You Can’t Draw Your Knees up to Your Chest With Duct Tape Around Your Ankles

If you’re a sane human being (i.e., not a writer), you probably had one of two reactions after reading that title:

1.       What the heck is she talking about?

2.       How in the world does she know that?

But here’s the thing… In order to get a real answer to either of those questions, you probably have to ask an insane human being (i.e., a writer). Your only other option is to find an actual kidnapping victim.

So yes, I’ll admit I duct taped my ankles together while I was writing “The Politician’s Pawn.” I would have duct taped my wrists too, but I found that was physically impossible no matter how many ways I tried to work it out.

Oh, the struggles we writers have to go through for our art.

That’s the thing though… I was writing about someone being kidnapped and tied up, two experiences I had no understanding of. And while I wasn’t about to go out looking for someone to kidnap me (this little writer isn’t THAT insane), I could at least partially solve the problem of the duct tape without causing myself any serious harm.

So I went for it. So what?

Honestly, I don’t understand why people look at me like I’m crazy when I admit this. It’s not even close to the dumbest thing I did while researching these stories. In fact, it’s downright tame compared to what I wanted to try out for Books 2 and 3 (more about that later).

Moreover, because I duct taped my ankles, I learned something very valuable… If you’re sitting on a couch – or presumably a Suburban seat – with duct taped ankles, you can’t draw your legs up to your chest. Can you imagine how embarrassingly inaccurate it would have been if I hadn’t sought out the truth for myself and written otherwise!

I know I’d rather not.

So really then, what I’m trying to say is you’re welcome.

Editor’s note: When I told my brother-in-law this, he immediately went about proving me wrong. But he’s six-foot. And Kayla is five-foot five-inches, which is a lot closer to my height than his. In addition, if anyone watches Castle, let me assure you that I duct taped myself well before he did. He copied me. Or at least he would have had to if he or the show’s writers knew I existed.

They Kicked Down the Door at 7:23!

One October night in 2012 or 2013 (I honestly can’t remember), I was sitting on my comfy couch in my secure living room at my safe residency doing absolutely nothing noteworthy on my laptop and watching something entirely forgettable on TV, when I happened to notice the time.

My clock said it was 7:23, and for some reason, that captured my attention. I stared at it, a little bewildered for a moment, with one thought – one question – imprinted on my brain…

What happened at 7:23?

And then it hit me: They kicked down the door at 7:23!

My imagination took off from there, and I began typing right away. “They” immediately became a gang of four masked men bursting into a tidy little apartment to drag the confused and terrified 28-year-old Kayla Jeateski out to their waiting SUV. The only clue she gets about why they’re abducting her is when the blue-eyed leader calls her Lucy.

It was such an intense opening, and I loved it! I absolutely loved it. It was dramatic, it was intriguing, it was confusing in all the right ways with the main kidnapper showing small signs of genuine compassion that I fully planned to exploit as the story went on.

Seriously, it was awesome.

Unfortunately, just not awesome enough to make the final cut.

As two dear and knowledgeable writers pointed out, there were some logical discrepancies in that first chapter. Basically, I talked about my team of four masked man being obvious professionals, yet they put themselves at unnecessary risk of discovery more than once. So while the opening was without a doubt dramatic, it just didn’t make sense. And so, with much sighing and moping, I changed it all.

The first chapter of “The Politician’s Pawn” no longer starts out at 7:23. It doesn’t mention 7:23 at all. Nor does the rest of the book, for that matter.

But it’s still awesome and intense, and sets up one wild ride of a trilogy that took even me by surprise more than once. Poor Kayla Jeateski wasn’t the only one scrambling to keep up with the plot as it rushed forward, twist by twist and turn by turn. And in the end, the beginning wasn’t the only aspect that took a far different route than I had planned.

Yet even so, I’ll never forget how it all still started at 7:23.