I was just two pages into Georgia Rose’s new thriller romance and she had me hooked. I knew her main character was living some sort of lie. But what was it? And when did I get to find out? And what was going on? From that point on it was hard to put down but, I have this life that does exist outside the written word, so I put it down. And then spent much of the time until I could pick it back up again pondering all the lies and foreshadowing the love and sneakiness the twists and turns the story had taken. I thought long about the supporting characters- I loved the supporting characters. They could each have a book, in fact I’d bet that with the amount of secret backstory they must all have to be so substantial that there are already a book’s worth of material floating around for each of them. I marveled at the complexity of it all and wondered how she came up with such a thing…
And then, lo and behold, look what I found in my inbox. A guest post from Georgia herself answering that very question! Read and enjoy!
Where do your ideas come from? Is a question I have often been asked. Again, it wasn’t until I took up the pen (overly poetic, I know, but indulge me) and started talking to non-writing people (there should be a name for them, don’t you think?) that I found out that non-writing people do not have this crazy imagination stuff going on in their head all the time. Which is weird.
I can’t speak for everyone but my ideas come from many things, something I read, watched, a random thought, an overheard phrase, some wild fantasy that passed through my mind when I was relaxed and daydreaming… ahem… moving on…
Sometimes those tiny thoughts don’t let me go and sometimes they want to be more.
This is what happened with Parallel Lies. I had a thought, an imagining, years ago. Well before the Grayson Trilogy ever popped into my mind. A place, a person, a situation and it stuck with me. This…
‘I hear it, behind me, and to the left. The snap of a twig underfoot and a sharp intake of breath at the indiscretion.’
… was all I had and it was the first line I wrote. I was going to start the book with it and do some sort of time jump back and forward thing. But changed my mind. It’s now where it should be in the natural course of time progression and, so that you’re not just left with that, here is the rest of that paragraph.
‘I hear it, behind me, and to the left. The snap of a twig underfoot and a sharp intake of breath at the indiscretion. He’s here, just as I knew he would be, but I allow myself a small smile of satisfaction knowing he’ll be cursing his mistake. I have no intention of making this easy for him so leave him to come and find me. I still, and although my heart is pounding, blood pumping in my ears until I’m sure he’ll be able to hear it too, I concentrate on making myself small and silent. I am one step ahead of him and plan on keeping it that way.’
The possibilities captured my imagination when I first had that thought, but I did nothing with them for years. Two lines expanded to become a 95K novel (which wasn’t as easy as I just made that sound) and
if it is in anyway intriguing to you the rest of those words are available for you to download right now.
So where do your ideas come from? I’d love to hear from any writing people (or non-writing, I’d hate to be discriminatory) who come this way with what has made their creative juices flow.
Thank you for inviting me on Behind the Willows, Jessie, it has been a pleasure to visit you and get to chat to your readers.
Thanks for guest posting, Georgia! I don’t know about anyone else but I have my own little narrator who likes to comment on my life as I go through my day, occasionally she makes up a story as well. Sometimes when the narrator is particularly fond of a story she repeats it over and over until I consent and sit down at the keyboard- and suddenly I’ve been blogging for seven years!
P.S. Would I recommend this book? This is the sort of book that I doubt John really wants to read. Bit heavy on the romance, not exactly his jam, but I liked it so much I told him about the whole thing anyway. If you are any kind of romance reader, or like a light thriller with a bit of drama and a bunch of suspense, you’ve got to get your hands on this book!
Georgia Rose is a writer and the author of the romantic and suspenseful Grayson Trilogy books: A Single Step, Before the Dawn and Thicker than Water. A short story, The Joker, based on a favorite character from the series followed and is free to download from Amazon.
Her fourth novel, Parallel Lies, a standalone to be released on 12 September 2017, encompasses crime along with Georgia’s usual blending of genre.
Georgia’s background in countryside living, riding, instructing and working with horses has provided the knowledge needed for some of her storylines; the others are a product of her overactive imagination!
Awards have never been showered upon Georgia but she is the proud holder of a silver medal gained in swimming at the tender age of ten and won Miss Rally Young Farmer (with a sash and everything!) more years ago than she cares to remember.
Her busy life is set in a tranquil part of rural Cambridgeshire in the UK where she lives with her much neglected husband and dog. Their son, currently at university, comes and goes and their daughter, having delighted them all for long enough, has eventually moved out, got married, and is discovering the joys of being all grown up and having a mortgage!
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