Most of you know that I create pitches for several books at a time in my series a year to three ahead of when I write the actual novels. By the time I write the books, the world has changed, my life has changed, and even the series has changed due to the books that have been finished and published in the series ahead of the one at hand.
And so it was with Her Burning Lies, in such a big, beautiful and even horrible way.
First... when I pitched, Eric had retired and we were living the majority of our time in Wyoming with a month or so a year in Maine each year. Weeks after I submitted the pitches, he had gone back to full-time-plus, but with a twist: he was working temporary assignments around the world. And I went with him. Four months in Fredericia, Denmark. Eleven months in Bakersfield, California. Then... a year on the Mediterranean coast of France.
I went from living in Delaney's world and experimenting with the types of things she does to starting Her Burning Lies while immersed in a new culture in France, a foreign language, and a landscape that looked completely different.
The most striking differences, to me as an American, was the age of structures (our own house two hundred years old; structures standing as old as 2000 years!) and the length of the written history in Europe. It made me consider the relative youth of my own country and our continent's written history and captured culture. That led to the extent to which we flirt with European customs and celebrations without understanding their significance—or having any real tie to them.
As an outsider welcomed into a tiny French village with my big furry loud American dogs where very little English was spoken, I also quickly came to appreciate how small the world has become. I pondered the ways the same thing was happening in my even smaller town back in Wyoming, albeit more slowly and to a lesser extent—it was still an unstoppable, inevitable force.
All of this played out in a slight twist in the focus of the plot in Her Burning Lies, which felt like fate. How had I anticipated this story before #ourFrenchyear had been a possibility? I had planned murders with swords, wanting to tie them in to ComicCons and cosplay. Which I still did. But now I could also link them to Renaissance Festivals, the Middle Ages, and Medieval History. My victims had similarities—I'll leave you to discover them—but I could add internationality to the list. Working these elements into my Wyoming book made writing it in Europe that much more fulfilling.
Second... when I pitched, I had to choose a season of the year in which to set the book and an attendant natural phenomenon to challenge Delaney and Leo and drive up the story tension. I pace the books in the series 3-4 months apart in their timeline, so this book was to occur in August, right before the school year was to start for Kat and Carrie. For those that are familiar with the Mountain West, this means wildfire season.
Mind you, our own house underwent a wildfire in 2006. Two barns and two cabins burned to the ground. The trees were lost, all but a handful. The main structure survived due to a gel truck operator who saw the fire and drove from the interstate and gelled most of the house. Only one corner caught fire. The owner and his son drove through the fire line to return and hold hoses on the lit section through the night, even as the fire doubled back toward the house. Luckily it died before it reached them.
Thus, fire is scary and real thing to us. Of all the disasters I've written about, this, to me, would be the worst. And it was time to include it in a book.
I began writing Her Burning Lies in August 2024 in Martigues, France. Two weeks later, the Elk Fires started in the Bighorn Mountains west of Dayton, Wyoming. Within a few days, there were Hot Shot fire workers swarming our home to prepare it for the worst and a seven-mile "last stand" fire line set up half a mile from our home to stop the 100,000-acre monster that had exploded out of control and threatened communities, ranches, homes, people, livestock, wildlife, water sources, and national forests. It was consuming timber, blackening mountainsides, sending herds of animals fleeing, creating choking clouds of smoke, and scaring the daylights out of all of us who live in or have love for the area.
I've had an irrational fear of "writing things into life" ever since I became a novelist. I know I don't have that power. Fiction is just that: fiction. Not real. It's often the reverse. I write fictional versions of things that have already happened, sometimes thinly veiled, sometimes blatant rip offs of my own life. But this time, I was wracked by guilt. I could barely admit the parallel to friends. (In a whisper, "I'm writing a book right now about this same thing happening in Delaney's world. Right here. Just like this.") I hoped when I did they'd tell me I was crazy. But secretly I feared they'd blame me. Chastise me. Hate me.
I'm still not clear which way it went.
But in the end, the fire was contained at the last stand, our house faced nothing but embers and a very thorough bushwhacking, branch trimming, and deadfall removal. The towns were saved. The fire finally burned out when the snows got serious. The grass will grow back next season. The forests... well, not in our lifetime.
As for the book, it was finished with no further real natural disasters occurring. Thank goodness!
According to all concerned (not me: I can never tell), it's my best. But reading is a subjective experience. Each reader brings their own selves and preferences to the words and there the alchemy occurs. Or it doesn't.
I would love to hear how the chemicals react for you with her HER BURNING LIES ....
Preorder until April 15th when we will celebrate the release of ebook, print, and audiobook!
Pamela