Start the week with LINDA MORRIS

Tipped violently forward with the engine still running, its rear wheels spinning in mid-air, was a wrecked SUV. Its front end was crumpled and its windshield spider-webbed with cracks. The vehicle didn't belong to anyone she knew. She flicked on her flashlight again and surveyed the damage.

It was no mystery why the SUV had crashed. Weakened by the heavy rains, the driveway had crumbled away on the lake side for a distance of at least twenty feet. Under the front bumper, an electrical pole lay in pieces. The driveway was unlit and treacherous at night. In the dark, the stranger must have swerved to avoid the washout and taken out the electrical pole instead. That explained the power outage.

Wanting to help, but still leery of a possible intruder, not to mention the downed power lines, Lara moved warily around to the driver's side. She pointed the beam of her light through the windshield and caught a glimpse of a figure slumped over the steering wheel.

Lara pulled the driver's side door open and blinked in the sudden brightness as the SUV's dome light came on. The driver, a man, was the only passenger in the vehicle. She got only a quick impression of thick dark hair and a lean body before she saw the blood. "Dear God," she whispered. Blood flowed copiously from the injury to his head.

She reached out to touch his arm, for what purpose, she wasn't sure. Was she going to shake him awake, or check for injuries?

"Get away." He lifted his head. His eyes opened, green and shockingly alert for a man who had appeared to be unconscious moments before, as he turned to capture her gaze.

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You just read an excerpt from:
Forget-Me-Not
by
Linda Morris

Buy Link: The Wild Rose Press
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Linda Kage: Today we're here with published romance author, LINDA MORRIS. Hi, Linda! Why don't you tell us a little about you and what you write please.

Linda Morris:I write romantic suspense, emphasis on the romantic, with well-developed characters. I'm a bit of a genre-hopper, though, and I dabble in historicals as well. I've got a short western novella out, too.

Kage: What happened to the first book you ever wrote?

Linda Morris:It's moldering (deservedly) at the bottom of a landfill somewhere, I guess. It was called When Zephyrs Blow. It had nothing to do with zephyrs or wind or anything blowing, and it had no discernible plot. Instead, it had lots of scenes of people having dinner. It did teach me at least two important things, though: Novels need plots, and titles should somehow be at least remotely connected to what the book is about. It was the first of several disastrous but ultimately very instructive attempts on my part to write a novel. In my defense, I was a teenager.

Kage:What’s your backlist and coming soon bookshelf look like?

Linda Morris:My first book, Montana Belle, the aforementioned western novella, just came out on Dec. 29th. Forget-Me-Not, a romantic suspense, was just released on Feb. 18th. After two such quick releases, the pressure is now on for me to finish my work in progress!

Kage: Which story are we going to talk about today?

Linda Morris: Forget-Me-Not is a romantic suspense about Lara Crosby, a woman who leaves the world of Chicago politics behind her after some professional and personal disasters. One night at her remote wilderness cabin, a car accident involving an enigmatic stranger leaves her wondering if her past has caught up with her. There's just one problem: The stranger has suffered a head injury, and can't remember who he is or why he's come to find Lara. Together, they piece his shady past together, uncovering dangerous secrets and falling in love along the way.

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Forget-Me-Not
by
Linda Morris

Lara Crosby left Chicago when her career as a big-time political fundraiser turned very ugly. Determined to put the past behind her, she envisions a peaceful new life at her cabin in northern Minnesota. Everything changes on a dark night when a mysterious and attractive stranger suffers an accident outside her cabin.

Jacob Sumner awakes in the wilderness after a car accident with no idea who he is or why he was coming to see Lara Crosby. She's beautiful and sweet, but she's a world away from the gritty world where he makes his living as a private investigator…or is she?
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Kage: What would the story be rated if it were a movie?

Linda Morris: I would give a PG-13, leaning to R. It's sexy, but not too explicit..

Kage: If you HAD to fit this story into a cliché, which one would it be?

Linda Morris:It's a "him and her against the bad guys" story.

Kage:Okay, now that we have a general idea which class to fit Forget-Me-Not under, what makes this book so unique from every other book out there?

Linda Morris: The hero, Jake, is pretty tortured, which was fun to write. He knows he has a dark past, but due to an accident that occurs at the beginning of the book in a remote area, he's uncertain about quite *how* dark it is. Due to his memory loss, he has to retrace his past, with the help of the heroine, Lara. Lara is a fun character too: She has a background in politics, which is a field I'm fascinated with, but she left it behind when she felt like the needed the sanctuary of her grandfather's remote wilderness cabin.

Also, it's the hero who has amnesia, which you don't see often. Somehow, it's always the heroine who has the memory loss. I wondered why that is and set out to do things differently.

Kage:What was the easiest part to write?

Linda Morris: Probably the characters were the easiest, which is typical for me. I got to know Jake and Lara really well and liked them a lot too. I enjoy writing scenes from the hero's point of view because writing convincing male characters is a fun challenge. Writing a character with memory loss was challenging too, because although he has a history and a personality, his life story was a bit of a blank slate, to him anyway.

Kage:What do you like most about the main character(s) and what do you like least? Did you learn anything from them?

Linda Morris: Don't want to give away too much, but I admire the hero's discovery that it's never too late for redemption. My heroine Lara struggles to break away from her family's expectations in a way that a lot of people can probably relate to.

Kage: Linda, Thank you so much for stopping by today and gracing us with your presence. Before we go, is there anything else you’d like to say to wrap things up?

Linda Morris: I hope everybody enjoys reading the book as much as I enjoyed writing it!

If you're still curious about Linda, here are other places to find her on the web:



Blog: http://lindamorriswriter.blogspot.com/


MONTANA BELLE Buy Link: The Wild Rose Press