Breaking the Story
Ashley Farley
Publication date: March 17th 2016
Genres: Adult, Suspense
Passion, peril, and a scandal that will rock American politics.
Scottie Darden’s life is a disaster. Her marriage has become toxic, and her career as a photojournalist has stalled out. To attract the attention of the main players in the news industry, she needs a standout story with a unique perspective. What she finds is a scandal that could turn the 2016 presidential election upside down. But before she can release her damaging images to the media, Scottie must uncover the truth behind the photographs. She turns to handsome mystery man Guy Jordan for help. When they join the campaign trail in search of answers, their investigation quickly becomes deadly.
Hop on board for a wild ride of adventure where desire ignites, lives are threatened, and secrets are revealed.
BOOK TRAILER:
EXCERPT:
Her cell phone lit up on the seat beside her, and Brad’s name appeared across the screen. She reached for the phone and powered it off. The next time she communicated with him would be through an attorney.
Scottie contemplated her options for a place to spend the night. Already approaching the fifty-mile mark, she couldn’t drive much farther on her spare tire. Her best friend, Anna, had been avoiding her since Christmas, since Scottie had inadvertently placed Anna’s husband in danger of losing his medical license. The rest of her friends would undoubtedly be spending quiet weekends at home, nursing their babies and making love to their husbands. She could drive to Church Hill to her brother’s house, where she knew she’d find a sympathetic shoulder to cry on. But Will would want all the details, and she wasn’t ready to give voice to her drama. Tonight, she needed time alone to think. Tonight, she needed to drink tequila.She took a right-hand turn onto the Boulevard, drove one block, and then turned left onto Franklin Street. She parked under the portico in front of the Jefferson Hotel, handed her key to the valet, and went inside to the front desk. After booking the cheapest room available, she wheeled her suitcase around the corner and rode the elevator to the third floor. The consolation prize to having the smallest room in the most luxurious hotel in the city was the stunning view overlooking downtown Richmond.
Author Bio:
Ashley Farley is a wife and mother of two college-aged children. She grew up in the salty marshes of South Carolina, but now lives in Richmond, Virginia, a city she loves for its history and traditions.
After her brother died in 1999 of an accidental overdose, she turned to writing as a way of releasing her pent-up emotions. She wrote SAVING BEN in honor of Neal, the boy she worshipped, the man she could not save. SAVING BEN is not a memoir, but a story about the special bond between siblings.
HER SISTER'S SHOES—June 2015—is a women's novel that proves the healing power of family.
Merry Mary—October 2015—a holiday novella, a young woman longing for a child stumbles upon a Christmas miracle.
BREAKING THE STORY is scheduled for release on March 17, 2016. A romantic political suspense. Passion. Peril. And a scandal that will rock American politics.
Interesting and Fun Tidbits from the Author:
An Interview with Ashley Farley on her writing process.
Do you write or type?
I type! There are plenty of authors who
still sit down and put pen to paper. But that is definitely not for me. Being
able to move sentences and paragraphs around on the screen saves an enormous
amount of time. I would be lost without spellcheck and my dictionary apps.
Do you begin planning your
novel with a plot line or a character?
A character. I imagine my character, and
once I blow life into her, she shows me the way.
Do your characters resemble
people you know?
Not intentionally, but it’s innate. As I
get inside my character’s heads, I can’t help but portray a little bit of
myself in each of them. I’m always on the lookout for interesting
characteristics in the people I encounter everyday.
Do you use your experiences
in real life for your novels?
Not the big picture events, but I often
use an anecdote from my real life to add humor or to make a situation feel more
genuine, more legit.
What is your writing process?
Are you a plotter or a panster?
For the most part I’d have to say I’m a
panster, but there are definitely times when I need to use outlines to keep my
facts straight and verify that my story flows. I’m fortunate to belong to a
club that has an outdoor heated pool. I swim laps every day, all year long,
even when it’s snowing. This peace and quite time allows me the opportunity to
mentally plot what I’m going to write that day, to make up scenes and devise
sentences. Then, when I sit down at my computer later in the morning, the words
flow much quicker and easier. Free flow writing, on the other hand, helps when
I’m suffering from writer’s block. Good material comes from these sessions,
from just typing out whatever comes to mind.
What is your main objective
in your writing?
I write the types of novels I like to
read. Readers are attracted to my books because of the fast pace. My goal is to
create interesting characters with the right amount of description and lots of
action. If my readers keep turning the pages well into the night, then I have
done my job.
How many hours do you spend writing
a day?
Writing has become a full time job for
me. Seven days a week, much to my husband’s chagrin. The process of writing
takes an enormous amount of time. When I’m not writing, I’m marketing or
working the social media networks. I love every minute of it.
What is your editing process?
Getting through the first draft is
challenging. Starting with a blank page every day taxes the imagination. The
process gets easier, and more exciting and fun, with each subsequent draft. The
story takes on a life of its own and things begin to fall into place. My
favorite draft is the last edit, the fine-tune edit, when I program my computer
to read the manuscript back to me.
Do you always know how your
story will end?
I never know how my story will end,
oftentimes until I get to the last chapter in my first draft. I bring my
characters to life, give them the big picture plot, and let them tell me the
story.
Can you speak to the
diversity in your books?
Saving Ben is a new adult book. Her Sister’s Shoes is women’s fiction. And
Breaking the Story is romance. I didn’t set out to write novels that
cross genres. It just happened that way. Again, I created the characters that
spoke to me, and I let them do the rest.
I worked hard to make certain Breaking
the Story is unbiased in terms of politics. While my novel is a romantic
political suspense, my message is more about the importance of integrity in
journalism than anything else. With the 2016 presidential election on the
horizon, I thought it’d be fun to give my readers a break from real-life
politics—the debates, incessant phone calls, and endless stream of television
commercials—with a sexy scandal within the political arena.
While I am a bit of a political junkie, I
do my best to keep my opinions to myself. Nobody likes a know-it-all,
especially when it comes to something we feel passionate about like politics,
religion, and sports. I recently had the opportunity to attend the Mock
Convention at Washington and Lee University in Virginia where my daughter attends
college. Since 1908, every four years, student volunteers at the college have
hosted a mock political convention, complete with roll call, for the
non-incumbent party. The school holds an amazing record of accuracy in
forecasting the party’s nominee. They have only been wrong two times since
1948.
For Mock Convention 2016, over the course
of two days, student organizers brought in world-renowned speakers like Newt
Gingrich and Dick Cheney to address conservative issues relating to the
Republican Party. This inspiring lineup imparted their wisdom upon this
impressionable group of young people, not by forcing their opinions on them but
by empowering them to be good citizens. The universal appeal was for these kids
to get out and vote, regardless of party. Educate yourselves on the issues
facing our nation—the $19 trillion debt, the immigration crisis, foreign
affairs.
I had an opportunity to talk with many of
the students, most of them my daughter’s friends, while I was at the
convention. Understandably, politics was at the forefront of everyone’s minds.
Many of these students have listened to documentaries and news reports, read
the continuous stream of social media tweets and Instagram post concerning the
state of our nation. I was not surprised to learn that these students had mixed
emotions concerning politics, but I was comforted to see how much they care.
These millennials are the future of our country. They owe it to themselves and
their future spouses and children to explore their options and make an educated
decision before they vote. Regardless of age, we each have the responsibility
to pick the candidate that best represents our principles. Don’t take a
candidate at surface value. Listen to the debates. Visit their websites. Find
out what they really stand for. Voting is a privilege and every person’s vote
counts.
Self-publishing in 2016
Why did you decide to
self-publish?
I made a half-hearted attempt to find a
literary agent with my first novel, Saving Ben, but I quickly grew
impatient. With traditional publishing, from contract to publication takes a
minimum of eighteen months. And that’s AFTER you secure a literary agent, which
in itself can take years. Every literary agent I’ve ever heard speak, and I’ve
heard a lot of them, share similar statistics. They receive thousands of
queries every week, only to take on one or two new clients a year. With those
kinds of odds, even Hemingway would’ve had a difficult time getting a contract
with a traditional publisher.
How long does it take you to
self publish a novel?
From first draft to Amazon shelf, if I
work seven days a week, I can publish a book in six months time. Broken
down—four months for writing and revising, four weeks working with my editor,
and two months packaging, the book cover and interior formatting. That all adds
up to seven months, but some of the process overlaps. I start working with the
cover designer while I’m still in editing.
What do you love most about
self-publishing?
I love the control I have over the
process. I get to choose my own editor, cover, and advertising channels. I am
an entrepreneur, creating and distributing books. And I love meeting
like-minded authors. There are many talented writers making their way in the
self-publishing industry today. That means more choices and lower prices for
the reader.
What are the key ingredients
for successful self-publishing?
Perseverance—Never, ever give up. If you believe in your novel, don’t abandon your
characters. There are millions of writers in the world today. The ones who are
successful are the ones willing to go the distance.
Strong story—Polish your craft. Reading novels and attending writing workshops are
great ways to improve your writing skills. Practice makes perfect. Write at
least a little bit every day.
Good editor—Hire the best you can afford. I go two rounds with my editor. The
first is the manuscript critique—the big picture. The second is the line
edit—the nitty gritty.
Great cover designer—Don’t bother with steps 1-3 unless you are willing to pay for a
professional cover. Otherwise, you are wasting your time. No one will give your
novel a second look without a stunning cover. You don’t have to spend a
fortune. Shop around.
What are the biggest lessons
you’ve learned about writing/self publishing?
Write the book you want to
write. Writing is art, and art is subjective.
If you ask twenty people for their opinions, you will get twenty different
responses. I have a few beta readers whom I trust to give me feedback relative
to my work and not based on their personal tastes.
Rules are meant to be broken. There are many rules in writing. Things like—not starting chapters
with a character waking up from a dream, and not describing characters by
having them look in the mirror. In today’s world of publishing, almost anything
goes as long as it’s done tastefully.
Do you always know how your
novel will end?
No! People ask me this all the time. When I begin
plotting my novel, I seldom know how it will end. I create a character, blow
life into her or him, and let them show me the way.
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