Authors tend to be the last to know what’s going on with their books. I’ve been fortunate that I’ve been kept in the loop regarding most aspects of my books journey from production to shelf, but there are a few things that came as a surprise. Like, when I walked into Target and saw THE PREY sitting on an endcap with a BREAKOUT BOOK sticker. It would not have been a surprise if I saw it a week or two after the release date. But this was two MONTHS after the release date. I thought Target just didn’t pick up… Read More

I remember one of the first questions my agent asked me when we were discussing representation was how many books I could write in a year. Her comment was that publishers really wanted at least one book every nine months. I told her that was definitely possible, and my goal was to eventually write four books a year. My long term writing goal has always been to produce four books a year once all my kids are in school. (Wow, six-and-a-half hours of uninterrupted writing time . . . I can hardly wait!) Why? Two reasons: First, I have so… Read More

Okay, we have a theme this week and my diversion is . . . I’m writing about something completely different. Which is really the story of my writing life. It took me years to get serious about my writing. Why? Because every time I started a story, I’d get 50-300 pages into it and then . . . get a better idea and start something new. But I have a good reason for going off on a tangent today. Several authors and I were chatting on-line (okay, there’s MY biggest diversion from writing: the Internet. End of story. See, what… Read More

. . . one of us. That’s right, one of the women at Murder She Writes is the dastardly villain. We’re on a boat. Why? Maybe it’s a murder mystery cruise. And Carson is there for any number of reasons . . . probably nothing to do with the murder. But he’s the only one who can solve it because everyone is a suspect, particularly the five women who had the means to kill . . . who? The most important clue about a killer is the victim. Who was killed? Where? How? No throwing overboard, that’s no fair, we… Read More

A couple months ago I wrote about “hooking” . . . how the first line or paragraph is crucial. But what about cliffhangers? How the author ends a chapter or keeps the story moving with a series of ups and downs so that you 1) don’t want to put down the book, and 2) if you have to put down the book, you can’t wait to pick it up again. I think the first part of creating that “I can’t wait to pick up this book again” is the characters–you feel like you know them, you want to find out… Read More

I’ve always believed that “character is story.” No matter what you’re writing, the characters make it or break it. A plot is just a series of events; the characters give the events depth and meaning. I don’t write detailed character analyses. In the page proofs of THE PREY, I noticed Rowan Smith had three different eye colors. That was fixed 🙂 But I can’t write page one until I can see at least one character, until I know how she will react, how she moves, how she talks, how she interacts with other people . . . or if she… Read More

Sorry to interrupt our fun filled fun with four week, but I wanted to share with everyone that I have titles for my next trilogy! SPEAK NO EVIL SEE NO EVIL FEAR NO EVIL They’ll be released in consecutive months in early 2007 (Feb, Mar and Apr.) Okay, now back to the regularly scheduled theme week . . . Allison

4 movies you would watch over and over Star Wars Casablanca Pirates of the Caribbean The Matrix (Boy, picking only four was HARD) 4 TV shows you love to watch Without a Trace Law & Order (I’m a new fan!) CSI (the original only) LOST (but I haven’t seen the second season, I’m waiting for the DVD, so no spoilers please! 🙂 4 places you have been on vacation: Honolulu, HI Disneyland Lake Tahoe, CA Fayette, AL 4 Websites you visit daily (Other than Murder She Writes!): Romancing the Blog Buzz, Balls & Hype Anatomy of a Book Deal Publishers… Read More

My office is temporary. After I gave birth to Brennan #5 in June of 2004, I lost my den. It had a door. It had a wall full of bookshelves. It had a big desk built into the wall that was perfect for stuff. (And lots of it.) But three kids to a room wasn’t going to cut it, so (sniff-sniff) I sacrificed my office and moved into the living room. I should say that we never used the living room. It had the piano I never play anymore (which is now in my bedroom), a lounge chair (also in… Read More

I sold my fifth completed manuscript. I knew it was it before I typed The End. I had started writing THE PREY when I was on maternity leave with my son in 2001, the year before I “got serious” about writing. I never finished it because the hero and heroine didn’t work. Well, there were probably lots of other reasons like I’d never finished any of the hundreds of books I’d started, but at least I knew exactly what had bored me about this one. But I loved the idea. I originally came up with the premise for THE PREY… Read More