Sunday, October 24, 2010

Halloween fun with Marie Beau


Cate: Please welcome Marie Beau to my special Halloween celebration. Marie, can you tell us a little bit about yourself.
Marie: Hi Cate, thanks for having me. I feel like I’ve been on a whirlwind tour with my first book release, so let me catch my breath here. I’m a native New Englander – spent most of my life in New Hampshire although I have visited a lot of the rest of the country.

Cate: Congrats on your release! What do you love most about Halloween?
Marie: Definitely the weather – fall is my favorite season. The crisp cool air, the colors of the changing leaves – and of course all the frightening ghouls and goblins out to get their fair share of sweets.

Cate: I love autumn too. Do you have a favorite memory of a Halloween past?
Marie: I have a few of them, but the best is of an especially chilly Halloween night and coming home to a crackling fire in the fireplace where I sat and sorted my candy then feasted of course.

Cate: Have you ever had an unusual experience you couldn’t explain?
Marie: Personally I haven’t, unless you want to include the fact that I nearly died in a car accident and I remember seeing my father (dead for many years at that point) and him telling me that it wasn’t my time. I have a number of friends who have seen ghosts and talked with spirits.

Cate: What frightens you the most?
Marie: LOL Things that go bump in the night. I don’t think I’ll ever outgrow that. You wake to strange sounds in the house, the heart starts pounding, and you lay still, staring out into the dark where you can’t see a thing. It’s amazing the games our imagination can play on us.

Cate: Any favorite Halloween recipes you’d care to share?
Marie: Pumpkin bread or zucchini bread are among my favorite treats, but my recipes are nothing special, sorry. Now, my friend makes a pumpkin cheesecake. Mmm Mmm Good. Here you go.

Cate: That does sound good. Tell us about your release, and where readers can find it online.
Marie: Wolf! from Whispers Publishing was released 10/1/10 and can be found at:
http://www.whispershome.com/ or http://www.allromanceebooks.com/, links are also available at my blogsite: http://www.authormariebeau.blogspot.com/

Cate: Care to share a blurb or excerpt?
Marie: Of course, I’d love to.
Lyssa Merrick has no intention of ever being involved with a wolf, but when Wolfe Reardon seeks her wildlife services she realizes choosing a mate is not always a conscious decision.
Excerpt:
Lyssa studied the man in front of her. He looked like someone she wouldn’t want to try matching her aikido skills against. It might not be all about size, but when you’re a kitten against a mastiff, it’s not all about skill either. She met his gaze.
He never blinked. He stared back, raising one eyebrow.
A hint of a smile tugged at his lips a moment later, as if he had caught her little joke to herself. He looked away and glanced around the shop. “I’d like to schedule a hike into the Adirondacks and your services come highly recommended…assuming you’re Lyssa Merrick.” He pointed at the plaque on the wall behind her.
His voice, like warm maple syrup, poured over her. A vision flashed across her mind of hiking with him, touching, holding hands. She blinked and did a mental shake. She flipped open her planner. “How long a hike are you planning?”
Wiping her damp palms on her jeans, she tried not to breathe too deeply. His scent had her wanting to step closer and inhale him, to touch him…to lean into his broad chest, dip her tongue into his...whoa. Down girl.

Cate: Loved it. What inspired you to write about the theme?
Marie: I have always loved shape shifter stories, but there aren’t enough of them around for a steady diet. So after reading a really good one last year, and finding a bunch of others that whetted my appetite, I decided to write one of my own. It’s pretty neat to be able to give some gorgeous animal a human intelligence to define their actions.

Cate: Anything else you’d like to share?
Marie: Well, I’m looking forward to writing the sequel to this one. I’m hoping it will be out early next year.
Happy reading!

Cate: Thanks for sharing in the Halloween fun, Marie! Best of luck to you.