C.R. Corwin is in Arkansas this week, receiving the prestigious Gooseberry Award In Contemporary Fiction. In his absence, we run this recent interview with Lloyd Hemphill, editor of Flyover Country Mystery Writers’ Magazine:

Hemphill: C.R., The Unraveling Violeta Bell is your sixth novel in ten years. That’s a lot of work. Which do you like better, boiled eggs or bananas?

Corwin: Uh—

Hemphill: I mean, they’re both great, aren’t they? The egg has a shell. The banana has a peel. You can eat them and the packaging is biodegradable. So as different as they appear, they’re sort of the same.

Corwin: Oh–I see what you’re getting at. I write both mysteries and literary novels. You’re asking which I like best. Clever.

Hemphill: So, which do you like the best?

Corwin: I guess I like them about the same.

Hemphill: Of course the eggs have to be boiled first. Which makes them different, I guess.

Corwin: We’re back on that, are we?

Hemphill: Actually, I was being metaphoric again. Writing a mystery must be way easier than writing a literary novel.

Corwin: Actually, it’s the other way around. With my mysteries I have to do a lot more plotting. Clues, evidence, suspects, all that. Everything has to relate to the murder in some way. So my outlines are far more in-depth. With my literary novels I work from a much loser outline and let the characters dictate where things are going. Of course I yank on the reins if they get too crazy.

Hemphill: I guess you could boil a banana if you wanted to.

Corwin: Look, Lloyd, I have to catch a bus to Hot Springs at three o’clock. Could we focus here?

Hemphill: Sorry. Let’s see: Your sleuth, Maddy Sprowls is an elderly woman. Do you secretly wish you were an elderly woman?

Corwin: Are you sure you’re the editor of –

Hemphill: Hey! There’s nothing wrong with wishing you were somebody else. I, for example, wish I was Zorro.

Corwin: That explains the mask and the pencil mustache.

Hemphill: Actually, I’m not wearing a mask.

Corwin: Really? You look like a raccoon.

Hemphill: I haven’t been getting much sleep.

Corwin: Afraid you’re going to swallow that centipede on your upper lip?

Hemphill: You know C.R., I don’t have to put you in my magazine.

Corwin: That would be a shame. What’s your circulation up to now? Eleven? Twelve?

Hemphill: That’s it. The interview is over.

Corwin: Ah, I was just kidding, Lloyd. I love your mustache. Very machismo insequro, to use a literary term.

Hemphill: Really?

Corwin: Cross my heart.

Hemphill: Boiled egg?

Corwin: Don’t mind if I do.

(Actually, C.R. was at Malice Domestic in Washignton this weekend and Monday was enroute to the Festival of Mystery in Pittsburgh. Two great events.)