Lisa Jackson's Blog - Posts Tagged "lisa-jackson"

Most of the time I come up with the ideas for my books by myself. I hear or see something that intrigues me and I think “What if?” 

In the case of Without Mercy I actually heard a radio ad about a school for troubled teens while I was in the car at a red light. The ad captured my attention and immediately got me thinking about the plot for the book. What if a school meant to turn troubled teens around, was actually something far more sinister? I was so into my thoughts about the book, that, I didn’t notice when the light turned green. The guy behind me did. He laid on the horn. I hit the gas and I turned around at the first place I could, then drove home, my errand forgotten as I raced home to call my editor and run my new idea by him. 

In the case of Cold Blooded, the idea had simmered for years. I’d always been fascinated with saints and how they died, so I created a book with a serial killer who found victims to mimic the saints’ bizarre deaths. 

However the idea for the first Montana “To Die” book wasn’t mine. At least the characters weren’t originally my own. The idea was floated to me by my editor. 

“I’d like to see a book with two female cops,” he told me.

I thought, Oh no! My first mental image was of the TV cop show, Cagney and Lacey from the eighties. It seemed so out of date, but, the more I thought about it, the more I liked the idea. Two strong, opposite characters emerged. Twice married and now divorced Detective Regan Pescoli was a hot-head who broke or bent the rules. The life with teenagers and an ex-husband who was a pain, was kind of a wreck. I teamed Pescoli with Detective Selena Alvarez, cool-and clear-headed a scientist who never married and held a deep, life-changing secret. So the characters came to life, at least in my head. 

I also came up for an idea for a serial killer story that would run through two stories, Left To Die and Chosen To Die, but didn’t think beyond that story-line. I wasn’t thinking “series” at that point. 

What I found during the writing of those two books was that I couldn’t let the characters go and I loved the little Montana town and sheriff’s department. So, fast forward a few years and now, seven books later, I still have at least one more book to write in the series. Maybe more.

Time will tell.

The books in the Montana “To Die” series by Lisa Jackson are, in order: [bookLLeft To Die], Chosen To Die, Born To Die, Afraid To Die, Ready To Die, Deserves To Die, and Expecting To Die. You can read more about each title at www.lisajackson.com.

Often I’ve been asked about sequels to books I’ve written. I have to admit that other than the books that are obviously a series, I don’t think beyond the book I’m writing. I might leave the door open for another book, just in case I have some inspiration, but generally I just write the one story and figure that’s it. However, when a character really grabs me, I do consider a companion book.



In the case of Sinister which I co-wrote with Nancy Bush and Rosalind Noonan, we thought a second story set in the same town with a few of the same characters would be fun and so Ominous (which will be in stores in August of 2017) was born. Also, when I wrote The Night Before, the Morning After was a natural. I loved the character of Nikki Gillette and I actually was coming up with the idea for The Morning After as I was writing The Night Before. Much later, my editor and I discussed Tell Me, the third book in the series. Once again, I wanted to catch up with the characters of Nikki Gillette and Pierce Reed. I didn’t think their story was finished. I’m still not certain it is. Maybe because I love the city of Savannah so much I can’t let go. The same thing happened with Deep Freeze and Fatal Burn. Those stories were written one after the other, but After She’s Gone came years later as I wanted to know what happened to Jenna Hughes’ daughters. People have asked about a sequel to Without Mercy. Though I left the door open and Shay had a cameo appearance in After She’s Gone, I haven’t come up with another story for her. Will it happen?

Maybe someday.

My sister Nancy Bush and I write joint novels, (The Wicked Series and upcoming One Last Breath—available in May 2018) and we’ve always partnered on books, bouncing ideas back and forth and editing, in general, talking out our books. Our friend Rosalind Noonan was originally our editor and has evolved into a great friend and fellow writer who, too, is involved in various stages of our books as well as writing her own. We all have different talents and interests and writing styles which, we think, complement each other. At least we hope so.

So writing together was a natural, right? Well, maybe.



I’d written a novel years ago (Most Likely to Die) with a couple of other authors, Beverly Barton and Wendy Corsi Staub. In that book, I came up with the concept of three individual but linked love stories beneath the broader umbrella of a mystery/suspense arc that covers the entire novel. So Roz, Nan and I decided to try something similar with our first book, Sinister, which turned out to be a whole lot of fun. Together we came up with the plot, town, characters and found a way to link the separate stories together. It seemed to work. The book was a bestseller–yay! On the heels of Sinister, we decided to write one more and came up with Ominous. Once again, three love stories under the suspense umbrella and a sequel to Sinister. Many of the characters the small Wyoming town of Prairie Creek show up in Ominous. Also, there’s a cowboy or certainly western feel to both books. We all ended up loving the characters.


So, I guess, three writers can actually work together and come up with not just one, but two books!

My sister, Nancy Bush, and I have been writing for years, usually on individual books, but other times together. We wrote a whole series of “Wicked” books about a cultish family where all the sisters have a bit of ESP. (You can check them out on http://www.lisajackson.com or http://www.nancybush.net )


Recently, though, we wanted to write something a little different so we started spit-balling and going back to our romance novel roots. I said, “I love the whole runaway bride idea.” Sister Nan’s response was, “I love the whole secret baby thing. And by the way, have you ever heard of Point Roberts, Washington?” I hadn’t but it’s a very interesting part of Washington state accessible through Canada.

Perfect! We had setting and the germ of an idea! ONE LAST BREATH was born.

We wondered how we could blend those stories and add in a mystery, while blending romance and spilling blood and tossing in a lot of suspense and came up with the idea of an attack at the scene of the wedding propelling the bride to leave.

The mystery hinges on who was behind the brutal attack.

I can’t tell you how much fun we had with this!

We loved the idea of the grace, reverence and beauty of a wedding juxtaposed against the terror of a horrific attack.

Yep. We felt like we pulled out all the stops on thisone and hope everyone agrees!