Fresh FIction Box Not To Miss
Lisa Dale | What Inspires You?
Uncategorized / July 31, 2009

Many people ask me where I get my ideas for my books. Sometimes, there’s no other answer except that inspiration falls into my lap like a star falls from the sky. For example, on the night that I got “the call” from my agent that my first book, SIMPLE WISHES, would be published, I couldn’t fall asleep. I sat on the couch in my little apartment, and since there was nothing to do, I just turned on the television and vegged out until the wee hours. As I was watching the Discovery channel, a show came on about meteorite hunters—folks who collect and then sell meteorites. It was like I got struck by lightning. I knew then and there that the hero in my next book would be a hunter of meteorites. I’ve always had a thing for nerd guys. The end result was that in my new book, IT HAPPENED ONE NIGHT, which comes out in late October, the hero is a sexy, science geek type. The book is about two sisters who own a wildflower farm in Vermont. Lana Biel longs to leave Vermont so she can travel and see the world. And her sister Karin wants nothing…

Kylie Brant | Making a Living
Uncategorized / July 22, 2009

I love being a writer. At least, most of the time. But occasionally there are days like today, when the words won’t come and everything I do manage to get on the page sounds like it was produced by an illiterate nine-year-old. Today my love for writing seems very far away. I begin to dream of other occupations. More rewarding ones. I become convinced that there has to be an easier way to make a living. So that train of thought takes over and distracts me from the cursor blinking so accusingly on the nearly blank page. Mentally I run through a list of possible job prospects. Maybe I can be a grocery store clerk. Nothing to think about except ringing up bananas and milk. Then I consider the fact that they’re on their feet all day. I’m stretched out on my chaise lounge with my laptop on my lap and a Diet Coke within reach. Cross grocery store clerk off my list. It might be interesting to run a dress shop, I muse, trying to avoid looking at that cursor. Is it possible for it to look smug? I could work with pretty clothes all day, and those employee…

Jessica Inclan | If The Skin Fits, Wear It
Uncategorized / June 12, 2009

What has amazed me about the past couple of years is how I have managed to finally gain some perspective on myself and my life. What’s appalling about this observation is that I used to think I had this perspective. I thought that I knew what I was doing and why and how. I thought I had things under control; I imagined I was in charge. I thought I knew what in the heck I was doing. Now, however, I realize that I have and had some behaviors and needs and feelings and thoughts, but I don’t imagine anymore that I have control of it of all. I just sort of “see” myself and know a little more about what I do. I also know that in another 47 years (should I make it that long) I will be able to say the same thing about my current self that I just said about my younger self. Poor thing, I will think. She thought she had it figured out. Click to read the rest of Jessica’s blog and to leave a comment. Visit FreshFiction.com to learn more about books and authors.

Linda Goodnight | Cinderella at the Book Expo
Uncategorized / June 3, 2009

I just returned from New York City and my very first trip to the Book Expo of America (BEA). For the uninitiated, BEA is an enormous trade show of publishers exhibiting their authors, books and other forms of media. People from literally all over the world gathered at the Javits Center on the Hudson River for several days of sales, book signings, workshops, and general schmoozing. The BEA buzz is noisy, energizing and exhausting. My feet are still recovering. Authors from every genre—children’s books to nonfiction to romance-were in abundance. Posters and banners bearing names such as Debbie Macomber, Oliver North, R.L. Stine, and literally dozens of others lined the walls and hung from the ceilings. All were scheduled to sign free books for anyone willing to stand in some very long lines. On a personal note, I had a couple of special highlights. One was a fun and friendly audio interview done by “All About Romance” to be aired online at their website at a future date. For someone with an Oklahoma twang, I’m a little nervous about hearing my voice online. Probably my favorite thing was signing my latest release from Steeple Hill, THE BABY BOND, in the…

Cynthia Baxter | Confessions of a Mystery Writer . . . Er, Travel Writer
Uncategorized / March 25, 2009

We’re all entitled to an obsession or two, aren’t we? One of mine is travel. I suppose it’s because I spent my childhood in the backseat of a car with my sister and grandmother – often a Volkswagen bug – with my parents in the front seat, acting as pilot and co-pilot. School vacation was synonymous with road trip. Since my father was an English teacher in a neighboring school district, he usually had the same days off that we kids did – and so off we’d go. Our home was on Long Island, in the suburbs of New York, which was a great starting point for traveling all over the eastern half of the United States. The five of us explored New England, Florida, and just about every state in between. (Eastern Canada, too.) We saw the big cities like Boston, Philadelphia, and Montreal; historic towns like Williamsburg, Virginia, and Salem, Massachusetts; and places that were just plain fun like Hershey, Pennsylvania, and St. Petersburg, Florida. In fact, Florida was a favorite destination for spring vacations. The drive took about three days, including stops at every Stuckey’s and Horne’s we passed along the way (a blast from the past…

Dianne Emley | Ten Commandments of Fiction Writing
Uncategorized / March 13, 2009

Thank you, Fresh Fiction for inviting me to blog today! I’m Dianne Emley, author of the L.A. Times bestselling Detective Nan Vining “thrillogy”: THE FIRST CUT, CUT TO THE QUICK, and, just out, THE DEEPEST CUT. These three are a thrillogy because they have an overarching storyline in which Nan Vining obsessively pursues the man who attacked her and left her for dead, the creep who Vining and her teenage daughter call T.B. Mann—The Bad Man. The Nan Vining series continues! I’m working on the fourth which will be out in 2010. I’ve learned a lot about the art and business of writing since the first book hit the shelves. I’ve become not just smarter, but wiser. I’ve developed a few rules that I strive to follow when I’m writing and editing a book and some that govern my behavior when the book is out. I’d like to share these with you. Herewith: Dianne Emley’s Ten Commandments of Fiction Writing1. I shall heed good editorial advice, shun bad advice, and learn how to tell the difference. Click to read the rest of Dianne’s Commandments! Visit FreshFiction.com to learn more about books and authors.

Maxine Sullivan | THE LONG JOURNEY
Romance / February 27, 2009

If anyone had told me in the early 1980s that it would take me over 20 years to be published, I probably wouldn’t have kept on writing. Perhaps. Back then the world was much smaller, and living in Australia it was smaller still and very isolated. There was no internet, no romance writer organisations, it took two weeks for a letter to get to a publisher before waiting months for a reply, and it took me weeks to type up a manuscript on a typewriter from longhand. Patience was something you had to have. And that was a good training ground for the next twenty years as I tried hard to get published. In the early 1990s the fledgling internet began to trickle information through. Luckily I knew a computer guru who set me up with an internal modem with a speed that is laughable now but was sheer heaven back then, and I started to learn that there was a growing network of writers out there. It was fantastic. The world was coming into my home and suddenly Down Under wasn’t so far away. Click here to the rest and enter Maxine’s one day blog contest. Visit FreshFiction.com to…

Margay Leah Justice | From Conception to Birth, Or One Book’s Journey to Publication
Uncategorized / January 6, 2009

Ah, the first blush of romance. The first time you see the idea, sitting there in the corner of your mind, trying to get your attention in that inconspicuous manner these ideas sometimes adopt. You look away, convinced that there is no way this idea could possibly go anywhere. It’s just a fluke, a fling. Surely, you’ll forget it by morning. But when you look back, the idea is still there, sitting in the corner, flirting with you. So what’s a harmless little flirtation? You approach the idea cautiously, in a manner you hope is suave and sophisticated, but as you get closer, your excitement rises. Your heart begins to race. You lick your lips in anticipation. It’s even more exciting up close. So you flirt with it, spend the night with it, take it home with you. In the morning, you’re surprised that it’s still with you. After two months, you begin to believe this idea has a future. So you cultivate it, give up sleep for it, nurture it as it grows within you. Soon, what began as a nugget of an idea in your mind blossoms into a full-blown creature. It grows within you, like a fetus…

Marie Bostwick | Fiction and Addictions
Uncategorized / November 14, 2008

It’s time for a confession. For years now, I’ve harbored a secret addiction. I’m not talking about my addiction to books. For writers, a book fetish simply goes with the territory. Right now, my nightstand is piled so high with books that if the stack toppled and fell on my foot, I’d end up with several broken toes. You understand what I’m talking about. Probably your nightstand is in the same condition. If not, you wouldn’t spend your time reading Fresh Fiction blogs, would you? No, the addiction I’m talking about is much more personal and insidious. Until recently, I’ve been in denial but the time has come to face the truth. I’m addicted – to fabric. I’m a quilter, Dear Reader, and I’ve got it bad. My home in New England is loaded with quilt shops and I can’t bypass any of them. There is a particular store in the wilds of New Hampshire that I been known to drive three hours out of my way to visit. Not three hours round trip – I’m talking three hours each way! Imagine how that went over with my kids, who thought they were just taking a little drive to see…

Stephanie Julian | A Writer’s List of Thanks
Uncategorized / November 10, 2008

Since November is the month when we give thanks for being lucky enough to live in our great country—and since I figure I’ve given enough tax dollars to the government to say thanks for the next fifty years—I thought I’d list all those things that we, as writers, should be thankful for every day. Ergonomic chairs. Pretty self-explanatory. Agents. The first line of defense in any writer’s arsenal against rejection. It’s not that you don’t get rejections, it’s just that she gets them first. Yes, they still sting but having someone who believes in you makes it all a little better. Writing buddies. Knowing I can call them, day or night and bitch about my uncooperative muse makes me breathe easier. Call waiting. Don’t recognize the number? Ignore. Recognize the number as your mother-in-law’s? See response to first question. Cattle prods. For those days when the kids demand to know why they don’t have any clean underwear and what exactly you did all day if you didn’t do wash. Tazers. For the husband on vacation (or retirement) who walks into your office as you’re furiously typing away, leans on the door and says, “So, what are you doing?” And the…