I’m enjoying my new brand! Nope, I didn’t get a tattoo and no cowboy sizzled my skin with his logo. I’m talking about my new author signature: a suspense writer who spikes her novels with romance and exotic settings. Call me an inexpensive travel agent, if you want to. With my novels, I promise you exciting adventures in a new locale, every time.
It took a friend to point out the obvious. My characters and I enjoy adventures in far-away places with people and cultures that challenge our sensibilities. Mix in mystery, danger, and romance. Watch the intensity spike!
LAST RESORT, my first novel, published by Wild Rose Press in 2011, began my ‘trend’ by taking the reader to an isolated fishing resort in British Columbia, Canada.
My three-book series (FADEOUT, FAINT, and SWOON), about a boutique funeral planner whose dead clients refuse to rest in peace, is set in Arroyo Grande, California, which was foreign to me when I first arrived from Washington State in 2001. FEAR LAND’s adventures focus on San Luis Obispo, California, a sure bet for tourist fun.
Watch how far and wide I travel in my next novels:
LIE CATCHERS: Petersburg, Alaska, settled by natives first, and lots of Norwegians later
BAD LIES: Italy (Rome and the Amalfi Coast)
CÉZANNE’S GHOST: Aix-en-Provence, France
FIRE IS NICE (coming soon): Sequoia National Park
You see, when characters are out of their comfort zone, away from home and the homey, the suspense ramps up. Soon we discover how resilient, flexible and confident we are, when faced with unfamiliar territory.
All this provides a juicy, boiling, embroiling stew stirred up by a writer like me.
How about you? Do you enjoy/use unusual settings to challenge characters (and readers)? Please comment for a chance to win a free e-version of CÉZANNE’S GHOST. From those of you who respond to the question between today and Friday at 6AM, I’ll pick one winner at random.
I hope you’ll celebrate with me, the release of CÉZANNE’S GHOST, climbing aboard for a wild, suspense-filled ride in exotic Aix-en-Provence, France.
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BLURB Three young American women vanish in Aix-en-Provence, France. The FBI suspects their American tour guide.
Leon Beaudet, formerly a U.S. Olympic wrestler, is proud of his five-star guide business, but when tourists disappear on his watch, the FBI dredges up a violent episode in Leon’s past and tap him for the crime. Worse, his new tour group includes Aline Kerig, who is as beautiful and carefree as the three missing women. Leon is fascinated and puzzled by Aline even while he fears for her safety. She refuses to go back to the States, forcing the FBI and local police to involve her in the hunt.
With the French tourist industry about to collapse and Leon as a prime suspect, how does he protect Aline and find his lost tourists?
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Come on! I’m celebrating the release of CÉZANNE’S GHOST so I want to give away an e-book version of the novel. Comment on favorite settings in stories you read and you have a chance to win!
I love your books, Rolynn. Such exciting locales. Best wishes on Cezanne’s Ghost. I love the cover.
Thanks, Diane! Sounds like you don’t mind a story set out of the USA. I call it a cheap vacation 🙂
I’m reading Cezanne’s Ghost right now. The only time I have for reading is when I climb into bed, so it’s takes me a bit longer. BUT I’m so enjoying it. I love reading books with the setting described within the context of the story…like you write. Good luck on this one!
I’ve used South Dakota (I live in Minnesota); St. Louis (researched what the city was like in 1890); 1499 Brittany (did tons of research); and modern Boston. (I’ve been there.)
Exotic settings add so much to the reading experience-especially when integral to the plot / suspense.
I have to read your release. I love books set in France!
Thanks for the shout-out, Brenda. Glad you’re enjoying Aix, Cezanne and the suspense. Take your time…you are one busy woman these days!
Oh, yrs…I LOVE exotic settings! Especially when they are well researched and the reader gets lots of details….you are transported there and get to discover a new place. Then, if you get a chance to travel there…it’slike you are travelling with an old friend!
You are a new to me author, Cezannes’s Ghost sounds intriguing.
Really enjoyed LIE CATCHERS and BAD LIES, and can’t wait to read CEZANNE’S GHOST! (A ghost story and France…what’s not to like?!) Seriously, sounds like a great story. I also love traveling vicariously through fiction. (It’s the only international traveling I do!)
Leah, you put a smile on my face this am. I’m deep into research on my next novel…in 95-100 degree weather in Sequoia…so your kind comments have pushed me onward and upward!
Thanks for your kind comments about my books! Makes this research I’m doing in Sequoia worth my efforts! (95 degrees yesterday!