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And Then Comes. . .

February 6, 2021 by in category Pets, Romance & Lots of Suspense by Linda O. Johnston tagged as , ,

A post from our archives . . .

For the last couple of months, my posts here included some of my take on what was happening with the Corona virus and how it was affecting my life–and how the changes had become my new normal.

Then there’s the economy, and all the people suffering because we mostly need to stay at home.  Businesses are closing. People are losing their jobs. Where’s the money??

My new normal now also includes worrying about the protests occurring in many places in our country–including areas of Los Angeles, which is where I live.  Oh, I sympathize with the protesters who are out there marching peacefully against racial inequality. The death that precipitated it all this time shouldn’t have happened.  But now looters are using the protests as an excuse to get out there, break into stores, and steal a lot.  And injure others. A lot of businesses in areas near me that haven’t experienced the riots are all boarded up, just in case.

And now here, and in other blog posts I’ve done, I’m wondering what’s next.

I’m writing, of course.  Right now I’m working on my third book in the long-running Colton series for Harlequin Romantic Suspense, featuring characters in one of the many branches of the Colton family spread all over the country. I keep thinking about the second one I wrote, when much of the action was precipitated by an earthquake–Colton First Responder.

Are we due for an earthquake as yet another major issue in our existence, like a pandemic and riots? After all, as I said, I live in Los Angeles. And there was an earthquake worth noting in Ridgecrest, a location not far from here, this week.

Other areas may be deluged with hurricanes or other storms.

Or will our next problem–no, read “disaster”–involve something else?

Well, I am a writer and my imagination never stops.  And I keep telling it to calm down and imagine instead what things will be like when there’s at least a small semblance of a return to normal.

Although what normal will be next…?

Anyway, I hope that all of you who are reading this are well and safe and not subject to any of those or any other major issues.

Who knows? Next time I post here, things may be quite different… again!


A Few of Linda’s Books

UNDERCOVER COWBOY DEFENDER

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UNDERCOVER COWBOY DEFENDER

SHIELDING COLTON’S WITNESS

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SHIELDING COLTON’S WITNESS

HOUNDS ABOUND

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HOUNDS ABOUND

THE MORE THE TERRIER

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THE MORE THE TERRIER

BEAGLEMANIA

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BEAGLEMANIA

GUARDIAN K-9 ON CALL

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GUARDIAN K-9 ON CALL

BEAR WITNESS

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BEAR WITNESS
UNDERCOVERING COLTON’S FAMILY SECRETS

HER UNDERCOVER REFUGE

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HER UNDERCOVER REFUGE
COLTON FIRST RESPONDER (The Coltons of Mustang Valley)

THE SOLDIER’S K-9 MISSION

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THE SOLDIER’S K-9 MISSION
COLTON 911: CAUGHT IN THE CROSSFIRE

FOR A GOOD PAWS

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FOR A GOOD PAWS

VISIONARY WOLF (Alpha Force)

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VISIONARY WOLF (Alpha Force)

TRAINED TO PROTECT

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TRAINED TO PROTECT

PROTECTOR WOLF

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PROTECTOR WOLF

BAD TO THE BONE

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BAD TO THE BONE

COVERT ALLIANCE

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COVERT ALLIANCE

TO CATCH A TREAT

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TO CATCH A TREAT

PICK AND CHEWS

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PICK AND CHEWS

UNLUCKY CHARMS

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UNLUCKY CHARMS

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Dear Extra Squeeze Team, Should I Quit Writing?

October 31, 2020 by in category The Extra Squeeze by The Extra Squeeze Team tagged as , , , , ,

Dear Extra Squeeze Team,

It feels like the entire world is telling me to quit writing…is this normal and what should I do? Should I quit writing?

Rebecca Forster | Extra Squeeze

Rebecca Forster 

USA Today Bestselling author of 35 books, including the Witness series and the new Finn O’Brien series.

I am tempted to sit down beside you and just cry.

Instead, I’m going to tell you to buck up, bucko!

I know, I hated hearing that too, but we’ve all been there, done that. Instead of being the company misery loves, I’ll offer this. I sold my first three books and then spent years trying to sell another one. When I finally figured out what was wrong, there was no stopping me. I also had a good friend who was rejected 40 times, and when she finally sold a book her career took off. Every writer’s struggle is different and how we deal with it is too.

In my case, I defaulted to my comfort zone — analysis. I certainly could put a sentence together, but when I reread my rejection letters, I realized my storytelling was lacking. Instead of flying by the seat of my pants as I had early on, I now sought out ways to educate myself about structure. I also realized I was afraid to delve into my characters. They were cookie cutter, and I needed to be more invested in their lives. I asked myself if I was writing in the correct genre. When the answer was no, and I switched genres my career turned around. Finally, I asked myself if I understood the publishing businesses well enough to navigate it.

The bottom line was this I needed to learn a craft. Writing isn’t just something that happens magically. You need to stretch your creative and business muscles, learn the game, and then make it your own. Information is out there. Embrace it, understand it, and use it. If you’re having trouble being objective about your own work, seek out an editor. If you can’t afford an editor, find a mentor. If you can’t find a mentor, find a friend who loves to read and who is very honest to give you feedback. If the world is telling you to quit, figure out why, and then show the world they were wrong.

Jenny Jensen | A Slice of Orange

Jenny Jensen

Developmental editor who has worked for twenty plus years with new and established authors of both fiction and non-fiction, traditional and indie.

Do your level best to ignore those negative feelings —there’s probably few writers who haven’t felt doubt. Keep writing. Everyday. Storytelling is a craft and like every craft it takes practice to perfect. Rejection is a part of that process and is often the most instructive tool a writer can receive: why was the work rejected? Work on strengthening the weaknesses that caused the rejection. Same with healthy criticism.

 

Simple is not always easy, but it really is simple. If you want to write, then there is nothing that will stop you. Just keep on writing and improving, writing and improving even more.

H. O. Charles | A Slice of Orange

H.O. Charles

Cover designer and author of the fantasy series, The Fireblade Array


Yes, it’s normal.

Commercially speaking, it’s very hard to know when to listen to the world and when to defy it. Sometimes great works are never appreciated until decades later.

Outside of money, if you feel you have to write, then it doesn’t matter what the world thinks. Most writers find their fingers tapping away at something regardless of negative reviews, poor sales etc. It has to be a hobby you enjoy before anything else.

 

Robin Blakely | The Extra Squeeze Team | A Slice of Orange

Robin Blakely

PR/Business Development coach for writers and artists; CEO, Creative Center of America; member, Forbes Coaches Council.

Welcome to the world of writing.

It is completely normal to feel, from time to time, that this world has conspired against you and that it is secretly or not-so-secretly telling you to quit writing. This quitting option seems to present itself at critical moments repeatedly while creative people are wandering up the road less traveled.

When you feel this kind of despair, you have two simple choices: quit or don’t quit. If you decide to quit, perhaps you can imagine that the quitting is just for a while, not forever. Sometimes quitting for a period of time can be a pretty good choice if you are exhausted and burned out.

But, I would hope that you might choose to not quit. If you choose to carry on instead of quitting, perhaps you could take this juncture to step back for a moment and evaluate what is happening to make you feel this way.

Perhaps you have surrounded yourself with naysayers. If so, get away from them. Perhaps you have driven yourself to exhaustion with self-demands of perfection or self-expectations of production. If so, get some help from someone who can objectively reset those goalposts with you.

Everyone goes through stages and phases of battle weariness when fighting the unknown. Writers face a lot of unknowns and the most intense moments typically happen right before a breakthrough.

The Extra Squeeze | A Slice of Orange

Ever wonder what industry professionals think about the issues that can really impact our careers? Each month The Extra Squeeze features a fresh topic related to books and publishing.

Amazon mover and shaker Rebecca Forster and her handpicked team of book professionals offer frank responses from the POV of each of their specialties — Writing, Editing, PR/Biz Development, and Cover Design.

If you have a question for The Extra Squeeze Team, use our handy dandy contact form.

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He Drove Right Into My Story

October 20, 2020 by in category A Bit of Magic by Meriam Wilhelm tagged as , , ,

Driving

My husband and I went driving through the hills of Palos Verdes last Sunday afternoon. He drives a too tiny for me sports car that he absolutely loves and that I find rather confining. It was a beautiful day outside. The California coastal skies were clear. The ocean waves were gentle and incredibly tempting. For October, it was surprising just how many people were still enjoying our ocean waters.

But the air was overly warm and all I really wanted to do that particular Sunday was to stay inside with a good book.  I had just finished writing my latest book and was well into the editing process and I was pretty sick of the whole thing. I still had not come up with a title, although there were several roaming randomly throughout my brain.

As much as I knew that I had work to do, I had grown tired of correcting punctuation marks and hunting for run on sentences. And so, really and truly, the only thing I wanted to do was to read my copy of Mary Higgins Clark & Alafair Burke – You Don’t Own Me. I had started it over a month ago and had just not found the time to get further into it. It had waited patiently for me on my desk for over a month.

Anyway, back to the car ride.

So my husband convinced me that the best way to get my book fully edited was to take a ride, clear my head and find something else to think about. “You’ll be sharper after you spend some time away,” he said, not really caring about my head but more about having company on his ride past the beach and through the still green hills.  

We started our journey off with me offering up potential titles for my book and him coming up with sillier versions to distract me.  To my surprise, he also came up with a few good ones. I was just about to launch into a discussion of why I might actually like his last suggested title when a strange man in a most unusual white car drove into the lane next to us. Our car being a lower to the ground Pontiac Solstice, I found myself having to look upward at the driver. The man, apparently aware of my interest, pivoted his gaze down on me, tipped his hat, smiled and promptly drove off.

Interesting Guy

“What an interesting guy,” I said. “I love his fedora hat (it was a strange shade of blue), but what the heck is he driving?” I asked my husband, who is well versed in the automobile world and knows far more about cars than I could ever hope for. 

“A Morris Minor. A 1950 something model, I think,” he said.

Hitting the gas, while hoping to avoid a P.V. cop or two, my husband took off after the beautifully polished white car. “It’s a British made car. Came out after the war. Think it’s named after the guy who designed it.” (See, I told you he knows a lot about cars!)

“That car is older than me!” I said. “And the guy driving it looked like he could be the original owner.” Okay, so maybe I exaggerated a little, but the gentleman did look really old and his style of dress did not speak of Southern California. I think he might even have been wearing tweed on a ninety degree day!

We followed the car and the interesting character chauffeuring it through the hills for a few more minutes before the man turned off on a side street and we lost him. But in that short time, the infamous Morris Minor driver was tattooed on my brain.  My husband and I drove home and I raced to my computer to learn all I could about the car I’d just seen.

Character

A few minutes later, my husband stuck his head in my office door and said, “You need to include that guy in one of your books. Stetson…”

“What about Stetson?” I asked.

“That’s what you should call him.”

And so I will. The man in the blue Fedora, wearing tweed and drive a 1950 something Morris Minor car. Hmm, can’t wait to start. And, of course, I’ll name him Stetson.

~Meriam

Books by Meriam Wilhelm

MURDER BY MAGIC

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MURDER BY MAGIC

THE WITCH OF BERGEN

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THE WITCH OF BERGEN
THE WITCHES OF NEW MOON BEACH BOXED SET

SEA DREAMS

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SEA DREAMS

SUNSET SPELLS

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SUNSET SPELLS

MIDNIGHT MADNESS

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MIDNIGHT MADNESS

NIGHT FLIGHT

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NIGHT FLIGHT

MORNING MAGIC

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MORNING MAGIC

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My Dad’s Super Power

June 22, 2020 by in category Write From the Heart by Veronica Jorge tagged as ,

My father always said, “Know who you are. In whatever you do, do your best.” By his hard work and example, he instilled in me the importance of integrity and quality. This makes me scrutinize everything I say and write (sometimes to excess). But also causes me to dig a little deeper and write from the heart which makes for a satisfying journey.

When I showed interest in wearing makeup, he made me feel beautiful and confident without it. In his own special way, he taught me that natural and simple is best. So writing, I find, is like learning how to dress and color coordinate. You develop your own style. Mix and match colors to accentuate. Create different looks depending on the season and occasion. Dress to impress or just to chill out. And when you meet a special someone…dress to be “effective.” You want your writing to stand out, but not overwhelm. That would be like wearing too much makeup. Picture the character, Mimi, on the Drew Carey show, or the sea witch, Ursula, in Disney’s, The Little Mermaid.

“Be original. Be creative,” said dad. “And above all, when you speak, don’t ramble.” By which he meant that if someone asks the time, don’t explain how a clock is made. (That’s when I edit, edit, edit).

Many writers speak of having a muse, but I find that although my father is long gone from this world, the words and teachings which he wove into my being continue to guide and inspire me. This leads me to conclude that my dad had a super power: Words.

I hope I have inherited it.

See you next time on July 22nd.  

Veronica Jorge

For all you’ve taught me, dad, this one’s for you.

Veronica Jorge – Manager, Educator, and former High School Social Studies teacher, Veronica credits her love of history to the potpourri of cultures that make up her own life and to her upbringing in diverse Brooklyn, New York.  Her genres of choice are historical fiction where she always makes new discoveries, and children’s picture books because there are so many wonderful worlds yet to be imagined and visited. She currently resides in Macungie, PA.

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CHOICES

June 19, 2020 by in category On writing . . . by Jenny Jensen, Writing tagged as , ,

In the oceans of writing instruction and advice available to anyone with a search engine I look for everything publishers have to say about current trends. Since you can’t really access publisher’s marketing info — and certainly not Amazon’s sales data — that’s as close to the horse’s mouth as I can get to learn about sales trends. That’s info that helps me help my clients. One offering stands out about contemporary fiction: keep the narrative fast paced. This digital world of FX, Twitter, flash fiction, etc. has our brains wired for lightening fast action. There’s not a lot of room for ruminating on superfluous details of landscape, the nature of family bonds or the sounds of church bells. The story has to gallop from the starting gate to capture and compel a reader.  I think we all get that. What’s interesting to me are the narrative techniques an author can use to set and maintain that just-right pace.

Voice and tense are formidable tools to heighten tension, move action and hook and hold the reader. I don’t know what goes into an author’s decisions about what tense and voice to use but I’ll venture to guess it most often comes organically. When a protagonist begins to take shape in the creative sphere of the brain the author hears 3rd Person or 1st Person (which is tricky to write but such fun to read when done well) and the story grows in the mind in the present or past tense.  Past tense is most common in fiction (and has been for eons) and is almost always 3rd Person. Present tense is more commonly used with 1st P voice; it creates an immediacy and intimacy that’s very engaging.

I’d never given a thought to 3rd Person present tense. Then I discovered the who-dun-it series of British writer Bruce Beckham. He’s amazing! Set in Britain’s Lake District his detective, Skelgill, is an irresistible mixture of irascible, self-centered, scruffy, generous and intuitive. Every character is roundly drawn and intriguing, the setting is as integral a character as the murderer and the pace never lags. Beckham accomplishes all of this in 3rd Person (omniscient) voice, present tense. It’s an unusual combination but in the hands of this author it is riveting.

It’s how he uses this tool to set and maintain a perfect pace and to draw the reader so fully into his world that amazed me. Reading a narrative described to you by an unknown, unseen, non-judgmental voice as the action unfolds just shouldn’t work. But it does. It’s like having your eyes covered at the movies while a very erudite friend describes what is happening on-screen.

Beckham is a master wordsmith and so uses dialog to show characterization and plot points but the present tense and 3rd P voice puts the reader in a front row seat as the action scenes unfold before our eyes.  I didn’t feel as though I was right there — I was right there.

A writer’s choice of voice and tense would have to be dependent, in some part, on the story they are telling. Not every tale will fit just any combination.  But it is amazing what a powerful difference the choice can make.

JENNY JENSEN

jennyjenseneditor.com

With a BA in Anthropology and English I pursued a career in advertising and writing and segued into developmental editing. It was a great choice for me. I love the process of creating and am privileged to be part of that process for so many great voices — voices both seasoned and new.

I’ve worked on nearly 400 books over 25 years, books by noted authors published by New York houses as well as with Indie bestsellers and Amazon dynamos. From Air Force manuals and marketing materials to memoirs, thrillers, sci fi and romance, my services range from copyediting to developmental coaching.

Having worked in advertising and marketing, I am always cognizant of the marketplace in which the author’s work will be seen. I coach for content and style with that knowledge in mind in order to maximize sales and/or educational potential. My objective is to help the author’s material stand out from an ever more crowded and competitive field.

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