Brick by Brick
Bringing an entire world to life.
“A book is a world constructed with words. But the true miracle in that is how readers enter this world upon opening the book, and then the world remains within the reader after closing it. That miracle is both amazing and terrifying. Indeed, you are what you read. So choose wisely the worlds you get in and the worlds you let in. There is not a hammer that can destroy what is built by the pen.”
― Khayri R.R. Woulfe, Stories Notepad
I think it’s fair to say that we all have a person in our lives who inspired us in some way. For me, it was my first grade teacher, Mrs. Hiles. Going into first grade, I already loved books, and while she nurtured that love of reading, she went one step further.
Each week, a student would be named the Student of the Week. When Friday rolled around, we would end our days with a writing session. We had to create a story featuring the Student of the Week. Of course, every story, no matter who the author was, ended the exact same way, thanks to some inspiration from The Wizard of Oz. A tornado would come along and spirit us students away, taking us to Worlds of Fun, Kansas City’s own amusement park.
With Mrs. Hiles’ coaching, I was allowed to build dynamic worlds for the very first time. Now, there are some authors out there who create vibrant science fiction and fantasy worlds. Whether I’m hanging out with Terry Pratchett in Discworld or TJ Klune’s house by the Cerulean Sea, I jump headfirst in to incredible worlds with problems not to dissimilar from my own. Then, you have your authors who blend the real world with mythical beings, like China Miéville’s Kracken or any Stephen King horror story that blends our world with others.
But for as much as I love living in these fantastic worlds, I also love to spend time in the real world with real people and their very real problems. As a child, I found myself drawn into mysteries. I loved every single Encyclopedia Brown book I could get my hands on. I read my copy of Sherlock Holmes stories ragged.
As I’ve grown older, the love has deepened, and when I finally sat down to write my first novel, I knew it needed to be my take on the dynamic between Sherlock Holmes and Watson if they had been a married couple in the modern day. At the heart of my story was a dark mystery and two people who would do anything to solve it before the horrors came to their front door. I wanted that world to be a real as possible, so I set it in Colorado and based their adventures in the mountains surrounding Boulder, Colorado, an incredibly beautiful place.
When it came time for me to write Closer Than You Know, I knew that it, too, needed to have a realistic feel, but I wanted to play a little with my settings, so I invented Pine Bend, a town located in the San Juan Mountains of Colorado. Pine Bend itself is based on Durango, Colorado.
I picked Durango after my husband and I spent a week in Southern Colorado for our anniversary. I fell in love with the area to the point that even my second series, A Secret to Die For, is set in the same area, although it’s just to the northeast of Pagosa Springs as you climb up the mountains to Del Norte.
To help keep the story real, I’ve pulled in details from Durango, such as the composition of the Durango Police Department and the town layout. Even Rocky Mountain University, where my lead character Charlie teaches English, is based on Fort Lewis College (although I changed the layout of the campus to match one I worked at in Kansas, as I wanted to use some of the natural elements of campus, such as the creek bisecting campus and the trail on the southern side of campus).
I chose to base my fictional towns in these very real settings because there is so much opportunity to use the environment as a character in my stories. In the second book in the Pine Bend series, Closer Than You Know, my lead character Cara, an evidence technician has to face the brutal summer heat and gusting winds as she processes crime scenes. Alexandra, the lead in the third Pine Bend book, Do No Harm, has to balance staying safe from someone who wants to harm her during a winter snow storm.
And the other reason I chose Southern Colorado is because it’s stunning. And, if I win the lottery, I’m going to land here for good.
What I’m Working On
I just received my fourth round of edits from my editor. With this, we are just about halfway through the books. Considering we’ve made it this far in just three months, I am hopeful that we can wrap up the editing process by the end of summer. At that point, I’ll get a date set for publication. SO EXCITING!
I mentioned before that I was struggling with identifying dangling modifiers, but this last time around, I found myself catching them more and more. This is definitely a case of practice will make perfect. In the weeks where my editor is working through my manuscript, I’ve been drafting more of A Secret to Die For, and I find myself editing the piece to match the grammatical lessons I’ve learned through this editing process.
Speaking of A Secret to Die For, I’m one chapter away from the end of the second act, which means I am getting closer to finishing it. I headed to Orlando this past week for a work training, and in my downtime, I managed to write most of a chapter. Of course, this chapter will end with a spicy, smutty sex scene. Being that I was surrounded by academics wanting to improve their discrimination and sexual misconduct investigation skills, I felt a little weird writing the sex scene, even if I was in paradise.
What I’m Reading
Speaking of spicy, smutty sex scenes… I have been a fan of Hilly Keen’s rom-coms for a while now. Her newest book, Gray Sweatpants Season, just came out, and I absolutely had to get it. I don’t even have to tell you where the name came from. IYKYK.
Gray Sweatpants Season follows Lottie, a recent law school grad who is cramming for the bar exam and trying to figure out what to do with the rest of her life. But offering a very sweet distraction is her neighbor Jack and his “slutty” gray sweatpants (Hilly’s words, not mine).
If you love your rom-coms hilarious and smutty, then Hilly is the author for you. Her Welcome to Wavecrest series and this new standalone (also set in Wavecrest and featuring some familiar faces) are fantastic books. Check her out!
Oh, One Last Thing…
Last week, I was at a local flea market and found an incredible bookish vendor. I bought a few things. Then, we stopped at Ollie’s, and I found one of my comp titles from when I was querying Closer Than You Know. I then found a copy of my other comp title online. With all these bookish things, I decided it was time to do a little giveaway.
I’m approaching 90 subscribers to this newsletter. But I need your help. I want to hit 100 subscribers. When I do, I will mail one lucky subscriber this prize pack.
If you’re the lucky reader, you could receive:
A copy of Allison Brennan’s The Sorority Murder
A copy of Karen Rose’s Say Your Sorry
A “Yes I really do need all these books” make-up bag
And four bookish stickers
To enter, all you need to do is comment on this post. When I hit 100 subscribers, I’ll pick one lucky winner. You can pick up extra entries if you share this post to your social media - I’ll give you one entry per post.