Wednesday, September 11, 2013

Why Are Mystery Writers So Nice?

I was at Killer Nashville, having lunch with Annamaria Alfieri, whom I had just met. We were discussing a session she’d attended about human trafficking (I had not been to it) and why there’s such a lot of it in Tennessee (a very chilling subject). (The main reason is that Tennessee has so many interstates running through it. More miles than any other state, I think I read once.)

Our waiter, however, must not have heard the gist of our horrifying conversation. He noticed our matching badges and asked what our group was. When we told him we were murder mystery writers, he acted surprised. He said we were, as a whole, a very nice bunch of people. He either said or implied that it was an incongruity, asking why that was.

We both agreed with him that mystery writers are a nice bunch. One or both of us answered him that it’s probably because we get all our aggressions out of our systems on the page. After we’ve committed mayhem for hours, days, months on end in a lonely room, we’re able to be bright and cherry when released and out among our own kind.

Both of us agreed that’s the reason. I’d love to hear other thoughts on this.

(I decided not to write anything about today’s anniversary. You’ll find plenty of that elsewhere, I’m sure.)


Image from Wikipedia

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