The mission of this board is to provide publishing, industry and technical writing advice and news to authors writing in the mystery genre. (You can define the extent of the genre any way you like.)
Please do not use this bulletin board system as a marketing tool for hyping your work, or reviewing mystery books. There are lots of other places to do that such as Dorthy L (see
http://www.netpat.net/~gwicker/crozet.htm for information on the DorthyL listserve digest) or the usenet group #rec.arts.mystery.
I'm not a writer, what about me? The Mystery Forum welcomes writers and non-writers, but asks that you keep on topic if you decide to post to a thread.
Please do not:
- Ask when a specific authors next book is coming out.
- Post a review of a book.
- Ask what the pseudonyms of a particular author are.
- Contribute facts that you're not sure about.
Who's running this site?I'm Bob Mueller. I took over MWF from the founder, Lauri Hart, in October 2006. Prior to that, Lauri ran MWF for 9 wonderful years. I'm married since 1994; we have 7 children in 10 years (plus my son from my first marriage). My real-world job is
funeral escort. I'm an ex-cop as well as Army veteran (MP from 86-89). I'm not published yet, but have two Works In Progress (WIP) as of October 2006.
I manage this site in my spare time and am not a trained professional in site management, HTML, programming, or anything related to the Internet.
I apologize if I don't respond immediately to any problems, complaints, or requests, but I do have other things I work on other than this site.
Contact me at MysteryAdmin@ravensbeak.com regarding this site. If you email me at my personal email address, you may not get as quick a response.
How do I get a new board set up?Email me at MysteryAdmin@ravensbeak.com and give me the board title and a short description. If it fits the mission of The Mystery Writers' Forum, I'll post a poll, and see what the members have to say. If there's enough support, I'll add the board.
Agent Scams Lauri discovered a very good website that posts agent and editor scam alerts. The website is called
The Short Order, and is targeted toward short story writers. Select "Scam Alerts" and page through the previous columns to get a good feel for the kinds of scams being perpetrated on aspiring writers these days.
What is Dorothy-L?DOROTHYL is a discussion and idea list in DIGEST form for the lovers of the mystery genre. It was concocted by a group of women librarians at a July 1991 Washington, D.C. meeting of the Association of Research Libraries and named in honor of one of the great women mystery writers of the century. Agatha Christie and Josephine Tey were strong contenders, but Dorothy L. Sayers had a LISTSERV-blessed middle initial.
[From the DorothyL Usage Guidelines]
The DIGEST is sent to your email address daily. To subscribe to DorothyL, send an email message to
LISTSERV@LISTSERV.KENT.EDU
Your message should read ONLY: subscribe DorothyL your name
(EXAMPLE: subscribe DorothyL Jane Doe)
You will receive a message back from LISTSERV asking you to confirm your subscription (this is to check your address). To confirm, Reply to the message, with the only text being the word okay (this will be explained more clearly in the message from LISTSERV)
Who Owns What? (Copyrights & Opinions) The postings found on the Mystery Writers' Forum are wholly-owned by each individual poster and cannot be reprinted or used without express written permission from that individual poster.
The opinions expressed are those of each individual poster and are not monitored for accuracy or potential slander, only for being 'on-topic'. The Administrator of The Mystery Writers' Forum does not warrant the accuracy of information posted to the Forum.
Postings are considered 'on-topic' if they relate to aspects of writing mystery fiction and getting it published.
The MWF Administrator reserves the right to delete postings that she determines are not on-topic, however, a good-faith effort will be made to contact the original poster to inform them of the deletion and the reasons the posting was deleted.
Advertising This is not the appropriate place to advertise fee services or free services. I will make exceptions, but if you wish to post such items, please clear it with me first. Email MysteryAdmin@ravensbeak.com with questions or requests.
The only exceptions are writers' conferences or seminars that charge a fee. Those may be advertised in the appropriate conference.
No posting of personal data Do not post home addresses or phone numbers on this Forum. They will be deleted. If you wish to provide this information to someone, do it via direct email.
Posting someone else's address or phone number is grounds for immediate dismissal from MWF.
The only acceptable addresses or phone numbers would be business addresses for Publishers, Agents, or other business services and conferences.
And, as a reminder, you are encouraged not to reveal too much about your personal life on this site. Not only is it inappropriate to the objectives of this site, not everyone on the Internet is what they seem. Don't open yourself up to danger from someone by revealing too much information.
Private Messages (PM's) are exactly that: private. No portion of any PM exchange between members may be publicly posted unless the other involved member(s) have given explicit permission to do so. Be prepared to provide proof of that permission upon request. Failure to adhere to this guideline will result in a site ban, which may be temporary or permanent depending on the severity and/or frequency of the violation.
Any complaint of harassment via PM will be investigated. If the allegations are true, the offending member will be placed on a temporary ban. Any subsequent harassment will result in a permanent site ban.