Sock It To Me

You can read an excerpt from my new book MR. MONK GOES TO GERMANY here.

Comments

[Rory L. Aronsky]

Lee, I started reading your blog around the time you posted the article about that student reading a certain high number of words and the subsequent package you sent to him with many of your books. Then of course I read about your siblings being writers as well (that's some set of genes to be born with) and of course your association with "Monk" by way of your books.

Recently, I scrolled down the sidebar containing descriptions of your books and was surprised to find that I had not heard of "Hollywood & Crime." I put that on hold through the County of Los Angeles library system recently and it's sitting among one of three deep stacks of books from the Valencia library (95% of the books are from other branches), waiting to be read.

Then I decided it was time. I'd read a lot about "Monk" from your blog, but had never seen the show and last week, I Netflixed the first disc of the first season and watched it all in one sitting.

I was interested from the first minute in seeing Monk and his obsessive-compulsive tendencies, but I became completely hooked towards the end of the pilot episode, where Sharona's been nabbed by the gunman and there's a shot where Monk has dropped a wipe onto each rung of the sewer ladder, stepping on each one as he goes down.

Unfortunately, I can't devote all three slots of my Netflix account to the show (one I use for freelance work with a website called ScreenIt (www.screenit.com) for reviews of films pre-1996), but I intend to see every episode now.

And "Monk" is an inspiration to me because I've still got the problem of thinking too much about how every thought sounds in my writing. A show like "Monk" demonstrates to me that sometimes, you can just write and see what comes out. Doesn't matter how it sounds, just that it gets out, gets on paper and takes on its own life.

I look forward to seeing the episodes that you wrote as well.

[Rory L. Aronsky]

Oh, and your "Monk" books. I think after I've seen a good number of the episodes, I'm going to start on those.

[Danny Barer]

I suspect that the missing sock is the key to the entire mystery.

[Lee Goldberg]

I am not that clever. But I have used socks to solve a crime before in one of my books, just not in this one.

[Dan Williams]

I laughed outloud six times. Thoroughly entertaining. Disher is such an excellent character. He really wants to do something and I find myself rooting for him and Natalie.

If the missing sock really was the key to the crime, would that be a horse of a different color? (Now Lee's got me making puns!)

Hope it's a great L.A. day.

[Ann Peek]

What a funny excerpt. I do have a question though. Randy did pert-near the same thing in Outer Space - with the Desecraton League of San Fransisco. Is this going to be a type of running gag, only less important each time?

[Lee Goldberg]

I think you mean the Special Desecration Unit, not the "Desecration League of San Francisco."
That particular Disher storyline in OUTER SPACE ran through the whole book -- this is more of an isolated vignette.

[Ann Peek]

Okay. Thank-y. I meant no disrespect for the mangling of the Special Desecration Unit (Outer Space was actually my favorite Monk book so far because of the SDU, and the Sci-Fi-Geek theme) I loaned my book out to a prospective Monk proselyte and used it as a tract. I did, however, remember Desecration and ran w/ it. Looking forward to the future novels, and especially what can be better than romance in Miserable.