Friday, May 13, 2011

Welcome to J.L.Oiler

Please welcome our Friday Friend, J.L.Oiler. Rather later than usual in the day due to all the problems with Blogger in the last 24 hours!

J.L. grew up in the mountains of West Virginia where she still lives with her husband and children. She is a graduate of Fairmont State University in Fairmont, West Virginia, and holds a Masters degree from Ball State University in Muncie, Indiana. She always possessed a passion to create stories to entertain her friends and family, but life led her on a variety of paths before she found the opportunity to return to the dream of writing stories to share.

JL currently has stories with Rebel Ink Press and Silver Publishing. She enjoys the Erotic Paranormal genre, but has dabbled in other areas of romance as well. Her first release came in January of 2010, since that time she has had multiple individual releases as well as the opportunity to work on several anthologies. She can often be found chatting about upcoming events or releases on facebook.

Writing Strong Women

My mother once said that her girls “had bigger balls than any man.” This might be the reason I personally find myself writing stories with a strong heroine. Of course, I was never the type to daydream about being the distressed princess in need of rescue. Instead, I spent my youth being the one to the jump to the rescue. Riding, roping, and fighting my way through my imagination to save the day.

Let us be honest. Writing weak female characters rarely captures the reader and allows them to create a sort of personal connection. Modern women don’t have the time to await rescue and there are not too many princely heroes looking for the damsel in distress. We have been empowered by the strong women who came before us seeking equality and self-reliance.

So how do I go about making certain my women have the “write” stuff.

First thing I like to do is get a good visual impression of the character. Is she short, tall, fat, thin? Then what is her career path? I enjoy looking a bit outside the general for these characteristics. The next thing is the baggage. None of us moves through our lives without some sort of baggage. Is she a single parent? Is she living in a abusive relationship? Does she have any physical, emotional, or mental disabilities? Once all those things are in place I can begin to analyze what my heroine will need to overcome to get where my goals need her to be.

I believe that our characters all take with them a little bit of our own personalities and I have yet to meet a romance author who was not strong willed and minded

JL Oiler
http://www.joiler.weebly.com/

Latest Release
Title: Between 3
Publisher: Rebel Ink Press
Cover Art: Carl Franklin
Purchase Link: http://www.allromanceebooks.com/product-between3-543212-140.html


Blurb:

When Celeste Drain attempted to make a break from an abusive relationship, she never dreamed she'd fall into an erotic ménage with two extremely hot strangers. Their one-night stand was the beginning of her new life, a life of self-reliance and inner strength. Now six months later, Celeste has a steady job at the same bar where she met her lovers, a home, and she's building a new existence.

Justin and Craig are part of the guard force known as the Keepers, men charged with protecting the human topside world from the violent monsters that live behind one of the gates to hell deep beneath Death Valley. Given little time topside to relax, Justin and Craig stumble into a one-night stand with a beautiful woman who challenges them not only physically, but also with her quick wit and intelligence. When a large breakout at the gate allows a group of vile Adze to escape to the topside world, Justin and Craig are mortified  to discover the woman they thought was just a one-night stand may be a whole lot more and worse, she's smack dab in the middle of what might just become hell on earth.

Thank you so much for being with us today, J.L. We wish you every success with your book and with your future writing career.

4 comments:

  1. Thanks so much for joining us today! I love stories about strong women--there's so many more things you can do with them than weak ones.

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  2. Hi J.L., and welcome to HWH.

    I like strong woman characters, too, especially in thrillers/cop stories, but once a strong woman always a strong woman and little leeway for character change no matter how attractive. Even if her match finally met she'll still aim to be in control.

    Whereas, a female character of slightly lesser strength albeit, perhaps a high-flyng exec, can grow and discover power by way of physical and emotional experiences: rebellion, sexual liberation etc. This kind of woman finds her way and learns how to get what she wants! So in that respect, I tend to find this character more appealing than strong sock it to 'em chicks. Just my take on the subject. :o
    best
    F

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  3. J.L., your excerpt is enticing, and the book sounds like a great read. I agree that women are capable of everything, but rural women can do most anything. Best wishes for continued success!

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  4. Thanks all! It was truely an honor to be here and share my thoughs and work with each of you.
    JL

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