Meet AKA teammate: Penny Fletcher

Here’s another one of my awesome AKA Literary teammates. Hope you check her out.

Name: Penny Fletcher
 
Lives in: Riverview, Fla., 10 miles south of Tampa. I grew up on the Jersey Shore and it is not like the television series.
 
Family: My husband, Bobby, died in 2003 of bone cancer. I have four grown children; stepchildren; "many" grandchildren and raised (adopted) a granddaughter for a disabled son from the time she was 7 months old until March of this year (1999-2011). She is now 13 and has just moved in with an aunt and cousins nearby. There is always some family living in my little house!
 
Writes: I started writing as "the high school reporter for the Asbury Park Press in N.J." Next I wrote for magazines while traveling with my first husband who was in the military, and have been writing for newspapers since 1980. I was a Bureau Editor for the Tampa Tribune's special sections division, Sunbelt Newspapers; edited for Amazon Books self-publishing division and now edit for private authors. I currently freelance news, features and columns for local papers but want to write books full time. Terrie is my agent for TRIAL BY FIRE, which I completed in January, and I have another in the works, CONFIDENTIAL CLIENTELE. Both are romantic suspense.
 
Titles of books you've written/sold: I wrote a press release guide while employed by Media General Communications Inc., and had to speak to groups about how to submit press releases properly. (Too boring!)

I am on Twitter, Linked-In and FaceBook and have a Web site (with references) for my editing service.

Favorite book: PEYTON PLACE (It changed mainstream fiction forever)

Favorite book character: Robin Hood

Book you've learned the most from: ROOTS (Keeps it real)

If you could have dinner with any author, who would it be and what would you ask him/her? Robin Cook. "How did your life change when you became a best-selling author?"

What is the best piece of writing advice you ever received: "Make everything so real readers feel like they're inside the character; touching, tasting, smelling, and most especially, feeling their emotions."

(Editors at McFadden Enterprises when I was writing for True Romance, True Story & True Confessions.)

Finish these sentences:

I wish I... could afford to stop chasing news and write books full time.

If I knew... what actions were mistakes beforehand I wouldn't take them!

Other AKA profiles:
Aaron Tate
Louise Caiola
Katie Lee
Lee Richmond
Robert Spiller
Edward A. Iannuccilli
Tasha Cotter
Gilda Evans
Luis Cruz