I'm thrilled to have Jennifer McQuiston join us on the blog! I read her debut, What Happens in Scotland, and really enjoyed it. When I found out she was a scientist (like me!) my author-crush was solidified (in a totally non-creepy way, of course!). Today, she's here to talk about her third book, so let's get to the good stuff!
Moonlight On My Mind
Publisher: Avon
ISBN: 978-0062231345
The Story Blurb
To ruin a man’s life once takes
a regrettable mistake.
To do so twice takes a woman
like Julianne Baxter.
Julianne has no objection to the match. More and more she’s convinced of Patrick’s innocence, though when it comes to igniting her passions, the man is all too guilty. And if they can only clear his name, a marriage made in haste could bring about the most extraordinary pleasure…
Read an excerpt!
Meet Jennifer!
A veterinarian and infectious disease researcher by training, Jennifer has always preferred reading romance to scientific textbooks. She grew up in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia, but now lives in Atlanta, Georgia with her husband, two daughters (who got a pony out of mom’s book deal!), and a house full of pets.
Lara: How often to you get lost in a story?
Jennifer: Honestly?
Every. Single. Day.
I try to read amazing fiction every day, even if it’s only snatching a
few minutes or so as I’m settling down for the nights. My e-reader is a fixture
beside my bed, and if the unthinkable happens (i.e. I forgot to charge the
battery), I’ve a handy stack of paperbacks waiting to fill in. I also snatch
moments to read in all of life’s 5 minutes slots: doctor’s waiting rooms. Waiting
on kids to finish riding lessons. The five minutes it takes to heat up a Lean
Cuisine.
Lara: Is writing or story-telling easier for you?
Jennifer: It’s hard for me to consider
separating these two things… in my head, they are completely linked. For me,
the process of writing IS telling the story. I am a pantser (i.e. write by the
seat of my pants without an outline), and rarely have any idea where my
characters are taking me, so the story unfolds through the process of writing.
I have been fortunate that this process comes easily to me. (And by easily, I
mean been lucky enough to find a measure of success, and still enjoy the
journey to The End.) I do get stuck sometimes, and that is when my reading
saves me. I find great inspiration to write when I am also immersed in an
excellent book.
Lara: What’s the first thing you do when you finish
writing a book?
Jennifer: The first thing I do is sleep.
I work a normal day job, so my usual writing schedule has me waking up at 4am
and writing until 6, when my family starts to stir. When a deadline is looming,
that alarm clock shifts to 3:30am, then 3am. (Don’t worry! I go to bed early. I
do get some sleep, LOL!) When I’m tearing into the home stretch of a book, my
characters often wake me up even earlier than that, messing with my head and my
dreams, and I am driven to get it all out. So when I finally type The End, I am
so exhausted I usually collapse in a puddle and let myself sleep.
Like, till AT LEAST 6am. [Lara: Yikes! As a true night owl, I can't imagine getting up so early to write! My brain just doesn't work right in the morning...]
Lara: What drew you to write historical romance,
especially with your scientific background?
Were you a history major/minor in college, or have you always been
interested in history as a hobby?
Jennifer: My entire life (well, from the earliest
time I could remember), I have wanted to be a veterinarian. I love animals and
science, and so my entire college education was focused on the sciences, with a
goal of getting into Veterinary School (which I did accomplish!) I didn’t have
time for any history or writing classes beyond the pre-requisite ones I needed
to graduate, and I regret that impatience now. How nice it would have been to
relax into classes I know I would have enjoyed! Looking back though, in high
school, I was equally strong in Science and English, and I’ve always enjoyed
the process of putting words and stories together on paper, even when I’m
writing scientific manuscripts. And I’ve always been an avid reader. So maybe
writing fiction has always been in me, simmering along and waiting its turn. [Lara: My background is pretty similar. Oh, the benefits of hindsight! :)]
Historical romance was my landing spot when the writing bug hit because
it is what I have always read. I LOVE being transported back in time, imagining
how things worked back then, how different everyday life must have been without
plumbing and antibiotics, but how similar the emotions that come with new love
were.
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Lara: What’s your favorite fairy tale?
Jennifer: I am going Disney on this one,
even though I know those fairy tales aren’t truly authentic, in the literary
sense. But as a girl, I NEVER liked the Snow White/Sleeping Beauty fairy tales.
I grew up feisty, refusing to wear dresses, rough and tumble with farm life and
horses, and I presumed those fairy tales didn’t apply to girls like me.
And then came The Little Mermaid. That was a game changer for me… and
not only because I was nearly an adult when it came out. A heroine who didn’t
wait for the hero to rescue her, but went after him with claws out, forsaking
everything she knew to have a chance at the future she wanted? That was MY kind
of heroine. And it’s still my favorite “modern” fairy tale of all time.
But the original Little Mermaid story though, penned by Hans Christian
Anderson? Tres depressing.
Lara: How is it working with hot guys and sexy women all
day?
Jennifer: Ummm… I had to laugh over this
question, because I only get to work with hot guys and sexy women for those
crucial 2 hours in the morning, when I’m playing with my characters in my head!
Then I go to the Centers for Disease Control, where I work as a disease
detective, specializing in zoonotic diseases (those swapped between animals and
people). I love the CDC and the people I work with, but CDC’rs tend to be very
intense and driven people, committed to making the world safer and healthier.
They don’t tend to worry about hair, makeup, and how hot the guy or girl in the
next office is. :) [Lara: Their loss, right? ;)]
Lara: Which of your characters would you most/least like
to invite to dinner, and why?
Jennifer: I think I would invite Julianne
Baxter, the heroine of my new book MOONLIGHT ON MY MIND. You see, Julianne is
fun and vivacious and sharp-tongued, and above all else, she says what is on
her mind. Makes for scintillating table conversation, as you can see from this
excerpt where Julianne is forced to dine with her distrusting new relatives for
the first time.
“Lady Haversham, I find myself
curious about the circumstances of your arrival. Has the magistrate yet been
informed of your arrival?” Mr. Blythe’s voice brimmed with faint hostility.
“Given that you’ve been summoned to provide a statement at your husband’s
inquest, I feel sure the man will want to know you have returned.”
Julianne examined her plate as she
considered how to respond to Patrick’s cousin. “By all means, you should feel
free to share the news with the magistrate,” she finally offered. “Although you
should also tell him I will not be providing the statement he seeks. A wife
cannot be compelled to testify against her husband.” She could hear the hushed
whispers, flowing up and down the table in response to her announcement.
Mr. Blythe, however, appeared to
have no use for whispers. “What vile subversion of justice is this?” he
demanded. “You were happy enough to accuse the man of murder eleven months
ago.” His venomous gaze darted to Patrick. “Has he forced you to it, then?”
“No one has been forced into
anything,” Julianne retorted. “But if my decision makes you uncomfortable, you
are welcome to leave.”
Aunt Margaret glared at Patrick. “Before
he died, your father always welcomed us at Summersby. Are you implying that
will now change, Haversham?”
Patrick’s expression remained
difficult to read. “Nothing has changed in that regard, Aunt Margaret. You are
of course welcome to stay here, as you always have been. My wife, I am sure,
speaks only of wanting our guests to be comfortable.”
“I am glad to hear that,” Aunt
Margaret said stiffly. “I’d hate to think you’d abandoned your family on
account of your wife’s ill manners.”
Julianne gripped her fork, scarcely
able to believe that not only had Patrick just openly contradicted her, but
that Blythe’s mother, of all people, had accused her of being ill-mannered. And that was when Julianne realized that
this was one of those times her mouth was going to quite run ahead of her good
sense.
She offered her new aunt a tight
smile, three Seasons’ worth of experience coalescing into the oft-practiced
gesture. “Perhaps, if my manners are so ill,
Aunt Margaret, you might feel more comfortable eating elsewhere. Your own
dining room in London, perhaps?”
Aunt Margaret’s mouth opened wide
enough to catch a three-tined fork. As it were, Julianne felt as though she
were being quite magnanimous to hurl only a well-timed insult instead of the
cutlery.
Lara: What one thing about your hero drives his heroine
crazy? And what one thing about your heroine drives her hero nuts?
Jennifer: Oh, this is a fun one. In
MOONLIGHT ON MY MIND, my hero is a veterinarian by trade, though he’s been
unwillingly thrust into the role of the serving as the new Earl of Haversham,
thanks to his father’s and older brother’s unfortunate (and mysterious) deaths.
Having personal experience with this profession and the dirt that comes with
it, it seemed a natural step to make my hero messy. Think: clothes strewn
about. Mud on his boots. Sweaty and smelly at times.
Enter Julianne Baxter, my uptight heroine. She’s a fashion goddess with
a bit of the OCD in her. Think: clothes always neat and pressed. Things in
order. She’d take a bath twice a day if she could.
And then I just threw them together in a fast marriage of inconvenience
and let all hell break loose. Here’s an excerpt from MOONLIGHT ON MY MIND, when
they first move in together.
What few choice words Patrick might
have managed became even more muddled as he considered whether he was even in
the correct room.
It was neat as a pin, for one
thing. His clothing had been picked up from the floor and was folded neatly on
his reading chair. The bed where he had awakened this morning was now made up
with military precision. The squared edges of the coverlet sneered at him,
proclaiming that any further mischief on its pristine surface would be
ruthlessly denied. The various medical supplies that usually stood atop his
bureau had been removed, and now small crystal bottles and ivory-inlaid brushes
and an entire army of hairpins lay scattered across the top.
“Did you do something to my room?”
he asked tersely.
“Our room, I should think. I straightened a few things,” Julianne
answered. “And I may have asked the maid to unpack my bag.”
An awful suspicion took root.
Patrick strode over to his
wardrobe, the one that held his jackets and riding boots and such, and threw
open the doors. A cloud of sachet-scented air puffed out at him, generated, no
doubt, by the sea of gowns that now hung there, glittering like jewels in what
heretofore had been an incontrovertibly masculine domain. There had to be at
least a half dozen or more, in varied rainbow hues, with lace and ribbons
sprouting like weeds from every crevice.
“What have you done with my
clothes?” he demanded.
“I am sure the maid folded them
away in one of the drawers. I shouldn’t think it would matter. It is not as
though you ever hang anything up.”
Damn
it to hell and back. She had invaded his thoughts and his life, like a
miasma on the wind, and now she had taken over his bloody room. He turned from
the travesty of his repurposed wardrobe, prepared to argue for a return of his
space and his things, only to discover that his wife was now working to reach
the buttons on the back of her dress.
Well. She’d certainly become more …
comfortable around him. Perhaps there
were some benefits to the intrusion he had not considered.
And the prolific nature of her
clothing and the loss of his personal space aside, he couldn’t deny she looked
so bright and tempting and unexpectedly right
undressing in his room, his bones hurt at the sight of her.
Lara’s GOTTA ASK: What is your biggest vice?
Jennifer’s GOTTA ANSWER: It seems like you have
excellent intuition, framing this question like you know I probably have
several, and you are forcing me to pick the BIGGEST.
I am a bourbon drinker, and I like to put it in my Diet Coke (if you’re
wondering, it’s the Diet Coke I consider the vice here, because I am supposed
to have given it up. Which I have. Except in bourbon, of course). But this
tends to be an occasional thing, once a week for social and rare
stress-reducing reasons. Not sure that such reasonable consumption qualifies as
a vice.
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So if by “vice” you mean that thing I can’t help myself around, that
thing I will do even though I know it isn’t good for me, even though I know
that overindulgence is almost certainly going to make me sick, why then that
would be Krispy Kreme donuts, the ones with the raspberry filling. Those are my
crack. If I buy a six-pack box of them, my family gets one each, and I shove
three down my throat. [Lara: Sounds completely fair to me!]
Where can you find Jennifer?
Her website
Find her on Facebook
Tweet with her
Check out her blog
Her GoodReads page
What's next?
My
upcoming book, MOONLIGHT
ON MY MIND, releases March 25th! I am both excited
as all get out and sad, because it is the last book in my debut series, and I
am already hard at work on a completely different set of characters.
Tell us about your previous releases
They
are on sale now! WHAT
HAPPENS IN SCOTLAND is a wild romp of a ride (think: the
Hangover, set in Victorian Scotland). SUMMER
IS FOR LOVERS is a breezy beach read and a poignant
unrequited love story, now on sale for $1.99. Get’ it now, though…I hear the
price goes back up before the end of March.
Got a question for our readers?
Clearly, given my dueling work personas, my life reads like a “don’t
try this at home” warning, but I have to think lots of people *think* their
lives are going to go in one direction, and are pleasantly surprised by some
professional detours.
What did YOU want to be when you grew up? And what has surprised you
about the journey?
One lucky commenter will win a signed print book (winner’s choice from my 3
titles)! U.S. and Canada, please.
Note: Please leave
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Lost In A Story cannot be responsible for an author's failure to mail the
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Thanks for stopping by today, Jennifer! And thanks for sharing those fabulous excerpts!
