As a newbie fiction writer I am constantly learning new things. This particular project started off as a non-fiction history/biography/memorial book about the haunted, historical hotel in Lake City, Florida called the Blanche Hotel. It was in the process of FINALLY being renovated. They get the renovations almost done and, bam! covid hits and everything shuts down. But, hey, I still want to write the history book so I keep working on gathering information, reading about 40 years worth of old newspapers, spending a couple of days in the old county records vaults and trying to get the local historical society to back with either a grant or endorsement. Sadly, my research flounder as I ran out of resources and would need to travel out of state to finish off the biographies of those who began and ran the hotel for the first 55 years or so. Covid still happening and no one willing to take a chance on sponsoring another history book with limited appeal. [hey, it appealed to me and most of the long-time residents of the area] So, I decided to take all of that knowledge, create a pen name, and write a fictional story using real places and events as characters and parts of the story.
Thus, "Spies at the Blanche Hotel" was born. I have been working on it off and on for about 2 years now. Sadly, life intrudes and other needs and family have to be taken care of. I do meet some great author friends along the way who are helping with the editing and development, encouragement and the push to finish. Seeing a great potential for the main characters and loving history as well as mystery the way I do this has morphed into a possible series. The latest book cover I designed sparked ideas for 3 other story titles. One of which I will be starting November 1, 2022 for #NaNoWriMo2022
Very exciting but also I am very nervous. It will be a learning experience for sure. So, if you want to help a sister out please visit the first book on Kindle Vella - https://amzn.to/3gV5Dkj - at give it a go. The first 3 chapters are free and every new person to Vella is given 200 tokens for FREE to begin. Might as well toss them my way please!!!!! Thanks and good luck to all my fellow writers out there who will be participating as well. -@jolenemacinjax is my handle on the site https://nanowrimo.org/ #writers