“For your born writer, nothing is so healing as the realization that he has come upon the right word.”

-Catherine Drinker Bowen

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Jaden Terrell is the author of the Jared McKean mysteries and a contributor to the new Now Write! Mysteries, a collection of writing exercises published by Tarcher/Penguin for writers of crime fiction. Terrell is also the executive director of the Killer Nashville Thriller, Mystery, and Crime Literature Conference and a recipient of the 2009 Magnolia Award for service to the Southeastern Chapter of Mystery Writers of America.

We’d like to thank her for taking the time to be part of our “5 Minutes Alone” interview series.

AuthorScoop: What was your very first publication credit?

Jaden: My first published work was the self-published version of RACING THE DEVIL, published under another title. My second published work was the second version, released by Nightshadows Press. This is the third incarnation of my first publication. I guess it took me awhile to get it right! Other than RACING THE DEVIL, my first publication credit was a chapter in Now Write! Mysteries, a collection of writing exercises published by Tarcher/Penguin for writers of crime fiction.

AuthorScoop: Tell us about your latest release.

Jaden: My latest release is a reissue of the first book in my Jared McKean private detective series. It’s evolved quite a bit since its first incarnation, but the essence is the same. Nashville-based PI Jared McKean is 36 years old, coming to grips with the loss of his job as a homicide detective, and divorced from a woman he still loves. He has a son with Down syndrome, a best friend with AIDS, and a troubled nephew who comes out of the closet and runs away from home. Jared also has a weakness for women in jeopardy—until one frames him for murder. He’s a good man trying to juggle personal and family commitments while keeping himself out of prison and protecting the people he loves from danger and sometimes from themselves.

AuthorScoop: Aside from your own hard work, who (or what) else do you feel has contributed to your success?

Jaden: There are so many! My practically perfect husband, Mike. My beautiful and supportive mom. Clay Stafford, for letting me help put on Killer Nashville, which led to getting my terrific agent, Jill Marr. My current publishers, Martin and Judith Shepard of The Permanent Press, and the Quill & Dagger Writer’s Guild, who have been helping me hone my craft for more years than I care to say. Not to mention a host of supportive, encouraging friends, co-workers, and fellow writers. When I think of all the people who have helped and encouraged me, I feel like I must be the most blessed person on earth.

AuthorScoop: At what time of day or night do you do your best writing?

Jaden: In an ideal world, 9 pm to 2 am. I’m something of a night owl, but I have a day job, so writing until 2 am is not really feasible these days. When I get that 6 million dollar movie deal, though…

AuthorScoop: Finally, what advice would you give to new or unpublished writers?

Jaden: Never stop learning. Never stop trying to be better at what you do. Persevere, but while you’re persevering, take workshops, read books on writing, study the work of writers you love. Do everything you can to make your writing shine and to make yourself the best writer you can possibly be. There is always room to grow.

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RACING THE DEVIL is available now and you can read a sample and the quick click to your favorite retailer to get your own copy. Visit her webpage and you’re on your way. Jaden Terrell is also at home on the web at her blog, Murderous Musings. Like her Facebook page to keep current with news and events.

While she’s left us, we will still get to enjoy one last book of poems by Wislawa Szymborska, due to be released later this year. (The Telegraph)

Friend to AuthorScoop, Gregg Hurwitz, is tapped to write BATMAN: THE DARK NIGHT for DC Comics. He’s a little bit thrilled. (DC Universe)

Six degrees of separation from your favorite book, courtesy of (GalleyCat)

The United States fell to 47th ranked in the world for freedom of the press. (The Atlantic)

Here’s some writing prompts from famous authors. (The Huffington Post)

Random House says it’ll raise the price on ebooks for lending, but it will allow the lending at least. (Publishers Weekly)

BookWeb has a look at what’s up and coming in Indie books. (bookweb)

First it was books, now it’s printed magazines that electronic reading is squishing. (The Telegraph)

“On this day in 1931, the Arkansas state legislature passed a motion to pray for the soul of H. L. Mencken. One of Mencken’s Laws was ‘Nature abhors a moron,’ and one of his favorite pastimes was to attack the South for being especially ruled by the ‘booboisie’; upon finding itself elevated to ‘the apex of moronia,’ Arkansas had apparently had enough…” (Today In Literature)

Wanna be a journalist? Yeah, there’s an app for that. Rawporter looks to make the man-on-the-street a trusted source for news. (ReadWriteWeb.com)

And if you need an app for inspiration for your fiction, there’s THE ARTIST’S WAY for smartphones as well. (GalleyCat)

Michael Chabon is the first announced speaker for this year’s Book Expo America. Watch the chart fill in at (BookExpoAmerica.com)

Barnes & Noble says they won’t sell Amazon-published books. (The New York Times)

Have a look at the 20 Most Beautiful Bookstores in the World. (flavorwire)

Book blurbs: the good, the bad, and the ugly truth of it. (The Millions)

Fourteen year old, Clare Kocher, is perched atop an online writing contest for Harper Collins subsidiary, InkPop. (triblocal.com)

Nobel Prize-winning poet, Wislawa Szymborska, dies at age 88. RIP. (The Telegraph)

American philosopher and Freud-jouster, Frank Cioffi, dies at age 83. (The New York Times)

“On this day in 1970 Bertrand Russell died, aged ninety-seven. Like Henri Bergson before him, Russell won his 1950 Nobel Prize in literature without ever having published any. In presenting the award, the most that the Swedish Academy could offer to justify their selection of a mathematician-philosopher-social activist was the view that Russell often wrote as ‘the outspoken hero in a Shaw comedy’ talked, and that his commitment to ‘rationality and humanity’ was ‘in the spirit of Nobel’s intention.’…) (Today in Literature)

“Always be nice to those younger than you, because they are the ones who will be writing about you.”

-Cyril Connolly

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Joshilyn Jackson’s, A GROWN-UP KIND OF PRETTY, fares well at (Kirkus Reviews)

THE FAULT IN OUR STARS, by John Green, gets all the stars at (USA Today)

The Telegraph finds excellent new volumes of poetry from Kinsella, Byard, Mort, Padel, and Sebald. (The Telegraph)

The San Fransisco Chronicle fairly swoons over Liz Moore’s novel, HEFT. (SFGate.com)

This title is everywhere: THAT’S DISGUSTING: UNRAVELING THE MYSTERIES OF REVULSION, by Rachel Herz. (The Denver Post)

AuthorScoop first met with SR Johannes this past December and we are delighted to have her back so soon, and with great news what’s more! She’s got a new book for the tween set, ON THE BRIGHT SIDE, just newly released and it looks terrific.

We’d like to thank her for coming back once again to take part in our “5 Minutes Alone” interview series.

AuthorScoop: Tell us a little about your new release, ON THE BRIGHT SIDE.

S.R. Johannes (Shelli): Gabby is a disgruntled tween angel who has just been assigned to protect her school nemesis and ex-beffie. Problem is her ex-beffie is dating Gabby’s longtime crush. Instead of protecting Angela, Gabby pranks her (since when is sticking toilet paper to her shoe or spinach in her teeth a sin?) Soon, Gabby gets out of control and is put on probation by her SKYAgent, who has anger management issues of his own. Determined to right her wrongs, Gabby steals an ancient artifact that allows her to return to Earth for just one day. Without knowing, she kicks off a series of events and learns what can happen when you hate someone to death.

AuthorScoop: Was it hard to kill off your main character right from the start and get her playing in the hereafter?

Shelli: Nope. An angel book doesn’t really work unless I kill at least one person off.

The hardest part was 1) making death funny and 2) creating a brand new world from scratch. I wanted to explore the light side of death and to do that I needed to get away from the religious aspects of Heaven. I could only do that by creating a fresh place called Cirrus.

AuthorScoop: Have the rigors of writing back-to-back books changed the way you read?

Shelli: Uh - yeah. I don’t have time to. I don’t get enough time to write as it is so if I read I want to be writing and vice versa. But I will say, these two books have both been written for several years so it’s not like I just wrote them in the last 2 months. It was just a matter of putting them out right. Which was exhausting and gave me very little time to read the last few months.

AuthorScoop: And with the hindsight of a serial YA novelist, what new advice would you offer to aspiring writers?

Shelli: Go with your gut. I’ve realized if I stick to my gut – I never go wrong for me. I find this comes with confidence though. If you are not confident – you are more easily persuaded by feedback. Don’t get me wrong, I get feedback and criticism, but if I am confident, I can tell what I need to change and what needs to stay – no matter what people say.

AuthorScoop: What’s next for S.R. Johannes?

Shelli: I am in an Anthology called IN HIS EYES coming Feb. 14th with me and about 15 other indie authors. The stories included come form our male protags and are written from his perspective about love and loss. I also plan to get the sequel to UNTRACEABLE (called UNCONTROLLABLE) out in the summer. I can’t really see beyond that right now

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ON THE BRIGHT SIDE is available now and S.R. Johannes runs a lovely website that will get you where you need to go for ordering and information. Just make a wish and click. She offers plenty of access via her social media page, and for more up-to-the-minute updates on Shelli and her work, be sure to check out her blog.

125 brand-name authors vote in the Greatest Books of All Time. (The Atlantic)

McGraw-Hill seems to be looking to sell, rather than branch off, its educational endeavors. (Financial Times)

The publisher of Bernard Schlink’s, THE READER, is in a clash over profits from The Weinstein Company’s film adaptation of it. (Deadline.com)

Edinburgh’s International Book Festival - refreshingly - wants authors, not celebrities, for its headline events. (The Guardian)

The National Times makes a case for why teens should read their porn, not watch it. (The Age)

Books bring nations together: Taiwan and China make cooperative noises over their ties in literature. (Focus Taiwan)

If you don’t like Apples terms, don’t use iAuthor, simple as that says (ZDnet.com)

Hank Haney wishes Tiger would read, THE BIG MISS: MY YEARS COACHING TIGER WOODS, before he gets upset about it. (USA Today)

Bangladeshi author, Taslima Nasreen’s, book, NIRBASAN, sparks a controversy at the Kolkata International Book Fair. (TheHindu.com)

Editor, Sam Vaughan, dies at age 83. RIP (the-leader.com)

“On this day in 1814 Lord Byron’s ‘The Corsair’ was published, selling out its entire first run of 10,000 copies. The poem was one of a handful of melodramatic verse-tales written by Byron between 1812-16, a period in which he was at the height of poetic fame in England…” (Today In Literature)

Sir Geoffrey Hill chews on Britain’s Poet Laureate, Carol Ann Duffy. (The Telegraph)

And Geoff Dyer runs Julian Barnes through with a blunt instrument. (Bryan Appleyard)

A diagramming of the struggle a self-published authors face over being taken seriously. (The Huffington Post)

Salon looks at moralizing and point-making in fiction. (Salon Magazine)

McGraw-Hill and its tentacles release last year’s earnings numbers. (Yahoo Finance)

The Scotsman interviews John Brockman on the development of electronic reading. (The Scotsman)

A look at the life and opinions of Adam Phillips. (Bookslut)

On the street where he lived: Dr. Seuss’ legacy from the starting point. (The New York Times)

Occupy Wall Street gets books to gutted Tucson library. (GalleyCat)

“On this day in 1948, J. D. Salinger’s ‘A Perfect Day for Bananafish’ was published in the New Yorker; in the same magazine, on the same day in 1953, Salinger’s ‘Teddy’ also appeared. These are the first and last selections in Nine Stories (1953), Salinger’s only collection apart from various bootlegged editions of the other, forty-odd stories…” (Today In Literature)

The deadline for contributions to World Book Night 2012 is nigh. Like really, freakin’ nigh. Like day after tomorrow nigh. (a-littlebird.com)

Stieg Larsson and his dragon-tattooed girl set them rolling, but Quercus Publishing is still the object in motion. (plus-sx.com)

Jonathan Franzen hates ereaders and ebooks. Some people think he’s dead wrong. (The Telegraph)

And The Atlantic takes it a step further and upwards for electronic reading - into The Cloud as is were. (The Atlantic)

The Guardian muses on a little trimming in the fat-classics department. (The Guardian)

What if there were no Barnes & Noble? (The New York Times)

Preview what’s on tap for March’s meeting of The Association of American Publishers. (publishers.org)

Cory Doctorow dishes on the problem on DRM shackles in electronic publishing. (Publishers Weekly)

NYU shares what books it’s most anticipating in 2012. (NYULOCAL)

Author Alain de Botton champions atheist churches. (The Telegraph)

“On this day in 1933 Ezra Pound met with Benito Mussolini. This was a brief, one-time talk, but it would bring out the worst in Pound’s personality and lead to personal disaster; it would also inspire some of the best of modern poetry….” (Today In Literature)

February will be the launch-pad calendar page for The Month of Letters and a push to revive the art of letter writing. (GalleyCat)

Author, Alec Wilkinson, has a chat with Amazon about his new book, THE ICE BALLOON. (omnivoracious.com)

John Lanchester chews on why John Updike might be too good a writer. (London Review of Books)

Some clown hollowed out a bunch of books and put 36 pounds of cocaine where the words should have been. (DNAinfo.com)

The NY Times profiles poet, John Galassi. (The New York Times)

A year in the life of House of Anansi Press. (The National Post)

Edward St. Aubyn’s congenital silver spoon stirs his imagination and typing fingers to skewer the upper class. (Slate)

Q & A with Walter Mosley in… (The Chicago Sun Times)

“On this day in 1728 John Gay’s The Beggar’s Opera opened in London. Its satire and singability made it a first-run sell-out, a cultural craze across England, the most produced play of the 18th century, and the original ‘ballad opera,’ first in the Gilbert and Sullivan line. Within the first week one London paper was reporting ‘a very general Applause, insomuch that the Waggs say it hath made Rich [the theater manager] very Gay, and probably will make Gay very Rich.’…” (Today In Literature)

From the Odd Files: Someone pretended to be Cormac McCarthy on Twitter. (GalleyCat)

Bloomsbury set to launch new imprint. (The Bookseller)

Henry Miller’s, TROPIC OF CANCER, is a hot topic at the NYTimes podcast feature. (The New York Times)

COMANDO: THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF JOHNNY RAMONE is set to hit the shelves in April. (January Magazine)

We had naked librarians for charity. Now it’s naked poets. (The Huffington Post)

B&N’s Nook to cross The Pond to Waterstones. (CrainsNewYork)

Tick off the President, hit the the bestseller lists. Ask Jan Brewer how. (Politico)

A reflection on the impact of Gertrude Stein at (The New York Times)

“On this day in 1873 Colette (Sidonie-Gabrielle Colette) was born outside Paris. Even given her mythologizing, and her intentional blurring of the lines in her autobiographical fiction, Colette’s full and sensational life made her one of the most popular writers and personalities in the first half of the twentieth century. She wrote over fifty books, and is credited and blamed with much…” (Today In Literature)

Will Maurice Sendak save us from children’s books by Stephen Colbert? Tune in to find out. (GalleyCat)

Caldecott and Newbery winners tell us what it’s like to answer the phone and get the big news. (Publishers Weekly)

The state of poetry in China gives rise to a cause to nurture it. (ChinaDaily.com)

Random House UK editor, Rebecca Carter, switches tracks and becomes a literary agent. (Publishing Perspectives)

Publishing Trends recaps this year’s Digital Book World events. (publishingtrends.com)

The London Book Review posts a a poem about Sherlock Holmes. (lrb)

Buy a good review? Say it isn’t so. (The New York Times)

How Chris Evans learned to love books. (The Telegraph)

The Museum of Modern Art in New York hosts a new exhibit devoted to print works. (The Los Angeles Times)

Simon Garfield rates the fonts. (fastcodesign.com)

“On this day in 1722 Daniel Defoe’s Moll Flanders was published. Defoe’s title page is one of literature’s longest come-hithers, and casts a wide net: ‘The Fortunes and Misfortunes of the Famous Moll Flanders &c who was born at Newgate, and during a Life of continued Variety for Threescore Years, besides her Childhood, was Twelve Year a Whore, five time a Wife (whereof once to her own Brother), Twelve Year a Thief, Eight Year a Transported Felon in Virginia, at last grew rich, liv’d Honest, and died a Penitent.’…” (Today In Literature)

Vladimir Putin compiles a 100 book to-be-read stack for Russian students. (The Guardian)

“There were more books published this week than there were in all of 1950.” Wow. (GalleyCat)

You’ll look silly if you confuse Shakespeare with The Telegraph’s chief book reviewer. (The Telegraph)

New York City’s mayor, Michael Bloomberg, has his reading tastes reviewed. (The New York Times)

A closer look as to why Andrew Miller’s, PURE, was awarded the Costa Prize. (The Telegraph)

If Scotland leaves, it’s taking its literature with it. (The Guardian)

Sesame Street joins forces with Random House to make ebooks for early readers. (DigitalBookWorld.com)

The Indian media weighs in on the Salman Rushdie mess in Jaipur. (The Wall Street Journal)

Mid-grade author, Peter Johnson, chats with Kirkus. (Kirkus Reviews)

Here’s a peek at the mansions of fifteen famous writers. (flavorwire)

A writer’s research leaves him scalded by the state of human trafficking. (The Huffington Post)

Apps and the publishing industry, a love/hate relationship. (The Bookseller)

“On this day in 1788 Captain Arthur Phillip brought the first British convict ships to anchor in Botany Bay, Australia. Over the next eighty years 825 such ships would bring 160,000 men and women to serve their “transportation” sentence — seven years for most, fourteen or life for some, no time at all for the significant number unable to survive the eight-month voyage. Captain Phillip went on to become the first Governor of Australia, and today became Australia Day…” (Today In Literature)

“Call it vanity, call it arrogant presumption, call it what you wish, but I would grope for the nearest open grave if I had no newspaper to work for, no need to search for and sometimes find the winged word that just fits, no keen wonder over what each unfolding day may bring.”

- Bob Considine

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Andrew Miller takes the Costa Award for his novel, PURE. (The Guardian)

… and it was a wrangle amongst the judges, too. Here are the top five literary prize battles, according to (The Telegraph)

For all it’s worth, Washington, DC is (once again) the most literate city in the US. (USA Today)

… and in the city, a famous bookstore, Politics & Prose, sets up a business model and cultivates a culture that seems to work, even in this economy. (The Atlantic)

Hey! They get their ideas from somewhere, you know. 11 Academy Award nominees are novel adaptations. (The Huffington Post)

Here’s a list of good books to watch for, coming this year from Down Under. (Library journal)

Houghton Mifflin Harcourt joins hands with The Devil. Wait. That’s not right. It’s just Amazon. (GalleyCat)

A turkey, not metaphorical, but flapping and gobbling, breaks into a South Dakota library. (The Huffington Post)

Author, Charla Krupp, dies at age 58. RIP. (The New York Daily News)

“On this day in 1759 Robert Burns was born in Alloway, Scotland, and on this night lovers of Burns or Scotland or conviviality will gather around the world to celebrate the fact. Burns was elevated to national hero in his lifetime and cult figure soon afterwards, the first Burns Night celebration occurring almost immediately upon his death. This is due partly to the poetry and partly to the legendary details of the ploughman-poet life — his years as a poor tenant farmer; his enthusiasm for women (fifteen children, six born out of wedlock)…” (Today In Literature)

There are the words, then there are how the words look. Here’s a peek inside the sketchbooks of typeface designers. (brainpickings.org)

The Chicago Tribune unveils its new Sunday book section, a premium subscription addition planned for test roll out this Sunday. (The Chicago Tribune)

A tightrope walk, a diplomacy gauntlet, a teasing out of tangles - an examination of the subtleties of poetry editing. (The Telegraph)

Recap of the Caldecott and Newbery awards presentations. (The Los Angeles Times)

Oh dear. Rehabilitated? John Hinckley, Jr. hovers at a shelf of books on assassinations at Barnes & Noble. (The Washington Post)

Now Salman Rushdie can’t even phone it in to the Jaipur Literary Festival. Or video-call it, as it were. (The Times of India)

The shortlist is up for The British Science Fiction Awards. (The Guardian)

A love advice Twitter-spree from Lemony Snicket should be good fun. (The Huffington Post)

A list of bestsellers that a lot of readers seem to hate is on tap at (GalleyCat)

The ebook revolution drifts Down Under. (smartoffice.com)

“On this day in 1670 English playwright William Congreve was born. His ‘comedy of manners’ toasted and tilted at the ‘gala day of wit and pleasure’ enjoyed by those who lived in the inner circles of Restoration power, or wished they did. His characters live the court-life fast and loose, and always rise to their names: Fondlewife, Maskwell, Wishfort, Witwoud…” (Today In Literature)

Author, Kong Yalei, celebrates the Chinese New Year with a wonderful essay on reading. (Granta)

Big day for children’s literature: Caldecott and Newbery Prizes awarded today! (The New York Times)

The bestseller lists, explained. (The Sacramento Bee)

The New Republic dissects the shade and nuance of journalistic language. (The New Republic)

Those sexy Canadians and their sexy literature. ‘Tis true. Check it out. (January Magazine)

Stephen King uses all his fingers to count up his favorite books. But, with as much as he reads, I’ll bet he wished he had a lot more hands. (The Christian Science Monitor)

The San Fransisco Chronicle lets the first lines of a few novels speak for themselves. (SFGate.com)

Barack Obama’s reading habits are scrutinized across The Pond. (The Telegraph)

If we write it, they will come: American authors and their sports novels. (Slate)

NPR chews on “predatory” Amazon. (NPR)

Simon Doonan is a little bit crazy, but he’s got a funny book and he’ll tell you how to get your picture taken flatteringly. (USA Today)

“On this day in 1930 Derek Walcott was born on St. Lucia. Walcott’s two-dozen collections of poems and plays — one recent work, Tiepolo’s Hound, widens the range by including his paintings — earned the 1992 Nobel…” (Today In Literature)

The National Book Critics Circle posts their list of finalists for its 2011 honors. (bookcritics.org)

The plot thickens: Salman Rushdie accuses the police of inventing the threats against him to keep him from the Jaipur Literary Festival. (The Daily Beast)

A look at the pending Costa Awards and its current shortlist via (The Guardian)

By today’s standard, Robert Burns might have been a terrorist. (The Scotsman)

Somebody’s buying a lot of ebooks, but nearly a quarter of the Christmas Kindle-gifted say they haven’t turned the thing on yet. (pocket-lint.com)

3M holds court at The American Library Association’s Mid-Winter event to showcase its Cloud Library for ebooks. (Yahoo Business)

While the ALA powers schedule a session with half of The Big Six to chew through more tangles in ebook lending policy. (Library Journal)

The Writers Guild is set to honor achievement in video game writing. (GalleyCat)

Richard Ketchum, author and editor, dead at 89. RIP. (The New York Times)

“On this day, fifteen years apart, Arthur Miller’s The Crucible (1953) and Thornton Wilder’s Our Town (1938) premiered. Although both were poorly reviewed to start, The Crucible would win a Tony and Our Town a Pulitzer; and both would become not only classics of American theater, but classic, opposite statements on the idea of community living…” (Today In Literature)

Jennifer Egan is the poster child for the upside of failure. (CNN)

January Magazine gets a kick out of the New York Daily News’ headline on BELOVED banning. (January Magazine)

French publisher, Flammarion, may soon be up for sale, as RCS considers heaving ballast. (Bloomberg)

A first edition copy of Audubon’s, BIRDS OF AMERICA, stretches towards $8 million at auction. (nydailynews.com)

The New York Times hosts a book discussion podcast. (The New York Times)

The U.S. Naval Observatory donates a rare volume to Thomas Jefferson’s Library. (loc.gov)

New book explores how our attitudes towards sex and morality aren’t as new as we might think. (The Guardian)

Waterstones picks eleven authors to watch in 2012. (The Telegraph)

“On this day in 1950 George Orwell died, aged forty-six. Whatever Orwell achieved in his last years seems over-balanced by what he suffered. Against the acclaim earned by the two famous novels — Animal Farm in 1945 and 1984 just seven months before Orwell died — stands a withering series of personal challenges…” (Today In Literature)