Tuesday, March 27, 2018

What's going on with the Writing???

I try to keep everyone up on the latest with my writing. It seems lately I have had a lot of interest in Sawyer's Rose and Wyatt's Bounty due to the narrated books being available. And I have been getting a lot of questions on when the next story will be released and will there be a story for various characters. And the answer is yes and yes and yes! There will be plenty more on the McCades with some spin offs of extra characters....one day.


 

You guys gotta remember I work a full time job as an RN Quality Analyst, Monday thru Friday, 8 to 5, and I have daughters aged 10 and 13 , ad husband (who does way more than I do around this house) and we also have my husband’s mother with dementia—so no rest for the weary.  While my main goal of each day is to make it to that part if each evening where I can write, somewhere in the middle are the things that must come first:

 

Up at 6:00 am

Out the door by 7:15am

Drop one daughter at elementary school

Drop the other at middle school

Race to work avoiding cop who always sits a little store on the corner-listen to books on the way there and back.

8:15 to 5:00...The Day Job  

5:20 Pick up one kid (the other buses home)

Home at last.....oh but wait....there's more

Cook supper

Dishes

Laundry

Feed the pets-2 dogs and 4 guinea pigs

Yard work

House pick up

HOMEWORK HELP

Mail and bills

Baths

Somewhere in the middle of all this being a mom and wife

9:00pm Off to bed for the girls

Yipee....WRITING TIME....and I am exhausted!!! But the weekend is on the way, isn't it hump day or is it Friday yet?

 

No whining but you guys can see I get 1 to 2 hours a night to write if I am not exhausted. Some weekends I get a lot of writing time, others not so much. But here is what is in the works:

 

Dawson's Haven, the third in The McCades of Cheyenne Series is more than half done. I am pushing hard on this story each night making progress. But I have to take the time to make this story right so that the character and the readers get the story they deserve. The gist of this story without giving too much away is: Dawson will be wrongly accused of a crime and it is the woman who he recently rescued that will return the favor.

 

The delay on Dawson’s Haven is due to me working hard to submit a fully written contemporary story that I completed in 2013. The Wild Rose Press had a call for contemporary cowboys and I pulled out a story I had written back then and dusted it off for several months last year. I have learned a lot since I first started writing in 2011 and so there were some craft issues I had to fix up. Anyway, this story was contracted by Wild Rose in January 2018 (Yipee!) And edits will begin soon which means this story All But the Fall will be out sometime this year if all goes as planned. It is about a horse stunt jumper on the set of an old west television series who falls for the nurse consultant on the set. She is running from the past and he is running to her and he is very yummy! And of course he has 2 brothers so more to come on this series too.

 

In the meantime, as some authors know characters sometimes demand to be heard. This time the voice in my head was Leaning Bear, Dawson's BFF Cheyenne Medicine Man buddy. And so in less than a week, and I am not by nature a plotter, I mapped out an entire story for this guy. Not only did I make an outline but I know all the characters and what happens in every chapter thru the whole story. For a pancer this is amazing. And then because this darn Medicine Man wouldn’t leave me alone, I have already written the first two chapters with a goal of this story following closely after Dawson's story if I can get my act together. In this book it seems Leaning Bear falls for the school teacher sent to the reservation, but I can’t tell much more without telling too much. Maybe this story, Paint the Sky, will be a good read in between Dawson and Evan's stories.

 

And I do have a full outline for the 4th McCade brother Evan!  Evan's Ransom will follow as soon as I can get these others out there. The youngest McCade will be loaded with a number of surprises that will bring something from all the previous stories full circle. Let's just say this youngest McCade brother has a lot of surprises!

 

And then the big question! WILL THERE BE A STORY FOR DODGE AND BRETT? When I first started writing this series, I never expected Dodge to be such a loved character and the response to her has been huge. I like to say I write romance and I write the west but truly I think my stories would fall into a family saga genre easily. With that being said and given the time, I would love to write a story for Dodge. The requests have been mostly for a current story for them and some for a story from their past. I am thinking I can accomplish both with a current story where she and Brett both reflect on the past while they tackle their romance and all the happenings around them.

 

And the saga will continue...everyone loves Zane, Sawyer's son and so do I. But I have not mapped any story for him yet though I think there is a good possibility he will find his girl back home on a visit to where he grew up!

 

Oh and there is still Hudson Collier, the deputy BFF of Wyatt who has a comically fun way of putting his words

out there. He ends up the sheriff in Denver at the end of Wyatt's story. I do believe I have a bit of story mapped out in my head for this guy but it will be a while.

 

And while we are at it, except for a few of my beta reader friends, I will bet you didn’t know unless you paid good attention in my current stories that I have stories for The Hagen Brothers. Remember the mention of the horse guys in Sawyer and Wyatt’s stories? Well, if I can one day get my act together these are full stories I have written for Adam, Samuel and Will Hagen. I wrote these three stories all in 2011 and 2012  and they need a good deal of work and story changes, but I would love the chance to rewrite these and get them out there to readers.  

 

Whew…no wonder I am tired. But for now, back to the story which must get written!

 

Kim

 

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