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                       Writing Love and Sex Scenes in Crime Novels Who cannot be aware of the well-deserved ruckus concerning cultural appropriation? It is no longer acceptable to ape features or stereotypes of another gender, race, ethnicity, or any demographic we do not personally occupy. Each such group in its own way has been culturally, economically, or otherwise deprived, and now demands its place in the sun. What is the fiction writer to do? We create all kinds of characters, and though it is wise to consider submitting certain of our work to “sensitivity readers,” some of us are loath to do that for a variety of reasons, mine being I don’t want anybody besides a professional editor telling me how to write. Yet, there is peril. My own response is to write characters within the confines of universal responses and feelings.   It’s safe to say we all feel threa...

  Death in the Family by Lanny Larcinese ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ GENRE : Crime thriller ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ BLURB: Donny Lentini is a talented young man hungry for his mother's love. To please her, he becomes guardian angel to his mob-wannabe father. When the father is murdered and found with his hands hacked off, Donny is dealt a set of cards in a game called vengeance. The pot is stacked high with chips; the ante, his soul and the lives of loved-ones. With the help of friends—ex-con, defrocked Jesuit Bill Conlon along with former high-school nemesis, Antwyne Claxton—he digs for whether the murder had anything to do with the mob's lust for a real estate parcel owned by the family of Donny's lover. He's new at this game. He doesn't cheat, but plays his cards well. And he gets what he wants. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Excerpt One: There is a purity to poker, moments of truth free of the ambiguity of motive or morals, moments philosophers never examine—clean moments—as when a...