For about fifteen minutes after I finished the 8th book of the Alvarez Family Murder Mysteries, I breathed a sigh of relief and took a break. Then I got back to work. First, I sent off the manuscript to my content editor, a master at letting a writer know what should be expanded, condensed, moved, clarified, or eliminated. That done, I conferred with the cover artist on the new cover. Then I conferred or rather listened to my publicists on marketing strategies i.e., the blurb, keywords, categories, stuff like that. Then began to implement them.

Once the cover and strategies were decided upon, and waiting for the return of the manuscript from the content editor, I went to Amazon Direct Publishing. I filled in the necessary information and uploaded what I could in order to get a URL for the new book. Once I had a URL, I set up the preorder and posted news of the new book wherever I could. Then I created and sent out my newsletter to my readers with all the information. I went online to Bowkers Identifier Services for new ISBN numbers. I registered the book with US Copywrite service. That took half a day, at least, but you gotta do all the legal stuff.

Within two weeks I received the manuscript back from the content editor and made 99% of the changes she suggested because, as I said, she is a master. When it was clean enough for jazz, I sent the manuscript out to my trusted, tried, and true Beta readers. They are just the best. They are terrific at telling me like it is, finding all kinds of typos, and making suggestions. After they gave me feedback, I sent the cleaner, corrected version –– a combo of content editor and Beta readers suggestions –– to the line editor. Meanwhile, I tweeted, blogged, and Facebooked. I had two months to let the world know (okay, not the world, just some of the people who know me in my small world) that The Drop-Dead Temple of Doom was coming out September 15th

I received the manuscript back from the line editor after about three weeks. She, too, is marvelous. Among the other things she found, did I know howler monkeys (and do not capitalize the name, she said) grow to be quite big? A grown howler monkey cannot sit on a man’s shoulder, as it does in my book, and have the man live to tell about it. Uh-oh! I neglected to put in it was an orphaned baby howler monkey. I set out to make the corrections she caught in the story, plus all the other things, like grammar, punctuation, and inaccuracies. I also collaborated with the woman who was writing the Afterword for the book. Once done with all that, the manuscript went off to the proofreader. He is married to and works with the line editor. They are quite a pair. He hasn’t sent the final version back yet, but I know when he gets done with it, it will be cleaner than I ever thought possible. And possibly as done as I’m ever going to get it.

The time came to set up a blog tour with Your Great Escapes Blog Tour. It goes from September 6^th through the 19^th. This means, of course, I will have to write character guest posts, Heather guest posts, answer interview questions, and convert the manuscript to MOBI, epub, and PDF files for bloggers and reviewers to read. Meanwhile, I continue to push the preorder button to as many reader as I can as often as I can without becoming totally obnoxious about it. And sometimes I walk a thin line.

I also created the print book cover, based on the cover the CA made for the eBook. Making the spine, back cover, not to mention (but I will) writing a shorter, more curt blurb for the back cover took me several days but it saved me 300 plus dollars. Doing a lot of these things myself saves money, but still getting the book out on the shelf, whether it’s a real shelf or an online one, usually costs a couple of thousand dollars. But when you are competing with the big boys, you gotta have a product that does just that.

September 15^th is right around the corner and I’m not done yet. Busy, busy, busy. But right now you’ll have to excuse me. I need to take a nap.

People often ask me how one goes about writing a book, be it a novel or a memoir. How do you get started? How do you finish? I don’t have a lot of answers but I do know one simple fact: you can’t be a writer if you don’t write. Below are a few things I’ve learned along the way to get me writing. Not foolproof, but helpful, I think. Now and then, I revisit these few rules. I don’t want to make my craft so complicated or get so lost in it I forget the basics.

1 – Give yourself permission to write. Many people think they can’t or shouldn’t write something. Maybe it’s not the time. Maybe other things are more important. Not so! If you want to do it, it’s important. Don’t let family, friends, or circumstances discourage you. If writing is something you want to do then do it! Giving yourself permission is the first step.

2 – Think about what it is you want to write, what you want to say. Fiction or non-fiction? A short story or novel? A memoir, biography, autobiography? It doesn’t have to be big, maybe a couple of pages to start you off. Then put pen to paper, so to speak. Following through is a big part of success in any field.

3 – Find the right set up. You’ll need a quiet place where you can work undisturbed. To be literary for a moment, Virginia Woolf makes this point in A Room of One’s Own. It doesn’t matter if it’s an office with a computer desk or a kitchen table and a tablet. Whatever and wherever you choose, make it your own. Claim it, at least for the span of time you’re writing.

4 – Have the right tools on hand. Notepad, pencils, pens, computer, printer, paper, etc. Be ready for the job of writing. Remember, it’s your job. Approach it that way.

5 – Set up a schedule for yourself and stick to it. Find or make the one time of day when you can concentrate on what you’re doing — writing. Try to choose the same time of day, every day, but if it can’t be that way, go with it. Let everyone around you know this is the time to give you some space. Make it a habit, whether it’s fifteen minutes a day, one hour, or six. Writing is a lot like playing tennis. The more you do it, the better you get. Practice, practice, practice.

6 – Explore the craft of writing. Take classes, read books on subjects that interest you, go to a few lectures. Join a writing group, join a reading group. Make it a living, breathing, attainable craft. Writing can be yours. It can also be a gift for future generations and your family. But most important, it’s what you want to do.

Happy Writing!

Being involved in what you write is one of the keys to being a good writer. But it can get out of hand. When I started the first book of the Alvarez Family Murder Mysteries, Murder is a Family Business, the story included finding a kitten. I discovered I couldn’t write those scenes without becoming a little misty-eyed. I think a lot of that was due to the fact the feline in the story was based on my cat, Tugger, whom I loved and adored. He’s been gone to that great catnip haven in the sky for over eleven years, and I still love and adore him.

Wait. Misty-eyed.

The scene where Tugger was found by our protagonist in an abandoned phone booth in the rain, a frightened, drenched kitty, could never be written with completely dry eyes. This stayed with me no matter how many rewrites. I didn’t think much of it at the time, but hoped it was an indication that I was a true writer rather than needing therapy. And I’m sticking to that.

Fast forward. As I was writing the 3rd book of the series, Death Runs in the Family, both Tugger and another cat, Baba, are catnapped. In the story, they’re put into their carriers, placed into the back of a station wagon, and are being driven to Las Vegas. As I write cozies, they would, of course, be rescued. That was the plan. However, before I could write the rescue scenes, something happened in real life that took me away from the computer. For three long days! I was good the first two. I would tell myself, this is just a story. But no matter how often I repeated the phrase, each time there was this little ping that would strike at my heart.

In the middle of the third night, I sat bolt upright in bed. It was three am. I had done nothing but toss and turn. I had to face it. I wasn’t going to get any sleep until I did something about the cats. My jerky movements and noisy sighing woke my husband up who wanted to know what was wrong. I said, “I have got to get those cats out of the back of the station wagon. They haven’t had any food or water for three days!” “Whatever you say, honey.” Then he rolled over and went back to sleep. You can’t be married to a writer for long without learning their ways. So I got up, went to the computer, and wrote the chapters where not only are the cats rescued, but they get salmon, water, and lots of cuddling. Within the storyline it had been probably six to eight hours. But in my heart it had been three long days. I went back to bed at seven am wondering how Eric Knight wrote the story Lassie, Come Home and managed to get some sleep.

I thought (hoped) this affliction only surfaced when there were animals in my stories. Unfortunately, not so. The 4th book, DEAD…If Only, has several chapters taking place on a thirty-foot cabin cruiser in the Gulf of Mexico during a hurricane. Many’s the night I would wake up seasick from the ten- and twenty-foot fictional waves pounding the boat. The 5th book, The CEO Came DOA, revolves around a Columbian drug called Devil’s Breath, a drug which reportedly takes a victim’s will power away and even kills in strong enough doses. You can succumb to this drug through swallowing, inhalation, or skin absorption. In short, pretty versatile, pretty lethal. Naturally, as I was writing this book we went on a Caribbean cruise that docked in Columbia for a day. I was a nervous wreck. I almost didn’t get off the ship. After hubby finally talked me into going ashore, I clung to him like a three year-old child to a teddy bear. This was a little difficult when one of us had to go to the baño or bathroom. I’m not sure what I did to international relations, but we took solace in the fact I was only there for one day.

I am currently writing the 8th book of the series, The Drop Dead Temple of Doom, set in the Guatemalan jungle. Woven into the story is the Yellow Dart Frog, one of the most poisonous amphibians in the world, and the Fer de Lance viper, one of the most poisonous snakes in the world. I threw in some pumas and jaguars just to round things out. Lately, I have been quite careful when I step outside my front door. You never know what’s going to pounce.

A writing teacher once told the class, “Get off the front porch.” What she meant by that was to stop explaining the who, what, why, and get to the story. As every writer knows, this can be tricky. You have to ground your reader. You have to let them know where they are. But you don’t want them to get lost in nothing but details. Or bore them to death, either. You have a story to tell. So get off the front porch and tell it.

Naturally, I forgot the teacher’s advice. Again. In rereading the first draft of The Drop Dead Temple of Doom, Book 8 of the Alvarez Family Murder Mysteries, I couldn’t believe how much backstory and explanation I’d put in. I even had the effrontery to open the book with three pages of a case Lee, the protagonist, just finished solving.

Really, Heather? The reader is interested in three pages of gobbledygook about a case that has nothing to do with the ongoing story? I don’t think so. What I was trying to get across was the protagonist had had a bad three weeks and was exhausted. All she needed in her life was to go traipsing off to the Guatemalan jungle.

Okay, why didn’t I just cut out all the junk and say that? Because sometimes we writers get caught up in how much exposition is enough and what is too much. That’s why I say they’re like prunes. Are five enough? Are six too many? It’s what writers grapple with continually. Expositions, not necessarily prunes.

Opening paragraphs set up the story, too. Or should. That’s where we make our contract with the reader. They are going to know right then and there what kind of a read they will have. Naturally, the writer has to live up to that contract. We can’t promise them an easy, breezy cozy with a happy ending and then hand a child or the family dog off to an axe murderer never to be seen again. A writer like Ruth Rendell has a different kind of contract. When she writes, “It reminded Burden of a drowned face he had once seen on a mortuary slab. They put the glasses back on the spongy nose to help the girl who had come to identify him” we know right where we’re going.

Within the first couple of paragraphs of my latest wannabe book I wrote, “The most vengeful I get is wanting CEO and mother, Lila Hamilton-Alvarez, to have the frizzies for just one minute of her life. Then I’d hand her some anti-frizz conditioner saying, welcome to my world.” These lines may stay or they may not. This is after all, only a draft. But it certainly does set up what kind of read follows. Within the first few opening paragraphs, the reader’s appetite is whetted for what’s going to come, how it’s going to come, and how much they are going to love it. Heady stuff.

This is not only about justifying the $ they spent to buy the book (I could have used more dollar signs, but my books are on the cheap side). Mainly, it’s because we want them to keep on reading. Not just this book, but all our books. And in order to do that, we have to make things clear, bring the reader to the starting point, but get on with the story.

After I reread the beginning of Drop Dead Temple, I wound up taking over half out of the first three chapters, in particular, the opening pages. I realized — again — it needs to start with the current problem and just a hint of why we are where we are. I am also in the process of taking out much of the backstories of my continuing characters. I will, of course, be sneaking some back in further on down the line. This is not only for newbies or because I try to make each book of a series a standalone, but as reminders to my ongoing readership. But this is after the story is moving, the reader is invested, and when they want to know more. Hopefully, after fourteen books I will know what I need to share and when I need to do it. But there are no guarantees. It changes with every book.

It’s a tricky bit of business, this exposition stuff. Please pass the prunes.