Interview with paranormal romance author Christine Wenrick

Today’s special guest is paranormal romance author Christine Wenrick.

She’s currently doing a virtual book tour for her latest novel, Guarding Poppy, Men of Brahm Hill, Book Two.

During her tour, Christine will be awarding one randomly chosen Grand Prize winner a $100 Amazon gift card and a Runner Up will receive an autographed copies of Someone Else's Skye and Guarding Poppy (US only).

To be entered for a chance to win these great prizes, use the form below. To increase your chances of winning, feel free to visit her other tour stops and enter there, too!

Bio:

Christine is a graduate of Washington State University where she received a BA in Interior Design. And true to form of using mostly her ‘right brain’, she splits her time between her commercial design career and her imaginary world of writing. She lives in the scenic Pacific Northwest where she enjoys hiking, camping and photographing many of the wonderful places that served as inspiration for her writing. Her biggest reward in life is any given day when one of her books connects with a reader because she herself is such a lover of reading. Some of her favorite authors include Lisa Kleypas, Julia Quinn, and Kimberly Derting.

Welcome, Christine. Please tell us about your current release.

Guarding Poppy is the second book in my paranormal Men of Brahm Hill series, which is an offshoot of my first series The Charmed. The premise is five individual stories of men who are trying to deal with the aftermath and consequences of one giant supernatural battle.

What inspired you to write this book?

I wanted to write a story about a man who was grieving the loss of his best friend when the right woman enters his life. Alec Lambert is a strong leader who feels a tremendous responsibility to remain strong to those around him even though he has not allowed himself a chance to grieve since his friend’s death. It makes him sort of a cold character in the beginning of our story and is one of many obstacles he and Poppy will have to face in order to find happiness.

Excerpt:

“Why. Am. I. On. A. Plane?” Poppy emphasized each word as her hands gripped at the luxurious sofa arm beside her. But the modern jet seemed determined to bounce all of them out of their seats as the cabin continued to jostle about angrily. They were definitely in the middle of some mean turbulence, which was to be expected of anyone fool enough to be flying in a small plane in winter conditions.

“Because it’s the most efficient way to get someone across an ocean,” Alec answered. “We still have about an hour or so before we land. So you’re going to have to let me know if you’re going to panic on me.”

Her gaze narrowed on him angrily as she pushed her next breath through her nostrils. “Can I just hit you instead and we’ll call it even?!”

His brow lifted as if he found that comment interesting.

Poppy leapt to her feet inside the small cabin and she noticed Alec braced his hands against his chair arm as if to steady himself. Surely he didn’t think she was really going to hit him? “You’re not going to trip again, are you?” he asked her.

Poppy glared at him and then down at herself. She was looking for any reasonable explanation to defend the innate clumsiness he’d gotten to experience firsthand within the first minute of meeting her in Joseph’s study. “These are very challenging heels!”

Yep. That was the best she could come up with.

The Elder smiled. No, it was definitely more of a smirk. “I’m sure they are,” he replied. “Now, will you please sit down before you get bounced off your feet? The turbulence may get worse before it gets better.”

“Worse?” Poppy squeaked. She might very well end up back in his lap if this turbulence got any worse. She didn’t like to think of herself as a coward, but when it came to flying she definitely was, even more so than her irrational fear of spiders. They just had too many legs. “Look—you need to understand. I don’t fly! Ever . . .! You need to find a way to land this plane, right now!”

“I can’t do that. As I explained, we’re over a lake.”

“Well get un-over the lake!”

The Elder didn’t say anything in response, just seemed to contemplate that. He removed the reading glasses that were a dead giveaway that he was human, though, he looked fit enough to give even one of his Dhampir guards a run for their money. He’d certainly felt fit enough when she had crash-landed into his chest in Joseph’s study . . . which had been utterly embarrassing. One moment, she’d been fully prepared to burst in and make her case to Joseph about why she needed to stay at The Hallow, and the next, the tip of her shoe had caught on the carpet and she was flying forward straight into a complete stranger.

“In an effort to have us all on the ground safely as soon as possible, I do not recommend suddenly veering off course to get ‘un-over’ a lake. We will be starting our descent shortly.”

“Oh God, descent . . .,” she mumbled to herself as she rubbed her hands over her face. “This is not good. This is not good.”

“It will be all—”

“Where are we landing . . . Elder Lambert?” she added awkwardly, realizing they had not actually exchanged first names.

He returned his glasses to the bridge of his nose and went back to looking at his tablet. “You may call me Alec. I much prefer it to Elder Lambert. We’ll be landing in Alberta at The Oracle, The Brethren site I’m in charge of. After discussing it, Joseph and I felt this would be the best place for you to stay.”

“Well, isn’t that nice,” she answered him flippantly. “You discussed it. By any chance—in any of this heavy dialogue—did anyone consider asking me if I wanted to go to Canada?”

Alec just sighed in that ‘you’re going to cause me a lot of trouble, aren’t you’ sort of way.

What exciting story are you working on next?

Next is the third book in my Men of Brahm Hill series, Leaving Lily Behind, which will continue to raise the stakes for all of our characters. It will be released next April.

When did you first consider yourself a writer?

Not until I saw my first novel, The Charmed, published in paperback. The first year I was releasing only in eBook format. That in itself was great but there is just something about seeing your work in a paperback, something you can hold in your hand that makes it all real.

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?

No, writing is a second job for me, which means I can’t write as fast or as often as I would like. For my day job, I own a small commercial interior design/architectural firm. I am very lucky in that I love my day job as much as my writing job. Finding time to write is tricky but you just have to stay committed to it. The hard part is making sure to carve out enough social time with my friends.

What would you say is your interesting writing quirk?

My friends tease me that if I give a character a more common name like Bill or Mike, they will surely die before the end of chapter three. They are exaggerating, of course, but I have to admit it’s very true. I like for my characters to have more uncommon names and I am particularly fond of English names like Poppy and Gemma.

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

An interior designer, which worked out well. My mom could tell early on that I was going to be an interior designer. She said even when I was very young I was constantly rearranging things in my bedroom. And even now, in my writing, you can see that design influence in things like the description of the tree house from my first series, The Charmed.

Anything additional you want to share with the readers?

I hope that your followers will check out Guarding Poppy and thanks for having me here today to talk a little about my Men of Brahm Hill series. The enthusiasm and dedication of readers is what allows all of us writers to be able to do what we love to do.

Links:

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Amazon 

Thanks, Christine!

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