Guest Author Interview with Lynn Cahoon and a Giveaway!

Alexis: Today we have paranormal romance author, Lynn Cahoon, visiting us and she will be giving away an ecopy of A Member of the Council to one lucky commenter. Welcome Lynn!

Everyone has their own writing process…how they come up with ideas, how they name their characters, how they choose the setting. Can you describe your writing process?

Lynn: Thanks for having me here today!  I love this question because I love reading the answers from others.  For me, an idea germinates from a setting or an activity.  I started writing fiction for the confessional magazines, so I took ideas from everywhere.  The first story I sold was I fell in Love with a Carney.  The not so true story of one night at the state fair.  It was fun to write and I realized that I’d been making up what if stories all my life. So now, I just write them down as they come. Some pan out, some not so much. :-)

Alexis: I definitely understand the “not so much.” Can you tell us your story of getting “the call”?

Lynn: My first ‘call’ came after a big 6 had turned down The Bull Rider’s Brother after several revisions and months of waiting. I sent it one more time, planning on shoving it under the bed if I got another no.  I’d never considered a ‘digital’ publisher but Crimson Romance was just starting out, had the backing of F&W, the Writer’s Digest people, and I figured, what the heck. 

I sent a query. In less than an hour I had a request for the full.  Then in a week, an offer came over email when I was at work.  Shocked, I turned to my cube mate and said, “I think I sold a book.”

Alexis: Too funny. Where did you get the idea for this story?

Lynn: Return of the Fae came to me when I was editing the first in the series, A Member of the Council.  I was running on the treadmill when I realized that my main character’s imaginary friend, wasn’t imaginary.  Toki was a fairy.  And although she didn’t even show up in book one, except for a memory, she became a strong secondary character in Return of the Fae. And of course, if the heroine had a fairy, the hero needed one. Their relationship is, well, complicated.

Both of the fae will return in the third book as well as a few other magical creatures.

Alexis: Oh good. So what are you working on now?

Lynn: As I write this I have one more week free before I have to start the third book in the Tourist Trap Mystery series releasing in 2014. I’m trying to finish my Bull Rider series with Jesse’s story (the bull rider) so it will be close.  But I really want Jesse to get what’s coming to him, I mean, find true love.

Alexis: What has been the best piece of advice you ever received for your writing career?

Lynn: Finish the dang book.  And there’s always a lake monster.

The first one is pretty self-explanatory, until you realize that I’d started five different books in five different genres before I learned to finish something.  I haven’t sold that first book and may never, but the magic was in the process.

I was telling a writer friend about a story I wanted to write about three cabins on a lake and the women who live there. He interrupted, “and then the lake monster…”

I stopped him, “There’s no lake monster,” and went on to tell about their lives and interactions.

He interrupted again, “Then the lake monster eats the little girl.”

Exasperated, I explained, “There is no lake monster.”

He sat back and smiled. “Then there isn’t a story.”

Conflict is our lake monster.  And if we don’t have conflict, we’re missing the best part of the story.

Alexis: I love the lake monster. How great!  Well, thank you so much for visiting us Lynn. It was great having you :-)

Be sure to check out the blurb for Return of the Fae and leave a comment below for a chance to win a electronic copy of the first in this series A Member of the Council.

Blurb for Return of the Fae.

A witch in training, a hunter on the prowl, and a world in jeopardy.

Learning the rules of being a witch takes years, but Parris McCall needs to master them in only weeks. Ty Wallace is going mad with his desire for Parris, but she’s a distraction in his quest to find Coven X before they take The Council and everyone he knows down.

The couple searches for Ty’s mentor, but he’s disappeared. Their only clue comes from a banished witch. When they return, not only are their own lives threatened, but a new life hangs in the balance.

About Lynn Cahoon

Lynn Cahoon is a contemporary romance author with a love of hot, sexy men, real and imagined. Her alpha heroes range from rogue witch hunters, modern cowboys, or hot doctors, sexy in scrubs. And her heroines all have one thing in common, their strong need for independence. Or at least that’s what they think they want.  She blogs at her website.

To learn more about Lynn:

Goodreads - http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/5857424.Lynn_Cahoon      

Twitter - https://twitter.com/LynnCahoon     

Facebook -https://www.facebook.com/LynnCahoonAuthor

website - http://lynncahoon.wordpress.com/ 

Amazon author page - http://www.amazon.com/Lynn-Cahoon/e/B0082PWOAO/ref=ntt_athr_dp_pel_pop_1           

Buy link - http://www.amazon.com/Return-of-the-Fae-ebook/dp/B00DJVH8V6/

Alexis: Don’t forget to leave a comment for a chance to win A Member of the Council.