J.A.’s Comments (group member since Mar 12, 2013)

J.A.’s comments from the Ask J.A. Jance - Monday, March 18th! group.

Ann wrote: "Reading your books has made me put Bisbee on my bucket list of places to visit. I am a history major and love when you put historical aspects in your stories. I can read your books over and over ag..."

A word of warning. If you go to Bisbee and visit the museum, you may well meet up with a docent there, a lady by the name of Laverne Williams. Growing up in Bisbee, Laverne was my Sunday School teacher and the Junior Choir director. She was also my Brownie, Girl Scout and Senior Girl Scout leader. So she knows WAY more about J. A. Jance that most people want to know.

In Bisbee's Greenway School, my second grade teacher was a woman named Mrs. Spangler. Under the windows in her room were shelves loaded with books, and if you finished your work early (which I always did) you could go to the shelves and choose a book to read. It was among Mrs. Spangler's books that I discovered The Wizard of Oz. Not just the one book we all know about but the other books as well. Some kids reading those books see the Wizard hiding behind the green curtain. I saw Frank Baum hiding behind the words. And from the moment I realized that a person put those word on paper, that's what I wanted to be and do.

Melannie wrote: "Edna wrote: "Cathy wrote: "I have to admit I'm expecting Ali and JoAnna to get together sometime soon. It's not all that far from Bisbee to Sedona."

Cathy, Sedona is quite away from Bisbee, maybe..."
As I answered above, there are publishers proprietary rules that keep that from happening.

Edna wrote: "Cathy wrote: "I have to admit I'm expecting Ali and JoAnna to get together sometime soon. It's not all that far from Bisbee to Sedona."

Cathy, Sedona is quite away from Bisbee, maybe not as the c..."

Yes, Arizona geography isn't like Connecticut or Rhode Island. At seventy miles and hour, more or less, it's two hours from Bisbee to Tucson, another two hours from Tucson to Phoenix, and another two hours from Phoenix to Sedona. At that point, you're barely scratching the surface of "northern" Arizona.

Edna wrote: "I live in Tucson, Arizona so I totally love the Joanna Brady series. Are you going to write another book about her? I so enjoy your description of places that I know about.
Thank You."
I'm sure I'll be writing another Joanna. In fact, I just sold one to the publisher LAST WEEK!! But since you live in Tucson, don't miss Left for Dead. That's an Ali book, but a lot of the action takes place in and around Tucson. Ditto for the four Walker Family books, starting with Hour of the Hunter. Those take place in and around Tucson and out on the Tohono O'odham reservation.

Darla wrote: "I have read several of the JP Beaumont books and love them.
The question I have is: You are one of the few authors I've read who has characters riding Goldwing motorcycles.
I am a member of GWRRA ..."
The late Gary Flynn was the Public Information Officer for Seattle P.D. when I first started writing the Beaumont books. He was a huge help to me. He answered my many questions and referred me to other folks who also helped. He was a Goldwing kind of guy, and I put the Goldwing parts into the book as a tribute to Gary.

Kate wrote: "Love that you are bringing Ali back and was so GLAD to see Joanna again...how about J.P.? Any plans for him to revisit us?"

I can't tell if everybody can see all the answers I'm writing, but yes. Beaumont WILL BE BACK!!! September 10. Second Watch.

And as I said above, Joanna will play a part in the Beaumont book coming on September 10, Second Watch.

David wrote: "Vickie wrote: "Do you plan on anymore "Crossover" books with J. P. Beaumont and Joanna Brady? I really enjoyed the book that featured both of them!"
I also wonder if there will be another crossove..."

Fire and Ice was another crossover, Beau/Brady I hope you didn't miss that one.

Jeri wrote: "Not related to your current book, however I have to say how much I enjoy all of them. Is there ever a chance that the JP Beaumont books will be turned into a movie? Whenever I read them I picture ..."

I have a Hollywood agent working on that right now, but I'm not holding my breath.

Lady wrote: "Ali Reynolds is my favorite of your characters. I too would love to see a cross-over with her and JoAnna. My question for you is this... how do you decide which series you're going to write for n..."

For the past eight years, I've been writing one Ali book a year for Simon and Schuster. The other three series belong to HarperCollins. When it's time to write the next book, my editor and I have a "Next Book" discussion. So Joanna will be the next HarperCollins book I write.

Adrienne wrote: "Ms. Jance: how do you feel about the electronic books? Especially when they are filled with editing errors? I have notice a lot of ebooks with errors that distract the reader from the story."
For me, e-books have been a real boon because they make it so easy for a new reader to go to the beginning of any particular series and read the books in order. In the old days, the only way to find some of the older books was to track them down in used bookstores.

I'm not unaware of the editing challenges in e-books. In fact, one edition of Hour of the Hunter was so bad that my publisher pulled it to reissue. If you have any experience with Siri making changes in your text messages you'll see the source of some of the problem. Yesterday I tried to send a text about a man named Oleg. It came out All Legs Dancing. I think some of the e-book editing problems are actually some kind of failure in the character recognition software.

Carol wrote: "Thank you, J.A.J., for doing this online discussion group. My question has to do with something I've seen happen in more than just your series; that is the matter of background changes. I tend to..."

Second Watch will be Beaumont 21. Each book contains approximately 100,000 words, including the ones that got printed and the ones that got edited out. That is to say, 2.1 million words on J.P. Beaumont alone. My little gray cells only remember so much. In the course of thirty years of writing about J. P. I've had several changes of editors. And, to a lesser extent, I've had multiple editors for both Joanna and Ali. 1.5 Million words for Joanna. 800,000 so far for Ali. I think you can see why it might be impossible to keep all those details straight, including some item that a character says in the course of a bit of dialogue. I guess what I'm trying to say is, we're all human here, and mistakes happen even thought we do our best to prevent those errors.

Cathy wrote: "I have to admit I'm expecting Ali and JoAnna to get together sometime soon. It's not all that far from Bisbee to Sedona."
Sedona and Bisbee may not be all that far apart in terms of distance but in the world of publishing, they could just as well be in different universes. Joanna belongs to one publisher, HarperCollins. From the second book on, Ali has been part of Simon and Schuster.

Vickie wrote: "Do you plan on anymore "Crossover" books with J. P. Beaumont and Joanna Brady? I really enjoyed the book that featured both of them!"

I didn't plan the first "crossover" book until my editor asked if I would write one. It turns out that Joanna plays a small but important role in Second Watch. Not enough for it to be considered a "joint" book, but her part of the story is essential.

I am answering the questions in the order I'm seeing them, so please bear with me.

Romantic wrote: "My question has to with another book she has coming out later this year; the latest in the JP Beaumont series. Recently, I heard Judy speak about an experience she had that lent itself in part to t..."

Romantic wrote: "My question has to with another book she has coming out later this year; the latest in the JP Beaumont series. Recently, I heard Judy speak about an experience she had that lent itself in part to t..."

What I call the Second Watch backstory--the story of how that part of the book came into being--will be told in its entirety as an afterward in the book itself. A shorter version will appear in may in Chicken Soup for the Writer's Soul.

Edward wrote: "Which series is your next book? Love them all"My next book is Second Watch, Beaumont 21. It's J.P. Beaumont as we know him now, but it's also as he was in 1973 when he first got promoted to homicide, and we also see him earlier when he served with the military in Vietnam. In that book, you'll meet a school mate of mine from Bisbee, an outstanding young man named Doug Davis who died in Vietnam in 1966.