Thank you so much for the opportunity to share my passion with my readers.
Some people are born with a “silver spoon in their mouth.” I was born with a pen clasped in my tiny fist. Which must have been highly uncomfortable for my mother but she should feel fortunate. The computer hadn’t been invented yet.
I was scribbling stories before I could form letters. I would tell long, drawn out tales to my family before I could fully talk. And once I could be understood, no matter what I would tell my mom, she would follow it with, “Is that a true story or a Kathy story?” Even now, I can’t relate a simple event without embellishment. My son has been known to let me talk it out then tell the story as it really happened.
I have no excuse except that “I am fearfully and wonderfully made.” Psalm 139:14.
I was finally able to launch my writing career in May of 2002 at the Colorado Christian Writer’s Conference where I won first place in a contest for unpublished authors. After I accepted that award, I walked back to my seat and heard God clapping like the proud parent He is and asking, “What are we going to write next?” I don’t know why He asked. He was the one to put then Heartsong editors Jim and Tracie Peterson in my path at that conference. He knew they would ask for a story I had not yet written. That story became Merely Players. It is now available in the 3-in-1 Florida Weddings from Barbour.
I left that conference feeling for the first time like a real author and quit my piddling job at Kohl’s where I was spending more in merchandise than was in my paycheck. With hubby’s blessing/sigh of relief that I would have to stop spending money, I began to write full time.
And that brings me to the purpose of this article. I was beyond thrilled when Heartsong picked up my contemporary Oregon series. Crossroads Bay is the second book in the series and releases this month.
Over on the Edit Cafe, I wrote an article on my Oregon research. Today, I’d like to talk about my characters. The hero in Crossroads Bay was easy to write because I had gotten to know him in the first book, God Gave the Song. Paul Godfrey was the guy who lost the girl. I liked Paul. So much so that I knew I had to write him a story, too.
Now, with whom do I pair a sensitive man? One who’s passion is cooking, and who’s only blatant flaw is his fear of boats. I know! A tough-as-a-lady-pirate charter boat captain!
Meranda Drake has inherited her father’s charter business on the Oregon coast. Her first encounter with Paul is when he caters a wedding on her boat. He is, of all things, draped over the rail praying for the ocean to freeze over so he can walk to shore. How are these two ever going to get together?
I asked myself the same thing. Often.
I had no problem getting inside the heroine’s head in God Gave the Song because Ruthanne was a girlie-girl like me. We shared much, she and I. A love of fuzzy alpacas, Bohemian clothes, and brooding men with sky blue eyes. Wait. . .I take that last one back. My hubby has brown eyes. In short, she became my new bff.
Meranda on the other hand. . .
Where do I start? We had nothing in common. She was a tomboy, the son her daddy never had. He taught her the biz, infused her with pirate stories at an early age, honed her boating skills. If she and I went to school together, I think she’d hurt me. How do I write a love story for a woman who won’t talk to me?
Readers, you have no idea how hard it is to create a character who doesn’t like you.
I struggled with Meranda for several chapters, until the day she sat in Paul’s restaurant ostensibly for his paella, her new comfort food. But when he came out of the kitchen looking all cute and vulnerable with her in his place of business—she looked at me and said, “Kathy, why didn’t you tell me he was so gorgeous?”
Hooked you, girlfriend! From that moment on, we connected.
Does that sound weird?
It’s okay. They have yet to develop a halfway house for writers who believe their characters are real. . .I think.
Watch for the third book, Fine Feathered Friend, which will take secondary character, Glenys, to the Crater Lake area where I pair her and her fear of birds with a falcon handler.
No wonder my characters won’t talk to me.
Kathleen lives in a tiny town in northeast Colorado out where the buffalo roam. She and hubby, Jim, traveled the world via the Air Force, raised two boys during their nomadic lifestyle, and is now a grandmother. She enjoys fishing and camping in her popup trailer, seeing live plays, and singing either on a praise team at church or loudly in her car to rockin’ oldies. Movies are also a passion, and she has created Craft Cinema, a blog where the passion for story and the craft of writing collide. Kathleen leads a local critique group and is an active member of American Christian Fiction writers, serving as the Rocky Mountain Zone Director. An award winning author of Christian fiction in the romance and comedy vein, the Lord has blessed her with laughter, and so she presents spiritual truths with a giggle, proving herself as one of God's peculiar people.
http://www.kathleenekovach.com/
