Search This Blog

July 24, 2012

Get to Know: Mindy Hardwick & Weaving Magic

A big PP welcome to Mindy Hardwick! Let's get the inside scoop:



How did you get from your day job to writing romance?  I took a leap of faith and trusted a net would appear.  I was a middle and high school teacher, and although I enjoyed my students, I kept feeling not quite satisfied. I went back to school for an MFA in Writing for Children and Young Adults, and afterwards, left teaching to write. I published freelance articles for about seven years before my books published.



What are your three favorite books of all time?
  1. A Little Princess by Frances Hodgson Burnett
  2. The Missing Piece by Shel Silverstein
  3. Homecoming and Dicey’s Song by Cynthia Voigt
Mindy Hardwick
Morning, afternoon, or evening person?  Morning

Music--with or without? What kind?  Without

First or third POV?  First

How's tricks? Do you juggle multiple projects? Lots of multiple projects! Right now, I’m working on drafting the third story in a contemporary romance novella series, drafting a children’s chapter book, and brainstorming for a contemporary romance.

What's harder: beginning, middle, or the end? Middle


Revisions: Love 'em or hate 'em?  Love ‘em!

How did you come up with that title?  He loves magic and she loves weaving—hence, WEAVING MAGIC.

Fill in this blank: My ideal fictional hero would think me gorgeous no matter…what I looked like in the morning!

What's your favorite dessert?   Fudge.

Do you write at home or someplace else? There is a new coffee and crepe shop which opened and is my new favorite place to write.

What's your favorite type of hero/heroine and why? I am a sucker for the bad boy hero. I run a poetry workshop with teens in a juvenile detention, and my main character, Christopher, is bad boy turned good in WEAVING MAGIC.
Excerpt:
Everything would be okay, I told myself. Christopher was my boyfriend. I trusted him. I crunched inside the wicker basket and curled my legs underneath me. I wiped my sweating palms onto my black slacks. The audience stopped calling for an encore. They were so silent I wasn’t sure anyone was still out there.

I’d barely gotten my balance before the first sword barreled into the basket with a lot more force than we’d practiced. Startled, I realized Christopher was keyed up from the magic show performance. He was overestimating the force he was putting behind the swords.

I tried to figure out how to tell him to slow down. I couldn’t very well call out to him or the audience would hear.


Before I could it figure out, the second sword zoomed past me and into the basket. The two swords crossed over my head, and I rearranged myself so I could crouch lower. As I shifted, a third sword whizzed by my left arm and peeled off a small layer of my skin. I saw the blood before I felt the searing pain.

Buy Links:

10 comments:

Vicki Batman, sassy writer said...

Good morning, Mindy! Thanks for visiting the Plotting Princesses and telling all the good stuff.

What would you say was difficult to write about this book?

Mindy Hardwick said...

Thanks for hosting me on the Plotting Princesses!

The hardest part about writing WEAVING MAGIC was keeping the two character's story lines intersecting. I had to make sure that when I ended one chapter with main character, Shantel, that the next chapter would pick up with main character, Christopher and their stories would continue to intersect and keep both of them on the page. I learned a lot about plotting writing WEAVING MAGIC!

Pamela Stone said...

Hi Mindy and welcome to the Plotting Princesses. I am in awe of your ability to juggle multiple projects. When it comes to writing, I am single minded to an extreme. But I am right there with you on the middle being the hardest part. Best of luck with your writing.

Unknown said...

Want this! Reminds me of SEP's scene involving a whip-trick that missed it's intended target and struck the heroine! Very emotional and you know the hero puts a new layer on remorse. Love the interview, of course, and I could just feel the atmosphere of your new writing place.

Mindy Hardwick said...

Thanks Pamela! I am in the middle of one of the writing projects. Painful!

Mindy Hardwick said...

Thanks Karen! Yes, I think there will have to be a crepe, coffee spot in a future story! The smells and tastes are too good to pass up!

Kathleen Baldwin said...

Hi Mindy!

Nice to meet you! good luck with the book - it sounds action packed.

Glad you could visit with us today The Princesses are a fun group.

Karilyn Bentley said...

Hi Mindy,
Welcome to the PP blog! I liked Dicey's Song and Homecoming too when I was a kid. Cool! And I loved your excerpt. Wanna see how that scene turns out!

Thanks for visiting us today!

Mindy Hardwick said...

The Plotting Princess is a great blog, Kathleen! Thanks for having me!

@Karilyn--I'm glad you enjoyed the scene...it's a good teaser for the book, eh?

Gareth Clapton said...

You can get a tattoo of an angel, it will protect you from all sorts of trouble.