My Regency historical is also a bit of a romantic suspense.  But, as I’ve been going back over  my story and synopsis post pregnancy, (read: after the resuscitation of many of my brain cells) I’ve realized there’s not a lot of suspense in my suspense.

There’s the plot.  They’re trying to trap the “villain.”  To gain enough information about him to put him in jail and avenge an innocent party.  But, that’s the plot, not the suspense.

So, I ruminated.  I picked and pulled at my brain, trying to find a way to keep readers at the edge of their seat.  I want them asking: will they catch the villain at his dastardly deeds or will the slippery fellow get away again?  Worse, will he accomplish his goal before they do?

Ultimately, I found myself asking, “Who cares?”  Not in a this-is-a-boring-storyline kind of way, but in a who-has-the-most-to-lose kind of way.

When I started, the only one who really cared if the villain got caught was my hero.  If the villain is caught, my hero’s brother is avenged and my hero’s reputation is quasi-repaired.  But, that was all I had.

Initially, my heroine sort of just got drug into the conflict.  She was collateral damage, forced to be part of catching the villain due to extenuating circumstances.  But she didn’t care because of her own motivation and I decided it would be more suspenseful if she wanted to catch the bad guy all on her own.   So, I added an external conflict that would be resolved if she got involved, namely, the hero offers to pay her a lot for her help and she needs the money to accomplish a very altruistic goal.

Finally, I decided the villain needed to care.  At the onset, he just didn’t want to be caught for the sake of it.  I mean, who wants to go to jail?  But that’s not an interesting reason because, in fact, no one wants to go to jail.  I wanted something specific to him, something that was compelling.  Something that makes him hell-bent on working at odds to my hero and heroine.  I’m still working on that part.

But I realized that there was a trend here.  I wanted all my characters to have a stake in the outcome of their actions.  And, I wanted that “stake” to be something immediate.  It couldn’t be something without a timeframe.  My hero only has a certain time to catch the villain because once the villain realizes he’s on to him, he’ll disappear and my hero will lose his chance.  My heroine needs to take the “job” my hero has offered because she needs the money—fast.  My villain can’t run and hide even when he’s foiled because of… well, something I haven’t figured out yet.

Their needs have to be immediate and volatile and in complete opposition.   And they have to be completely invested.  No turning back.

My story gets a little life or death.  But I don’t think suspense in every story has to be that dire.  I think as long as the characters have an immediate need that is in opposition to another character, an author creates tension and suspense.

So, I wanted to see how everyone else does this.  How do you create the suspense between your characters, the immediacy of them accomplishing their goals?  Anyone want to offer up their own hero’s or heroine’s motivations for example?

I’m a contrarian.  This is so deeply embedded in my DNA, for the longest time I didn’t even suspect its existence.  I spent the first *mumble, mumble* years of my life going along with everybody.  I’d say, “Of course”, or “That sounds great!”, or “Whatever you want”.  Not only did I mean it, I’d expend a lot of time and energy to make it happen, even if it made me unhappy (which it often did).

But that contrarian gene was like a sleeper cell, waiting for the precise moment before it was called into action.  Now if I utter, “Of course”, or “That sounds great!”, or “Whatever you want”, it’s more likely said in an ironic tone of voice, or with a sardonic lift of my eyebrows. 

There were moments in my youth when I should have realized I was a budding contrarian.  I remember watching Mighty Mouse cartoons, hoping that flying rodent with the cape and oversized pecs wouldn’t make it to the rescue in time.  I wanted the villain and the girl to get together.   Obviously I knew the villain wasn’t truly evil.  But I figured out pretty quickly he was way more interesting to me than the hero was.

Now that I’m an adult, my taste in villains has expanded.  As I’ve mentioned recently, I’m watching the BBC TV series, “Robin Hood“.  And yes, I confess the reason I am watching it is because of Richard Armitage, who plays a villain.  But he’s not THE villain, who we all know is the Sheriff of Nottingham.  The Sheriff is smarmy and sleazy and cowardly and evil to his core.  Yecch.  Boo, hiss.  Not the kind of villain I’m advocating here.

The handsome Richard Armitage plays Guy de Gisbourne, the Sheriff’s henchman.  He really rocks that whole villainous sartorial thing—black leather pants, long black leather coat with shiny metal doodads, black boots with clinking spurs that make my heart dance with anticipation for his arrival—so yeah, I’d be lusting after him just for that aspect. 

But the thing that makes him, and other villains of his ilk, so genuinely fascinating?  The possibility he MIGHT do something heroic. 

One of Guy’s most humanizing traits is when he gets disgusted by his boss, the Sheriff.  Haven’t all of us rolled our eyes at the crazy stuff our bosses ask us to do?  Still, he grits his teeth and follows orders anyway, hoping it will help him get ahead in the world, so he can have what he really wants:  The Girl.

Even though Maid Marian makes me want to take archery lessons so I can learn how to shoot flaming arrows at her skull with 100% accuracy. . .I do love how Guy keeps trying to win her over.  He is dazzled by her (God knows why – oh yeah, because he hasn’t seen me yet), and he can’t seem to figure out why she isn’t dazzled by him (me either – I mean, I love Robin and all, but he’s cute and good rather than sexy and bad). 

The bottom line is Guy could just take Marian by force, and do all kinds of dastardly deeds to achieve his goals. . .but he doesn’t.  And that’s what intrigues me.  It signals there is a seed of something heroic inside him.  He struggles to keep in touch with it, and when he ultimately fails, then he wrestles with his failure.  If he truly were a villain, he’d be whistling a Disney tune as he wiped the blood off his sword, mentally crossing off another item on his never-ending “Evil To Do” list.

With the hero, it’s a pretty safe bet that he will be heroic, because, well, it’s in his job description.  Since he gets paid to be heroic, there’s not a lot of suspense involved, because there are expectations of heroism.  Don’t get me wrong.  I love heroes, and I want them to be that way.  And it’s no doubt a heavy burden to carry, being heroic 24/7, yet they do it without hesitation, making them even more admirable.    

But if the villain does something heroic?   Get out the smelling salts because women everywhere are going to swoon. 

And if he does something heroic because of the heroine?   Plug your ears because the heartfelt “ahhhhs” are going to deafen you. 

It takes a lot to sway a villain from his nefarious goals, so it’s naturally very sexy when the heroine inspires him to change his mind, and his course of action.  Talk about a character arc! 

So now I’m not feeling so bad about my contrary attachment to these luscious villains.  They are merely heroes in disguise, battling their defiant DNA, trying to keep their laudable qualities from being extinguished.  All I ask is that they don’t let their latent goodness become a dominant feature.  If they do, they’re going to lose me as a fan. 

I am a dyed-in-the-wool contrarian after all.

So anyone else love to love a villain?  Tell us about the villains you’re writing, and what makes them so delicious.  Or confess which fictional villain makes your heart flutter.  And if you’re not a fan of villains, that’s okay too.  Just tell us why you aren’t.

I spent the last ten weeks childless and pretty much all alone. Except for Bumblebee, but he’s not much of a conversationalist. Back in May I had big plans. Big goals and for the first time, they were within sight.

June and half of July was my revision class. Learned a ton, totally motivated, ready to polish this baby up. The end of July was the RWA Conference where I pitched said mostly unpolished MS and got even more motivation to finish in the form of a full request. Sending off at the end of September seemed doable. No problem.

And yet, all these best laid plans were totally mucked up. Blown to smithereens. Obliterated. By whom, you ask?

ME.

Yeah, I know, I’m an idiot. Late May I decided we should buy a house. June kicked off with house hunting and we must have seen a couple dozen a week. I was still revising, but not nearly as much as I should have been. Hunting turned to offering which turned to a complete cluster and eventually fell into the crapper. Eventually being two months and two days. Not that I was counting.

So now kiddo is back, my dad is here for a visit, and I have a month to get this shit done. Here’s my new plan. The desk is going into my bedroom so I can sequester myself as far from the living room and television as I can get. It’ll be right in front of a wall so I can plaster my storyboard up there. September will be all writing all the time.

What about you? When you have a deadline you simply can’t continue to piss away, what extreme measures do you take? Ever been the ruin of your own best laid plans? Anyone willing to pitch in and revise this book for me? (It was worth a try.)

Saturday–after doing some cleaning and shopping–I flopped on my couch and tore through my new novel by a favorite author. With a sigh of relief, this one was as magical as some of her earlier books and I stayed up very late reading to the end. With particular note, I enjoyed the love scene because she has a real gift for laughter and sex. The only thing that stood out was that, well, one of the secondary characters–two, really–seemed like mirror images of characters she had written in previous books. I ignored it because the dialogue was witty; the main characters were so likable; and the prose was verdant.

If I perhaps noticed that something life-threatening happened to the heroine at a crucial moment and then I spent about ten minutes going over in my mind the other books this author had done that to the heroine, it was only for the sake of writing study. The similarities were surface really; and how original can you be when talking about the human experience, the early 19th century; and falling in love? Secondary characters have archetypes too, right?

I carried on and finished the book, sighing as I closed it. And then, in a fit of nostalgia, I went and got my favorite book by this author. The book that is complete Desert Island Keeper. The book I’d recommend to anyone who hadn’t read a romance before. The book I wished I’d written. I opened it and began reading, immediately drawn into the story as if I had not read it a dozen times before. And that’s when it happened.

There. The Lord of the Underworld and Persephone metaphor. Which was exactly the metaphor she’d used in the book I just finished reading to describe a kiss. I looked at this version carefully. In this one, she was describing the hero’s smile instead. Whew, what a relief. Of course, at this point I’m now tempted to read through all her books and see if she’s used this particular metaphor in any other books. Not likely all of them, but I bet I could find a few more books she does it in.

I’m pretty sure you can’t plagiarize yourself. And it’s not that I don’t enjoy a Hades/Persephone reference because that story does beguile me, but now I think about my own writing and think about all the ways I’m repeating myself. As we’ve discussed in other blogs, we have “core” heroines, core themes, core heroes, and a number of other repetitive things that I know I do. But now I’m also repeating my metaphors. And not even just my metaphors. I have a great affection for: “indeed” and “honestly” and “clearly” used as dialogue responses from my characters, an indication that Harry Potter is playing in the background as I write. All my characters use these lines–they’re not restricted to one character because I like for all my characters to be sarcastic. I can’t bear for one of my characters not to have the perfect thing to say.

Now I grant you that me worrying about repeating myself when I have yet to be published is definitely putting the cart before the horse; however, I am basing this on stuff I’ve started and stuff I’ve finished. Clearly (see how much I like the word?) not everything I’ve written will see the light of bookshelves, but I’m hoping for a least a stack. Are my readers–all ten to fifteen of them–going to read my stuff and go, “If she uses the Harry Potter metaphor one more time, I’m going to scream”? Is this malaise the result of reading too much and not having other hobbies like, oh, writing or taking a walk? Can you actually prevent this sort of repetition because this is the author’s voice for better or worse? My favorite author could no more keep from making Hades references than I can keep from making Harry Potter ones. We are who we are.

Have you ever suffered author burnout? Have you ever noticed your favorite author repeating metaphors and/or dialogue as well as similar characters or plots? Do you care? If you do, what do you do about it? What are you reading now? What are you looking forward to coming out?

Wow! What a summer! I know we gots a few weeks a’ official summer left, but let’s start the party now and make it last until September 21^st. We’re pirates, we can do it!

And the bar is fully stocked and ready to go… Let’s see, we got the pretty sunset one, let’s call that a Pirate Sunset. Then we gots the white creamy looking one and I’m not gonna get near naming that, ya filthy minded wenches! The purty orange one I’m calling the Kraken’s Froth. The white and red one…? Let’s not go there either.  Well, OK… Blood and Cream! The last looks like something wit’ chocolate in it… I’m going fer Yummy.

Now, it’s just a matter of picking yer sweat inducin’ activity… I gots Frisbee…

 We got Slick here willin’ ta teach anyone interested in surfing… He’s a bit blurry looking, think he’s been in the water a bit long. But that jus’ means he’s a good surfer… Or not. He might fall off his board too much… Well! Fun in the water then!

 Or the lads are always happy ‘bout stringing up a net and breaking out the volleyball…

 If you’d rather play wit’ what’s familiar…sailing! 

 Fer Q, I brought along a snorkling instructor…look at her go!

 Now me? I got Sam here and we’re gonna kick back in the shade and polish off some mojitos!

Have fun!

Sam? I need one a’ those mojitos now, this were hard ta do! Time ta turn the hottie postin’ over ta someone new! Yer turn, Hal!

No guest this week, but I’m sure we’ll all come up with brilliant things ta discuss on ‘r own!

You know, I’ve had some strange weekends this summer. And in contemplating all I’ve done, I realize somewhere along the path of my life, I made some interesting choices. And per discussions earlier this summer regarding how perspective changes as you age, I took some time to wrap my head around how I got here.

Honestly, how did I end up with dressing up to attend the Northern California Pirate Festival on Saturday, then put on my lime green and turquoise to support my NASCAR driver, Carl Edwards, at the race in Infineon Raceway? On the same weekend? The path I walked to get here is really convoluted!

When younger, you have a myriad of possibilities ahead of you. The world is your buffet and you have the power to choose and choose and choose. Of course, my experience with youth is that they waste these choices. Or more importantly, they waste the opportunity to change their mind. To admit they made a mistake, learn from it and take a step backwards. They are so focused on the future and forward momentum, that they refuse to retreat, regroup, re-choose.

The older you get, if you’re lucky, you are more forgiving of your bad choices…or…let’s call them poor choices or simply not the best choices…and you don’t let them limit what you do next. Be it retreat and redo or simply move forward ignoring what you did before.

For example, in school you pick a major that you believe you’ll love and, most importantly, you’ll earn a damned good living at. You are three years into the four year degree. And, man…this sucks. But you picked it! You can’t retreat! That would be like giving up. And you have these student loans to pay and you need the money and…and…and… So, you finish the degree, you get a job, you work it.

And you’re basically miserable. Now, your parents told you that if you really wanted to change degrees, they’d help out, they’d support you. Your friends at the time told you to dump the accounting classes and follow your heart into the theater, dentistry, whatever. But, you felt honor bound, if I can call it that, to finish what you started.

Sigh.

Youth can see things so black and white. Characters in fiction often operate in this fashion also. We, the writers, need them to do this so we can teach them why they are wrong and offer up a solution that involves falling in love, having a child, taking a new job, or, when I write, saving the world.

It’s always the extreme choices that make the best fiction, IMHO. But!

Extreme choices don’t always make the best real life.

I made a lot of interesting choices. I seldom let one wrong choice lead me for long. I’d make a rotten character in a story! Or I’d be the flakey woman who the heroine would badger for being flakey.

Anyway! I was believer in real black or white. As most young people are. And I flitted, but I flitted thinking this was the one thing I’d be called to do! Yes! And this would be the one friend, the one who I’d bond with for life.

Eh, never worked that way. As I get older, I realize this was all about choices I made and choices I unmade. And it was good. (Okay, I made one choice that I stuck with, I am the woman who celebrated 30 years married in May.)

At the urging of the Bo’sun, I went to the movies and saw “Letters From Juliet” a while ago and I was quite charmed. (For one thing Franko Nero is hot. And my new poster man for every silverton hero I write from now on.)

*fanning myself

But I love how the idea of making a choice is revisited in this movie! Firstly, you have young lead, who gradually realizes she can actually change her mind. The young male lead, who does and has his heart broken. (For a little while. It is a HEA movie, after all.)

But to me, the real story was the senior heroine. At 15, she chose to follow her parent’s lead and not her heart. And she didn’t go to Leonardo. She went home to England, met a man, married, had children, who had children. She didn’t really regret, but she wondered. And when reminded that choices can be revisited, she did it.

She’s so brave as they search for her Leonardo…and they see a lot of nice, senior, hot men.

*fans self again

But when finally facing the reality of her Leonardo, she tries to back away. It’s too scary, it’s too real. Luckily, he arrives and the reality of him sweeps her doubts away. For me, the movie could have ended there, but they had to finish up with the main lead story, the kids.

Ho hum. Both Bo’sun and I felt this was handled a bit awkwardly, but it concluded nicely and everyone was happy, walking among the vineyards of Italy.

Vanessa Redgrave was wonderful. And she and Franko Nero are husband and wife! They met decades ago while filming Camelot. Hard to beat that for real romance! And a choice that lasted.

Topic of the day: Choices. The good, the bad, the ugly. And the redos, the new choices…writing, living, watching. Your experiences? The experiences of your characters?

I’m taking a class this semester on how to teach writing workshops. It’s an interesting class, but not my point today. While slogging through the first of five textbooks (five! Eeek!), I came across a cool idea:

Writing is a tool for thinking. It’s a medium, a process for identifying or organizing our thoughts, reconsidering an issue from a new direction, or solving a problem.

And if writing is thinking, then we can look at the entire act of drafting and revising as one of exploration and discovery. (Which personally, sounds much more exciting than revising).

While this is probably common sense, I found it fascinating to see it articulated. And I wonder what it means for my process of writing.

I certainly find it true that while writing, the very act of writing gives me new ideas and new thoughts I would have never had otherwise. The very act of writing propels the new ideas which will be scribbled down next.

I just started a huge round of revisions on a manuscript I finished six months ago. And you know what else I noticed? The more I work on the revision, the more I try to clarify and consolidate, the more I learn about my characters. As I keep revising, I find tweaks in the plot that make it all come together at a new depth. I find ways to increase characterization. I’m not just editing, but thinking it through from new angles as I revise, and strengthening the story in the process.

And how about plotting? If we get ideas from the writing process itself, is it possible to plot out a whole book ahead of time? If we learn characterization from writing the characters, can we ever really know them at the beginning of a book?

So what do you think? Does the very act of writing create new ideas to write? Or do you wait for ideas and then write them down? Do you plot, or do you wait for ideas to come from the writing itself? Do you agree that writing is a medium for thinking?

“I Get Off” Halestorm  (Halestorm, 2009)

I just saw them live. I love the energy in a crowd during a concert. I may not be a people liking type of person; but there is nothing like a pit full of women under the scorching sun screaming, “I get off on you, getting off on me. Give you what you want, but nothing is for free.”

I’ve debated how to learn more about the relationship between my hero and heroine. I’m not writing a heavy romance novel where there is lots of hot sex between them to build momentum to a HFN/HEA. My heroine really can’t stand the sight of the hero. They have a past with some complications. The hero really isn’t doing himself any favors by coming back into my heroine’s life. He’s just serving a reminder that she’s still hopelessly in love with him after he broke her very young and naïve heart. She’s very determined that will never happen again, especially with him.

Let’s be honest. As the writer, the characters are under (loosely) my control for the time being. I’ve furiously scribbled in my notebook for a few weeks now notes on how to make this story work and potentially make a series work between them and resolve even their relationship by the end. I understand the attraction between them. If you’ve ever wanted something you knew you’d never have again, it only serves to fuel the flames. The hero knows what he’s done (he’s justified it in his mind) but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t want what’s “his”. (Men are so arrogant. Well, 99.98%- just to cover my ass.) My heroine is so torn when they are together. She wants to prove that she’s indifferent to him now. Now that she’s older, less naïve and more worldly.  But she still remembers everything about him and it embarrasses her to think she can’t get past that part of her life.

So I was in a curious predicament of my own making. I don’t plot. But I needed a way to figure out how to make the H/H have a semblance of a stable working relationship while I finish the first book and launch into a series.

So last Thursday while cleaning the house I’m dancing around in the kitchen with the vacuum and these lyrics inspired a thought in my head.

“You don’t know that I know you watch me every night.

And I just can’t resist the urge to stand here in the light.

Your greedy eyes upon me, and then I come undone.

I could close the curtain… But this is too much fun.” (Halestorm, 2009)

Sounds like a good erotica fiction in the making, doesn’t it? I thought to myself, maybe I should just write a little snippet scene between my H/H that definitely won’t make it into the final draft but will help me grasp the tension between the two better.

No, I haven’t yet, but I’ve seen it. It’s good. That should make for utmost extra embarrassment come morning time. I do enjoy mortifying characters. God knows I blush way too much in my own life to not make everyone in my fictional world do the same. If I’ve learned anything from a life of people watching is that interaction with one another is an art form that each of us takes different brushes to paint with. No two interactions are ever the same, even if you interact with the same person over and over again. The interaction is always evolving and that’s how I look at writing my H/H relationship. They have to evolve to move the story. I have to evolve as the writer to keep up.

What inspires your scenes between your characters other than the natural flow of the story? Do you get passing thoughts? See scenes play out in front of you as if you’re watching a movie? Hear a song on the radio and think “AHA!”? Eavesdrop on a conversation as you’re passing by and get inspired to take it in a different direction?

There’s an author I love who shall remain nameless, but I recently realized her heroines all seem to be the same woman. Well, I haven’t read all her books, but I’ve read five of them and four of the heroines could be interchangeable. They each come across as how I imagine the author to be. Smart, self-deprecating, funny, and occasionally cranky.

Not long ago, we took tests to see what kind of “girl” we all were, and if I remember correctly, the results for our heroines usually matched the results for ourselves. At least I know that was the result in my case. I don’t consider this a problem, but it does make me wonder. Am I writing me over and over again?

My heroines show up in my mind. They appear out of nowhere, usually bringing their hero along for the official introductions, then set up camp in my brain as if waiting for the blow out sale at Kleinfeld’s. Because of this, I rarely think of them as my creations, but rather characters already fully formed who just happen to live in my brain. Who I’ve only just met.

If this were the case, you’d think they would all be different, and in some ways they are. But in many ways they are not. Other than all being brunette and slender, my heroines are not the trusting sort, they often don’t think very highly of themselves, and to say they are skeptical of men is an understatement.

But, while Emma is a control freak, Melissa is a push over looking for her spine. Bridgit is a hard ass hiding her mushy, vulnerable center behind a wall of attitude and rebellion, and Anna is enjoying finding her hidden sex kitten. They are different yet similar. And still, at the risk of revealing too much, they are all versions of me.

Just as we all have a core story, do you have a core heroine? How do your heroines come to be? Do they just show up or do you build them like haute couture on a dress form? Is there an author you’ve read where it seemed her heroines could blend together? (No names necessary…karma and all that.) And do you ever worry that your characters are not different enough to stand apart?

I had to make up my own parody “Oooh, I’m halfway there, oooh-ho, writin’ on a prayer” just to psyche myself up that I was halfway done with the story. This is a lie because I hate the first couple chapters–loathe them with the fire of a thousand hells might be more apt–and I’m ready to pull a Sin, delete the thing, and start over from scratch, complete with reworking the GMC and storyboarding devices. There is something to be said for writing at least 4-10 pages a day, everyday, and churning out a book in a modest 2-3 month period. Nothing ever gets so old and stale at any point that you realize how bad the beginning is compared to the end…because it’s still in the same writing growth period.

But that’s a discussion for a different blog. Today is about parodies and psyching yourself up for being halfway there, damnit. It’s Monday–bring on the Bon Jovi!

Once upon a time

Not so long ago—

My hero used to be in love with his bride

But she’s gone on strike

He’s down on his luck, no bright side.

Evie wants a little respect, she’s strong,

The original showdown, can’t he admit he’s wrong?

He won’t even try.

But I’ve got to make them hold on to what they’ve got

‘Cause it doesn’t make a difference

If they like it or not

They’ve got each other and that’s a lot,

For love—I’ll make them give it a shot

Ohh, I’m halfway there!

Whoa, writin’ on a prayer

Give me another chocolate; I’ll make it, I swear!

Whoa, writin’ on a prayer

What sorts of things do you do to keep in the Zone? Chocolate? Rock music? Lashing yourself to your desk chair so you don’t wander off from your keyboard? What fakeouts do you tell yourself to keep going? It’s Monday–what are you telling yourself now just to make it through the rest of the week?