#WriteTip: On Story & Voice ~ @AuthorKristina Knight

Lately, I've been thinking a lot about voice.

Barbara Kingsolver once said, "Close the door. Write with no one looking over your shoulder. Don't try to figure out what other people want to hear from you; figure out what you have to say. It's the one and only thing you have to offer."

For a very long time, I thought that quote was about theme...and maybe it partly is. We all have themes that we navigate to. I love friends-to-lovers and reunion tropes, and if I can throw in a loving/finding yourself theme that makes it all the better. That's why I've come to believe this quote is also about voice.

We all have unique experiences in roughly the same place. I blog a lot with a group called WordWranglers; we're all over the 35 mark in age, so we have some of the same references, but we aren't in the same country (shout-out to our Canadian, Jana!) or region (hey, Margie, how's life in the PNW lately?). I have a group of writer friends within about an hour's drive from me and we meet for coffee and every year we have a writer's retreat. We're mostly from the same area (northern Ohio/southern Michigan) and we're (mostly) also over the 35 year mark. But, ask us who the hottest 1980s actor was, and we'll all have a different name (I call Tom Selleck because...well, short-cargo-shorts). Ask which is the best spring flower (I call Nemesia because of the color and resemblance to Orchids). Ask us why we are writers, you'll get another unique answer. And its the same within every writer group I've known. Different people, unique experiences, singular feelings.

All of that uniqueness creates a voice, a frame of reference that we bring to every book, be that a friends-to-lovers romance or a mistaken heir romance or a were-being meets Darth Vader space comedy. Voice includes our syntax, our slang, punctuation and even diction.

A writer's voice also covers the things we care about.

Step One in finding voice and story is to think about what makes you you and not your brother, sister, best friend, or spouse.

Here are just a few of the things that make me, well, me: I'm a soapbox-standing proponent of adoption and advocate for kids in foster care because of our experiences adopting bebe. I'm a die-hard Kansas City Royals fan (but never the Chiefs. Never. Okay, fine, they're in the Super Bowl and *my team* isn't so I'll root for them), lover of Cadbury Caramel eggs who also has a slight addiction to tuna-on-wheat, peanut-butter-on-white and mustard-and-bologna sandwiches. I am also a day-dreamer, and once the letters and numbers combined I couldn't do math to save my life. I was raised on a farm but was afraid of the goats and cows in our fields, and although I love to ride, I could never remember how to cinch the freaking saddle correctly...mostly because when my family would demonstrate, I'd get lost thinking about my books again. For a very long time I felt like I didn't fit in my own family.

So a big part of my voice, of the stories I tell, is finding home. Finding safety and security and coming to terms with who you are...and who you aren't. My core story, and my voice, are suited to optimism and embracing differences and learning to love yourself so that you can love others.

Once I figured out what my voice brought to the table, writing books became so much simpler...because I knew what I had to say.

Step Two in finding voice is ... well, just to think about these things some more. How are your experiences already influencing your writing? Are you digging deep enough into YOU to dig deeper into your characters? If you can't see the connections between yourself and your writing, take that deeper look. Sit down with a notebook and write about you. Then write about your favorite character (one you didn't write) and what makes them stand out to you. Then write about a favorite character you've created. What things do you and these characters have in common?

Have you found your voice? What is it that your stories bring to the table?

Kristina Knight's latest release, Moonlight Match, is available now in paperback or e-format! 

Moonlight Match is part of the Resort to Romance continuity project ~ 10 sweet romances, all set during a week-long matchmaking event in the Bahamas!
Aster Harrington believes in love but love doesn’t seem to believe in her. She’s hoping Goldie and Ginny, the matchmakers who’ve matched on two generations of Harringtons, can work a little love magic for her…

Some call Ethan Talbot rigid, but he prefers to think of himself as prepared. Unfortunately, when he’s matched with Aster Harrington at Joy Island’s Matchmaking Week, all those carefully prepared plans go out the window. He can get back to finding a suitable wife once he’s home in New York. After all, how much damage can one week in the Bahamas do to his plans?

Kristina Knight is a contemporary romance author, part-time swim-kid wrangler, and full-time ThinMints enthusiast. You can find out more the book and Kristina on her website, and feel free to stalk follow her on Facebook, Twitter or Instagram.

Michelle Styles : Harlequin's new Romance Includes You Mentorship sacheme

Sometimes, someone does something so simple but wonderfully powerful  that you wondered why it had not been thought of before but are very pleased that it is being done now and you hope that it will be a huge success and continue for many years.  This is how I feel about Harlequin’s Romance IncludesYou Mentorship scheme.

It can be argued it is long over due but one simply cannot  turn back time or change the past. The past is written stone but the future is yet to be.
 The fact the largest publisher of romance in the world has recognized that the reading public is not simply from one background but from a myriad of backgrounds and that they are going to cater for that by actively recruiting voices from underrepresented groups is something to be celebrated..

Sometimes people from these groups have felt discouraged from submitting because Harlequin doesn’t appear to publish the sort of books they write. Because series romance in particular can be very specific about the type of story (tight focus on the growth of the emotional relationship between an aspirational couple), it can help if an aspiring author can get a mentor who knows the business. However, getting that mentor can be difficult, particularly if you feel you will be rejected or torn to pieces simply because of the stories you want to tell. The aim of being a mentor should never be to create cookie cutter lookalikes.  Kate Walker, a woman I very much consider a mentor (even when she didn’t know she was my mentor)  and now a friend, once told wrote something along the lines – Harlequin has its Nora Roberts, Debbie Macomber, Betty Niels and dare I say it even Kate Walker and can reprint those stories at will but what it doesn’t have is you and the way you tell your stories.  As a very newbie author, I found that horribly comforting as I knew deep in my heart and still do sixteen years later I can’t write like anyone else.

Mentors can really help but the fact remains that not every author is the right mentor for that particularly author. Sometimes it can be in the way the mentor is saying things. Sometimes they don’t understand the question or the answer. Sometimes because of the differing backgrounds, they think are talking about  page 100 but the other person is actually on page 20.  Or people do not bother asking simply because they don’t want the rejection.

Harlequin has recognised that authors from underrepresented groups need mentors, just as badly (if not more so) than authors from groups which have traditionally made up their authors. Therefore, they are running the Romance Includes You Mentorship scheme. The grand prize is a book contract, working one to one with a Harlequin or Carina editor and $5,000 to help the author complete the book. The money is because they recognise that often people from underrepresented groups are often financially disadvantaged and can simply lack the time to write. In order to establish a career in writing, you actually need to sit down – bottom in chair, hands on keyboard -- and write.

The real winners in this scheme are the reading public who will eventually get to read the mentored author  and be able to be in their shoes or slip into their skin for a short while. Reading is the best way to develop understanding and empathy.

So if you are an aspiring author from underrepresented group or if you know of anyone who might be interested, the initial phase runs until 15 October 2019 (You need to submit the first chapter, a synopsis and a 500 word personal statement) – the full details are be found here. Good luck.

Michelle Styles writes warm, witty and intimate historical romance for Harlequin Historical in a wide range of time periods. Her first book The Gladiator’s Honour  (published in 2006) was the first time  a major publisher had published a historical romance set in that time period (something that people who thought they were in the know confidently predicted could not happen) . Her 28th book for Harlequin HIstorical A Deal with Her Rebel Viking will be published in December 2019. You can learn more about Michelle  and her books at www.michellestyles.co.uk

Nothing Like a Little Added Deadline Pressure...by Jenny Gardiner

I don't know what I was thinking when I emailed my editor and told her I'd love to do one additional book with her this year.

I adore this editor and we work really well together, but as is the case with indie editors, you need to plan well in advance to line them up. I'd already done two books with her this year, and had long ago scheduled another terrific editor for three more books. But when she offered to squeeze in one more with me, well, I couldn't help but give it some thought. Of course this happened just as I was brainstorming some new series ideas, and then I thought, well, if I start another series I'd better get three books ready to launch at once, and well, that would mean it would be just perfect to have that extra edit lined up!

At the time I'd just finished a book and had what I madly viewed as idle time in front of me for a few weeks. Sure, I had a crazy May lined up: my youngest graduating from UVA undergrad, my oldest graduating from UVA with 2 Masters degrees, and my middle coming home from halfway around the world in Australia for a very infrequent visit to coincide with graduations. Throw in some 18 people staying at my house for graduation (I think I was in deep denial about that).

Oh and did I mention our house is on the market and there's all sorts of extra work involved with keeping a house clean and organized for any sudden showings? No worries...All under control...

But 5 weeks ago, this was hardly on the horizon! I had time on my hands, baby! I was going to crank out that additional book in no time flat and be in bed by midnight! Not only that, I'm going to confide in you my little secret: I was also planning to resurrect my all-but-dead daily mindfulness-based stress reduction meditation practice and also get my fat ass off the couch (where it's been parked writing books) and resume my anaerobic interval spin workout so I could try to get back in shape. And maybe get back to regular yoga classes. Let me tell you, people, I was going to be Wonder Woman (minus the metal breast plates)!

Um, er, well...Graduation is this weekend. I'm too stressed without free time to do any stress reduction (I had been doing it! I swear it!). Finding a daily hour for the bike workout? Are you kidding me? I have been running around like a crazy person preparing for the onslaught of houseguests and graduation and graduation breakfasts for 20 people both mornings before the ceremonies and then the combined graduation party mid-day Saturday for some 50 people as well as lunch mid-day Sunday for another 30 and, yeah, very little writing has happened.

Plus, I am releasing a book in less than a week and kind of need to figure out my marketing strategy for that, eh?

So just now, instead of writing? I gave my dog a bath. In my defense, with all of these houseguests showing up, we don't want the poor thing to be shunned because she smelled like, well, dirty dog.

Ah, well...the good news is I was the girl who pulled all-nighters studying for exams in college and self-conditioned to crank out papers one after the other shortly before their due dates. It must be the former journalist in me, but I definitely thrive under time constraints, so...the good news, is I just sort of lit a fire under my butt, which isn't such a bad thing after all. Now if I could figure out how to burn the fat in that butt with the fire now scorching it, I'd be good to go!

Hope you can check out my upcoming release: It's Getting Hot in Heir, book 7 in my It's Reigning Men series! 

It's available for pre-order, coming out May 24! You can get it here: iBooks, Kindle, Kobo, GooglePlay

And I tell you I really am writing book 8! Just not as fast as I'd planned to. Here's the cover--what do you think? It's available for pre-order here:   iBooks   

Oh and for a limited time I've got an awesome free book for you if you sign up for my newsletter: Something in the Heir, book 1 of the It's Reigning Men series! Sign up here  and you'll be first to hear about deals and giveaways.

    

           

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The Season of Giving

This is the season of thankfulness and of giving, and in that spirit I would like to bring to your attention a fabulous opportunity for giving...to the booklover in your live or to yourself (perhaps your loved ones are open to a little subtle hinting!) The cause is a fundraiser for author Jo Leigh and the long list of gifts will be put up for eBay bidding starting this weekend.

For writers: author, agent and editor critiques and mentorship opportunities, some by NYT bestselling authors, others by multiple RITA finalists, all of them extraordinary opportunities. Also promotional gifts including website and blog design, website hosting, community membership, promo newsletter, book video, bookcover design, etc.

Anne Gracie and I are offering an on-line workshop for the month of January, exclusive to this auction and suitable for writers of category or single title romance, whether starting with a story idea, honing an outline, or revising a completed draft.

For book lovers (aren't we all?): bundles of books--complete libraries by some authors--which include hard-to-come-by-new backlist titles, ARC's, and gift baskets including books, gift vouchers, chocolate, spa products, calendars and diaries and other lovely goodies.

For everyone: a scrapbooking opportunity, a beautiful quilt, handmade jewellery, your name as a character in a book, and lots more. I hope you will take a look and consider adding your help by bidding. And do check the website often as more lots will be added.

Lightbulb & Other Fun Moments in a Writers Life

I won't pretend that every other romance author has the same experience, but I've talked to enough to know that lightbulb moments when writing a book are a beautiful, beautiful thing. Me? I love lightbulb moments, no matter when they come. This past year plus has been a real struggle for me - healthwise, family wise and personally. So, the fact I've had a few really crucial lightbulb moments regarding my writing over that same period has been an utter blessing to me.

Like the time I was reading a review of another author's book. The reviewer was mad because the author had taken what she considered the easy way out in resolving a particular conflict that is pretty common in modern romance. I have no idea how dead-on the reviewer's views were in relation to that particular book, but I took her admonishments to heart and resolved never to dismiss that particular plot element as an any easy give. It's a conflict that comes up in both The Real Deal and Deal With This, each book resolving the conflict differently. Can you guess what it is? Anyway, several months later, I'm still keeping it in mind as plots develop and characters and I argue over the direction the book is going.

Jut FYI - the characters always win.

Another moment of clarity came when I was working on one of my own books and I realized I was listening more closely to my internal editor than I was my characters. The sad truth of it was, s/he was louder! Again, I can't speak for other authors and their internal editors, but my little monster has a personality disorder. That's right, Sybil eat your heart out - my IE has more voices than a busload of NY City traffic cops giving the driver directions to a Mets game. And they were all clamoring for my attention. I introduced IE to Elle, the heroine from my upcoming TGP book, The Spy Who Wants Me. Though gorgeous, Elle is tough. She drop-kicked the little monster into the deep, dark reaches of the wasteland beyond my imagination.

Whew, that was close!

Another recent mental lightening bolt came while I was reading one of my autobuy authors. She'd set up an really wonderful emotional conflict and then...resolved it with a single discussion and no follow-up scene to show the altered reactions of the characters. She's on my autobuy lists because she's so brilliantly imaginative. She's also a fantastic writer of sensuality. Her books are emotional, but she does the quick resolution a lot. She's incredible at building worlds and creating characters, but the emotional and plotlines of her stories aren't yet at the same level. When they are? She's going to rocket to the top of bestseller lists. I'm sure of it. But see, this lightning bolt singed me personally, forcing me to take an evaluative look at the imagination, characterization, emotional journey, sensuality and plotting in my own stories. And I realized I've got some real growing as a writer to do to bring some of those elements in line with one another.

A sobering but exciting revelation.

Well, I titled this post Lightbulb and Other Fun Moments in a Writer's Life. Maybe, I'd best share some of the other before you all get cornea burnout from all the flashbulbs going off. LOL

Seeing the first historical I'd written in print definitely counts as a fun moment in my life. I adore the heroine of Annabelle's Courtship. She's a sufferagette before the right to vote became an official movement. She's smart. She's strong willed. And she's lots and lots of fun. So, I'm particularly happy to see her book available in print.

I had more than one fun moment while visiting the Greater Detroit chapter of RWA and then attending Lora Leigh's Reader Appreciation Weekend afterward. If you want to read more about that, visit my blog.

But the best, most fun moments in my life as a writer? When I get a chance to interact with readers. So, thanks, Lee, for having me here to guest blog and thanks to everyone reading. Hopefully, you'll each take a moment and share your favorite or a recent lightbulb moment in your own life!

Hugs to all,

Lucy

http://lucymonroe.com

My Plan

I freely admit it - I'm not as organized as I used to be. I had lost my ability to multi-task and worried I would never get that talent back. But it all came back to me in one heart-stopping moment. Allow me to back up a few steps. :)

In about mid-May, my editor emailed to say she would be sending me her notes on the revisions and edits she would like for my December book, Dancing with the Devil. Now, anyone with kids in elementary school knows that the last month of school is crazy busy with field trips, concerts, yada yada yada. So I set myself a plan of how to get everything done in an organized fashion so that when the revision letter arrived, I'd be ready. And I was.

Friday May 23 - editor's email arrived with a note asking if I could please have it back to her by June 16th. Not a problem; I was ready. I spent most of the day reading over it several times and making notes, with the plan to start in on the work on Monday morning. And I did.

My Plan was going beautifully. (can you hear God laughing? Yeah, I wish I'd been listening to Him more carefully that morning.)

Monday night, I was sitting on my couch with my printed out manuscript spread all over, my lap top going, and my note paper beside me. One kid was in bed and the other 2 were going to be shortly. At first, the smell was only a whiff. Then it was a full on "hmmm, that doesn't smell right" kind of thing that got me off the couch to investigate. (Let me digress here a moment to add that my husband was on a business trip in another province at this point). I follow my nose (just like the Froot Loop guy) and whip open the man-door to the garage to find a lovely little fire just a cookin' under one of the work benches. ACK!!! So all at once, I'm the person I used to be! I'm multi-tasking like a crazy woman.

I'm:

1. Hurding the kids outside

2. Calling 911 with one hand while

3. Trying to figure out how to work the stupid fire extinguisher and kicking myself for not having learned before then.

Long story short, the fire dept arrived, couldn't save the garage, but thankfully, they kept the flames from getting into the house. (smoke damage is a royal pain in the you-know-what, though). At this point, it sounds really bad, but here are the good things.

1. My brother in law is a full-time fireman with the local fire department

2. said brother-in-law was acting chief the night of our fire

3. the entire fire department was at practice when I called 911 and the practice hall is literally 3 blocks from our house.

Once the fire was out, my BIL knew there were things I needed. So back into the house he went and brought out my keys, my cell phone and, God bless him, my laptop and scattered manuscript pages. Sure, they smelled horrible, but did that matter? No!!

Needless to say, My Plan has not gone anything like it was supposed to. LOL I did manage to get the revisions done and in on the 16th (though, technically, it was the 17th in New York, but according to the clocks in my house, it was only 11:45ish - LOL). I am learning how to multi-task again, though. It's not pretty, and I'm still pretty horrible at it, but I'm getting there. Because, apparently, just because you have a fire or some other stressful or tragic event in your life, the world does NOT quit turning. Bills still have to be paid, kids still have to get to baseball/hockey/soccer and everyone still needs clean clothes and food on the table. The added 'fun' though is that we need to keep on keeping on while we try to work with 3 different insurance companies (boat, truck, house) and find a place to live and continue to assure the kids that once the restoration company gets everything cleaned, they really will get their GameBoys back (something that is vitally important to all three of them).

All kidding aside, we were incredibly lucky. Sure, everything we own is now in boxes, either here at our rental house, or in storage with the restoration company, and sure we're going to be out of our house for many many months until they rebuild it from stud, but in the grand scheme of things, none of that matters one iota. It's truly amazing how much of our "stuff" we can live without. The important thing is that the kids got out safely.

And so did the manuscript. (come on - all you writers - you know what I'm talking about! LOL)

Romance Writing and The Single Gal

You wouldn’t believe the number of people that think romance novels give women unrealistic expectations of love in the real world… And as I’m a single gal, it also seems to allow people to carry that misconception over a little so that they believe it also means I shouldn’t know how to write one either!!! One person recently, (who shall remain nameless to save their embarrassment and not mine you understand), when informed by a proud friend of mine that I wrote romance novels, whilst looking surprised, asked; ”Does she have much experience of romance then, I thought she was single?” Sheesh.

I guess to the former set of critics I’m the ideal example to back them up. I read these books from my early teens. In fact, I often kid my mother that her idea of sex education was Mills & Boon and pamphlets from the doctors left strewn around the house. I certainly don’t remember a sit down conversation on the subject! But rather than giving me an unrealistic expectation, I think what they did was make me believe it was possible to still find real love out there in a world that seems determined to make the subject more *practical* or worse still, more physically based. Yes, there is a certain practicality to it in the real world – but I think the fact that my characters often have to deal with some of the everyday troubles reflects how I feel on that subject. And the physical part of it is also important in the stories I tell, so that kinda tells a tale on my opinions too, even though I believe that my characters should be able to stay together when that part eventually fades. But what I believe most of all is that reading romance taught me a lot about human nature, about taking a chance when you maybe wouldn’t, about looking below the surface, and about not settling for second best when the real thing might still be out there…Which ain’t bad lessons to learn in your late teens when you think about it…

Does it mean that I spend my days waiting for a Sheikh or a Billionaire to whisk me off my feet and I won’t settle for anything less while I wait? Not so much. But then neither does reading a romance make me believe that no-one ever needs to go to the bathroom – something that never happens in a category romance. If I was that easily led then I’d have serious kidney problems by now…

My being single has nothing to do with too high an expectation brought on by reading romance, and to suggest that women are so easily led is kinda patronising, don’t you think??? It’s like in some way we have to be labelled dumber for reading romance in the first place and therefore would fall into this terrible trap…

Erm… NOPE.

As to whether or not being single means I’m qualified to write one… well… that’s like suggesting that Terry Pratchett shouldn’t be able to write about the Discworld cos he’s never been on a flat planet carried through space by a giant turtle, or Patricia Cornwell shouldn’t be able to write about the workings of a mass murderers mind because she’s never murdered someone herself! Nah – when it comes to writing romance, for me, it’s all about having an imagination, with an understanding of why people might do the things they do, a fair share of life experience to understand what they might feel at any given time - oh - and a good dose of the kind of discipline needed in order to sit down and write from the beginning all the way to the end thrown in…Being single or being married or even currently being head over heels in love has nothing to do with those things, does it?

Having said that, could this single gal have written a romance when they were given to her in her teens? No. Could she have written one before she understood what it was like to have had a broken heart or having picked the wrong guy somewhere along the way? I don’t think so. Is she less likely to find the kind of hero she now writes about because they subliminally set the bar too high for mankind in real life? Actually, when it comes to men like that not existing in my life that was a given before I even started reading or writing them - really – if you saw where I live you’d understand why…it’s a population thing…and a percentage of guys who would fancy me within that population thing… Move me somewhere with a larger population and I guess my percentages would go up… But I digress...

So, do I write better heroes because I haven’t found one of my own in real life? Well no, I know many authors extremely happily married who write gorgeous heroes!!! And do I only write them to fill a void in my life? Hell no.

Simply, I guess I read and write romance because I believe in happily ever after – which maybe means all the fairy stories I read as a child set up those ‘unrealistic expectations’ and are really to blame. Or maybe Disney Movies. Or Chick-Flicks now…But the truth is, I still believe it can happen. I think it’ll be a sad day when the world stops believing in that possibility, don’t you?

But would I give up writing romance for a real life hero as delicious as some of the ones I create on paper? Mmm… That’s a tough call… I think if he loved me he wouldn’t mind if I passed on my belief in happily ever after to a few more women. After all, believing in romance and the possibility of that happily ever after would be what made me hold out for him in the first place…Right?

So do Romance Novels make your expectations higher? What do you think?

And I'm currently running a competition to win a copy of Breathless! with details over on my Blog if you'd like to have a go! Pop over and answer a nice simple question for me and I'll put your name in the draw...