New Equestrian Fiction: Show Barn Blues

by Natalie Keller Reinert

The newest novel in my equestrian line-up.

Ready for a new read? Just in time for... fall? Is that a thing to be just in time for? Anyway, just in time for you to read, I have new equestrian fiction for you!

Show Barn Blues is my latest horse book for grown-ups, a story about surviving in the horse business, the changing nature of our countryside, boarding stable drama, and our connections with our horses. It's a story full of characters anyone who has ever stepped foot inside a barn will recognize. It's a story about horse-people.

From the back cover, here's what Show Barn Blues is all about:

Grace has built her life on show horses. It's been a good life, too -- she mounts her wealthy students on European warmbloods, competes her horses on Florida's rigorous A-circuit, and runs the nicest barn in the neighborhood. Then, suddenly, it's the only barn in the neighborhood. 

As Grace's country town becomes a sun-drenched playground of pools and golf courses, she vows that no bulldozer will ever touch her farm. With her neighbors selling their farms and moving to more isolated corners of Florida, she finds herself fighting off land-hungry developers alone -- until Kennedy comes along. 

Kennedy is everything Grace doesn't want around her bustling show barn -- a pleasure rider who would rather wander in the woods than tackle a show-jumping course. Kennedy might make for an unlikely sidekick, but she's just the inspiration Grace needs to fight back against the developers who want to bulldoze her corner of Floridian wilderness -- and, eventually, against the wilderness itself.

I really think that you'll enjoy this novel, and the first reviewers back me up on this:

You are one of a very few authors who "get" what makes horse-people tick.

-Amazon review

If you like equestrian fiction -- or any fiction with a helluva good story -- this book will satisfy, and then some. 

-Amazon review 

Show Barn Blues also holds a place in the Ambition universe. If you're looking for more Jules, I'm working on the sequel to Ambition now -- but you'll find that Show Barn Blues is connected to her story as well.

You can find Show Barn Blues as an ebook at Amazon right now, with a paperback edition coming next week. If you're a member of Amazon Prime, you can borrow the ebook for free.

I hope you'll take a look and let me know what you think!

A Writer-Friendly Lifestyle

by Natalie Keller Reinert

When time grows scarce, ideas grow like weeds.

I'll admit it, I haven't been writing much lately. Life just feels a little insane. Starting to work a day job, instead of puttering from one freelance assignment to the next, was supposed to make things easier. Thing was, I still had too many freelance assignments, and I was putting those off at night because I had "worked" all day.

(I have to put work in quotation marks because fiddling with papers at a desk, although technically work, was hardly using the parts of my brain that I used for writing. I was worn out with boredom, not with the actual job.)

Horses on the brain. That's me.

So while I was glaring at my work computer screen, or coming home at night and crashing on the couch to do some serious vegging out with The Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, of course I was having all kinds of ideas. Since I wasn't writing anything, my creative side was going haywire.

I was thinking about the next eventing novel (the follow-up to Ambition), the next Alex novel, this middle grade and/or young adult book Kissimmee Katie that I've been playing with, even DREAMING a plot loosely based on a book I started writing two years ago and put to one side. In the dream, the book was published, a beautiful blue paperback with silver lettering, and it had a new title that I liked much better than the working title. I made a note of it in my phone - A Door Opens - and went on vegging on the couch.

I know! My inner muse is calling and I'm not picking up!

It became really obvious that this 8-5 office jazz was not good for my creative side. The boredom was draining all my interest in writing, even while my brain was screaming ALL THE IDEAS! I needed a writer-friendly lifestyle, pronto.

So, I'm making a change. I decided to change jobs for one that's more fun, involves more interaction with people (something I desperately need as a writer!) and has less routine hours. I'm wrapping up most of my freelance work, including my travel business, which has been a huge part of my life for the past two years but has also taken a tremendous amount of time. 

The thing is, ideas are just one thing. They're the easy part. The writing, the fleshing out of characters, the quirks of personality, the inflections of speech, those are the hard bits. For that, you need stimulating atmospheres, people to talk with, conversations to listen to, individuals to observe. I find that people are hard. Horses? I can create a shedrow full of unique and recognizable horses in ten minutes. For people I have to get out there and mingle.

(Or at least watch from a safe distance.)

So here goes nothing. New job, new lifestyle, new schedule -- and hopefully a load of new books! I'm already writing more just out of anticipation of the change -- pages and pages of Pride, the sequel to Ambition, have materialized this week!

Very Flawed Characters

by Natalie Keller Reinert

I want to piggyback off Kate Lattey's post earlier this week, "Writing Strong Female Characters." If you haven't read this post, and you're interested in the technical side of writing, definitely check it out. Go ahead. I'll wait.

You're back? Great. So, here's the thing: I have a history of writing particularly difficult female characters. Not really on purpose... they just are that way.

Alex takes a lot of flack for not being strong enough
 in The Head and Not The Heart.
But give her time. It's a series.

A lot of female characters are reluctant heroines. Think of Katniss standing up and announcing that she'll stand as tribute (or whatever she said, I only saw the movie, true fact). She didn't want to go be a human sacrifice in a particularly nasty bit of child pit-fighting, she was just aware that she was the one for the job. She was the toughest, strongest, mightiest teenager in all the land, or certainly more so than her little sister, so she did what she had to do.

Or look at the character Kris in Lattey's blog's post: "Kris is a pillar of strength, although she never sees herself that way, and (for me at least), is one of the most inspiring characters I've ever written."

Two young women who stood up and did what they had to do with a minimum of complaint. Admirable. I wish I was that sort of person, but I complain when I have to wash the dishes.

I have two main female characters in my two equestrian series: Alex, and Jules. Alex is trying to define herself in a world that does not respect her, which would be fine, if only she respected herself a little more. Jules is trying to show the world that she's the best rider in the world, which would be fine, if only she realized that she wasn't, not yet, anyway.

These flawed personalities manifest themselves in all sorts of moments that don't fit into the traditional Strong Female Character mold. It makes some people crazy, and I really don't blame them. But for others, it makes Alex and Jules incredibly realistic... sometimes maddeningly so.

As a writer, I really just set out to create characters and situations that I find realistic. Things that could happen to any of us as equestrians -- that's my number one inspiration. I never sat down and said to myself, "Alex is this sort of character and has these sorts of flaws and these sorts of attributes." It's just what happened. And so I've learned from reader reviews what sort of characters I have created.

People say...

Jules' focus on her career and distrust of
others really rubs some people the wrong way.
I look at her as a challenge. Jules, how are we
going to fix you? I'm working on that
problem now, as I write her next book.

"Her characters are so alive that I found myself mentally arguing with them over their choices as I read." - Amazon review, Turning For Home.

"It is beautifully written with strong and flawed characters... I also love how complicated Alex is. You just want to shake her half the time and admire her orneriness the other times." - Amazon review, Turning For Home.

"I became so engrossed in the characters, both human and equine, that they felt very real to me, and I cared about them. Even Jules, the main character, whose behavior at the beginning of the story is less-than-stellar (and who we occasionally want to strangle) is a compelling character, because we want to see her grow, change, and learn to accept advice, criticism, love, and friendship." - Linda Benson on Ambition.

"Our main character Jules plants the seeds of her own destruction, as do so many." - Karen McGoldrick on Ambition.

"I found the main character very unlikable, selfish and irritating." - Amazon review, Ambition.

Well, to be fair, nobody likes everybody.

Are Jules and Alex still Strong Female Characters, despite their all-too-average-human tendencies to make bad choices and completely fail at interpersonal relationships? I think so. They still have to overcome monumental challenges in their lives. They still have to step up and take control when there's no one else to do the job. I suppose they're still Reluctant Heroines… just more reluctant than most. They're growing into their roles -- and that's what the books are all about.