After completion of “Rules of Engagement,” now on the shelf (you have 1 more day to purchase it on sale, jus’ sayin,’), I have serious time to chill.
Starving authors get to go places, right? Hahaha … but I am thinking about putting the ocean YouTube video on the big screen and sink my feet into 2 buckets of sand and drink a virgin pina colada.
Down time … yeah.
Since I have around 200 books on my Kindle, I believe I will abandon writing in extremis like I had been, a wee bit of reading won’t hurt me, will it? I figure I can write a hundred words to fiddle with “Glass Slipper,” and take a chunk out of the Kindle library that rivals the Hangzhou Zhongshuge Bookstore in Dujiangyan, Sichuan Province, China (pronounce that fast …). Well … almost.
Have a fine finish off in June and read a book. Oh, here’s a few (this one on sale ’til the 21st of June:
Just out! Free on KU. Also available on Kindle and in paperback.
And …
Debut novel, free on KU and Audible, also Kindle and in paperback
That’s the buzz for the day. Don’t forget to like, subscribe, comment, and share!
OKAY, OKAY, since it’s been a bit over a month since I last wrote, I figure just perhaps since I posted on Twitter my blog site and website that I really should keep up to date.
So this is for Jack who so graciously sent me his hysterical blog link on being a lawyer with a sense of humor … in the event he’s checking in on me.
Hey, Jack!
What exactly have I been doing with my time? Uh.
ahem
I’m a night owl. That’s when I read, write, rewrite, etc. So I am working hard(ly?) on Glass Slipper, my third novel. Police procedural, forensics, my first serial killer novel. Yay! Cough, I mean …
Anywho it is a sequel to “Romance Under Wraps,” murder mystery, forensics, police procedural, romance. It wasn’t my title or cover concept, so no, to say it’s a romance would be misleading, but all is well if folks like romance with suspense. And gunplay. Etc.
“Glass Slipper” continues on in fictional (almost real) Whiskey River, where Jack McCLoud is the medical examiner. Morose. Trying to go straight. Trying to forget the dame who shot him, giving him a bad attitude (more so than usual) and a nice limp.
Mercedes Hall has a few secrets of her own. She’s the new tech in the morgue with a handful of secrets and a lot of Jack’s new problems and temptations.
Trying to go straight with a knockout redhead stepping into his world and shaking it up was not his plan.
Sharing an excerpt. This is how Jack’s mind goes (this of course, is up to change via the editing process. But you get the idea).
Gass Slipper concept
“I was still mulling over how I’d been shot.
How did I miss it? The woman I had almost married was an assassin. She wasn’t sent for me, but she’d used me up, and shot me. It was, at the very least, unexpected. My knee pained me, especially in the Dead Room, so naturally, it was hard not to think of that Mata Hari. I might be wrong, but ‘once bitten, twice shy,’ certainly seemed to apply. Nearly sleeping the big one at the hand of a crazy blonde could make a man cranky, and I’m not likely to take another broderick, emotionally or otherwise.
The thought of her and the ache in my leg dogged me as I readied the newest arrival, Lindsay Pratt, D.O.A., for viewing in the morgue.
Every building, every room has its own whiff test. The bleak corridor that led to the Dead Room was long, and smelled like formaldehyde, and bleach, and maybe a thousand dead bodies. That was the nature of my business as medical examiner.
I’m Jack McCloud, the lone ranger of the dead across Southern Oregon, our very own Rest in Peace Department.
* * *
I had a hard and fast rule: nothing jumps in the morgue so when a stranger comes through the doors, I tend to take note.
A live one walked in, jarring my thoughts. The blonde strode into the Dead Room, a knockout, a tomato with gams that kept on going like a kid’s toy with an Energizer battery. Her threads were a spending spree beyond my annual take-home and she was like a fine porcelain vase. In a tight-fitting cerulean dress, with thin straps over her shoulders, all those blonde curls spilled over her shoulders like a waterfall over a cliff. And her curves? Her curves were hugged by all that lucky, lucky blue.”
Very happy to have sent off the review/approval my “final” manuscript off for the last time to the publisher. Nothing is ever set in stone and the publisher may want more edits, whether content, grammar, or wording. May the Waiting Game commence. I hit “send” at 11:57 pm last night. Oh, yeah. “Rules of Engagement.” So tired I forgot to mention the name of the novel!
Titles are always subject to change per the publisher, and I will be seeing a cover come maybe soon. Cool. Beans.
So, that said, I get to spend time catching up with my To-Be-Read (TBR) pile and chill a bit until she goes through it and asks for changes, etc. The nature of the writer’s life. Currently reading a serial killer novel. Hahahaha. Ahem.
There is nothing in the writing world better than a good editor. So many, many thanks go to her for cracking the whip.
did she learn from him, or did he learn from her?
It’s tough to pigeonhole a genre sometimes and this is no exception. Is it a Christian fiction? Well, ya, just not heavy-handed. Is it a thriller? Oh most definitely. Is it a crime fiction? Depends on whether crimes against humanity count. Is it military? Yep, any mistakes, thoroughly my own. What about intrigue? Yes. Anything medical? Oh, of course, but any mistakes are again, thoroughly my own. What about romance? Um, some, clean of course. Is it bloody? I plead the 5th!
I am pretty sure there should be a “Not for the Faint of Heart” genre, though. If you want the truth. Because I write different genres. Truth be told.
Or can you?
Not to worry, ye faint-of-heart. My next novels involve forensics and murder (uhhh, that’s not a problem, is it?), cozy mystery with romance, spinster sisters cozy, and a novel yet to be announced.
Why dead bodies always show up in my sweet romances is beyond me.
I am almost done with those pesky rewrites for “Rules of Engagement” (working title). The critique group is shredding it like mozzarella for me. My cover? Yet to be determined. However, if you wish to see some of what I envision, keep on reading. No, it’s not about weeping, mozzarrella, or Operation.
Oww
That helpful process is great. Until you realize it’s like going into open heart surgery without anesthesia and car batteries are attached to the surgeon. Routinely zapping him awake or simply for fun. Who is getting his advice from the game, Operation.
Yeah, like that
After that, it may go directly to the editor for giggles. Or I may withhold it until it’s as clean a copy so she doesn’t. Pretty much she will tear it apart. Re-shred.
Editor’s motus operandi
Annnnnd this is me. Once she’s done with it.
That would be me
*The writing life*
Cover ‘in the works.’
“Writing is easy. Just put a sheet of paper in the typewriter and start bleeding.” — Ernest Hemingway
Been busy, busy. Rewrites on Rules of Engagement and juggling ARC and TBR books, reviews, promoting Romance Under Wraps, have been a challenge.
(promote, promote right here): Find Romance Under Wraps on Amazon. Free on KU and Audible. Also available on Kindle and paperback. Click:
Two people (editor and my husband) have started cracking the whip on me to finish the rewrites ASAP. UH.
ouch!
Truth be told those last chapters will be the hardest.
Truth
Anyone else stuck in that?
I like keeping posts short. My attention falters with long posts. So, off to rewrites or whatever my calendar tells me to do. Maybe I should get a calandar. Hmm.
The author weaves together a story across the lifetime of a marriage/family – falling apart. Secrets kept. Trauma, depression. Human trafficking,
The story of us all, right? No? Think about this. We all have secrets, some worse than others. We all have the goals to help someone. Our families often fall apart because we are 1. trying to protect someone and 2. not communicating.
It’s a fight for his family, for those trafficked, for his nightmares in the military to stop.
This is a real life type novel that will keep you up late at night!
I had the pleasure of listening to The Superior Word’s Easter Message, and Jim Dwyer mentioned “Romance Under Wraps.” Starts at min 4:42… Got the print screen time for ya. 4:42
‘Cause he’s a dude, he sees the cop side more than the romance side, and is almost done reading my first novel.
If you enjoy clean/Christian romantic suspense/police procedure you enjoy “Romance Under Wraps” … with the main character off the rail, Catherine Cade, an identity thief, wholly unlikeable, especially when dealing with Rick Calhoun, homicide detective.
Oh, he has plans for her all right. And she is not amenable to his offer but does she have a choice? Not even. Not if she wants to stay out of prison. And not if she wants to solve a murder — with or without the dirty cop.
How many laws will HE break and what will he sacrifice to keep her safe?
What will she do with that?
And many thanks to Linda Rodante for surprising me with a fantastic meme for one so technically challenged (me).
Yesterday, someone with a long history of working forensics asked me why I write crime fiction. Well, I write a combo of crime/romance or thriller/romance but that’s neither here nor there.
I thought it through and it didn’t take long.
Here it is:
“I write (romantic suspense) crime fiction primarily because of the evil I have seen in the world, the crimes perpetrated by others, and people so hurt, so lost, that they need a message of hope. I write specifically to a crime or serial killer with an obstacle standing in the way of the main character’s ability to find the suspect as well as a subplot for the main character, an obstacle for him/her to overcome emotionally/spiritually.
Everyone has a wound, physically, emotionally, spiritually. Everyone has physical obstacles to overcome whether the huge stack of dishes caked with eggs, cheese, and no dishwasher or a crime, a villain, and the chase. These elevate people (I pray) that they see something in their mundane lives that they can relate to (the chase, the doing of, the dishes, whatever) and give them a message, one of redemption.
I was a nurse practitioner and saw a lot of evil. Patients in need, ignored. I also have taken forensics classes and I give the main character a good pile of evidence for the main character through forensics (which is a lot like performing a history and physical, examining labs, imagining, diagnosing, chasing down the ‘villain’ of the body). Also I understand redemption and prayer, overcoming physical and emotional obstacles, as well as spiritual. And that’s why I write crime fiction.”
She emailed me back and said in her twenties she’d seen much of the same.
Yes, I agreed with her statement, “It’s heartbreaking.” Indeed it is, and folks, even by being entertained, often need a hope, for someone to understand, even if it’s on a subconscious level.
Perhaps some of you could relate on a level of fear from not knowing who you really are. Or running from abuse. The life of indecision or shame? If you are one of many who has backslidden, or never really made a decision, consider reading “Romance Under Wraps.” The message of hope and redemption are within your grasp.
With the debut of “Romance Under Wraps,” promoting, writing “Alex and the Very Dead Doxy” AND “Rules of Engagement,” I am having a riot!
See?
I am pleased to see solid 4s and 5s popping up for “Romance Under Wraps,” and on Kindle, it is on sale in time for Christmas for 99 cents from December 24th to December 30th.
That’s what my main character, Catherine Cade, would call “easy as takin’ candy from a baby.” She’s a thief, and betting within this romantic suspense, she’d tell you to get it while it’s hot enough for the black market!
![Night to Knight by [Randy Tramp]](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/516-PS6VYtL.jpg)
Claire O'Sullivan 
You must be logged in to post a comment.