I only had one job: get literary agent Sandra Bishop to the airport. We had spent the weekend teaching together at a private writing seminar in the middle of Minnesota, and woke up early Sunday morning with a three plus hour drive in front of us for her flight out of Duluth. I had mapquested the trip, so I knew that the journey would take us three hours, but I added an hour cushion just to be safe and declared we’d leave at 10am. We pulled out around 10:30, but since I’d allotted the time, I figured..we’re all good here. The little town we taught in had a convenience store for a coffee shop, so we hustle by for a pitiful version of coffee and then hustled […]
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Does your protagonist have a Super Power? You bet!
During the My Book Therapy Deep Thinkers Retreat I threw Beth Vogt a curve. “What’s your heroine’s super power?” She looked at me like I was crazy. But I had a plan. A purpose. In Beth’s story, her heroine left a high powered job to work with a poor community. As the character realizes her limitations on a local mission field, I suggested she jump to her super power. “And what would that be?” Beth asked, brow arched, lips twisted with dubiosity. “She can raise money,” I said. “She knows how to get money from people. She’s gifted. She has the contacts, the connections, the right talent to pitch ideas.” Ah, so lights began to dawn. Now, I’m not sure Beth is going to use this super power, but it […]
Read the RestHow to cause a little trouble: the how-to’s of peripheral plotting
How do you find those Peripheral Plotting elements? Yesterday we talked about Peripheral Plotting – a great little trick to widening your suspense plot. How, however, do you find those elements? Look around you – each one of us has people and things we care about in a widening circle. This is our periphery. Let’s say my goal is to get to the airport so I can get to Seattle to see my mother for Christmas. In a linear plot, all that might stand between me and my goal might be transportation, or perhaps money. Maybe getting time off from my job. But let’s do some peripheral plotting. Let’s say that I get a call from the principle of the school. My son has had a fight on the playground […]
Read the RestHow to use “Sacrifice” in your suspense novel – some examples
Yesterday I talked about building that essential element of sacrifice into the emotional journey of your suspense novel. It thought it would help to show some of the ways I’ve built this into my novels: Here’s how I’ve used sacrifice: In Taming Rafe, Rafe sacrifices his trophies and everything he’s earned. Rafe (Taming Rafe) would never turn his back on bull riding and his accomplishments. Not when it is the only thing he believes gives him value. Unless he believes that it doesn’t matter how much he’s worked for, it’s all gone. In that moment, he might even despise his past, and all that he worked for that netted him nothing. So, in a scene that exemplifies this, Rafe burns everything he’s worked so hard for. In Finding Stefanie, […]
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