This interview is posted on Samantha Fountain’s blog, please stop by and check out her great website!
Romily Bernard
Author of: FIND ME-YA Suspense
Release date: September 24th, 2013
I could talk to Romily Bernard for hours and stay entertained. Her quick wit and slightly brash charm is infectious and addicting. Romily graduated from Georgia State University with a Literature degree. Since then, she’s worked as a riding instructor, cell phone salesgirl, personal assistant, groom, exercise rider, accounting assistant, and, during a very dark time, customer service rep. What did this prove to her? “Don’t let anyone tell you a BA degree will keep you unemployed.”
Samantha: I love your playlist for FIND ME. How do you go about choosing the songs that help you feel what you’re writing? https://www.romilybernard.com/2013/06/pitch-dark-reading-playlist-for-find-me/
Romily: I’m so glad you liked the playlist! But I have a confession….I actually never write to music. I have friends who do and swear by it. Unfortunately, I do quite a bit of writing on the sly at work so I have to keep my ears open in case I need to flip back to the spreadsheet I should be working on. I know. I know. I should be ashamed, but all’s fair in love and word count. The playlist songs came to me later. I was listening to the radio and going “That is so Wick and Griff.” Basically, I’m the writer-equivalent of the girl who thinks every Top 40 song is about her break-up, but, in my case, I think all these songs were totally meant for FIND ME.
Samantha: You’re a horse lady. Do you own any and how often do you ride?
Romily: Yep, I have a Georgian Grande named Tempi. Or Wonder Pony when she’s being super good. Or Brat when she’s being ornery. I love her to pieces and try to ride at least 4 times a week even if I have to do it in the dark. It’s exhausting, but it’s a sanity check for me too. You can’t think about work when you’re trying to adjust tempo, realign your weight, watch for a jump’s distance, etc. I need that break or I become obsessive…well, more obsessive.
Samantha: With the vast array of jobs that you have experienced what skills did you learn that you have been able to apply to your writing?
Romily: Um, yeah…I learned that I should’ve gone to law school like my parents wanted?
Kidding! Sort of. It exposed me to a ton of people. There was the multi-millionaire who showed up to meetings filthy, reeking of gasoline and oil. My manic boss who would lock himself in his office and refuse to come out. The coworker who liked to use the copier to copy…well his unmentionables. And every single one of these people thought they were behaving normally. If that isn’t a testament to character motivation, I don’t know what is. I try to remember that stuff when I’m writing. Characters must behave in a way that doesn’t have to make sense to us, but we have to see how it would make sense to them.
Samantha: Wick, your MC in FIND ME, has computer-hacking skills. What kind of research did you have to do to get savvy with this?
Romily: Thankfully, I’m married to someone who’s pretty savvy, but I also did a lot of Googling–so much Googling that I’m actually a touch scared I’m going to score myself a visit from the FBI. No one normal looks up “how many gallons of gas to burn a body beyond recognition.” Except I did and, for the record, it takes six gallons and an empty dumpster.
Samantha: Can you describe Wick to us?
Romily: Wick’s a smart-mouthed hacker who doesn’t believe in love, families, or belonging and has no idea she actually wants all three.
Samantha: I read you are working on number 2 right now? How is that going?
Romily: It’s…going. I actually wrote FIND ME as a standalone so when HarperTeen asked me for a trilogy I was thrilled and stumped. I had to think about what life would be like after FIND ME finishes, what kind of consequences the characters would be grappling with, and, how everyone would be trying to move on. REMEMBER ME is a different animal than FIND ME so I hope–really hope–it works for readers.
Samantha: Oh my gosh I loved this interview. I’m smiling as I type. As writers we sometimes have to research details into things that only psychopaths would do…and I can honestly say I have wondered if a SWAT team would come busting through my windows clinging to ropes that are dangling from helicopters when I was looking up things about human disection.
…that being said, I CAN”T WAIT to read FIND ME. Add it to your Goodreads shelf. NOW. http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13645069-find-me
This interview is posted on Samantha Fountain’s blog, please stop by and check out her great website!