Her Parenthood Assignment: the heroine

I'm sorry to say that I can't post a picture of Gaby here. I only have a fuzzy idea of what she looks like. Although, if I saw a photo that matched my vague idea of her, I'd know it in a second.

She describes herself as ordinary. She has brown, not-sure-what-the colour-it-wants-to-be hair and brown eyes. And when Luke first sees her, he thinks of her as being pretty ordinary too. I see her as having a kind of quiet beauty. The sort that creeps up on you bit by bit until you realise the person standing in front of you is actually quite stunning. The fact is, as Luke gets to know her, the beauty of her warm and giving personality shines out and captivates him.

Gaby is escaping from the wreckage of her marriage to super-controlling, city-slicker David. Since childhood she's been the person other people have wanted her to be. She described her old life as like being as suburban version of Frankenstein's monster. She looked the part, with all the right pieces in the right places, but somehow the spirit was missing.

She arrives in Devon, a super-nanny sent to help Luke Armstrong with his troubled daughter, Heather. The last thing she needs is to get involved with another controlling man who just can't seem to keep a lid on his temper. However, as she becomes embroiled in Heather and Luke's lives, she empathises with Luke for the horrors he must have endured in prison and starts to see glimpses of a wonderfully warm and caring man underneath the gruff exterior.

But, as they reveal their feelings for each other, Gaby's old insecurities surface and she starts to unwittingly sabotage their relationship. If you want to see Luke and Gaby in action, pop over to my website and read the excerpt here.

Her Parenthood Assignment: the hero

Luke Armstrong is prematurely turning into a grumpy old man. But then again, he's got a lot to be grumpy about. He spent five years in prison after being wrongly accused of his wife's murder and now he's been set free on appeal he's trying to rebuild his life with an 11-year-old daughter who can't even bring herself to call him anything but "Luke".

When I started writing Her Parenthood Assignment Luke looked a little bit a cross between Rupert Penry-Jones, who plays Adam in Spooks (MI5 in the USA) and actor Jeremy Sheffield. As the book developed, Luke took on his own identity within my head and have not been able to find a picture that matches him exactly, but the guy on the front cover is pretty close!

Five-star review

I've just discovered that Her Parenthood Assignment received a five-star review at Cataromance. Here's a snippet:

Her Parenthood Assignment is a well-written tale which will tug at your heartstrings and tickle your funny bone with its captivating blend of dramatic scenes, hilarious one-liners and potent emotional intensity.

Obviously, I'm rather chuffed about this. If you want to read the whole review click here.

The missing prologue

This is the prologue to the second draft of 'Her Parenthood Assignment' which was cut in the final round of edits:

‘They’ve reached a verdict.’

Luke Armstrong peeled his gaze from the floor and looked at the uniformed man standing in the doorway. For weeks he’d sat in the courtroom and watched it all play out. Witnesses fidgeted, jurors frowned, lawyers attacked and counter-attacked, but none of that mattered now. It had only been a prelude to this moment.

So much hung on where the scales of justice finally tipped. His and Heather’s lives would be defined by the clipped reply of the jury foreman. They had to make the right decision. His wife’s murder could not go unpunished.

He felt strangely numb as he navigated the network of corridors that led to the courtroom. Why wasn’t his heart punching against his ribcage, his adrenalin levels in the rafters? There was only a sense of inevitability, like the eerie calm of a deserted beach waiting for a storm.

The future was no longer his to command. But then, it never had been. Not since the moment Lucy had been found in that hotel room.

The hotel room.

Just that thought alone should send a tremor through him, but there was nothing. Not a blip. He’d seen the glossy pictures of the crime scene, heard every grisly bit of medical evidence countless times over. It had taken on the surreal, impersonal quality of those late night forensic shows he used to enjoy so much.

He’d become desensitised. He’d had to. ‘Till death do us part’ was supposed to have referred to when they were old and grey, not when they when they were barely halfway there.

All that mattered now was his daughter. Heather needed every scrap of his love and strength if she was going to make it though this. He would have to be her rock while she grieved; he could do his own later when she had come to terms with the loss of her beautiful, vibrant mother.

The spectators' gallery of Courtroom Two was packed. Every seat in the high-ceilinged, panelled room was filled. All except the judge’s chair and the twelve empty spaces to his left. Seats reserved for the seven men and five women would decide the fate of his shattered family.

A plain door on the left creaked and an usher appeared. Every head in the courtroom swung round.

The jury were here.

Their faces had become as familiar to him as actors in his favourite television dramas. For weeks, day in, day out, he’d studied them. He didn’t know where they lived or what they filled their days with, but he felt like he knew them. He’d even given them nicknames.

The shuffling and whispering in the gallery hushed as they filed in. They weren’t in their usual order. The woman he’d labelled “The Redhead” led the way. The fact she’d been made foreman had to be a good omen. Not that he believed in any of that stuff. He used to laugh at Lucy when she’d read her horoscope. But he was desperate, and he’d cling to any sign of hope.

It seemed to take an age before they were all seated and the judge entered and started talking. The words were just background blah. All the time he kept his eyes on the Redhead, trying to gauge her secret.

Would her answer be one word, or two?

And then he heard the clerk say, ‘Would the defendant please rise?’

It took him a few seconds before he realised that was his cue to move. His legs didn’t seem to want to work, but somehow he hauled himself to his feet and looked the judge straight in the eye. He had nothing to be ashamed of. He was innocent, had said so all along. The Redhead believed him, he knew she did. He’d seen it in her eyes when he’d given evidence.

But now she wasn’t looking at him, none of them were, and he didn’t know if this was a good or a bad sign. He didn’t really hear what the clerk said next, because he was waiting for her to look up, waiting to see that look of understanding in her eyes. Then he’d know he was safe, that Heather wasn’t going to lose both her mother and father in the space of a few short months.

‘…and have you reached a verdict on which you all agree?’

‘Yes.’

‘And on the count of murder, do you find the defendant guilty or not guilty?’

The world stopped spinning. Luke certainly stopped breathing.

The Redhead tore her gaze from the court official and looked at him, her eyes filled with pain and sadness. She seemed to plead with him to understand. And he did.

A split-second before her lips moved he knew what she was going to say and his knuckles whitened on the rail in front of him.

‘Guilty.’

Her Parenthood Assignment - the inspiration

This was a bit of an odd book in terms of the starting idea as the original plot twist was axed by my editor and I had to completely rework the book.

A few years ago I was called to do jury service. I only served on one case and it was a fairly minor charge, but a difficult one to decide on. I couldn't sleep that night, even though I felt I had made the right decision, because I was very aware that I had changed the course of someones life. I wondered how I would feel if I had sat in on a really serious case, say a murder, and had convicted the defendant. Then the what ifs started coming thick and fast...

What if my gut instinct had told me one thing, but the forensic evidence had told me something else?
What if the verdict was overturned a few years later and I discovered I'd been wrong?
How would I feel? What would I do?

The seed idea for Luke and Gaby's story was planted. In my original draft, Gaby had served on the jury that convicted Luke of his wife's murder six years earlier. She was racked with guilt after he was set free on appeal and became determined to find out if he was okay. In a bit of an identity mix up, she ended up looking after his daughter. The conflict of the story centred around the fact that Luke hadn't recognised Gaby and the problems that were going to erupt when her secret was revealed.

I was itching to write the story over Christmas 2005 and had racked up seven chapters before my editor got back to me with a verdict on the synopsis I'd sent her. She very wisely picked up on the fact that this storyline could be an ethical minefield. In the end, despite writing a whole new section where Luke and Gaby had a shared past, I decided the simplest option was best - Gaby was a nanny who specialised in difficult situations and she and Luke had never met before.

Very painfully, I went back over my seven chapters and ripped out the original storyline. The emotional problems that the characters were going to face were already there but, without the external conflict of Gaby's secret identity, they had to deepen and were brought more sharply into focus. I think I ended up with a much stronger book because of this, even if it was a pig to rewrite.

This is a lesson I keep coming back to. Quite often, when I write a synopsis there will be an element of external conflict that seems important but, as I write the book, I often find it a better idea to ignore that external conflict and build on the internal conflict between the two characters.

I was delighted to discover a few weeks later that Luke and Gaby's story had sold with no revisions. The overhaul I'd given it had obviously strengthened it. The only change was that we lopped the prologue off the front - a scene in which Luke heard he's guilty verdict at the end of his trial. Without the jury storyline it just didn't seem necessary. I'm tempted to post it here as a bit of a teaser. Perhaps I'll do that tomorrow...

Book number 2!

Finally, my brain has emerged from the post-book haze enough for me to blog again. My fourth book, working title The It-Girl and the Heir, is with my editor and I am wearing a my inbox checking for the verdict. When I sent it off, I was really pleased with it, but as the days tick by I'm becoming more and more convinced that it is pants.

Anyway, enough of obsessing about things that are out of my control. I'm really excited because the favourite book I have written so far Her Parenthood Assignment is out in the UK at the moment and will be released in North America next week.

Here is the blurb and the cover just to whet your appetite.

Falling for her boss... and his family!

Working as a nanny for the rather gruff, yet extremely good-looking Luke Armstrong's spirited daughter seems like just the challenge Gabby Michaels needs to kick-start a new life!

Arriving at the Old Boathouse on the rugged coast of Devon, Gaby can see that the rift between Luke and his daughter can only be breached if Luke allows himself to be healed, as well. But in helping to fix this family, Gaby realises she wants to be more than just the nanny - she wants to be a mother to Heather... and a wife to Luke.

I'll be blogging about the ideas behind the story over the next few weeks.

In the same week as the Oscars...

Just as I was putting the finishing touches to Josie and Will's story, I discovered my first book, Blind-Date Marriage, won a Cataromance Reviewers' Choice Award for the Best Silhouette Romance of the second half of 2006. And even better news, I'm sharing it with Sophie Weston's The Cinderella Factor, which I thought was a really wonderful book.

You can see the rest of the award winners here. Congrats to everyone on the list!

The latest

Well, I'm having great "fun" with my voice recognition software.
I do most of my writing on a laptop in my bedroom and deliberately have no internet access to on it. Mainly to stop me wasting my time when I should be writing. Since I've been using the voice recognition software up there quite a lot, it's getting quite good at recognising my voice.

However, I also have the software installed on the family computer - which I'm using at the moment to write this post this - and it hasn't had as much practice. Some of the results are very amusing.

Anyway, I'm going to try to post at least once a week and will probably do more than that once I'm past my deadline for the current book (1st March).

In the meantime, Donna has tagged me to reveal 10 a random things about myself, but my head is so full of the current book as I try to get it finished in time, I may have to wait until I can think of anything interesting about myself. At the moment my characters seem to be having all the fun and I'm feeling particularly dull.

I will have to add some of her funny mistakes my software is making as it learns to recognise my voice. The for example, before I corrected it, the start of the previous paragraph read: " In the meantime, Donna has attacked me to reveal..."

Ooops!

Steam has been coming off the keyboard this week. I have been writing up a storm and managed to notch up almost 17,000 words. Unfortunately. it appears I have been working a little too hard as I have RSI in my right wrist. The doc says no more typing for a couple of weeks, but I have a 1st March deadline and an unfinished book.

Before anyone tells me off for posting, I have done this entirely with my left index finger and, believe me, it's torturously slow. I'm investigating voice recognition software to tide me over. I will finish this book!

No time, good time

I'm hurtling towards a dealine at the moment, so the blog has been quite quiet. I need to produce 20,000 words in the next fortnight, so it's going to get even quieter.

Good news! I looked on the Mills & Boon site this morning and discovered that my second book, "Her Parenthood Assignment" is on the bestseller section! Cool.

The Hero's Journey: Meeting with the Mentor

This is a feature in the hero's journey which I've seen less often in the books and films I've been reading, but it's still interesting.

The mentor is one of the character archetypes that Vogler mentions in the beginning section of his book. You know the the kind of character: the wise old woman or man in the fairy tales that imparts wisdom and sometimes gifts to help the hero as he starts his quest. The most obvious examples would be Gandalf in Lord of the Rings, Obi Wan Kenobe in "Star Wars" or Mr Miagi in 'The Karate Kid'. (Seriously, who can forget "Wax on. Wax off."?)

Now, Vogler stresses that the archetypes are not necessarily hard and fast character types in a story. A very non-wise old woman-ish person may wear the mask of the mentor for a time.

This is a preparation time in the story where the hero may need to equip himself for the task ahead: a best friend may give some advice; the hero may need to learn some new skills; he may need to arm himself or listen to his conscience.

Mentors may not appear in every story and they may appear at other key points, not just as the hero embarks on the quest, it's just that, in many myths and fairy tales, the presence of a mentor at this point is common.

Shrek doesn't really have a mentor as he leaves the swamp and travels to Duloc. He is only just tolerating donkey - although at other points, donkey wears the mask of the mentor, teaching him about friendship.

In a similar way, in French Kiss, Luc teaches Kate how to live life, despite her attempts to return things to the stale, secure state they were once in. I suppose, in a loose way, the scene where he annoys her on the aeroplane to distract her from take-off, is him passing on his knowledge.

Questions for 'Meeting with the mentor'

1. Does your hero have a mentor?

2. If so, are they:

• A full-blown mentor?
• Another character that wears the mentor's mask?
• An inner code of ethics?

3. What dramatic function do they perform?

• Teacher - many mentors impart wisdom or teach new skills. What does the mentor teach the hero?
• Gift-giver - the gift may come in the form of a weapon or something useful for the journey.
• Motivator - helping the hero to move past her fears and embark on the journey. Helping with mental preparation is in important function of the mentor.
• Do they give the hero information or plant a prop that the hero will find useful later?

4. In what form do they appear?

• Traditional mentor
• Dark mentor - Sometimes the villain (shadow archetype) can be the hero's mentor.
• Fallen mentor - A hero who has been on his own journey but has stalled. Helping the current hero may help him finish his journey.
• Continuing mentor - someone like 'M' in the James Bond films.
• Multiple mentors - there may be a groups of teachers all with different skills and lessons to impart.
• Comic mentor
• Inner mentor - the hero's own conscience or inner set of beliefs may teach him.
  

5. Is the mentor a cliché and how can you avoid this?

6. Is the mentor what the hero/reader believes them to be?

• Sometimes the mentor may seem benevolent, but has his/her own agenda.
• Is the hero being duped?
• If so, at some point he will need to break free of the mentor and finish his journey on his own.

7. Does this story need a mentor?

• If so, at what points?
• Don't just shove a mentor in because you think you ought to have one.
• every character needs to earn their keep - especially in a category romance where the word count is around 50,000.

The Hero's Journey: The Refusal of the Call

In many stories, even the most gung-ho hero may have a moment of hesitation before embarking on the adventure. A reluctant hero may dig her heels in and refuse flatly.

I think the important part of ‘The Refusal’ is that it allows us to see that this quest is not going to be easy for the hero. If the journey is going to be easy, it’s not going to make an interesting story. Really exciting stories challenge the hero to their very core, whether this is physically, mentally or emotionally.

This section of the journey is a good place to show or voice the hero’s goal, motivation and conflict:

In ‘Shrek’, he tries to ignore (refusal) the fairy-tale animals that have invaded his swamp, but in the end, he snaps and sets off to petition Lord Farquad.

In ‘French Kiss’, in the very first scene, we see Kate refusing the call to adventure most vehemently. She is afraid of flying and is in a flight simulator trying to overcome her fear. When asked what her calming mantra is, she yells: “We’re going down! We’re going down! We’re going down!” Clearly, she is not ready to answer the call.

In the following scenes we see Kate giving all the reasons why she can’t follow her fiancé to Paris: she hates the French, she hates the cheese, she’s afraid of flying and – actually a valid reason – she’s not supposed to leave Canada while she’s waiting for her citizenship application to be approved.

This is quite a long refusal. Some heroes only have a flicker of doubt before diving headlong into the quest. But this lengthy refusal works. Kate wants a home and a family and she is holding onto this dream of security so tightly she is scared to let it go and live. It is a very important part of her character and it needs to be set up so the audience understand how difficult the following challenges will be for her.

Sometimes a hero just gives a list of weak excuses, stalling tactics. Sometimes it takes digging deeper within themselves to summon the courage. In Kate’s case she would never have left Canada unless her motivation had been deepened because the stakes were raised to the highest level: her dream of a home and family with Charlie is threatened because he has met a French woman and fallen madly in love with her.

Now Kate’s reason to fly is not just to enjoy a nice trip to Paris and see the Eiffel Tower. She needs to cross the Atlantic to convince Charlie they are meant to be together. It is only the prospect of losing her strongest innermost desire that drags her into the adventure.

Some heroes may not show any doubt at all. But often, at this point, another character in the same situation will back down and totally refuse the call to adventure, giving the reader a chance to see the high stakes and danger ahead.


Questions:

1. Does the refusal:

• Make the stakes clear?
• Examine the quest?
• Review consequences?

2. At what level is the hero refusing the call?

• A moment's hesitation
• Flat refusal
• Something in between

3. Does another character show the consequences/dangers if the hero is willing?

4. Why does the hero refuse the call?

• Past experience?
• If so, what motivates them to accept?
• if you've already set up your backstory and character well, the reader will understand why the character falters.

5. What excuses and delaying tactics does the hero use, if any?

6. Are there two conflicting calls?

• Does the hero have two possible paths to take, each with their own challenges and rewards?
• A hero may have to choose between success and family. Following one path may rule out getting the goal from the other.
• Which one will the hero choose?
• What effect will this have?
  

7. Is there a positive refusal?

• For example, a hero may be offered something that it would be wise to refuse.
• What if a hero needing money turns down the offer to do something illegal?
• This decision may have consequences that propell the hero into the adventure.

8. What is the hero afraid of?

• If you are going to make your hero face up to and overcome their deepest fear, you might as well know what it is!
• Is this a real or false fear?
• How do they express this fear?

We interrupt this broadcast for an important announcement...

Thought I would break up the craft-heavy posting with something more personal. There were storms in the UK yesterday, and while we certainly fared better than some, we were not unaffected.


A large section of my fence is in next door's garden for a start. And then my oldest daughter had to stay home from school today. Her school is a lovely Victorian building and her classroom in on the top floor of a three-story section. Yesterday afternoon one of the windows in the neighbouring classrooms was blown in - we're talking the whole multi-paned hefty wooden frame, which must be at least six foot high. As a result, the workmen are in today fixing things and making sure everything is safe.


Most tragic of all was the news that, when my husband went to visit our allotment this morning, he found his greenhouse, full of his much-beloved carniverous plants, in a tangled heap. Now, I may moan at the amount of love and dedication he lavishes on these plants - I have been heard to comment that I would get more attention if I painted myself green and sat on the window sill - but even I was sad. Somehow, along the way, I seem to have grown fond of them myself. I even know my droseras from my nepenthes.

The Hero's Journey: The Call ot Adventure

The second step on the hero’s journey is The Call to Adventure. Other terms I’ve read for this same point are the ‘trigger’ and the ‘catalyst’. In other words, something happens to start the story. If it didn’t, your protagonist would just trundle along in her ordinary life and we’d all…..zzzzzzzz.

I had a bit of a quick think of what was the call/trigger/catalogue in some well-known books and films:

Pride and Prejudice
Mr Binlgey arrives at Netherfield. Without this event the poor Bennett sisters would have continued doing up bonnets, embroidering and bickering until they were old maids.

A Christmas Carol
Scrooge is visited by the ghost of Jacob Marley.

Shrek
Shrek is disturbed by fairy-tale characters hiding out in his swamp. This is in direct opposition to his goal – to live alone and happy in his swamp. He has a choice to make: live with the squatters or leave the swamp and visit Lord Farquad. One and a half hours of Shrek shouting at the three little pigs etc. would not have been a satisfying story, and he wouldn’t have learnt anything or grown at all.

Pretty Woman
Edward gets lost and has to stop and ask a hooker (Vivien) for directions.

French Kiss
Kate’s fiancé asks her to go to Paris with him.

There are as many different ways for the call to come as there are stories and characters. It may be a very obvious call – a telegram asking for help from a long-lost uncle, a friend who asks the hero to accompany them on a dangerous trip, war breaks out. Some calls come from within the character themselves – a vague feeling that they have to do something or die of stagnation, temptation, or a dream or vision.

Here as the questions I asked myself after reading Christopher Vogler’s chapter on the subject:

1. What is this character's call to adventure? Is it:

• A message
• An event
• A new character
• Something within the hero
• Dream/vision
• Hero's fed up with the status quo
• The last straw
• Synchronicity (lots of little things coincidentally pointing them in the right direction)
• Temptation (money, love, travel to exotic places)
• Lack or need (do they need money or are they searching for a lost dog?)
• No more options
• Something else.

I decided to identify which, if any, of these calls applied to my current story. I then pondered whether the call would be more effective if it was given in another way. In the end, i stuck with what I had already written.

For Will, it was a letter from a solicitor, informing him that at the death of a distant relative he was now Lord Radcliffe and owner of Elmhurst Hall. None of this happens in the book. By the time we meet Will he has received the letter and travelled back to England. This is because the story starts with Josie receiving her call – the arrival of the new lord. Life at Elmhurst Hall is going to different and Josie has to decide whether she's going to dig her heels in or welcome him enthusiastically.

2. Is there a herald to present the call?
Sometimes there’s a character who delivers the call

3. Is the hero unsettled or confused?
Is the hero a willing or reluctant hero? Being asked to step out of the ordinary world can be disorienting or even downright scary.

4. Should the call come earlier/later in this story?

5. Does the call have an interesting twist so it's not a cliché?

6. Does your story have a succession of calls? If so, what different levels of adventure do they have?

First things first

Now, I know this kind of approach doesn't work for every writer, but it sure helps me! if you are one of those lucky creatures who can sit down at the keyboard with a fuzzy story idea and watch it flow from there, I offer you my congratulations.

I find I am totally constipated (story-wise, of course) until I dig deep and unearth some central things about my characters and my story. Sometimes I don't have to get very far under the surface; other times I seem to be heading for China before the words flow.

These are my questions for the section of the Hero's Journey that Christopher Vogler calls "The Ordinary World". Some of the questions are his, but many are mine.

1. What is the hero's ordinary world?

2. What problems/conflicts are already there dormant?

3. Is there anything foreshadowed from the coming conflict here?

• Vogler says that there should be hints. little shadows of the coming conflict - perhaps seeing how the hero's flaw is a problem.

4. What dramatic questions are raised about the hero?

• The famous story question!
• Will Indiana Jones get the treasure?
• Will Romeo and Juliet have their happy ever after?
• Will Shrek be able to get all the fairy tale animals out of his swamp and live in peace again?
• The story question is what keeps readers turning pages. They want to know the answer.
• According to Jack Bickham, the quicker you ask the story question the better. It's the central question of the story, the one you have to answer at the end of the book for it to be a satisfying read.

5. What lessons does he/she need to learn?

• Every hero needs to learn something. None of us are perfect.
• Shrek needs to learn to stop shutting the world out because he is doesn't want any more rejection. He needs to learn how to interact with other people and have relationships. It's not going to be easy. Relationships are hard for everyone.
• The struggles your hero faces through out the story should help him/her grow. They may gather experience by learning new skills or by their mistakes, but by the end of the story they will not be the same as they were at the beginning.
• In fact, this was why I ditched my first-ever novel attempt. Halfway through the second draft I realised that the struggles I was putting my characters through didn't relate to their biggest fears/inner conflict/lessons as well as they could. If you want an emotional story, you need to hit the characters in their weak spots. Tough for them, but great for the reader as we see them stumble along, being stretched and earning their happy ever after.
• This was a 'light-bulb' moment for me. Find out what your character's weakness is, what their biggest fear is, and make them face it.

6. What are the hero's Inner and Outer conflicts?

• I love Debra Dixon's book, "GMC: Goal, Motivation and Conflict". I can't begin a story without mapping this out. So, I thought I would include this in my little questionnaire.
• Goal: what does your character want? Motivation: why do they want it? Conflict: what's stopping them getting it?
• Characters often have inner (emotional/intagible) goals and outer (tanglible) goals.
• Shrek's outer get rid of the fairy-tale creatures squatting in his swamp, because he wants to be left in peace to live on his own, but before he can get the deed to the land, he has to go and rescue a princess for Lord Farquad. He can do something tangible about this problem.
• Shrek's inner goal is to protect himself from further rejection, because he has been hurt in the past when people didn't look beyond his appearance, but he's going to have to interact with other beings and forge relationships as he goes on his quest.

7. What does our first meeting with the hero say about her?

• Vogler says that when we first meet a hero, the hero should be doing something typically 'them'. This gives us clues to their personality and anchors them in their ordinary world straight away.
• Shrek is farting in a mud bath the first time we meet him. That sums him up pretty well, doesn't it?
• In 'French Kiss', Kate is panicking about flying. Later on in the film she is told she is "too afraid to live". Our first meeting with her sums up where she is in her emotional 'ordinary world' rather well.

8. What universal goal does your hero have?

• Readers identify with characters that want something they can understand.
• Does your hero want success, a happy family life, power, love, stability...
• The list is endless, but it doesn't hurt to make sure that your central character is someone who the reader can relate to quickly. After all, they're going to be riding on that character's coat tails for most of the story.
• The reader doesn't necessarily have to like the character, or even want the same things themselves, but they have to understand their goals.

9. What is your hero's tragic flaw?

10. What does the hero stand to lose/gain?

11. What backstory needs to come out?

12. What is the theme of the story?

Theme is such a huge subject I could blog about it for a month. Maybe I will one day. if you want a good lesson in theme watch an episode of "Grey's Anatomy" and listen to the voice over at the beginning of the episode. Then watch the rest with that in mind and see how it is played out in the character's lives and even the medical situations that arise.

The hero's comfort zone

The first stage of the hero’s journey is called The Ordinary World. The idea is that something happens to call the hero to adventure which means he must leave his ordinary world (this need not be a geographical change; it could just be exploring a new emotional territory) and enter into the Special World of the adventure.

There is a trigger, or catalyst for most stories. Something happens to make the protagonist act. This is what Vogler describes as The Call to Adventure. But before the hero answers the call, we may need to get a glimpse of him in his Ordinary World to see why this call is going threaten him, why he is going to have to grow and change to overcome the situation.

In novels a hundred years ago, much more time would have been spent describing the life and background of the hero (I am using the word ‘hero’ to mean the central character, the protagonist of the story, not just the central male character). In modern fiction, we don’t want to spend too long in backstory. We want to get into the action fairly quickly, but it can be helpful to set up a little of the hero’s life before the call to adventure comes.

My kids were watching "Shrek" the other day and I thought it was quite a good story to illustrate this:

At the beginning of the film, as the credits roll, we see Shrek, alone in his swamp and happy. He likes his solitary life and has no desire to change it. It is important to set this up because his desire to return to this life is his motivation for leaving the swamp and going on a quest to save a princess. On a deeper level, it is where he is comfortable emotionally—rejecting the world because it has rejected him—and his journey will take him out of this comfort zone and challenge him severely.

Different stories require different treatments. As I’m reading different stories and watching different films, I’m seeing how flexible this idea can be.

While watching ‘French Kiss’ with Meg Ryan and Kevin Kline the other day, I noticed that at the very start of the film Kate’s (Meg Ryan) call to adventure has already come. Her fiancé is going to Paris on business and she has been invited to go with him. We find Kate in a flight simulator, trying to overcome her fear of flying. She rips the door open and tumbles out, yelling she can’t do it. We see hints of her Ordinary World in the following scenes, but her refusal of the call to adventure (step 3 on the hero’s journey) is a much more important place for this particular story to start. (More on that in a later post.)

Anyway, as I went through Vogler's book, I thought about Josie and Will, the characters in my work in progress and decided there were questions I needed to ask myself about them. It wasn’t always easy, but I came away with a much deeper understanding of my them and their motivations. I had plenty of ideas for secondary characters and possible scenarios floating around my head and answering the questions helped me narrow down my choices and decide which ones were going to be the most helpful in telling this story.

This post is long enough already, so I’ll post my 'Ordinary World' questions tomorrow.

This Writer's Journey

Finally, I’ve found the groove for Josie and Will’s story! I started it in November and I’m still only at the start of chapter five. Deadline is in 6½ weeks, so I’d better speed up.

I find I just can’t write if I don’t have a clear idea of where I’m going. I’d plotted out this book, but somehow it just wasn’t working. Help!

Help came in the form of “The Writer’s Journey” by Christopher Vogler. I’d read about it on Michelle Styles’s blog and had decided to by it just before Christmas.

Vogler has studied the works of a man named Joseph Campbell who looked at traditional stories and myths from all over the world and discovered that similar characters and plotlines kept appearing again and again. Vogler has expanded on this from the viewpoint of telling a satisfying story.

When I first heard of this idea, I wrinkled my nose a bit. I wasn’t sure I liked the idea of a character having a prescribed series of events he must go through. It seemed a bit restrictive. Vogler is the first to say that what he calls “the hero’s journey” is only a rough guideline. Not all stories will incorporate all the elements; what goes in depends very much on the needs of the story.

I found, as I read the book, I started asking myself all sorts of questions about my current wip, and by the time I had gone through the book and written all these questions down (and answered them) my mind was boiling with ideas to get my stalled novel kick-started. I also feel I’ve found a deeper layer to my characters.

So, I thought I’d blog about this over the next few weeks. I don’t pretend to be an expert on this. I’m learning how to apply it, but I’ve been fascinated to read books and watch films with it in mind and see its varied applications.

Books and covers

I'm not posting much because I'm wrestling with the current book. It is not behaving itself. I love my characters and I've got some great ideas for later chapters, but getting the beginning right is practically impossible.


On the up side, I just found the lovely cover for my next North American release on amazon. I love this book. I think it's my favourite so far.





I was a bit miffed yesterday evening when my husband disappeared to have a bath and didn't get out again for an hour. We were supposed to be having a little bit of 'together' time.


"How come you were so long?" I huffed.
"I was reading the last two chapters of your book (Her Parenthood Assignment) and I couldn't put it down."
Instantly forgiven.

How did I do?

I checked back on my New Year's Resolutions from last year. I really should hang my head in shame. This is last year's list:

• To sell a second book - Did this! And sold a third.
• To finish the above book (still stuck in Chapter Four) - currently stuck in chapter four of wip. Sensing a pattern.
• To eat more healthily, do more exercise and generally reduce my acreage - the less said about this the better. I am about to do something positive and join my local gym, so I'm hoping I can say something different in 2008.
• To harness my over-active imagination for writing alone and, therefore, stop making mountain ranges out of minor mole hills - imagination still on the loose and way out of control.
• To clean my oven. - Pass me the halo. I did this a number of times.
• To read the Bible in one year - I didn't read the whole thing, but I did manage significant chunks.
• And last, but not least, learn to touch-type properly - I've improved, but I could do better. Must try harder!

Mind you, if anyone else has ticked off all of last year's resolutions they are a saint. My husband hates New Year's Resolutions. He reckons they're a waste of time because nobody ever sticks to them. He's partly right - about me, anyway. But I'm going to have a think about a list again this year anyway.

What's life without goals? I may not have achieved all my goals for last year, but I tried and I've learnt things along the way. I think I would prefer to struggle and fail than sit on my behind and not even try.

Silent Night

...and a silent Christmas for me. I've lost my voice. My husband didn't have to look quite so pleased, did he?

At least he did until I whispered to him that he would have to do all the chatting tomorrow when the family (mine) arrive. But then, since they are related to me, it is highly possible he may not be able to get a word in edgewise. I'm the quiet one in the family.

Anyway, Merry Christmas and I'll be back posting again after the festivities.

Christmas Madness

Yes, the season of complete craziness is upon us. So busy. Kids are overexcited. Husband is doing late shifts, so I've hardly seen him.

The other night my evening meal consisted of Sauvingnon Blanc and large amounts of Bombay Mix. Says it all, really.

Settings: the final showdown

Last in my list of settings for Blind-Date Marriage is the theatre mentioned in the final chapters. I used a real theatre that I have performed in myself (that sounds very grand, but it year upon year of dancing competitions when I was a school girl). Back then it was called Lewisham Theatre, but now it's called The Broadway Theatre.

It's a lovely art deco building that looks a little lived in and I thought it was just the right location for the charity show - a not too-posh-local theatre that hosts shows by local dance schools, pantomimes and acts that were big names a couple of decade ago. I can't seem to post any pictures, but follow the link and you'll get an idea.

Uh-oh

Uh-oh. I’ve been tagged by Donna.

No, no - you don’t need the darkened room and the bare light bulb swinging menacingly from the ceiling. Call off the rottweilers and I’ll answer the questions, I promise!

Four jobs I’ve had:
Dance teacher
Barmaid
Video editor
Church administrator

Four places I’ve lived:
London
London
London
London
Even when I was at college, it was on the other side of London.

Favourite foods:
Salmon – any way, any how.
Lamb (especially curry)
Roast beef
Avocados

Four movies I could watch over and over:
Serendipity
The Mummy
The Breakfast Club
Strictly Ballroom

Four TV shows I enjoy:
Grey’s Anatomy
Gilmore Girls
Strictly Come Dancing/Strictly Dance Fever - although I am in a huge strop since Emma Bunton got kicked off last night. She was clearly the best dancer in the competition.
CSI

Four places I’ve travelled:
Russia
Italy
Germany
France

Four places I’d like to visit:
The Great Pyramid
New York
Australia
Capri

Four websites I visit daily:
eHarlequin
Various blogs
Yahoo groups (to read my email loops)
At the moment, Amazon, to see how BDM is doing – even though I know amazon sales rankings are not that accurate and can be manipulated. Can’t seem to stop myself.

Four people tagged:
Ally Blake
Liz Fenwick
Jessica Raymond
Kate Hardy

Settings: a wonderful date come crashing to the ground.

Jake and Serena spend an idyllic date wining and dining and end up with a trip on the London Eye, (If you follow that link, have a look at the virtual tour) a kind of huge ferris wheel on the banks of the Thames. At the top it's 135m tall and it feels as if you are floating high above the London skyline. None of the surrounding buildings even come close in terms of height.

I thought I was being sooooo original when I used it, but since then I’ve seen it popping up in romances all over the place.

I’ve been on the eye twice and I loved every second. A glass pod carries you up into the sky on the banks of the river. Just opposite are the houses of Parliament and you can clearly see Buckingham Palace and St.Paul’s Cathedral. It might not look very high when you are down on the ground, but considering the tower of Big Ben starts to look titchy and seagulls flying down by the river are only tiny specks of white, looks can be deceiving.

I decided a private pod, a trip at night with the lights of the city sparking like diamonds, would be the perfect setting for a romantic encounter. What could go wrong?

Settings: First Kiss

Next on my list of settings in Blind-Date Marriage is Greenwich Park. My grandmother—Nan, as she liked to be called—looked after me and my sister a lot when we were little and we used to jump on one of those lovely old red double-decker buses and find fun things to do all over south London.


Greenwich Park was a favourite, mostly because it has fantastic grassy hills which are great for rolling down. From where I live you have to cross Blackheath to get to the park which looks like this. I always find it odd to be driving through residential areas and shops one minute and suddenly it all melts away and all you can see is flat, green grass. But the Thames is not far away and the high ground of the heath dips sharply to meet the river not long after you enter Greenwich Park.

There is a fantastic view of the city from the top of the hills. I love the fact I can be sitting in a grassy meadow, the wind blowing the leaves on the branches above my head, and over the other side of the river there is a completely different landscape: glass and stone and steel.

This is where Jake and Serena have their picnic, a little spot called “One Tree Hill”, although it must have been named that a long time ago, because there are plenty of them there now! You can actually see a high-rise council estate from this point, but Ellwood Green (so named because my husband was watching the Blues Brothers when I was wondering what to call it) is a completely fictitious place, although based and bits and pieces of real locations.

Right in the centre of the park on the top of the hill is The Royal Observatory, and a little path below it is where Jake and Serena share their first kiss. Here is the ‘kissing gate’ that Jake gets deliberately stuck in so he can spend more time squashed up against Serena.

And here is the little brass strip in the path that marks the point where the Greenwich meridian – zero degrees longitude – passes through London. I can’t remember a trip to the park where I haven’t stood with one foot on either side of the line, half of me in one hemisphere, half of me in another.

Cataromance review

I was all set to blog about Greenwich Park, but I'm going to have to interrupt myself to post about the review for Blind-Date Marriage on Cataromance. I got five stars!

Here's a snippet:

Blind Date Marriage is simply divine! Warm, witty and engrossing, I devoured this book in one sitting! Fiona Harper has got this wonderful ability to make you fall in love with her gorgeous characters and you will be rooting for them and cheering them on till the very end.

Fiona Harper has written an absolutely fantastic debut novel! Vibrant, moving and emotional, Blind Date Marriage has established Fiona Harper as an amazingly talented writer who is set to be one of the biggest names in romantic fiction!

For the full review go here.

Scene and setting

I’ve blogged about Jake and Serena and how they met. Over the next few days I'm going to post about the places in my Blind-Date Marriage. I always love seeing authors’ inspiration for settings and finding out if they match the pictures in my imagination.

Here’s a pic of Jake’s flat. I love these tall, red-brick Victorian apartments. Of course, I'd need to sell a kidney and probably a couple of limbs to afford one in London...

And this is the sort of house I envisiged Serena and her father living in - although in my imagination, the stairs were on the other side and there was an ivy-covered path leading round to the back door.

Dreaming up locations for books is great, because there are no mortgages and the only limit is my imagination. I happily trawl through property web sites looking for inspiration - even if I have to remind myself I house-hunting for my characters, not for myself.

I'm everywhere today!

If you want to know a bit about my rollercoaster journey to publication, visit the fabulous Pink Heart Society today where I am featured on Writers' Wednesday.

Also, I've discovered that Blind-Date Marriage is being featured on the read with the hostie section of eHarlequin's message boards this week. If you've read it and want to natter, pop in and say what you think.

Now what?

So, I have a hero and a heroine. Now what? They had to have a reason to meet, a reason for their very different worlds to collide. And sometimes the oddest things provide inspiration.

When my editor asked if I wanted a dedication in Blind-Date Marriage I didn’t have to think too long. When I emailed it to her she responded by saying it was “strange, but nice”. It reads:

For the unknown man I soaked while driving through a puddle.

One rainy October morning I was driving along a road I know, but don’t use very often. Since the rain was heavy, puddles were collecting near the kerb and I drove through one not realising how deep it was. As my tyres hit the puddle a spray of water a good four-feet high flew into the air and soaked a poor man passing by.

I felt awful, but chickened out of stopping to apologise as I was on my own and didn’t want to aggravate an instance of ‘puddle-rage’. At the same time I was scolding myself for my cowardice, my brain was whirring.

What a great way for my hero and heroine to meet, I thought. What if she was brave enough to stop? Where would they both have been going? And before I knew it I had an idea for the opening of my story. The location changed and so did the car, unfortunately, but the basic nugget of the idea was in place.

Heroine inspiration

Serena in Blind-Date Marriage is a bit of a contradiction. This picture from a fashion spread was as close as I could come to pinning her down.

She’s got a slightly unusual, boho style and Jake thinks she looks like a “bean sprouts and tofu kind of girl”. But if he thought that meant she wasn’t looking for a traditional relationship, he was sorely mistaken. Her unusual background has led her to crave the soap-commercial family life more than other girls.

That was my starting idea for Serena – a girl who might look unconventional on the outside, but inside wanted the fairytale so badly she could taste it. Just the right kind of girl to attract a commitment-phobic accountant with a gift for jumping to conclusions.

I like creating heroines who don’t fit the mould, whether that’s because of the way they dress or the way they look or think. Maybe it’s because I used to like being a little different myself.

As a teenager, I didn’t rebel much, only in what I wore by becoming what was labelled a ‘goth’. Most of my gothic friends were intelligent and sensible and it was okay visit art galleries together to look at pre-Raphaelite paintings and show each other our depressing poems. I look back now and wonder how I didn’t realise how pretentious we were sometimes, but I suppose that is the joy of being young: knowing everything except yourself.

Here’s a picture of me trying to look moody at the tail end of my gothic phase. I do have one where I have a six-inch Mohican and blue lipstick (I was going to a Siouxsie and the Banshees concert, I think), but thankfully, I couldn’t find it.

While I am nothing like Serena – she’s much braver emotionally than I will ever be – her personal style owes a little to my teenage love of dangly jewellery and long, swishy skirts.

Dreaming up a hero...

I don’t know about you, but I love finding out the inspiration for other people’s stories – where the characters came from, why they chose a certain setting for a certain scene. I’m completely addicted to director’s commentaries on DVDs. I sometimes enjoy all the talk about which scenes they cut and how they used such-and-such and image more than the film itself.

Anyway, I thought I would blog about some of the inspiration behind Blind-Date Marriage. All of those who hate this kind of thing, prepare to hit the fast-forward button…now!

I’m going to start with my delicious hero, Jake. I’m not one of those people who can pick a picture of someone famous and use them as my hero. Even if I start off with a picture the character in my head starts to differ from them as I get more and more into the book.

The best I can do with is give you a picture of someone who is the closest match I can find. For Jake, it’s James Purefoy, and if you want to see a whole host of droolworthy pictures you’ll have to head on over to the Pink Heart Society and take a look at their most recent Male on Monday.

Jake likes to think he’s a tough businessman in control of his life. I felt so sorry for him when he met Serena and suddenly all his cool seemed to take a hike. But that’s what you get for denying who you really are and ignoring a whole side of your personality. Eventually it’s going to rear up and bite you on the bum.

Jake is much more creative than he gives himself credit for. He has a runaway imagination that quite often gets him into trouble and sometimes stops him seeing what is straight in front of his face.

I don’t exactly know where the idea for Jake came from. I just decided I wanted to write about a hero who had a very creative side that he wanted to hide. The idea drifted round in my head for quite a while until I decided he could team up very nicely with another character I’d been day-dreaming about. I’ll blog more about the heroine who brings him to his knees next time.

Proof!

I snuck back into W H Smith and took a photo of Blind-Date Marriage on the shelf. I asked a member of staff if it would be okay first. She clearly thought I was barking mad. But here's the proof:

Fifty-three

On a scale of one to ten, fifty-three is how excited I am today.

I was walking down my local high street and decided to duck into Smith's to see if my book was on the shelves. The fact I had checked at six o'clock yesterday evening to find last month's books (well, only one) still on the shelves made no difference. So, how shocked was I when I came face to face with a newly stocked display and my book happily sitting there, looking as if it hadn't a qualm in the world about being next to big name authors?

I'll tell you how shocked I was. After staring it for about five minutes and quite literally not being able to tear myself away, I walked straight out of the shop. And then I walked right back in again, because I'd completely forgotten I'd been on my way to buy drawing paper for the girls and inkjet cartridges. (Of course, I had to have another look on the way out of the shop as well.)

I then bumped into my mother-in-law, who I promptly dragged back in to have a look at my book on the shelf. And what do you think? There was a lovely lady filling up her basket with Mills & Boons and mine was in there! I saw someone buying my book! That was the point at which I did a little happy dance right there in front of the display.

Of course, then I had to explain myself and I got chatting to the lady in question.

So, hello to the lovely Dilys. Thanks for buying my book and I hope your dream of one day dancing with Anton Du Beke comes true. You made my day.

Kate's stockings

Now before you all think I've decided to write something a little steamier than a Romance, let me put you straight. Kate Walker is running a Christmas competition on her website and she has two Christmas stockings stuffed full of books to give away.


Blind-Date Marriage is going to be part of the prize bundle along with:

• Christmas Kids and Kisses - 3in1 including Kate's "The Christmas Baby Gift".
• Accepting the Boss's Proposal - by Natasha Oakley. (I've read this and it was fantastic. Jemima was a wonderfully real and sympathetic heroine and Miles was just plain yummy.)
• The Italian Doctor's Bride by Margaret McDonagh. (The Pink Heart Society gave this a fab review).
• White-Hot by Trish Wylie. (This one made me laugh and cry. Gives a whole new meaning to the phrase "pants on fire" and no, I'm not going to explain, you'll just have to read it!)
• Chosen as the Frenchman's Bride by Abby Green. (Haven't managed to get my sticky paws on this one yet, but I wanna!)
• The Italian Billionaire's Virgin by Christina Hollis. (Brand new Modern Romance/Presents author).
• A Mistress for the Taking by Annie West. (Sitting on my to-be-read pile this very minute!)

And there may be more to be added.

Rain and rainbows

Yesterday I got wet. Really wet. I had been to the post office to post some books to Kate Walker (more on that later...) and got back to the playground to pick up my kids about twenty minutes early. Stupidly, I decided to wait.

It started to rain, freezing cold spiky drops. By the time my girls came out of school (late, of course, due to chatting with their friends - don't know where they get that from), I was absoluely soaked. The rain had gone through my raincoat and my legs were wet almost up to my knees. My trousers were the sort that stretch when they get damp, so they were trailing in the puddles by the time we left.

But life has a funny way of making up for raining on your parade (or school run, even). As we turned to leave the playground, we saw the most fantastic rainbow I have ever seen. A perfect arch, so bright you could see the colours repeating twice underneath the main bands. Not only that, there was a fainter one above it, making it a double rainbow.

I ran home with my soggy trousers, ditched them at the front door and ran upstairs to take a picture out of my daughter's bedroom window.



There. Isn't that beautiful?

You'll just have to come back tomorrow to see why I was posting things to Kate Walker...

RNA Winter Party

I’ve been a busy bunny the last couple of days. Wednesday night was the RNA’s Winter Party and I also attended the RNA ‘Money Day’ on Thursday. Very useful, but more about that later.

Anyone who has read my blog recently and accused me of being organised would have had their opinion overturned if they had seen me trying to work out how to secure my coat on the hanger (plus lockable wire) in the cloakroom of the Institute of Mechanical Engineers. Thank goodness Liz was with me and came to my rescue. I could have been there all night trying to work out which way to thread the wire.

The library at Imeche, as it is known, is a great place for a literary party. It’s a lovely old room, stuffed full of bookcases and has lovely warm-coloured wood and wrought iron all over the place. While having my first glass of wine, a few of us perused the titles of the books nearest us. Not very romantic. Although there was one called ‘Internal Fire’, or something like that. Sounds a bit like an M&B from the eighties or Modern Extra to me. Not much evocative about ‘Theory of Gas Turbines’, though.

I had a great time (waves to anyone I met) talking to old friends, new friends, authors, editors and agents. I’m hopeless at networking, though. I forget all about it and just yak. I had a rather hairy moment in the middle of a heated discussion about CSI with some of the lovely M&B staff, though. Someone mentioned how cute they thought Nick was and, in my eagerness to agree, I choked on my wine.

Liz and I were very good and, because we had the RNA money day to attend the next day, resisted attempts to lure us out to drinks and dinner afterwards. Seriously, we should have haloes. I was going to post a photo of me and Liz, but I’m looking far too shiny and I have hamster cheeks.

Yummy Christmas food

My favourite thing about Christmas dinner is the bread sauce (picture me drooling right now just thinking about it) and my recipe is being featured on the Christmas recipe swap at eHarlequin.

Now, for all of you not in the UK (and probably thinking "Eeewwww!"), you can't knock it until you've tried it. Just imagine a nice succulent slice of turkey breast smothered with the most creamy, comforting sauce you could ever imagine. Just add a little dollop of cranberry sauce and you have perfection. The acidity of the cranberries set off the creaminess of the bread sauce beautifully. Scrummy.

My husband's family were all a bit sceptical when I brought it along to Christmas dinner many moons ago. But then again these people think pickled onions are a suitable accompniament to Christmas dinner. Nuff said. Now they beg me to bring some bread sauce every year.

Actually, even better than Christmas dinner is the leftovers sandwich I make on Boxing day: thick slices of fresh bread, turkey breast, pork and chestnut stuffing, bread sauce and cranberry sauce. Mmmmmm.

Great review!

I woke up this morning and found my book reviewed on the Pink Heart Society review blog.

If you haven’t found the Pink Heart Society blog yet, go and have a look here. It’s a great site dedicated to celebrating romantic fiction. They have great articles every day. Go and have a squizz!

Back to my review…

I was really thrilled with it. The reviewer said:

Blind date marriage is a humorous and touching story with a riveting plot, plenty of action and a loveable, quirky heroine. It’s written in a young, contemporary style and I absolutely loved it. A book you should not miss!

It got five out of five hearts in all the review categories: Hero Hotness Factor, Heroine lovability factor, Awww factor, Stickability factor, Humour factor and Weepy factor.

Wooo-hoooo!

Staying focused

Right. I said I’d post about what I did to tidy up Make Up to Break Up (Magic Hour) when the revisions came in. If I leave a note about it here I shall be able to come back to it when I’m panicking about the next book.

Okay, that’s not going to help. I’m already panicking about the next book and I haven’t even started it. I think it’s the literary equivalent of stage fright. My first book is out in the shops in a few weeks and I’m terrified people won’t like it – especially people that know me.

It seems to be having a knock on effect and I’m second guessing myself about book four and trying to be far too clever in the plot and structuring rather than just starting to write the darn thing.

Anyway, that’s beside the point. Paranoia aside, this is what I did to help myself focus on the central conflict of Make Up to Break Up:

1.I did a GMC (Goal, Motivation, Conflict) chart. I didn’t go back and tinker with the one I did before I started the book; I did a new one based on what I knew about the characters now. It ended up being much meatier and more focused – especially the internal conflict.

2. I made a table with a row for each chapter and two columns: one for Nick and one for Adele. Then I wrote in what their goals were at each stage and what they were feeling. Not in great detail, just the main points. If their goal/emotional state was the same for a couple of chapters, it didn’t matter. I was giving myself a road map of their emotional journeys.

3. I printed out another chart (can you tell I love diagrams and charts?) a row for each scene and, using my emotional road map from no.2, I filled in what the main emotional focus of each scene should be, bearing in mind my editor’s suggestions. Then, when I revised each scene, I would check the little bit of blurb I wrote for each one. Anything that didn’t help the scene run in that direction was history. Whole pages of meaningless bickering disappeared instantly.

Now, I know this approach will send some people running for the hills screaming, but it works for me. When I have too many conflicting ideas swirling round my head I need to anchor them down in some way and creating something visual like a chart helps me focus. And at the end of the day, this was what this story had lacked: focus.

The things to strengthen it were already there in the text, but they’d just got muddied by a lot of extra stuff. In other words, my attempt at adding complex, layered conflict. I can’t remember where I read it recently (it may have been a Q&A on eharlequin) but someone said about conflict: Keep it simple. Keep it deep. I’m going to repeat that to myself while writing the next book.

Five things

Oo-er. I’ve been tagged by Jess to list “Five Things You May Not Know About Me”.

Here goes:

1. I’m half Scottish. My grandmother was a Robertson, so if I have a clan to belong to – that’s it. King Duncan (the one who was murdered by Macbeth) is way back in my line of ancestors.

2.I was born prematurely – two months early – and weighed only 4lbs.

3. I have tinnitus, the condition where I hear noises in my head that aren’t really there. (I’m not bonkers, I promise!) I manage to ignore it most of the time, but when it’s very quiet I can always hear a high-pitched whine – a bit like the noise you used to get when BBC closed down for the night.

4. I’m addicted to playing Tomb Raider. A kick-ass heroine who gets to explore beautiful locations and exotic temples – what’s not to like?

5. I’m married to a forensic scientist. I can snort at CSI like a pro now. Why, oh why, do they do everything in the dark? Use the light switch, for goodness’ sake! Having said that, I love the show and watch it every week – even if I have it on good authority that half of the fingerprints on their computer are upside-down.

A note from Sharon, the creator of People Collection (which seems to have originated this "Five Things..." list), says: PLEASE LEAVE THE FOLLOWING IN ALL ‘PEOPLE COLLECTION’ POSTS:Remember that it isn’t always the sensational stuff that writers are looking for, it can just as easily be something that you take for granted like having raised twins or knowing how to grow beetroot. Mind you, if you know how to fly a helicopter or have worked as a film extra, do feel free to let the rest of us know about it! :)

I tag two Liz Fs: Liz Fielding and Liz Fenwick!

It just gets better

Oooh! And I've just realised it's up on eHarlequin too!


Go on. Treat yourself for Christmas!

On sale!

Very excited. Blind-Date Marriage is on sale at Mills&Boon.co.uk.

It's finally happened. People can buy a book I wrote. Hee hee. Don't all start a stampede now.

...Oh, go on then, if you really want to!