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Home » Weekly Roundup of History, Archaeology and Writing Wisdom Feb 20-March 4

Weekly Roundup of History, Archaeology and Writing Wisdom Feb 20-March 4

Logo of Left Coast Crime Cactus CaperI’ve been very busy and missed putting up a post last week. Among other things, I attended Left Coast Crime and had a delightful time meeting readers and reconnecting with lots of writer friends. The panel I participated in was knock-out with Priscilla Royal, Sharan Newman, John Maddox Roberts and Susan McDuffie, as moderator. What a smart, august crowd I was honored to speak amongst! Lots of people came up afterwards and asked when my Hittite mystery series will come out. No date now, but life is looking hopeful for Queen Puduhepa and the various villains she’s been tracking down. That’s part of what I’ve been so busy with lately. I’ll keep you all posted.

Here are some posts I enjoyed from around the web the last couple weeks (when I had any time to look.)

“A chain of improbable events” says archaeologist: a mammoth gets buried, stays buried, the land is purchased by a vertebrate paleontologist and then also the animal met its end and was utilized by Clovis people as evidenced by the presence of one of the distinctive fluted points they used. A rather miraculous find of the earliest people in North America (Clovis) and their mammoth hunt kill. The previous largest find spot gave these prehistoric people their name: Clovis, New Mexico. Click here for University of New Mexico “An Afternoon Walk and A Mammoth Find” 

“Everything I need to know about dialogue I learned from Aaron Sorkin” This is an entertaining post whether you write dialogue for a living or read it for pleasure. The art of the brief window into a character with wit and intelligence. From a favorite website of mine, Writer Unboxed. Click here for Writer Unboxed “Everything I Need to Know about Character I Learned from Aaron Sorkin”

image of Double handled drinking cups
Double handled drinking cups from Istanbul Museum

The finds revealing Mycenaean life in the time period I write about just keep popping up in northern Greece. This time 31 stone cist graves with jewelry and kylikes (elegant stemmed ceramic drinking cups). Lots of intact bones. It will be interesting to see as time goes by if anyone is going to do special studies of these bones. Ancient history keeps expanding daily. Only a tiny portion of the overall site has been excavated so I’m sure there will be much more coming each season. Click here for 31 intact burials unearthed at large Mycenaean cemetery”