Character Monday & A New Release : A Double Feature

Here at Astraea Press we have had several amazing and unexpected events. We are behind yet ahead. How is that possible? I'm not really sure you'd have to ask Steph Taylor the cornerstone of our outfit. Anyways with that being said we are catching up on some releases while also promoting our new one. Without further ado please welcome Elaine Cantrell and her character Violet Emerson from A New Dream. 

After an auto accident destroys his pro-football career, Matt McCallum struggles to find a new dream for his life, but nothing engages him the way football did. After a stint in rehab, he takes a job managing a grocery store where he meets Violet Emerson.

Violet works in the bakery department, but her dreams carry her far beyond the doors of Chef’s Pantry. As soon as she can save the money, she plans to open a catering business. And she thinks the new manager’s broad shoulders and blue eyes are simply divine.

Thrown together at work, Matt and Violet find a common dream for their lives, but a loose end from Matt’s past returns to jeopardize their future. Will love be enough to save their new dream before it turns into a nightmare?

Character Interview

Elaine: Good morning.  Welcome to WSPD’s Up and Coming Show.  I’m Elaine Cantrell, and my guest this morning is Violet Emerson.  Violet, who is currently employed by Chef’s Pantry, has big dreams for her future.  Violet, welcome to Up and Coming.  Can you tell us a little bit about yourself?

Violet: Thank you so much for having me on your show, Elaine.  I graduated from Tri-State Tech with a degree in culinary arts.  Since that time I’ve been employed by Chef’s Pantry in their bakery department.  Marjorie English is the department head, and I’ve learned a lot from her.

Elaine: Oh, I’ve tasted some of Marjorie’s apple pie.  It’s to die for.

Violet:  (Laughs) I think so too.

Elaine: So, tell us your dream, Violet.  That’s what Up and Coming is all about: people who’re going after their dreams.

Violet: I plan to work at Chef’s Pantry for a few years both to practice my craft and save some money.  After that I plan to open a catering business with my friend Josh Bailey.

Elaine:  (arching eyebrows) Do I smell romance in the air, Violet?

Violet: (blushing) No, Josh is just a friend.

Elaine: (laughs) You remind me of a young Elizabeth Taylor, and your eyes are a wonderful shade of blue.  Don’t tell me men don’t notice.

Violet: I don’t know if they notice or not, but my priority is my business.

Elaine: Do you think it’s possible for a woman to have a career and a family at the same time?

Violet: Yes, but first I have to get the career and the man in that order.

Elaine: I like that.  You have clear cut goals and a path to achieving them.  I’m sure that one day your dream will come true. 

Violet: (blushes) Thank you, Elaine.  Give me a couple of years, and then call on Bailey-Emerson for all your catering needs.

Elaine:  I’ll do that.  Thanks for coming.

Violet shakes hand with Elaine and leaves.

Elaine: My next story doesn’t have such a happy ending.  Many viewers will remember last week’s guest Matt McCallum.  Eighteen months ago Matt signed a contract to play football for the Green Bay Packers.  His first season with the Packers was phenomenal.  He kicked the winning field goal during the last minutes of the Super Bowl to win the game for the Packers.

Last night Matt and his fiancée Stacey Thomas were driving home from Greenville when a deer ran across the road in front of them.  Miss Thomas was uninjured in the resulting crash, but Matt was taken to the hospital with severe injuries to his legs.  WSPD learned this morning that surgeons were unable to save his right leg.  It was amputated right above his knee.  I’m sure all of Matt’s fans wish him a speedy recovery.

We’ll pause for a break, and when we come back, Bart Ridgeway will tell us about his dream. 

 Wow that was fun and an amazing way to get to know a character from one of our latest releases. Thank you Elaine and  Violet. Now lets get to know Elaine better. 

Author Interview

A random fact about your story.  My husband didn’t want me to write the book because he didn’t like what I had planned for my hero.

A random fact about you as an author. I wrote my fist book when I was around five.  Actually, I dictated it to my father who wrote it down on notebook paper and kept it until the day he died.

Favorite line in the story (can be funny, romantic, etc).    Violet thought some of the tears on her cheeks belonged to Matt, but no, a pro football player wouldn’t cry just because a woman said she loved him.

How did you get the idea for your book?  My sociology class at the high school where I work was studying the different life stages that people go through, and we started talking about the dreams people have for their lives.  I’ve been lucky to have achieved some of mine, but I started to wonder how it would be to get everything you wanted.  I also wondered how it would feel to lose everything.  And so A New Dream took shape.  Matt McCallum had it all and ultimately lost it.  A New Dream is the story of what happened next.  

What are you currently working on?  I’m doing edits for a book from Lachesis Publishing.  It’s tentatively titled Kara’s Second Choice, but we’ve changed it several times.  After that I’m going to polish my time travel novel.

Is this your first published book?   No, it’s my seventh.  My first novel A New Leaf was the 2003 winner of the Timeless Love contest and was published in 2004 by Oak Tree Press.
  
Vanilla or Chocolate  Oh, please give me chocolate.

As a child what did you want to be when you grew up?  LOL.  I had no idea.

What was the scariest moment of your life?  When My children were very young we lived near a large river.  Our back yard was fenced in, so they often played there.  One day they were playing on their swings, and I went inside to get some Kool Aid.  When I came back they were gone.  You know I thought about that river!  I started the search for them, and found them asleep in their beds.  I had to sit down for a long time before my knees quit shaking.  Needless to say I never left them alone again fence or no fence.

How do you develop your plots and characters?   Once the germ of an idea presents itself I decide what type of character would fit in with the plot.  I know my starting point and the place where I want to end up, but I make some of it up as I go.

Do you listen to music while writing?  No, I have to have it nice and quiet.  If the music is playing I’m paying attention to it and not my work.

Plotter or Pantser? Why?  A little bit of both.  I have a starting point, and I know where I want to end up, but getting there is a mystery to me.  I make it up as I go.

Tell us about your current release.  After an auto accident destroys his pro-football career, Matt McCallum struggles to find a new dream for his life, but nothing engages him the way football did. After a stint in rehab, he takes a job managing a grocery store where he meets Violet Emerson.

Violet works in the bakery department, but her dreams carry her far beyond the doors of Chef’s Pantry. As soon as she can save the money, she plans to open a catering business. And she thinks the new manager’s broad shoulders and blue eyes are simply divine.

Thrown together at work, Matt and Violet find a common dream for their lives, but a loose end from Matt’s past returns to jeopardize their future. Will love be enough to save their new dream before it turns into a nightmare?

Tell us the "story" of your book and how it came to be.  This book was the first one I ever wrote.   My son came home one day and told me he’d written a book.  Since I’d always wanted to write myself, I was in awe of my genius son.  Then, he told me he had always made up stories in his head, and he thought he might as well write them down.  Glory be!  I had always done the same thing.  So, I sat down to write my masterpiece.

 Nobody liked it.  My husband was upset about what I planned for my hero, and my friends didn’t like my heroine.  I wrote a second book and left A New Dream on my computer for almost ten years before I dusted it off and sat down to revise it. 

I’m glad I did.  I did a pitch to Astraea Press who loved it.  Thanks, Astraea for this opportunity.

Do you have a writing routine?  Since I have a day job I have to write whenever I can.  In the summer time I don’t work so I’ll write from around nine until lunchtime.  Then I’ll write a little more after dinner.

What inspires you?  Inspires me to write, you mean?  Anything.  Another book, music, a news story.   Maybe even a dream.

What are you working on right now?  I’m polishing a time travel novel, and then I’m working on my first fantasy.

Tell us something about yourself that your readers might not expect.  A ghost said hello to me.  Long story.  I have an open mind about the whole experience but some skepticism too.

Favorite Muppet?  Kermit. 

Favorite movie and why?  This is a tough one.  I liked Pearl Harbor and Titanic, Remember Me, The Princess Diaries, Twilight, The Sound of Music,  golly I can’t remember them all, but my all time favorite is probably Gone With The Wind.  Why?  Because I love history, it’s about the South where I live, and Clark Gable looked exactly like I thought Rhett Butler should look.

What are your goals for this year?  I want to promote my two new books, polish my time travel romance, and work on my fantasy novel. 

To find out more about Elaine, including her blog and social media information check out the forum page over at Astraea Press.com.

To purchase A New Dream click the title.