Thanks so much to Fresh Fiction for hosting me on the tour for RUNNING WILD: Havoc Book 1.  This is the start of a brand new series, with different heroes for each book and HEAs at the end of each book.  Sean Rush and Ryker stole my heart a long time ago, and I’m excited for you guys to meet all of them. *** So today, I wanted to talk about Sean and Ryker from RUNNING WILD. I keep saying that Sean is Blue-ish (from FREE FALLING)…they’re still alphas but a different, quieter kind of alpha.  A complete wiseass, hopeless when it comes to understanding the basic tenets of love and romance, I feel like Sean was raised by wolves. And I mean really, he was.  He’s the son of a thief—a murderer—so Sean’s got stealing in his blood, but he doesn’t have the violence he tells us his parents had.  Yes, Sean will always fight for survival (his and those closest to him) by whatever means necessary, but even in his stealing, he only takes the more expensive cars.  He’s found a way to justify his addictions. Ryker is the most patient man in the world.  And he’s not…

I’ll start at the beginning. Before you can get a reader on the edge of their seats, the reader must get to know, like, and sympathize with your character. Let’s face it a nameless, faceless woman running from a killer sort of bores us.  It reaches high up there in the “so what?” category. Therefore step one in writing suspense is to  get the reader involved and invested in the character. What if our story starts out with Marcy a single mom with 5 kids who recently left her abusive husband and is working three jobs to make enough money to save up for a small home of her very own where her kids can grow up safe. Already we know there is tension for this woman. She had an abusive husband. She has five kids. She is working three jobs which likely means they are not high paying jobs. As a reader we know that any one of these things could go seriously wrong. We are now invested in this woman. Can she continue to work three jobs? That leaves her about 4 hours of sleep a night and who is watching the kids?  If her parents are watching…