This is an interview with amazingly prolific, stupendously creative, and magnificently sexy author, LORA LEIGH.  Her work is just incredible and we LIKE IT, as you can see from the many reviews and posts.  I have read nearly all of her work myself and am always entertained, frequently moved to tears, and often panting a bit heavy.  So I’m seriously charged that Sybil has shared this interview with us.

By the way, some of the hyperlinks below are my creation.  Lora and Sybil know nothing about what I’ve done to the text (heh heh).

Please tell me a little bit about yourself and your family.

I’m married to a husband whose type A personality gives me hours of research. Trying to figure him out sometimes requires rocket science.   I have two children, a daughter and a son, three dogs, three tropical birds and a life that is often way too busy. I’m bad to forget the simplest things, and thank God daily that for the most part I can keep my characters and my stories together, because I sure have a hard enough time keeping everything else together.

What hobbies, if any, do you have?

I love gardening, but I don’t get to do near enough of it. I have a few flower beds I work in and forget to water often. Besides writing, reading is my favorite hobby, but I’m such a picky reader that I can’t find enough books to satisfy the habit. I’m horribly picky, and have been known to email favorite authors and beg for ARCs. So far, most of them feel sorry enough for me to give me the goodies.

What kinds of books do you like to read?

Hot, sexy romantic suspense, any genre. I don’t require erotic romance, but I do require sensual. I want the whole package and without it, I’m just not satisfied. I have a few authors that supply that demand, but not near enough to keep up with my voracious appetite for it.

When did you start writing? What or who inspired you to write?

In the seventh grade. I had a teacher, Mr. Mueller. One day he walked into class and said “write me a story”. I don’t think I’ve stopped writing since. I’m still writing Mr. Mueller stories I guess. I have to give him credit for showing me the outlet for the daydreams and the stories that had evolved in my head to that point. He opened a world for me that I had never imagined, and I thank him for that daily.

What type of stories did you write initially?

Romance. I’ve always written romance in some form or another, it’s always fascinated me, always drove me. Romance revolves around so many emotions, so many conflicts, dreams and nightmares, at least in my little world. So it’s the genre I’ve always gravitated toward. As a freshman in highschool I found Harlequin Romances, my first romance was When Seagulls Cry, I remember the title, the characters and the story, even now, and how it impacted me. After that, there was turning back. I was writing romance.

How did the idea for the Breeds books come about?

Several different ways, but it began with an internet news article about experimentation into genetic alterations and questioned the results of predatory animal DNA being introduced with human DNA. What would that create? How would it effect a man or a woman to feel, to be taught, trained, convinced they were not human, nor were they animal. That they were tools, disposable creatures. Characters began slamming into my head. The first book was merely sensual, then one day on an authors loop, someone questioned using the sexual differences that animals possessed within werewolf stories, etc. As I remember, several authors were hesitant to do this, but the idea took hold of me. I revised Tempting The Beast within a few weeks and my first Breed was born. It’s been a love affair from that day on. I can’t envision not writing Breeds, because there’s so much they would face, so many things they would have to deal with. I love writing that series.

Where does your inspiration come from to keep writing such fantastic stories?

My inspiration comes from everything, everyone, waking and asleep. Sometimes I dream the characters and the stories. Sometimes, an email, a newstory or a chance comment overheard will slam the idea into my head. Sometimes, it just happens though. One minute you’re breathing and relaxing, the next you hear a cry in a your mind and see a story that has to be told. I love the evolution of the stories and the characters, I look forward to sleeping because I dream them, and waking up to write them. The whole process is as essential to me as air itself I think.

What was the name of the first book you had published? How did you feel when you had your first published story in your hand?

The first book published was Broken Wings, originally through Zumaya Publications, but I didn’t get to hold that first print book until Marly’s Choice at Ellora’s Cave. It was… like being out of step all your life, then suddenly, everything was right where it should be. I remember looking at that book, seeing my name on it, knowing my characters were in it, and feeling that finally I’d found something I’d been searching for all my life.

Have you published anything else, e.g. short stories, articles, non-fiction etc.?

I had a short story on an eZine that has sinced closed. It’s put back for a longer story later. I’ve not written anything else that I can think of, at least nothing that’s been published.

Looking at your website, I can see that you have quite a packed writing schedule. How do you keep all your stories straight?

How do you keep your aunts and uncles straight? Do you get your brother’s and sister’s mixed up? Now, sometimes I’ll forget eye or hair color, but I don’t have a problem keeping the characters themselves separate, because in my head, they’re separate, individual, and full of life. I know them better than I know myself.

How does your family cope with your writing career?

Well, I work at home, I work around my family. My daughter is married and now lives away from me, but I get to see her often. Family visits and my son will stand in front of my desk and play his guitar when he wants me to listen. He talks to me when I’m writing, and we talk a lot when I take breaks. My office doesn’t have a closed door. If he needs me, he knows I’m here. My husband takes care of the business and most of the promotional demands that come through, and he does all the cooking. And he’s a wonderful cook. So it all pretty much works together well.

Do you have a set writing area? Do you listen to any particular music when you write?

I have my office, and when I want to write outside I have my laptop and wireless internet. For the most part, I write at my desk though. I get up, start writing, and usually work between ten to eighteen hours a day, depending on how well the story is flowing. I do listen to music. Mostly Sarah McLachlan. Something about her music opens up my mind. Occassionally I’ll listen to Evanescence or the Miami Vice soundtrack, but rarely music that I want to sing along with. Country music distracts me. I listen to a lot of techno music, because I can’t understand the words being sung, but I love the beat.

Do you plan your stories, or do you plunge right into writing them?

I plunge in and write by the seat of my pants. Sometimes it works out well, sometimes I end twenty different stories before I have the finished product. But I write very fast. I’m completely impatient, so I have to get that story out of my head and get to the next one to see what those characters are doing. I’m not just impatient, I’m nosy, and my characters are nice enough to spill their guts to me for the most part.

Does anything in your background/life experiences influence your writing?

I think to a point every fiction writer is influenced by their out pasts or their own lives. What we are and what we’ve experienced, seen, heard, or felt plays a part in what we write. Like my Bound Hearts series, the eighth book Forbidden Pleasure, releases June 12, 2007, I started writing this series because I found myself judging a friend’s sexual lifestyle. It was an odd thought in my head, that when it hit, I had to sit down, because this friend is so dear to me, it hurt me to catch myself judging anything she did. Bound Hearts was an attempt to understand that lifestyle within my own head and heart. So yes, I’d say in many instances past, present, friendships, whatever, they all play a part.

Have you had any rejected manuscripts? If so, how did you deal with rejection?

Oh many. I sent in my first submission when I was 18, and was rejected until Zumaya’s Publications accepted Broken Wings. After going with Ellora’s Cave, there was period of two years there that New York rejected everything I sent them then as well. So I’ve had a lot of rejections, but I’ve tried to take it as a learning experience, and find ways to try harder, or to write better.

What advice, if any, would you have for our aspiring authors?

Always be open to critique, and always listen to your character’s hearts. That, with your own writers intuition will normally guide you. It’s what I’ve always depended on.

I’d better stop now, though there’s more I’d like to ask.  Thank you for answering my questions, Lora.

Thank you for asking  And thank you so much for the opportunity to talk about my books, my characters and my writing.

And coming in August, the next of Lora’s The Breed series, Tanner’s Scheme.

Now it is your turn. Got a question for Lora? This is the place!

I know many of you loved the books, feel free to tell us about it. What is your favorite book or series? Why do you lurve it best? Some of you didn’t enjoy the books as much or at all, you are welcome to comment as well, tell us what didn’t work in the plots and ask why things happened or why they didn’t. (no bashing of fangrrls or authors please – it will be deleted without question)

The author is in the house, so lets talk books. Thanks go to Lora for being willing to be something of a ‘live interview’! And thanks to you guys for playing. I will have a contest up shortly *g*.

Lora Leigh will be around to answer questions until 3 Eastern/4 CST