In April 2015, B.K. Stevens debuted the blog series “The First Two Pages,” hosting craft essays by short story writers and novelists analyzing the openings of their own work. The series continued until just after her death in August 2017, and the full archive of those essays can be found at Bonnie’s website. In November 2017, the blog series relocated to my website, and the archive of this second stage of the series can be found here.
Last week, Robert Lopretsi introduced his new anthology Crimes Against Nature: New Stories of Environmental Villainy with an essay on his own story for the collection: “The Trouble with Saving the World.” This week we’re welcoming another contributor, Janice Law, who starts off her own essay with some context on the challenges posed by an ecologically themed prompt. In her essays for the blog SleuthSayers, Janice often writes about history and social issues, and those perspectives inform her comments here—alongside a terrific look at craft choices for short story writers too.
Janice has been nominated for the Edgar Award and won the Lambda Literary Award for her work as a novelist, and as a short story writer, she’s a frequent contributor to both Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine and Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine in addition to contributions to various anthologies. You can find out more about her work at her website: www.janicelaw.com.
Additional contributors to the anthology include Michael Bracken, Susan Breen, Sarah M. Chen, Barb Goffman, Karen Harrington, R.T. Lawton, Jon McGoran, Josh Pachter, Gary Phillips, S.J. Rozan, Kristine Kathryn Rusch, Mark Stevens, and David Heska Wanbli Weiden.
You can find more about the book at the Down & Out website here.
Please use the arrows and controls at the bottom of the embedded PDF to navigate through the essay. You can also download the essay to read off-line.
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