Miranda MacLeod's Blog, page 2
January 15, 2021
Kickstarting 2018
Mega Lesfic Sale December 26-29, 2017 @ iheartlesfic.com!With the start of 2018 just a few days away, I’ll be honest and admit I’m not sad to see 2017 coming to an end. It’s been a difficult year in many ways. But instead of dwelling on the negatives, I’m going to focus on a positive, and that is the amazing opportunities I have had for collaborating with other lesfic authors this year. If you want an example, click on the picture above to see the mega sale I’m a part from December 26-29th (more on that below).
When I published my first book in 2016, I didn’t know anyone who was doing what I did. As an indie author, I participated in some groups and forums with other indies, but I soon found that the experiences of authors writing urban fantasy and cozy mysteries, or even mainstream contemporary romance, didn’t necessarily apply to the world of lesfic. I didn’t fully realize how isolating that was until I got an email from T.B. Markinson telling me about her new iheartlesfic site and inviting me to participate in a multi-author sale. Suddenly, I was part of a community with all these wonderful writers who were having the same experiences and struggles as me!
As the year has gone on, I’ve made friends and found support at a time when I really needed it, and as we go into 2018, I think it will make all the difference in giving me a better approach to life and work in the new year. If you’re a lesfic writer or reader looking a community, too, check out some of interviews on iheartlesfic and sign up for the newsletter, and maybe join a lesfic group on FaceBook (there are several!). Things can sometimes seem bleak, but there are wonderful people out there!
Oh, and if all you really need to make your year complete is some new books, go check out the sale! There are dozens of authors and books, all priced from free to $1.99, but it ends tomorrow! If you missed it this time, be sure to sign up for their newsletter as there are many more exciting multi-author promotions coming up next year!
Love is in the air!
It’s almost Valentine’s Day, which most people assume, being a romance writer, must be my favorite holiday. It really isn’t. For one thing, my cats love to eat flowers, which they later “regift” in most unpleasant ways, usually on or in my favorite shoes. So, roses are out. Also, speaking of roses, my local public radio station spends weeks hawking long-stem red roses for Valentine’s Day. I love public radio, and by right about now, I can recite the whole spiel. Want to know what gave me the idea for my spy in Stockholm Syndrome to have the public radio station be the only phone number she could remember? Yep, it was the Valentine’s Day pledge drive. Forget about 911. If I’m ever in a life threatening emergency, WBUR will be the only phone number I remember, thanks to those Valentine’s roses.
However, there are two very exciting bits of news I have to share that are Valentine’s Day related. First, two of my books, A Road Through Mountains and Your Name in Lights, are part of the Fall in Love lesfic mega sale, priced at just 99c until Friday. If you happen across this post once the sale is ended, similar sales are held several times per year, so make sure you sign up for the iheartlesfic.com newsletter to find out about the next one.
And second, I’m a few weeks away from publishing my next book, Letters to Cupid, a story that just happens to begin on Valentine’s Day. It’s a charming story about an American celebrity chef named Andie, who is hiding out in a little hillside village in Tuscany to escape a tabloid scandal when she meets a local chocolate maker named Valentina, a woman who, despite her very romantic profession, has given up on love. There’s food and wine, and lots of chocolate, and a little bit of magic, too. Keep an eye out for the email announcement when it publishes in March!
Q&A TAG: The Debut Novel
Thanks to Niamh Murphy for suggesting this and asking me to play along!
Did you know you can get a free e-copy of my debut novel, Telling Lies Online, just for signing up for my newsletter? It’s true! Sign up today and start reading right away!
This is a ‘Tag’ post, so if you’re an author yourself, check out the end of the post to see how you can get involved!
What is the title and genre of your debut Novel
Telling Lies Online
What gave you the idea to start writing it?
Actually, it was a much darker news article I read about a catfishing scam, where a woman had made up a man and posed as him online, and eventually “killed him off” through an illness, both to mess with the woman she’d been corresponding with and also, presumably, to scam her out of money to help with the fictional illness. It wasn’t funny at all, but I immediately thought, “What if someone accidentally found themselves in this type of situation?” And then the potential for humor was pretty clear.
How long did it take you to finish?
I started this book as a NaNoWriMo project, which is National Novel Writing Month. I did the outline in late October of 2015, and then tried to write 50,000 words in November, as the challenge demands. I failed at the challenge, but I finished the first draft later in December, and after editing and proofreading, the final 72,000 word novel was published in February of 2016.
What was the biggest challenge you had when writing it?
There were two. First, the time constraint of the NaNo challenge was nothing I’d attempted before, especially when it coincided with a cross-country driving trip to Texas for Thanksgiving. It is very hard to type on a highway. But second, the premise of the main character getting caught up in so many lies was difficult because I wanted her to be a generally likeable and honest person and someone the reader could easily see themselves in. She didn’t try to lie about who she was, but when an error resulted in the perfect woman essentially landing in her lap, the temptation to hide the truth was overwhelming. It was a very fine line between making her keep up the pretense, which after all was the whole premise of the story, and knowing that the longer she took to come clean, the less sympathetic she might appear to readers. Ultimately, I hoped that readers would think, “I don’t like that she’s doing this, but can I honestly say I would do it differently?”
How did you get it published, Indie or Trad?
I had opted for indie even before I wrote the book. I attended a conference hosted by my local chapter of RWA (Romance Writers of America) and heard a very successful author of straight contemporary romance extolling the virtues of indie publishing. For years, I had played around with the idea of writing more seriously, but the whole traditional publishing process made me hesitate. I hated the idea of spending months or years on a book and being at the mercy of a publisher to decide if it would ever see the light of day. Knowing I could make it happen on my own terms was a huge incentive to finally following through.
What was the most important thing you learnt from the process?
The creative process requires discipline! When I told myself I could just write “when I feel like it,” I had a couple of unfinished manuscripts that lacked direction that I had been poking around with for two years or more. I thought finishing a whole book would take forever. When I set a goal of 50k words in a month and worked from an outline, I ended up with an actual book in 3 months, and have completed seven full-length novels in two years! And let me tell you, the latest one is a doozy, at over 90k words.
What are you working on right now?
Right now, I am working on getting my final draft of Stockholm Syndrome formatted for publication, and will be following it up with a sequel due out in early 2018. Stockholm Syndrome is the story of a seasoned spy, Leigh, who joins forces with a surprisingly savvy office temp, Amanda, as a result of dialing a wrong number. It started out as an entry in my Americans Abroad series, where American women travel abroad and find love on the road, but it soon took on a life of its own and is now the first book in a new series, the Agency of Secret Agents. It’s a silly name for a series, but hopefully you’ll see the humor in it by the time you get to the end of the first book. Oh, and if the names Leigh and Amanda seem familiar to you, first, you are probably as old as I am, and second, you may have been a fan of Scarecrow and Mrs. King back in the 1980s. I sure was, so using the same character names was a little tribute to the show.
If you’re an author, why not play ‘Tag’? Cut and paste these questions into your own blog with a link back to me, and provide your own answers to the questions! Then drop me a comment below with the link to your blog and I’ll check it out! I can’t wait to hear about all your debut-novel journeys!
And don’t forget to check out Niamh Murphy’s answers on her blog, and to sign up for my newsletter to claim your free copy of Telling Lies Online!
#EpicLesficWin
Have you heard about the huge indie author lesfic paperback giveaway? Have you entered yet?
I don’t know about you, but I never win contests, which is why I usually don’t enter them. It’s not a great policy, after all, how can you win if you don’t enter?
This is why I’ve decided to guarantee that if you sign up for this contest, you absolutely will win something. Sign up to win, and once the drawing is over, even if you weren’t one of the lucky three big winners, I’ll send you a link to download the ebook of my debut book, Telling Lies Online, for free.
So, no more excuses. Sign up today because you’re already a winner! But hurry! Contest ends September 15, 2017. If you missed the deadline, be sure to sign up for my newsletter to find out about the next contest.
Sneak Peek and Early Bird Giveaway!
Don’t miss my special contest for early readers! Simply buy a copy of Stockholm Syndrome (or read it in Kindle Unlimited for free) by November 15, 2017, find the contest link at the end of the book, and enter to win a $25 Amazon gift card AND an autographed paperback copy of Stockholm Syndrome.
My latest book defies a simple description. It’s a romance and a thriller, with comedy and a dash of political intrigue. The story centers around a case of mistaken identity when Leigh, a real-life spy, accidentally enlists the help of Amanda, a savvy office temp who answers a wrong number and ends up on the adventure of her life.
Want a sneak peek at one of my favorite scenes from the book? Here it is:
Caution yielding to panic, Leigh rushed in, grabbing the back of the chair and spinning it so she could get a closer look. Relief swept over her. She’d gotten there in time. “Amanda, what happened?”
Amanda’s eyebrows twitched as she bit her lip, looking undecided how to answer. “I won’t tell you!” she declared, her voice strong. “Not even if you torture me.”
Leigh swayed between bafflement and alarm. “I don’t understand.” Her nerve endings tingled as all at once a horrifying possibility presented itself, the only one that made sense. Betrayal. Amanda wasn’t the victim after all, but a traitor. “Is this about the Berlin Syndicate?” Leigh whispered, already dreading the answer.
“Yes!” Amanda’s face lit up enthusiastically. “Oh, that’s a good one! Yes, exactly. The Berlin Syndicate.”
“My god. You’re working with them, aren’t you?” Leigh let go of the chair and stumbled backward, feeling gutted. She stared as she reached for her phone, uncertain how any woman could be so calculating and cold. But far from revealing fear or anger, Amanda looked…perplexed. And slightly miffed.
“What are you doing?” Amanda inquired, her voice shockingly calm for a woman whose evil plan had just been blown out of the water. “What do you think I’m doing? I’m calling it in.”
“Calling it…But…” Amanda’s brows drew closer together, her face a study of consternation. “Aren’t you even going to try to get the information out of me first? It’s just,” she said in a strange sort of stage whisper, “there’s a whole drawer of lovely interrogation tools, right over there.” Her head simultaneously bobbed in the direction of the dresser that stood against one wall, as if providing Leigh with a useful hint.
Approaching the dresser while still keeping watch on her prisoner, Leigh glanced inside the open center drawer. Time stood suspended as she struggled to make sense of what it contained. “This is a drawer of sex toys,” Leigh said, her tone flat. She squinted, taking a really good look at Amanda, who was nodding slowly and giving her the indulgent look usually reserved for a village idiot who finally got an answer right. “A lot of them.”
“There was a sale.”
Perplexed, Leigh circled Amanda’s chair, stopping in her tracks as she got an unobstructed look at the back. “Do those handcuffs have pink fur on them?”
“Well, er…”
“They’re not even attached to the chair! If somebody tied you to the chair, they sure did a crap job of it. Why are you still sitting there?”
“You’re kind of ruining the atmosphere, here.” Amanda’s face was wrinkled, and she was clearly put-out. “I mean, it started out okay with that Berlin thing, but this isn’t exactly how it was supposed to go.”
Leigh gaped. “How it’s supposed to go? How exactly is being tied up supposed to—oh…” The truth struck her between the eyes. I’m such an idiot. “This is some sort of a role play thing, isn’t it?”
Real Writers Don’t…
This was a guest post written for iheartlesfic.com. Check out the original here . And be sure to sign up for the wonderful new release email that their site sends out weekly!
If you were to meet me at a cocktail party, there are a few things you would discover right away. First, I love a good gin martini, very dry, with extra olives. Second, I am not actually a cartoon character like my online avatar, but I do have strikingly similar red glasses and have been known to wear pink. In fact, I have a pink dress with martini glasses all over it, and this surprises pretty much no one who knows me.
What you would probably not find out is that I am a writer, and this is because, even though my sixth novel publishes this week, I find it difficult to claim that title for myself. In my mind, real writers retreat to castles on deserted windswept coastlines, or live in sleepy villages in Maine with shockingly high murder rates, where they somehow hit their deadlines while simultaneously helping the local sheriff solve crimes.
In case you hadn’t guessed, I watch a lot of television and movies, which almost certainly disqualifies me as a ‘real’ writer. My humor is equal parts Monty Python and I Love Lucy, and I adore romantic comedies. If anyone ever tells me one of my books could be a Meg Ryan or Sandra Bullock movie—and let’s face it, wouldn’t the world be a better place if either of them had made a lesbian romcom?—I will have accomplished my mission on earth.
One thing is for certain, writers definitely do not stare at their blank laptop screens and then procrastinate for weeks by doing laundry and baking, and then stay up until 5 am three nights in a row to feverishly finish their last chapters in order to meet a foolishly optimistic and self-imposed arbitrary writing deadline. Which, I’m going to be honest, is simply how I function.
But then I went to a retreat a few weeks back—in Maine, in fact, because as we’ve already established, most real writers live there. At this point, Fifty Percent Illusion was woefully behind schedule and I was addressing the issue by ordering a gin and tonic from the hotel bar instead of sitting down to write (they had martinis, but the G&Ts were free, so…).
In walks a hugely successful romantic suspense writer. Like, so well known, I have her books in paperbacks that I bought at the grocery store. And she starts talking about her writing process. It involved a lot of dog walking, hand wringing, late nights, and wine. I could have kissed her, if it wouldn’t have been really awkward. But I did come away from it feeling like maybe, just maybe, I was a real writer after all. It still took me another month to finish my manuscript, though.
But now it’s done, and I hope people find it worth the wait. I’ll probably have a martini or two before jumping into starting the next one. I have a few planned, mostly romcoms, plus a romantic suspense I hope to tackle next year. I’m sure you won’t be surprised that it will be set in Maine, nor that I will likely take some weekend when I really should be writing and drive up the coast to do some ‘research’ instead. You know, now that I have it on good authority that real writers do stuff like that, after all.
February 13, 2018
Love is in the air!
It’s almost Valentine’s Day, which most people assume, being a romance writer, must be my favorite holiday. It really isn’t. For one thing, my cats love to eat flowers, which they later “regift” in most unpleasant ways, usually on or in my favorite shoes. So, roses are out. Also, speaking of roses, my local public radio station spends weeks hawking long-stem red roses for Valentine’s Day. I love public radio, and by right about now, I can recite the whole spiel. Want to know what gave me the idea for my spy in Stockholm Syndrome to have the public radio station be the only phone number she could remember? Yep, it was the Valentine’s Day pledge drive. Forget about 911. If I’m ever in a life threatening emergency, WBUR will be the only phone number I remember, thanks to those Valentine’s roses.
However, there are two very exciting bits of news I have to share that are Valentine’s Day related. First, two of my books, A Road Through Mountains and Your Name in Lights, are part of the Fall in Love lesfic mega sale, priced at just 99c until Friday. If you happen across this post once the sale is ended, similar sales are held several times per year, so make sure you sign up for the iheartlesfic.com newsletter to find out about the next one.
And second, I’m a few weeks away from publishing my next book, Letters to Cupid, a story that just happens to begin on Valentine’s Day. It’s a charming story about an American celebrity chef named Andie, who is hiding out in a little hillside village in Tuscany to escape a tabloid scandal when she meets a local chocolate maker named Valentina, a woman who, despite her very romantic profession, has given up on love. There’s food and wine, and lots of chocolate, and a little bit of magic, too. Keep an eye out for the email announcement when it publishes in March!
December 28, 2017
Kickstarting 2018
Mega Lesfic Sale December 26-29, 2017 @ iheartlesfic.com!
With the start of 2018 just a few days away, I’ll be honest and admit I’m not sad to see 2017 coming to an end. It’s been a difficult year in many ways. But instead of dwelling on the negatives, I’m going to focus on a positive, and that is the amazing opportunities I have had for collaborating with other lesfic authors this year. If you want an example, click on the picture above to see the mega sale I’m a part from December 26-29th (more on that below).
When I published my first book in 2016, I didn’t know anyone who was doing what I did. As an indie author, I participated in some groups and forums with other indies, but I soon found that the experiences of authors writing urban fantasy and cozy mysteries, or even mainstream contemporary romance, didn’t necessarily apply to the world of lesfic. I didn’t fully realize how isolating that was until I got an email from T.B. Markinson telling me about her new iheartlesfic site and inviting me to participate in a multi-author sale. Suddenly, I was part of a community with all these wonderful writers who were having the same experiences and struggles as me!
As the year has gone on, I’ve made friends and found support at a time when I really needed it, and as we go into 2018, I think it will make all the difference in giving me a better approach to life and work in the new year. If you’re a lesfic writer or reader looking a community, too, check out some of interviews on iheartlesfic and sign up for the newsletter, and maybe join a lesfic group on FaceBook (there are several!). Things can sometimes seem bleak, but there are wonderful people out there!
Oh, and if all you really need to make your year complete is some new books, go check out the sale! There are dozens of authors and books, all priced from free to $1.99, but it ends tomorrow! If you missed it this time, be sure to sign up for their newsletter as there are many more exciting multi-author promotions coming up next year!
November 9, 2017
Sneak Peek and Early Bird Giveaway!
Don’t miss my special contest for early readers! Simply buy a copy of Stockholm Syndrome (or read it in Kindle Unlimited for free) by November 15, 2017, find the contest link at the end of the book, and enter to win a $25 Amazon gift card AND an autographed paperback copy of Stockholm Syndrome.
My latest book defies a simple description. It’s a romance and a thriller, with comedy and a dash of political intrigue. The story centers around a case of mistaken identity when Leigh, a real-life spy, accidentally enlists the help of Amanda, a savvy office temp who answers a wrong number and ends up on the adventure of her life.
Want a sneak peek at one of my favorite scenes from the book? Here it is:
Caution yielding to panic, Leigh rushed in, grabbing the back of the chair and spinning it so she could get a closer look. Relief swept over her. She’d gotten there in time. “Amanda, what happened?”
Amanda’s eyebrows twitched as she bit her lip, looking undecided how to answer. “I won’t tell you!” she declared, her voice strong. “Not even if you torture me.”
Leigh swayed between bafflement and alarm. “I don’t understand.” Her nerve endings tingled as all at once a horrifying possibility presented itself, the only one that made sense. Betrayal. Amanda wasn’t the victim after all, but a traitor. “Is this about the Berlin Syndicate?” Leigh whispered, already dreading the answer.
“Yes!” Amanda’s face lit up enthusiastically. “Oh, that’s a good one! Yes, exactly. The Berlin Syndicate.”
“My god. You’re working with them, aren’t you?” Leigh let go of the chair and stumbled backward, feeling gutted. She stared as she reached for her phone, uncertain how any woman could be so calculating and cold. But far from revealing fear or anger, Amanda looked…perplexed. And slightly miffed.
“What are you doing?” Amanda inquired, her voice shockingly calm for a woman whose evil plan had just been blown out of the water. “What do you think I’m doing? I’m calling it in.”
“Calling it…But…” Amanda’s brows drew closer together, her face a study of consternation. “Aren’t you even going to try to get the information out of me first? It’s just,” she said in a strange sort of stage whisper, “there’s a whole drawer of lovely interrogation tools, right over there.” Her head simultaneously bobbed in the direction of the dresser that stood against one wall, as if providing Leigh with a useful hint.
Approaching the dresser while still keeping watch on her prisoner, Leigh glanced inside the open center drawer. Time stood suspended as she struggled to make sense of what it contained. “This is a drawer of sex toys,” Leigh said, her tone flat. She squinted, taking a really good look at Amanda, who was nodding slowly and giving her the indulgent look usually reserved for a village idiot who finally got an answer right. “A lot of them.”
“There was a sale.”
Perplexed, Leigh circled Amanda’s chair, stopping in her tracks as she got an unobstructed look at the back. “Do those handcuffs have pink fur on them?”
“Well, er…”
“They’re not even attached to the chair! If somebody tied you to the chair, they sure did a crap job of it. Why are you still sitting there?”
“You’re kind of ruining the atmosphere, here.” Amanda’s face was wrinkled, and she was clearly put-out. “I mean, it started out okay with that Berlin thing, but this isn’t exactly how it was supposed to go.”
Leigh gaped. “How it’s supposed to go? How exactly is being tied up supposed to—oh…” The truth struck her between the eyes. I’m such an idiot. “This is some sort of a role play thing, isn’t it?”
October 27, 2017
Stockholm Syndrome: Behind the Scenes
How did you get the idea for Stockholm Syndrome?
This book started out as a relatively short, flirty romance that would fit in nicely with the other books in the Americans Abroad series. I wanted to set a story in Stockholm because I have friends there and have some great vacation memories of places that I just felt were perfect for a book.
Then I was listening to NPR, as I often do, and I realized that my local radio station phone number is literally the only phone number I know by heart anymore, and I thought wouldn’t it be funny if two characters met because one of them dialed the station number by accident and the other one picked up? And of course, it could’ve been anyone doing that—local bakery owner, a teacher, a plumber—but for some reason, I became convinced it should be a spy. Of course, they say ‘write what you know’, so I made Amanda an office temp.
Okay, but really…Russians and spies? How 1980.
I know, right? A book with Russian spies in 2017? Come on.
When I got the idea, it was in early 2016, and I thought it was a little far-fetched, too. I was like, no, it can’t be Russians. This isn’t the Cold War anymore. I figured I’d have to come up with a story that involved terrorists or something. Then we had an election, and the Russia investigation, and OMG, ya’ll—Russian spies are everywhere!
In that case, how much of this story is real?
I could tell you, but then I’d have to…no, seriously, it’s fiction. But actually, the sad thing is that, while the specifics of this story are made up, the alt-right focus and activity in Sweden is very real. Sometimes the plot ideas I had felt a little too plausible. And for various reasons, Sweden is a favorite target for these folks, especially when it comes to their immigration and refugee policies, for making an example out of about how Sweden’s liberal policies are ‘wrong’. So Sweden is definitely the right setting for this type of book. Oh, and all the locations are real, and so very much worth visiting if you get a chance. Sweden is a great country, and the food is excellent, in case you couldn’t tell by reading the book.
What’s next for Leigh and Amanda?
Well, they are going to have to save the world. I mean, obviously. In the next book, they head to Moscow. Will that be the end of the Russia stuff? I’m not sure. I know they will be taking Aunt Millie to Monte Carlo in the third book, tailing a sneaky con-woman. Is she connected to Russia? Maybe…There are so many possibilities for where this series might go, and part of it depends what crazy stuff is in the news between now and then, and how much more of it readers want to see.
Those names, Leigh and Amanda. They feel familiar.
My favorite show when I was a kid was Scarecrow and Mrs. King. The main characters were Lee and Amanda, and I loved the idea of a civilian and a spy, and all the witty and flirty banter between the leads. That was my inspiration, without a doubt, when writing this book.
