Rogue's Angels Present: Sins of the Father by Lisa Beth Darling

Please welcome Lisa Beth Darling author of Sins of the Father.


Lisa Beth Darling will be awarding a $25 Amazon/BN GC to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour, and a $10 Amazon/BN GC to a randomly drawn host.

Sins of the Father

by Lisa Beth Darling

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GENRE: Family centered drama

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INTERVIEW:

1. What elements are necessary components for this genre?

The Sister Christian Series and more pointedly this novel, Sins of the Father, is a contemporary family drama. As with all genres, every story needs strong characters facing conflict either from within or without to build tension and make it interesting.

2. How did you come up with your idea for your novel?

I started writing this series a few years after I made contact with my birth family and discovered I had three brothers. I was raised an only child so the idea that I had siblings was rather new to me, growing up I often wished I had a sibling but then I'd go to my friend's houses and see how they interacted with their siblings and went home happy I was an only child. The idea of the brother/sister dynamic always interested me even when my friends were shouting at each other over nothing. This series and a lot of its contents, planted deeply in the fertile ground of a writer's imagination, grew out of those two situations.

3. What expertise did you bring to your writing?
Genesis, the first book in the Sister Christian Series opens with Doctor Richard Mason reading a letter informing him his father, James Rice, has died and Mason has been put in charge of his sister, Hannah Rice. Problem is, Mason is in his early 50s and had no clue he was adopted until that very moment. Luckily for me, I've always known I'm adopted but once when I was little a friend took it upon herself to tell me that because she'd found out from someone and was completely upset that this fact was being hidden from me. I still remember the worried look on her face as she took my hand told me the 'news'. I can still her astonishment when I replied: "Is that it?"

I really liked the idea of opening the whole series that way with one great big secret revealed on the very first page.

Hannah has known for decades that Rick is her brother, her mother told her just before she committed suicide leaving Hannah in the care of her father, James Rice. Hannah had a very unpleasant childhood. When we meet her, she is a troubled woman both physically and mentally who has spent 30 years of her life in one group home or another.

I suppose, in a lot of ways, that's exactly how I felt at that point in my life dealing with shuffling through all of the adoption and birth family stuff. I felt as though I'd been shuttered away somewhere for 30 years and was finally coming into the light. Although it wasn't in the ways I would have expected and that we all hear about on TV Talk Shows and on the Huffington Post. I grew stronger from the experience and, over the course of the series, so do Mason and Hannah as they deal with dark family secrets and their own failings.

4. As far as your writing goes, what are your future plans?

I'm currently working on finishing up the Sister Christian Series with the last book, Prodigal Son. I hope it will be available in the summer. It should tie everything up nicely and give my readers the one thing they always crave from me and I hardly ever give them; a happy ending.

5. If you could be one of the characters from this book, who would it be and why?

Nick Jackson. He's tall, broad, dark, handsome, very intelligent, loving, caring and is not afraid to stand up to Mason when it comes to Hannah. Mason is quite the curmudgeon, he's absolutely brilliant at what he does but totally clueless when it comes to the Human Condition, most especially his own.

6. Can you give us a sneak peek into this book?

"Yes," he said, "that's when and where I learned there was no God. At St. Mark's."

Hannah didn't know what to do or say all she knew was that she was damn angry. How dare he stand there and deny the existence of God! Who the hell did he think he was? World famous doctor or not, who was he was to say that God didn't exist?  There was a word for that. A big one. "Ba-bab-ba-ba-bbb-b—"

"Bbbbb…what?"

Hannah stared up at him from her wheel chair with smoking eyes as she gripped the armrests until her fingers turned white. Feeling as though she might bust a blood vessel or something as she sat there straining to control her anger as she fought to find the word. The big word.  "Ba-lasss-fffaa-me!" Hannah pushed the word through slotted lips.

"Blasphemy."  Mason repeated and began to put forth his argument but then pulled back the rancid comment rising on his tongue as a different thought took over. "Blasphemy? Damn…good one." He complimented, yes, that had to be a very hard one to get out, but that didn't stop him from continuing. "It's not blasphemy if God really doesn't exist. And He doesn't."

"You take that back!" Hannah shouted. "Now! Rright now!"

"No," he said in a snarl, "I won't."

Hannah put her hands on the wheels of the chair and backed away from him.

"Where are you going?"

"Ah-way from the light-n-ing bolt."

"God's not gonna strike me dead. He can't. He doesn't exist."

That was it for her, Hannah rudely pointed toward the bedroom.  It was one thing not to believe in the same God that she did, Hannah understood that some people believed different things but to deny His existence altogether had to be the most self-centered arrogant thing she'd ever heard.  "Go."

"I'm not gonna go to my room. You're not my mother." He sniped.

"This is…my room now…you go."

Mason looked around the living room, Hannah was still sleeping out here, and since she wanted to be alone and not have this conversation with her egotistical big brother, he was being banished to his room for the rest of the night. "Are you kidding? You can't order me around. This is my house!"

7. Do you outline your books or just start writing?

I think on them a while and then, when I'm ready to give myself over to the Muse, I do so and follow wherever he leads. I always have an idea of where we're going but not necessarily of how we're getting there.

8. How do you maintain your creativity?

I try not to lose faith. It's when I lose faith in myself and my ability to pen a good story for nothing more than my own amusement that the dreaded Writer's Block hits. I won't lie it can last a very long time but it's mostly nothing more than a lack of confidence.

9. Who is your favorite character in the book. Can you tell us why?

I adore Mason and Hannah equally but, in the end, Hannah would be my favorite. For all she's been through, everything she's suffered, and all that's been taken away from her, she's still smiling and looking forward to a future that gets a bit better for her with each passing day. She brings a lot of light to Mason's lonely world.

10. Are your plotting bunnies angels or demons?

My Muse is about 40% nice-guy and 60% warrior so he always leans toward the darker harder hitting things we can do but every now and then he surprises me and turns into a ball of mush.

BLURB:

As Hannah recovers from emergency brain and heart surgery, memories of the past overtake her dreams with such clarity they cannot be denied. As the last of the painful family secrets come to light it's up to her brother, Doctor Richard Mason, and his unconventional methods to help her confront the ugliness.

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EXCERPT:

Running a hand over the side of his close-cropped gray head Frank tried to keep his cool as he pled his case, "Look, I just want to see Hannah, are you going to let me in there or not?"

Mason seemed to think about it for a second even though he really wasn't. "Ummm…not." He said finally. "She doesn't want to see you."

"She told you that? I don't believe it."

"Well, you could go and ask herself…oh, wait, that's right…you can't go in there. Guess you'll just have to take my word for it."

"Yeah, like that's worth anything."

"Some people think it is." Mason retorted as he held out his cupped hands, "Some people put their lives right here.  Crazy, right?"  From the look on the man's face Mason thought he'd stand there and bitch all day long. "While you're waiting for noon to come around, why don't you do Hannah a favor?"

"What's that?"

"Tell me about the two years between her accident and the birth of my pre-maturely deceased nephew."  He watched Frank's mouth drop open. "Take a load off." Mason said and gestured toward the chair opposite his desk. "In fact, why don't you just tell me everything you know?"

"She told you about Little Ricky?" Frank asked as he leaned forward but the question was more directed to the air than anyone in the room. "She's never spoken about him…ever."

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AUTHOR Bio and Links:

It was in the 4th grade when Lisa Beth Darling discovered she was a naturally gifted writer. For her very first creative writing assignment, the teacher asked the class to pen a story about a baby bird's first flight and read them to the class. Putting pencil to paper, Lisa was instantly whisked away by a force she couldn't explain. When they were finished, all of the children read their happy stories to the class. Not Lisa. She got up and told of how the baby bird flew too high, hit a plane, crashed to the ground and died. She told of how the mama bird and daddy bird cried of how even God was upset sending the rains pouring from the sky. The class was speechless when she finished all they could do was stare at her. The teacher kept her after class told her the story was very good but it was different from the others. She asked Lisa if she'd ever heard of Icarus and had she based her story on him. Lisa had yet to encounter Greek Mythology or hear a whisper of Icarus. As Lisa left the classroom the teacher again told her how good the story was but suggested she might want to write something happier next time. Perplexed,  Lisa turned and asked her teacher: "Why?" The teacher had no answer. Luckily for us, Lisa never took that teacher's advice.

Today she brings us complex multi-layered stories rich with the trials and tribulations that make up the world in which we live. Not one to be pigeonholed into any single genre, Lisa's stories revolve around the intricacies of couples from range the intimacy of lovers, to mothers and sons, and brothers and sisters.

Lisa Beth Darling is 49 years-old, lives in her hometown of New London, CT with her husband of nearly 30 years, Roy.  She is the author of more than fifteen novels along with several short stories and non-fiction books.

Author web links: (web, blog, twitter, facebook, goodreads, etc)

Website: http://www.lisabethdarling.com  

Blog: http://lbdarling.wordpress.com

Twitter: https://twitter.com/lb_darling

Facebook: http://facebook.com/lbdarling

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/1577311.Lisa_Beth_Darling

Purchase Links:

Kindle/Amazon (paperbacks available on Amazon)

http://amazon.com/author/lisadarling

Nook

http://barnesandnoble.com/c/lisa-beth-darling

iBooks

https://itunes.apple.com/us/artist/lisa-beth-darling/id411650358?mt=11

Smashwords

https://www.smashwords.com/profile/view/lisadarling

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GIVEAWAY INFORMATION and RAFFLECOPTER CODE

Lisa Beth Darling will be awarding a $25 Amazon/BN GC to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour, and a $10 Amazon/BN GC to a randomly drawn host.

 http://www.rafflecopter.com/rafl/display/28e4345f1527