CHOCTAW, Okla. (KFOR) — He’s the early riser.

William Bernhardt has always found those pre-dawn hours best for getting his writing done.

“Nobody is going to make you write,” he argues. “You’ve got to make yourself.”

That method has worked pretty well over the years.

His courtroom and crime thrillers can line a whole shelf.

“You just have to keep plugging away at it, day after day, until it’s done,” he continues.

William’s wife Lara does her writing mostly at night.

Her subjects approaching the ‘witching hour’ have more to do with the paranormal than the paralegal.

Her best ideas, she insists, arrive while she’s soaking in a hot bath.

“Yep,” she confirms. “In the bath tub. Everyone leaves me alone. I have a spiral notebook and a ball point pen.”

So Lara has been working on a novel about a TV psychic who solves a mystery in a town called Guthrie.

“I like to describe it as a cross between the X-Files and Ghost Hunters,” she says.

William got pretty deep into the fourth book of a series about a fictional defense attorney named Daniel Pike.

“Usually he’s the defense attorney,” describes Bernhardt. “This time around he’s the defendant.”

It’s not like they never shared ideas or never read each other’s rough drafts over coffee and cupcakes.

“I’ve definitely read her book,” smiles William, “And she claims to have read mine.”

Lara laughs and says, “Oh stop!”

But they never thought they might finish their respective novels at the same time.

“Kizmet,” she explains.

The writing Bernhardts didn’t plan it that way, but they did come to embrace the idea, especially at a time when people might need an escape from the drama of current events.

“We decided to go for it,” Lara says.

William agrees. “Always go for it.”

So here’s to two good stories, a couple of books and books from a couple whose different writing habits timed out perfectly.

William’s new book is entitled ‘Twisted Justice’.

Lara’s newest novel is ‘Ghosts of Guthrie’.