Reading, wRiting, and Roaming with Author Valerie Biel

Welcome to the June  installment of the 2021 Author Series, where a published author takes the stage and tells us what they wish they had known before they published their first book along with what advice they would go back and give their pre-published self. Greg Renz, author of Beneath the Flames, is our June author. You can find my earlier review and author interview with Greg here. His book was based upon his own experiences as a firefighter and remains one of my favorites!

ABOUT GREG:

The first rule of firefighting is to never enter a burning building alone. Sometimes rules must be broken, much like writing. Fire Captain... Continue Reading

Joe jumped behind the wheel of his car. He felt like he’d been swimming in his morning coffee, a triple-shot death wish, extra sugar. From the passenger seat, Susan watched him, thinking Joe looked beyond hyper. What was wrong with her best friend?

Yes, dear reader, I committed a writing faux pas in the above sentences. I shifted POV in the same paragraph—within two sentences, even!

I read something similar on the first page of a new mystery release, unfortunately.

Sigh.

What’s a writer to do when cautioned against narrative POV shifts but then sees the very thing in a book from a major publisher?

During the last months, I’ve been revising... Continue Reading

My four favorite books from the past two months include a poignant middle-grade novel, a beautifully written adult fiction, a spiritual book about connecting with nature, and a wonderfully suspenseful, twisting thriller.

But there’s this other thing I did that I need to talk about … it makes me feel guilty perhaps because it was so indulgent. I binge-read 49 other books (all in the same series), one after another after another. It was lovely, but I have so much guilt, because I have a rather large stack of other books waiting to be read and reviewed. But this binge of books taught me a few things about series writing and myself, which I share further into this post. First, let’s celebrate four excellent books:

I didn’t become a coffee drinker until my forties. How did I survive without it? I’m an early bird, so coffee, my computer, and my characters are what I’m about at five o’clock in the morning. Also, I love local coffee shops. They’re great places to meet friends and make notes about writing projects. (I can’t write in public spaces, though. Too distracting. When I write, it has to be in a quiet spot without noise or diversion.)

I’m a member of a writer’s group where we share chapters of our mystery-novels-in-progress. We have different writing styles, characters, and plots, but one location we write about is similar: The coffee shop.

Coffee shops are our “third place.” A home-away-from-home where... Continue Reading