Interview Lisa Beth Darling about contemporary family drama novel

Today’s special guest is Lisa Beth Darling. She’s chatting with me about her new contemporary family drama novel, Sins of the Father.

During her virtual book tour, Lisa will be awarding a $25 Amazon or Barnes and Noble (winner’s choice) gift card to a lucky randomly drawn winner. To be entered for a chance to win, use the form below. To increase your chances of winning, feel free to visit her other tour stops and enter there, too!

Welcome, Lisa. Please share a little bit about your current release.
Sins of the Father is the second installment in the Sister Christian Series, in it Doctor Richard Mason and his newly discovered sister, Hannah Rice are still getting to know each other. Except now, as we open, Hannah is debilitated having suffered a massive stroke at the end of Genesis, the first book in the series. She's on her way to recovery but the process is slow and as her body heals her mind begins to remember the details of her horrific car accident thirty years before. Dark family secrets are uncovered and in Mason's own reckless way he forces Hannah to face them.

What inspired you to write this book?
I started writing this series a few years after I made contact with my birth family and discovered I had three brothers. I was raised an only child so the idea that I had siblings was rather new to me, growing up I often wished I had a sibling but then I'd go to my friend's houses and see how they interacted with their siblings and went home happy I was an only child. The idea of the brother/sister dynamic always interested me even when my friends were shouting at each other over nothing. This series and a lot of its contents, planted deeply in the fertile ground of a writer's imagination, grew out of those two situations.

Excerpt from Sins of the Father:
The suppressant kicked in quickly and Hannah stopped coughing so hard and so much. The tea did its job. When she coughed great gobs of green goo exited her lungs with ease instead of discomfort.  "Frank's still hanging around. What do you want me to tell him?"

Hannah laid there waiting to see if she was going to cough again but she didn't. Hannah remembered seeing Frank in Victorville, she remembered being at the courthouse and then at the Dew Drop Inn but it all seemed like a dream. Just unreal. That was all right, the last twenty-five years of her life felt the same way. Like it was all a dream, some horrible nightmare, and when she finally woke up from this part of it, she'd still be 17 with a lifetime of possibilities ahead of her.  "Backseat Betty in the rain."

"What?" Mason asked as he blinked and shook his head at the clarity in her voice.

"Huh?"

"What did you just say about Betty?"

"Nuhthing."

"Oh, yes you did, you said 'Backseat Betty in the rain'."

No, I thought it. Oh, no I did it again.  Hannah just sighed and, even though it was painful, she turned her head away from him.  That lifetime of possibilities, that was the dream, that was the illusion and she could never have it.  On a dark rainy night, everything shattered and it could never be put back together.

Mason, being Mason, couldn't help himself. "You saw them that night, didn't you? You saw Frank with Betty, the night of the accident."  Frank said he went and met with Betty but he didn't say he ran into Hannah, why was that?

In her head, the voice near the floor spoke for the first time since the surgery. Its ugly mouth opened and out came Betty's voice: Jealous Banana? Hannah's mouth echoed it in a perfect imitation of Betty's voice, "Jealous Banana?"

Mason walked around to the other side of the bed. The monitors said she was fine but those eyes said; nobody's  home right now, please leave a message and someone will get back to you when we return.  He knew that she did see them. They argued, about him and about Betty, she stormed off, Frank stayed with Betty and the next thing you know it's too late to say you're sorry.  Those wide distant eyes grew heavy and Hannah drifted off to sleep, it was a great defense mechanism.  "You rest." Mason leaned down and kissed her bandaged head.

What exciting story are you working on next?
Prodigal Son, it will be the last novel in the Sister Christian Series and I hope to have it out sometime late this summer.

When did you first consider yourself a writer?

The first time I put pencil to paper for a creative writing assignment, that was in the 4^th grade.

Do you write full-time? If so, what's your work day like? If not, what do you do other than write and how do you find time to write?
I work 30 hours a week outside the home as the secretary/web mistress for a local trades union. I have roughly 2 ½ hours from the time I come home to the time my husband comes home for writing and throwing dinner together. Once he gets home it's dinner and us time, no more writing for the day. I give myself all day on Saturday and Sunday—well, in between bouts of laundry.  Now that our daughters are grown and out of the house I don't have as many distractions and time for writing is a bit more plentiful and uninterrupted.

What would you say is your interesting writing quirk?
I drink a hot and a cold beverage at the same time while I'm writing but not at any other time of day.

As a child, what did you want to be when you grew up?
A writer.

 
Anything additional you want to share with the readers?
Thanks for reading this interview I hope you've enjoyed it and that you'll check out Sins of the Father along with the Sister Christian Series.

Links:

Website | Facebook | Twitter | Goodreads 

Thank you for being a guest on my blog!

Thank you so much for having me here, it's been my pleasure.

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