Guest Post from Elaine Raco Chase

Book Review #13: The People of the Mist Film Review #79: The Damned United

Guest Post from Elaine Raco Chase

Today's guest post comes from Elaine Raco Chase, author of eighteen novels including the #1 bestseller DESIGNING WOMAN, which you can find on Amazon at http://amzn.com/B004X6MWOY Elaine has a wealth of experience and has very kindly offered to share a few very useful tips. Many thanks for guesting today, Elaine, and thank you for a great article.

[image error]

WRITE WHAT YOU KNOW

That's always the first thing a writer is told to do. I've been a creative writing teacher for over 20 years (with over 25 students who've published) and I always tell my students: WRITE WHAT YOU DON'T KNOW…then learn it.

I've eighteen books published – a dozen category contemporary romances, a mystery series, edited a book of mystery short stories and a non-fiction book – How to Write The Amateur Detective Novel – which was nominated for the Agatha Christie Award.

When I sit down to write, I have a vague – What If? Idea in my brain. And that launches me into the wonderful world of research.

1. Who – are the character's that would fit this idea

2. Where – is the best place to set this idea

3. When – time of year that would best highlight this idea/characters

4. What – is the idea and what info do I need to make this idea work

5. Why – ahhh the key…why is all this happening to these people

6. How – how will I make this story happen

There is a formula for every book and it's a simple one: Character(s) + problem (s) = story

without fabulous, real characters that people believe in and compelling problems, you have no story.

Let me show you how I did it in DESIGNING WOMAN

Main female character: Brandy Jerome Abbott – a brain…with dyslexia…who worked hard for 3 degrees in college at the same time and her big finish is getting her architect's license. She's a tough Scorpio whose father is chief of police in Palm Beach…so she's relocated to Tampa where her step-brother/wife live.

Her problem: she's interning with a local firm which is needed to get her license but they've been working her 100 hours a week/not paying/and now they want her to do even more. She snaps and quits….her quitting conversation is overheard by Griffen St. Clair who thinks she's ending an affair with her boss – not her job.

Sure it's the classic 'overheard/misunderstood' problem with quite a few twists – but that's another blog.

This one is about me, the author, becoming: an interior designer and an architect…that's just for Brandy's character. And while my own prowess as an interior designer wasn't too bad, what did I know about architecture and design…absolutely nothing.

So – off I went to architect and design school – well not actually…it's amazing what you can find in the library and online. I studied/studied – read magazines, hunted for interviews, everything. By the time I finished I could have passed the exam.

Next step – making it interesting for the reader. I come from a background of writing for radio and TV so my books are 90% dialogue. And that's exactly how I interacted with the reader…Brandy, being a dyslexic, had to talk alot as her writing was often backwards – many dyslexic's do go into architecture/math/numbers as that is the least problematic for their brains.

Worked perfectly to get the character/reader connection even stronger and many readers sent fan mail. My surprise was a letter from the General in charge of the Army Corps of Engineers. Who wrote that his wife was reading Designing Woman and actually fell out of bed laughing. He took the book away from her and reluctantly started reading it himself. It was his first romance…"not bad" and then he hit me with: "I'm sure your husband wrote all the engineering/architecture information as NO WOMAN could ever know that much and be so correct."

Hmmmm….loved that one! I politely wrote back, that my husband had never read any of my books let alone helped me write them. And any woman could be anything – even an architect, with the proper research." I also thanked him for writing…a rarity from men in regard to a romance novel.

He did write back…with an apology and a request for an autographed copy to keep with his text books!

So – please don't write what you know. Enjoy the fun/excitement/and brain building of learning something new and then turning it into a #1 bestseller – that's what DESIGNING WOMAN was when it first came out…and top seller for the year for Dell Publishing.