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That’s Right Ellie was here!!!

T: Good Evening Ellie thanks for joining me this evening. I hope the whiskey is strong enough?

Whiskey or Wine T…I love them both. Given a choice, Tenessee Honey is my preferred drink, but I do love me some Jim Bean Maple…yum…I could be content sipping that all day long.

T: I promise for this set of questions I’m going to keep things fun and light (well light for me) so let’s get started.

Fun and light sounds fine, but how about dark and heavy? That sounds much more yummy.

T: Have you thought about adding more of your outdoor passions into your books?

Do you think I don’t have enough? I don’t think I had rock climbing or spelunking on my list. I could add those as well. Bottom line, it’s a magical world out there, one we should all be out enjoying more than not. My favorite day is a day spent outside.

T: Your bio list a few jobs you have held: counter-girl at McDonalds, a research assistant in a Nanofabrication facility, rocket scientist, physician and published author? I’m pretty sure I know one that’s missing? Can you tell us a little about your time at them? Or if you’ve thought about writing about them?

LOL…YOU know…the counter-girl at a McDonalds was an incredible experience. I worked one summer for them, and would you believe I had several guys ask me out while I was asking if they wanted fries with that? It made a very long summer that much more enjoyable! Not the working at McDonalds part, but all the dates with strangers! Rocket scientist..yeah, I am a bit of a dork. I was trained as a physicist and worked on guidance systems for rockets. I even had the opportunity to fly in NASAs vomit comet and racked up over two and a half hours of zero gravity! My first thirty minutes I was tossing my cookies! Yeah, not so sexy, but damn that was the best roller coaster ride in the world! Would I write as story about a counter girl? Probably not…but I have written a story about a girl out in space…so yup, I’m working on that one.

T: How often do you take the family back to your old haunts in Hawaii?

We’ve gone back a couple of times, but they’re not really interested in where I lived or my high school. The best part is in knowing the islands. We can be tourists with an insider’s view. I know all the cool beaches and the places the tourists don’t go.

T: Besides the sun and weather what is one thing you miss the most from Hawaii?

The ocean!!! When I retire, I’m retiring near the ocean. I love the movement of the water, the sound of the waves, and scuba diving is as close to zero-gravity as I’ll ever get again. Life is slower there too. Sometimes, I want to stop, pause, and simply breathe in the fragrant air.

T: When did you start writing? Did something happen?

This is one of my favorite questions, and much like medicine, I never wanted to be a writer when I was growing up. NOPE! I hated writing. I didn’t even like medicine. Math and science were always my passion, aka a degree in applied and engineering physics and a stent as a rocket scientist. Only, I lost my passion for hard core science and found myself on the path towards becoming a physician. I love my job by the way. Writing kind of came about the same way, by accident perhaps?

Here’s the story…My son, 14 at the time, had a creative writing assignment. He’d been given a prompt, to write ONE paragraph about a woman looking over a valley. He was so frustrated by the assignment, saying ‘What more is there to say? A woman is looking over a valley? It’s impossible!’

Well, I worked with him (really it was more of an argument) and showed him how he could breathe life into that one sentence with creative words. I wrote one paragraph to show him. He stalked off and went and wrote his assignment, then later came back to me. He had the paragraph I’d written, loved it, and asked me what happened next. This is the paragraph I wrote:

“As had all Servants before her, Kiera faced west toward the valley at the noon hour. Alone, clad in a vivid red skirt worn, by tradition, only by the Servant, Kiera waited to greet the Emperor. Spun of the finest wool, the fabric hung in soft loose folds around her legs. The lazy breeze blew it softly against her legs with occasional gusts fanning it behind her, framing her like the sovereign’s flag.”

He asked me…WHAT COMES NEXT? And I shrugged, because I didn’t know. I’d merely wanted to show him how he could take the writing prompt and turn it into anything he wanted. In my case, I talked about a girl, what she was wearing, and a hint of a meeting. But his question spurred a 170,000 YA novel! Most novels are 70K. I’ve always been wordy, but HE loves CALAGONIA, and that was my first book.

I guess I owe becoming a published writer to my son’s questioning mind.

T: What are the furbabies names? What type of pup?

My fur babies, the cats, are all rescue animals. We got them when we lived in Okinawa and so they all have Japanese names. Katamuki means bent in Japanese. Okinawan cats have a genetic defect in their tails, where they have a bent bone. It makes the tip of their tail bend. Katamuki…aka ‘Muki’ is black and white. Shinzu is an all white cat. Her name is derived from the Japanese word for pearl. She was rescued when an Okinawan tossed her out of a car when she was a kitten. Oni, he’s an all black cat, the youngest of the three. Oni means devil spirit in Japanese.

Loki, is a Baraque Francais. He’s a bird dog, pur- bred, and our only non-rescue animal.

T: Have you lived anywhere other than the United States? If so where? Did you like it? Do you miss it?

LOL…yup. Lived six amazing years in Okinawa. For an island girl, Okinawa was a lot like returning to my island heritage. I learned to dive in Okinawa and have nearly 2000 dives under my belt. I loved it. I hated leaving it. I would return in a heartbeat.

T: While you’re curled up on the couch with your wine and laptop writing where’s the family? Does your husband sit next to you?

Sometimes the hubs sits with me and rubs my feet!!! But, naw, usually I’m alone. He’s in his man cave. I need quiet to write. Not quiet, quiet. I write best with music on (hard rock!!!) But if the hubs is there…he says he’s going to be quiet, which for him means an interruption every three minutes. Every time I get back in the groove of writing…there he is with another coment/question/whatever!!!! Yeah! I need to write by myself.

T: How do you come up with the stories you write about?

They speak to me!!!! All the damn time. I must have 15 stories in my head right now…and nearly as much in pre-edit, completed form!

T: How much research went into Changing Roles? How much went into Heart’s Insanity?

Changing Roles: None. I wrote from experience, things I knew. I did have to google how long it took to make Detective, but that was about it, but I didn’t have to research anything else.

Heart’s Insanity: I had to google … the stuff that happened in Niagara! LOL. But all the medical stuff was drawn from my personal experience.

T: Since you read so many genre’s will we see any of your writing in more than dark erotica and romance? Will those themes run in all your writing?

The main themes in all my writing will always be for a strong, independent female lead. I don’t like clingy women, or women who aren’t strong enough to saves themselves. Not that their hunky hunks can’t help out, but yeah…strength in femininity as well as the choice to be saved.

I will be writing in science fiction and fantasy. I have two YA science fiction novels completed, which need revision. One epic science fiction saga which needs to be finessed a bit. A fantasy novel is out there too…2/3rds complete. These are stories I wrote while learning my craft. I’m a much better writer now and really want to make them great. You’ll see more BDSM themed stuff from me. What can I say, but power-play intrigues me, and more contemporary romance as well.

T: What comes next?

Up next…well….I have a contemporary romance coming up…Twist of Fate. Think Silence of the Lambs meets Romance. I am currently writing the first in The Collector Trilogy, a dark romance. And I have a book of erotic shorts and poems on the horizon. YUP…I’ve got stuff coming!!!

T: Well Ellie that’s all I have for you today? Until next time thanks again for joining me, now get back to work and write your next book.

Yes, I’d love too, but first dear T…I need a whiskey refill!