Wednesday, July 25, 2018

The Light of Redemption by Natalie Damschroder


Today's Wednesday guest post is my good friend, Natalie Damschroder. Learn a little about how her writing process and how her latest novel came about. After you meet Natalie, please visit me today at Diane Burton's blog where I'm sciencing again. I just invented that word.

Thank you so much, Sue, for having me as your guest today!

This is the release day for my second superhero book, The Light of Redemption. I’m always looking for a twist on common themes or ideas, and for this book, it was a small-town superhero. Most of us know superheroes as fighting crime in big cities, and that was the case in my first book, The Color of Courage. In that book, the twists were that 1) my heroes operated as a team and weren’t anonymous; 2) the heroine’s superpower is seeing emotions rather than something physical.

Something for Readers

I had the title for my new book before I had the story. That is EXTREMELY unusual for me! I struggle with titles. The Color of Courage took me 45 minutes with a thesaurus after the book was completely written and revised. I knew The Light of Redemption would be the second book before I finished writing the first one. I decided to give the light to Harmony Wilde, a librarian in the town of Pilton, Ohio, which exists only in my imagination but right next to the town where I went to college. She uses her ability to manipulate light to help protect the people in her town (mostly from each other). The redemption was a need given to Conn Parsons, one of those big-city superheroes who’s had it rough and has come to town to hide…I mean, retire. His presence blows up Harmony’s life, both figuratively and literally.

Something for Writers

One thing I learned writing this book was to trust myself, and that’s advice I’d give to any writer who might be struggling with a story. I set this aside many times, sometimes deciding I wasn’t coming back to it, for various reasons mostly relating to things out of my control. But my creative center (muse, inspiration, drive, whatever you want to call it) just refused to let me. Whenever I read through the book to re-orient myself, I found it to be much stronger than I remembered. Not lacking room for improvement, of course! :) But ready to be deepened and tightened and fulfilling. I hope the result is that people will be entertained and happy when they finish the last page.

The Light of Redemption

Harmony Wilde is a unique kind of superhero. She operates as Eclipse in a small town in Ohio instead of the big city, on her own instead of on a team, and in near-complete anonymity. For the most part, she’s satisfied with using her ability, manipulating light, to bust drug dealers and prevent drunk drivers—until Conn Parsons comes to town.

Conn has been a superhero all over the world. Dissatisfied with the little bit of good she can do in comparison, Harmony asks Conn to train her. He refuses, feeling responsible for superhero and civilian deaths in big-city incidents. He doesn’t want to risk the same thing happening here. But the attraction between them is hard to fight, and so is her determination.

Then small-town problems get bigger, and it looks like both Eclipse and Conn are being targeted by CASE, the Citizens Against Superhero Existence, who are responsible for those city disasters. When her town seems destined to become collateral damage and the stakes get personal, Harmony must tap undeveloped powers and convince Conn to work with her to stop their mutual enemy. The only problem is that when they succeed, it may give Conn the redemption he needs to move on, away from Pilton…and away from Harmony.


About Natalie Damschroder

Natalie J. Damschroder is an award-winning author of contemporary and paranormal romance, with an emphasis on romantic adventure. She has had 25 novels, 7 novellas, and 16 short stories published by several publishers, most recently with Soul Mate Publishing, Entangled Publishing, and Carina Press. She recently debuted her Fusion Series, a young adult paranormal adventure series, with Full Fusion, as NJ Damschroder. Learn more about those books here.


Natalie grew up in Massachusetts, and loves the New England Patriots more than anything. (Except her family. And writing and reading. And popcorn.) When she’s not writing, she does freelance editing and project management. She and her husband have two grown daughters, one of whom is also a novelist. (The other one prefers math. Smart kid. Practical.)


 Do titles come easy to you, writers out there? What is your favorite super power? Ever use real towns in your stories?

12 comments:

Hilary Melton-Butcher said...

Hi Susan and Natalie ... I love the way you've posted this and the way you linked both books via 'finding the titles' ... I don't write books ... but sometimes blog posts are a nightmare for a title!! Good luck - the premise/s look like they'll make interesting reads - Cheers Hilary

Natalie J. Damschroder said...

Thanks so much, Hilary! I'm glad it worked for you, and appreciate you stopping by! :)

L. Diane Wolfe said...

Sounds like a series in the making all right. I knew the other four books in mine before I finished writing the first.

Natalie J. Damschroder said...

That's very impressive. Titles are more often a struggle for me than not!

Pat Hatt said...

Great when that creative center refuses to let go, then out a new one shall show. Really do never hear of small town superheroes.

Natalie J. Damschroder said...

I'm always looking for the twist! :)

Susan Kane said...

I love the idea of a small town as a setting.

Natalie J. Damschroder said...

Cool! Do you live in a small town?

It was fun to revisit the town where I went to college and where my dad still lives.

messymimi said...

The two things that strike me are that your world has people who don’t want superheroes (what do those people want to get away with is my first question for them) and that a superhero would get tired of it and want to slip away. It sounds like these themes help make it a fascinating read!

Natalie J. Damschroder said...

You hit on two things I hoped would resonate with readers! That's so exciting when that happens! :)

nashvillecats2 said...

A most enjoyable post to read. Good book.

Yvonne.

Natalie J. Damschroder said...

Thanks, Yvonne!