Welcome - boys, girls, children of all ages - to this week's Not-So-Guilty Pleasures!
Walking the tightrope today, we welcome Heather Reid. Heather's debut YA novel, Pretty Dark Nothing, is being released on April 23rd. Very exciting stuff. Plus the blurb for the book sounds awesome. Check it out here.
But before you all go and get lost in Heather's world, take some time to find out a little about the lady herself.
Guilty Pleasures
Want to know all my
little secrets, what makes me strangely unique? It would take all day to list
the weird and wonderful things that strike my fancy, believe me, my mind is a
curious and sometimes scattered place to live. I’m easily distracted by the ‘Oh
Shiny’ things in this world from watching documentaries on spontaneous human
combustion to wondering how many tiles make up the roof on my neighbor’s house.
I can stare out my window for hours daydreaming, and like my mind, a lot of my
guilty pleasure change depending on my mood and the weather. With the exception
of the five I’m going to share with you today.
1)
Gamer
Girl:
I’ve always been a
gamer girl. From Atari to text based PC games like Zork, to traditional role
playing games like Dungeons and Dragons, and on to modern day console games
like Halo, Fable, Knights of the Old
Republic, Mass Effect,
Skyrim, and Dragon Age. And let’s not forget the MMORPG’s. I LOVE my games. I
even found love playing Star Wars Galaxies online. Yes, it’s true. My Scottish
hubby and I met seven years ago on the planet of Naboo and fell in love while
fighting the Imperials in the skies above Kashyyyk. “But you
don’t LOOK like a gamer.” That’s what I get from friends and colleagues when
they find out about my guilty pleasure. I just shrug. What does a gamer look
like anyway?
2) Ghost Hunters:
I can’t get enough of
Jason and Grant and the whole TAPS (The Atlantic Paranormal Society) team. For
me, it’s not just about the search for evidence of the paranormal; it’s about
the history and the story behind the haunting that fascinates me most. I
actually love watching them disprove certain phenomenon as much as I like
seeing some of the unexplainable evidence they capture in EVPs (Electronic
Voice Phenomenon) and on film.
3) Pajamas:
If I see a cute pair I
love, I must own them. Purple ones, striped ones, floral ones, shorts, pants,
tanks, t-shirts, lacy, geeky, and rocker chick, I have a pair to suite my every
mood. No onsies please! Adults wearing onsies creep me out! And my pajamas must
match. I can’t put on a pair of non-matching pajamas. That includes the socks.
Pajamas rock!
4) Swimming:
Water is like a siren
song to me. I’ve been called a mermaid by friends and family all my life. I’ve
been on the swim team and did a year of competitive synchronized swimming when
I was younger as well as spending my summers kneeboarding and jet skiing on
local Texas
lakes. I even ventured into the frigid sea here on the west coast of Scotland where
the temperature in the Firth of Clyde averages 58 degrees in the height of
summer. No, I wasn’t wearing a wetsuit and yes, I know I’m a bit mad. Once you
start swimming and your body goes a bit numb, you don’t feel the cold anymore.
I wouldn’t dare go in the water in winter though. That’s WAY too cold, even for
me.
5) Musicals:
Why does this list
suddenly make me feel like I’m a character from Glee? A gamer girl who loves
watching Ghost Hunters in her pajamas after a hard day of synchronized
swimming, and is a Sondheim loving, former show-choir and musical theater ingénue
to boot? Please don’t slushy me. I have an extensive, if not eclectic, collection of cast recordings from
the obscure to the popular. I know every word and
every note from Into The Woods, Les Miserables, and City of Angels--
three of my favourites—and just mentioning the name Stephen Sondheim will have
me fangirling like crazy. I love him.
Heather L. Reid has always had a sense of wanderlust and a belief in the paranormal. She eats mayonnaise on her fries, loves video games, and getting lost in a good story. This native Texan now lives with her Scottish hubby in South Ayrshire, Scotland, where she spends her weekends wandering the moors in search of the ghost of WilliamWallace and exploring haunted castles.
Her debut young adult Paranormal, Pretty Dark Nothing, will be released on April 23, 2013 by Month 9 Books.
You're a curious bunch, so I'm guessing you still want to know more.
Check out Heather at:
http://hugs-and-chocolate.com/
https://twitter.com/HeatherLReid
I'm with you on the socks. Must match. And I'm down with the swimming, too. I think Lake Michigan is just a tad warmer. Fun stuff, Gamer Girl!
ReplyDeleteIs it warm enough to swim there in the summer, Vaughn? I would love to try it sometime.
ReplyDeleteHaha! Whenever my young children made Mother's Day cards in school, and the teacher would prompt them to write what they loved about their mom--the answer was always "My mom is awesome because she plays video games with me." :P I didn't know whether to be horrified or laugh. I y'am what I y'am.
ReplyDeleteI love that you're such a brave swimmer! It's an admirable life-skill in my book. All of your guilty pleasures were so much fun to read. It's easy to see how your creative imagination will take us, the reader, on a delightful adventure. In pajamas. With great background music. And the amiable ghost or two for company. :D
Best of luck, my friend.
Thanks, Denise! I hope some day my children can say they loved that I played video games with them. :) Gamer girls unite! Thanks for stopping by and commenting.
ReplyDeleteI have to get Skyrim. There is something about pajamas... And I often watch the ghost shows. Very pretty cover, Heather. Congrats on your upcoming release.
ReplyDelete