Writers and Readers Network Chat with Author Cyndia Depre

Welcome to our chat with Cyndia Depre, author of “Amanda’s Rib.”

[clyons] Cyndia, thank you for joining us today. I really enjoyed Amanda’s Rib. You did an amazing job of grabbing the reader and holding on to the end. It’s not the typical mystery, although it has those elements in the characters efforts to find Amanda’s husband’s killer, unusual, but great.

[Cyndia] Thanks! That can be tough...people want to load a book's first chapters with backstory and that's not good. First, grab the reader, then give backstory only as needed and teaspoon at a time. I wanted more than a whodunit...I like getting into characters' heads

[clyons] Wade and Amanda were a trip, both enhancing and lightening the tension of the story. Tell us a little about them.

[Cyndia] The Wade character was kind of mentor/guide/fixer/friend...he was great fun to write. Amanda has a cynical take on the world, and Wade plays off it...he doesn't bug her about why she's the way she is. He just uses it to tease her, He helped me show that Amanda was able to laugh at herself. So the humor and dialogue between them allowed me to show rather than tell who both characters are.

I much prefer writing dialog to anything else, and rely heavily on it for triple duty. Dialog is good for plot, setting and especially character development. Why read a boring narrative when you can hear the conversation? That's what I tried to do with Wade and Amanda...

[Dave_M.] Dialog tends to slow down pace- what devises do you use to speed it up?

[Cyndia] I disagree...I think narrative slows pace...but assuming you're right, I use humor and quick lines a lot....not paragraphs of one person talking but the back and forth repartee. AR isn't fast-paced, or wasn't intended to be. It's more a character study.

[clyons] Ah, here, as a reader, I disagree, great pacing, the story always moving forward even when it was going back.

[Cyndia] I never thought of it as fast, so it surprises me to hear that...Thanks!

[vettes] does your timeline go from start to finish  or jump back and forth?

 [Cyndia] Yes, but backstory is brought in through journal entries...Amanda has found diaries she wrote years ago. That's how I got necessary backstory in...  There are a few flashbacks, but I tried to avoid them. The flashbacks are told as if in real time, to make them more active.

[Carol] I recently read an article that said one thing editors dislike mixed genre books. Does AR fit a single genre. If not, did you find that made it harder to get accepted?

[Carol] should be editors dislike is mixed...

[Cyndia] I don't think it made it harder because the genres are both popular...mystery and romance...but there is one thing in it that made it harder to sell...I wouldn't change it, though...I was stubborn about that. I've heard 'issue' books are good now, and AR has an issue, so that may have helped.

[Cyndia] What was the issue? Domestic violence.

[clyons] Yes, and it made this book much deeper and richer, bringing an element of association and even solution and hope to it.

[Cyndia] Thanks...that was my hope...I'm tired of battered women being badly judged and wanted to show the slow process of erasing a personality...

[clyons] good way of putting it.

 [Cyndia] But I didn't want to show the violence itself...more what it does to a person's soul...that's why the abuse.

[clyons] And that does come through strongly in Amanda's Rib. As does her slow rise above it.

[Cyndia] One person pointed out that Jack dismissed abuse immediately, thinking Amanda would never put up with it. Jack was usually half right about everything in the book <G>

[Carol] how did you pitch it - both to editors and readers?

[Cyndia] I just wrote a query letter...is that what you mean by 'pitching'?  In the query I said it's a novel of mystery and romance.

[Carol] Well, I meant more as how you presented it - I guess your query gives me the answer. So you didn't stress one or the other?

[Cyndia] No, I gave them equal emphasis.

[Dave_M.] do you do a lot of research for the book, and if so does it carry on through the whole process?

[Cyndia] The research was amazingly easy...I thought few women would discuss something like that...they were usually happy to talk...then I ran parts of it past victims and a therapist to make sure I'd gotten it right.

I'd try to put myself in their place, and had Amanda do what I do at the dentist...let her mind take her somewhere else... I was told that's very common and called dissassociation'.

 For the gun parts, I just asked my hubby...he was afraid of me for a while because of my odd questions...lol

[vettes] back to your query letter, did you use a general form from a book or make your own?

 [Cyndia] I made my own...my first was dreadful, but the second got lots of nibbles...it may be in a writing book soon as an example of the Hook Query.

[clyons] Good for you. Which book?

[Cyndia] The new edition of Your Novel Proposal...

 [clyons] Congrats.

[Cyndia] They expressed interest in it...thanks! I hope they do use it...free ink!

[Cyndia] I think my query was very similar to the teaser at my website...going on memory here, and it's not what it used to be.

[vettes] did you get a lot of rejections?

[Cyndia] Oh, yeah.....lots....I never let them get me down for long...I'd tell myself a rejection meant I'd tried.

[vettes] did any of them have suggestions ...that you might have used .

[Cyndia] One agent did, and I did make changes due to her suggestions...she was right.

[Carol] Is AR set in a location that is familiar to you? I notice you didn't mention that in your research.

[Cyndia] I made the towns up...I didn't want the grief that often comes with a real place setting..."You got that road wrong.

[Carol] But in a familiar area to you even if they are made up? Or did you completely make them up?

[Cyndia] Completely made them up....Minneapolis is real, but they weren't in Minneapolis for more than a day, and then only at her house. I do know Illinois and Minnesota, so they are real.

[Jenna] I'm sorry, but I haven't read your book. Just wondered where you were published? You mentioned an agent.

[Cyndia] I had an agent for a while, but she kept wanting me to make more and more changes, so we parted ways as friends. Then I checked out publishers recommended by Preditors and Editors and queried them. Poisoned Pen had the ms for a year, exclusively, then rejected...never again...from now on there's going to be a time limit. Mundania Press is my publisher.

[vettes] i researched my phone numbers and no matter what i used i found actual people at them could that be a problem?

[Cyndia] Yes...the prefix 555 is never used, though, so use that and you'll be okay.

I think the phone company left 555-xxxx for writers.

[vettes] i did use the same area codes for the area i was in at the time.

[Carol] I'm interested in the process you use when you write. Do you outline? If so, how closely did you stick to your outline?

[Cyndia] Oh, boy! LOL I tried an outline and strayed so far I tossed it...I wrote the ending first...some scenes were written because I liked them, then I had to make up something so they'd fit...it was a patchwork quilt method, but it worked for me.

[Carol] Did you know the overall thrust before you started or did that develop along with your characters?

[Cyndia] I knew where I was going...I thought of what I'd like to read and wrote that...in the first draft, Amanda died, but that didn't go over well with crit partners, so I had to completely rewrite it so she could live. I knew the characters inside out, but never made a character chart...I just made them up and crawled in their heads. I did write down birthdays, but that's the extent of my character chart.

[Carol] sounds like good advice. Thanks .

[Cyndia] One more thing...I think writers can get too hung up on the 'how' sometimes...go with your instincts, too don't do everything the 'How To' books tell you, or you risk losing your 'voice'...that's just my opinion.

[vettes] Did you pay someone to critique your book?

[Cyndia] No, I never paid anyone to read or crit my book...I do have a crit partner I trust completely, though. Be careful of critiquers, too...some of them don't know what they're talking about.../ In the end, go with your instincts.

[vettes] yes i have several also,  i trust implicity. did you use all their suggestions?

[Cyndia] No, I used a lot of suggestions, but not all...sometimes comments made me realize I hadn't been clear so I rewrote a sentence. Some suggestions I ignored completely, and some I used...I had to answer to me in the end.

[Carol] How long did you work on AR?

[Cyndia] AR was my first novel, so I worked on it for five or six years while I learned to write...when I started I didn't know] a POV from a SUV, so I had to learn everything...I thought reading a lot qualified me to write...duh. I had too much backstory in the front and tossed a lot...many rewrites.

[Carol] Had you done other writing? And when is your next one coming out? :)

[Cyndia] I'd never written, just wanted to...I hope to finish my next, Oblivious, by the end of the summer...then it's back to querying!

[Carol] What is Oblivious about?

[Cyndia] Oblivious is a comic mystery/romace...not as dark as AR.

 [Carol] Did you start it before AR was accepted?

[Cyndia] Yes...I needed to laugh at the end of a day writing AR, so I began Oblivious for myself...on a lark I tossed out a chapter at a crit group and was amazed at the response...they liked it! One lady named her baby after my protag and we'd only gotten to chapter three by then! I was truly stunned to find lots of people share my humor.

[clyons] I can understand after reading some in Amanda, you have a gift for it.

[Cyndia] Thanks Char! Humor is fun to write. I love it! I wish all writing were that easy. TY .

[clyons]You say you wrote the ending first. Boy! Amazing story to get to that ending, it is a real twist.

[Cyndia] It's an odd way to write, that's for sure...that's why I say find a method that works for you...don't let anyone tell you HOW to do the process...just do it!

[Jenna] I am so glad you said that! I have seen wonderful bits of writing go down the drain when someone tried to fit them to an instructional book.

[Cyndia] Exactly! What a waste...people I know who memorize the How To books often write cardboard characters. Sometimes I hope the protag dies...LOL. So write what and how you llike, but do learn the mechanics and follow those rules.

[clyons] I have to agree, the how to's have a gem here and there, but can grind down style and story. Hard balance when learning.

[Cyndia] If you constantly worry about scene/followup, you risk losing your voice and instincts... (That's just my opinion, but I really do believe it)

[vettes] i have read authors who have broke all the rules but have still gotten publish/ so you can break the rules?

[clyons] Only if you know them, Vettes.

[Cyndia] Some of them...I wouldn't break many mechanical rules, but a fractured sentence is okay now and then... You have to know the rules and make a decision whether or not to break one...if you don't learn the rules, you're probably sunk/

I broke one rule on purpose...I hate long narrative and I hate lots of description, so I purposely avoided them. 

[Jenna] As an editor, I run into that sort of thing a lot. And a lot of new writers seem to think that the editors will do all of the clean up work.

[Cyndia] They do seem to think that, Jenna, and they are wrong, wrong, wrong.

[Jenna] And most likely the ms will never make it past the submissions editor to be anything else.

 [Cyndia] Exactly! But some people are too lazy to learn to self-edit...they will never see their work in a book store.  IMO, self-editing is essential.

[Carol] I have to say I do understand the editor's POV. I read a book to review lately and had to have a pencil in hand to fix the grammar in the first chapter or so before I got into the story.

[Cyndia] Very distracting, Carol! Writers simply must learn to write!  I don't care if the plot is the best in the history of the world. If you can't write, no one will get to read it. I'm kind of passionate about this <G>

[clyons] We have to write for our readers, and care enough about them to make sure we give them quality. That means leaning and hard work.

[Cyndia] Or admit we are just writing for ourselves and stop begging crit partners for line edits.

 [Jenna] I used to do acquisitions for a small press and I would not usually read past the first page if there were glaring mechanical  errors on it. It went back with a note to brush up on punctuation.

 [Cyndia] Exactly...that's what I tell newbies....about one in fifty listen.

[Cyndia] Passives are another peeve of mine...don't write 'Jenna could see Carol...'write 'Jenna saw Carol'....let the reader see her, too...don't tell us.

[clyons] Are you finding the new work easier than AR?

[Cyndia] Much easier! I still make some of the same mistakes, but now I catch them!

[clyons] Well, I will wait anxiously for Oblivious. I know others will too, after experiencing Amanda. You have been a wonderful guest, where can interested readers find Amanda's Rib and Cyndia in the near future.

[Cyndia] AR is at all online stores and can be ordered through any brick and mortar one...I'll be here, so if anyone reads AR, email and let me know what you think...I love feedback.

[clyons] Have local libraries been cooperative in setting up readings and signings?

[Cyndia] Not really, but I didn't expect much help...first authors are on their own, and promotion is much harder than writing .

[Cyndia] I'm thinking of asking for a boycott of AR, just to get some attention! LOL.

[clyons] LOL, Well if you have time, join us here next Saturday morning for our chat with Francine Silverman on promotion.

[Cyndia] I'll see you next week, then...again, thanks so much...you guys are great!

[clyons] Thank you, Cyndia. I hope you will join us again when “Oblivious” comes out.

Visit Cydia and learn more about “Amanda’s Rib at www.cyndiadepre.com

 Amanda’s Rib
By: Cyndia Depre

“If Amanda Winslow had been an only child she’d be dead.”

Cyndia Depre’s “Amanda’s Rib” grabs with the first sentence and doesn’t release its grip until the end.

Only the knowledge of what her death would do to her sister kept Amanda from suicide during the sensationalized trial for the murder of her husband, Michael. Now in a secluded cottage, on the outskirts of a small rural town, Amanda wants only to escape and forget a haunting and traumatic past. But when the charismatic Jack Lindsay learns she was tried for her husband’s murder, he demands she tell his friend and law partner, Wade Harris, and threatens the quiet life and new friendships she has just managed to build.

Should Amanda run again, or risk everything, including her own shattered heart, and trust Jack when he takes an interest in solving the mystery of Michael’s death?

Amanda Winslow is intriguing but not his type, so Jack is surprised by his reaction to his partner, Wade’s, friendship with the striking redhead. When he learns she stood trial for the murder of her husband, at first convinced he is only protecting his friend, Jack is determined to force Amanda to reveal the truth. Then he convinces himself he is only interested in solving the mystery of Michael Winslow’s death.  Will he recognize his feelings for Amanda in time to save her from the past that haunts and hunts her?

I received “Amanda’s Rib” to review, sat down intending to read a chapter or two, and was instantly captured in Ms. Depre’s maze of intrigue, clues, and revelations. I didn’t stop reading until the last page.

 Cyndia Depre casts a powerful spell of mystery, clouds it with emotion, haunting secrets, and misunderstandings, and weaves it into a heartrending, imaginary journey through a real-to-life drama. Mixed amid the darkness is a cast of charming characters. The quick witty dialogue that peppers the relationship between Amanda and Wade, and so disturbs Jack, adds just the right amount of humor to lighten the darker revelations and suspense Ms. Depre crafts onto the pages of “Amanda’s Rib” with a master’s hand. This one goes on the do-not-miss-it list.

-Charlene Austin © 2005 (chars@writersandreadersnetwork.com)

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