Cass Elliot #Crime Novels are #FREE and 50% off during the #SmashwordsSummerSale through July 31

Ahh, a holiday. What could be better than diving into a new book? Settle in for some great summer reading during the Smashwords Summer Sale! You'll find loads of books on sale - many for free, including the first book in the Cass Elliot Crime Series.

Grab a few books (on sale!) for your vacation and find new authors to love!

The first book in the Cass Elliot Crime Series, THE DEVIL OF LIGHT, is FREE! Books two and three, AVENGERS OF BLOOD and A CASE OF SOUR GRAPES, are 50% off!

An Unexpected Antagonist - The Character We Love to Hate #amwriting #amreading

A reader recently asked me which of the baddies in my books has been my favorite - which did I have the most fun writing about and making readers love to hate.





That made me pause, because I don't view my characters in terms of good or bad. My characters just are. They each develop the role they play, and each has their own personality. But with a little prodding, I realized that the character I get the most feedback about as detestable is a police officer named Hugo Petchard. He showed up completely unexpectedly as I wrote THE DEVIL OF LIGHT, but as with all of my characters, he popped up at just the right time. I thought he would be a minor character and perhaps come and go quickly, but without fail he has turned up in all three Cass Elliot novels. Although he does play a minor role most of the time, he and his love interest ended up dramatically impacting the plot in AVENGERS OF BLOOD.

Let me tell you a little about him, and then you can tell us what you think about his detest-ability:

Officer Hugo Petchard is an absolute snot, a big fish in a small pond. (In his own mind, he pronounces his name PetCHARD, with a kind of French flair. But when readers speak about him, they call him PETcherd, with a bit of a redneck twang - he really hates that.) Despite having been given the grand name of Hugo, he’s small in stature, which bothers him mightily. Petchard has his job because his daddy has money and the Forney County Sheriff, Bill Hoffner, owes Daddy for making significant campaign contributions. Deep down, Petchard suspects that he doesn’t have what it takes to be a real police officer. That unacknowledged insecurity makes him show off in ways that inevitably lead to embarrassment for himself, his fellow officers, and occasionally the entire sheriff’s department.


Petchard is the kind of person we’ve all worked with who thinks he’s important / intelligent / gorgeous / witty / and dead sexy - why wouldn't everyone adore him and why isn't he already in charge around here? In reality, he's a bumbling buffoon and totally incapable of self examination. Petchard is the guy who raises your blood pressure with a single superior snort. He’s that co-worker: the one the boss tolerates despite his incompetence, the one the boss refuses to fire. It’s a blast to put Petchard in positions where he has the potential to succeed, but because he can’t contain his ego, he ends up falling on his face. It’s also fun to put Sheriff Hoffner in the position of having to defend Petchard’s stupidity to keep the campaign dollars flowing.


Writing scenes where Petchard appears makes me laugh and cringe at the same time. I love and hate him in equal measure. My other characters seem to simply despise him.

What do you think? Is Hugo Petchard the kind of character you could love to hate?

Cass Elliot #Crime Novels are only 99cents thru July 4th!

You know it's true. Some folks just need killin'. They really do.

Play it safe - read the Cass Elliot Crime Novels and stay out of jail this summer.

On sale for 99cents through July 4, 2016.

Happy 4th of July!

Cass Elliot #Crime Novels - #99cent Christmas #Book #Sale

As a thank you to everyone who has shown an interest in the Cass Elliot Crime series, the ebooks are only 99cents from Christmas Day through New Year's Day.

Click on a cover below to meet the characters you'll love, and those you'll love to hate!

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

What Do You Do When Your #Characters Won't Shut Up? #amwriting

Has a character ever invaded your head and refused to move? It happened to me when I finished AVENGERS OF BLOOD, the second Cass Elliot Crime Novel, and it was quite annoying. You know what it's like when you finish a novel. You edit like crazy, obsess over the cover, finally get to the point when you're satisfied, push the 'publish' button, and collapse.




Then you write the next book.




That's what I dug in to do. But one of the characters who appeared about halfway through AVENGERS OF BLOOD wouldn't leave my head. Her name is Maxine Leverman and we learned that she's Cass Elliot's best friend from childhood, that they lost touch during Maxine's marriage years, and that she's come home to Arcadia because she wants Cass to find the man who raped her, and then kill him. That's where we left things at the end of AVENGERS OF BLOOD.

Sounds simple enough, right? I expected that she'd show up in the next Cass Elliot Novel as the hunt for the rapist continued, probably as a subplot since I already had an idea for the next Cass novel.

But Maxine wouldn't shut up. She kept popping up at random times, enticing me into thinking about what could happen next for her. I was working on that third Cass Elliot novel but making little headway and finally decided that to get rid of Maxine, I'd have to write her out of my head.

So I decided to do it.

Trouble was, I didn't have a place in my imaginary Forney County for Maxine. I didn't know how she fit in the world. I was whining about this one day to the gals I work with in real life, and they came up with the idea of a private investigative firm. One even offered a name: Lost and Found (thanks Babby!). It was perfect. There's no way Maxine could be a real police detective like her friend Cass, but she might be able to work as a PI. That was settled; Maxine had a place in the world.

But then I realized I had a bigger problem: Maxine needed a mystery to solve, and I didn't have one for her.




Over time, I've realized that my story lines reflect my outrage over an injustice that I believe hasn't been satisfied. My outrage at the time of the Maxine drama was directed toward the men who cheated on several of my friends. Mid-life crisis, alcohol / drug fueled idiotic decision making, or a savior complex, it didn't matter. They all had inane and mundane reasons for cheating, and they lost women who had financial and community resources. They lost family, friends, their reputations.

One even had to leave town.

Stupid. All of them.

When one of your friends is in this situation, there's little you can do to ease her pain except be there, and help her excavate his electronic devices.




Unless you're me: then you write him into a novel and kill him.




Suddenly, I had a mystery for Maxine: a cheating spouse who's disappeared, a wife who's desperate to find him and stop him hemorrhaging their money, and a newbie PI at Lost and Found Investigations who secretly takes the case.

That's where A CASE OF SOUR GRAPES came from, and as irritated as I was with Maxine for banging around in my head for so long, I'm grateful she did. I absolutely love the book, the characters, and the story. I hope you do, too.

I was serious when I wrote the title of this post: what do you do when your characters won't shut up?


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Book Signing and Jazz with @VivraPatricia in Henderson TX Friday, June 26

Join fellow East Texas author Vivra Beene and myself on Friday night, June 26 at MoJoe's Coffee Cafe in downtown Henderson, Texas. We'll be signing books, reading a few passages, and enjoying live jazz by guitarist Martyn Popey. (You want to hear Vivra read. She's Welsh. Her paranormal stories are spooky. Enough said. And you want to hear Martyn play. He's phenomenal. And my husband. Enough said.)

Our event starts at six o'clock and ends at eight, when a live band takes the stage from Martyn. You can find MoJoe's on Facebook for details and directions.

We hope to see you there!

Going to a Book Signing with no #Books to Sign! What's an #author to do?

I received an invitation Wednesday night to attend another author's book signing Thursday evening, along with an offer to sign my books, too. (Yes, the other author is a generous gal.) There's only one problem: I have no books to sign.

Head. Desk.

Bad Gae-Lynn. Very bad.

But I'm not one to surrender easily, and in this instance, PowerPoint and sugar are my friends. Here's what I pulled together Thursday morning:

• Bowls of hard candy and chocolate. Everybody loves sugar. Right?

• A PowerPoint slideshow promoting my new book, A CASE OF SOUR GRAPES, due out this month. I set the slideshow to cycle for 15 seconds on the first slide and 45 seconds on the second slide. I folded my keyboard back and set my computer up vertically, creating an automated poster from the slides. Small, but effective.

• I used PowerPoint again to whip up some bookmarks...

• ...and an email sign up sheet.

• I packed up the two hard copy books I have (one of THE DEVIL OF LIGHT and one of AVENGERS OF BLOOD), a bottle of water, pens, and a pad of paper in my nifty Union Jack bag, and headed off.

The result? Thunderstorms and flood warnings aside, all in all, it was a great evening. I spent a few hours with my wonderful niece and toured the historic Rusk County Library in downtown Henderson, Texas; met local author Vivra Beene (an absolute hoot and a joy to talk to) and purchased a copy of her book (click on Vivra's name above to go to Amazon and check out her short story collection); met several new readers; gave away a few bookmarks and picked up new names for my email list; saw THE DEVIL OF LIGHT on its first library shelf; and took an order for ten more books for the Rusk County libraries.

Not a bad evening at all. The good news? (Once I order books,) I'm ready for the next book signing!

Now please, tell me I'm not the only one. Do you have any advice for the unprepared author?

Mystery, Thriller, and Suspense #Book Extravaganza - #99cents on January 2 only!

That's right, Book Addicts!

For one day only, 26 mystery, thriller, and suspense authors come together to offer a total of 34 books for only 99cents each. This is the first time AVENGERS OF BLOOD, the second Cass Elliot Crime Novel, goes on sale.

And that's not all. Join in the fun on Facebook for giveaways, interaction with the authors, and a chance to discover new books to love.

Catch all the action from 12:01 a.m. through midnight January 2nd!

Join us on Facebook (click here) and browse the books at dougdorow.com.

Happy 2015!

Have Your Characters Ever Gone Missing?

The main character in the new series I'm writing has gone AWOL and I think I know why: she's not getting enough attention.

Her name is Maxine Leverman and she's a moody creature, even a bit of a diva. She first made herself known in AVENGERS OF BLOOD, book two of the Cass Elliot series, and hasn't shut up since. She's caused such a ruckus that I shelved plans for the third Cass Elliot novel and started working on a new series featuring Maxine. Why would someone who loves center stage disappear? I think she's in a huff because she's not front and center, so she's pouting in silence. (Not very mature, granted, but that's part of her beauty - and it gives her great room to grow.)

Life is exhausting at the moment, due to the family-type stuff we all go through, and to tax season. ("It's just math," someone said recently. I shuddered. It is math, but not as we know it, Jim. It's a soul-sucking blend of addition, subtraction, and the occasional venture into astrophysics when calculating deductions. But I digress...) Suffice to say that my time to write and my emotional capacity to even ponder this current book is limited.

And so Maxine has wandered off.

I was a little freaked out when I couldn't find my main character and ran around like a frantic parent, scouring my consciousness for any sign of her, but she wouldn't appear. Then I tried ignoring her, glancing sideways when I thought she might not be looking, but no luck there, either. I've also tried thinking about her as I fall asleep, hoping to lure her out of my subconscious, but she's not having any part of my dreams.

This current book is about Maxine's foray into the world of private detectivedom. Without her, does the story still exist? Probably not. But thankfully, there's been a surprising benefit while she's been gone: when I do have time to write or ponder, the other characters are demanding to be heard. They're spilling all kinds of good gossip about the main character and her history, and they're adding morsels about their own pasts. This story is gaining depth from unexpected angles, which is great news.

Although I'm not as frantic as I was when she first went missing, there is that nagging worry that she won't come back at all, and this book will be kaput. I hope that with a little love and attention after tax season - and maybe a new pair of Jimmy Choos (Maxine'll do almost anything for expensive shoes) - she'll decide it's worthwhile to stalk back onto the page and take the limelight again. But only time will tell.

What do you do when your characters go silent, if they do? How do you find them? Do they eventually come back and grace you with their presence, or are they gone for good?

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Chinese Whispers - Author to Author: A Blog Chain

The inimitable Bert Carson asked me to join in this author blog chain thing, and I was a bit dubious at first.

"What exactly is this blog chain thing about?" I asked, being a girl who likes to know.

"Not sure," Bert said, being a guy who isn't bothered about knowing. "But Christina tagged Beca Lewis and she tagged me and now I'm tagging you. Will you do it? You can be captain of the blog team."

This sounded like that game we played as kids, Chinese Whispers, but I gave his offer the brief consideration it was due and struck a hard bargain: in exchange for acting as captain of Bert's blogging team (which, as far as I can tell requires no responsibility), he agreed to supply me with a decoder ring and a four-inch long baking powder powered submarine. How can a girl say no to an offer like that?

If you haven't yet met Bert or his lovely wife Christina, you can follow them on Twitter at @BertCarson and @CarsonCanada, respectively. As we'd say in our slice of redneck paradise, they're good folks.

I was lucky enough to catch C.J. Peterson when she was distracted editing her new book, and she agreed to be tagged as the next link in this author blog chain thing without asking many questions. You'll learn more about C.J. in a minute, and she's certainly a gal worth knowing.

Now I'm supposed to answer four questions. These are the same four questions that Bert answered, and they're the same four questions that C.J. will answer. Maybe I'm getting the hang of this blog chain thing:

1. What are you working on? 

I'm starting a new series featuring Maxine Leverman, a character introduced in book two of the Cass Elliot Crime Series, AVENGERS OF BLOOD. Maxine may not be the polar opposite of Cass, but she's pretty close. Impetuous, mouthy, overtly sexy, she's decided to become a private investigator to 'help' her best friend catch criminals. This book is about Maxine's foray into the wild world of private investigation in East Texas.

2. How does your work differ from others in the same genre?

One of the finest compliments I've received about my books is that the characters are so real. People tell me they know folks who are just like Cass, or Mitch Stone, or even Goober or Hugo Petchard. I think that's pretty high praise and one of the ways my books differ from others. I write about imperfect people. Most of them want to do the right thing. Those that don't do the right thing? Well, those are the baddies and that's where the real fun comes in...

To date, my stories have been triggered by actual events that cause my sense of fair play to feel violated. When I feel violated for myself or someone else, I want justice, but life isn't always fair. The Cass Elliot books let me have my way with the bad guys, or at least they let my characters try and work things out. The endings aren't always tied up neatly with a bow, with the bad guy getting his just desserts immediately. But hang on and keep reading - eventually they'll all get what's coming to them!

3. Why do you write what you write?

I can't help it. Crime and consequences swirl around in my head and that's what spills out when I put fingers to keyboard. This is the stuff I love and at the moment, the characters in the Cass Elliot crime series speak the loudest and demand to be let out.

4. How does your writing process work?

Process, eh? That's pretty strong language there, pardner. I'm not an outliner (*she shudders*), so when I start writing, I kind of know what crime has been committed, who done it, and how the book ends. All the other stuff comes out as I write. For me, that's the fun of it all. I get to set things in motion, but the characters quickly take over, each with their own personality, and the twists and turns are a direct result of their actions. I'm almost always surprised with the path a story takes and where we end up.

And now it's time to introduce Christian author C.J. Peterson. She's the author of YA novel STRENGTH FROM WITHIN, and has published the first two books of The Holy Flame Trilogy, THE CALL TO DUTY and OPERATION A.N.G.E.L.. The book that has her so busy right now is the final part of the trilogy, due to be released in May 2014.

I first met C.J. about a year ago when she asked if I'd like to be a featured author on her blog. Since then, I've had the pleasure of meeting C.J. and her husband in person, which is a rare thing in a world driven by remote communication! We live about 80 miles apart in East Texas, but have managed to meet in the middle on occasion. She's a delight to know, but one of the things I enjoy most about C.J. is her sincerity. In this electronic world where anyone can be whoever they want to be, C.J. is consistent in her friendship and in her love of the Lord. Take the time to get to know her and read her books - you'll be glad you did.

Check C.J.'s blog on Sunday March 2 for her installment of the blog chain. You can also catch up with C.J. on Facebook and on Twitter (@authoress_cj).

Thanks so much to Bert for asking me to play, and to C.J. for agreeing to be tagged!

Cardboard Dragsters - A Cure For The Creativity Blahs

Do you ever get stuck in a creativity slump? Suffer from the soul sucking 'blah' of everyday life-dom? Sometimes a change of scenery helps, but it's hard to find time for a trip to the beach or a few days hiking in the mountains. Never fear - there's a faster fix. An easier fix. Even a cheaper fix. It involves a box and / or a mud pie. (No, not the fancy-schmancy kind - an original mud pie.)

While my husband and I are childless, I have been blessed with nieces and nephews and friends who let me consider their children to be family. Maybe it's because I come and go with these kids, I'm not around them full time, but I'm always amazed at how far and wide their imaginations roam. Get a kid talking about who or what they want to be when they grow up, or the game they're playing, or the bike they're riding, and you'll be astonished at what they can imagine.

Those of you who have kids surely recognize that children are the most creative beings on the planet. Spending some time with a kid in full-blown imagination mode is all you need to refresh your creativity and your soul. And get this: they'll do all the work.

Don't believe me? Go find an empty box - preferably one large enough to hold a kid, like a refrigerator or oven box - and put it in some kid accessible spot. It won't be long before somebody has climbed in and is on their way to Mars; defending a fort in the desert against savage Indians; at Sea World, swimming with dolphins; or racing down a drag strip, tires smoking, engine screaming.

Think I'm nuts? Climb in the box and ask what's going down. Better yet, pull on a helmet and space suit. I'll bet there's room in the ship for that trip to Mars, but make no mistake - the kid is the captain, you're just the first mate. Get ready to take orders.

No boxes? Got water and some dirt? Pull on your play clothes and host a mud pie party. 

(I love cardboard boxes, but who can resist imaginary food? It has zero calories, no cholesterol, and is good for your skin, eyes, heart, overall well-being, and it makes you smarter and better looking. Hey, if it's imaginary, it can be as great as we want, right?)

Mud pies are easy to make and come in a variety of flavors - ask any kid for the recipe. No fancy invitations are required to a mud pie party. Tell one kid in the vicinity and you've told them all. You might be surprised at who turns up. Bakers, shop keepers, kings, queens, elves, trolls, hungry cowboys, space adventurers, famous actresses, singers, even the occasional imaginary farting mouse. (Yes, that happened and fed into a scene in my second novel, AVENGERS OF BLOOD.)

Adults are nothing more than grown-up kids. That child-like wonder with the world is still there, inside you. But its sharp edges get worn down with the day-to-dayness of life, the weight of responsibilities, the exhaustion of routine. Sometimes we need a nudge to remember how to set it free.

When you're feeling those burdens, that 'blah', sit down for a nice slice of mud pie or take a ride in a cardboard dragster. No kids? No worry. Eat that mud pie alone. I won't tell if you won't.





 
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Love Is In The - Oh, Wait, It's Under The English Channel...

So, here we are in June on our 13th anniversary, sweltering under the Texas sun, and my husband Martyn and I have recently had the chance to reminisce about how we met. At the time, it all seemed perfectly normal, but looking back, I guess it was a little strange.

Me, a Texan, him, an Englishman. Both of us in France. Or, rather, under the English Channel.

Fourteen years after we met and I'm still so glad he offered to buy me that cup of coffee. A lot has changed since that fateful Sunday in March 1999 - I joined Martyn in England for seven years and then we decided to escape the corporate life and pursue our loves, writing for me and jazz for him. Somehow, we ended up on a ranch in East Texas, taking care of a herd of Black Angus cattle and a donkey, with two books published and a successful music career underway.

Many thanks to Gary Borders for taking the time to interview us and tell our story, and to Piney Woods Live Magazine for running the article back in February 2013 (click here or on the pages below to read the article). Stop by the Piney Woods Live website to catch up on all things art in East Texas. You'll meet up and coming musicians, painters, seamstresses, poets, sculptors, writers, etc.

Surprised at the thought of creative rednecks? Then visit the website to discover what you're missing!

The Second Cass Elliot Crime Novel, AVENGERS OF BLOOD, Hits Amazon!

The second book in the Cass Elliot Crime series, AVENGERS OF BLOOD, has landed on the virtual shelves at Amazon!


A deadly game of cat and mouse is playing out in Forney County… 

Detective Cass Elliot is still on suspension after killing a fellow officer and Sheriff Hoffner refuses to sign her release papers. But when four people are murdered in one night, one with the exceptional brutality of a lynching, the Medical Examiner side-steps Hoffner to hire Cass and loan her to Forney County’s overstretched police department.

As Cass and her partner investigate, they realize that three of the murders were committed by the same person but find no connection between the victims. Their frustration intensifies when another victim survives and disappears instead of coming to the police.

Sheriff Hoffner is frantic about anonymous letters claiming one of his star officers is dirty, and Cass suspects a link to the current crimes. The pieces fall together when she uncovers the true identity of the man who was lynched, revealing connections between the victims, the killer, and an unpunished crime committed nearly fifty years ago.



"Avengers doesn't disappoint--all your favorite rednecks are back, plus some great new ones. I stayed up way too late again and loved every minute of it."

Toby Neal - Author of the Lei Crime Series

Thanks to everyone who read THE DEVIL OF LIGHT and urged me on to book two. There's more murder and mayhem in store in AVENGERS OF BLOOD - watch out Forney County!

Genesis of a Novel: The Horrific Death of James Byrd Jr.

James Byrd Jr.

On occasion, an idea for a novel will spring fully formed into my mind. More often, it takes some time and several prompts for an idea to take hold and germinate. 

In the case of AVENGERS OF BLOOD, the tiny seed of an idea came to me when I read about James Byrd Jr.'s brutal killing. It took place in Jasper, Texas on June 7, 1998 and is a shameful part of our state's history.

Byrd was beaten, chained by his ankles to the back of a pickup truck, and then dragged to his death. The coroner believed it took almost three miles to kill him. This was as cold-blooded a murder as you'll come across.

Although Byrd's death caught my attention, what really grabbed me and planted the seed of the idea was his family's reaction. I cannot imagine the hell they must have lived through as they learned the circumstances of his death and sat through the trials of the three men eventually convicted of Byrd's murder.

But instead of responding to his killers with anger, with outrage, they spoke about forgiveness. When the Ku Klux Klan and the Black Panthers held demonstrations in Jasper, Byrd's family called for peace and tolerance. When two of his murderers were sentenced to death, the Byrd family spoke out, asking that their sentences be commuted to life, saying that was punishment enough for them.

I'm a little ashamed to admit that I couldn't get my head around this.

I'm a Christian. I believe in the power of forgiveness, for both the forgiver and the forgiven. The Byrd family has my respect, my admiration for their words and actions. But if what happened to James Byrd Jr. happened to someone that I love? I'm not sure I'd be strong enough to react in the same way, and I can only hope I could muster the courage to try and forgive.

As for the novel, the seed didn't germinate until I was sitting in church one Sunday, bored by a sermon. (Hey, all you preachers, it happens more often than you'd think.) Instead of paying attention, I was leafing through my Bible looking for distraction. And I found it in Numbers 35:20-21 (NIV):

And if he thrust him of hatred, or hurled at him, lying in wait, so that he died, or in enmity smote him with his hand, so that he died; he that smote him shall surely be put to death; he is a murderer: the avenger of blood shall put the murderer to death, when he meeteth him.

Brutal, eh? It's Old Testament, and I like it. This reaction would be more true to who I am than offering forgiveness. (I did say that I'd like to have the courage to forgive, but I'm giving you honesty.)



And there it was. The idea for a story about vengeance for a crime that was so unimaginably horrible, made even more intolerable because justice was denied, that no punishment other than death would do. That led me to the tag line for AVENGERS OF BLOOD:

A horrific triple murder; a crime without punishment; and memories that will not be silenced.

This is not the story of James Byrd Jr.'s killing. No piece of fiction could come close to portraying the nightmare of his death. Instead, it explores the opposite of the Byrd family's courageous reaction to their loved one's murder: the desperate need for resolution, for a price to be exacted in payment for a terrible wrong.

Read AVENGERS OF BLOOD and then tell me: which is closer to your heart? Forgiveness or vengeance?


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THE DEVIL OF LIGHT Wins Award for Best Mystery Cover Design!

Many of you know that I'm prone to, well, we could call them 'bad' decisions, but 'bad' has such a negative connotation, doesn't it? Instead, I like to think of them as 'character forming decisions'. Much more positive.


Choosing to design the original cover for THE DEVIL OF LIGHT was a decision that I hard-headedly pursued and that didn't work out so well. Thankfully, redemption was at hand in the form of fabulous cover designer Ares Jun, who created a stunning new cover for THE DEVIL OF LIGHT in late 2012.



This cover is so stunning that it has won the award for Best Cover Design for a Mystery Novel from the prestigious Venture Galleries! Kudos to me for at last recognizing that the original cover just wasn't good enough, and even bigger kudos to Ares for a spectacular job.



Many thanks to the judges over at Venture Galleries. Take a moment to stop by the Venture Galleries website to check out THE DEVIL OF LIGHT and the winners in other genres.

(And - shameless bit of self-promotion - get THE DEVIL OF LIGHT on Amazon to find out if the book lives up to its cover. AVENGERS OF BLOOD is coming February 2013 - get hooked on Cass Elliot now!)

The Next Big Thing Blog Hop: AVENGERS OF BLOOD

Charles Dougherty

Last week, fellow writer Charles Dougherty (@clrdougherty on Twitter) invited me to participate in The Next Big Thing Blog Hop. 

If you haven't met Charles, stop by his blog. And if you haven't read his books, give them a try. I've read DECEPTION IN SAVANNAH and enjoyed it - it's a great mystery with quirky characters (even a raccoon with a personality) and it'll have you laughing out loud!

You'll find links to six other fabulous authors at the bottom of this post. Follow the links on February 7, 2013 to learn more about their works.


 

1) What is the working title of your book?

AVENGERS OF BLOOD. It's the second book in the Cass Elliot crime series.


(AVENGERS OF BLOOD is now live on Amazon! Get it here.)

 
2) Where did the idea for the book come from?

The idea for AVENGERS OF BLOOD came to me after I read about James Byrd Jr.'s murder in Jasper, Texas back in 1998. His death was atrocious, but even more than his killing, it was his family's reaction that caught my attention. They chose to forgive his killers, even asking that the two who received the death penalty have their sentences changed to life without parole.

AVENGERS OF BLOOD isn't a book about James Byrd Jr. or his family. Instead, it asks what would happen if someone chose vengeance instead of forgiveness. If you want to read more about how the novel came to be, read this post.


3) What genre is your book?

It's a crime thriller.


4) What actors would you choose to play the characters in a movie rendition?

Oooh, this is a hard one. Each of my characters is fully formed in my head, but finding the right person to fit that image is tough! I picture Cass Elliot as a Kate Mara or Jennifer Lawrence kind of gal. 

Kate Mara

I can see Matthew McConaughey as Mitch Stone, although he might have to put on a little weight. Just a smidge. He's an East Texas boy, so he's got the accent down and he could probably pull together Mitch's swagger and vulnerability. 

My editor recommended Harrison Ford for Sheriff Bill Hoffner - yup, that would definitely work. 

Harrison Ford

5) What is the one sentence synopsis of your book?

A horrific triple murder, a crime without punishment, and memories that will not be silenced.

6) Will your book be self-published or represented by an agency?

Self-published.


7) How long did it take you to write the first draft of the manuscript?

About 90 days for the first draft and another 45 for editing.


8) What other books would you compare this story to within your genre?

Probably Karin Slaughter's Grant County series. They're gritty crime thrillers with a strong, flawed female lead.

9) Who or what inspired you to write this book?

This story has been nagging at me for years, but the plot is a bit complicated and I wasn't sure I could pull it off. It involves two sets of individuals who are seeking vengeance from the same people, but for different reasons. Things get nasty when their paths cross. When I finished THE DEVIL OF LIGHT, I talked the plot for AVENGERS OF BLOOD over with my husband, and he encouraged me to try writing it.


10) What else about the book might pique the reader's interest?

If you've read THE DEVIL OF LIGHT, you know that the book ends without full resolution: some of the bad guys get away, a character's life hangs in the balance, and Cass Elliot's future as a Forney County Detective is uncertain. Some of those loose ends are tied up in AVENGERS OF BLOOD, and others continue to weave through the series storyline (yup, Hitch and the old man still linger...).

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And now to introduce six great authors - in no particular order. Remember to check out their Next Big Thing posts on February 7, 2013:

Wendy Potocki (@WPotocki) - horror author, her most recent is the second book in the Adduné series - The House of Cards

Douglas Wickard (@DouglasWickard) - author of the Sami Saxton thriller series 

Joseph Souza (@josephsouza3) - author of The Living Dead Trilogy 

Teri Heyer (@TeriHeyer) - poet and author of contemporary and paranormal romance, her most recent is Bayou Blues and Other Sorrows

Ron Dahle (@chrningcauldron) - author of The Churning Cauldron paramilitary novels

David Perlmutter (@davepperlmutter) - author of true story Wrong Place, Wrong Time