The China Conspiracy

Hi, everyone!
I'll be here this month talking about my latest suspense/thriller, The China Conspiracy, about the publishing industry, and writing in general. I've been teaching writing/ publishing classes for a few years now, so ask me any questions you want. If I don't know the answer, I'll find someone who does!
Just a little background about The China Conspiracy: the main character is Kit Olsen, a woman in her 40's who works for the CIA as a computer programmer/analyst. She's married to an increasingly absent husband and mother to a 16-year-old son named Tim. She's just trying to get through each day as "superwoman" -- holding down a full-time job with all the demands that makes upon her, trying to figure out where the spark went in her marriage, and trying to do the best she can in raising Tim. Then Tim is kidnapped - a mother's worst nightmare. The ransom is some programming code written in Mandarin that the CIA covertly intercepted. Now Kit is trying to get her son back, and also trying to learn what the code does and why the kidnappers want it. It leads her from a sedentary life as a programmer to politicial espionage and international intrigue... and a political bonfire she never could have imagined.
I'm looking forward to discussing how the whole idea of The China Conspiracy came about (leading back to the 2000 Presidential Election), and your thoughts about Kit as a Boomer Woman... and answering any questions you have about writing or publishing!

Glad to see you jumped right in.

Here's a little information about patricia:

The China Conspiracy is the second suspense thriller in a series that casts female programmers in the lead roles—women who find themselves caught in life or death situations where they must use their knowledge and their guts to rescue themselves.

"I always have admired strong women," Patricia admits. "I think it came from listening to my father tell us stories about our ancestry, and all the strong women in our family. One ancestor, Paralee Drake, was left at home during the Civil War when her husband joined the Confederate Army. When a group of Union soldiers tried to steal the hams from the smokehouse, she stood in the doorway with her shotgun, and told them those hams were all she had to feed her seven children, and they would get to them over her dead body. Legend has it, they left her, her children and the hams alone."

It's the kind of guts the characters in her books would admire.

Reviews:

Editor Rebecca Brown (http://www.rebeccasreads.com/reviews/11mysthr/11terp33.html) says: “p.m.terrell, author of the wildly successful Kickback, is back with another hair-raising, fast-paced thriller pitting a savvy programmer, a TV news reporter with a painful past, & an enigmatic Chinese-American translator against a dogged police inspector, a newly elected politician & the shadow men of the CIA & FBI… With a nod to The Manchurian Candidate, this modern caper comes out the gate at a gallop, & keeps you hurtling through winter storms & burrowing into the mazes of a shell company, moments before the killers, inches in front of certain disaster.”

Reviewer Deborah Hern (http://www.theromancereadersconnection.com/reviews/terrellpm1503.html): “This exciting story takes off from the very first page and never lets up for a moment. The pace is fast, the plotting excellent, and the characters are human and believable. The evolving relationship between Kit and Carter seems very natural, never strained. The secondary characters moving in and out of the story are all well-drawn and add intrigue to the mix. My advice: Don’t start this one late at night. You’ll find yourself feverishly turning pages long into the wee hours.”

Patricia Terrell, a Boomer Woman who writes under the pen name p.m.terrell, was born in Washington, DC to an FBI Special Agent and his homemaker wife, the third of five children. Although they lived for short periods throughout the country, Trish (as she prefers to be called) is a native Washingtonian who has lived most of her life in the Washington, D.C. suburbs.
Her life, like the novels she writes, took a series of different twists and turns. Until recent years, her writing took a back seat to marriage, raising a family, and earning a living. Through a stroke of luck (or some would say, fate) she was working for a subsidiary of IBM when the first Apple computers rolled off the production lines, and she found herself on the ground floor of a mushrooming industry.
In 1984, when she was known as Patricia McClelland, she opened her first business, McClelland Enterprises, Inc. It was one of the first companies in the Washington, DC metropolitan area that was devoted entirely to personal computer classroom instruction. She personally wrote all of the course manuals that were used in the classes. During this period, three of her computer how-to books were also published: Creating the Perfect Database, published by Scott-Foresman, followed by The Dynamics of WordPerfect and The Dynamics of Reflex, both published by Dow Jones-Irwin. She also wrote a series of columns for The Washington Business Advisor, The Washington Post, and The Washington Business Journal, among others.

Ten years later, she became Patricia McClelland Terrell, and opened her second business, Terrell Computer Services, Inc., which is now known as Continental Software Development Corporation, USA.

Trish is a strong supporter of Crime Solvers, Crime Stoppers, and Crime Lines. She served as the first female President of the Chesterfield/ Colonial Heights Crime Solvers, breaking through the glass ceiling to chair a board that had previously been firmly managed by a “good old boys” network. “It was not a job for the faint of heart,” Trish says laughingly. Using her background in computers, she took the organization into the 21st Century, including establishing a web site that receives almost a quarter million hits per month and has earned a link from America’s Most Wanted.

On April 1, 2004 she was with Virginia Governor Mark Warner when he signed into legislation additional protection for citizens calling Crime Solvers and Crime Stoppers with tips. It ensures that citizens will remain anonymous and can not be called to testify in court.

Although Trish wrote stories growing up, she set aside her literary pursuits until 2000, when she wrote her first published suspense/thriller, Kickback. She’d been working as a programmer and had developed an application for a trucking firm when they approached her and asked her to add a routine that effectively hid their under-the-table kickbacks.

“I was the worst programmer in the world for them to ask,” she says, laughing. “I went straight home and called my dad, who is a retired FBI Special Agent.” He put her in contact with the local FBI field office, and she turned over evidence to them of the kickback scheme.

“As time went by,” she says, “I wondered what would have happened if the FBI hadn’t believed me… or if the trucking company threatened my life.” So the idea for Kickback was formed, in which a much younger programmer enters her first job, right out of college, only to find they want her to write a program to hide illegal kickbacks. Only in this story, the FBI don’t believe her and the closer the main character gets to gathering evidence of illegal activities, the closer the bad guys get to ending her life.

During the 2000 Presidential election, Trish was having lunch with two of her computer clients when they began discussing the problem of hanging, pregnant, and dimpled chads. “I argued that the U.S. would have to computerize the elections; we had come so far technologically that it didn’t make sense to continue with old-fashioned paper ballots with punch holes. But as I thought about it, I realized how easy it would be to “fix” an election if it was computerized.”

So once Kickback was finished, she started on The China Conspiracy. And as The China Conspiracy was hitting the bookshelves, Johns Hopkins University led a study into the real computerized touch-screen technology used by many states in the 2004 election. And their findings were chilling: that the new technology was so security flawed, “even a foreign government could easily infiltrate the system and rig our elections.” The China Conspiracy has received international attention, including segments broadcast into Communist China by Voice of America and a thirty-minute PBS television show.

In August 2004, Trish combined her literary pursuits with her law enforcement connections to co-found The Book ‘Em Foundation (www.bookemfoundation.org), a non-profit organization, whose mission is to increase public awareness of the connection between high illiteracy rates and high crime rates, increase literacy rates, and decrease crime rates. They held the First Annual Book 'Em Event on October 23, 2004 in Waynesboro, Virginia, which featured 48 authors who signed their books and participated in talks and discussions. Proceeds from the event went to literacy projects and decreasing crime. The event was so successful the City of Waynesboro signed a 20-year agreement (the first in its history) to have the Book ‘Em Event held in their town every October. The next event is scheduled for October 22-23, 2005.

Trish is currently working on her third suspense/thriller, Ricochet, which is due out later this year. She has two more suspense/thrillers scheduled after that. And her agent is currently negotiating the movie rights to both Kickback and The China Conspiracy. You can view more information about her and her books at www.pmterrell.com.

So glad you are here Trish...! Fellow Boomers I'm here to tell you both "The China Conspiracy" and "Kickback" are excellent books, and very fascinating stories. Trish has been so helpful to me over the last year and knows so much about so many aspects of writing and this business in general.

Please share your "trick of the trade" for making your characters more than one dimensional.

Hi, everyone!

Dotsie, thanks so much for that great introduction. And my dear good friend Pam, I should hire you as my publicist. I'm always happy to help someone as wonderful as you are.

Dianne, what a great question to get this forum going! I have a number of "tricks of the trade". Sitting on my desk is a very worn copy of "Building Believable Characters" published by Writer's Digest Books. Every single time (without fail!) that I develop a new character, whether it's a main character or a secondary or temporary (one scene only) character, I reach for this book.

Let's say I start out with a nondescript male coworker in one of my scenes. Using the physical description portion of this book, which is divided by eye color, facial expressions, noses, hair, physical body type, etc., I come up with a description, interwoven throughout several paragraphs. The nondescript worker now becomes: a programmer with stooped shoulders, whose hours in front of the computer left him with the muscles of linguini, his fawn-colored eyes so bloodshot they remind me of a parched desert, the cracks deep and wanting, his face doughy from lack of sun...

There are personality traits in this book also, so this coworker becomes an anomie (a person with feelings of alienation and not belonging to society) whose only friends are the pet spider and turtle he keeps in glass containers set side by side... (a spider and a turtle, because they can not be hugged; they are cold blooded...)

I also love to go to a busy coffee shop or cafe, where I can sit and listen to snippets of conversation, observe clothing and mannerisms...

I could go on and on. I love developing memorable characters!

Trish-- I'm struggling at this moment--in a hotel in D.C. (I presume you're somewhere within a 100-mile radius)--with the wording to the forward of the Chinese edition of my book. So, true to form, I'm fidgeting and doing everything I can to avoid the hard work of facing the page. (Can you relate?) In other words, I'm checking my e-mail, checking the forum, etc. I know I'll finish today, which is the deadline, but I'm undoubtedly going to be tinkering with a word here, a word there, until the very last moment.

Anyway, despite what I just said, I'm so glad I checked the forum. I want to welcome you. You're off to a tremendous start! I've already learned something from you. I'm going on-line this afternoon and ordering "Building Believable Characters." Can't wait to follow the discussion and see what else you have to say.

Trish, following what Prill said about doing everything but writing. How do you schedule your writing time so you aren't distracted by all the things Prill mentioned? Do you write hours a day, when the mood strikes, set word count goals, chapter at a time? What makes you put pen to paper?

Trishhhhhh...yuhoo...it's me hon, Queen Jaw Jaw. How are ya gal? So glad you're here with us.

Tell me, where do the ideas come from?
And besides the obvious (novels) do you submit writing anywhere else?

And more importantly, are you bringing the margaritas Friday night to the hotel in October? Pam wanted me to ask that.

What? You expect me to bring my own? I'm a Queen for Pete's sake!

JJ

Hi, Prill and Dotsie!
Prill, I'm so glad you checked the forum, too! Good luck with your deadline.
Dotsie, I have a goal of writing one chapter per week, which means I finish the first draft within 6-8 months. Then I usually do the rewrite within another 4-6 months.
I am the consummate daydreamer. I live in the minds of my characters. I form whole scenes in my mind before I ever approach the keyboard. I do a lot of long distance travel, and I try to take any road but the interstate. I might be traveling at dawn on a back country road, see a ramshackle house with a waft of smoke coming from the chimney, and I have the basis for a house in my book. By the time I sit down to write, the entire chapter comes out within 2-3 hours (the creative part). Then comes the technical part: adding scent, color, and atmosphere.
When I was writing The China Conspiracy, there was a chapter between a Governor-elect who believed that Tibet was better off under Chinese rule than they had been under Tibetan rule, and a reporter who believed just the opposite. I spent weeks researching China's official stance on Tibet, "brainwashed" myself to believe as they did, and wrote the scene only from the Governor-elect's point of view. Then I cleansed myself of that thinking, spent more weeks obtaining information from official U.S. government transcripts going back to the end of World War II, all the way to the present day... and wrote the reporter's rebuttal to everything his interviewee had to say. Then I melded the two together into a heck of a debate. I spent much more time on that one scene than I do on a typical scene.

Awesome description of technique, Trish.
Georgia, don't worry, honey, I'll bring your Margaritas if no one else will. Salt or no salt?
And Trish, do you ever talk to yourself on tape to keep your story line and not forget things? or is your daydreaming so intense that you can just pick up where you left off? Is the story vivid enough to remember it all until you get to a point to write it down? Alz Heimer hangs out at my house - good ideas dissipate like smoke on a windy day.

Hi, Unique!
I am usually near a PC at some point during the day, and I keep a Word document open to the current chapter. I might pop in and type up parts of sentences or ideas, contained within square brackets so I know it's not actual writing. Then as I write the chapter, I refer to those notes to make sure I've covered everything. I don't use a tape recorder; there are too many voices in my head, to add to them! And when I see something, like the house at dawn described above, it leaves an imprint on my mind so I don't forget the object or the atmosphere surrounding it.
In fact, one night this winter I was driving back from Roanoke late at night, past Appomattax, Virginia... which is so desolate not even my cell phone works. I was the only vehicle on a road for more than an hour and a half. And suddenly, my headlights caught something moving, and the image was surrounded with fog. It scared me to death! Turned out to be a deer, which almost crashed through my windshield, but it left an imprint of a scene that will find its way into a future book... only it won't be a deer, but a person running through the darkness, looking for help...

Just reading your description gave me chills.

Good! Wait until you read it in my next book!

This is already becoming another great discussion. I've been sick (still am), so I'm comforting myself with the boards, and voila! here's our Trish talking about writing mystery and suspense!

My question: Do you visit every place that you write about - How do you get the scene details just so...

How much of your personality is in the main characters?

Hi, everyone!

JJ, sorry I missed your post yesterday. Can't understand how I did that! Good to hear from you.

You asked where I get my ideas. I'm a news junkie. My books are all suspense/ thrillers, and I watch reports of crimes that could be committed with the use of computers. Or my imagination sometimes takes off, and I realize what could be done with a computer. (I'm a computer programmer by trade.)

During the 2000 Presidential Election, I was sitting in a restaurant with some clients watching the election officials in Florida holding up cards and debating whether a chad was pregnant, dimpled, hanging, etc. And we got into a discussion about technology and how antiquated our election system is, and how it needed to be automated. But as I sat there, I realized that I was writing a complicated program for these clients to detect Medicare fraud and abuse, and they really had no idea how I did what I did. They only knew if it alerted them of someone "suspicious"... And I realized how easy it would be for me to build in a few lines of code that would rig the election. That's where the idea for "The China Conspiracy" was born. Later, as the book was hitting the bookshelves, an independent study was done of the new election touch-screen technology, headed by Johns Hopkins University. And their findings were that the election software was so security flawed, even a foreign government could infiltrate it and rig our elections. Despite the security risks, a number of states still used this software in the 2004 election. By the way, there are no recounts with this software. The recommendation was to provide a printed "receipt" that would be submitted like we submit the punch cards now, but it was determined to be "too expensive" to implement...

Yes, I do occasionally write elsewhere; not too often, as I'm so busy with my books (and running a few companies) ... but on March 21, several of my poems will be published online at www.sistersinthelord.org/magazine. I hope you'll check them out!

Hi, Dian!

Thanks for tuning in. I hope you're feeling better soon!

Yes, I do visit each place I write about. In "The China Conspiracy", there's a scene of an attempted kidnapping at Iron Bridge Park in Chesterfield, VA at midnight. I actually went to the park, scouted out the best place for the kidnapping to take place, took pictures, and recorded every aspect so it was depicted exactly as it truly exists. But I had several scenes at a ski resort near Staunton and Waynesboro, VA, where the resort didn't come off looking too well (a dead body found and a successful kidnapping) so that location was a composite of several ski resorts.

In a real twist, I asked Marc Woolverton of the Manassas City Police Dept to help me locate an area in Northern Virginia where a dead body would throw the government into beaurocratic wrangling over jurisdictions... And he found the perfect place for a body to wash up from the Potomac, and even sent me aerial photographs! When I wrote that scene, I even used street addresses so the reader could find their way to that exact location. It is in Fairfax County, but on federal property, so it would possibly fall into Park Police territory, but the FBI has jurisdiction over homicides on federal property, and the body had a laptop strapped to her that the CIA wanted desperately to get their hands on... So it was the perfect spot! I gave special thanks to Sgt. Woolverton for that information. I depend a lot on police officers, FBI, and CIA employees (past and present) to lend a lot of realism to my books.

You also asked how much of my personality is in the main characters. Very little. In "Kickback", the main character has a lot more guts than I do, and doesn't mind living life on the edge. In "The China Conspiracy", I don't know if I would have had the guts to do what Kit does in getting her son back... and then turning the tables on the bad guys.

In fact, because "Kickback" started with something that really happened to me, I originally wrote the story with a male main character. But when early reviewers read the book, they said it reminded them so much of John Grisham's "The Firm" that I should change the main character to a female. I have mixed feelings about doing that; I don't know why that was necessary, simply because it reminded people of Grisham's early works... But so many people love Sheila that I am writing a sequel about her now. In one scene, Sheila actually drives through David's Bridge and meets Bailey, Pamela June Kimmell's main character in "The Mystery of David's Bridge". We are in the process of collaberating on that scene; many thanks to Pam for allowing me to introduce her fantastic character Bailey, into one of my books!

Well you all can't imagine (or maybe you could!!) how thrilled I am that Trish's "Sheila" and my "Bailey" will be meeting in one of Trish's books........I'll be returning the favor - you can count on it!

Trish what amazes me is not only the depth of your characters and their "situations", but how you are able to juggle your business AND your writing time. On top of that you participate in so many other things like organizing Book 'Em and Crime Solvers, etc.......where do you find the energy?

Hi, Pam!
Great to hear from you!
I'm sure every one of us finds ourselves in situations where we have to rise "above and beyond" what we thought we were capable of handling, and somehow we just find the strength to do everything.
Right now, I am actively running three corporations, and serving on the board of directors for four more. And writing a book. And I'm in the process of moving. There are some nights I'm convinced I'm going to have a heart attack, but I don't, and each day dawns and I just simply have to get back on the treadmill. "A woman's gotta do what a woman's gotta do."
... Can't wait for Sheila and Bailey to get together. They are so much alike!

Trish
Really enjoying all the insight here. I think as a "reader", I can appreciate all the research you pour into your work. Every reader should take some time once in awhile to read about "how" the author wrote the book - where did the idea come from? what kind of research, etc? I know now that I have a greater appreciation for the author when I read a well written novel.

A couple of questions:

1) Does the plot always turn out the way you conceive it at the beginning, or do your characters begin to take you down twists and turns you hadn't originally planned? ie are you ever surprised yourself at the outcome?


and

2) How does one get an autopgraphed copy of your book? (or do I have to wait for Miss Pinkie to pick me up one at Book 'Em?)

oh, and a third question - what kind of drugs are you on? If you can spare any energy, I'll take it!

Trish, I've read the book and am lovin' reliving it with you in the forums. I can recall every little tid bit you've mentioned. That proves you're an excellent writer. Sometimes I read books and can't recall whole sections!

Hi, Evie and Dotsie!
Thanks so much for tuning in. Dotsie, thanks for the compliment. I'm so glad you enjoyed the book and can still recall it!
Evie, I always plan the crime first. In fact, I rely so much on law enforcement officials that they know when I start asking questions about crimes and murders and how to commit them, that I'm researching another plot!
I haven't been surprised at how they've turned out, because I decide how the crime will unfold and how it will end up... With The China Conspiracy and Ricochet (the book I'm finishing now) I have a specific timeline. The China Conspiracy's climactic scene had to occur on the day the new governor is being sworn into office. With Ricochet, the climactic scene is the day after Thanksgiving ("Black Friday").
Thanks for asking about an autographed copy. You have two options if you'd like to order it via Internet: if you go to my web site at www.pmterrell.com, you can specify how you'd like it autographed, and it will ship out within 24 hours (I keep some on hand just for this purpose). If you'd like to do a good deed at the same time, go to www.bookemfoundation.org, and order it from their online store, and 40% of the proceeds will go toward increasing literacy. The book will still be autographed.
What kind of drugs am I on? None... I'm high on Life! )

Thank you for being with us Trish, I'm enjoying reading your posts and learning so much.
I was going to ask about the autographed copy but Evie beat me to it.

How long does it take you to finish a novel? And do you do any other types of writing? (i.e. poetry or short stories)

Robin

Thank you, Robin!
So far, it has taken me two years to complete each novel. The first draft has taken 6-8 months, and then another 4-6 months for the rewrite. Once the editors get their hands on it, I rewrite it yet again, but I think I'm getting better... there were a lot fewer rewrites involved in my second book than my first.

I do write short stories, and earned an honorable mention for one of them ("The Storm") which I'd submitted to the Writer's Digest Short Stories Contest. And I also write poetry, and songs. Some of my poetry will be published at www.sistersinthelord.org/magazine the week of March 21. I hope you'll check them out and let me know what you think - good or bad.

Trish I am such a mystery buff I read everything and have been writing them as well. I have several finished short stories that are being held hostage by floppy disks I don't know how to retrieve the manuscripts from...I adored Pams character Bailey and am anxiously awaiting a sequel. Now I can look forward to her meeting your character Sheila. I wish I had half your energy and talent...

Wow! I'm learning so much here, Pam. As I told Dotsie today when we had lunch together, I'm thrilled that you're the author this month because I'm beginning to write some fiction of my own. Your specific comments about how you budget your time, how you research your storylines, and how you flesh out your descriptions of settings and characters are very helpful to me, not to mention inspiring.

I know I'll have questions for you as the month goes on.

Hi, Chatty Lady and Prill!
Thanks for dropping in.
Chatty Lady, I agree with you about Pam Kimmell's character, Bailey. I adore her, too. I've been after Pam to hurry and get the sequel out - I can't wait for Bailey's next adventure. I'm very fortunate that Pam is allowing Bailey to make a cameo appearance in Sheila's next adventure. I have a feeling Sheila and Bailey are going to become fast friends.
Prill, ask me anything you want. I've taught writing classes that cover everything from developing characters to setting up scenes to writing a real page-turner. If I don't know the answer, I'll find someone who does!

I'd like to know the secrets to writing a real page turner. I'm fairly new to writing and could use all the help I can get!
I have mostly been writing personal essays but would like to get more involved with fiction. Before my family kills me for giving away all their secrets

Hi, Robin!
Great question!
There are so many tricks of the trade when writing page turners.
Briefly: thoughts slow things down. Never have a character thinking by himself/ herself when you're writing a page turner. Thoughts are for giving the reader a breather when the action has been going non-stop.
The best thing is action. The old adage "show me, don't tell me." Action propels the reader forward.
I also don't like flashbacks. Stephen King said once that every time he read a flashback he thought of the old movies where the character got a funny look on his/her face and things went fuzzy... Flashbacks bring a reader back in time. You want to keep propelling them forward.
Never write more than three paragraphs of narrative (at a time) if you want a page-turner.
Dialogue propels a story forward; the reader can flip through dialogue very quickly, but it isn't as good as something physically happening.
Stay away from talking heads.
Change locales.
And leave each chapter with something hanging, so the reader has to go to the next chapter. They can't manage to put the book down!
A really good book to see how each chapter leaves you hanging is "What Dreams May Come". Regardless of what you think of the storyline, the author ends each chapter in such a way that you can't stop reading. (The book is very different from the movie, as they all are...)
What propels a story forward is conflict, conflict, conflict. Nobody wants to read about someone where everything is going right. Every single thing they try to do has to be like climbing a mountain. Especially with suspense. The noose has to keep tightening until you, the reader, feel so much suspense you can barely breathe.
A great movie to watch for how they work with suspense is "Out of Time" with Denzel Washington. I buy movies (only DVD) and study them. The reason I buy only DVD's (as opposed to tapes) is the DVDs come with the Director's comments and background info, which I've found incredible for a writer, especially if you would someday like for your book to be made into a movie.
Hope this helps!

Yes, that helped immensely...Thank you so much!

Another question...When you start out writing, do you always know where your story will end up or do you surprise yourself?
I guess what I'm really asking is, do you make an outline and stick to it or do you go with the flow? I have trouble making outlines.

Hi, Robin!
Thanks for dropping by. I'm glad to be of help.
I personally do not write an outline, but I do have an idea of where I need to be at various points in my manuscript.

For example, with The China Conspiracy, I started with the plotline. I was shooting for approximately 40 chapters (there are 43). I knew one problem with longer books is the middle seems to drag. So I set a goal of having what could in itself be a climactic scene in the middle of the book; then the book veers into a different, unexpected course of events. Because it dealt with a new Virginia governor, I knew the final, climactic scene had to occur as the governor was being sworn in - January 20. That set the stage for when the events happened. So I developed a timeline.

So, my anwer is, I don't actually do a complete outline, because that takes the spontaneity out of the characters (for me). But I did have a good idea of where I wanted to be at different parts of the book.

By the way, speaking of timelines, if you want a real page turner, have the events happen in as short a time as possible. Did you ever see the movie "Three Days of the Condor" (starring Robert Redford, at the height of his box office fame). It was actually based on a book called "Six Days of the Condor". The director thought it would turn things up a notch if the action occurred in half the time - and he was right.

Hi, everybody!
Just wanted to drop in and let you know I'll be going out of town this afternoon (Friday) but I'll be back on the forum and answering your questions on Sunday. I hope you all have a terrific weekend, and I look forward to any more questions you might have!
Trish

Have fun, be careful, travelling mercies, *see* you when you get back.

Thanks, Unique!
It was a whirlwind trip but very enjoyable. What a difference a couple of hundred miles can make... from folks in shorts and t-shirts to snow. I see the forum has been quiet. I hope everyone has had an enjoyable and relaxing weekend.

Trish, I'm playing "catch up" with your comments, having jumped in late in the game. You've given some wonderful examples of how you build suspense, set a scene, and develop a character. You mentioned "Building Believable Characters" (I think that was the name of it) as a book you'd recommend. What other books would you recommend to a fiction author who wants to write suspense?

Hi, Vicki!
Thanks for dropping by. I have a long list of books I recommend for mystery/ suspense authors...

Anything by James Frey; he wrote "The Key", "How to Write a Damn Good Novel", and "How to Write a Damn Good Mystery";
"Writing the Thriller" by T. MacDonald Skillman; this explores the various subgenres - technothrillers, legal thrillers, medical thrillers, cozies, etc;
Something in addition to "Building Believable Characters" that I can't live without is the Writer's Digest Flip Dictionary; when you just can't remember that specific word, or you need to know the parts of something, like a gun...
Generic books I think are invaluable for anyone trying to get published are "The Publishing Game" books - How To Find an Agent, How to Publish a Book, and How to Have a Best Seller. At the end of each subtitle is the phrase "is less than 30 days" -- forget that, but they still have great advice.
And of course, I always keep a baby name book close by;
And believe it or not, I use Linda Goodman's Sun Signs, Moon Signs, or Love Signs. I don't really believe in astrology but they are terrific at building personalities in your characters, especially when you have two people in conflict, like a married couple or boss/subordinate, siblings, etc. Lots of great ideas in those books!
I hope this helps... I have literally about 100 books just used for reference here in my office, but those are the main ones I'd recommend.

I'd add David Morrell's book "Lessons from a Lifetime of Writing" Fantastic!

Great suggestion, Dian! In fact, I was fortunate enough to purchase an autographed copy of this book at last year's Book 'Em event. I love it, too. It is easy for writers to become discouraged when doing the book tour... we think of the best selling authors and the lines out the door, when very few authors get that kind of a reception. David Morrell's book gave me some great laughs, especially reading about the book store employees who drew straws to see who would have to buy his book, because they felt sorry for him sitting there all alone... and the entire tour where all of his books had been destroyed by a flood and never made it to the stores... It gives us all the hope that even though we may not be household names now, things can change mighty fast!
He also has some great information about taking books and making them into movies, and the entire process involved in that.

trish, I want to hear more about the son in the story. How did you come up with his plight as the plot thickened? I always found myself feeling sorry for him.

Hi, Dotsie!

Thanks for dropping in and asking about Tim.
I saw Kit as a "reluctant hero", someone who really preferred not to get involved unless she absolutely had no other choice. And the one way to get a woman involved in ANYTHING is to threaten her child. That's how Tim became embroiled in the story.
I enlisted the aid of a 16-year-old boy, the son of some book store owners, to help me with Tim. I'd written several chapters involving Tim and gave them to Robert to tell me if that was truly how a 16-year-old boy would react to a kidnapping, the media frenzy, and all that was happening with his parents. Robert gave me some great information, which I incorporated into the book. It really helped round out Tim's character.
I'm told that Tim evolved more than any of the other characters... he went from being very distant from his parents and frightened because of his ordeal, to rising to the challenge and helping to outwit the kidnappers.
I've been asked more than once to write an entire book from Tim's point of view. I might just do that some day.

Trish, I just ordered my book and left you a message on your phone that sounded like a Southerner on drugs...I'm sorry but I was in a hurry and wanted to make sure I got an autographed copy sent to me. Zat possible?

Hugs, and I can't wait to read it!

JJ

Hiya, JJ!
Of course! Anything is possible for you, dear! Just finished autographing it and it will be in the mail to you Tuesday morning. Thanks for ordering it!
I absolutely LOVE your accent. Can't wait for the four of us gals (and whoever else wants to join us!) to get together at Book 'Em. We're going to have a blast!
Trish

huh...what accent?

JJ

pssst Trish - JJ, doesn't think she has an accent, the rest of US talk funny - just play along, OK

Oops. Mum's the word.

quote:

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Originally posted by pmterrell:
Hi, Dotsie!

And the one way to get a woman involved in ANYTHING is to threaten her child. That's how Tim became embroiled in the story.
I enlisted the aid of a 16-year-old boy, the son of some book store owners, to help me with Tim. I'd written several chapters involving Tim and gave them to Robert to tell me if that was truly how a 16-year-old boy would react to a kidnapping, the media frenzy, and all that was happening with his parents. Robert gave me some great information, which I incorporated into the book. It really helped round out Tim's character.

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I am so impressed with the type of research you do for your books. Robert allowed you to do wonderful job of presenting a teen's perspective. I thought you were right on the mark with his character.