NOT YOUR USUAL SUSPECTS

A group blog featuring an international array of killer mystery, suspense, and romantic suspense writers. With premises and story lines different from your run-of-the-mill whodunits, we tend to write outside the box. We blog several times a week on all topics relating to romantic suspense and mystery, our writing, and our readers. We welcome all comments and often have guest bloggers. All our authors can be contacted separately, too, using their own social media links.

We find our genre delightfully, dangerously, and deliciously exciting - join us here, if you do too!

NOTE: the blog is currently dormant but please enjoy the posts we're keeping online.


Julie Moffet . Cathy Perkins . Jean Harrington . Daryl Anderson . Nico Rosso . Maureen A Miller . Sandy Parks . Lisa Q Mathews . Sharon Calvin . Lynne Connolly . Janis Patterson . Vanessa Keir . Tonya Kappes . Julie Rowe . Joni M Fisher . Leslie Langtry

Friday, October 24, 2014

Character Mimicry


Sometimes, after I create a new heroine, I find myself mimicking her world—often without realizing I’m doing it. For example, Delaney is a rock-climber (no, un-uh, I’m afraid of heights) who has a gray tabby Maine Coon cat with attitude. When my cat of sixteen years passed away a while ago, I began visiting the local shelters looking for a replacement.
Petzl
After several weeks and multiple trips I found the one that was destined to be mine. Until I named her I hadn’t realized subconsciously this was Delaney’s cat. Part Maine Coon, my Petzl (named for a climber/climbing equipment manufacturer) has an uncanny resemblance to that fictional cat I had created four years earlier.

 
In my new series, Caitlyn is a lieutenant in the US Coast Guard. Her “office” is a Jayhawk helicopter (I bet I could get a lesson in a helicopter…) and her ground transportation is a sexy black sport bike. When I started this story I had a Honda Blackhawk (trust me, the only thing in common was the color). But after researching sport bikes I found myself becoming more and more intrigued with the idea.
My Ninja
Yep, when the opportunity presented itself, I became the proud owner of a Ninja 500 (while it lacks the horsepower of Caitlyn’s monster, I prefer mine red with black trim).


Kelly, my female USCG rescue swimmer, gets to live one of my fantasies too. (No, jumping out of a helicopter is not my idea of fun!) She lives on a cabin cruiser in a Florida marina. While my 36 foot Sea Ray was the inspiration for her abode, I never spent longer than a week on the water. But oh, how I would love to do that full time (well, not when a hurricane is bearing down on Florida—it was bad enough hunkered down in a concrete-block home—imaging what that would be like on a boat is the stuff of nightmares).

Hmm, I wonder how my new Steampunk heroine is going to influence my future….

5 comments:

Sandy said...

Your adventures fit well with writing romantic suspense. Looking forward to your upcoming Coast Guard Series.

Unknown said...

Thanks Sandy. I really need to check into that helicopter intro lesson!

Toni Anderson said...

Wow--I tend to steal from my real life to feed my fiction and you do it the other way around. Very cool :) The first job I ever wanted was helicopter pilot but I was too short and short-sighted. My second was marine biologist. One of these days I'm going to have to write a novel about a writer :)

Great post.

Larissa Emerald said...

both you and your heroines are much more adventurous than I am. I like my feet planted firmly on the ground. But that's what makes it so much fun to read books where the characters do things I would never do. It's fun living vicariously through the character.

J Wachowski said...

Wow Sharon! I love the Ninja!
I always wanted a motorcycle. But my family says no. I'm not exactly known for my motor skills.;)
srhare eyes

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