Tag: stories
How can I write the first chapter of my fantasy novel as a scene that happened 8 years previously?
About rain — rainbows — writing — stories of wonder.
It’s raining today. Sort of raining, just enough to get everything wet and make me not want to go outside and stand in it because I’d get chilled and soaked, though the ground will still be thirsty when it ends because it’s not coming down hard.
Still, considering we’ve been in a ‘red flag’ event for a while — forest fires so likely that it’s scary — I love that it’s raining. Love it.
Perhaps one of the things I love most about rain is what comes afterwards. And that’s a rainbow. Once in a while the rainbow is double, making for double the wonder and double the beauty.
I always feel lucky when I see a rainbow, and if you’ve ever seen a double rainbow—two rainbows on top of one another— it’s an amazing sight.
But triple and even quadruple rainbows are possible. Okay, maybe they are found more often in scientist’s labs than out-of-doors after a rain, but they are still beautiful. Scientists in a lab used water droplets and a laser to create a 200th order rainbow. I can only imagine what that was like!
But I’ve tucked the idea and a gorgeous mental picture in the back of my mind because I fully intend to use it in a future story.
Imagine a world where seeing a rainbow is considered good luck and a double rainbow would bring double the good luck. Then imagine a character seeing a rainbow to the 200th order.
What a story that would make. Will make.
More about black cats. Yep, there’s more.
Black cats are as easily adopted as cats of other colors.
Although euthanasia numbers for black cats have been some of the highest of all cats, their total number of adoptions was the highest of any hue as well. There may just simply be more black cats than other colors.
Furthermore, the Black Panther movie has made black cats so wildly popular lately that animal shelters are often not able to provide all the black cats people want.
So does it surprise you that I chose a black cat as one of the main characters of my latest small-town romance, A Very Black Cat?
Of course it doesn’t and if you read the book, you’ll see why he’s so perfect for the role he plays in the story.
How can I get readers to relate to a non-human character in a story?

How do I write a science fiction short story when I don’t have any ideas on what to write about?
Another interesting factoid about black cats. (They are healthy.)
THE GENE THAT CAUSES BLACK FUR MIGHT MAKE THESE FELINES RESISTANT TO DISEASE.
The mutation that causes a cat’s fur to be black is in the same genetic family as genes known to give humans resistance to diseases like HIV. So perhaps their color has less to do with camouflage than disease resistance. Scientists hope that as more cat genomes are mapped, we may get a step closer to curing HIV.
Hummmmm. Any black cat owner could tell those scientists that black cats are — well — special.
Black Cats. Gotta love ’em.
There’s a lot to love about these black, fur-balls as evidenced by holidays in their honor. What, you say? Holidays just for a specific color cat?
Yep.
The ASPCA celebrates Black Cat Appreciation Day annually on August 17.
In England, October 27 is National Black Cat Day.
I mention these because my latest clean small-town romance features a black cat. In fact the title is A Very Black Cat. I didn’t know when I sat down to write the book just how the cat would play against the other, human, characters but it worked out just fine.
Of course. Because Little Guy is a cat. Need I say more?
Check it out: http://www.Amazon.com/dp/B07BTGN58M