Silent Deceptions/Idea for a Novel

It's Friday, a good day made even better by my guest blogger, Dorothy Ann Skarles.

Today, she shares an idea that is fermenting in her mind about a suspense novel she is thinking about writing.

Welcome Dorothy.

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My publisher, Twilight Times Books, has a book out titled, How I Wrote My First Book, told by 20 authors, including me, about what went into writing their first book.   

A Scent Of Diamonds was my first suspense/mystery, followed by Enchanted Hunt and then the non-fiction book Learning To Write The Easy Way.

However, today I have another book in mind called SILENT DECEPTIONS


My idea for suspense in a novel is to create tension, that bad feeling that trouble is on the way. A bad situation generates suspense along with efforts made by the protagonist to solve the problem:  Will she or won't she?

This conflict can be personal or psychological. Man against man/woman. Man against himself/herself. Man against nature. A story begins when the conflict begins, and ends when the conflict is resolved. The more conflict you have, the more suspense you have.

Here is a sample draft of my idea…

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Silent Deceptions

A chill ran down Tiffany's spine as she scanned the room.  It was getting more crowded by the minute. People were full of Christmas cheer, all laughing, talking and having a jolly good time. How she hated it! Hated it all! If only she were more skilled at lip reading. For that matter, if only she didn't need to wear the damn hearing aids, those modern devices that carried frequencies and tones.  But in this crowd, even the best hearing aids wouldn't let her hear the way she wanted to. There were too many sounds, and too much music being funneled into peoples' ears, as if they, too, were deaf.

She searched the room and spotted her husband, Spencer, talking to another man in full Santa regalia. Instead of a black belt around his waist like the other Santa's in the room, this particular Santa wore a white one. He kept pulling down on his beard as if he were having trouble talking through the bunched-up hair strands. Tiffany smiled to herself. Spencer had refused to wear a white beard. He said the hairy thing got in his mouth.

She leaned her body against a tall pillar and tried to concentrate on reading peoples lips. It was the only way for her to know what was going on.

She saw Spencer's lips move. "Kill!"

Tiffany dropped the black belt she'd been holding in her hand.

Words formed on the inside of the mouth were hard to read. She might have mistaken the letter K for a T.

But no! The word her husband had used was kill; she was sure of it,

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My question to you is:  Do the first few lines catch your interest to read more? Please tell me what you think.

Dorothy.

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Here's your chance to help a writer decide if she should spend months developing an idea, and then possibly years revising it until it's ready for publication.

Would you read more?  

Any suggestions? 

Thanks for stopping by,

Margaret

Dash Off A Memory/Create A Memoir/Humor and Research

Dorothy Ann Skarles, my critique partner and a long-term-guest-blogger here at Enter the Between, is back with some questions to help generate ideas for your story/memoir.

With a little research, she says, this could also be a good article for a magazine or local newspaper.



Welcome Dorothy.

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Today, taking a side road from bereavement, my funny bone got tickled when I read the following quote.

"The reason why so few good books are written

is that so few people who can write know anything."

--Walter Baghot. 

This struck me as funny because I have written for three newspapers, had a cooking column, wrote a suspense/mystery, Scent Of Diamonds, a fantasy/suspense, Enchanted Hunt, and a nonfiction book, Learning To Write The Easy Way, published by Twilight Times Books.  And I didn’t know anything.

But I did learn.

When I say you can write a story from personal knowledge, it's true. And you can sell it, too.

I wrote my first short story about a poker game my father told me about, and it sold. I called it, “The Poker Game.”

So now it's your turn to begin---

Dash Off A Memory/Create A Memoir

By purolipan

Here are ten questions to help generate ideas to write your own story for all who play (or don't play) golf. 

With a little research, this could also be a good article for a magazine or a local newspaper. 

Keep an open mind and give it a try.

Rules At Local Golf Links

1. Does the golf course you play on have any strange local rules?  Louisiana golfers,for instance, are warned not to wade into a pound in search of their balls—because of alligators.  And on the Saturday golf channel it was announced that golfer Ryiyi Imada was assessed a 26-stroke penalty after he failed to read the local rules sheet at a tournament in China.
2. Do you ever take it out on your clubs while playing with someone or during a tournament?
3. Do you ever do something not approved of in official play?
4. Ever break your putter?
5. What kind of golf course was it? Was it difficult and why?
6. Ever use profane language?  What happened when you did?
7. Play on any famous golf courses and how much did it cost you?
8. Ever fined? How much and what did you do to get fined?
9. Did you play with a partner and why? Or do you like to play alone, and why?
10. Ever makeup a rule?

Remember, a good memoir is doing a little research about every day things by a person who has personal knowledge of their topic . Good luck writing.

daskarles© 2011

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Thanks Dorothy