Writer's Guilt

By: Maegan Beaumont

Well, it's that time of year again. Time to start another novel.

I start getting the itch around November. Ideas start to niggle. Characters start to whisper. By December they are no longer niggling and whispering. They are pulling and yelling. I have to shove them aside while I'm basting the Thanksgiving turkey. I have to mentally shout back, I can't play with you right now--my kids are opening Christmas presents.

January, I promise them. I'll start in January.

January is the right month to start, right? In with the new and all that... right? The people in my life will get it. That this is not only my passion but also my job. That it's important to me. That I have to do this on about a hundred different levels.

They love me and want me to be happy. They get that if I don't write I'll end up like Jack Nicholson in The Shining and that's never a good look on anyone.  

They'll be understanding and supportive... right? 

I've come to realize that it just doesn't matter. No matter when I decide to start my novel, I still run into trouble. Kids still want dinner (EVERY SINGLE NIGHT!!). Husbands still want clean socks (my kingdom for a maid... honestly, I'd settle for a chimpanzee I can train to fold towels and match socks). Friends still get weird when you don't pay attention to them. 

I try to juggle it all but I'll never make it in the circus. I suck at juggling. Something's gotta give--historically, it's my novel... which explains why I haven't made a deadline since I started this whole crazy business. It's not that the people in my life don't want to understand. It's that they can't understand. 

They just can't. Not unless they understand what it's like to have an entire universe full of people shoved into their brain, talking all at once. They don't what dinner. They don't want clean socks or attention. They want to exist. They are literally fighting for their imaginary lives. A space, out here in the world, where people can see and hear them.

And sometimes, that's pretty hard to ignore. So, yeah. Something's gotta give.

I guess what I'm saying is that I still-- 4. books. later.--haven't figured out how to balance it all. I struggle. I forget to start dinner. I stumble. Socks get recycled and my husband pretends not to notice the dead fish smell emanating from his shoes. I drop balls. Friends feel ignored and I feel like crap... and my novel still suffers. I give in to guilt and start to put writing off. 

I'll write tomorrow becomes my mantra.

But every January, without fail, I make myself a promise: This year, I will put writing first. Well... maybe not first but definitely in the top 3. Top 5? Ahead of the laundry, for sure.

As I'm writing this, I realize that this isn't about putting my novel first--it's about putting myself first. Something I've never been able to do. Something I'm not even sure I know how to do and yet something I've encouraged others to do time and time again.

Put yourself first. It's okay. You deserve it. If they love you, they'll understand.

This year is different. This year, I'm bound and determined to take my own advice. Kids, husbands, friends--I hope you understand, but there's something I've got to do...

Maegan Beaumont is the author of  the Sabrina Vaughn thriller series. A native Phoenician, Maegan’s stories are meant to make you wonder what the guy standing in front of you in the Starbucks line has locked in his basement, and feel a strong desire to sleep with the light on. When she isn’t busy fulfilling her duties as Domestic Goddess for her high school sweetheart turned husband, Joe, and their four children, she is locked in her office with her computer, her coffee pot and her Rhodesian Ridgeback, and one true love, Jade.

Look for her latest, Promise to Keep, available through Midnight Ink, summer 2015

A Bit of Shameless Self-promotion...

By: Maegan Beaumont

I woke up to the best news today... The very first review of my latest novel, Sacrificial Muse, has been posted! Even better, it's from, the owner of  Bookworms Tri-cities Books ... and she liked it!! Check it out!

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/19348116-sacrificial-muse

Fade to Black

By Maegan Beaumont

My annual client conference held by my agent is coming up soon and it's made me think about something that happened while I was there last year.

 It was my first time attending, having only been picked up officially that August, so I was a bit out of my depth. I was in a strange city full of complete strangers. I had absolutely no idea where I was going or who I was going with. If you know me at all then, you know that these are things that usually send me into a tailspin… but I maintained.

I was very proud.

While we were waiting for the train to take us into the city for dinner, I listened to people talk—“Hi, I’m blah, blah. Blah, blah has been my agent for 2 years.”

“Oh, I know you. My name is blah, blah. I’m with blah, blah.”
 

“So, what's your name and who are you with?”

It took me a few seconds before I realized someone was talking to me.

“Ah… My name is Maegan Beaumont and I’ve been with Chip for a few months.”

I sounded like I was introducing myself at an plumbers' convention, but I managed to get the words out without any nervous stuttering. Suddenly, the young woman standing in front of me whirled around and after a few seconds of scrutiny, said, “You’re Maegan Beaumont?”

Oh. God. What did I do? The juvenile delinquent in me was screaming—No. No you are not. Deny, deny, DENY!!

“Yes…?”

She smiled. “I joined the agency the same week Chip received your manuscript. It was the first thing he gave me to read. I couldn’t get past the first five pages. I still think about it,” she said. “I’m pretty sure it scarred me for life.”

I didn’t know what to say. What did that mean? Was it really that bad? Before I could say anything, she saved me from imploding.

“Oh, no. It was really, really good… but it was too intense for me,” she said. “Most writers have this fade to black moment where they choose to leave the rest of a graphic scene to the reader’s imagination. I kept reading your work, waiting for the fade to black… but it kept going. I kept reading, waiting for it. Fade to black… I kept thinking, when is it going to fade to black? Fade to black. Dear God—FADE TO BLACK!!” She mimed flipping through pages, her eyes as wide dinner plates.

She stopped and smiled at me. “I took it back to Chip and said, “It’s really, really good and really, really disturbing. Here you go—you should read it. And now you’re here.”

I had no idea what to say—again. I felt like an apology was in order but I swore to myself a long time ago that I’d never apologize for anything that I’d written. Maybe I should offer to pay for her therapy…

Her name was Erin and she turned out to be the one person I really connected with in Chicago. We split a pizza and she admitted that I was nothing like what she expected. I took it as a compliment. We really didn’t talk about my work again (although, she did ask me if my husband was afraid to fall  asleep around me...) but her reaction has stuck with me. nearly a year later and I’m still thinking about it.

Fade to Black.

I’ve tried writing that way but it felt… almost like a lie. What I’d "put on paper" was not what I really wanted to say—the problem was, what I really wanted to say was pretty freakin’ disturbing. I was worried what my family would think. I was worried how, if it was ever read by the general public, I’d be regarded (remember, nice girls don’t write about torture…). Would the parents of my children's' friends think I’m a depraved lunatic and keep their kids away from mine?

I was afraid of offending someone. I was afraid of disappointing everyone. I was afraid of what people would think.

I was afraid.

But you can’t write with fear—not if you want write with honesty and passion and all the things that make a book worth reading. Good writing isn’t always pretty or pleasant. It isn’t about what people want to hear. It’s about what you have to say. As soon as I realized and accepted that, I was able to let go of all that worry and doubt and just write. Instead of fading to black, I kept the lights on. I threw open the doors and windows and wrote.

And what I wrote scared me. Not the actual content… okay, maybe a little... but  what really scared me was that the words came from me so easily.  That I was able to go there without any real effort at all. As I sat back and read what I had written, I felt  the strong and sudden urge to delete it off the page before anyone else saw it. I didn’t. I considered cutting it from the book. I didn’t do that either. I’ve come to recognize that feeling this way is a sign that I’ve written something that will affect people. And if we’re not affecting people with our words, then what’s the point?

Truth is, there’ll always be people who will be offended. There will be some who are disappointed or disturbed by the things I write. Who will see me differently. Who will build pre-conceived notions about what I’m really like. And as much as I wish it weren’t so, I can’t let any of that dictate what I write. I’ll go crazy if I do…

So write what you want. Say what you need to say, in the most honest way possible. Don't let fear or doubt decide what you put on paper. You deserve better than that, and so does your reader.

Fade to black. Or not...

It's totally up to you.



Maegan Beaumont is the author of CARVED IN DARKNESS, the first book in the Sabrina Vaughn thriller series (Available through Midnight Ink, spring 2013). A native Phoenician, Maegan’s stories are meant to make you wonder what the guy standing in front of you in the Starbucks line has locked in his basement, and feel a strong desire to sleep with the light on. When she isn’t busy fulfilling her duties as Domestic Goddess for her high school sweetheart turned husband, Joe, and their four children, she is locked in her office with her computer, her coffee pot and her Rhodesian Ridgeback, and one true love, Jade.


"Prepare to be overwhelmed by the tension and moodiness that permeates this edgy thriller. Beaumont’s ability to keep the twists coming even when the answer seems obvious is quite potent."

--Library Journal

 

The First Rule of Book Club...

by: Maegan Beaumont

Is you don't talk about Book Club.

Come on, you didn't really think I'd talk about my first Book Club experience without referencing what is arguably the best Brad Pitt movie of all time (12 Monkeys is a very close second...)

Anyway...

I'll be the first to admit that CARVED IN DARKNESS isn't exactly what I'd deems as "book club" material. I never imagined a group of readers gathering in someone's home or in a restaurant to talk about my book.
I just never thought of CARVED as that kind of book.
Apparently, I was wrong (it does happen from time to time...).

A few weeks ago, I met with a group of women who not only chose CARVED as their book club monthly read but were thrilled at the opportunity to discuss it with me. I can tell you, they weren't half as thrilled as I was! What an honor to be able to sit and talk about my writing with such a wonderful bunch who listened with genuine interest and asked some very thought-provoking questions. One woman in particular had some pretty hard-hitting questions that I'd like to share as I imagine she isn't the only one who's read CARVED that has wondered the same thing...

How do you reconcile the role of mother to young children with the graphic violence you write about? How are you able to transitions between such extreme roles so easily?

Much like my protagonist, Sabrina Vaughn, I'm able to compartmentalize quite well. It's probably a skill I acquired during my days working in mental health. No matter what is going on around you or inside you, there is a job to do in front of you and you do it. And while you're doing it, everything else gets put in the box. In action, this looks like me spending hours dreaming up gruesomely horrible murder scenes and then when the bell rings (I have to set an alarm or I'll forget to pick up my kids from school... don't judge me.) I close down my computer and become a mom again. That doesn't mean the other stuff isn't there... it just means I've put it away for later.

How do you feel about your contribution to the culture of violence against women in society?

I can honestly say that while CARVED is violent and yes, that violence is centered around women, I never thought that I was contributing to a "culture of violence against women".
And I still don't.
What I did was give this world something it can never have too much of--a strong female protagonist who not only survives what what done to her, she perseveres. She fights and she wins.

Of all the questions though, this was by far my favorite...

I've read other books  featuring what was billed as strong, female protagonists but it seems like every other page someone is calling  her "baby" or "sweetie"--and she lets them without even batting an eye.  I read CARVED very carefully and didn't find one such instance. Did you find yourself ferreting those exchanges out in the editing process to make Sabrina more equal to her male counterparts?

No. No, I never went through the book to weed out what I thought were instances that would make Sabrina appear less than equal to her male counterparts. I never did that because I never wrote them. It honestly never even occurred to me to write them because Sabrina is equal and all the men in her life know it. They also know that if they ever called her "baby" or "sweetie" she'd go ten kinds of Tyler Durden all over them.

Maegan Beaumont is the author of CARVED IN DARKNESS, the first book in the Sabrina Vaughn thriller series (Available through Midnight Ink, spring 2013). A native Phoenician, Maegan’s stories are meant to make you wonder what the guy standing in front of you in the Starbucks line has locked in his basement, and feel a strong desire to sleep with the light on. When she isn’t busy fulfilling her duties as Domestic Goddess for her high school sweetheart turned husband, Joe, and their four children, she is locked in her office with her computer, her coffee pot and her Rhodesian Ridgeback, and one true love, Jade.

  "Prepare to be overwhelmed by the the tension and moodiness that permeates this edgy thriller. Beaumont's ability to keep the twists coming, even when the answers seem obvious is quite potent." 

- Library Journal (starred review, Debut of the Month)

CARVED IN DARKNESS ~ Fantasy Cast

By: Maegan Beaumont

    I've had more than a few people email me and post on my FB author page, to tell me that the CARVED "reads like a movie" and ask, "when is the movie coming out?"

    My reply is always, "thank you!" and "just soon as someone Hollywood deems important cuts me a check."

    Sigh.

    Still, it's fun to play pretend... so, here are my fantasy cast picks, ya know--just in case :



Sabrina--Jessica Biel. I'll admit of all my characters, Sabrina was the hardest to pin down. I didn't want someone too obvious (Angelina Jolie) but she still has to have the physicality necessary to pull it off. I think Mrs. Timberlake offers a good balance of vulnerability and toughness. If you doubt me, watch Blade: Trinity... What? I'm an action movie junkie. Don't judge me.











Michael--Sam Worthington. Okay... Worthington and Jeremy Renner were neck and neck. Both are great action stars but Worthington is a bit more low key, which I like. He has that vulnerable yet tough thing going on. Besides... look at those eyes!
Movie justification: Terminator: Salvation












Strickland--Damien Lewis. I've been a big fan of Lewis since he starred in a little-watched NBC show called LIFE. Strickland has a razor-sharp, tough-as-nails center, disguised by a slobbish, slightly sarcastic candy-coating. Lewis fits him to a T.
If you can find LIFE on hulu or netflix, give it a watch.



Val--Sarah Shahi. I'm not sure it came through on the page, but Val is tiny.

Tiny but fierce. She's the only person on earth who can go toe-to-toe with Sabrina and feel she might win with any degree of confidence. Shahi portrays that take-no-prisoners attitude beautifully.
Shahi starred opposite Damien Lewis in LIFE, she currently has a re-occurring role on CBS's PERSON OF INTEREST.

Nickels--Ryan Reynolds. Yes, I'm well aware that I now have both feet firmly planted in the Land of the Ridiculous but whatever, it's my movie! Reynolds is all kinds of hot, plus he has that wholesome, boy-next-door thing going on... with just enough hard-ass to keep him interesting.

Lark--Idris Elba. Lark is tricky... he's huge. I mean, huge... when I wrote him I kept picturing Michael Duncan Clarke who was 6'5... At 6'3, Elba comes in a few inches shy but he's got more than enough bad-boy in him to make up for it. He was just about the only thing I liked in PROMETHEUS. I've had more than one person say to me when we discuss the book, "I didn't know Lark is black!"
So... Lark is black. Now you know.




Tommy--Adam Beach. I've had a crush on Beach ever since I saw him in WINDTALKERS and he is exactly who I thought of when I wrote Tommy. Just the right mix of boyish charm and wisdom.








Carson--Warren Cole. Carson is a complicated guy... he's not really a bad, he's just too wounded and entrenched in the past to evolve into something more than what he is--a small town cop with a chip on his

shoulder. Cole plays bad beautifully (Have you seen THE FOLLOWING??) and I think he would do a great job at bring out the complexity in Carson's character.

Wade--Michael Fassbender. This one might seem like a head-scratcher, but hear me out. Like with Sabrina's character, I didn't want obvious. I want someone you'd never see coming. He's charming and handsome but at the same time, if I look hard enough, I can see a hint of cruelty. That's who Wade is to me.

Ben--Chris Hemsworth. My daughter is in love with this guy... me? He's super cute but not at all who I pictured when I wrote Ben's character. The guy I pictured isn't an actor. He's an Irish boxer named John Duddy, with whom I had a brief, yet intense, obsession. All the same, I promised my daughter that if CARVED was ever made into a movie, I'd make sure Hemsworth was in it... and a promise is a promise.

Mandy Black--Kristen Bell. You know, the coroner we see for about five minutes. She's featured prominently in book two and I like her so much that I'm thinking of moving her to the forefront later on in the series. She's witty, sharp and not afraid to put Sabrina in her place, which makes her awesome. Bell, whom I've loved since her Veronica Mars days, fits her like a glove.





And there you have them, my picks for Carved in Darkness: The Movie. If you've read CiD, I'd love to hear your thoughts on who you'd place in the roles, given the chance.

Five Fine and Dangerous Novels

Guest Post by Keith Raffel


My experience, probably not that different from other authors, is that the following three questions come up in just about every appearance I make.

Question 1: Where do you get your ideas?

Question 2:  What are you reading?

Question 3:  What have been your strongest influences?

My answer to the first question is that I have no clue.  It’s a miracle.  My answer to the second is Canada by Richard Ford and Death’s Door by James Benn.  Partway done with both, I recommend them highly. The answer to the third question might take a bit longer to spin out.

Like so many thriller novelists, I write about ordinary people confronted by extraordinary circumstances. The acknowledged master of that genre isn’t a novelist at all.  It’s Alfred Hitchcock, of course, but we’ll save rhapsodizing about North By Northwest, The Thirty-Nine Steps, Shadow of a Doubt, and Rear Window for another time.  (Well, maybe I’ll need to come back to The Thirty-Nine Steps before the end of this posting.)  In my latest thriller, though, I am trying something different than writing about a high tech guy who finds a dead body in his bed (as in my Dot Dead) or a man shattered by the terrorist death of his wife (Drop By Drop).  I’m still telling the story of an ordinary man confronted by extraordinary circumstances -- what could be more extraordinary than a Palo Alto businessman given the chance to save a world hurtling toward nuclear war?  What makes A Fine and Dangerous Season different from my other books is that it’s not set in the present day, it’s a historical thriller, and I try my best to fit its action in the interstices of history.  A Fine and Dangerous Season describes something that might well have happened if only we could have had the right vantage point to watch events unfold.

So what novels by what writers influenced me in the writing of the book? Here’s a top 5 list:

1.  The Winds of War by Herman Wouk.  After writing a few chapters of A Fine and Dangerous Season, I picked up this tome to see how a master interweaves history and fiction.  Wouk puts a navy captain on the main stage of history.  FDR sends Captain Henry to weekend with Goering and negotiate with Stalin.  The Winds of War together with its sequel War and Remembrance constitute a big sprawling saga, though, while A Fine and Dangerous Season focuses on a few October days in 1962.  Still, my character Nate Michaels accepts a dangerous assignment from President Kennedy as the country hurtles toward war during the Cuban Missile Crisis.  Following Wouk’s lead, I did research in archives and primary sources to make sure I got the historical background as right as I could.

2. Seven Days in May by Fletcher Knebel and Charles W. Bailey.  I have Nate Michaels, the protagonist of A Fine and Dangerous Season, carry a copy of the then-bestselling Seven Days in May with him as he flies to the White House in the fall of 1962.  Seven Days unfolds over a week in May.  I try to move even faster in A Fine and Dangerous Season action with the action compressed into five days.  Heck, I even thought of calling my book “Five Days in October.”

3.  The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit by Sloan Wilson.  Unlike the first two books, I did not re-read this one before writing A Fine and Dangerous Season.  Nevertheless, I vividly remember the flashbacks that took suburbanite Tom Rath back to his service in World War II.  Rath behaved irresponsibly in his personal life because he figured it didn’t matter -- he wasn’t going to survive the War anyway.  In A Fine and Dangerous Season, I used flashbacks of Nate Michael’s experience as a B-17 pilot and infused them with that sense of wartime fatalism.

4. The Thirty-Nine Steps by John Buchan.  Richard Hannay, just a regular chap who’s stumbled on a deadly diplomatic secret, is chased hither and yon by foreign agents in this 1915 novel.  Because A Fine and Dangerous Season is set in D.C., I have Nate skipping across townhouse roofs instead of the Scottish moors.  Perhaps influenced by Hitchcock’s 1935 movie version where Hannay is handcuffed to a beautiful woman who makes no appearance in the novel,  Nate is accompanied in his leaps between buildings by a beautiful Russian spy.

5. Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy by John Le Carré.  This one may be a bit of a stretch, but how could I leave it out?  I take inspiration from Le Carré’s theme that the same human emotions and motivations inspire both sides in the Cold War.  While writing my book, I remembered how Le Carré writes characters that operate and even love in a hall of mirrors where nothing is as it seems.



Keith Raffel’s stints as counsel to the Senate Intelligence Committee and Silicon Valley entrepreneur inspired him to try his hand at writing mysteries and thrillers.  His first novel, Drop By Drop, was published by Midnight Ink and deemed "without question the most impressive mystery debut of the year” by Joe Hartlaub of Bookreporter.com.  His fourth, A Fine and Dangerous Season, is available now as an ebook from Amazon and Barnes and Noble just in time for the 50th anniversary of the Cuban Missile Crisis.  Check the latest on what Keith's up to at www.keithraffel.com.