TEXAS BAD BOYS

Texas Bad Boys!

Oh yeah.
Gotta love em. I know I did!

This book is such a kick (just like my friend Dianne Castell) that I decided to interview her on it.

Dianne and I have known each other since before we were published.
We talk almost daily on the phone. In fact, other than my family, Dianne is one of the very few people whose calls I'll take.



Just to give you an idea of who Dianne really is, here's a few photos.
Yep, Dianne is always loads of fun!



And here's a cool photo of James Denton
reading one of Dianne's fabulous books! Dianne gets around, let me tell you!

In comparison to Dianne, I'm a complete dud, so maybe that's why we get along so well.
But it's also because I LOVE Dianne's voice and storytelling style. She's witty, fun, fast-paced and she writes characters I adore.
As much as I value her as a friend, I respect her talent more.

So without further ado... time for the interview, Dianne!


Dianne: Hi Foster!! Thanks for making Karen, Rosemary and me part of your Running With Quills blog. What a totally terrific blog. Terrific authors and so much fun.

Lori: Ahem. Enough brown-nosing, Dianne. Let's talk about this fun, sexy antho! The three novellas related. Can you explain that to readers?

Dianne: Yes, all three stories are conneted!. There are three half-sisters who have the same father...a no-good philanderer. They didn’t know they were sisters and they come to Silver Gulch when their grandfather dies. There’s the action and adventure of solving a mystery together, and the emotions of finding siblings and the humor of falling in love at the same time with hunky men they had no intention of ever falling for.

Lori: Other than my glowing recommendations, any advance reviews yet?

Dianne: Texas Bad Boys made the cover of the September Romantic Times. They gave us a four-star review and labeled the book Hot. I’m glad they liked it.

Lori: Definitely hot! I know these are Texas cowboys, but was that a deliberate choice? If so, how come?

Dianne: Rod, Lance and John are all totally real Texas cowboys who think they know just what they want in a woman till Juliet, Nina and Lillie come to town and nothing is the same for Silver Gulch or the guys again.
We set it in Texas as bad boys and cowboys just seemed like a fun fit with all that macho testosterone attitude in the air.
Also, Karen Kelley lives in Texas and could tell us like it is for weather and terrain and customs.

Lori: How did the three of you come up with the idea of having a connected story with the mystery opening in the first novella and not winding up until the last?

Dianne: We wanted something different. There are anthologies out there with the same theme, but we wanted to take it a step beyond and have the stories all tied together.
Warning…only do this with writers you reeeeeeeally get along with.
There are a lot of details to work out and the plot to settle on and getting characters that work together...
I'm happy to report that Karen and Rosemary and I are still vast friends and intend to write another connected anthology as soon as Kate Duffy lets us.

Lori: It's complicated - I know, because we did the same thing in Star Quality, with Lucy Monroe. In fact, I think it was your idea then, too. Shew. Loads of extra work! (Note: Dianne obviously likes extra work!)
So Dianne, why don't you tell readers how you went about writing each other's characters.

Dianne: I read the other stories and it worked well…except for Rosemary’s Juliet who is a Brit! Terrific, now I have to write a Brit accent or whatever and Rosemary is in England while I’m doing this story and she won’t be back till I have to have it in.

Lori: We probably talked on the phone about this, didn't we?

Dianne: It always helps to vent! Anyway, as you know, I winged it. Rosemary said there was one part where she thought “no Brit talks like that.” We should run a contest to pick out that part out.

Lori: Rosemary is a hoot. Love her and her accent.
Now back to the antho... how'd you figure out the map of Silver Gulch, where all the stores are, where everyone lives?

Dianne: I made a basic map and we all added stores and buildings and locations we needed. We wanted to do this to give the readers a sense of where they were in the town, where folks lived and played and socialized and where the mystery took place and got solved.
I thought the art dept at Kensington would do the art work. Wrong! I get a note from them saying…Where is that map??
So I worked it up to make it cute. Now I’m really into the map thing.
I always use them for myself when I write my story but now I’m hooked on having a map included in the book.

Lori: Whose Idea was it to get this anthology together?

Dianne: I went to Rosemary who is a good friend. We’ve known each other since before we were published.

Lori: You know, we're all starting to sound really old, aren't we? All this "pre-publication" stuff. But we sure did make some great friendships!

Dianne: Foster, I couldn't survive this biz without those friendships!

Lori: Same here.

Dianne: Anyway, I asked Rosemary… “Hey, girl, wanna do some writing together?” I knew we’d be able to work together because Rosemary is easy to get along with. Also…since she’s from the UK I love to hear her talk with her neat accent…or do we have the accent?? I can never figure that one out.
Then we asked Karen Kelley because we met up with her at RT in St. Louis at the Kensington dinner and she was a total hoot. Karen’s a Texas country girl and she sat next to Kate Duffy at the Kensington dinner. When Karen told us she named her pet pig after her mother Kate nearly fell off her chair. New York gal meets Texas gal. What a fun dinner! Wish you all could have been there. Side-splitting stuff!

Lori: So does Karen have an accent, too? Nevermind. I know she does. Forget I asked! Instead, tell us what makes your characters so deliciously baaaaad?

Dianne: John Snow is a player in his “old” life. In fact, he was sent to Silver Gulch because the mayor’s twin daughters got into a china-throwing fight over who was going to marry John and, of course, he had no intention of marrying either and had to skip town…actually he was thrown out.
Also, John is a Texas Ranger…takes no grief from anyone and once he sets out to find grandpa’s killer there’s no stopping him…even if he thinks Lillie…the heroine…may have done the deed.

Lori: As y'all have figured out by now, we're all friends, so I couldn't stop with interviewing Dianne. I also tossed a few questions toward Karen and Rosemary, too!

Ladies, you ever been to Texas? Wanna go?

Karen: I’m already there! I love Texas. From the bayous and tall pine tree forests of East Texas, to the rolling hills and cedar trees of Central Texas, to the Southern part where you can walk on a sandy beach in Galveston, to the prairies of Northern Texas. What’s not to love? And we even have bull-riding, boot-stompin’, good-lookin’ cowboys who are only too happy to let the right woman mess with Texas.

Rosemary: Yes, actually :-) Twice to Dallas and once to Houston and for course the time I’ve spent in Silver Gulch.

Lori: Do you want to do this type of anthology again? Any other connected anthologies in the works?

Karen: I’d love to do another anthology. This one wasn’t as easy to do because of the connecting stories but I think it made a richer book.

Rosemary: I would LOVE to. We have another one we’ve just contracted for and an idea we’re jiggling about. A lot depends on reader reaction and of course, selling the idea.

Lori: Did you always want to be a writer?

Karen: No. I was definitely a reader first. I’d sneak mom’s True Stories into my bedroom and devour them. Then after I married, I discovered romances and I was hooked. Writing came a few years later.

Rosemary: No. Never seriously thought about it until I hit upon it as an idea to make some tuition money. (I had three sons in college and really really needed extra tuition money.) By the time I realized it wasn’t that easy I was hooked and kept on writing. They were all in grad school by the time I sold.

Lori: Thank you, Dianne, Karen and Rosemary, not only for the interview, but for the fabulous anthology. I'm sure it's going to be a big hit!

You can find these fun, talented, and totally likeable ladies at:

www.authorkarenkelley.com
www.rosemarylaurey.com
www.diannecastell.com

Happy reading everyone!