If I'm not writing, then just shoot me

I've been in a funk. Even my husband commented on it.

The problem?

I wasn't writing. I wanted to write ever since I'd gotten back from Nationals. I just couldn't decide which book to do next in my six-book series Whitehorse: The Winchesters. I had this great weird family with lots of stories to tell. Book one was in the mail but I wasn't sure which story was book two.

I wanted to do something fun.

To me there are two kinds of heroes. The solid, down-to-earth guy with a good job who just hasn't found the right woman yet. Or a hero who is a sexy, charming con-man sort who has secrets, a dark past, could do anything at any moment and will.

While those solid, down-to-earth heroes are fine, I was in the mood for a bad boy.

And once I gave in to it, my funk went away like magic.

His name is Jack Winchester. We met the day he came down two-lane Highway 191 in an old yellow Cadillac convertible. He was driving through my isolated part of Montana headed for trouble wearing jeans, boots and a cowboy hat. Blue-eyed, blond and deadly handsome, I knew the moment I saw him that Jack was just what I needed.

I wasn't even surprised when he spotted my heroine standing beside the road with her thumb out. Josey Smith standing there in her blue jean jacket, crop top, jeans and red cowboy boots, her mane of burnished brunette curls floating in the breeze around her shoulders. A backpack resting on the ground next to her feet. A backpack she isn't about to let out of her sight.

Jack took one look at Josey and recognized himself in her. Why else would he have made her an offer she couldn't refuse?

And now I'm having the time of my life. I'm out of funkdom. I'm having FUN.

It's sad but I'm not happy when I'm not writing. I get antsy, I get irritable, I get in a funk.
But once I dive into a new book, I can't stay away from either my computer or my AlphaSmart. I keep hearing my characters and have to write down what they're saying. Scenes just keep popping into my head. I'm excited. I love life.

And I love the Winchesters and all their secrets and mysteries and skeletons in the closets. They are the ultimate in dysfunctional families. And I know dysfunctional family.

(I should mention that when I was stuck, trying to make up my mind where I was going next, I had to write so bad that I wrote some short stories and mailed them off to Woman's World. One of those short stories will be in the Aug. 10 issue, tentatively titled REMEMBER ME. )

Now it is great to be writing again on my Intrigue series and... Oh, gotta go, Jack's callin' and I just saw Josey sneaking into one of those off-limits rooms at Winchester Ranch. Oh, this is so fun.