Stop Dancing and Write the Next Book

What I'm reading: Spying in High Heels, by Gemma Halliday

Don't forget, you can still enter the drawing for Donnell Bell's book. Scroll down to Tuesday's post and leave a comment.

First, some odds and ends. I'm going to be sending out my newsletter in the very near future. In addition to updates and other writing news, I hold contests that can only be accessed through the newsletter. If you're not already a subscriber, why don't you take a moment to sign up at my website.

Speaking of my website, it's moving forward … slowly, because I've got a lot of travel this month. But it's getting there.

Sometimes, everything seems to hit at once. And even when it's good, it can be overwhelming. Where do you focus? How do you prioritize? If you add coming back from being virtually off the grid for five days, it can make your head spin.

What I came back to:

Labor Day Weekend Giveaway

Don't miss out on a chance for a free download of either WHAT'S IN A NAME? or DANGER IN DEER RIDGE. Offer expires Monday, Sept. 5th, 2011. Click here for details.


Like this post? Please share by clicking one of the links below.

A Gift For You

What I'm reading: Betrayal of Trust, by J.A. Jance

A reminder that tonight (7 PM Eastern) I'll be hosting a chat at Savvy Authors. The subject is foreshadowing. Hope some of you can make it.

There's been a lot of talk about reviews around the blogosphere lately. Opinions as to their effectiveness vary. Some say they never read them. Some say they use them to help decide on book purchases. Some (myself included) read them after the fact to see if they agree or disagree with other reviewers.

I don't think there's an answer, but I'm offering a free download to anyone who wants either WHAT'S IN A NAME? or DANGER IN DEER RIDGE. The hope, of course, is that you'll take a few minutes after reading and post a short review. However, I can't require it, nor would I want to. I'm happy enough that you'd want to read one of my books.

Here's how it works.

1. Decide which book you want. The best way is to go to my website and read the book blurbs, excerpts, and/or first chapter. WHAT'S IN A NAME? is here. DANGER IN DEER RIDGE is here. If one seems to be something you'd enjoy, then:

Rule of Three

NOTE: all copies have been claimed. But don't stop -- there's a lot about the Rule of Three below.

Yesterday's post mentioned my donating a percentage of my sales to Team In Training to honor mothers and my daughter's efforts (and she's training for an ironman, so her efforts are considerably more than simply asking for donations!) to help raise money for blood cancer research.

One reader, who wishes to remain anonymous, bought 20 copies of What's in a Name? She kept one for herself, but asked that I donate the rest.

If you'd like a copy of this e-book, simply email me, with What's in a Name Giveaway in the subject line, and tell me what format you'd like. If you have a Kindle, I will gift you a copy. If you prefer to shop via Smashwords, I'll give you a free coupon. If you want an e-pub format, I can send one your way.

First nineteen responders will get the book. As for writing. I've started another manuscript. In anticipation of getting rights back to two of my books, I've decided to write a third. There's something about the 'rule of three' that seems ingrained in us as human beings, from Three Little Pigs, the Three Stooges, to the Third Time's the Charm. (Did you notice the use of three examples?)

Repetition helps readers remember. Things presented in threes just seem to stick with us: Faith, Hope. and Charity. Winken, Blinken, and Nod. Blood, Sweat and Tears. Stop, Look and Listen. Stop, Drop and Roll. How many more can you name? Dozens, at least, I'm sure.

Happy Mother's Day - Help a good cause

Yesterday, WHAT'S IN A NAME? was a featured book at the Kindle Nation Daily. My daughter is a triathlete who coaches and is training for an ironman to raise money for Team in Training, which gives money to the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society to help beat cancer. If you want to pitch in, I'm donating 10% of today's sales of WHAT'S IN A NAME?

You can buy it from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Smashwords, or All Romance eBooks.

It's a good cause, and you get to read a good book.

No Mary Sues Allowed

Since I was talking about heroes last week, I thought it only fair to include heroines as well.

One thing we've all been warned against is the TSTL heroine. (Too Stupid to Live, should you not be up to speed on all the acronyms.) This is the heroine who goes down into the dark basement to see what the noise is—when she's aware there's a killer in the neighborhood. How to avoid this syndrome has been discussed at length, and I'm not going into it again today. Instead, I thought we'd look at the perfect heroine.

The romance heroine of days long past was dependent upon the hero. She was subservient, and if in peril, had to wait for the hero to come to her rescue. The pendulum swung the other way, and today you're more likely to find the heroine as a no-nonsense, kick-ass character who can handle herself.

Back in my early writing days, when I was learning the craft via fan fiction, there was a great deal of discussion about not creating a Mary Sue. In fact, there was even a test to make sure you didn't have one of these unbelievable heroines (or, in fact, any character) in your books.

Is this to say that you can't have a heroine who is fully competent? Of course not. But you can't just plop those convenient skills in front of the reader when it becomes convenient for her to have them.

Love and Heroes

Yesterday I talked about what makes a hero someone both the reader and writer loves. There were some great comments, and one of the frequent ones was that he had to love the heroine.

When writing a romance, there are some reader expectations that have to be met. When we write a romance, we're promising the reader that we're going to address them. One of the "requirements" is to show that moment when the hero realizes he's in love with the heroine (and vice-versa, of course). There are others, but this is a blog post, not a workshop.

I seem to have a theme for my heroes that they're all career consumed, and their careers don't lend themselves to family lives. With the exception of Blake Windsor in What's in a Name?, they're all either cops or covert ops specialists, and don't think their jobs can mix with relationships.

My preference is for that moment to sneak up on the hero. None of mine have been actively seeking a life partner. And, like with all writing, you can't just dump these things on the reader. They need foreshadowing and setups.

And of course, taken out of context, these 'aha' moments aren't as meaningful, but I thought I'd share a few examples from my own work (no issues with copyright that way).

So, here they are:

Only Trouble is Interesting

Thanks to Molly for yesterday's post (even if my books didn't make her list!). There's some good reading material there.

One of the first lessons I learned when writing was "Only Trouble is Interesting."

Conflict doesn't have to be earth-shattering, in-your-face, knock down drag-em-out. In fact, sometimes the best conflicts are the everyday events. They may not be "exciting" in terms of things like car crashes or explosions, but readers can relate to them. And these sorts of things can keep the tension going in between the big stuff. And too much of that 'big stuff' can either exhaust the reader, or get boring..

Recently, All Romance eBooks opened its doors to individual publishers, so I decided that I'd upload my two books, What's in a Name? and When Danger Calls to their online store. I'd already uploaded them to the Kindle Store and Smashwords, so I figured it would be simple enough.

Nope. First, there's no formatting provided. If you want to put your book on their site, you have to provide it in the formats they offer. Although I can handle PDF and HTML easily enough (those are simply "save as" options in Word), I was clueless about things like lit, PRC, mobi, and epub.

The Winner Is

And the Winner Is ....

The winner of an autographed cover picture of What's in a Name? is Ciara. Thanks for commenting on my post. Send me your snail mail address, and I'll get it out as soon as I can.

And thanks to everyone for taking the time to leave a comment.

Plotting for Non-Plotters - Sneak Preview

First - another warm fuzzy. I received this email yesterday evening.

Hi Terry
Just wanted to let you know that I finished reading your book What's In A Name? that I won recently in your contest and loved the book. I liked the relationship between the main characters and the premise of the story was believable. The intimate scenes were not overdone like so many stories I see today...sometimes that ruins the story for me ...I think some authors think they need it in order to sell their books but you had just enough. Thanks for that. I'm going to share your book with my sister before I put it on my keeper shelf. I'm so glad I won it...I doubt I'd ever picked up a copy on my own to read. Looking forward to reading some more of your work.

I never used to write 'thank you notes' to authors, but I do now that I'm writing. I know how much they can brighten someone's day, and since we work in a virtual vacuum most of the time, that contact with the end user of our product is priceless.

I have my handout for Saturday's workshop on "Plotting for Non-Plotters" ... um ... plotted. Here are the bare bones. I'll provide more after the workshop.

Keep Reading...

A bit of Googling gave me the following quotes. The first is my favorite.

“It's like driving a car at night. You never see further than your headlights, but you can make the whole trip that way.”

“Planning to write is not writing. Outlining, researching, talking to people about what you're doing, none of that is writing. Writing is writing.”
E.L. Doctorow

"If I had a plot that was all set in advance, why would I want go through the agony of writing the novel? A novel is a kind of exploration and discovery, for me at any rate."
Chaim Potok

"I always start with characters rather than with a plot, which many critics would say is very obvious from the lack of plot in my films although I think they do have plots - but the plot is not of primary importance to me, the characters are."
Film Director Jim Jarmusch

"In order to have a plot, you have to have a conflict, something bad has to happen."
Mike Judge (Beavis and Butt-Head, King of the Hill)

"Plotting isn't like sex, because you can go back and adjust it afterwards. Whether you plan your story beforehand or not, if the climax turns out to be the revelation that the mad professor's anti-gravity device actually works, you must go back and silently delete all those flying cars buzzing around the city on page one. If you want to reveal something, you need to hide it properly first."
Colin Greenland


My bullet points:

Where to start

How far to go

Trust your instincts

Tracking

Materials needed

Method

Of course, those bullet points will be fleshed out with examples, suggestions, and caveats. I'll also drag my story and idea boards to the meeting. I'm looking forward to working with Lara. She came over last night, and we had a very easy time deciding what each of us would cover, as her approach is very different from mine.

And don't forget -- tomorrow: The next chapter from the case files of Homicide Hussey.

Surprises and SleuthFest

What I'm reading: Tempt the Devil, by Anna Campbell

First, thanks to Maris for sharing her experiences in the world of a writer. This is a short post today--I'm way behind in SleuthFest prep.

Some surprises: I got an email saying that HIDDEN FIRE was now available in print from the publisher. No advance warning, other than they'd told me it would be out in time for the book signing at the Romantic Times conference in late April. Thus, I spent much more time than I'd planned trying to put together an excerpt booklet so I could have them ready for SleuthFest.

In other news, I got an email from Night Owl Romance saying a reviewer had read What's in a Name?, loved it, and wanted to know what else I'd written. I haven't seen the review yet, but ego-stroking is always a good thing.

I'm going to be busy with SleuthFest preparations. We leave tomorrow, so I might be putting the next installment of Homicide- Hussey up a day early.

In the meantime, here's a quick peek at the opening section of my dialogue handout. Time permitting, I'll figure out the most effective way to share it.

Keep Reading...

Some Dialogue Basics

First, the absolute nitty-gritty. If you don't understand these first four rules, your work will probably never get beyond the form rejection letter. If any of these aren't automatic, you should take a refresher course in basic writing.

1. Use quotation marks to indicate words which are spoken by characters.
2. Always start a new paragraph when changing speakers. You cannot have two people speaking in the same paragraph.
3. Make sure the reader knows who is speaking.
4. Use correct punctuation, capitalization and spacing.

Assuming you've got those down, what next? I suggest the following two books as handy references, not only for dialogue.

The First Five Pages, A Writer's Guide to Staying Out of the Rejection Pile, by Noah Lukeman

Self Editing for Fiction Writers – How to Edit Yourself into Print, by Renni Browne and Dave King

Elaboration and examples later ... please come back.

Reality in characters?

What I'm reading: Bones, by Jonathan Kellerman

Following through on yesterday's post about things that can 'date' novels, I recall my first writing mentor chastising me for describing a scene where a group of volunteers was repairing a house to "the barn raising scene in Witness." She called it 'cheating' to use someone else's description. Given how long it's been since Witness came out now, it would have also dated the book, although I suppose it's on television often enough that people who weren't even born when it hit the theaters have seen it several times.

What about character descriptions? One question that crops up in blog interviews is, "Who would play your characters if they made your book into a movie?" (Sorry, hubby, but it's probably not going to happen in this lifetime, but hang in there). I'm not a movie-going person, and don't watch a lot of television. I'd be hard-pressed to conjure up images of the latest celebrities if an author used them to describe a character. So, not only would they date the book, they might be lost on readers.

I prefer to paint my characters with much broader strokes, and let the readers fill in the details with their own images. Diana Gabaldon says the same thing: she refuses to answer the question because she wants readers to keep whatever images they've got of Jamie and Claire.

I'm not much into paranormal or YA books, so the Twilight phenomenon has passed me by. However it's buzzing around the blog circuit now that the movie is out, and it's interesting to follow the threads where people have been 'disappointed' because the characters didn't match the visions they brought into the theater with them.

When I started writing, I wrote Highlander fan fiction, and the characters were already defined. When I adapted one of my short story ideas into What's in a Name?, the hero, Blake Windsor, bore an uncanny resemblance to Duncan MacLeod. However, I had to go in and describe him in more detail, because the novel was not a Highlander story, and readers needed to see Blake. But the first time we see Blake, I don't bother with a lot of detail. Partly because Kelli, the heroine, is trying to get rid of him, so she's not going to spend a lot of time analyzing every facial feature, and partly because I didn't want to stop the progress of the story and make the reader remember a lot of details. So, this is all we see:

She inched the door open. Swallowed. Twice. A man waited on her porch, wearing jeans and a windbreaker over a black turtleneck, holding an olive-green duffel bag. He stood at least six-two, with black hair that hung almost to his shoulders. Even the fact that his face and a razor hadn’t kept company in several days didn’t detract from his raw good looks.

“I’m Kelli.” She forced herself to meet his eyes. Dark chocolate brown, they grabbed and wouldn’t let go.

I'd rather the reader fill in the blanks for what constitutes "raw good looks."

Today's Gratitude List:
1. Nit-picky crit partners who make me think.
2. No school this week, so no traffic on the way to the Y
3. Richard, my hairdresser, who is one of my best promoters.

Daphne du Maurier Finalist

It's official, and I am allowed to shout from the rooftops! I'm a Daphne Finalist!



What's in a Name? has been selected as a finalist in the Single Title Romantic Mystery/Suspense Category of the Daphne du Maurier Award for Excellence in Mystery Suspense. This is a well-respected contest sponsored by the Kiss of Death chapter of Romance Writers of America. There are a lot of familiar names among the finalists, and I'm delighted to be one of them. The Single Title category finalists.

"Overkill" by Linda Castillo
Editor- Cindy Hwang, Berkley

"Into the Dark" by Cindy Gerard
Editor- Monique Patterson, St. Martin's Press

"Dead Giveaway" by Brenda Novak
Editor- Paula Eykelhof, Mira

"What's in a Name?" by Terry Odell
Editor- Helen Woodall, Cerridwen Press

"Head On" by Colleen Thompson
Editor- Alicia Condon, Dorchester

In addition to personal gratification, I think it proves that small publishing houses can hang with the big NY players. The winner is announced at the RWA National Conference at the Kiss of Death's annual Death by Chocolate party. What could be better than that!

Gayle Wilson Contest Finalist

What I'm reading - Redemption by Karen Tabke in What You Can't See

What I'm working on: edits, edits, edits. Finished Hidden Fire last night.

Yesterday afternoon I got a phone call informing me What's in a Name? is a finalist in the Gayle Wilson Award of Excellence contest. This is especially exciting, because there are some Really Big Names in the competition. I've been dealing with the 'second class citizenship' because I chose to sign with a publisher that puts its books out digitally before they go to print.

Although What's in a Name? is in print, the words on the paper are the same words that are in the digital edition. The Four Star review from RT and now the contest final gives me a great feeling of validation, that my work can hold its own, and generalizing that e-books are inherently inferior is an unfair judgment call.

Counting Down To South Africa T minus 1

Whew!
Had a FANTASTIC time at the book signing, even if there were a couple of glitches. In this case, things worked in my favor. The bookstore didn't have my books in stock, so I got my stash from my car and sold from those. Since these were leftovers from a previous signing at another store, I have already received royalties for the sales, since that bookstore bought them from the publisher. I purchased the excess at a substantial discount. I'll get paid by yesterday's bookstore for the cover price minus a percentage. I come out ahead on the bottom line, always a good thing. The people were great, got to chat with a bunch of authors, and even met some 'on line' folks who have seen me on various writing loops. And there was chocolate.

My own ditz moment: I splurged on a herbal neck wrap thingie you heat in themicrowave. The vendor was near our signing site, and offered a discount and extra eye mask to authors. I figured it was a nice treat and would help alleviate some of the neck strain from stress and hours at the keyboard. Of course, when I got home it was nowhere to be found. The receipt was in the bag, so I didn't have any way to contact the vendor to see if someone returned it to him. I posted a message to my fellow authors, and was VERY pleasantly surprised to find that the Barnes & Noble rep found the bag when she was clearing things out, and Roxanne St. Claire found my name on the receipt, and gave it to Catherine Kean to return to me. Thanks, fellow authors for being supportive in EVERY possible way. I won't be using it for the plane trip--far too heavy to deal with, but I'll have it waiting when I get home.

And...the good news! I found two reviews in my Google Alerts this morning.

http://www.fmam.biz/reviews/nov07.shtml#startingover

http://www.fmam.biz/reviews/nov07.shtml#whatsinaname

Have to turn in my galleys for Hurricane Breeze today. And laundry. And errands, since I'll have to be home tomorrow because my replacement keyboard is due to arrive and I have to sign for it. Was supposed to have happened two weeks ago, but ...

Listening - to readers and characters

I had some kind words about What's in a Name? from a reader. She said, "You didn't miss a beat and you kept the tension high right to the end."

She also requested the chicken recipe Kelli cooked for Blake in the book. I'd wanted to add it to the manuscript, but things were too far along in the publishing process to go back and do it. However, the request reminded me about it, and I've posted the recipe in the Free Reads section of my website.

I also added what happened when Randy Detweiler came to me with a request while I was writing Finding Sarah.

Here's a snip -- the rest is on my site.

"Come in, Randy," I say. We've been working together for a couple of months now, but I still can't get used to how tall he is. I've written him as six-six, but I have a hunch he's even taller. But he's comfortable with his height, walks with an easy grace across my office and settles himself on the couch.

I remember his awkwardness at our initial interview. Like he was afraid it was a stereotypical casting couch and he might have to 'buy' his way into the job, or I was going to make sure he could handle the sex scenes.

"What can I do for you?" I ask.

His lips curve up in a shy smile and he shoves a lock of hair off his forehead. "I…um…I had a suggestion. For my character."

I give him my full attention now. He's never demanded—heck, he's never even suggested anything. Maybe he's nervous. We're about to get into his first real sex scene with Sarah. It's not like he's naïve or anything, but I know how characters can get self-conscious when they're actually asked to perform on cue. At least he's not one of the cocky ones, no pun intended, who thinks he can take over the scene.

Guest Blogging

I'm Featured at the Hussie's Book Slam today.

See how I got started writing by mistake.

TWO BOOKS IN PRINT!

I'm excited to announce that both Finding Sarah and What's in a Name? are now available in print from Cerridwen Press.
I'm also tickled to death that Cerridwen Press has changed its pricing structure, so although these books are still trade paperbacks, they are priced competitively with mass market books! No more shelling out hard cover prices.

It will take a while for them to show up on Amazon.com, or the Barnes & Noble list, but Cerridwen Press assures us this will be happening soon.

In the meamwhile, you can see (and order) my new print releases here:

If you want to hound your local bookstore to carry the book (I know Barnes & Noble will carry Cerridwen titles), the ISBNs are:

Finding Sarah:
ISBN: 9781419907821 (digital)
ISBN: 9781419956515 (print)

What's in a Name?:
ISBN: 9781419908545 (digital)
ISBN: 9781419956522 (print)

And ... here's the cover

Cover arrived, approved and finalized, for What's in a Name?

Dealing with Promotion - Again

What I'm reading: I've Got You, Babe, by Karen Kendall

What I'm writing: Finishing chapter 29 - or is it 30? 89,000 words so far.

Since What's In A Name? is on the Cerridwen Coming Soon page, even without a cover, I've updated my website to give readers a behind the scenes tour and a peek at an excerpt. One of these days, Front Page and I will coexist peacefully, but right now, I think it's Front Page 5, Terry 2. Let me know if you can find the pages via my own "Coming Soon" link on my website. A web-tech, I'm not.