Friday, June 13, 2014

Interview and Giveaway with Sherrie Cronin





Please share a little about yourself, your genres, any other pen names you use.

My name is Sherrie Cronin and I write novels that are a hybrid of contemporary fantasy and science fiction, and they fall in a sub-genre called magical realism. The world in my books should look a lot like the world you live in, but with occasional odd twists. I’m now writing the fifth novel in a collection of six called 46. Ascending.

Tell us a little about your latest or upcoming release.

c3 is my fourth book and it just came out in paperback June 10th. I’m very excited about this one. Each book in this collection details the adventures of a different family member, each of whom has a nearly believable super power. c3 tells the story of the youngest child in the family, a teenager struggling to understand her ability to have out-of-body experiences.

Are you a mom ?

I’m the proud mom of three wonderful children, all in their twenties. In recent years, watching them grow into young adults and find their own passions and places in this world has been fascinating and rewarding.

If yes do you find it hard to juggle writing and parenting?

You’d think that once they were as old as mine, the answer would be “of course not” but the truth is they still interrupt, they still have crises of their own, and concern about them still sometimes clouds my writing time. I wouldn’t have it any other way. I haven’t yet faced what I hear is the ultimate distraction, known as grandkids.

Have you ever based your book or characters on actual events or people from your own life?

Funny you should ask. All three of my children loosely inspired a superhero character in 46. Ascending,  as did my husband. It caused me some grief to have to invent character flaws and various calamities to befall them, but so far they all seem to think it was a cool idea. 

Is there a theme or message in your work that you would like readers to connect to?

There are a few of them. I’m a pretty idealistic writer and I genuinely want my books to make the world a little better. At the core, my books are about how much we humans have in common and how important it is to treat each other with kindness and respect. It’s not a unique or surprising message, but I don’t know a more important one.

Is there a genre(s) that you’d like to write that you haven’t tackled yet?

I’m also a fan of crime fiction, and I see a few whodunits in my future.

If this book is part of a series…what is the next book? Any details you can share?

d4 is the story of the middle child in the family, a prescient young woman in her mid-twenties. I’m almost finished writing it, and the one I’m working on is always my favorite and my “best yet”.

What is in your to read pile?

I can’t read other people’s fiction while I write, so as soon as I finish the sixth book in this collection I plan to dive into my TBR pile and enjoy.  Top of the list right now is China Mieville’s “The City and the City”,  Connie Willis’ “To Say Nothing of the Dog” and Charles Yu’s “How to Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe”. What can I say? I like quirky speculative fiction.


c3
46. Ascending
Sherrie Cronin

Genre: Fantasy, contemporary, metaphysical

Publisher: Cinnabar Press

ISBN: 9781941283035
ISBN: 9781941283233
ASIN: B00I58T5FU

Number of pages: 405
Word Count: 135,000

Cover Artist: Jennifer FitzGerald

Book Description:

Teddie likes her country music and her old pick-up truck and she's not sure how she let her best friend talk her into spending a semester abroad in Darjeeling India. Once she arrives, her innocence quickly collides with an underworld in which young women are bartered and sold. As she fights to understand a depravity that she never dreamed existed, Teddie finds that her own mind develops a unique ability for locating her friends and that an ancient group is willing to train her to use her innate skills for out of body experiences to save others.

It will require trust in ideas she barely believes, and more courage than has ever been expected of her. When it becomes clear that the alternative may be her friends' deaths and the unchecked growth of an evil crime lord's empire, Teddie accepts the challenge and shows those guilty of unspeakable crimes just how powerful a young woman can be.

Available at Amazon, and out in paperback June 10, 2014.

Note: this is a collection, not a series. The books can be read in any order

About the Author:

Sherrie Roth grew up in Western Kansas thinking that there was no place in the universe more fascinating than outer space. After her mother vetoed astronaut as a career ambition, she went on to study journalism and physics in hopes of becoming a science writer. She published her first science fiction short story long ago, and then waited a lot of tables while she looked for inspiration for the next story. When it finally came, it declared to her that it had to be whole book, nothing less. One night, while digesting this disturbing piece of news, she drank way too many shots of ouzo with her boyfriend. She woke up thirty-one years later demanding to know what was going on.

The boyfriend, who she had apparently long since married, asked her to calm down and explained that in a fit of practicality she had gone back to school and gotten a degree in geophysics and had spent the last 28 years interpreting seismic data in the oil industry. The good news, according to Mr. Cronin, was that she had found it at least mildly entertaining and ridiculously well-paying The bad news was that the two of them had still managed to spend almost all of the money.

Apparently she was now Mrs. Cronin, and the further good news was that they had produced three wonderful children whom they loved dearly, even though to be honest that is where a lot of the money had gone. Even better news was that Mr. Cronin turned out to be a warm-hearted, encouraging sort who was happy to see her awake and ready to write. "It's about time," were his exact words.

Sherrie Cronin discovered that over the ensuing decades Sally Ride had already managed to become the first woman in space and apparently had done a fine job of it. No one, however, had written the book that had been in Sherrie's head for decades. The only problem was, the book informed her sternly that it had now grown into a collection of six books. Sherrie decided that she better start writing it before it got any longer. She's been wide awake ever since, and writing away.

Twitter: @cinnabar01





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