5--no, 6--Things I Love About Launch Day the Third Time Around

By Lisa Alber

Path Into Darkness is out in the world now. My third novel, and I can't help but compare the book launch day experience for this novel against the same day for my debut novel, Kilmoon. There's nothing like a debut novel. I remember wiser novelists cautioning me to remember to enjoy the experience; it only comes around once.

So true! But, just to play Devil's Advocate with myself, in some ways, thank goodness the experience only comes around once! Here are the five ways that I enjoyed the book launch for Path Into Darkness.

1. It wasn't heady, loud, OMG everything is going to change BECAUSE I'LL BE PUBLISHED AUTHOR. So much stress and drama to go along with the thrill. Every year, the new batch of debut authors reveal themselves, and I so understand how big and new everything is, and I think, I was like that too; that was fun; but I'm glad I'm here now.

By contrast, what was launch day like this time around? Pleasant and relaxed because I had no expectations. I woke up and got my writing in for the day as usual before doing the online thing.

2. Not having a book launch party the week of book launch. The past two book releases I had the party at my local bookstore the week of. Ugh. I'm a stressed-out event planner anyhow, and I'm not exactly an extrovert who loves being the center of attention. I planned big parties in the local Irish pub and made a big production of them, especially for Kilmoon. I mean, you gotta for the first book, granted, but, man--too much stress!

So what am I doing this time around? My launch party is next week, a couple of weeks after book launch day. Best yet, it will be a joint event with two other author friends with books out now too. I'm so much more relaxed -- and I'm even looking forward to it! (That's mostly a joke, but not 100%.)

3. The little things that surprise me. Since I don't have huge expectations anymore, I found great pleasure in the little things that posted online. For example, I was the book of the day for Foreword Reviews. I enjoyed sharing that. Other mentions and reviews and hurrahs came through too. I appreciated every one of them.

4. I don't feel desperate. I have a way more relaxed attitude about the whole thing when it comes to readers. I remember for Kilmoon, I was so nervous. It was like my very existence hinged on whether people would like my book, and how many (sales!) of them there were. It's true that promotion is an important part of our jobs, but I now understand how little control I actually have. That's a relief. Honestly.

So what is it I'm really saying? I've returned to the love of process. I love writing. Just that. I'm writing the first draft of my next book now, and I'm having so much fun with it. Just gotta keep writing!

5. Holding the book in my hands. This is one of the few things that hasn't changed. I brought a copy to a few parties over the last month for show-and-tell, like I was showing off my newborn infant. I still take pride in my work. It's an awesome feat, to complete a novel all the way to the point of publication. I'm honored to be a member of the tribe, and I appreciate it so much.

On a related note, one of the things that was cool this time around was holding a book in which the flap copy says things like, "By the author of Whispers in the Mist, heralded by Library Journal as “a first-rate crime novel,” comes this haunting tale of family secrets, madness, and healing in small-town Ireland." It feels weighty in a nice way, like, yes, I have a track record now, and it's pretty darned good. I'm surprised by how good this feels.

And 6. This just came to me. There are people out there who have been looking forward to the next in my series. I didn't notice this so much for the second book, because it's a second--that's it own thing--but now? It's so--I don't know--heartwarming? It's like, Wow, I've written stories that people are telling me they're excited to read. That they CAN'T WAIT to read. I don't know what the word for this is, actually. Mind-boggling comes pretty close. :-)

5 Ways I Improved PATH INTO DARKNESS at the Last Minute

By Lisa Alber

I just finished the final, FINAL nit-piks for PATH INTO DARKNESS, coming out in August. Talk about under the wire! The book is at the printer as I write this post. Yay! I'm so grateful for the chance to provide a detailed final proofread, and then quickly proofread my proofread for a sanity check on my final changes. (And, yes, I found four more wee, itty, bitty, teeny, tiny typos ... It could never end, seriously.)

It's amazing how you can always improve a story. I didn't change big things, and some would argue that small changes like the ones I performed couldn't matter that much to the overall reader experience ...

That might be true, because the book has been out in the world as an advanced reader copy for awhile now -- advanced readers seem to be enjoying the story. But still. I'm a proponent of subtle changes for overall improvement in my storytelling. No one else may care. But I do. (But then, you gotta stop. JUST. STOP. after awhile. Let the beast go. Be free, fledgling novel!) 

So, yeah, I put on my nit-pik hat, and this is what I came up with besides leftover typos and awkward word choices and grammatical bloopers:

1. Murkiness factor. Mysteries work because they are purposefully murky until the end of the story. I deleted and adjusted dialog that was too spot-on, i.e. dialogue in which one character was talking with too much clarity. I thought, Wow, that's certainly shining too much of a light on such-and-such character or event or bit of information. In my own writer self-talk, I call this toning it the hell down. :-)

2. Subtle consistency errors. The consistency errors I fixed had to do with proper setup for events that come toward the end of the novel. True, most readers probably won't catch these things, but there is an overall effect as one scene builds on another and on another, and you get to know the characters. Readers are left with feelings about the characters without knowing why all the time. The point for me is not to come out of left field all of sudden at the end of the novel.

3. Lingo adjustments. My novels are set in Ireland, so I try to be conscience of using the correct vernacular. I'm sure I don't catch everything, but, for example, in my final proofread, I changed "steal" to "pinch," "rent" to "let," and "mom" to "mum."

4. Improve the last chapter. I have my wonderful editor, Nicole, to thank for this one. She had made some edits to the final chapter with a passing comment that made me realize that I'd floated off course with one of my subplots. Just a little, but it was enough to bug me. The last chapter didn't hang right. This was with Danny, my detective, having a heartfelt moment with his kids. The final moment, the final decision he's making in this story. And it's a big decision. So, yeah, I adjusted that chapter, and went back and employed number two above.

5. Simplified backstory aspects from the previous novels. One of my eternal questions as a writer of a series is how much of the previous novels' backstories to include in the current novel. I want my novels to standalone as much as possible. For me, this means NOT dumping all the details in from previous novels. I don't like info dumps. That's just me. I prefer to simply not mention past events or background character details that aren't germaine to the current story. For example, the fact that Danny has a dead daughter from years back didn't need to be mentioned -- mentioning this daughter added more question marks than it clarified Danny's character.

So now, having gone through this process, I can finally say that I've done all that I can possibly do to create the best book I'm capable of at this moment in time. Whew!

How forgiving of typos are you when you read novels? (Me, I'm very forgiving now; before writing novels I used to be a hard ass.)

What's Your Creative Type? (Take the Quiz!)

By Lisa Alber

Last week on the Jungle Red Writers blog, author Meta Wagner introduced her book WHAT'S YOUR CREATIVE TYPE?: Harness the Power of Your Artistic Personality. I'm a sucker for this kind of thing, so I took the online quiz, which you can find here: http://snapp.to/2lHVOEY.

I wasn't surprised to find out that I'm a sensitive soul, which is defined as, "Brimming with emotion, you’ll use your art to explore your personal history and as a catharsis."

 The other possibilities are:

• Artisan: "You’re here to create, you enjoy the process itself."
• A-Lister: "You want to have an emotional impact on the audience, you live for the applause." 
• Activist: "Through art, you want to change the world. Wherever you go, you see wrongs ready to be righted."

The most interesting thing about the Jungle Reds blog post were the comments it inspired. People tended toward being sensitive souls and artisans, which you might expect from a bunch of writers and book lovers and aspiring writers. But then, the topic came up that doing any kind of quiz like this is limiting, because we may feel tied between two options.

OK, then, I and many of the commenters went through the quiz again, choosing our second choices. At this point, many people got "a-lister." I found this intriguing because we so often don't want to admit to wanting fame and glory for our creative endeavors. God forbid! However, it strikes me that writers who are artisans or sensitive souls with a-lister tendencies might be highly motivated to "make it" and do all the work required to "make it."

(The question becomes what is your definition of making it? I'm using the notion that many of us creatives have, which is to earn a nice income, which is closest to "a-lister.")

In any case, it's a sliding scale. None of us are only one thing. That said, I was oddly bummed when I took the quiz a second time and came up with "artisan."

WHERE'S MY A-LISTER!??! I'd love to be a little more a-lister, but apparently, I'm not. I'm all about self-expression and the process, and all that airy-fairy stuff. I even tried to be an a-lister, but my second choices didn't lead to that outcome.

I even did it a third time -- and I still got artisan!

Sigh ... Does this mean I'm never going to "make it"?

Of course not, but it did make me think about this: If I'm not an a-lister type, going for the glory, how do I reconcile that with the external pressure to be more of an a-lister? Do I care if I see my fellows who are a-listers get the glory, while I remain a relatively unknown, midlist author? (Of course, I care; we all like to succeed -- I guess the question becomes how I deal with my feelings around this.)

In any case, I had to laugh that even when I try, I'm not a going-for-the-glory kind of person. So figures. But, on the other hand, I don't think that matters in the long run. The work itself matters. That's all. Whether any of us "make it" or not isn't under our control. And not making it doesn't lessen the creative endeavor or the value of our work.

All creative expression is good -- and **necessary** in this weird world we're living in these days.

P.S. I'm going to buy the book ... Just to see, you know, what the author has to say about all of this. :-)

What's your take on all of this?

10 Ways I'm Organizing in the "New" Year: Late Adopter's Edition

By Lisa Alber

I don't know about you, but about this time of year, mid-February, I'm itchy for spring. In Portland, OR, crocus and other spring bulbs are sprouting and the black-capped chickadees have returned. It feels like almost-spring, so I count is as the true start to my New Year. Forget January. January is for people who aren't bothered by season affective disorder.

I've always been a late adopter, so it's no surprise that each year I adopt a late-nik attitude to organization for the new year. Here are some of the things I'm doing right now to get back into a groove after a worse winter season than usual, weather-wise -- and morale-wise, if I'm going to be honest about it.

1. Invited gal pals over for brunch, which forced me to do my spring cleaning early. No one needs to know that all winter long I watched a generation of spiders live through their life cycles in the various corners of my home. Amazing how a clean home picks up my spirits.

2. While under brunch deadline, I spent hours organizing every paper that had accumulated on every horizontal surface for the last, oh, three-four-five months. Much of this had to do with finishing up PATH INTO DARKNESS, for sure. But still, I'm a crazy paper lady. If you're like me, you'd find inspirations and ideas for stories, phone numbers you thought you lost, stray checks, and so much more.

3. Bought a ridiculous day planner that I suspect I'll rarely use, but that has inspired me to start writing down task lists again, not to mention goals for the year.

4. Invested in Post-It notes and deposited them in various places around the house with pens nearby. Then, I'll write random thoughts down randomly as they occur to me, rather than try to hold everything in my mind and inevitably forget stuff.

5. Assigned a section of wall as my Post-It place. Every few days I plan to gather up my Post-Its and stick them up on the wall. I might even decide to group them according to priority. And, I'll throw them away as I go along rather than let them accumulate so that my counters and table tops end up looking like hamster nests.

6. Speaking of throwing away--I threw away my mail pile. Except for bills and tax documents, that's right, I zapped it! Anything important will come back to haunt me later -- I'll deal with it then. :-)

7. For longer-term projects that require planning, before month's end I'll pull on my big-girl undies and sit down, just me and my thoughts. Have you noticed how hard it is to just sit and think? It's crazy out there, and it's crazy in my head. I'll use my handy-dandy day planner to work backwards from writing deadlines (for me, this is publication of PATH INTO DARKNESS in August).

8. Money stuff? Yeah, who doesn't have money stuff. Every year there are at least a few larger expenses I need to wrangle. I planned a tight budget to hopefully, if all goes well, save up as much money as possible before the expenditures. This year, I'll be going to Toronto for Bouchercon, and I'd like to hire painters to paint my house (interiors--I hate beige and all my walls are beige) -- I can't do it myself because I don't feel like dealing with it -- plus I've got vaulted ceilings. I've got a house savings bucket and a travel savings bucket, and I'm gonna fill them slowly but surely.

9. Ack, the yard... Screw it, I hired someone to do the major stuff. Problem solved. Sometimes throwing money at things is the best solution. Frees up my brain for other things.

10. As soon as I run out of something, *especially* things I don't have to buy often like Scotch tape and light bulbs, my new plan is to re-stock immediately. Light bulbs drive me nuts. I never seem to have any around, and I've let it go on too long. I'd say about a quarter of mine are burned out now. So before the end of the month I'm hitting Home Depot for a light bulb binge. (And I'll buy extras!)

So that's what my February "New" Year looks like.

How are you doing right now as we wish for winter's end? 

Lisa Alber is the author of the County Clare mysteries. Her debut novel, Kilmoon, has been called "utterly poetic" and "a stirring debut." Her second in the County Clare mysteries, WHISPERS IN THE MIST came out in August from Midnight Ink Books. Looks for PATH INTO DARKNESS in August 2017. Ever distractible, you may find her staring out windows, fooling around online, or drinking red wine with her friends. Ireland, books, animals, photography, and blogging round out her distractions. Facebook | Twitter

Moonstones, Intuition, and My Upcoming Novel

By Lisa Alber

I'm cheating this week. This post comes from my blog. I ran out of time to write an original post -- yeeks. I'm hard at work on my novel for next year. AND, Whispers in the Mist comes out in less than three weeks! Midnight Ink is hosting a Goodreads giveaway for Whispers. Cheers!

***

I recently visited my favorite local coffeeshop, Driftwood Coffee, to splurge on an iced mocha. I love walking there with my dog on a lazy Sunday afternoon. The shop is a feast for the eyes because of the way the owner has decorated it. An old ladder hanging along the ceiling festooned with lights and dangling trinkets, a colorful collection of shutters arranged on the wall like a mosaic, shelves of locally made arts and crafts.

This moonstone necklace caught my eye, and it reminded me of my second novel, Whispers in the Mist. One of my protagonists, Merrit, wears a moonstone necklace that came from her mom. In fact, the necklace is one of Merrit's most cherished possessions. In my first novel, we learned that Merrit's long-lost father gave the necklace to her mother just before their relationship ended tragically. We also learn that moonstone is said to enhance intuition.

Intuition is a funny thing. Whenever I hear someone say, "I'm intuitive," I suspect they're talking about being psychic or highly empathic, as if "intuitive" is a superpower code word. Maybe thousands of years ago, when we were closer to nature, we were kind of psychic--this was our norm as a species ... I don't know. It just gets me thinking, is all. Like, maybe our world is so full of stuff and sounds and sensory inputs and social media and JUNK, that there's no way for the still, small voice of intuition to get heard.

I picture Merrit's necklace looking something like this.

Maybe people who do hear their intuition believe it to be a superpower because it's such a rare thing. Again, I don't know.

I believe intuition is an aspect of our humanity, but we're far away from our true natures, most of the time. The closest I get to feeling intuitive (and in those moments I do feel empowered) is within my writing process. Perhaps this is one of the many reasons I'm attracted to writing fiction--I get closer to my core. Sometimes I feel a welling of knowingness about some plot point or character insight. A-HA! My body reacts in a happy way, all tingly and excitable. I like to think my body is rewarding me for paying attention to my intuition.

Intuition is a sub-theme in my novels. It's something Merrit thinks about quite often. In Whispers in the Mist, coming out August 8th, she could use more intuition when a mysterious women steals her necklace right off her neck. Merrit is about to discover that her necklace has a connection to a past murder.

Do you consider yourself an intuitive person? What does "intuition" mean to you? 

10 Signs That Writing Stress Is Getting to Me

By Lisa Alber

Writing novels is a job like any other. There are deadlines, and to make those deadlines we often have to work when we're feeling cruddy or low or uninspired or crabby. And in the midst of hustling to make a major deadline called Hand Off Manuscript to Editor (and pray she likes it!), there are all kinds of other writerly tasks that come into play.

I'm on a yearly deadline. This means that while I'm writing the novel for next year (2017), I'm also gearing up for the release of this year's novel, Whispers in the Mist.

August is my month. Whispers arrives at bookstores near you AND I hand off the next book to my editor. Whew! That's a lot. I have a huge list of things to do in the next few months. In other words, just like with any other job, we may get totally stressed out and overwhelmed. I can tell I've reached that point because:

1. The only thing that sounds good for dinner is pasta.

2. I go outside for some fresh air, and suddenly it's an hour later and I've dug up three bushes.

3. I don't see the pet hair on the rug, or the dust on the nightstands, or the spiders taking up residence in random places. House cleaning--what's that?

4. I forget appointments, like the crown-placement dentist appointment I almost missed this morning. In fact, I've forgotten so many dentist appointments that last year she instituted a missed appointment penalty fee. Yes, I can take credit for that.

5. My social life goes down the tubes--and I already have a, shall we say, "curtailed" social life as it is. I'm more likely to be watching a movie on Friday night with the dog and the cat snoozing nearby than socializing.

6. My idea of a good time is going to bed early.

7. I don't care about ice cream -- I mean, it's okay, whatever -- but I find myself buying a pint of the local Alpenrose brand strawberry cheesecake ice cream that I promise myself I won't eat all at once because that would be gross.

8. The nice folks at my local bistro know me by name because I come in so often to drink red wine write. Budget, be damned.

9. I get up in the morning already yearning for an afternoon nap.

10. Last but not least, the novel I'm writing? Yeah, it's the worst dreck in the world, everyone will hate it, and why am I doing this to myself?

Stress is like anything else--it comes, it goes, and then when it goes we forget about it like it never happened. Or, we look back on it and think, Wow, I was totally nuts; so glad to be back to normal now.

The habit that works in a pinch to ease stress? Breathing. Really. Unclenching your core and feeling your lungs move in and out as you breath.

How does stress and busy-ness and feeling overwhelmed affect you? Do you have a go-to food or habit?

Lisa Alber is the author of the County Clare mysteries. Her debut novel, Kilmoon, has been called "utterly poetic" and "a stirring debut." Her second in the County Clare mysteries, WHISPERS IN THE MIST will be available in August 2016 from Midnight Ink Books. Ever distractible, you may find her staring out windows, fooling around online, or drinking red wine with her friends. Ireland, books, animals, photography, and blogging round out her distractions. Facebook | Twitter

5 Sure Signs That I Can Let Go of My Manuscript (Finally!)

By Lisa Alber

Over the weekend, I read a printed copy of my manuscript for WHISPERS IN THE MIST (August 2016). I read it fast, looking out for loose ends and moot remnants still hanging around from previous versions.

At this point in the writing process, I always know that I'll feel compelled to read the manuscript just one more time before hand off, and I know I'll still find things that need fixing, and I know I'll worry about whether the newest changes have themselves caused inconsistencies (or typos!) that will require me to re-read the manuscript AGAIN ... 

It could go on forever, but there comes a point when I have to let my baby go. Given that I can always continue improving my stories, when do I feel that "yes" feeling about letting a manuscript go?

1. The latest manuscript read-through was mostly clean. Changes were only for clarity, consistency, and pruning. Nit-piks.

2. I have no more questions to myself about nitty-gritty plot points. (My stories are kind of complex.) Yes, all the bits and pieces are there.

3. I've considered every piece of beta reader feedback. I've incorporated what my gut says "yay" about, and I've ignored what my gut says "nay" about.

4. I've gone through a copyedit (as best as I can since I'm not a copyeditor) on my own. I catch a lot of weird prose quirks when I focus on the line-by-line. We all have our easy-way-outs when we're writing. For example, I love m-dashes, but they can be used in place of properly crafted sentences.

This is also when I deal with rhetorical questions, such as this example from a previous draft of WHISPERS:   

Danny still couldn’t fathom why Malcolm had offered up the alibi unless it was to humiliate Danny. But why? Because he was pissed that Danny hadn’t prioritized the graffiti vandalism? Because he didn’t like Danny prying into McIlvoy’s life?

This is just lazy writing. Really. At least for me. A bunch of rhetorical questions in a row tell me I need to go deeper and get to the heart of the matter in a more precise fashion. This might mean adding word count, but that's OK. So now it's this:

Danny still couldn’t fathom why Malcolm had offered up the alibi unless it was to humiliate Danny. He hadn’t prioritized finding the phantom graffiti artist, true, but surely Malcolm understood that vandalism didn’t rate as high as murder.

No, the alibi had to be a good-old-fashioned diversionary tactic. Most likely to distract Danny from prying into Malcolm’s relationship with McIlvoy.

 
5. Last but not least, I've word-searched words I know to be problematic, such as the "just"s and "really"s. Excess adverbs. The verb "was," which could indicate a yucky passive voice sentence or a sentence that needs rewriting with a stronger verb. I have a word list that I keep handy for this tedious, final task.

It's not that I get rid of every "just," "really," and "was" -- but I do consider them carefully. It's so easy to fall back on them -- another easy way out. (Oh, look at that, falling back on m-dashes again!)

Also, during all of this, I'll have noticed other words -- not the usual "blah" words -- that I fell in love with for some reason. For example, while writing WHISPERS, I used "flicker" a lot. Everything was flickering, from candle and sconce light, to gazes, to birds in flight. It was a positive flicker-fest, enough to cause a migraine!

All of this may be tedious, it may add to my writing time, but in end, I love the satisfaction of knowing, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that I've done all that I can do.

There's no such thing as perfection; there's only doing the best we can.

5 Things Revision Has Taught Me About Myself

By Lisa Alber

I'm having a fantastic time revising WHISPERS IN THE MIST. Aspects of the story that had been bothering me have finally achieved clarity. Yay! I got to thinking about how the revision process illuminates some aspects of my own character.

1. It's funny how sometimes our characters' lives parallel our own. Merrit Chase, one of my  protagonists, is an American living in rural Ireland. As I worked through her plot line in an attempt to get to the heart of her, I started thinking about the concept of "home." This year, for the first time, I bought a house. My very own sanctuary with no shared walls, a blank canvas that I could make all my own. It took me no time at all to feel like I was home. It's a soul thing--for me and for Merrit. As soon as I realized that Merrit was missing a little soul, I knew exactly how to revise her scenes to better bring out her story.

2. I may be having a fantastic time revising now, but you should have seen me a month ago. I might have written a different blog post entirely. At times, I got to wondering: WHY am I putting myself through the ringer like this? What's the point? After all, I'm not motivated by some of the usual things like money, power, and vanity. I mean, I'm a poor and lowly, not to mention disheveled, novelist. I'm joshing, but it's sorta true. So what does motivate me to work through the doldrums and frustrations? Authenticity, connection, and personal achievement. It helped to clarify these for myself. When I do my character development, I call these "core needs."

3. I'm an introvert, to be sure, but I'm less of a lone wolf than I like to think I am. Self-sufficiency is a sham game I play with myself. The truth is, when it comes to my life and also my stories, I can't figure everything out on my own. I've learned this over and over during revisions as I turn to others to provide feedback on my drafts. Sharing is a good thing, risking vulnerability is another good thing. Sometimes it's difficult to cop to my flaws or to my story's flaws, but once I do, the flaws lose their power. Come to find out that I like the communal aspect of the revision process.

4. I hang on to my little darlings for too long. This includes darling notions that I carry around with me that I don't need anymore, like outmoded emotional crutches and avoidance tactics. A writer friend recently said (related to writing), "If you're not sure you should hang on to your little darling, it probably means you should let it go." In my revision, I've been doing quite a lot of darling deletion lately. And you know what? It feels great! Time to take some of that and apply it to my life.

5. I do have pretty good instincts -- I need to trust them more. When it comes to fiction, I sometimes don't know what the exact problem is, only that something's not quite right. I can't let the manuscript be finished because in my heart it's not. The niggling feeling may be related to a plot point or character, anything really. And then, lo and behold, I engage with my community (#3) and receive feedback that gets the A-HA going. I'm vindicated! I wasn't just being a crazy perfectionist or an Eeyore. In my life, the same thing goes: listen to the niggle and trust it.

Recently, I felt the "fill the well" niggle, so next week I'm going to the Oregon coast to relax for a few days before Christmas. Will I work? Oh probably, but only after sleeping (lots of catching up to do!), reading, walking the beach, staring at the waves, and sleeping some more.

Wishing you all the best for a wondrous holiday and happy new year, cheers, Lisa

What do you do to fill the well? How can you tell when you need well-filling?

WHISPERS IN THE MIST is available for preorder here.

What Does My Research Say About My Novel?

By Lisa Alber

I'm about 15,000 words (~60 pages) into my work in progress (WIP), and it occurred to me that you might be curious about what novel research looks like for one author.

My novels take place in Ireland, so I have an extra level of research. For example, I can't just research, say, coma patients in hospitals. I'd need to know the particularities about coma patients in Irish hospitals.

I start with research here in the States -- this gives me a baseline -- but then I need to do the groundwork in Ireland. (Lucky me!) As I'm writing my first draft I keep notes about everything that I'll need to check into in Ireland.

It may seem odd, but I prefer to do my Ireland research after I've written the first draft. I can get away with this because I already have a feel for the country from previous research trips, and I have a world that I've already created. And there's so much I can find out online to get me started anyhow.

And frankly, at this stage in my progress, when the story is a tender thing with shallow roots, I'd prefer not to let reality get in the way of the storytelling. I know, I know -- that may sound bass-ackwards, but I truly believe that knowing too much reality could limit my creativity.

I can just hear my big old editor brain bossing me around like it alway does: Oh no, character X couldn't possibly do that because that's not realistic.

So, yeah, I like to steer clear of reality as much as possible while writing the first draft. Here's my equation:

ignorance = writing bliss

I'm exaggerating somewhat, but you get my drift. And, just to contradict myself, in my initial  research forays I often stumble onto quirky, odd, and interesting factoids that rock my novelist's world, things I could never have thought of on my own.

So maybe research is a balance, after all. Enough research to get me started but not so much that I get bogged down trying to cram my story into what the research tells me reality it supposed to look like.

So here I am, 15,000 words into my first draft, and here are some of the topics I've looked into thus far:

• Psychiatric nursing as a career
• Sociopathy
• Night terrors
• PTSD
• Bible quotes related to resurrection
• Butterflies as symbols
• Easter/Spring rites
• Private nursing homes
• Lung cancer misdiagnoses
• Raku pottery
• Objectivity

You can probably tell a few things about the story from this list. Or may not. Give the same list of prompts to 100 writers and you'll end up with 100 vastly different stories.

So what do you think of when you read my list of research topics? What's the last thing you researched online, related to anything?

Lisa Alber is the author of KILMOON, A COUNTY CLARE MYSTERY, which has been called "utterly poetic" and "a stirring debut." The second novel in the series will be published by Midnight Ink in 2016 (more information to come!). Ever distractible, you may find her staring out windows, fooling around online, or drinking red wine with her friends. Ireland, books, animals, photography, and blogging round out her distractions. Visit her on Facebook and Twitter.

Welcome to Me! My First InkSpot Blog Post

by Lisa Alber

This is my inaugural InkSpot blog post, and I'm so happy to be here. I became a member of the Midnight Ink author clan last month, which means I get to blog right here along with a crew of fabulous authors. Yay!

I don't have much to tell you yet. The process is just beginning. Midnight Ink has my next novel within its editorial grip, and pretty soon I'm going to receive an editorial letter. Over the next year I'll revise and revise some more; I'll see my cover art; I'll gear up for marketing and publicity -- and all while writing the NEXT novel.

Waahoo, let the games begin!

Here's what I can tell you right now. I named the novel GREY MAN, but that might change. It's my first novel with Midnight Ink, but not my first published novel. My debut novel, KILMOON, came out last year. It's set in Ireland and features Detective Sergeant Danny Ahern and Merrit Chase.

GREY MAN continues their stories, and I'll have waaay more to tell you about that in the upcoming months. Meanwhile, let me tell you about another Grey Man, a predatory faery of Irish folklore and one of the inspirations for the novel.

Grey Man is said to ooze onto land with the fog, disappearing hapless innocents into its damp grip. Ireland is a land of myth and folklore. Even today, there's something vaguely otherworldly about the land--as if you might look under a hedgerow and see a sprite. It's not about believing or not believing in these things; it's more like the feel of Ireland (at least to me) allows for their possibility.

I loved the imagery of the dark faery when I first read about it. I don't write paranormal mysteries, but I like a little magical realism, and I love symbols. I love that creating a grey and obscured atmosphere could incite locals in my fictional town of Lisfenora to start thinking about the faery while a real Grey Man lurks within their midst.

I welcome comments and conversation. Please visit me every third Wednesday of the month!

What would you like to know about me? Ask away!

Lisa Alber is the author of KILMOON, A COUNTY CLARE MYSTERY, which has been called "utterly poetic" and "a stirring debut." Ever distractible, you may find her staring out windows, fooling around online, or drinking red wine with her friends. Ireland, books, animals, photography, and blogging round out her distractions. Visit her on Facebook and Twitter.

THINKING OUTSIDE THE PROMOTIONAL BOX

by Lois Winston

As authors, along with writing the next book, we have to promote our current books, but promotion often feels like we’re shouting into a tsunami. Does anyone really hear us? How many people who see our social media postings will run out and buy our books? How many people show up at book signings and talks we give, let alone purchase a copy of our latest baby? How many people run out to buy a copy of our latest release as soon as it comes out? Sadly, very few. Whether an author is traditionally published, indie published, or both, competition for consumer dollars is stiff. And if your name isn’t King, Patterson, Rowling, or Roberts, it’s even stiffer. So we’re always on the lookout for new ways to get readers to learn about us and our books—and hopefully entice them to pull out their wallets and take a chance on us.

One of the newest promotional tools many authors are taking advantage of is the boxed set. Publishers have been producing boxed sets of a single author’s work for many years, especially if the books are part of a series. However, they’ve never done so with multiple authors. Recently some enterprising authors have begun to think outside the traditional promotional box. They’ve banded together to produce themed boxed sets rather than single author boxed sets. The price is set low enough to make the set an incredible bargain, which hopefully will entice readers to take a chance on authors they may not already know. If they like what they read, they might then buy more books by those authors.

Because this has proven to be such an effective marketing tool, I recently joined with nine other authors for a boxed set. Along with writing mysteries, I also write romance and romantic suspense. Because the other authors invited to participate are all romance and romantic suspense authors, I contributed Love, Lies and a Double Shot of Deception, one of my previously traditionally published romance suspense novels that had gone out of print. I had received the rights back to the book and several months ago published it myself as an ebook.

Our boxed set is titled Romance Super Bundle and is a collection of 10 full-length contemporary romance, historical romance, and romantic suspense novels. Along on the ride with me are authors Dale Mayer, Donna Marie Rogers, Edie Ramer, Amy Gamet, Linda McLaughlin, Kate Kelly, Pamela Fryer, Barbara Phinney, and Wendy Ely. Many of these authors are award-winners and bestsellers.

We priced the Romance Super Bundle at $5.99. That’s less than .60 cents per novel. However for a limited time the collection is on sale for only .99 cents. That’s mere pennies per book! Hopefully, it will entice readers to take a chance on us. Time will tell.

Buy Links:

Amazon 

Nook

Kobo

Award-winning author Lois Winston writes the critically acclaimed Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery series featuring magazine crafts editor and reluctant amateur sleuth Anastasia Pollack. Assault With a Deadly Glue Gun, the first book in the series, received starred reviews from both Publishers Weekly and Booklist. Kirkus Reviews dubbed it, “North Jersey’s more mature answer to Stephanie Plum.” Other books in the series includes Death By Killer Mop Doll, Revenge of the Crafty Corpse and the ebook only mini-mysteries Crewel Intentions and Mosaic Mayhem. Lois is also published in women’s fiction, romance, romantic suspense, and non-fiction under her own name and her Emma Carlyle pen name.Visit Lois at www.loiswinston.com, visit Emma at www.emmacarlyle.com, and visit Anastasia at the Killer Crafts & Crafty Killers blog, www.anastasiapollack.blogspot.com. Follow everyone on Twitter @anasleuth.

Maintaining Balance in a Creative Life

by Sheila Webster Boneham

Balance. I’ve long been a great believer in balance in life. Not necessarily moderation, mind you, but balance. Hard work balanced against hard play, or hard rest. Think very long nap on a rainy afternoon after writing from seven until noon, with a couple of hours bicycling or hiking in the early evening. Balance.



Indian Paintbrush looks to me like
creativity feels.
©2011 Sheila Boneham, Evans Canyon, Reno, NV



For creative people – writers, painters, musicians, actors, crafters, and more – balance can be hard to achieve. The siren that is creative work is seductive. It can sing its way into our brains and make us attend to its needs until our joints lock. That same siren, though, can be painfully shy, hiding itself at the first hint of distraction. Something good on tv? You can write that poem later! Friends want you to come play parcheesi? The painting can wait. The socks in your sock drawer are rebelling? Clearly more important to organize them than to write that novel.

I jest. Sort of. The truth is that there’s ALWAYS something else to do. Some distractions even look from the outside very much like actual work. You’re a writer, you’re on the computer – checking what’s happened on Facebook in the last ten minutes, and reading the latest writers’ group digest post, and checking the five hundred blogs you frequent because HOLY COW! You might miss something that will make or break your career!

There's always some seductive path
calling, "Follow me!"
©2011 Sheila Boneham, Wrightsville Beach, NC

I confess. I do all those things. Sometimes. But in the past fifteen years I’ve also written twenty three and a half books, sixteen tons of articles (more or less), a pile of short stories, a small clutch of poems (very recently!), and the various related documents – query letters, proposals, blurbs, bios, bull..., er, marketing materials. So, rumors to the contrary aside, I do maintain some degree of balance.

How? A surprising (to me, anyway) number of people ask me that. It’s no mystery, really. Like many busy people, I compartmentalize my time, and have done so for so many years that my "time habits" are part of me. I write in a local café every morning, beginning around 7:00, ending around noon, with a half hour or so off for breakfast with my husband. I go home, have lunch, have tea. I read for a couple of hours. Take a short nap most afternoons. Go for a long walk, sometimes with my dog Lily, sometimes with my camera, sometimes just with my thoughts. I often write more in the evening, or meet my writers’ group, or friends, or go to an event or movie, or paint and listen to music, or watch a movie at home. And, yes, reading social media and posting on my Facebook author page, or updating my website or my own blog.  And ok, maybe an hour of Frasier reruns. Hey, we all have our vices. I read some more late at night, when everything is quiet. I sleep. And the writing gets done, because I know I have those four or five hours of dedicated writing time, and I use them to....write!



I find that other creative pursuits,
like painting, help feel my work as
a writer. Creativity begets creativity.
©2011 Sheila Boneham, "Sydney," watercolor

Balance, of course, should extend to all of life, not just work. Because creative work is so personal, it can be very difficult to separate the artifacts of our creativity – the books, the paintings, the hand-thrown pots – from our Selves. But the truth is that our creativity comes from without as well as from within. We need experience of the world to feed the fire inside. The precise experience each of us needs varies, but we all need something. A few days without my writing time make me crave my keyboard, but I know from experience that if I lock myself away to do nothing but write for more than a day or two, my siren stops singing. I need time in nature, travel, long walks, cuddles with my dogs, talks with my husband, flowers, music, my friends, good books, photography, art, and more in my life if I am to have anything worth saying.

What do you need to create balance in your life and work?

Just the facts, ma’am!

by Lois Winston

Years ago I made a huge geographical error in Talk Gertie to Me, my first published novel. Even though the manuscript had been read by members of my critique group, my agent, my acquiring editor, and the line and copy editors at the publishing house, no one caught the fact that I’d set the Mississippi River on the wrong side of Iowa. It took a reader to point the error out to me within weeks of the book’s release.

His comment came as a shock because I really do remember pulling the Atlas off my bookshelf and checking the location of the river. This was before Google Maps, and unfortunately, the Atlas was small, and my eyesight isn’t what it used to be, thanks to so many hours each day staring at a computer screen. The font was way too small to read. I saw a line bisecting the map of the United States and running down into the Gulf of Mexico. I assumed it was the Mississippi. It wasn’t. I should have noticed that what I thought was the river didn’t come anywhere near the state of Mississippi. I was mortified that I’d made such a dumb mistake and upset that no one had caught it before the book went to press.

Ever since then, I’ve checked and double-checked all the facts and every piece of research I do for my books, especially when it comes to geography. Since that first published book (which has since been corrected for the e-book release,) I’ve also had the good fortune to work with editors who took their responsibilities more seriously and always double-check my research. Readers notice when you make mistakes, and they let you know about them. Few things are more disheartening than receiving an email from a reader who points out you need a remedial course in geography!

However, I’ve come to realize that novel authors are held to a much higher standard than scriptwriters, who apparently have even less of a grasp on geography than I do. Over the past few years I’ve come across countless geographical errors in television shows.

The first time I became aware of this was watching House. That show was set in the fictional Princeton-Plainsboro Medical Center in New Jersey. I live in New Jersey. I know the Princeton and Plainsboro areas. And I know that no one would ever hop a plane to get from there to Baltimore for a conference, as House and Stacy did in one episode. It’s only a 2-1/2 hour drive. When you consider the distance to either the Philadelphia or Newark airport and the time needed to get through security, you could be in Baltimore before the plane took off. Why didn’t the writers know this? Unlike me, they certainly had Google Maps available to them at the time.

If you’re going to set a story in a location you don’t know well or even at all, you need to learn about the area. Yet time and again I see television shows where the writers don’t even bother to check out the basics. I recently watched an episode of a show set in Philadelphia. The series, now cancelled, was actually filmed in Rhode Island, and maybe that’s the problem because except for some of the establishing shots in the opening credits and some scenes that take place in the suburbs, there’s nothing remotely similar to Philadelphia in the show’s exterior scenes.

In the last episode of the show, they gave a location where a witness could be found. The two streets they mentioned don’t intersect; they’re actually the same street, the name changing after the street crosses over into another county. On top of that, the area is quite urban, and the show portrayed the home as a quaint cape cod on a bucolic street. I went to college a block from that supposed location. Trust me, there’s nothing bucolic about it!

In that same episode, the camera zooms in on a piece of paper with the protagonist’s address. The writers have her living on 14th Street. The problem, though, is that there is no 14th Street in Philadelphia. What should be 14th Street is called Broad Street. It’s the main intersection that runs the length of the city. Anyone with even a passing knowledge of the City of Brotherly Love would be aware of this. Apparently, the show’s writers never took a field trip to the city where they were setting their show.

Someone pointed out to me that perhaps the writers did this deliberately so as not to show an actual address. If that were the case, they could have simply given the building a number that didn’t exist. Few people would be aware of that, but many people know there’s no 14th Street in Philadelphia.

Little things like this bother me. They pull me from the story. So I completely understand why that reader years ago was annoyed that I’d placed the Mississippi on the wrong end of his state. I learned my lesson and work hard not to make mistakes in my books. Maybe scriptwriters don’t have the luxury of time to research carefully, or maybe they figure viewers won’t notice or care. Probably most TV viewers don’t unless they happen to live in the city or state where the story takes place.

Do errors like this in books, movies, and television shows bother you, or am I being too picky? Do they pull you from the story? Do you continue to read authors or watch shows that make mistakes because the story or characters are so intriguing, or do you give up and move on to other authors and shows?

***

Award-winning author Lois Winston writes the critically acclaimed Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery series featuring magazine crafts editor and reluctant amateur sleuth Anastasia Pollack. Lois is also published in women’s fiction, romance, romantic suspense, and non-fiction under her own name and her Emma Carlyle pen name. In addition, she’s an award-winning crafts and needlework designer and an agent with the Ashley Grayson Literary Agency. Visit Lois at http://www.loiswinston.com, visit Emma at http://www.emmacarlyle.com, and visit Anastasia at the Killer Crafts & Crafty Killers character blog, www.anastasiapollack.blogspot.com.

The Capricious Nature of This Life We Live

by Lois Winston

Malice-Go-Round authors
(photo by Greg Puhl)

Malice-Go-Round Attendees

I recently attended Malice Domestic in Bethesda, MD and the Festival of Mystery in Oakmont, PA. As is wont to happen when authors get together at conventions and conferences, there is considerable discussion (and grousing) about the capricious nature of the publishing industry. It got me thinking about why one author will shoot up the bestseller lists when another author with an equally well-written book lingers in obscurity. Over the years, I’ve also seen too many poorly written books take off, climb the lists, and make gobs of money for the authors who wrote them (50 Shades of Crap, anyone?) while fabulous books that should have become bestsellers never caught on.

Mystery fans lined up, waiting to get into the Festival of Mystery

I used to think an author’s success was tied to how much promotion her publisher was willing to give her books and how much effort the author put into social media. But I’ve seen books that had huge publisher support never take off and books shelved spine out alphabetically (meaning, no promo dollars were allocated to the author,) become the book everyone was talking about.

Same for self-promotion. I know a debut author who became ill shortly before her book was to be released. She was too busy fighting her disease to think about flacking her book. Her publisher did nothing for her. Her book wasn’t reviewed anywhere. Yet that book sold and sold well. Six years later she was still receiving royalty checks twice a year from her publisher.

Another author I know had a debut book come out at the same time. Her publisher also spent no promo dollars on her, but this author hired a publicist. She received some pretty good press coverage for her book, including fabulous reviews and a huge write-up in a major newspaper. She barely earned out her paltry advance.

Some authors are phenoms when it comes to social media. Readers hang on their every Tweet and Facebook update. Other authors who do basically the same thing have next to no followers, even though the books are worth reading. Why do readers gravitate to some of these authors and not others equally worthy of having followings? Why does word-of-mouth favor one author’s book over another?

And it’s not just in traditional publishing where you find this. Indie authors experience the same disparity. I know indie authors who write equally good books in the same genre and sell them for the same price. One sells hundreds of books a day while the other sells maybe one or two books a week.

I don’t have any answers. I wish I did. The only conclusion I can draw is that publishing, whether in the traditional arena or as an independent author, is a crapshoot. And success at publishing is even more of one. Roll the dice!

~~~

Award-winning author Lois Winston writes the critically acclaimed Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery series featuring magazine crafts editor and reluctant amateur sleuth Anastasia Pollack. Lois is also published in women’s fiction, romance, romantic suspense, and non-fiction under her own name and her Emma Carlyle pen name. In addition, she’s an award-winning crafts and needlework designer and an agent with the Ashley Grayson Literary Agency. Visit Lois at http://www.loiswinston.com, visit Emma at http://www.emmacarlyle.com, and visit Anastasia at the Killer Crafts & Crafty Killers character blog, www.anastasiapollack.blogspot.com.

Truth Is Stranger Than Fiction

by Lois Winston

One of the most common questions authors are asked is, “Where do you get the ideas for your books?” My ideas for characters, scenes, and plots often bloom from actual people and events. Often something will happen in my own life, or an event will occur that I read about in the newspaper or see on the news, and I store it away for future reference, knowing it’s too good not to use in a book.

Case in point: March 6, 2011. My husband and I are watching “Sunday Morning” on CBS. Bill Geist is interviewing a woman by the name of Laura Bell who creates paintings out of dryer lint. Her masterpiece is a 14-foot x 4-foot replica of Leonardo daVinci’s “The Last Supper,” which took her 7 months of lint collecting and 200 hours to create. “Ripley’s Believe It or Not!” bought the piece for $12,000. Really. I’m not making this up. You can see a video of the interview here. 

Assault With a Deadly Glue Gun, the first book in my Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mysteries, had debuted two months prior to this interview appearing on television. I had already turned in Death by Killer Mop Doll, the second book in the series and had begun work on Revenge of the Crafty Corpse.

In Revenge of the Crafty Corpse, Lyndella Wegner, a 98-year-old resident of an assisted living facility is a consummate crafter with a penchant for anything X-rated. The moment I saw Bill Geist’s interview of Laura Bell, I knew Lyndella had to create lint paintings. Her piece de resistanceis a three-foot tall, two-dimensional reproduction of Michelangelo’s masterpiece, “David,” down to every anatomical detail, minus any censoring of a certain body part.

Now, some might read Revenge of the Crafty Corpse and scoff at the idea of anyone painting with lint. Some readers might think Lyndella is a totally unrealistic character. Painting with dryer lint does sound kind of absurd, doesn’t it? But go back and look at the title of this blog post: Truth is Stranger than Fiction. Laura Bell and her $12,000 check from Ripley’s certainly proves that. 

Award-winning author Lois Winston writes the critically acclaimed Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery series. She's also published in women's fiction, romance, romantic suspense, and non-fiction under her own name and her Emma Carlyle pen name. Visit Lois at her website or Emma's website, and visit Anastasia at the Killer Crafts & Crafty Killers blog.