WHAT ARE THEY UP TO NOW? Featuring Piper J. Drake

Today's author: PIPER J. DRAKE

Here is Piper's ORIGINAL ENTRY ON THE BLOG (entered as PJ Schnyder) from an August, 2009 Secret Agent Contest featuring Emmanuelle Alspaugh Morgen. And here is the WINNERS POST from that contest.

Here is Piper's SUCCESS STORY PAGE.

QUESTIONS FOR PIPER:

1. What role did your participation in a Miss Snark's First Victim contest or critique round play in your ultimate success as an author?

Ms. Alspaugh provided valuable constructive feedback in follow-up to my 1st runner up win and 30 page request. The novel, Heart's Sentinel, was written as PJ Schnyder and became my first sale to Decadent Publishing. It went on to publish in both digital and print formats.

Participation in the Miss Snark's First Victim community helped me to receive constructive feedback. It helped me learn to pick out recommendations or critiques that resonated with my intent for my book and incorporate them. This skill has served me well for every book I've written since.

Now, I still participate in contests and critique rounds when I can because I strongly believe in paying it forward and I also believe the more we provide good critiques, the better we are at self editing our own work.

2. Tell us what your journey has looked like from your MSFV Success Story until now.

As PJ Schnyder, I went on to sell more paranormal romance and science fiction romance to Decadent Publishing and Carina Press, a Harlequin digital-first publishing company. I also co-wrote The Ministry Initiative steampunk role playing game and short stories for the Ministry of Peculiar Occurrences. My books went on to win the Golden Leaf and the PRISM awards and my podcast of A Swan in Siam won the Parsec Award as part of the Tales from the Archive Vol 2.

In 2014, I was asked to reboot as Piper J. Drake, writing romantic suspense. It took a lot of courage and careful planning, which paid off in the form of a 3-book digital deal with Carina Press and then a 3-book print deal with Hachette Group, Grand Central Publishing's Forever imprint.

My True Heroes series made the Nielson Book Scan bestselling lists and has been featured two years in a row as a success in my genre by Nielson at their book summit. In 2016, I signed another 3-book print deal to continue the True Heroes series.

My digital format Safeguard series with Carina Press has been chosen for Harlequin's Direct To Consumer program and will be available in print from online retailers starting in January 2018.

While I plan to continue to write bestselling romantic suspense, I am also working on science fiction and fantasy while I plan for the right time to bring those stories back into my brand.

3. What has been the best part of your experience as an author? What has been most difficult/challenging?

Best Part: Seeing my books out there for readers to enjoy never gets old. It is my joy.

Most Difficult/Challenging: Balancing my writing schedule with my very demanding day job has been incredibly difficult. The biggest challenge is maintaining the balance because I love both my writing career and my day job career. I could not do either one nearly as well without the other.

4. What's your latest offering, and where can we find it?

From my True Heroes series, Absolute Trust is available online and in bookstores.

From my Safeguard series, Contracted Defense is available online at e-retailers everywhere.

5. Please leave us with some words of wisdom for all aspiring authors.

I've given this advice consistently for years and I still believe in it wholeheartedly: Surround yourself with nifty people who continually inspire you and challenge you to continue to do the next nifty thing.

One Young Writer

My niece will be 14 next month.  She lives and breathes ballet, and I'm thrilled that she is now studying at the School of Nashville Ballet.  She's also a gifted baker, a dependable childcare giver, a decent photographer (photo cred for the pointe shoe shot) and a lovely young woman.

And she writes.

Writing is one of her more recent pursuits, but like everything in her life, she isn't going at it halfway.  I knew she'd begun writing, but even her mom wasn't allowed to see anything she'd written.  When my grown daughters both shared with me that their cousin had let them read some of her stuff, I was determined to dig my little claws loving fingers in.

Fortunately, she bent, and shared with me the first chapter of her WIP.  To say that I felt honored is an understatement; garnering the trust of a 13-year-old is no small thing.  We all feel a bit "undressed" the first time someone reads our work, yes?  And these emotions are especially heightened in the young teen years.

You can tell my niece has what it takes.  And you can tell that she has read a lot of books.  Truth:  reading lots of books really does affect the depth and quality of your writing.  If you aspire to be an author but you never take the time to read novels, then you will never truly become the writer you want to be.  So, yes, my niece's reading habits are reflected nicely in her writing.

Her setting is historical--the "prairie" years of the United States--and she already has a great sense of how to create tension.  Is she ready to query agents?  Of course not.  Her work is raw, young, undeveloped. But SHE IS WRITING.  Her characters have emotion and believability.  She instinctually knew that she needed to create an inciting event that would propel her protagonist into the story arc.  With an instinct like that, this girl will go places.

Here's what struck me most of all:

Yep.  Those are STICKY PLOT NOTES ON HER CLOSET DOOR.

What 13-year-old does this?  As soon as I saw this photo on her Instagram, I knew I wanted to write a blog post about my niece.  When I was 13, I had lots of story ideas that I started to write, but never finished.  I didn't even know what it meant to "plot a story".  Thanks to the Internet and the wealth of resources out there for writers, my niece is already way ahead of the game.

This is very much her personality as well, so I'm not completely surprised to find that she works out her stories so meticulously.  But still.  SHE'S 13.

I don't know.  Maybe I was just a slacker, but I find this attention to detail extraordinary at this age.

(Yeah, I'm doting a bit.  But I never gush about things that don't truly inspire me, so it's not blind dotage, I assure you!)

She's even got the find-a-pleasant-spot-to-write thing down.  This is a "work station" on the back deck of her home.  I'm pretty sure I'll be having coffee/writing dates with this gal at some point!

I love--I absolutely love--to fan the flames of passion in young people who write (or who do anything else that I also do, like music).  If anything reaffirms my own undying devotion to the art of writing, it's finding and affirming that same flame in someone less one third my age.  I'm so delighted to see my niece wholeheartedly pursuing this!

Need a pick-me-up?  Find a young writer and pour yourself into them.  You'll both benefit!  And you may just find yourself squealing and doting over someone with a fresh mind and an eager pen who wants, perhaps, to be just a little bit like you.

You have much to give, dear writers.  Go forth and give it!

Drop the Needle: Critique Guidelines

Okay, folks, here we go!  Let's see how well we do with sexual tension.

(There are 11 entries instead of 10 because several people ran into technical difficulties while trying to enter.  I took their entries and put them in manually, and since there were fewer than 10 entries this time, I just took everyone's.  I mean, why leave out one person? :) )

Guidelines for Critique on MSFV:

• Please leave your critique for each entry in the comment box for that entry.
• Please choose a screen name to sign your comments. The screen name DOES NOT have to be your real name; however, it needs to be an identifiable name.  ("Anonymous" is not a name.)
• Critiques should be honest but kind, helpful but sensitive.
• Critiques that attack the writer or are couched in unkind words will be deleted.*
• ENTRANTS: As your way of "giving back", please critique a minimum of 3 other entries.

*I can't possibly read every comment.  If you ever see a comment that is truly snarky, please email me.  I count on your help.

Drop the Needle #11

Title: Rewriting History
Adult Contemporary Romance

Camilla and Ellis meet again after an errant kiss and a two-year separation.

Camilla reached for her wallet to pay for a much-needed cup of tea. Only her bag wasn't there.

“S***.”

“How about you add her order to mine? I’ll take a cappuccino, please.”

Ellis Jones materialized at her elbow pushing a crisp twenty across the counter. She swallowed hard while her stomach did a little flip.

“Thank you. Again. Seems you’re destined to come to my aid.”

Ellis nodded. “Was it sprained?” He peered at her sock-covered foot. Under his gaze, each of the Hello Kitties scattered across the toe seemed to shrivel up from embarrassment. She wanted to do the same.

“Mildly.”

They moved away from the counter. Ellis slowed to match her hobbled gait.

“I’m Ellis, by the way.” His eyes were even bluer than she remembered.

“Camilla Tanner.” She watched his face carefully but the expression never changed. Something in her sank a little. He didn’t remember.

“Where are you headed?”

“I have a Public Policy presentation in a half-hour.”

A tapping overhead drew their attention. A frantic Sunny leaned over the railing tapping his wrist. ‘Hurry up,’ he mouthed.

“Team member,” Camilla added in explanation. “If I don’t hurry, there’ll be fighting over the slide fonts again.”

“Never underestimate the power of a good font.”

“Ah, but which one? Arial or Calibri?”

“No contest. I’m an economist, we scoff at Calibri.”

She swore his lips quirked. Oh, two could play this game.

“Really?" She tilted her head. "I’m more of a Baskerville girl myself.”

“Baskerville? As in hounds?” Ellis laughed, and she nearly melted. “That’s not a real font. You’re joking.”

“It is!” She grinned and tucked her hair behind her ear. “But, I am.”

Wide-eyed and smiling, he looked so boyish. And adorable. Camilla stared at the floor to hide her s***-eating grin.

Drop the Needle #10

Title: A THOUSAND YEARS TO WAIT
Young Adult Fantasy

Reina and Quinn’s group has just escaped a surprise attack as they traveled through a mountain pass. After hard riding, they have set up camp for the night. Quinn and another companion have suffered mild wounds and Reina, as Healer, is tending to Quinn. 

I continued to hold the cloth to Quinn’s face as my eyes fell upon the dark stains on his tunic.

Finally, I asked, “What happened? To what chaos did we leave you?”

Quinn did not immediately respond. Instead, he reached a warm hand up, closing it gently over mine as he pulled it down and cradled my palm in his.

“Do not ask to know the details of death, Reina,” he said, his eyes dark.

I opened my mouth to reply, but was unable to find a suitable response. Did he think me too weak to hear of death? Did he think I’d never seen it myself? It was true that most of my experiences with death were due to illness and old age, but I had seen blood, I had seen pain, and I knew what waited in the end.

“Ah, settle, Reina,” he said upon seeing the fight in my eyes. “’Twas not an insult against you.”

I did not hesitate this time. “What am I to think?”

He covered my hand with both of his, rubbing a calloused thumb lightly against my palm. “You’ve too much life within you to hear of death. I would sooner steal the song from the meadowlark than dampen your light with talk of darkness.”

Wide-eyed, I found my lungs reluctant to fill with air. “What talk is this?” I managed in a whisper.

Quinn dropped my hand.

“Antony,” he said loudly. “You’ve a wounded arm. Let Moreina tend to you.”