Crimes and Criminals and the Writers Who Love Them

Crimes and Criminals and the Writers Who Love Them

Saturday, October 3, 2020

Join us for our Building Character Online Workshop!

Please join us on Thursday, November 12th from 5:00-6:30 p.m. for our Building Character workshop and Q&A with mystery author Leslie Budewitz. Leslie will be presenting this event as part of the Sisters in Crime Speakers Bureau.

It is FREE to all members and friends of Low Country Sisters in Crime. However, registration is required.

Please sign up using the following link:

https://www.crowdcast.io/e/building-character-with/register

About the workshop:

The heart of every story is the characters. No matter what type of fiction you’re writing – crime fiction, romance, women’s fiction, or mainstream novels – the best plots flow from the characters. Even in a mystery or a thriller, where the plot is critical to the success of the story, the characters are the key. When someone tells you about a book they read, they don’t say “it’s about a bomb... .” They say “it’s about a guy who… .” And when readers fall for series, they remember the characters as much as the individual plots – sometimes more.

This program will look at several ways to dive into your characters, and discover what makes them tick. Writing exercises and a handout will be provided.

What you will learn:

— You will learn several methods for creating coherent, consistent, credible story people.

— You will learn how to think about the essential characteristics of a good character, how to identify critical character traits, and how to use such things as physical characteristics, social standing, personality traits and personality classification systems, and your own experience to deepen the people on the page.

 About Leslie:

Leslie Budewitz blends her passion for food, great mysteries, and the Northwest in two cozy mystery series, the Spice Shop mysteries, set in Seattle’s Pike Place Market, and the Food Lovers’ Village mysteries, set in NW Montana. The latest is the 5th Spice Shop mystery, The Solace of Bay Leaves (October 2020). She’ll make her suspense debut with Bitterroot Lake, written as Alicia Beckman, in April 2021.

Leslie is a three-time Agatha Award winner: 2011 Best Nonfiction for her guide for writers, Books, Crooks & Counselors: How to Write Accurately About Criminal Law & Courtroom Procedure; 2013 Best First Novel for Death al Dente (making her the first author to win Agatha Awards for both fiction and nonfiction); and 2018 Best Short Story for “All God’s Sparrows,” her first historical fiction. Her work has also won or been nominated for Derringer, Anthony, and Macavity awards. Leslie is a practicing lawyer, whose practice focuses on civil litigation and employment law, with an unhealthy dose of criminal law.

A past president of Sisters in Crime and a current board member of Mystery Writers of America, she lives and cooks in NW Montana with her husband, Don Beans, a musician and doctor of natural medicine, and their gray tuxedo cat, an avid bird watcher.

Learn more at her website: http://www.lesliebudewitz.com 

You can also find information about this event at the Low Country Sisters in Crime Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/events/262021851724691