Monday, August 14, 2017

[Author Interview]: Pamela Clare + "Tempting Fate"

Today Pamela Clare is back on the blog with another interview, this time with Kame and Pat. They're talking about Pamela's writing in general, and the various genres she's done, and in particular her latest releases, Tempting Fate!




Kame: Hi Everyone! It has been a while since I have reviewed or done an interview for TBQ. My life with teens has left me little time to read for fun. TBQ has graciously invited me back to talk to one of my favorite authors. Pat and I are very excited about Pamela Clare’s new contemporary romance series based in the imaginary Scarlett Springs Colorado. We are so excited that Pamela has joined us today.

Pamela, thank you so much for joining us. 


Pamela Clare: Thanks so much for taking time to chat with me.



K: Pat and I are huge fans of your historical romances and of course the I-Team which is romantic suspense. Why did you start writing a contemporary romance.


PC: It was a matter of necessity. I was bound by contract with Penguin Random House, my publisher, which had the rights to any historicals or romantic suspense novels that I wrote. After my battle with breast cancer in 2014, I just couldn’t afford to write books for New York any longer. It takes six to 18 months after a book is turned in for it to be published, and royalties are paid only twice yearly. I needed a way to earn writing income that put money in my pocket faster and which didn’t give the bulk of what my books earned to a publisher. That meant I needed something I could publish independently.

Contemporary romance was my best bet. It’s the most popular subgenre of romance, and I was contractually free to write and publish contemporary romance.

I come from a rock-climbing family and have personally had my life saved by a rescue team. My younger son is a park ranger. I quite literally grew up in the mountains, so it was very natural for me to turn to the search and rescue community for a new series set in Colorado.



K: Contemporary is one of my go-to categories. The series may be contemporary romance, but it is Pamela Clare style – these aren’t sweet books, are they?


PC: No, they’re not sweet. The sex scenes are pretty hot and explicit. I don’t use euphemisms for body parts — you won’t find a “moist female core” or “turgid manhood” in this series — and I let each couple be different. The language is what you’d expect to hear in the real world, at least in Colorado. 

At the same time, I’ve tried to build a real sense of community among the characters. So there are small-town romance elements combined with hot sex and passionate romance.



K: I love Scarlett, a quirky small town. Is Scarlet a mixture of towns, or some place you have visited?


PC: I’m so glad you like it. Scarlet Springs is based on the small, weird mountain town of Nederland. I live close to Ned, as we call it, and can zip up the canyon to write or take photos or seek inspiration there. It is impossible to write anything weirder than Nederland is in real life. The town’s biggest event is Frozen Dead Guy Days, which has its origins in a guy’s grandpa, who was placed on ice in a freezer in a Tuff Shed. I believe Grandpa in the Tuff Shed (that’s what we call him) is still there, taken care of by the town. 

Honestly, you can’t make this stuff up.

The people in Nederland — volunteers and staff at the Nederland Mining Museum, the Ned fire department — have been incredibly helpful and fun in working with me for research. I can’t say enough wonderful things about the museum and the fire department.



K: That is just wonderful that they have shared so much with you, it kind of makes me want to visit. 

The series has four books so far – Barely Breathing, Slow Burn, Falling Hard, and Tempting Fate. Can you give us a quick snap shot at these four books?


PC: Barely Breathing tells Austin and Lexi’s story. They were lovers during their senior year of high school and had a bad breakup. Lexi comes home after losing her job in Chicago and runs into Austin right off the bat. He’s now a park ranger, paramedic, and a lead climber for the Rocky Mountain Search & Rescue Team. He also has his red card (wildland firefighting credentials). Yes, he wears a sexy ranger uniform when he’s on duty. Their relationship is incendiary — and just a little bit kinky.

Eric Hawke is the fire chief of Scarlet and a paramedic. He’s also a climber and part of the Rocky Mountain Search & Rescue Team. He really takes care of his community, but when he meets Victoria toward the end of Barely Breathing, they get off to an awkward start. Slow Burn shows them moving past that rocky beginning and giving in to their intense attraction during the week before Lexi and Austin’s wedding. This forces Victoria to face some recent hardship — and make some tough decisions about her life.

Falling Hard is about a former Army Ranger and a Gold Star wife with twins. Jesse Moretti is using climbing as a way of dealing with PTSD, while Ellie Meeks, who lives next door, is coping with raising the twins her husband never got to see because he was killed in combat. It’s very sexy, but it’s also a tear-jerker. Have the tissues handy.

Tempting Fate tells the story of Naomi Archer, a woman who has had to fight for everything she has in this life, and Chaska Belcourt, a propulsion engineer and climber who lives in a big house with his sister and their wolf. Yes, a wolf. Chaska is Lakota, while Naomi has no idea what she is. Her past is a mystery. Chaska helps her to find out the truth about herself while at the same time coming to grips with his own beliefs about Lakota spirituality and his intense attraction to Naomi. It’s a pretty emotional story, too. 



K: And I loved them all!

I adore your characters. There are no throwaway characters in your books. Do you have a favorite secondary character? (I do!)


PC: I’d love to know who your favorite is. If I take Rain and Joe out of the picture — they’re getting their own story — I’d have to say it’s probably Bear. He’s the Gospel-preaching panhandler who has memorized the entire Bible and knows the name of every person in town, but apart from that is a bit helpless. The townsfolk take care of him and accept him the way he is. 

Or maybe it’s Megs, the director of the Team. She’s got a mouth, and she makes me laugh in every story with her cutting wit and sarcasm.



K: I love every scene Megs is in, she just has such a quick wit about it, but she truly cares about everyone on her team. If I had to pick a favorite secondary character I pick Chaska’s sister Winona – she has a wolf and she loves ice cream as much as I do.

Pat and I are I-Team fans as you know, I was so excited to see a few of our I-Team favorites in this series. How close is Denver to Scarlett – will we be seeing other I-Team characters?


PC: Denver is about an hour away from Scarlet. If the I-Team members and their families, past and present, are like other Coloradans, they head into the mountains as often as they can. One place they’ve surely all visited is Scarlet. Even before starting this series, I went up there fairly frequently, but then I’m only about 30 minutes away. 

Gabe Rossiter from Naked Edge is a member of the Rocky Mountain Search & Rescue Team (called “the Team” in the books). He pops in now and again. Zach McBride from Breaking Point has made a few cameos in his role as Chief Deputy US Marshal for Colorado. The mountains draw all kinds of people — I’m taking real life now — and it’s not unheard of for there to be a manhunt or two going on up there. There are places where I, as a lifelong Coloradan, would not go camping. (I sent Naomi to one of those places because am a mean author.)

I am playing with ideas for an I-Team meets the Team story. No promises, but the wheels are turning.



K: I have loved all the cameos so far!

I am so excited for your new releases – I think they are incredible and I just know people will be blown away. Can you give our readers a hint of what maybe on the horizon?


PC: Right now I’m starting a Christmas novella that will feature Joe Moffat, the owner of Knockers, the town’s brewpub, and Rain, the free-spirited woman who works as the pub’s general manager. I can tell you that it will involve a realistically huge amount of snow and the collapse of at least one roof. 

After that, I think Conrad, the Team’s alpinist, will get his story after that. He’s just survived a tragedy on Mt. Everest and hasn’t yet come back to Scarlet. Megs is worried about him, as are the other Team members. 

That will finish out 2017. In 2018, I’d like to get another I-Team book written (Joaquin’s story), followed by another Scarlet Springs book, and then a historical romance.



K: Okay TBQ has a tradition of a few quick questions that everyone has to answer– ready for the speed round?

SPEED ROUND:


A day in the mountains OR a day at the ocean?
OCEAN! Believe it or not, I get my fill of mountains. I live right next to them. I love the ocean.


Reading a classic OR a suspense thriller?
A classic. 


If you could blink your eyes and become ANY fictional character written by ANY author who would it be?
Arwen Undómiel. She gets Aragorn. That’s really all the explanation that’s necessary, right? Aragorn pretty much ruined me for real men.


Hardcover, Ebook or Audiobook?
Audiobook when I’m cleaning or cooking, and ebook the rest of the time. It’s nice to save shelf space. I have so many books. At one point, I thought I’d never read ebooks, but it’s nice to be able to take every book I want to read with me on vacation.

Oh My – I am not sure I could survive without my ereader.
What is your favorite writing on a deadline indulgence?
Ice cream! Milk chocolate! Blueberry scones! Okay, those are great, but coffee is my lifesaver. 




Kame: Thank you so much Pamela for your time today we can’t wait for more visits to Scarlett Springs!


Pamela: Thank you for the fun questions and for having me here. 




Tempting Fate by Pamela Clare
Publisher: Pamela Clare (June 28th, 2017)
Series: Colorado High Country, 4
Genre: Contemporary Romance


A woman with no roots…

Naomi fled the cult-like nightmare of her childhood and learned to rely on one person—herself. Her resourcefulness keeps her alive during a catastrophe in the mountains, but it’s no help at all when it comes to Chaska Belcourt, the sexy EMT who saves her life. Raised to feel shame about her body and sex, she is putty in Chaska’s hands as he strips away her armor, exposing the vulnerable woman beneath, awakening desires in her that she’d been taught to ignore.

A kiss that changes everything…

Chaska Belcourt grew up on the reservation, the son of a hereditary Sun Dance chief. He left all of that behind for a new life in Colorado as an engineer with an aerospace firm and a member of the elite Rocky Mountain Search & Rescue Team. He doesn’t share his sister’s belief that fate led him to find Naomi. But from the first moment their lips touch, he can’t get enough of her.

A love that transforms…

As the passion between them turns into something more, Chaska is forced to admit that his sister is right. There’s no other way to explain the depth of his feelings for Naomi—or the fact that he and his people might hold the key to unraveling the mysteries of her past. But she will have to learn to trust again before the two of them can find the answers she needs—and claim this once-in-a-lifetime love. 



Where to Buy*:
More Info:


Read Pat's review of this one HERE



Reviews of Clare's Previous Books:


Barely Breathing
Breaking Point
Extreme Exposure
Falling Hard
First Strike
Hard Evidence
Naked Edge
Seduction Game
Slow Burn
Soul Deep
Striking Distance
Sweet Release 
Upon a Winter's Eve








USA Today best-selling author Pamela Clare began her writing career as a columnist and
investigative reporter and eventually became the first woman editor-in-chief of two different newspapers. Along the way, she and her team won numerous state and national honors, including the First Amendment Award and the National Journalism Award for Public Service. In 2011, she was honored by the Colorado Pro Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists with their Keeper of the Flame Lifetime Achievement Award for her work. A single mother with two grown sons and two cats, she writes historical romance and contemporary romantic suspense within view of Colorado’s beautiful Rocky Mountains. She is a two-time RITA finalist (Surrender, Defiant) and a three-time Daphne du Maurier finalist (I-Team series). She loves history, having studied archaeology in college, and has traveled extensively, living for almost three years in Denmark, which feels like home to her. She attributes her love of historical romance with the years she spent visiting ruins and castles in Europe.




Where to Find Pamela:







Kame: Pat and I loved Tempting Fate, you will chuckle and maybe cry a little too. 




Enjoy!



Until Next Time,

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