Heart Knot Mine Blog Tour
Lily Velden lives on the east coast of Australia, her family having
emigrated from Holland
when she was a child.
She’s both a left and right brain person, holding qualifications in both
Finance and Fine Arts. She tells her friends that her way with numbers will
make her a profitable artist and writer… one day.
Lily has always had a love of language and a beautifully crafted
sentence, and admits to having a fetish for collecting quotes, poems, and song
lyrics. What she won’t admit to is how many notebooks she’s filled with those
quotes… Her fascination carries on into her artworks where she often
incorporates text. When a shoulder injury slowed down her art practice she
decided to explore her love of the written word more fully and began writing.
“I’ll paint my pictures with words.”
Not that she’s abandoned artmaking in its entirety—Lily collaborates on
the designs for all her book covers.
There are many things Lily loves, here are just a few of the PG rated
ones: a good laugh (all the better if caused by a naughty joke), the smell of
freshly baked goods and mown grass, a smile from a stranger, rainbows after the
rain, and witnessing a promise kept.
Her latest book is the M/M Contemporary Romance, Heart Knot Mine.
Has writing been
something you always did, or was it a discovered talent that came to you at a
later point?
I’ve always written, starting with short
stories that I’d illustrate when I was a child, but it wasn’t something I
thought I’d pursue as a career. For me, it was something to amuse myself with,
and as I grew older, to share with family and friends.
It was only after a car accident where I
injured my neck and shoulders that I devoted more time to it. After I’d written
approximately two-thirds of a novel I showed it to a friend and she encouraged
me to finish it and submit it to a publisher. The rest, as they say, is
history.
Now, I’m obsessed with writing!
Do you remember how
it felt when you were offered that first contract? What emotions stand out in
your memory?
The wait time from submission to the yay or
nay would have to be one of the hardest waits I’ve ever had to endure. It is
truly excruciating.
When I woke up one morning about eight weeks
after submitting my manuscript and checked my emails and saw a message from the
publishing house, I started to shake. I must admit, I was too scared to open it
at first.
I dealt with every other email first and
each time I went back to the inbox the publisher’s email seemed to grow in
size. Even with all my emails answered and filed, I stared at that email for a
long time before I finally plucked up the courage to open it. When I read the
sentence about them offering me a contract I burst into tears. I was a
veritable fountain! I don’t know which emotion was stronger –happiness or
relief.
If I’m being honest, I’d have to admit to
having similar reactions to subsequent submissions!
Is this a first
book, part of a series, or the latest in a long line of many?
Heart Knot Mine
started as a stand-alone, but somewhere along the line the continuation of Noah
and Robert’s story began to sound like a great idea! They’ll have to wait
though, because Jonah and his guardian angel from Echoes of Mercy are getting rather impatient with me! They want
me to finish their story.
What is the oddest thing that’s happened to you since you chose to
become a professional writer? Will it ever make it into a book, or is that a
secret?
I don’t know whether to
admit to this or not. I feel so shy about it, but I’d have to say the oddest
thing that’s happened is the earning of a male admirer who is quite a few years
my junior.
Will it make it into a
book? Possibly, but seeing as I write M/M, I guess I’ll have to become a man!
Of course, the fact that I write M/M and my admirer is straight is part of what
makes it odd! Still, I can just see me with grey hair at my temples and glasses
perched on my nose. I’d look ever so sexy…
Do you have your
next book underway, or other titles in the planning stages?
I usually write more than one story at a
time. It depends on who is talking the loudest on any given day! Currently, I’m
working on Jonah’s story which is Echoes
of Mercy. It involves a journey he goes on with his guardian angel. It
sad and sweet and funny and should be out sometime over the summer.
After that Jaxon and Liam have insisted I
finish the third book in their series (How
the Light Gets In) and trust me, Jaxon can be quite persuasive!
Do you have a
favourite genre and why? Is it one you write in, read in, or both?
I do love the genre I predominantly write in
which is Contemporary Romance, but I have a soft spot for both historical
novels and dystopian future ones. Oh and I love ones like the Da Vinci Code
where facts are woven into the fiction and the reader is required to solve
puzzles and race against the clock! A good old whodunit is a winner with me
too. Hell, I just like to read a good story!
What, to you, is
the most exciting part of the writing process? Does it change from book to book
or remain the same?
It remains the same for each book and it’s
the beginning of finally putting words on the page for a new story. I spend a
lot of time getting to know my characters and so it’s great when we’re all
ready for me to start the actual writing. It feels like I’m about to embark on
a wonderful adventure with friends with endless possibilities unfolding before
us. It’s exciting.
If you could
co-author a book with anyone, who would you choose and why? What kind of book
do you think would come from the collaboration?
I think I’d have to go with Ira Levin and
we’d come up with some freakish dystopian future novel. It would be scary and
unnerving because we’d make it all sound so plausible.
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Information
Despite a successful college teaching career, Noah Daniels has become depressed. He feels he’s leading a monochromatic life: love has eluded him. When he’s offered a chance to teach in London as part of an exchange program, he accepts, hoping a change of scenery will do him good. But once he’s there, his outlook on love and sexuality changes in ways he never expected.
Robert Callinan is Noah’s English counterpart in the program. The men exchange not only their jobs, but also their homes, and it is what Noah stumbles across while staying at Robert’s house that sends him on a journey of self-discovery—both mentally and physically. A journey that puts color back into his life… just not in the way he expected. When the exchange program ends, Noah has to go home, but he doesn’t know if he wants to return to the life he left behind.
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Sitting with my ass
parked on my favorite barstool, at my favorite bar—the Redhead Piano Bar on Ontario—I nursed my
bourbon and silently asked myself the usual questions. Well, actually, it was
really only the one question phrased a hundred different ways. That’s what
happened when you went the route of academia—you learned how to complicate the
shit out of things and use fancy-schmancy words. If you thought about it, it
was a bit ridiculous to be using three-plus-syllable words to ask a question,
when most of us were usually seeking a simple one- or two-syllable word answer.
Yes. No. And, if we’d really lucked out: maybe.
I snorted into my drink,
remembering the words of my most admired college professor, Ross Whedon: Noah Daniels, how many times have I told
you? An academic will always take a whole paragraph for what could have been
said in one sentence. Christ, even my thoughts were long-winded.
What was my question
again?
Oh, yeah.
What the hell is wrong with me?
I mean, really, what the
hell was wrong with me? She was
gorgeous. Tall and willowy, with long, flowing mahogany hair that still managed
to look sleek and glossy under the dim lights of the bar. Big brown eyes, clear
skin, an impressive rack, and when she walked away from me, I saw she had a
great peach-shaped ass.
That’s right, she walked
away. Why?
Because I gave her the
brush-off. That’s why.
Hence my question. What the hell is wrong with me?
She wasn’t irritating.
Her voice didn’t grate. Quite the contrary. She was charming and friendly. In
fact, I’d go so far as to say she was interesting and articulate—she was in PR.
Surely that meant she could string together a sentence?—and yet, I’d passed on
her not so subtle come-on. I looked at her again, knowing I could have her if I
wanted her, but try as I might, I couldn’t muster even the slightest bit of
enthusiasm for the idea.
And that was the problem.
Me and enthusiasm didn’t
seem to be on speaking terms anymore. All the color had seeped out of my life.
I was living a monochromatic, black-and-white photograph of a life where
everything was a shade of tedious.
I wasn’t sure how it
happened, or even when it happened.
It just had.
It crept up on me, like a
slow-spreading parasitic vine, gradually sapping the vibrancy from my life. One
day I woke up and everything was gray, dull, and lifeless.
And it had been that way
for a while.
Lifting the glass, I
paused, letting the bourbon wet my lips before throwing my head back and
tossing down the last of my drink. Closing my eyes, I hissed, relishing the
searing burn to my throat—a small reminder I was actually alive—a living,
breathing, sentient being and not merely a walking, talking robot.
If only there was a whiskey
burn for my emotions, I’d be set.
Glancing down at the aged
cherrywood bar, I vaguely wondered what they used to achieve such a high
polish. It was almost mirrorlike in its sheen. I could clearly see my face
reflected upon its surface.
And instantly wished I
hadn’t.
After grimacing at the
shell staring back at me, I decided scrutinizing myself wasn’t such a good
idea. Taking my own advice, I looked up, meeting Seth the bartender’s gaze. He
raised his eyebrow at me in query, and I gave him a brief nod, watching as he
poured me another finger of Booker’s.
As he slid it across to
me, not a word was spoken. I nodded, he nodded, and we both went back to doing
our own separate things—me to thinking, him to serving the other patrons. The
opening notes of a melody from the piano situated at the opposite end of the
dimly lit room, and the dulcet tones of Stella McClaren floated above the
chatter of the Thursday-night crowd. They went quiet as she continued. I wasn’t
surprised. She was good.
The start of the music was
my alarm clock, telling me it must be eight
o’clock. Time to head home to the never-ending pile of papers
waiting to be graded.
Sighing at the thought of
what awaited me, I took another sip of the amber fire in my glass and swirled
it around my mouth before letting it seep, drop by drop, down the back of my
throat. Once again, I said my silent thanks to the bourbon for serving a dual
purpose: anesthetizing me while at the same time reminding me, with its burn, I
was still alive and breathing. Quite an achievement.
Chincoteague Island, Virginia
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