A Word on Words; 2342; Mary Higgins Clark

award and were programmed delving into the world of books and their other news this week mary higgins clark talks about let me call you sweetheart your toes forward and words mr john singleton the chairman of the freedom forum's first amendment center at vanderbilt university a lot of simple once again welcome to world words a treat various parties here to talk about let me call you sweetheart and then you only thunder and there's no it's not roma that now is not a romance novel it's a mystery know as old you know sorrow and surprise surprise surprise to nobody right back up there on the top of the bestseller lists the week before the book comes up you are phenomenal i do it do you you have a sense why how it happens why is it that this country just loves a good storyteller and and your name on the board i your name on that book is larger than the name of the book i mean can you believe that well you know that my parents both guide you

think the name is like you know it's a wonderful progression to keep the political battle on how well it's a it's another stunning story i was muslim as you intended for maybe and we won't give away the secret but i will say i thought was dr smith in and i thought it was jimmy weeks in and you knew i was and i also thought it was the most are not and i'm fascinated by the way you create these characters who have just a streak of the lonely somewhere beneath certainly with jamie it's a much larger st jimmy as the dnc has a chinese it is without comment they're dead man without conscience at all the last sunday on this program you said you spend a good deal of

time in court and then friday is and i guess so because the drama of the courtroom was maybe greater civil and i think it as the greatest interval i'm not surprised in the fun then but the heroine is a lawyer across we see i raised two you see i raised my first two allies though is that i raised two eyes because i plan to get in a lot of trouble you're there so you couldn't afford a lot and my daughter who is now a judge was a very good judge was an assistant prosecutor so i used to go and watch her in court and i also went through before she was even doing that i was going to call it because as you say the greatest theater is caught on one of the things that you find in most cases is that the main character

is not the defendant is not the job of the jury and it's not the prosecutor of the judge it is the victim in his last scene where it is and it is that the dress she was wearing when us so yes the dress is now on a bag and its mark state exhibit number so and so will how do you know it was the dress how can you be sure because it was the first time she wore it and you look so pretty and she came to show which means she twirled around my desk and two hours later she was dead in that dress and you know a hush comes over the courtroom as you see a pretty young woman twirling an address that is now stained in battered and these are the kind of things that i like to see and i empathize with some a sixteen year old at as you have a system that no i have a sister and everyone goes qua the the young it seems to me was an astronaut more

other fiction that dialogue makes the story among write about the real well you must move the dial out quickly is he was so used to the sound right stop and television you're not getting long long stories you're getting the essence of the story the most exciting part of it and i think in fiction you really it's especially suspense he really gonna do it that way i used to run a radio show for a living you know after i was read out and in forty minutes i had to have to read a lengthy plugs for the sponsors sometimes a male and for the cookie recipe and i had x number of minutes maybe two and a half to tell a story and i learned to write night she wondered slowly through the room but he went up and that kind of discipline was very very good when i started writing a suspense because i've had to learn to write says simply define the word that did the work of five words and i think it works is and it was a method of hoover's in the story

i thought at first that you had created and just to give them just to give her carry someone to talk to in order to set the stage then he emerges jonathan martin a political wheeler dealer who really see as it as a way to have to make her a judge his recommendations which is reliable and so he had another wrote at least one a role in the story ended and then it turns out that his wife also had couple roles of distortion it's very absurd very what he ever observed why she have uncertainty from an opposition a wheelchair she could look up and said that that's in a little perfect expression i said exactly i know and i know that it is the

dynamic that is and so she becomes the source for the fbi to give them the lead to what we are led to believe the american captors play with gabbert i thought he was a martyr and a cat burglar <unk> orleans well he had a lot and it led me cali hanging that he had unintentionally committed difference yes he had but by pushing you know one side is actually a man of the house because i always love of a little line micah the fbi is very anxious to get it because she is a vibration that they can use its leverage with the president why i was on an adult i think that little lines like that really embrace that owl so let them i find there is i don't know you certainly have an acknowledgment that day you are indebted the

rental for a few lines that came out of robins mum the rabbit is ten years old and i don't think like a ten year old and one of the worst mistakes writers camera can make is thinking awhile while i say mm ten years old a question others say the same way so i said to live look this is the situation how would you put it for example i said it one of the boys in your class they're totally like you have woody say he she said well he'd say i wasn't as dorothy look is the other night it was not in our vocabulary odd and then there has to be a woman ms franklin just the way you put a little sugar on the cake you know it has just a little touch of sweetness of the unfinished isn't me all you know for i watched on television from time to time we end of a new ceo and

all that ear on valuable or broke on larry king and the question will immediately turned to a scenario isn't which explicit sex makes a story and it does strike me that there are numbers of publishers and many officers many agents and editors do not think that it will be a bestseller unless it's quote a sexy book and the sexually explicit way your novels belied that you have very nice guys and very nice gals falling in love gradually the phone and you leave the bedroom i think it's more glamorous idea of what i think the sexiest lines written in this century wire said by rhett butler <unk> twenties they do not shut me out of those

deadlines inside of the idea i think that's a lot sexier a lot more wealth then they explode said i don't love the story of the french markey was over year nineteen hundred and he was asked how he liked you know he travels to the country he loved everything he loved the whether the people the hotels the meal name it nemeth the bodies the the children or there's no story there he was a journalist know so they filed suit i finally socially this something you would change if you could is it well if you will permit me you americans are so familiar with each other there is no mistake for example i would never dream of approaching my wife until i said my valet to ask her maid if she was ready i'm nobody before you sit down to write the mystery novel like

this one out with as many different suspects and us discover the suspects as we as we all do you is the plot clear in your mind that basic premise is clear in my mouth and the basic that in this one a plastic surgeon is giving a number of women the same case why is he compelled to do it and who is the ideal woman whom he is forced to re create that's the premise all right ben yagoda who were either said i thought well be lazy into new jersey because i have had a home there and no my way around especially in the legal system because of education and everybody new york has a certain glamour of the plastic surgeons in new york there's a glamour said ok let's establish who is my main character i always use a woman even though it's multiple viewpoint oh a woman

anchors the story and i like the early thirties as an age i think you know the old friends thing is no one was beautiful until she's thirty but i decided to be divorced because there's so many single parents and at first i was gonna have the guy decided to pick at that now the child enjoy his family never bothers with and he's the course of her minor accident some getting a live someplace i was going to have to carry be a municipal court judge who sees that there's something wrong in that office and then i realized the judge can't mess around with cases sure that within that that is well even at cases are not his job or her job so i made her a prosecutor where when she knows that something almond says those two women the prices and reopen the victim in the suite on america's then she going to say the next morning to inject and get that file and one look at it and our boss the chief prosecutor frank green

is the navy while most ambitious politicians and frank's getting too he wants to be the devil a lot of ego and he has built his reputation on his sweetheart murder case and you know it's very bad if it turns out that you sent an innocent man to prison for ten years who always said i didn't do what i didn't do it the doctor is lying part of what you do in these books is that you create tension outside attention on the main interest of me as a reader from the outset was that but i also won know if she's going to spoil her career sheriff chances to be as another quarter as a very good just is sheila bash her bosses not the swedes got the world but he's not a villain by an endangered she did that his chances to be government if she continues to fool around with this old old murder case eleven years old but she's drawn to the prison she's drawn to the four convicted murderer

she's dedicated to following him up to a point and then little ambition creeps into and her let's get its gear because when the child is that me and it's funny here again i asked liz about that and i said hat which you played it you know if you would see a mother and father literally calling the father delivers a massive stack of that carrie she said you mean to say you do know who almost ran robin over and then when i said she's decided that said she stand this case analyst said to me well i would say that is totally unfit you accuse daddy of situational ethics and what are you playing with now that cain that's a direct quote from the german hero she said you really direct quote from them you write in year old she just gave me a kind of a general contract designed i have an apartment over that rodriguez department and you know friends love that say if you just would have a contract yesterday i signed that whereby

i give it to them and even though they're under age this is a legal contract and i agree that they get electricity and heat and they will pay for the water i suggest we have a well is no one of them ah good reason i get joy and good now and the judge decided as though the witness and of authorizing itself to god help me i think i'm at an apartment the same again with these with it with that with a clear concept that you gonna have to build more than one suspect you have to just as hansel and gretel you know one of the tales of their tail is that hansel drops most towns and rental properties and the very day the breadcrumbs which is why they eventually got low as well the rhine in les gets most islands which are legitimate close but they don't go anywhere then they not pointing to the murder and the breadcrumbs and the breadcrumbs of what point of america what i ate an awful smooth stones along with way and

finding out where the regime as long as at the end you don't feel cheated as long as you can go back and say ok she fought me that look here is a bread crumb and here is a bread crumb and they were there and they were there you can say cause you must not cheat you know you can't have the postman be the one who didn't we you never seen before you know that's the worst thing in the world to build up and then let down the reader because you say that's not being on a plane they are you know that's like there was a story in the post the saturday evening post is at cereals and i think it was corresponding to tell and he would just sending one installment at a time and they trusted him so that you know at one point he had the hero down on the base of the mountain and the water was rushing in and everything is smooth and he had eliminated every way of getting them free and even the editors were frantic to see what was going to happen and the next installment started once out of the pit but a lot is

i and i wonder as you will as you sit around the story work now your lawyer said yesterday rajan yes because you know some people say well when you're inspired and lets inspiration inspiration as perspiration i make a cup of coffee in the morning and i always get up fairly i listen to the travel reports a minute it was a void roof or avoided jewish orphanage avoid as i commuted for thirteen years and traffic those ways and i say thank you but i'm not sure that he can i slap up with the cost they turn on the computer read the last six pages of the manuscript to warm up and say okay kids what

kind of trouble til we get him today and i say with wound seven another day's news is not on your shoulder and then the news that this winds its way into the news because if it if something is going particularly really slow you have to say what's the matter what's wrong with this and it was in this case municipal court judge doesn't work then i'll you know then she'd have to be also this issue that have a friend who would lend her and break rules and ew writer as a municipal court judge and then come back and write her as a prosecutor and yes as i say no i did not assume on that i was into it about three chapters not that this doesn't work i i knew something was wrong that you always unfinished but you know you want i mean you know when your resume is rotation you know it was easy in those of the court judges not is one step below superior court she wants to be

superior erie but she would have her own practice as a municipal and it just didn't work she still would not have access to records and witness testimony that never showed up and collective the only way she can do that is to be in the prosecutor's office where she is every legitimate right to say get me that far she also did a wonderful job of it in convincing people that they should talk to in budget doesn't necessarily bad you have to put yourself into something different roles if you're going to be a mystery writer and do you think you could write a heroine you think about your own role in ireland well it had been heroes i mean i had a lot of men due lines but i've always felt that i'm better to stay with a woman as the anchor person enter a woman owes a woman

better out for the most but ninety nine in name or the odds are a woman can do a woman that is i think the anchor person will stay a woman for me but for example you know use everything my little one little grandson has retarded and he can say this as a red book but if he's so you're caught he would pick your collier red color and say that's john scott and it would be a red cadillac chevy or whatever exactly the model zach with a number of donuts so that's why use that were the little boy who is developmentally is a disadvantage he said pop it's got up as garlic and the babysitter said that meant it was a black mercedes avoid a black mercedes i don't kill anyone says it was avoidable black mercedes and then use the kerry and we're sort of helping our it was understand this book that every that gives her the lead she needs to say who had a black mercedes and shias closer and closer and closer now as you get closer

you gave me one ring whether somebody who has a black mercedes is really going to be able to turn out to be the killer may knew you don't give away the secret until the very end the litigation keep key people in our holiday hell i could you waited i mean could you could you get it what does the story have to end i mean this story ended when william killer got years but that she was in danger the name is angel what you want to do that point of understanding and knowing that you are with the count that's what i want i mean and loves music when the head of the care what comes over his handling of the dancing slippers and he knows he can't he puts dancing slippers on and then he kills you i would i would i want that moment of you saying oh my god he's gonna kill in there

i mean if that said the last line who done it then you don't have the attention i want that by the ten pages of scary ms alice carey the better now you do a book like this and one reader i mean now you're going to look into it a bookstore argue into a day of an airport newsstand in your books is not just wants three or four up there and each year huge turnout another it's a bestselling mystery how you do it silly thing i do well until it can think and so no one at the beginning the day's into my dinner table <unk> town today where a nutritionally ii i mean years ago i remember i sent a button on my husband became a

latin america with the lebanese accent you'd secretary asked if i was a bachelor with sally i'm not leaving so even show you know i keep wondering how going to be this many years for stories and each time she finds a new twist a new term i mean it's not a case of how it's a case of how many can i write you know there's always an idea i have a book coming out in october called silent night and takes place on christmas eve well i was going ask you how far ahead you working solemn it is written yes it's coming out and i said sure i did but it's more than a valid fact i think ever since madison county the us gathers more liberals right fit scenario does the bridges of siren so let the solar so it's all night will be on christmas because reddit yes said takes a little seven year old vanishes from his mother's side as the looking

at the rockefeller center trade and ends up a hostage for a cappella know me out this fall yes this fall for president for the christmas values and now and then are you now working on a new book wasn't i just finished this one just i haven't chosen the subject get to the next one that i got three of our ideas dancing in my head and says i'm happy when i'm writing i mean no i definitely got better play golf once with enough and it's as good and the worst tennis player in the world are they so you begin in the early morning a new ride until you write out a robert parker and i probably aren't that at it was here not on an un uses it as ten pages today quits walked away from it and so those are the first to be his body in shape he admits

you were white or that four o'clock sort of fourteen i just have a sandwich at the desk i never have lunch out unless it's a business lunch was just it kills a whole day or if i'm speaking at a charity or something like that but for the rest of it i just like to work then at four o'clock i quit and i get invited out every night of the week i could be out of i wanted so i just start playing agent at the time to work this book something over three hundred cases how long does it take you to finish what you see in manuscript it's about for a record and it's now it used to be two years it was three when i had a full time job and the kids were younger then two years since the computer i can do it within the year because that has eliminated or the retired think or the manual this is the sea answered a sea answered be cut and paste that i can't read a thing myself so at the waist maybe a whole day every third day just retired and that's where all the time was wasted i can do a book

about six or eight months now as long as i'm concentrating and working every day savitt sales it's wonderful first will be such an accomplished startup and you understand just how much joy and excitement the ring of people are very grateful i really mean that when somebody says i was in the hospital and miserable and someone gave me a book and the next five hours i forgot my aches and pains it's very very nice but there's one letter i keep from a thirteen year old by my guest kenneth dear mrs clark i love the book so much i don't even want a boring arkansas louisiana investigators but i'd say that you just look at the look at all enjoy you brought it must be great mary higgins clark author of let me call you

sweetheart has been our guest on a word and more corrosive than john sigg involve chairman of the freedom forum's first amendment center at vanderbilt university this program was produced in the studios of wbez in nashville