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Mystery writer Sue Grafton has one of the most recognizable trademarks in fiction: the books in her series, from A Is for Alibi in 1982 to her new book, U Is for Undertow, are all named after a letter of the alphabet. That formula regularly takes Grafton's books to No. 1 on the New York Times best-seller list, and Undertow is no exception. TIME senior reporter Andrea Sachs talked with the prolific author about the ABCs of writing crime novels during her recent visit to New York City...
...What's the origin of the alphabet tradition? In the back of my mind, when I thought I would write a mystery novel, I understood the virtue of having titles that readers-at-large could recognize so that they'd know you had a next book out. I was reading an Edward Gorey cartoon book called The Gashlycrumb Tinies, and his book is a series of pen-and-ink drawings of Victorian children being done in various ways. If you have not read it, it is truly amusing. His book goes, "A is for Amy who fell down the stairs...
...This is the 21st book in the series. How have you come up with so many different plots? Part of what I do is keep charts of the books I've written, so I have a record of the gender of every killer, the gender of the victim, the motive for the crime and the nature of the climax - how does the book end? I also have a series of log lines for each book. In A Is for Alibi, Kinsey Milhone is hired to prove the innocence of a woman just out of prison for the murder...
...Your new book deals with false-memory syndrome. How did you become interested in that? There have been many instances in cases where people have been accused of sexual molestation, sexual abuse, satanic rituals with children, where it is purely the artifact of a therapist who decides that you have this problem and little by little elicits memories from you that are totally false. They are planted; they are conjured out of smoke ... Eventually - sometimes, if you're lucky - these people will recant, but the torture they put their families through is incredible because there are some people...
...Rick Warren's prized achievements over the past few years has been his outreach to Africa. The influential pastor of Saddleback Church in Southern California, author of best-selling book The Purpose Driven Life, has become an influential voice in several countries on the continent, including Rwanda, Kenya and Uganda. But that prominence has recently drawn him into controversy. When the Ugandan legislature began considering a draconian anti-homosexuality bill - which in one version would have punished "aggravated homosexuality" with death or life imprisonment - Warren was castigated for not denouncing the proposed law, especially when one of its most public...