Meet Author Susan Edwards

4 December 2013

Welcome Susan, and thank you for being our guest today on Reader’s Entertainment. First, tell us a bit about yourself.

Where you’re from, where you live? Do you have one of those day-jobs?

Hi, I’m totally a California girl. Lived here all my life. I call the central valley home but used to live in the heart of Silicon Valley. It’s hot here and I’d love to be able to move to the coast! I don’t have a day job at the moment. I used to have my own retail shop until the economy reared its ugly head! Now I stay home and write.

Tell us about your latest release?

Autumn Dreams is a SpiritWalker Novel and book 2 in my Seasons of Love mini-series. It is a historical/Native American/Paranormal romance. Here is a short blurb:

Kangee is a SpiritWalker, haunted by dreams of her mother held prisoner by an evil spirit. She turns to Night Warrior, a young shaman, for help. Together, they explore the dream world and come face to face with the father of evil. Autumn Dreams takes them into a world filled with beauty and terrifying darkness.

Would you share one detail from your current release with readers that they might not find in the book?

There is an evil person in the book who will be featured in the next book. And he carries his own secrets and it all ties to the Creation Myth which will also be told in this next book. The Creation Myth Part 1 is up on my website (http://susanedwards.com) under the SpiritWalker tab.

Your books feature Native Americans as the hero. Are you Native American? Or is there a reason you choose this hero?

I’m not Native American, at least not to my knowledge. I do have some “mutt” in my heritage and love believing that there is a small part as I am very much NA in my heart and beliefs. Before I became a writer, I was an avid reader and Native American Historicals were my passion. I followed the old saying of “Write what you know”. The more research I did, the more this genre spoke to me.

Who has been the most difficult character for you to write?

This is a hard question. Most are not hard because I know a bit about each of them from appearances in my series. Starting the new series was hard because I didn’t know any of them. So I’d have to say that no one has been super hard. Perhaps the hero and heroine in my new book due out later this month (Bodil and Beth Ann in White Christmas) were hard. We last saw Beth Ann in White Dove when she was a confused and scared six-year-old.

If you could be one of your characters for a day which character would it be? Why?

Now this is easy! I’d be Jessie Jones! There’s a lot of me in that woman. The pranks she played on Wolf came from the part of me who used to do the same. She was such a fun person, and a very determined character who knew what she wanted and didn’t take no for an answer.

If you could have dinner with any writer living or dead, who would it be and why?

Hmm, Nora Roberts for sure as I love the way her characters grow from one book to another in her series. I’d also love to have dinner with Carolyn Keene, as the Nancy Drews hooked me into reading and series.

What authors do you always read?

Reading is something I truly miss. The luxury of just reading for hours at a time! I have so little time that my reading had become very focused and I’m not as widely read as I used to be. I read absolutely all of the JD Robb Death books, I read Nora Roberts other series when time allows, as is the case with Christine Feehan. I also am totally hooked on LE Modesitt Jr.’s Imager series. Hmm, add him up into the dinner question too!

Do you have a secret talent readers would be surprised by?

Wow, I don’t think so. I’m a very sensitive person, very empathic so sometimes crowds are hard for me to handle. People, perfect strangers, sometimes immediately tell me things that most would not tell a stranger!! When I had my shop, I felt like a bartender at times <g>. Not sure I would call that a talent! I do love to knit, crochet and quilt, as well as garden.

What is the one question you never get ask at interviews, but wish you did?

Did you want to be a writer all your life? Did you write stories as a child? Answer, no. I never imagined me writing and hated it in school. Wasn’t good at it, and barely passed my English classes. But what I want people to know, is it isn’t what you learn in high school that determines who you become as an adult. Whether you were good at something back then doesn’t mean you won’t be good at it in the future.

It’s what’s inside you that you explore and grow and allow to become. I wasn’t a writer at any time of my life, but I was always a daydreamer. And my daydreams were stories told in my head. They had conflict, goals, motivation and happy endings, along with villains and victims and heros. I was forty before I realized that I was a natural storyteller and that is how I became a writer.

Thank you for joining me today.

Readers, you can find all of Susan’s books listed on her website. Plus, she has given Reader’s Entertainment readers a sneak peek at the cover of her holiday release which will be available near Christmas. Take a look!!