Last Friday I went out for my second daily walk in the neighborhood. The first one took place after lunch rather than around 7:30 am. We had a fall storm blow through with high winds, humongous lightning, much needed rain, and a major drop in temps that morning. All welcome. I was struck with how much easier it was to get in those steps when the sun wasn’t blasting down, and the temps were nearing 90. In this part of Texas, we have most people’s summer clean into October!

As I walked I rummaged around in my head looking for my next book idea. TAINTED released in September. I’d finished a quick revision while getting the print book up and ready to go. D 2 D is slower than Amazon, but I like having everything under one roof.

Then I moved on to get THE THEATRE, which released in 2016, ready to go up on iTunes. Not sure why I didn’t have it up there alrelaldy, all the others are. I hadn’t read this book in years. Oh, my it’s pretty hot! LOL Apparently I was working on the idea of two people falling for each other fast. Anyway, I like this story because the heroine speaks out against any kind of discrimination especially when it’s based on sexual orientation. So there’s a message. I like to think all my books have a message, but hopefully subtly presented. So if you read on KOBO you’re in luck. The revised book is there. I’ll paste the new universal link on our website after I get word the book is live elsewhere. 🙂

So what I’m getting to is that it’s time to mull over ideas for the next book. I hadn’t looked at my Book Ideas file in a while and was pleasantly surprised at what I found. Several ideas have been suggested by my younger daughter, the former musical theatre performer, now owner of her Pilates Studio and Pilates instructor in TCU’s dance department. Every so often she drops me an email or leaves me a voice message. I dutifully note it down and put it in my file.

The weather Friday made me think of winter (I know not for most of you. 50 degrees with a brisk wind is nothing by y’all’s standards, but the forecasters are telling us we’ll have a mild winter, so I’m calling this winter.) This made me think of Christmas and how I’d like to write a book that takes place mostly at Christmas. (I have Truth Be Told, but it’s not primarily a Christmas book even though it takes place during the holidays.) Maybe even a book with a Christmas miracle in it that I could release next November or December. You know, kind of a Hallmark, though my books usually have a murder or two and threats, which doesn’t fit with the Hallmark model. But they always have a HEA.

Which brings me back to where I began with my walk last Friday. I think I came up with the idea while I walked. I even yanked out my phone and dictated the ideas. Listening to the tape is fun because of all the wind caught by the mic, and I’m walking, so it’s a bit breathy. It’s tentatively called Santa and the Ballot Box.

I have no idea if this will pan out. As I said I ran across some cool other ideas in my file, even a paranormal idea, which I don’t remember ever penning. In the Santa book, my heroine is a 50 year old widow. Her husband died because the town council allowed a builder to take short cuts on some project. I need to research whether a town can call a special election any time it wants. I don’t think it can, which is something of a spanner in the works. I’d like the election to happen in December. BTW, my heroine’s family encourages her to run for office. Have no clue what the “miracle” could be. I think the hero might be Santa?

Isn’t inspiration funny? Mine came from a walk on a blustery fall day. Where do you find your inspiration? Love to hear from you.

Oh, Happy Halloween if you celebrate, and be safe.

Please sign up for my NEWSLETTER and BLOG and visit my website https://authormarsharwest.wordpress.com/

Contact me at marsha@marsharwest.com , and follow me on my social media sites.https://www.facebook.com/?ref=tn_tnmn

https://www.twitter.com/Marsharwest  @Marsharwest

https://www.pinterest.com/marsharwest/

https://wordbyword.net/blog/

https://www.instagram.com/marsharwest