I was so delighted last month to see that I was A Slice of Orange’s featured author for June!
The post had a picture of me holding one of my books, plus it contained some of my covers in several of my series, including both romance and mystery. It also contained a description of me and my writing. It looked great!
I don’t use social media as much as I should, but first thing I thought of was sharing the post on my Facebook page to let people know about it—which I did.
And now, on my usual post on the 6th of each month—July 2018 this time—I want to thank A Slice of Orange for featuring me!
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Linda O. Johnston started publishing fiction with a series of short stories for Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. The first story, “Different Drummers” won the Robert L. Fish Memorial Award for best first mystery short story in 1988.
Her first novel published in 1995, A Glimpse of Forever was a time travel romance for Love Spell. Since then she has written over 40 novels . . . mysteries, paranormal romance, romantic suspense and more.
Pets and especially dogs frequently show up in Linda’s novels. She has written for Berkley Prime Crime, The Kendra Ballantyne Pet-Sitter Mysteries, which was a spin-off of the Pet Rescue Mysteries and for Midnight Ink The Superstition Mysteries.
She is currently writing three different series. Her most current releases are Pick and Chews, the fourth Barkery & Biscuits Mystery from Midnight Ink, Second Chance Soldier, in the K-9 Ranch Rescue series for Harlequin Romantic Suspense and Protector Wolf, a paranormal romance for Harlequin Nocturne.
In addition to blogging for A Slice of Orange on the 6th of every month, Linda blogs at Killer Hobbies, Killer Characters, the Midnight Ink authors blog, and Writerspace.
Linda enjoys hearing from readers. Visit her website at www.LindaOJohnston.com or friend her on Facebook.
One of the questions I’m commonly asked is how do you write dialogue? No question, dialogue between characters can be tricky. Each character has a unique voice that is distinct from others in the book.
Since I’ve never been particularly good at description, letting the characters tell the story is my favorite way to craft a novel.
Of course there has to be narration, ways to move the story forward and set the scene. A lot of writers simply have a different way of telling a tale, maybe through a single character’s actions and observations or just a majority of narrative. But if you want to move the book forward through dialog, here are a few helpful tricks.
First, enter the scene late and leave early. Readers don’t want to hear “How are you?” “I am fine.”
Second, once the characters start talking, let them talk—you can always delete or alter the conversation later. But the fun is in hearing what the characters have to say.
Third, something I’m careful about, try not to overwork unfinished sentences. “What do you mean you didn’t—“ Or “I don’t think you should—“ What? Readers can’t read minds. Yes, this is how people talk in real life, but your job is to make it sound like real conversation while it’s actually more fleshed out, easier to understand.
Fourth, be sure to use contractions to make the character’s speech sound more real. Unless you have a character who says things like “I cannot do that,” use “can’t” or “won’t,” or “don’t” or whatever.
So now that you know some of tricks, you just have to listen to your characters and get them talking in your head—which I think is at least partly determined by how you describe them.
Once I sat in front of the post office with the car windows rolled up and tried to hear the voice of every person walking out. It was amazing—no two voices sounded the same! A strange story but true.
So listen to the voices in your head. That’s my best advice. And just keep writing. It gets easier as you go along.
Bestselling author Kat Martin is a graduate of the University of California at Santa Barbara where she majored in Anthropology and also studied History. Currently residing with her Western-author husband, L. J. Martin, in Missoula, Montana, Kat has written sixty eight Historical and Contemporary Romantic Suspense novels. More than sixteen million copies of her books are in print and she has been published in twenty foreign countries. Her last novel is BEYOND CONTROL, which will be released May 29th.
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Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/36190397-beyond-control
Victoria Bradford and her four-year old daughter are on the run from Tory’s abusive ex-fiancé. Seventy miles north of Dallas, the Iron River Ranch is pretty much nowhere, exactly what Josh Cain wanted when he came back from Afghanistan. Big skies, quiet nights, no trouble.
When Tory shows up with her adorable little girl, Josh realizes he is in for trouble of the most personal kind. But Josh has seen trouble before, and he doesn’t scare easy. Not when “accidents” start happening around the ranch. Not when Tory’s best friend is abducted. Not even when he realizes their troubles are only the tip of the iceberg.
To CELEBRATE the release of BEYOND CONTROL, enter Kat’s new contest for a chance to win a KINDLE FIRE 7″ Display, Wi-Fi, 8 GB and a Kindle copy of AGAINST THE WIND, AGAINST THE FIRE and AGAINST THE LAW.
Special Contest runs from May 1, 2018 through June 30, 2018.
SPECIAL CONTEST: https://www.katmartin.com/beyond-control-giveaway/
Monthly Contests
For MAY, Kat Martin is giving away to THREE winners a copy of both INTO THE FURY and MIDNIGHT SUN.
For JUNE, Kat Martin is giving away to THREE winners a copy of both INTO THE FIRESTORM and SEASON OF STRANGERS.
Monthly Contests: https://www.katmartin.com/monthly-contest/
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Alaska tour boat guide Stacie Calder faces the deep freeze
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