……..of AMERICAN DERVISH by Ayad Akhtar

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Timestamp: 2012-01-25 23:33:24 UTC

Karen Gonyea    Very intriguing 

  FB friend: Teresa Sprague Lukey

An email has been sent to the winners and they have 48 hours to respond with their mailing address or another winner will be chosen.   Thank you to those that entered.

It has been 2 years now that I have had my blog and been part of the cyber world of book blogging and reviewing.   Two years!!  And I am enjoying it and am as enthusiastic today as I was that first day.   And it still amazes me that authors contact me and ask if I would review their book and/or visit my blog.  Today is one of those days.  So please help me welcome my guest, Ms. Harlow Coban!

ABOUT HARLOW COBAN

She spends her free time writing, dancing, traveling and defending mailboxes from her 16-year-old twins’ driving.

She loves to connect with her readers and can be found on Twitter , Facebook , and her website 

HOW TO WRITE A NOVEL BASED ON A TRUE STORY

BY

HARLOW COBAN, AUTHOR OF LIFE IN DEATH

 

My story isn’t a warm and fuzzy one.

My father was murdered when I was 12 years of age.

A few years ago, at my uncle’s urging, I looked into what happened to him. The police had suspects, but no one was ever arrested and the case remains unsolved.

I learned a lot about police procedure when I looked into my father’s murder. It was then that I decided to write a novel.

While my murder mystery novella, Life in Death, is not entirely based on what happened to my father, it draws from real life experiences I had with him.

Writing the novel was a cathartic experience for me. What I liked most, and found particularly cleansing, about the experience was my power to spin the story as I saw fit.

We all love, hate, laugh, cry, and everything in between, so we’re never at a loss for stories to tell.

Here’s how you get started writing a novel based on a true story:

•  Determine what kind of story you want to write. Talk to family and friends. Look at newspaper articles. I don’t want to be morose, but look at obituaries, too. Take notes. There are stories there.
•  Determine the story’s theme: Good/evil, love/hate, birth/death, peace/war, etc. Again, take notes. This may be where the title of your book comes from or maybe not. The title of my book came to me in a dream.
•  Construct a compelling plot. I suggest creating a plot outline to start with. I used the “what if” technique to determine what would happen in my chapters. Basically, you ask yourself “what if” this or that happened to your character and expand from there.
•  Create dynamic scenes. My advice is something has to happen in “every” chapter or scene.
•  Create multi-dimensional characters. Many writers, including yours truly, base their characters on real people and then add nuances to create more complexity and depth. This is one way to go.
•  Read, read, read. The more you read, the better writer you’ll become.
•  Lastly, start writing. “Begin at the beginning and go on till you come to the end; then stop.” ― Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland.

Truth can be stranger than fiction, but maybe not as entertaining. The key to writing a novel based on a true story is in how you spin the story to make it enjoyable for readers. Cheers!

ABOUT THE BOOK

THANKS TO AUTHOR, HARLOW COBAN,
I HAVE ONE (1) SIGNED COPY
OF THIS BOOK TO GIVE AWAY.

CLICK HERE TO BRING YOU TO
THE GIVEAWAY ENTRY PAGE.
ONE ENTRY GIVEAWAY WITH A TWIST!!!

Hosted by Miz B at Should Be Reading

What are you currently reading?

What did you recently finish reading?

What do you think you’ll read next?

Hosted by Michelle from The True Book Addict

Total Progress To Date:  5 hours
Tuesday’s hours:  3 hours
Monday’s hours:  2 hours

 Murphy’s Law…it never fails.  I sign up and it is a time frame when I have my worse reading schedule albeit, real life obligations, not feeling well, appointments, etc etc. Next time I will not announce nor sign up for a read-a-thon and I can guarantee, it will hours of reading  lol.  Yesterday, I think I have bronchitis, I sat in my recliner, switched on Kimmy Kindle and the next thing I remember was that Steve was calling to let me know that he was leaving work ( he still has not been released to drive from the surgery so a coworker drops him off at a drop off/pick up spot where I meet him everyday to bring him to and from home).  So again yesterday I didn’t get much reading time in.

………of COME BACK TO ME  by Melissa Foste

 Gigi Ann   I think they each fall in love with others.

An email has been sent and Ann has 48 hours to respond or another winner will be chosen.

My good friend Gina, from Hott Books, recently interviewed me and today she posted it on her site.  It was an honor to be asked .  Let me tell you a little about Gina,  she has a huge, caring heart.  A great Mom!!   Even though we have not met face to face,  we have become close friends via the internet.  If you haven’t visited her blog, (btw she designed it), take a look around, read her interview, say hi, and once you see what you have been missing, become a follower.  I’m headed there now.  Hope to see you there too.

Hosted by Miz B at Should Be Reading 

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by MizB of Should Be Reading. Anyone can play along! Just do the following:

Arianna gasped slowly for air.   She didn’t cry.   The pain she felt in her side wasn’t bad enough to give her husband the satisfaction.
“When I say it is time to leave, it is time to leave.   There is no room for negotiation in this marriage.”

Hosted by Miz B at Should Be Reading

Today’s question:
Why do you think that the Young Adult genre is so popular with even the adult readers? Do you read YA books, yourself?
My answer:
Ironically, I have been thinking the same thing myself over the past few weeks.  As some of you know, I am a partner in Partners In Crime Tours, a virtual tour PR company for authors of mystery, suspense and crime novels.  We have become very busy, which is a good thing, however, because of that and not wanting to over work our awesome hosts, I have been visiting a lot of blogs to read their policies to see if  they might be interested in the genre we represent to send an invitation,

And I am AMAZED at how many YA blogs there are.  It’s like a whole different neighborhood, community,state, planet of blogs.  I, for one, do not read YA only because I have this preconceived notion that Iwould not be able to relate to the characters or premise of the books.  I have, however, like the question states, wondered why so many adults do read this genre.  Am I missing out on some good reading because it is out of my comfort zone?  But then I look at my TBR bookcase and think, I have enough books that are in my comfort zone just waiting patiently to be chosen to be my “current read”.

January is being hosted by At Home with Books 

Mailbox Monday was created by Marcia of A girl and her books and is now on tour.

According to Marcia, “Mailbox Monday is the gathering place for readers to share the books that came into their house last week. Warning: Mailbox Monday can lead to envy, toppling TBR piles and humongous wish lists.”

                

 

                           The Story Plant                                 Author (WOW)

Hosted by Michelle from The True Book Addict

I am participating in the Winter Respite Read-A-Thon of 2012.  Wish me luck because it never seems to fail that whenever I sign up for one, real life tends to interfere, matter of fact it already has.  Of course, life’s obligations are  always a priority over hobby, but I will try to do my best.  I will keep a daily approximation of how many hours I put into my reading.   Want to join?  Click on above and it will bring you to Michelle’s sign up post.  Read-A-Thon starts today and ends Jan 29th so that gives us a lot of time to read and make dents in those TBR piles.  Good Luck if you have already signed up.