Lexi: I’m happy to introduce Romance Author Tina Susedik who has brought a giveaway! Be sure to check out the Rafflecopter below.
Welcome Tina,
when did you know you wanted to be a writer?
Tina: I’d
always had these stories floating through my head, but back when I was in
school, they didn’t stress writing like they do today. I never knew I could
write these stories down. At one point in our lives, my husband and I moved to
an area where I couldn’t get a teaching job. I was going through a magazine and
saw an ad for the Institute for Children’s Literature. I decided to send in a
story. To my surprise, I was accepted. That started the ball rolling for my
writing. I believe I was 30 or so.
Lexi: What
is the strangest thing that inspired a story for you?
Tina: There
is a scene in “Never With a Rich Man,” where Cassie and Hogan are in a fancy
restaurant. There is an embarrassing incident with a bottle of steak sauce. This
scene is taken straight out of the first date I had with my husband. We were
freshmen in college. The restaurant wasn’t fancy – we were poor farm kids
working our way through school. I wore a borrowed dress for homecoming.
The steak sauce incident was one of the most embarrassing moments of my life. Needless to say, we didn’t make it to homecoming. For some reason, Al saw more than my clutziness and asked me out again and again and again. We’ve been married forty-four years. I do have to say the scene that follows in the book DID NOT happen in real life. We were, after all, only eighteen and on our first date.
The steak sauce incident was one of the most embarrassing moments of my life. Needless to say, we didn’t make it to homecoming. For some reason, Al saw more than my clutziness and asked me out again and again and again. We’ve been married forty-four years. I do have to say the scene that follows in the book DID NOT happen in real life. We were, after all, only eighteen and on our first date.
Lexi: What
has been the most memorable fan comment you ever had?
Tina: That
she had my book on her “keeper shelf”. I have a keeper shelf of my own with my
favorite authors’ books. To know I was on a “keeper shelf” was amazing. I think
I shed a tear.
Lexi: Can
you tell us your story of getting “the call?”
Tina: Every
fall I take a week and go camping by myself. My husband, who is my best
supporter, hauls our camper to the campground, leaves me for a week, then comes
back for the weekend. Each year I work on a different book. I can’t recall
which book I was working on in 2012, but one morning I was checking my emails
and there was one with the topic: Congratulations! It was from a publisher. To
my surprise, excitement, joy, etc., etc., etc., they said they wanted to buy my
book. OMG. I cried. I paced up and down the camper, (which isn’t very big). I
called every member of my family. I paced outside, climbed rocks, jumped up and
down as I called all my friends. It was a good thing the campground was fairly
empty or I think they would have carted me away in a loony truck. I later found
out that a fellow author had received his email from the same publisher the
night before and didn’t sleep all night. I’m glad I hadn’t seen mine until the
morning. I didn’t get any writing done that day.
Lexi: Can
you describe your writing process?
Tina: I’m
not sure where my ideas come from. They just seem to pop into my head. I have
problems with character names. I keep coming up with the same names, so I have
to change them all the time. I also lose track of which characters are from
which books, so I finally created an excel spreadsheet to keep track of them.
Setting comes with the story idea.
Most people have heard of plotters and pansters. I’m a panster
– sort of. I do create my characters and setting. I have an general idea of
what my story is about and where I’d like it to end. But from there, I just let
the characters tell me what they want. I also write erotic romance under my pen
name, Anita Kidesu. I had an incident with a short story I was writing for one
of my publishers. I was struggling and getting frustrated with it. One day I
was sitting on our back deck, when the characters screamed at me, “We want a menage!”
After that, the story just flowed. I think if I plotted everything out, I’d get
frustrated when the characters wanted to change the storyline and I wanted to
stick to my plotline. I enjoy those moments when things become clear to me and
the story seems to write itself.
Lexi: Does
your pet help or distract?
Tina: I’ve
inherited my daughter’s cat for the winter. I love the cat, but she can be a
real pain. Sits on my lap, so I can’t reach the keyboard. (I write sitting on
the couch with my laptop on my lap.) Will try to bite my fingers as I type.
Will sit on the laptop. Whines until I stop typing and pet her. She’s has even
sat on the back of the couch, then lay on my head.
Lexi: Thank
you for chatting, Tina.
For a chance to win an eCopy of Never With a Rich Man be
sure to enter the rafflecopter below. Good luck!
Blurb:
from Never With a Rich Man:
Cassie Jordan has been lied to, cheated on, and passed over
for a promotion. All by men. She was tired of men. She didn't need a man, and
certainly not a rich man. Then she met Hogan Wynnters, and ordinary salesman -
or so she thought.
Hogan Wynnters is part owner of a family business and has
the kind of money Cassie despises. He's tired of women coming on to him because
he's rich. He decides to never tell a woman about his financial status until
she gets to know him as a person. As an undercover FBI agent, he uses his
knowledge of antiquities to find the people who are bringing stolen WWII
artifacts into the country. Unfortunately, the woman he's falling for is in the
crosshairs of the FBI.
Can they work through their preconceived notions and find
true love?
Buy Link: Amazon
Excerpt
for Never With a Rich Man:
A comfortable silence settled around them while the waiter
took away empty salad plates and set their main courses before them, along with
fresh, hot bread, and a variety of condiments to accent their meals. Hogan was
about to cut into his steak when he noticed
Cassie finger a bottle of steak
sauce the waiter had left on the table.
“Do you put steak sauce on roast beef?” he asked.
Cassie gave him a small smile. “No. It’s just . . .”
“What? You can tell me.”
“When I was little my parents would make steak on Saturday
nights after Bess and I went to bed. I’d lie under my blankets feeling warm and
secure, listening to the hum of their voices, smelling the cooking meat. When I
couldn’t stand it anymore, I’d sneak down into the kitchen and watch. My father
always knew I was there because suddenly he would grab me and set me on his
lap.”
“What then?” Hogan asked when Cassie paused obviously
reliving pleasant memories.
“Dad would cut small pieces of steak and feed me.” She
fiddled with her napkin. “One of the things he loved on his meat was steak
sauce, but he’d never let Bess and I have any. He said it would grow hair on
our chests, and he didn’t want any of his daughters looking like orangutans.
The funny thing is, for as much steak sauce as that man used, I seem to
remember he had the barest chest of any man I’ve ever seen. Redheads don’t have
hairy bodies.”
Hogan pointed at her chest with his fork. “I, for one, am glad
he wouldn’t allow his daughters to have steak sauce. I can’t imagine hair all
over your lovely chest.” Her chest turn pink, the blush rising to her neck,
then her face. The sight caused his body to perk up and take notice.
He turned his attention to slathering butter and sour cream
on his baked potato, much like he would like to slather his tongue over her
bare breasts. He wondered if they also blushed when she was embarrassed. He
adjusted his napkin on his lap as he grew hard. Luckily
Cassie wouldn’t see his
discomfort beneath the tablecloth. Painfully, he ignored his crotch and went
back to her story.
“Anyway, after he died when I was twelve, we moved in with
my mother’s parents for a short time,” Cassie continued as she sliced her
roast. “I don’t know, it must have been a man thing or something because my
grandpa wouldn’t let us girls have steak sauce, either.”
It shook Hogan to hear her father had left when she was so
young. Girls needed a father until they were . . . well, until they were old
and gray. If he ever had a daughter, or son for that matter, he planned on
sticking around forever. Hogan gave Cassie an encouraging smile.
“Go ahead, have some. I don’t think you’ll start growing
hair on your chest at this point in time.”
Cassie laughed and picked up the bottle. “I can still hear
the smack of the bottle hitting the palm of Dad’s hand when he shook up the
steak sauce.” She picked up the bottle and jerked it upward.
About Tina:
Tina Susedik has been
researching and writing books for over twenty years. She has five history
books, two military, and two children's books in print, as well a romantic
mystery and a several short stories in anthologies. She also ghost wrote a
military book. Tina also writes under the name Anita Kidesu for the Wild Rose
Press.
Tina belongs to the Romance Writers of America, Wisconsin Romance Writers of America, and the Wisconsin Regional Writers' Association. In 1996 she established the Chippewa Valley Romance Writers, which will celebrate its twentieth anniversary in October of this year. She is a member of the Published Authors Network with the Romance Writers of America.
Besides writing, Tina
gives talks to schools and organizations, judges writing contests, and helps in
the business she and her husband own. She lives in northwestern Wisconsin with
her husband of forty-three years. She adores her five grandchildren and loves
to camp, hike, bike, scrapbook and, of course, read, read, read.
Twitter:
@tinasusedik,author
Website: www.tinasusedik.com
Facebook: Tina
Susedik, Author
Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/tinasusedik/
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