Editing, Updating, and Completing a Manuscript

 

By Kathryn Lane

Technology innovations are accelerating at warp speed. At least that’s what it seems like in my writing world.

A year-and-a-half ago, I started research about a child math prodigy interested in rockets and space travel. The story takes place in the present day. The plot revolves around a family-secret type mystery and a subplot involving the girl’s dream of space exploration.

Then my commitment to write another novel in my Nikki Garcia mystery series shelved the girl-genius project.

Recently I took up the prodigy manuscript again and realized that maybe I should re-do my research since space travel has changed – several ordinary citizens have flown to or near the Kármán line – an imaginary but practical boundary separating mere air travel from space travel. Blue Origin flew 62 miles above the earth’s surface and kissed the Kármán line while Virgin Galactic flew a bit over 50 miles, the altitude where the Federal Aviation Administration awards astronaut wings to crew members.

The real clencher is SpaceX’s flight to the International Space Station. The crew were civilians. These three events impact important details in my young girl’s story.

All of those events were anticipated in the manuscript. Yet now they’ve actually occurred and it’s possibly a game changer for me. I'm wondering if I should make several substantial edits. Not that those space companies will be mentioned specifically, but the accomplishments do impact the story.

I can leave the novel as it was originally conceived and not re-do my research or I can spend time rethinking and rewriting it. You, as writers, might tell me it’s irrelevant to update it since I’d never complete it if I keep revising for the latest space and scientific discoveries. That’s true, but these events have been groundbreaking. To ignore them would be the easy way out. Plus the developments of the past year should make a positive difference in the young girl’s story.

Regardless of whether I update or not, the novel is about three-fourths done. If I’m going to make changes, now is the time.

Has anyone else faced this issue? If you have any advice, please share it!

Kathryn's latest Nikki Garcia Mystery Thriller: Missing in Miami (available on Amazon)

About Kathryn

Kathryn Lane started out painting in oils and quickly became a starving artist. To earn a living, she became a certified public accountant and embarked on a career in international finance with a major multinational corporation. After two decades, she left the corporate world to plunge into writing mystery and suspense thrillers. In her stories, Kathryn draws deeply from her Mexican background as well as her travels in over ninety countries.

Visit my website at https://www.Kathryn-Lane.com

Photo credits:

All photographs are used in an editorial and/or educational manner

Earth Math by NASA 

Rocket Launch - Twitter

SpaceX's Dragon Capsule Docking with the International Space Station by NASA 

Why I Wrote Missing in Miami by Kathryn Lane

Location is important in my novels, yet it is only the setting. It does, however, dictate the type of story that can take place. By selecting Miami and Havana,  I had to delve into the creativity pool in my frontal cortex to select a topic bursting with possibilities for a new and interesting storyline. A storyline that would entertain readers and keep them guessing about the bad guys.

To be released on Amazon: eBook - Feb 23
Paperback Feb 21 

Stem cell therapy gave me a platform where I could build an interesting medical angle and include medical tourism as a subplot, adding the risks and rewards that such therapy can bring to those who undergo treatment. Add then a teenager in need of stem cell therapy. When she disappears, my protagonist, Nikki Garcia, is hired to try to find her.

Nikki calls on her husband’s expertise as a medical doctor to help in the case. Of course, her boss, Floyd, is there to provide access to law enforcement agencies and their information gathering. Bring in a cast of characters, locations, and situations that Nikki must maneuver.

And the hunt is on!

At some point along the path of writing a novel, something wonderous takes hold. I realize the magic is coming from somewhere outside of myself, as if the characters are directing the story. And they always make it better!

The twists and turns of a mystery novel are my favorite part of writing. I hope you will also find it fun to follow the labyrinth Nikki must travel in Missing in Miami.

 

***

Happy Lunar New Year!

NOTE: If you’d like to write an advance review, contact me at KathryLaneAuthor@gmail.com and I will send you a free copy of Missing in Miami through Book Funnel. The review needs to be posted on Amazon on February 23, the day of the eBook launch. In the review, you can mention that you received an advance copy of the novel to write a review. If you also wrote a review on BookBub and Goodreads, I’d appreciate it so much! Thank you to my Stiletto Gang friends who have already told me they will write a review!! 😊

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To Find a Monarch

 By Kathryn Lane

Mexico, my country of origin, is a cultural paradise. I always experience a nostalgic yearning for the traditions I grew up with, especially during the last quarter of the year, which is rich with festivities. Starting in September, we have holidays that spill over into multiple days, like the 15^th and 16^th of September, independence day. Posada time, from December 16^th through the 24^th, brings out families from entire neighborhoods where revelers of all ages gather in candle-lit processions singing Christmas carols along the streets until they arrive at the host house for that evening. At the designated home, the carolers sing “Para Pedir Posada” to reenact Mary and Joseph’s journey into Bethlehem asking for shelter before the birth of Jesus. The hosts, after several stanzas, invite the revelers in for food, drink, and games for the kiddos.

Wonderful as Christmas and Independence celebrations are, it’s Día de los Muertos (Day of the Dead) on November 1^st and 2^nd, that makes my soul yearn for a trip to the state of Michoacan.

When I was twelve, my mother took me to Lake Pátzcuaro to experience a vigil in a cemetery where townsfolk would commune with their departed loved ones by sharing music, dance, food, and drinks.

I’ve never forgotten the scene when we arrived. Lake Pátzcuaro’s famed butterfly net fishermen, their canoes filled with bright orange cempasúchil, or marigolds, floated on the lake like a colorful flower market. The marigolds, like rays of sun dropped along the way, to lead the ancestors’ spirits into town where ofrendas, or altars, awaited them in the private homes of their earthly relatives.

We climbed into a vividly decorated canoe to navigate to Janitzio, the largest island. On the way, Mother told me Día de los Muertos is a truly Mexican tradition, a legacy of indigenous Aztec practices. The Aztecs recognized that death was part of the continuity of life. Yet Pátzcuaro is P’urhépecha¹ territory, the other powerful Mesoamerican empire, the one the Aztecs never conquered. The two empires fought many battles. Yet, the Purépecha integrated the Day of the Dead as their own.

We were mid-lake when a butterfly brushed its brilliant orange-red wings with black veins on the golden marigolds. The fisherman smiled, saying, “Está perdido este ancestro. Debe tener familia en Rosario o Angangueo.”

Mother agreed the butterfly was lost and had overflown its winter home near mountain villages. She explained that monarchs migrate yearly from Canada and the US to the high elevations of Michoacán where they cluster on oyamel trees to spend the winter. They start arriving at the end of October, coinciding with the Day of the Dead celebrations. The local people believe the butterflies are the spirits of their ancestors returning home.

I remember asking if we would visit the monarchs.

“Another year,” she said.

Yet, we never trekked to the monarch’s overwintering sites. When I see a butterfly, it reminds me of that trip we never took.

My brother, Jorge Lane, is a nature photographer and monarchs are one of his favorite subjects. He’s visited several sanctuaries to photograph them.

Carlos Gottfried, a butterfly conservationist in Mexico, said: “When you stand in a Monarch butterfly sanctuary, your soul is shaken and your life is changed.”

Gottfried’s quote beckons me to find monarchs overwintering on Oyamel firs to fulfill that trip never taken.

¹ Also known as the Tarascan.

For fun articles on Mexican holidays, you can purchase: The Insider's Guide to the Best Mexican Holidays. It will be available in Kindle format on Amazon on December 17, 2021. Nineteen authors, including yours truly, contributed articles. 

HAPPY HOLIDAYS TO EVERYONE AT STILETTO GANG!!!

Photo credits:

Monarca Encantadora© by Jorge J. Lane

Rosario Monarca© by Jorge J. Lane

 

 

Interview with Kathryn Lane

 by Bethany Maines

Today I'm interviewing fellow Stiletto Gang member Kathryn Lane. Kathryn enjoyed a two-decade career in international finance with Johnson & Johnson before taking an early retirement from corporate life to follow her passion to write fiction. So today we're finding out more about her writing and what inspires her.  From growing up in Mexico to traveling the globe, and splitting time between Texas and New Mexico Kathryn's journey into writing has been unique.  

Q: What do you write?

I’m enamored with the mystery genre. During my corporate career, I traveled all over the world. Before a long flight to Japan, I purchased a Harlan Coben paperback at the JFK airport in New York. The twists and turns in the story slapped me around like a go-kart on uneven terrain. I was instantly smitten. Now that I’m a novelist, I write mystery and suspense.

Q: What got you excited and started you on your writing journey?

During my two decades in the corporate world, I always thought someday I’d return to painting, the object of my natural abilities. Growing up in Mexico, a country with an abundance of talented singers, I always felt left out since I could not even carry a tune.

Yet I could draw. And I could paint. By age ten, I sketched portraits and painted landscapes. Naturally, I thought I’d grow up to be an artist. Life, or perhaps destiny, had other plans. I had to earn a living, so I became a CPA and specialized in international finance. Hence my corporate travels.

Before leaving the corporate world, I analyzed what I really wanted to do. After all the countries I’d visited, it quickly became obvious I should write rather than paint. It’s exciting to pen stories set in other lands.

Q: Are you a Plotter or Pantser?

Since I’d written strategic plans, I thought I’d complete an outline for each story my brain conjured up. After all, wasn’t it like analyzing the steps in a product launch?

It didn’t work that way – my right brain took over. As much as I’ve tried to plot, my stories grow organically every day while I pound away at the keyboard. Even after deliberate attempts to speed up my writing, I struggle to plot anything. It’s normal for me not to know from one paragraph to the next what I’ll compose. Stories unfold magically in my mind like a movie reel.

Q: Who encouraged you to write?

I’m so fortunate, friends, family, and my husband are all incredibly supportive. I could not do it without the help of my husband who manages the back office details and takes on household tasks, except for cooking, to give me time to write.

Q: What secret skill do you have that our readers might not know about?

I can kill snakes. I’ve lived in places with deadly snakes, like the Inland Taipan of the Northern Territory of Australia, considered the most dangerous in the world. (One 100mg dose of Inland Taipan venom is enough to kill 100 adult humans). I’ve encountered corals and rattlesnakes of the Chihuahua desert and mountainous terrain, and now the copperheads and cottonmouths of Texas. Don’t misunderstand me. I don’t like killing snakes, but when it comes to either them or me, it’s an easy choice.

At our summer cabin in northern New Mexico, we don’t have snakes. Only bear and mountain lions and I leave them alone!

Q: And of course, I would be remiss if I didn't ask... what are your favorite shoes?

Knee-high leather boots with stiletto heels!

Connect with Kathryn!

• Website: https://www.Kathryn-Lane.com
• Newsletter sign-up: https://www.Kathryn-Lane.com
• Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/kathrynlanewriter/
• Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/kathrynlaneauthor/
• Google+ - https://plus.google.com/u/0/102104411030225875710
• Twitter -  http://twitter.com/kathrynlanebook
• BookBub - https://www.bookbub.com/profile/kathryn-lane
• Goodreads - https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/15096935.Kathryn_Lane?clear_facebook_session=true

 

Snatch up one of the globe-trotting Nikki Garcia Mysteries:

https://www.amazon.com/gp/bookseries/B08C7V2675/ref=dp_st_1942428944

**

Bethany Maines is the award-winning author of the Carrie Mae Mysteries, San Juan Islands Mysteries, Shark Santoyo Crime Series, and numerous short stories. When she's not traveling to exotic lands, or kicking some serious butt with her black belt in karate, she can be found chasing her daughter or glued to the computer working on her next novel. You can also catch up with her on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and BookBub.

Deadlines

By Kathryn Lane

I love deadlines! They revitalize me. Twists and turns in my mystery novels become more exciting once I’m approaching the deadline with my editor.

Not all deadlines are equal. Some are important; others can be juggled. Then there are deadlines I gleefully ignore.

At times, I fantasize what would happen if I missed such and such important deadline. That activity takes the form of various possible outcomes, as if I lived in a quantum world where there’s an infinite number of possibilities.

Meeting a deadline!

And it reminds me of a wonderful European film from 1998 titled, Run, Lola, Run. An experimental film at the time, the lead character, Lola, needs to acquire $100,000 deutschmarks in TWENTY minutes or her boyfriend will die. The film gives three versions of what happens. Each version is predicated on the lapse of a few seconds where random, unexpected events happen that impact Lola’s ability to obtain the money. These random events change each one of the three endings.

In the past month, I’ve had the opportunity to think about random, unexpected things that happen. Some are good, some not so good.

On the return trip from the Killer Nashville International Mystery Writers’ Conference (which was wonderful) in late August, we experienced an unexpected event.

Driving through Georgia, a speeding motorist hit us a few miles south of Atlanta. Fortunately, everyone, including the motorist who hit us, walked away with only minor bruises. A different story for the vehicles – both were totaled.

Random events, good or bad, set off unexpected consequences, which ripple through already planned events, like getting a manuscript finished for your editor.

Meeting manuscript deadlines!

As in the three outcomes in Run, Lola, Run, my mind considered various scenarios: If only we had not stopped for gas when we did, if only we had started our journey a few minutes earlier (or later) that day, if only we had been in a different lane. But we don’t live in a quantum world. Nor do we live in a world where we can restart the day and get a different outcome.

Small, unplanned events can add spice to life. Large ones, like car accidents, can create havoc on deadlines. C’est la vie.

Deadlines are important to my characters too. It’s like they’re telling me “If you write it this way, it will be better”. Or they will kick my butt, saying “Go this other direction and get our story told”.

Maybe that’s a little like the different outcomes in Run, Lola, Run. In novels, only the author knows the various endings that could have taken place.

How do you handle deadlines?  

***

Kathryn’s mysteries – The Nikki Garcia Mystery series:

https://www.amazon.com/gp/bookseries/B08C7V2675/ref=dp_st_1942428944

 

Kathryn’s short story collection – Backyard Volcano and Other Mysteries of the Heart

https://www.amazon.com/Backyard-Volcano-Other-Mysteries-Heart/dp/1943306044

 All available on Amazon

 Kathryn Lane started out as a starving artist. To earn a living, she became a certified public accountant and embarked on a career in international finance with a major multinational corporation. After two decades, she left the corporate world to plunge into writing mystery and suspense thrillers. In her stories, Kathryn draws deeply from her Mexican background as well as her travels in over ninety countries.

https://www.kathryn-lane.com

 

Clicking Our Heels - Summer Vacation Preferences

CLICKING OUR HEELS – SUMMER VACATION PREFERENCES

Can you believe summer is almost over? Three more days and no more white shoes or white pants! Before summer ends, the Stiletto Gang members thought we’d share our favorite summer vacations – indoors/outdoors, beach/mountains, or staycation.

Debra H. Goldstein:  The Beach! Something about the white capped swirling water and glistening sand is my nirvana.

Anita Carter: Definitely outdoors. One of my favorite vacations was when my husband and I traveled to Hawaii for 10 days. We island hopped. We had the best time at the beach and hiking through the mountains and around the volcanos. I’d love to go again.

T.K. Thorne: I have to see the ocean regularly or something inside doesn’t get fed. Also, I live on a mountain, so I get my tree and fresh air fix every day.

Debra Sennefelder: Staycation. I really don’t like summer weather. I much prefer air conditioning.

Kathryn Lane: My husband and I spend the summers in the mountains of northern New Mexico near Taos, where we enjoy outdoor adventures as well as watching wildlife drift by from our cabin deck.

Dru Ann Love: I like sightseeing various locations, so outdoors. Staycations are good as well.

Kathleen Kaska:  It’s the beach for me – anytime.

Robin Hillyer-Miles: Beach or staycation!

Lois Winston: I much prefer a warm getaway in the winter, but I’m not a beach person. I love exploring museums, ancient sites, and foreign cities.

Linda Rodriguez: Anymore, I’m a stay-at-home person most of the time, thanks to health issues. In summer, you’ll find me inside in the air conditioning or sitting on my spacious porch, spinning or knitting and chatting with my neighbors.

Shari Randall: I’m a culture vulture, so I’d love to somewhere with great museums and theater. I live near a beach, so I’ll admit it, I’m spoiled.

Mary Lee Ashford: My summer vacation preference would be outdoors with a beach and a book! Staycations are fun but since I’ve been working from home since March 2020, I am more than ready to see some walls that aren’t my own.

Gay Yellen: Mountains. Hiking in a cool mountain forest is the best break from summer in the city.

Lynn McPherson: I love the beach and the mountains. I'm home most of the time so when vacation time rolls around I'm ready to go explore new places.

Cathy Perkins: What is a vacation these days? When I can travel again, definitely the beach!