SEELIE KAY: Postcards from The Ledge: This Week in The Loft: Author Maggie Blackbird!

Joining me today The Loft is fellow eXtasy author Maggie Blackbird. An Ojibway from Northwestern Ontario, Maggie resides in the country with her husband and their fur babies, two beautiful Alaskan Malamutes. When she’s not writing, she can be found pulling weeds in the flower beds, mowing the huge lawn, walking her dogs deep in the bush, teeing up a ball at the golf course, fishing in the boat for walleye, or sitting on the deck at her sister’s house, making more wonderful memories with the people she loves most.

The Avatar of Author Maggie Blackbird

S: Thanks for joining me today, Maggie!

Why did you become a writer?

M: Writing has always been a part of me, something I did for fun. So I can’t say I became a writer. Why did I become an author? Because I wanted to share my stories with the world in hopes others will enjoy them as much as I loved writing them.

S: What attracts you to the romance genre?

M: The conflict and resolution between the two main protagonists. There is something satisfying about the two making the journey together toward their happily ever after.

S: I have a friend who claims that you have to love romance to write about it. That seems to be true for you.

What is the best or worst thing that has ever happened to you as a writer?

M: For the best, it was submitting to eXtasy Books--the second place I submitted to after I withdrew my submission from another publisher--and expecting to wait for the standard eight to 12 weeks turnaround time to hear whether my manuscript would get the yay or nay. Instead, the owner emailed me the very next morning stating she wanted my book. Whee! As for the worst, this is tough because I’m a naturally optimistic person. Even during the worst situations, I find something good to take from the experience, whether a lesson learned, etc. But if I did have to choose, I’d say getting my first full request from an agent and then being told she didn’t connect with my writing. As I said, though, there is always a silver lining, because if not for her rejection, I wouldn’t have connected with another eXtasy author to ask her about the publishing house.

S: Our stories are pretty similar. I also pulled my submission from the first publisher I submitted to, but it was due to a disagreement over the contract.

If you had to do it all over again, would you still choose to write books?

M: I sure would. I have to write. It’s in my blood.

S: Have you ever “shelved” a book?

M: I sure have. I shelved eight. (Laughs.) Seriously. The seven-book series was written in the 90s and I still had a long way to go as a potential author. Those manuscripts weren’t fit for publication and still aren’t. The same goes for the other manuscript. It was a great idea, and I loved what I wrote, but I’d have to completely re-write everything to make it work.

S: What inspired "Knight Moves?"

M: This is an easy question because it’s the third book in the When We Were Young series, so I had to write it. As for the inspiration for the series, it came from another “shelved” manuscript. Oops, make that nine I shelved! I was very much taken with the character of René Oshawee, who was the chief one hero has a major crush on. I wanted to know more about René. Then when I began the next book--oops another shelved book, so make that 10 now, but who’s counting--René had a bigger role. Even some backstory. And his backstory was Billy Redsky, the major hero in the When We Were Young series. At first, I tried writing them as adults, but Billy kept insisting I go deeper into their history, so I started writing a short story about their youth. This expanded into a novel. In the first draft, Billy was 13 and René was 17. But I scrapped that and upped Billy’s age to 14. I scrapped that, too. His perfect age, I found, was 15, and it worked well! Some might say that’s a lot of writing to waste. Not so for me. I love writing. So I find that even if the work stays on my hard drive, all writing is good writing and tons of fun.

Here's the blurb--

After receiving his grade twelve diploma and marking his eighteenth birthday, René Oshawee cannot fight the temptation seventeen-year-old high school junior Billy Redsky blatantly offers now that what they share has become taboo.

When their secret romance is blown into the open, Billy’s foster parents send René to Toronto to complete the last of his schooling under the supervision of a family friend, leaving Billy behind at their Ojibway community.

Now Billy and René must make the biggest decision of their lives—fight for the true love they know they’ll never find with anyone else or go their separate ways.