Jo Goodman, Historical Romance Author

Hello Fellow Writers!

Yesterday I went to the NaNoWriMo "TGIO" (that's Thank Goodness It's Over) party at Charlie Brown's Steakhouse in Fishkill, NY. It was a very fun time, although I have to say I am very sad that it's over! A few of us are going to continue meeting up on the weekends to get some writing done with good company.

They gave us our internal editors back, still encaged in envelopes, along with red pens.

I just finished reading "Never Love a Lawman", by Jo Goodman. I love a good story about an arranged marriage! This book is a historical romance set in the wild west.

From LikesBooks.com, here is an excerpt from an interview with Jo Goodman. Read the whole interview here.

Q: Do you consider yourself driven by plot or by characters and how do you develop your stories and characters?

A: Jeezey peezy, I don’t know. Can’t I just drive? It’s both, I suppose. Plot without rich characters is a pretty flat story. I mean, who do you root for? Good characters without a plot are just Waiting for Godot. I develop my stories with a “what if?” question and go from there. I work without a net (no outline). That is a personal preference, and it causes me headaches sometimes, but I know that I have a tendency toward rigidity and following rules, so that if I do an outline, I’ll get myself stuck in the box that I’ve created. (I know this because I did it once, and it was a horrible writing experience. I couldn’t save me from myself.) Developing the characters begins with naming them, doing a brief description, and then doing a family diagram (also called a genogram). That’s where I think out the familial relationships, the birth order, that things that happened in their family that might impact the way they behave. I don’t squeeze all of that background into a book, but it’s in my head as I’m working

Q: Do you have any advice that you would like to share with aspiring writers?

A: I’ll pass on the piece of advice that was given to me that I found the most helpful (and it wasn’t from a writer): Don’t talk about the story that’s in your head; write it.

Today I am going to go through the rest of my WIP, "Snowed In With a Millionaire", and get rid of as many dashes as I can. One of my writing buddies suggested that I might be overusing them. I said "If you think I might be overusing them, than I definitely am! Otherwise you wouldn't have noticed." So that's the plan for today.

I'm also going to get my query and synopsis for "The Movie Star's Very Personal Assistant" ready to go out tomorrow morning to Harlequin. The query and synopsis (and novel, of course) are already written, I just need to address the envelope and such. I'm terrified.

Wish me luck, and good luck to you too!
Yours Truly,
Shoshanna Evers