Blog Hop!

So it takes a blog hop for me to write a post, apparently. Regency Romance author Anna Elliott tagged me with three questions. I "met" Anna over email. I've read a couple of her books and thought they were great, so we invited her to contribute a novella to our All Regency Timeless Romance Anthology coming out January 2015. Here's a sneak peek at the cover:

Anna sent me 3 questions to answer, and you can read her own answers about her own writing on her blog.

1. What are you working on?
I'm writing a Biblical novel on Miriam and Moses, which is due to the publisher in October, so it's my top priority right now. It's the first in the series of 3 (or 4) books. I'm also working on the next contemporary romance novel in the Tangerine Street Romance series that we're calling Boardwalk Antiques Shop. The first was The Fortune Cafe. It's a ton of fun to co-write with Julie Wright and Melanie Jacobson. And, I've outlined the regency romance novella for the anthology mentioned above that I'm doing with Anna Elliott, et al. And just yesterday, I finished going through the final copyedits for the re-release of Finding Sheba, which is being republished February 2015.

2. How does your work differ from others in the same genre?
Since I've written mostly historical novels and thrillers, I'd say that the way my work differs from others in the same genre is that I have a very strong religious base in those books. I also bring out strong female characters and make them a main part of the storyline. Ironically, I'm a discovery writer, which means that although I have a very vague outline due to historical events, I don't know from one day to the next what I'll be writing. Many times not even from one paragraph to the next.


3. Why do you write what you do?
I love to learn about the past and to learn why people do what they do. What were their motivations and how does their upbringing affect their actions? Writing historical is very fascinating, and not only am I creating characters, but I'm world-building as well, which deepens the layers of those characters.

4. How does your writing process work?
I look at the calendar and when I determine what my deadline is for the first draft, I divide the days by word count. Currently, I'm writing 2,000/words a day, 5 days/week. I rarely work on weekends. Normally with my historicals, 1,000 words a day is pretty intensive. With contemporary, 2,000 words a day isn't too daunting. But I don't do this year round, just when I have a commitment that I need to fulfill.


Up next on the blog hop is Jennifer Moore. We are not related... I met her a couple of years ago at a writers conference, and so we'd chat here and there at conferences after that. She's been a fun person to get to know. Jenny had her first book come out this summer, a Regency Romance, Becoming Lady Lockwood. By next summer she'll have 4 books out. So you never knew when your writing career will take off. (Just keep writing!) Check out Jennifer's blog here.