The Trouble started when I decided to sit down.

 I’ve worked in bookstores all my life, and I love my work. Not only do I get to spend all day, every day playing with books and talking to readers, but I’m able to put ideas into people’s hands and encourage them to buy the books I love.

But working in any retail trade means you’re on your feet all day, every day, and after twenty years, it took its toll. My feet were permanently cramped into a high-heel slant, like Barbie doll feet. And they hurt.

It was time for a change. I needed a sit-down job.

I decided medical transcription would be a good fit. It would let me spend my day at a desk, and I had the skills I needed — I type fast, and I’m a good speller. The training was reasonably priced, and I got to use cool words like desquamation and borborygmi. I was doing pretty well, but then I started listening to actual doctors’ dictation.

Doctors drone. And desquamation and borborygmi aren’t nearly as entertaining when you realize they’re happening to a real person.

But I dutifully tapped away at the keyboard, transcribing my little heart out. Once in a while, though, I needed a break. So I’d bring up a new document, free my mind from all the depressing medical stuff, and start typing whatever popped into my head.

I’d always wanted to write, but I never got around to really trying. Now that I was forced to sit in front of a word processor all day, all the pent-up stories inside me started to spill out onto the keyboard.

Here’s how it started: 

A chicken will never break your heart.

Not that you can’t love a chicken. There are some people in this world who can love just about anything

But a chicken will never love you back. When you look deep into their beady little eyes, there’s not a lot of warmth there — just an avarice for worms and bugs and, if it’s a rooster, a lot of suppressed anger and sexual frustration. They don’t return your affection in any way.

Expectations, relationship-wise, are right at rock-bottom.

That’s why Libby Btrown decided to start a chicken farm. She wanted some company, and she wanted a farm, but she didn’t want to go getting attached to things like she had in the past.

She’d been obsessed with farms since she was a kid. It all started with her Fisher Price Farmer Joe Play Set: a plastic barn, some toy animals, and a pair of round-headed baby dolls clutching pitchforks like some simple-minded version of American Gothic.

A Fisher Price life was the life for her.

Take Atlanta, just give her that countryside.

It turned out that Libby was a big-city journalist who was fleeing a romance gone wrong. She’s determined to live a solitary, self-sufficient life, so she moves to the most isolated area she can think of and literally buys the farm: thirty-five acres of sagebrush and a quaint clapboard homestead in Lackaduck, Wyoming.

She’s looking forward to her quiet, peaceful country life — but then Luke Rawlins shows up. Luke’s a genuine Wyoming cowboy who looks like Elvis, talks like John Wayne, and cooks like Martha Stewart. Suddenly Libby’s not so alone anymore. She’s not looking for love — not now, not ever — but she tells herself it’s okay to have a friend who makes your heart beat a little faster.

Libby loves her new hometown, but she gets tired of writing feature stories about mutton-busting rodeo clinics and a local rancher’s freak heifer. It’s pretty sad when your hometown’s only claim to fame is a two-headed cow, so when Luke tells her about the disappearance of a local teenager, she’s eager to put her city smarts to work wrapping up the town’s one and only unsolved mystery.

There’s no shortage of suspects, and no shortage of complications for Libby and her reluctantly resurrected love life. Her simple little homestead takes on a Grand Central Station feeling with tutu-clad muskrats, feral chickens, a predatory veterinarian, and way too many dogs all vying for her attention.

Like Libby, I’m a transplanted Easterner who fell in love with the big sky and wide open spaces — and the cowboys. When I first moved here, seeing men dressed in boots, hats and chaps was like moving to Austria and finding your neighbors decked out in Lederhosen (only infinitely more attractive). And the longer I live there, the more I see why cowboy romances are so popular. Westerners tend to be very honest and straightforward, with a simple but profound sense of right and wrong. That makes for really good romantic heroes.

I hope you all get a chance to read Cowboy Trouble and I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. Let me know what you think at joannekennedybooks.com - I love to hear from readers. And I’ll send one reader from the comments on this blog a free copy of Cowboy Trouble!

Thanks in advance for your time.

Thanks in advance for your time.

The smile Cadence bestowed upon him was undoubtedly the most brilliant he’d ever seen and for a moment, Curtis was certain heaven had opened its gate just enough to let a glimmer of light shimmer upon the mere mortals and sinners. For half a heartbeat he dared to believe she was one of the lost angels his grandmother had so oft spoken of. Surely she was one of them, fallen from the heavens, adrift on the earth to help lost souls find their way. No one had ever smiled at him that way, and when she plied him with those huge amethyst eyes, he wasn’t just lost… 

He was wrecked. 

Oh, but she shouldn’t look at him that way, as though he were some sort of hero, because he wasn’t. She shouldn’t look at him with all the innocent trust in the world glistening at the surface of her eyes because it was downright dangerous. And it was dangerous because, even though heknew he shouldn’t, he liked having her look at him that way. He wanted it. Craved it. Deep down in the farthest reaches of his soul he wanted to be her white knight, and it made him remember when he hadn’t been a total bastard, and it made him want a whole world of things he couldn’t begin to dream of having. 

How many of us have watched a movie or read a book and thought… I could have written a better ending to that story…?  I know I have, and it goes to show that coming up with a stellar story idea is not always the most difficult task for writers.  So, you ask, what is the most difficult task for writers?  Getting that amazing story idea on paper in a way that sucks readers into the book. 

Descriptions, ranging from scenery to character emotions, are a key element in creating the world of your story.  In the above excerpt from ANGEL AND THE UNFORGIVEN rather than say—Cadence smiled at Curtis—the hero describes what he sees in the heroine’s smile…  

So how do you make ordinary wording and sentence structure extraordinary? 

Here are a few tips for drawing readers into your story: 

1.      First of all remember that writing fiction is fun!  You can bend and break a few of those little rules English teachers spent years drilling into your head.  You can begin a sentence with a conjunction—in moderation of course… use sentence fragments… and a slew of other “rules” the English professors loved to ding your grades for. 

2.      Remember that small details make the difference between a must read and a so-so story no matter how amazing the plot.  Don’t just tell me your character sees a dog—describe the dog for me.  For example: 

A wagon clattered down the down the road, a dog panting at the back wheel. 

A wagon clattered down the muddy road, a floppy eared, yellow mutt panting at the back wheel.           

 Which sentence gives the better visual?In the second sentence we learn that the road is muddy.  How would your visual change if the road was described as dusty or the dog described as rangy?     

3.      The thesaurus is your best friend.  If a word seems overused and boring it probably is.   

Take for instance the word walked—several synonyms include strode, sauntered, ambled, loped and each has it’s own connotation for how the character is walking.  For example: 

Brian walked toward the study door. 

Brian ambled toward the study door. 

Brian sauntered toward the study door.

Find the word or synonym that best describes your character’s action and use it.  If you’re stuck go ahead and insert the more generic word and go back later.             

4.      Bringing back our English teacher… I’d like to point out the necessity of tools such as  metaphors and personification in creating descriptions that are artful and grip your reader. 

The chilly breeze whispered a prudent warning to the riders cantering deeper into the forest. 

We know the breeze isn’t really whispering, or warning, but it certainly adds to the setting and overall feel of the scene.  

5.      Never underestimate the power of rewrites and a read through (or two or three) in finding new and better ways to improve your story and descriptions. 

6.      Use action words—instead of saying to turn use turned 

The smell was enough to turn Lydia’s stomach. 

The smell turned Lydia’s stomach.   

7.      Stay away from words that deter from the strength of your sentences—that, almost, it, to.   

8.      Also avoid from passive voice whenever possible.  In a nutshell passive voice is ‘has been’ or ‘have been’ followed by an –ing word.  Was is another passive word, but one that I personally have trouble staying away from.    

Now tell me… Writers what are your tricks of the trade?  And readers what draws you into a story? 

To learn more about me, my March release ANGEL AND THE UNFORGIVEN, and other books and projects visit www.melissalynneblue.com. 

To purchase ANGEL AND THE UNFORGIVEN visit http://www.champagnebooks.com/books/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=19_4&products_id=367

Thanks in advance for comment.

I was on my way home the other day when I passed this woman who was sporting a slamming Afro hairstyle. The woman’s fro was big, high and poufy. I think it was a wig but it was so good I couldn’t tell. She was also sporting the clothing to go with the fro. She looked fierce. People were turning and looking at her. Me included. People were complimenting her on her look. Like any good diva she said thank you graciously and kept strutting. As I watched the woman stepping looking cool and fierce my mind was racing.

Yep another idea was taking shape. As I walked home I thought of the Fro. The idea took shape for a book with a woman in a fierce fro and clothes to match.

A fro brought so much more than viewing pleasure. It brought an inspiration. I’ve mentioned before that there are inspirations for ideas all around you. Taking something that happens in the everyday life then using it create a concept and make it yours. The unexpected can lead to so much more.

Any little thing can give you an idea spark.

Taige Crenshaw
http://www.taigecrenshaw.com/
…increasing the sizzle factor

Blog: http://www.taigecrenshaw.com/blog
Chat Group: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/crenshawcafe
Newsletter: http://www.taigecrenshaw.com/newsletterandgroups.shtml
Free Reads Site: http://www.satinnotes.com/

Wilde Seduction – What happens when a woman who doesn’t know how to relax meets a man whose lust for life will change her and make all her deepest desires come to life?

Buy here at Total-E-Bound.

Thanks in advance for your time.