Author on Board: Flossie Benton Rogers Welcomes Kenzie Michaels

Please welcome fabulous author Kenzie Michaels! She’s here to tell us about her new SciFi Romance entitled Heart’s Last Chance coming out from Secret Cravings Publishing and how she got started in the genre.

Good morning! Ever wonder how a romance author gets her ideas? Well, for this author, it all began back in 1978, when I ‘swore’ I would ‘never’ see the new movie, Star Wars. My best friend and I saw the trailer and decided right then and there it looked too violent. A few months later, my parents herded my sister and I into the car and we left for an adventure.

Dad hadn’t told us we were traveling to Indianapolis to see Star Wars on a larger screen than our theaters had. I was stuck. Nothing else was playing at that theater that I wanted to see, so I reluctantly accepted my bag of buttered popcorn and followed my parents into the darkened room, prepared to be bored out of my skull.

Two hours later, however, I was excitedly rehashing it with my dad on the way home, and over the next several months, would see that movie twenty-eight times, plus switch my undying love from blonde Luke Skywalker to the dark, dashing bad boy Han Solo.

When Empire Strikes Back finished on a cliffhanger, I decided to write my own ending in English Class during our Creative Writing time. By the end of the school year, my teacher was literally begging me to write something else!

I finished that story, but had to wait two more years for Return of the Jedi to arrive in theaters, and discovered something: In my wonderful, 27 page story, I’d forgotten the main plot! My story simply focused on rescuing Han Solo, something Spielburg managed to attain in, what, the first hour of the film?

Looking back, I see now I was destined for the Happily Ever After in Romance books, even while I dabbled in Women’s Fiction under another pen name.

In 2002, when I was first introduced to e-books, I went to the popular publisher’s site and downloaded two books. One of them, a short called Water Lust, held my interest so much, I read it several times over the next week. I decided to try my hand at something of that heat level.

I locked myself in my room, blushed furiously every time I wrote certain slang terms to describe the female and male anatomy, and after my hero told me he wasn’t human, I stopped, finished the scene, then put it away. How could I write about aliens? Didn’t my 9th grade story prove I was horrible at it?

Last year, I unearthed that notebook and dusted it off. Hmmm….I reread it and voila, ideas kept nudging me. I decided to make it my NaNo project, and see if it went anywhere.

Nov 30, 2013, I typed ‘the end’, and nearly cried. My hero’s siblings began clamoring for their stories! How did this happen? How did a contemporary romance author suddenly switch over to Sci-Fi Romance?

Contemporary Romance will always be my first love. And I hope after the next four books of The Chosen series are written, I’ll dust off some more of those contemporary wips and get them finished.

Here’s a look at Book #1, Heart’s Last Chance, which releases Sept 12th at Secret Cravings Publishing. Enjoy!

Blurb:
Everyone has an imaginary friend at some point, right? Well, what if you discover yours is actually an alien who is fascinated with Earth?

Excerpt:
“Do you get the feeling you’ve known me? Or that I vaguely remind you of someone?”

Oh god, she’d slept with him before, only didn’t remember. Shit!

“Not exactly.” Tricia shook her head and frowned. Who was he?

“We’ve never formally met.” His fingers stroked her hair. “But I’ve known you for a long time.”

A stalker? A devoted customer? “But the restaurant’s only been open for two years.”

“Yes; I’m proud of your success.”

“Did we go to college or high school together?” Thoroughly confused, Trish searched her memory.

“No. Tricia, try to understand what I’m saying. I met you when you were four years old.”

“Four years-We were living in the country and our nearest neighbor was a mile away. I don’t remember any playmates until I started school. Were our mothers friends or something?”

“I didn’t meet you in that manner.”

“I’m waiting.”

Brock took a deep breath. “You say you had no playmate. But you had an imaginary friend.”

A shock chilled her blood. “H-how did you know?” Indignation took over. “Lots of children do that; so what?” But the memory assaulted her. She’d spilled her secrets, her most private thoughts over the years, to an imagined best friend. It had become a habit by the time she’d reached the third grade, and had often talked to her favorite doll or stuffed animal, until her hormones kicked in at puberty, and she’d discovered boys. But even at night, sharing a dorm room at college, or even an apartment, she’d found herself silently talking to herself, expressing thoughts she couldn’t tell anyone else, or even write in a diary.

Brock tipped her face upward. “You’re remembering.”

She felt the color drain from her face. “Who are you?”

Brock cleared his throat. “At four, you called me ‘Louis’. At eight, it was ‘Shawn’. At twelve, you decided you needed female companionship, so I became ‘Kathy’. And as time went on, various other names of men you liked.”

“How-how can you know this?” Tricia struggled to sit up and stay in control of her swirling emotions. “God, you make me sound like a mental case.” She wrapped the blankets around her and turned her back.

She heard him shift his weight. “I’m not exactly from Earth.”

That did it. Tricia got to her feet and pointed to the door. “Out.” She refused to admit the sight of his naked body still aroused her. “Out, before I call security.”

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Huge thanks to author Kenzie Michaels for visiting today! I’m looking forward to reading her new book. How about you?

Cheers & Happy Reading!
Flossie Benton Rogers, Conjuring the Magic with Paranormal Fantasy Romance