Booking Through Thursday

Booking Through Thursday

Do you find yourself thinking that the books you read would be good on film? Do you wish the things you watched on TV or in the movies were available as book?

I always liked reading a book first before it hit the big screen. Shows I watched on TV never interested me in it becoming a book.

Tamelia Tumlin - Deadly Image - Guest Post

Guest Post
Plotter, Pantser or Somewhere In Between?

First, I’d like to thank The Plot Thickens for the opportunity to be a guest blogger. It is an honor to be here and meet your readers.

As an author I’ve been asked many times how do I begin when I write my books. Do I plot? Am I a pantser? Let me start off by saying I’ve never been one to conform to the rules in anything, so that includes my writing. Some writers will tell you they meticulously plot out every detail of their story ahead of time and know exactly how each scene will play out. I wish I could say the same, that’s not really my style. Other authors will tell you they never plot out anything and simply write by the seat of their pants and edit later. Again, I wish I could say the same. Still not my style.

I have used many techniques when plotting my stories. Once I was so enthralled with one author’s method of using colored sticky notes to plot out each strand in their story that I promptly went out and bought a poster board and a stack of colored sticky notes. I had the best time coordinating colors and jotting down notes about each scene. Green would be internal conflict. Yellow external conflict. Pink love emotions. Well, you get the picture. The lovely board was displayed in my living room for several months while I worked on my book. Unfortunately, I rarely used the board and realized I had simply just enjoyed organizing and playing with the sticky notes.

When I started writing Deadly Image, I had a nice little white board plastered to my wall with a dry erase marker and several written notes about my novel. It was similar to the way they do on the crime scene shows where they have pictures or notes about the case on the wall at the precinct. I will say my board made for an interesting conversation piece when visitors (who didn’t know I wrote books) would come over and see things like “three year old missing from daycare”, “woman on meds for anxiety disorder” or “body found in the bayou”. Seriously. That board led to more than one embarrassing moment until I explained its purpose.

I guess you could say my style of writing is a combination of both plotting and pantsing. My plot outline is the bare minimum. I generally know how my story will start, what the characters’ internal and external conflicts are and how the book will end. That’s pretty much it. The rest is pure fly by the seat of your pants writing. As I begin a scene the story plays like a movie in my head. I visualize the characters in the scene, listen to what they have to say, watch how they act and react, tap into to how they feel and write it all down. I do edit as I go which slows down the writing process a little, but in the end I don’t have quite as much rewriting to do which is great. So, the bottom line is I’m an “in between” kind of writer. A little plotting, a little pantsing and whole lot of staring at the computer screen while the story plays out in my head. But, it gets the story written and that’s what’s important. So what kind of writer are you? A plotter? A pantser? A stare at the blank page on the computer screen until inspiration strikes?


About the Book

Gone without a trace...

Lexi Yates knows she hasn’t harmed her three-year old daughter, yet the Louisiana town of Gator Bayou seems to think she’s guilty. With her daughter missing, the evidence stacking up against her and her faith in God tested to the limit, Lexi must find a way to convince FBI agent Ace Valdez she’s innocent before she becomes the next target.



Ace Valdez doesn’t trust easily, and he certainly knows better than to fall for a case, yet there’s something about the widowed mother that makes him want to believe she’s innocent, but evidence doesn’t lie. Or does it?


Pages: 113
Publisher: Steel Magnolia Press (July 6, 2012)
Sold by: Amazon Digital Services, Inc.
Language: English
ASIN: B008IJ5FPA
Buy Link: Amazon


About the Author

Tamelia Tumlin sold her first story to Dogwood Tales Magazine many years ago while taking a creative writing course in college. The short story titled "The Traveler" was the feature story for that edition. After graduating college in elementary education, life, a teaching career and a wonderful son consumed most of her time. However, in the past couple of years, the yearning to pen fabulous romantic tales of to-die-for heroes and spirited heroines has taken over. Ms. Tumlin has worked with several online publishers, but she is now writing for Steel Magnolia Press. Juggling motherhood, teaching and writing is a challenge, but one she welcomes to pursue her passion. Her novels range from sweet and sassy to dark and dangerous.

Links to connect with Tamelia:
Web site (author)
Web site (publisher)
Facebook
Twitter
LinkedIn
Goodreads

Feature&Follow

Feature&Follow

Q:
Do your reading habits change based on your mood?

Sometimes it does but I like to mix it up a lot.

Do you read a certain genre if you are feeling depressed or happy? 

Again, I have to say I read a lot of different genres and if at the time I can pick and choose.

Brenda Stanley - The Color of Snow - Guest Post & Giveaway

About the Book

Can a troubled young girl reenter society after living in isolation?

When a beautiful 16-year-old girl named Sophie is found sequestered in a cage-like room in a rundown house in the desolate hills of Arbon Valley, Idaho, the entire community is shocked to learn she is the legendary Callidora--a baby girl who was kidnapped from her crib almost seventeen years ago and canonized in missing posters with portraits of what the fabled girl might resemble. Authorities soon learn that the cage was there to protect people from Sophie, because her biological father believes she is cursed.

Sophie is discovered after the man she knows as Papa, shoots and injures Damien, a young man who is trying to rescue her. Now, unsocialized and thrust into the world, and into a family she has never met, Sophie must decide whether she should accept her Papa’s claims that she is cursed and he was only trying to protect others, or trust the new people in her life who have their own agendas. Guided by a wise cousin, Sophie realizes that her most heartbreaking challenge is to decide if her love for Damien will destroy him like her Papa claims, or free her from past demons that haunt her mind.

Guest Post

The Color of Snow has been described as dark or mysterious. I feel most of my writing fits this description because I enjoy looking at the strange and unusual things in life. My novel will definitely make some people uncomfortable. I like to look at situations and issues and try to figure out how people will react. For years I was a crime reporter, so I enjoy investigating stories and learning about the parts of life most people try to hide. When I wrote The Color of Snow, I was working on a story about a young girl who went missing years ago and has never been found. I started thinking about what would happen if she were to suddenly show up now. I loved putting myself in Sophie’s shoes and seeing things for the first time.

Sophie’s relationship with Damien is both intense and tempered. Her father has raised her to believe that she will destroy anyone who truly loves her, so she is torn between her love for Damien and her fear of causing him harm.

The story changes between what is going on with Sophie and what happened in her parent’s past that brought her to where she is. I wanted readers to experience the often isolated feeling of living in a vast rural area, but also the mental confinement of a small town.

Mental illness, teen pregnancy, religious intolerance, and racism are all big parts of The Color of Snow. I like my characters to face challenges and see them grow from them. It is not only the conflicts with the other characters that keeps the story going, but also those within the person’s own mind.

***

Click here to read an excerpt.

The Color of Snow can be purchased at:
Kindle
Nook
iBookstore
Google
Smashwords
PDF

Price: $2.99-$4.99 ebook
ISBN: 9780983741893, 9781476172309
Pages: 413
Release: June 1, 2012


About the Author

Brenda Stanley is former television news anchor and investigative reporter for the NBC affiliate in Eastern Idaho. She has been recognized for her writing by the Scripps Howard Foundation, the Hearst Journalism Awards, The Idaho Press Club and the Society for Professional Journalists. She is a graduate of Dixie College in St. George, Utah and the University of Utah in Salt Lake City. She is the mother of 5 children, including two sets of twins. Brenda and her husband Dave, a veterinarian, live on a small ranch near the Snake River with their horses and dogs.

Connect with Brenda:
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Twitter
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Blog Tour Site


About the Giveaway

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L.M. Preston - Flutter of Luv - Author Interview

Author Interview

1. Who is the plot based around?
Flutter Of Luv’s plot is based on finding love while finding yourself. The main character, Dawn, was comfortable hiding her beauty because she’d never had anyone to make her feel beautiful. But inside, deep within, she had been through a lot but looked at life as it was given to her. However, Tony moves in and slowly peels away the layers to discover what she’s afraid to reveal to everyone else.

2. What is the main idea of the plot?
The main idea is to show how loving someone can allow us to love ourselves.

3. When does the plot take place?
Flutter Of Luv’s story takes place in present day but has an older feel to it since the characters spend more time outside playing with each other than inside playing video games.

4. Where does the plot take place?
Flutter of Luv takes place in an urban city. I envisioned, Washington, DC but I don’t specify since I just want it to be a universal city for the reader.

5. Why did the plot develop the way it did?
In Flutter Of Luv, Dawn starts off with a crush on Tony, and through friendship she finds much more. It was a slow development where she went from watching Tony, to him watching her, to them developing something new for both of them.

6. How did you come up with the idea for the plot?
My critique group had a writing prompt challenge. I created a few short stories for it, and the one Episode: Bug Juice was the story I submitted. My daughter is my ever supportive beta reader. She told me I should create 9 more Episodes and develop the story because she felt there was more to it. And within a week, I’d finished it.

About the Book
Dawn, the neighborhood tomboy is happy to be her best friend’s shadow. Acceptance comes from playing football after school with the guys on the block while hiding safely behind her glasses, braces and boyish ways. But Tony moves in, becomes the star running back on her school’s team and changes her world and her view of herself forever.

eBook
Price: $0.99
Release: June 1, 2012
Buy Link: Kindle
Other Links: Goodreads

About the Author

L.M. Preston loved to create poetry and short-stories as a young girl. She worked in the IT field as a Techie and Educator for over sixteen years. Her passion for writing science fiction was born under the encouragement of her husband who was a Sci-Fi buff and her four kids. Her obsessive desire to write and create stories of young people who overcome unbelievable odds feeds her creation of multiple series for Middle Grade and Young Adult readers thirsty for an adventure. She loves to write while on the porch watching her kids play or when she is traveling, which is another passion that encouraged her writing.

Links to connect with L.M.:
Web Site
Blog
Facebook #1
Facebook #2
Twitter
Goodreads
 

 




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Flutter of Luv blog tour site
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Jerome Charyn - Back to Bataan - Author Interview & Giveaway

About the Book

New York City, 1943. War is raging in Europe and the Pacific, while Jack Dalton is stuck attending Dutch Masters Day School. What Jack really wants is to enlist in the army, to fight...

Everything changes when Coco, Jack's "fiancee," throws him over for one of his classmates. Jack sees red and does something drastic. Then he runs away. Hiding out in a nearby park, Jack joins ranks with a group of vagrants and is soon under the sway of a man called the Leader, an ex-convict who is as articulate and charismatic as he is dangerous. The Leader turns Jack's world upside down. To put things right, Jack must prove himself a braver soldier than he ever imagined.

Author Interview

1. What are your thoughts on the explosion of popularity concerning the YA genre?
I think it might very well be that it started with Harry Potter, that young adult writers are trying to tell good stories and adults have moved into that kind of dream.

2. You are the master of writing across a realm of different genres, what excites you about connecting with different audiences?
I’m not so sure that these are different audiences, I think we all love stories, whether we’re children or great-grandfathers and when you move from genre to genre you are still telling a story like Scheherazade and the king is always waiting for the next tale.

3. Your writing is so precise, yet evocative – how do you work at crafting your unique style of prose?
Everything begins and ends with the word, with the music of the sentence and as Tolstoy once said, “I’m always composing.”

4. Being a published author for nearly 50 years, what do you think of eBooks?
I think that this is a kind of logical step as we move from the internet into eBooks. Publishing is changing even as we speak. I think there now will be a more complicated dance between the eBook and the printed book, and as we’ve seen recently, successes in eBooks allow the author to move into print.

5. What would be your advice to young people who aspire to a literary career?
It’s not worth the money – only write if you’re absolutely in love with it.

6. How much of your life is in Back to Bataan? How did you personally experience New York during World War II?
I think so much of the source of my writing comes from my childhood, I grew up during the War – so many of the terrors and the magic of certain films have remained with me. And all of this appears in the character of Jack.

7. Your older brother was a detective. Did your experiences with him influence the plot?
Not really, I think all writing is crime writing. And Back to Bataan is a crime novel with a very original twist.

8. Why did you decide to include the fascination with the famous as a theme – Gary Cooper, Eleanor Roosevelt, etc.?
These people were heroes to me as a child, particularly Eleanor Roosevelt, who was one of the most extraordinary women who ever lived, and of course as a child I fell in love with Gary Cooper’s face and with his very slow drawl, that seemed so exotic to me.

9. Jack finds acclaim through his writing, yet feels guilty for exploiting other people (Mrs. Fink). How does a writer starting out work to bridge this gap?
You’re always cannibalizing other people and writers when you start to write, so it’s natural that Jack should be a young cannibal.

10. How important is the New York Times in your own life? Why did you decide to make it a form of connection between Jack and the Leader?
As a child, I didn’t even know that the Times existed – I grew up in a neighborhood without newspapers and books, so that when I first fell upon the New York Times, I was very very greedy, and wanted to include it in Jack’s middle-class life.

***

Back to Bataan can be purchased at:
Kindle
Nook
iBookstore
Google
Smashwords
PDF

Price: $2.99-$4.99 ebook
ISBN: 9780985792206, 9781476119076
Pages: 98
Release: July 1, 2012


About the Author

Jerome Charyn (born May 13, 1937) is an award-winning American author. With nearly 50 published works, Charyn has earned a long-standing reputation as an inventive and prolific chronicler of real and imagined American life. Michael Chabon calls him “one of the most important writers in American literature.”

New York Newsday hailed Charyn as “a contemporary American Balzac,” and the Los Angeles Times described him as “absolutely unique among American writers.”

Since 1964, he has published 30 novels, three memoirs, eight graphic novels, two books about film, short stories, plays and works of non-fiction. Two of his memoirs were named New York Times Book of the Year. Charyn has been a finalist for the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction. He received the Rosenthal Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters and has been named Commander of Arts and Letters by the French Minister of Culture.

Charyn lives in Paris and New York City.

Connect with Jerome:
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Facebook
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Goodreads
Blog Tour Site


About the Giveaway

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Natalie Wexler - The Mother Daughter Show - Guest Post

About the Book

At Barton Friends a D.C. prep school so elite its parent body includes the President and First Lady - three mothers have thrown themselves into organizing the annual musical revue. Will its Machiavellian intrigue somehow enable them to reconnect with their graduating daughters, who are fast spinning out of control? By turns hilarious and poignant, The Mother Daughter Show will appeal to anyone who's ever had a daughter - and anyone who's ever been one.

Guest Post

When I took a creative writing class for the first time, back in high school, the teacher told us about a book you could buy called Plotto. This book supposedly contained the bare outlines of every plot that could possibly be devised. The teacher’s message was clear: plot is just the skeleton. It’s how you flesh it out—with characters, setting, lyrical language—that really makes or breaks a novel or story.

Well, yes and no. What I learned writing The Mother Daughter Show is that a good plot may not be sufficient to ensure a successful novel, but it’s absolutely necessary. If you don’t have a storyline that keeps your readers turning the pages, they’ll never get to all that other stuff you’ve worked so hard to dress it up with.

When I started writing The Mother Daughter Show, I was still involved in the real-life experience that inspired it—an annual musical revue at my daughter’s school, written and performed by the mothers of graduating senior girls. While the book was definitely fiction, I borrowed a number of scenes and plot twists from what was actually unfolding before my eyes.

I was lucky enough to find an agent who was enthusiastic about the manuscript, but from the beginning she told me she felt there was something missing. She focused on the characters. Maybe they needed more “sparkle,” she suggested? I labored over several more drafts, trying to introduce some sparkle, until finally my agent managed to get across the message that what I really needed was … a plot.

My initial reaction was: forget it. I already had a plot! But ultimately I came to realize that my plot had hewed too closely to my actual experience working on the show. It turns out that other people found those show planning meetings somewhat less fascinating than I did. I needed to get beyond what happened on the show itself and introduce elements of drama that came from elsewhere.

So I made two of the three mothers in my book good friends, allowing for greater emotional impact when they clash violently over the content of the show. I moved the job search of one character, a longtime stay-at-home mom, into the foreground. I introduced a flirtation between her and another character that seems to be heading dangerously towards infidelity—always a good plot move! And I had one of the daughters run away from home. It wasn’t easy shoehorning a new plot into the confines of an existing one, but it was worth it.

So while real life may give you the inspiration for a novel, it rarely hands you a ready-made plot. And Plotto may not be the answer either. For a plot to work, you not only need to have a lot of stuff happen—it also has to be stuff that grows out of what your characters yearn for.



***

The Mother Daughter Show can be purchased at:
Amazon
Fuze Publishing
Kindle
Nook

Price: $19.95 paperback, $9.99 ebook
ISBN: 9780984141296
Pages: 274
Release: December 2011


About the Author

Natalie Wexler is the author of The Mother Daughter Show (Fuze Publishing 2011) and an award-winning historical novel, A More Obedient Wife. She is a journalist and essayist whose work has appeared in the Washington Post Magazine, the American Scholar, the Gettysburg Review, and other publications, and she is a reviewer for the Washington Independent Review of Books. She has also worked as a temporary secretary, a newspaper reporter, a Supreme Court law clerk, a legal historian, and (briefly) an actual lawyer. She lives in Washington, D.C., with her husband.

Connect with Natalie:
Web Site
Goodreads
Fuze Publishing Web Site
Fuze Publishing Blog
Fuze Publishing Facebook
Fuze Publishing Twitter
Tribute Books Blog Tour Site