Day Three: Puzzling it out with Tara Fox Hall

Remember Wednesday we announce our first winner!!

 

Please leave those EMAILS with COMMENTS! 

Join me today as we look into each author's contribution to their release of 

Bedtime Shadows

Amazon 

Amazon UK

Lulu

 Melange Books

Take it away Tara!

Puzzling It Out

Clive Barker wrote a book called The Great and Secret Show years ago. The theme of the book is that many events that were seemingly unrelated in many times and places were really interrelated in a great show, a battle of evil and light forces secret to most of the bit players. Each time and place with characters were parts of a great whole, a puzzle with a purpose.

I love this theme and how it is related to writing. In a regular puzzle, there are a set number of pieces, and you try to form part of an object with them, to make a larger picture. The easiest way to do so is by grouping the pieces into subsets, and using those sets to form smaller pictures;  first the border, then some of the main characters of the larger picture. As the puzzle forms, you can almost see the bigger picture, and when you finally can, you know how to finish it, as there are a set number of pieces left. Every piece has a place, and unless you’ve done something weird, there are no extra pieces.

In writing, all the elements of puzzle solving are there. The picture is the story, the small subsets are scenes, the actual pieces dialogue, settings and characters. Writers may form their puzzles in different fashions– some forming the border into an outline for their story, then putting the scenes together to make smaller parts, then forming the scenes into bigger subsets, finally linking them all together in a novel. Others form the scenes first, then flesh out characters, adding on until a larger picture begins to unfold.

But in writing, there is one very important difference:  no set number of pieces. An author’s story is done when the writer says it’s done. Need another piece? Fabricate one that fits. Need a larger picture? Expand the border to include more scenes and pieces. 

My advice? If you find a few extraneous pieces, save them. You never know…they might go to a new puzzle you haven’t thought of yet! 

 Some recent book by Tara 

Tara Fox Hall’s writing credits include nonfiction, horror, suspense, action-adventure, erotica, and contemporary and historical paranormal romance. She is the author of the paranormal action-adventure Lash series and the vampire romantic suspense Promise Me series. Tara divides her free time unequally between writing novels and short stories, chainsawing firewood, caring for stray animals, sewing cat and dog beds for donation to animal shelters, and target practice.

www.tarafoxhall.com
tarafoxhall@gmail.com

Tara's Blog: http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/5286654.Tara_Fox_Hall/blog

Tara's Facebook Page:
 www.facebook.com/pages/Tara-Fox-Hall/151813374904903

Twitter: https://twitter.com/#!/TerrorFoxHall

For info on my recently published books Lash and Promise Me, click here: http://www.amazon.com/Lash-ebook/dp/B007UJ6KGC and here http://www.amazon.com/Promise-Me-ebook/dp/B0086G4GDC

For my latest interview, click here: https://www.coffeetimeromance.com/Interviews/TaraFoxHall2012.html