Murder and Mayhem in the Bluegrass
By Rick McMahan
One of the best-kept secrets in the Bluegrass State has been the dynamic writing team of Hal Blythe and Charlie Sweet, two mild-mannered English professors in sleepy little Richmond, Kentucky. However, just like the misconception that murder and mayhem are solely the property of big cities, these two professors have been plugging along quite successfully as a writing team where most of their murderous intent takes place in rural Eastern Kentucky. They've written everything from scholarly articles to short stories for religious magazines, as well as being regular contributors to Writer's Digest Magazine. However, under the penname of Hal Charles, these PhDs have been writing for a long time in the mystery genre. Hal Charles is a regular byline in Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine, and every one of their tales is a gem. A collection of their short stories, BLOODY GROUND, was published by the Jesse Stuart Foundation a couple of years ago.
Recently, I had the opportunity to talk with the two writers, and since both of them compliment each other and finish each other's stories and answers, it seems only right to just refer to them in this interview by their mystery pen name Hal Charles.
Rick McMahan: Tell us about each of your backgrounds and how you came to fiction writing?
Hal Charles: Hal is a native Kentuckian, born in Louisville while Charlie hails from Connecticut. Hal got his PhD at the University of Louisville, and Charlie got his from Florida State. Both of us were avid readers growing up, so writing just seemed a natural progression. Charlie actually wrote an unpublished paperback while in undergraduate school, and Hal wrote a few stories but stayed mostly with critical writing.
Rick McMahan: Exactly how long have you been writing together? How did this writing partnership start?
Hal Charles: We began writing together in 1974. Our university bought some new television production equipment, but didn't have any programming. Our chairman asked us if we'd try to put something together. Our first real collaboration was writing scripts for educational television. We had been playing together as a doubles tennis team for several years (we were actually pretty good), so writing together wasn't a great leap. We wrote the scripts and then just kept working together.
Rick McMahan: Before this had you each written fiction separately?
Hal Charles: As we said, be had both written fiction (and poetry) as individuals before we started writing together.
Rick McMahan: So, you guys were playing tennis together and were "volunteered" to write teleplays for the university? How did you move from writing teleplay scripts to writing fiction as a team? And what drew you to writing mysteries?
Hal Charles: After our stint as television screenwriters we just kept writing. At first we searched for a genre we felt comfortable with. We tried our hand at several things before we realized that no matter what publication we were writing for, our stories were always essentially mysteries. Even our tales for religious magazines involved a parent trying to solve the mystery of why his kids seemed to be pulling away from him or something on that order. Finally, we gave in and turned our interests and energies towards the mystery genre.
Rick McMahan: Whom do you consider your influences for writing in general, and any specific mystery writers who've impacted your writing style?
Hal Charles: In our formative years as a team, Fred Dannay (who was the surviving member of the Ellery Queen collaboration and editor of Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine) and John D. MacDonald served as our mentors. Both took an interest in us and provided us with guidance and inspiration. John D. MacDonald was particularly kind in all of the advice he offered. We are indebted to both.
We've liked many writers over the years and borrowed from them all. Perhaps Robert Parker with his Spenser series influenced our style more than any other author. We like the way he puts a chapter together and his expert use of dialogue. Parker is always a good read.
Rick McMahan: I understand that for a while you guys were writing the feature story of the now defunct Mike Shayne Mystery Magazines. How did you end up writing those stories? What did having to write a story every month teach you about writing?
Hal Charles: We consider our three-plus years of writing the lead novella for each issue of Mike Shayne's Mystery Magazine one of the most important segments of our career. The pay was lousy, but getting to add our personal touch to what was then the longest continuously running detective series in the world was pretty gratifying for two young writers. The gig taught us a lot about characters and plotting. But mostly, it taught us about discipline. Turning out 15-20,000 words every month while teaching full-time, writing other projects and trying to have family lives (we're both married with children) was stressful, to the say the least. Just coming up with a new idea every month was a trip. Toward the end of our tenure (we were the last Brett Halliday) we turned coming up with a plot into a game. We had a clip file into which we threw interesting stories, etc. from newspapers, magazines and television. Each month we would draw three pieces at random. Charlie would go home that night and write an opening using the three in some strange combination then Hal would take the opening and rough out a complete plot. After discussing the outline, we'd sit down and start writing. As always, we wrote the entire story together with Charlie (Hal writes like a physician) acting as scribe. Interestingly, we wrote one full year BEFORE we had a computer--uck!
One of the fascinating things about writing the Shayne series was following the tradition established for the detective's world over the years. As with any long-running series, Mike Shayne had a "Bible" containing all of the established backstory so that a ghostwriter wouldn't transgress the tradition. Over our years we stuck to the backstory while adding a few details to Mike's "history." If the series is ever revived we will be a lasting part of the tradition. We're proud of our work with Shayne. We think the stories hold up pretty well, even today.
Rick McMahan: You guys are a fixture at the local McDonald's in Richmond, Kentucky -- that is, for sitting and writing. How did you come to write/create at McDonalds? What's the routine?
Hal Charles: While we no longer write at McDonald's, we had a great relationship with the restaurant for almost twenty years. Everyday we drove to the restaurant, where we had our own booth (complete with plaque and picture) and wrote for two to three hours. The people there were great, and our years there were very productive. We started writing at the McDonalds almost by accident, but it became a very comfortable place for us to get away from our university office. Each day we started by eating lunch (the restaurant's treat) and reading the paper. Then we'd read over the previous day's work to get the juices flowing before launching into the day's writing. Charlie would take the longhand home and type it up for the next day's reading. We usually wrote about 1000 words a session. Now that we started writing in our office (yes, we have to close the door), we use the computer--but we still talk out every sentence.
Rick McMahan: The two of you write as a team, which is very different from creating as a solo author. How exactly does that work? In other words, what's your division of labor?
Hal Charles: Since we've described the actual process, we'll simply add that we both research (at night and weekends). Charlie handles the manuscript preparation and Hal takes care of business (letters, etc). This process has worked for us for nearly thirty years of writing every weekday, including holidays (except Christmas Day and New Year's Day). In fact, the day Hal's son was born (25 years ago in June), we were at McDonald's when Hal's wife called. We jumped in Charlie's sports car (a guilty pleasure) and sped to pick up Marsha. When Chris was born the doctor came to get Hal in the waiting room where we were finishing up a story!
Rick McMahan: Where do most of your ideas come from?
Hal Charles: While we both contribute ideas, Charlie seems more the Greek. He often comes up with the ideas for the story then Hal (the Roman) builds the roads, plotting out things and applying the glue. The roles switch occasionally, but we're comfortable with the way things work.
Rick McMahan: What other fiction and non-fiction writing have you two dabbled in and enjoy doing?
Hal Charles: We've tried our hand at lots of genres. We've written novels, plays, television, scripts, movie scripts, poetry and even interactive mysteries. We have a repertory company that stages evening and weekend "whodunits" wherein a cast of actors stage a murder and the guests working in teams try to solve it. We stage these mysteries at state parks and other locations, with each mystery tailored for the location and the group. They are lots of hard work but are fun and make tons of money. Probably the strangest one we ever did involved the killing of a basketball coach. That evening one of the guests was Joe B. Hall, the former basketball coach at the University of Kentucky. He played along with the fun.
Rick McMahan: I noticed that a lot of your mysteries are set in Kentucky, and specifically rural Kentucky, and your fictitious Clement County. On top of that many a murder seems to occur at the Cutler Marathon. Reading your stories, most of them have this rural setting. How did you come to create Cutler and the people who inhabit this violent part of Kentucky?
Hal Charles: Hal is a native Kentuckian, and Charlie has adopted the state after thirty years of teaching at EKU. So we feel at home in this area. We reasoned that people might like to read about some location other than New York, LA or Miami. We know this area well and love to write about its people and stories. There are many things going on around here. We decided that it would be better to create a fictional locale than to try to keep it too real. The fictional locale gives us more options. But, believe us, Cutler is closer to the real thing than you might think.
Rick McMahan: Kind of a follow-up, I notice that a lot of mystery genre is centered in New York or LA, or some other big city. Besides, the big cities, the other most popular setting to me seems to be Florida; there's a deluge of mysteries in the Sunshine state. But, I don't really consider Florida, to be the South. A few truly Southern mystery writers are working the field like John Grisham, Sharon McCrumb and James Lee Burke. Your writing has a distinct Southern feel to it, and a very distinct flavor of the culture of Kentucky. What's been the driving force behind this idea of creating stories with a Bluegrass flavor?
Hal Charles: The previous answers sort of answers this question, but we'd add that we write about this area because we know it well and we'd like others to get to know Kentucky. Our BLOODY GROUND stories are all set in Kentucky, and we're proud of the variety of stories it contains. We think writing about Kentucky gives us a chance to be unique in the mystery field.
Rick McMahan: How have you seen your writing evolve over the years? Looking back over the career of Hal Charles, how do you see that you two approach a story differently than when you first started?
Hal Charles: If anything, our stories are moving more toward mainstream fiction. We find our more recent stories tend to emphasize character over plot, and, at times, the "mystery" becomes simply a device to help develop character. Because of this new emphasis, we don't plot out stories as we use to. Rather, writing is a discovery. We start with a character and a conflict and let the story go where it will. We're enjoying writing more than ever before. In addition, we've learned so much over the years that putting a story together is just easier than before. We use to think William Faulkner was silly when he said he created characters then followed them around to see what they would do and say, but now we understand.
Rick McMahan: Which is your favorite mystery story you've written (each of you)?
Hal Charles:
Note: Both of these were published by Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine.
Rick McMahan: The two of you teach writing as well as being writers yourself. What do you see as the most common mistakes your creative writing students make?
Hal Charles: That question would take pages. But other than grammatical matters, plotting is probably the biggest problem. They fail to plant clues properly, and often their endings are not prepared for adequately. Also, having students fail to use solid details to create verisimilitude, and their use of dialogue is often not believable.
Rick McMahan: Are there any "bad habits" you two have when you write that you have to look out for (passive language or not varied sentences)?
Hal Charles: Not so much in style, but we have a tendency to repeat plot lines and characters at times. When you've written as much as we have, you sometimes forget things you've done and use them again. Truthfully, we don't have any serious problems--at least we don't think so.
Rick McMahan: Do you all actually read a lot of today's mystery authors or not?
Hal Charles: We read our share--Grisham, Burke, Parker and other selected authors. We wish we had more time to read--but doesn't every mystery fan?
Rick McMahan: Your story, "Moody's Blues" was included in THE YEAR'S BEST MYSTERIES of 2002, and lately Hal Charles' by-line has been pretty regular in ELLERY QUEEN'S MYSTERY MAGAZINE. Have you had any offers for another collection of short stories or have you thought about writing a novel?
Hal Charles: Actually we've written several novels over the years, but that's one format we've had little success with. We do want to create a new collection of stories in the near future. In any case, we'll keep writing whatever comes to mind.
Rick McMahan: I understand that you have co-authored some other non-fiction books, can you tell us about that?
Hal Charles: In reply to the question about other books, we've had four others: PRIVATE EYES: A Writer's Guide to Private Investigators, a nonfiction book for Writer's Digest's HOWDUNIT SERIES. We did the book with John Landreth, a practicing PI in Richmond at the request of Bill Brohaugh, who was then editor of Writer's Digest Books. In the book we discussed all sorts of real-life issues that mystery writers need to know in order to write credibly. John provided some actual experiences as examples, and we had a blast writing the book. It's been one of the best sellers in the series. Another book we did for Writer's Digest Books was THE WRITER'S DIGEST CHARACTER NAMING SOURCEBOOK, a work we did with Sherrilyn Kenyon, who had worked for years compiling all sorts of background for names. Our part was to writie the various introductions and to show writers the importance of name choice in fiction. The book has helped many writers with naming their characters. We've also done two pedagogical books for New Forums in Oklahoma. These books were collections of teaching tips (hey, we are college profs) and have done very well in the market. We're currently doing a third in the series--this one has tips on teaching online classes.
Writing these books was not that much different from doing BLOODY GROUND; lots of research, writing, revising, etc. PRIVATE EYES was the most fun--and the hardest work. We learned a lot from researching just what it takes to be an effective PI. But we enjoyed all the books in their own way.
Rick McMahan: Thanks for giving us your time guys, and an insight into your vast writing ability. For the readers who want to learn more about Hal Blythe and Charlie Sweet's anthology of mystery stories, BLOODY GROUND, click here for the review on the Over My Dead Body Website.
Daniel Boone statue
in front of
Keene Johnson Building
on Eastern Kentucky University campus.
Photo credits: Andrew Harnack
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