Stories By Mina Khan: August 2013

THE SHADOW OF MUDFLAP is a fun book written by Christi Snow and MF Smith to raise money for the Lubbock, TX. Red Cross (all the proceeds are being donated to this incredible organization from the sale of this book). I was fortunate enough to read a few chapters because Christi happens to be the same writing group as moi and let me tell you, the action is fast, the heat is sizzling and things go BOOM!

Christi is a romantic suspense author with four previously released books and MF is a radio personality. They might seem an unlikely pair to write a romance novel together, but they have done it and are both really proud of the end result. They should be.

To celebrate the release of this great book, I'm giving away TWO digital copies of THE SHADOW OF MUDFLAP, so keep reading!!!

Check out the awesome cover!

"To us, first responders are heroes. But for them, risking their lives is a normal, everyday thing."

Blurb:

Mudflap:

Born the baby of the family, Mudflap has always had something to prove to emerge out of the shadows of his older siblings. He spent eight years as a Special Ops elite sniper and is now a firefighter. But at his heart, he’s just a normal West Texas good old boy who loves his beer, women and football, until the Department of Defense calls him up to say they need his skills again.

Shanae:

Shanae is a first responder of a different sort. She’s a trauma nurse who works on a medical evacuation helicopter team. But while she lives a life full of adrenaline every day, it’s just a cover for her real life, where she hides in the shadows as secret agent Shadowfox for the Lubbock Foxtrot Team (LiFT). She’s living the kind of life that most people think exists only in movies and books.

Working for two different branches of the government, Mudflap and Shanae are in a race against time and the terrorists who threaten the very heart of West Texas life, football. They’re working toward the same goal, but find themselves in a confrontation against each other and the lies they’ve each had to hide behind. Can love win out in the end or will the cost be each other and their very lives?

SO, how did Christi & M.F., two very different personalities make a long distance partnership work? Here's Christi with the inside story:

M.F. and I are related. We’re second cousins and as family often does, we hooked up as friends on Facebook. The only thing I really knew about him was that somehow he was related to me on my mom’s side of the family and had a bizarre name because he works in radio in Lubbock, TX. I didn’t think I’d ever met him, but you know how family functions are…you meet lots of people that you never remember who knew you when you were only one.

So when he messaged me on January 8^th of this year, I was a little surprised. But he follows my Facebook page, so he knew I was a romance writer and it was something he wanted to try his hand at as this year’s charity project for his radio show. Over the next couple of months, we threw ideas around and learned the best way for us to communicate was via text.

We also began to slide into our writing roles. M.F. is a creative guy and he intuitively knows how to amp up details in the story that make a book work. He created the core of the characters within the book and I built the story around them, then we began to write.

Almost every component of our writing relationship and friendship happened through 160 character texts. It’s a little mind-boggling to think about.

But here’s the way our typical day would go:

6:00-9:00 a.m. … this is the time slot of the Jeff, Kelli, and Mudflap morning show on 96.3 KLLL, Lubbock. Typically, I would listen to it via my phone app or computer internet while doing the morning/school routine with the kids. We almost always exchanged a few texts during the show about what they were talking about or promo for the book or simply about what was happening at home.

Lunchtime …would usually bring a few texts from M.F. with feedback about the new writing I’d sent him the night before. He read the new writing daily and gave amazing feedback about what could be changed or made better and what was really working.

Afternoons …these are my quality writing hours, so we would tend to exchange a few texts as I hit snags with the writing or story line or needed the perfect comeback (that golf scene…it’s his!).

Evening …at some point, I would send him the updated doc of the story so he could read the newest additions or changes. That would always prompt a flurry of texts as he read and provided immediate feedback with where he felt the story was. Easily most evenings, we would text back and forth for a couple of hours. (It should be noted here that both of our spouses are saints and obviously very patient and understanding people…we love you, Shannon & Ben!)

From start to finish, we’ve been working on this project for eight months. Thank goodness for unlimited data plans. But along the way, we’ve become friends too…and that honestly, is the best thing to come out of this project. And….I did finally get to meet him and his gorgeous wife Shannon in June.

The book is THE SHADOW OF MUDFLAP. It’s available in print for $9.99 or e-book for $2.99.

Buy Links:

Amazon (print and e-book)

Barnes & Noble (print and e-book)