Today’s Featured Author: Cinthia Ritchie

Today I have on my blog author Cinthia Ritchie discussing her debut book, Dolls Behaving Badly. And after the interview, check out an excerpt from her book.

Interview

Where were you born and where do you call home?

I was born in Pennsylvania but call Alaska my home. I’ve lived in Anchorage for the past 25 years and can’t imagine living anywhere else. The winters are long, dark and brutal and summers are often wet and cool but the twilight is like nothing else, the sky dimming but never darkening so that often I hike past midnight. Nothing compares to running down a mountain at 1 a.m., no one else around, the air hushed, the shadows tinted lavender. Sometimes I think that Alaska is in my blood.

Do you write full-time? If so, what is your work day like? If not, what do you do other than write and how do you find time to write?

I worked as a journalist for over 13 years and now freelance and write almost full-time. In the summers I often pick up seasonal jobs for extra money. As for finding time to write, I think that if someone wants to write, he or she will find the time. I wrote Dolls Behaving Badly as a single mother while working two jobs. I wrote segments at work, at my son’s soccer games and even jotted notes at the supermarket. It wasn’t easy but it was the only way I could write. After a whle, it became second nature.

What fuels you as an author to continue to write?

I can’t imagine my life without writing, it’s so much a part of who I am and how I see the world. I can’t stop. I have characters inside my head that need to speak. Sometimes I think that I am simply a medium, that there are energy currents around us that use me to tell their stories. I don’t know if this is true. Sometimes I become discouraged and stop writing for a few days and mope around, feeling lonely. It’s almost as if I’m lonely for the sound of my own writing voice. When I sit down and begin to write again, I feel so strong and pure that I sometimes weep.

What inspired you to write this book?

I was a single mother working two jobs, always tired, and at night after my son went to bed I’d sit in the bathroom and read novels. One night I realized that there were very few books with strong, single-mother heroines, and the few that did usually supplied fairy tale endings that left me, as a reader, frustrated and depressed because I knew by then that life wasn’t a fairy tale and endings were rarely clean. So I decided to write a book about a single mother, and I wanted her to be funny and warm and flawed, the way we all are, and I wanted her journey to be messy and real, and I wanted the book to include food and recipes and correspondences, and I wanted the love interest to be part of the story but not the whole story. I suppose I wrote Dolls Behaving Badly because it was the book I had been waiting to read.

Did the story turn out the way you planned from the beginning? If not, what change happened that you didn’t expect?

No, the story didn’t stay the same but then again, does it ever? One of my creative writing professors once said that the moment your characters begin to dictate their next moves is the moment you know that you’re truly writing a book. That happened to me early on, by about the third chapter, and after struggling for a few nights I turned my book over to my characters. I wrote recklessly and without a plan. I had no idea what would happen next, where my characters would go, if or when the plot developments would intensify. I loved writing this way, loved the mystery and the wonder. Strangely enough, it all worked out. My characters carried me through the book. 

What book are you reading right now?

I read multiple books at a time. I always have three or four going at once. Right now it’s Standing Up to the Rock by Louise Freeman-Toole; Drinking in the Rain by Alix Kates Shulman; and advanced review copies of The Irresistible Blueberry Bakeshop & Café by Mary Sims and Shorecliff by Ursula DeYoung.

Tell us a random fact about you that we never would have guessed.

I have a tattoo on my right forearm, a blue dolphin, because I love to swim. I got the tattoo about nine years ago when a man I loved dearly moved away from Alaska, and I stayed. I wanted (needed?) to etch a permanent reminder into my skin, to alter myself, to feel pain and then watch it transform into beauty.

Excerpt

Thursday, Sept. 15

This is my diary, my pathetic little conversation with myself. No doubt I will burn it halfway through. I’ve never been one to finish anything. Mother used to say this was because I was born during a full moon, but like everything she says, it doesn’t make a lick of sense.

It isn’t even the beginning of the year. Or even the month. It’s not even my birthday. I’m starting, typical of me, impulsively, in the middle of September. I’m starting with the facts.

I’m thirty-eight years old. I’ve slept with nineteen and a half men.

I live in Alaska, not the wild parts but smack in the middle of Anchorage, with the Walmart and Home Depot squatting over streets littered with moose poop.

I’m divorced. Last month my ex-husband paid child support in ptarmigan carcasses, those tiny bones snapping like fingers when I tried to eat them.

I have one son, age eight and already in fourth grade. He is gifted, his teachers gush, remarking how unusual it is for such a child to come out of such unique (meaning underprivileged, meaning single parent, meaning they don’t think I’m very smart) circumstances.

I work as a waitress in a Mexican restaurant. This is a step up: two years ago I was at Denny’s.

Yesterday, I was so worried about money I stayed home from work and tried to drown myself in the bathtub. I sank my head under the water and held my breath, but my face popped up in less than a minute. I tried a second time, but by then my heart wasn’t really in it so I got out, brushed the dog hair off the sofa and plopped down to watch  Oprah on the cable channel.

What happened next was a miracle, like Gramma used to say. No angels sang, of course, and there was none of that ornery church music. Instead, a very tall woman (who might have been an angel if heaven had high ceilings) waved her arms. There were sweat stains under her sweater, and this impressed me so much that I leaned forward; I knew something important was about to happen.

Most of what she said was New Age mumbo-jumbo, but when she mentioned the diary, I pulled myself up and rewrapped the towel around my waist. I knew she was speaking to me, almost as if this was her purpose in life, to make sure these words got directed my way.

She said you didn’t need a fancy one; it didn’t even need a lock, like those little-girl ones I kept as a teenager. A notebook, she said, would work just fine. Or even a bunch of papers stapled together. The important thing was doing it. Committing yourself to paper every day, regardless of whether anything exciting or thought-provoking actually happens.

“Your thoughts are gold,” the giant woman said. “Hold them up to the light and they shine.”

I was crying by then, sobbing into the dog’s neck. It was like a salvation, like those traveling preachers who used to come to town. Mother would never let us go but I snuck out with Julie, who was a Baptist. Those preachers believed, and while we were there in that tent, we did too.

This is what I’m hoping for, that my words will deliver me something. Not the truth, exactly. But solace.

Book Description

Carla Richards is many things: an Alaska waitress who secretly makes erotic dolls for extra income; a divorcee who can’t quite detach from her ex-husband; and a single mom trying to support her gifted eight-year-old son, her pregnant sister and her babysitter-turned-resident-teenager.

She’s one overdue bill away from completely losing control–when inspiration strikes in the form of a TV personality. Now she’s scribbling away in a diary, flirting with an anthropologist, and baking up desserts with the ghost of her Polish grandmother.

Still, getting her life and dreams back on track is difficult. Is perfection really within reach? Or will she wind up with something even better?

About the Author

Cinthia Ritchie is a former journalist and Pushcart Prize nominee who lives and runs mountains in Alaska.

She’s a recipient of two Rasmuson Individual Artist Awards, a Connie Boocheever Fellowship, residencies at Hedgebrook, Kimmel Harding Nelson Center for the Arts and Hidden River Arts, the Brenda Ueland Prose Award, Memoir Prose Award, Sport Literate Essay Award, Northwest PEN Women Creative Nonfiction Award, Drexel Magazine Creative Nonfiction Award and Once Written Grand Prize Award.

Her work can be found in New York Times Magazine, Sport Literate, Water-Stone Review, Memoir, Under the Sun, Literary Mama, Slow Trains Literary Journal, Sugar Mule, Breadcrumbs and Scabs, Third Wednesday, Writer’s Digest, Foliate Oak Literary Magazine, Cactus Heart Press and over 30 other literary magazines and small presses.

Her debut novel, Dolls Behaving Badly, released Feb. 5 from Grand Central Publishing/Hachette Book Group.

You can find out more about Cinthia on her website. Feel free to follow her on Twitter and Facebook.

Her book, Dolls Behaving Badly, is available on Amazon, Barnes and Noble and IndieBound.

 

Authors thrive on reader feedback

As an author and a blogger one of the things I love most is reader feedback. It is nice to have someone comment on your work. After all who doesn’t like a compliment? (OK – all reader feedback isn’t positive, but you take the good with the bad.)

Blog

At the end of most blog posts is a place for readers to comment about the post. It is awesome when someone mentions they not only liked the post but learned something. It could be as simple as “Good advice. Thank you.” Or they can add their own experience or story. This happens most often for me when I write about parenting (every Monday).

Recently, I also received an email from a mom who read my blog about Lexie’s birth. It was nice to connect with someone who had a child with similar medical conditions. In fact, it inspired two additional posts. One ran on Monday about Situs Inversus and an Interrupted IVC, and another will run in a week and a half about Polysplenia.

Books

The best compliment you can give an author is to write an honest review of their book. But in lieu of that, I also love to receive email messages from readers. I love when they tell me what they loved about the book and how they couldn’t put it down.

Recently, I had one reader say that her love for cats drew her to my short story, The Search. She loved it so much that she went on to read my trilogy. Another reader even suggested I do a follow-up  trilogy or at least one more book with those characters. (And I am now considering doing just that because I too love them and have an idea for a new adventure, but that will have to be after my current work in progress.)

But you don’t have to email an author or do a review to show your support. Even sending out a tweet about the book or passing along one of my tweets is greatly appreciated. So if you don’t normally write reviews or have never considered emailing an author, I encourage you to do that. You just might make someone’s day.

Quote of the Week – May 22

When you get into a tight place and everything goes against you, till it seems as though you could not hold on a minute longer, never give up then, for that is just the place and time that the tide will turn. -  Harriet Elizabeth Beecher Stowe

Gifting a copy of your ebook

Whether it is for a prize, or because you are sending it to someone for review, you may need to send your e-book to someone else. Now you may have a mobi file, a PDF of your book or even an ePub version but there are benefits to gifting your reviewer a copy, especially if it is on Amazon.

For those of you unsure how to gift a copy of your book, here is how to do it on both Amazon and Smashwords. For both methods, you will need the recipient’s e-mail address.

Amazon

To send a copy of your e-book on Amazon, go to your book’s page and click “Give as a Gift” button near the buy button. Enter the email address of the person to whom you want to send the book, or you can enter your email address and then forward it to the recipient. (I use this method since my Amazon account is under my real name, and I want to send the book using my pen name.)

The recipient will receive an email that they have reviewed the book as a gift. When they accept it, the e-book will be delivered to their Kindle device or app.

If you are sending this to a reviewer, I have heard that recipients can decline the book and elect to receive a gift certificate instead so make sure you only gift books to people who have expressed a willingness to receive, read and review your book.

Of course by gifting a book, you have to pay full price for the book. But you do receive the royalty from the sale so basically your cost is your sales price less your royalty. If your e-book sells for $2.99 with a 70% royalty, your cost will be just over $.90 (Amazon’s 30% plus a small download charge, usually a few cents). That is a small price to pay, especially when you compare it to the cost of printing and mailing a paper book.

Now you may be wondering why you want to send your book this way instead of just sending them the mobi file. In the case of a reviewer, when they post their review on Amazon, it will note “Amazon Verified Purchase.” Showing this can add credibility to the reviewer.

Smashwords

Now with Smashwords you have two options for giving someone a copy of your book. You can gift them a copy similar to the method above or your can create a coupon making the book free. The good thing about Smashwords is that the reviewer can pick which e-book format they need.

To gift a copy, go to your book page and select “Give as a gift.” You will enter the recipient’s name and email address, or you can enter your own information if want the notification sent to you. Once you have completed the gift purchase, your recipient will receive an email with instructions on how to redeem their gift. They will need to have a Smashword account to access the book. If they don’t have one, they will be promoted to set up a free account.

If you choose to create a coupon to do a giveaway or to offer review copies, you just have to ensure that the expiration date on your coupon is far enough away that the recipient has time to use it. In other words, don’t make it a few days after you give them the coupon. You will need the expiration date a few weeks away.

Unique Anatomy: Situs Inversus and Interrupted IVC

In March, right before my daughter’s fifth birthday, I wrote about my pregnancy with Lexie. I briefly mentioned she has situs inversus, an incomplete IVC and polysplenia. After that post, I received an email from a woman with a child with these same conditions. She commented that she had never met anyone whose child had those issues. This made me think back to the days when we found out Lexie had these conditions. I would have loved to have been able to talk or even just read up on another child with similar concerns. All I found online were medical journal which were not always easy to understand and sometimes just downright scary. I am writing this for all of those who find out their child has one or all of these conditions.

Situs Inversus

Situs Inversus is a congenital condition where the major organs are reversed or mirrored from their normal positions. This means the heart is on the right (also called dextrocardia). The stomach and spleen are also on the right while the liver and gall bladder appear on the left. This is a rare condition that happens in only 1 in 10,000 births. (There is also a similar condition –  Heterotaxy - where the organs are in different locations than the norm but not an exact reversal. There tends to be a wide variation in heterotaxy and from what I have read it appears to offer more complications.)

While Lexie’s situs inversus was diagnosed prenatally during my first sonogram, many people are unaware of their unusual anatomy until they go to the doctor for another unrelated condition or have surgery.

So what does having situs inversus mean for Lexie? Not much. It means that we need to let doctors know about her condition, so they know where her organs are during an examination. She probably should wear a medical bracelet or keep information with her that states she has situs inversus just in case she is ever unconscious and can’t relay this to the doctors.

It also means that organ transplants could be a problem in the future since most organs are donated from people with the organs in the standard layout. (situs solitus) (I will briefly talk about some of the tests they performed on her at birth related to her situs inversus in my next post.)

Famous People with Situs Inversus

One of the first things I remember reading after she was diagnosed at 16-week gestation was that actor/singer Donny Osmond also had situs inversus. It was not discovered until he had appendicitis as an adult. His doctor originally misdiagnosed it since his appendix was on his left side instead of his right.

NBA Baskeball player Randy Foye (currently a member of the Utah Jazz) and actress Catherine O’Hara (she played the mother in Home Alone) also have situs inversus.

Situs Inversus in Fiction

As an author I have to point out situs inversus can easily be incorporated into your plot. You can have someone survive being shot because their heart is on their right side. Wikipedia use to have a list of notable fictional characters with situs inversus, but it has been since taken off the webpage. I found this webpage that still contains that original list.

Interrupted IVC

At the same sonogram where Lexie was diagnosed with situs inversus, they also noted that her inferior vena cava (IVC) was what they called interrupted. (This too is rare, happening in 1 in 5000 births.) Of all the things diagnosed with Lexie, this is probably the hardest to explain without too much medical jargon.

Your IVC brings blood from your lower extremities and should connect to the right atrium of the heart. In Lexie’s case, instead of continuing to the heart, this vein joins another vein (hemiazygos) and continues to the superior vena cava which then connects to her heart.

A pediatric cardiologist did a fetal echocardiogram at 27-week gestation to ensure that Lexie’s blood flow and heart were working properly. He explained it to me using math. If a normal person’s blood flow was the same as 2+2=4, then Lexie was like 1+3=4. You get the same answer but just slightly different way of getting it. In other words, everything was fine in her case.

Again, what does this mean for Lexie? Not much. Doctors will of course need to know about this prior to surgery, but it hasn’t affected her one bit so far. The worse thing has been trying to get health insurance companies to understand that and not deny her coverage which they have on two different occasions.

While neither of these rare conditions affects Lexie’s daily life now, they (along with a diagnosis of a hole in her heart) did point toward her having either asplenia (no spleen) or polysplenia (multiple spleens) which I will discuss in a separate post.

Basically, I guess what I want parents who find out their child has situs inverses to know is that it will have little effect on their child but could point to other conditions. As for the interrupted IVC, in many cases the blood still flows in a manner that works for your child but you may have to see a specialist to verify this.

If anyone has a child with either of these two situations, feel free to contact me. I am not a doctor and have no medical training but I have been there when you are feeling overwhelmed by everything your doctor is telling you.

 

Today’s Featured Author: A. Wrighton

Today I am pleased to welcome fellow fantasy author A. Wrighton to my blog.

Interview

Where were you born and where do you call home?

I’m one of those weirdos who is from Los Angeles and then stays there to live and work in Los Angeles. Side note, I have visited/lived in 43 states so I have left my sunny sandbox but, I am an oddity. I currently live along the Los Angeles/Ventura County border lurking closer to the marine layer and beaches.

Do you write full-time? If so, what is your work day like? If not, what do you do other than write and how do you find time to write?

I do write full time, but I also have a day job. I guess that means I work two full time jobs… which probably explains why I don’t really sleep. My day job entails the entertainment industry, agents, and casting directors – it’s 100 miles a minute and non-stop creative & challenging fun. Every moment I have a break at work (lunch) or at home (single mom) I am writing. I write in the car with Bluetooth audio notes. I scribble scenes and dialogue in notebooks and napkins. I just don’t stop. I’m sure when I’m older it will catch up to me but until then I’ll keep on trucking.

How do you conceive your plot ideas?

Random sparks. Random thoughts. I see a little girl stare into space too long and I imagine what she’s looking at. I think of a sneezing attack and I wonder what might really be the cause. I read, I watch documentaries, and I just enjoy life. There are endless possibilities and if I just relax, they’ll hit me. I may not start writing them all into full concepts just yet, but I keep a file of story sparks (ideas) and anything I’ve thought of in relation to them.

Please tell us about your current release.

My current release is the first book in a genre-bending fantasy series called Dragonics & Runics – Defiance. It introduces the story of a resistance movement composed of dragon riders determined to unleash a prophecy to dethrone a tyrannical dictator that has done the unthinkable – a magic genocide. Defiance gets the ball rolling and introduces the key players on both sides of the battle – Council and Resistance. It also gives hope and inspiration that nothing is as it seems and that sometimes the definitive line between good and evil is actually quite blurred. Defiance also introduces my style of writing where I genre-bend (or blend) and push the boundaries of traditional genre fiction.

Did you base any of your characters on real people?

Yes, historical personas and some real life people I have encountered or learned about in passing. I think that many of my readers know who is who historically in my novels as some are obvious (tyrannical genocide-hungry dictator ring a bell?) while others are quite intricate and delicately woven together so that who they might be isn’t revealed until much later on in the series.

Which of your characters is your favorite? Do you dislike any of them?

My two favorite characters haven’t actually appeared in the series yet so I can’t really say much about them. I always find it fascinating how different readers have different favorites. As for disliking? Hell yes. Out of all the baddies, I can’t stand Lady Diesden the most… which makes her quite fun to write.

 If this book is part of a series, what is the next book? Any details you can share?

The next book is set to be released late this summer and is called Allegiance: Dragonics & Runics Part II. This book continues where the first left off and rejoins the Rogue Dragonics and their Resistance movement to find the Five Catalysts and The One destined to save their realm with the prophecy. We get to meet a few new people and learn a little bit more about what happened politically and emotionally in the Soleran Realm for things to get as bad as they have been. And…happily, we get more insight into our Rogues and meet one of the strongest females in fantasy fiction (though I am biased).

If you could be one of the characters from any of your books, who would it be and why?

From Defiance: Dragonics & Runics Part I, I’d prefer to be Princess Chloe since she gets the best of everything. She’s a tomboy, a princess, a ruler, and a friend of dragon riders who’ll do anything for her. Hello? Free dragon rides! That, and she has one hell of a personality on her and her dresses are beautiful too.

Do you have a specific snack that you have with you when you write?

Green grapes, ice water, dried cranberries, yogurt, granola & Café du Monde French Roast coffee with hazelnut and vanilla. Oh, and sometimes I like to make Elvis Crackers (graham crackers, peanut butter, chocolate chips, and banana).

Do you have an all time favorite book?

Lewis Carroll’s Through the Looking Glass is an absolute favorite of mine. I love the written material, the poetry, the movies, everything. And man, did Tim Burton nail it. I could fall asleep to that rendition over and over and over… you get the idea.

If you could meet two authors, who would you pick and why?

Jane Austen because she is a quintessential chic lit author and because she had this amazing way of creating and revealing characters. Man, to pick her brain for five minutes would be divine. The other author I’d like to meet would be Hemingway – sober. Okay, so that might come off as a cheap shot but he was a genius sober – writing. He was a creative crazy while drunk and depressed. To sit and have coffee with Hemingway in Spain would be a creative moment to remember for a lifetime. And, who knows, maybe I could convince him not to shoot himself… write more, ya know?

Tell us a random fact about you that we never would have guessed.

I have severe dyslexia. I got through high school by memorizing the text parts I would have to read out loud in class (having a photographic memory definitely helped). I took AP courses by the boatload and none of my teachers ever realized I was severely dyslexic – not even my English or Creative Writing teachers – until I took AP Calculus. Luckily, my calculus teacher worked with me so I’d not only pass but that I wouldn’t be flagged with a learning disorder. When I went to high school, if you were recorded as having a learning disorder, you couldn’t do extra curricular (I did theatre) and you couldn’t take as many AP classes as I wanted. If it hadn’t been for that teacher working with me through lunches and breaks, I wouldn’t have been able to jump into college the way I did. And no, none of my college professors – history, politics, linguistics, science, or writing – ever realized I was dyslexic. So yeah, thanks Mr. Mansfield. You are amazing and I owe you… about a billion solved equations.

Book Description

Rule #1: Stay the Udlast away from the Dragons.

Rule #2: Defy the Council or die trying.

WHERE DOES IT END?

Over a generation ago, the Council ordered the systematic extermination of the magic wielding, Runic Race. In the face of the damning orders, a few Dragonics refused to participate and instead demanded justice. But their call to defiance came too late – no Runics survived. Now, those against the Council’s oppressive reign have long since been outcast to the fringes of society – their numbers and determination dwindling.

Alaister Paine, Commander of the Rogue Dragonics, leads the Resistance with little hope of success, until he deciphers one of his predecessor’s logs. Within the cryptic text, Alaister reveals that one Runic – a girl of untold power – was hidden from the Council’s grasp. Find the girl, and the Rogues will finally be able to enact a long lost Prophecy to bring freedom back to Solera.

Trouble is… they are not the only ones searching for the last Soleran Runic.

Check out the book trailer for Defiance AND also for the upcoming Allegiance.

About the Author

A. Wrighton has been imagining flights of wild fancy since before she could figure out how to tie her shoes. Her love of writing, creating, and imagination has led her through a life full of flights of fancy and amazing adventures. A. Wrighton’s literary efforts were first noticed in grade school and again in college where she was held at grade point and commanded to switch majors and write. Since that fateful day in autumn, she has followed her creativity’s calling and went forward to earn honors in a BA in English as well as honors in a MFA in Creative Writing.

A. Wrighton writes sci-fi/fantasy (her passion), historical fiction, character-driven fiction, romance, and suspense. She also writes feature screenplays, TV spec scripts, and the occasional short film. Her literary influences include: Jane Austen, Ernest Hemingway, Sherrilyn Kenyon, Anne McCaffrey, Simon Winchester, T.A. Barron, & Agatha Christie. In her spare time, A. Wrighton mentors fellow writers – local and online – and hosts a developmental editing service.

A. Wrighton resides somewhere in the beautiful Ventura County and loves her native city of Los Angeles. She lives with her amazing family and two dogs and often finds herself writing in little neighborhood joints – a cup of coffee or tea at her side.

You can find out more about A. Wrighton on her website or on Dragonics & Runics Series website.

You can also follow her on Twitter or Facebook.

You can purchase Defiance: Dragonics & Runics Part 1 on Amazon.

Staying away from the typical plot or character clichés

As you write, you want your work to be original, but it sometimes is hard not to fall into the old cliches. You have an elderly man as your sorcerer. The witch is an old hag with a wart on her nose. The hero is dashing. The damsel is in distress. You know the routine.

A cliché is anything that is overdone and overused. These pop up all the time in movies and books. Your best option is to try to avoid these cliches or at least put a new twist on them.

Plot Clichés

Plot clichés are the hardest to avoid as there are only so many things that can happen during a story. The mark of a good writer is to turn that same old plot device into something special.

Some plot clichés: a man/woman loses their memory; tycoon’s son must prove himself; a young girl grows up among horrible family members; the ugly duckling story-line and of course, the love story between two people from the opposite sides of the track.  In romance novels, you have the tough rancher who meets the sophisticated woman from the city, the guy with a past meets the innocent virgin and so many more I don’t want to take the time to list them here.

One of the oldest clichés in fantasy writing is having a prophecy that must be fulfilled. Often this is the driving force that sets the story in motion, and your main character is the “chosen one” who is the only person who can save the world. Legend and prophecy that always come true are not realistic even in the real world (or the world would have ended by now.)

The key to avoiding a plot cliche is to fill your story with fresh, compelling characters and make the story your own.

Character Clichés

Of course you have to be wary of falling into the typical character clichés. The villain has piercing dark eyes, and the hero is a dashing and likeable. The young stable boy is mentored by a wizard or wise old man, the police detective has a broken marriage, and the private investigator has a drinking problem are just a few examples.

Knowing that these things are overdone, doesn’t mean you can’t use them. It just means you need to be more creative. Turn them into something new. Take something people are expecting and change it around. The orphan isn’t the savior but perhaps the love interest. Instead of having your villain either be handsome and charming or dark and menacing, aim for a plain person who no one would even offer a second glance.  No longer do you need to make the heroine a modern-day Barbie doll. Instead instill her with average looks and a truer to life personality.

Remember that your characters should be complex. They need a history, problems, dreams and more. They need to feel real. If your character acts normal and dresses normal, they become just another stock, cardboard character and turn into nothing more than a plot device. Surprise readers by giving them something they don’t expect. The key is to make your characters believable.

Create characters with unique, disarming, funny, or strange traits. Remember they are not made from a cookie cutter. They need real traits and attributes. Go against the norm and make these characters and plots your own.