Kris Neri's Blog

What does Valentine’s Day mean to you? For some, who are happily committed, it’s the most romantic day of the year. Yet cynics often regard it as a fake holiday started by the greeting card companies to boost card sales between Christmas and Easter.

Turns out the cynics are wrong. According to the History Channel, while some believe that Valentine’s Day is celebrated in the middle of February to commemorate the anniversary of Saint Valentine’s death or burial–which probably occurred around A.D. 270–others claim that the Christian church may have decided to place St. Valentine’s feast day in the middle of February in an effort to “Christianize” the pagan celebration of Lupercalia. Celebrated at the ides of February, or February 15, Lupercalia was a fertility festival dedicated to Faunus, the Roman god of agriculture, as well as to the Roman founders Romulus and Remus.


To begin the festival, members of the Luperci, an order of Roman priests, would gather at a sacred cave where the infants Romulus and Remus, the founders of Rome, were believed to have been cared for by a she-wolf or lupa. The priests would sacrifice a goat, for fertility, and a dog, for purification. They would then strip the goat’s hide into strips, dip them into the sacrificial blood and take to the streets, gently slapping both women and crop fields with the goat hide.

Far from being fearful, Roman women welcomed the touch of the hides because it was believed to make them more fertile in the coming year. Later in the day, according to legend, all the young women in the city would place their names in a big urn. The city’s bachelors would each choose a name and become paired for the year with his chosen woman. These matches often ended in marriage.


Okay, so not a fake holiday created by the card companies after all, but I do find the practice of just exchanging cards more appealing that being flogged by bloody goat-skin strips. 


The History Channel also shares that exchanging Valentine greetings were popular as far back as the Middle Ages, so the practice of sharing cards isn’t a recent invention either. The oldest known valentine still in existence today was a poem written in 1415 by Charles, Duke of Orleans, to his wife while he was imprisoned in the Tower of London following his capture at the Battle of Agincourt. 


Maybe we should thank the card companies for making such scribblings unnecessary.


But Valentine’s Day can also be a complicated holiday. Unattached singles sometimes find it an unpleasant reminder of their single-state. Newer dating couples are often unsure what if anything they should exchange, since the holiday seems to force a commitment that isn’t there yet. And some committed couples think that love should be celebrated every day, instead of just once a year. Even kids sometimes feel the hurt, when classmates exclude them from valentine distribution lists.
Shame on the kids who see the holiday as a chance to be mean.

So, what do you do in your life? Joe and I exchange cards, but not gifts. And we haven’t gone out to dinner on Valentine’s Day since our reservation was pushed back by an hour once years ago, and we suffered through bad service and an undercooked dinner on a night that does stress kitchen staffs. We enjoy cooking together at home instead. Still, I have friends who wouldn’t dream of missing that date-night out, no matter what the service is like. 


How about you? What does Valentine’s Day mean to you? How do you and your sweetie celebrate it?


Will you be my Valentine?
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Hopscotch Life

Magical Alienation

Silver City, NM peeps, next Sunday (2/6) I will be presenting a talk at the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Silver City: Journaling Your Way from the Darkness to the Light: the Teachings of Julia Cameron. I'll talk about how artists and non-artists alike can use her teachings to make their lives lighter and brighter. I will sign copies of my own books after the program. 10 am. 3845 N Swan St, Silver City, NM. Guests are welcome.

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Hopscotch Life

Magical Alienation

January is a time when we often vow to take up new behaviors and shed old ones. We diet, eat better, exercise. And for writers, January becomes a time when newbies pledge themselves to starting a new project — such as a novel — that they’ve always wanted to do.

The trouble is that changing behaviors, or adding new ones, is challenging. Too often people don’t consider what’s involved in making changes. Sometimes they don’t give themselves the best chance of meeting those goals.

One way that new writers sabotage their progress is by imposing on themselves a high word count quota that someone new to the work can’t hope to meet. No question, quotas can keep many writers on track. But if you’re just starting out, how do you know what would be a reasonable word count for you?

I understand the impulse of shooting too high, mind you. If we writers didn’t invent procrastination, we certainly keep it alive in us. What else could explain why so many wordsmiths eagerly do laundry, or clean kitchens, or plan dinners, before they begin to write.

The blank page, especially when you’re not yet used to filling it, can be intimidating. But an unmet quota that keeps growing, and getting further out of reach, won’t just intimidate you, there’s too great a chance it will immobilize you.

Have you ever joined a gym after a long period of not working out? Did you really throw yourself into it? And did you injure your out-of-shape muscles and lose time if you were forced to rest? (BTW, that’s not a judgment. I have been and remain a marshmallow.)

I used to have an inspirational poster that I kept until the paper started becoming dust. I kept it that long because of how profoundly the message struck me. It read: “The race doesn’t always go to the swift, but to those who keep running.”

If your writing goal involves a long project, such as a novel or nonfiction book, give yourself the chance to develop your writing muscles. After you do, then you can think about establishing a word-count goal, and only if you’ve discovered an effective way of motivating yourself. When I’m working on a deadline, it’s enough for me to simply record my daily word count, without imposing a specific quota. My own compulsiveness makes me keep the numbers high.

So, give yourself a chance to learn, and the freedom to write at your own pace before you take on more stringent goals. Your future book will thank you.

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Hopscotch Life

Revenge Of The Gypsy Queen

High Crimes on the Magical Plane

The Southwest Word Fiesta is coming to Southwestern New Mexico — and everyone on Zoom — from Friday, October 22 – Sunday, October 24!

If you love the written word, this event is for you.

You’ll find virtual sessions with advice to newer writers, authors such as Kirstin Valdez Quade, Brandon Hobson, Rick Bass, Sharman Apt Russell, Naomi Shihab Nye, and so many others. We’ll cover poetry, fiction, journalism, the environment and how climate change is affecting it, and other many other timely topics.

I’ll be on the Advice for Novelists panel on Friday, October 22, 3:30-4:30 pm, and the Mystery Novels panel, on Saturday, October 23, from 2:30-3:30.

All sessions are free and open to the public.

To register to attend, click this link and follow instructions:
https://wnmu.zoom.us/meeting/register....

Then you can go to the events page, and click to enter any panel room: https://swwordfiesta.org/2021-festival/

As a member of the SWF’s steering committee, I'm looking forward to sharing our festival with you!

My friend, Greg Lily, posted an interview with me. Read it now:

https://tinyurl.com/t3lr9v6

I want to share news of my own new publication, HOPSCOTCH LIFE, featuring quirky protagonist, Plum Tardy. It's an accept yourself in all your glory novel.

In HOPSCOTCH LIFE, quirky protagonist Plum Tardy feels like she’s living in a country song, after having just lost her job, her house, and her man. In her usual hopscotch fashion, Plum sets out to find a completely new town and a new man, but even knowing how out-of-synch she is and how oddly she moves through life, Plum could never have predicted the unexpected way that her past would collide with her present. Will her offbeat approach save her, or land her in behind bars in hopscotch hell?

Here’s what other authors are saying about HOPSCOTCH LIFE:

“Hopscotch Life is an utterly charming contemporary fairy tale for adults. If you've ever faced the homely monster of self-doubt, you'll gladly worry about and cheer for good-natured protagonist Plum Tardy on her quirky quest for self-belief.”
— Beate Sigriddaughter, author of Dancing in Santa Fe and other poems

“With a bevy of fun secondary characters, enough sparkling dialogue to fill a dozen champagne flutes, and just enough charming humor to keep Plum’s plight from breaking our hearts entirely, Neri finally walks her heroine through the execution of a plot twist worthy of Danny Ocean...oh, yes, utterly satisfying. Hopscotch Life is fun, charming, and rich in emotion.”
— Sally J. Smith, USA Today Bestselling Author

“Wonderful writing, a captivating protagonist, and one humorous complication after another add up to another winner for Kris Neri.”
— Bonnie Hearn Hill, author of The River Below

Available online. Free with Kindle Unlimited!

Thanks for sharing my good news!

With Valentine's Day coming up, I’d like to ask what it means to you? For some who are happily committed, it’s the most romantic day of the year. Yet cynics often regard it as a fake holiday started by the greeting card companies to boost card sales between Christmas and Easter. 

In fact, the cynics are wrong. According to the History Channel, while some believe that Valentine’s Day is celebrated in the middle of February to commemorate the anniversary of Saint Valentine’s death or burial—which probably occurred around A.D. 270—others claim that the Christian church may have decided to place St. Valentine’s feast day in the middle of February in an effort to “Christianize” the pagan celebration of Lupercalia. Celebrated on February 15, Lupercalia was a fertility festival dedicated to Faunus, the Roman god of agriculture, as well as to the Roman founders Romulus and Remus.
To begin the festival, Roman priests would sacrifice a goat for fertility, and a dog for purification. They would then strip the goat’s hide into strips, dip them into the sacrificial blood and take to the streets, gently slapping both women and crop fields with the goat hide.

Okay, so not a fake holiday created by the card companies after all, but I do find the practice of just exchanging cards more appealing that being flogged by bloody goat-skin strips.

Still, Valentine’s Day can be a complicated holiday. Unattached singles sometimes find it an unpleasant reminder of their single-state. Newer dating couples often feel unsure what if anything they should exchange, since the holiday seems to force a commitment that isn’t there yet. And some committed couples think that love should be celebrated every day, instead of just once a year. Even kids sometimes feel the hurt, when classmates exclude them from Valentine distribution lists. Shame on those kids!

While I’d like to see the holiday devoted to expressing our love for everyone we care about, be they lovers, or family members and friends, I’d also like to see us express love and acceptance to one who is too often forgotten. Ourselves. Too many of us judge ourselves so much harsher than we would ever judge others. We say terrible things in our self-trash talking, things we would never say to other people. We accept ourselves only conditionally: you know, I’ll accept myself when I lose that weight, finish writing a novel, get a promotion, etc., etc., etc., 

The need for self-acceptance is the theme of my forthcoming (only one more month now!) novel, Hopscotch Life. Poor Plum Tardy, the protagonist of Hopscotch Life. Once she hits her rock bottom of awful losses, she can barely offer herself even conditional approval.

Since that’s true for too many people who don’t recognize themselves for the amazing creatures they are, I’ve created a handout of ways to help improve your self-acceptance.

Here it is:

* Be kind to yourself.
Nobody judges us more than we judge ourselves. Take a look at some of your worst self-judgements and resolve to let them go, once and for all. Focus instead on everything that’s good about you.

* Believe in yourself.
Celebrate your accomplishments and what’s unique and great about you. When something good happens for you, or if you receive some recognition of your value, keep souvenirs of that experience or write about how those things make you feel. When doubts creep into your thinking, take out the reminders of your accomplishments and review them.

* Practice gratitude.
Nothing helps us to feel good about ourselves and our circumstances like focusing on what we appreciate about them. You’ll begin to feel better about your life if you shift your focus from what’s wrong with you, to everything that’s right, and everything you’re grateful about experiencing.

* Grieve the loss of unrealized dreams.
For some, failing to achieve unrealistic goals may lead to a lack of self-acceptance. Mourn what hasn’t come about, but don’t weight it higher than what you have accomplished and all that’s worthy about you. Realize you can always set a course that’s better for you.

* Stay positive.
Work at living your life in an atmosphere of positivity. See the good in any situation, and express gratitude for that. Repeat positive affirmations to yourself. Hang up inspirational arts, or vision boards that project that spirit. Be aware that transitory bad moods are only temporary. Challenge your inner critic with a genuine awareness of your worth.

* Accept imperfection.
Let go of whatever unrealistic vision of perfection you hold. Let go of who you think you’re supposed to be, and celebrate the wonderful, unique being that you are. Perfectionism isn’t about trying to be your best—it’s a self-destructive form of blame for not living up to someone else’s ideal. Let go of what you think perfection looks like. Whatever mistakes we might have made, they’re never as big a deal as we tend to think they are.

* Forgive.
It’s hard enough to forgive others, especially when their sins against us are great, but you can’t heal without letting go of your grievances. As hard as it is to forgive others, it can be infinitely harder to forgive ourselves for whatever mistakes we think we’ve made. You cannot move into a place of joy and grace if you’re holding onto whatever you blame others and yourself for doing. Forgive others for their mistakes. Forgive yourself for your own mistakes, and for not knowing what your own healing would require.

* Establish a support system.
Surround yourself with loving people. If you spend time with people who negate your self-worth, you may have a harder time accepting yourself. When people do treat you negatively, accept that as more of a reflection of how they feel about themselves, than a statement about you. But also realize you deserve to be surrounded by good, loving people who will help to build you up, not tear you down.

So…how do you practice loving self-acceptance? Have you had to overcome some hurdles to reach the point of self-love? Have you witnessed others who have?

Will you be your own Valentine?

Readers often wonder how closely we writers resemble our characters. In my case, I have to say, “Not a bit!” After all, I write the madcap Tracy Eaton mysteries, Revenge of the Gypsy Queen, Dem Bones' Revenge, Revenge for Old Times' Sake, and the latest, Revenge on Route 66, a humorous romp along the Southwestern Route 66. Tracy is too much the offspring of her reality-challenged, zany parents, movie legends, Martha Collins and Alec Grainger, to be anything like me.

The question I often hear from fans is, “Who are you parents? Anyone we'd know?” See, they assume my parents are also major motion picture stars, or how else could I write the hilarious scenes I create between Tracy and the banes of her existence? I'm flattered that readers regard Martha and Alec as so real, they can't imagine that I simply made them up. But that's what I did.

Tracy also brings the most eccentric approach to crime solving. I'm sure if I were an amateur sleuth, I'd never make my escape from captivity by shimming up a rope with my mother on my back, as Tracy and Martha did in Dem Bones' Revenge. Or when they eluded the bad guys by posing as hookers so the cops would arrest them for solicitation and whisk them away.

In Revenge for Old Times' Sake, free-spirit Tracy cheers when her stodgy husband, Drew, finally loosens up enough to rearrange the nose of his boorish boss, Ian Dragger. Too bad the next time anyone saw Dragger, he was floating face down in the Eaton pool, deader than disco.

I certainly didn't draw on my life for that. Not only isn't my hubby Joe at all stodgy, I don't even own a pool.

Still…I have to admit offbeat things always happen to me. Wherever I go, if there's a person who merely flirts with the periphery of sanity, he gloms onto me like I'm his long-lost twin. My husband always asks if I send out a homing signal that only wackos can hear. I don't know. Do I?

I also always find myself faced with problems that nobody else has to deal with. For instance, I went to a party recently in a gate-guarded community, The road that leads to it is a tough-to-navigate, narrow S-curve that takes a sharp dip where it crosses a creek, which is heavily studded with boulders.

When I stopped beside the gate speaker box, I realized I couldn't remember the code to open the gate. No problem. There were instructions for dialing the houses. Too bad that didn't work. Again and again. In six tries, I got mostly busy signals, although I also hit the voicemail a couple of times. I didn't feel too helpless babbling, “Uh, I'm here, but…”

Okay, Plan B. I decided to call my husband at home, since he wasn't coming. If he didn't know the code, he could call our friend and get it. Why do we have cell phones if not for emergencies? Oops! No network.

Hmmm. There was no way I could back out of there. I must have played hooky the day they taught reverse in Driver's Ed, since I've never learned it. I could barely navigate that entry going in. If I lived there, I'd just park the car in the water and get it over with. And the road was too narrow for a k-turn. Maybe a hundred tiny k-turns would do it, but I'm not too swift on those, either.

Since I arrived late, I wasn't sure when someone else would pass that way. I ended up staying there until a woman walked near the gate and shouted out the code. I was the only partygoer who didn't just breeze in.

Turns out the gate-phone connection stopped working sometime before I showed up, but after everyone else did. But that kind of thing always happens to me. I can't be the only one who's out-of-synch with virtually everybody else. There must be others marching to the un-syncopated beat of goofball drummers that nobody else can hear.

If I were writing that experience for a character, I'd make it read funny. Tracy's always wrecking her vehicles, so that would be perfect. I'd just send the car off the road, where it would float along, crashing into boulder-after-boulder, like Mother Nature's own bumper car ride.

Only in real life, I make payments on that car, and I pay for insurance. I'd be the idiot whose claim the folks working at the insurance agency would laugh themselves silly over — right before the company cancelled my coverage.

Okay, so maybe I am more like Tracy and her gang of daffy misfits than I'd like to admit. Maybe I really am living my wackiest characters' lives. I'm just not having as much fun with them as they are.

I’ve been asked the question many times, as I’m sure other authors have as well: what was your worst book event?

No contest. My worst signing occurred in the months after my second book, Dem Bones’ Revenge, was published, at an LA-area Barnes & Noble. I’d rather not get more specific than that because, although the store in general did nothing wrong, some employees didn’t acquit themselves too well.

When I arrived I was thrilled by the turnout. I was scheduled to present a workshop on getting published. This was before the self-publication explosion when people still wanted to know the how-tos of getting an agent and finding traditional publication. Some of my established readers who lived in the area and a current student were in attendance, along with about forty or so strangers. The evening’s prospects looked good.

Then a wackadoodle wandered into our midst presumably to hear the talk, wearing filthy clothes, with snot running down his face, and clutching a messy, yellowed manuscript to his chest.

While I spoke to the audience, the wingnut began mumbling some nasty neo-Nazi crap to himself, just loud enough to be heard. Well, he was either saying it to himself, or me, or the audience, or the universe in general — I was never sure about that, but while it was a low mumble, people around him could hear well enough.

I kept trying to make eye contact with the CRM, who was seated in the first row of chairs, looking for some direction about how I should handle this situation. She mostly kept her eyes on me, though not intently, wearing a vague benign smile on her face that never changed, which told me she was off in never-never land somewhere. I’m sure she never heard a word I said, and she really didn’t pay any attention at all to the Aryan disaster.

I’m not sure I made the right choice, but since he kept his diatribes mostly at a muttered level, I carried on as if he weren’t there. I don’t think I would do the same today — I’m a lot more outspoken now — but I was newer to book signings then, and trying to make the best choice for everyone.

Throughout this, though, my anxiety spiked off the charts. At one point, he placed his manuscript on the floor and began reaching into his pants and grabbing something there. He was probably just grabbing what men have in their pants. That would have been gross enough. But I secretly feared he might have been reaching in for a weapon. I kept expecting him to pull a gun out. This was a really scary wackadoodle.

Obviously, he made others in the audience as uncomfortable as me. People began to get up and leave. Some of them were nice enough to grab a copy of my book and, with a little wave, took off. Mostly, however, they simply left. I didn’t know that some had stopped at the front desk and suggested they call the police and have them get rid of this guy. But the employees chose not to.

Towards the end of my talk, he quit mumbling and groping, picked up his manuscript and wandered off. By the end, two-thirds of the good audience I started with had left. My fans and my student had stayed, as had some strangers. I ended up having adequate sales to my surprise, given the diminished crowd. But fear had turned my legs to rubber, and I thought I might have developed an ulcer during the prior hour. Thankfully, that didn’t actually happen.

While I signed books, all my customers could talk about was the wingnut and the stuff he was saying. The CRM claimed not to have heard any of it, even though she only sat two seats away, and people much farther away had heard plenty. I wish I could turn off my hearing like that.

Since then, I’ve had great signings and I’ve had crummy ones, as all authors do. But none of the so-so ones have ever been a fraction as colorful. Never before or since have I ever seriously believed that someone might shoot me. Books do tend to bring out more cerebral people, though not exclusively that day.

I can laugh about it now. I’ve actually laughed about it for years, just not then.

It’s on my mind because next week, I will soon be taking off for my latest Southern California signings for Revenge on Route 66, and that memory always reminds me that no matter how my signings go, they’re always better than that. But no matter what happens, there will probably also be less to laugh about, too.

Mind you, I expect my SoCal events to be great because they’ll be at some of my favorite stores, including Book ‘Em Mysteries in South Pasadena, and the two Mysterious Galaxy locations, in Redondo Beach and San Diego.

I am saddened that two of the other stops I’ve always made there — Mysteries to Die for in Thousand Oaks and the Mystery Bookstore in Westwood — have closed their doors. As an independent bookstore owner myself, I know what a challenge it is keeping an indie store going today. Boy, will I miss those stops.

If you read below, you’ll see my schedule. If you’re in the area, I’d hope you’ll stop by one of my events. It would be great to connect with you.

But if anyone there, or at any future signing of mine, sticks his hand in his pants — this time, I’m ducking.


Signing Schedule:

Saturday, June 8, 2 pm: Book ‘Em Mysteries, 1118 Mission Street, South Pasadena, CA. (626) 799-9600.

Sunday, June 9, 2:30 pm. Mysterious Galaxy – Redondo Beach, 2810 Artesia Blvd Redondo Beach, CA. 310-542-6000. I’ll be signing there with Kate Carlisle.



Monday, June 10, 7 pm. Mysterious Galaxy – San Diego, 7051 Clairemont Mesa Blvd., Suite #302, San Diego, CA. 858-268-4747. I’ll be presenting a writing workshop, Creating Memorable Characters, in addition to signing copies of REVENGE ON ROUTE 66.


Revenge on Route 66

Some years back, the publicist for my first two Tracy Eaton mysteries, REVENGE OF THE GYPSY QUEEN and DEM BONES' REVENGE, suggested I consider setting a Tracy Eaton novel on Route 66, calling it REVENGE ON ROUTE 66. She told me the title and idea had come to her in a dream (which meant her dreams were way more useful than mine!). She backed up the idea by telling me how many millions of people visit the Mother Road, as John Steinbeck dubbed Route 66, each year. That certainly supported its great marketing potential. The trouble was that, while I’d heard of people touring Route 66 and had a vague idea of what they found on it, I didn’t really get its appeal.

Then I moved to Northern Arizona, where Route 66 cuts a significant swath. Even before my husband Joe and I began conducting our own Route 66 trips, we discovered the fun of seeking out old Route 66 roadhouses, such as Miz Zip’s, in Flagstaff, AZ, where the food is good and reasonably-priced, and the décor is strictly something from yesteryear.

Finally, I started to get what Route 66 was all about. Those slices of Americana preserve little pockets of time from the days before everyone became so cool, from the time when we were comfortable with being offbeat and unique. When individuality rocked more than sameness, before Anytown, USA became Everytown, USA.

I also discovered that my former publicist was right — it was the perfect place to set a Tracy Eaton mystery. (I thanked her for the great idea in the acknowledgements.) This madcap series, which features the unconventional daughter of eccentric Hollywood stars, along with a cast of loveable loonies, celebrates quirkiness as much as the road. Not a drop of sameness in the entire daffy bunch.

And so, REVENGE ON ROUTE 66 came to life. Since it venerates a time past, I decided some of the characters would have a history with the road, and the seemingly divergent mysteries that make up this storyline, would be linked to it as well.

Quirky spots that I could make part of Tracy’s road trip began to occur to me, such as the Biker Bunny Bin. That’s an odd self-storage yard, which is guarded by a hellish pair of giant plywood rabbits that make the whole place seem like Disneyland on acid. Or the signs that might catch the eye of motorists along the way, not just those for “Burma Shave,” which you really do see, but also “New Dead Things.” And the restaurants that lure them away from the anonymous fast food stops, like the diner that promised, “Warm beer, lousy food.” Tracy insisted to her husband Drew that they had to reward humor like that, though it turned out that all they rewarded was truth in advertising.

I hope I did justice to the spirit of Route 66. Not just because that road has stolen my heart, although it has, but because it might be our last hold on a time that’s all but vanished. Because it celebrates the people we used to be. And maybe, deep down, still are.
Revenge on Route 66