When a Computer Stares at You by June Shaw

Today Author Expressions is pleased to welcome as our guest blogger veteran author June Shaw. Her writing is well-known to fans of both mystery and romance novels. And now here's June!

What do you do if you get to your computer, ready to become “The Next Greatest Author in the World”—and all it will do is stare back at you?

Your fingers want to touch the keyboard and start striking keys that will make the story you’re creating work well in all areas. You must start in the exact place that will draw readers in. Your very first word and first line must be perfect. Make readers care. Doesn’t something have to happen right there, something that’s going to ensure that they won’t put your book down until the last sentence, and they’ll be shouting, “I want more!”

Certainly you need to create characters who fly off the page, who your readers will care about and not want to leave. They have to be perfect. No, actually they shouldn’t. Your main characters must be likeable but with flaws (so you can’t think of any? Look around, or inside yourself.) Your female lead has to be beautiful (if you’re writing romance), and a striking alpha male would go with her. Mysteries will give you much more leeway for creating people. You’re going to want interesting secondary characters, but only in longer works. Short stories won’t allow space for developing them, even if they start to become so interesting that they’re creeping into the most important spot and taking over your work. If that happens, what will you do with those people? Toss them out like candy wrappers? Consider using them as main characters in another story? So then which story will you begin working on now?

Besides these people, your novel will need a well-balanced plot. This story line will have to race and peak at certain parts and in other places let readers catch their breaths, but just for a second, before you race toward the showdown and slam on the brakes at the end.

After you complete this one-of-a-kind yet not too different masterpiece, you’ll have to let it sit. How long? Half an hour? Two days? A week while you take a well-earned cruise, until you remember you can’t afford one?

Whenever you can’t stand the wait any longer, you get back to your work of art. Only this time, something’s happened to that first sentence. Surely someone hacked into your computer and replaced your enticing draw with dull words. You yourself wouldn’t read beyond this, so what can you do? Start all over of course. Decide that your whole work must have poured out of your fingers well before your first cup of java reached your system, and all of the words you jotted must be thrown away and new ones put in? Or possibly you can force yourself to read the entire work again, this time making your soul bleed while you struggle to improve each word before you type it, all the while knowing that after you finish many drafts of this work, you will need other eyes (that don’t belong to your family) to decide whether these readers agree that it’s good.

Or should you plot before you start? When your fingers are striving to hit the first word in your tome, should you draw them back and make them wait? Possibly if you use a pen and legal pad, you could see where to begin your story and where peak and valleys might go. But a pencil and notebook might work better so that you can erase and feel more like you did when you were accomplishing so much back in school.

Maybe you should just wait awhile till an idea strikes. Surely a better idea than the one touching your mind will come up next week. A month from now will give you time to consider what type story or novelette or novel you really should write.

You have one major decision to make. Do you want to be a writer?

If so, then when that blank screen that wants the first page of your book or the first sentence of your next chapter stares at you, instead of just staring back at it, you will do something, something that will further the writing career you chose. Write a word. Make a list. Come up with names if you must. Jot down all the awful things that could possibly happen to make your character’s life miserable, even all those that don’t make sense. See which ideas excite you, and go with them.

Or set your fingers on your computer keys and begin typing. Write a title or a sentence to start or go on from where you stopped. They can be changed later.

Keep typing.

The thing to remember is you wanted to write. You’re stronger than a blank page, no matter how threatening it may look. What comes later might seem overwhelming, but won’t be if you start. Keep going. Strike those keys. Beat that screen. You will thank yourself for being a winner.

Thank you, June! Anyone with questions or comments for our guest author, please feel free.

You can also find out more about June and her novels at: http://www.juneshaw.com/

Writing a Novel by June Shaw

Welcome to Author Expressions. Our guest blogger today is well-published author June Shaw. She is going to discuss how and why she became a writer.

“What made you decide to become a writer?” is a question I’m often asked during talks about writing or when I’m signing my books. My answer—“A splinter.”

I wasn’t fortunate enough to have anyone ever teach me creative writing, but while I was in ninth grade, my English teacher said he was sending me to a literary rally for English I. I’d take a test that was mainly grammar and also need to write a paragraph in case there was a tie. To practice writing, he told me to write a paragraph about a splinter.

His topic assured me that he was a boring man. I described a splinter using perfect grammar and brought it to his desk. “This is boring,” he said. “Yes, but you told me to write it.” And then he wrote a magic word: “Ouch!” He told me to take it from the splinter’s point of view. Somebody just sat on it. Wow, I thought. A writer can do that? She can make up any thing or person and make it say or do anything she wants? One day I’m going to do that. Be a writer.

No matter that it wasn’t until I had five children who’d begun giving me grandchildren, and my aging mother had moved in with me that I finally sold a novel. I did it! What happened was I’d kept the desire after I won: ) that literary rally. I was busy throughout school, married young, had five children, and became widowed when they were small. Often I’d recall that splinter and know I wanted to be a writer, but life intervened. I finished college, started teaching, and finally discovered time to write and sell a few small pieces. Much more time passed before I found time to read and write and rewrite novels—and now I have nine of them published!  

Now I proudly represent Louisiana on the board of Mystery Writers of America’s Southwest Chapter and am the Published Author Liaison of Romance Writers of America’s South Louisiana Chapter. My children, grandchildren, and squeeze Bob are really proud of me, and I am content.

ABOUT MY BOOKS: I sold my series of humorous mysteries to Five Star, which produced them in hardcover. To my surprise, the first one, RELATIVE DANGER, was nominated for a David award for Best Mystery of the Year and garnered excellent reviews from Publishers Weekly, Kirkus, and many others. The next books, KILLER COUSINS and DEADLY REUNION, were also well received. The series features a spunky widow who “thinks” she wants to avoid her hunky lover so she can rediscover herself. But he opens Cajun restaurants wherever she travels—and she is so bad at avoiding tempting dishes and men.

RELATIVE DANGER was just released as an e-book. KILLER COUSINS and DEADLY REUNION will soon follow. In November Harlequin will reprint DEADLY REUNION in paperback, which they’d done with others.

RED SKIES revolves around three generations in a story of secrets, lies, lust, love, and redemption. Everyone asked me to, so I wrote a book about my mom. Many readers tell me NORA 102 ½: A Lesson on Aging Well is the most inspirational book they’ve read in a long, long time. And then my youngest granddaughter asked me to write a book with her. We’ve sold many copies of HOW TO TAKE CARE OF YOUR PET GHOST, and now an editor has a YA that both her young teen sisters and I wrote and hope she’ll accept. I’ve written other books, too—and loved every minute with each of them!

I appreciate your interest in reading about my writing journey and thank Jacqueline for inviting me here. I do hope you’ll check out my books and see my mom dancing and me holding an alligator….and I love to hear from readers!   www.juneshaw.com

Comments or questions for June are welcome!

GREAT FOOD

Great Food
By June Shaw
I live in south Louisiana and am accustomed to Cajun dishes. Some readers of my humorous mysteries ask why I haven’t set my series in our area. Of course we have interesting characters, a unique culture, and fabulous meals. But my protagonist wants to travel—just like me. She and I like to see various places while we still eat great food. That’s why her hunky sometimes-ex lover that she tries to avoid owns a chain of Cajun Delights restaurants. And some of his restaurants happen to be opening in places she travels—and she is horrible at avoiding tempting dishes and men, but—
Here’s the thing. Some people joke and say every Cajun dish begins with a roux. In case you aren’t familiar with the term, a roux is a mixture of almost equal parts oil and flour stirred over a low fire until it turns golden brown. It’s what thickens and darkens our gumbos and stews and many other dishes. And it’s not actually used for everything—not cake anyway.
You might start with a small roux, such as 3 T. flour and 3 T oil, although some people make them much larger, maybe 1/3 C. of each. Roux can be saved in the refrigerator for quite a long time. You’d cook a roux in a heavy pot and after it’s uniformly brown, add onions and other desired seasonings, stirring until transparent, and then add needed liquid.
Here’s one recipe for a Chicken Stew: 1 large hen, 3 onions, 1 bell pepper, 1 large T. cooking oil, ½ cup flour, green onions and parsley, salt and red pepper to taste. Cut up the chicken, chop bell pepper and onions very fine. Brown the chicken in hot oil. Remove the chicken and add flour. Stir until this mixture is light brown. Add onions and pepper and cook about five minutes. Then add the chicken and one quart or more of boiling water. Season with salt and pepper and when almost done, add green onions and parsley. Stir the stew as it thickens to prevent burning. If you like mushrooms, add a can toward the end. Serve this dish over rice. Yummy!
Stuffed Crabs: 1 C. crab meat, 1 large onion, 2 T. flour, 2 T. cooking oil, 1 C. stale bread broken into pieces, ¼ C. chopped bell pepper, ¼ C. chopped celery, 2 T. parsley, ½ C. water, salt and pepper to taste. Make a golden brown roux with oil and flour. Add bell pepper, onion, and celery; cook five minute. Add water and cook till thick. Add crab meat and cook about 15 minutes. Add bread and chopped parsley. This will stuff about four crab shells. Sprinkle them with bread crumbs and brown in the oven. Terrific!
Actually I am not a woman who enjoys staying in the kitchen, although my mother and her mother loved to cook. So does my squeeze Bob.
Bob is a terrific Cajun cook, so when I want some of his great recipes to include in my books, I ask and he writes them. You can find samples in the first two books in my series, RELATIVE DANGER, which is now also available on Kindle and Smashwords for just 2.99, and KILLER COUSINS, available in hardcover and soon an e-book, Be looking for DEADLY REUNION, the third book in my series, in July. In this murder mystery, a class reunion takes place on a cruise ship in Alaska. I loved doing the research.
Have you ever eaten Cajun dishes? If so, what are your favorites? Have you tried cooking any?
I love to eat but keep busy and like faster dishes. That’s why I offer my Oven Dressing, which my family loves, on my Web site, www.juneshaw.com. Lots of people down here spend hours preparing dressing, but my great recipe lets you throw everything raw in a casserole and stick it in the oven. I hope you’ll check it out. Thanks for letting me join you today. June
Here’s a link to my first book in the series, which can be read on an e-reader. Deadly Ink nominated it for their David award for Best Mystery of the Year: http://tinyurl.com/2443cac