Annika Bengtzon Crime Reporter

Is anyone else watching this? It's a Swedish television show based on the novels by Liza Marklund about a crime reporter named Annika Bengtzon. Marklund is a crime reporter herself and also the co-owner of one of the largest publishing houses in Sweden.
Annika Bengtzon one of the projects from Yellow Bird, which a couple of years ago bought up a slew of Nordic Noir novels to make into movies and television shows.
It stars Malin Crepin as the title character who balances a career with a home life that includes a social climbing boyfriend and two young children. (In the first episode, "Nobel's Last Will," one of the subplots involves bullying and Annika's solution to the problem horrifies her partner but is absolutely satisfying.)
The material is not as dark--at least not so far--as most Nordic Noir stories. which is good because sometimes you just don't want to be left in the dark.
You can watch Annika Bengtzon Crime Reporter on Netflix.

Where do you get your ideas?

I'm always curious about how writers come up with their stories--one reason I really enjoy "How I Came to Write This Story" over at Patti Abbott's blog. Most of the time when I come up with an idea it's because of some sort of collision between something I've read or seen on TV and something that has happened in my daily life.
Right now, I'm writing a story called "Failure to Communicate." It's about a crazy cat lady that thinks her cat is sending her secret messages via the cat box.
The idea came to me one morning as I cleaned up after the cat and found a perfect letter L left for me in the cat sand. Eeeewwww. 
Nothing is ever wasted.

Word Snoot Wednesday

I did a lot of book-clearing over the holidays and one of the books I found tucked away was a very old copy of Poplollies and Bellibones, a collection of "lost words" and their meanings by Susan Kelz Sperling.
Poplolly, by the way, is not a backwards way to say "lollipop" but is an old-fashioned term of endearment, like "poppet." If you are, like me, a word snoot who enjoys unusual words, you should check the book out. It's available new for less than $5 and used for a penny and postage.

Happy Inauguration Day! Happy MLK Day!

This terrific image is from Nikkolas and Nicole Smith and pretty much says it all.

Win a Weird Noir Mug

Note: prize is just the mug

Perfect for sipping coffee or tea or hot chocolate as you snuggle in against the winter weather with a good book and a warm dog or cat sitting on your feet to keep you cozy. Enter Weird Noir editor Kate Laity's "Ride the Wild Haggis" contest to win a Weird Noir mug. Details here.
And if you haven't yet picked up your copy of Weird Noir, you might want to do that now. The nights are starting to get longer. You need something to read.

How does anyone learn English as a second language?

It's not just that the language is filled with words that look absolutely the same but are pronounced differently--I read for pleasure; I read the book--or words can mean two different things that are contradictory (inflammable, for example). But I was recently struck by a phrase I've heard all my life and realized it had two seperate meanings and only context to set them apart.
The phrase is, "The die is cast." For me, the meaning is that someone has rolled the dice and made a decision. But I recently went to a printing museum where the docent, as part of the spiel, actually showed the crowd how a particular letter was cast into metal. "The die is cast."
These are the thoughts of a word snoot.

Miles Marshall Lewis on Mixed Couples in Paris

In his "Expat Diaries," Ebony Magazine's arts and culture editor, talks about race and culture in the US and France. Read the article here.