Q&A with Fresh Fiction

 

How did you decide where your book was going to take place?

Luxor and London were pretty much de rigeur for a story about Sherlock Holmes and the pharaoh’s curse. Monte Carlo was just for fun, and the Reichenbach Falls seemed like a good place to kill off Holmes. 

Wait! Did I say that? 

Did I do that?

A little bit about Holmes, a little bit about Tut, a little bit about me. Catch the whole piece at Fresh Fiction.

Golden State Gabfest

Up for more talk about 

The Strange Case of the Dutch Painter, as well as a peek at my nearly-completed next next Holmes epic, The Strange Case of the Pharaoh's Heart, and even a whisper of what's to come after that?

Then tune into:

Golden State Media Concepts Podcast

for all the lowdown.

 

No 'Rithmetic Involved

 Miss my dulcet tones?

Want to get the lowdown on my latest novel The Strange Case of the Dutch Painter, and my upcoming novel,
The Strange Case of the Pharaoh's Heart?

Then hie thee to: 

 Readers and Writers Podcast (by request, no arithmetic was involved in the making of this podcast)for the double scoop treatment.

Tea and Crumpets

 

Actually, you're not going to get tea or crumpets, but you can get a nice conversation about The Strange Case of the Ditch Painter and cabbages and kings with the crew at Beyond the Trope .

HERE.

Lermolieff has his say

 From an interview with "Ivan Lermolieff, Holmes's confederate in The Strange Case of the Dutch Painter:

What is something you want people to know about you?

My name is not Ivan Lermolieff. That’s only a nom de guerre hung on me by Vernet—or can I say Sherlock Holmes? My real name is—oh, perhaps I should stick with Lermolieff. Which is actually an anagram of my mentor’s name. More or less.

For the complete piece, visit Karen's Killer Book Bench--

Interview: Historical Novel Society

A review/ interview with the Historical Novel Society:

 

"Timothy Miller’s second ‘Strange Case’ novel features a witty amalgamation of Sherlockian investigation with historical oddities. The Strange Case of the Dutch Painter (Seventh Street Books, February 2022) revolves around the suicide of Vincent Van Gogh, and throws up some intriguing perspectives on the era, the painter, and the power of art."

For the entire piece, visit the Historical Novel Society

Interview with Nerds that Geek/The Dutch Painter

 
NTG: Do you think Sherlock Holmes would have good taste in art? Why / why not?

 

Timothy Miller: Watson claimed that he had dreadful taste in art, but then Watson was something of a Philistine himself. But I think Holmes would have been more apt to analyze art, to try to derive clues from it rather than simply enjoy it. I think he would have been more comfortable with abstract art, Kandinsky, for instance, which would have allowed his mind. to release its grip, the same way that improvisation on the violin did.

For the full interview on The Strange Case of the Dutch Painter, visit 

Nerds That Geek.

Another Wafer-thin...

Would you care for just one more
wafer-thin...interview? 

                                                                                           

Then check out my talk with three ladies named Dark, Stormy, and Night. It's mainly about The Strange Case of Eliza Doolittle, but I spill the beans on all three books.

 

Raiders of the Lost Interview

 I just came across this, which I had almost forgotten about. This was an interview with a site which will remain unnamed, which for reasons unexplained they never published. So, hell--I'll publish it and you can still enjoy it. 

Hello Timothy Miller! As you're a relative newcomer to most readers of historical fiction, please take a few moments to introduce yourself. In particular, tell us about your writing background before you took on your first novel. 

 Well, I took on my first novel the summer after first grade, but I only got as far as ten pages, so perhaps that doesn’t qualify.

      [Note: these were the characters. Weird-O's, they were called.]

I got serious after college with poetry in traditional forms, which I would recommend to anyone wanting to learn how to write compactly—which, when your favorite writer is Dickens, is something you really need to learn. Then somewhere along the way I drifted into screenwriting, which taught me plot and structure. (In case you’re wondering, I was a theatre major in college, not a creative writing major, which is why I had to teach myself all these basics—slowly and painfully.) Then I felt I was ready to take on a novel—not this novel, but a children’s fantasy novel (sort of The Borrowers on acid), which I still hope may see the light of day. Then I thought I was ready to take on this novel. 

 For years, many writers have created Sherlock Holmes "mash ups" featuring Holmes encountering a wide range of both historical and fictitious figures from the Victorian and Edwardian periods. Why did you take the creative leap of having Holmes and Watson working on a mystery featuring the characters George Bernard Shaw created in his play, Pygmalion? And those of Robert Louis Stevenson? 

 My characters first bumped into each by accident other when I was teaching Italian in Milan. I had a young couple who were having trouble with English prepositions. There are something like six prepositions in Italian, and, if I recall rightly, about thirty-five in English, so you can imagine. So I decided to write a little fill-in-the-blank story centered around prepositions, and a detective story suggested itself. So there was Sherlock, well-known to even Italians, and a well-known villain, Hyde, and a well-known setting—27A Wimpole St., the home of Professor Higgins. I think in that one, Eliza murdered Higgins. The next twenty years were spent figuring out why my subconscious had suggested this particular grouping. 

 Tell us about the research you did to prepare for this story. Clearly, you explored a lot of details about London, the minutia of the time period, and, of course, the Sir Arthur Conan Doyle canon. 

 This was a little different from your ordinary historical novel, because most—not all—of the characters are fictional. (Although Holmes, due to the fervor of his fans, who play the Great Game, is almost real, like the Great Pumpkin.) Probably the most important thing was simply to read and re-read the Holmes canon for one thing—Watson’s voice. I didn’t want a word out of his mouth that didn’t sound like him. Certainly I had to consult contemporary maps, and currency, and train schedules, and fashions and a thousand details which actually became more important for cementing a fully dimensional world. But I was awfully lucky in my research. Did I need a member of nobility interested in Eliza? I found that the prince of Bavaria’s wife had just died. Did I need something to delay a train? There had been a plane crash near Oxford and both airmen had lost their lives. It was like dealing with a three-dimensional jigsaw puzzle. 

 Beyond Doyle, Shaw, and Stevenson, Who have been your literary influences? As I mentioned above, Dickens above all. For big hearty scoops of shameless pathos and gut-busting humor, he has no peer. Certainly Nicholas Meyer, whose Seven Per-Cent Solution opened the world of Holmes pastiches to me (and to, I suspect, half the writers working in the genre). And then Italo Calvino, who taught me the virtues of lightness. 

 What is next for Timothy Miller? Clearly, you didn't set us up for a sequel, so we should all expect some non-Holmes surprises down the road? And where can readers go to learn more about your novel and learn more about you?

Actually I have another Holmes pastiche, set earlier, already taken by Seventh Street, and I’ve got a third in the oven—set later. After that, I think I’ll wander afield, although I have a couple of ideas which might include a cameo role for Holmes. Where can people go to learn more about me? Well, I’m a southerner, so I would say to drop by for coffee, but apparently there’s this pandemic thing going on, so that’s out. So I’ll try to keep folks up-to-date on my web page, https://www.thestrangecasesofsherlock.com/, and on Goodreads and Amazon. Thanks for reading!

Portrait of the Artist as a Young Pup

 Something a little different: a great profile of yours truly by Jule Ward at Jule Ward Writes. Jule is an old Chicago friend as well as a formidable writer herself. Check out some of her blog posts while you're over there.

A snippet:

When it comes to writing, however, he likens his mind to a popcorn machine. “I can take a scenario and play a thousand different variations on that. It’s hell for solving real-life problems, but it works pretty well for fiction.”.

Kings River Life: Review/Giveaway/Interview

It's an interview.

It's a review.

It's a giveaway of my book.

It's a threefer--

It must be seen to be believed!

The Strange Case of Eliza Doolittle By Timothy Miller: Review/Giveaway/Interview: 

 by Lorie Lewis Ham of  Kings River Life Magazine.

From the review:

"This story is filled with many twists and turns, most of which I never saw coming. It was so much fun having all of these familiar characters thrown together in this new story. I felt like Miller’s portrayal of Holmes and Watson was accurate, which is always a key for me in enjoying a new Holmes adventure."

From the interview:

"For me, writing is like blowing up a balloon. I start with a few puffs: beginning, middle, and end, and then expand, and let the breaths mingle and heat up. I just have to keep from spitting too much."

Penguin on the run

 

From Karen's Killer Book Bench: an interview with Dr. John Watson.

6. A penguin walks up to you, right now, wearing a sombrero. What does he say to you and why is he here?

It being London, of course, he would first mention the cold. Then he would ask for directions to 221B Baker St., but I would have to inform him that Holmes no longer resides in London, and indeed no longer involves himself in cases. Then I would then invite him to a pub for a brandy, where he would tell me of his impending peril. Almost certainly of his escape from an Argentinian guano farm and the pursuit of bloodthirsty gauchos. It’s an old story. There’s an office in Special Branch now that looks after penguin emigres.

Nerdgirl Interview

From My interview with Nerdgirl Official.

Where do you get your ideas?

I think it’s a vision problem. I have a cock-eyed view of the world. It’s like you’re slipping off a horse, and then you notice it’s got wings and no it’s a camel, it’s a mule, it’s a gryphon, it’s a pig, and then you notice it’s got wings, but the one constant is that you’re always falling.

Meet the Thriller Author

                  My conversation with Alan Peterson at Meet the Thriller Author

Read Between the Lines

This is my interview with Read Between the Lines podcast, where we discuss the book and I spill way too much info about my second book...and my third.

The Alluring Puzzle of Fact and Fiction

         From my interview with Writer's Digest here.

The Shark Bites Podcast

                                                                       P. J.'s got his copy!

 A podcast interview about The 

Strange Case of Eliza Doolittle with PJ Rahall of Shark Bites.