Navigating the Writing Path: Start to Finish

Welcome to the I C Publishing Summer Blog Tour on navigating our writing paths from start to finish. Jonnie Martin, author of Wrangle invited me to participate in this fun tour. Read her blog post here. www.jonniemartin.com

Here are my answers to the Blog Tour questions:

How do you start your (writing) projects?

My novels are historical, so I usually do quite a bit of research before I start writing. They’re also based on a real person, my grandmother, so that helps formulate the storyline. I don’t do a formal outline, but I may jot down notes or an informal timeline. When I have my idea of how to start, I’m in that state of excitement about a new project, and I can’t wait to get going!

How do you continue your writing projects?

I often continue research as I’m writing, as questions will crop up and I need specific historical details to ground my characters or the incidents in the story. I belong to a critique group, so that helps keep me on a deadline. I know that every week I have to bring several pages, and the feedback also keeps me on track or gives me ideas where to go from here.

How do you finish your project?

Once I’ve finished my first draft and have gone through it with my group, I go back over it and do an initial rewrite or two. Then I have a couple of Beta readers read and critique it and then I do another rewrite before submitting it to my publisher.

Include one challenge or additional tip that our collective communities could help with or benefit from.

One thing I learned in a writing class is to give yourself permission to write out of chronological order. If you get to a certain point and are stuck, but you know where you want to be in future pages, go ahead and write that future scene. That helps bridge the gap, and gives you an idea of what you need to do to get from Point A to Point B.

I’m the author of  a “Dreams” novel trilogy: Cowgirl Dreams, Follow the Dream, and Dare to Dream, and a non-fiction book which has just been released, Cowgirl Up! A History of Rodeo Women. You can order autographed copies through my website.

Cowgirl Up! A History of Rodeo Women is Here!

It’s official: Cowgirl Up! has been released. I received my author copies last night, so I’m now in business! I’ll kick off my release with a panel discussion “Women Who Broke the Mold” Sept. 6 at 2 p.m. at the Peregrine Bookstore in Prescott AZ, along with WWW friends Amy Hale Auker and Carolyn Niethammer.

And my launch party will be at the Phippen Museum next Saturday, Sept. 13, at 1 p.m. I’ll give a PowerPoint presentation on women’s rodeo history, we’ll have refreshments and fun! Then I’ll be on tour in Washington and Montana.

You can order books through my website, on Amazon, and from your local bookstores (please request that they carry it, if they don’t have it in stock!)

Hope to see you all soon!

Review: “Heidi Thomas’s story struck a resounding chord with me as I began chapter twelve. I loved the book up to that point, but on page 111 the stories of rodeo women intersected the story I tell, about the forgotten women pilots of World War II, the WASP. The seat hit the saddle and the rubber met the runway. From early in the twentieth century, women began ‘making it’ in the rodeo, in aviation — in life — but the Depression followed by the War changed everything. The years since are witness to a world where women have had to re-earn what they were on the verge of having in the early 1940s. Here, a descendant of a rodeo cowgirl spins a fascinating tale of hard-won accomplishment, and she tells it artfully, with love, honesty, and respect.”
—Sarah Byrn Rickman, author of five fiction and nonfiction books about the WASP of World War II