Chocolate City Justice

With the book launch of Jambalaya Justice barely over, I finally had some time over the break to work on Chocolate City Justice. My publisher recently contacted me about a possible July release day, to time it to coordinate with the PSWA writer's conference, a conference in Las Vegas I try to attend every year.

The deadline was a little short, so I suggested a release date later in the year, but the question did bring working on the novel back into my focus again. I mainly worked on retooling the outline, something I'm still in the process of doing.

When I write, I do an initial outline. I then start writing, and after several chapters I realize it's missing something, whether it's one of the secondary plot lines, a supporting character, a scene, whatever it is, I go back and modify the outline.

Right now, I have the initial outline and about 30,000 words written, but I've had to change the outline and in doing that realized a few issues that have to be resolved. So I've stopped the forward progress of actually writing the novel to tinker with the outline and make the story better.

This is a process I'll do several times before the book is ready to go to my publisher. So while it won't be ready in July, it should be ready before the end of 2012.

In between the writing and the retooling the outline, I'll continue to promote Jambalaya Justice and Gumbo Justice until I can announce the release of the third in the series.

Jambalaya Justice Book Launch Party

I am finally having the book launch party for Jambalaya Justice, Saturday, December 17, at our bar, the Last Stand, 424 Destrehan in Harvey, LA. I say finally because the book was actually out in July, although we had it pulled once for some minor issues and re-issued. A few copies went out with the "issues", but I wanted to wait until the final version was out in hard copy and Kindle to officially launch the book.

Time kind of got away from me, as it has a habit of doing. I try to figure out where all the hours of the day go, and I can't seem to do it. I do keep busy with my youngest daughter's school as PTO president. Very busy. I also spend much of time on what I call my "job-job", criminal appeals for clients I get appointed to represent. Then I write legal articles every week for a publisher on Helium.

Oh, and did I forget to mention I write books? Not to mention have two kids, a husband, a cat, a dog, and some fish. Now I think I see where all the time goes, although I think I work on too schizophrenic of a level to categorize the time spent or put it on a chart.

I'm working on Chocolate City Justice right now. The third in the Crescent City Mystery Series will take Ryan, my protag, directly through hurricane Katrina. It kind of brings back bad memories, writing the book, but when I see how far we've come since then, it does tend to make me feel a little bit better. At least we don't have those post-Katrina flies the size of birds any longer. (My cup-still half full.)

BOB DOERR GUEST BLOG

Today, special guest and fellow PSWA member Bob Doerr, author of ANOTHER COLORADO KILL (and 3 other novels, with another on the way in 2012), joins me and explains why he chooses to write fiction. Bob has had a fascinating career in criminal investigations and counterintelligence in the military, which would explain why his books are so authentic and how he is able to come up with the ideas for his novels. He now writes full-time, which I greatly admire (and perhaps envy a little!)

FICTION OR NONFICTION

by Bob Doerr

As an author of four fiction books,I’ve often been asked if I ever plan on writing a nonfiction book. It’s a simple question that I can give a simple answer to. Yes, I would like to. However, there really is a lot more to it, and that reality I find somewhat intimidating.

In fact, I’ve had fellow authors, more successful than me, come up to me and say, “I write nonfiction. I don’t think I could ever come up with enough ideas to write fiction. I’m sure that I would get writer’s block on every page. It’s so much easier to write nonfiction.”

I hear them, and I want to believe them, but are they really just playing with me? I remember a high school teacher once admonishing me about the history paper I had submitted as part of a test. “Bob, anybody can make up stuff. I expect my students to do a little studying and write about what did happen.” The sad part is that I had studied.

Maybe, making things up simply comes natural for me. I remember one autumn day driving through Maryland with my wife and five year old daughter. “Look at those leaves,” I told my daughter. “All those colors are caused by little elves that come out at night and paint the leaves when the weather turns cold.”

“Daddy, I thought it had something to do with chlorophyll.” No lie, that’s exactly what she said. It floored me, but she explained her first grade teacher had explained the photosynthesis process that same day in school.

Writing book length non-fiction and making it interesting to read has got to be really difficult. I admire those that can do it. The research, documentation, organization, and everything else that goes into writing a nonfiction book infers hard work. I mean isn’t it easier to blame it on the elves than to learn the real science?

I enjoy reading nonfiction and there are a lot of real stories out there that interest me and beg to be told. I have a couple in mind and hope to get to them some day, but in the meantime, I’ll stay focused in my world of make believe, sinister plots, murder and mayhem. Oh, it’s so much easier!

ABOUT BOB

Bob Doerr grew up in a military family, graduated from the Air Force Academy, and thenhad a twenty eight year career of his own in the Air Force. It was a life style that exposed him to the people and cultures of numerous countries in Asia, Europe and to most of these United States.

Bob specialized in criminal investigations and counterintelligence gaining significant insight to the worlds of crime, espionage and terrorism. His field of work brought him into close contact and coordination with the investigative and security agencies of many different countries and with the FBI and CIA. This background has helped Bob develop the fictional plots and characters in his books.

His education credits include a Masters in International Relations from Creighton University. Bob is now a full time author, with four mystery/thrillers already published and a fifth to be released in the fall, 2012. Two of his books, Cold Winter’s Kill and Loose Ends Kill, were selected as finalists for the Eric Hoffer Award. Loose Ends Kill was also awarded the 2011 Silver medal for Fiction/mystery by the Military Writers Society of America. He lives in Garden Ridge, Texas, with Leigh, his wife of 38 years.

Emerging Novelists

I'm excited today to be featured on Emerging Novelists, a site that features, well, emerging novelists. It sounds so much better than unknown author or something like that. The interview is at http://emergingnovelists.com/Interviews.html and the background info is at http://emergingnovelists.com/index.html

Interviews are a part of promotion, and it's difficult sometimes to know how much of your personal life to reveal to strangers. On one hand, you want to be interesting, so you want to make sure you mention those things that will make readers want to read your books, but you also don't want to put your entire life on display for the world to see.

Fortunately, the most interesting things about me are public record. No, I don't have any convictions, although that certainly would make me seem more interesting. But I was in a serious head-on collision with a drunk driver, something people find notable. I also own a bar in the metro N.O. area, which sounds a whole lot more interesting than it is, although it does provide ideas for some pretty interesting characters.

So while I didn't reveal any deep, dark secrets, hopefully I provided enough personal and background information to draw a reader's attention.

Interview on Morgen Bailey's Blog

An interview for Jambalaya Justice is up at Morgan Bailey's blog at http://wp.me/p18Ztn-Xf
Morgan Bailey is an extremely nice person and an excellent interviewer. She has a way of making an interview spring from the page and not sound so, well, interview-ish. I have not yet had the chance to read any of her writer, but hope to soon.

There is also an excerpt from the third in the series, Chocolate City Justice, which is in progress.

On to another topic, my contest winner, Pamela Briggs, who won the naming of a character in Jambalaya Justice (she picked a stripper), and who I now consider a friend, visited me in New Orleans a few weeks back and I have to say we had a fantastic time.

I was a little nervous not knowing what to expect, wondering if she would run out of our bar screaming, thinking we were insane. I don't know is she thinks we're crazy or not, but she didn't run out and we had a great time talking about family, mysteries, reading, and our rival football teams. It's amazing how much you can have in common with someone you've never met who lives all the way across the country. I can't wait for her and her husband two come visit us again. (And Pam, I finally got my copies of Jambalaya Justice with the new cover, so I'll be sending out your copy soon if you're reading this!)

Now I am busy working on promoting, as well as writing Chocolate City Justice, working on my cases for my "job-job", writing legal articles for my other "job-job", and doing what I need to as president of my youngest daughter's school co-op (similar to PTA or PTO.)

I can always sleep when I'm dead.

KEITH BETTINGER 9/11 GUEST BLOG

What Was It Like When…?

I enjoy studying history. I watch the history channel, read the tomes of Stephen Ambrose, and love to read historical novels. I am a baby boomer, a member of the generation that came to be when our heroes returned from World War II.

When I read about the attack on Pearl Harbor I wonder what went through the minds of the American public as they heard the news that the American Military had been attacked. I wondered what it was like to be suddenly pulled into a war. My mother can still tell me stories about rationing, food and gas coupons, and friends going off to war. Every community has a memorial to those friends and heroes who did not return.

The war of my generation was a long and protracted one. It too has many heroes that are now growing gray. It was not like World War II. It had been around for years, and slowly swallowed up the youth of the United States. Our veterans were not treated with the respect they deserved. The Viet Nam war did not answer for our generation the question, what was it like when Pearl Harbor was attacked.

Now we have our answer. On September 11, 2001, terrorists stole our aging innocence. On that day, America was plunged into a new war; probably different than any other it has ever fought. This time our military was not the only target. Symbols of American pride were destroyed. Along with the twin towers went thousands of civilians working in many different occupations, while they tried to secure the American dream. Stolen from us along with all those civilians are the heroes of the New York City Fire Department, the New York City Police Department the Port Authority Police Department and the military and civilian personnel at the Pentagon, who went
into the burning buildings to rescue people while others were fleeing for their lives.

In the history of law enforcement and fire fighting, losses of these staggering proportions have never been seen before. The losses from this horrific event took more lives than those lost during the attack on Pearl Harbor.

Baby Boomers, who wanted to know what it was like when Pearl Harbor was attacked and America was plunged into war, now have their answer. The "other" generation can tell you where they were on December 7, 1941. Many generations can tell you where they were when they received the news that President John F. Kennedy was killed, and now we all will remember where we were on September 11, 2001. We now know what it was like when the United States was attacked and plunged into war. It has happened to us. May God Bless America!

JAMBALAYA JUSTICE

Jambalaya Justice is finally available through Amazon.com, Bn.com, independent book stores, and other websites where books are sold. I will also have some available int he near future from my website, but have to get my computer guy (translation, brother-in-law) to add the info to sell through Paypal. It's supposed to be easy to do, but for some reason I couldn't get it accomplished on the Gumbo Justice website and had to get him to do it for me. But that's what family is for, right?

In any event, I was pleased to see it is finally out, although it is not yet available on Kindle or Nook, but hope it would be soon. I saw today purely through luck that someone has already done a really nice review of the book.

Soon, I will be re-organizing my blog to include guest bloggers, interviews and book reviews, and am continuing to work on the third in the Crescent City Mystery Series, Chocolate City Justice, which is a little darker as it opens as Katrina approaches and follows the various characters through the hurricane.

And of course I'll be getting word of Jambalaya Justice out there. Hope you enjoy it.