Interview with Amber Polo

Today's interview is with Amber Polo, a writer I met on line and offered to exchange interviews with. Hope you enjoy this as much as I have learning about a new and talented writer.


1. What's your genre or do you write in more than one? I'm published in paranormal romance and contemporary romance (or mainstream with romantic elements) and now am working in an urban fantasy genre.

2. Did you choose your genre or did it choose you? My stories always dictate the genre. And often the paranormal aspects pop in on their own.

3. Is there any genre you'd like to try? I am working on a contemporary novel that covers 20 years, so it's sort of historical but doesn't fit in any genre. It's a romance where the hero and heroine part in the beginning and don't meet until the final page with lots of coincidences in between.

Or is there one you wouldn't? My stories are complicated enough, so mystery wouldn't be my forte.

4. What fiction do you read for pleasure? A little of everything. As long as it's fresh and surprises me.

5. Tell me a bit about yourself and how long you've been writing,

I spent most of my life as a librarian. (I think I even helped in my grade school library.) Does that say it all? I worked in a many types of libraries in a lot of states. Now I use all those places as settings in my stories. I like to say being a librarian (and an English major) held me back from writing my own fiction because I didn’t think I could compete with all those great books already published, so I wrote bibliographies and computer manuals. I've been writing fiction for ten years ever since I moved to Arizona.

6. Which of your characters is your favorite? I love them all. I guess they all have a little of me in them.

7. Are there villains in your books and how were they created? I have trouble making villains 100% bad, but some definitely seem that way.

8. What are you working on now? Urban fantasy where dog shifters are librarians.

9. What's your latest release and how did the idea arrive? My most recent is called Flying Free. I live on a residential airpark (like a golf course with a runway in stead of a fairway0 in Arizona. I realized my home was a unique setting that I couldn't resist sharing. Then I wondered what would happen in a "younger woman" moved in among the senior citizens and their airplanes and needed to learn to fly..

10. Tell me about your latest book and how it came about. Enclose the opening of the book around 400 words.

Flying Free(Treble Heart Books)

Contemporary Romance available in Print and ebook formats

http://www.trebleheartbooks.com/AmberPolo.html

and

http://www.amazon.com/Flying-Free-Amber-Polo/dp/1936127059/ref=gfix-ews-form


Blurb:

Can a meat eating Texas advertising woman find love

with a vegetarian Buddhist and get her pilot's license

despite interference from her wacky Arizona airpark neighbors?

Excerpt -

Lia’s heart jolted against her chest. She was sure, if she opened her mouth, her heart would pop out and explode across the instrument panel. Her hands loosened a little and she whispered in disbelief, “I did it!” Another flight, one more hour of flight training finished. Almost. No time to think. All she had to do was stay calm and land the plane. Compared to landing, flying was a breeze.

She scanned the sky in all directions for air traffic as she had been trained to do and noted another plane to her left. Lia glanced down at the area surrounding the airstrip. The grid of the nearby town of Sunrise looked like a model train village in the tan mesquite-scattered desert. Close to the base of the airport mesa the Cottonwood River snaked through the valley and was easy to spot by the wide channel of green trees and farmland on either side. Near the river, small homes, trailers, and sheds crowded together like a poor third world village.

A gust of wind threw the plane sideways and the yoke twisted in her hands. As she fought to regain control—wham—another plane was right on her tail. Its red underside cut in front of Lia’s plane and dropped into the landing pattern—her landing pattern. Her instructor had been the only voice on the radio when she called her approach.

“I’m going to die.” Lia’s fingers gripped the yoke. “Damn you, Ben! I don’t belong here.” How appropriate. She was talking to her dead father, who with thirty years flying experience, died in a plane just like this one. But not before he wrote a will requiring her to learn to fly.

With a whoosh, the other plane passed so close, she bounced against the harness. Her head brushed the ceiling as her plane was buffeted by the near-miss. Engine roar filtered through her headset. Lia’s heart stopped beating. She tried to move, to think, but her body and mind froze. The cockpit closed in on her.

She pulled up and felt the plane rise.

It seemed like forever until she felt safe enough to whisper, “The danger is over. The danger is over. Do what Flo trained you to do.” Why didn’t small airplanes have flight attendants serving drinks or at least a mini-bar?



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