This month’s blogger interview is with The Romance Cover. I love Donna. She has been so good to me and most recently I have her quoted on the back cover of the Hale Brothers Series box set. If you haven’t stopped by her blog… make sure you do!
1. You are blog The Romance Cover – Tell me a little bit about yourself…
Well, my name is Donna and I am one half of The Romance Cover. I am 41 years old, married and have three children aged 6, 5 & 4. By day I am an accountant, wife and mum and by night, still wife and mum but an avid reader and blogger. My life is busy and hectic so I use reading as an escape and I love nothing more than getting wrapped up in a good book. I read A LOT, usually a book a day but I am a quick reader. I love emotional reads, I love a tear jerker, yet I love my general romances and dark reads too, really I love anything bar historical. I play darts for a ladies darts league and I am also currently working through a proof reading course so that I can give back to the writing and reading world.
2. How did you get into blogging and why do you do it?
As I said above, I am one half of The Romance Cover, the other half is Willow. One day quite a few years ago I was trawling Amazon as one does and came across a chat thread that was titled “What to read after Easy…” and the question was posed by Willow, I answered and gave some book recommendations and we just started chatting daily about books. This went on for well over a year and we spoke on Amazon every day. We then exchanged numbers and facebook friendships and went on from there. One day Willow suggested we start a blog, she had been thinking about it for a while and asked if I would join her. From that day The Romance Cover was born. Willow is the technical guru and does all the blog posts on our blog page she also maintains the diary and emails, she also reads and reviews when she can.
Me on the other hand is the avid reader and reviewer and I also stalk all the authors, make friendships and just generally talk books to anyone who will listen. I look after our Facebook page and do the posts on their and make sure they make their way onto other social media sites.
For both of us, we just loved books and loved talking about books, there is nothing more exciting than finding a new author and finding a gem of a book. We love to read newbies as well as established and if we love it, we will pimp it to high heaven. If only one person reads and review and then purchases the book we have achieved something and that is what we set out to do. To tell people about the books we love and help the authors that write them.
3. If you could sit and have lunch with three authors, who would it be and why?
This is a tricky question because I love so many authors and ideally I would love to sit and chat with all of them. I have already met a few at various signings so I will pick some that I have not already met:-
- Tiffany Reisz- I absolutely adore her “Original Sinners” Series, she has a way with words and her books are risque, yet emotional and captivating all the same. Her characters are flawed yet perfect and while their life is not ideal or normal to the average lay person, it is perfect for them.
- RL Griffin – she has written some amazing books and is not as well recognised as she should be. I read her first published book not long after it came out, it was called By A Thread and the characters struck a chord. So much so I reached out to her on Facebook and we started chatting. She recently wrote a book called Razorblade Kisses and it absolutely killed me, this woman can write. Now another 4 books later and we still chat daily and I don’t see her as an author any more but a friend. We still haven’t met but I feel like we know each other just through our conversations. I cannot wait to meet her…one day…
- As I said, I support the newbies and this author was another one I stumbled on by trawling Amazon, her name is Marni Mann and I have loved everything she has written, she has written the erotic and the emotional and romantic and she can seemingly turn her hand to anything she wants. Her Seductive Shadows series is hot and steamy and her Bar Harbour series is contemporary and romantic, but she can write and again is not very well known. Another author that needs some recognition.
4. Which character in my books so far do you like the most and why?
To be honest this is a really hard question, the Hale men are totally and utterly perfect in their own imperfect way. I love them all but for totally different reasons. Before reading Unforgettable Sun, I would have said that Beau pipped it because he really went through the mill yet still came out a survivor and he never lost his sense of humour. His useless facts have kept me entertained for three books now and the way he has grown as a person and as a father is so endearing. Now we have Matty and this man truly broke my heart, his story had me in tears, he was so broken, so cut off from society and everyone, he never felt wanted or loved and began to believe he just wasn’t destined for love. To see the change in him was remarkable and beautiful and really moved me. So Matty may have just edged it, but even Drew left his mark too….gah this is too hard…and cruel.
5. Tell me something on your bucket list.
My bucket list…hmmmm I am by no means an adrenaline junkie and there is nothing really interesting on there. Just general things I would at least like to try and do. Neither me nor my husband particularly like flying, we are fine on shortish flights but long flights give us the heebie jeebies, however, we are determined to take the children to Disney World when they are old enough to appreciate it. So flight be damned, I will be on American soil at some point and I cannot wait to have an explore. It is one country I have wanted to visit for a long time but have just been too scared to fly to. It is amazing how children change you and you will do anything to give them everything you possibly can, even if it means a long flight…
Couldn’t agree more. Great to see my lovely friend being interviewed.