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Impostor Syndrome
I’ve recorded about forty episodes of my conversation series Making It Up, and I find it fascinating how different each writer is. Rarely do any two of my interviewees share the exact same writing habits and routines, roads to publication, or approaches to style. Yet...
Halloween Scream Reel
For this year's Halloween theme I was going to convert my entire garage into a disco inferno (picture Bee Gees with Satan masks), but decided it was best during a pandemic not to make little kids walk through an enclosed area (next year!). So I went back to...
What’s Your Thing?
Welcome to October, which is a great time if you're into all things creepy, spooky, or otherwise tinged in darkness. And fortunately I am. You see, apparently it's my thing. We all have a thing, I suppose. Like your aunt in Florida who, for whatever reason, likes...
What If?
Screw outlining.That’s easy for me to say, because I suck at it. Sure, I had tried outlining very early on in my career, but never in earnest. So after I'd written a few books, I decided to give it a serious go—notecards and everything. I spent nearly six months...
Musings – Audiobook Edition!
After years of writing my musings I decided to do something a little different this month. Audiobook musings! Same great content, but now I get to ramble on with a microphone instead of a keyboard. I discuss my experiences with my new conversation series Making It Up,...
A Review of Reviews
You know what interviewers like to ask? They always like to ask if I read my own reviews, and they ask in a way that always makes me think they're going to feel sorry for me no matter how I answer. Oh, poor, thing, you do? OR Oh, you don't? That's...
Now What?
With the launch of my seventh book now more than a month behind me, it's natural to wonder what I should be doing now. In books past, during the few weeks post-launch I would obsessively monitor sales ranking (It just hit #1,054 in Domestic Thrillers Featuring...
Making It Up
I enjoy talking to people. Mostly. I believe everyone has a good story to tell. The trick is getting the story out of them, and I love that challenge. Likewise, I hate small talk, and am slowly dying inside whenever the discussion turns to weather or...
How a Book is Born
This month my seventh novel will officially launch. Maybe "will be born" is a better phrase, considering how many of my titles have either had boy or girl in them. In this case, my publisher will be giving birth to a dead husband, and I'm not sure what kind of...
I Remember
I write a lot about memory in my books. Good memories, bad memories, and especially false memories. My dad was diagnosed with early-onset Alzheimer's at the age of 62 and he passed at 69, so the horror of slipping into a milky haze of one's own existence has never...
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