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Guest Blogger ~ Heather Weidner

~ patyjag ~ 2 Comments

With a Little Help from Some Friends

Heather Weidner, Author of the Jules Keene Glamping Mysteries and the Mermaid Bay Christmas Shoppe Mysteries

I am extremely grateful for all the authors who have shared their ideas, advice, and successes with me through the years. Writing is mostly a solitary process, so it’s nice to know that you’re not alone and that others have experienced what you’re going through. Here are some tidbits that I’ve picked up through the years that have helped me improve my craft and to stay focused.

When I’m working on a new novel, I plot out a simple outline. I learned from Donna Andrews to color-code the different kinds of action in your outline, so you can see it over the course of the book. For example, I mark all romantic elements with pink, humorous items are orange, clues are green, etc. It helps create a visual as you write, and it shows you where you’re missing elements or when you’ve overloaded the story.

I learned from Mary Burton to keep a running list of over-used words. Add to it as you write, and then at the end of each revision cycle, search your document and remove the culprits. She also calls your first draft the “sloppy copy.” Typing “the end” doesn’t mean you’re finished. It’s the beginning of the revision cycle.

I learned from the late Kathy Mix to keep a list of character names for each book. Her rule was to name each character with a different letter of the alphabet. If she already had a Krissy, then she couldn’t have another character whose first name started with a “K.” I build a chart of characters for each book and note where the characters appear. I also create a list of key locations. I enter all the important facts, so I can keep track of the details.

Mary Miley gave me some great advice about honing dialogue. She recommends cutting out the unnecessary pleasantries and chitchat that don’t move your story forward.

Elaine Viets said to know your genre and who is publishing in it. Do your research and know the conventions before you query agents or publishers.

Lynda Bishop recommends that authors keep a timeline for each book to make sure all events are in order and make sense. This helps with pacing. This helps me keep the days straight (so the character doesn’t have lunch two times in the same day).

Tina Glasneck suggests that authors create a calendar for each book launch. Mine starts three months before the launch and runs three months after. Plan all events, interviews, blogs, and media campaigns. Make sure that you track the details.

Jane Friedman tells writers that their platform grows from their body of work. An author’s website and blog should be at the center of all of your marketing.

Frances Aylor and Alan Orloff gave me the best advice for writing. Butt glue (Frances) or BICFOK (Alan). They’re essentially the same. If you want to be a writer, put your Butt in the Chair and Fingers on the Keyboard.

Hollywood has come to Fern Valley, and the one stoplight town may never be the same. Everyone wants to get in on the act.

The crew from the wildly popular, fan favorite, Fatal Impressions, takes over Jules Keene’s glamping resort, and they bring a lot of offscreen drama and baggage that doesn’t include the scads of costumes, props, and crowds that descend on the bucolic resort in the Blue Ridge Mountains. Added security, hundreds of calls from hopeful extras, and some demanding divas keep Jules’s team hopping.

When the show’s prickly head writer ends up dead under the L. Frank Baum tiny house in what looks like a staged murder scene with a kitschy homage to the Wizard of Oz, Jules has to figure out who would want the writer dead. Then while they are still reeling from the first murder, the popular publicist gets lost after a long night at the local honky-tonk and winds up strangled. Jules needs to solve both crimes before filming is canceled, and her business is ruined.

Book Links

Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/dp/1685122000

Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BHLSYBZ9?ref_=pe_3052080_276849420

Barnes and Noble: Film Crews and Rendezvous: A Jules Keene Glamping Mystery by Heather Weidner, Paperback | Barnes & Noble® (barnesandnoble.com)

BookBub: Film Crews and Rendezvous: A Jules Keene Glamping Mystery by Heather Weidner – BookBub

Books a Million: film crews and rendezvous : : Booksamillion.com

Bookshop.org: https://bookshop.org/shop/heatherweidner

Fantastic Fiction: Film Crews and Rendezvous (Jules Keene Glamping Mystery, book 2) by Heather Weidner (fantasticfiction.com)

Goodreads: Film Crews and Rendezvous by Heather Weidner | Goodreads

Kobo: Film Crews and Rendezvous eBook by Heather Weidner – EPUB | Rakuten Kobo United States

Scribd: Film Crews and Rendezvous by Heather Weidner – Ebook | Scribd

Through the years, Heather Weidner has been a cop’s kid, technical writer, editor, college professor, software tester, and IT manager. She writes the Jules Keene Glamping Mysteries, the Mermaid Bay Christmas Shoppe Mysteries, and the Delanie Fitzgerald Mysteries.

Her short stories appear in the Virginia is for Mysteries series, 50 Shades of Cabernet, Deadly Southern Charm, and Murder by the Glass, and her novellas appear in The Mutt Mysteries series.

Originally from Virginia Beach, Heather has been a mystery fan since Scooby-Doo and Nancy Drew. She lives in Central Virginia with her husband and a pair of Jack Russell terriers.

Social Media Links

Website and Blog: http://www.heatherweidner.com

Twitter: https://twitter.com/HeatherWeidner1

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/HeatherWeidnerAuthor

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/heather_mystery_writer/

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/8121854.Heather_Weidner

Amazon Authors: http://www.amazon.com/-/e/B00HOYR0MQ

Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/HeatherBWeidner/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/heather-weidner-0064b233?trk=hp-identity-name

BookBub: https://www.bookbub.com/authors/heather-weidner-d6430278-c5c9-4b10-b911-340828fc7003

TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@heather_weidner_author?lang=en

Guest Blogger ~ Robin Henry

~ patyjag ~ 1 Comment

Great mystery/thriller books writers should read… by Robin Henry

It is time for year end lists!  Here’s my list of favorite mysteries and thrillers I read in 2022.  NOTE—I read these in 2022, some of them were published earlier…

Each of these are a great mini-masterclass for mystery writers, too. Each does a wonderful job of keeping the reader curious, building suspense, but without frustrating the reader.  Several of them are also playing with form, like epistolary or traditional historical.  If you want to write a great mystery or just get lost in one for a while, these are all excellent choices.

The Appeal by Janice Hallett

An excellent use of the epistolary form, and just a fun mystery with a load of crazy characters who will keep you guessing.  Definitely recommended for Cozy fans…

Apples Never Fall by Liane Moriarty

Domestic Thriller by the current Queen of the Genre in my opinion.  So many family secrets…but somehow all loose ends are explained and tied up at the end.

The Paris Apartment by Lucy Foley

Need a book that will make you stay up until 2 AM?  Look no further.  This apartment building is creepy and so are the people who live there…

The Bullet That Missed by Richard Osman

You’ll laugh, you’ll tear up, you’ll love every moment you spend with the gang. One of the most fun things about Osman is the observations he makes about the world through the eyes of his characters.  Surrender to it and you won’t be sorry.

Apothecary Melchior and the Mystery of St. Olaf’s Church by Indrek Hargla

English translation by Adam Cullen, English version published by Peter Owen

A finely plotted traditional medieval whodunit.  If you’ve been wishing for a new Father Cædful, try Apothecary Melchior…

Fatherland by Robert Harris

Gritty, alternative history mystery set in the Berlin of a partially victorious Third Reich.  The Cold War looks a little different and the Americans under President Joe Kennedy (mobster father of John, Ted, and Robert) is cozying up to the fascists. The book is simply fantastic and also a little frightening because of the way Harris understands human nature.

See more book reviews along with free writing tools at http://readerly.net

Robin Henry is a librarian and independent scholar turned book coach who loves history and mysteries along with her hot beverage.  You can find out more at http://readerly.net or contact her at readerlybooks@gmail.com 

Happy Holidays!

~ patyjag ~ 6 Comments

I hope everyone who reads this blog, writes for this blog, and guests on this blog has had a wonderful year reading all the unique and interesting posts. I know I enjoy each post for different reasons. Some are about how to write a mystery, some are about marketing, and some are about how the writer came up with the story, premise, characters. Some are vignettes about a writer’s life. There is always something interesting to learn from a post at Ladies of Mystery.

Today, as I write this post, I am starting a read through and edit pass before book 10 in the Gabriel Hawke series heads out to my critique partners. By the time you read this, the manuscript will be in the hands of my CPs and I will be fleshing out the next Spotted Pony Casino book.

Even with the holidays, I still have books in my head that want to get out. I have slowed down the last few months which has driven my on time, schedule-to-keep-self crazy! This book that is just now being read by critique partners was (on my white board) to be published by now. Life got in the way and while my disciplined self is kicking my backside for not getting it done on time, my family self is saying, it’s okay. Things happen and you begin to see that hanging out with friends and family are more important than getting that next book out on time.

And that is why, I backed off on my goals for 2023. Next year I have two wonderful trips planned. One with family and one with friends. They will take away a month and a half of writing time. And I plan to do more in-person events, which when you live as far away from where most in-person events happen, I have to add 2 extra days for travel.

I’m taking a marketing class while getting ready for company for Christmas and helping my daughter with a wedding 2 days after Christmas. Yes, life is always interesting!

Have a wonderful Holiday Season and a Healthy Happy New Year! See you in 2023!

NOT THE THANKSGIVING I HOPED FOR

~ marilynm ~ 10 Comments

We’d been invited to have Thanksgiving with one of our grandsons and family and I really looked forward to it. We’ve gone there in the past. He lives in another foothill community, up a winding road to a hill top retreat. His father-in-law, a master chef, prepares the feast—always gourmet.

Besides the wonderful food, many other relatives and friends join the festivities.

However, this year for us it wasn’t too be. I came down with a vicious bug. No way could I go anywhere.

All was not lost, however. We share our home with our granddaughter and family and she looked forward to doing her own Thanksgiving. She and her hubby made the food with the help of her two oldest daughters.

Though I didn’t have much of an appetite, what I did eat was delicious, and hubby didn’t miss out on a Thanksgiving meal.

What does this have to do with writing? Not much, only that I haven’t felt like doing any. I’ve kept in touch with family members via Facebook. I learned my brother-in-law was too sick to go to their big family feast. One of my author friends has the same symptoms as I do, and she had chicken soup for her Thanksgiving meal.

I’ve had many great Thanksgivings in the past, many I prepared myself. These days, I’m happy that the younger generation is taking over those duties.

Despite not feeling well, I’m thankful for so much in my life, having my husband of 71 years, my big family, and my friends including all my author friends, the joy of creating a fictional world and sharing it with others, and still being able to enjoy life.

My hope is that all of you who read this post, had a wonderful holiday and are looking forward to what’s coming next.

Marilyn

What To Write

~ patyjag ~ 9 Comments

While I always have a lot of ideas bouncing around in my head, when I finished the latest Spotted Pony Casino book, I wasn’t sure which idea I should write next.

Should I just pick one of the titles? I have a list of gambling terms that I use for the titles in the Spotted Pony Casino series. Or should I use one of my ideas and figure out which term/title would work for it? I pondered this as I began the next Hawke book. I like to be thinking about several books ahead while I write the current one. It’s how I can finish up one and dive right into the next one, because I’ve been thinking about it in the back of my mind.

I had a little help from my subconcious.

One night as I was taking a shower a scene popped into my head and I knew which idea I’d be using. I got out of the shower and wrote the scene down. Now that I know the direction the next story is heading, I can pick one of the ten titles I have to go with it, and I can begin plotting the suspects and motives.

When I finish writing the current Hawke book, Bear Stalker.

Because I write two series, hopping from one to the next I have also been wondering which of my Hawke ideas would be the next book. There are times I can have two to three books in a series lined out in my head and on paper, but I’m working on book 10 in the Gabriel Hawke series and while I have three more ideas written down, I wasn’t sure which direction I wanted to go.

The other night, just as I was about to drift off the opening scene for the next Hawke book trickled through my mind. I immediately grabbed the notebook by the bed, went into the bathroom and closed the door to not wake hubby and the puppy, and started writing it down.

As I wrote the opening scene, I realized the story would play out differently than I had originally planned for this scenario. I love when my brain figures out a better story line than what I’d first thought.

This new idea should make the readers who like when Hawke tracks in the mountains happy and will keep them wondering how many bodies Hawke will come across. 😉

When ideas come to me like this- out of the blue when I’m not trying to figure something out-I call them gifts. Because they are always better than what I had come up with while forcing myself to figure out a story line.

The mind is a wonderful thing. I hope we don’t lose our originality and creativity to machines.