Bookmobile Christmases

In Where Love Once Lived, Christmas is the cause for the break up between Brian and Karen. Well, sort of. Thirty years earlier, Brian went home from the university because his mother wanted him there to celebrate Christmas with the family. It was while he was in California that he was tempted and failed.

In the current time of the book, Karen tells her daughter Julie the only gift she wants is for Julie to go to church with her. Although the ploy didn't work, Karen is eventually rewarded for her efforts.

Julie goes on a ski trip with her father and his new family and leaves her mother for the first time during Christmas. But Karen doesn't stay home alone. She goes to visit her brother in Iowa. However, after a short visit, she wishes she had stayed in Austin.

Meanwhile, Brian is in California with his family after the head librarian shuts down the bookmobile service. He is shocked to learn his mother has Alzheimer's and there is no mention of a joyous Christmas.

In Vengeance Is Mine, Chris and Tex borrow the bookmobile to go to Galveston searching for some terrorists on Christmas Eve. They get arrested for breaking and entering and spend Christmas Eve in jail. It is a turning point for Chris so I've included the manuscript of that night in jail in the next three posts.

Enjoy.

Let Your Computer Help Your Writing

In a recent post in The Writer's Alley, Krista Phillips talked about using software such as Microsoft's Outlook and Excel to keep track of the timeline in your novel. Her reason was to make sure you don't overlook an important event such as Independence Day as you are writing.

I used an Excel spreadsheet while writing Where Love Once Lived for a simple scene summary worksheet. The fields included:

• Chapter number

• Scene number (computed after scene 1)

• Number of pages in chapter

• Number of words in scene

• Total number of words (computed)

• Date

• Day of week (computed)

• Location

• Scene Goal

• Conflict

This worked fine for Where Love Once Lived, but when I started working on Vengeance Is Mine, I ran into trouble trying to line up events with the calendar. I had my amateur detectives finding clues hidden in a field in Massachusetts that was more than likely under five or six feet of snow at the time. As it is, they spend Christmas day in the Galveston jail. I decided I liked that and made use of it in a later scene.

To simplify change, I only enter the date of scene 1. The rest are computed. That way, I can modify the starting date until all the scenes fall into place. So, I've added a new field before Date called Days. It is the number of days from scene 1 to the current scene. With this information I can easily compute the date and day of week of the scene.

It's not easy to explain worksheets in text, so if you're interested, I'll be glad to send you a copy of what I ended up which includes the formulas.

The Bookmobile Series

Many years ago, while a student at the University of Texas, my friend Rollo Newsom helped me get a job as a bookmobile driver at the Austin Public Library. Although I was assigned to work with several librarians, one of my favorites was a lot like Liz in Where Love Once Lived. She was constantly doing more for the patrons than a librarian was expected to do. I started writing a book about my experiences that was something like Suds in Your Eye by Mary Lasswell. I never finished that book which was more of a series of episodes rather than a novel.

When I started writing Where Love Once Lived, I thought of Jan Karon's Mitford and decided to use a bookmobile to make the locale in my book smaller and more manageable than all of Austin, Texas. As it turned out, one third of the scenes take place on the bookmobile. So, I learned to love that vehicle and have included it in my next book and I have a plan for a third and fourth book that includes the bookmobile. Although there are some crossover of characters, the books are all independent.

I told you some about my next book, Vengeance is Mine, in previous posts, but I haven't mentioned it includes a bookmobile. Liz is the crossover character and she is now the head librarian. The city has now bought its own bookmobile, so, when Chris and Tex's van is damaged by gunfire received when they visit El Paso, Liz offers them the use of Brian's bookmobile for the trip to Galveston. It is wheelchair ready and has a Internet connection. When Liz travels to Galveston to bail them out of jail, she jumps in the bookmobile for the ride back to Austin. Before they leave Galveston, they learn the killers are in Houston. Chris encourages Liz to fly home, but she insists on going with them. So the bookmobile is back in action, with Liz aboard.

Let me know what you think about this use of a bookmobile. Many of my friends don't understand it, but I like it.

Vengeance Is Mine--Part 2 of 2

I mentioned last time that I'm preparing for an agent pitch this Saturday by updating my Vengeance is Mine synopsis. As you know, I've been so busy with Where Love Once Lived, I've hardly had time to work on the new book. Here's the rest of the synopsis which was too long to show you yesterday:

The search turns international when a classmate of Sarah's comes over from London and warns Chris the killers are terrorists planning to bomb a site in the United States. The friend, who purports to be with British Intelligence, is killed in Chris's apartment while Chris is away on a search trip. Chris uses his computer skills plus clues found at the scenes to follow the gang from one city to another.

Clues take them first to an abandoned warehouse in Albuquerque where Chris discovers an intact hard disk from a smashed computer. Back home, he reads the disk and finds a clue that takes them to a small town in Massachusetts. From there, with trips back home in between to review the clues with Liz and Angela, they go to El Paso, and then Galveston where Chris and Tex are arrested and jailed.

While in jail, Chris comes to terms with his grief and realizes vengeance is not up to him. They are freed with Liz's help and they find a clue that leads them to the killers in an underground pedestrian passageway in Houston the President of the United States is using to go to a meeting. Angela is taken captive leaving it up to Chris and Tex to save her and stop the killers.

Afterwards, Angela introduces Chris and Tex to the President. Tex gets a full pardon from the President and a college scholarship from Liz's friend who has financed the search. Liz and Chris find Tex's estranged parents and reunite them with their son. Angela, Chris, Tex, and Liz, along with Tex's wife get together for the Christmas dinner they missed while in jail.

In an epilogue, the gang is meets twelve months later for another Christmas dinner and there is a kiss between Chris and Angela.

Let me know what you think about Vengeance is Mine.