Real Life and Writing (and a giveaway)

What I'm reading: A Creed in Stone Creek, by Linda Lael Miller

I'm still talking characters at Coffee Time Romance (link in the sidebar).

And don't forget my goal of 500 followers by the end of the year. And 250 likes. Giveaways when milestones are reached. I still can't count on the followers gadget to show up, but I'm optimistic things will stabilize.

We've had family visiting all week, so we've had a change in our routine. I was going to recycle a writing post I'd posted before, but thought I'd simply share one of our 'adventures.' On the other hand, it IS a writing post, because everything can be considered writing fodder. I can think of several writing connections here. What about you? Leave your ideas in the comments, and I'll given one commenter a download of Finding Sarah once it goes live. And now, join us for tea.

Hubster's sister is a tea aficionado, so we went to our local coffee house that advertises "high tea." In our rural area, any sort of approximation of elegance is rare, so we didn't know what to expect. We know the coffee house well—we have breakfast there almost every Sunday, but despite it's decor, which reminds me of my grandmother's house, it's more 'local grub'—breakfast burritos, biscuits and gravy type stuff. And the clientele is usually the "rugged" sort.

Launch Party #5

I think it's time to get a closer look at Graham. I had a lot of fun "interviewing" some Orange County deputy sheriffs (translation: buying them beer and listening to them talk). Of course, I did ask a few specific questions if I knew what I needed for a scene. Then it was a matter of making sure all those tidbits would fit the story and not just sound like I'd stuck them in to fill space.

Graham parked his unit and raced across the station parking lot. Clarke passed him and gave him the usual smirk. What was Clarke doing at Central? Maybe Schaeffer really was pitting them against each other.

Schaeffer wasn't in his office, and Graham breathed a little easier. Maybe he'd been gone all afternoon and hadn't noticed the lack of Graham's paperwork. He hurried to the computer he'd used earlier, breathing a sigh of relief when it was available. Scrolling through the directories, he cursed, softly at first, then louder. "Shit!"

Wednesday Wanderings

What I'm reading: Chasing Darkness by Robert Crais

What I'm writing: Workshop notes, newsletter articles.

After spending FAR TOO LONG getting an email setup on my cell phone (even the cell phone store manager didn't understand why things weren't working), I'm now down to the camera issues. No matter what, the pictures are blurred. Had to join yet another forum group to try to get answers. Started utilizing some of the vacated bookshelf space. Only problem is that when your books are already stacked three deep. things don't look to different when you're done. And I'm never sure of the best way to organize them, because if I put them on the shelves by author, which is logical, I have to reorganize every time I add new books to their proper spots. But, headway is being made.

I had one of those "dang-it" moments while I was writing--a realization that my setup for putting my hero out of communication range might not work because I've already established him as a techno-junkie. Unlike Dalton, my previous book's hero, Fozzie definitely would want to have the latest tech gear. I had to stop and figure out why he wouldn't have the best possible cell phone, one that would ensure he was never out of range. He'd probably have a satellite phone. This meant researching cell phones and satellite phones, learning about high-orbit and low-orbit satellites in the process.

I did discover some drawbacks to the satellite phones--you still need a line of sight to the sky, and the connections are much slower. That might put a hitch in his ability to get immediate communication, but I didn't want to have to deal with geography every time I wanted a call delayed. While it's fine to write what's possible, if you stretch things too far, readers get annoyed. Can't have these coincidental 'bad connection' situations happening or it starts becoming author intrusion.

What I did find that will work (I hope) is that the cost of these satellite phones is prohibitive for your Average Joe Consumer, my protagonist included. All I had to do was add a quick grumble that he couldn't afford the kind of equipment he used on the job, and I could move forward again. Of course, by the time this book might hit a book store shelf, it's likely that the cell phone technology will be advanced enough so dead zones are a thing of the past--but I can't write what might happen. I can only plod along with what's available during the time frame of the book.