In a writer's group we had to write down our top five favorite movies.  Mine are:

The Counte of Monte Cristo

You've Got Mail

Hitch

Ever After

How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days

Then we had to find a common theme.  Do you see it?  (Besides in the title of this post.)  The characters all have a hidden identity.

From there we had to look at our own writing and see if the theme is in our work.  Guess what.  It is!  I'm writing a romantic suspense about a woman whose family went into the witness protection program when she was twelve.  Sixteen years later she ends up working for a man who had been her childhood playmate.

This made me think about how much I've always loved the hidden identity theme.  My absolute favorite book is The Scarlet Pimpernel.  (If you've never read it, you need to pick up a copy.)  My favorite Nora Roberts novel is Sweet Revenge--about a modern day princess who doubles as a Robin Hood type character.  (Another book for you to buy.)  And Pretend You Don't See Her (also about the Witness Protection Program) is my favorite Mary Higgins Clark mystery.

As for Bible stories, I've loved Joseph and Esther since I was little.  I'm reading about Joseph again right now, and it's had me in tears.  I can just feel the inner turmoil.  And I love how he uses a translator when talking to his brothers so they don't know he can speak Hebrew, and they talk right in front of him.  Brilliant!

Anyway, I don't know what this says about me--the whole hidden identity thing.  I just find it kind of interesting.  And it gives me lots more ideas for novels.