Kassandra Lamb's Blog, page 14

How I Learned to Write by the Seat of My Pants

by Kassandra Lamb ~ The story of how I discovered I should write by the seat of my pants is a good lesson in two things—everybody is different and trust your instincts.

Like most of us, I was taught in English class to write outlines before starting an essay or story. So for years, I dutifully wrote outlines of stories, and then shoved the outline into a drawer and never finished the story.

There was one story, in particular, that periodically insisted I write it. It was about platonic...

Writing Romantic Suspense: Sugar and Spice and Things Not So Nice

Happy Valentine’s Day!! This seemed like an appropriate time to do an encore presentation of a post Kirsten Weiss and I wrote a few years ago, about the challenges and joys of writing romantic suspense.

by Kassandra Lamb and Kirsten Weiss ~ Both of us have ventured a bit into the realm of romantic suspense lately. Since we already had romances as subplots in many of our mysteries, we thought it shouldn’t be that hard to make the romance a bit more central and call it romantic suspense.

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How Important Is One’s Favorite Childhood Author? Very!!

by Kassandra Lamb ~ I did a blog tour recently for my new release, Lethal Assumptions, for which I was asked to provide several short blog posts. One suggested topic was writing about a favorite childhood author.

We authors get that question a lot—who was your favorite childhood author? And I never have trouble answering it—Laura Ingalls Wilder. But this time I asked myself WHY she has remained my all-time favorite childhood author.

I read a ton of books as a kid, always had my nose stuck...

The Speed of Write (Plus a New Release)

by Kassandra Lamb ~ I suspect most people realize that writing a novel is a lengthy process. But how lengthy varies from author to author. Also sometimes “the speed of write” is faster than at other times, depending on what else is going on in a writer’s life.

Most of our misterio press authors lean toward slow writing—taking over six months and possibly up to a year to write and flesh-out a new book.

But one—Kirsten Weiss—is definitely a super fast writer. And extremely organized. She...

A Humorous Look at Expertise

by Kassandra Lamb ~ I’ve talked about expertise before HERE, asking the questions what is expertise and how do you know when you have enough of it to teach something to others.

But I recently stumbled upon a friend’s post from 2018 on the topic, and as always Barb Taub manages to make her point while also making you laugh.

Her post is about a potter on the Isle of Arran, where she lives part of the time. I went to this pottery while visiting her in 2019, and I came home with a sugar bo...

10 Surprises I Didn’t Expect on Jury Duty (Plus a Sale!)

by Kassandra Lamb ~ First, Happy Martin Luther King, Jr. Day! A day late, I know, but in his honor, I’ve put a related book, Police Protection on sale for $0.99. (See below.) Second, today’s blog post, also somewhat relevant as it’s about justice, or rather the justice system ~ 10 Surprises I Didn’t Expect on Jury Duty.

In early December, I was tapped for jury duty. This is something most people try to get out of, but I was delighted. And I was also a little surprised by several things I didn...

Off-Week Goodie: A Fun Interview with my Main Character

by Kassandra Lamb ~ Here’s an off-week goodie for you all, a fun interview with my main character, Judith Anderson, in my new series, the C.o.P. on the Scene Mysteries.

I love doing character interviews. Of course, I’m actually answering the questions, but I put myself inside the head of the character first. And often the character says something I wasn’t really expecting.

This interview was conducted by author Lois Winston’s main character, Anastasia Pollack. (Yes, fictional character...

Goals for Year 3 of Covid: Finding Balance Between Writing and Life, Again

by Kassandra Lamb ~ Finding a sense of balance between writing and life is an ongoing challenge for most writers. Many are also dealing with multiple responsibilities such as day jobs and families.

photo by Bekir Donmez on Unsplash.com

Others of us who are retired may not have as much trouble finding time to write. Our issues tend to revolve more around the fact that our lives are less structured. For me, at least, the tendency is to spend too much time on my writing business and not enoug...

Happy Holidays from misterio press

We always like to offer some holiday melodies for your listening pleasure when the blog goes on hiatus for the holidays.

And as many of you know, Pentatonix is one of my all time favorite singing groups, especially when it comes to Christmas music.

So here are a few of their songs—one fun, one totally traditional, and the last one is the first song I heard by Pentatonix. It’s also one of my two favorite Christmas songs.

We will be on hiatus until January 4, 2022. Wow, it feels weird to...

How Releasing a New Book is Like Having a Baby

by Kassandra Lamb ~ I always forget just how much work goes into releasing a new book. The whole process reminds me of being pregnant and having a baby.

First the Pregnancy

It starts off okay…a little bit of “morning sickness,” taking the form of anxiety over whether or not I will have enough plot points to fill up an entire novel.

Then I get into the flow and it’s not bad at all. The baby, I mean the book is growing, slowly but surely.

The “Third Trimester” Photo by Juan Encalada...