The first five sentences of... THROW AWAY TEEN
Who cares if it’s a beautiful April day? The glare of the sunshine on the windshield is killing my eyes. I wish Carol would hurry up and get her butt out of the youth center already. She sent me out here to wait in her Ford Escort that’s older than I am. Whenever I bitch about the decrepit rust-bucket, Carol just shrugs and says the would-be wreck is paid for.
Who cares if it’s a beautiful April day? The glare of the sunshine on the windshield is killing my eyes. I wish Carol would hurry up and get her butt out of the youth center already. She sent me out here to wait in her Ford Escort that’s older than I am. Whenever I bitch about the decrepit rust-bucket, Carol just shrugs and says the would-be wreck is paid for.
Available September 2012 from Black Opal Books
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FUN FIRST FACTS ABOUT SHANNON
FUN FIRST FACTS ABOUT SHANNON
What was the first romance you ever read?
The first romance I ever read was a sweet category story, Roses in December by Essie Summers –at least I think that was the title. It was about a young woman who crossed a riverbed in
Tell me about the first novel you ever wrote? What ever happened to it?
At eighteen, I was fascinated with romance. I had read tons of them growing up and they were my favorite fantasy. I always wanted a hero on a white horse to rescue me although I knew it would never happen. Life in a single-parent household taught reality. Men came with baggage and they always expected women to buy the suitcases. One of my first jobs was on a reserve Army base and my boss allowed me to use the office typewriter to type my first book.
While I happily typed away on my masterpiece, Ed occasionally looked over my shoulder. If he felt my hero was turning into a jerk, or worse acting like a coward, Ed told me so. My orders ran out about the time I finished the novel, so I bundled up my baby and shipped it off to Harlequin Books in
Worst of all, while the man my heroine thought she loved was dashing, romantic and charming – he was also unfaithful, dishonest and nasty, a little too much like the real life I knew about. She ended up with her nice, quiet, dull best friend, Toby – the kind of guy a woman could spend a lifetime loving, but he wasn’t a traditional romance hero. Still, as a
Long story short, Harlequin didn’t buy the book and I spent years learning to perfect my craft. I still have that book tucked away in a box and one day I’ll probably rewrite it and make it work.
If you could live your life over again, what’s the first thing you’d do differently or change?
I would follow all my dreams instead of letting anyone talk me out of them. I stopped and waited too many times – I didn’t quit on those dreams, I just didn’t pursue them wholeheartedly because I had such tremendous gaps in my knowledge. For example, I knew in high school that I wanted to be an English teacher, but it took me far too long to obtain my teaching certificate– I was almost 50. I didn’t know the questions to ask my college advisor and so now I tell teens how to find the answers. As the saying goes, “You’re never given a dream without being given the power to make it come true.”
More about Shannon: As a child, I loved to dream away the days in an old cherry tree on my family’s pony farm. It was my favorite place to read books. Now, I write mainstream western romance and young adult realistic fiction. I used the setting of the pony farm for my second romance from BookStrand. The Daddy Spell is a finalist in the Colorado RWA Award of Excellence contest. Today I live on the family ranch in the Cascade foothills of Washington State. Some days are longer and harder than others, but I still write from 8PM to 2AM, seven days a week. As a substitute school teacher, I love the school breaks but I’m just as busy, since there are 36 horses to look after, along with other assorted animals.
With all the critters on the ranch, I don’t have time for a husband. As for kids, I have to give back the ones who come to learn how to ride at the end of each day. Now, I’m teaching the kids and grandkids of the ones I taught way back when we started. I’ve had a lot of adventures over the years – and in my next 50 years, I plan to write all about them. I hope you enjoy reading about them!