Readers often ask where I get an idea for a story, and my answer usually is, “I don’t know.” Which is usually correct. I don’t know. Most always when a story comes to me, it’s because of the crazy way my brain combines three or four separate incidents, characters, stories, or a combination of all […]
Behind the Scenes: Author Mary (ML) Hamilton finds a mystery in a newspaper
Does anyone out there still enjoy getting your news from a newspaper? I look to the Internet for up-to-the-minute news, but there’s nothing better than a newspaper for leisurely reading about what’s happening around the local community and the state. You just never know what you’ll stumble across. For example, years ago while living in […]
Behind the Scenes: Author Glenn Haggerty thinks like a bad guy
My story ideas usually start with a visualization of a scene in my head, often a dramatic moment. So, my novel Chase was initially just a picture in my mind: a bad-guy drug-dealer meets with one of his runners. The incident then turned into a scene which expanded into a full-length novel. Interestingly, I ended up cutting […]
Behind the Scenes: Author Debra E. Marvin identifies the murder weapon
I recently had the great pleasure of writing a mystery for Journey Fiction’s Nosy Parker series based on ‘grown-up’ fans of the girl detective—girls of the fifties who’d obsessively read those books many of us also grew up with. My original idea was to have a 1950s heroine with a history degree become involved with […]
Behind the Scenes: Author Leeann Betts adds up the numbers to solve the crime
Writers hear this all the time at conferences: write what you know. As a new writer, I took this advice seriously. So when I sat down to write my first book, I asked myself: what do you know? I knew numbers. I was trained as a bookkeeper, had worked for many years in accounting departments, and I […]
Behind the Scenes: Author Lillian Duncan gets story ideas in many places …
Where do you get your ideas? Is this book based on your life? Those are two questions I get asked often. My answer: I should hope not since I write suspense and mystery novels. Let me assure you, I’ve never had to run for my life nor hunt down a killer. And I’m pretty sure if […]
Behind the Scenes: Do you think of redoing parts of your life?
Bill Garrison is a CPA by day. But by night, he’s a writer. And he likes to pose what-if questions. For example, what if you got the chance to re-live parts of your life? And what happens to yourself and others if you change key decisions you made? It’s a question we’ve all wrestled with–“I […]
How to market a novel with spec-fic elements
Do you write novels set in the real world but containing some weirdnesses? Or have you thought about doing it? Adding time-travel, maybe, or heavenly messengers, or maybe a Raiders-of-the-Lost-Ark style plot? Here’s some advice from author and marketing guru James L. Rubart: don’t market it as speculative (defined as sci fi, fantasy, or otherwise […]
Behind the Scenes: Real Life Is the Catalyst, by James R. Callan
Over My Dead Body is a murder mystery, the second in the Father Frank Mystery series. But, what prompted the story line? The genesis for the plot came from the Keystone Pipeline. This massive project had been in the news over the last few years. It has raised much controversy, and Congress and the President […]
Author James R. Callan asks “what if?” to find book ideas
I majored in English with the intention of writing, but I soon found I couldn’t support a family that way. So I went to graduate school in the field of mathematics. For thirty years I worked as a research mathematician. When all the kids were out of college and successful, I returned to writing. In […]