Guest Blog: Cora Blu

Today's guest in Hot MAMA Land is: Cora Blu! Welcome!

Thank you for hosting me today. My name is Cora Blu and I write Contemporary Interracial Romance and Parafantasy Romance. An underwater series.

Today I wanted to share how I find my characters voice. The actual sound of their voice. The way I hear a character is vital to how I see them. This adds to their mannerisms, habits, everything.

Walking down the street or through a mall, many of us see a person and form a voice for them in our minds. As soon as they begin to speak and a different voice comes out they’re not as attractive or interesting as they were a minute ago. Worst the voice is warmer, graveled, sexier or deeper than you thought it would be. Now you’re standing there staring at a perfect stranger. Lips drying up because now they’re … interesting , attractive, hot. Blind—they’re staring at you now because your mouth is hanging open and your purse strap is hanging off your elbow. One eyebrow jacked up.

(You know you’ve been there)

That’s how I approach my characters. Listening to the radio is a good way to find pitch in a voice. Not just a deep voice for a brooding hero, but a tone hiding pain. A kind male voice you feel on your skin when the person speaks to you. It lays across you like a spent lover warm and moist with a faint pulse. Not weak, but caring and inviting.

Now that voice has to fit the face in my mind. A short statured man, with a boy next door face and a stocky build that could push a F-150 down the street without breaking a sweat, give him that voice and he becomes your best friends brother that you never liked until he pulled the b-b-grill across the back yard at her parents pool party.

Now all you need to hear is one syllable in that voice and your disposition changes. You start looking around the room, standing on tiptoe trying to see if you see him. All because the voice is a prologue to the personality.

Pair him with the wrong voiced heroine, and the story never works. Place him with a fast talker who speaks faster than she thinks and watch them balance one another out.

Once I can hear their voices I can hear them in any room with any person I place them with, because not only do they have a personality, but so does their voice.

In my Underwater series, Brothers of Element Series, my heroine, Drew, a human, meets her security, Her’lion, a bull shark shifter, for the first time after meeting her hero Dagger, a tiger shark shifter and King of the Atlantic out on her pier.

She couldn’t believe what he was saying. It was more incredible than the idea of living beneath the sea, predators and prey living together in clans. This was straight out of a sci-fi novel. He noticed her confusion.

“Come meet my head of security, a bull shark, mated to my life assistant, Carina, a dolphin.”

“I can’t concentrate. There’re too many questions to ask.”

She watched the men as they approached the pier, introducing themselves and to her surprise, kissing her palm, one by one. Dagger knelt behind her on the pier as a man came closer. His skin was darker than a nightmare; his eyes, a soft purple, almost lavender shade, were serious with pride.”

“Queen Drew, this is your personal security, Her’lion. Her’lion, this is your Queen, Drew Hamilton.”

“My Queen, it is an honor to serve you.”

Dagger’s voice was deep, but this man’s voice led you down a dark alley, to an unmarked door with no handle requiring a password and a handshake for admission—yet somehow she knew him.

“Her’lion, it’s a pleasure to meet you.” She threaded her fingers together, uncertain of protocol. “Have we met before?”

“I watch from the breakwaters, patrolling with the killer whale you refer to as Bandit.”

“Oh—” she said shyly. She’d danced for him that morning to save Jim, so she assumed at the time; now she was embarrassed.

“Do not be concerned, my Queen, you believed me to be a threat this morning. You are very brave.”

~~~

Thank you for sharing time with me. If you have any questions please ask. I would love to give one commenter a copy, in their preferred format, of one of my ebooks, their choice. If it’s from the Brothers of Element Series I’ll add “Desmond” to it.

http://corablu.com/blog/

https://www.facebook.com/corabluromanticwaves

http://pinterest.com/corablu5/

Books available @Amazon, B&N, Allromance, Kobo

Sincerely, Cora Blu