Views and reviews

It's been a few months now since the book came out. I remember how terrified I was to let go of it and hit the "publish" button. Who would read it? Would people who read it think we were looking for attention or, worse, pity? What if the people who meant the most to this story ending well (God, family, law enforcement, district attorneys) were disappointed in us; in me? What if people who've just gotten to know us suddenly turned away from us as so many did before? Would publishing the story be of value to anyone - maybe keep them safer- or would it be just more white noise?

We had and have no marketing budget. We wanted it that way. Early on, we looked at crowd funding, but decided that if this book had legs, it would make it by word-of-mouth. It's still got a long way to go before I'd call it a success in the sales sense, but it has been a success. Thanks to you. If you're one of the many that have bought it and read it and told others about it, you've made it a success and we thank you.

We were honored to speak at a local Rotary group because someone told someone else about the book. I was blessed and honored to be guest author at a local book club recently for the same reason. Blessed even more to be invited to become a member of that group! It's been a wonderful surprise and makes my day when I see a review on Amazon or Good Reads that the person has gotten something valuable from reading the book. In every case, the best thing of all was to hear statements like these:

"My husband and I realized, from the book, that we have too much routine. We're changing that." "I lock the door between my garage and house now." "We don't post minute-by-minute activities on Facebook now." "I'm more alert to where I am and who's around me." "We have started a check-in system in our family because of your book." "We don't open the door to anyone we're not expecting." "I make sure every door is locked, even my car." "We have a construction business and realize that this could have happened - could happen - to us. We are much more careful now."

We can't completely avoid tragedy in our lives. We can't know God's plans for our lives, but, He told us to keep alert; to be ready always. Our prayer is that this book honors the ones who risked their lives to save ours, honors the advocates who fought for justice on Paul's and Lance's behalf and prevents this kind of crime from happening to any other family.

True crime writing

All writing takes planning and, to some degree, all writing takes research. True crime writing involves mountains of research and then culling through the mountains for "the book" within. "Walking Between The Raindrops" is a combination of first person accounts and documentation carefully woven together so that the reader will get a more 3D-version of the whole story. Putting it all together has been kind of like eating an elephant. Massive and overwhelming at times.

To give you an idea of how much research - check out the reference material I've collected over the past 5 years! This doesn't include books like, "The Executioner's Men", "Gangland", "Border Wars" and 5 years of Stratfor.com articles which are on another shelf.

My part of the editing is almost done. So far, of the nearly 800 pages I had when I finished the first draft, almost 100 pages have been cut! When I hand the manuscript off to the real editor, I expect it will get trimmed down even more. That sounds like a lot of pages still, right? Those pages are double-spaced, so, in reality, the book should end up between 300-400 pages - not so bad.

The book...

Everything is moving forward toward publishing "Walking Between The Raindrops". The first session of editing is underway, which is to say, my own proofing and tightening. Flaws and errors jump off the pages! I am a very harsh self-critic committed to cutting the first draft to manageable size. So far, I'm through the first section and well into the second. Once these cuts and corrections are made, the whole manuscript will go to another person to edit to final release form. After that, the book will be available in e-book and printed formats.

It's hard to believe.  This project has consumed me for the past year and it is almost completely finished.

Sooner than that, though, will be the unveiling of the book's cover art! Target date for that is June 1. I feel so fortunate to have the cover art that's going on this book. It's more than perfect to me - it totally captures what Paul and I saw in our minds.

Thank you for reading my words and God bless you for your support.