Interview Mona Sedrak Author of Gravity
Give a warm welcome to Mona Sedrak, author of Gravity. Pull up a chair, grab a drink of your choice from the cooler, a Chocolate Chip or Peanut Butter cookie from the plate, and let’s find out a little about Mona and Gravity.
Gravity is an interesting title. Give us some insight into this story.
Gravity is a heart-warming story of two individuals from remarkably differing backgrounds that are inexplicably drawn to one another, forming a strong friendship and falling in love–– despite the odds against them. The story depicts the beautiful Middle Eastern culture I was raised in and its many traditions as well as some of its challenges. Readers will identify with this story, no matter their background because it speaks to and awakens the human heart.
Gravity is about tolerance, acceptance, understanding, and forgiveness. Finally, it is a story of love and hope. When I started writing Gravity several years ago, I couldn’t have predicted how relevant it would be today. At the end of the day, I want readers to understand that although we may be different, as members of the human race, our similarities out-weigh our differences and love is the universal language that binds us.
What inspired this story?
I was born in Cairo, Egypt and immigrated to the US as a child. Still, I was brought up in a very traditional home. I had a strong family unit and a loving family, but I always felt torn. I was neither fully Egyptian nor American. There are many misconceptions about the Middle Eastern culture, and I wanted to write a story that shed light on many aspects of that beautiful culture from a fictional point of view. I am a romantic at heart, and thus, I couched what I wanted readers to know in a beautiful, heart-warming story with many twists and turns.
Why should we read this book and what sets this book apart from the rest?
This book is very special to me because it depicts the beautiful Middle Eastern culture I was raised in and its many traditions as well as some of its challenges. The story is one many people will identify with, no matter their background. It is a story of loss and love and a story of forgiveness and understanding. For readers who enjoy learning about other cultures and reading women’s fiction with romantic elements, this books for you.
What inspired you to write?
I have loved to write since I was a child. It has always been my outlet and my preferred method of communication. Writing fiction is especially rewarding because I enjoy getting lost in building characters and a world that may or may not be like mine. I can create a story that others will lose themselves in and forget their own worries for a while. I enjoy writing realistic stories with satisfying endings that make readers hungry for more and more.
What do you want your readers to take away from your book?
This book is very contemporary and timely. I want readers to understand that all people are valuable and should be treated with love, dignity, and respect. No matter your race or culture, our similarities out-weigh our differences. With acceptance and understanding, love can triumph and always should.
What’s your favorite thing about being an author?
I live in two worlds. By day, I am a college administrator, but by night I lose myself in my writing. Like my readers, I too need a break from the real world and by writing, I can do just that. Writing allows me a creative outlet I do not always experience in my day job and it is remarkably rewarding.
Tell us a little about Gravity:
After being shunned by her Middle Eastern family, medical assistant Leila Solomon struggles to build a life for herself and her child. Landscape photographer Aiden Stone built a career seeing what others miss, and the second he meets Leila, he is drawn to her unassuming beauty and fragile strength.
Leila cannot defy the gravitational forces pulling her toward Aiden and to the family who cast her out. To build a future with Aiden, she must face the past but is she strong enough to resist being pulled back into the family fold?
How about a sneak peak between the pages of Gravity?
Aiden stopped pacing. His brain once conjured an image of the perfect family––his family. He first pictured them as he sat on the beach with Leila, asking for her forgiveness after he stood her up. He searched his memory banks, recalling the image. His breath hitched as his brain hiccupped and the picture focused with such clarity his hands shook, and the crystal tumbler slipped from his fingers, shattering on the deck and spraying scotch across the wood.
Leila stood on the beach laughing with her gorgeous midnight curls flowing down her back, holding their boy’s hand. AJ’s green eyes danced as he grinned. With his free hand he grasped his little sister’s tiny palm––her wispy blonde hair tousled by the wind. Aiden closed the circle, holding Leila’s hand in one of his and Mia’s in the other. Each member of his family was unique. They didn’t resemble each other, but that fact didn’t matter because their hearts were in sync. The ties that bind were invisible yet strong as steel.
“Aiden? Are you there? Are you okay?”
As the image receded, Aiden blinked. But before the photo completely dissipated, a strong wind battered their circle, and the smile slid off Leila’s face. Their hands were torn apart, breaking their circle and fissuring their foundation. Blinking again, Aiden focused on the shards of glass surrounding him. He gasped for air.
No matter what either of them did, or how hard they resisted, gravity drew them together. But could the awesome force of gravity be defied?
Buy Links:
About the Author:
Mona Sedrak lives in Cincinnati, Ohio and works as a university administrator and professor. Although she has co-published two academic books, she is now writing mainstream fiction and women’s fiction. She is an avid reader and is probably Audible’s best customer.
Writing and reading fiction is her escape from reality.
Mona lives with her husband of 30+ years, a geriatric maltipoo, and an Amazon Parrot named Pretzel. She binge watches too many shows to count and she loves fine brandy.
Website: https://www.monasedrak.com/
Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Mona-Sedrak/e/B003VGUOZQ
Twitter: https://twitter.com/AuthorMSedrak
Facebook:https://www.facebook.com/MonaSedrakAuthor/
Goodreads:https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/4563964.Mona_Sedrak
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/authormonasedrak/
It was wonderful having you with us today. Please feel free to stop by anytime. Good Luck with Gravity!
Views: 2544
Posted in Authors' Secrets Blog and tagged Gravity, Interview, Mona Sedrak, Sweet Romance, Women's Fiction by Tena Stetler with 8 comments.
Interview with Judith Marshall Author of The Cauldron Stirred
Give a warm welcome to Judith Marshall, author of The Cauldron Stirred just released on July 21, 2017!
Pull up a chair, grab a drink of your choice from the cooler, or there’s fresh lemonade on the counter. Choose a Chocolate Chip or Peanut Butter cookie from the plate, and let’s find out a little about Judith and The Cauldron Stirred.
Judith, tell us inspired this particular story? A deep love for Ireland, my travels there, and paranormal events in my own life.
What defines you as an author? As a person? Are they one in the same? As an author: passion, empathy, and a magical view of the world. As a person: those same qualities, but also an eye toward adventure and a desire to understand, love, and heal people I encounter.
What secret do you use to blast through writer’s block? I step away for a bit, then return and poise my hands over the keyboard, signaling my muse that I’m ready to go!
Who is your favorite character of all of the books you’ve written and Why? Maybe Sir Robert le Donjon, the hero in Shadow of the Swan (The Novels of Ravenwood, Book 3) which I just turned in to my editor. He has wit, patience, and a generous heart.
What inspired you to write? An instinctive urge that’s always been with me.
How long have you been writing? Since I was three years old. By age nine, I was writing chapter stories and elaborate scripts for my dolls to act out. Of course, I played all the parts!
Did you tell friends and family that you were writing a book? Or did it take a while to come out and tell friends and family you were a writer? Friends and family have always known my passion for writing.
What do you want your readers to take away from your books? Interconnection. A sense of the mystical. Warm memories of a beautiful world.
Where do you find your story ideas? If they come to you in the middle of the night, do you get up and write them all down? It’s hard to pinpoint exactly how and why inspiration strikes, but I always use old-fashioned pen and paper for brainstorming and outlines. If I sit in front of blank paper with my pen poised above it, images and ideas just start to flow. Sometimes they’re connected to my own experience; other times, not. And yes, I have jumped out of bed to jot down ideas!
Do you find it easier to write from a male or female point of view? Why? If I had to choose, I’d say female, because I am one! But I also empathize with my male characters.
Why do you write what you write? Contemporary, paranormal, suspense, etc. I write what I love: the paranormal, history, romance, and mystery. I enjoy weaving stories, and sometimes, writing a scene can be cathartic.
If writing is your first passion, what is your second? The paranormal.
What do you like to do when you are not writing? Hang out with my family, visit historic sites, watch classic movies and favorite TV shows, walk through the woods, read, travel, cook, bake, and EAT!
Alright, one last question, and it’s my favorite. You’ve got a time machine, a cloak of invisibility, and one hour. Where would you go, and what eavesdropping would you do? Ooh! There are so many events I’d witness if given the chance. The building of Stonehenge. The moment when Antony met Cleopatra. The coronation of Elizabeth I of England. The filming of Hitchcock’s Rebecca, The Birds, and Rear Window. And of course, I wouldn’t mind spying on the set of the TV series, Supernatural!
Okay, wow, you’d make good use of the cloak. LOL Tell us a little about The Cauldron Stirred.
Ashling Donoghue never dreamed moving to Ireland would rock her perception of reality and plunge her into a mystery that brings legend to life.
At seventeen, she’s never had a boyfriend, but she feels an immediate connection to Aengus Breasal, the son of the wealthy Irishman who’s invited her family to stay at his Killarney estate. For the first time in her life, a guy she likes seems attracted to her.
But Aengus is secretive, with good reason. He and his family are the Tuatha Dé Danann, ageless, mythical guardians adept at shifting between this reality and the magical dimension known as the Otherworld. Evil forces from that world threaten the Breasals, the Donoghues, and all of Ireland. Ashling must open her heart, face her fears, and embrace a destiny greater than she could ever have imagined.
How about a peek between the pages of The Cauldron Stirred?
The night air was deliciously cool. Moonlight and darkness held equal sway over the backyard thanks to the shifting clouds. I dashed across the lawn and halted in the exact spot where Aengus had stood. Panting, I looked around, willing some kind of clue to materialize.
The ruins in front of me darkened as large, heavy clouds swallowed the moon whole. The wind tugged at my long, loose hair and pajamas. Tiny raindrops spattered on my nose and cheeks. I turned my palms to the sky, and cold rain pelted them.
“Great.” Intending to return to the house, I swiveled around.
I gasped. My right hand flew to my chest. “Aengus?!”
The man himself stood an arm’s length in front of me. “Why are you here?”
“You scared the crap out of me!”
“Whisht!”
“What?”
“Shush!”
Pop!
The strident sound came from the ruins. I whirled around and stared at the dark keep.
Aengus grabbed me from behind. He pulled me to him and wrapped his arms around me. I reveled in the feel of his taut body, of his warm flesh against mine.
Suddenly, everything changed. The rain stopped. The wind died. The entire landscape was bathed in the soft hue of twilight. Breasal Castle looked brand spanking new, just as it had during the bizarre dream in which I brought Aengus to the cottage. But this time, I knew I was awake.
Dumbfounded, I gawked at the medieval magnificence before me. I had no idea what had happened and no desire to pull away from his embrace.
His lips brushed my right ear, sending a shiver down my spine. “This way.”
His right arm released me, and his left slid down to my waist. Maintaining body contact the entire time, he steered me toward the stand of oaks on our right.
Once sheltered by the trees, he turned us around so we faced the castle.
“Are we hiding?” I whispered.
“We are.”
“Why? And what just happened?”
“I can’t say.”
“Can’t or won’t?”
“Both.”
Until that moment, I’d forgotten I wore pajamas. Now I was acutely aware of it. Satin was pleasing to the touch, but something told me my attire had nothing to do with his grip on me.
I looked up at him. “Not that I mind, but why are you holding me so close?”
His hand tightened on my waist. “It’s necessary.”
“I don’t suppose you can explain that, either.”
With his gaze locked on the castle, he shook his head. He pressed his right forefinger against his mouth in a silencing gesture. Then he pointed up at the keep.
High on the battlements, the black-haired woman from my dream—and from Branna’s painting—paced back and forth. Her hair whipped about her pale face and slender frame.
She paused beside a gap in the crenelated wall and glared down at the fairy mound. Her colorless lips curled into a sneer. Then her human form morphed into a dark shadow, which fragmented into what seemed a million black particles. They swarmed into the air and shot across the twilit sky, disappearing into the distance.
I took a deep breath. “So she’s real.”
He nodded. “She’s real, to be sure. Come.” With his arm still hooked around me, he led me out of the woods and toward the fairy mound.
You can purchase The Cauldron Stirred at: Amazon
About the Author:
Judith Sterling’s love of history and passion for the paranormal infuse everything she writes. Flight of the Raven and Soul of the Wolf are part of her medieval romance series, The Novels of Ravenwood. The Cauldron Stirred is the first book in her young adult paranormal series, Guardians of Erin. Written under Judith Marshall, her nonfiction books—My Conversations with Angels and Past Lives, Present Stories—have been translated into multiple languages. She has an MA in linguistics and a BA in history, with a minor in British Studies. Born in that sauna called Florida, she craved cooler climes, and once the travel bug bit, she lived in England, Scotland, Sweden, Wisconsin, Virginia, and on the island of Nantucket. She currently lives in Salem, Massachusetts with her husband and their identical twin sons.
Learn more about Judith:
Website – https://judithmarshallauthor.com/
Facebook – https://www.facebook.com/judithsterlingfiction/
It was wonderful having you with us today Judith. Please feel free to stop by anytime. Good Luck with The Cauldron Stirred!
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Posted in Authors' Secrets Blog and tagged Interview, Judith Marshall, Paranormal, Romance, Teen, The Cauldron Stirred, Young Adult by Tena Stetler with 20 comments.
