Meet the Austen Variations Team! (Part 3)

Hi friends! We’re back with part three of our “Meet the Team” Q&A! I hope you all enjoy getting to know a few more of our authors. And if you missed either of the previous posts, you can find them HERE and HERE. 🙂

L.L. Diamond

Where do you live? Southern Maryland.

Drink of choice: Depends on what I’m drinking. Hot coffee first thing in the morning, but I do love iced on a warm afternoon.

Do you have any pets? We have Layla who is 11 years old. She’s a Springer Spaniel Mix although the rescue swears she’s a pure bread. The vet believes she has some Brittany Spaniel in there as well. We also have Evie Fae, my polydactyl grey cat who was featured in That Perfect Someone. Dobby a tuxedo cat who is called Atticus in the new Christmas story A Novel Holiday. Our last cat is Pepper, a cali-tabby who is good at pretending to be the victim with the other cats. She has the perfect sad face but is a bit of a bully to tell the truth. She’s a sweetheart to us though.

Place you most want to travel: I’m really lucky to have gone to as many places as we have. I’d love to see more of Europe: Florence, Italy; Greece; Crete; British Columbia, Canada.

What food could you eat every day? I love eggs. It might be weird, but I can eat them for breakfast every morning.

What is something you couldn’t live without? e-books!

What is your ideal writing location? In my writing chair with Evie on my lap.

Name something that instantly makes your day better: Cuddles with Evie.

Where is your happy place? Sitting on the patio by the pond.

What’s one thing people might be surprised to learn about you? I tend to jump around genres a lot but lately I’ve been into reading werewolf romances.

Lucy Marin

Where do you live? I live in Toronto. I grew up mostly in Montreal, having moved there as a young child from Vermont.

Drink of choice: I love hot tea (Earl Grey, green, and mint especially) and good coffee. Otherwise, I tend to drink water. Have to stay hydrated to write well, right? 😀 

Do you have any pets? I have two wonderful furry babies of the feline variety; they are both named in my modern book, A Pinch of Salt (Cherry and Ginny). 

Place you most want to travel: There are so many places I want to visit. We’d be here all day if I explained where and why. Haha. I’d always be glad to visit someplace in the Mediterranean, and I’d really like to see more of Southeast Asia. I’ll leave it at that. 

What food could you eat every day? Pasta, olives, berries, beautifully ripened tomatoes.

What is something you couldn’t live without? I can only think of sarcastic and/or literal answers, so I think I’ll move on.

What is your ideal writing location? My favourite chair at home, a cup of tea beside me, a cat sitting with me.

Name something that instantly makes your day better: Good news, personal, professional, or in the world. 

Where is your happy place? It’s not so much a place as a situation—being somewhere relaxing with my family with us laughing about something, maybe enjoying some good food.

What’s one thing people might be surprised to learn about you? I love to cook.

Maria Grace

Where do you live? I’m in the Texas Gulf Coast and have been for a long time. Not much in the way of cold or snow, but we make up for it in humidity, mosquitos, and hurricanes. Seriously our mosquitoes (and palmetto bugs—a fancy name for tree roaches) need airport clearance for Take-off and landing.

Drink of choice: Diet Dr. Pepper—makes me a true southerner, I guess. When we travel, I always know when we have crossed the Mason-Dixon line by the availability of diet Dr. Pepper in the gas stations and fast-food places.

Do you have any pets? Much fur flies around our house. We have one senior cat and two 2-year-old cats, though we still call them kittens. All were rescues and are quirky as they come. The senior, white cat is as sweet as diet Dr. Pepper and purrs when you look at him. The little female black cat adores my husband and is a bit jealous of me. If I’m talking to hubs, she invariably comes up and reaches for him so he’ll pet her at the same time. She has no shame. Her brother is a marmalade tabby and shares a single brain cell with every other orange cat on the planet. He’s adorable, but, putting it the kindest way possible, he’s not the brightest bulb on the tree.

I have two cardboard boxes on my desks where the cats can file themselves while I am working. The theory is that it will keep them from walking on my keyboard and composing their own novels. Most of the time it works, although the orange cat has attempted to write his own works more than once.

We also have a rescue dog who appears to be mostly Plott Hound—no, not kidding, they are a real thing, the state dog of North Carolina. What more appropriate dog for a writer? She’s stubborn, and spirited, but when she wags, her entire being wags, and what could be wrong with that?

Place you most want to travel: Hubs really wants to go to Alaska, the only of the 50 states he hasn’t been to. But it’s cold there, (yes, understatement, I know) and that makes it a challenging trip for me, the sun-bunny. I’m much more invested in a trip to Hawaii!

What food could you eat every day? Chocolate, dark chocolate in particular, 72% cacao is ideal. It’s one of the four major food groups, right?

What is something you couldn’t live without? That’s definitely my family. I wouldn’t be who I am without them, and I definitely couldn’t do what I do without them.

What is your ideal writing location? It really depends on how my brain is firing (or not) at the time. I have an office that I share with hubs, which is wonderful, but sometimes I need to get pen and paper to shake words out of my recalcitrant  brain, so then I like a comfy recliner in a sunbeam.

Name something that instantly makes your day better: Sunshine­—I’m definitely a warm sun kinda gal; a purring cat or three; and a waggy dog who’s happy to see me.

Where is your happy place? Anywhere with my family. My kids and grandlings live close by, so I have the privilege of seeing each one of them pretty much weekly, often times more.  There’s nothing like having them run to greet me at the front door.

What’s one thing people might be surprised to learn about you? I look like a mild-mannered writer-lady, but being a boy-mom, the kids (now adults) have gotten me into things I would never have done on my own. We’ve done numerous wild cave tours—as in hard hat, flashlights, and belly crawls through mud hundreds of feet underground—, gone snorkeling in two oceans, I’ve taken motorcycle riding lessons, several canoe trips, and earned two black belts because of them. When in doubt, blame it on the kids.

Melanie Rachel

Where do you live? Southern Arizona, near where many John Wayne westerns were made. Did you know the only original building still standing in Tombstone served as the brothel?

Drink of choice: Iced tea, because desert life demands it. But on deadline days, I’m powered solely by very cold Diet Coke and regret.

Do you have any pets? I have two rescue pibbles who believe their life mission is to bark at imaginary threats, redecorate the backyard with new “craters,” and stage chewable-object rebellions. Basically, they’re four-legged anarchists with fur.

Place you most want to travel: Ireland or Scotland, because my soul does not belong in Arizona but in misty green landscapes. Also, Australia, New Zealand, and Iceland, but one passport stamp at a time!

What food could you eat every day? Enchiladas of any kind with green sauce. My husband makes them for me, which is convenient because at heart I am a Bennet girl who has nothing to do with the kitchen.

What is something you couldn’t live without? Books. And while i was initially resistant to the kindle app, now I love carrying my entire library with me wherever I go.

What is your ideal writing location? My backyard when the weather isn’t trying to kill me. Bonus: the birds provide a gorgeous soundtrack, and one has decided my porch light is prime real estate.

Name something that instantly makes your day better: My husband’s jokes, which are either brilliantly funny or so bad they loop back around to hilarious. And my daughter, who’s learning the art of comedic timing, usually at my expense. Not that she’s wrong . . .

Where is your happy place? Anywhere with mountains and trees. So naturally, I live in a place with neither. Life choices.

What’s one thing people might be surprised to learn about you? I have a Ph.D., which somehow shocks people. Apparently, my vibes say “ink stained wretch,” not “academic overachiever.”

MJ Stratton

Where do you live? I live in a tiny rural town in Utah. There are around 900 people in city limits. There are a lot outside of town, but still, it’s small by most standards. There’s an authentic German café here that is amazing!

Drink of choice: I am a water drinker, though I do drink certain herbal teas. We make our own grape juice, too, and I love that.

Do you have any pets? I am 100% a cat person. I have six cats currently. Two showed up at our house and we adopted them. We think they’re from the same litter. Also, my mom’s cat adopted us years ago. He goes back and forth between our houses. In order:

Pumpkin: Ginger tabby who loves snuggles.

Cheddar: Also a ginger tabby. He’s skittish and likes to stay in the garage.

Klinger: Tuxedo cat that is true to his name. He clings to you!

Ahsoka: Klinger’s sister. She’s calico and has an attitude.

Binx: The first black cat that showed up. He has a small white splotch on his chest.

Salem: The second black cat that showed up. He is all black except for a small white spot on his shoulder. Both were dumped near our house. We found Binx first and Salem a month later.

Place you most want to travel: Europe. England specifically. My ancestry is European and I’d love to spend a month or two just traveling everywhere.

What food could you eat every day? Green olives.

What is something you couldn’t live without? My feather pillow. It’s the only one that’s comfortable enough to sleep on.

What is your ideal writing location? I have a spot. It’s on the couch on one end. I put my feet up, too, and then I can write for hours. I find it hard to write when I am not in my spot.

Name something that instantly makes your day better: When my neurospicy daughter who does not like to be touched hugs me.

Where is your happy place? My house with my husband and kids. This is our safe zone, our sanctuary. 😊

What’s one thing people might be surprised to learn about you? That’s a tough question. I’ve never felt like I’m very interesting. I always used to tell my students that I don’t really like Pizza. They were always shocked. I also have a HUGE extended family. I’m the 4^th of 8 siblings and both my parents have 8 siblings, so I have around 50 cousins on both sides of my family. I grew up with some of my second cousins.

JA