Pairing Golf with Writing by Rolynn Anderson

First you have to know that I am the golfer, not my husband.  He hates golf as much as I love it.  What this means: twice a week (or so), I go off golfing on my own.  When I'm home, I play with my women friends, but when we travel and I haul my clubs along, I play as a 'single,' rounding out a foursome with three men I've never met before.  Two wonderful aspects of playing as a 'single:' I can play anytime I want to...and I get to play with very interesting people.

Yesterday I played with two men from Houston and one from Atlanta.  One of the fellows from Texas sells massage business franchises across the country.  Recently he's added a lucrative bundle of franchises for glue-on eyelashes, a ballooning industry.  What?  I am not making this up!  In fact, the man had to drop out of playing a couple of holes while he was wrapping up the sale of an eyelashing franchise.

I gather some plot and character ideas from my golf partners, but I also grab readers.  They are entranced by the idea I write suspense novels.  They always ask for my card, quiz me about my writing process, and promise they'll buy my books (or their wives/girlfriends will).  Some of my new golf buddies want to tell me stories I might use in an upcoming novel.  They are tickled when I tell them about the next suspense novel I'll be polishing, which centers on golf and is entitled BAD LIES.  Check out my works on my website: http://www.rolynnanderson.com

Until I get that story out to you, you'll have to be content with my funeral planner series: FADEOUT, SWOON and FAINT (releasing this summer).  The setting is a golf course community in Arroyo Grande, California.

Here's the gist of the series:

When their research upends terrible secrets about the dead, a boutique funeral planner and a hard-charging journalist confront danger and clash over how to protect the living.

FADEOUT

http://amzn.com/B00YWE3Z2U

SWOON

http://amzn.com/B00A1P6P3U

TAKING CHARGE OF MY BUCKET LIST by Rolynn Anderson

As you read this posting, I’m golfing at La Quinta with two friends, an event I bull-dozed into happening.  Enough of saying ‘let’s take a golf trip together.’  If this is something a bunch of friends want to do, then someone has to organize the ding-dang thing. 

Time’s a wasting and I'm not getting any younger.  I'm taking control of my bucket list!

Most of you know I’m a golfer, leaving my writing desk to play a couple times a week...for exercise, for the competition and for the camaraderie.  My husband doesn’t play golf, so I’m going on these trips with my girlfriends.  Ready?  Set?  Go!

What golf courses are in my bucket?  Easy!  I pulled up a list of the 30 best golf courses in California:

1. Pebble Beach, Pebble Beach

2. Spyglass Hill, Pebble Beach

3. Pasatiempo, Santa Cruz

4. Torrey Pines (South), La Jolla

5. Trump National LA, Rancho Palos Verdes

6. Spanish Bay, Pebble Beach

7. CordeValle, San Martin

8. PGA West (TPC Stadium), La Quinta

9. Pelican Hill (Ocean South), Newport Coast

10. La Quinta Resort (Mountain), La Quinta

11. Rustic Canyon, Moorpark

12. Pelican Hill (Ocean North), Newport Coast

13. Poppy Hills, Pebble Beach

14. Indian Wells (Players), Indian Wells

15. Bayonet Black Horse (Bayonet), Seaside

16. Marriott Shadow Ridge, Palm Desert

17. Aviara, Carlsbad

18. The Grand, San Diego

19. Barona Creek, Lakeside

20. TPC Harding Park, San Francisco

21. Desert Willow (Firecliff), Palm Desert

22. La Costa (Champions), Carlsbad

23. Silverado (North), Napa

24. Old Greenwood, Truckee

25. Maderas, Poway

26. Half Moon Bay (Ocean), Half Moon Bay

27. Indian Wells (Celebrity), Indian Wells

28. Journey at Pechanga, Temecula

29. Saddle Creek, Copperopolis

30. Coyote Moon, Truckee

Three of us are driving to Palm Springs, staying there three nights to play golf courses #10, #21 and #11.

No question about it, we will have fun and we will be challenged…and we’ll be ready to play more of the courses on our bucket list next year.  Goal?  Three courses a year for the next 9 years.  Can we do it?  You bet we can!

Talk about meeting goals: I’ll be trotting out two novels this summer.  Here’s a sneak peak at one cover; expect pages in June or July.  Meanwhile,  grab LIE CATCHERS if you haven’t yet read it!

LIE CATCHERS http://amzn.com/B00HJDS1LG

ROLYNN’S Web: http://www.rolynnanderson.com  

FEAR LAND is coming soon.  Watch for it in June!  Happy summer adventures.  Rolynn

THE AUTHOR AND HER SPORT

I think we writers need sports. We can sit at a computer just so long, building characters and plotting, crafting worlds and words for ourselves…and for readers who aren’t even in the room. The sport should pull us out of our chairs, get us outside, involve real people and provide a more tangible goal than writing does. I’m pretty pleased with my choice: golf. I play eighteen holes at least once a week and I’m active in my local women’s golf group. With my club, I’ll whack (with all my might) a small, dimpled ball, ninety to one hundred times in five hours. Note two more beneficial elements of golf…getting rid of pent-up aggressions and seeing a goal met immediately: getting the damn ball in the hole in the least strikes possible. (I didn’t say the sport you have to pick is easy, did I?)

Sure there are similarities between golf and writing. Both are challenging. I pick a club, align the ball and calibrate my swing as carefully as I choose words for my novels. I love playing with great golfers as much as I’m inspired when I read novels by fabulous writers. Practice? Vital to a golfer as it is to an author. Have I written a novel about golfing? Absolutely. And here’s the cool part…my heroine (in BAD LIES, a novel I haven’t released yet) plays great golf. Now you see the advantage of being a writer who also golfs…through my character, I can be the outstanding golfer I want to be!