Susan Grant | Ever Yearn to be Swept Away?

I’m often asked how an airline pilot/ex-USAF jet jockey ended up writing romance. “Easy,” I say. “Too little time on the ground coupled with way too much time to think!” Trust me, nothing aids plot-hatching and character-developing like fifteen straight hours stuck in the cockpit with lukewarm coffee and a sky so black you can see every star in the Milky Way. I do six to eight Pacific crossings in a month. On any given day, you can find my body clock hovering somewhere between Tokyo and Sacramento. Ouch. Perpetual jet lag. But on the up side, the sights, smells, and tastes of the exotic locales I visit, and the conversations I have with people I’d never normally meet, provide the most amazing material to weave into my stories. With a little imagination, a dank high-walled alley in Taipei, ripe with the stench of sewage, garlic, and moped exhaust becomes the lower deck of an ill-maintained 19th century sailing ship. A Chinese restaurant where I nibble on pickled jelly fish, stir-fried fungus, and sautéed morning glory transforms into dinner-for-two on a distant planet.

Okay, so I’m a hopeless daydreamer. Only I don’t publicize that fact – I mean, the last thing air passengers want to hear is that their 747 pilot is “zoning out.” Not to worry, though: my imagination “runs” in the background like Norton Antivirus software. And, because I am, after all, a professional, I ensure that all musings cease during critical phases of flight. :)

When I’m not a jet-lagged zombie wandering around Sydney, Shanghai or Saigon, I’m a typical suburban mom, if there is such a creature. They’re teens in high school now, but when they were much younger I used to bring them (and the neighbor kid who somehow ended up eating all his meals at our house) to the local park. I remember one day when the boys ran off, each clutching a laundered-too-many-times Beanie Baby (the only two toys in the car), leaving my daughter empty-handed. “But, Mom,” she said, grief-stricken. “Now I have no one to be!”

To be...

Whoa. Simple words, but what a concept. My daughter, with the boundless, easily accessed imagination of a child, intended to be a Beanie Baby, slipping into the fluffy body of a kitten, or duck, or crocodile to live through its eyes. And, boy, did I understand her disappointment. That’s exactly how I feel when I open a book and can’t lose myself in it, when I’m unable, for some reason, to form that seamless emotional connection with the characters that allows me to live the story right along with them.

At that point I suppose I got that faraway look that so exasperates my family, because my daughter accepted my understanding hug and deserted me. I sat on a park bench, mentally shuffling through some of my many “keeper” books like One Perfect Rose by Mary Jo Putney, Elizabeth Vaughan’s Warprize, Primary Inversion and The Radiant Seas by Catherine Asaro. What linked them? A terminally ill duke, a woman forced to marry in order to secure peace for her people, a battle-weary futuristic soldier? Certainly at first glance the characters share little in common with each other, let alone me, yet I was equally swept away with each book.

Because the authors succeeded in giving me someone to be.

When I open a book, I yearn to be swept away to another place, another time, another body! I want a story that will completely engross me to the point of being totally unaware of my surroundings, so that when I look up I’m disoriented for a few seconds. I can identify with the situation and characters to the point of being totally immersed in a book and not realizing what time it is or even what century I’m in then the author has written a great book.

Although I’m not any closer to knowing the secret to why some books have the magic to sweep me away and others don’t, the question itself has always intrigued me. How about you? What makes a book sweep you away? What are some you’ve read lately that have worked this rare magic on you, where when you turned the last page you looked up blinking because you forgot who and where you were?

If you’d like to come along on some of my adventures, visit my blog: susangrant.blogspot.com. No luggage required! Oh, and for a peek at the stories these adventures have spawned over the years, stop by my website http://www.susangrant.com/ where I maintain a printable list of all my books and what series they belong to.

Susan Grant

Linwood Barclay | Five Days and Counting

My new book No Time For Goodbye comes out in North America in less than a week, and while this is my fifth novel, in many ways it feels as though it's my first.

My four previous works of fiction have been about an obsessive-compulsive, well-meaning, but generally pain-in-the-ass character named Zack Walker. He made his first appearance in 2004 in Bad Move, which was followed by Bad Guys, Lone Wolf, and Stone Rain. While I consider these books legitimate mystery thrillers, they were also intended to be pretty funny. (I know, from writing a humour column the last 14 years for the Toronto Star, that even when you intend something to be funny, plenty of readers will go, "Huh?")

No Time For Goodbye marks a significant shift in tone for me. After finishing the fourth Zack Walker book, I wanted to do something more ambitious, and darker. And not particularly funny. All I needed was the right idea to get me started. I awoke one morning at five, thinking about what it would be like if one day you got up and discovered your entire family was gone, vanished into the night. No Time For Goodbye was born.

The reaction from publishers and editors was overwhelmingly. Everyone had loved the Zack books, but this new one struck them as something else again.

And so that's why it feels like a first book. The curious thing is, the book's already out there.

No Time For Goodbye was released, in translation, in Germany back in June. (I know it's odd that an English book makes its debut in a foreign country, but what can I say. That's just how it all worked out.) Published as Ohne Ein Wort (Without a Word) the novel has been an enormous hit, selling about 300,000 copies to date. So expectations are high for the book's release in the U.S. and in Canada, which is my neck of the woods.

So, five days and counting. Anticipation's always a killer.

Linwood Barclay

http://www.linwoodbarclay.com/

Jerrilyn Farmer | Advice from "Mad Bean" for a Killer Event!

A great party, like a great mystery, needs to provide a few surprises and even a twist. I have given a good deal of thought to both parties and mysteries because I write about Hollywood event planner/caterer Madeline Bean, and it is her job (when not dodging murderers) to make sure every party guest has a good time.

Pulling off a remarkable party isn't a snap, but it helps to start off with the fun concept. Think vices! Do your friends enjoy imbibing? Try a wine tasting evening. Are they into gluttony? Make sure you feature gourmet goodies. Would they like to gamble? Have an Academy Awards party and keep a tote board to track each guests predictions in each category--perhaps surprising the group with a cool prize for the highest totals. Or try a casino theme. Now if your girlfriends are like mine, they don't mind flirting, so by all mean pick a theme where everyone dresses up so the women can let their necklines plunge.

In my books, the larger-than-life Hollywood types require the Godzilla of all party concepts--from a wedding held at the Natural History Museum's Hall of Predators (KILLER WEDDING) to a Black-and-White themed charity ball (PERFECT SAX) to supplying dim sum carts pushed by pretty girls at a private mah-jongg dinner on Chinese New Year (DIM SUM DEAD). Get creative with your theme and it makes all your party decisions so much more fun.

Invitations to your Vegas night can include wads of play cash to entice the big rollers. The menu on Valentine's Day can include a chocolate fountain and large strawberries for dipping. For some guests, only one drink gets them tipsy--but if that one drink is their twelfth or thirteenth, they might appreciate your party bar offering a cool signature drink. A great Mojito (theme: Cuba of the 50's) or Bellini (theme: Lotto!--buy all your guests Lotto tickets and watch the numbers called out on your big screen tv) can certainly get the party in a festive mood fast.

Have a blast designing the menu, decorating the space and providing a little interactive entertainment, and your guests will remember your party long after the night. Just a tip, though: to make sure your evening is a true success, try to avoid inviting disapproving neighbors, the dullest man in your office, or any would-be murderers.

Jerrilyn Farmer
http://home.earthlink.net/~jerrilyn/index.html

T. Lynn Ocean | Reliving My Tomboy Days

It all began when I was five or six years old and saw a boy peeing on a tree. I remember being outrageously jealous. Not because he had something down there that I didn't, but rather because he could pee standing up and I couldn't. I know this for a fact because I tried, and trust me, it wasn't easy having to explain to my mother why my shorts and socks were wet when I went in from the neighborhood playground.

I never tried to pee on a tree again, but I did grow up playing with matchbox cars instead of Barbie dolls. By the time adolescence rolled around, I could outrun and out-climb all the boys my age. So when the idea for SOUTHERN FATALITY came to me, I decided to relive my tomboy days by writing from the first person male point of view.

A mystery, tough guy action adventure, it was so much fun to write as I tried to think and talk and fight like a guy. But then something strange happened. The character woke me up in the middle of the night and told me she was a woman. So I gave her a sex change and did a rewrite.

Who is Jersey Barnes? Take the toughest, most hardcore military-trained dude you can imagine. Then stuff him inside the body of a 5' 8 female with a gorgeous set of size D breast implants and a knockout smile. Give her a penchant for quality lingerie and a quick wit. Oh, and don't forget to strap on a .45 caliber Glock. Getting the idea? The first in a new mystery adventure series, SOUTHERN FATALITY is due out today. I hope you'll enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it!


T. Lynn Ocean

http://www.tlynnocean.com/

Robyn Carr | Want to Live in Virgin River?

A lot of readers have written to ask if Virgin River is based on an actual town, because they’d like to move there. Unpack those boxes – the town lives only in my mind, although I have heard from people who claim to live or have lived in such a place. They don’t usually say where.

It might be all in my head, but I’ve been living there for a long time. I’m committed to delivering four more Virgin River novels. I’m not sure the actual release dates for these books yet, but when I know for sure, I’ll post them on my website. Meanwhile, I couldn’t ask for a better home. I get up in the morning, fire up the computer, and settle in with my old friends. When nothing much is happening with them, I bring in some newcomers who have their – uh – issues.

I knew what it was about the town that appealed to me, and it didn’t take long for me to hear from readers what appealed to them. It goes without saying, my readers have fully enjoyed the strong, handsome, virile men of Virgin River; they’ve admired the beauty, inner strength and intelligence of the women. But what I hear about most is a place where commitment is law – and not just romantic commitment, but the bonding of brotherhood, the fealty of neighbors, the loyalty in friendship. It seems the number of people who have ties to the military is simply huge – and the fact that the Virgin River men have served their country in times of war has lent greatly to their appeal. Not their sex appeal nearly as much as their emotional appeal. They seem to embody those values that readers hold as admirable. Honorable.

When I’m writing, of course I’m looking for character traits anyone can understand, issues we can all relate to, challenges we or loved ones have dealt with, but I seem to always reach a point at which I become an observer, watching to see how these characters manage to work things out, get their lives on track again. It begs the question – can we find answers and role models in fiction? Well, considering one of the reasons we read fiction is for entertainment and we’re not very entertained unless the characters are up against a lot, must overcome great odds and evolve, I think it’s possible. I don’t write to give advice, I write to create a solid, positive, memorable story. But if someone gains insight or inspiration from one of these fictional characters or gets an idea for how to resolve a problem from the way they resolved theirs, double bonus.

That being said, Virgin River is a town that not only exists in my mind, but can be created in any heart – that place where a glass is half full, where we struggle to let burdens and challenges give us strength rather than break us, where fealty and friendship have more value than money, commitment is honored, and people do the right thing simply because it’s the right thing to do.

Want to live in Virgin River? Close your eyes.... Open your heart....

Robyn Carr
http://www.robyncarr.com/