Here is what you’re going to find out about me today:<\/p>\n
What am I working on now?<\/strong> Right now I\u2019m working on promotion. Guest blogs, workshops, author appearances. That is all. I am, of course, thinking. I must get started on the eighth Alafair Tucker mystery. Some of it has already been written. I know who the featured characters are going to be, and I know what is going to be happening in the world during the month and year that the story will be set. I know the basic source of conflict. World War I has begun, and contrary to what we now think about the attitudes of the country when America entered the war, at the time about half the country thought we had no business getting involved in the European conflict. Feelings were running high and hot on both sides of the question. Certainly hot enough for murder. I just don\u2019t know yet who\u2019s going to get murdered or who did the murdering.<\/p>\n How does my work differ from other books in its genre?<\/strong> The Alafair Tucker series is unlike most traditional mysteries being published today. It is set during the pre-World War I, an era that is becoming increasingly popular with readers of historicals, but it takes place in eastern Oklahoma and features a 40ish farm wife with ten children. Possibly the least-hip idea for a protagonist and setting ever though of. But I don\u2019t care. Why do I write what I do? I\u2019m tired of urban cool. I want to write about the people who are really important. The people who create the world, the mothers and fathers and quiet providers of homes and food and education and civilization itself. That\u2019s the hard stuff, my dears. That\u2019s the stuff of heros. Transformers and cage fighters and gun-toters, spies and drag-racers, femmes fatale, that\u2019s just fluff. Ego-stroking fantasy. I want to write about air, water, and earth. The basics, and the people who are brave enough and strong enough to muscle through.<\/p>\n How does my writing process work?<\/strong> I have to tell you the truth. I don\u2019t know. Ideas come to me from the oddest places–from something I\u2019ve read, or some off-hand comment someone says within earshot of me (be careful what you say around a writer). Once or twice from a dream I\u2019ve had. In any event, the idea gets in my head one way or another and wiggles around in there for a while. Eventually it begins to take shape and I think, \u201cThat might make a good story.\u201d Then I do research. I choose a narrow time period, such as April of 1917, and start reading the April 1917 newspapers from anywhere in eastern Oklahoma to see what was going on in the world and what Oklahomans were thinking about it. This usually adds layers of story to my basic idea. Then I ponder some more, make a few notes, and then start writing. When I begin, I usually know where I want the story to go. It never ends up there. Where it does end up is as big a surprise to me as to anyone. It\u2019s usually better than I had planned, so thus far I have no reason to complain.<\/p>\n The three sets of authors I’m tagging are:<\/p>\n Sally Smith and Jean Steffens<\/a><\/p>\n Arizona native Sally J. Smith lives in Scottsdale with her husband. The rarest of breeds, a native Arizonan, she has been a writer since she could spell. These days she stays busy at her chosen professions of writing and freelance editing. Jean Steffens also lives in\u2028Scottsdale with her family. \u2028She’s a mother, reader, \u2028movie fan, and the Steffens’ \u2028family chauffeur. She’s \u2028active in church activities. \u2028Busy lady. Jean grew up in \u2028Chicago near Lake Forest \u2028where Jordan Welsh, P.I., \u2028grew up.<\/p>\n Jean and Sally are the authors of Stealing the Moon and Stars<\/strong>.\u00a0Dollar by dollar, a fortune is being leeched from the bank account of a children’s charity. Scottsdale P.I.s Jordan Welsh & Eddie Marino vow to stop the despicable, corrupt larceny or die trying. And the case is so complex and low down, it’s beginning to look like one may happen before the other.<\/p>\n Dane McCaslin<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n![\"Small_Smith_&_Steffens\"](\"http:\/\/www.doniscasey.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/06\/Small_Smith__Steffens-300x232.jpg\")
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