The excellent writer Art Taylor recently asked me to contribute a short essay to his blog, and I was delighted to oblige. Art, along with Donna Andrews and Greg Herren, edited Double Crossing Van Dine, the new anthology from Crippen & Landru, which features my story ‘Confess Your Secret!’, and asked me to write a bit about the first two pages of that story.
‘First Two Pages’ is a wonderful series, which started life on the late B.K. Stevens’ blog, encouraging writers to analyse their own work. I was honoured to take part. Last week, Art published an article from fellow Van Dine contributor Delia Pitts, which is a wonderful read.
It was an intriguing piece to write because the story didn’t start at the very beginning for me. Unlike ‘A Date on Yarmouth Pier’: that stemmed entirely from its first line (‘I went to university with a serial killer’… which is true). But this made the experience really interesting and enjoyable. I’ve analysed a lot of people’s work, observed the looks of pleasure, horror, or confusion on writers’ faces when telling them excitedly ‘I loved your book so much I want to write about it!’, and now have written about my own work — something I’ve only ever done before on Creative Writing courses.
Anyway, please enjoy the essay! The book was published earlier this month, and is sure to be a treat for all fans of crime fiction and the Golden Age.
JC Bernthal 