I am delighted to be joining in with Grace Lowrie’s Safe With Me blog tour! 🙂
Many thanks to Karen Bultiauw, at Accent Press, for the opportunity to take part.
Q&A with Grace Lowrie…..
For those who don’t know already, could you tell us about yourself and your book(s) please?
Hi Kerry, thank you so much for inviting me to your blog.
I’m a romantic introvert with a penchant for rock music, art nouveau design, blue cheese and grumpy ginger tomcats. Having worked as a collage artist, sculptor, prop maker and garden designer over the years, I now write contemporary women’s fiction from my Hertfordshire home. Safe With Me is a standalone novel, the first of three, set in the fictional town of Wildham. It is my second novel to be published by Accent Press.
Where did/do you get your ideas from?
I’m fascinated by human relationships and tend to conjure up intriguing questions in my mind, for example: What if you were abandoned as a child and your only family was a foster brother/sister? What if you were then separated? Would that bond always exist between you? In this case the answering of these questions led me to create Safe With Me.
Are any of your characters based (however loosely) on anyone you know?
I don’t think so – I tend to draw on aspects of a variety of different people’s personalities, both real or imagined, to create my characters. Some of my friends and family may recognise parts of themselves in the pages of my books, but hopefully never enough for them to take any offence.
How do you pick your characters names?
That’s often tricky as the name can make or break a character for a reader. Sometimes a name comes instinctively once I start hearing my character’s voice but not always, and I do prefer to put a name to the voice early on. One of my favourite sources of inspiration is watch the closing credits of films and TV shows – it’s a great way of picking up interesting and unusual names.
Can you share your writing process with us, in a nutshell?
I tend to start with a great idea for an ending and a feel for some strong characters and then plot to create a beginning and a middle. Life is busy and I haven’t yet managed to carve out a set time each day in which to write, but I’m constantly scribbling notes and bits of dialogue on scraps of paper and then spend hours at a time typing furiously at my laptop.
Who are your top 5 favourite authors?
Wow that’s tough, that changes all the time. Right now I’d have to say: Kate Atkinson, Lucie Whitehouse, Ian Banks, Diana Gabaldon and Iain McEwan.
If you could meet any author, who would it be and what would you ask them?
I would like to meet Audrey Niffenegger to ask her about the sequel to The Time Traveler’s Wife that I believe she’s working on.
Were you a big reader as a child?
Yes. My parents are both keen readers and got my sister and I into books from an early age. After a long day at work my dad would fall asleep reading The Hobbit to me at bedtime – somehow he managed to keep talking but all the words would turn to gibberish as he drifted off.
When did you start to write?
As soon as I was able – I wrote a lot of poetry and short stories at school and won a competition for a Haiku about a post box. I stopped during my teenage years, through a lack of confidence more than anything, but found my way back to it again about ten years ago on a lonely trip to Malta.
If you could re-write the ending to any book what would it be and what would you change?
I loved reading The Miniaturist by Jessie Burton but I found the ending frustrating – too many loose ends that I would like to tidy up. I’m hoping she’s working on a sequel.
Is there a book you wish you had written?
If Nobody Speaks of Remarkable Things by Jon McGregor is absolute genius but easily accessible – everybody I recommend it to loves it. I’m really looking forward to reading his latest work; Reservoir 13.
If you could invite any fictional character for coffee who would it be and where would you take them?
Is it shallow to say Jamie Fraser from Diana Gabaldon’s Outlander books? I’d invite him to my place for coffee so that I wouldn’t have to share him with the rest of the female population.
What are you working on right now?
I’m currently editing the next two books in The Wildham Series and writing the first draft of a fourth.
Do you have a new release due?
Safe With Me is due out on 22nd June 2017 and is already available to pre-order here:
What do you generally do to celebrate on publication day?
I have a bottle of bubbly on ice ready to share with my family, as a thank you for all their support.
How can readers keep in touch with you?
I have a website http://www.gracelowrie.com and a facebook page http://www.facebook.com/GraceLowrieWriter and can also be found on twitter @gracelowrie1.
Is there anything else you would like us to know?
Only that I’m very grateful for this opportunity and appreciate all the readers out there that make being an author so rewarding.
Thank you for taking the time to answer my questions, Grace 🙂
Hitchin author publishes emotional and evocative second novel about the deepest bonds of friendship.
Accent Press is publishing Hitchin-based author Grace Lowrie’s second novel, a contemporary women’s fiction novel exploring how friendship can be a life-long influence.
How far would you go to feel safe again?
Abandoned as children, Kat and Jamie were inseparable growing up in foster care. But their bond couldn’t protect them forever.
From a troubled upbringing to working in a London greasy spoon, Kat’s life has never been easy. On the surface Jamie’s living the high-life, but appearances can be deceiving.
When they unexpectedly reunite, their feelings become too intense to ignore. But as secrets come back to haunt them, are they destined to be separated once more.
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