GATHERING THE FACTS

 By Caroline Clemmons

An author friend and I were talking recently about starting a new book or series. It's always an exciting time, but there are many factors that go into laying the background for a series. For instance, in my recent book SHAD, for the Guns For Hire series, I deliberated where to have the action happen. Back in the Depression (the big one), my father-in-law as a young man worked for the Civilian Conservation Corps, the CCC. This was about the time of the Works Progress Administration, the WPA. My father-in-law felt lucky to be assigned to a work crew up in the northern New Mexico forest. He had photos that showed how pretty it was there. The pictures were black and white, but you could visualize the beauty.

A friend had a cabin at Questa. She talked about how much she loved the area. She would sit on her front porch and watch the wildlife. She even saw a bear go by, but it didn't bother her, fortunately. Her description sold me on that location. I got off the beaten path and started checking locations that would work,  chose the area, then made up the town.

 You see, if I used a small town that was real, I'd have to be careful to put in the right streets, the right buildings, and so forth. If I make up the town, I can place the buildings I want just the way I need them. So, that's what I usually do for my books—with a few exceptions, such as Santa Fe and San Antonio. It's fun to create a new community.

I have been to northern New Mexico, but not the exact place where I said in the book. I've been to Taos. As I mentioned, one of my friends has a cabin at Questa, a town I used in SHAD. I looked online to see what features it had. (The internet is such a blessing for research.) I was surprised to find Questa has a walled downtown that sounded interesting. But I didn't want my main set there. I made up the town of Ben Rock. I visualized a large rock shaped like a flat bench, sort of hanging on the side of a mountain over this town, like a bench for a giant.

 Next, I had to learn the type of ranching and farming, or whatever was going on in that area. Goats as well as cattle stock the ranches. Another aspect I must consider is the weather—the temperatures, the rainfall, when the first snow falls, and when the last snow falls. Frequently, I use weather in my books as I did in SHAD. You might think I do too much research, but having actual things correct in my fictional stories is very important to me.

 You can see that there's often a lot of research before authors begin writing, and more popping up while they’re immersed in the world they’re creating.

 Thanks for stopping by. Stay safe and keep reading.

REAL PEOPLE VS. IMAGINARY CHARACTERS

When I asked one of the guests on this blog if she used real people in her novels, she replied, “Of course. Everyone does.” I immediately bristled and thought, “Humph, not me.” But the statement started me thinking about my own writing. What I realized is that I do not use real people as the main characters in my books or their situations as plots. Occasionally, though, I do model a secondary character after a person I’ve known or about whom I’ve read. How embarrassing to admit that after my initial reaction to her statement. Picture me blushing.

Here are some examples:

In my western historical novels  THE MOST UNSUITABLE WIFE and THE MOST UNSUITABLE HUSBAND, Burris and Willard are sort of modeled after Don Knotts and Tim Conway in “The Apple Dumpling Gang” movie. I loved that movie! Bumbling brothers who are really not so bad, but who need constant guidance, are exactly what I needed for this story. They made me laugh. You may think it’s odd for a writer to enjoy her own characters, but why else would I write? Oh, yeah, to quiet the voices. ☺

In OUT OF THE BLUE, a contemporary romantic suspense time travel, the hero’s mom is a compasionate sort of retro-hippie who wears rose-colored glasses in spite of the difficult life she’s led--an opposite to her level-headed police detective son. I named the mom Blossom because a person of that name saved Darling Daughter 2’s life. DD2 had been to her doctor because of a suspicious sore on her nipple that would not heal. After consultation and a mammogram, the doctor she consulted pooh-poohed her concern and told her to wait six months and see if it grew or went away. Immediately after that, DD2 learned the grandfather who had raised her friend Blossom had died, and she attended the funeral. She had sort of lost touch with Blossom and hadn’t seen or heard from her in months and months. At the funeral, Blossom wore a turban to cover her loss of hair from chemotherapy. Long story short, Blossom had the same type breast cancer as DD2 and sent my daughter to the breast surgeon she’d consulted. As a result, DD2 learned that she had an aggressive, rapidly growing type of Paget’s cancer that would have entered her chest wall before six months. So, I thought Blossom at least deserved a character named after her. Don’t you agree? And I gave Blossom a good doctor in love with her.

Blossom Hunter and her beau, Dr. Dave Roan

In BRAZOS BRIDE and HIGH STAKES BRIDE, the first two books of the western historical Men of Stone Mountain trilogy, the aunts Maggie Jo Gamble and Lizzie Mae Fraser are named after my mom and her sister, Elizabeth. Even though she was generous to her immediate family, my mom, like Maggie, was not lavish with her praise. We joked that her glass was not only half-empty, but it had a crack down the side and a chip on the rim. ☺ In contrast, my Aunt Elizabeth never said anything negative around me. Ever. She had a sad life, but she never let her private life destroy her demeanor. There were times, of course, when each was unhappy at what life had delivered. My dad was blind the last fifteen years of his life, and my housewife mom had to become the breadwinner. With no education or work history, she felt fortunate to obtain a job clerking at Sear's for the next 22 years. My aunt’s husband was, to quote my mom, “Not worth the bullet it would take to shoot him." My farm wife aunt had to get a job in town when my uncle went bust farming from his nefarious rambling. But together around me, the two women were laughing and happy. Each would have done anything for her family, just like Maggie and Lizzie would do for the Stone brothers.

Maggie and Lizzie from iStock rather than life

In addition to these five characters, my plots and characters are a result of the sum of ALL my life experiences and everything I’ve read or heard. Isn’t that true of all of us? We store away these experiences in a cache somewhere in our subconscious. They affect our actions and opinions forever.A minister friend from a moderate denomination once told me that he thought he'd put his childhood's restrictive teachings behind him. But when he least expected it, there came one of those teachings creeping forward in his mind. For writers, they rise forth as characters who talk to us until we write them down. How that differs from mental illness, I can’t say. Maybe it doesn’t. ☺ Except writers don’t actually kill people, we just let our characters kill other characters. Legal and much more satisfying for all, right?

Thanks for stopping by!

Happy Labor Day! And Writing What We Love

Bobbye Terry/Daryn Cross gave me this photo because she
knows I love Texas sunrises and sunsets. No, it has nothing
to do with this post except I love the photo.

Labor Day Weekend—a nice long weekend with an extra day to relax and be with family. What could be better? I hope you have time to read a good book. Like THE TEXAN’S IRISH BRIDE, hint, hint.


Why do I write historicals? A writer should writer the kind of book he or she likes to read. Although I’m an eclectic reader, one type book I love is western romance. The first one I read was by Lorraine Heath. I fell in love with the concept and read each one of her books I could find. She’s a very nice person as well as being a great writer. I’ve continued to follow her books as she’s moved into English Victorians, but that’s another subgenre of historical romance. A bookseller I trust suggested I try Jodi Thomas’ books. Thank goodness she told me about Jodi Thomas, because I read each of her books—and reread several—including the contemporary and suspense as well as the western.

Writing is more involved than reading. Any novel usually requires research to set up the world the writer will describe. My husband and I took our dream trip to Ireland and fell so in love with the country that we returned a second time, and would love to go back there. We also love our home state of Texas. What better than to combine the two? Cenora Rose O’Neill, the heroine of THE TEXAN’S IRISH BRIDE, is from Ireland. Dallas McClintock, the hero, is a Texas rancher in the Texas Hill Country, near Bandera but in the fictional area of McClintock Springs.

McClintock Springs was founded by Dallas’ grandfather, Vincent McClintock, and the fictional county named McClintock, too. It’s so much fun to invent a new town and county. Then I can make them anything I choose. The ranch buildings and house are so vivid in my mind that I’d like to be able to paint them so others could see them as I do. Perhaps I’ve described them well enough in the book that readers will be able to form a mental picture for them. Large two-story home painted butter yellow with dark green shutters and white railing around the wide front porch. Screened in sleeping porch on each floor to catch the Southwestern summer breezes.

I hope you enjoy western historical romances, too. I’ll include a copy of mine in the prize drawing on September 11th. You have until 11:59 pm that day to enter. If you don’t win, please keep returning to comment. I’ll have weekly drawings for quite a while. To enter, you simply comment on my blog and include your email address. If you sign up as a follower, that counts as an extra entry. Couldn’t be easier.

Have a safe and happy Labor Day!