Did You Catch the Name? by Leah St. James

You know how you hear about a good new book or movie you’d like to check out but you can’t quite remember the name? For me, something like this will run through my head: “I’m looking for the new book by the author who wrote that other book that was about a man and woman...”

You get the picture.

I’m terrible with names, whether I’m trying to remember the names of new acquaintances, or books or movies, or naming my own books. (For some reason, I don’t have a similar problem naming characters, just the books themselves.)

I was thinking about my naming-challenged situation a few months back while reading the list of best-sellers in the Sunday paper, wondering how they all came up with the names.

I’ve never published a nonfiction book, but it seems fairly easy.  You have a specific expertise or point of view you want to share, then you stick on a colon and a bunch of explanatory words after. Here is the list that printed in my paper this past Sunday. Take a look at No. 1:

“Girl, Wash Your Face: Stop Believing the Lies About Who You Are So You Can Become Who You Were Meant To Be” by Rachel Hollis. Okay, so I presume that first phrase has a special meaning to the author, maybe an expression she heard over and over growing up. The rest, after the colon, is all self-explanatory. Easy, right?

Why can’t naming fiction be like that?

Why can’t we title a book something like “Raven: A story about a woman with black hair and how she meets the man of her dreams”?  (Yes, I just came up with that. Catchy, huh? :-) I kind of like the Raven bit though....)

Fiction authors aren’t that lucky. We have to come up with a catchy title that somehow, in some way, conveys what the story is about, without giving too much away. And we have to be somewhat unique. With literally MILLIONS of fiction titles currently published, that’s not always easy.

To me, Margret Mitchell’s classic “Gone With the Wind” is a perfect title, one that – if memory serves me correctly – borrows from a phrase in the book itself.  None of my titles have come that easy, but then I am not a world-famous best-selling author!

Seeking guidance, I took a look at the current list of fiction best-sellers and discovered  something interesting. It seems the trend is to tack a colon after the title, followed by “A Novel.” 

I’ve seen that before, and not just recently, but it seems more and more book titles are following that naming model. Five of this week’s top ten sellers have done it.  Another two have “novel” stuck in the series title, like “Feared: A Rosato & DiNunzio Novel.”

The latter I understand perfectly. You want readers to know the book is part of a specific series. But I don’t understand why you would add “A Novel” to a book title that everyone pretty much knows is a novel.  Do we really need “A Novel” added to Stephen King’s “The Outsider” to know it’s a novel?

 Is it a way to assist with searching? So if I can’t remember the book title (which is probable for me), I pop “A Novel” in the search field and I’ll narrow the field down by 50 percent? (That’s presuming I remember there’s “A Novel” in the title.)

I tested that theory by searching for “A Novel” in Amazon’s book section, but it pulled up every book with the word in the title or description. So that can’t be it.

Next I theorized it’s a device meant to indicate a certain type of novel, a certain intellectual level, maybe literary versus genre fiction. But then I saw the King novel. Stephen King is a brilliant novelist on so many levels, but he doesn’t write literary fiction.

Do those simple words add a mystique? Would “Gone With the Wind: A Novel” have sold more copies? Doubtful.

Whatever the reason, it annoys me. It feels pretentious, like the author is saying, “Hey, look at me. I wrote A NOVEL!” But then I remember the publisher usually rules the title, so the publisher is saying, “Hey, look! He/she wrote A NOVEL!”

None of these thoughts seem to make sense, so I figured I’d toss my question out to this group.

Any idea why so many current book titles seem to include “A Novel”?

Does this annoy anyone else, or is it just me?

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When not frittering away her writing time obsessing over things like book titles, Leah writes stories of mystery and romance, good and evil and the power of love. Learn more about her books (not necessarily the titles) at leahstjames.com, or visit her on Facebook or Pinterest where she occasionally posts about life, writing and her favorite things.

The Suspense is Killing Me! ~ by Leah St James #amwriting

I’m deep in the guts of my current WIP, a sequel to my first published novel. (It’s only been about 10 years.... Um, better late than never, right?) Anyway, after TPM (hubby) ripped apart what I had about a year ago (or maybe it’s been two?), I’ve been picking up the pieces, mending what could be saved and consigning the rest to a “Not Used” file. (Who knows, maybe they’ll make good “extras” to “fans” some day.)

I came to a screeching halt the other day, though, when I realized I don’t have a bad guy scene. Not one. And I’m about two-thirds of the way through the story. The bad guy is wreaking havoc  among my cast of characters, but I’ve given little to no clues about his identity! No scenes where I get into his head or see him in action.

Since this is supposed to be a romantic suspense novel, I decided it was a problem and quickly wrote a couple short bad-guy scenes and tucked them into the story.

Then I started thinking about all elements of suspense I need to incorporate into the story and realized when I finish the first draft (I will finish...I will!), I will have a lot of work left to do.

There are a number of techniques writers can use to create suspense, like making the stakes really big (whether personal or universal) and creating a short timeline for solving the issue.

This article from Writers Digest talks about other things, like applying pressure and creating dilemmas. (Yeah, they go without saying, I think.)
 
For me, as a reader, what creates the most suspense is when I know something bad is coming, and I’m reading/watching the bad stuff develop, waiting for the hero/heroine to figure it out. 

Example:  The shower scene in Alfred Hitchcock’s classic film Psycho with Janet Leigh. Run! Run! I shriek in my head every time I see it.

 

(Just because I think Hitchcock is THE master of suspense, I thought I’d share this article in which he explains the difference between surprise and suspense. 

And talking about applying pressure...

Did everyone see the original Terminator film (1984, directed by James Cameron and starring Arnold Schwarzenegger and Linda Hamilton)? To me, the last ten minutes or so are some of the most suspenseful in film. 

The Terminator has been chasing  poor Sarah Connor throughout the film. She’s gotten herself cornered in this massive forge-like industrial plant. She’s running while machinery is twirling and spinning, plunging and hissing around her. John Connor is there, trying to protect her, until the monster takes him out. Then it’s just Sarah against the creature sent back through time to kill her.

All vestiges of humanity have melted  off his metallic skeletal frame. It’s half blown to smithereens. But it won’t stop. It...keeps...coming. Relentlessly. Until it has her trapped less than an inch away.

 


When I first saw this movie, I remember pushing back against the couch where I was sitting and folding myself into a fetal position.

Even today, just watching the scene has me holding my breath, and I know the ending!

And that’s the level of suspense I shoot for. I want readers holding their breath, pushing back against their seats, their eyes racing across the pages until the scene is resolved. It's a pretty high bar. Like I said, I have a lot of work ahead of me, but it’s fun trying to figure out what I can do to ratchet up the pressure on my beloved characters and make them run for their lives.

What are your favorite suspense moments?

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Leah writes stories of mystery and romance, good and evil (really, really evil) and the power of love. Learn more at her website or visit her at Facebook where she occasionally posts about life and writing.

Error-riddled but clueless: To "help" or not - by Leah St. James #grammar #amwriting

Dear fellow grammar nerds:

I know you’re out there. You’re the readers who take note when the wrong to/two/too (or there/their/they’re, roll/role, past/passed...) is used. The first time you might roll your eyes, but you’ll keep reading. Twice in the same page and you might cringe and send a silent message to the author to spend more time proofing. But more than that, if you’re like me, you’ll stop reading.

That happened to me the other day while I was reading an author’s promo blog. (It wasn’t any of our authors!) When I came to the first misused word (an error so bad, I actually laughed, until I was hit with a wave of sympathy), I almost started an email to let the author know there was a bad (really, really bad) error in the blurb. The second stopping point came courtesy of a misplaced modifier (a body part was doing something it shouldn’t be doing). But when the point of view started hopping from head to head so quickly, mine started spinning, I X’d out of the site.

This was all within a couple paragraphs. What do you think the odds are that I’ll purchase that book? Yep. Zero.

We all make typos or grammatical errors from time to time. There could be a few in this blog post, even though I’ve read and re-read to look for them. I’m so embarrassed to discover my own, or when someone else points them out, but I think something bigger is going on. I think there has been a slippage of general grammar knowledge over the past few years. Auto-correct features that seem to have been trained by the untrained masses don’t help.

 

Thanks to Bizarro cartoonists for the timely quip!

 Or maybe it’s not that writers today know less, but that more are publishing poorly edited content. It used to be that published texts—books, articles, etc.—were vetted by editors, probably several layers of them, before reaching the reader. Today, those layers have largely disappeared. Many self-published authors go cheap on editing because, let’s face it, most of us don’t make a lot of money in this business. 

Today it takes an instant to post a piece that could be filled with typos and those cringe-worthy errors. And the more they appear in public, the more those errors are ingrained into the collective lack-of-knowledge base. Maybe that’s how language changes over time—too many people making the same errors over and over until the error becomes the accepted form!

So what, if anything, should the grammar nerd do when stumbling upon those error-filled pieces? (I’m not talking about a single instance. I’m talking about those so bad, we can’t keep reading.) Do we just wince behind our screens and post something benign in the comments? Or do we send a private message to the author so he/she can make corrections? 

Maybe something like: Dear (name of author), I noticed you posted what was probably a draft of your blurb on your blog. I spotted several errors. I hate when that happens to me!”
 
I tell myself that I would want to know if that were my post....maybe. I think that for most of us, any unsolicited “corrective” contact, no matter how well intended, would come across as condescending, resulting in either embarrassment/humiliation or anger, or both. It could generate more bad will than any benefit to the greater grammatical good is worth!

As for the example I mentioned at the beginning, I don’t know the author, so I chose to wince behind my screen and post a benign comment. But those awful errors keep lurking in the back of my mind, and I wonder if I should have tried to contact her.

What do fellow authors and readers think? Let sleeping errors lie, or offer a hoping-to-help hand?.................

Leah writes stories of mystery and romance, good and evil and the power of love. She is a true grammar nerd who sometimes finds herself mentally diagramming complex sentences. Learn more about her work at her website. Or visit her on Facebook where she posts occasional tidbits about writing and life. (For more Bizarro, go here.)

Character is king (...or queen) by Leah St. James #amwriting

The Plot Master (TPM) and I watched The Martian the other night. I had never read the book by Andy Weir, but the story of the self-published novelist rising to mega success, followed by a mega hit movie, always inspired me, and it's been on my "watch" list since it came out.

For whatever reason, TPM wasn’t all that keen on watching, but I talked him into it. Within the first few minutes as we followed the adventures of the Mars explorers, I was hooked, exclaiming things like, “This is fascinating!” Meanwhile TPM was watching half-heartedly and playing solitaire on his tablet.

When the crisis stranded poor Mark Watney (Matt Damon) on this uninhabitable piece of rock, his crewmates thinking him dead, I was curled up on the couch in a fetal position, biting my fingernails, and TPM had started to take interest.

According to the movie’s website, the film lasts 143 minutes, although I was completely unaware of the passage of time. In fact, I only paused the video once for a break...which is significant since I’m a serial pause-for-breaker. Somewhere in there TPM put down his tablet, and when the final credits rolled, he said, “That was excellent.” High praise from TPM. Even more striking, for once he had no comments on what he would have done differently, plot-wise, no suggestions for improvement.

It got me thinking about plot vs. character and which drives a story. (It also convinced me to put the book on my reading list!)

As a reader, I generally tend toward the character end of the see-saw. I read to find out what’s going on with the characters and their relationships, and how they react to the action around them. To me the pickles they get themselves into are sort of secondary, or interchangeable. Substitute car chase for martial arts butt-kicking—that type of thing. Or in a romance novel, substitute discovery of the hero’s past mistake for discovery of something he did two days ago. So for me, the story isn't so much about what the characters do as how those plot turns affect them.

But with The Martian, I was completely absorbed in the plot, while almost ignoring the character. Not that Mark Watney wasn't likeable, just that the situation was so compelling he was almost secondary.

But then I thought about it a bit more.

Certainly any of the astronauts on the mission would have done what they could to save themselves. Probably, since they are all scientists of one form or another, each would have approached the situation methodically, forming a hypothesis for each problem, then testing the theories. At least in the beginning. But how many would have persevered through the seeming insurmountable challenges, right up to the final moments, as Watney did? (I’m trying to NOT give away the ending for any who haven’t seen the movie or read the book.)

Finally I decided it was that component of his character (calm, steadfast perseverance in the face a situation that would have reduced most of us to a wailing pile of self-pity) that drove the plot, and ultimately the story. So for me, it’s a character story after all.

Then I got to thinking about all my favorite books and movies and tried to figure if it was plot or character, and again, I chose character.

Gone with the Wind, for example: Aside from this Yankee's curiosity of the setting in the ante-Bellum South, it was the characters and their relationship that intrigued me more than the story of war.

Or Kristen Hannah’s The Nightingale:  Two sisters in German-occupied Paris (WWII) and how they deal with the horrors of war. While the situation and setting are compelling (emotional and heartbreaking), how the sisters react is what tells the story.

What about romance?
Since the ending of a romance novel is, to a great extent, predetermined by the genre, romance writers have to be pretty clever and skilled to create suspense, either plot-wise or relationship-wise, to keep readers turning the pages. But again, that’s why I read: To find out how the characters react to those plot twists and how they achieve their HEA/HFN ending.

What do you think? Plot or character—which drives the story for you?

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Leah writes stories of mystery and romance, good and evil and the power of love. Learn more at her website, or visit her on Facebook.

Is my #amwriting “voice” schizophrenic? by Leah St. James

In my continuing saga of hoping to someday finish my current work in progress, I took a half day off from work on Monday, determined to make some progress. I  got up  about an hour later than usual, and basking in the luxury of not having to go into the office, lolled about in my pajamas, working on the Sudoku in the day’s paper, until TPM (The Plot Master a/k/a hubby) went off to work for the day. 

After exercising and showering, I got down to work. It was only 10 a.m., and I felt like I’d been released from bondage—hours and hours of free writing time  before me.

I think I reported in a recent post that I’ve been making decent progress, averaging about 250-500 words in the morning before work (which is incredible for me). But something happened that morning that slowed my progress.

I’m working on the sequel to my first  book—a dark and gritty look into the world of sexual slavery, with some consensual BDSM mixed in there. The sequel, which picks up the story about six weeks after the end of the first, is supposed to be a suspenseful, thriller-esque story with a continuing romance. 

But on Monday, everything I wrote was just awful, or lackluster at the best. No emotion. No grit. No suspense. In fact – help me, please – everything came out kind of slapstick-y! 

In my quest to diagnose this condition, I put the laptop aside and did another 30-minute workout, figuring maybe increasing the blood flow to my brain might bring an epiphany. It did not (although I burned calories!), and I struggled to write for the rest of the day.

When I went to bed that night, though, and settled in with my Kindle for my pleasure reading, it hit me.  My writing that day was similar in style and tone to the book I’m reading! It’s a contemporary romance by a national best-selling author with probably 30 published books in several series. She doesn’t write slapstick-y by any stretch, but she does use physical situations in humorous ways. I do believe I  was channeling her tone and voice while writing that morning. (If only it were as good as hers, I’d switch genres!)

It reminded me of a trip to Disney World when I was 16. I’m a native northeasterner with no discernible accent. I encountered a lot of southerners at the park, and at some point, I started subconsciously mimicking their accents. I forced myself to stop when I unintentionally offended one of the performers, a really cute teenage guy from Georgia (blond, blue eyes, nice muscles...I’ll bet he grew up into a fine looking man...).

Anyway, either I’ve transferred that tendency to my writing voice, or my overall mood (happy, relaxed) prevented me from going to the dark place the story calls for. Or maybe it’s a combination of both.

So now my question is, how do I turn off these subconscious voices in my head? Am I destined to finding my own voice only in the pre-dawn hours, when the world is dark and I’m exhausted from the drains of my every-day life?

Is my writing voice hopelessly schizophrenic, helplessly bound by the time of  day or by mood?

Disgusted, I told myself that “professional” writers are supposed to be able to power through these glitches and make it work, and that’s what I’ve been doing—at least the powering through part. I can’t say I’m making it work, but that’s what second and third and fourth drafts are for. Right?

Eventually I’ll be in a dark enough mood, I’m sure, to get back to normal.

If any of you have experienced this phenomenon and figured out a way around, I’d love to hear your tips!


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Leah writes stories of mystery and romance – or goofball slapstick, depending on her mood – and the power of love. Learn more at leahstjames.com.

The Dark Side of #Indie Publishing by Leah St. James

There was a time in the not distant past that being self-published labeled an author a pariah in the book world, not good enough to cut it with the big boys (traditional publishing). Those days have changed, and today, most readers know the publisher of a book (big company or self-published) doesn’t predetermine the quality of the book.

I have read many, many wonderful books by “indie” authors. I am an indie author. Several of our Roses are indie authors. The ranks of indie authors are filled with brilliant writers who have produced compelling and entertaining stories with fascinating characters that make me want to read more and more.

However – you knew a “however” was coming, right? – there are still too many poorly written books being released via self-publishing. I’m not saying this as a reader. I’m saying it from several years’ experience as a local book columnist/review coordinator for the news organization where I work.  We ran monthly lists of new releases, “reviews” (although not critical reviews, more like book reports), author profiles and a weekly calendar of local book signings. As you might imagine, I received books and pitches daily, and the majority were from authors who had self-published their stories.

Some of them were very well done, great stories, and I was happy to share with our readers. But too many were just bad – amateurish formatting and cover design, little or no evidence of proofreading or sometimes even the most basic skills in writing.

I often worried about this latter group of authors. They were the ones who hadn’t done the hard work it takes to learn the craft of writing. Neither did they educate themselves on the business side of the craft and were easy pickins for companies happy to take their money, sometimes lots of it, to help them see their books in print.

I’ll give you a perfect example that happened just the other day. (While I no longer write the column, I still get calls and emails from authors and publicists.)

Caller: Hello, uh, I wrote a book and need some help.

Me (feeling a prickling of unease at the back of my neck): What kind of help?

Caller: Well, it’s almost ready to be published and they said it needs to be proofread.

Me (red brain-flags waving): Are you self-publishing?

Caller: Yeah. I know I gotta pay, but can you proofread for me, or tell me someone who can?

Me: What’s the genre?

Caller: It’s called a manuscript.

Me (heart sinking...rapidly): Right, but is it fiction, like a story? Non-fiction, like a how-to book? Or maybe a memoir?    

Caller: Yeah. That’s it. A memoir.

It turns out he contracted with one of those notorious companies (once known as vanity presses)  that rake in dollars from naive authors. They offered to proofread for him, but the cost would be $2,000 (yikes!!) for his 388-page manuscript. He’s disabled, living solely on disability, and can’t scrape that kind of money together. Worse, when I asked him what the $2,000 covered, his response was, “Uh...that’s a good question.” All he knew was that it was an add-on buried somewhere in the contract. He’d already given them a lot of money and now they were asking for another couple grand before his book would see life.

For a nanosecond I considered whether I could help him out, but I was worried the manuscript would be a mess (I'd seen how some of these companies "edit"), and I knew I wouldn’t be able to muster the energy it would take to do a good job. 

Instead I gave him the names of a couple local writing groups and a nearby writing center with a great reputation. I hope he followed through, but I’m worried that somehow he’ll find $2,000 and get ripped off even worse. It’s bothering me.

So this is a plea for new authors who are thinking of self-publishing:

Please:

• Do your homework before you hand over money to anyone, whether an editor, cover designer, book formatter...any author services. 
• Join a local writing group and/or an online group like the Alliance of Independent Authors where you can network with others and learn from their experiences. Here’s a list of writing organizations by state. Here's a list of national groups. I’m sure neither list is exhaustive, but it’s a start.
• Take writing classes and hone your skills. Check your local community college for opportunities. Listen to constructive criticism.
• Please, hire a real book editor. Your best friend/cousin/brother-in-law who’s really good in English might be cheap, but book editing is a specific skill. Being “good in English” doesn’t make someone a good book editor.
  

Lastly, please don’t let my cautionary tale throw cold water on your dreams, but pursue them with your eyes open, and your wallet closed until you know what you’re buying.

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Leah writes stories of mystery and romance, good and evil and the power of love. Learn more at LeahStJames.com, or visit her on Facebook.









                   

Honoring the best of us -- by Leah St. James

Tomorrow is election day. In my state (Virginia) we’re selecting various local officials and all members of our House of Delegates, as well as the state attorney general, lieutenant governor and governor.

For two weeks now I’ve planned to write about the election. For two weeks thoughts have been running through my head about the need to inform ourselves about our local races, and the need for civil discourse. And  now that I’m sitting here putting my thoughts to “paper,” I can’t do it.

I can’t bring myself to delve into all the nastiness and negativity of politics, especially since as an employee of a news organization who deals frequently with our very opinionated readership (my “day job”), I get an earful every day. And believe me when I tell you it’s not pleasant. Most days I’d rather just forget these exchanges, not memorialize them in a blog!

So how appropriate that my answer on what to write came with delivery of Sunday morning’s newspaper. Inside was a special 16-page Veterans Day section honoring a dozen of the men and women in our community who have served in the armed forces.

The stories are all different – from a 99-year-old WWII vet who served in the Himalayas, to a young woman, a native of South Carolina’s low country, who left home at age 18 to travel the world with the Air Force, to a 33-year-old Special Forces veteran of Operation Enduring Freedom. Yet there is one commonality: Each expresses a love of country and pride in serving.

The WWII vet endured difficult living conditions as an engineer traveling from North Africa to Burma, had to jump in fox holes to survive air raids, and was subjected to daily doses of propaganda courtesy of "Tokyo Rose," but came home to his family unscathed.

The young woman who left her home in South Carolina talks about life in the military as a woman. In the lower ranks, she was surrounded by women and experienced little difficulties, but as she advanced in rank, ran into occasional roadblocks from men who weren’t thrilled at having to take direction from a woman. Now, 35 years into her career, she says a decision that started as a way out of a small-town existence became her life. Another woman vet tells about the fight to integrate women, to get VA benefits for women, and to construct a memorial near the entrance to Arlington National Cemetery that honors the 3 million women who have served.

There are several stories of Vietnam vets, stories of evading patrols of Viet Cong, suffering disabling injuries, surviving mortar attacks and coming home to a less-than-welcoming public and the cries of “Baby Killer.” It was an era I experienced as an adolescent, and some of my memories are still vivid. I remember a class trip to Washington, D.C., stepping off the bus on Pennsylvania Avenue into a crowd of Vietnam protesters. I remember seeing terrible things on the news, like people spitting at the returning veterans. I was old enough to process and understand why so many were against our involvement but also old enough to believe the individual soldiers (many of whom were drafted) shouldn’t have been treated like pariahs when returning home, especially by their own countrymen. Years later, I visited the Vietnam Memorial in D.C. and came upon a reunion group. When I thanked them for serving (all choked up and teary-eyed), I got a big hug of thanks in return.

I got all choked-up and teary-eyed again reading these stories. I think about their individual sacrifices. I think about their families who have sacrificed as well–raising children alone, dealing with returning soldiers who have terrible injuries, both physical and emotional, all so that our rights and privileges would be protected.


And that’s when I figured out what to say about Election Day. Here it is: 

Vote. Please.

And come Saturday (Veterans Day), maybe see what’s going on in your community to salute those who serve. 

Here's a salute to the men in my family who have answered the call.

For those reading this who have served (or are serving) or are the family of a service man/woman -- thank you. 

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Leah writes stories of mystery and romance, good and evil and the power of love. Learn more about her writing at leahstjames.com, or visit her on Facebook. She loves meeting readers and other writers!
                    
        

Writing History-based Fiction - It’s not that easy! By Leah St. James

As I reported last month, I’m deep into WIP V.2 with a revamped plot. Part of the plot revamping was to swap out the original prologue (a murder that takes place contemporaneously) to a murder that takes place about....oh...200 years ago. And it’s based on a real event.

Indulge me for a moment please in a brief history lesson.

Most of us remember the legendary team of Lewis and Clark (a/k/a the Corps of Discovery) who mapped the newly purchased Louisiana Territory in the early 1800s. What some might not know, however, is that the leader, Meriwether Lewis, died several years later in suspicious circumstances while stopped at an inn along the Natchez Trace, about 70 miles southwest of what is now Nashville. At the time, Lewis’s death was ruled a suicide, but there are many who believed (and believe now) that he was murdered. (If you’d like to learn more, Google it; you’ll find tons of material...just no definitive answers!)

That murder theory is the foundation of my new prologue. I’m using real characters in a real event but with a fictional outcome. (Dear editor: Please don’t let me forget to mention this in the book notes!) At the same time, I need to be as accurate historically as possible within the framework of that fiction. Yikes!

I’ve read tons of historical fiction, but most of that was set in Regency England....a bit different from the American frontier!

When I realized how much I don’t know, I started researching like crazy.

• What is the climate in that part of the country at that time of year (early October)?
• Will there be leaves on the ground already, or would it be more summer-like weather? 
• What did the inn look like? 
• What would the interior of a typical wilderness inn be like? Would they use pillows? Would they have beds or sleep on the floor? 
• What did they eat and bake? 
• What did they wear?

I found all sorts of old journals and letters and lists of household goods (including images!) online that answered most of those questions. But what about speech/dialogue? I figured there would be plenty of different accents of people traveling through the area (the inn bordered Cherokee lands), but I don’t know what words were in common use for everyday Americans.

For example: If I write something like, “Is he catching?” (meaning is he contagious), would that be historically accurate?

Aside from that, was the speech pattern of someone educated (like Lewis) as stilted as the writing, or would it be more casual like we are today in spoken language? And how much did his cross-country adventure (where he met people of all different tribes and nations) affect the way he communicated with others?

For a general sense of the language, I turned to books written around that time period. (I mean, should I be thinking Nathaniel Hawthorne here, or Laura Ingalls Wilder’s "Little House" books which were, admittedly, written for children!?) And if I were to emulate the former, would I bore contemporary readers to tears?

So I tried to pick a midway point between overly flowery and overly simplistic. And I tried to limit Lewis's dialogue while incorporating what fact I knew.

Here’s a sample of my first couple pages (first draft!). I’d love to know if you think I’m on the right track or need to take a class in History Writing 101.

In this scene, Priscilla Griner is real. The inn (Grinder’s Stand) and the general description of the property are real, and the typo (Grinder for Griner) is real. (Apparently travelers mispronounced it so much, the wrong name just stuck.) The man on horseback is Meriwether Lewis, and the description of him being ill on his arrival is factual according to what I read. The other characters (the inn’s scullery maid and Lewis’s servants) are real, but fictionalized.

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Tuesday, October 10, 1809
Grinder’s Stand
Natchez Trace, Tennessee


“Amelia. A man is coming.”

“Ma’am?” Amelia straightened from the table where she’d been mixing a batch of cornbread and turned toward her mistress. Miz Griner had hired her just two weeks past, needing help she said with all the chores at the small inn she operated with her husband, way out here in the Tennessee wilderness. It was no wonder, what with having children to care for, two cabins to clean, family and travelers to cook for, plus the garden and livestock to tend to. Still, Amelia half thought Priscilla Griner only wanted another female staying with her since her husband was gone hunting half the time. She was probably lonely, and scared, as they were just as likely to be visited by bands of neighboring Cherokee as western-bound travelers looking for lodging on the trail. Some came with families seeking a better life, others came alone seeking fortune.

That’s what Amelia wanted, too—to find her fortune…and a man if it so happened. This place was as good as any to start looking.

Miz Griner swiped her arm down the side of her face, wiping away sweat as she hurried toward the doorway to the cook house. “I said, a man is coming. I need to see to him.” She gave Amelia a frowning glance over her shoulder. “Don’t let that cornbread burn. We need it for supper.”

“No, ma’am, I won’t.” Amelia took a peek at the batch of cornbread she’d put in the oven earlier. It hadn’t yet started to brown. She moved in behind Miz Griner to peer around her, down the trace. Fallen leaves, just starting to bronze with the coming change of seasons, muffled the hooves of the horse plodding toward them. The man on its back wore a fancy coat and breeches and a tricorn cap, and he carried a rifle across the saddle in front. With each step of the horse, he swayed from side to side as if only sheer grit kept him seated.

Two men carrying thick bedrolls on their backs and rifles in their hands trudged behind him. They were conversing, their heads angled toward each other, making Amelia wonder what they were up to. They stopped short when the horse lurched to a halt in front of them, nearly tossing the man from its back.

“Lord have mercy,” Miz Griner muttered. She wiped her hands on a rag hanging from her skirt’s waistband, then moved into the yard. “Good afternoon, gentlemen. You look sorely in need of refreshment.” She waved a beckoning hand toward Amelia. “Water, if you please.”

Thoughts?? Does anything strike you as being out of place or time? Thanks for your feedback!
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Leah writes stories of mystery and suspense, good and evil and the power of love. While she has really enjoyed all the research for this chapter, she’s just as happy making up her own events, and places and characters to fill them. Learn more at her website or visit her on Facebook. She loves meeting readers!