" I will repay you for the years the locusts have eaten -
the great locust and the young locust,
the other locusts and the locust swarm –
my great army that I sent among you."
Joel 2:25 (NIV)
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In my many years of reading, there have only been a couple of times when I've actually liked a story in which I didn't like the characters. I don't remember the books, but I remember being surprised that in spite of the characters I managed to like the story. In other words that doesn't happen very often. In fact, I think it's probably rare. Characters are the life blood of fiction. We never forget our favorite characters, and if we remember them, then it's a pretty safe statement to say that we will remember the story.
Some of you know my process for writing is what has been termed by the writing community as "seat of the pants" as opposed to creating a story outline, using a story board, making a list, lots of notes, or some other organized preparation before the endeavor begins. Very occasionally, I will make notes as to what must happen a little farther along in the story just to make sure it's included, but my novel writing consists of allowing some character(s) to enter my brain, simmering beneath the actual "pen-to-paper" progress, establishing a personality in its most basic appearance, physically and emotionally, and then pressing my conscious awareness to begin writing. And, if I wait too long, the character nags me relentlessly. Generally, I have no idea what the real story is going to be, but I know I have to proceed with this character. Saying no is not an option.
I said no to the murder mystery I finally finished (Race) for probably two years until it just wouldn't go away, and I knew it had to be written. It was by the far the hardest novel I've ever had to write. If I hadn't had "Patrick" helping me with police procedural and other investigative information, I never could've written the story. One would think since I almost exclusively read mysteries, suspense, and thrillers, it would come easy. Not even a little bit easy. I admire mystery, suspense, and thriller writers beyond my ability to express. I don't know how my favorite authors in those genres can pull them off with such skilled effectiveness.
I believe my strength as an author is in character creation and development. I think it comes from a love for people and the struggles we all face in our imperfections. My desire is to entice the reader to invest in my characters in order to care what happens to them. If you love the character(s), you'll most likely enjoy the novel. Let me take it one step farther. I want my readers to find themselves in my characters, to think these are authentic "people" so the readers can relate to them on some level. I thank God for any traits in me that produce something meaningful in story form. Truly: apart from Him, I can do nothing.
Do you remember anything specific about why your favorite characters became your favorites?
Father, you're an amazing, benevolent God. You are the Creator. We celebrate the beauty and do our best to use what you've given each one of us for your glory. Thank you is never enough. In the Name of Jesus, Amen.
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REMEMBERED
He hoped this hadn’t been a bad idea, but even if it was, there weren’t a lot of choices as far as he was concerned. Why not go back to his roots? He just hoped she was still here right where she’d always been. How old must she be by now? At least 80 he figured. What if she was in some kind of facility? Not her. He couldn’t imagine it.
He drove his black Bronco II up the long gravel drive to the house, the hot dust spinning around behind him no matter how slow he attempted to go. No rain around here in awhile. Typical hot summer day. He reached the asphalt circular drive, the irrigated summer flowers brightly surrounding it on each side. He admired the sprawling Spanish style ranch house and put the vehicle in park, shutting it off. He stayed inside it for an extra minute trying to remember why he thought he should come here, but he knew. In his heart he knew. Heaving a weary sigh, he got out and walked along the stone path leading up to the exotic design of the carved double door. He knocked, a firm knock that spoke of a confidence he didn’t feel or own.
It took so long for her to answer he was just about to head back to his rig. He stayed put when he heard the big door open.
There she stood, a tiny wisp of a woman leaning on a cane on her right side. Her grey hair with a few black strands remaining was cut stylishly short and held its shape on her narrow head. She wore Levis and a bright yellow western blouse with white vertical stripes and matching dainty yellow and white sandals on her small narrow feet. Her blue eyes sparkled bright as he remembered how they always seemed to look right through him . . . and still did.
“Grams,” he greeted her quietly with the name he and many others had always known her by.
She narrowed her gaze and cocked her head just slightly. Then she took her long thin left arm and reached up to grab his right arm and turn him just enough to where she could see his dark auburn hair pulled neatly back and tied with a leather string in a ponytail resting just below the nape of his neck. Then she pulled him back to face her.
“Tommy, that you?” she asked matter-of-factly.
“Yeah, Grams, it’s me,” he replied, realizing she was the only one on the face of this earth who could still get away with calling him “Tommy”.
She turned and began talking as she walked back into the house, expecting him to follow which he did. “Hank Jr. always used to like his hair grown all long like that. You know it drove Ace crazy. I think that’s why he did it. Course by the time he went into the military, all those pretty locks ended up on the floor, but he never really minded.”
She walked all the way into the kitchen before she turned around again and told him to have a seat at the kitchen table. The place was immaculate and it was like stepping into a fancy hacienda in Mexico—at least what he imagined one would look like.
“Something to drink?”
“A coke if you have it, please, Grams.”
“Of course I have a coke. Couldn’t live without it myself. Best drink on the face of the planet,” she said adamantly as she went to the modern stainless steel refrigerator and slid a glass into the alcove that produced ice. She filled two glasses with ice and then produced two cans of coke. “Here ya go.”
“Thanks.”
“So how old are ya now?” she asked, calculating in her mind how long it had been since she’d seen him. “’Bout 30 or so?”
“Yeah, 31, almost 32.”
“Seen some trouble, huh?” Compassion evident in her voice.
He laughed slightly. “I think you’re the only one who could ever read my mind,” he answered, solemnity taking hold.
“Ain’t about readin’ minds, Tommy. I always thought you pretty much put everything right out there for a person to see if they’d just look, you know?”
He smiled at the old woman, appreciation for her straightforward ways welling up inside of him. “What’s with the cane, Grams?”
She gave the cane a horrible look of disgust. “Temporary, my boy. Hip replacement. Won’t be long and I won’t need it anymore.” She paused. “I almost didn’t use the darn thing, but when the doctor threatened me with the alternatives should I lose my balance and yada, yada, yada, I decided I wasn’t too proud to use it. For a short season, you know.”
He took a drink of his coke, the cold welcome burn sliding down his throat.
“So you need a place to stay?”
“I do, Grams. But you know I’ll work for it. Anything you want done, I’ll do.”
She eyed him. “That bad, huh? Well, you know there’s always plenty to do, son. I don’t run the farm anymore. Leased out the hay fields. A good family operates it like Ace would’ve done, so it’s alright.”
“How long has it been now, Grams?”
“Ten years.” She paused and gazed across the room. “Seems like just yesterday he’d be comin’ in from the fields for supper. Darn him. The old soldier made it to see Jesus before me. We used to argue about it, you know. He insisted he’d beat me to Him. True to his word . . .” Her voice trailed off.
Father, you're the whole reason I can put two words together, write a story, come up with a title. Apart from you, I can do nothing. Thank you is never enough. In the Name of Jesus, Amen.
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So which do you prefer? If you enjoy reading series novels, do you prefer to read them in your favorite genre or do you prefer to go outside your favorite to read a series?
Do you prefer a series which features one character in various stories (such as Mitch Rapp, John Milton, Raleigh Harmon)?
If not, do you like a series with a continuation of each of the characters from the first novel getting center stage in each additional book (such as The Bradford Sisters Series by Becky Wade)?
Father, thank you again and again for your authors. You've given such amazing gifts and talents. May you bless your writers and your readers. In the Name of Jesus, Amen.
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My favorite of Elton John's multiple hits. Love this song even to this day.
Father, you give the talents. Only you know the hearts of mankind. Only you save souls. In the Name of Jesus, Amen.
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Smoke Signal by L. T. Ryan and Brian Shea is Book 4 in the Rachel Hatch Novel series. Hatch (aka Rachel Hatch) returns home from Africa after discovering the source of and resolving the murder of her father. While she survives the physical and emotional ordeal and learns some new life lessons, she can't help but wonder if she'll be able to find "normal". She's missed her mom after beginning to re-establish a relationship with her before she left, her loving niece and nephew, and, more than she can admit to herself, she's missed Dalton Savage.
In the emotional sense, neither Hatch nor Dalton can muster up the courage to declare their genuine feelings for each other. Dalton's clumsy with his, showing his attachment and respect to her via offering her a position working with him as a deputy. Hatch is afraid of her feelings for him, needs a break from a committed position in law enforcement and all that procedural hoopla to be instated would require. Her real question is whether or not she can find or lead a "normal" life, having nearly lost hers on more than one occasion in sanctioned battles at war and in private battles to discover who murdered her father. Although she needs time off to regroup with her mom and her dead sister's kids, the investigation Dalton is working has her itching to help him with his current case.
On a brief impromptu hiking endeavor to express her desire to confront their "relationship", everything that can go wrong does. It's a life and death struggle to get back to the house where Hatch has to figure out how to protect them all.
Okay, I've gotta say this: I'm impressed that these two male authors were able to emotionally bring me to tears with the ending to this Book 4. And I mean real tears. They captured a hardened female soldier's emotional state with perfection according to the character they'd created, and it literally broke my heart. Well done, Gentlemen.
(Some profanity.)
Father, you know hearts, minds, bodies. All of us, each of us. Only you save souls. Bless these men as they write. Minister as only you can do. In the Name of Jesus, Amen.
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Then he continued, "Do not be afraid, Daniel. Since the first day that you set your mind to gain understanding and to humble yourself before your God, your words were heard, and I have come in response to them. But the prince of the Persian kingdom resisted me twenty-one days. Then Michael, one of the chief princes, came to help me, because I was detained there with the king of Persia. Now I have come to explain to you what will happen to your people in the future, for the vision concerns a time yet to come."
Daniel 10:12-14 (NIV)
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Five questions for you:
Do you have a favorite male and female character or characters from a novel, a movie, and a television series?
Do you enjoy Christmas shopping whether you do it online or in person?
Setting aside the political ruination of professional sports, do you have a favorite professional sport?
If you've read more than one of my novels, do you have a favorite?
Do you have a favorite slang expression?
Father, you make each of us unique in some way and then surprise us with our similarities. Thank you for your creativity and Creation. You left us beauty in spite of us. Apart from you, we can do nothing. In the Name of Jesus, Amen.
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I've spoken here before about my Forewords. Well, here's the one from my novel Sweet Release. Feel free to leave your thoughts.
FOREWORD
Be warned: this is Christian fiction. From start to finish.
We are constantly besieged with what the world calls “love”. This book was written as a stark contrast to the multi-layered attempts of the world to define love. When I began this novel, I had no idea it would take the direction it did, but as with all of my writing, I trust the Lord has the contents in His beautiful, creative hands, and I am so blessed to go along for the ride.
Love, romance, and sex are the subjects of endless books, films, television shows, and various other media efforts. Some of those efforts are educational and informative, others are purely for entertainment, and yet others demonstrate the most perverse nature of mankind. In Christian literature authors in the non-fiction arena strive to inform us about God’s intentions for us in love, sex, and romance. They try to diligently address the “normal” as well as the terribly destructive roadblocks to achieving freedom in learning to love at the spiritual, emotional, and physical levels. It is a divine task given the nature of our souls and the condition of our world.
Since God is Love (1John 4:16), and since He is the Creator of lovemaking (Genesis 2:24-25), it is my heart’s desire to give readers a picture of the way relationships should be in contrast to what the world tries to sell us as the “real” thing. Christian couples are not immune to the hard sell of the worldly style of love, romance, and sex. Many have never been presented with a contrasting viewpoint. To me that’s tragic.
Every now and then I need a novel that illustrates the goodness, passion, and the lighter side of being a human in love. A story of people finding love, working through their pain or hardship, finding real truth and meaning in their lives . . . Having said all that, I give you Sweet Release and hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it.
Most of my writing is for adult readers, and this novel is no exception.
Father, thank you for every inspiration, story, word. Apart from you, I can do nothing. And thank you is never enough. In the Name of Jesus, Amen.
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Melinda Leigh's Book 2 See Her Die is a good follow up to Book 1 Cross Her Heart of the Bree Taggert novels.
Bree Taggert is the newly appointed sheriff, replacing the crooked but apparently well-liked man before her. There are still some loyalties to the former sheriff, but mostly she's earned the respect of the deputies even though there seems to be a residual resentment from a couple of them. Now she's facing a mysterious shooting on the frozen lake at a closed resort where two young women have been squatting in one of the cabins without heat other than the fireplace and no plumbing.
Besides no evidence of blood on the ice, there is no body. The young woman who reported the shooting of her friend said she woke up to the absence of her friend, her keys and wallet also missing. She went outside to see her vehicle still there and looked through the snowy woods to find her friend but instead came upon a male and her friend out on the lake.
When Bree takes her to the station for questioning, she learns the two girls are homeless but met in a shelter. This girl, Alyssa, is holding something back although her fear is real. Bree decides to put her up in a motel and takes her shopping for some necessities since her backpack is in evidence but she experiences a harrowing incident inside the store.
Meanwhile, the man Matt Flynn, who used to be an investigator with the police force until he was injured, is still hopeful that he and Bree can make something work between them. He's a K-9 specialist and his sister operates a dog rescue that Matt helps with. Bree is terrified of dogs after having been mauled as a child by one of her dad's dogs. Matt does his best to help her address her fear.
When mutilated bodies start turning up in places on the frozen lake, Bree hires Matt to help with the investigation since he's trying to find a missing young man who could be related to the case.
It's not an uncommon plot where the killer's motivation is concerned, but there are multiple crimes and suspects to keep the story interesting. Melinda does a good job of disguising the killer, making the reader shiver in the icy cold, fear for potential victims, and feel the frustration of hitting dead ends in the pursuit of a vicious murderer.
See Her Die covers a lot of territory as far as human emotions, fears, psychopathy, and real needs. The conclusion counters the ugliness of the murders and provides the reader with a positive ending – and two effective visits from characters in one of Melinda's other series.
Profanity present.
Father, you know hearts and minds and the thoughts of humanity. Only you save souls. Please continue to bless Melinda's life and her writing. In the Name of Jesus, Amen.
