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| Cover Shot for Body in the Gallery C.J. Meyers |
Body in the Gallery, the second in the Lenora Whitley Cat's Tale Mystery series, is now available in both paperback and ebook versions online. For those of you who are writers, you know how much it means to finish a book and get it ready for release. I'm in that rather euphoric state of nearly complete exhaustion and exhilaration that follows the completion of a big project. Yesterday the ebook went live and today I received the news that the paperback is now available to be ordered too.
Thrilled as I am to finish this book, Body in the Gallery, I am also excited for you, the readers, to read this next installment of Lenora "Lennie" Whitley's adventures. There will be a third book in this series, as well as a new series that I've been working on. A new cast of characters has shown up to tell me their stories, and to urge me to get to work on their first adventure. Suffice it to say, that I'll be doing that shortly, but first, it's time to rest, refuel, and restore.
Creating anything results in generating energy. For some of us, that means we fuel up through the creative process itself. Often when working on a long, involved project, I find release through writing poetry or playing music. In my writing mode, when I actually put pen to paper or fingers to keyboard, I do not listen to music. In fact, I need a great deal of quiet and calm. However, once I'm finished with a big project or when taking a break, music helps me release energy and restore.
Writing poetry allows me to operate purely out of inspiration (I edit later, not during the creating process), and music allows me to wake up my senses and gets me into the expression of other moods, feelings, and ideas. Poetry too, is often a way to feel some sense of completion. The book writing, editing, publication process is just that. A process. A long process, and though I do try to take regular breaks and celebrate small steps along the way, until the book is in print and on the shelf or in the hands of my readers, it's not done. If it's not done, I don't rest. At least I don't rest mentally. There's always more to do.
Poetry, on the other hand, is usually written on a whim. I might ponder an idea for a poem for a while, but when I set to writing a poem, it usually comes as a steady, unhampered stream of inspiration and images. When I later compile poetry into a collection, I edit and smooth out the pieces. By the way, in the middle of writing Body in the Gallery, I wrote and published my fourth volume of poetry, Sea Change Poetry of Transformation. I haven't even gotten around to doing much marketing, as once it was completed and published, I went right back to work on BIG (Body in the Gallery).
BIG is what my editors, readers, and I nicknamed this latest book. The first in the series, Body on the Beach, was called, you guessed it, BOB. Just a 'little known fact little worth knowing' as my daughter's father would say. Love that expression, as I love so much about language. Another thing you might be interested in learning is how much we fiction writers actually learn as we do our writing. At least I'm guessing most good writer do this. Research is so important. While my sleuth, Lenora 'Lennie' Whitley, is not a trained law enforcement professional. She does, however, work with them.
As a former big city reporter for a major newspaper, she was the investigative reporter. We learn this about Lennie, through some of the contacts she maintains, and some of what she understands about criminal justice. She is, however, not a professional. That means as an author, I have to do enough research to make her character and interactions believable enough. As an author though, I reserve the right to use creative license in hopes that my readers will be able to suspend belief just a bit. It's what poet Coleridge called, poetic faith. We allow ourselves to travel into the imagination of the writer to see through that lens and understand the world as the characters do. This may not always be in alignment with the facts, man, just the facts.
My editors/prepublication readers keep reminding me what is believable and what is not. I write about dreams. For those of us who know and work with our dreams, we understand that is a whole other area that requires a suspension of belief. When we are dealing with the bizarre, macabre, and surreal realm of images and messages, we know that we can't take what we dream at face value. At least not always. The truth appears amid stark, conflicting images.
The puzzles or questions our subconscious struggles with, receive clues and answers in ways that often require our own poetic faith in order to comprehend what they might mean in the reality of our waking lives. Lennie has the gift of dreams, and they often appear with no obvious connection to her life or the life of the mystery unfolding around her. As dreams do though, the dream always has some element that points us and our character, Lennie, in the direction of answers, solutions, and clues.
Coasting Along: A Writer's Journey is an irregular blog. Today I am compelled to write, and what is the obvious thing to write about? The process, the art, the challenge, and the joy of writing. Truly, when a writer is done writing a book, it's entirely possible that you'll find that writer writing something else. You see writing is not just the creative act, it is also the life-giving, life-affirming, and life-altering act of love. We writers love the words, and love to use the written word to express what cannot be done in other ways. I admire so much my artist friends who have the talent, discipline, and gift of expressing themselves through their art. And I admire anyone who uses their work as a way to give life to others while enriching themselves spiritually, emotionally, psychologically, and creatively at the same time.
Hope you enjoy reading my latest mystery or some of my poetry. I hope both encourage you to follow your passions and dreams as well. Don't wait for permission to start something you love. Do it, and do it now. Even if you only just begin. A few steps, a few words, a few strokes of the brush or pen will add up. More importantly, you will release something powerful from within. You will allow your voice to emerge in the unique way that only you can do. Try it. You'll learn to like it and perhaps love it. Happy creating all.
Visit my Author's Page where you will find all my books, both paperback and ebooks.
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