Interview by Margaret Carter
Author Margaret Carter has a newsletter and interviewed me for the January 2023 issue, “News from the Crypt.”
It can be found on her website http://www.margaretlcarter.com/newsletter-208-january-2023/
You also can visit her at Margaret Carter’s Crypt (http://www.margaretlcarter.com), devoted to her horror, fantasy, and paranormal romance work, especially focusing on vampires and shapeshifting beasties.
Here is the interview with Laura Freeman:
What inspired you to begin writing?
When I was twelve, I read “The Hobbit” and “Lord of the Rings” and wanted to create stories about friendship and adventure, especially for girls. I had four brothers, and they always seemed to do the “fun” stuff.
What genres do you work in?
I have written a six-book historical romance series, a holiday supernatural romance novella, and a female detective mystery scheduled for release Jan. 30. I like to mix two genres like a romance within a mystery or a mystery within a romance.
Do you outline, “wing it,” or something in between?
I begin with my main characters’ names and keep a character list going. Then I write a rough draft of the action and dialogue to form a series of events broken into chapters that make up the story which is around 100 pages. I create a formal outline from those chapters and adjust it as I add details or move scenes around. To help build tension, I’ll edit the last chapter and move backwards through my story so I know where the story is heading. This allows me to reveal clues later in the story and remove them from the beginning or replace a clue with a subtle hint. This is a must for me because I initially reveal too much too soon and this forces me to move important details to a later chapter and create suspense.
What have been the major influences on your work?
My favorite authors have been J.D. Robb, Sue Grafton, and Janet Evanovich, who have strong female characters. I was a reporter for 16 years and covered events, politics, and crime which I draw from for ideas. I also worked in a hospital and use that setting in “Raining Tears.”
What effect did your journalism career have on your fiction writing? And what would you say are the principal differences between those two types of writing?”
Reporting requires research and interviewing others which helps with background and historical data for my fictional writing. News writing also limits how long a story can be which makes me choose my words wisely. Fictional writing allows more flexibility to convey meanings and share the thoughts of a character to explain behavior or the why of a crime.
Please tell us about your Impending Love Series. Also, how did you research the historical background?
Each book is about a different Beecher sister and begins in 1860 with a runaway slave and ends in 1866 with the last villain stalking the youngest sister. I researched my family tree and used family names but placed them in different time periods. I made Sterling Beecher the father of the six sisters in the books. He was my great-great-grandfather with a long family history back to New Haven, Connecticut. Set during the Civil War, I read books, visited battlefields, and interviewed reenactors. I used real historical figures sparingly but researched them to make sure they would act the way they did in my books.
What inspired your Christmas Cookies novella “Tackling Molasses Crinkles”?
I wrote a column under Freeman of the Press, “The unopened gift on Christmas morning” about the Sandy Hook Elementary School shootings on Dec. 14, 2012, in which parents had bought presents for their six-year-old children, but they would never be opened. The gifts represented a child’s unfulfilled life and inspired this story. I wanted to give hope to those who have lost a child and imagine their angel watching over them.
What is your latest or next-forthcoming book?
My next book is “Raining Tears” due out Jan. 30, 2023. It is a female detective mystery that is told from the viewpoints of four women connected by the death of an innocent man. I attended a Citizens Police Academy, and my brother was a police officer and detective which helped with the technical information. I enjoyed writing the villain because she could say and do outrageous things.
What are you working on now?
I am working on two stories. One is a cozy mystery where a woman finds a body in the park and discovers later that her co-worker’s husband was having an affair with the victim. She tries to help her friend and uncovers important clues that put her life in danger and angers the handsome police officer investigating the case. The other story I’m working on is a historical romance set in 1774 where the heroine tries to figure a way out of a forced marriage and uncovers the hidden reasons for the union.
What advice would you give to aspiring writers?
You can have lots of ideas in your head but until you put them in print, you aren’t a writer. And your writing requires a goal, problems, and resolution to be a story. Learn the basics of writing, the expectations of a genre, such as a happily ever after in a romance, and study other authors. Writing can be time consuming and challenging, but if you love creating characters and putting them in danger, you need to write. It makes you happy. At times developing a story will drive you crazy, but don’t quit.
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