Sourcebooks Casablanca Romance Authors

Since my debut, Beautiful Crazy , is out next week and I’m currently finishing up book 3 (Beautiful Wreck) in the Rock ’n’ Ink series, I thought it might be fun to share some thoughts on inspiration. Authors, and creative types in general, glean creative kindling from a myriad of different sources. Some authors have dreams that play out as full scenes, others journal, and many use art to light the fire of inspiration. Usually I draw my ideas from the Internet (Yay for Instagram , Pinterest and Tumblr ), but a lot of inspiration comes from facets of my own life. Music: If you know anything about me at all, you probably know I’m a huge music lover . I listen to everything from electroswing to Jack White to heavy metal to rockabilly. Music plays a big part in my new series, Rock 'n' Ink, as it centers around a heavy metal band on the rise. But my tastes are much broader and a lot more eclectic than just one genre. For a sample of some of my favorites, check out my playlists ...

Music has always played an important role in my life as it has for many people. If books are my refuge then music is my foundation. So when I sat down to write my first novel I was told over and over to use what I knew and since I know marketing and music I chose to write about marketing set against a backdrop of heavy metal and rockabilly. My taste in music is fairly eclectic…I like a little of everything (except country, the only country I like is Sam Hunt and the Mavericks, but that’s another story). For me, music is a family affair. In my teens and early 20s, I spent a lot of time seeing bands: punk, rockabilly, ska, rock, metal, you name it. Before kids, my husband and I spent a lot of time in blues clubs and going to festivals. Once our children started developing their own interest in music we expanded our musical road trips to include Taylor Swift, EDM, death metal (I still shudder a little when someone mentions the Black Dahlia Murder), Imelda May, George Ezra, Purity Ring. ...

The latest novel in my Broadswords and Ballroom series for Casablanca is due in a week, so thoughts of writing flow and creativity have been at the forefront of my mind. One of the things I love most about being a writer is the same thing I love about being a reader, namely, being swept away into another world. I love to get to know my characters as they interact on the page, as a scene I thought would be a simple moment in the park, for example, turns out to be a pivotal moment when a Highland girl with a claymore and an unsuspecting earl meet. It is always fun to watch scenes unwind themselves in the theatre of my mind as I write, but it is especially fun now that I am writing comedy, because the freedom of comedy allows my characters to step out of their norms in ways that shock me a little, and often shock the calm English characters who watch them do it. The flow of a scene, whether comedy or drama, comes at its own pace when I sit down to write. I have a word cou...

Every year I set goals. For the past couple of years one of them has been to come up with a Christmas themed story. After three years I still have nothing. Zip. Nada. Not a hint of an idea. I can get ideas from the weirdest of places. I was talking to a friend about good names for heroes and she mentioned her grandfather’s unusual name. I got a whole story in about 10 seconds. Mad scribbling ensued and the idea is pinned to my board. The most recent ads for the Western Australian Opera  were very inspirational (not that I’ve written that story yet either). A conversation on a plane about ménages and what made them work or not (in our opinion) triggered another story (which is now on my pile to polish up). However Christmas is eluding me. I see all the Christmas stories and the novella anthologies coming out. I like reading them. I love A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens. I loved the Doctor Who version with the flying fish in the fog (it’s awesome even if you don’t ...

I've never been much of a believer in muses or inspiration. I'd like it if lightning flickered down from the heavens and zapped me with genius, but the books don't get written if I wait around for creative magic to whack me upside the head. It tends to come on slowly, after I've knuckled down to work on a manuscript. In fact, sometimes the notion of having a muse can be downright destructive for me. After all, if I have a muse, I need to nurture her, right? Something as delicate as a muse must be pretty high maintenance. It seems like a muse would need a comfortable home, spacious and airy, where she could fly free. She would require elaborate little rituals that would lure her out to play. She might be easily frightened, and easily sidetracked; if she doesn't run away altogether, chances are she might dash off to do something else--watch TV, maybe, or play with the dog. In her book The Creative Urge , choreographer Twyla Tharp covers all those issues. "When yo...

The Declaration of Independence declares, among other declarative things, that we all have a right to "the pursuit of happiness." For some of us, that run is harder than it is for others, but we all enter the race. Some of us rush headlong toward bliss; others hang back, helping those who aren't as fast. And some of us trip and fall right out of the starting gate, sprain our ankles, and have to crawl the rest of the way. Being the first to cross the finish line doesn't matter in this race. It's a long run, so what matters is finding out what kind of runner you are so you can enjoy the trip. Are you a speed racer who won't be happy unless you're whipping past the competition? Or are you a helper, who finds their victory in making sure everyone has a fair chance? Or are you like me, standing in the middle of the track, watching the runners flow around you while you figure out how to immortalize the moment in a painting or story? Chances are, you won't w...