Author's Name: Betty Hanawa
Website: www.bettyhanawa.com

Betty Hanawa writes long contemporary, paranormal and sensual romance. She has three releases from Triskelion Publishing available and is currently finishing a fourth project that has a tentative publication date of March '05.

New Releases:
Balanced Heart
January 2005 from Triskelion Publishing

Despite their ten-year divorce, Martha Ryan and Phil Russell never stopped loving each other. Now there's a possibility for reconciliation. A level-headed investment counselor, Martha is determined not to play Wendy to Phil's Peter Pan any longer. Will it work? Between steamy nights with Phil and days spent with the children she loves, she might not be the only one to come out of this set up with a Balanced Heart.

Turquoise Dreams
January 2005 from Triskelion Publishing

Lovers are possessed by ancestral ghosts trying to reunite and experience both their passion and their pain.  When the dead are at peace, will the curse that separated them be lifted so today's lovers can have a joyous life together?

Betty Hanawa says she's always dreamed of being a writer, but settled for the more "practical" jobs that developed from the "practical" degree of a BBA in Marketing with a minor in Accounting.  As a parent volunteer in various organizations, she's always done the newsletters and publicity stories, and she was one of the final three for Assistant Publicity Director of a local school district.  While she didn't get that job, that was her wake-up call that if she truly wanted to be a writer and get out of the drudgery of bookkeeping and retail sales, it was time to do it.

On Writing...

Both ONCE UPON A FAMILY and BALANCED HEART are contemporaries.  ONCE UPON A FAMILY was a learning process for Betty.  The first generation of it was written in chunks whenever she thought of a scene, then she bolted the scenes together. 

"I love it absolutely and no one will ever read it in that form except me.  After I finished it, I went to my first writer's conference in Houston and discovered I knew nothing.  Example: I knew to use Courier New.  I knew to have 20-22 pages per chapter with 15 -18 chapters.  Somehow I missed that those pages were supposed to be double-spaced.  That's probably why it took me 3 years to write it.  250,000 words.  As I said, no one will ever read it in its original form. <g> Over the next 2 years, I gutted it twice more and rewrote it.  Finally, in frustration, I set it away and started BALANCED HEART using two minor characters from ONCE UPON A FAMILY. "

On Her "Big Break"...

At the NYC RWA Conference, Betty had dinner with Silhouette Intimate Moments author Terese Ramin with whom she had been corresponding for several years.  In the course of their conversation, Betty told her the premises of both ONCE UPON A FAMILY and BALANCED HEART.  Terese commented both sounded too gritty for Superromance and predicted their rejections.  Betty wrote to her after the sting of the rejections had eased and said, "You were right."  By then Terese had started working as an editor at Triskelion Publishing and asked to read them.  Six weeks later she received an emailed acceptance of both.

On the Rewards of Writing...

"The comments from strangers who enjoy my books and who have come to regard my characters as though they are new friends.  My best friend of over 25 years paid me the best compliment.  She said she started ONCE UPON A FAMILY out of loyalty and got so caught up in the characters she'd stay up late reading and would worry about them when she had to leave the book to go do "have to' things.  She also said she saw extremely little of my personality in the characters.  They were their own people.  She was annoyed with me because, "There was no place I could just stop and pick it up later.  I had to keep scrolling down to find out what happened next.'  But it's one thing when close friends and family tell you the book is good, it's wonderful to receive email from someone I've never exchanged email with, much less met, and tell me how much they loved this or that.  Even more awesome is how people relate to things in the book that I hadn't even thought about.  That's the realization there is Art in what we write. "

On the Challenges of Writing...

"Refraining from smacking the sneers off the people who don't think I've written a "real book' and being polite to the snarky comments.  As a published e-book author, I catch it both ways: the sneers of people who despise, but probably have never read, romance novels and pity and/or disdain from so-called professionals for "settling' for e-publishing.  I find myself paraphrasing Jennifer Cruise's comment: "I like writing pretend books that never get published.  It's so much easier.'  The SARA group has a T-shirt I love: "Yes, I'm a romance author.  No, I don't need help with the research.'"

On Genre...

"I've never wanted to live in the past so I've never been interested in writing historicals.  I live very much in the here-and-now so I write contemporary.  Even those I've written with fantasy and paranormal elements are basically contemporaries.  My March release, that just went to my editor, FALLING STAR WISH, features an Elf hero who is inadvertently summoned into the contemporary human plane.  Because he is able to move between the realms, I needed to create his community. That was my first attempt at world-building a different world in which I live.  After working with Edan's world, I've got a futuristic beginning to percolate.  I've always been a big Star Trek and science fiction fan so I'm interested in facing the world-building challenge again."

Current WIP

With FALLING STAR WISH being reviewed by her editor, Betty is starting January with a new slate.  Her goal this year is to complete four novellas and two full length novels.  Her first project will be a requested erotica novella.  She's also had a requested erotica novel and another fantasy, Elf related, novel requested.  

On Plotting

"Mine usually come in clumps of scenes.  I've done the visualization montages of photos torn from magazines for scenes or characters faces.  I plot – loosely – but have learned characters tend to take on lives of their own.  I do brief character sketches, but again the characters surprise with details from their lives as I write.  For me, what's worked well is 25 to 30 scenes broken up into 10 to 15 Chapters (depending on the story length).  I make a 3 column grid: Her Internal Conflict, His Internal Conflict, Outside Forces.  The grid is the broken into Chapters.  One of the 3 columns will be the Focal Point of the Chapter with the other two columns reacting from that.  While I'll use this for reference, I've learned not to be restricted by it.  The characters developing personalities will take over.  In TURQUOISE DREAMS, I had over 15 scenes for 10 chapters.  I used 3 of those scenes.  The characters just took over and wrote that story."

On Triskelion Publishing

Triskelion Publishing is looking for sensual to erotica stories.  Books range from novellas of 20 K to novels of 100 K.  Fantasy and Paranormal are very popular. 

Triskelion Publishing reached its one-year milestone in January 2005.  Numerous books published by Triskelion Publishing have received awards already, are finalists in the Eppies (Electronic Published Internet Connection award), and are finalists in the CAPA awards (The Romance Studio's Cupid and Psyche Award).  They may be new, but the publisher and editors have a strong sense of a well written, greatly enjoyed book.

Guidelines for the product lines and submission requirements are available on the Triskelion Publishing website: http://www.triskelionpublishing.com.

Advice For New Writers

"Always keep a back-up of your work and never completely delete even old ideas or stories you think will never sell.  ONCE UPON A FAMILY got an early release date because the author who was scheduled for the June 2004 release had a total hard drive failure and didn't have back-ups.  She couldn't meet the deadline for June and it was given to my first book."

On FTHRW...

"The workshops are always fabulous.  I take as many as I can fit into my schedule.  It's great to have people to share the consolations and celebrations with the ups and downs of this business.  I love going to RWA National Conferences and seeing the FTHRW logo pins (Sister! Friend in the midst of strangers!  *** and those of you who've met me can just stop snickering "yeah, Betty, they don't get much stranger than you!')  Procrastination's BIAW makes me push myself.  Plotting Therapy has helped me through a couple of "I don't know what to do' spots.  Often helping others brainstorm their stories helps me figure out what to do with my own.  I was so proud and pleased when Rosanne Armstrong, whom I mentored, sold her short story to "True Romance."  I swear, Rosanne, I learn as much as you did in our mentoring emails.  Basically, it's the people who keep me going."

Betty Hanawa's newest releases
from Triskelion Publishing:

BALANCED HEART

Released January 2005

Despite their ten-year divorce, Martha Ryan and Phil Russell never stopped loving each other.  Now there's a possibility for reconciliation.  A level-headed investment counselor, Martha is determined not to play Wendy to Phil's Peter Pan any longer.  Will it work?  Between steamy nights with Phil and days spent with the children she loves, she might not be the only one to come out of this set up with a Balanced Heart.

TURQUOISE DREAMS

Released January 2005

Lovers are possessed by ancestral ghosts trying to reunite and experience both their passion and their pain.  When the dead are at peace, will the curse that separated them be lifted so today's lovers can have a joyous life together?

FALLING STAR WISH

Due to be released March 2005

ONCE UPON A FAMILY

Released June 2004

Visit Betty online at http://www.BettyHanawa.com