Wednesday, April 11, 2018

Interview with Peggy Jaeger, CAN'T STAND THE HEAT


Do you have any tattoos?  Where? When did you get it/them? Where are they on your body?
I do. I have a small one on my left upper arm of my husband’s and my initials woven into a heart. When my daughter turned 18 she wanted to get a tattoo and asked for permission, even though as a legal adult she didn’t need it. Then she asked if I’d go with her when she got it. I’d always wanted to get a tattoo but was going to wait until my 50th birthday rolled around to do so. The day I went with her, we both got inked. It was – in my opinion- a very sweet mother/daughter bonding experience.

Is your life anything like it was two years ago?
The only things that are the same is that I’m married to the same man and live in the same house!! 2 years ago my first book was published and I quit my job to write full time. Not having to get up everyday and be out of the house by 5:30 am to go to work was a real adjustment but wonderful as well. Now, I spend the days in my pajamas, sans makeup, and with my hair stuck in a bun, writing to my heart’s content.

How long have you been writing?
Professionally, as a living, 2 years. But I have written since I was a child. I had several short stories published in my 20’s and 30’s in literary magazines, and I’ve been published in non-fiction trade magazines and parenting newspapers for over 20 years.

What advice would you give a new writer just starting out?
If you seriously want to write, and write enough that you make it your career – because you should love what you do! – then treat writing like just that: a career; a job. You can’t call in to an office job and say I just don’t feel like coming in today, or I’m just not feeling my muse today, so I’m gonna stay home. More times than not, full time writers will fall into this trap of thinking the writing can wait while they shop/play on my phone/ troll around social media/ watch a Housewives marathon. No. If this is what you want to do with your life, you must take it seriously. Yes, it is your passion, but it is also, probably, your livelihood. Treat it with respect.

Tell us something about your newest release that is NOT in the blurb.
The secondary character of 15 year old Melora Stamp has anorexia, triggered when her mother is killed in a car her father was driving. I added the eating disorder to her character because I wanted to reach readers who may be afflicted along the same lines and let them know there is hope. I’ve suffered from bulimia and intermittent anorexia since I was 11 years old. I’m 57 right now, so that’s 46 years of feeling overwhelmed, underappreciated, and unloved. Feelings that started in my pre-teens due to a horrible childhood. Even as an adult in her 5th decade there are times when emotions get out of control and the bulimia rears its ugly head. In the book, and without going into  too much detail right here, Melora’s treatment is one that I wish had been given to me.

 
BLURB:
With three successful TV series under her belt, including her cousin Kandy’s, executive producer Stacy Peters is ready to helm her own show. But to make that happen, she has to do her network boss one favor first—spend two months on a ranch in Montana wrangling the notoriously difficult director of Beef Battles. Apparently, he eats producers for breakfast. Yet all Stacy can think when she meets the lean, rugged man is how hungry he makes her . . .

Dominic Stamp—Nikko to his very few friends—has had enough interference from TV newbies. And when Stacy climbs out of the car in Montana, he’s not convinced she’s even old enough to drive, much less produce his show. But he can’t deny that the long-legged blonde with the stubborn will and the dazzling smile whets his appetite. And as Stacy proves her talent with the crew and the budget alike, Nikko vows to prove to her that love is on the menu for both of them . . .


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AUTHOR Bio and Links:

Peggy Jaeger is a contemporary romance writer who writes about strong women, the families who support them, and the men who can’t live without them.

Family and food play huge roles in Peggy’s stories because she believes there is nothing that holds a family structure together like sharing a meal…or two…or ten. Dotted with humor and characters that are as real as they are loving, Peggy brings all topics of daily life into her stories: life, death, sibling rivalry, illness and the desire for everyone to find their own happily ever after. Growing up the only child of divorced parents she longed for sisters, brothers and a family that vowed to stick together no matter what came their way. Through her books, she has created the families she wanted as that lonely child.

Tying into her love of families, her children's book, THE KINDNESS TALES, was illustrated by her artist mother-in-law.

Peggy holds a master's degree in Nursing Administration and first found publication with several articles she authored on Alzheimer's Disease during her time running an Alzheimer's in-patient care unit during the 1990s.

In 2013, she placed first in two categories in the Dixie Kane Memorial Contest: Single Title Contemporary Romance and Short/Long Contemporary Romance.

In 2017 she came in 3rd in the New England Reader's Choice contest for A KISS UNDER THE CHRISTMAS LIGHTS and was a finalist in the 2017 STILETTO contest for the same title.

A lifelong and avid romance reader and writer, she is a member of RWA and her local New Hampshire RWA Chapter.













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