Behind the Book with Ignite Authors Genie Davis and Linda Marr

Two authors collaborate… read their story!

Between the Sheets with Genie Davis and Linda Marr

How did we start writing Between the Sheets?

The answer starts over twenty years ago. Not that we really want to admit we knew each other that long ago without the word “kindergarten” being mentioned.

We first met when Linda was visiting California from New York, and Genie had an office near the beach. After one lunch by the sand together, we became fast friends. Cut to a few months later, when Linda moved to Los Angeles and we picked up where we’d left off. Not only did we become closer friends, we became occasional writing partners, crafting a number of screen and TV projects together. But we’d never written a novel together. And we thought it would be a lot of fun.

Little did we know how much fun! Genie had already published a number of different books; Linda came from the world of television. While we sometimes have our differences over what words sound more poetic and which more pedestrian, or the names of our main characters, we genuinely love working together because two heads often really are better than one when it comes to story, dialog, and heat.

If one of us is off, the other can step in with a fresh story arc or a pithy bit of dialog. It’s like sitting around a campfire telling stories to each other, only we’re sitting around a computer screen. Pass the ‘smores please. Actually, as far as Genie goes, it’s Trader Joe’s dark chocolate peanut butter cups.

We really believe that telling a great story and sharing experiences is what friendship’s all about. Writing together is just an outgrowth of that by two people who also happen to BE writers. But instead of simply sharing our own experiences, we get to share what our characters do and feel.

The characters in Between the Sheets were especially fun for us to create, since the heroine, Jenna, is a writer herself, and the hero, Riley has just about every trait we love in a man. The idea of the story originally came from the fantasy of what would happen if something we wrote could come true? As first conceived there was going to be a supernatural element that caused this, but we decided it would be more relatable if the heroine only thought her romance was magical, and the real reasons behind their spark were more down to earth. Something that could, conceivably happen to anyone, no spells or incantations required. But a new way of looking at our story was required.

That was just part of the fun of it. Together we can handle almost any plot change, any edit notes, any sudden inspiration to turn our story on its head. So the real story behind this book is that it has made us even better friends. And combining writing time with time spent with a friend is pretty much unbeatable.