heath in Winter’ is one of John Clare’s most admired poems, its subject being – as the title makes clear – a heath during the wintry season when its ‘withered brake / Mingle its crimpled leaves with furze and ling’. Before we offer an analysis of this curious and […]

With this week’s recent announcement that season 4 of GLOW—which would have been the show’s final season—was canceled, many fans were left devastated. Sure, there are other ways to watch women wrestle on TV, even during the social distancing era—but where are we going to get our explorations of female friendship and community? Our body diversity? Our thoughtful, nuanced explorations of identity? Our ‘80s music cues? It would take a lot of books to fill GLOW’s wrestling boots, but we’ve given it our best go with a variety of reading options covering different aspects you might miss about the show.

Swing Time by Zadie Smith

Into GLOW’s exploration of the ‘80s, intensely intimate friendship between women, and complicated artistic tensions? Swing Time tackles all of these topics with Smith’s exuberant and eloquent prose. The narrator and Tracey meet in a tap dancing class in 1982, London; as the only two mixed-race girls in the class, they stand out—and become fast friends. Smith traces how their life trajectories diverge from one another, asking questions about lineage, talent, and racial inequality. (And if you want more books set in the ‘80s, check out this list.)

The Secret Lives of Church Ladies by Deesha Philyaw

Filming the show provides a way for GLOW’s female characters to find a community, expressing sides of themselves they weren’t previously allowed to explore. (How dare they deny us more Sheila as Liza Minnelli!) In a similar vein, Philyaw’s debut collection of short stories explore the lives of churchgoing Black women. Whether eating brussels sprouts together or finding solace in a parking lot, Philyaw’s characters explore what it’s like to publicly follow the rules of the church whilebreaking them in private, discovering new truths about themselves.

Trust Exercise by Susan Choi

Do you love the meta-framing of GLOW, the shooting of a show-within-a-show? Trust Exercise shows just how important narrative framing is, and asks similar questions about who gets to tell which story. Set at a performing arts high school, Choi’s novel begins with a passionate affair between two theater kids—but what starts out as a typical-seeming love story spirals out into anything but. Choi masterfully juggles topics like class, age gaps, friendship loyalties, and the idea of “fiction” itself. 

Big Friendship: How We Keep Each Other Close by Aminatou Sow and Ann Friedman

Our society tends to undersell friendship, usually placing romantic relationships or familial ties above being “just friends.” If you love how GLOW puts friendship (and the consequences of having a falling out, cough cough Debbie and Ruth) at the center of its narrative, try Sow and Friedman’s non-fiction book. The authors, co-creators of the podcast Call Your Girlfriend, talk frankly about what it means to have and sustain a “big friendship”—embracing both its messiness and gloriousness.

Interior Chinatown by Charles Yu

If you appreciate how GLOW tackles stereotypes, Interior Chinatown might offer a topsy-turvy lens into Hollywood stereotyping and racial microaggressions. Willis Wu, a self-identified “Generic Asian Man” who acts in bit roles for a never-ending cop show—the most Willis can hope for is to achieve the status of “Kung Fu Guy” (not unlike Jenny, reluctantly trapped in the role of Fortune Cookie). Structured as a screenplay itself, Interior Chinatown is a deft satire of the entertainment industry and stereotypes. 

Sisterhood of the Squared Circle: The History and Rise of Women’s Wrestling by Pat Laprade and Dan Murphy

Are you one of those viewers that are super into the wrestling sequences? Have you sought out the original GLOW footage—and rewatched it many times? Take a deeper dive into wrestling with this thoroughly researched, detailed study on women’s wrestling. From the 1800s carnival circuits and to contemporary matches, the book tackles politics, big personalities, and the history of wrestling in the U.S. After this book, you’ll find yourself well-armed with information to beat anyone at wrestling trivia. 

The Sea of Light by Jennifer Levin

If you’re interested in how GLOW explores queer sexuality in tandem with the intense physicality of wrestling, try Levin’s novel about competitive female swimmers. The Sea of Light focuses around three women, each driven to success: Brenna Allen the coach, swim captain Ellie Marks, and recruited athlete Mildred “Babe” Delgado. As a tentative community forms between the women, they must balance their desires with societal pressures. 

Tipping the Velvet by Sarah Waters

Are you into the backstage escapades of the GLOW crew? Can’t get enough of the big ‘80s hairstyles? Big Yolanda/Arthie shipper? Jump even further back in history and amp up the glitter with Tipping the Velvet. Set in the 1890s, the book centers on the relationship between Nan King and Kitty Butler, a male impersonator performer. Although Nan begins as Kitty’s dresser, the two run away to London to begin a double-act. Gender performance, disreputable women, and self-discovery take center stage in Waters’s debut novel. 

The post 9 Books to Fill the Void of GLOW Season 4 appeared first on Electric Literature.