Power Heels

By Cathy Perkins

Aloha from Kauai, where none of us have worn shoes this week other than swim fins! 😊

This month on the blog we're celebrating friends, fellow authors, and a fun new logo—a red stiletto high heel. We’ve considered themes from fashion, to movie tie-ins and dancing, with numerous steps in between. Scroll through the posts if you’ve missed one.

I’ve thought about heels a lot over the past few weeks while I considered what they represent to me. While many images came to mind, my first impression is the suits and high heels that were part of my professional personae for so long. A west coast transfer changed the heels requirement—telecommuting tends more to fuzzy slippers and flip-flops. The professionalism expectation, however, never wavered.

I think that professionalism is one of the things that drew me to this blog. Each member of The Stiletto Gang approaches her stories in a different way, reflecting our personality and experiences, as well as how we want to tell a story. All of us are committed to bringing the best possible experience to our readers.

Holly Price, the protagonist in my amateur sleuth series, knows her heels and suits are excessive in her hometown, but to her they represent professionalism and commitment to clients—and to her family. (She’s saving the family business.) We'll leave political discussions of powerful women for another day. Of course, part of me just loves the red high heels on the cover of So About the Money, book one in the series.

To celebrate the newest book in the series—In It For The Money—book one (So About the Money) is on sale this weekend!

Enjoy!

So About the Money romps through eastern Washington with its rivers, wineries, Native American casinos, and assorted farm animals. Add in some wicked fun chemistry between the CPA amateur sleuth & a local detective and Holly Price better solve the case before the next dead body found beside the river is hers.

 Amazon   Nook   Kobo   iBooks   

Prizes!

We’re celebrating our new logo with a giveaway! Readers who comment on one of the Red Shoes blogs in September and October are entered to win either an Amazon or Starbucks $10 gift card. Join in the fun! The winner will be announced on our November Clicking Our Heels blog.

An award-winning author of financial mysteries, Cathy Perkins writes twisting dark suspense and light amateur sleuth stories.  When not writing, she battles with the beavers over the pond height or heads out on another travel adventure. She lives in Washington with her husband, children, several dogs and the resident deer herd.  Visit her at http://cperkinswrites.com or on Facebook 

Sign up for her new release announcement newsletter in either place.

She's hard at work on The Body in the Beaver Pond, which was recently presented with the Claymore Award. 

Series and Standalones

Series or Standalone? 

By Cathy Perkins

Hitting today’s Frustration Meter - getting to the end of what you thought was a really great standalone novel and stumbling onto the words "END OF BOOK ONE."  

(Yes, First World Problem.)

Worse yet - ugh - a serial novel.

Or the flip side - you reach the end of a story, and the ending is so perfect... 

...or you're like a food addict and someone just took away your cake. 

"How am I supposed to live without these characters? What happens next? How could the author be so cruel?"

Which begs the questions: Series or Standalone?

Probably the single biggest advantage to a series is if you like the characters, you can get more of their story. After a while it becomes comfortable, like hanging out with friends.  I know these people! I like them – what’s happening?

Over the course of the series, the characters can change, hopefully improving for the better, over a more realistic, longer period. As a reader, it’s easier to commit time and money if the book in a series. If you like the first one, you figure you’ll like the next one in the series, rather than chancing another random book, even another book by the same author.

The down side is, if each book in the series doesn’t have a complete and satisfying story arc of its own, you may feel you’re left hanging while waiting for the next book. Books aren't like TV shows. You don't get the next episode a week later. Also, depending on the overall story arc of the series, there may be significant threads left unresolved. This can bother a reader who has to wait for the next book.

Writing a series means every installment has to be as good as or better than the last. No rehashing of a theme. No cookie cutter plots. No formulas. Readers deserve to feel their appetite for the adventure was satisfied, and they can’t wait for the next in the series.

Another challenge is backstory. Can the reader pick up a book in the middle of the series and get enough backstory for it to make sense? Or do they have to start with book one? How much backstory does the author include in subsequent books without boring the dedicated series fan or confusing the mid-series pick-up reader?

Finally, what if a series goes too long? What if the protagonist keeps falling into the same old danger time after time? This can result in the B word: boring. You don’t want to go there.

The advantage of writing a standalone is trying new ideas or themes without the confines of your established setting and characters. Your readers can discover a new side of your talent. A standalone for a series author is like an experimental science lab. Just don’t blow up the place and go so far over the line that your fans don’t recognize you.

What do you think? 

Do you prefer reading or writing a series or standalones?

Cathy Perkins

After publishing three standalone novels, I’m easing into the series idea. DOUBLE DOWN (presale available here) features several of the characters from So About the Money (JC speaks! He finally gets a point of view!) with events right after “book one” ends. 

I’m working away on Book Two, so hopefully readers will jump on board with this new story and series.

Keep in touch at my website or sign up for my newsletter.

Grateful – With or Without (Horrors!) Wine

We’ve been talking (off and on) about gratitude this month. I poked around to some of the sites I routinely follow and have loved all the recognition this month that as individuals, as a community, (and totally avoiding politics here, but I’m gonna say it anyway) and as a nation, there’s a lot to celebrate. There’s so much good going on, but it’s easy to focus on the Not So Good (or the absolutely abysmal).

Tonight as I sip a glass of wine (always grateful to the people who make wine), I keep thinking about a challenge I read. The challenge is to focusing on the good things. Okay, admit it. Do you beat yourself up over the fumbles, the thing you might could’ve done better, and bring yourself down in the process? (Yeah, I might’ve done that.) Or do you quietly (or loudly if that’s your style ;) ) give thanks for the good things in your life?

I’m choosing to focus on the good. That we can reach out to each other within the writing community -- and beyond it to our local town or whatever sphere you can touch -- and make things better.

I’ll save talk about community service for another post. Tonight, rather than wallow in the Not So Good, I’m celebrating the Good Things.

This week I’m savoring that after a year and a half in a tiny apartment (which was also my day job office), we moved into our new house! I walk through the rooms and revel in the space. (I have a dining table again. A place to have friends over where they can actually sit down.) And art that’s been in storage for too long is slowly finding a new place in our home.  

I’m grateful for family. My daughter asked if she and her fiancé could have their engagement pictures taken at our house. I’m so happy for the two of them, that they found each other and that they want to include us as they forge a life together.

I’m grateful for friends on so many levels. Old friends who are helping me out professionally and new friends who are easing the transition into a new home and new options for the future.

What are you savoring this week? What are you grateful for?

And because it’s So About The Money’s book birthday, I’m putting together a present for my readers, because I’m always grateful when people choose to spend their time with my characters. 

Watch my Facebook page for details or sign up for the newsletter that I swear I'm finally going to send out. 

Cathy Perkins started writing when recurring characters and dialogue populated her day job commuting daydreams. Fortunately, that first novel lives under the bed, but she was hooked on the joy of creating stories. When not writing, she can be found doing battle with the beavers over the pond height or setting off on another travel adventure. Born and raised in South Carolina, she now lives in Washington with her husband, children, several dogs and the resident deer herd.

You can also visit her online at the following places:  Website | Facebook | Twitter | Goodreads

Actions Speak Much, Much Louder Than Words

I picked up a new craft book (aren’t all authors addicted to improving their craft?) that has me excited about writing again. Part of my funk over the winter had been that writing seemed yet another job - with a long list of Must Do tasks - and like most of you, I had too many balls in the air already.

I wanted to buckle down and just write the damn book. I actually had people contact me and ask when the next in the Holly Price/ So About series would release—which should make me feel happy rather than pressured. Right?

Anyway, I stumbled over two books titled The 90-Day Novel. 

Okay then! 90-days! Score! (Is this where I admit it takes me a year to write a novel?)

The first craft book was a disappointment. It contained a very summarized rehash of things we’ve all heard a million times. Set your turning points, make the index cards, park your butt and go.

Yawn. 

The other one, by Alan Watt, hit the note I needed to hear. Step back and consider the possibilities, he recommended. What if…? 

What are you afraid of? Your heroine probably has the same fears. Can you work with that? Lots (and lots) of 5 minute writing drills occurred during the first week, but none of it needed to appear directly in the book. I was encouraged to scribble images, scenes, scene-lets, ideas, whatever. No pressure, because nobody was going to read or critique it. It was playing with words, which I hadn’t done in ages. It was diving into what I was passionate about—and how that drives my story. 

And through the process, the dilemma, which is the root perception cause of the problem (which is what your protag thinks she’s trying to solve) evolves. I realized “trust” is the emotion I needed to tap into and now, everything else is falling into place. The conflicts between all my characters really come down to that one, very basic emotion. Trust is crucial for a relationship. All relationships. Relationships between friends, family, lovers.

Trust is what happens when actions speak much, much louder than words. You can’t make someone trust you. From Holly’s perspective, when others’ actions are undermining her trust in them, going with what she believes is the right thing to do will show others she’s trustworthy—and hopefully won’t get her killed. 

I started this craft book adventure in connection with my own 100x100 challenge (a friend who’s 300 days in inspired me). The 100x100 challenge is to write at least 100 words every day for 100 days. Three weeks into in, I’ve filled half a spiral notebook. And the scenes, plot, and subplots are coming into focus. 

How’s your writing going this summer?

Cathy Perkins is currently working on Book Two in the Holly Price/So About series. So About the Money was blessed by readers and booksellers with the Award of Excellence – Best Novel with Strong Romantic Elements. 

A spin-off in that series, Malbec Mayhem features one of the secondary characters and is available now.

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