THE INVISIBLE WOMAN IN THE RED DRESS - Zoe M McCarthy - One Free Ebook

Welcome back, Zoe. Why do you write the kind of books you do?

I started out writing inspirational romantic suspense. My rejections always praised my ideas, but most invited me to send another project. I realized incorporating three elements, faith, suspense, and romance, always left one element wanting. I let the suspense aspect go and wrote inspirational romance. I contracted my next book. I learned from my characters that before opposites attract, opposites distract. I loved writing how extreme opposites learned to embrace each other’s differences.

But as an analytical person, I also enjoyed writing, contracting, and publishing a book on writing. I wanted to help aspiring writers and other writers to have an easier time getting a manuscript in shape for publishing. Tailor Your Fiction Manuscript in 30 Days is based on my experience and years of researched blog posts on writing.

And to the shock of my Word Weavers group, relatives, and myself, I have drafted a hero’s journey synopsis for speculative fiction.

Besides when you came to know the Lord, what is the happiest day in your life?

When I had a second chance at love and married my husband.

How has being published changed your life?

The rose-colored glasses came off. Writing is a lot of work. And much of the work is not writing stories. I write full time—a nine-to-six job. Even with my husband taking on many of the promotion and marketing tasks, I’m often overwhelmed fitting in deadlines. Weeks need an extra day inserted! No, that’s not the solution. I’ve learned to turn down some opportunities.

Also, writers must bear criticism or rejections from critique partners, acquisition professionals, editors, readers, and reviewers. My skin is like leather … almost.

This year, after so many people have helped me on my writing journey, I believed I should give back. So besides posting blogs on writing and offering Tailor Your Fiction Manuscript in 30 Days, I agreed to be the ACFW Virginia Chapter treasurer. I’m still dealing with the learning curve. Perhaps I’m spreading myself thin by taking the job, but I believe another harried author shouldn’t have to take the job so I can enjoy the benefits of the chapter.

I enjoy creating stories. So I march forward.

What are you reading right now?

The Final Race by Eric T. Eichinger and Eva Marie Everson. In my book, The Putting Green Whisperer, Shoo is a golf caddy aspiring to be a PGA pro golfer. Eric Liddell is Shoo’s role model. Eric Liddell is the 1924 Olympic runner featured in the movie, Chariots of Fire. At the North Georgia Christian Writers Conference, I saw The Final Race for sale. When Eva Marie said it was about Eric Liddell, I had to buy it. I’m reading it to husband John on our trips to our lake cabin.

I’ve always been fascinated by Eric Liddell, too. What is your current work in progress?

I have several books in progress at different stages. I had to put aside my edits for The Identical Woman In a Black Dress while I met two other deadlines. But I’m working that book back into my schedule. It’s the next book in the Twisty Creek Series and follows The Invisible Woman in a Red Dress.

What would be your dream vacation?

John and I have enjoyed many vacation spots from the ski slopes out West to the romantic cities of Italy to the breezy beaches of Punta Cana, Dominion Republic. My dream vacation would be to spend a month in a quaint town in a country like Ireland, taking day trips into the countryside.

How do you choose your settings for each book?

I’ve chosen cities I’ve lived in or been to. Recently, I prefer to create settings based on a real or a combination of real places. That way, I can include the charm of the actual town and what I need to create to make the story work well.

If you could spend an evening with one person who is currently alive, who would it be and why?

Anne Graham Lotz. We are only months apart in age. I’ve attended one of her “Just Give Me Jesus” presentations and have read several of her books. I would ask her questions participants and I bring up in the Bible study I lead.

What are your hobbies, besides writing and reading?

My husband John and I enjoy canoeing the New River and can’t wait to explore the lake we recently bought a cabin on. I enjoy knitting and crocheting for a prayer shawl ministry I host. I’ve learned to enjoy watching golf from our annual trip with my sister and brother-in-law to the Wells Fargo golf tournament in Charlotte, North Carolina. (This is how The Putting Green Whisperer came about.) I’m working on growing a penchant for Wake Forest football.

What is your most difficult writing obstacle, and how do you overcome it?

For me, it’s multiple small roadblocks combined that prevent me from moving forward. For example during one day, my book is released on time on several bookstore sites, except the important one. Suddenly, an application freezes on my laptop and I have to reboot. An important email I need has gone to my junk mail. I’m bombarded by messages to update operating systems, software, and my website. The electricity goes out, and I must drive forty-five minutes to the nearest library to work. These obstacles always come in fives or sixes. I build them into my schedule and have resigned to treat them combined like any other task.

What advice would you give to a beginning author?

If writing your stories is important to you, don’t give up. It takes time to make it all happen. To hasten success, attend conference workshops, visit writing blogs, and read books about writing. Get connected with critique partners and local or online writing groups.

I say this humbly, Tailor Your Fiction Manuscript in 30 Days will help you write or get your manuscript in publishable shape. The book has nine endorsements by writing conference professionals, editors, bloggers on writing, agents, and those who will most likely use the book, aspiring writers.

Tell us about the featured book.

The Invisible Woman in a Red Dress was first published in a 2018 Valentine’s Day collection of books by five authors. The collection is a finalist for the Book of the Year Award from Interviews and Reviews.

Candace Parks lives a passionless life in Richmond, Virginia. The computer programmer returns to the empty family home in the Blue Ridge Mountains solely to evaluate her job, faith, and boyfriend. Her high school crush, Trigg Alderman, who barely remembers her, visits his Gram next door. Things look up. When a local beauty vies for Trigg’s attention, his ex returns, and an unwanted mission to Papua New Guinea calls, sorting her life out becomes nothing of the sort!

Please give us the first page of the book.

PASSION, DON, OR PAPUA NEW Guinea. Once again, Candace mulled the choices. Don pulled his sedan into the no-parking space in front of her apartment building.

Always the same. All-you-can-eat pizza in noisy Luigi’s and talking work with this friends, until they moved on to other subjects and she became invisible.

Every Saturday night.

Richmond offered movies, plays, and a historical canal walk. Even the state motto promised, “Virginia is for lovers.”

Candace released her seatbelt and shifted to face Don. He cocked his ear toward a sports announcer’s rehash of a basketball game on the radio.

“Kiss me, Don.”

He glanced at her and held up a finger. “Just … one … minute.” He leaned closer to the dashboard. Don already knew his team had won, yet not a face muscle twitched. His brown eyes remained focused on the radio knob.

Candace swung her knees away from Don, opened the door, got out, and closed the door.

The car window whirred. Don bent over the passenger seat until he could see her. “Don’t you want that kiss?”

“That’s okay.” She turned away and plodded up the snow-dusted sidewalk.

“Are you sure?”

She waved and kept walking. “I’ll see you at work on Monday.” She skirted a pink Big Wheel in the stairwell and shuffled up the cement stairs.

I’m already eager to read this book. How can readers find you on the Internet?

https://zoemmccarthy.com  

https://www.amazon.com/Zoe-M.-McCarthy/e/B00ODC1ZNW/

Thank you, Zoe, for sharing this book with my blog readers and me.

Readers, here are links to the book.

The Invisible Woman in a Red Dress (Twisty Creek) (Volume 1) - Paperback
The Invisible Woman in a Red Dress (Twisty Creek Book 1) - Kindle

Leave a comment for a chance to win a free copy of the book. You must follow these instructions to be in the drawing. Please tell us where you live, at least the state or territory or country if outside North America. (Comments containing links may be subject to removal by blog owner.)

Void where prohibited; the odds of winning depend on the number of entrants. Entering the giveaway is considered a confirmation of eligibility on behalf of the enterer in accord with these rules and any pertaining local/federal/international laws.

The only notification you’ll receive is the winner post on this blog. So be sure to check back a week from Saturday to see if you won. You will have 4 weeks from the posting of the winners to claim your book.

If you’re reading this on Goodreads, Google+, Feedblitz, Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin, or Amazon, please come to the blog to leave your comment if you want to be included in the drawing. Here’s a link:

Http://lenanelsondooley.blogspot.com

TAILOR YOUR FICTION MANUSCRIPT IN 30 DAYS - Zoe M McCarthy - One Free Book

Welcome, Zoe. What would you like for our readers to know about you personally?

In 2011, my husband John and I moved to the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia and built a house on a hill overlooking a valley and the mountains. I became a full-time author working weekdays from nine to six in the office John allowed me to design in the house blueprint. In 2012, I concentrated my blog posts on writing, including what I learned from conference workshops, books on writing, Writer’s Digest, and online articles.

Tell us about your family.

John and I are both retired actuaries. We have two sons, two daughters-in-love, and six grandchildren.

Have you written other nonfiction books?

Tailor Your Fiction Manuscript in 30 Days is my first.

Do you have any other books in the works right now?

My novella Good Breaks released January 11 in the Love, Sweet Love collection. I’m working on The Identical Woman in a Black Dress, the book that follows The Invisible Woman in a Red Dress in my Twisty Creek Series,.

What kinds of hobbies and leisure activities do you enjoy?

John and I canoe the New River, spotting bald eagles occasionally, and spend time at our lake cabin. Once we finish remodeling the cabin, I hope to host writing and spiritual retreats there. I enjoy developing the Bible studies I teach in a community Bible study and teaching writing workshops. For a prayer shawl ministry, I knit and crochet men’s and women’s shawls.

Why did you write the featured book?

After I had published over one hundred fifty blog posts on writing, an agent and a publishing house editor suggested I write a book based on my blog. The idea interested me, and I attended a workshop on the dos and don’ts for turning blog posts into a book. I wanted to share more than the information I’d accumulated. I desired to organize the material into a guidebook to help writers who had manuscripts but didn’t know how to get them ready for publication, writers whose manuscripts received rejections, writers whose self-published novels received poor reviews, and writers who wanted to write the stories on their hearts but needed help to put them to paper. Tailor Your Fiction Manuscript in 30 Days was born.

What do you want the reader to take away from the book?

Confidence and a marketable manuscript. Writers’ works are continually under spotlights—book acquisition professionals, editors, and public and professional reviewers. My hope is to give writers the help they need to produce a worthy product and fare well under the spotlights.

Is there anything else you’d like to tell my readers about your book?

I’d like to share the back-cover blurb, which is a few of the endorsements for Tailor Your Fiction Manuscript in 30 Days.

Zoe McCarthy’s book, Tailor Your Fiction Manuscript in 30 Days, is a fresh and innovative refocusing of your novel or novella. Through a few simple—and fun—steps, Zoe helps writers take their not-ready-for-publication and/or rejected manuscripts to a spit-polish finish. Writing is hard work, yes, but it doesn’t have to be difficult.

—Eva Marie Everson, best-selling and multiple award-winning author, conference director, president of Word Weavers International, Inc.

If you want to increase your chance of hearing yes instead of sorry or not a fit for our list at this time, this book is for you. If you want to develop stronger story plots with characters that are hard to put down, this book is for you. Through McCarthy’s checklists and helpful exercises and corresponding examples, you will learn how to raise the tension, hone your voice, and polish your manuscript. I need this book for my clients and the many conferees I meet at writer’s conferences around the country. Thank you, Zoe. A huge, #thumbsup, for Tailor Your Fiction Manuscript in 30 Days.  

—Diana L. Flegal, literary agent, and freelance editor

Tailor Your Fiction Manuscript is a self-editing encyclopedia! Each chapter sets up the targeted technique, examples show what to look for in your manuscript, then proven actions are provided to take your writing to the next level. Whether you are a seasoned writer or a newbie, you need this book! 

—Sally Shupe, freelance editor, aspiring author

Please give us the first page or two from the book.

Send Your Characters on a Journey

A story is not a series of unconnected events, interesting or not. Your story must have a theme, a plot, and interesting characters.

Day 1

Welcome to Day 1. Today, we’ll look at the high-level elements of your story. I suggest you create a word-processing document or purchase a notebook to record your answers to ACTION exercises. Examples for this chapter come from the movie, Love Comes Softly, based on Janette Oke’s novel by the same name. Often, even in a romance, one character’s journey dominates the story. This is true for Love Comes Softly; therefore, we’ll follow Marty’s story in the examples.

You’ll spend three days addressing problems you identify in your story’s theme and plot. So, let’s get started.

Theme

Why do we begin with your theme? You’ll want to be ready to state your theme when you write a proposal, pitch to an editor, write a back-cover blurb, and have conversations with readers. Identifying and becoming comfortable with your theme will help you improve your story.

ACTION

State your theme. (Don’t worry if you can’t. I’ll give you ways to uncover your theme.)

Whether or not you had difficulty expressing your theme, let’s test what you wrote.

ACTION

First, jot down the main values your protagonist struggles with throughout your story.

Example:

Marty has traveled in a covered wagon from the East with her husband to find the perfect spread to raise a family on. Immediately after they stake their claim, her husband, Aaron, dies. A settler, Clark Davis, has lost his wife and proposes marriage in name only so he can provide a mother for his daughter, Missie. Marty wants only to go back East. Throughout the story, Marty struggles with grief, fear of the unknown, anything she can’t control, and having a place to belong.

ACTION

Next, recalling your protagonist’s main struggles, peruse the list of short themes in the table at the end of this section. Which best describes what your protagonist grapples with in your story?

Example:

For Marty’s story, I marked Abandonment, Loss/Grief, Uncertainty, and Place to Belong. These all apply, but Marty’s main struggle is with a Place to Belong. Arriving in the unknown West, she thinks she’ll be fine as long as she’s with her husband. When he dies, she wants to go back to familiar territory, refusing to accept there’s no one to go back to in the East. She’s sure she doesn’t belong with strangers—a man who wants her to mother his child and his daughter who wants her to leave.

ACTION

Now, expand on that theme. What does your story say about this short theme? Write it in the form of a general question, one that’s universal for people

Example:

What happens when circumstances leave a person with no place to call home?

ACTION

Finally, turn your question into a statement that is specific to your protagonist.

Example:

A widow finds security and love in a place she can call home.

Congratulations. You have a theme to work from as you improve your story.

When you include your theme in your proposal you may want to accompany it with a guiding quote or Scripture from the Bible. For Marty’s journey to a place to call home, the Scripture might be Haggai 2:9. “’And in this place I will grant peace,’ declares the Lord Almighty.”

If your theme is different than what you first wrote down, keep the revised theme in mind as we move forward, and you evaluate your plot.

Interesting. Where on the Internet can the readers find you?

https://zoemmccarthy.com  

https://www.amazon.com/Zoe-M.-McCarthy/e/B00ODC1ZNW/

Thank you, Zoe, for sharing this book with me and my blog readers. I look forward to reading the whole book and trying your system.

Readers, here's a link to the book.

Tailor Your Fiction Manuscript in 30 Days

Leave a comment for a chance to win a free copy of the book. You must follow these instructions to be in the drawing. Please tell us where you live, at least the state or territory or country if outside North America. (Comments containing links may be subject to removal by blog owner.)

Void where prohibited; the odds of winning depend on the number of entrants. Entering the giveaway is considered a confirmation of eligibility on behalf of the enterer in accord with these rules and any pertaining local/federal/international laws.

The only notification you’ll receive is the winner post on this blog. So be sure to check back a week from Saturday to see if you won. You will have 4 weeks from the posting of the winners to claim your book.

If you’re reading this on Goodreads, Google+, Feedblitz, Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin, or Amazon, please come to the blog to leave your comment if you want to be included in the drawing. Here’s a link:

Http://lenanelsondooley.blogspot.com

CALCULATED RISK - Zoe M McCarthy - One Free Book or Ebook

Welcome, Zoe. Tell us how much of yourself you write into your characters.

Especially with Calculated Risk, I wrote a lot of myself into Cisney, a marketing rep, and into Nick, the analytical actuary. (Actuaries evaluate financial risks for insurance companies.) I’m a retired actuary. Two popular personality tests confirmed I’m creative and expressive on one hand and analytical and introverted on the other. So it was easy to get into the heads of expressive, vibrant Cisney and analytical, numbers-man Nick. My analytical husband, also a retired actuary, was good model for Nick.

The tests have shown that I am equally strong in both sides of my brain as well. What is the quirkiest thing you have ever done?

When I was twenty, I accepted a ride in a taxi with a drunk American stranger in his fifties in Bangkok, Thailand. That was the stupidest thing I’ve ever done. When I was ten, my sister, two friends, and I walked on ice to the middle of a lake and all fell through. That was plain dumb. But quirky? Well, at a come-as-your-character dinner, I dressed up like Cisney with yellow stickies plastered all over my suit and hair. Attendees didn’t remember my name, but the next day, they said, “You’re the one who had adhesive notes stuck to her outfit.” So, the quirky part is, I’m going to wear my Cisney costume to my upcoming book signing and to my launch party.

When did you first discover that you were a writer?

Others have said if you write anything, even journals, you’re a writer. I didn’t start calling myself a writer until I wrote contemporary Christian short stories to explain to myself what I read in the Bible and heard in Bible studies. People liked the stories, so I self-published two books of them. Then I performed dramatic readings of the stories in several venues, including a male juvenile correctional center. I felt guilty calling myself a writer at that time. But now, I believe if one spends time writing on a regular basis, he’s a writer. That doesn’t mean he’s a good writer.

Tell us the range of the kinds of books you enjoy reading.

I especially enjoy witty romances with sassy or droll heroines. Much to my husband’s chagrin at bedtime, I laugh through Jenny B. Jones’s adult and young adult books. Reading her books gave me permission to use my dormant writer’s voice. Check out her Just Between You and Me, So Not Happening (YA), and In Between (YA). I also loved the heroine in Talking to the Dead by Bonnie Grove. In addition to romances, I like suspense, legal thrillers, and historical fiction. On the non-fiction side, I read biographies and books classified as Christian living or spiritual growth.

How do you keep your sanity in our run, run, run world?

I spend considerable time in the early morning praising, praying, reading devotionals, and studying the Bible. And I’m blessed to have a husband who loves me, supports me while I treat writing like a 9 to 6 job, and does all the laundry, grocery shopping, and vacuuming. I won’t say I’m calm and serene. (I grind my teeth while I sleep.) But my life is full and good.

My husband is like yours. We truly are blessed. How do you choose your characters’ names?

Cisney is my deceased maternal grandmother’s middle name. I liked it. For Nick, I looked for an unusual last name. Finally, I asked my husband what was the least common surname of someone he knew from his past. LeCrone. The name fit Nick.

What is the accomplishment that you are most proud of?

My college freshman math teacher assigned a “marbles” problem. My three roommates worked on it for an hour and gave up. I worked on it all afternoon and evening. Well after midnight, I climbed into my top bunk. But the problem wouldn’t go away. I had my hands in the air, using my fingers for marbles. Then the solution hit me. The answer wasn’t one case but a set of cases. On the floor outside our room, I scribbled like crazy, writing out cases. Someone approached and asked me a question. I’d been in “marble world” so long I couldn’t compute what she said. The next day the professor asked smugly if any of us got the answer. Two of us out of fifty had. I shot my hand up so forcefully, the professor chose me to put it on the board. After I started writing the second of multiple cases, he smiled and nodded. So exhilarating.

If you were an animal, which one would you be, and why?

A puma. I startle very easily. Two kinds of people cause me to jump: quiet people who are suddenly there and loud people who come in talking. One Christmas, I gave everyone in the office rattles to wear so they wouldn’t scare me. At another company, the chief actuary started rapping on my outer office wall for ten feet so he wouldn’t scare me when he reached the door. So, if I were a stealthy puma, I could startle others for a change.

What is your favorite food?

Potpourri. I like to bring all kinds of foods from the pantry that are in bits and put a little of each on a plate. For example, one meal might be: Froot Loops, Craisins, peanuts, and dark-chocolate-covered pomegranate nuggets. Another might be: small chunks of ham, cherries, chips, and almonds.

What is the problem with writing that was your greatest roadblock, and how did you overcome it?

Characterization. For a while, I’d been adding traits to people like I was dressing and accessorizing paper dolls. In my first four “practice” books, I avoided letting my hero and heroine have family near them. To me, creating parents and siblings was too much painstaking work. Then during a couple of short stories I wrote, I found my voice. I felt free to just let the characters be who they are. I loved writing all the members in Nick’s family. Their quirks surfaced so easily. For me, it’s easier to model characters using bits from several people I know. Cisney’s mother was the hardest to write because she’s somewhat like my deceased mother.

Tell us about the featured book.

I decided to use the little known actuarial profession for my hero. I like romances about extreme opposites, so I knew Cisney had to be a social marketing rep. I maintain that opposites distract before they attract. This’s true for Cisney and Nick. In the throes of being dumped by her overbearing father’s choice, Cisney has rashly accepted Nick’s invitation to spend Thanksgiving with his family. After Nick witnessed the dump-Cisney call, he extended the invitation only because he felt sorry for her. Now she’d rather be skiing with her single marketing friends in Colorado than spending four days with a house infested with actuaries. And so the fun begins.

Please give us the first page of the book.

In search of the yellow sticky with her ideas for today’s meeting, Cisney Baldwin sifted through papers on her desk. She had a choice: honor her rash commitment to spend the Thanksgiving holiday with Nick LeCrone and his family, or lie and join her friends on the Colorado ski slopes.

Biting cold air and exhilarating speed might keep her mind off slime-ball Jason. And, she’d need her Richmond friends nearby to nurse her self-esteem after she told Daddy she’d lost his pick for her future.

She planted fists on her hips and stared at the papers sprinkled with yellow stickies that covered her workspace. Minutes before her meetings with Nick, she could never put her fingers on her notes. Why did this always happen?

How was she going to face him today, after he’d stood in her office doorway last week and watched her disintegrate during Jason’s dump-Cisney phone call? If only she’d stopped there, but no, she hung up and blubbered about the end of her six-month relationship and having nowhere to go for Thanksgiving.

She splayed her arms over her paper-covered desk and knocked her head on the piles. This was all Jason’s fault. Jason needed space? Right. What he needed was freedom to date that woman with a waist the size of his muscular neck.

“Hi.”

Way to leave us hanging, Zoe. How can readers find you on the Internet?

http://zoemmccarthy.com

Thank you, Zoe, for sharing your new book with us and giving us a peek into your life.

Readers, here are links to the book. By using one when you order, you help support this blog.
Calculated Risk - Christianbook.com
Calculated Risk - Amazon

Christian Book Store

Leave a comment for a chance to win a free copy of the book. Please tell us where you live, at least the state or territory. (Comments containing links may be subject to removal by blog owner.)

Void where prohibited; the odds of winning depend on the number of entrants. Entering the giveaway is considered a confirmation of eligibility on behalf of the enterer in accord with these rules and any pertaining local/federal/international laws.

The only notification you’ll receive is the winner post on this blog. So be sure to check back a week from Saturday to see if you won. You will have 4 weeks from the posting of the winners to claim your book.

If you’re reading this on Goodreads, Google+, Feedblitz, Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin, or Amazon, please come to the blog to leave your comment if you want to be included in the drawing. Here’s a link:
Http://lenanelsondooley.blogspot.com