Distractions

William Powell and Myrna Loy day on TCM, including the Thin Man movies.

A friend telling me how much she loves Laura Kinsale's books. (I must be the only romance writer who's never read them, but they're on order now).

A filthy house that looks as if its normal cleaner is on deadline.

Fast food, which I'm not eating as I'm dieting, but ohmygosh, anything with grease in it smells so stinking good!

My girl's having some toothwork tomorrow. My brother-in-law, a wise man, invited me to "get over it." So, I'm going to try to do that.

Maybe those characters who are impatient to have a tidied happily ever after will help distract me!

The Man Makes a Good Showing

Please excuse the boasting, but I’m so excited. At least for this morning, The Man from Her Past is the #1 Superromance at Barnes and Noble online! Yay! Thanks so much to the folks who’ve bought it! I hope you’re enjoying.

And now, back to the next Honesty, VA book, working title The Bad Twin. The thing is, she doesn’t mean to be so bad. ;-)

Singing. Out Loud. In Public.

I'm drowning in deadline and distracted at home, so I got up, swam, did errands, and now I'm at a sandwich shop working because people won't like it if I buttonhole them to chat about whatever's in my head. (Not that people are enjoying that at home lately!)

However, today must be Mommy and Me at the sandwich shop because there are at least fifteen under-one-year-olds here. I love little 'uns, but gosh, they're noisy when you're hiding from distraction. So naturally, I put on headphones and iTunes--and Keith Urban. He and Rascall Flatts appear to be the only country music I like, but I really like them.

Imagine the dismay of those poor little babies, trying to eat their lunch and shout and cry and--whatever, when I suddenly forgot I wasn't home and burst into song. I'm not even sure Keith needed my assistance, either. He was doing fine on his own.

I probably ought to leave, but honestly, when you come to a sandwich shop, don't you sort of expect some wild-eyed writer on deadline to belt out a little Keith Urban at you?

Uneasy

It's silly, but my girl is having her wisdom teeth pulled this week, and I feel it hanging over my head like an anvil. Maybe if I do the worrying she won't.

I find writing romance difficult when something like this is going on, even though I'm being a little ridiculous. But I hate seeing her in pain. (Yeah, we've been lucky and our offspring have been healthy--no broken bones, etc.)

Anyway, this is one of those weeks where a muse would be helpful, but since I don't have one, I'd better just bang away at the story and throw my angst into the pages.

I hope you're looking forward to something fun and fine this week!

The Man from Her Past, Showing Up Any Day

Welcome back to Honesty! I'm starting to receive lovely letters about The Man from Her Past. A new book on the shelves is always exciting. I love this series, set in the small town of Honesty, VA. I hope that readers will enjoy it, too.

I've written a couple of series before, The Talbot Twins, set on a fictional island near Savannah, Georgia, and The Calvert Cousins, set in Bardill, Tennessee, another fictional town in the foothills of the Smokies. The thing I didn't consider was that I was going to run out of cousins and twins before I ran out of stories for these two settings. Hence, Honesty came to life.

When my son was little, we read a set of books about a community of foxes in a medieval English town. I loved the maps and the recurring characters and the life in those stories. That's what Honesty means to me--life going on in a town with real buildings and roads and people who know too much and care too much and love just enough! I hope you'll join me there.

The Logic of Writing

I love when a story is working. When one scene leads naturally to the next. Folks always consider writers "creative types." As if we're all airy and light, tossing back bonbons with one hand, dreaming up stories in a pink, frothy cloud of distraction.

I don't see it that way at all. In fact, I mentioned in a post not long ago that I'm IT for my family. I have a facility for technology and I think it's the same kind of thing that works for me with writing. Logic. Being able to decipher a problem because of what should come next.

I couldn't care less about muses. My goodness, if I waited for one to show up, I'd never have finished the first book. (Two small children, little league, guitar lessons, violin lessons, school choir practice, a husband constantly on travel--and oh, yeah, a full-time day job.) So, muses--I don't think so--not unless he or she had shown up with a driver's license and the undying devotion to my children that schedule required! (Have you ever noticed how few people are as willing to slave for your children as you?)

However, I believe in story logic, in the logic of the English language, in using both to write a story that appeals to me, because I am kind of my first reader, and those pages where I'm going "let's get to the good stuff" need to suffer the plunge of the delete key.

The book I'm tidying now has been one of the most difficult I've ever written. Do all writers get one that writes itself? Cause, hello, I'm tapping my foot with impatience for my shot at that! This one has been start and stop, running gleefully into a brick wall, realizing my hero and heroine had no real problems so I dared not let them be in the same room or they'd declare themselves in love. And why couldn't they? Why, because I was writing a romance. (Kiss of death for romance writer who wants to offer an involving story.)

So, my friends, Jennifer LaBrecque (Harlequin Blaze and NASCAR) and Susan Floyd (SuperRomance) helped me to an answer and suddenly those pages and scenes began falling in place. Scenes I'd already written had purpose (hiding, just out of my view until the conflict was right). Usually, when I'm this pushed and--let's be frank--late--I start to hate writing, but not this time. I'm loving the logic of a story with all its pieces intact!

I wish I knew it was perfect. I wish I had faith that it will grab a reader with the emotions I'm feeling as I write it, but I never feel that kind of confidence, and I'm just grateful for a lovely editor who's willing to point me in the right revision direction. But work is going well. I'm gleeful, and I'm not too afraid of that wall sliding out of nowhere again.

If you're working today, I hope you're enjoying, too.

Small Towns/Hot Weather/Christmas in July/History Lessons

I live in a small town. So small my girlo and I visit the bookstore taking shape to admire the new changes which mean we won't have to rely on online stores and a 45-minute trip to feed our addiction. That's right--I live in a town so small, watching a bookstore rise is a pastime.

We have one road that falls prey to traffic, but if you get on this 2-lane parking lot, you're on for the duration. Yesterday, I forgot to look at the time before I made that deceptively clear-looking right turn. Over the hill and into a string of red lights, wavering in a heat shimmer--a traffic jam that lasted for the length of 2 programs on XM's Radio Classics.

I love the glimpse of history on Radio Classics, and this is Christmas in July week, where they play radio shows from way back, all set at the Christmas season. While I whiled away an hour on a stretch of road that takes five minutes w/o traffic, I listened to Bob Hope and Bing Cosby performing for wounded veterans in a California VA hospital in 1946.

Bing's Christmas wish was that next year the hospital would be empty because all of these wounded soldiers would be at home. Bob's was that the holiday spirit had so filled the hearts and homes of soldiers and sailors who would not be coming back that their places were not empty.

So little changes. I usually ramble on this blog--whatever's on my mind--and I actually care about not offending folks because I hate a rant, but I have to say, just this once--even in my lifetime, history has provided lessons we ignore.