Author Interview: Sarah Barrie + Giveaway

Recently I had the privilege of reading Getting Wild by Sarah Barrie – which I rated with an A, by the way!…:)  I really enjoyed this novel – especially the characters!  So, when we were invited to do an interview and provide a giveaway to for this title, I was so excited!  So please take a moment to read a little more about Sarah Barrie – I know I really enjoyed getting to know the author behind the book.  ~Sarah

TBRG: Who has been the biggest influence on your writing?

Probably Nora Roberts, especially with her romantic suspense titles. I love the way she weaves drama and intrigue into her romances.

TBRG: What was the first romance book that you read?

That’s going back a few years! My grandmother was an avid romance reader. I remember that every couple of weeks she’d come home from senior cit’s with a box of books, and every couple of weeks she’d load them up and take them back, only to bring home another box to work her way through. There was a bit of a book pool going on, heavily aided by the mother of a local bookseller!

Well, I liked reading as much as the next person…and probably a little bit more, so the whole process – and how gran could get through so many books – intrigued me. They all looked similar, with covers portraying handsome men and beautiful women, usually locked in some sort of embrace. Being that I was by that time eleven… maybe twelve years old and in the throes of my first, very mature, bout of puppy love, (we kissed on the mouth and everything! Albeit a peck, because tongues were still considered gross), I worked up the courage to secretly poke through gran’s stash and I noted they were all ‘Mills and Boon.’

I was fascinated. I smuggled one home.  Do I remember the title? Not exactly, but it was something about an affair in Rome involving a much older man. And this man drove a fast car and wined and dined the heroine and flirted and did… that.  And wow, did my eyes pop at that! My poor puppy love no longer stood a chance! I was hooked. Under the spell of authors such as Jessica Steele, Penny Jordan, Emma Darcy, and Charlotte Lamb, I quickly became a romance junkie. I wanted all of it. For me. And I wanted to write my own stories. So I did. It only took me twenty five years to have the nerve to submit anything to a publisher! And that was Getting Wild.

TBRG: What is the one thing your readers would be the most surprised to know about you?

From that first M&B I adored romance stories, both reading and writing them. I loved weaving fantasies onto a page – but I never really believed it!  Even through several boyfriends and one engagement, I didn’t believe in the fairy tale. Not until I was thirty. Then I met my husband.

TBRG: Where do you get inspiration for your characters?

Everywhere and anywhere.  Friends, news, novels, the shopping centre… People are fascinating. As an editor of a coupIe of magazines and a freelance writer, I get to meet and interview a lot of people from relative unknowns to some pretty high profiles. As a novelist I like to try and take note of their personalities, their strengths and weaknesses and eccentricities and how they interact with people around them. I love looking ‘through’ a person and challenging myself to see who they really are under the façades they so often put up.

TBRG: What is your guilty pleasure?

Hmmm…  Time to myself… especially when I can’t really afford to take it! When I’m feeling lazy I like to turn off the emails and the phone, lock the door and just be by myself and write. When I want something to do, I hike or ride my horse down the gully behind my property and sit in amongst the tall trees and waterfalls and dream up my next story or take photos. I love nature and I love writing and photography. So that’s perfect.

TBRG: What are you working on now?

I have a romantic suspense just finished that I hope someone will pick up. It’s a long manuscript, and different to anything I’ve attempted before, but it has a strong romance and some amusing elements that I think readers will really enjoy. I’m also about halfway through another sweet little romantic comedy that is just so much fun to write.

TBRG:  How did you get the idea for Getting Wild?

Honestly? It might be better to make something up but… through necessity. Prior to Getting Wild, I was too petrified to submit anything to a publisher so I decided to join RWA and go in a couple of no-pressure competitions. I started with the High Five comp. It only required five pages, so I sat down and wrote five pages that I thought would fit the competition. Because I only had two days to submit, I fell back on what I knew: editing and travelling. It was a fun exercise and I placed pretty well. So I thought I might enter another comp, which required a little more writing. So I wrote a little more. Two judges loved it, one hated it, but the two positive judges spurred me into writing more again and sending it off for another couple of competitions. For one of those, it needed to be completed. When it did well in a US comp and in another RWA one, I gathered up the courage to finally send it in to Kate at Escape Publishing. Basically, I never had a plan, and until I was two comps in I had no idea at all where the story was going to go – or how! It just kind of took on a life of its own.

TBRG:  Getting Wild was all about travel….where are some the places you have been and did they provide inspiration for the book?

I love Australia. I love exploring the country and most especially the wilder parts. I’ve been from one end to the other; experienced everything from trudging through forests with nothing but a backpack and a compass, to staying in absolute luxury accommodation. I enjoy it all, and I certainly fell back on that for inspiration when I was putting the story together.

TBRG:  If you could list one place that you have always wanted to travel to, but have not yet been, where would it be?

Have you ever wanted to be one of those astronauts that just floats around and watches the earth from that totally different perspective of space? Unfortunately, I just know I’d be in the rocket that decided to explode! (I have enough trouble taking a domestic flight). But it would be kind of wonderful. Back on Earth… I’d love to visit Ireland. Many of my ancestors came from there and I’ve always been fascinated by the country and its legends.

TBRG: Who are some of your go to authors, and what are you reading right now?

Nora Roberts, Carla Neggers, Tess Gerritsen, Steven King… I have loads of them. Right now I’m re-reading Angel’s Fall by Nora Roberts. I can’t make myself sit through a movie – no matter how much I like it – more than once or twice, but I can reread my favorite novels until the books fall apart! And I often do. Then I buy them on Kindle…

ENTER to win a copy of Getting Wild here:  Getting Wild Giveaway