Sourcebooks Casablanca Romance Authors

For some reason I've received a lot of questions this week asking do I use people from my day job in my books? Do I kill off former bosses? My staff kept asking if some day they'd get to be heroes or perhaps victims? And would they recognize themselves? No. No. No. And another no just to be sure. Then they ask again. So I reply that my books start with a character's voice and often with a season. The voice probably comes from years of running the high school theater and then later working several years in live theater and six more in the opera (where I was a computer tech, but I heard a lot of magnificent voices). I'm also a movie buff which doesn't hurt. Voice tells you me so much about a character. Beyond accent, there is region, and beyond region there is pacing. My characters tend to think quickly and speak abruptly... Of course, I'm currently writing military romantic suspense so that makes some sense. But also season. Book two of my Night Stalkers,...

In Greek mythology, the muses were nine sisters, daughters of Zeus, who presided over the arts, whispering in artists’ ears, inspiring them to create great works of art. I don’t like to spend a lot of time thinking about muses. Oh, I believe I have a muse. I’m certain of it, in fact. Well, probably not a daughter of Zeus, but you know what I mean. I have this idea, however, that if I spend time thinking about my muse or trying to figure out where it comes from, that I’ll lose it. Go ahead and laugh. I know it sounds silly, and yet I believe it whole-heartedly. How do I know my muse exists? I know this because I am a “pantser”. Half the people reading this just went, “Ah. Yep, you have a muse.”For the rest of you, and for those who don’t know what I mean by “pantser”, the short version is I don’t know what will happen in my story until it happens. Often I’m just as surprised as any reader would be. Probably the most tangible way to explain this to someone else would be explaining the d...

posted by Loucinda McGary aka Aunty Cindy Since our theme this month is mothers and motherhood, I sat down to write this blog intending to post about some of the fictional mothers in my work. Then I realized, there aren't any! Well, hardly any... And very few of them are ever actually "on stage" during the course of the story. Here's what I mean: both my hero, Donovan, and heroine, Rylie in The Wild Sight are motherless. Donovan's mother disappeared when he was seven years old, and Rylie's mother died six months before the story takes place. No real mother figures there, and I won't even start on the "daddy" issues! In The T reasures of Venice , my hero, Keirnan also lost his mother as a child. He was eleven and his sister was sixteen, and she became his substitute mother figure. One of the reasons he is so desperate to save her. The heroine Samantha actually has a mother (At Last!) , but she's never seen "on stage." She's als...

posted by Loucinda McGary aka Aunty Cindy APRIL 15th?!?!?! OH NO!!!!!!!!!! Today in the US it is "Tax Day," the deadline for everyone to file their federal tax returns. I'm sorry to say that yer olde Aunty is going to be hard pressed to find anything humorous about paying taxes, and I do not think there is anything remotely funny about the Internal Revenue Service. (I survived an audit once and remain scarred and scared for life!) Hmmm, come to think of it, there is not much inherently humorous about Aunty's books, which center largely around murder and mayhem -- not very funny subjects (though certainly not unfamiliar to the IRS) . Okay, are you sensing a theme here? While Aunty does indeed possess a puckish sense of humor, I do not 'write funny.' I leave that to several of the lovely Casababes whose books are quite funny -- intentionally. All right, now that we are clear on that, I will admit that while I may not be a humorous writer, one thing I do have goi...

posted by Loucinda McGary aka Aunty Cindy I haven't seen the new George Clooney film Up In The Air yet, but I understand that Clooney's character is a man who has no home but travels from place to place for his job. Well, the DH and I met a guy on our recent flight who is just like that character. Everything he owns is in two suitcases, he travels from place to place every few weeks for his job, and lives in hotels where ever he happens to be. He'd finished a two week stint in Seattle, and had just spent the weekend with his girlfriend in Tampa. Now he was off for a month long assignment in Washington DC when our paths crossed. After parting ways with your young friend (who looked about 30) , my DH began to rhapsodize about what a wonderful lifestyle this guy was living. Yes, sick man that he is, my DH thought it would be FUN to have everything you own fit in two suitcases (never mind that he's the world's biggest pack rat and still has clothes he wore in college ...

posted by Loucinda McGary aka Aunty Cindy Back in my college days (oh so very long ago!) , I was a history major and totally enamored of Tudor and Elizabethan England. (Yes, I know I was a geek.) But when several of my friends recently encouraged me to watch the new TV series "The Tudors" I was less than enthusiastic. I felt pretty much as I had about Peter Jackson releasing his "Lord of the Rings" flims. I just didn't believe someone else's version could live up to my own private imagination. However, since I'd been more than pleasantly surprised with Jackson's films, and I happen to think Jonathan Rhys Meyers is one VERY HOT Irishman (though certainly not my first choice to portray Henry the Eighth) , I rented Season 1. I watched the first two episodes with a great deal of skepticism and kept muttering between bites of popcorn, "This isn't very historically accurate." "Give me a break with all this melodrama!" But I kept wa...

By Robin Kaye When people ask why I write romance, I tell them that it’s because I love to read it. It wasn’t always that way. I don’t think I read a romance until eight or nine years ago. I grew up reading all my father’s books, Harold Robbins, Robert Ludlum, Sidney Sheldon and the like. My mother was never a big reader, thank God because if she’d known what I was reading in the third grade, she probably would have had a conniption fit. It wasn’t until a few months after I moved to Maryland from Boise, Idaho in October of 2000, that I picked up my first romance. I fell in love with the smart heroines, great dialogue and to die for heroes--what’s not to love? Once I got one in my hot little hands, I couldn’t put them down. I’m a book a day reader, and believe me; if I don’t get my book fix I go through romance withdrawal. I’ve been on a reading ‘diet’ due to a crazy family life and writing deadlines. You should see me now—It’s not a pretty picture. But going on a reading diet has shown...

posted by Loucinda McGary aka Aunty Cindy Some of the questions I'm most often asked by readers and aspiring writers are about my characters. Specifically, how do you come up with them and are they based on real people? So without further adieu: HOW DO YOU COME UP WITH YOUR CHARACTERS? I don’t come up with my characters so much as they come up to me! My characters tend to arrive in my imagination fully intact, complete with their first, middle, and last names. Though I will admit, I changed my hero of The Treasures of Venice , Keirnan Fitzgerald’s middle name. My First Reader, whom I've known for over 30 years, told me she’d always been very fond of the name Sean. So in deference to her, I changed his name from Keirnan Padriag Fitzgerald to Keirnan Sean Fitzgerald. Luckily he didn’t mind. When my characters arrive, they tend to tell me all kinds of things about themselves. Quite handy, though I know it sounds bizarre to people who don't write. We writers are very possessive...

Years ago, I was a soap opera addict. Well, let's make that... today I'm addicted to one soap opera. And maybe not really addicted. I mean, I don't tape it or Tivo it or anything. I just watch if I happen to be home at that time. This particular soap has had some fantastic plots over the years along with the usual fare for daytime serials. In addition to the switched-at-birth, kidnappings, amnesia, coma, now-he's-dead-now-he's not stories, this show has also featured possession by the devil and visions and other crazy things beyond the usual crazy things. How can these unbelievable stories keep viewers? Daytime television, after all, is not jam-packed with special effects that can transport the viewer into a new world. To bring viewers into these wild plots, the acting has to be serviceable, but the characterizations have to be spot on. The characterizations--the building of characters--is the work of the writer. Yesterday, Beth talked about writing great secondary ...

By Robin Kaye My hero in Too Hot to Handle is named Dr. Mike Flynn and I have to tell you, I’ve taken quite a lot of ribbing because of it. It all started because I’m terrible with names. I have a hard time remembering my own name, no less those of my secondary characters. When I wrote Romeo, Romeo, I needed a doctor. Since I had no plans to make this doctor a central character in the book, I called him Mike after my personal doctor so that I’d remember his name. That seems harmless, doesn’t it? After all, it wasn’t as if I used his last name, too. Well, was I ever wrong about the fictional Dr. Mike being just a walk on character. After writing the scene – a conversation between Nick, the hero in Romeo, Romeo and Dr. Mike Flynn, I fell in love and not just with my hero. I’m fickle that way. I was head over tongue depressors in love with Mike. Who knew? At one of my appointments with Dr. Mike, he asked how my writing was going. Since I eventually had to tell him that Too Hot to Handle w...

By Robin Kaye Everyone wants to know how I come up with my characters, and honestly, I wish I knew. For the most part, scenes pop into my head and the characters are already there. I know them and they’re almost real to me. I know, it sounds as if I need therapy. When I’m deep into writing a book, I find myself talking about the characters to friends, and it takes them an embarrassingly long while to figure out that I’m not talking about real people. These are fictional characters. I’ll never forget when Dr. Mike Flynn, the hero of Too Hot To Handle popped into my head. I was writing a scene in Romeo, Romeo—it was a phone call between the hero Nick and his Mike, his best friend, who was supposed to be a little secondary character. By the end of that conversation, I’d fallen head over heels in love with Mike, and I knew I had the hero for my second book. I knew everything there was to know about him. I knew which deodorant he wore, that he didn’t have time to date, that he worked his wa...

posted by Loucinda McGary aka Aunty Cindy Last time my post was all about the hero of my upcoming release The Treasures of Venice , charming Irish rogue Keirnan Fitzgerald. I thought it only fair today to give equal time to my heroine, American Samantha (Sam) Lewis. Just as I always fall in love with my heroes, I also identify with my heroines, and I want my readers to do the same. Since I know far more about them than ever makes it to the printed page, let me share a few of those details about Sam. The only child of a flighty and somewhat irresponsible mother (I picture Sam's mom being like Diane Chambers on "Cheers") , Sam found solace in books early on, so it was a natural for her to become a librarian. By the time she reached her teens, Sam had taken over the parent role and her mother stayed the rebellious child. Choosing to do a complete 180 from her mother, by the time Sam graduated from high school she had her life all planned out with one year, five year, and t...

Loving Mr. Darcy ~ Journeys Beyond Pemberley will not be released until September – and that seems so far away still – but as we know in the publishing world, stuff starts happening way before the actual release date! So while my head has been wrapped up in finishing my fourth novel in the Darcy Saga series, almost to the point where I had forgotten that September was creeping upon me, it was wonderful to receive the printed pages of Loving Mr. Darcy yesterday. Naturally I was thrilled and not in the least surprised to see that the Sourcebooks crew had marvelously put the chapters together. Opening the PDF and seeing my title page was enough to give me sweet tingles of happiness! I am proud of all my books, of the life I have given to Fitzwilliam and Elizabeth, but I have always felt that this second installment is where the tale takes flight. Mr. and Mrs. Fitzwilliam Darcy centered almost exclusively on the newlywed couple. This was on purpose, of course, and they are forever the...

Remember The Fallen In the long weekend, take some time to remember all of those who have given their lives to make our freedom possible, and all those who put their lives on the line every day guarding it. Hi, I’m Robin Kaye, the author of Too Hot to Handle. Today I was looking through the clip art for a Memorial Day picture to post and I saw this one. It's a photo of a Wild Quaker Parrot rising up above the markers of Civil War Graves in Brooklyn's Green Wood Cemetery. For those of you who have read my books, you'll know that I was brought up a block away from the Green Wood Cemetery. The Brooklyn Parrots and are a wonderful part of Brooklyn and Green Wood Cemetery. For more information about the Brooklyn Parrots, you can visit the Brooklyn Parrot Website . Annabelle Ronaldi is the one of the heroines of the Domestic Gods series and I thought it would be fun to talk with Rose, her nosy, slightly zany, and possibly psychic aunt. I made an appointment to meet Aunt Rose at h...

posted by Loucinda McGary aka Aunty Cindy I LURVE my heroes! Can't help myself. Must be because they are all (at least thus far) Irish hunks. And like all true Celts, they are dark haired and blue-eyed, but there the similarities end. Donovan O'Shea, my hero of The Wild Sight is a man who tried to escape his painful past. But basically he has a dual nature, and near the climax of the story he actually recognizes this in himself. One side of him is a healer. Though he himself may be wounded (not nearly as much as the hero of my current Work In Progress, but that's a blog for another day) , he seeks to fix things that are broken, soothe hurts, and generally set things right. But the other side of him is a warrior. When threatened, he doesn't hesitate to fight back, especially in defense of someone he cares about. Cross him at your peril! The same can be said for my hero of The Treasures of Venice , Keirnan Fitzgerald. When necessary, this man can be dangerous. In fact...

By: Marie Force I’m riding shotgun right now on a family road trip from Rhode Island to Indiana where my husband’s family lives. Since the last time we did this trip by car about five years ago, my children have discovered electronics and we’ve lost both of the dogs who used to ride along with us. So this is a quieter, less intense version of the road trips of yesteryear. The only disruption to the peace in the car is the hourly dust up over feet creeping over “the line.” Remember the sibling line of demarcation in the backseat? The ‘he’s touching me’, ‘she’s looking at me’ line? I’m here to tell you that “the line” is timeless. I’m also enjoying listening to my husband bicker with the Garman, who he has named Lola. She is NOT happy with him and how he continuously defies her by freelancing his way to Indiana. Being from New England, specifically the Biggest Little State in the Union—Rhode Island—I’m always struck by the vastness of our country when I take to the road. Earlier this yea...

I’ve always been fascinated by the role of secondary characters in novels. What would Jane Austen’s Persuasion be without Sir Walter Elliot and his overweening vanity? Or Jane Eyre without poor, dear Helen Burns, or lively Adèle? Those characters live to serve, in a way. In the best sense, secondary characters provide more than a placemarker, or merely someone for the hero or heroine to talk to. They should mean something to the plot, and they should reflect bits of the primary characters, exposing their strengths and weaknesses along the way. And so I thought I’d reveal a little about the secondary characters that people Lady Anne and the Howl and the Dark , and the next two installments Lady Anne and the Ghost’s Revenge & Lady Anne and the Gypsy Curse . Many secondary characters in ‘Howl’ are, I realize, missing someone who has died or disappeared. ( Hmm, funny how things can occur to the writer only after they are done writing the books! I never thought about that before I wro...

By Robin Kaye I spent this weekend at a writer’s conference, which is one of my very favorite things to do. I find being in the company of other writers to be invigorating. We all suffer from the same mental problem – we have characters talking to us whether we wish them to or not. Now, to the normal people, this might sound as if we all need psychological help. I think that might be true to some extent. However, I choose to think of myself as a highly functioning insane person. Still, going to writer’s conferences confirms that I’m not alone in my insanity. I recently read a book that I loved. It spoke to me. The Winter Sea by Susanna Kearsley is brilliant. The writing is beautiful, but the thing I loved most about it was that the heroine, Carrie, was a writer. I felt as if Susanna was writing about me--a much more successful version of me of course, a version who can afford to live and write in the place she’s writing about which is a dream of mine. Carrie is writing a historical no...

While writing my blog for Wickedly Romantic on Monday, I went on a Hero-Hunt. What is a Hero-Hunt you ask? One of the best parts of being a romance author. But it can also be one of the toughest. I have Logan, the hero of Catch of a Lifetime , in my head. I know what he looks like, how he sounds, how he smiles. I know his backstory, I know all his emotions with the opening of the book. I know this guy. But I like to have the visual. The first two heroes were easy: Reel is Matthew McConnaughey from Failure To Launch , and Rod is a combo of Matt and Hugh Jackman (since Rod and Reel are twins). But Logan doesn't look like a celebrity, so how to find him? A lot of internet research is hit or miss. I scored a hit with this one. Googling didn't quite work when you plug in characteristics, or "sexy guy," or "hot guys." (You get some pretty interesting pictures though when you do...) So I thought, let me check models. Again with the interesting pictures. It took me...

We've all met a few of them along the way: those characters who live on in our thoughts long after the story has ended, prompting us to wonder, however irrationally, what happened to them. As a reader, I've encountered a number, and going back to read their tales is like meeting up with old friends. For instance, I'm re-reading Stephen King's masterpiece The Stand right now, a book I've revisited every couple of years since discovering it in the sixth grade. His particular gift as an author, and one that has always inspired me, is to create characters who leap off the page and truly breathe. I have wondered about the eventual fates of Frannie, Stu Redman, and Tom Cullen for a long time, wishing I could check in on them. There's no way to know, of course. Stephen King himself probably doesn't even know. So I re-read their story and try to content myself with revisiting the places I, and they, have already been. And "Don't Fear the Reaper...