Today, author MA Church is stopping by to talk about writing and the re-release of her sci fi book Nighttime Wishes.
QSF: Let’s start with you telling us a little bit about yourself:
MA: I’m forty-six, been married for over twenty years (to the same man no less, lol) and have two grown children who live on their own. No, I didn’t suffer empty nest syndrome. Didn’t have a chance to, lol. I see them more now than when they lived at home!
I’m a huge football nut (go Steelers!). Don’t get between me and the TV during a game. Bad things will happen. *wink*
Let’s see. I also hate cold weather. I live in the south, so we don’t get much snow. Still, it gets entirely too cold down here sometimes. I drink Coke, but have cut that back. I have a very sweet cat called… you ready for it? His name is Kitty-Kitty.
Yup, lol. The hubby calls him Skeeter.
QSF: How did you first stumble upon the MM genre and what is it about MM Romance that made you want to write romance stories about two guys?
MA: Long story short is I stumbled across this genre completely by accident. I found a free site that had a gay male section. Out of curiosity, I clicked on the category. Thank goodness the first few stories I read were excellent. Matter of fact, the first two authors I read that night are published in this genre.
I was hooked, lol. I read for half a year, then decided to try my hand at writing. There were certain things that changed in my life about that time, and new opportunities opened up. As to why I write about two men, I can’t really answer that. It interests me. I *can* say I have no interest in writing M/F (and I’ve tried lol) nor reading it. MM is new and exciting to me, where MF isn’t anymore.
QSF: How long does it take for you to write a novel and how do you motivate yourself to regularly continue writing? And do you ever abandon a draft that was partly written when you realized the idea wasn’t working for you?
MA: The time depends on real life. I’m married and have two kids. Hubby comes first. Then the kids. They no longer live at home, but they’re love near me. So when they stop by, writing stops. Plus, the youngest is in college, so she is running in and out a lot.
On the whole, I’d say a 60/70K novel takes three months to write, have beta read, and then edited. I’m lucky, I don’t work. I love to write, so motivation isn’t a problem.
QSF: Do you keep a file with plot ideas and what do you do about ideas that suddenly come to you in unfortunate moments during your regular life, when you can’t write them down? Can you share one of those ideas with us?
MA: Yup, you can bet I keep a file
Ziang, a tentacled warrior from the planet Maz’Rar, has come to Earth to claim his most precious prize and start a new life. When an unforeseen accident results in a crash landing, his plan for a quick removal of the human Shawn lays in a twisted ruin at his feet, much like his shuttlecraft. If that isn’t enough, the FBI is sniffing around.
Confronted by the very same alien who observed him since he wished on a shooting star as a child, Shawn finds his initial inability to communicate with Ziang leads to misunderstanding and fear. Forced to hide until rescue arrives, tensions mount. Shawn learns of Ziang’s intentions of taking him as a mate. Ziang, on the other hand, is completely befuddled at Shawn’s less than stellar reaction to said taking.
As they wait, a spark ignites. Turns out humans and Maz’Rarians are very compatible—tentacles and all. Shawn falls for the big alien he jokingly calls E.T. Now he must decide if he’s willing to throw away all he knows to travel the stars with Ziang.
This is the second edition of this novella. It has been tweaked and re-edited.
Excerpt
“Mayday, mayday! I’m taking fire. We are hit. I repeat: We are hit and losing altitude. My coordinates are 33.3872° N, 104.5281° W. Date of transmission: Standard Earth Time July 4, 1947.”
“Frack! Captain, what are we going to do?” Co-pilot Napal Moray fought the shuttle’s holo controls. “Engines offline. We’re leaking radium vapor out of the rear engine.”
Captain Ziang’lamdious Ta snarled at the holo controls. “How the hell did they know we were here? Dammit, this is the last thing we need.”
“The power transfer conduits are overheating. We’re losing containment in the radium core. It’s going to blow, Ziang. We’re about to light up the nighttime sky.”
“Not if we shut the core down and eject it.”
“If we do that, we won’t have enough power to maintain… We’ll descend. We won’t be able to stop it,” Napal argued. “As far as ejecting the core, do we really want the humans to access that kind of technology? They’ll try to reverse engineer it. You know they will.”
“For now the shuttle has power to weapons. We’ll detonate it. Since it’s not a warp core engine, the fallout won’t harm the humans.”
“Can’t we just transport to the main ship?” Napal asked.
“It’s on the other side of Earth’s moon. We simply don’t have the power for that now.” Ziang frowned at the computer’s main control panel. “As a matter of fact, the transporter is offline. We’re not transporting anywhere.”
“Then I guess we’ll try and land the shuttle.”
Ziang rubbed his forehead. “Yeah, that’s not a great answer either. Remember that whole conversation we just had about reverse engineering?”
Napal threw his hands up. “What else do you suggest then? We either go to the surface or we blow up. I’m not for the blowing up option.”
“Right. Down we go then.”
Ziang waved his hand on the computer holo and brought up the engine semantics. He entered the command to eject the core. It took two tries to get the command and his captain code entered and acknowledged.
“We’re losing power to the ship’s computer. If we’re going to do this, it has to be done now,” Ziang said. “I hope to all our gods we don’t end up scattered all over Earth’s atmosphere.”
“I hope we aren’t found by the Earthlings. That’s my main concern. You know what those humans would do to us. ”
“We have to get to the surface in one piece first. Then we’ll worry about the humans.” Ziang tapped in the coordinates where he thought was the best place to land the shuttle. Then he ejected the core.
As it floated away from the shuttle, he raised shields and programmed the phasers to fire. He hoped the shields would protect them from the majority of the blast.
“Ready?”
“As much as I’ll ever be. I wanted to see the wildlife here, but not quite like this.”
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Author Bio
M.A. Church is a true Southern belle who spent many years in the elementary education sector. Now she spends her days lost in fantasy worlds, arguing with hardheaded aliens on far-off planets, herding her numerous shifters, or trying to tempt her country boys away from their fishing poles. It’s a full time job, but hey, someone’s gotta do it!
When not writing, she’s exploring the latest M/M novel to hit the market, watching her beloved Steelers, or sitting glued to HGTV. That’s if she’s not on the back porch tending to the demanding wildlife around the pond in the backyard. The ducks are very outspoken. She’s married to her high school sweetheart, and they have two children.
She was a finalist in the Rainbow awards for 2013 and is a member of Romance Writers of America, Rainbow Romance Writers, and Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America.
Where to find the author:
Blog * Twitter * Facebook * The Harvest FB fan page * Goodreads * Amazon
Thank you for having me!
~M