Tour Through Blogland

★¸¸.•¨¯`•. ★TOUR THROUGH BLOGLAND ★¸¸.•¨¯`•. ★

I was nominated to participate in the Tour Through Blogland by the wonderful author of Shadows of the Past 

Carmen Stefanescu

Please make sure to check out the amazing treasures she has on her website. As a writer I am delighted to participate in sharing my creative process as well as learning from others. 

 

The rules for this tour:

1. Pass the tour to one – four other bloggers.
2. Give them the rules and a specific week to post as described in number 4 (usually a Monday but can be another day of the week).
3. Answer 4 questions about your creative process which lets other bloggers and visitors know what inspires you to do what you do. Your answers will be posted by the writer who nominated you.
4. Post your answers on your own site the following week in a separate article. You can expand your article however you wish. Link to the writer who nominated you.

My lovely author guests are:
Jennifer Taylor 
Ronnie Allen

Jennifer Taylor

Jennifer Taylor spent her childhood running wild on an Idaho mountainside. Although she’s lived across the United States, she’s still an Idahoan at heart and a notorious potato pusher. She has a degree in Human Services, but has worked as a roofer, a hoofer, a computer data operator and a stay-at-home mom.

Music has ruled her world since birth. She shimmied out of the womb with a bad case of boogie fever, but soon fell in love with lyrics, how the words fit together perfectly like a jigsaw puzzle. Jennifer uses music on a daily basis to uplift and inspire her writing. It’s no coincidence that Ian, the hero in Mercy of the Moon uses music to win heroine Maggie’s heart.

Mercy of the Moon is her debut historical romance, and Book #1 in her Rhythm of the Moon Series, published by the Wild Rose Press.

Jennifer lives in rural Florida and enjoys the comings and goings of her three grown children and three grandchildren. She feverishly lobbies for the return of breeches and would really love to see her husband of thirty-five years in a pair.

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Creative Process

1. Are you more plot or character driven in your writing process and why?
I always start with the characters in my stories. In Mercy of the Moon, the hero and heroine are interesting people by their own right, but put them together, and that’s when the plot catches fire. Take my heroine, Maggie Wilson, an 18th Century midwife. She is practical and serious, hard-working, and self-sacrificing, like a lot of women in this time period—all of her energies are spent on behalf of others, and she does nothing for herself. She must set aside her needs and emotions to take care of the women of King’s Harbour, and particularly her sister, who has been the victim of a sinister attempted murder. Then she meets Ian Pierce, a musician and apothecary, who brings her emotions to the surface and confounds and charms her with his humor and music. He makes her feel, and that’s something she cannot afford to do. The plot develops from their very diverse and passionate reactions to each other and to the mysterious circumstance in which they find themselves.

2. Where do you find most of your inspiration?
My biggest inspiration is music. Since childhood, I have been fascinated with how the lyrics and music fit together like a jigsaw puzzle, and to me there’s nothing more magical than the perfect blending of the two. My favorite musicians and songwriters inspire me on a daily basis, and I have playlists for characters and settings. Most of all, I depend on music for emotion: the elation of a first kiss, yearning, sorrow. Music also keeps me going on those days when I need a little motivation!

3. Do you work on more than one project at a time?
Since Mercy of the Moon is Book #1 of the Rhythm of the Moon series, while I’m working on my current story (Book #2), I get ideas about the plot of the next one, and jot them down in a crazed fashion so I don’t forget. I get a little story thread and I think my subconscious gnaws at it until it’s time to work on it.

4. Do you stick to projected storyline or do you let a story flow and take its own life?
I start a story with a rough outline, but it invariably changes as I work. For example, this week I was writing a scene where Maggie and Ian were supposed to be doing one thing, but they ended up having hot sex instead. What’s a writer to do? 😉

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★¸¸.•¨¯`•. ★

Ronnie Allen

Ronnie Allen is a NYC woman transplanted to rural central Fla. seven years ago. She’s still experiencing the culture shock as she depicts within her protagonist, Dr. John Trenton in her debut novel, Gemini, which will be released by Black Opal Books this spring. Ronnie worked within the NYC Dept. of Education for thirty-three years as a teacher, crisis intervention specialist, staff developer and teacher’s mentor. She’s a NYS licensed School Psychologist, which her antagonist, Barbara Montgomery pretends to be. In addition to her day job, Ronnie is a Board Certified Holistic Health Practitioner specializing in the mind body connection, spirituality and metaphysics. I guess you can say, every trait in Ronnie is portrayed in Gemini. Well not every, more will come through in Aries, her second novel to be released in the fall.

Creative Process

1. Are you more plot or character driven in your writing process and why?
I write psychological thrillers, which are usually more plot driven, but as I delve into the psychology of the mind behind the crime, my novels convert to character driven. So, I would say I am 50/50. My novels are crime based, in NYC primarily, so the setting is very important to me. My antagonists range from psychopathic serial killers to drugs and weapon traffickers, to mobsters, both killers and kind, prison inmates or gang members. All are appropriate in behavior and language that is expected in their social sphere. So in this aspect, my character driven focus comes out. I also have a background in psychology so my heroes, protagonists, are in this field.

In Gemini, which will be released by Black Opal Books, late spring early summer of this year, my protagonist is a forensic psychiatrist. The antagonist is a school psychologist, who is a stripper by night, school psychologist by day.

In Aries, the second book to be released in the fall of 2015, the protagonists are a forensic psychiatrist and a newbie detective who was a former teacher before she entered NYPD. They are also the romantically involved characters in this novel which ends happy for now.

2. Where do you find most of your inspiration?
For me, most of my inspiration comes from my own fantasies, and I put myself into the roles of both the protagonist and antagonist and every other character, even minor ones.

3. Do you work on more than one project at a time?
Actually I tried that but it doesn’t work for me. I produce a much more cohesive manuscript when I am focused on one at a time.

4. Do you stick to a projected storyline or do you let a story flow and take its own life?
For Gemini I plotted an outline from start to finish, and then when I actually began to type it, I expanded, added plots, characters, twists, setting. Gemini being my first novel ever, took me a few years from beginning to write to finding a publisher and now it will be released in a few months.

Aries, the second in the Sign Behind the Crime Series, was plotted for a good five months before I sat down at the typewriter to begin a chapter. I flushed out all of the characters, a majority of the plot, did a lot of research, in preparation to have a cohesive story. When I sat down to write the plot thickened, more unexpected twists arose and I was able to get 122,000 words onto paper in three months and 10 days. After writing the novel, I worked with critique partners and beta readers and submitted my novel to the publisher November 4. I received a contract two weeks later. So to answer the question, I do plot and plan but the story does take a life of its own flowing out of my mind through my fingers onto the paper.

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