Blog Tour Interview & Giveaway - Her Heart's Liege by Olivia Fields

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Her Heart's Liege

Author: Olivia Fields

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Book Description:

Tomboy Alex Bonham has fought her male peers tooth and nail to prove herself worthy to become captain of the king’s guard. When her country is invaded by Danes, she is ordered to take the king’s younger son, a charming but irresponsible rake, away from the front lines for safekeeping.

Alex walks a difficult line, trying to balance her growing attraction to Prince Holden with her dedication to duty and her responsibility to keep him safe from robbers, Danes...and even himself. But when they are drawn into the struggle to defend East Anglia from occupation, both the prince and his captain must grow. Can spoiled Prince Holden evolve into a good man who could lead the kingdom--one Alex can trust with her heart?

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Author Interview

1. What inspired you to want to become a writer?

As an only child (a “lonely only,”) I found reading to be the ultimate escape into a better place.  From there it was only a short step to writing. Creating a better world, where the possibilities that don’t come to you in real life can be explored and experienced, is the ultimate compensation for the deficiencies of real life.

I had a vivid imagination and received positive feedback from adults for my first story, a science fiction story in which kudzu vines turned out to be an extraterrestrial menace that devoured an innocent farmer.

Not long after, I attended a youth camp where I made a friend who was also a writer.  For several years, we exchanged stories or wrote serially in our own little universe, corresponding at a ridiculous rate.  I used an old battered manual typewriter to turn out ream after ream of adolescent stories which thankfully are now lost to the mists of time!   

As an adult, I realized it was finally time to make my dream of becoming a published author happen.  I felt there would be far more point in writing stories to share than keeping them to myself and showing them only to a friend or two.

2. Tell us your most rewarding experience since being published.

Being published isn’t as easy as I thought it would be, so I can’t paint you a softly-lit Maxfield Parrish-style picture of flowery fields blowing in the breeze while I lie on a divan in the shade nibbling raspberries and murmuring lazy thanks to everyone who wants to gush about me being a Published Author.  ;-)  Editing and promotion have been hard work!  I think the most rewarding experience was when my publisher sent me the finished electronic copy of my book and I could finally see it on my iPhone and my Nook.  That finally made the accomplishment of getting published truly feel real.

3. If you could have a signed copy of any novel what would it be and why?

As a long-time convention goer, I often saw Robert Asprin’s name in the “Author signings” part of the DragonCon convention booklet and promised myself “Next year I’ll bring my Phil Foglio illustrated editions from the early Myth series and get him to sign them.”  However, I never remembered.   I kept saying to myself, “There’s always next year.”  Then one day I opened my browser and read that Asprin had died suddenly, tragically young and unexpected.  I’ll always wish I had remembered to take them to be signed while I still had that chance.

4. If you could have any superpower what would you choose?

The power to finish writing better books much faster, without including any editing mistakes?  Seriously, though, I’m not much interested in the conventional powers of super-strength, invisibility, mind reading, or shooting spider webs out of my wrists.  I’d like to be able to fly, though.

5. Please tell us in one sentence only, why we should read your book.

My book has all the ingredients for a great read: a strong, pretty heroine, a smoking-hot hero who starts out bad but mends his ways, romance, sex, relationship-building, armed combat, trickery, adventure, excitement, and lots of love.

6. Any other books in the works? Goals for future projects?

Lots!  My next book has been accepted for publication and is due out in around a year.  It’s the story of a reluctant, shy incubus who accidentally killed the first woman he preyed on.  He’s tried to stay isolated ever since, taking only what he needs to survive.  But after centuries of loneliness, he slipped up: he fell in love with one of his victims.

Before he can leave his beloved for her own good, the incubus’s old enemy shows up.  He’s been lurking, waiting to avenge the long-ago death of the innocent woman by trapping the incubus in a situation where he must drain and kill someone he loves.  The couple is forced to go on a globe-spanning quest in a race against the clock to find a solution that will allow her to survive their relationship and stay together.

I also have a two- or three-novel series half-written about a couple fleeing from the 1664 outbreak of bubonic plague in London, a m/m novel about two men falling in love as they work together to save a community theater, and a sequel to my paranormal romance, which will involve the incubus’s cranky father.

7. Do you write as you go or do you have the book planned before you start the first draft?

I have a vague plan when I begin my stories.  Nearly always, the plan includes a specific situation or set of motivating forces that will jump-start and drive the plot.  I also develop ideas about who the leading couple are going to be and how they will react to one another before I begin.  In addition, I usually have in mind a prospective plot point or two that will probably occur along the way as the couple progress toward their happy ending.  Other than that, I prefer to figure out what’s going to happen as I go.  If I have an extremely detailed plan worked out ahead of time, I get bored and don’t have the patience to finish.

This can make for anxiety or mistakes sometimes.  Many times as a novel’s plot develops during the writing process, I worry about not knowing what to do with plot points and endure delays while I try to figure out a solution.  Sometimes I follow a tangent that doesn’t pan out and have to backtrack, rip it out, and try again.  Occasionally the characters develop into different people than I’d originally envisioned and make different choices than I anticipated when I made my initial vague plan.  That’s part of the adventure of writing, though.  Most people don’t like spoilers for movies and novels they consume.  I feel that way about my own writing.  The journey is more fun if it isn’t predictable!

8. What movie and/or book are you looking forward to this year?

I’m looking forward to Rodrigo García and Emmanuel Lubezki’s “Last Days in the Desert.”  Reviews from Sundance say it avoids the typical heavy-handed pedantry of religious biography movies by taking a secular approach and by envisioning a non-scriptural situation inserted near the end of the forty days Jesus spent in the desert.

Critics complain about its reliance on atmosphere over dialog and its lead actor being yet another WASP portrayal of Jesus.  However, atmosphere is right up my alley.  I love the writing of Rodrigo’s father, Gabriel García Márquez, so if the son is anything like the father, he will bring grace and sensitivity to his storytelling.  While I recognize the problematic nature of the WASP male dominating the Hollywood entertainment industry, I’m also excited about Ewan McGregor’s acting ability.  I think he could do a fine job in the role of Jesus in a production of this type; he’s great at portraying subtle nuances of suffering, and he excels in quirky, offbeat films.  Finally, I’m looking forward to seeing the setting of the Anza Borrego, which is similar to the southern Arizona desert where I lived as a small child.

9. If you could live anywhere in the world where would it be?

Somewhere quiet without a lot of houses close by, with plenty of wilderness and natural beauty well within reach.  This is complicated by the co-requisite that there be a semi-decent Chinese restaurant within convenient driving distance.

I like the Appalachian Mountains, but some of the northwestern and northeastern United States are nice, as well.  Scotland and New Zealand would also be fantastic candidates for consideration.

10. Can you see yourself in any of your characters?

My characters definitely aren’t intended to be me; I don’t have much interest in self-insertion stories.  As Stephen King remarked in Misery, that kind of story tends to become a sort of auto-cannibalism in which you inevitably succumb to the temptation to fictionalize and idealize yourself.  That would quickly become very dull for me—and probably for readers, too!  However, as with any writer, the characters I write are inevitably filtered through my own perceptions and values.

I like to write about characters who explore possibilities that aren’t realistic for my life, which separates them from me from the get-go.  Sometimes they are ideal possibilities, sometimes not.  Sometimes I just like to toss a monkey wrench into the gears of a character’s life and see how the character reacts.

One thing that’s important to me is writing about characters who are basically good—or at least they believe they are serving a strong moral framework and doing the right thing given their individual circumstances.  This is true even if the character follows a moral code or makes unique decisions that wouldn’t be shared (or possibly understood) by the other characters or even the reader.  I suppose that’s the most important similarity between me and many of my characters: we have a passionate commitment to our moral systems and are willing to suffer to uphold what we believe in.

About the Author
For years, college professor Olivia Fields has been writing romantic tales to pacify her muse and entertain her friends. She believes in making her characters work for their happy endings.

When not at her keyboard, Olivia enjoys nature hikes, photography, and the constant companionship of several rather irregularly trimmed Shih Tzu dogs. Olivia’s first published novel, Her Heart’s Liege, will be released in March 2015 by Rogue Phoenix Press.

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