Getting to Know the Authours: Featuring Patty Blount!

Bio

   Patty spends her days writing facts and her nights writing contemporary romantic fiction. A coworker once said if Patty were a super-villain, she’d be called The Quibbler. Her costume would be covered in exclamation points. Fueled by a serious chocolate obsession, a love of bad science-fiction movies, and a weird attraction to exclamation points, Patty looks for ways to mix business with pleasure, mining her day job for ideas to use in her fiction. Though she’s passionate about happily-ever-afters, her first story wasn’t a romance at all. Penalty Killer, a whodunit, was written on a dare from her oldest son. Though unpublished, it was the subject of so many seventh-grade book reports that year, the English teacher requested a copy and later returned it, covered in red ink.

Ripped from the headlines, Patty’s novel, Send, a YA story about a former cyber-bully learning to deal with the suicide he caused with a single thoughtless click, was conceived when her boss suggested she learn about social media. Send was released August, 2012 from Sourcebooks Fire.

What has she written?

She has written:

Goodness and Light (Christmas in New York #4), TMI, Send, Orange Karen: Tribute to a Warrior and Some Boys

Now on to the Interview! 

1) How old were you when you started writing, in your opinion?  

I've been writing all my life but I didn't get serious about it until about 10 years ago when I finally finished my first novel. That one was never published, but it taught me I could really do this. I could be a novelist. 

2) What do you want a reader to gain from reading your works?

I would love for readers to close my books with a new perspective -- a different one from what they had when they opened it. I wrote my debut novel from the bully's perspective, hoping to show readers that some bullies really do deserve forgiveness. I wrote Some Boys from the perspective of a not-so-innocent girl, to convince readers that nobody ever asks for it.

3) What are your three top suggestions on becoming an author, or being a pleasure writer?

To be a writer, you need to be a reader. Read outside your genre and study what resonates with you. And finally, never give up. 

4) What is your favourite novel, why?

I can't narrow it down to just one. I love the Harry Potter series. I love the Avery Cates series. I love the In Death Series. 

5) Who is your favourite author, why?

See above -- I can't narrow it down to one. I'm a big fan of JK Rowling, Jeff Somers, JD Robb. In my genre, I love Kendare Blake and Katie McGarry. 

6) What are your favorite pass times besides writing? 

I don't have time for any hobbies. I like to bake, but now limit that to just holidays.

7) Who in your life do you credit your imagination to the most?

Reading is what cultivated my imagination. When I was kid, too shy to make friends, I found them in books. 

8) What are the top five things on your bucket list?

I'd love to have a best-selller some day. Maybe a movie made out of one of my books. I really need to visit Italy. 

9) What is your funniest childhood memory?

When I was little, I shared a room with my sister and she was always getting me in trouble. She had this collection of tiny stuffed animals she kept in an old basket on a shelf in our closet and kept tattling to Mom that I was stealing her animals. I never touched them! One day, I caught our cat sneaking into the closet and coming out with one of the stuffed animals clasped in his teeth. They never believed me. Every time I got in trouble, I'd cry, "It wasn't me! It was Frisky!" and they'd look at me sideways, thinking I was so pathetic to blame my crimes on a poor innocent cat. Well, one day, Frisky stole an animal when I wasn't home and I was finally vindicated. 

10) To the youth of today, if you could tell them one thing, what would it be?

 I wish I could tell today's teens that the people on all their social networks are not really 'friends' and shouldn't be trusted with all their secrets as if they were.