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| Photo: Dan Whale/Unsplash |
Today's featured author wrote a very summer-y book. Find out more about Six de los Reyes and discover her nerdy side (YAY, NERDS ARE SEXY!) from my interview.
- What is your inspiration in writing “Sounds Like Summer”?Like most stories, Sounds Like Summer is a product of my imagination, my fascination and love of music festivals, and my inevitable propensity to write about conversations I’m not invited in. Sounds Like Summer is part of the #SparkNA class mentored by Mina V. Esguerra and sponsored by Spark Anvil. The theme was “Be Brave” Write in striking clarity the truth you’re afraid of. At the time, I was on field with several research associates and one drunken night at the beach, we shared stories about our lab lives and the dark clouds that follow us along. I did not set out to write about depression or touch on mental health. I just wanted to write about the beach and a music festival, but the character of Lux had anchored herself in my mind and I knew I had to write about her and her journey.
- How is your writing process like? Do you have any quirks in your writing process?I outline! Outlines are very useful. They give me structure and provide a reference point for each part of the story. As for quirks, every book has a “personality”, and some are more demanding than others. Lux and Micah were nicer to me. While they did set me off into a frenzied panic, afraid I’d lose the words before I wrote them down, they didn’t demand to be written at odd hours of the night and they didn’t wake me up after only two hours of sleep. I can’t multitask, so when I write it’s the only thing I need to be doing. Can’t have snacks or drinks—I always forget about them.
- If you will be given a minute of face to face encounter with any of your book characters, who would you want it to be with and what would you say to him or her?Can I cheat and say instead of meeting with just one character, can I just attend an EDR concert and watch NICO, Rhys, Egosonic, Arabella and everyone else perform live? (with a backstage pass and a meet and greet HAHA!)
- Do you believe in love at first sight? Why or why not?I don’t think about it as “love” at first sight, but I think sometimes you get this feeling, this inkling like how an object gains potential energy, gravitational or elastic, and then it reaches that instantaneous point when force is released and sparks fly, so to speak. I guess in short, it might not be love, but a potential love.
- Give us your best banat or pick-up line.Hi. Would you like to conduct an experiment with me? I can talk nerdy all night.
- Finally, use “spark” in a sentence.Sorry, was that a spark? Let me review the voltage applied to the current, I can’t seem to resist you.
Six de los Reyes has been reading and making up stories for as far as she can remember. In fifth
grade, she learned to wield dragons and phoenixes through written word. As a pretend grownup, she writes contemporary romance novellas. Her day job doing science has something to do with being part-time labrat. She currently lives next to the sea.
Other works include Just for the Record and Beginner's Guide: Love and Other Chemical Reactions.
Synopsis:
It’s not just a weekend for Lux Castelo. She has a plan, of course.
Phase One: Escape to the beach for a music festival.
Phase Two: Deal with what she can’t control.
Phase Three: Return to reality whole and ready.
Nowhere in that plan is Micah Jacinto, self-proclaimed adventurer and the kind of boy with his head stuck in the clouds and the moon inked on his arm—everything her rational sense tells her to stay away from. And yet Lux finds herself welcoming the distraction. As they spend the entire weekend together, Micah leads her to rediscover the lost pieces of herself amidst the excitement and the confusion of a raving mosh pit.
But all weekends come to an end and Lux needs to return to the dreaded reality she’s running away from. Does being brave enough to leave summer behind mean being brave enough to ask Micah to stay?
