Start spreading the news...

by Jenna Bennett

Yes, it’s me. I have a new name. And to go with it, I have... well, not a new book, exactly. Just a new edition of an old book.

It’s a long story, but the short version is that the publisher who published A Cutthroat Business last year, decided not to publish the sequel, Hot Property, this summer. They gave those rights back to me, and for a couple of different reasons, none of which matter to this blog post, they threw in the subsidiary rights for A Cutthroat Business as well. Subsidiary rights meaning audio, electronic, foreign, movie and serial rights. Anything except print.

What that means is that I can now self-publish A Cutthroat Business in electronic format, along with all the other books in the Savannah Martin mystery series.

So that’s what I’m doing. What you’re looking at is the new cover for A Cutthroat Business, which is available from Amazon.com, BN.com, Smashwords.com, and maybe a couple of other sites, for the low, low price of only $3.99.

(Yeah, I know there are people out there who sell their books for $.99. But this is 88,000 glorious, beautiful words that I spent a year of my life crafting, and believe me, they’re well worth $3.99. Library Journal said so. “Will delight fans of chick-lit mysteries and romantic suspense.” And if Library Journal says it, you know it’s gotta be true. Besides, $3.99 is only half of what the DIY e-books sell for, and I have it on good authority – I did a poll – that my readers would pay more.)

In another month, I’ll be publishing Hot Property, and the month after that – that’ll make it July – I’ll be throwing book 3, Contract Pending, out there. Book 4, Close to Home, is written but not yet edited, so I don’t know if I can get it ready by August – I’m a third of the way through writing DIY-6, and that’s the priority right now – but I’ll be able to get Close to Home out sometime this fall. If I’m super-focused and really, really lucky, I might have book 5, which has the tentative title of A Done Deal, written by Christmas, although that’s probably pushing it.

Anyway, for the next couple of months, my posts will most likely be focused around this brand new adventure I’m trying on for size. If you’re not interested in e-publishing and the skinny on my journey through the twisted maze of doing it myself, feel free to tune out the first Friday of every month.

If, on the other hand, you find the new frontier to be as exciting as I do, stick around and answer a few of the following questions for me:

1. Do you buy/read e-books?

2. Does it matter to you whether an e-book is self-published (by the author) or traditionally published (by a publisher)? Do you even know whether it is or not when you buy it?

3. Do you think the e-book revolution means the end of the printed word as we know it? How does that make you feel, one way or the other?

4. Does it piss you off when people show almost malicious glee at the thought that print books are on their way out and traditional publishing may go the way of the dodo? (You can probably tell where my feelings are on this subject.)

5. If you’re into e-books and I offered you a free download of A Cutthroat Business, would you read it and do me the favor of posting a review somewhere?

Thanks, y’all! I’ll see you next month with an update.

Free at Last

by Bente Gallagher AKA Jennie Bentley


Swear to God, I had a post titled Free at Last about a year and a half ago too. Didn’t I?

I’m in the same situation now that I was in then. I’ve handed in the manuscript for the last DIY-book, tentatively titled Flipping Out!, and I’m flipping out a little myself too, being out of contract. Until my editor approaches me with an offer to continue the series, I’m unemployed.

Sure, there’s the Cutthroat Business series which isn’t finished, but I write those on my own time and submit them to my publisher when they’re ready. We’re on a book-by-book basis, not a contract. And I’m a book ahead of the game: #2—Hot Property—is in the pipeline and ready for release next summer, while #3—Under Contract, or maybe Contract Pending—is written and under consideration; that would be slotted for the summer of 2012. So I have some time I can waste until I have to get started on #4, which has a working title of Close to Home. Don’t know yet whether that’ll be the last, or whether I’ll need another to tie up the action. It’s a relationship-focused series, so it just depends on when I can get my people together and keep’em that way.

For the next four months, until DIY-4, Mortar and Murder, is released in January and I have to start promoting, I plan to write something new. Something different. Something exciting.

The question, of course, is what.

I thought I had it all figured out. I’m eighty pages into a romantic suspense/thriller/FBI-procedural sort of thing that’s—gasp!—all plotted and outlined. (I know. The world is surely coming to an end.) And I still like my story. I do. I just managed to get caught up in something else, that’s sort of taken over my brain for the time being.

Remember that flash fiction Will had me do earlier this year, during Short Month? 200 words starting with “If you have to die, February is the best month for it?” Remember Quinn Conlan? The poor galactic smuggler I left to rot in a prison colony on the moon Marica-3? I even said at the time I could have kept going and spun the idea into a book.

Well, during the month of August I’ve been taking this online workshop through RWA on how to write suspense. I thought it was a workshop on writing romantic suspense, and that I’d get a grounding in the genre I’m considering slipping sideways into, but instead it’s been more about making sure your writing is suspenseful. Which I already know how to do, at least to a degree.

Not that I’m complaining. I’m having tons of fun. First we had to write a scene or prologue—500-1,000 words; take that, Freddy!—beginning with the words, “The blood dripped on the floor” and submit it to the group. Then we had to do a character sketch for our protagonist. Then we had to write a 1,500 word synopsis for the book, and submit that and the first ten pages.

When you’re writing for publication, you can’t really throw your WIP out there for the world to see. Neither of my publishers would be happy about that. I had to start from scratch and come up with something brand new that I could share with the class. So what I did, was resurrect Quinn. And I ended up with a first scene, a character bio, a detailed synopsis, and eventually, the first chapter of a book I never intended to write.

But as I submitted it to the class, other people—including our New York Times bestselling instructor—told me how much they liked it, and that I really should consider writing the book. And the thing is, it’s got me by the throat now. I love when characters do that, when they grab you and hold on and yell in your ear until you write their stories. But I had other plans for the next four months. Other plans for the direction I wanted to go from cozies. And let me tell you, I never intended to branch off into futuristic romance.

You can read the synopsis HERE if you’d like, and tell me whether it’s something you’d read. And then you can tell me whether, if you were me, you’d abandon your carefully laid plan of writing a romantic suspense/thriller/FBI-procedural thing in favor of it.

Till next time!

Presenting...

by Bente Gallagher (yes, I'm Jennie Bentley too...)

Looks like we have a free day today, with no posts. Let me remedy that.

I've got a new book coming in June, the first in a new series. This is actually the book that started it all, the one that caused an editor at Berkley Prime Crime to offer me the opportunity to write the DIY series. It's a case of writing what you know: as a brand new real estate agent in Nashville, Tennessee, going into empty houses with strangers every day of my life, I got to thinking about what might be lurking inside some of these houses. Escaped convicts, crazed axe-murderers, homeless junkies, dead bodies...

That's how A Cutthroat Business was born. Here's the elevator pitch:

Everyone has warned new-minted Realtor® and Southern Belle Savannah Martin that real estate is a cutthroat business. But Savannah doesn't take the warning seriously... until an early morning phone call sends her to an empty house on the other side of town, where she finds herself standing over the butchered body of a competitor, face to face with the boy her mother always warned her about. Now Savannah must figure out who killed real estate queen Brenda Puckett, make a success of her new career, and avoid being killed - or kissed - by Rafe Collier, all before the money in her savings account runs out and she has to go back to selling make-up at the mall. 


Library Journal, bless their little hearts, say that "The hilarious dialog and the tension between Savannah and Rafe will delight fans of chick-lit mysteries and romantic suspense." 


Check it out:

1.

Forewarned is forearmed, they say, and in justice to — well, everyone! — I guess I must admit that I was forewarned. It’s just that when people told me that real estate is a cutthroat business, I didn’t think they meant it literally.

My name is Savannah Martin, and I sell houses. Or I should say that I try, because I’m brand new at my job, and truth be told, haven’t sold so much as a lean-to yet. I should have realized, when the call came in about 101 Potsdam Street, that it was too good to be true.

It was about 8:45 in the morning on the first Saturday in August, and I was at work. As usual. For the past six weeks I’d been on call pretty much 24/7 — not exactly what I’d had in mind when I looked forward to setting my own hours — and I haunted the office like the proverbial ghoul.

I guess I should also mention that I didn’t actually have anything else to do. I used to work at the make-up counter at the mall, but when I got my real estate license, I quit my job and started living off my savings in the hope that my dwindling bank balance would give me the incentive I needed to succeed. So far it hadn’t worked, and if something didn’t change soon, I’d have to crawl to Dillard’s to beg for my old job back. And that was assuming it was still available, with the way the economy was going these days.

But that was why, when the phone rang, I snatched it up on the very first ring, and had to take a couple of steadying breaths before I put the receiver to my ear. “Good morning. Thank you for calling Walker Lamont Realty. Savannah Martin speaking. How may I help you?”

“Savannah Martin?” a male voice repeated.

I nodded. “Yes, sir.”

I waited for him to comment, but instead he just continued chummily, like we were old friends, “See, Savannah, it’s like this. I was supposed to be meeting Miz Puckett at eight, to see 101 Potsdam Street, but I’ve sat here for 45 minutes, and I ain’t seen hide or hair of her.”

“I haven’t seen her this morning, either,” I answered, my heart starting to beat faster. Someone was interested in buying 101 Potsdam? And my colleague and competitor Brenda Puckett had dropped the ball...? “Though it isn’t like her to be late.” Much more like her to be early, so she could feel superior when you merely showed up on time. “Are you able to wait while I try to call her?”

My caller said he was, and I put him on hold before dialing Brenda’s cell phone, and when there was no answer, her home number. There was no answer there either. I got back on the line. “Sir? I’m sorry, I can’t get in touch with her. But if... that is... I mean...”

My tongue tripped over itself in its eagerness to offer help. The caller didn’t say anything, but I could sense amusement through the line. I gritted my teeth and tried again. “If you’d still like to see the house, I’d be happy to come out and open the door for you...?”

I held my breath. The Italianate Victorian and surrounding two acres were listed for almost a quarter million USD, a fairly high price for Nashville, Tennessee. The commission would pay my rent and keep me in gasoline and Ramen noodles for the rest of the year, at least.

“You sure you can spare the time, darlin’?”

I assured him, with all the sincerity I could muster, that there was nothing I’d rather do than be of service to him. He chuckled, but didn’t comment. Even so, the ripeness of the chuckle brought a blush to my cheeks. I ignored it, promising him I’d be there in fifteen minutes, and then I wasted the first thirty seconds of that time doing a (premature) victory dance before I grabbed my purse and headed out the door. If I was going to get from the office to Potsdam Street in the fourteen and a half minutes left to me, I would have to get my tail in gear and keep my foot glued to the gas pedal the whole way.

  ###

 

So there you have it. The first couple pages of A Cutthroat Business, for your delectation. Whatcha think?

Realtors® Writing

by Jennie Bentley

Welcome to the Stiffs on this lovely Wednesday morning, when I’ve booted Annette out of the desk chair and taken over. I’m here with my fellow Realtor® and writer Nancy Lynn Jarvis, a real estate practitioner in California, to talk a little about her books, THE DEATH CONTINGENCY and BACKYARD BONES.

Here’s Nancy’s bio:

Twenty year veteran of the real estate industry, Nancy Lynn Jarvis, is writing murder mysteries instead of selling houses. Real estate is an interesting business, the stress level involved in buying or selling a home ranks right after death and divorce. People reveal a lot about themselves during the process. The business attracts its share of colorful practitioners, too. Their stories and Nancy’s experiences provide the settings where her Realtor and part-time sleuth, Regan McHenry, works while she unravels mysteries.

Nancy, would you give us the elevator pitch for the series, please?

The characters in my books have secrets. Protagonist Regan McHenry is good at unraveling them. She has been compared to Agatha Christie’s Miss Marple because she solves crimes by observing and seeing connections and asking questions the police overlooked. You’ll have fun figuring things out right along with her as you read. As the San Francisco Examiner says, the books are “smart, funny mysteries.”

Doesn’t that sound interesting, fellow Working Stiffs?

I’ve got a real estate mystery of my own coming out in June, by the way. Y’all know about the Do-It-Yourself home renovation mystery series, featuring designer turned renovator Avery Baker, and her boyfriend, hot handyman Derek Ellis. This is something different. The book is called A CUTTHROAT BUSINESS, and stars Savannah Martin, new-minted Realtor® and Southern Belle in Nashville, Tennessee, who stumbles over a dead body in a house she’s showing to a potential client. I’ll give you three guesses as to cause of death.

But enough about me. Nancy, tell us a little about how you came to write BACKYARD BONES and THE DEATH CONTINGENCY. Were these your first books, or have you written others? Have you always been writing, or is this a more recent dream?

I never had aspirations to be a writer. Starting The Death Contingency was almost accidental, really. My husband and I decided to experiment with being retired for a while when the real estate market tanked. To beat being bored, he built a spectacular greenhouse and a 16’X22’ foot office from the ground up — I decided it would be an interesting puzzle solving game to see if I could write a mystery. I had a beginning and ending in mind and a stockpile of real estate related experiences ranging from the humorous to the bizarre to use as background material and not a clue what to do to weave them into a book.

To get started, I read Tony Hillerman and reread my favorite Agatha Christies for structure, made the protagonists me and my husband and other characters people I knew, and began acting out the day’s scenes and dialogue alone in my office each morning. Over time the characters developed personalities separate from the people who inspired them. The Death Contingency was a learning experience; large portions of it had to be rewritten several times.

By the time I started Backyard Bones I had discovered the importance of outlines, at least loose outlines, and time-lines of who-knew-what-when which are critical for mysteries, so the first draft was much easier.

The books are different, though. Pacing for The Death Contingency is slower and the book more introspective since the amateur sleuth thing is new to Regan, the protagonist. She can’t quite believe what’s going on, she keeps hoping she’s mistaken, and she’s reluctant to trust her instincts. Backyard Bones begins with a Regan who, while she may change her mind as to who she thinks the murderer is, is much more surefooted in her sleuthing.

Those sound great! And way to go developing the main character over the course of the series!

So tell us a little more about Regan. You said she’s based on you, but that she developed a personality of her own as you wrote about her. Share a few things that you and she have in common, and a few ways in which you're absolutely different.

She’s curious, impatient, and determined. She’s a bit of a crusader. She cares a great deal about her family, friends, and clients. Those aspects of her are like me. But she’s much more daring, younger and thinner, and more obsessive than I am. She’s also a lot better at thinking on her feet than I am, especially in stressful situations.

Yeah, Savannah is younger and thinner than I am, too. What’d be the point otherwise, right?

So does Regan get up to any trouble in the books that you've been in yourself? Does she do things you wouldn't do in a million years?

The murder story lines in my books are made up, but other than that, the things that happen to Regan have happened to me. Occasionally I’ll get an email from a reader saying, while they liked the book, they thought a particular event wasn’t believable. I love responding to those emails, although one man emailed back that he still didn’t believe me.

I’ll bluff like Regan sometimes does, but I wouldn’t pursue a criminal like she does. I’d be afraid I might be right and that the murderer would realize I was on to them and come after me.

Definitely. Although Savannah tends to fall into trouble more than she seeks it out. Some poeple are just like that, you know? She causes things to happen, but not on purpose.

So what was the hardest part of writing the books for you? Was it the same thing for each book, or did it vary? What did you do to overcome it? Do you have a favorite part?

The hardest part of writing for me is creating an unpleasant scene like finding a body or being in a tight situation with the bad guy. When I write, I’m really in the moment and sharing what’s happening to Regan. I get upset. I’ve been known to cry while I’m writing.
I haven’t figured out a way to overcome that problem, but I may not ever want to.

My favorite parts of writing are coming up with the Dave character’s terrible jokes and puns and creating the characters I completely make up like Jerry in BACKYARD BONES and Mrs. Rosemont in THE DEATH CONTINGENCY. As I was writing about her, I ran into Mrs. Rosemont, a very unusual looking and completely made-up elderly woman, in the grocery store. I was afraid to talk to her because I had her voice perfectly imagined and I didn’t want to risk ruining it, but I did silently follow her to watch how she moved. Evidently I wasn’t a very good stalker, though. She finally got so troubled by my staring at her that she abandoned her grocery cart and hurried out of the store.

That’s funny! I amuse myself by following people around sometimes, too, just to get the feel for what tailing someone must be like. Just in case I ever want to write a PI novel.

So what has most surprised you about being a writer?

Two things have surprised me about writing. The first is how much fun it is. I love all aspects of it: writing, publicizing, and especially talking to people at book signings. I’ve met many interesting people I would never have known if I hadn’t written the books.

The other thing that’s even more of a surprise to me is that even though I have an outline and have created a life history for all the characters so I understand them, sometimes the characters tell me things about themselves I didn’t know. In BACKYARD BONES I had intended to have a different character be the murderer, but when it came time to write the unveiling, as it were, I knew I had been wrong about the killer’s identity. I thought I could go back and change a few things and add a few clues to make the new killer work since the book presents many suspects, but when I went back to make the changes I discovered the clues were already in place. Evidently the killer had been telling me about his guilt all along and I missed it until then.

That’s happened to me, too! And isn’t it fun when the characters correct you that way?

If you could give one piece of advice to the prepublished writers reading this, what would it be, and why?

Edit, edit, edit. When you think your book is ready for prime-time, edit it again and get a good copy editor to go over it, too. Even if your story is wonderful, your reader won’t think it is if they get distracted by mistakes.

This is very true. As someone said—I have no idea who—editing is where the real writing begins. And as it happens, it’s my least favorite part of the process, but a very necessary one. I'd also recommend making sure other people get some input into the process, as it's soooo easy to become too close to our own work, and to not see it clearly.

So there you have it, fellow Stiffs: my friendly chat with Nancy Lynn Jarvis about the Regan McHenry books. We’ll both be hanging around the blog today, if you have anything you want to ask us. And big thanks to Annette for relinquishing her Wednesday!

See you next time!

Nothing to say...

by Jennie Bentley

We were supposed to have another guest blog here today, but my friend Beth, for whatever reason, didn't get one to me yesterday. I guess it's up to me to save the day.

Hah.

The thing is, I don't really have anything to say. Nothing pithy or pertinent, anyway.

I think Beth may have decided to talk about Killer Nashville, our local mystery/crime writers conference taking place here in Tennessee August 15-17. She's the conference coordinator - you'd enjoy swapping war stories, Annette, and I'm sure you, at least, can understand why a guest blog might slip her mind a month or so before the conference is set to go off.

She's working on the panel topics right now, and sent me a list of them a week or so ago. The only two I feel supremely confident talking about, is Animal Mysteries - there are two cats in the DIY-series - and the Relationships in Mysteries panel. (It has another, more euphonious name, but I can't remember what it is.) The relationship-panel replaces the sex-panel, and I'm sort of sad to see the sex-panel go, since it's always good for some entertainment. Especially at 8:00 in the morning, which is when they usually schedule it. Then again, if it was still the sex-panel, I couldn't be on it, since I don't get to write sex, and unlike last year's panelists, I'm not sure I could talk about BDSM at 8:30 AM on a Sunday morning, anyway.

Another interesting one is the social commentary panel. I think that might have been suggested by Liz Zelvin, whom I know is attending. Liz writes about recovery, i.e. alcoholism, which is one of those social commentary things.

The thing about social commentary, is that you have to be careful how you put it. My first book, A Cutthroat Business - the one that has finally found a home and will be coming to a store near you in June 2010; yay! - has some social commentary. Unfortunately, it's the kind of social commentary that some people find hard-to-swallow, which I think is part of the reason why that particular book was so hard to sell. Racial prejudice is ugly stuff, and only OK to tackle as long as it's the bad guys who suffer from it; but give the heroine's family reservations about the fact that she's getting involved with someone of a different race, and suddenly you're in deep s***.

I think the most fun panel I've ever been on, was last year's Humor in Mysteries panel. We got to tell jokes and talk about people like Terry Pratchett and Janet Evanovich and Donna Andrews and Carl Hiaasen. There's no humor panel this year. I guess maybe not enough funny people are attending the conference this year. Sobering thought.

Let's get interactive. What's the most fun/interesting/challenging/amazing panel you've ever been part of, or attended, and why? The schedule isn't set in stone yet; and I'm sure Beth can always use another suggestions.

Till next time!

Location, Location, Location!

by Jennie Bentley

As you read this, I’m on my way to sunny Saint Augustine, one of my favorite places in the whole world.

Saint Augustine is the oldest town in the US, founded in August 1565, forty-two years before Jamestown and fifty-five years before the pilgrims settled on Plymouth Rock. There’s so much history there—from the first free community of ex-slaves in the country, Fort Mose, and the Castillo de San Marco, to the Fountain of Youth and the Spanish Quarter. And that’s without even mentioning the ghosts. Or the beaches. Or the birds and dolphins and manatees. Or alligators.

I’ve always thought it would make a great setting for a series of books. I even went so far as to pitch a ghost story/mystery idea to my agent once. She picked another idea she wanted me to work on instead, but I haven’t forgotten about it. While I’m waiting for the time to be right, I’m enjoying Nancy Haddock’s vampire series, set in Saint Augustine. If you haven’t yet tried La Vida Vampire and the sequel, Last Vampire Standing, get thee to a bookshop. I intend to get Nancy to autograph me a copy while I’m on vacation, since she lives there.

Setting has always been a very important part of a book to me, both books I like to read and books I write. My favorite books aren’t set just anywhere, they’re set somewhere specific. If the locale changed, the book wouldn’t be the same. That’s the way it ought to be, I think. The setting becomes almost like a character, playing its own part in the story.

I’m partial to ‘real’ settings, with ‘real’ history attached to them. In the first book I wrote, A Cutthroat Business, the setting is East Nashville. I live here, and I wanted to write about what I know. I changed some of the street names, since I don’t want anyone to come knocking on my door to complain, but I know exactly where things are. Savannah’s apartment is on the corner of Fifth and Main, and I know what she’s looking at when she looks out her window in the morning. The decrepit house in the book—the one where the body is found—is based on this one, called the Ambrose House, in Historic East End. (I’ve been looking at for long enough to know what it looked like before someone sunk a million dollars into fixing it up. It's an events venue, and if it weren't so danged expensive, I might just have my release party there...)

Waterfield, Maine, on the other hand—the setting for the DIY-books—is a fictional place. It’s located about 45 minutes up the road from Portland, on the coast, but it doesn’t exist. It’s more a conglomerate of every small town I’ve ever seen, with the landscape I grew up with. Dark pine trees and white birches, a craggy coast dotted with rocky islands, and a Main Street made up of turn-of-the-last-century Victorian commercial buildings. Waterfield’s history is the history of downeast Maine, and if Waterfield was located somewhere else, the series would be different.

While I enjoy reading about ‘real’ settings, though, some of the best locales out there are the fantasy kind. And I mean that literally. The Harry Potter books, with their alternate universe, away from prying muggle eyes. Tamora Pierce’s Pebbled Sea and the countries surrounding it, steeped in ambient magic. Lois McMaster Bujold’s Vorkosigan saga, taking place on planets like Barrayar and Komarr and Beta Colony and Jackson’s Whole. Or if sci-fi doesn’t count—the earth is mentioned once or twice, so it’s not technically fantasy, I guess—Lois McMaster Bujold’s Chalion series. Terry Pratchett’s Discworld. (Flat, carried on the backs of four elephants standing on the shell of a giant turtle, inhabited by dwarves and trolls, vampires and werewolves. And people. Strange people.)

So what about you? Do you care about setting? If you write, do you make setting an integral part of your work, or could your book be set anywhere and not really miss much by it? (That’s just fine, and works well for some types of books.) As a reader, does it matter to you where the book is set, or is one place pretty much like another? Do you have a favorite locale? Or a favorite author you think nails the setting for his/her books?

I’ll only be around in the morning today, so play nicely amongst yourselves, please, but I’ll check back over the weekend, in case there are any questions I have to answer.

Till next time!