 |
| Cherry Adair |
When asked what I write, my response is
usually- "Running-chasing-shooting-wild monkey sex-running-being
chased-shooting-wild monkey sex -
vanquishing the bad guy, and getting the girl
kick-butt-his-equal-in-every-way-woman- happy ending." J
I love writing
action adventure. I love the running, chasing, wild monkey sex of it all, and I
love having to work really, really hard to find a place where they are not
running-chasing, so they have time and a place for all that wild monkey sex.
lol
I do a tremendous
amount of research for every book. Each
book has its own 6” binder filled to overflowing with information on everything
from weapons to details about careers, information on the different exotic
locations in the book, and scientific or specific information.
So much information
was just sitting in a closet until a friend and avid fan told me my readers
would love to get their hands on my binders. So now I'm doing Enhanced e-books
of some of my back titles, and adding dozens and dozens of pages of my notes,
my revised synopsis, interviews about the book and characters, info on weapons,
and vehicles, dossiers
on my operatives, pictures associated with the different missions my characters
have been on, as well as interviews and fun stuff.
My readers are crazy for these Enhanced books, and I'm updating them as quickly
as I can.
I do a ton of
research for every book. Even if it's something I know fairly well, or a place
I've been to myself. I like to talk to people who talk the talk and walk the
walk. I've met and spoken to some fascinating people along the way. For
example- Jacques Cousteau’s grandson Fabien Cousteau helped me extensively (the fact that he’s as
delicious looking as one of my heroes didn’t hurt either! J) with research and interesting bits and pieces for IN TOO DEEP which had
the hero, ex-Navy SEAL Michael Wright, sailing around the world, living on his
boat and fighting his fear of water.
A nuclear physicist
I talked to was thrilled to help me with my nuclear physicist heroine,(what was
I thinking?!) Michaela in CHAMELEON. (Yay! Sex in a one man submarine – don't
think that wasn't a challenge!) I wrote out what I wanted my heroine to
say in English, he translated it into. . .I have no idea. For all I know,
instead of talking the talk, she ordered Chinese for dinner. Lol
I have several
military consultants who share with me things I really don't want to put in my
books. I want to get the facts straight, but sometimes reality is just too. . .Real!
I write T-FLAC, my counterterrorist
organization because the safety of the world is a relevant topic in today’s
climate. I’m fascinated by military personnel and what it requires for these
true-life heroes to go out every day to make the world a safer place for the
rest of us.
To me writing is like building a house, and not that dissimilar to the
business I used to be in – interior design. The first draft is the blueprint
for the building of the house. It’s a lot of left brain functions and by
necessity, logic and reasoning. The hardest part of the book for me is writing
the first draft. Once I have that done, I can go back and do all the fun things
I love (the choice of carpets and drapes and artwork, the colors and textures that take it from an interesting, but anyone could do it
house, into a home filled with color and life).
Layering in description, fine-tuning dialogue so that it zings,
rewriting passages where the pacing is too slow or find places to insert a bit
of research to make something more authentic. Going back and rewriting
is the fun part for me.
I always
start with character and emotion when I write a love scene. There are only so many places you can slot A
into B- and that’s basically choreography. I’m more interested in who these people are- to themselves and to
one another- than what body part goes where. That, I think, is what makes each
scene fresh and different, because no two people are alike.
I could go on and
on – but instead you can
get a really good idea of what I write and how visual I am if you look at my
website, www.cherryadair.com. Since I am
so visual, I wanted to give my readers and visitors a feel for the worlds I’ve
created.
I love what I do. Love what I write. Yes,
it's over the top, and no, I would not like to trek through a steamy jungle,
or trudge through a broiling hot dessert. But I put my heroine there and
she can get sweaty and eaten by bugs. Of course she also gets to have the
amazing wild-monkey sex with the hero, so that’s the tradeoff. lol
