Fleshing Out Your Story by Betsy Ashton

Every time I speak to book clubs, I hear the same question: where do you get your ideas? It usually comes halfway through the talk and before the reading. I don't have a stock answer, so I'm going to walk you through how I built a character for a new series.

Back in grad school when dirt was young and dinosaurs were slowly fading away, one of my friends got into trouble with her family when she started dating a guy named Sa-Li Ma.

Hmm, great name. I filed it away at a time when I never thought I'd write one book, let alone plan out a series. Fast forward to now.

I decide to set a novel in Roanoke, VA. I want a stranger in town, someone who will stand out and not fade easily into the local population. I want him to have a prominent position in law enforcement. And I want him to be called Sa-Li Ma.

I have a name. It's a Chinese name. What does this skeleton of a character look like? Well, he's tall because his ancestors come from an area in China where most were horsemen. Why horsemen? Because "ma" in Chinese is horse. He has black hair and eyes, is muscular in a lean sort of way. His face is a land of planes, not at all round.

Good, this name now has a body and a hint of a profession. Let's make him a DEA agent leading a multi-jurisdictional task force charged with slowing or stopping the opioid epidemic sweeping through many southern states. It's an important job, prominent, dangerous.

His age? Ah, he has to be around forty-five. Not much older. Is he married? Here comes a chance for character development and conflict. His wife is dead when the series opens, an FBI agent killed in the line of duty a month before he shows up in town. Does he have children? One. A daughter aged five.

So, where are we? We have a widower in a dangerous job with a princess for a daughter. What opportunities to humanize the tough guy when he has a tea party for her birthday, plays knight-in-shining-armor, and reads her to sleep at night. He needs someone to take care of the little girl, whom we will call Maggie Rose (named after a fellow writer who lost her battle with cancer a few years back). Enter his sister, who has no name right now. Having a Chinese woman living in his house opens the way for misunderstandings about her role in the family.

With this, we have a protagonist who can carry a single novel or multiple novels. His first challenge will be...

Oooh, that would be telling.

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Betsy Ashton is the author of Mad Max Unintended Consequences and Uncharted Territory, A Mad Max Mystery. She has a new short story, "Midnight in the Church of the Holy Grape," in 50 Shades of Cabernet. Her works have appeared in several anthologies and on NPR.

Ice, ice baby

It's the Good News, Bad News thing: The Good News: it's not that bad. The Bad News: it still hurts.

I'm an avid walker, and I always get in my 70K a week. For about a month, I've been plagued by a painful right foot. Just one spot on the foot. I thought, "Yikes. Bunyon? Bone spur?"

Went to the podiatrist and he x-rayed it (rather a nifty machine, I must say). The Good News: "You have marvelous bones. All straight and good, no problem."

The Bad News: no problem. Probably a ligament inflammation. Maybe muscle strain. Options? Quit walking (not an option, really). Or ice. I always have an ice pack in the freezer, so no biggie. I now prop up the hoof every night, plop the ice pack on it, and so far, it's working okay. The pain is diminishing except for those moments when it's excruciating. Which are few and far between. And luckily, we're leaving the winter months, so I don't really mind a pile of ice sitting on my foot (or so I keep reminding myself).

Another good part of this: it immobilizes me. Anyone who knows me knows that I seldom sit for long periods of time (unless forced to do so by circumstance). I am always getting up, moving around, pacing, moving. But with an ice bag on one foot, a cat draped over the other one, a pile of sewing on my lap, and a glass of wine close at hand: I am immobile and often remain so for long periods. Which is all helping the healing.

And it's helping my manuscript. I keep a notepad at hand and jot ideas as I sit, often sketching out an entire chapter in one sitting.

Maybe there's something to this "sit and be still" stuff I hear about...

J L
(jayellwilson.com)

Stuck in the Middle by Alison Henderson

We're all familiar with the dreaded "sagging middle", that bed of quicksand that's sucked the life from many a hardworking writer. Well, I'm smack in the middle of my current manuscript and have to admit it's getting the better of me. It isn't sagging. In fact, I've just finished a major action scene, and the hero and heroine have shared important revelations. That's part of the problem. I have to figure out ways to keep the tension building.

I'm suffering a crisis of confidence. I'm a plotter, and I'm afraid I don't have enough plot to fill the second half of the book. I've got an idea of what happens next, but when I look at my outline, all I see is "growing attraction, humorous scene with the robot, another action scene, couple makes love, climax action scene, HEA." I have details for those scenes, but they won't support another 42K words. I need to do some serious brainstorming, and I've always been lousy at it.

I've never had this problem before, but this story has the most complex mystery/suspense plot I've ever concocted. All four main characters are hiding secrets from at least two of the others. Unbeknownst to each other, the hero and heroine are working undercover on the same case. Suspicions abound, and I'm about to lose my freaking mind. 

It's so hard to remember who suspected what when, and who revealed what to whom at what time. I finally broke down and wrote it up in chronological order, like an outline, but only containing the suspense elements. At least now I can go back and check without having to page through the manuscript trying to find a couple of key sentences. Why did I ever think this story would be fun?

It would probably be easier if I were a faster writer; I might be better at keeping the details straight in my head. It would also be easier if I stuck to a single POV. (I now know why so many mysteries are written in first person.) However, I've always written my romances from both the hero and heroine's points of view. I like getting inside the hero's head, and many of my readers have said they do, too. 

The one saving grace at this point, and what will pull me out of this quagmire of creative anxiety, is that I'm delighted by what I've written so far. When I re-read earlier passages, searching for the details for my outline, I had that wonderful feeling of reading something funny and new, as if I'd had nothing to do with it. That's one of the few benefits of writing slowly. You forget what you wrote a month or two ago and can see it with fresh eyes. By the time I finish the first draft and start revisions and edits, I hope to be thoroughly entertained by the work of a complete stranger. Wish me luck!

Alison
www.alisonhenderson.com