Right-click and select "Save As" to download this podcast episode to your device.

This week on the Writer's Detective Bureau, U.S. Marshals, the CIA, and Being Taken Downtown. I'm Adam Richardson and this is the Writer's Detective Bureau.

Welcome to episode number 56 of the Writer's Detective Bureau, the podcast dedicated to helping authors and screenwriters write professional-quality, crime-related fiction. This week, I'd like to thank Gold Shield patrons, Debra Dunbar from debradunbar.com, C.C. Jameson from ccjameson.com, Larry Keeton, Vicki Tharp of vickitharp.com, Dharma Kelleher of dharmakelleher.com, Chrysann, Jimmy Cowe of Crimibox, and Larry Darter for their support. I'd also like to thank all of my Coffee Club patrons for their support month after month. You can find links to all of the writers supporting this episode by going to the show notes at writersdetective.com/56, and to learn about setting up your own Patreon account for your author business, and to help me keep the lights on in the Bureau, visit writersdetective.com/Patreon,            P-A-T-R-E-O-N.

This week's first question comes from Ken Shoemaker who you can find at facebook.com/ShoemakerKen51. Ken wrote, "Congratulations on the one year anniversary for the podcast and congratulations to all the winners. My question this week is how often do you or other agencies use the U.S Marshal service to apprehend wanted fugitives? Do you or other detectives work with them in the hunt?" Yeah Ken, I've worked with the U.S Marshals deputies a few times on cases and there are a variety of reasons why a local agency might work with the Marshal service.

In the most memorable case that I was involved in the Marshals were helping police department track a murder suspect who had also been involved in a gun fight with the police, and the deputy U.S Marshals were able to track the suspect's cell phone into my jurisdiction. So in this case the Marshal Service was providing technical assistance in a state fugitive case. That was a crazy night because I ended up on surveillance as the point person on the hotel room all night long. Then when our SWAT team was setting up on the hotel room, I somehow ended up being the one at the front desk, calling all the rooms in that wing of the hotel as part of our SWAT teams evacuation plan.

Then once that wing of the hotel was clear, I became the defacto hostage negotiator talking to this murderer. I mean this guy had his girlfriend in the room with him and he's been drinking all night and after being in a gunfight with the police. He confirms to me in one of my many phone calls into that room that he is in fact armed with several guns, and after a dozen or more phone calls I somehow convinced him to surrender peacefully. And I'm not really clear on how or why the hostage negotiators were not called out on this incident, but I just relied on my skills of being able to talk to people, rapport building and being honest, knowing that if I started bullshitting him, things would end badly for him and his girlfriend and everyone really. Which is why I'd say I'd rather be lucky than good any day...                            Continue reading...

Right-click and select "Save As" to download this podcast episode to your device.

This week on the Writer's Detective Bureau, Being Held Without Charges, Stalking and Desk Pops. I'm Adam Richardson, and this is the Writer's Detective Bureau. Welcome to episode number 55 of the Writer's Detective Bureau, the podcast dedicated to helping authors and screenwriters write professional-quality, crime-related fiction. This week, I'd like to thank Gold Shield patrons, Debra Dunbar from debradunbar.com, C.C. Jameson of ccjameson.com, Larry Keeton, Vicki Tharp of vickitharp.com, Dharma Kelleher of dharmakelleher.com,Chrysann, Jimmy Cowe of Crimibox, and Larry Darter for their support, along with all of my long-time Coffee Club patrons for their support month after month. You can find links to all of the writers supporting this episode in the show notes at writersdetective.com/55, and to learn about setting up your own Patreon account for your author business, visit writersdetective.com/Patreon, P-A-T-R-E-O-N.

I hope you've all had a great week. I just realized I failed to congratulate the winners of the Writer's Detective Bureau one year anniversary giveaway last week, so congratulations to Elias Barnes, Jennifer Blake, Daniel Miller, Dan Petrosini, who all won Writer's Detective logo coffee mugs and one-on-one story consultations with yours truly. Then also, huge congratulations to Amanda Feyerbend who won all of that, plus a full license for Scrivener writing software. I hope you enjoy writing with Scrivener, Amanda. There is a bit of a learning curve, but oh my goodness, once you get the hang of it, you won't want to write in an any other word processing software.

​​I wish I could write my police reports in Scrivener. I just find it frustrating when I have to write in anything else. If you would like to check out Scrivener for free for 30 days, and that's like 30 days of actually sitting down to write, opening the software, not 30 days on a calendar, because Literature & Latte, the company that makes it really understands how we work as writers, but you get your free 30-day trial by going to writersdetectivebureau.com/Scrivener, and that's spelled S-C-R-I-V-E-N-E-R. Scrivener is available for Windows, Mac, and even iOS, which I use way more often than I ever thought I would, working on my iPhone and on my iPad, so yeah, check it out. Congrats again, Amanda, Elias, Jennifer, Daniel and Dan, and thank you so much for listening to the podcast over the last year.

I appreciate you so much. This week, I didn't get any new questions for the podcast, so I will see you guys next week. Thanks ... No, I'm just kidding. I picked a few questions that popped up in the Writer's Detective Q&A Facebook group for this week's content...    Continue reading...

Right-click and select "Save As" to download this podcast episode to your device.

​This week on the Writer's Detective Bureau, physical agility, foreign nationals and missing children. I'm Adam Richardson and this is the Writer's Detective Bureau.

Welcome to episode number 54 of the Writer's Detective Bureau, the podcast dedicated to helping authors and screenwriters write professional quality crime related fiction. This week I'd like to thank Gold Shield patrons, Debra Dunbar from debradunbar.com, C.C. Jameson from ccjameson.com, Larry Keaton, Vicki Tharp of vickitharp.com, Dharma Kelleher from dharmakelleher.com, Chrysann, Jimmy Cowe of crimibox.com, and Larry Darter for their support.

I'd also like to thank my newest coffee club patrons, Terry Thomas, Carol Tate, and Marty Knox, along with all of my longtime Coffee Club patrons for their support month after month.

You can find links to all of the writers supporting this episode by going to the show notes at writersdetective.com/54. To learn about setting up your own Patreon account for your author business, visit writersdetective.com/patreon, P-A-T-R-E-O-N.

​The Crimibox cases have been made to follow real Belgique police procedures. But now Jimmy and his Crimibox team have launched their first American investigation for you to solve. It's called Missing in Jericho, and they're doing a Kickstarter to get it off the ground.

I just backed it this evening and I cannot wait to work this case where you get to interrogate and inspect and investigate a case online, and it seems like you do most of it on your phone. Even getting calls as part of the game, or at least that's what I kind of gleaned from the comments that I was able to read.

But I love the idea of blurring the lines between game and reality. So I am really excited to see how this unfolds. So if you'd like to learn more and even consider backing the Missing in Jericho case on Kickstarter, you can Google "Kickstarter Missing and Jericho," or I've just set up a quick link. You can go to writersdetectivebureau.com/kickstarter, and it will take you to the Kickstarter page. So I wish you the best of luck, Jimmy. This is awesome and I can't wait to play the game.

​K.A. Lugo from jackslaughterthrillers.com writes, "In an effort to make sure all my characters have a realistic background and not on the page to fill space, I'm building a character arc for a minor but recurring character. And I'm wondering about previous injuries before joining the police academy.

This particular character has previously been a football player, a few years drafted from college, so still pretty young. I don't want his injury during a game to cripple him. Just take him out of the game long enough that he'll seek a new career.

Head, back, neck injuries, would certainly keep him off the force, but what about a broken knee or ankle that would keep them down long enough that he won't go back to football or they may not want him back, but would a broken knee or ankle or leg keep him from getting into the academy and becoming an officer? Thanks in advance.".

Great question K.A. If they have healed enough to pass the physical agility testing to get hired, and they're healed enough to fully complete the police academy, then they're good to go. Those physical agility tests are pretty much our only screening, and anything else might be an ADA, the Americans with Disabilities Act, an ADA issue because they are demonstrating that they can do the job by completing the physical agility testing successfully...                                                                                                                                                                               Continue reading...

Right-click and select "Save As" to download this podcast episode to your device.

This week on the Writer's Detective Bureau, the podcast's one year anniversary, undercover part two, license plate records and drug money. I'm Adam Richardson, and this is the Writer's Detective Bureau.

Just days away from our one year anniversary. This is episode number 53 of the Writer's Detective Bureau, the podcast dedicated to helping authors and screenwriters write professional, quality crime related fiction. And this week I'd like to thank gold shield patreons, Debra Dunbar from debradunbar.com, C.C. Jameson from ccjameson.com, Larry Keeton, Vicki Tharp of vickitharp.com, Dharma Kelleher of dharmakelleher.com, Chysann, Jimmy Cowe of crimibox.com and Larry Darter for their support.

I'd also like to thank my newest Coffee Club patreons, Terry Thomas, Carol Tate, and Marty Knox, along with all of my longtime Coffee Club patreons for their support month after month.

You can find links to all of the writers supporting this episode in the show notes at writersdetective.com/53. And to learn about setting up your own patreon account for your author business, visit writersdetective.com/patreon, P-A-T-R-E-O-N.

August 6th, 2019 marks the one year anniversary of this podcast and this podcast has been listened to over 26,000 times over the course of this year. So to say thank you, I will be giving away a few prizes on Tuesday, August 6th, 2019 just in case you're listening, those in the future, but you can enter to win by going to writersdetectivebureau.com/entry for your chance to win a Writer's Detective Bureau coffee mug, a private story consultation with me, or even a full license for the latest version of Scrivener writing software. So I will be drawing the winners after I get home from work on Tuesday, August 6th, 2019 so the actual time of the drawing may vary depending on what emergencies I'm handling that day.

So when you go to writersdetectivebureau.com/entry you'll see that I'm using one of those contest websites that encourages you to share the contest with your friends. It's like for additional chances to win, but that is not my goal here. So I want to say thank you to you, my loyal listeners. So when you go to that page you should see that you get entry points for only three things, by entering your email address, that way I can notify you if you win, for following me on Twitter and for following me on Instagram.

Anything else like sharing the contest with your friends on all the different platforms and stuff gives you exactly zero extra points. So I'm not trying to gain more followers by doing this. This is a contest just like I said to give back to you. Oh, and about that email address you will use to sign up. I am a big fan of privacy and I hate spam, well at least the email kind. So the only thing you will get by opting into the sweepstakes is the monthly APB email from me, which is filled with curated links for crime fiction writers.

And if you don't want to get the APB emails, you can unsubscribe from that at any time. And speaking of the APB email. Today, which is August 2nd and I still haven't sent out the APB for August because I've been working nonstop ever since that last podcast episode dropped, and for the foreseeable future, and I'm talking about my day job. My next day off is over a week away. So, and this is ... Okay. What I'm about to share here has been a knot in my stomach, literally making sick to my stomach, making me ... I can't even speak.

It's really impacted me having all of these work days, wrapping up the book that has a delivery deadline in just a matter of days. I mean it's not even two weeks away. And I have come to the painful realization that the book is not going to be ready in time. So if you are one of the amazing folks that pre-ordered the book, I am so so sorry for failing to deliver. At this point there is only one thing I can do, and that is to be upfront, open and honest about how this all happened and share the ramifications that I'm going to be encountering here.

Well there's also finishing the damn book, but real quick, let me explain how this happened and what the immediate consequences are going to be. You might remember that I was interviewed on the Creative Penn Podcast in early June of this year. So at the time of that interview I was well into the second draft of my book, and I felt super confident that my book would be completely done by the end of the summer. And realizing the opportunity I had by being featured on such a popular writing podcast, I went ahead and put my book up for pre-sale on Amazon and immediately the countdown clock started ticking.

And if you haven't done a presale on Amazon before, I mean that, that there is actually a literal countdown timer on the page. So there is no question how much time you have until your deadline. Now, Amazon sets the final deadline for your manuscript three days before it goes out as a live release. So with my launch date set at August 18th, it means I had until August 15th to get it turned in, which is still a couple days away. And back in early June, I totally thought this was a cinch. But despite my diligent efforts throughout the summer and not because of procrastination, I still came up short on time, and it's given me a completely new understanding, perspective and appreciation for what you guys do in putting your books out.

And since I'm not going to be able to meet this deadline, all of my presales are going to be lost. So thank you to the 68 of you that pre-purchased the E-book version. I feel beyond horrible for letting you down. And as a side note, I did see a few weeks ago that the book earned an Amazon Orange Number one new release banner that happened with 62 presales in its subcategory. And I'm only sharing that number and info as an indicator of what it may take for you, sales number wise to get the orange banner.

Honestly, I wasn't even thinking about the orange banner. I know many of you will have that as a goal when you release your book. But when I saw that with this book, or it's not even a book, it's the concept, it's the second draft of this book really. But when I saw that banner, it really filled me with dread and anxiety. Surely a sign that things were not on track. So the most important thing for you to know about missing your pre-sale deadline is that not only do you lose your presales, Amazon also prevents you from offering presales for a full calendar year.

Now, this is not going to have a devastating effect for me personally as this book is pretty much a one off. But if you are starting your career as a self published author, this would be devastating to your business as presales count as first day sales when it comes to calculating bestseller status. So anyway, I will end it here about the book. I just wanted you to know, it's still coming very soon, just not in the immediate next few weeks, unfortunately.

I'm teaching fall semester as well at the college where I work in addition to all the other stuff I do, so that time demand we'll be back in full force in a few weeks as well. But anyway, I just wanted to take a moment to apologize to everyone that I let down, to say thank you for the support during the presale and let you know exactly what was going on. So now let's get onto making sure your books are on track for a spectacular launch with this week's questions...                                                                                                                                  Continue reading...