Archive for the ‘Guest Blogger’ Category
The Bali Terrorist Attack
by Lisa Heidke
I had already written the first draft of Lucy Springer Gets Even when I was in Bali, Indonesia, in October 2005 for a family holiday. My husband and I had been many times before but this was the first time we’d taken our three children. My mother and the in-laws also came. It was a family reunion, of sorts and coincided with my birthday and one of my son’s birthdays.
Bali had already been written into Lucy’s story so I looked upon the trip not only as a holiday but as an opportunity to make sure the finer details regarding Bali and the Balinese way of life were accurate.
On our first evening we ate at one of our favourite seafood restaurants in Kuta. As usual, the outside streets were crowded and the noise from nearby DVD and music shops, combined with the in-house restaurant band was raucous. We all needed to shout to make ourselves heard.
All of a sudden, we heard sirens and very quickly noticed police clearing the streets to make way for police motorbikes and ambulances. Then, silence. Unheard of in Bali. Meanwhile, restaurant staff and other Balinese chatted in hushed voices amongst themselves, many of them in tears. Soon after, we were told that Kuta and Jimbarran Bay had been bombed. The attack in Kuta had been barely 300 metres from where we’d been dining.
By the time we arrived back at the hotel, our cell phones were crammed with messages from relatives and friends asking if we were okay. We were shocked but devastated for the poor Balinese people and all the victims of this senseless act.
Back in Sydney a few weeks later, I was reading over the Bali chapters and decided to include the terrorist attacks to provide a turning point in Lucy’s life. However, I knew I had to handle the writing sensitively and whilst making the trauma as real as possible, I didn’t want to sensationalise it either.
Though those pages were difficult to write, I was pleased with the outcome. The Bali scenes became pivotal for Lucy and brought about her epiphany regarding what she needed to do in order to gain control over her life and family again.
If I had not been in Bali during those attacks, I would not have written about them. But being there and witnessing the destruction first hand, I felt I could write about it credibly. Bali is a beautiful island and the Balinese are peaceful, happy people. I hope I was able to achieve that feeling in Lucy Springer Gets Even.
Lucy Springer Gets Even is about Lucy, an out of work actress and mother, who is living through a renovation nightmare when her husband suddenly takes off and she is forced to get her act and life together. I wanted to write a light hearted story in diary form about a woman whose husband leaves her, day one, sentence one. I thought it would be interesting to look at a woman in her mid-thirties with a couple of kids who thinks her life is moving happily along and rip it to shreds. I plotted Lucy’s journey from the depths of despair and bewilderment on day one to her getting her life together by day sixty-five.
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Lisa Heidke lives in Sydney, Australia, and was a feature writer on several national magazines including Practical Parenting and Bride To Be, before deciding the time had come to write a novel. Lucy Springer Gets Even (Allen & Unwin, 2009) is her first novel and was quickly followed by What Kate Did Next (2010). Her third novel, tentatively titled Claudia Changes Course, will be published early 2011. Follow Lisa on Twitter and visit her website at www.lisaheidke.com.
Lisa’s books can be purchased at www.allenandunwin.com and www.amazon.com
Enjoying the sad
by Rebecca James
On reading my book, Beautiful Malice, several people have asked me why I wanted to write something so sad. Why would you want to even think about, let alone write about, such morbid stuff? And when asked such a question I always confidently answer:
‘Ah…oh…um. I don’t know?’
As much as I’ve pondered and wondered and strained my brain to work out why I enjoy writing about sad stuff I can’t come up with anything better than I like things that move me. Some of my favourite books have made me howl. I love nothing better than curling up on the sofa with a movie and a box of tissues. Lots of my favourite songs make my eyes well up – and I play them over and over and over.
I don’t think I’m some kind of freaky masochist. Lots of us enjoy a good weep. But I do wonder why. Psychologically healthy people don’t welcome real tragedy into their lives. We don’t usually want to cry about real life, because when we cry about real life we feel bad, deep-down-inside bad, through-to-the-bones bad. It’s not the same when we cry in response to a book or a movie. What exactly is it about fictional situations that make a good wallow so strangely enjoyable?
I even used Google to try and find an answer. (I Google everything, everything!) One article I found suggested that we like movies and books that make us cry because it helps to release some of the repressed pain that is already there within us — reading and watching as catharsis. A certain blog I happened upon suggested that sad movies and books allow us to imagine our own worst fears, face them, cry a little, and move safely back into our comfortable reality without being truly hurt.
Both ideas seem feasible to me — and I reckon the real answer would involve a mish-mash of both plus a whole lot of other stuff that I haven’t even covered. The truth is that I don’t really care enough to investigate further because the important thing to me is that when I cry over a book or a movie or a song, it means I care enough about the characters or situation to have an emotional response. And that, to me, means that the book or movie or song works as a piece of art.
I’m not a cruel person but I have to admit that when people tell me that my book made them cry it always makes me smile.
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Rebecca James was born in Sydney and spent her twenties teaching English in Indonesia and Japan. She currently lives in Armidale, Australia, with her partner and their four sons.
You can visit Rebecca online at http://www.rebeccajamesbooks.com/
An Island Memory
by Fran McNabb
The Gulf Coast is my home. Its miles of beaches and line of barrier islands, and countless winding bayous and bays have been an influence on me, and now I find it’s an important influence on my books.
ON THE CREST OF A WAVE, my newest Avalon release, is set on the coast during the Civil War. Unlike Scarlett in GONE WITH THE WIND, my heroine didn’t live on a plantation. In fact, her simple life is that of the daughter of a fisherman. I can relate to that. I, too, am the daughter of a fisherman so I understand many of the feelings she had about her life. She finds herself helping a Union officer who is in charge of a prison camp on Ship Island just off the coast of Mississippi. The tiny strip of sand that housed thousands of soldiers, both Union and Confederate, has always been dear to my heart.
Because my mother’s family run the ferry boats to and from the island, I was able to spend one of my childhood summers there while my family worked. For six days a week I roamed the island, swam and played in the surf, and slept in the simple building that my grandfather built. On Saturday evening I took the ferry back to the mainland to attend church on Sunday morning. What a glorious way for any child to spend the summer!
One night during that unforgettable summer, we had to evacuate into Fort Massachusetts because of a high tide from a storm. I remember the night as if it happened yesterday, and when I used the fort in this new novel, I was able to pull from those impressions.
Granted, most authors don’t have the opportunity to personally experience all the places they write about, but getting to know those places and studying the lifestyles during those periods are important to form the types of characters we create.
Today, when my husband and I take our boat for a day or a weekend of fishing and swimming, we can see the fort from where we anchor. It’s hard to walk the island and not think about what happened there over a hundred years ago. For me, it’s easy to look beyond the fishermen and the sun bathers and see my hero and heroine. I was able to immerse myself in that time period when I wrote the story, and I think we need to do that with every story we write or read.
(As I watched the news this morning to see the oil spreading to the beaches of this island, my heart aches to think that even though the island has survived uncountable natural disasters, we could ruin its natural beauty with our man-made mistakes.)
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Fran McNabb received both her BS and an ME from the University of Southern Mississippi. After spending two years in Germany with her husband, they returned to the Coast where she taught English and journalism until taking an early retirement. She now lives on a quiet bayou harbor with her husband and cat and spends her time writing, working for her RWA chapter, and presenting writing workshops.
Besides ON THE CREST OF A WAVE (Avalon, Feb 2010), her writing credits include two contemporary tender romance novels and numerous articles in magazines and newsletters. Visit her at www.franmcnabb.com or at franmcnabb@yahoo.com.
MY PARENTS, MY INSPIRATION, & MY FIRST NOVEL
SECRET LOVE MATCH
by Nancy Lennea
Thank you, Lisa, for welcoming me today and for inviting me to enlighten you all with how my parents, Robert and Audrey Beegle, inspired my debut novel, SECRET LOVE MATCH. My contemporary romance, released this month from Red Rose Publishing, tells how a 40-year-old former TV actor seeks out an old friend. Taylor Adams wants him to help get him into film. When he meets the man’s 21-year-old daughter, the tennis ace, he is compelled to get close to her…as long as her father doesn’t find out.
I could fill several pages answering a reader’s question like “how do you get ideas?” Simply, write what you know. My hero came to life when I wanted to portray a drifter looking back on a wasted life. I wanted him a bit older, a little wiser, and he needed a goal; a dream. My character is loosely based on both William Shatner of Star Trek fame and Tim Allen, star of the comedy film, Galaxy Quest.
I grew up during the original Star Trek TV show’s short-lived run. My parents recognized my passion for space during those pre-moonwalk days. They allowed me to stay up late on a school night. William Shatner became a movie star years later when Star Trek-The Movie hit the theaters. In Galaxy Quest, Tim plays the star of a space western, popular eighteen years earlier, now earning a living at sci-fi conventions and other low budget appearances. My own character’s popular TV space western drifted into reruns fifteen years earlier, and now he wants his name in lights.
My parents inspired me to write and keep writing, and helped by editing my drafts. They also helped in the creation of my heroine, Rebecca Delacourt. I was again fortunate to have parents who scrimped and saved so we could enjoy the nearby beach club. I learned to swim and dive then was presented with a tennis racket. It felt good in my hand. I felt powerful each time I hit the ball over the net. I competed against friends. A few of the cute boys came by to play…tennis, that is. I continued to play up and through college and watched Wimbledon and the Olympics. I never would have created a tennis ace with a dream set on an Olympic medal if it wasn’t for my parents. They inspired me to get up from the sand chair, or out of the water, and learn a sport, which in turn made me create Becka.
My characters are two headstrong individuals with specific plans for their futures. Never mind Taylor is nearly twice Becka’s age. Forget that they have absolutely no plans to marry, much less date when such a distraction could impede on their goals. When they meet, everything changes!
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Nancy Lennea lives the dream. After growing up in Huntington, New York, and raising two handsome sons in New Hampshire, Nancy and her husband moved to North Carolina where she writes full-time. She is a member of Romance Writers of America, Heart of Carolina Romance Writers, Celtic Heart Romance Writers, Fantasy-Futuristic & Paranormal Romance Writers, and Sisters in Crime. She also writes paranormal romance as Nancy Lee Badger. Visit her website: www.nancylennea.com and her blog: www.nancylennea-inlove.blogspot.com.
Check out her book trailer on You Tube at
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k21mhLa-0Nc
SECRET LOVE MATCH is available now from http://redrosepublishing.com/books or just click on the buy link: http://redrosepublishing.com/books/product_info.php?products_id=666&osCsid=8947694298c709e5d692a1db9aca15b3
Dr. Strangeinspiration or How I Learned to Hate the Contraction!
By Joe Sergi, Author of Sky Girl and the Superheroic Legacy
I recently saw a review of Sky Girl and the Superheroic Legacy where the reviewer did not like the way one of the characters spoke. The book is about a teenage girl named DeDe, who develops the same super powers as a fictional comic book character named SkyBoy. Luckily, DeDe’s best friend, Jason, is a self professed comic book geek that helps her discover the origin of her powers and face the all-too-real enemies of SkyBoy. Jason uses perfect English and doesn’t use contractions, which annoyed the critic. Jason’s dialogue is intentional.
They say inspiration comes in strange ways. For Jason, it came, fittingly, from my experience at the New York ComicCon. The organizers had oversold the show and the fire marshal had stopped letting people in. Locked out, I sat on the floor to work on an early draft of Sky Girl. Instead, I found myself people watching.
I noticed all of the great shirts that people were wearing and immediately knew that Jason was going to wear a different geek shirt every day. This allowed for some great inside jokes. In the first book, the shirts are relatively straight forward with things like “Han shot first!” and “Frak!” In later books, he wears: “You can’t have manslaughter without laughter.” and “Honk if you are going to hit me!” At shows (or if you order the book through DCBService.com during June), when I sign the book, I draw different character sketches in the cover. As expected, Jason’s shirts are always different.
But, something else caught my eye while sitting on that floor. A fan with a wheeling cart full of books to be signed was getting irate about being kept off the floor. He started by calmly talking to the marshal, but soon was yelling at everyone. But, no matter how excited he got, his grammar never deteriorated, he never used a contraction, and he emphasized every syllable (think Sinatra in the younger days.) There are other people who talk similarly (a fictional example is Sheldon from Big Bang Theory), but this guy was incredible.
“This is not very fair!”
“I do not know why we cannot go in.”
“I cannot believe this. You are not very nice, kind sir.”
The entire rant was awkward, stilted, and uncomfortable. Most of all, it was perfect–Jason had his voice. I took out every one of Jason’s contractions. I read the sentences out loud stressing each syllable.”
Every editor who looked at the book tried to change Jason’s dialogue. But, like Jason’s inspiration, I would not back down. I even added lines of dialogue about the awkwardness of Jason’s diction.
So, if you pick up Sky Girl, I hope you don’t think,, “No one really talks like that”. Instead, I hope you remember my story. I would like to thank Fodder for Fiction for letting me explain Jason’s quirks.
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Joe Sergi is an author who lives outside of Washington, DC with his wife, Yee, and daughter, Elizabeth. He has published short prose stories and articles in the horror, science fiction, and super hero genres. Joe has also written for comics in the romance, horror, science fiction, and super hero genres. Sky Girl and the Superheroic Legacy is his first novel. In 2008, Joe was selected as a semi-finalist in the Who Wants to Create a Superheroine contest sponsored by the Shadowline Imprint of Image Comics. When not writing, Joe works for an unnamed government agency.
Joe’s publications can be found at www.joesergi.net. For more about Sky Girl and the Superheroic Legacy, visit the book’s website at www.skygirlnovel.com.
Adults Do Forget and We Pay The Price!
By Dr. Barbara Becker Holstein
One of the major themes that has become a cornerstone of my fiction writing is that once we are adults we often loose some of the most fabulous traits and capacities that we had as children. For example, the ability to laugh easily and have fun. Do you remember as a kid how easy it was to enjoy yourself? I can remember all sorts of happy moments that are much harder to create now. Catching fireflies and running around on the grass with the bottle that had a couple of them inside at twilight, seemed to be an endless delight. And if I fell while I ran it was all the more fun. After all, no scabs when I fell on the grass. Laughing with my girlfriends in junior high was an endless treat. We sometimes only had to look at each other. Now that I know laughing is so good for mental health and is like an internal massage, I wish the chuckles came as easily. Also, as I child I was able to feel competent so easily. I may have been blessed with good parents, but after being in education and psychology for over 30 years, I can say it is innate in most children. Most of us as kids would strive to learn a game and play it well. We would strive to roller skate and endure many falls in the process. At lot of us were proud of all the household and academic tasks we could do successfully.
As a child I was also aware of many of the limitations of the adults around me. Teachers didn’t always listen to kids’ questions and remarks. They played favorites. Parents didn’t listen and were too busy to bother with important things to kids. Parents got angry too easily. Grown-ups had silly fights that spoiled the day. Grown-ups accepted terrible news on TV and radio and still went about their business without really trying to change things.
The list could go on and on.
So as a fiction writer I have chosen to try to highlight some of the things we loose as adults. Why? For two reasons: to help us better understand and listen to the kids in our lives, and to help us light a fire inside of ourselves so that we recapture the best of what we left behind. Just because we have grown up doesn’t mean we have to close down! We can have more fun. We can laugh more. We can do hobbies and have adventures that make us feel special and bring excitement and learning into our lives and the lives of our kids and grandkids.
We can do it. We just need to remember how! That’s one of the reasons why I suggest to not just have your kids read The Truth (I’m a girl, I’m smart and I know everything) or Secrets: You Tell Me Yours and I’ll Tell You Mine… Maybe. Read them and you will find the beginnings of your own pathway to the best of your younger self!
Dr. Barbara Becker Holstein, nationally know Positive Psychologist, is the creator of The Enchanted Self,® a systematic way of helping to bring more joy, meaning, and purpose into our lives.
Dr. Holstein has been a school psychologist for more than 25 years. She has taught elementary school children and was an assistant professor in education in at Boston University. She has been in private practice as a psychologist with her husband, Dr. Russell M. Holstein, in Long Branch, New Jersey, for over 25 years.
Contact Dr. Holstein on the web at http://www.enchantedself.com/ and http://www.thetruthforgirls.com/.
Get Out of the Way!
By Audrey Vernick
I started out writing literary short fiction for adults, so writing about a buffalo attending kindergarten was never really part of the Big Plan.
For me, the move to writing for children was gradual. Years ago, I wrote a nonfiction picture book with my sister that was published by a small press. After that, I had another nonfiction picture book accepted by HarperCollins. But all my fiction picture book projects went nowhere.
And then, one day, a buffalo.
It actually started with the book that will be the sequel to the book coming out this June. I was sitting with my son one morning, waiting for the school bus. He was bringing a batch of pumpkin muffins to school for a consumer science class, and our dog was sniffing around the muffins. I said something like, “He seems really interested in those muffins. You might need to teach your dog to bake.” And then I said, “A smarter writer than your mother would take that idea and run with it. Teach Your Dog to Bake. Teach Your Cat to Surf. Teach Your Buffalo to Play Drums.”
While walking the dog later that morning, I wrote most of the text of Teach Your Buffalo to Play Drums in my head. It was the fastest book I ever wrote. And I learned something from writing this book that has informed all the writing I’ve done since: I need to get out of and stay out of my own way.
If I had tried writing this book five years ago, I would have spent a very long time explaining. Justifying. Trying to have the fact that a buffalo wants to learn to play drums make sense. When really, it’s better not to think too much about it. To just let it happen. While a preschool audience is accepting of even the most out-there premises, I think the same can be said of most readers. Almost anything can be plausible if the writer treats the premise as truth.
As long as she stays out of her own way.
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Audrey Vernick is the author of IS YOUR BUFFALO READY FOR KINDERGARTEN?, illustrated by Daniel Jennewein, published by Balzer & Bray (HarperCollins) June 2010. She is also the author of SHE LOVED BASEBALL: THE EFFA MANLEY STORY (HarperCollins, 2010); TEACH YOUR BUFFALO TO PLAY DRUMS (Balzer & Bray, 2011); TEAM OF BROTHERS: THE TRUE STORY OF BASEBALL’S LONGEST-PLAYING ALL-BROTHER TEAM (Clarion, 2012); and SO YOU WANT TO BE A ROCK STAR (Walker, 2012). She lives with her husband, son, daughter, and dog near the ocean in New Jersey. You can visit her at www.audreyvernick.com.
IF I WERE EVIL…
by Karen Rose
The question I get asked the most often is: Where do you get your ideas? Sometimes they come from every day, ordinary events or experiences.
And sometimes I have to give the ordinary a twist, to see it through a villain’s eyes. You know how you can add “in bed” to a fortune cookie fortune? I add, “If I were evil…” and see what happens next. Bwahaha. (I should confess that the thought of my being so comfortable with evil villains makes my poor mother upset.)
The villain in SILENT SCREAM is a blackmailer, who’s not afraid to shed blood. He was born in a coffee shop! Several summers ago the kids were out of school and driving me crazy, so I’d escaped the house for the easy-to-focus-environment of my local coffee shop. I have friends who write in coffee shops, who can sip a latte and pound out pages, oblivious to all that’s going on around them. I cannot do this.
It’s not my fault. People talk loudly in coffee shops. Maybe it’s the caffeine. Maybe it’s that they think because they’re deep in their own conversation and not paying attention to me, that I’m also not paying attention to them. Not so.
So, I was surrounded that summer by loudly talking people who didn’t pay me no never mind. People used the coffee shop for their office, conducting interviews and business meetings. They came to gossip and start political arguments. But the most interesting was that the local coffee shop was also the “safe place” for couples to meet in person after having met on the Internet.
This was the part I found impossible to ignore, no matter how hard I tried. The woman was typically older and wore her Sunday dress. I felt sorry for her, because I could feel how awkward and nervous and uncomfortable she was. I imagined she’d been out of the dating pool for some time, having been left by a snake of a husband for a younger chickie. The man usually wore a suit, sometimes a tie, but usually his shirt was unbuttoned halfway down his chest. He looked suave, and on the move. And sometimes the men were nice, but more often it was clear their main goal was getting the woman to go home with them.
I’d sit with my fingers on the keyboard, trying to write my own story, but sending mental vibes to the woman instead. DON’T GO HOME WITH HIM. HE IS A SLEAZE.
And then I thought, I bet at least some of these guys are married.
If I were evil, I could blackmail them and make a lot of money.
And my villain was born.
So be open to all experiences! And if you’re writing suspense, think about what a villain would do. You may find it leads you to your next great book idea!
Where do you like to read? If you’re a writer, where do you write? Do you have a favorite neighborhood coffee-shop?
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Karen Rose is an internationally bestselling author, her books appearing on the New York Times, London Sunday Times, and Germany’s Der Spiegel bestseller lists. Her novel I’M WATCHING YOU received the Romance Writer’s of America’s RITA ® award for Best Romantic Suspense for 2005. Five of Karen’s other titles have been RITA finalists. Her eleventh novel, SILENT SCREAM, was released in May, 2010. Her books have been translated into eighteen languages. A former chemical engineer and high school teacher, Karen lives in Florida with her family, a dog, and two cats.
Website link: www.karenrosebooks.com and blog: www.thegoddessblogs.com
What Kind Of DNA Did You Say?
By Kaye Manro
It is foregone conclusion that I write SFR, Sci-Fi Romance. In this genre, you’ll find all sorts of odd and diverse species and characters, from sensual lime green women to furry Wookies.
When I wrote Forbidden Love, my bestselling erotic SFR from Red Rose Publishing, I wanted to think outside the proverbial box. I’d like to share something unique that had a direct influence on how and why I created my character, T’Kon. No doubt, my involvement in anything relating to Science Fiction played a big part in the world building of this story. Yet as I pondered on character development, it occurred to me this hero should be very unusual indeed.
…He will come from a planet that is hotter than the hottest Earth desert, I’ll call it Asconage, and it will revolve around two suns, one near, one far. There will be laws that forbid interspecies mating… And even though this hero will be from an advanced civilization, he will have—what kind of DNA did you say?
A flash of memory washed my mind featuring Camo, my beloved pet chameleon. Camo wasn’t exactly right for a people environment, yet he was so sweet, and very smart. He would sit in my hand for long periods and calmly observe his surroundings. He would even perch on my shoulder as I did my homework each day. He seemed to want to know exactly what I was doing. A gentle and quiet little creature, Camo had to have lots of light—he preferred natural and very hot sunlight, but artificial heat lamps worked too. Because of his cool blood nature, he had to stay in the scorching heat for many hours a day. Sadly, because I lived in a cold climate and he needed the hot desert sands to survive, I had to give him up. But I’ll never forgot our connection. Just like any pet, he became a big part of my life.
When I thought about my character, T’Kon, I wanted him to be very different and to have pristine qualities similar to Camo. So I gave his species a touch of Reptilian DNA. His heroine, Maya got her qualities in a similar way. Although she is human, Maya is a natural scientist that saves desert lizard habitats.
From a special memory of a childhood pet, an entire wellspring of creativity opened, allowing me to explore and develop my work of fiction. I invite you to give Forbidden Love a read. You may enjoy it!
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Kaye Manro Bio
As a romance author, I lean toward the adventuresome in my writing. I love science fiction and all the enticing quantum theories surrounding it. Where characters rush through outer space at FTL, or teleport into another time, and even slipstream into an alternate reality. I like creating sizzling love scenes too with sexy heroes, and captivating heroines. It just seemed natural to combine all these elements together in my stories.
FORBIDDEN LOVE
Blurb
Exploring the galaxies at faster than light speed (FTL) is routine for the inhabitants of Asconage. T’Kon’s cool-blood culture exists on a planet in the scorch of binary suns. Yet there are governing archaic rules to prohibit interspecies mating with those from different worlds and evolutionary paths.
When T’Kon crashes his spacecraft on Terrain, a seasonal planet barely on the cusp of space travel, he cannot resist Maya, the warm-blooded audacious female who gives him aid. His desire for her entices him to abandon his species moral code.
There is little time to linger inside their illicit passion. The warring factions of her world are closing in. A quick fix of his spacecraft and a fast exit is his best choice. But can T’Kon leave Maya behind and forsake their emerging Forbidden Love?
FORBIDDEN LOVE Buy Page: http://redrosepublishing.com/bookstore/product_info.php?manufacturers_id=317&products_id=772
Kaye’s Website: http://sfr.kayemanro.com/index.htm
Kaye’s Blog: http://kayemanro.blogspot.com/
Make Me Write It
by Michael Ruddy
An inspiration that not only creates a plot line, but a novel and writing vocation as well——the best way to explain it? Let’s say you experience something in life that you know is not legitimate. You’re not completely sure though, because you’re still thinking naively that most of the world is trustworthy. But after a few more coincidences it’s obvious, the probability of events proves highly improbable. Now you are focused.
You begin to suspect and question——everything that has one dollar of interest in conflict with your genuine belief of fair and just. It’s the same from any viewpoint. The answers become an unbelievable convergence of conflict from many different directions, even related parties with different interests.
You become party to a lawsuit that unfolds slowly as you learn the legal process. “Can it be true?” you ask yourself——then start examining each detail of conflict for a better understanding and possible explanation. Instead, only validating the corruption laced into the present day system. More disappointment.
Why didn’t anyone teach you about this? Why has nothing been published on the topic; or the possibility, if nothing else?
It has been said that anger and frustration equal motivation. Call it inspirational anger, perhaps, but there was a need to tell the story of frustration for others. And, once I started processing the frustration, it acted in a therapeutic way … giving way to exposing more stories to come … wanting the reader to derive a real-life benefit from each story.
——Michael Ruddy, Author of Conflicts with Interest.
Michael Ruddy is a graduate of the University of Denver with a degree in engineering administration. He has spent the last forty years associated with both the commercial and residential disciplines of the construction industry, which inspired many of the events in his novel, Conflicts with Interest. Currently, he resides in Boulder, CO with his wife, five children, dog and cutting horses. While the author has been published in short-story format, Conflicts with Interest is his debut novel.
You can find Michael online at www.rodeopublishing.com