Spirited Woman Blogger Team

Guest Blogger - Lisa Jackson - Full Circle

When I first started writing, I began with series romance novels and I wrote a ton of ‘em, let me tell you. I really cut my teeth (and writing skills) on Silhouette Special Editions. One of the rules at the time was “no suspense” and/or gunplay/crime/anything hard-edged. That didn’t work for me or my sister, author Nancy Bush, so we snuck in mysteries wherever we could. They were hidden deep in the romance of the book, of course, but the suspense was definitely there.

Our first attempts at writing had too much suspense, so we toned the nail-biting down and concentrated on the love stories. Over the years, we’ve both branched out and Nancy has written the popular Jane Kelly Mystery series and also was part of the head-writing team for the ABC soap opera, All My Children. I stuck with novels and as I started writing single-title releases was allowed to add in more and more suspense. And guess what? It became popular. Finally, I was able to write what I wanted.I saw a clear path between the books where the romance overshadowed the suspense and the books where the suspense didn’t allow any room for a love story. I split the middle.

You know the old saying “What goes around, comes around.” I heard it a lot during the months right after my divorce. It’s used often for people to feel better if they’ve perceived themselves to be harmed. However in my case, with the writing, it’s a real truism. Not only am I writing the kind of books I want with as much suspense as possible, but also the dream of writing with my sister has come to fruition. She is now writing romantic suspense novels on her own and we’ve teamed up for a series of books set in a creepy, cultish colony established on the Oregon Coast. The first book, WICKED GAME was released by Zebra Books this past February. Talk about a rush!

Guest Blogger - Lisa Jackson - Oh, The Irony of It All...

(Photo: Lisa and her sister Nancy)

You might think that once a person sells a book, it’s just a matter of a little time and effort before she sells another, and yet another and so on and so forth on her way to the grand prize of becoming a New York Times best-selling author. If so, you’d be wrong.

I kind of lucked into my career. As I said in my previous post, my sister came up with the idea of becoming authors. When our joint romance novel didn’t sell, we split up and tackled the market from different angels. Nancy sold first. As a matter of fact, she sold her very first solo effort ABBY’S CHANCE which was purchased without an agent, over the transom to First Love from Silhouette. A chaste “teen” novel, it was retitled DARE TO LOVE.  Boy, oh, boy, we thought: we’re on our way.

Not so. I, struggling to break into the market tried anything. I wrote longer adult novels for Silhouette Special Edition without much success. I tried writing the teen novels, too, but wasn’t that good at it. I was frustrated and my family was drowning in red ink. When I dropped the IBM Selectric typewriter my sister had purchased with her advance from her book and broke the damned thing nearly beyond repair, I figured it was a sign from God that I should pack it in. The writing career was O-V-E-R! I had to get a job and fast. 

On a whim I sent in one last synopsis (A Twist of Fate), a book about an embezzling scheme which I thought was taboo for the line to which I was submitting. I didn’t care. I was in a bad, bad mood. I believed I’d landed a “real” job in a credit union, my friend who worked there had clued me in. The job had everything I needed: decent pay, benefits, and . . . did I mention decent pay? My mom had helped me build a wardrobe as I had nothing to wear to an office - I had five dresses, one for each day of the working week.  So . . . why hadn’t my new boss called. I waited and I waited as the bills mounted. Nothing. Finally, in desperation, I called my friend and asked what was up? She freaked. Apparently the woman who hired me was an embezzler.  Anyone close to her was suspect. New hires were out. The upshot: I had no job.

Another sign from God.

Guest Blogger - Lisa Jackson - Never Say Never

I have to admit that I started writing as a lark. Actually it was my sister's idea. Although I had always thought "someday" I'll write something, I didn't have any concrete plans. In fact, in my typically jaded way, I thought it a bit of a pipe dream. I had been an English major in college, so of course I would write something. Someday.

When my sister, Nancy, suggested we write a romance novel, I laughed and said, "Are you nuts? We've never even read a romance novel." And that wasn't far from the truth. Nancy and I always had been mystery buffs. From Nancy Drew to Perry Mason, we loved an intriguing puzzle and a good old-fashioned homicide didn't hurt. But romance? No way. No how. 

I told Nancy I thought she was out of her mind. However, Nancy is nothing, if not stubborn. The image of a terrier with a bone comes to mind and she was dead-set on this. She'd read an article about young mothers like us making a fortune writing romance novels in the current edition of Time magazine. The names of the writers were unknown to me: Parris Afton Bonds, Rachel Ryan and Jayne Krentz to name a few.

Really? Nancy was serious? About writing a real, full-length romance novel?

I quit laughing the next morning when I went to my real job: Babysitting. I was taking in kids because I had two boys of my own, one a baby, the other a toddler, and my husband had started his own business. We were broke and I couldn't afford to pay someone to watch my children. I did have a line on another job, through a friend, but that was iffy.