For today’s Author Spotlight, I’m delighted to be joined by International Bestseller Pandora Pine! We chatted found family, ideas coming first and her love of Stephen King’s It.
Over to you Pandora…
First things first, please introduce yourself!
Hi everyone!! I’m Pandora Pine! I write the Cold Case Psychic, Haunted Souls, and Protect and Serve books! Found family, strong relationships, and memorable characters are the hallmarks of my books.
Tell us a little bit about your writing style.
Each book has a life of its own. Some have fully formed outlines before I type one word. Others come to me chapter by chapter as I write.
Describe your books in only three words.
Fun! Found Family! Unforgettable!
What’s your next book about and when is it coming out?
Holt’s Hope is the fifth and final book in the Protect and Serve series. It publishes on Thursday July 8th. It follows McCoy foster brother Quentin Harding and cancer patient Holt Robertson. Lola is up to her usual hilarious antics and we get a peek at all the brothers ultimate happy endings in the epilogue!
Out of all your books, which one are you most proud of?
Dead Speak. Unbelievably, the Cold Case universe has grown to 41 (!!!!) books. Ten and Ronan are the reason I get to do this job that I love every single day.
What or who (or both) has influenced you most as a writer?
I’ve always loved writing. From middle school I knew this was what I wanted to do with my life, but honestly never thought it was possible. I started writing fan fiction back in 2013 and had a friend who was going to give Amazon publishing a try in 2015 and urged me to do it too. At first, only friends and family were buying my books, but then, something magical happened with the Student Bodies books, the MM reading community discovered them and started reading them! My biggest writing influences have been Stephen King, Julie Garwood and Jude Devereaux.
What inspired you to start writing?
The love of storytelling. I’ve always been a reader and I figured maybe other people would enjoy my stories as well. What inspired me to start self-publishing was a three hour daily commute and a boss that made my teeth ache!
What’s your writing process like? Do you have a typical “writing day”?
I’m trying to be better with this. Honestly, sometimes I write in the morning, sometimes in the afternoon, sometimes at night. When the words are flowing, I try to give them their way.
What comes first for you – the plot or the characters?
Usually it’s the idea for a book. I’ll have a glimmer of an idea and then one of the MCs will pop in and introduce himself! For Cold Case Psychic, I wrote “Psychic and Cop series” on a blue sticky note one day at work and the next morning while driving to the grocery store, Ronan O’Mara introduced himself!
What’s a book that you wish you’d written?
It by Stephen King! LOL! The storytelling is masterful. I read It for the first time back in 1987 and the characters and the fear of Pennywise have stuck with me ever since. Imagine writing a book that’s had a thirty year hold on people!
If you could only write one trope for the rest of your life, what would it be and why?
Found family for sure. Everyone should have a place to belong, where they feel valued and loved unconditionally. The romance and sex are great, but at the end of the day, its the relationships that make me the most proud of what I’ve written.
What would be your three desert island books?
Uncharted by Allison Temple
It by Stephen King
How to Survive on a Desert Island by some awesome survivalist!
If one of your books could be made into a movie/TV series, which would you choose and who would you cast?
The Cold Case Psychic series would be my choice. I’d love to see Tennyson and Ronan brought to life on Netflix! My original inspiration for them is Kit Harington for Ten and Scott Eastwood for Ronan. A weekly instalment of these boys and their antics would be so much fun!
What do you like to do when you’re not writing? Do you have a secret passion or hobby that we don’t know about?
In my spare time, I’m a photographer. I love shooting pictures of birds and other animals. I’m also a HUGE true crime fan.
Finally, what’s your favourite dinosaur?
I’ve always been a big fan of the T Rex. They’re so big and ferocious.
Sick of the slogging rat-race of her 9-5 job, PANDORA PINE put pen to paper (literally!) to make her ambition of becoming a romance novelist a reality. She cut her teeth in the dog-eat-dog world of fan fiction, still dreaming of the day when she would be a published author.
In her spare time, Pandora fancies herself an amateur nature photographer. She enjoys mucking around in swamps, hiking through the woods and crawling around on her hands and knees in her backyard seeking out the perfect shot. Pandora is a fan of roadside seafood shacks and always thinks Mexican food is a good idea at the time.
Some of Pandora’s favorite things are chocolate, writing longhand with purple pens, and handsome men falling in love with each other.
For more information on Pandora and her work you can sign up for her newsletter. You can also join her Facebook reader group, Pandora’s Box, for more news and updates.
