Today, I’m pretty excited to be hosting the third stop on Amy and Danielle’s blog tour. Amy is the author of The Arotas Trilogy and Danielle is the author of The Twin Flames Trilogy. The three of us (The Authors From The Boonies Of Maine Trilogy?) will be among the 35 writers attending the Stamford Author Event on August 10 in Stamford Connecticut (we would all LOVE to see you there). Danielle and I have been good friends for several years (you may remember her from this interview a few years ago) and I’m looking forward to finally meeting Amy in person. But without further ado, allow me to present Amy Miles and Danielle Bannister…

Between the two of you, you have a pretty large fan base. What would you say is the ONE question they want answered most, and are you willing to answer it here?

 Amy: There are several burning questions that I hear quite often.  Will Gabriel and Roseline end up together? Does Sadie live?  Will Bastien return in the sequel to Defiance Rising?  Am I Team Bastien of Team Eamon!

If you have read my books, you know that I don’t make romance easy for my characters.  Life happens, people get hurt, hearts get broken.  I love a happy ending just like the next gal, but I also like realism.  If my characters are going to be happy in the end, they are going to go through some tribulation along the way.  Also…I hate to be predictable.

 Danielle: I think most people want to know if Pulled Back Again will finally deliver the happily ever after ending they are looking for. All I can say is…maybe? Ha!

 What is one thing you wish fans would ask you more about?

 Amy: What my favorite food is.  Seriously?  I’m willing to take bribes for sneak peeks into my upcoming books. Haha.

Um…this is a hard one to answer because I’m pretty open about things happening in my life.  If you follow me on Facebook, you know I’m rather vocal about my obsession with Game of Thrones, my love of movies/books and I’m always bragging on my guys.  I’m an open book!

Danielle: I guess what I’m working on?  This is a hard one.

 Okay, then. You are currently working on a couple of projects. Can you tell us a little bit about them—spoiler free of course.

 Amy: Oh my, I am always working on something.  Usually more than one thing at a time.

I’m currently diving into the final draft of a new novella, FACELESS, that will jump start readers into my Cherished Hearts inspirational romance books.  I’ve always had a passion for inspirational romance, but up until this point have always remained in the fantasy realm.  It’s great to break out of that every once in a while.

I’m also obsessing over the completion of my Arotas Trilogy.  REDEMPTION has a lot going on, with several POV shifts and tons of action so it’s kicking my butt right now!  As soon as I finish with REDEMPTION, I will be jumping straight into the prequel, IMMORTAL ROSE.  I hadn’t actually planned on writing this book but so many of my fans wanted to know Fane and Roseline’s tale, so I caved.

I’m also currently working with Danielle on NETHERWORLD.  This joint venture has been a lot of fun, melding romance with fantasy and of course banshees ROCK!  I’ve having a blast designing the underworld and playing around with some mythology.  It’s a good thing Danielle loves writing about human’s cause there is no way I would give up working on the hot and steamy, Aed, god of the Netherworld!

Danielle: Amy and I came up with the idea to co-write Netherworld almost as a joke. A sort of ‘We should totally write a book together!’ But the more we chatted about it, the more it makes sense. We write in completely different genres, I do romance she does fantasy. So we thought what if we had a fantasy sort of character fall in love with a human character?  We tossed out some ideas and soon the Netherworld was born. We’ve just started drafting the early scenes and I’m really excited about what we’re coming up with! The Netherworld puts us into the world of the Banshees, the mythical creatures sent to carry the dead to the other side. The Banshee’s are supposed to be unseen by the living, but one mortal sees a banshee. What happens when they fall in love?  It’s soooooo cool!  She writes the fantasy parts, I write the human parts! It’s perfect!

What is one goal yet unaccomplished in your life?

Amy: I want to see the pyramids in person.  I have always been fascinated by mythology, no matter the race it pertains to and Egypt is on the top of my list.  As a kid, I used to write notes to a friend in hieroglyphics.  Yes, I was that child!

Danielle: I want to go to Greece. I want to walk on the first stages!

 If you were trapped on a desert island with ONE of your characters and ONE endless supply of one type of food, what would they be?

 Amy:  Oh dear.  How do I choose?  My characters are all so much a part of me that it would be hard to pick just one, but I think if forced to I would choose Bastien.  He’s hard core but compassionate.  He makes sacrifices when he must for the woman he loves.  Plus he’s H O T!!!  Yeah, I would go with him.  Food…oh goodness me.  I would totally go with Ranch Doritos. Those suckers are worse than Chinese food filled to the brim with MSG!  Oh phooey, now I’m craving Chinese food!  Do you think they deliver?

Danielle: This is so not an easy question! I guess I’d wanna be stuck with Etash, so I’d have a warm body to snuggle up against! As for food…hmmm…I suppose wine doesn’t count as food, so I’ll have to go with egg salad. Love that stuff!

What drives you to write?

Amy: I fully believe that writers are born, not created.  Just like painters are born to move beyond stick figure people (which I have not!) or chefs are moved to create culinary excellence.  The gift is within you.  Sometimes it can take years to unearth it, but the talent is still there.

I write because I have to, I yearn to.  Sound a tad dramatic?  Trying living in my head.  Haha.  I’ve got four books worth of characters fighting to be heard at the same time!

Danielle: The tiny voices in my head of course! Seriously, I ache to make people feel something. Maybe that’s the actor in me, but there is something satisfying in making people react internally to something you’ve written. It’s magical.

Is there anything unique about yourself that you’d like your readers to know?

Amy: Washing dishes grosses me out.  I have a different favorite color each day depending on my mood.  I adore 80’s rock.  I love to eat my mashed potatoes mixed with KFC coleslaw.  I go to Cardinal’s baseball games for the food. I despise Opera music.  I’m a firm believer that vampires don’t sparkle.  I’m terrified of spiders, no matter their size.  I’m not a lover of chocolate and I can spin an entire book plot in less than 5 minutes.

Danielle: Reading Amy’s list I don’t feel so crazy now! Um, let’s see. I suck at all things sports and math related, I have a really bad memory for important things but can tell you exactly where that balled up sock is you threw across the room two weeks ago ended up, and I’ll eat the chocolate Amy won’t.

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AMY MILES:

Amy Miles has been a carbaholic since birth and is hopelessly addicted to Dr. Pepper. When she’s not chatting with fans on Facebook she can be found goofing off with family, traveling or stomping her husband at Scrabble. She is an obsessive writer and an avid reader and loves to chat about all things books.

Her teen paranormal romance books, Forbidden and Reckoning, have been on several of Amazon’s Top 100 lists as well as best seller lists in both America and the UK. Her highly anticipated final book in the Arotas Trilogy, Redemption, is due out 2013.

She is currently hard at work on a two new series, The Rising Trilogy and The Remnant Trilogy.

DANIELLE BANNISTER:

Danielle lives in Mid-Coast Maine with her two children and husband. She holds a BA in Theatre and a Masters in Writing and the Teaching of Writing. She has two novels currently out, Pulled and Pulled Back and is working on several others, including Pulled Back Again, releasing soon, and Netherworld which she is co-writing with author Amy Miles, which is due out in December, 2014.  She also has a collection of short stories, brilliantly entitled, Short Shorts, and her work is also featured in several anthologies: GooseRiver Press 2012 Anthology and the Maine Writing Project’s anthology, Writious. Both titles are available on Amazon.  When not writing, she can be found pouring her heart out on the stage.