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After spending a long time thinking about the next book (number 13) and working on the character backgrounds, the plot and the detailed outline, I have finally started writing.

I just finished Chapter Nine, about 14,000 words.

I looked up "cognitive dissonance" on Google a few minutes ago. They list a quote by F. Scott Fitzgerald -- “The true test of a first-rate mind is the ability to hold two contradictory ideas at the same time.”

I guess I must have a first-rate mind because I'm certainly feeling that way about this book.

On the one hand, I think I am doing a great job. I think the writing is terrific, that the characters are admirable (or despicable), that the dialog is true-to-life and I feel an emotional tug when I read the scenes.

On the other hand, I think that many people who like mystery novels will not much like this book which means that I'm doing a terrible job. Why do I think that?

Instead of starting with a crime or an action scene, which is the convention, I start with a lone detective in a squad room. To make it worse, by the end of Chapter Nine I still have not included a single action scene -- no depiction of a murder, no gunfight, no car chase. Neither have I introduced the villain, leastwise let the reader in on the villain's plans for his next evil deed if the hero does not succeed in thwarting him.

If all of that wasn't bad enough, I cannot summarize the story in one sentence, or in two, not even in three. Four? Maybe four.

This is practically a primer on how NOT to write a crime novel.

So, here are my two simultaneously held conflicting beliefs:

1) that this will be a terrific book and that I am thrilled with the work I have done so far

2) that I am doing a bad job, -- that crime-novel readers will not like this book, not a simple enough idea and not nearly enough shoot-outs and car chases.

My only option is to keep writing.

I have just joined Goodreads and thought this would be a useful first post.

I have been very pleased with my last book, Shooting Crows At Dawn, and that has encouraged me to get to work on the next novel. I have some ideas for the protagonist and a few of the subsidiary characters. I plan to start the outline next week (late September 2011) and have the book completely outlined by Thanksgiving.

For me, figuring out the story starts with the character. From there I try to figure out what kind of situation he will be involved in and the issues he will need to deal with. These issues need to be emotional and exciting. The story, therefore, grows from the hero's character, not the other way around.

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