Clicking Our Heels: No New Year's Resolutions Because Our Noses Are to the Grindstone

Clicking Our Heels – No New Year’s Resolutions Because Our Noses Are to the Grindstone

WE LIKED DOING A GIVEAWAY SO MUCH, WE'RE DOING ONE EVERY MONTH ON CLICKING OUR HEELS DAY (FIRST WEDNESDAY OF THE MONTH)!

To enter for a chance to win Paula Benson's Let it Snow and Debra H. Goldstein's One Taste Too Many just comment on this blog with your what you are working on whether writing or in some other area of life. Good luck and happy reading! -- winner will be announced next Wednesday on The Stiletto Gang Facebook page - https://www.facebook.com/stilettogang 

Most people make New Year’s Resolutions, but the Stiletto Gang is a busy group. Today, we’re going to tell you what each of us is working on and how it differs, if it does, from things we’ve written in the past.

Julie Mulhern – I am currently plotting the ninth Country Club Murder – more Ellison, more Anarchy, more murder, and, of course, more Mr. Coffee.

Juliana Aragon Flatula – I recently was invited to submit to the Colorado Online Encyclopedia by the Colorado Poet Laureate, Joseph Hutchinson. It will help K-12 teachers search online for poetry using key words. I submitted ten of my poems and look forward to seeing the website.

Cathy P. Perkins – I’m currently working on the sequel to The Body in the Beaver Pond, which just won the Claymore Award (squee!). I’m also slowly moving forward with a more literary mystery, a book I’ve wanted to write for years, but promised not to touch until after my father died.

Kay Kendall – My first two mysteries are set in the late 1960s and feature a young woman named Austin Starr. She becomes an amateur sleuth in order to prove her new husband is not a murderer, and then she continues when her best friend becomes a prime suspect. The book titles are from Bob Dylan songs:  Desolation Row and Rainy Day Women. My third mystery debuts in early 2019 and is a prequel about Austin’s grandmother, set in small town Texas during the Roaring Twenties. Because I have no emotional attachment to that decade, it was easier and more fun to write. The prequel is called After You’re Gone, also the name of a tune that is still covered by artists today, including Ella Fitzgerald and Fiona Apple among many others.

J.M. Phillippe – I feel like I am really leaning in to world building these days, and really enjoying creating worlds for my characters to run around in.  It does make it harder to come back to the actual plot sometimes though.

Bethany Maines – Ohhhhh. I’m not sure this is a conversation we have time for. I’m working on another sci-fairy novel to be part of the Galactic Dreams universe that I share with two other authors (Karen Harris Tully and J.M. Phillippe). Then I’ve got a Christmas mystery novella that may or may not get done in time for Christmas, a literary thriller, and another San Juan Islands Murder Mystery novel.

Debra H. Goldstein – I’m working on Three Treats Too Many, the third book in my Sarah Blair mystery series while preparing to launch the series’ first book, One Taste Too Many in January. I’m also working on a group of new short stories.

Linda Rodriguez – I’ve been making notes for a literary novel that my agent wants me to write. It will be a different experience from writing the mysteries. I think it’s going to take a longer time to completion. I’m just sort of feeling my way through it right now. I have written literary short fiction before, but not for a long time. So I’m really looking forward to it.

Shari Randall – I’m working on a standalone. It’s a thriller with humorous elements based on a character in a short story I wrote called “The Objective Case” in the Chesapeake Crimes: This Job is Murder anthology. She’s been bugging me to write her into a novel for years – I’m having a blast!

 TK Thorne – I’m stepping way out of my comfort zone with my new Magic City Trilogy. My previous books have been historical fiction set in the ancient past about strong women, given no name and one line in the biblical stories (Noah’s wife and Lot’s wife), as well as civil rights era nonfiction. But House of Rose, the first book, is set in current time with a different kind of strong woman – a police officer with abilities to see glimpses of the past or future. I called on a previous career in law enforcement and mixed it with large doses of imagination.

Paula Gail Benson – I’m working on some darker stories now. Learning how to respect the villain’s rationale while still making sure justice prevails is a challenge!

AB Plum – Although I’m writing a paranormal romance trilogy loosely based on The Wizard of Oz – quite different from the dark, psychological thrillers series I recently finished, the major themes – family and misfits – remain constant.

Dru Ann Love – Because I’m not a writer, my blog, dru’s book musings, keeps me busy.

Judy Penz Sheluk – I’m working on book 3 for both of my mystery series (The Glass Dolphin and Marketville), but I’m also starting to do research for a collection of non-fiction essays, as well as a non-fiction novel. The non-fiction doesn’t have a mystery element.