Inside the Mind - Deborah Spencer Foliart

In 2016, I purchased a used bookstore that I renovated into a new and used bookstore with a coffee shop. It became a third place in our community. I have a great friend who is also an author, editor who I asked to do a Writers Workshop for me at the store. She agreed but only if I would take the workshop. I didn't see the benefit but did it anyway only to find out I enjoyed it. She said after one of my assignments that I should really continue to write the story because it was very good. So I did. I've always been a reader since I was very young.

The day hot-headed Abby Carter’s heart returns to its normal rhythm when the Leading Ladies (her ride-or-die friends) tell her she’s done the right thing. She just blew up her carefully curated life in Chicago. She quit her job. Come home to Logan’s Creek, they tell her, where they’re all waiting. Her spirits lift; she is, after all, a small-town girl, and the big city has worn her down. But then she remembers she hasn’t told her laidback boyfriend (no labels) Ian. Then there is her first love, Josh who she runs into after she moves back home. .Josh is running for mayor. Abby needs a job, so the two make a deal. Abby will run his campaign. A win/win, right? Not so fast. The current mayor is as crooked as a corkscrew and is willing to do anything to win. If that means undermining Josh and threatening Abby to step away from the campaign, then so be it. In the meantime, Ian decides Abby means more to him than he realized. And maybe, just maybe, their casual arrangement wasn’t the best idea. He shows up in Logan’s Creek, intent on winning her back. He may even be willing to commit. Stranger things have happened. But then there is the old Mayor Thornton. He’s ready to take on Josh running against him and plans on winning. Regardless of the cost to Logan’s Creek.

Abby was a girl after my own heart. The two fellas are a combination of all the men in my life. The Leading Ladies are a group of friends of mine that have been in my life for many years. When I realized Abby needed a support system and some female friends. I just took all the personalities of my friends dubbed the same group name, their characteristics, their fun, wit and their charm, threw it all together then divided it up into the 5 ladies who became her friends. Many of the characters are based on people I've met in my lifetime through work or in our small town in Arkansas. When you live in a small town, you get to know quirky things about everyone so things stick with you! Abby's parents and their values are much of what my parents taught me and my siblings or what my husband and I were with our kids.

I don't write every day, but I do each week. Sometimes it is at home or sometimes it might be at our lakehouse in Missouri. I don't particularly like sitting at a desk inside. I'd rather sit outside by myself with the wind blowing and the chimes ringing, able to look at the beauty. It gives me peace of mind and helps me be creative generally. I'd say I write three days a week on an average.

I'd say part of it is meeting people that have read your work and like it or sometimes really love it. That is a joy. But mostly looking at a book and knowing that you did the work yourself, created something that came from your imagination that other people can hopefully enjoy. Also hoping that they look forward to another book or two or three like I have in the works.

Creativity is something that is hard to have constantly which goes back to being able to write each day. There are days that it flows easily and others where nothing comes to you and everything is jumbled. So making the story flow in a way that someone else can read it and enjoy it is the hardest to me. Also getting it out there to people; making others know so they want to but it.

I use Grammarly which is very helpful in the spelling and grammar areas. Outside of that I really don't use any apps for writing. Just the old head! I sometimes write things out on a notebook, like notes to myself so I don't forget things when I am busy with other things but don't want to remember them during my writing time. But for the most part I write on my computer through a word document then send to my editor.

First of all, don't let anyone tell you not to try to write something if you have the passion to do it. Everyone has a story. It may not be the story that puts you in the limelight or on the map, but you have a story. You just have to find yours.

Mostly I used social media, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok. But I also do a lot of booksignings at Indie bookstores. I have made contact with Booktok'rs on Tiktok and mailed them a hardcopy of my book to ask for them to review it and have had several that have been happy to do that for me. It has helped me in the Amazon review numbers plus it got my TikTok numbers up by their numbers of followers watching as they reviewed my book on video.

Yes! I have a planned three books to follow A Small Town Somewhere. They are all part of the Logan's Creek Novel series and are set in a small town in Arkansas. I am currently halfway through the second which will come out in early 2026.

I owned an Indie Bookstore prior to deciding to write my Logan's Creek novel series. But sold the store on Main Street to give me time to do so. Before that I was in marketing for 30 years.