Early Years... Scribbling
Today I’m writing abut my own writing journey! I knew I wanted to write stories at the age of 7. My first story idea was the character of “Super Braids”, a piece of wish-fulfillment if there ever was one – I had very long hair that I usually wore in two braids. Super Braids would be a girl with super powers and long hair. Sadly, she never got past the idea stage and a single drawing.

For a few years after that, my writing endeavors took second place to more important activities, like making mudpies and playing in the sprinkler to ward off the scorching Texas heat. During my preteen years, I wrote a chapter book about crickets. It was loosely inspired by the plague of crickets that afflicted the downtown area of the city I lived in. I look back on it with affection because it was the first long story I actually completed.

After that, a series of short stories flooded with varying levels of sentimentality appeared. Luckily for you and me, they have since disappeared into the garbage. I did learn from them, though, so I guess they weren’t a complete waste of time!

Teen Years... Studying
Once I hit my mid-teens, I knew I wanted to be a real writer – you know, the kind that slaves away for years on a first novel! I read a lot. I dipped into Annie Dillard, Madeleine L’Engle, Ernest Hemingway. When I was in the mood for a good scare, I read Dean Koontz. I started reading literary criticism, like Leslie Fiedler’s Love and Death in the American Novel. That book gave me ways to think about the themes I was already drawn to. It sits on a special shelf in my mental bookcase.

Since Then... Soaring!

 About three years ago, I was struck by an image from another book. Before you cry plagiarism, let me remind you of what Cormac McCarthy says: “The ugly fact is that books are made of other books”.


Anyway, the image was one of a young man who was at loose ends, and he was sitting in the kitchen with this young woman who he’s been friends with for a long time. She and her husband are very poor and there is this odd moment of tenderness where the young man looks at her and sees her poverty and how life is weighing her down.


From that one image, I started to build a story. The characters got their own names and personalities. A shared background grew between them before I started writing.


I wrote a 14-page story about them and then shared it with several critique groups. The overwhelming response nudged me to start thinking of it as a potential novel instead of a short story. I was trying to tell a story with a strong backstory, but the backstory itself was more interesting than the present.


I’d always wanted to write a novel, so I should have been thrilled that I had one staring me in the face, right? I was terrified. I’d written what was my best short story to date and now I was going to potentially destroy it by attempting to turn it into a full-fledged novel. I had no idea if I’d be successful (still don’t actually, though it’s looking more likely as I near the end of writing the first draft), and I didn’t know if my love for the short story version would survive the trauma of reshaping it.


In the end, I decided to go for it. The short story would never satisfy my artistic side once I knew it could (and should) blossom into a novel.


So far, it’s been the most satisfying writing project I’ve ever undertaken. I fell completely in love with my characters, their world, and their journey. I can’t even imagine what I’d be writing if I’d left this one as a short story. That's why I titled this section "soaring" - I'm constantly learning, trying to apply what I'm learning, and working on a novel that's somehow come to life in spite of my fears.


Have you taken risks with your work? Tell me about it in the comments! I’d love to hear about your writing process.

Welcome to the blog, Nick! Could you tell us a little bit about your book?
Mandate 33 is the story of what happens when a good idea falls into the wrong hands. A country’s dictator passes a law stating that only citizens carrying government-issued parenting licenses are legally allowed to bear children. Any child in the custody of adults without a parenting license will be eliminated. The law is passed, they say to protect children from unfit parents. But it’s not long before certain citizens soon begin to suspect an underlying motive for the law.

What led you to write this novel?
I always believed that such a law would be a great idea - we all know someone who is unequivocally unfit to be a parent, right? But then the questions remain: what would the stipulations to being a “good parent” be? And who would decide that? And who would enforce it? And how could such a policy remain incorruptible? It’s a pretty good policy, but in all honestly impossible to fairly impose. So I enforced it and called it fiction.

What is the function of violence in fiction, and how did you approach the violence in Mandate 33?
Most of the people who have read my book enjoyed it but found “the violence towards children to be a bit much”. It’s a comment I consistently get, and I always find it fascinating because there are only two moments in the whole book which demonstrate violence towards children, and both moments are depicted in a single fleeting sentence. I never expounded on the violence just to get some visceral shock value out of it…that would have been tasteless.

I think the reason why people keep saying that to me is because of the tone and mood I set for the book. The subject matter is very dark in nature, and so readers go into it with a mindset that it’s going to be a bloodbath. If you remember the famous shower scene in Psycho, the knife never actually touches Janet Leigh, but everyone swears it did because the mind of the audience was conditioned to see it. The truth is that the threat of violence is always more powerful than the actual violence. That's why the best horror movies contain very little blood. The original Texas Chainsaw Massacre, for example, contains almost no blood. As far as Mandate 33 goes, the fact of the matter is that most of the violence in this book is directed at the adult characters, not children.

What was the biggest challenge you faced when writing Mandate 33, and how did you overcome it?
My biggest challenge was staying focused to the central theme of population control. There were so many different subjects I wanted to incorporate into the text, and I had to do it all in a way that was both seamless and did not distract from the central theme of the book. It’s very easy to go off on a winded diatribe about the Big Bad Fascists, but it’s very difficult to do it without getting sidetracked or turning people off.

What is your best advice on writing?
The clichéd answer is “read, read, read”. And it’s true. But what they always forget to tell you is “read, read, read…different authors”. Reading 50 books by Stephen King is going to teach you how to write like Stephen King; reading 50 books by 50 different authors will give you an eclectic dossier of writing styles and techniques that different authors use, and will ultimately enhance your education and enrich your writing that much more.

Bio
I started writing because I had something to say. There's no point to art unless you are saying something with it. Art can say many things, not necessarily controversial, but things the creator is passionate about. If there is care put into the art, the goodness always comes through.

I take a simple approach to writing. Simple words, simple sentences. Ernest Hemingway, John Steinbeck, and Elmore Leonard taught me how much more you can actually say with less. If you look at all the pre-Victorian literature you were made to read in school, the paragraphs are six pages long and filled with adjectives that don't really enrich the story in any way. That's not my cup of decaffeinated, sugarless, bitter, black, lukewarm tea.

I hope to have my upcoming book, The Uninvited Guest, posted on Amazon next year. Truth be told, it’s ready now, but I like to focus my energies on one book at a time.

Thanks so much for stopping by, Nick!

Jon Reisfeld, author of the historical fantasy novel The Last Way Station, is our guest today!

Welcome to the blog, Jon! Could you tell us a little bit about your book?
Sure. The Last Way Station tells the story of what happens to Adolf Hitler after he kills himself to escape capture and to avoid any accountability for his unprecedented crimes against humanity.
 
What led you to write this book?
Thirteen years ago, when I started writing long form fiction, I found myself obsessed with the notion of Hitler’s brand of expansive, organized evil, which he carried out so shamelessly and on such a grand scale. One of the things which sets Hitler’s evil apart is the ‘loving’ way he paid attention to every detail of the holocaust. It was the kind of attention you might expect an artist to pay to his work, such as a painter carefully executing nuanced brush strokes to achieve a desired effect.

Sick, twisted references to Germanic culture, folk lore, and anti-semitic beliefs run, like a theme, through everything that Hitler and his henchmen did to their victims. They seemed to take a giddy, perverse pleasure in their ability to artfully manipulate the condemned, deceiving them about their fate, on the one hand, and yet teasing them with conflicting elements that all but screamed out the horrific nature of the evil awaiting them. They went to great pains to reassure and mollify those on their way to the gas chambers that they were not going to be killed, but relocated. Then, in the next breath, they packed them into sealed cattle cars which were used specifically to send animals to the slaughter house. At the camps, they sent the trainloads of now ‘dirty’ Jews that they had created through their gross mistreatment, to the ‘showers,’ for a much-needed cleaning. But, for most, the cleaning that awaited them was a brutal, painful ethnic cleansing with Zyklon B gas. They created their own twisted version of the Hansel and Gretel story by tossing live children directly into the ovens that a German bakery equipment manufacturer had built to their precise specifications. Then they turned the fat that the ovens baked out of the corpses of the ‘dirty’ Jews into soap,which they sold for a profit to German consumers. It bothered me that Hitler had never been tried for these crimes, even in absensia.

Hitler’s apologists also motivated me to write this book. At the time, there had been a resurgence in Holocaust denials and deniers, and I wanted to use Hitler’s final judgment at the hands of omniscient creatures who could not be swayed by his lies and manipulations, to help set the record straight. It turns out Hitler’s own words and ideas, which I extracted from the pages of Mein Kampf, proved quite helpful in this regard.

How did you strike a balance between historical fiction and fantasy?
That may have been the easiest aspect of writing this book. Every reference to events that occurred prior to Hitler’s death, except for the specific details of the made-up incident involving the Weiss family and Hitler’s encounter with his grandmother, came directly from the historical record. They remain faithful to it. Everything else - my vision of the hereafter, the supernatural caseworker character, and Hitler’s various assignments - constitute my fantastical imaginings. I relied heavily on the historical record and first-hand accounts by holocaust survivors to flavor the Weiss family’s story. 

When did you first realize you wanted to be a writer?
I have been writing since I was in the second grade.  Initially, I wrote poems. I was so prolific by the third grade that our teacher got the entire class involved in writing poetry, and we put on an end-of-year assembly for the entire school. By the end of elementary school, I had decided on a career as a newspaper reporter, with eventual plans to write non-fiction books. I went on to edit my high school newspaper and then got my journalism degree from Northwestern University’s Medill School of journalism. I wrote for Baltimore Magazine and several newspapers in Maryland and gradually shifted into marketing communications. Now, I’m finally writing books, but they’re fiction rather than non-fiction. So much for my grand plans!

What is your best advice on writing?
The best thing a writer can do is write, and write often. Your facility, and fluidity, as a writer will increase through practice. It’s like Jascha Heifitz, the great violinist, used to say.  “If I don't practice one day, I know it; two days, the critics know it; three days, the public knows it.” (Of course, if you’re trying to write a book, and you intend to finish it, then, you need to write a few pages of it every day.) The other key piece of advice is something I find much easier to pass along than to follow, and that is: write recklessly and energetically first. Edit later. You’ll get a lot farther, faster.  But you have to be a bit of a split personality to pull it off. 

Your suggestion to ‘write recklessly’ is a one I’ll try to remember! Thanks so much for stopping by, Jon!
It was my pleasure.

Bio
A former newspaper and magazine journalist turned marketing consultant, Jon Reisfeld began writing long-form fiction in 1998. Most of his books address issues of social justice. He is currently expanding his next book, The Reform Artists, into a novel. The Reform Artists offers a male perspective on the dark side of divorce; Jon hopes to have it ready for release by fall. Then he will start work on a sci-fi trilogy that, he says, has been percolating in his mind for several years.

Jon Reisfeld can be found blogging at http://writeatyou.wordpress.com or on Facebook.
 
His ebook, The Last Way Station, is available at Amazon or at Smashwords. 

See  “TheLastWayStation” long book trailer here.

See “TheLastWayStation’s” short book trailer here.

So, I finally took a moment to find out what Six Sentence Sunday is all about and thought, "That's not too hard!" In case you haven't run across one of these posts before, here's what Six Sentence Sunday requires: Post six sentences from any of your stories. That's it! Of course, if you want to go the official route, you have to post by a certain time and then link to your blog via the official Six Sentence Sunday website, but that's not important to me.

Here are six sentences from my novel, a work in progress that will very soon be a work-to-be-edited. :) Enjoy!

"Her voice seemed to come from over his shoulder, close as when she had bent over him to point out her home state as it had looked years before. He blinked and brushed a trembling drop from the darkening surface of the map. Staring hard at the ugly squares, he imagined the jagged beauty of the old map his mother had spread out for him. Section 81 covered New York and part of Pennsylvania, he decided. Farther to the east were the sea blocs, great slices of waterfront that were closely guarded. The ports required a Protectorate license for anyone wishing to do business. Citizens were never allowed through to the water."

If you've been reading this blog long, you know I love thoughtful guest posts on the writing life. Today I'm thrilled to share an article by my wonderful friend Stella Deleuze, author of No Wings Attached. Enjoy, and when you're done reading here, get a copy of the book! She's an indie author who deserves the support of readers far and wide.

No Wings Attached – A Journey of Two Years

“I'm going to write a book!” I said into the phone, my voice a few notches higher, signalling to my friend I was very excited.

“Finally!” was her response. “I've waited for you to say that.”

That's how it started, really. After we finished our conversation, I sat down and typed away furiously. When I had my first twenty pages, I sent it to her and got it back a day later, terribly ripped apart. The story: a woman, me, decided to move countries. I knew it didn't work, but needed her confirmation. I was new at writing, had no idea, no clue, no understanding or any skills whatsoever. I deleted everything I’d written so far and began afresh.

As I do send wishes to the universe (not that they come true), I decided to have my MC (main character) Celia do the same, and to get them fulfilled I needed someone to do that. Enter Tom, a wish consultant, aka, angel of wishes.

I wrote every day up to 2500 words and sent them to my friend, who did a light plot edit. Then I altered as I went and continued, loved every minute of it. 2.5 months later, I had a completed novel of 120K words. Since I was naïve, I thought editors would help me to smooth out my syntax, as I wrote in second language. I searched for publishers and found authonomy. How lucky! That was when I learned about editing, about writing skills, about dialogue attributes and punctuation.

The writing was done, now the hard work began. With every single bit of knowledge I gained, I went through the book to correct what was needed. I taught myself how to use dialogue tags correctly, I edited round after round after round. Then rewrote bits that didn't sit well with me. After thirteen times reading my own book, I began to hate it. Imagine you repeatedly have to read the same book. I usually read them once, seldom twice. Never three or four times, let alone thirteen. I stopped, thought about shoving it into the drawer and never taking it out again. I needed a break from it.

So I wrote my short story collection, totally different from the novel. I had a bone to pick with people, situations, chores, and even wasps. Short stories don't require plotting as much as a novel does, they basically flew out of my brain – into the keyboard. By now I had more skills I could rely on, hence the editing and rewriting was less intensive. I published them in March and dug out No Wings Attached, admittedly with a heavy sigh. I couldn't give up on the book. I knew it was good and I wanted to entertain people as much as I had fun writing it.

A wonderful beta-reader who I sent it to came back with a few minor suggestions and with lots of love for the book; that charged me again. My battery fully loaded, I pulled myself together and did one last round of editing/rewriting and then, the magical thing happened: I thoroughly fell in love with it again. Honest, heartfelt love for the story I created two years ago, and I knew it was ready to be published. Two of my friends did the proofing for me, I did one big final correction and prepared the book for its release.

I put it on Kindle on the 3rd of June and sold my first copies on the 4th. It has two wonderful reviews on the UK site and I heard from other reviewers that they really enjoyed the book. To make a story believable, the characters likeable, and a reader forget about his or her problems for a few hours is a difficult task. I personally prefer characters that could be your next-door-neighbours and I wanted to achieve it with Celia. According to the feedback I got so far, I seemed to have managed and I honestly cried tears of joy over the reviews.

Now I'm working on the sequel, which I plan to bring out in October. I can tell you straight away that I enjoy writing it as much as I enjoyed creating the world in No Wings Attached.

You can find No Wings Attached at Amazon and Smashwords!

I just finished reading Let The Right One In two days ago and I can already tell it will be one of my favorite books. It's a very creative vampire story full of incredibly realistic characters. I loved it.

Now I'm reading The Hunger Games. So far, it's a really good YA novel. The pacing is excellent; I've had a hard time putting it down because there is just constant conflict/danger. I know these books have been popular for a while now, and I finally got motivated enough to read them because the movie is coming and I know I'll want to see it. I'll rarely read a book after seeing the movie, but I will watch a movie after seeing the book. Let The Right One In is the exception - I saw the Swedish film and almost all of the American remake first, but the book had so much more to offer that I fell in love with it.

Do the movies affect what you read? Will you reread a series if a movie is coming out? (I'm looking at you, Harry Potter fans, although you'll have to read fast to do a series reread before The Deathly Hallows Pt. 2.) I'd love to hear your thoughts on books and movies and how they intersect.

It's been a while since I read a good thriller. After chatting with Robert Capko about his novel Say Goodbye, I might have to dive back into this genre!

Welcome to the blog, Robert! Could you tell us a little bit about your book?
Thank you so much, Rachel, for giving me the opportunity to talk about my new novel SAY GOODBYE. It is an Action/Adventure Thriller about an Air Force pararescueman (PJ) named John Paxton.

Here is a little bit about this award-winning book:

John Paxton is a man who understands duty—both to his family and to his country. As a highly decorated pararescueman in the Air Force, he's risked his own life numerous times to save the lives of others.  He was the epitome of the pararescue motto: These Things We Do That Others May Live. But now that he's married with two small children, he's content as an instructor at Lackland Air Force Base.

Then Paxton is commanded to lead a team on a dangerous mission—supposedly to rescue the pilot of a stealth fighter shot down over Serbia. Yet, nothing is as it seems. As the mission goes from bad to worse, Paxton uncovers a deadly plot that threatens National Security. But to fight an enemy with ties to one of the most dangerous organizations on the planet, he risks not only his own life, but also the people he loves the most.

Here is a video trailer for the book.

What led you to write this novel?
I first learned about the PJs when I served in the Air Force.  The more I learned about these heroes, the more I was convinced that their story needed to be told.   They do an amazing job of saving lives and most people have never heard of them.  I felt it was about time they start to get the recognition they deserve.  I hope my novel, small contribution that it may be, helps in that regard.

What are some interesting facts about pararescue that you can share with us? How did John Paxton’s job make him a great protagonist?       
Pararescue Jumpers (PJs) are the Air Force Special Forces operators that go pretty much anywhere in the world to rescue people.  Their primary mission is to rescue downed airmen behind enemy lines, but they do much more than that.  They are also on standby for all the manned space missions ready to rescue the astronauts should something go wrong.  They are also involved in civilian rescues both on land and at sea in the most extreme circumstances.

What was the biggest challenge you faced when writing this book, and how did you overcome it?
Finding the time to actually sit down and write.  I had to make it a priority.  I made some big changes in my life to allow me to pursue my passion for writing.

What is your best advice on writing?
Keep writing.  Work every day to perfect your craft.

Thanks so much for stopping by, Robert!

Bio
I am a decorated veteran of the United States Air Force.  I am an educator and I live in Florida.  I am currently finishing my second thriller THE LONG ROAD HOME that should be out in time for the Holidays.

Robert Capko can be found on RobertCapko.com, Facebook, Twitter, and Goodreads.

Say Goodbye is available at Barnes & Noble, Apple iBooks, Smashwords, Books A Million, Sony, Kobo, and Diesel!

If you enjoyed this post, please subscribe via email or Networked Blogs. You can even follow me on Twitter!

Connie Jasperson has some good thoughts on NaNoWriMo and her book, The Last Good Knight.

Welcome to the blog, Connie! Could you tell us a little bit about your book? 
The Last Good Knight is a medieval fantasy tale detailing the merry adventures of a mercenary company called The Rowdies, and Sir Julian Lackland in particular.  It is a series of vignettes from his life, taking his life from the age of eighteen until he is sixty-five.  It details the good and the bad, the sad and the humorous.

What led you to write this novel?
A friend of mine talked me into entering the 2010 NaNoWriMo contest, where you write a 50,000 word novel from start to finish in November.  I finished the first draft of 68,000 words on Nov. 21, because I had to cook Thanksgiving dinner for the family and didn’t want to be distracted from that.  I re-wrote it in December and February, and then Fantasy Island Book Publishing published it to the Kindle and Nook in March.

How did you make this fantasy world feel real? 
I make an outline of the general story, diagram out the laws, the rules for religion and for magic, how they dress and what the moral values are when I start writing, and then when I am at the stream-of-consciousness stage, it flows out of my mind.  I am able to visualize it fully formed and I don’t have too many contradictions to deal with in the re-write that way.

What was the biggest challenge you faced when writing this book, and how did you overcome it?
This book flowed from start to finish, but my house went to heck while I was writing it.  So now, when I am writing I have learned to set the timer on the stove so that I come back to reality and cook dinner, or vacuum, or do anything domestic.  A buzzer goes off and I stop keying and try to remember what task I had going that is calling me now!

What is your best advice on writing?
Get involved with a group, like NaNoWriMo, and enter contests, because the support that other authors give you is absolutely invaluable.  I learned so much from them!

Thanks so much for stopping by, Connie!

Bio
Connie Jasperson lives and writes in the small quarry town of Tenino, Washington.  She and her husband share five children, nine grandchildren and a love of good food and great music.  Connie has worked as a field-hand for a Christmas tree grower, a dark-room technician, a hotel maid, a bookkeeper and also ‘did time’ in the data entry pools of several large corporations.  She now is semi-retired and is writing full time.  Currently in the works are several tales based in world of Neveyah, the first  novel of which, ‘The Rose Tower’,  is due to be published in June by Fantasy Island Book Publishing.

Connie J. Jasperson can be found blogging on the craft of writing at Life In The Realm of Fantasy.You can find Connie on Facebook as "Connie J. Jasperson, Author", and on Twitter as cjjasp.

The Last Good Knight  is available at Amazon.com for the Kindle and in paperback.

It is also available direct from the publisher at Fantasy Island Book Publishing and at GoodReads.

If you enjoyed this post, please subscribe via email or Networked Blogs. You can even follow me on Twitter!

Alex Sinclair is our guest today. The concept of his romantic suspense novel Five Days Notice is one I haven't seen before!

Welcome to the blog, Alex! Could you tell us a little bit about your book?
Hello, thank you for having me here. Five Days Notice is a romantic suspense novel. It is a character driven story about ordinary people living in a world where the global economy have collapsed and the third world war has left the planet a dark and horrible place. There are no new jobs, which mean the two classes in society are the poor and the damned. The poor are those people that works long hours for low pay. The story is about seven people that work in the last superstore in the city, but when job cuts are announced the staff have five days to prove they should be kept on. It is a story that shows the lengths and depths people go through to keep their jobs. Five Days Notice is full of passion, romance, corruption, betrayal and deceit.

What led you to write this novel?
I had the concept of the story for a while. I really liked the simple idea that it all stems from. I use to work in a superstore and at Christmas you would have temps come in. It is how I started there, but after Christmas three of the twenty temps would be kept on and it got very competitive. Some of it got nasty and people back stabbing and gossiping. So I thought what would actually happen if people’s lives actually depended on this low paying and tedious job? How far would people be willing to go to survive and provide for their loved ones? And once I started writing down the idea in my notebook I simply couldn’t stop. The story came alive.

Your novel starts out with only a handful of jobs available. Would you say the current economy influenced your book? How did you make the leap from “bad economy” to “having a job is like winning the lottery”?
Oddly, I wrote this book a while ago and it has been sitting on my computer. It was completed before all the global problems we have all faced. One reason I didn’t put it out until now, I thought it was too depressing at the time. I wanted to really stress the point that the dead end job was a lifeline and that without a job people really couldn’t survive. To do this I have to create a horrible and depressing world, which included a war and global economy collapsing. I never thought that would actually happen! The harsh world in the story sets the tone for the characters. It starts out nice and friendly, but slowly it is every man and women for themselves. 

What was the biggest challenge you faced when writing Five Days Notice? How did you overcome it?
I think my biggest challenge was the ending. I knew which characters I wanted to lose their jobs, kill or turn bad, but the more I wrote the story the more I liked the characters. There really are no bad guys. Everyone does what they do for a justified reason. One character is a single mother, another suffers from domestic abuse, the other is suicidal and depressive and another would do anything for the woman he loves. So the more the story went on and the more I liked the characters I didn’t want anything bad to happen to them, but that is what makes the story. You connect with the characters so much that you end up routing for the bad ones or the corrupt ones, but then you hate them for the things they do and then love them. It is ayo-yo of emotions. In the end I stuck to the plot I planned out and I am glad I did.

What is your best advice on writing?
My best advice for writing is never give up. Sometimes writing is hard and sometimes it is heartbreaking, but you only get from writing what you are willing to put in. If you work hard, stay focused and keep writing then good things will come your way. If an idea isn’t working then place it upon the shelf, brain storm and come up with something new. Don’t disrupt the creative flow. Keep moving forward.

Thanks so much for stopping by, Alex!

Alex Sinclair can be found on Facebook.

Five Days Notice is available at Sinclair Books.

Let’s welcome M.K. Carver to the blog! M.K.’s mystery novel, titled The Abattoir, is available on Amazon.

Welcome to the blog, M.K.! Could you tell us a little bit about your book?
The Abattoir is a story about a sadistic serial killer stalking Manhattan’s Meatpacking District and the Detective, Ellie Danson, who is out to stop him. There are also a couple of interesting subplots as well. Ellie pursues the case while battling sexual harrassment from her male colleagues and trying to save a teenaged boy from the clutches of the street before it pulls him down permanently. These narrative threads eventually all come together in what I think is ultimately a satisfying whole.

What led you to write this novel?
I was interested in exploring the psyche of a killer compelled to murder not necessarily because he wanted to, but because he needs to. Due to certain events in his childhood, he has become unable to engage in the kind of healthy, romantic relationships that can truly make life worth living. He has been psychologically disfigured in a way that belies what unsuspecting others around him see when they look at him.

I was also fascinated by the idea of a female Detective balancing several things in her personal and professional life while struggling to solve the case in a way that so many women do on a daily basis in a variety of occupations today. I’ve always been fascinated by that kind of story. 

How did you create the mood you wanted to share with readers?
I decided to construct a narrative that gave alternating perspectives of the killer and Detective as a way of maintaining a fast pace and keeping it as fresh as possible. I suppose the closest analogy to that would be the Patterson style in his earlier books, though I don’t employ first-person perspective the way he does for the Alex Cross series, only third. 

When did you first realize you wanted to be a writer?
I can recall writing a personal essay for a sixth grade English class about my little sister, who had just been born nine months earlier. My teacher was so moved that she created a writing award just for me during our awards season that spring. From that moment on, I knew that I wanted to be a writer.

What is your best advice on writing?
Read and write as much as possible and most important of all, to stay positive about your work regardless of how well it is received. Rejection is just another word for opportunity in my opinion.

Thanks so much for stopping by, M.K.!

Bio
M.K. Carver is a freelance writer and graduate of the University-at Albany and an alumnus of the Columbia University SOA. M.K. has written grant proposals, blogs, and essays on crime, short stories, novels and screenplays. M.K. is currently working on Point of Impact (An Ellie Danson Mystery) coming this fall.

M.K. Carver can be found at www.mkcarver.blogspot.com. You can follow him on Facebook and Twitter @carvermk

The Abattoir is available at Amazon UK and Barnes & Noble Nook.