Tag Archive for: writing

The Dog Was Doing What in the Bathroom?

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From the cat who literally swallowed the canary (and then threw it up on your aunt’s antique Persian rug) to the dog who ran away, we at the Stiletto Gang put our collective heads together and thought: what could be better than walking down memory lane with thoughts of some of our favorite–and not-so-favorite–pets? Join us for the next two weeks as we reminisce about the animals we loved and those who loved us.

by Bethany Maines

If you’re friends with me on Facebook then you know of my
picture-snapping obsession with my dog Kato.  He’s a two-year old Lab Rottweiler mix with a belief that
people-chairs are really dog beds and that dishwashers are where we put the
silverware to be licked. We named him after Inspector Clouseau’s surprise
attacking valet, so that we could yell, “Kato, now is not the time!” whenever
he jumps out at us, which he does frequently. My friends, acquaintances, and
frequently strangers are forced to listen to my “hilarious” dog stories and
occasionally shown the “baby” photos on my phone.  Yes, I’m that “pet parent.”  I try not to be, but my dog is just that darn cute.  (See photographic evidence below.) 

However, it occurred to me, as I tried to integrate a dog
into my latest manuscript that pets are rather like the bathroom in most books
– they never get mentioned. That is, unless they’re important to the plot line
or they ARE the plot line (see The Cat Who…
series by Lillian Jackson Braun). Both bathrooms and pets are important
features of everyday life. Pets require feeding and water and are generally
greeted immediately upon entering a house, as well having a host of other
little ways of integrating themselves into their owner’s lives. Bathrooms, for
obvious reasons, are visited multiple times a day and usually have their own
attendant routines of make-up, showering, and dressing. But both rarely rate a mention in most
books. What gives?
Well, like all the strangers I accost with my Kato stories,
most readers probably just aren’t that interested in the heroine’s pet. And
really, who wants to spend that much time with a protagonist in the restroom?
And of course, with space at a premium, it’s a bit hard to justify giving
paragraphs of space to the pet while the plot languishes about looking for a
little attention. But is a well-written story with a fast moving plot mutually
exclusive with pets and bathrooms? 
Can’t a character blurt out, “I have to pee,” when faced with shocking
news? Can’t the dull routine of feeding the dog, feed a characters wish for
excitement and adventure? Why should the pets and restrooms not at least get
the recognition they deserve for being a meaningful part of our lives?
All of which makes me want to write a story that takes place
in the bathroom… with a dog. I just need a plot and some characters and I’m
golden.

Writing Emotionally

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by Bethany Maines

Just so you know, I’m writing this blog under duress. I have
this great idea for a story where I give one of my characters a heart attack
(literally) and instead I’m having to do other, actual work. The horror! How
dare real life interfere with the creation of fiction? This is exactly the kind
of feeling that leads to me receiving emails from my boss saying things like
“For an illustrator, you sure type a lot.” Of course I type a lot! I’m writing
a whole novel over here. 
Sheesh.  Oh wait, you’re not
paying me to write a novel? Rigghhhhht. Got it. I will attempt to remember that
and to actually care. Fortunately, these days I’m more or less self-employed (I
have a business partner who eyes me suspiciously if I start to wander off too
much), but it’s still surprising how much the pursuit of a second career
interferes with the first one.
Meanwhile, as excited as I am about my new idea, it occurs
to me that many of my ideas lately have involved a strong element of hospitals,
death and dying. I attribute this to the fact that my friends and I, in the
last year or so, have been experiencing the loss of parents and grandparents at
a rate that I think is rather alarming. However, my hair cutter described the
issue with humorous sangfroid as just a light bulb problem. “Well, it’s like
light bulbs, if you put them in all at once they all tend to, you know, go out
all at once.” True enough, and I even laughed, but it’s always different when
they’re your light bulbs.
They say that art imitates life, or vice versa, but I think
fiction imitates therapy. I can’t afford to go see a therapist about my
unresolved feelings about people dying and all life eventually ending, but I
can make my characters suffer and come to some sort of emotional resolution for
me. It works great, and it’s so much cheaper. Not to mention, that it let’s me
indulge my God complex without a therapist calling me on it. It does make me
wonder about other authors though. Shakespeare for instance – that’s a lot of
killing and cross-dressing for one dude. 
And what’s up with Beattrix Potter?  Can we say bunny fixation? But we love both those authors,
so maybe mental issues are cathartic to read as well as write?  I guess I can only hope.

They Always Ask: What Comes After THE END?

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       By Laura Spinella     
It’s itchy palms and a cold sweat, a compulsive urge
that a team of interventionists couldn’t thwart. That’s what I’m down to.  No, don’t be ridiculous, I haven’t quit
drinking. I said compulsive not insane. But what I have done is turn in a
manuscript. It leaves me with time, a gaping hole from 7 a.m. until noon. Initially,
I’m dazzled by the prospect—think cats and a tinfoil ball. By living in the
mainstream I can get things done, big and small.  I’ll chase time until it lodges itself under my sunroom sofa, moving something like this: Instead of
brushing by old newspapers and dirty toilets, I take the papers to the recycle
bin, scrub the toilets until I’ve drowned the Ty-D-Bol man. I make every bed and vacuum the
floor of my closet. Afterward, I’m surprised but only marginally alarmed to
find that morning has two hours left. 
Not a problem. I have a 30%-off Kohl’s coupon. By noon everyone has new
underwear and I have half-a-dozen potential outfits for a trip that’s three months
away.   On day two, dinner is a planned
event.  My usual incidental dash to the microwave
morphs into a Julia Child effort, one that involves béchamel sauce and a 1,000
calorie French dessert.  By day three, my
real jobs are organized as if they
are my goal. Newspaper stories are booked weeks in advance; my editor is dazed
but delighted.  Normally, I’d segue from my
WIP to my cyber-gig needing a shower and wearing pajama pants with a
hole in the crotch. Not now. Now I show up in makeup and clothing that does not
involve an elastic waist. Day four I surprise my son and pop in at track
practice. I bring brownies for the hardworking boys. From across the field, his
head pivots sharply. It’s as if he smells something repugnant in the air. I
wave. He trots steadily in my direction, glancing right at a gaggle of girls
who, apparently, also stopped by to watch.
            “What are you doing here?
Is someone dead?”
            “I had free time. Can’t
a mother watch her son practice?”
            “Seriously, why are you
here? It’s track practice. I’m perfectly safe.”
I assume he’s alluding to his younger years when I tended to hyper-fret
about things like child abduction. I decide it’s still plausible. “You never
know who’s lurking.”
What happens if you’re not careful with your javelin
              “I have
a black-belt in Taekwondo and a javelin in my hand.  Go home; go write something.”  He darts across the field, taking his
position. Only for a moment do I think he’s considering hurling the javelin at
me.
            And this is where dazzle
turns to disaster. I’m not the mom who goes to practice. The thrill of a
three-course meal can only satisfy for so long. I hate shopping and my day jobs
function fine on the fly.  Twenty-four
hours later, I stare at my sunroom writing chair. It’s wrapped in metaphoric
yellow caution tape.  I may not enter; I
have no business there.  There’s a hard
rule about revisiting a manuscript that’s no longer in my possession. I’d only see
a thousand missteps, unable to change anything. Rationally, I should look
forward to this break. Downtime is supposed to be beneficial, an opportunity to
recharge the muse. Well, clearly, my muse is an addict. I sit and write a blog,
thinking it’s a quick fix.  Two paragraphs
in and I find my knee bouncing like a drunk with a Dixie cup. It’s not enough.
This is not to say the muse has anything remotely brilliant to relay. In fact,
it’s the very reason I equate it to an addiction. A wiser person would seek
help. Besides, what would I write?  The
muse has a suggestion.
            “Remember that idea I spun
a year ago? We were driving. Instead of the license plate game we played the what if game.  What if that girl, the one with the crummy
newspaper job and the psychic gift, landed in your lap top?  Come. Sit. You know you want to.”
            “No I don’t. What I want
is for you to quit delivering half-baked ideas, expecting me to fill in the
blanks.”
            “Sorry, if you wanted a thorough
muse your last name should have been Rowling or Roberts. I work with what
they give me.”
            “Do you have any idea
how much time and commitment your ideas take? Someday I’ll regret it, the
endless hours I’ve wasted on you.”
            “And still, you would have
spent more time sleeping. You’re not getting that time back either. So come, sit. Just try it. One sentence, a character
name, the way he looks at her—focus, you’ll see it.  And I haven’t even told you the best part of my
idea.”
            “Ha! I’ve lived your
ideas, holistic designer, rock star, a rogue man on a motorcycle.  They’re absurd.”  Yet, ruefully, I inch into the room.
“Maybe. But the motorcycle man worked out fine. I heard
he’s up for a few nifty awards.  Besides,
what are your options?  Plant a garden,
take up golf, stalk the high school cafeteria?”
“Shut up.” But as I speak, I’m fighting temptation and
gravity.  I move closer.
“That’s it. Ease your way in. We’ll go slow. We’ll talk.
Hell, maybe I’ll even float you some backstory.”
My fingers move past the cautionary yellow tape. The
leather chair does feel good.  It’s only
been a week, but there’s dust is on the keyboard. We can’t have that.  Okay, I’ll sit—but only for a minute…  

Laura Spinella is the author of Beautiful Disaster, a 2012 RITA Finalist, Best First Book; NJRWA Winner, Best First Book; Wisconsin RWA Write Touch Finalist, Best Mainstream Novel; Desert Rose RWA Finalist, Best First Book and a Favorite Book of 2011 at SheKnows.com. Visit her at www.lauraspinella.net
         
            

Traveling in the Spicoli Way

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by Bethany Maines
Next week I will be making, what is turning out to be an
annual pilgrimage to New York City to visit my editor and watch a friend
graduate from Columbia (Goooo… Lions?). When I started this whole writing thing
I specifically targeted LA agents because I thought it would be a heck of a lot
easier to fly from the Evergreen State to the Golden State. I was absolutely
correct, of course – travel out to the Empire State (that’s your nickname New
York, seriously?) kind of bites, particularly since some dude invented the shoe
bomb. Or the Underwear Bomb.  Next
thing you know there’ll be the Hair Bomber and we’ll all have to shave. And I
swear the 3oz liquid debacle is fully sponsored by the water vendors on the
other side of security, but that is beside the point.
The point is that I didn’t want an agent in New York, but
Fate, as per its usual modus operandi, had other plans and now mocks me with
every trip to the East Coast. Which isn’t to say I don’t heart my agent with
big googly eyes (little hearts going pwap! over my head), and I’m not extremely
grateful to be able to visit NYC, because I am. I just keep thinking that maybe
this year my vacation will be someplace
more palm tree oriented than the Big Apple. I miss palm tree vacations – they
come with coconuts and beaches and sometimes giant turtles (See the picture? That turtle swam right by me!).
But there are benefits to visiting a place repeatedly. For
one thing, you know when it’s being faked on television. OK, maybe that’s not
the primary benefit, but it is a good one (Don’t think I don’t remember you Ally McBeal and all your fake Boston sets). Traveling is always a window onto
another place and by visiting it repeatedly you start to really understand the
cultural ecosystem of that town and how far that ecosystem spreads.
It wasn’t until my second visit to New York that I
understood just how very New York Sesame Street was. From Oscar’s crappy garbage can, to the street sign, to the Brown
Stone houses, the main street in every toddlers life is a New York street.  Or the bizarre rubber boot fetish that
currently holds sway in fashion. The that makes a lot more sense when you
realize that even in the summer, New York City is home to a billion disgusting,
fetid puddles waiting to envelop sandal clad feet. Each visit reveals some
further facet of how New York is different, but also how it’s connected to
me.  And while it may not have a
lot of palm trees, the mai tais still taste good, and as Fast Times at Ridgemont High pointed out – “Wherever you are, that’s the place to be.”

Villainy!

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or How a Gas Cap Helped Me Write
by Bethany Maines
 

So today as I was driving to the Starbucks (because I was too lazy to make my own oatmeal) I saw a woman driving with her gas cap perched on the hood of her car. I was going to honk and try and indicate the issue when I realized that little door covering the gas hole was completely missing.  So I didn’t honk.  I figured that clearly this wasn’t the first time she had a problem like this and it might be better for her if she just rid the car of all accessories that weren’t bolted on.  Less to keep track of.
Facebook friend reaction says this was not the appropriately kind, good-Samaritan thing to do.  I should have honked and pointed, or pulled up alongside and yelled my message.  My reaction to such ideas?  Meh.  What would be the point?  She’d probably just do it again three weeks from now.  Some people are just Teflon coated against help.  And then I realized… I was the villain! Admittedly, the villain on a very small scale in a very tiny drama, but still, I was the bad guy!
Maybe I shouldn’t be so excited, but when I’m writing I sometimes I have a problem with villains. What excuse could possibly be enough to justify the villainous behavior of the bad guy? If my villain isn’t a sociopath or someone with a personality disorder of the highest degree, then they have to have a reason for doing what they do. At some point, they have to choose to do the bad things. And that where I struggle – coming up with reasons of sufficient validity to actually kill someone (or any of the other dastardly deeds they do). I remember a villain in one of my early attempts a novel writing seemed to have been cut from a Dickens novel – abused, with an evil uncle, penniless and starved as a child he set out to seek his revenge on all and sundry. He was one twirling moustache away from being Snidely Whiplash. My writer’s group told me in kind and restrained terms that just like my hero couldn’t exhibit all the traits and talents of herodom, possibly it would be more realistic if my bad guy acted like a human being.
In The Wild One Marlon Brando was asked “What are you rebelling against?” and he replied “What do you got?” Maybe that’s closer to the truth of villainy. It’s not that they’re not bad for a particular reason; maybe some villains are bad because they just don’t care.

Writing is Like Getting Punched in the Face

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or
Your Sensei-ism of the Day

by Bethany Maines

A member of my writer’s group, who is at the relative beginning of her writing journey, recently turned in a story for critique and my response was that clearly the middle sucked and it needed to be totally restructured, but other than that the story was great. Or at least, that’s probably what I sounded like to her. She understood that I wasn’t trying to be mean, but, as another member of our group pointed out, she probably hadn’t been expecting a critique of that magnitude, and was probably more hoping for a stamp of approval, with maybe a “just change a few lines here or there.”  And then I had a sharp memory that I used to feel the same way (and occasionally I still do).
One of the other things I study, besides writing, is karate. Now, the first thing everyone asks is, “What belt are you?”  So let’s just get this out of the way now. I’m a third degree black belt. Most people have no idea what that means, but it sounds impressive, so they give enthusiastic nods. (Or if you’re that dillhole trying to date a black belt, you make an ineffectual grab and say, “What would you do if I did this?”  Um…. Throw you on the floor and then watch how you never call again?  Right, that’s what I thought.)  There are many belts between white (absolute beginner) and black, and each one is an achievement that is worthy of being bragged about. Sadly for poor karate students talking to random acquaintances, if it ain’t black, it ain’t nothin’.  So if you know a karate student and they say “green,” congratulate them on their hard work and, unless they’re six, please don’t ask them to show you anything. If they’re six, then ask away, because that’s just plain adorable. But, word to the wise, if you’re a dude protect your crotch (unless you’ve got the video camera rolling and want to win $10,000 on America’s Funniest Home Videos), because we all know how coordinated your average six year old is.
Anyway, back to the point (why does everyone always doubt I have one?). I’ve been a sensei (teacher) for long enough that I’ve started to see trends or traits in the course of a karate student’s journey. One of the most common beginner traits is that once a student has learned a technique, say reverse punch, they consider it complete. Why would we revisit the topic? And then I have to break it to them that I’ve been learning my reverse punch for about eleven years now. And I’ll learn some more about it tonight when I go into the dojo. Each time I cross the threshold and bow to the dojo, whether or not I’m teaching the class, I’m there to learn.
But when you’re a white belt, you’d really just like to get your reverse punch signed off so you can test for the next belt. Being told to go back and do it again can be very disheartening, but from the black belt perspective it can also be very freeing. I’m free to get the first one wrong (and the third, and the fifth, and the twenty-fifth) because I’m going to do it again.  With karate, and with writing, there is always the opportunity to go back the next day and do it again.
I know that when I started writing, I didn’t want to edit.  And then I rewrote my first novel 9.5 times.  And believe me, I wanted to stop at about 6.  But after awhile, I started to think that a novel is a fluid thing with endless permutations of how it can be put together. I can’t be hamstrung by the idea that the first draft has to be the finished draft; by accepting that I’m going to be wrong I free myself to create something better.
They say there are very few masters in karate, but many students – meaning that, while some may be more advanced, we are all still learning.  I believe the same can be said of writing. 

A pinch and a dash

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by: Joelle Charbonneau

I love to cook. There is nothing more gratifying that chopping stuff up, throwing it in a pot and watching it become dinner. So few things in life bring that same kind of immediate gratification. Hard work = payoff. Cool! So while many people treat cooking like a chore, I look forward to the adventure and I’m always beyond delighted when people love the food I make.

Until someone asks for the recipe.

Recipe? What recipe?

I mean, I understand the concept and I use them when I’m baking, but in every day cooking I tend to be a bit more freeform. I look in the fridge, pull out a bunch of stuff and throw it together with a dash of this and a sprinkle of that. I can always tell you what went into the dish, but the exact amounts – um – I haven’t a clue.

Which probably shouldn’t be a surprise. I love making to-do lists, but very rarely do I actually follow them. And while I’ve tried to follow an outline when I write, I tend to go off track somewhere around page 70 and the outline becomes obsolete. I love the idea of being prepared, but there is something about improvisation that motivates and interests me. Which is kind of a problem when I’m writing. I mean, I write mysteries. In theory, I should know where I’m going when I start. I should know who the killer is so I can leave clues. But even when I think I know what ingredients I’m going to add to a story, I find myself adding a pinch more pepper and a lot more basil and suddenly my initial vision is completely changed. Hopefully, for the better.

For me, cooking and writing seem to require a flexibility to go with what works as opposed to what is outlined or expected. Just because a recipe says you are supposed to add a teaspoon of something doesn’t mean you have to. Just because a mystery typically contains certain ingredients doesn’t mean you can’t change things up.

At least this is what I’m trying to tell myself as I work on my new manuscript and plot dinner for tonight. So tell me Stiletto readers and writers – do you use always use a recipe when you cook? And if you are a writer and use a recipe – do you also find you are inclined to use an outline to get the story from the beginning to The End? Inquiring minds want to know.

Writing through… Oooh! Shiny!

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by Bethany Maines

What do we think?  Alex Trebek – with moustache or without? Why is it that the only “star” I know on “Dancing With the Stars” is Rikki Lake? Did I buy wrapping paper for that wedding present? And speaking of the wedding, what should I wear to that wedding on Saturday? 

I’m having a wee bit of trouble concentrating (in case you didn’t notice). I’m really close to completing my latest mystery manuscript and if I just buckled down I could be done before you know it. Well, at least by the end of the weekend. But I’m having some sort of mental block.
I sit myself down.  I open all my little files and stare at the screen and then thirty seconds later I’m surfing the web, and checking the newsfeed on Facebook for the umpteenth time. It’s not the same as writer’s block. I know what to write and, theoretically, I know how to write it. This is more like attention deficit disorder for writers. Of course, once I had that thought I went to look up the symptoms of ADHD.
  • difficulty paying attention to details and tendency to make careless mistakes in school or other activities; producing work that is often messy and careless
I’m pretty sure my editor thinks this is absolutely true. And since it took me five minutes to realize that I’d left “is” out of one of the sentences of above, I think we can easily say – check.
  • easily distracted by irrelevant stimuli and frequently interrupting ongoing tasks to attend to trivial noises or events that are usually ignored by others
Ok, so I ignore the noises, but my dog never does, and then I want to know what he’s looking at so I get up, and then I go for a snack, and then… Ok. Check.
  • inability to sustain attention on tasks or activities
 Um… yeah, or I’d be done with the damn novel by now.
  • difficulty finishing schoolwork or paperwork or performing tasks that require concentration
Isn’t that the same as the last thing? Didn’t I already… ooh, look at that bird!
  • frequent shifts from one uncompleted activity to another
What are you trying to say?  Have you been talking to my business partner? I told her I would finish the quarterly taxes before the deadline!!
  • Procrastination
Don’t put off till tomorrow what you can put off until next week, I always say.
  • disorganized work habits
Are you implying that working from the couch with notes scattered among the paper tow…napkins from lunch is a bad idea?
  • failure to complete tasks such as homework or chores
Seriously, haven’t we already covered this?
  • frequent shifts in conversation, not listening to others, not keeping one’s mind on conversations, and not following details or rules of activities in social situations
They’re not rules – they’re guidelines.  And conversations are what happen when I’m thinking about plot.

  • forgetfulness in daily activities (for example, missing appointments, forgetting to bring lunch)
Oh, whew, I was starting to think I might have this, but since I never forget lunch, I’m out of the woods.

Are You Ready to Rock? I Mean, Write!

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I am fiercely right-brained and numbers-challenged enough not to have balanced my checkbook in twenty years, if ever.  There’s something about math that makes my mind go blank.  How I was ever a card-carrying member of Mu Alpha Theta—the honors math club—is a freakin’ mystery, right up there with Black Holes and Donald Trump’s hair.
Not surprisingly, I’ve always gravitated toward the arts, though my attempts at expressing myself with anything other than words were less than spectacular.  As an artist-wannabe, I drew hands well but never faces, dabbled in acrylics, and produced a metal sculpture that my sister incredibly assumed was made by our very talented architect uncle.  She dug it out of a box in Mom’s basement and admired it so much that she put it on display in her apartment only to have me exclaim, “Oh, God, that’s ‘diving boy’!  I did that in seventh grade!”  I was far more excited than she.
Despite my artistic failures, I’m still a huge fan of visual arts and often attend art fairs and festivals in St. Louis. When I’m not crazed on deadlines, I love to visit the Art Museum to see the latest exhibits and pine over their permanent collection (I heart Impressionists!). 
My right brain also adores the Symphony, as there’s nothing as glorious to the ears as a Mozart piano concerto or Yo-Yo Ma on the cello.  But my biggest love is ‘80s rock.  Despite my preference for clothes that actually cover my boobs and my butt, I am a closet rock ‘n’ roll chick. 
Before I met Ed, I would have dropped everything to be Def Leppard’s roadie.  Their music feeds something inside me like nothing else does.  A few notes of “Photograph” or “Promises” pushes all the right buttons and conjures up so many moments from my past, good and bad, falling in love, breaking-up, sad times, glory days.  I will never again hear “Pour Some Sugar On Me” without thinking of a trip to Nashville with the Deadly Divas where I cracked up Letha Albright by singing aloud in an elevator filled with musicians clutching guitar cases (and staring at me, agape, presumably horrified).
My iPod is full of my favorite ‘80s tunes, and I wear it religiously on the treadmill so I can hear Van Halen belt out “Dance the Night Away” or Night Ranger harmoniously “Sing Me Away.” Whenever Kansas’s “Point of No Return” or Rush’s “Fly By Night” comes up in the shuffle, I’m in heaven, if only for three and a half minutes at a time.
The first concert I ever attended was Billy Joel and a succession of my favorites followed (no, you’re not allowed to laugh):  The Cars, Journey, Styx, Rick Springfield, Tom Petty, Night Ranger, Kansas, Prince, Clapton, Bon Jovi, Jefferson Starship, and, of course, the Leps.  I have newer stuff on my iPod, too, (I love The Script, The Fray, Gavin DeGraw, and even some Katie Perry and Lady Gaga); but I always go back to my true love.  
It might surprise you to know that I don’t listen to music as I write.  It’s too distracting, and I’m too easily distracted already.  I have a rhythm in my head when I’m putting words on the page, so I keep the music off; though if you read my books you’ll always find music in them. When I’m not writing, there’s nothing I like more than turning on iTunes and singing at the top of my lungs. Okay, yes, and I dance, too, which freaks out the cats.
So what music do you listen to?  Do you play tunes while you write?  Has any piece of music ever influenced a storyline?  Inquiring minds want to know!

P.S.  Just for fun, my Little Black Dress video, which has very cool music (reminds me of the theme from Harry Potter!).  Take a peek!

 

Too Young for Stilettos, But…

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By Lauren Baratz-Logsted

I’m just retro enough that I use a real physical dictionary when I need to look a word up and my 11th edition of Merriam-Webster defines “stiletto” as: a dagger; an embroidery tool; a shoe.
The Sisters 8, being just seven years old, are too young to go teetering around in stilettos for very long. They’re also too young to use daggers as weapons although they are fond of the spear from the suit of armor in their drawing room. As for embroidery tools, they might take up needlecrafts if only they weren’t so busy trying to solve one very big mystery.
WHAT?

What are The Sisters 8? They’re the eponymous octuplet heroines of a nine-book series for young readers ages 6-10. At the beginning of Book 1: Annie’s Adventures, their story begins on New Year’s Eve 2007 when Dad goes out to get firewood while Mommy goes to the kitchen to get eggnog…and neither return. The Eights, as they are known, discover a note behind a loose stone in the drawing room, stating they each need to discover their individual powers and gifts before solving the mystery of what has happened. There is one book for each Eight with a ninth to wrap up all the mysteries. Book 7: Rebecca’s Rashness was just released in early May.
HOW?
How did the series come about? My family – husband Greg; daughter Jackie, who was six at the time, and I – were stranded by a blizzard for 10 days in December 2006 in Crested Butte, Colorado. So what did we do to amuse ourselves? We did exactly what you would do – we brainstormed a series of books!
WHY?
Why should you care about The Sisters 8? Because like the heroines of the novels penned by The Stiletto Gang, the Eights are powerful, mysterious, adventurous, magical heroines, who – even at age seven! – kick butt. And they do it without being old enough to wear stilettos. Each of the Eights has her own personality: capable, nurturing, complaining, even-tempered, scientific, fearful, mean, greedy. Each, over the course of their nine-book journey, must learn to work with the group and stand alone, in the process becoming a little more than the person they were before. Every day, I receive emails from kids, and even their parents and grandparents and teachers, saying, “X didn’t like to read before discovering The Sisters 8.” For a writer, at least for this writer, that’s better than anything except maybe winning the Nobel. (Actually, it’s better than the Nobel too but I’d still like some of that money Sweden hands out with the awards.)
Thanks to The Stiletto Club for letting me natter on here about one of my favorite writing topics: the series I created with my family. How lucky am I?

Lauren Baratz-Logsted is the author of 21 published books for adults, teens and young children, including the YA Victorian suspense novel The Twin’s Daughter. All of her heroines wear metaphorical stilettos even if their age or time period prevents them from literally doing so. You can read more about the first five books in The Sisters 8 at http://www.sisterseight.com/ and more about all of Lauren’s books at http://www.laurenbaratzlogsted.com/.