Great minds think alike - or, taking reality and making it your own

I went to hear my friend Jennie Shortridge read from her new book, Love and Biology at the Center of the Universe. We met at an Oregon Writers Colony event. She had just gotten a contract for her first book, Riding with the Queen, and I told her we HAD to have lunch. There were so many things I wish I had known with my first book. Since I couldn’t time travel, telling them to someone in the same place I had been was the next best thing.

Jennie has since moved to Seattle and published two more books. After her reading, someone asked her what her next book was about.

Remember that new story in 2004, she asked, about the Vietnam Vet and his 12 yo daughter found living in an extremely isolated area of Forest Park? It’s about that.

It was a very strange feeling to hear her say those. Because in my next book with Lis Wiehl (called Face of Betrayal), when a girl is found murdered in Forest Park, that vet is going to be one of the prime suspects.

Then I calmed down. We write completely different types of books. In our story it’s a subplot, while in hers it is the main plot. And Jennie talked to the cop involved in the case quite a bit, and changed the vet to an Iraq war vet. All we used was imagination and a three-year-old newspaper article.

So it doesn’t make any difference.

I hope!