#AuThorsday with Kathleen Rovner

Today I’d like to welcome Kathleen Rovner, YA & Adult fantasy author of the Lightning Series and TV Apocalypse.

Can you give us your quickest description of your books?

I have two series going right now.  My Lightning Series is a fantasy suspense with a romantic twist.  It reads like a mystery, which people love, since the first book and the whole series will keep you guessing.

My second series, that came out October 2015, is the TV Apocalypse series.  It is a thriller set in modern day with a spooky twist to how the apocalypse could hit the suburbs.  The book should make you alternate with both chills and laughs.

Great names for both serieses, by the way.  So who is your audience?  Young adults, but adults also? 

I’m glad you like the names!  For the Lightning Series it is for both YA and adults.  I actually wrote the series thinking that one day I’d like my 3-yo daughter to read it when she is a YA. The TV Apocalypse series is for adults.

What are you working on currently?

When Lightning Burns, the third book in my Lightning Series.

Do you have plans for how many books will be in each series, or are you just going until you’re out of ideas? 

I do have plans for each series.  The Lightning Series is a bit of a surprise with how I’m going to do it, so readers will have to wait and see.  The TV series should have six books to complete the story.

What is one bit of advice you’d like to share with writers?

Write what you enjoy and keep doing it.  If you don’t enjoy it you will give up when it gets hard.  And there will be times when it gets hard no  matter how much you love the story.

Have you ever found yourself writing a story that you didn’t love?  (If not, hypothetically…) How would you go about changing it and getting it back to what you love? 

All the time!  By the time I have read through one of my books for the fifth or sixth times all I see is the bad stuff.  It is hard to remember why I loved it during that first and second draft.  But, what keeps me going is the excitement of starting the next book, so I have to finish the one I’m working on first.  Thinking about the next story and trading back and forth between these two series, these things keep me going.

When you get stuck in your writing, how do you make yourself keep going?

I take a break, read a few books and relax for a week or two.  Try to take some of the pressure off, then get back into the story again.  This helps me remember why I enjoyed it to begin with.

It’s amazing how much we can stress ourselves out doing this thing we love.   When you take a breather, do you read books in the same genre you’re writing or take a complete break and read something completely different? 

I read over a lot of genres.  It depends on my mood at the time.  I don’t worry about reading or not reading outside the genre I’m working in.

Do you use your personal experiences in your writing?

Oh yes!  Especially with a lot of the kid scenes in TV Apocalypse.  A lot of the family scenes come straight from my life or are variations from real life things.  I love documenting these things in my fiction so that when I am old I can look back at these books and smile at the antics my kids got into.  The murderous psychopaths that make it a thriller are all fiction though.

Haha!  Thanks for the clarification. 🙂  That’s a really cool idea for documenting your kids’ antics.  Can you share an example of something that makes it into your fiction?   

Umm, there is a scene in the second TV book that I’m finishing.  My son was three and we went out at night to a laser show.  He fell asleep and I was carrying him back to the car when I felt something warm spreading all over me.  Yes, he had a potty accident in his sleep and I paid the price – lol.  In the book I changed it a bit and the boy in the book is older, but it is from the same event in my life minus what happens immediately after the accident — again no maniacs in my life currently 😉

Thanks, Kathleen, for sharing!

WHERE TO FIND Kathleen Rovner:
Website:  www.KathleenRovner.com
Goodreads:  Kathleen Rovner
Amazon Page:  Kathleen Rovner
Facebook:  Kathleen Rovner
Twitter:  @KathleenRovner