Meet Author Ryan Jo Summers

Please welcome fellow romance writer, Ryan Jo Summers. She's joining us today on the Blog Hop Tour. 

What are you working on? 

For the first time, I am working on multiple pieces simultaneously. One is a YA/NA novel of a young girl coming of age, immersed in a world of family, growing up, choices and consequences. Another is a one novel trilogy of three sisters each finding love in the wonderful little North Carolina town of Sweetwater Harbor. The third is still heavily in the plotting and outlining stage but basically it's a woman's lit novel about living life as a military widow, with her young son, only to have her son discover one day his dad is very much alive and amnesic fromTBI. Taking him back in under her new roof, she discovers he is being hunted by the military because of 'special' skills he possesses.

How does your work differ from others of its genre? 

Well, first of all, I can't seem to just write the story. I have to twist and blend and crank it around. For example, my debut contemporary romance was about horse racing. But the heroine had supernatural Celtic gifts and then there was the mystery of who was trying to sabotage the hero's horses. All strong elements in a basic love story. The story coming out this fall through Soul Mate, Shimmers of Stardust, is much the same. It's a basic Christian love story, except it begins and centers around the hero having traveled through time. That, of course, conflicts with the heroine's core Christian beliefs.

Why do you write what you do? 

I am a sentimental softie at heart. The characters and settings and conversations come to me, asking to be recorded. I couldn't stop writing even if I wanted to. All this stuff has to come out. And I love to see how it all grows and becomes so real.

How does your writing process work? 

It starts with an idea, which can honestly come from just about any tiny, obscure phrase, comment, picture, or just about anything. My friends are amazed at how that tiny little thing became such a big thing in the story. Whatever the origins, the tiny nugget becomes an outline and character worksheet, filling in details and setting and dialogue. I research things I don't know, which is a lot, and start writing. Each day starts with review of previous writing, adding new stuff that was scribbled down during the night, and then running from there.

Ryan Jo Summers is a fellow romance writer and Soul Mate Publishing peep. Her first novel, "Whispers in her Heart', is published with Black Lyon Publishing.  Click here to purchase. "Shimmers of Stardust" is slated for release Fall of 2014. 

"Shimmers of Stardust" Blurb

Civil War hero, Logan Riley, turned outlaw is hanged in 1869. He survives, traveling through time, until he is found by modern day anthropologist, Dr. MacKenzie Lynne. Hired by team of physicists, she soon learns real fate they have in mind for him and takes him and runs. Now, pursued by obsessed physicists and the military, they race across deserts and mountains of AZ and NM. If they get caught, it’s a lifetime of imprisonment and tests for him and probably worse for her. But staying free means forever on the run, hunted and homeless. Running and hiding, hunted like criminals, they also discover attraction and love blooming like desert flowers. Kenzie's strong Christian faith works to convict Logan of his past crimes better then the hangman’s noose had. As their love grows and their pursuers close in, their love will face the harshest test of all—Christian morals against nineteenth century outlaw justice.

Visit Ryan Jo Summer's website.
Read Ryan's blog.