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Weird Crime plus an excerpt

3/27/2017

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Weird crimes are the source of infinite story ideas for writers. Take this story about a taxi driver who drugged female passengers so they would pee in the backseat. Seriously. Weird.

As I said in the post earlier this week where I detailed the weird crime that inspired the opening of Unstoppable,  truth is just as strange as fiction and we writers dig that stuff.

​In Unstoppable: 

​BAD BOY MICK DONOVAN IS OUT TO AVENGE HIS BROTHER’S DEATH, AND ALIGNING WITH DESTINY HARPER AND THE FBI TASK FORCE IS HIS TICKET. BUT LANDING IN THE MOUNTAINS AMIDST A BLIZZARD AND A PAST DEZ WOULD RATHER FORGET TESTS WHAT MICK WILL SACRIFICE FOR REVENGE.
Sunday, I detailed the first true crime story that inspired the opening of Unstoppable. The second story will be posted on Entangled's blog once the book releases (yep, I'm a tease). :) But, if you read the original post, you know that my Mayberry-like suburban neighborhood wasn't exactly as perfect as it seems from the outside. In fact, I remember hearing the shots fired, but in my head, I thought: "No way, not this neighborhood." Although police still haven't released the cause of this shootout, the idea sparked this scene:

Multiple pops sounded like firecrackers through the radio, but the double tap pattern was unique to guns, not fireworks. The wheels of her car squealed as she took the corner faster than planned. She stopped in the middle of the road as she approached the target house. A sedan was parked on the street in front of the house. The driveway was clear. A narrow front porch was barely big enough for the body crumpled near the open door. The face was turned toward the house, but she recognized Agent Summerfield’s bald head.

“Officer down,” she said over the radio. “Repeat. Officer down. Requesting backup.” Heart pounding, the echo of gunfire fading, Dez scanned the neighborhood for the source and found a man on the roof of the two-story across the street. She couldn’t leave the family unprotected, but she had no clue what she was walking into. The glint of early morning sun caught the flash of metal as the suspect lifted a rifle. Either he was gunning for her or he was going to make sure Summerfield was dead.
​
“Shit, shit, shit,” she muttered under her breath. Anger rose inside her chest, covering the fear and adrenaline. This was the kind of crap that went down when you didn’t stick to the plan. When you didn’t wait for backup. Now she was sitting in the middle of the suburbs with some nutjob taking aim and had about two seconds to decide on a course of action. 

To celebrate the release of the new cover, I've got a giveaway going through Rafflecopter. Be sure to add Unstoppable to your Goodreads TBR list. The prize is a list of romantic suspense titles that are on *my* TBR list! One winner walks away with 5 ebook titles.

Unstoppable releases 5/1/17.
a Rafflecopter giveaway
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Weird Crime

3/26/2017

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Weird crimes are the source of infinite story ideas for writers. There isn't enough time in the world to write about all the crazy stuff that happens in our mixed up world. Take this story about a murder attempt and a Ouija board where the writer of the article says things went from "buddy to bloody." Sometimes, truth is just as strange as fiction and we writers dig that stuff.

Unstoppable, the next in my Untouchables series, is no exception. While it is fiction, the real world does provide plenty of inspiration. There were two real world crimes, plus my Police Informant, that added realism to Dez and Mick's story. The first weird crime aspect relates to something absolutely unheard of in our neighborhood. We live in a very suburban suburb, the kind where people walk their kids to school. After dinner they walk their dogs or a baby stroller through the neighborhood. We're Mayberry normal in the middle of a midsize city.

What isn't normal is guns in the street, but that's literally what happened. Twice.

The second incident I'll post next month, but the first instance was just bizarre. My daughter the ballerina came home to say she had to drive the long way around because the police had blocked off an entire street. Because this is abnormal, we hit the Internet to figure out what the heck was going on. Turns out, this suburban street wasn't Mayberry after all.

Witnesses said that they heard gunfire first. Moments later, two guys ran out of a house and into a newer red pickup truck. Another man chased after them firing a handgun. The pickup goes tearing off and the man who had chased them sat down on his front porch holding his gun. This happened just before 4:30 in the afternoon. People were outside doing yard work and kids were playing. What the heck?

The original scenario in itself is bizarre, but what happened next is even stranger. The truck was found at a stoplight less than two miles away. One person was dead at the scene and the second was in critical condition. Had they driven out of the neighborhood the other direction, they would have been at a major hospital, but that wrong turn caused at least one death.

Police aren't saying what incited the incident, but that just makes it more interesting for my writer mind. So of course, I had to put the puzzles together in a way that made sense for me.

Unstoppable opens in what Dez considers a sickeningly sweet suburb where things immediately escalate. Gunshots fired and... well, the AND is what happens next in Unstoppable. :) I'll post that opening scene later this week.

To celebrate the release of the new cover, I've got a giveaway going through Rafflecopter. Be sure to add Unstoppable to your Goodreads TBR list. The prize is a list of romantic suspense titles that are on *my* TBR list! One winner walks away with 5 ebook titles.

Unstoppable releases 5/1/17.

a Rafflecopter giveaway
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Behind the book: Unforgettable

3/4/2017

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The story of the Craigslist murder for hire intrigued me. A man advertised for someone to kill his wife. On Craigslist. And he expected to get away with it. Some crimes solve themselves, but most require actual police work.

My background is military, and academic, and library, so on my FBI stories, I resort to research, which actually suits my library research background, but the real scoop isn’t always found on the Internet and in the research databases. Enter my PI.

No, not a private investigator, but a Police Informant (PI) a little like a Criminal Informant (CI), but less gritty. This informant started as an informal conversation. David, a retired police officer, would tell me police war stories like the Craigslist murderer and I was fascinated. As I started writing Unforgettable, a light bulb clicked on. Why not mine David’s past for more realistic story details?

Sadly, David can’t give me classified information (the writer’s dream), but he does fill me in on all the details of criminal informants, police operations, weapons, and the workings of an FBI task force. In the world of writing, he’s a short cut, like the Staples Easy Button.

The first few draft chapters of Unforgettable had Blake as an FBI agent, but as I talked more and more with David, I realized that scenario was unrealistic. We started talking about how big drug busts happen and how long they take. I realized that it took a multi-agency task force to take down someone like Nick Calvetti and his cohorts.
​
Thus the undercover operation morphed into a multi-agency task force complete with a bureaucratic boss in Stiles, with Blake and his partner working undercover.

The PI process was ongoing. I’d write a few chapters, and then ask David questions. His answers would either alter something I had already written, or give me ideas for an upcoming scene. For instance, the antagonistic scene between Blake and Stiles came from a discussion about interdepartmental rivalries and the realities of a police officer on loan to a task force. The officer is still on the local PD payroll, but answers to the head of the task force. Because the work for the task force is classified, the officer can’t share the information, even with his regular police department. This leads to some tension and a little good-natured (or not) pushy-shovey between the different people within the task force.

This was the kind of stuff I would never have found with my library research. Conversations with David led to the longer story arc between Unforgettable and the third novel coming out in April 2017. But our conversations aren’t over. David assures me he has more than two books worth of insight to share.
​
To quote Casablanca, “Louis, I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship.”
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    Funny story. During the Mercury Retrograde Incident in September 2016, Cindy's original blog disappeared. Five years, gone in a random act of chaos. Now she gets to repopulate her blog world one post at a time. Join her if you dare. :)

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