Disappearing Women ~ Tess Gerritsen

Tess Gerritsen left a successful practice as an internist to raise her children and concentrate on her writing. She gained nationwide acclaim for her first novel of medical suspense, the New York Times bestseller Harvest. She is also the author of the bestsellers Life Support, Bloodstream, Gravity, and The Surgeon. Tess lives with her family in Maine. (PHOTO CREDIT: Paul D'Innocenzo) --as appeared on Murderati on August 23, 2011




Now that I'm in my fifties, I'm noticing more and more what generations of women have complained about: that right around this age, we start to disappear in the eyes of the world. As we grow gray we become invisible, dismissed and ignored. No wonder there's a spike in suicides as women pass the frightening threshold of fifty. Invisibility happens to us all, whether we were once fashion models, prom queens, or hot actresses. (With the possible exception of Betty White.) When we lose the dewy glow of reproductive fitness, suddenly society thinks we are no longer worth the attention.

 Yet men in their fifties still get plenty of attention, both in real life and in the movies. Harrison Ford, Arnold Schwarzenegger and Sean Connery, were alll playing sexy action heroes in their fifties. Silver-haired men, at their peak of political or financial power, are considered hot catches and Hollywood producers don't bat an eye at the thought of casting a 50-year-old film hero with a 30-year-old heroine. But a celluloid romance between a young man and an older woman? Well, that's got to be an outrageous comedy, right? A story that no one would really believe, like Harold and Maude. Because while fiftyish men can be sexy as hell, a fiftyish woman is just, well, somebody's boring mother.


Life is so unfair.


It's unfair in crime fiction as well, where you don't find many sexy, kickass heroines in their fifties. Which strikes me as surprising, considering how many authors are women in their fifties. You'll find plenty of fictional heroines in their twenties, thirties, and forties. But then women vanish as heroines until they suddenly pop back into view on the far end of the age spectrum as sharp-eyed, inquisitive Miss Marples in their seventies. And these older heroines are often objects of amusement or even ridicule, the troublesome old biddies who solve mysteries only because they can't mind their own business.


I try to remember any older heroines in the books I've been reading. The only recent one who comes to mind is the narrator in Alice LaPlante's TURN OF MIND (a terrific novel by the way). Alas, although that heroine is tough, smart, and determined, she also has Alzheimer's disease. Not exactly the sexy heroine I'm looking for.


I confess, I too have been guilty of ignoring the fifty-year-old heroine. Part of it was my desire to meet the demands of the fiction market. People want to read about sexy heroines, don't they? And if I want to sell film rights, wouldn't a younger heroine be more attractive to Hollywood? Years ago, I wrote a book that featured a number of senior citizens (LIFE SUPPORT), and one of the discouraging comments I got from my then-Hollywood agent was a dubious: "Gee, there are an awful lot of old people in this story, aren't there?"


When I started my writing career, it made sense for me to focus on young heroines, because I could identify with them. As I got older, so did my heroines. They matured into their thirties and then their forties, just as I did. But suddenly I hit fifty, and my heroines didn't cross that line with me. They stayed frozen at forty-something, the oldest age that I believed the marketplace would still accept them as romantic heroines. I certainly know that women can be sexy at all ages; I just didn't have any faith that readers would think so. Or that they'd accept a 50+ woman as an action hero.


Then, a few years ago, I came across an article about martial arts master Bow Sim Mark. Now in her seventies, Master Mark is credited with bringing Chinese martial arts to Boston, where she still teaches at the studio she founded. How cool, I thought. Here's an older woman who really can kick ass. And swing a sword. And even take down a Navy Seal. If a woman like this exists in real life, why couldn't I put her in a novel?


So I did. In THE SILENT GIRL, the character of Iris Fang is a 55-year-old martial arts master who not only swings swords and takes down bad guys, she's also sexy. So sexy, in fact, that Detective Barry Frost, who's two decades younger, develops a wild crush on her. Unlikely, you say?


No more unlikely than a real 70-year-old female martial arts master. Or a 98-year-old woman who just earned her tenth-degree black belt in judo.


As I scan popular fiction and film, I find that on the rare occasions when an older woman does play action hero, it's a real crowd pleaser. In the movie RED, about retired CIA agents called back to action, the scene everyone seems to love best is Helen Mirren grabbing a gun and shooting up the place. In Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part Two, the audience whooped in delight when staid Professor McGonagall went wand to wand in a fierce duel with Snape, and when mad mama Molly Weasley finished off evil Bellatrix LeStrange. Call it hot flash fury; these women are forces to be reckoned with. They may be silver-haired but they're also capable, powerful, and ready to fight.


We all know such women exist in real life. Now it's time we start seeing more of them in fiction.

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Author Interview ~ Gina Holmes

Gina Holmes is the bestselling author of Crossing Oceans and the newly released novel, DRY AS RAIN. She's the founder of Novel Rocket, (formerly Novel Journey), a registered nurse,  wife and mother who makes her home in Southern Virginia. You can learn more about her at www.ginaholmes.com 

Your debut novel hit ECPA, Amazon, PW and CBA bestsellers list (some throughout the span of a year!) For several weeks Crossing Oceans was the #1 free kindle download and then stay in the top hundred for a long time.

Beside the commercial success, your book was a finalist in every major Christian book award, including: Christy, ECPA, Retailer’s Choice, Carol Awards, and won RWA’s Inspirational Reader’s Choice and an INSPY. Does having that kind of success put the pressure on for your second book?

I try not to think too much about it. I didn’t expect that kind of success but am very grateful for it. I had a lot of pressure on me on this releasing novel, not because of the success of the first book, but because, unlike the first, I didn’t have all the time in the world to write it. Some books flow smoothly, this one I had to yank out like a bad tooth. I faced multiple rewrites, some of them pretty major, all while trying to promote my all important first novel. I was still working full time, mothering, running Novel Journey (now Novel Rocket) and all of that, so this was a tough tough book for me to produce.

Tell our readers about your latest release, Dry as Rain:

I'm a really bad pitchman so I'll just repeat the back of the book copy:

Behind every broken vow lies a broken heart.

When Eric and Kyra Yoshida first met, they thought their love would last forever. But like many marriages, theirs has gradually crumbled, one thoughtless comment and misunderstanding at a time, until the ultimate betrayal pushes them beyond reconciliation. Though Eric longs to reunite with Kyra, the only woman he has truly loved, he has no idea how to repair the damage that’s been done.

Then a car accident erases part of Kyra’s memory—including her separation from Eric—and a glimmer of hope rises from the wreckage. Is this a precious opportunity for the fresh start Eric has longed for? Does he even deserve the chance to find forgiveness and win back Kyra’s heart . . . or will the truth blow up in his face, shattering their last hope for happiness? A richly engaging story of betrayal and redemption, Dry as Rain illuminates with striking emotional intensity the surprising truth of what it means to forgive.

You can read the first chapter HERE. 

"Holmes grabs the reader with a unique storyline about infidelity and what it truly means to forgive after betrayal.  By looking at the situation from a different angle, the author provides a great deal of food for thought and contemplation." RT Book Reviews – September, 2011


Library Journal says, "Fans of emotionally packed domestic fiction will love it."

This novel feels so much different than Crossing Oceans. Why did you choose to take such a different path?

I didn’t intend to write something completely different and I think it feels that way because of the characters telling the story. In Crossing Oceans, Jenny was our narrator and she was a melancholy, all woman sort.

In Dry as Rain, we have Eric, who is a man’s man and doesn’t think in flowery language and descriptions so it would have been wrong to write him that way. While both books have a heavy subject matter, Crossing Oceans was much more so. You can’t get heavier than dying, so it was bound to be more emotional, no matter how I wrote the next book.

But, my genre seems to be relational drama which both are and I like to pepper in a quirky cast and that’s true of both books.

You took a lot of chances in this book. First writing first person from a male’s perspective, secondly to have the protagonist someone who does a lot of things that aren’t very Christianly, like cheating on his wife, drinking, lying, etc. Are you afraid this might hurt your sales in the Christian market?

Afraid? No. Concerned, sure. While I don’t personally have a problem with Eric drinking a beer, the rest I have a problem with too. The thing is Eric’s a nominal Christian at the beginning of the book, lukewarm about his faith like many who call themselves followers of Christ. This is his journey though and he doesn’t end up where he begins. I wanted to tell the story as truthfully as I could and at the end of the day let the chips fall where they may.

What happened to your long time website, Novel Journey?

www.noveljourney.blogspot.com is now www.novelrocket.com You can get to it by either address but we decided on an overhaul because we wanted to drop the blogspot address and just have a dot com. The guy who owned Novel Journey didn’t return our emails to sell so we had to do something a little different. This turned out to be a good thing maybe because we’d been chewing on broadening the site for some time. We’ve got some exciting changes now, the most notable is the addition of “Rocket Pages” a sort of Craig’s List for writers to find the services they need to launch and sustain their career.

What’s going on with you personally?

Well, I’m blissfully married, mom to two, stepmom to three, and owner of 2 dogs and a fish. I bought a guitar and hope to start fiddling with that soon and just writing a lot. Nothing too exciting over here but that’s the way I like it. I’m the happiest I’ve been in my life. I’ve accomplished many of the dreams and goals I’d hoped to and I always tell my husband, if I died today, I’d feel I lived and full and rewarding life. Not that I’m looking to die just yet.

What are you working on now?

I can’t give the title yet as that’s a work in progress but it’s a story very close to my heart. I’m more excited about this one than anything I’ve ever written. Hopefully my publisher agrees and you see it on the stands in the next year or so. That’s really all I can say for now.

Tell us something we don’t know about you.

I’ll tell you a few. I thought I was afraid of heights until I bungee-jumped and loved it. I’d love to skydive for the first time in the next year, white water raft and get at least a little skill on the guitar. My husband is a talented songwriter. My kids are the sweetest in the world, (yes, the world!), and I love to get my hands dirty. That should do it. Thanks for having me!

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Taming Time by guest blogger Sarah Sundin

Sarah Sundin lives in northern California with her husband and three children. When she isn’t ferrying kids to soccer and tennis, she works on-call as a hospital pharmacist and teaches Sunday school. She belongs to American Christian Fiction Writers and Christian Authors Network. She is the author of the Wings of Glory series—A Distant Melody (Revell, March 2010), A Memory Between Us (September 2010), and Blue Skies Tomorrow (August 2011).

Taming Time—Practical Tips to Increase Writing Productivity

“How on earth did you find time to write a book?” a friend asked.

Perhaps it was my ability to type at the speed of light or my complete lack of a personal life.

Um, no. Snails type faster than I do, and they don’t have fingers. I’m a mother of three, teach Sunday school, and have a part-time job. But I make time to write. This year I’ve made the transition to published author, and time management has become vital.

Four tools for increasing productivity are herding up goals, corralling blocks of time, lassoing the on-line beast, and harnessing snippets of “wasted” time. Honestly, I don’t write Westerns.

Herd up Goals

We’ve all been there—you finish a busy week and have nothing to show for it. Setting goals is the best way to prevent this. Even if you aren’t published yet, make deadlines—it’s good practice for when you have a contracted deadline. Set yearly goals, then break those goals down by month. At the beginning of each week, I look at the month’s goals, and set daily goals to keep myself on target. My goal sheet hangs over my desk. Staring at me. Prodding me.

If you hate charts and organization, make it fun with color coding or cute logos or stickers. Why should kids have all the fun?

Corral Blocks of Time

“I am a professional. I am a professional.” Repeat this until you believe it.

Now, act like it. Keep office hours. Even if you only have one hour a day to write, use it well. During your office hours, act like a professional. Review the day’s goals and get to work. No excuses, no distractions, no phone calls—use Caller ID or (gasp!) unplug the line. Very few calls are emergencies. Also remember, professionals take breaks—walk the dog, play with the kids, chat with a friend—then back to work.

Having children at home complicates things, but even a toddler can learn to respect office hours. I started writing when my youngest was a year and a half. I did most of my work during naptime, but he learned that when Mommy was in her writing place, he could play by himself for a while. Despite what parenting magazines say, a child does not need constant entertainment by an adult—in fact, when a child learns to entertain himself, his imagination grows.

I strongly recommend Making Work at Home Work by Mary M. Byers (Revell, 2009) for fantastic, practical advice.

Lasso the Internet

All right, I’m still working on this. Many days I’ve logged on to check my e-mails—and then it’s noon. E-mail loops, blogs, Twitter, Facebook—they’re necessary for platform and publicity, but they can drain away that time you corralled.

Set strict limits. Some people avoid the internet entirely until their work is done. Since I’m in California and my publisher is back east, I can’t do that.

My plan…should I choose to follow it…is to check e-mails and Facebook and Twitter notifications first thing in the morning. I deal with anything urgent immediately—or schedule a time to do so—then save the rest for later. After my lunch break, I do another check. In the afternoon, when my children are doing homework and need my availability, I answer non-urgent e-mails, read blogs and loop digests, and scan Facebook and Twitter feeds.

If necessary, use a good old-fashioned kitchen timer.

Harness Time Snippets

One of my favorite ways to boost productivity is by using snippets of time while waiting at the baseball field, doctor’s office, ballet studio, or department of motor vehicles. Why not use that “wasted” time to your advantage? You’ll be amazed what you can accomplish in ten-minute spurts.

Be prepared. Have your laptop case ready to go or a clipboard box stocked with paper, pens, and sticky tabs.

Here are ten things you can do in ten minutes:

Study: Read a book on the craft of writing, peruse an online writing course, or listen to a conference CD.

Story Research: As a writer of historical fiction, I always have a pile of books to read for research. A book and note paper, and I’m set.

Market Research: Thumb through a book catalog or read a book in your genre.

Pre-write: Scribble down an outline for a novel or chapter, fill out character or plot charts, or work on a synopsis or query letter.

Edit: Editing is my favorite on-the-go activity, well suited to interruptions. Clip a chapter together with a binder ring, and mark it up with highlighters and a red pen. And God bless laptops and the track-changes feature. I did a significant part of my publisher’s content edit for my first novel while my daughter practiced soccer.

Critique: If you belong to a critique group, time snippets are great for reviewing your partners’ work.

Communications: With a smart phone, you can take care of phone calls and e-mails on the run—and free up time at home to write.

Publicity: Public writing means free publicity. People will ask what you’re doing. So tell them. Make sure you always bring business cards or bookmarks. Maybe your dental hygienist doesn’t read in your genre, but maybe her daughter does. Use those serendipitous encounters to build word of mouth publicity.

Observe: Stuck someplace without a laptop or writing materials? Don’t hyperventilate—release your observation skills. Watch people, listen to dialogue, observe the weather or landscape, and let your mind roam. And always have a notebook with you.

Write: Use a time snippet to write. Really. Try it. This is easiest when you’re in the flow and have to leave for an appointment. Take it with you. Finish it.

So, my dear writer friend, how do you plan to improve your time management this year?

A Memory Between Us

Major Jack Novak has never failed to meet a challenge—until he meets army nurse Lieutenant Ruth Doherty. When Jack lands in the army hospital after a plane crash, he makes winning Ruth's heart a top-priority mission. But he has his work cut out for him. Not only is Ruth focused on her work in order to support her orphaned siblings back home, she also is determined not to give her heart to any man.

As the danger and tension of World War II rise to a fever pitch, Jack and Ruth will need each other more than ever. Can Jack break down her defenses? Or are they destined to go their separate ways?

From the English countryside to the perilous skies over France, A Memory Between Us takes you on a journey through love, forgiveness, and sacrifice.

A Memory Between Us is the second book in the Wings of Glory series, which follows the three Novak brothers, B-17 bomber pilots with the US Eighth Air Force stationed in England during World War II. Each book stands alone.

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Is the Thrill Gone? by guest blogger Karen Witemeyer

Karen Witemeyer writes historical romance novels for Bethany House and dearly wishes she had the funds to hire an assistant to manage all her promotion activities. But since she has three kids to put through college, she'll continue to bite the marketing bullet and do it herself. At least she gets the wonderful perk of interacting with readers and other authors. She wouldn't give that up for the world. You can find her online at her website.

NJ: Karen is giving away a copy of her new release, Head in the Clouds. To enter the drawing, just leave Karen a comment.

Is the Thrill Gone?

My first book, A Tailor-Made Bride, debuted in June this year, and like any proud mother, I went all out to celebrate its arrival. I hosted an elaborate launch party, set up blog tours, arranged interviews and book signings, spoke at writers meetings, visited area book stores, updated my web site with new content, started a monthly contest, created a newsletter database, set up a Facebook page, and I even broke out of my introvert shell long enough to do a television interview for a regional news program.

Over the next several months, I responded to fan mail, visited all the blogs that popped up on my Google alert, and kept an eye on reviews. It was an incredibly busy time, but a joyful one.

Then, just as things started to taper down and normalize enough for me to reestablish a good writing rhythm, the second wave hit.

I am fortunate enough to have two books releasing very close together, due to the fact that my second book was actually written before my first. Head in the Clouds started hitting bookshelves in September. This blessing offered me the chance to build my readership more quickly. However, I was so tired from promoting book 1 that it was hard to muster much enthusiasm for doing it all again for book 2.

Call it the pacifier syndrome. When you have your first child, you sterilize everything. If the baby spits his pacifier onto the floor, you get a fresh one from your bag. With the second child, you rinse it off first before giving it back. But by the time the third kid comes around, you simply check it for visible floor grit then pop that sucker right back into his mouth.

So how can we keep from losing the thrill when it comes to promoting our second, third, or twentieth book?

First, I had to buckle down and tell myself that just because I didn't feel like promoting didn't mean that I could let that responsibility slide. Didn't I love this second book just as much as the first? Didn't I want it to succeed? I couldn't let my lack of excitement translate into a lack of action.

Next, instead of trying to do everything under the sun, I decided to promote more strategically, using the wisdom I'd gained from my previous experience. For example, I didn't do my own launch party. Instead I opted to speak at a local book festival and later have a pair of signings at local stores. This took the pressure off of me to plan and organize the event. I also cut back on store visits and one or two blog tours. I updated my web content, but instead of creating six character vignettes, this time I put together only four. I cut back in some places, expanded in others, but overall, I sought to streamline the process.

Now that marketing Head in the Clouds is in full swing, my excitement has risen to match my actions. As fan mail starts coming in and positive reviews show up, it is easier to find the enthusiasm that was lacking earlier.

Perhaps when I settle into a one-book-a-year rhythm, balancing promotion and writing will be less of an issue since I'll have more recovery time between books. Until then, I'll continue doing the best I can to fake it 'til I make it.

So have any of you ever experienced this kind of emotional sophomore slump? How did you handle it? Any marketing tips for authors looking to streamline their promotion process? Leave a comment and be entered for a chance to win a copy of Head in the Clouds.

Head in the Clouds

When a recovering romantic goes to work for a handsome ranch owner, her heart’s not the only thing in danger.

Adelaide Proctor is a young woman with her head in the clouds, longing for a real-life storybook hero to claim as her own. But when a husband-hunting debacle leaves her humiliated, she interviews for a staid governess position on a central Texas sheep ranch and vows to leave her romantic yearnings behind.

When Gideon Westcott left his privileged life in England to make a name for himself in America's wool industry, he never expected to become a father overnight. And five-year-old Isabella hasn't uttered a word since she lost her mother. The unconventionality of the new governess concerns Gideon--and intrigues him at the same time. But he can't afford distractions. He has a ranch to run, a shearing to oversee, and a suspicious fence-cutting to investigate.

When Isabella's uncle comes to claim the child--and her inheritance--Gideon and Adelaide must work together to protect Isabella from the man's evil schemes. And soon neither can deny their growing attraction. But after so many heartbreaks, will Adelaide be willing to get her head out of the clouds and put her heart on the line?

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Wasted Days & Wasted Nights by Mary Connealy, Guest Blogger

Mary Connealy is an author, journalist and a teacher. She releases three books with Barbour this year, is a columnist for the Lyons Mirror-Sun, and an occasional book reviewer for the Sioux City Journal. She lives on a farm in Nebraska with her husband, Ivan and their four daughters, Joslyn, Wendy, Shelly and Katy.

Wasted Days and Wasted Nights

I’m better now, but time was I wrote for a long time before I got to the beginning of a book.

I’m going to talk today about how to pick your beginning, but also how to not let it drive you nuts when you get told, often by a contest judge, that your book hasn’t started yet on page fifteen.

I’ve heard this called an ‘inciting incident’ and I like that. Incite is a word you hear attached to riot. Incited a riot.

That’s what you want for your beginning. Something big and fast paced and high stakes. But I used to write along telling my story and at some point it would all sort of click and, especially when it came to characters, I’d suddenly find a key to them and it would all be real. It wasn’t uncommon for that CLICK to come at around page ONE HUNDRED.

So, I’d go back and rewrite. Often throwing out huge chunks of the story to recreate the character as I now knew he really was.

It was painful to do, toss away all that work, cut thousands of words. I am a Nebraska ranch wife and as such I’m pretty conservative in many ways. No one needs to tell me to shut the light off when I leave a room, or turn the thermostat down and put on a sweater, or buy a car that gets high gas mileage. That’s something I’ve been doing from birth and not because I’m a ecology freak trying to save the planet. It’s because I’m cheap and because waste bothers me.

So wasting all those hours, throwing away all those words, it’s like just tossing out the mushy apples in the fridge when it would be so easy to just make apple sauce. It’s like throwing out three stale slices of bread instead of making bread pudding or stuffing for a roast chicken.

It is not natural.

And then I got a hold of a mindset that helped me handle it better.

I’ve read a lot about character charts or ‘interviewing your characters’ or creating background sheets for your characters. And I realized that’s what I was doing. All that writing that had to be tossed out was NOT wasteful, it was necessary. It was an exercise I needed to do to create my story.

So the next time someone in a contest critique tells you ‘your story doesn’t start until page nineteen” (that happened to me once—and she was right—but it took me a few years to figure that out) don’t get upset, don’t feel like your time was wasted. Just pick a new spot to start, farther on down the road of your story.

What you’ve written becomes back story and chances are it’s all important—it’s just not FIRST.

You need it. Now you’ll weave it into your story, bits at a time, in dialogue and sentence tags.

~~~

My book Wrangler in Petticoats released this month.

DRUMROLL PLEASE—

TODAY.

Wrangler in Petticoats

Ride into the Rockies where love peaks between a tough Texas tomboy and a passionate artist. On her way to Montana, Sally McClellan’s party is attacked and robbed. But then artist Logan McKenzie saves the badly wounded cowgirl who has been left for dead. Can this landscape painter tame the tomboy without breaking her spirit? Sally doesn’t know much about ribbons and lace, but Logan’s presence makes her want to connect with her feminine side. Will this fractured female discover a way to capture the artist’s love—or find herself captured and killed by outlaws?

In honor of that I am giving away one free copy to one commenter here on Novel Journey, so this is no time to lurk.

Seekerville

Petticoats & Pistols

My Blog

My Website

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Guest Blogger ~ Anita Higman

Award-winning author, Anita Higman, has twenty-six books published for adults and children. Her latest book is Love Finds You Under the Mistletoe (Summerside Press) and is a 2-in-1 novella collection with coauthor, Irene Brand. As a special promotion to accompany the book Anita and Irene created a free Christmas gift book (in e-book form) to view, download, or email to a friend. It’s full of family traditions, memories, recipes, and cozy Christmas thoughts. Please feel free to check out their new book, Love Finds You Under the Mistletoe, view the book trailer, and receive their free Christmas gift book on Anita's website.

Robert Louis Stevenson said, “There is but one art, to omit.”

He obviously appreciated the power of editing. I call it power, because editing has the ability to transform a rough draft into something remarkable. Something salable. After I complete a rough draft I go over it quite a few times, checking for problems, large and small. Here are just a few of my editing checks. You’re welcome to add these to your own personal list.

1. Did I sprinkle in backstory like a fine spice or dump in the whole jar at the beginning?

2. Do my characters have quirks and ticks like real people?

3. If I repeated words are they beautifully rhythmic or just annoyingly repetitious?

4. Is it clear who’s talking, or will readers need to stop to figure it out?

5. If I altered anything midway—character’s hair color, season of the year, etc, did I make those changes all the way through the manuscript?

6. Did I check each “was” and “were” as well as other scrawny verbs? Do any of them need to be removed from the herd?

7. Is the word “that” used so much that readers will become so weary of that that they’ll want to use my novel pages for kindling?

8. Have I included literary devices such as sensory details, foreshadowing, irony, metaphors, and similes to give my story depth and delight?

9. Did I dip so randomly and deeply into the barrel of limp and lifeless adverbs and adjectives that my prose came out with a sickly purple hue?

10. Are the elements of action, description, and dialogue balanced in my story?

11. Is my point of view consistent, or did I slip into head-hopping?

12. Is the setting clear in each scene?

13. Are my characters memorable and believable, or are they one-dimensional and uninspiring? Even with their flaws are my heroine and hero relatable and likable? Do I want to cheer them on?

14. Will readers easily know the year, the season, and the time of day?

15. Does my timeline have inconsistencies?

16. Did I vary the length of sentences in my paragraphs so they’re eye-appealing and easy to read?

17. How is my pacing? Is there a good rhythm to my storytelling? Are there passages I need to slow down or speed up for effect?

18. Do I have too many summary paragraphs? Do some need revision so I’m showing and not telling?

19. Does my work have the fine brush strokes of subtext dialogue?

20. If I’ve written in first person does it look like there was an “I” explosion all over the manuscript?

21. If the professions and hobbies of the main characters are important to the story will the readers get a good look into this part of their lives? Was this material presented in a way that is organic to the story, and did I check the information for accuracy?

22. Is my dialogue mind-numbingly boring or realistic and fresh?

23. Have I read the work out loud, or at least did I have my computer read it to me? By the way, the woman who reads to me on my computer is named Crystal. Even though she is a little robotic sounding, I know when I listen to the words I will “hear” errors that I won’t “see.” Give it a try. It really works.

I hope this mini version of my editing checklist is helpful in all your novel-polishing endeavors!

Under the Mistletoe

Two Christmas stories - one historical, one contemporary - under one cover.

Love Finds You under the Mistletoe: An Appalachian Christmas

A promise to her dying sister compels Julia Mayfield to take her young nephew to Mistletoe, Kentucky, a tiny town tucked away in the Appalachian Mountains. Sparks fly when she meets David Armstrong, a World War II veteran like herself. Even as shadows from the past weave a dangerous web around Julia and David, will their love flourish like the mistletoe that blankets the nearby hills?

Love Finds You under the Mistletoe: Once Upon a Christmas Eve

Hollie Goodnight's store has just been voted best Christmas shop in America. All the new publicity draws flamboyant novelist Van Keaton to the cozy town of Noel, Missouri, demanding to write Hollie's story - a dramatic tale of misfortune and triumph. She is swept up in his world of beautiful words and fanciful interludes ... until Owen Quigly, her lifelong best friend, launches a plan to win her back.

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