WIPs Unwrapped

In an unusual moment of clarity, I realized that I knew nothing of my fellow bloggers’ WIPs, an unforgivable lapse since we all blog to promote our work. Last week, I asked James Montgomery Jackson and Alex Morgan about their WIPS. This week, I ask the same questions of WWK alumnae Pauline Alldred and current blogger Linda Rodriguez.

 Pauline Alldred

1. What is the title or tentative title for your WIP?
The tile for my WIP is DAD’S CHOICE. As the protagonist confronts obstacles and antagonists, the choice becomes hers.

2. Tell us your jacket hook.
DAD’S CHOICE, combines a hair-raising plot involving murder, money laundering and human traffickers with the secrets and emotional conflicts of a family in crisis. The novel is set in Boston and Cambridge, Massachusetts in 1995, the year when O.J. Simpson was tried for murder. Jess, the protagonist struggles to master Windows ’95 and learns her two pound mobile phone can be used as a weapon.

Co-owner of a visiting nurse company, Jess believes she’s reached the point of taking charge of her life with work she enjoys and a potential life partner. However, the death of her estranged father and the disappearance of her sister plunge her into the task of unraveling past secrets and forgiving family members who prefer her to focus on their needs. At a turning point in the story, the villain offers her the choice—to save her family members and, accepting disgrace, to give up her business or to keep her business and let her family members save themselves without her help.

3. In which stage of progress is your WIP?

This is the first draft of my WIP. Since I belong to a Guppy critique group, I revise chapters on a regular basis. However, I am not trying to polish my writing to perfection because I want to give free rein to my imagination and subconscious before tackling the inconsistencies and gaffs I am sure are there.

4. How many hours a week do you work on your WIP?
I write for three to four hours a day but spend at least two more hours thinking about characters, plot, and problems in the writing so far. I am often doing other tasks while thinking about my WIP.

5. What are your aspirations for your WIP?
I plan to enter DAD’S CHOICE in competitions. So far, the competitions I am considering are, the Amazon Break through Novel Award, AWP Award Series, First Crime Novel, Daphne du Maurier Award, and the Pikes Peak Writers Fiction Contest. As the novel develops, I may revise this list. Briefly, I will look for an agent but, in the present and future publishing environment, I am not certain about the role of an agent. I attempt to keep up to date with news about small presses and e-books and about the future of reading in general. The digital age and even education has brought changes in how people satisfy their need for stories.

6. Where do you hope to be at the end of the year?
At the end of this year, I hope I will be at the point of deepening DAD’S CHOICE, revising the main character’s emotional arc, and I will be able to see when it is time to stop meddling.

Linda Rodriguez

1. Name the title or tentative title of your WIP.
EVERY BROKEN TRUST. This is the sequel to Every Last Secret, which is going out for reviews from St. Martin’s Press/Minotaur Books as I write this.

2. Provide the jacket blurb of your WIP.
Here’s part of the jacket copy for Every Last Secret: Half-Cherokee Marquitta “Skeet” Bannion thought she was leaving her troubles behind when she fled the stress of being the highest ranking woman on the Kansas City Police Department, a jealous cop ex-husband who didn’t want to let go, and a disgraced alcoholic ex-cop father. Moving to a small town to be chief of the campus police force, she builds a life outside of police work. She might even begin a new relationship with the amiable Brewster police chief.

All of this is threatened when the student editor of the college newspaper is found murdered on campus. Skeet must track down the killer following trails that lead to some of the most powerful people in the university. In the midst of her investigation, Skeet takes up responsibility for a vulnerable teenager as her ex-husband and seriously ailing father wind up back on her hands. Time is running out and college administrators demand she conceal all college involvement in the murder, but Skeet will not stop until she's unraveled every last secret.

I don’t have jacket copy for EVERY BROKEN TRUST yet, but here’s the synopsis:
In EVERY BROKEN TRUST, Skeet Bannion manages, most days, to balance her job as chief of campus police with her unexpected responsibilities for raising a teenage boy and overseeing her difficult father’s rehab from a stroke. When her best friend and surrogate mother, Karen Wise, is attacked and becomes involved with murder that stretches back into the past and the supposedly accidental death of Karen’s husband, Skeet finds their relationship strained. As Karen grows obsessed with finding her husband’s killer and becomes a suspect in new slayings, Skeet must work with and against her beloved friend and her own adopted son to save Karen’s life and her freedom.

3. In what stage of progress is your WIP?
Every Last Secret is out for reviews while EVERY BROKEN TRUST is in final revisions.

4. How many hours per week do you devote to their writing?
I treat it as a job, 8 hours/ day to it, usually 4-5 hours/day writing with the rest of the workday devoted to promotion and writing business. Right now, with a book coming out, I’m devoting more time to promotion and writing business, so I’m only writing 3-4 hours/day. On weekends, I work for 2-3 hours/day.

 5. What are your aspirations for this WIP?
Most of all, I want to reach readers who will enjoy and appreciate my stories and my people. I hope to garner excellent reviews and plenty of online buzz for my first book, Every Last Secret, and then I hope it will win awards. I also hope to sign a contract with my publisher for several more novels in the EVERY series with Skeet Bannion.

6. By the end of the year, where do you hope to be with this WIP?
I hope by the end of this year to have finished the first draft of the third book in the EVERY series, EVERY HARD HOMECOMING, and to be talking with my publisher about another series I have in mind in which they’ve expressed interest. I’d also like to see Every Last Secret up for some first-book awards in the mystery community.

7. In what area of the country are your novels set?
They are set in a fictional small college town a few miles outside Kansas City, Missouri, right next to the Missouri river and the border between Missouri and Kansas.

8. Will St. Martin’s help publicize your first release?
St. Martin’s has assigned me a publicist and will have an active campaign to sell the book to libraries around the country. They have been working to get Every Last Secret selected by national book clubs, and I hope to share good news on that front shortly. They are giving me a platform on their huge website, Criminal Element. I’ve been setting up events for a book tour myself, but my publicist is helping with that and making sure my books are in stores for all of them. My publicist is seeing that my books go out for review and persuading the big outlets to review them. Most of it I’m doing myself, but I feel fortunate they’re doing what they are since most big trade publisher do almost nothing for first novels.

9. How long have you been writing, and how long does it usually take to complete a manuscript?
I started as a novelist as a very young wife and mother (twins the hard way—less than a year apart). Later, I became a university administrator and turned to poetry because I never had any chunks of time to work on novels, just minutes here and there. Poetry works better under those circumstances. I had success—publication, books, awards—and I’ll continue to write poetry, but when Ill health forced me from my job, I turned back to the novel. I wrote Every Last Secret over two years and started sending it out three years ago. My newest book, EVERY BROKEN TRUST, was begun after I learned I’d won the Malice Domestic First Novel Competition with Every Last Secret—in May 2011. I’m finishing the last revisions right now. It wouldn’t have taken so long, but I had a lot of traveling in there.

10. Do you work with a critique group or partner?
I’m fortunate enough to be married to a publisher and editor. My husband runs a university literary press. He’s my first reader. Then I have a fabulous critique group, The Novel Group, with three other women novelists in Kansas City, and I regularly attend the Book Dissection Group of my local Sisters in Crime chapter. This is a wonderful post-graduate workshop in crime writing led by Nancy Pickard. So I’m very lucky.

Farewell to Thursday Blogging

I have enjoyed blogging on Writers Who Kill and feel honored to be a member but my life is very crowded at the moment. Finding time to work on my WIP and short stories is becoming increasingly difficult. Therefore reluctantly I must say goodbye to the blog readers.

I look forward to hearing about further developments in the lives and writing careers of my co-bloggers. Three new writers are joining the blog, Gloria Alden, Alyx Morgan, and Linda Rodiguez, and I am sure their contributions will be interesting and worthwhile reading.

Thank you again to the blog readers and to my co-bloggers, dedicated to the art and craft of writing.

Sharing the Pleasures of Reading

In preparation for 2012, I’ve transferred all my passwords scribbled on two disintegrating pieces of paper onto a Rolodex. I’ve removed from the top of my scanner the piles of often needed reference books and printed online advice. With a present of a MP3 player, I’ve joined the ranks of the miniature digital world. How can a gadget so small hold so much downloaded music that travels weightlessly on my person from computer to bathroom and to mailbox?

Most of all, in the upcoming year, I look forward to attending two local book discussion groups, one for mysteries and one for non-genre books. Several of the readers in the mystery group also belong to the other group, seemingly unaware of less prestige given to genre writers. In fact, the readers don’t seem interested in writers’ egos and problems. The readers’ great love is the stories themselves. Readers are willing to attend writer presentations free of charge. However they seem no more interested in long and torturous biographies for writers than for creators of anything else they purchase.

Gone by Mo Hayder deals with the kidnapping of children. Several American editors and publishers refuse to consider this topic. However kidnapping exists in the US and readers in the discussion group identified with anguished parents.

In the non-genre book group, we read Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand by Helen Simonson and readers expressed the opinion that the themes were safe because they happened outside America. Themes such as the clash between the Pakistani Muslim culture and British culture could be examined without reservations.

Readers in both groups are intelligent and knowledgeable readers and the librarians that lead the groups understand books. They all display a love of the written word that I’d guess most writers want to engage. Also, as readers, they want the writer to present them with subject matter and characters that make them think as well as entertain them. In Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand, readers enjoyed the romance between a middle-aged couple from vastly different and opposing backgrounds. Readers like being party to the thoughts, feelings and observations of fictional characters no matter how flawed. Several readers expressed pleasure at well-written sentences and evocative images.

With the internet, intellectual information travels fast. People in rural areas are as well-informed as city dwellers. Perhaps readers in rural areas have fewer distractions and curling up with a good book seems very attractive when snow piles up outside and it’s a long, dangerous drive to the nearest theater or restaurant.

The next book we’ll discuss is Jo Nesbo’s The Snowman. Some discussion group members would prefer less violent mysteries because their workplace presents them with enough hassles without seeking out fictional wake-up situations.

I enjoy being part of both discussion groups with members who clearly love reading and don’t just skin through what they read. As a writer, I welcome the opinions of readers.

Two Days before Christmas by Pauline Alldred

Emma struggled to avoid skidding toward the evergreen trees close to the pavement as snowflakes slanted across the country road that wound through the woods where she’d played as a child. When she’d worked as a nurse, she learned some of the veterans she cared for lived in these same woods. She wondered how her patients especially the ones with artificial limbs could survive the winter months here.

The snow obscured her vision but she thought she saw movement at the side of the road. She gripped the steering wheel, fearful of spinning out. Had she imagined it? At seventy-eight, she knew she had to monitor her eyesight regularly and her last check-up had been fine. There it was again. She could barely make out the two figures trudging along the breakdown lane through the slush and ice. How could they see her or the roadway with the wind whipping snow into their faces?

Even in a blizzard, she wasn’t going to offer a ride to strangers. No point asking for trouble. Decelerating for safety so as not to skid into the couple, she glanced away from the snow-covered road just long enough to realize one of them had the shape of a heavily pregnant woman. The man held an arm around her but she still looked as though she hesitated with each step.

Emma thought of her grandkids and her daughter trying to raise them alone. If it were them slogging through this storm, she would hope that someone would stop to help them.

She slowed to a stop not far from the couple. Perhaps they owned the car she’d seen abandoned on the shoulder about half a mile back. Leaning across her car, she opened the passenger side door and gasped as icy air rushed into the car. The young man smiled at Emma. Snow clung to his jacket and jeans. He couldn’t be more than twenty-one or –two.

“Where are you going? Can I give you a ride?” Emma said.

“We’d really appreciate that. We live a couple of miles up the road. Could my wife sit in the back and put her feet up? She’ll take her boots off.”

“Of course.”

The young man opened the back door and assisted his wife into the car. Emma waited for him to climb into the passenger seat.

A chopping blow knocked her hands off the steering wheel. The man reached across and turned off the engine. Oh My God, she was trapped with no one to help her. How could she let this happen? Emma tried to grab the key so she could jab it in the young man’s face but something thick and soft was pulled tight around her face. The woman laughed as Emma struggled to breathe.

“At least we didn’t have to wait so long this time,” the woman said. “You were a genius to think of the baby bump.”

Emma struck out with both fists and connected with an unshaven cheek.

“Bitch,” the man said.

Whatever covered her face was pulled tighter. Rough hands grabbed her right arm and yanked it to the side and backward. Emma heard the bone snap. Pain paralyzed her.

“Enough, Grandma. My arms are getting tired holding this pillow,” the woman said.

Emma heard the man get out of the car. Twisting and turning in her seat, she grasped the woman’s hands and wrestled to pull the pillow off her face. The man opened Emma’s door and dragged her onto the road.

Emma noticed the woman’s smile of triumph as she dropped the pillow onto the back seat. She’d used it as a baby bump, as a blindfold, and to obstruct Emma’s breathing. Once out of the car, the woman tried to pull Emma’s hands behind her back. Emma kicked backward and managed to free her uninjured arm. The man slapped her face hard. She fought to keep her balance. The woman grabbed Emma’s arms and secured her wrists with duct tape. Waves of stabbing pain radiated to Emma’s right shoulder and wrist.

The man tied a scarf so tightly over Emma’s eyes that it irritated them.

“You lived too long.” The man pushed Emma forward.

Stumbling in the snow, she counted her steps. It might help to know how far they made her walk. Emma still had strong legs because she’d been active all her life but she doubted whether she could outrun the young couple. She had to conserve energy.

“What do you want?” Emma asked. “Money?” She’d used most of her cash but she had a credit card.

“We take what we want. Check her pockets.”

By the amount of force used, Emma guessed the man gripped her in a choke hold. Afraid he’d strangle her if she struggled, she still felt a rush of anger as fingers probed the pockets of her jacket and pants. Finally, the man let her go and pushed her to her knees.

“Nothing except a tissue and a piece of candy,” the woman said.

“Everything’s in your car. Plus keys to your house.”

A job well done his tone implied. Snow numbed Emma’s skin. She heard an engine start. As though she were a rag doll, she was picked up and dumped astride what could be a snowmobile. Sandwiched between the two young people, she felt the vehicle jump forward and the motor’s vibrations shoot down her broken arm as they sped uphill.

“This is a lot easier than the sled we used for the first one.” The woman’s voice faded in and out. “No one will ever see our snowmobile behind all those trees. You think of everything.”

The wind hurt Emma’s teeth. She’d lost her hat in the scuffle beside her car. Her ears ached. At last, the vehicle spun and stopped.

Hands shoved her, knocking her off the snowmobile. Emma fell hard, her right arm under her. Snow muffled her cry of pain.

“You’re fantastic, the way you always find the spot where your mom made you drop the puppy.” The woman’s tone sounded almost conversational.

Emma struggled to sit up, to escape the wet snow on her skin. With her wrists tied, she had to push on her knuckles and kept falling back. What did they plan to do with her now—break more bones?

“Bitch was a lousy mother, would’ve let us go if she could’ve got away with it.”

Emma heard a hint of sadness in the man’s voice.

“Your classmates, the ones who put the puppy’s half-eaten body in your locker at school weren’t your friends and they still aren’t.”

“They didn’t kill it. Mom did.”

Emma shivered. The woman sounded as though she’d do whatever the man wanted. Emma couldn’t drive a wedge between them. What did the woman see in him? He obviously had issues. In Emma’s experience, men who hated their mothers rarely made considerate lovers.

“I drop out of school to get a job to help her and the second I’m fired, she kicks me out. I should’ve iced her years ago.”

“I know people who can help you with a place to live and a job,” Emma said.

“Shut up.” The hate in the woman’s voice made Emma recoil. “Let’s get out of here. She’s history.”

The snowmobile started up. Struggling to free her hands, Emma heard the chug of the engine diminish until there was nothing except the howl of the wind and the splat of wet snow falling into more snow. Pain in her broken arm dominated her thinking. She couldn’t give in to it. She bit into her numb lower lip.

Had the wet snow weakened the duct tape? Moving her body like a clumsy beached walrus, she used her frozen fingers to search beneath the snow for a young shoot or a sharp rock she could use to cut the tape. By the time she located a prickly low shrub, she no longer felt her fingers. Looping her wrists over a short branch, she pulled away from it, gasping as her right arm throbbed. Crying aloud, tugging with all her strength, she split part of the tape. She dragged her good hand free and pushed on it until she sat upright.

Her head bent forward so far that her chin almost rested on her chest, she waited for her breathing and heart rate to slow. The young couple might have left her to die but Emma had no intention of letting that happen. She needed only one hand to push off the blindfold. She had no flashlight and darkness pressed in around her. All her bones ached from the freezing temperature. Her struggling had made her perspire. She couldn’t feel the skin on her face and ears. Icicles made her hair heavy. She knew the danger of losing head heat.

She leaned against the shrub. If the prickles stuck in her skin, she didn’t feel them. Bending her knees, she tensed her leg muscles and dug her feet into the ground beneath the snow. With the help of her good hand and arm, she staggered to her feet. She took a step and stumbled as her legs shook. What was wrong with her? She’d lived in the Northeast all her life and knew cold. If she didn’t move, she’d die of hypothermia. But which way? Trees packed close together yielded no clues to help her pick a direction.

Her feet sank into deep snow. She knew the part of the woods close to where she’d stopped to pick up the young couple. The dense canopy of overhead branches blocked out moonlight so she couldn’t see the time on her watch and had to guess how long she’d spent on the snowmobile. They’d driven uphill so, whether the couple had taken a direct or diagonal route, she knew she would eventually hit the narrow clearing where fire had destroyed all the trees or she’d reach the lake. If she arrived at the clearing, she’d travel west until she found the lake. Hunters made camp close by. Buoyed by the hope she wasn’t completely lost, she stepped forward.

The first time she stumbled, she put out her right hand to save herself and cried out as the ragged ends of her broken bones jammed against each other. She had to keep moving and used her good hand to push against tree trunks to gain extra momentum. Something plopped rhythmically into the snow—she froze. Had to be paws, not feet. Prey animals sought out the vulnerable. She imagined a wolf with hot, smelly breath sinking its teeth into her neck. Teeth breaking through the skin would hurt but what about when they reached muscle and bone? Snow hid any sticks or small rocks she could use as a weapon. The bite of a hungry animal could immediately cut off her air supply and blood to her brain, certainly a better death than being mauled and eaten alive.

The sound of movement through the snow receded. She heard only the wind and the rattle of ice on pine needles. Thick branches helped shield her a little from the falling snow. Trying to ignore the icy water in her boots, she imagined the orange-red of a blazing fire and the smell of roasted chicken.

Tears caused by the wind stung her cheeks. Her throat hurt and she had to take short breaths. Was this how life would end for her? Alone and so cold? As a nurse, she’d become familiar with death. She’d lived a full life. Perhaps she’d been luckier than the young couple that abandoned her. She shrank from believing people could be cruel for no reason. That would be like giving up on years of trust and hope. But she’d been stupid to offer a ride to strangers, and now thought how easy it would have been to dial 911 and gotten them assistance. The woman with a pillow stuffed under her jacket had reminded Emma of her daughter, the reason she stopped. A sentimental trusting old fool, Emma had to pay for her mistake. A pain in her side made her bend forward. She was so tired. She pulled back her shoulders. Giving up so soon, a voice whispered in her head?

She called out to her daughter and grandkids. If only she could see them once more. She leaned against a tree trunk. A long time ago, she’d realized she had to die to make room for other generations. She thought of young soldiers destroyed before they could enjoy peace and of children suffering illnesses that stunted their growth and stopped their play. Memories of what life had given her flooded her brain. Perhaps she was overdue for death but she never imagined it would be like this.

She pushed away from the tree trunk. As though they’d lost bone and muscle, her legs trembled. Her lungs burned from the cold. She made herself take another step, then another, the uneven ground jolting her spine. Eventually she’d drop into the snow. How could a seventy-eight year old heart keep up with the demands she placed on it?

Reaching the top of a mound, she expected to see the clearing but instead looked down on what shone in the moonlight like glittering metal. She’d reached the lake. Could she walk across the ice?

At the edge of the lake, she dug beneath the snow with her boots, reached sandy dirt, and used it to cover the soles of her boots to provide traction. She took a step onto the ice and instinctively tried to raise both arms for balance but her right arm hung limply at her side. There was no possibility of her walking the distance around the lake. She kept her head down, focusing on where she placed her feet. How could the cold make her stomach and bowels hurt so much?

She thought of her husband, a good man who’d died too soon. She had no idea whether she’d see him when she died but now she felt his presence. Voices she remembered from long ago whispered but she couldn’t make out what they said. Her knees started to buckle and she had to hold her injured arm to her body because it wouldn’t break her fall. She heard a whooshing sound behind her but her neck hurt too much for her to turn her head. Without trees to lessen its power, the wind scoured her exposed skin. Using her one good hand, she struggled to pull up the back of her jacket to shield her ears and face. The shrieking of the storm and the swirling snowflakes took away her hearing and vision. She had to keep going towards the cabin she remembered close to the lake.

“Okay, Ma’am. You picked a real bad time for midnight skating.”

The human voice broke through her semi-consciousness. She smelled whisky breath and sweaty clothes. Someone picked her up, placed her gently on what felt like a sled, and wrapped course-textured blankets around her. There were two of them. One pushed and the other pulled a rope tied to the front of the sled.

“You’re vets who live in the woods,” she said.

“Don’t you dare tell anyone where we are or they’ll come around with social workers and priests.”

“When I worked as a nurse, veterans told me about your camps in the woods.”

“We’ll take you to the nearest emergency clinic,” the man with the thick beard and long hair said. “But we won’t be staying for the introductions.”

Emma reached out with her good hand to touch the man pushing the sled. “Thank you.”

“No problem. You’re the second skater we found this week.”

THE CHOCOLATE SOLUTION, the conclusion

(Eight year old Mandy decides chocolate will make her mom smile again, something she hasn't done since the birth, three weeks ago, of Mandy's twin brothers. Finding the right chocolate proves more difficult than Mandy thought. Her search continues.)

Three more stores and still Mandy couldn’t find the chocolate her mom liked at a price she could pay. Her legs were tired and it was getting dark. Her mom had been so excited when her dad came home from fighting in Iraq. She’d promised Mandy everything would be better. Well, it wasn’t. Her mom had stopped spending time with Mandy after breakfast. She was busy with Dad and then the smelly twins. They never had these problems when her dad was overseas. And Mom was so miserable. She told Mandy not to complain and grumble but her mom did that all the time.

Mandy stepped inside a store where she remembered her mom bought Easter eggs. A pretty young woman asked her what she wanted.

“I have to get chocolate for my mom. I’ve only got four dollars.”

“Let me see.” The young woman searched the shelves. “What about this? I bet your mom would like it.”

She held up a white box with gold stars.

“You bite into the chocolates and they’re filled with caramel or berry flavors.”

Mandy held out her crumpled four dollars. “Will it be enough?”

The pretty young woman pulled off the price tag. “The exact amount.”

She took a long time at the cash register before she placed the box in a red bag with handles. Mandy knew she’d been right to keep looking.

It was dark outside the store. Back over the bridge, but now she couldn’t see all the cars. She could do this. Her legs ached and the wind hurt her ears. Nearly there, and she could see the twenty-four hour store. Someone bumped into her pushing her across the sidewalk so she almost fell.

“Hi, Mandy. Shouldn’t you be in bed?”

Mandy stared up at Fran, the fattest girl in the school and a big bully.

“What’ya got there?” She grabbed Mandy’s red bag.

“No. It’s for my mom.” Mandy reached up for the bag.

Fran tore open the box and stuffed one of the chocolates in her mouth. She smacked her lips. “Good.”

“Please.” Mandy stretched up for the bag again.

“They’re mine now.”

Mandy grabbed Fran’s arm. Fran jerked her arm down hitting Mandy on the head before she shoved her to the ground.

Winded, Mandy pushed on her hands, and scrambled to her feet. Fran had gone. Mandy hopped away from the curb and leaned against a fence. Her left knee was bleeding. People rushed past her. This was worse than when her mom went to the hospital. Mandy just wanted to stay where she was. Everyone would go home and she would freeze here in the dark.

“I saw what happened.”

She looked up at a man covered with tattoos on his bare arms and wearing a leather vest.

“I lost the chocolate for my mom.”

“Here. Take one of these.” He held out a red box big enough to hold a pound of candy. “I was taking these for the girls in the office and I always have extras.”

She wanted the box but she didn’t have any money.

“Take it.” He pushed the box into her hands. “I hope your mom likes them.”

He was gone before she could thank him. She blew her nose. Blood dripped down her leg onto her sock. No time to stop. She placed the box so her jacket covered it. When she got home, she’d sneak upstairs and hide the box until tomorrow so her mom would be surprised on Christmas morning.

As she turned the corner into her street, she saw her house ablaze with light. Two neighbors stood with her mom.

“Where have you been?” her mom said. “I was frantic. And what’s that?”

She reached down Mandy’s jacket and pulled out the box of chocolates. “Oh My God. Did you steal these?”

“No No.” The surprise was gone.

“I can’t believe you’d think about candy when you knew I was waiting for the Tylenol.”

The neighbors turned away.

“They’re yours. For Christmas,” Mandy said. “My birthday money—”

“Oh, sweetie.” Mom hugged her close before putting an arm around Mandy and leading her indoors.

Mandy’s dad stood in the hallway, buttoning up his coat.

“She’s okay. No need for you to go out again.”

“What happened to your knee?” her dad asked.

Mandy wanted to tell her parents everything that happened but where would she start. “I fell on it. It doesn’t hurt now. Do you like the chocolates?” What if her mom hated the candy?

Her mom opened the box. “The stores must be clearing everything out on Christmas eve.” Her hand hovered over the top layer before she picked out a candy. “Caramel and nuts.” She put the chocolate in her mouth.

Mandy waited, her heart beating faster. Maybe they were the wrong ones.

“They’re very good,” her mom said.

She offered the box to Mandy’s dad. Before Mandy could say the chocolates weren’t for him, he shook his head, refusing the candy.

Mom smiled. “You really surprise me sometimes.”

The chocolate worked. Mandy stopped holding her breath. Tomorrow, no, the day after Christmas, she’d start her errand service. She knew which neighbors would give her some of their change if she picked up at the store the paper or milk they’d forgotten. When she had five dollars, she’d tell her dad it was for her first dance class.

Q & A Part II

Last week Jim, Jordaina, Pauline and I answered questions about our reading likes and dislikes. This week, we focus on our writing. Please let us know how you would answer these questions.

What makes one set of characters ripe for a series? How has the author set up the characters for continuing the story?

PA: A character for a series usually has depth and potential for growth. However, Kinsey Millhone doesn’t seem to age or change much but she remains interesting because she’s clearly drawn and Grafton’s books are well-written.

EBD: The difference I see between a stand-alone book and a series is in conclusions. In a series, the character’s back story shows just enough to further the reader’s curiosity about the character. The main story may also have unanswered questions, which spurs the reader to continue reading the story. Of course, in a stand-alone book, all the major story lines are tied up neatly or nearly so. What I find annoying are obvious hooks to the next book, and this annoyance is a recent phenomenon that I think has come about because of marketing. For example, in Martha Grimes’ Richard Jury series, she always came to a resolution of the story and started the next book with a new case. Recently, the series has focused on one recurring villain who Jury can’t catch. Perhaps Grimes was the one who instigated this change, but after three books, Jury still hasn’t caught the guy and the reader is left frustrated. It is also hard for the reader to keep track of the story because since she writes two series, it may be more than a year between books. Ian Rankin’s last Inspector Rebus novel, publicized as his final Rebus novel, he leaves the reader with the villain lying in a hospital bed without a plot conclusion. This tactic is an obvious marketing ploy annoying to the reader, even if we are glad, it really isn’t the “last” Rebus novel.

JMJ: It’s really important not to kill your character off in book one if you plan to make it a series.
Joking aside, I think any interesting character can be the basis of a series as long as the book has not already answered all the interesting questions about the character.

JSR: I think that’s a tricky question to answer. I can only say you have to make the characters likeable enough to want to follow through a series of adventures.
That said, I found Laurell K Hamiltion’s Anita Blake thoroughly dislikable but kept reading until book six because I really enjoyed the rest of the characters.

Are you writing a series or a stand-alone book, and why?

JMJ: Yes. Every book I work on is a standalone, at least until it sells. However, BAD POLICY, my WIP that I will be searching for an agent later this summer or in early autumn and CABIN FEVER, which is in its second draft, have a common set of characters.
I am also sketching out a futuristic novel that will have one character overlap (he’ll be very, very old).

JSR: I view all four of my WIP’s as series, for no other reason than I really enjoy writing all of the characters but any of them could be read as a standalone.

PA: I plan on writing a series but at least the first two books can stand alone.

EBD: I’ve been told to write a stand-alone book first. Then, if it sells, the publisher may want to continue the series, but to write it as a series from the beginning is presumptuous. Of course, I’d love to have a series and that leaves me with a dilemma because I planned to leave one big resolution outstanding. If my concept is found intriguing, then I will let the publisher decide. I can resolve the dilemma if pressed.


What POV are you using and why have you chosen it?

JSR: All are written in first person. Aurora North started out in third person but I felt first person suited her, and my style for her, much better.

JMJ: BAD POLICY is written in first person POV. CABIN FEVER uses first person for the protagonist and third person for four other characters.

EBD: I’ve never written a book in first person, which is strange because a lot of beginning writers chose this POV, but I’ve found it very limiting. In my second book, A Travel Guide to Murder, one of the elements of the plot is timing. My characters are shown in different chapters acting simultaneous to one another, effecting the plot and each other. This timing can’t be shown in first person. In Sparkle Days, I want to show different POVs so that one character's actions impact another’s actions, not timing as much as character driven action. Again, the third person POV is my best choice because it is less limiting.

PA: I’ve just finished a novel in first person and I’m planning my next novel in multiple viewpoints. A different point of view makes for a different story for both the reader and the writer.

What type of mystery are you writing?

PA: I’m writing an amateur sleuth because I feel most comfortable writing this type of mystery and because I feel most able to develop this character.

JSR: A paranormal which has no actual paranormal happenings in it, a paranormal which has plenty of paranormal happenings, a YA urban fantasy and a not YA urban fantasy.

EBD: My first book, Janet: Drunk and Disorderly is a traditional mystery. My second novel, A Travel Guide to Murder, is a comedic romance mystery. Sparkle Days, my third, is a paranormal romance mystery. I love a traditional mystery, but sales are dwindling in the traditional market. Writing subgenre adds interest to the story and expands the universe of creativity because normal boundaries need not be kept and subplots are woven into the main plot just like the back story. There are more layers, keeping the reader interested.

JMJ: Very good ones, but of course, I would think that. A medium-boiled amateur sleuth probably best describes my works. The futuristic novel seems to want to be a thriller.

What turns you off a character after you've already followed them through two or more books?

JSR: If the character doesn’t grow or learn from their experiences or mistakes. To use Pauline’s example, Stephanie Plum is still the same awful bonds agent she was fifteen books ago. I know there’s humour in her ineptitude but when she’s making the same mistakes over and over again it becomes annoying.
I don’t need her to be Bruce Willis, but I do need something to show me she’s learned from the last few times her skips have climbed out the window on her for me to keep reading.

PA: With Stephanie Plum, it was the exploding cars and her sidekick, the ex-prostitute who always wears outrageous clothes and wants to eat junk food.

EBD: That situation usually doesn’t happen to me. I like the character in combination with the writing or I don’t. What sometimes does happen is that I won’t like a first book of the series and then try the second and love it, as if the first book was a trial run for the author. In this instance, usually the subsequent books get better and better. Occasionally, I’ll love the first books in a series, but in the sequel, the writer’s good ideas ran dry. The only time a character turns me off is usually in chick lit when the situations become too inane.

JMJ: I want to read a new story each time building off the characters I have enjoyed getting to know. If a series becomes the same/old same/old, I’m on to something new.

Labels: Paranormal, POV, Series, Writing

Organic Doesn’t Have To Mean Manure

Let what happens in your story emerge organically from the characters or the story itself. I’ve read that in books on writing and I’ve heard it in writing classes. Like Aphrodite rising from the sea, hands over strategic body parts, coasting to the shore on a half shell, that’s what the advice brings to my mind. As a nurse, I’ve learned much about organs, what’s organic and what’s chemical. None of that knowledge correlates with story parts. I can see a relationship between what’s humanly organic and organic food or gardening.

After my husband died, I moved into a condominium because I didn’t want the hassle of dealing with a house and garden as well as two teenagers and a job as a nurse manager on a neuroscience unit. I didn’t realize how much I missed a garden until my guests had to move aside houseplants so they could see each other or sit down.

Once my kids were independent, I moved into a new house with a naked garden. I had all the furniture I needed plus town water and sewage so I concentrated on the yard. I traveled from garden center to garden center checking out shrubs and trees. Once I had the bones of the garden in place, though still small, I focused on beauty, on filling space to please the eye and nose.

Everything tempted me. Forget a design in blue and white, or red and green, or even matching size and texture. I dug, planted, watered, and fertilized ending up with a mixture of New England wild flowers and an English cottage garden. This year, I’m branching out into fruit trees, brambles, and vegetables.

Until now, all the spade work, weeding, and maintenance were done by me. I know what the soil looks like two feet down, and where the sand and stone layers start. I can tell which plants will emerge from dormancy first, too fast often and be bitten by late frosts. I’ve seen where the sun shines ten hours a day during the summer. It took me six years of a hands-on approach to learn the nature of my yard. I’m sure I’ll still be surprised if I follow through and transplant evergreen shrubs planted in too stiff a row during my first autumn here.

I don’t use Scotts 4 step approach. My goal is not a weed free lawn. I like buttercups and clover. Grass is the mat that sets off the rest of my plants. I favor compost that comes from the Maine coast and a mulch of salt marsh hay smelling of the sea. Wind gusts felled local trees but the salt marsh hay remained in place over the strawberries and raspberries.

Could this learning that comes through the hands, from the senses, and from the touch of wind and sun on the skin be like the understanding I need to make plot points rise organically from within my story? It took me a long time to know how to work with the soil and climate I have. I think I’d be very lucky for everything in my story to work organically in the first draft. Incidentally, most nurses will say, there comes a time in their careers when they no longer need to rely on what they learned in school. Without having to think about it, they draw on years of experience to understand what a patient is trying to tell them. More experienced writers and editors know what I had to chew over and digest to grasp.

Pauline

Late Settler

Since the number of roles and jobs an individual can have is limited, I let my fictional characters try out parts I won't live long enough to play. I use my experiences at work, at home, and in a wider social setting to flesh out my characters.

My husband and I emigrated from the UK to the US when I was still in my teens. We loved the wide open spaces in America and the energy and drive of the American people. Soon after we arrived, my husband found work as an engineer in Boston. We sat in a coffee shop looking through a local newspaper for apartments close to his job because we didn't yet have a car. Then we walked back from his place of work to each apartment until we found the one we wanted.

During our first two years here, we used our weekends to drive to different places in New England. It was a time of exploration and learning for us. I joined a writing group and wrote poems and short stories.

In the UK, I'd won a scholarship to a boarding school founded in the sixteenth century for the poor of London and I graduated early at the age of fifteen. Instead of going to college, I wanted to experience the "real world" and that meant living and working in London. I worked in the Foreign Office, opposite 10 Downing Street where the Prime Minister lives.

In the US, I would've lived in New York if my husband and I could've afforded that. Instead, we settled in Boston and its suburbs and raised our two children there. I've always liked the bustle and energy of cities and the cultural opportunities they offer. I acquired an MA in literature and taught at Northeastern University and an MS in nursing and worked at Massachusetts General Hospital and at the Veterans Administration Medical Center.

Just as we were beginning to feel like an American family that could reap the rewards of working hard and being involved in our local community, my husband died. He was the person with whom I'd spent the most time in my life and my closest companion. I thought I'd never get over my loss but I had kids to consider and they got me through that time.

Once they were able to fend for themselves, I became restless and decided to move. My real estate agent helped me discover Western Massachusetts where I now live. Nature and everything that happens within it is so close. During storms and the height of summer, nature presses against the walls and windows of my home.

I use Western Massachusetts with its contrasting seasons as a setting for my WIP. In my work as a nurse, I learned to observe and solve problems and I give my protagonists these skills and enhance them. As a nurse and foster mom, I learned more than I could've imagined about relationships and the way we behave under stress or facing crises. In my writing, I like to place my characters in near impossible situations so they have to find their way out. As the only one in my natal family who moved so far from home and who still likes to explore new places, I create characters that have to track down clues and villains.

I'm finding out it takes time to develop fictitious worlds that deepen my understanding of the people and places I thought I knew.

Pauline

Turning Points

If you've read a book on writing, you're aware there are writers who map out their novels in detail so they know exactly where they're going. Then there are writers who start with a crime, a character, or an image and keep writing until they find out where they're heading and if their destination is worthwhile.

I need characters and a story, preferably one with a crime that calls out for justice. Caught up in the excitement of creating a novel world, I peck away at the keys on my laptop until good wins out over evil, or at least over one of its representatives. The result is often a 90,000 word story with too many detours. Not to worry. Writers have a chance to revise, unlike stand-up comedians. How to revise in an efficient way--that is the problem.

One of the advantages of belonging to the local chapter of Sisters in Crime (there's no discrimination against brothers) is being able to attend workshops free. I attended a workshop given by Hallie Ephron, author of the Edgar-nominated WRITING AND SELLING YOUR MYSTERY NOVEL, and reviewer of mystery novels for the Boston Globe. The advice that was the most helpful for the revision of my WIP was the section on turning points.

At first I focused on plot points. Although these are essential, they didn't pull my story together. It wasn't until I returned home from the workshop that I was able to pull out three turning points, each of them making my story go in a different direction. The fourth and final turning point is the confrontation between the protagonist and the villain but I had that scene more or less clear in my head. It was the other three turning points I needed to focus my revision.

I could foreshadow the next turning point, build towards it, and cut out scenes that didn't contribute to dramatic tension and cause and effect. All the meandering side-stepping dropped away. I chopped off extra scenes without a single regret because I kept working towards the turning points.

I doubt whether I'll ever map out a novel as Hallie Ephron suggests in her book on writing but I will look out for the turning points in my first drafts so my revision zigzags to the climax in style.

Pauline