Hello Old Spirituals readers!

I’ve been thinking about writing and future books.

If you’re a long-time reader, you may know I’ve written four books. All of them are true stories about forgotten crimes from the early twentieth century. The era and certain types of crime are fascinating to me, but I’m selective about what I write about.

I like crimes that have a psychological or mysterious element to them—I avoid gruesome! I steer clear of well-known crimes that people have already written about, and stories involving the rich and famous. The lives of so-called ordinary people are so much more interesting—the people have far more freedom and privacy, and they face more temptations, uncertainty, and danger. The rich and famous have always lived in gilded cages. Their freedom is restricted and they have no privacy, but in exchange they have safety, security, and can buy what they want—or at least a very nice substitute! I don’t mean that as a value judgement on the people themselves; there are plenty of good and bad people in every socioeconomic class. But the lives of regular people are much less predictable and more interesting to write about. Another advantage is that their stories have never been told so they interest people.

The flip side is that stories about crimes involving ordinary people were more likely to get pushed out of the headlines, especially years ago. Newspaper reporters abandoned the stories before they were resolved to chase new headlines and, if the court transcripts have been lost or destroyed (as they often are), the stories are completely lost. Many of the stories I post here could have been good books if all the information still existed.

I would love to publish another book and have been researching a few possibilities for the past two months. I will self-publish this time so I’m not sure how well the book will sell, but I can still achieve my main goal, which is to tell the story.

That brings us to my questions for you. About time I got around to it! I’m interested in what you like to read.

What makes a story interesting to you? Is it certain elements, like a love story or a mystery? The setting or time frame? Types of crime?

I also want to test the conventional wisdom I’ve heard, which is that the length of a story is very important. I write nonfiction and the unofficial standard to aim for is between 200-300 pages. It’s a problem if the book is over 350 pages but it’s much worse if it’s 100 pages, for instance. The conventional wisdom also is to avoid collections of short stories. What are your thoughts on these points?

Lastly, do you have thoughts and opinions about the book format. For instance, do you prefer paperback, hardback, ebook, or audiobook? Are there some formats you don’t like?

I appreciate any thoughts you’re willing to share! If you haven’t commented before, your first comment is held for moderation before it’s published but I approve them quickly even if it takes me a bit longer to respond,

Thank you: I can’t wait to read your thoughts!