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The Mythic Journey Behind Daughter Am I

November 21, 2009 — Pat Bertram

Today is the last day of my Daughter Am I virtual book tour, and what better place to end it than here, at my own blog. Thank you everyone for your support during the past five weeks. It was a wonderful journey!

Daughter Am I was the combination of two different stories I wanted to write. I’d read The Writer’s Journey by Christopher Vogler, and the mythic journey so captured my imagination that I knew I had to write my own quest story. I also liked the idea of telling little-known truths about the mob, and I settled on the story of a young woman — Mary Stuart — going on a journey to learn about her recently murdered grandparents. Accompanying her are six old rogues — gangsters and conmen in their eighties — and one used-to-be nightclub dancer. As Mary listens to stories the old-timers tell, she gradually discovers the truth of her heritage and of herself.

Developing so many characters at one time is difficult under normal circumstances, but the mythic journey archetypes helped me create the characters and keep them focused on their roles. Whether gangster or wizard, hit man or Darth Vader, the archetypes — and the power of the archetypes — are the same.

A hero is the one who grows the most in the story, who gains knowledge and wisdom. Heroism, in the mythic journey sense, is connected to self-sacrifice, risk, and responsibility. The hero must perform the decisive act of the story, though at the beginning, before their transformation, heroes often need to be goaded into action. Mary starts out only wanting to learn about her grandparents, and ends up becoming intensely loyal to the elders in her charge. (If you saw Bed of Roses, you might have met Mary. Mary Stuart Masterson’s character — naïve and intelligent, strong and vulnerable — inspired me to write my Mary.)

A herald gets the hero started on the journey. Kid Rags, a dapper forger forced into retirement by computer technology, eggs Mary on, challenges her to find out more about her grandparents. Kid Rags is also a mentor, giving guidance and gifts, a role he shares with Teach. Teach is a con man who believes everything is a con, and he is not hesitant about sharing his vision. (You’ve met Teach a hundred times. Remember Charles Lane? I’m sure you do. He started acting in 1926 and didn’t stop until 2005. Well, Charles Lane was my inspiration for Teach.)

Every mythic journey needs a trickster, a character who embodies the energies of mischief and a desire for change, and who provides comic relief. The trickster in Daughter Am I is embodied by Happy, an ex-wheelman for the mob. Happy always wants to be on the move, is always urging action, and he peppers his talk with morose and unanswerable pronouncements about death. Did I mention that he carries a gun, but that his hands shake too much to be able to aim it properly? Poor sad Happy.

Tim Olson, Mary’s romantic interest, is the shapeshifter. He doesn’t actually change shape, but he appears to change constantly from Mary’s point of view. He temps, dazzles, confuses her, and makes her question his loyalty. (Tim Daly from The Year of the Comet was my inspiration for Tim Olson. He had some great lines like: “I never said I didn’t go to MIT.”)

I could go through the whole list of characters, talking about which archetype each represented, but I don’t want to bore you by with a long discussion about the underpinnings of the story. The main point is that I wanted to use the same “hero’s path” that worked for such disparate stories as The Wizard of Oz, Star Wars, and Tin Cup, but head out on my own journey.

Click here to find the Daughter Am I Blog Tour Schedule Even though the tour is over, it exists forever in the eternal presence of cyberspace, so stop by any time.

C lick here to buy Daughter Am I from Second Wind Publishing, LLC.

Click here to buy Daughter Am I from Amazon.

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Posted in blogging, books, fiction, writing. Tags: archetypes, Christopher Vogler, Daughter Am I, shapeshifter, the herald, the hero's path, The Writer's Journy, trickster, virtural book tour. 6 Comments »

Creating Perfection

November 21, 2009 — Pat Bertram

Today I am at Mark David Gerson’s blog talking “All About Balance,” and he is here with an article about creating perfection. As you know, I’m planning to start writing again, so I am taking special heed of Mark David’s words. Mark David says:

Have no fear of perfection, you’ll never reach it.
~ Salvador Dali

Are you frustrated?

Do you struggle to find the perfect words that consummately evoke the depth of your passion or flawlessly paint the fullness of your vision?

Are you frustrated because the words you have chosen seem inadequate, their ordering unsatisfactory?

You’re not alone. Many writers echo your frustration.

It’s a futile frustration, for language is an approximation. It’s a powerful but often inadequate device for translating experience and emotion into a form others can share.

When I originally wrote these words for an early draft of The Voice of the Muse: Answering the Call to Write, the sun was sliding through a marbled Hawaii sky toward the Pacific, its light skipping across wind-rippled waters.

If I was successful in that description, you will have seen some version of an ocean sunset. Some version, but not mine.

It may approach mine. It may approximate mine. Yet my words, as expertly as I may have deployed them, cannot create a Kodak moment. (Even Kodak can’t create a perfect Kodak moment.) My words are more likely to create an Impressionist moment.

That’s not a bad thing. It gives readers space to have their own experience, to paint their own pictures from the words you have freed from your pen.

Just as you can’t control the words that flow from you, you can’t control your reader’s experience of those words. Nor would you want to.

How often have you been disappointed by a film portrayal of your favorite literary character because your inner director cast the role more astutely than the movie director did?

Empower your readers to have their own experience and recognize that all you can do is translate your experience as heartfully as you’re able into little squiggles on a page. Begin by recognizing that most of the time you’re only going to come close. Continue by knowing that it remains within your power to have your words incite revolution, topple dynasties, overthrow “reality.”

That’s perfect enough for me. How about you?

Can you let go your natural human perfectionism long enough to let your story tell itself to you on the page?

What are you waiting for? Pick up your pen. Describe what you see, what you feel, what you yearn for, what you love. Don’t try to be perfect.

Don’t try at all. Just allow. And know that from that place of surrender, you are creating perfection.

Mark David Gerson has taught and coached writing as a creative and spiritual pursuit for nearly 20 years and is author two award-winning books, The Voice of the Muse: Answering the Call to Write and The MoonQuest: A True Fantasy. He has also recorded The Voice of the Muse Companion: Guided Meditations for Writers on CD. For more information on Mark David and his books, coaching, workshops, blog and radio show, visit www.markdavidgerson.com.

To rean an excerpt from The Moonquest: A True Fantasy by Mark David Gerson: click here

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Posted in blogging, books, life, writing. Tags: Answering the Call to Write, blog tour, creating perfection, frustration, Mark David Gerson, Voice of the Muse. 2 Comments »

My Books, My Way — Yay!

November 20, 2009 — Pat Bertram

This is the second to last day of my blog tour. I wasn’t sure I’d manage to do all the work — 52 stops in 35 days. When you count the posts I did here to promote the tour, that means I wrote eighty-seven articles in five weeks. Whew! I truly did not intend the tour to be so long and involved — somehow it just took off on its own. I have a lot of sleep to catch up on — too many late nights — but the tour was worth it. Not in sales so much, but in what I learned about my books, me, other blogs. Because of all the interviews, I had to think about where I came from in regards to writing, and where I want to go. It turned out to be quite intensive. I do not recommend such a long tour, however. A week or two is sufficient.

Today I am at Book Reader’s Heaven with Glenda Bixler talking about My Books, My Way: Experiences With a Small Independent Publisher. It’s a bit ironic. Yesterday I started reading Dan Brown’s Demons & Angels for no other reason than I somehow ended up with the book, and it struck me that the main difference between small presses and the large corporate publishers is the distribution capacity the big guys have. It certainly is not quality. I have seen some excellent books published by small presses, and Demons & Angels doesn’t even come close. There are way too many inconsistencies, both internal and external.

Robert Langdon is supposed to be an intelligent fellow, knowledgable about symbols, yet when he finds out that physicists are trying to answer such questions as where we came from, what life is made of, and the meaning of the universe, he is astounded. Why? That’s what physics is. Or what it does. Any halfway educated person knows that. He’s also astounded when he discovers that a scientist was also a priest. Why? If he knows anything at all about ancient symbols, he would know that many of today’s religious symbols were ancient scientific symbols. He would also know that the “priests” in ancient times were scientists — science was religion, or perhaps religion was science — and that the division between church and science is a relatively new occurence. This post is not supposed to be a dissertation on religion, but a refutation of Langdon’s character. He simply would not have been surprised if he was as smart and knowledgable as he was supposed to be.

Perhaps that example is a bit esoteric. So try this: the scientists explain to Langdon that a bit of anti-matter is suspended in the center of a container, held there by two magnetic fields. Yet when Langdon looks for the bit of matter, he searches for it on the bottom of the container, and then is surprised to find it suspended in the center of the container. Sheesh. If that’s the kind of writing that is acceptable to corporate publishers, I’m glad not to be a part of it. Though I wouldn’t mind a bit of their cash.

If you want to know why I am glad to be published by a small independent press, you can find the article here: My Books, My Way: Experiences With a Small Independent Publisher.

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Posted in blogging, books, writing. Tags: Angels & Demons, character, Dan Brown, Glenda Bixler, Robert Langdon, small independent publishers. 1 Comment »

Three Discussions with Me!

November 19, 2009 — Pat Bertram

One of the real joys of my Daughter Am I blog tour has been the people I’ve had a chance to talk to. Dave Ebright, author of Bad Latitude was kind enough to be a host — twice — and he also followed my tour. How cool is that! He sent me a string of questions, and what ensued was a fascinating discussion. Well, fascinating to me. I like knowing how other writers work and how they think.

Dave: A few Qs, Pat – if you don’t mind:
Do you outline 1st?
Do you start at the beginning & write through to the end?
Book signings – Love ’em or hate ’em?
Favorite – 1st draft? Rewrites? Editing? or … uhm… Marketing?
Least favorite???
Character or plot? What do you consider your strength?
Coffee Tea or Vodka? (Kidding)
Thanks Bobby for having Pat as your awesome guest. Good interview.

Pat: How long have you been saving these questions to ask me, Dave?

Dave: Right off the top of my head — I was curious. You seem to really have your act together.

Pat: As for your answers — I don’t outline first. I know the beginning, the end, the general idea of the story. I start at the beginning, thinking out each step of the way as I go. The only time I deviate is that somewhere in the middle I write the end. Don’t know why. Perhaps it gives me the push I need to get through the murky middle.

Dave: That’s exactly how I do it. I make some changes during the rewrite / editing, but the story is the story.

Pat: Book signings — so far I haven’t done one. There are no bookstores around here, and I don’t seem to be able to get together with the librarians to plan an event there.

Dave: I was scared to death with my first signing (there are pictures on my FaceBook from the one at the St Augustine Lighthouse) Fortunately, I write for kids & relate well (was a coach for many years), so I’m sorta in my element.

Pat: There are only two parts of the whole writing process that are difficult for me — getting motivated to write and then incessant copyediting after I’ve written the book. Other than that, I enjoy the whole process. Or maybe not. If I did, I’d be writing! I like promotion, but whatever I’m doing doesn’t seem to be effective. At least not yet. I have hopes, though.

Dave: My problem is time – I’m not one for sitting down for only an hour or so. When I get into it — I’m good for several hours. Editing, I’m okay with snippets, but I print everything, mark it up with red pen & then make changes on the word doc. (several times).

Pat: That’s my problem, too. Some people can write in fits and starts, and few minutes here and a few minutes there, but not me. It takes a while for me to get into the proper frame of mind. That’s why getting motivated is so difficult for me — I know that I have to make a real commitment not just on blocks of time but for the year it takes for me to write a novel.

Pat: As for your question about character or plot: character and plot are pretty much the same thing in my books. Character determines plot, plot determines character.

Dave: I get most compliments about characters & plot twists. Love ‘the I didn’t see that coming’ reaction.

Pat: As for what’s my strength, that’s up to my readers to decide. Dialogue is the easiest thing for me to write, though.

Dave: Love dialogue with lots of quips & one liners. Current work includes conversations with a dead pirate (Calico Jack Rackham) which has been a blast to write.

Pat: What do I drink? No coffee, no tea, no vodka. I’m strictly water with an occasional hot chocolate.

Dave: I am a coffee-holic.

Pat: Whew! I think I answered all your question!

Dave: Sorry – didn’t mean to be a pain. I just admire your ability to provoke thought. I’ve enjoyed your blog tour. Don’t worry though, I’m not a wacko stalker. Hah!

Pat: You weren’t a pain, Dave. This was fun. I’ve liked your impromptu parts of my tour, first the article on your blog, and now this conversation.

Dave: I’m anxious to buy your book. I went online to order from 2nd Wind using my wife’s PayPal account but, since I’m out of town, the shipping address didn’t match up with the account & that, apparently, screwed them up. I’ll be home in a week or so & I’ll order it then.

Keep up the good work Pat. What I’ve read of your work so far is excellent & your blog posts are always entertaining & informative.

Pat: Thank you, Dave! That was fun. If anyone wants to answer Dave’s questions, I’d like to hear your responses!

The second discussion of the day is taking place at James Rafferty’s blog. I met James through an online writing group. We are talking about contests and the difficulty of straddling genres. You can find James and me here: Collaborative Interview with Pat Bertram

The third discussion took place on Gather.com, a now defunct site, so it will remain forever a mystery!

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(Pat Bertram is the author of the suspense novels Light Bringer, More Deaths Than One, A Spark of Heavenly Fire, and Daughter Am I. Bertram is also the author of Grief: The Great Yearning, “an exquisite book, wrenching to read, and at the same time full of profound truths.”) Connect with Pat on Google+. Like Pat on Facebook.

Posted in blogging, books, internet, writing. Tags: Bad Latitude, character vs. plot, Dave Ebright, James Rafferty, No Whine Just Champagne, talking about writing, writing discussion. 7 Comments »

Judi Fennell — Going with the Flow

November 18, 2009 — Pat Bertram

I have an exciting day ahead of me today. I am a guest on Judi Fennell’s blog talking about mermaids and mountains, and Judi is here talking about mermen and humor. Judi is the author of In Over Her Head, the newly-landed Wild Blue Under, and the soon-to-be-netted Catch of a Lifetime. As you will see in the following article, Judi writes fairy tales with a twist:

Thanks, Pat, for having me here today.

As some of you may know, I write a paranormal romance series about Mermen. Yes, Mermen. I figured if there were mermaids in stories, there had to be Mermen, right? Otherwise how would you get more little mermaids…

I didn’t really start out to write a series about Mermen, though. That’s the funny part. I was writing a series about modern twists on fairy tales: Cinda Bella, Beauty and The Best, and Fairest of Them All. For my story, I chose The Little Mermaid, and figured the best way to twist that was to make him the Mer. So I did, made the Human a female, stuck her under the sea, tossed in some stolen diamonds (literally tossed them into the sea), added a sucker-less remora fish named Chum, a mafioso-type great white named Vincent, the mother of all sea monsters (Ceto from Greek mythology), stirred in some other mythologies, a couple of pop cultural references, manipulated our language to be sea-appropriate, and voila, In Over Her Head was born, the title a play on so many things having to do with the story I don’t think I can remember all of them.

I had such a blast writing this story and laughed to myself the whole time.

The funny thing is, I hadn’t exactly been planning to write humor. It wasn’t until Chum showed up and opened his mouth, that I realized this could be a comedy. And once I made that realization, I figured, what the heck. Whatever pun or silly comment I came up with… in it went. That’s when the story started flowing. (And, yes, pun totally intended.)

Actually, there are a lot of puns in the story. On purpose. I mean, you can’t write a sea-themed story with a whole civilization and not play with the language. That’s it in a nut shell becomes That’s it in a conch shell. I think you might want to sit down becomes I think you might want to rest on the bottom, Son-of-a-bitch! becomes Son-of-a-Mer! and so on. There’s a line about Johnny Depp in there that got me my agent and readers have told me I hooked them (see? they just keep coming!) with the heroes’ names in the first two books – they’re twin brothers, one is the Heir to the throne, the other is The Spare, and their names are Rod and Reel. Yes, you are supposed to role your eyes, and go with the flow. Not quite campy, but the stories don’t take themselves too seriously.

Now, I’ve always had a wacky sense of humor that either gets some chuckles or some eye-rolling. Never would I have said that I’d be writing romantic comedy. I still scratch my head at that. Me? Funny? Hmmm… But, for whatever reason, it’s working for me, so you can bet I’ll keep swimming with it. Or, actually, in my next series about genies, I’ll keep flying with it. (Ah, to have a real magic carpet…)

So here’s some of the fun from Judi’s latest release: Wild Blue Under excerpt.

And if that’s not enough excitement, I’m Reading at the Beach with Vicki Newell. (We have a theme going here! Vicki even provides the proper sound effects.) So please stop by and say hi: We Are Story

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Posted in blogging, writing. Tags: Catch of the Day, In Over Her Head, Judi Fennell, puns, Wild Blue Under, writing humor. 20 Comments »

First Lines and Free Time

November 16, 2009 — Pat Bertram

Can you believe it? This is the thirtieth day of my Daughter Am I blog tour! Only five days left. Oh, dear . . . what am I going to do with all that free time? As if I don’t know.

For one thing, I’m going to get back to writing. I figure if I tell myself this enough, it will sink in and I will actually do it. I keep hoping I’ll stumble on a new idea to give me a renewed enthusiasm for the story, but perhaps that idea will come during the writing. I’ve been rereading what I’ve already written so I know what the story is, and it’s different, but then what’s the point of writing the same?

For another thing, I’ve decided to follow the story of A Spark of Heavenly Fire in real time on my blog. I just checked the book. The story begins on December 2. Whatever happened to December 1? That’s when the original story started. Apparently, when I condensed the first fifty pages, I decided to leave the rest of the timeline intact. The book originally began with Rachel Abram’s death on December 1, then the jogger’s death on December 2. Somehow in the rewrite, the order got reversed.

My original first line was: “There’s something terribly wrong with me,” Rachel Abrams said. “I feel great.” I always liked the idea of starting with that line, but sometimes we need to do what’s best for the story.

But I’m getting ahead of myself. I have to focus on this tour — there are still articles about Daughter Am I to write, comments to respond to, and the end-of-the-tour party to plan. As if that’s not enough, my party will run concurrently with the Second Wind Publishing new release party. Daughter Am I will be in good company. JJ Dare’s new book False World has just been released, and so has One Too Many Blows to the Head by Eric Beetner and JB Kohl.

Today’s tour stops are all wonderful, and that’s due in no small part to my hosts.

I’m in South Africa with horror writer Joan De La Haye talking about: Creating Interesting Characters.

I’m talking Over Coffee with Sia McKye about: Running with a Gang of Rogues.

And I’m on Bobby Ozuna’s blog talking about: The Story Behind the Story–an Author Interviewed.

Click here to find the Daughter Am I Blog Tour Schedule

Click here to buy Daughter Am I from Second Wind Publishing, LLC.

Click here to buy Daughter Am I from Amazon.

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Posted in blogging, books, internet, writing. Tags: A Spark of Heavenly Fire, blog tour, Bobby Ozuna, Daughter Am I, Eric Beetner, False World, JB Kohl, JJ Dare, Joan De La Haye, One Too Many Blows to the Head, Sia McKye. 8 Comments »

News from the Blogosphere

November 15, 2009 — Pat Bertram

I’m exaggerating a bit — whatever news I have is from my own private byte of the blogosphere.

I just finished reading Jeffery Deaver’s Roadside Crosses, and I sure am missing out on all the excitement of blogging. Hundreds of thousands of people do not read my blog, and I can’t imagine that anything I say could inspire murder, except in a literary way. And perhaps not even that.

I hope I’m not as obsessed about blogging as Deaver’s characters, though I might come close. I wasn’t going to turn on the computer first thing this morning — trying to wean myself away a bit at a time — but it didn’t work. I got up did a couple of overhead presses, a few curls, a couple of bench presses, decided that was all the exercise I needed, and fired up the computer. I didn’t post to this blog, though. I posted to the Second Wind Blog, so perhaps that doesn’t count as obsession. On the offchance that you will have to ever discuss what I meant when I wrote Daughter Am I, you might want to check out the article: Message in a Novel.

Tomorrow I will be in South Africa!! Way cool.

I’ve also been invited Over Coffee with Sia McKye at her blog tomorrow. Well, I’ll be there if I write the article, and I will as soon as I finish this one. Sia told me to “talk about the fun you had creating a cast of rogues. In their time, they were men to be reckoned with. Even now, being up in years, their spirit is willing, they have experience and they have taken the main character under their wing, determined to protect her. It cracks me up that you have a character that shakes so bad he probably couldn’t shoot the broadside of a barn.

I think, what’s lovely about this story is the caring between them all. The determination to protect though they aren’t the men they used to be. It speaks to their heart, their sense of adventure, the enduring quality of what makes people what they are. Even the wicked or “bad” can care about things. I think you show a glimpse of the good in their heart, regardless of what they did in their life.”

Hmmm. Maybe I should get Sia to write the article. She knows the characters in Daughter Am I better than I do!

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Posted in blogging, books, internet, life, writing. Tags: blogging, characters, Daughter Am I, Jeffery Deavery, message in a novel, Roadside Crosses, Sia McKye. 2 Comments »

Daughter Am I Blog Tour — Final Week!

November 14, 2009 — Pat Bertram

My Daughter Am I blog tour is winding down — I have seven days to go (eight if you include today) and I don’t know whether to be sad or to rejoice. Since my promotion motto is “Promotion is just another word for party,” I decided to rejoice and have an end of blog tour party on the 22nd and 23rd. You are all invited, of course.

The most interesting aspect of the tour has been coming up with unique guest posts that highlight various elements of the story. Unique, in this case, meaning that all the posts for the tour were different. I range from talking about the hero’s quest, to gangsterism, to descriptions of my characters, to researching the book. This should, ideally, give prospective readers a better idea of the story than a simple blurb.

I didn’t have a real tour for my first books. I just did a guest appearance on a few of my blogger friends blogs, but that was more of an international get-together than a real tour. Always one for a challenge, I halfway considered going ahead and doing a tour for those books now, but then I really would never get back to writing and, as hard as turning off the computer in the evening is going to be, I am ready to finish my work-in-progress. If nothing else, its completion will be another excuse for a party!

The point I’m stumbling over here is that I’m thinking of doing a series of articles in December similar to my blog tour posts, but focusing on my first two books, especially A Spark of Heavenly Fire. After all, odd though it may seem considering that I decimate Colorado with a bioengineered disease, it is a Christmas story. Since the story leads up to Christmas, I wonder if my blog could mirror those fictional December days without my giving away the story. Something to think about.

Click here to find the Daughter Am I Blog Tour Schedule

Click here to buy Daughter Am I from Second Wind Publishing, LLC.

Click here to buy Daughter Am I from Amazon.

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Posted in blogging, books, internet, life, writing. Tags: A Spark of Heavenly Fire, blog tour, bloggers, book promotion, Daughter Am I, virtual book tour. 4 Comments »

Tweet-y Bird

November 13, 2009 — Pat Bertram

I received a direct message from someone I was following on Twitter. (Notice I said was following? Anyone who sends me junk gets unfollowed.) The message included a link to a site that promised to automate my Twitter. It will find followers for me, it will Tweet for me, and it will read the feed for me. Well, perhaps I exaggerating a bit when it comes to the last point, but the first two are true. It makes me wonder what the point of it is. Who are we tweeting to? Birds? Bugs? Bots?

Even without signing up for the various sites that purport to help me live a tweeter life, I still participate in a bit of automation. Whenever I post a blog, WordPress automatically updates Twitter, which in turn updates MySpace and LinkedIn. Perhaps I am missing the point. I do know Twitter is supposed to about real people talking in real time about real subjects, but I have yet to participate in a real conversation. Occasionally I RT (retweet) someone’s update, sometimes I remember to return a #FF (Follow Friday), but for the most part I don’t see anything I want to comment on. As I said, I could be missing the point.

I’m rethinking my social networking time. After my blog tour, I’m going to be spending way less time on the computer. (Eyestrain, anyone?) I want to go more for quality than quantity. I used to friend everyone on Facebook I could, but now I unfriend anyone who spams me. I have a particular dislike of people who arbitrarily stick me in a group in order to send me junk, because even if I delete the message, I keep getting messages as long as anyone in the group responds. Don’t get me wrong — I like getting messages that are sent to me, specifically, and I always respond. I just don’t like anonymity. (If you knew me in offline life, you would be laughing at the irony of such a statement. Offline, I am the epitome of privacy.)

I’m looking forward to taking a step back from online activities. So much of it seems counterproductive, even foolish, that I will be better off working on my poor neglected WIP. At least I will have accomplished something.

Don’t worry, though. I bet none of you will notice any difference. I’ll still be blogging three or four times a week, will keep up with my discussion groups, will respond to genuine messages.

I’ll even tweet. And if I don’t, WordPress will do it for me.

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Posted in blogging, internet, life, writing. Tags: #FF, Facebook, Follow Friday, retweet, RT, social networking, spam, Twitter. 13 Comments »

Message in a Blog-gle

November 12, 2009 — Pat Bertram

When Margay Leah Justice from Moonlight, Lace, and Mayhem invited me to be a guest, she said, “November is going to reflect the themes of gratitude in honor of Thanksgiving, so if you can work up a post along those lines that ties to you as a writer and/or the theme of your book, that would be great, especially if you could tie the two together.”

Of all the topics I’ve discussed during my blog tour, this one gave me the most difficulty. I have plenty to be thankful for, it’s just that I couldn’t think of a single original idea. So, what did I do? I did what I always do when I have a writing problem to work through — I blogged about it. A couple of days ago, I posted this note:

I’ve agreed to write an article about giving thanks, and I have no idea what to say. I am thankful for many things — for my online friends, for my fans (odd to think I actually have fans!), for my publisher who understands my books even better than I do — and yet it’s not the sort of article I would want to read, so I’m looking for a different angle — a hook — and not finding it.

The wonderfully generous and supportive A. F. Stewart commented: I’m thankful for art, nature, Hugh Jackman, that I have an almost zero chance of being eaten by a shark or velociraptor.

My good friend Joylene Nowell Butler commented: Giving thanks for literary critics. What would our little corner of the world be like if we weren’t aware of some literary critic ready to pounce on our books and scream bloody murder that we wrote a disgusting book! Makes me pay attention to every tee and every I.

Susan Helene Gottfried, who maintains the incredible Win a Book site, commented: turn the topic on its head. When did you FAIL to be thankful? How did that teach you the value of giving thanks?

Great ideas, all of them, but Ms. Stewart’s comment gave me my hook. I am thankful I have almost zero chance of being eaten by a velociraptor, but my hero in my poor stalled work-in-progress is in such a danger. (Or he would be if I knew what a velociraptor was.) So, here is my hook: I am grateful that I am not a character in one of my books!

I am also grateful for my blog readers. They never fail to offer support and suggestions, and they are not afraid to let me know when I am wrong.

Thank you.

You can find today’s blog tour stop here: Grateful to be an Author

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