One of the most satisfying elements of being an author is when someone reads what you’ve written and gets it. I mean REALLY gets it. Book Blogger and Author Ali Crean is one of those who truly did. Her fantastic review of MOTOR DOLLS on her All the Things In Between blog put the goofiest grin on my face for the entire day. Click the image below to read her lovely words.

She also did a Q&A on her Weekly Word Slinger feature, where she asked some fantastically deep questions about the whys behind certain elements of the novel. Click the pic if you’d to get inside my head as she did, and understand the characters a bit more.

Ali’s questions served another purpose as well: helped me get back in touch with my characters. I’ve been working on the sequel, something I struggled to start, until I found my inspiration. Sometimes it takes a nudge, like a new project–say a ’36 Harley-Davidson–to really get the creative juices flowing. A project like this one.

I know, I know… it’s a bit of an ugly beast right now, but it won’t be. I promise.

See? It’s already looking better. So what kind of creative nudge am I talking about? Writing.

I have a confession to make. When I wrote MOTOR DOLLS ten years ago, my agent had me put together a plan for the second book before we shopped to publishers, but with several years past, a branching out on my own, an evolution of the characters, and three other novels written, my feelings about the storyline changed as well as my writing style and I no longer liked the plan. Problem was, due to book one’s ending, I’d committed myself to writing a second one. You can’t end on a cliffhanger and not follow through, right? So what to do?? I honestly couldn’t get inspired with where to take the story. Meanwhile, I had readers asking,

[quote]”Where’s book two?? We aren’t going to have to wait ten years for that one too, are we?”[/quote]

Uh… No? Of course not. I hope not? Ten years. Pshaw. Who would do that? Ahem.

Meanwhile, I was massively sweating. Seriously stuck. Yeah, I could go back to the old plan, but it didn’t excite me enough to sit down and actually write it. Completing a novel takes tremendous discipline and passion, and I simply didn’t have it for that storyline.

And then it at last began to coalesce, thanks in part to my new project, a 1936 Harley-Davidson VLD.  On my personal motoring blog, Bondorella and Friends, I’ve written all about the lovely beast. Check it out if you haven’t already but promise not to laugh at the poor baby, okay? Yes, it will require a ton of work to get this 74″ side-valve flathead back to her glory, but my feller and I are super excited about it, AND… it will be featured in the Motor Dolls Sequel! Yee haw!!

Speaking of the sequel, I’m eleven chapters in and having a blast. In fact, I now have so much material, I may even break it into a trilogy. We’ll see. A hint of what’s to come? A lot more fun with things that go VROOM!

So why am I writing this blog post? I reckon it’s to give myself a very public deadline. First draft done by April, published exactly a year from the first, September 2014. If you’d like to keep up on the progress, be sure to subscribe to the blog by entering your email in the box, or you can email me and I’ll add you to the mailing list!

Thanks for reading.

Later gators!