 I recently read John Grisham’s latest, The Reckoning, a fascinating tale whose content and format are a departure from his norm. I wasn’t quite sure how to review the book and, when I went to read the comments of others, I realized I wasn’t alone.
Those who are fans of John Grisham are addicted to the formula that won him such popularity: a young, idealistic lawyer goes up against impossible odds, beats the bad guys and (often) gets the love interest in the end. Most of his career has been based on this winning strategy. In his latest book, which uses an unexplained murder case as bookends for a harrowing tale about the Bataan Death March, Grisham gives readers a Gothic tale, murkier and more ambiguous than his normal fare. This has irked his readers, but I think that’s a bit unfair from the point of view of the writer. Growing up I read The Hardy Boys, while girls my age may have read Nancy Drew. These were formulaic serials in which variation and maturation were strictly forbidden. In the modern era, authors like Clive Cussler and Sue Grafton have done much the same (though Grafton, who passed in 2017, explored a bit more growth with her protagonist Kinsey Millhone). But what happens when writers want to grow and expand beyond what they have done before or even (Perish the thought!) write in a different genre? Well, they have to get a bit creative. Famed horror writer Stephen King created the pen name Richard Bachman, while more recently, best-selling Christian author Davis Bunn as adopted the persona of Thomas Locke to produce general market titles in a dizzying variety of genres. These writers, and many others who have assumed noms de plume to express their creative range, have done so because they yearned to defy the expectations placed upon them. As for my thoughts on The Reckoning, I will agree that while the book is not a good “John Grisham novel”, it is a good novel by John Grisham. The fact I have to make this distinction saddens me.
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 I received a complimentary copy of Stratagem for an honest evaluation of its merits.
The book’s premise took the reality TV concept and stretched it to its limits, which intrigued me. I am glad I was not disappointed. Carrol established compelling characters (with one small deviation which I will address later) and the story line is very well paced. At one point, I was fascinated how the description of the video replay made me think the author was writing a screenplay, as she constructs the narrative with such precision that I could easily visual what was happening. Carrol also makes a big deal about the timeline which is important. I tend to read quickly, which I do not advise during these key segments because it is easy to not keep track of characters and their movements if you are going at too fast a clip. Carrol also does a good job with her red herring of a suspect, as I did not figure out the actual culprit until near the reveal. The wrap-up was rather pleasant as well. The only real complaint I had was motivation of the female detective. To her credit, Carrol provides an explanation for hard-line approach, but it seems to wrap up a little too neatly and the character is back on the right page before you know it. Again, this is the B story, so it’s not that big of a deal. In short, if you enjoy a good suspense story, you really can’t go wrong with Stratagem, or, if this work is any indication, with Carrol’s other titles. And, for a fortunate reader, here's your chance to win an $25 Amazon gift card.  Whether laced with abject fear or indescribable giddiness, one thing all writers dream about is going on a book tour.
You have visions of flying into a faraway town and being swept from book shop to book shop. You meet fans, sign copies of your masterpiece and get interviewed about you characters and what makes them tick. When you’re an indie writer, this is where the bubble bursts. Forget jet-setting and limo rides. The only book tour you can afford to take is to chatting up about your latest tome with the cashier at Trader Joe’s or Target. But there are economical ways to get people buzzing about your book and one of them is the virtual book tour. Basically, you sign up for a service where people agree to read your books and review them, providing that much needed booster shot either before or just after a book launch (Before works best). The plus side is that people who others listen to are reading your book. They are sharing their thoughts, discussing the relative strengths and weaknesses of your story line and character descriptions. You have arrived. People who enjoy your genre have picked up your book and are telling their friends about it. This also is the downside. The problem with indie writing in particular is that you tend to live in this isolated bubble where your family and friends who love you are just amazed you wrote a book (or another book). They likely aren’t going to say anything too bad. When you ask people to give honest opinions in their reviews, that is exactly what they are going to do. While I have more Amazon reviews than any of my other titles, my overall rating is lower than with my previous books. I still have really good reviews, but I’m probably not as good a writer as those who love me kept telling me I was. All in all, I wholly recommend creative and cost-effective ways to promote your books, even if not every response is glowing. There is an axiom about too much heat and a kitchen that comes to mind.  I received a complimentary copy of Chosen People in exchange for an honest review of its merits.
For years, Robert Whitlow has been marketed as the John Grisham of Christian Fiction, which I think might be a bit unfair. While it may have been true in the beginning of the Christian legal fiction genre there was no one but Whitlow, but that is not the case today (Cara Putman comes readily to mind, for starters). Also, it presupposes there is one style in which one can write a legal fiction: in a conversational, around-the-campfire storytelling yarn. That may be how Grisham writes, but Whitlow has his own style. Whitlow has matured in his narrative prose (as do all good writers) and that is on display in Chosen People. The characters are well formed and there is some humor to break up the tension that runs throughout the story. The author clearly has done his research and the locations both near and far feel real. As the characters walk the streets of Jerusalem, for example, you feel you are doing the same. And there were some secondary characters that were a nice addition to the tale. I suppose that my chief storytelling concern was that the love triangle was not resolved in a way that made sense to me. In Whitlow’s attempt to set up both potential partners as interesting prospects, I thought Hana made a choice that went against her character. Then again, Whitlow might argue that he wasn’t setting up a triangle at all, or that I didn’t truly understand what was driving Hana and her decisions. The ending also seemed a bit rushed, but that tends to be an unfortunate trend in contemporary storytelling. But, to be fair, these are smaller concerns when weighed against the positive elements of the tale. All in all, nicely done, Mr. Whitlow. Check out this chance to win three of Whitlow's books.  A lawyer and college professor, Cara Putman’s skills in crafting solid, fast-paced legal fiction comes from a mixture of experience and imagination (unless she’s actually been chased down by an angry drug cartel leader, which I hope is not the case). Delayed Justice, the latest book in the Hidden Justice series (Beyond Justice and Imperfect Justice round out this trilogy) features a great blend of solid writing and a good story.
When did you first realize you were a storyteller? I have always loved books, but I was 13 or 14 when I actively started writing and dreaming up stories of my own. When I started college at 16, life wasn't really my own, so I stopped writing until I was 31. But I have always read voraciously. I must read. I must be surrounded by story. So, it makes it natural that I see stories all around me and itch to tell them. What do you love about the writing process? I love the research. I love the discovery of the characters. To me the hardest part is the beginning. Getting the idea cemented in my mind. Figuring out how the characters will interact and what they really want. Then I hit a point where the story simply flows. That is the best! I love to live in that space where I can't wait to get back to writing. It carries me through the not as fun parts. What is the hardest part of being a writer? How solitary it is. I'm an extrovert, so I can't just write. I have to have space to interact with people and pour into them. That's why the combination of writing and teaching at a world-class university works so well for me. I also don't enjoy the early stages of wrestling for the next big idea. Where do you find your inspiration? I find my inspiration all around me. For the Hidden Justice series it was in newspaper articles and in people I know. I take many different situations and pull them together and twist them up into something new and different. That's where the germ of the story is located. And that's what keeps me writing and marketing for the months each story requires. What are you working on right now? I'm in the idea germinating stage. I have several floating around in my mind and trying to flesh a couple up enough to sell to my publisher. These will be standalone legal ideas and that excites me! To find out which of these ideas blossoms into her next novel, follow Cara on her website.  Photo Courtesy of The University of Texas. H.W. Brands, who holds the Jack S. Blanton Sr. Chair in History at the University of Texas at Austin, is a master storyteller. But instead of creating worlds of his own, Brands introduces readers to America’s past in a way that engages as it educates. One of the best historians in the nation, his narrative biographies on Benjamin Franklin and FDR were both finalists for The Pulitzer Prize. His narrative style is conversational, yet refined in a way few are able to match.
When did you first realize you were a storyteller? When I became teacher. I first taught high school math, and I found that my stories about math hooked my students on the subject. As I segued to history, I kept telling stories. Still am. What do you love about the writing process? The only part I don't like is reading page proofs. At that point the scope for revising is severely limited. I find myself wishing I could make changes my editors won't allow, for cost reasons. Everything else I like. What is the hardest part of being a writer? I haven't found any hard parts yet. See above. If it was hard, I wouldn't do it. Where do you find your inspiration? The reason I write history is that you couldn't make this stuff up. No one would believe you. History is an inexhaustible supply of tales about the comedy and tragedy of being human. What are you working on right now? My book Heirs of the Founders will be published in November. My next book is a history of the American West, currently called Dreams of El Dorado. To be published in the fall of 2019. To find out more about Brands and what he is working on next, check out his website.  I received a complementary copy of Hidden Among the Stars in exchange for an honest review of its merits.
To begin with, it is best to establish that I am not one who fancies a romance novel when I am picking up a book to read. I don't mind romantic elements, and tend to include them in my own novels, but for me character motivation is most important. That being said, I enjoyed the characters and their drives for the most part in this book. The time-slip nature of this tale involved two storylines, one in the present and one 80 years earlier during the opening days of World War II. As a former World History teacher, I appreciated the author's strong research into into pre-war Europe, as this helps the reader connect to the era. The development of the love triangle between Luzia, Annika and Max is well-crafted throughout the story, leading up to climatic reveal at the end. The idea of missing Jewish treasures is a fascinating sub-plot to the storyline. The love story in the present between Callie and Josh flows along at a natural, if halting, pace. There are significant barriers between the two and it is clear why her past rejection is crippling forward momentum in this area. I was intrigued by the brash actions of one of the clearly undesirable suitors. I was shocked by his behavior, but, sadly, did not find it unbelievable, just a highly disappointing example of my gender. One of the most endearing aspects of this work is where Callie, the Story Lady, is often quoting famous lines from children books when she faces challenges in life. If she were spouting Bible verses, the story would seem too preachy, but the fact that she finds wisdom in the stories she shares with kids at her store every week gives the character an air of authenticity that rings true. On the whole, Melanie Dobson weaves together two disparate time periods to deliver a well-told tale. SPOILER ALERT - If you wish to remain in the dark about my thoughts on the ending, please stop reading here. OK, since you are still with me, here we go… The only aspect of the book that doesn't ring true is the climax. I get the noble nature of the sacrifice Annika makes so Luzia and her unborn child are not taken away, but, in my estimation, this makes her a weaker character, not a stronger one. She already has to give up on Max because he loves Luzia (we will look past her son's true parentage, which I thought was well, if painfully, told), but does she also have to give up on a relationship with Hermann just so she can play the "best friend ever" role. I would contend that she does act with honor but, in reality, passively sublimates her needs for someone who will never really understand her true feelings for him. There may a religious covering over the entire affair, but it seems a poor excuse for her actions. Then again, all that is subjugated upon the assumption that authors direct the actions of characters, rather than characters doing what comes natural to them. In the end, the Dobson asks if I agree with Annika's actions. I, for one, do not, but maybe I am not supposed to. Just like Luzia is not supposed to end up with her first love either, which is the second of many tragedies in this story. The fact that I don't agree with the actions of a character may be exactly why Dobson allowed her character to do what she did In addition, the ending seemed overly sentimental but I tend to be much more forgiving of such endings on screen than in print, so that might be a wholly unfair criticism to make as well. By the way, don't forget to enter the Amazon gift card giveaway!  As a former reporter who has segued into fiction writing, I can definitely relate to YA author Jacqui Castle. In her debut dystopian novel, The Seclusion, Jacqui explores themes that will resonate with anyone following today’s headlines.
When did you first realize you were a storyteller? When I was a child, as young as four or five, I loved to tell stories. I would often act out complex scenes for my extended family in my grandparent's living room, and as I got older I was incredibly involved with theater. But, for some reason, I didn't attempt to write fiction until just a couple of years ago. I've been a writer for most of my adult life - mainly journalism and freelance content writing. However, the world of fiction is somewhat new to me. The Seclusion was my first foray into fiction, and I'm not looking back. What do you love about the writing process? One of my favorite things about the writing process is solving complex puzzles. I'm working on being better at plotting my stories before diving in, but in reality, my writing style often lends itself to writing several scenes that don't have anything to do with each other quite yet. I then enjoy the challenge of getting my characters from point A to point B, and on to point C. What is the hardest part of being a writer? I think the hardest part is holding yourself accountable, and writing even when you might not feel like it. There are days when all I want to do is work on a story, but there are also times when that's not true at all. Even so, most of the time once I sit down and get a few words on the page, everything starts to flow. I have come up with some of my favorite scenes when I didn't think I was in the mood to write. Where do you find your inspiration? I find that it's not so much looking for inspiration, but giving myself the time and space to reflect and play with a story until it works itself out. One of my favorite ways to begin my writing sessions is by soaking in the words of other authors. If I spend ten to twenty minutes reading before I open my computer, I'm often motivated to dive back into my own story. What are you working on right now? Right now a lot of my energy is tied up in preparing for the launch of The Seclusion on September 4th. But, in my spare time, I'm working on two other projects - The second book in The Seclusion series, as well as another project titled Apate after the Greek goddess of deceit. This story will involve a member of Congress, an asteroid, and a few fed-up NASA scientists with a secret. The story is still taking shape, and I can share more soon. For more information about Jacqui, check out her page on Inkshares.  Gene Doucette doesn’t necessarily like to play in the genre sandbox to which sci-fi is typically confined. The Spaceship Next Door, for example, reads like the literary love child of The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy and The Gilmore Girls (or so I said in my Goodreads review). He creates distinctive voices and characters, which is a breath of fresh air, especially when you’re fighting aliens and whatnot.
When did you first realize you were a storyteller? I’m pretty sure I never had such a moment, or if I did, it didn’t happen in the way the question implies. I decided I was going to be a writer at roughly the same time I learned how to read. Probably, this involved Shel Silverstein, only because the earliest recorded piece of writing from my hand is a poem in big block letters, recounting how six-year-old me felt about snow. But I didn’t discover I had a gift for writing—or storytelling in general—and then decide to start doing this; I spent my life working out what kind of person I needed to be in order to become a writer. What do you love about the writing process? The surprises. It’s great getting into a rhythm in a story and then having it go somewhere unexpected. I know I’m writing the thing, but when the plot twist pops up, I’m as surprised as anybody. What is the hardest part of being a writer? This goes in hand with the best part about the writing process, above. Here’s the thing: I don’t outline, and I barely plan ahead. I’m completely at the whims of my own unconscious mind, which apparently knows what it’s doing. That’s what’s really going on when I say a plot twist surprises me. I mean, it’s can’t really be that big of a surprise if I’m the one setting it up and revealing it. But I don’t always know I’m doing that until I get there. The hardest part is trusting that there’s something going on in my head that knows what it’s doing. This is terrifying, because I will dive into a book with exactly no idea how it’s going to play out, until it does. Where do you find your inspiration? Not a clue. Some unholy mixture of non-fiction reading, fiction reading, and I-couldn’t-tell-you-because-I-don’t-know-either. The non-fiction is to discover something new and neat. The fiction is generally for more technical reasons: figuring out how someone else solved the problem of storytelling. The I-couldn’t-tell-you part is the catalyst, though. Sometimes all I start with is something I thought was neat, sometimes with a story structure I learned from another novelist. Sometimes it just struck me one day that such-and-such a thing would be fun to try and write. Basically, I have no idea. What are you working on right now? I’m in the middle of a new book for my Immortal novel series. I feel kind of bad about having put this off as long as I did, since I ended book four on something like a cliffhanger. Assuming I get this out on schedule, it will have been two years since Immortal and the Island of Impossible Things. I get emails semi-regularly from fans who want to know what happens next, and I sympathize, since I don’t really know what happens next either. But I’m working on finding that out. While he might know yet what’s coming up next, you probably should spend some time at his website to be among the first to find out.  One of the greatest challenges most authors face is not in the development of a story, but in its distribution. Whether or not a wordsmith is an introvert or extrovert, the process of marketing one’s creation is none too easy.
Many years ago, a publisher did much of the marketing for its favored scribes. But, with the explosion of stories and platforms for authors to share those stories, said publicity falls mainly on the shoulders of the writers. This is why I am going on tour for the next two weeks. A blog tour, that is. For the next two weeks, bloggers from around the country will feature my novel, Running. These book lovers have read my latest Jim Mitchell story and will give their honest opinion of its merits. While putting myself out there is scary, the potential payout in increased buzz (and hopefully book sales) is the price that must be paid. It would be easy to reject this option, and to remain safely ensconced behind my screen, selling a couple of books here and there. But part of being a storyteller is going out there and telling the tale you have to tell, whether or not people enjoy the adventure you have led them on. In that spirit, I shall venture forth. |
AuthorI've been writing stories and taking photos since I was old enough to hold a pencil and stand behind a tripod. Archives
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