This month's Round Robin question: Has an event in your life, or that of someone you know, or one
covered in the news ever worked its way into one of your stories?
covered in the news ever worked its way into one of your stories?
Why, yes, yes it has! My characters are a melange of people I've met, people I've seen while people-watching, characters I've encountered in movies and television, and images and personalities that I've made up in my head. Their personalities are all my imagination.
My first published book, Never Too Old for the Game of Love, had a heroine and her best friend who were both divorced. Part of the tension in this story is that Tegan's husband rejected her long before they divorced because he was tired of fighting the fact that he prefers men. Neither of them has told their children, so their pre-teen daughter and her younger brother both blame their mother for breaking up their home.
This actually happened to a friend of mine, except for they both sat down with their kids and told them the truth. They are still friends, but I remember how shocked my friend was initially. I wanted to "give" her a happy ending, so I invented Alejandro, the consummate alpha-male who has a gentle, loving side due to his large Hispanic family and his many sisters.
What was supposed to be just one book, became two, when the best friend in the first book insisted that I write her love story next. So I wrote Recipe For Love, basing her loosely on a friend of mine who I felt was not appreciated by her husband. I wanted to give her a man worthy of her, so I invented J.T., the tall, burly, bald, and multi-tattoed Roma biker of her dreams. Plus he's younger than Patti; who doesn't want a younger man with his enhanced appetites and staying power? Woof!
Then a third, fourth, and fifth book were written when the supporting cast of family members wanted me to tell their stories also. Finally, I wrote Love Therapy, with all of the stars of the previous love stories, still happily-married and a part of the book. But Miguel's loved one has an ex-husband who was always a jerk to her. He treated her and every other woman he ever encountered, as disposable entertainment, discarding them when someone new caught his eye. But when he gets stricken with ALS, he begs her to use her nursing skills to see him through his final days in his apartment, depending on the love she used to feel for him, and her sense of compassion for all of her patients, to make his last days comfortable and private, where no nurses or other females he'd been so mean to, would be able to rejoice in his downfall.
Another friend of mine's husband had not been a good husband to her, and when he was diagnosed with ALS, I thought he was lying to her, to try to get her to feel sorry for him, despite how he had acted toward her. But she stuck by him to the end. So did another friend of mine who had become a nurse after she divorced her philandering husband, only to return to his house to nurse him through his last days as he was dying of cancer.
***
Are all of my books based on friends? No. Some came from dreams, with whole plot arcs playing out before my closed eyes, and me waking with a feverish desire to start typing right away, lest the story dissipate with the morning light. And others were solely the product of my imagination, based only on the flotsum and jetsum that floats around in my brain.
But the Reyes Family Romances are near and dear to my heart, since they were my first books, and I truly love all of the characters. Alejandro, in particular, will always be my dream man..as will J.T., and the heroes of the other books in this series. They are all compassionate and sensitive men, who are also skilled lovers who know how to please a woman. Kind of like my husband...whoops! Did I say that out-loud? While none of them physically resemble my husband, all of them reflect my belief that there are men like them in the world, since I've been lucky enough to be married to one of them for many years. So go ahead and fall in love with my heroes...they'll never let you down!
To find out what other authors think about this subject, check them out:
Victoria Chatham http://www.victoriachatham.com
Skye Taylor http://www.skye-writer.com/blogging_by_the_sea
Judith Copek http://lynx-sis.blogspot.com/
Dr. Bob Rich https://wp.me/p3Xihq-1Dm
Beverley Bateman http://beverleybateman.blogspot.ca/
Margaret Fieland http://margaretfieland.wordpress.com
Anne Stenhouse http://annestenhousenovelist.wordpress.com/
A.J. Maguire http://ajmaguire.wordpress.com/
Diane Bator http://dbator.blogspot.ca/
Rhobin L Courtright http://www.rhobincourtright.com
Connie Vines http://mizging.blogspot.com/
My first published book, Never Too Old for the Game of Love, had a heroine and her best friend who were both divorced. Part of the tension in this story is that Tegan's husband rejected her long before they divorced because he was tired of fighting the fact that he prefers men. Neither of them has told their children, so their pre-teen daughter and her younger brother both blame their mother for breaking up their home.
This actually happened to a friend of mine, except for they both sat down with their kids and told them the truth. They are still friends, but I remember how shocked my friend was initially. I wanted to "give" her a happy ending, so I invented Alejandro, the consummate alpha-male who has a gentle, loving side due to his large Hispanic family and his many sisters.
What was supposed to be just one book, became two, when the best friend in the first book insisted that I write her love story next. So I wrote Recipe For Love, basing her loosely on a friend of mine who I felt was not appreciated by her husband. I wanted to give her a man worthy of her, so I invented J.T., the tall, burly, bald, and multi-tattoed Roma biker of her dreams. Plus he's younger than Patti; who doesn't want a younger man with his enhanced appetites and staying power? Woof!
Then a third, fourth, and fifth book were written when the supporting cast of family members wanted me to tell their stories also. Finally, I wrote Love Therapy, with all of the stars of the previous love stories, still happily-married and a part of the book. But Miguel's loved one has an ex-husband who was always a jerk to her. He treated her and every other woman he ever encountered, as disposable entertainment, discarding them when someone new caught his eye. But when he gets stricken with ALS, he begs her to use her nursing skills to see him through his final days in his apartment, depending on the love she used to feel for him, and her sense of compassion for all of her patients, to make his last days comfortable and private, where no nurses or other females he'd been so mean to, would be able to rejoice in his downfall.
Another friend of mine's husband had not been a good husband to her, and when he was diagnosed with ALS, I thought he was lying to her, to try to get her to feel sorry for him, despite how he had acted toward her. But she stuck by him to the end. So did another friend of mine who had become a nurse after she divorced her philandering husband, only to return to his house to nurse him through his last days as he was dying of cancer.
***
Are all of my books based on friends? No. Some came from dreams, with whole plot arcs playing out before my closed eyes, and me waking with a feverish desire to start typing right away, lest the story dissipate with the morning light. And others were solely the product of my imagination, based only on the flotsum and jetsum that floats around in my brain.
But the Reyes Family Romances are near and dear to my heart, since they were my first books, and I truly love all of the characters. Alejandro, in particular, will always be my dream man..as will J.T., and the heroes of the other books in this series. They are all compassionate and sensitive men, who are also skilled lovers who know how to please a woman. Kind of like my husband...whoops! Did I say that out-loud? While none of them physically resemble my husband, all of them reflect my belief that there are men like them in the world, since I've been lucky enough to be married to one of them for many years. So go ahead and fall in love with my heroes...they'll never let you down!
To find out what other authors think about this subject, check them out:
Victoria Chatham http://www.victoriachatham.com
Skye Taylor http://www.skye-writer.com/blogging_by_the_sea
Judith Copek http://lynx-sis.blogspot.com/
Dr. Bob Rich https://wp.me/p3Xihq-1Dm
Beverley Bateman http://beverleybateman.blogspot.ca/
Margaret Fieland http://margaretfieland.wordpress.com
Anne Stenhouse http://annestenhousenovelist.wordpress.com/
A.J. Maguire http://ajmaguire.wordpress.com/
Diane Bator http://dbator.blogspot.ca/
Rhobin L Courtright http://www.rhobincourtright.com
Connie Vines http://mizging.blogspot.com/
