Meet the Exquisite Quill Authors


Friday, February 14, 2014

Author Interview: Miriam Newman

Exquisite Quills Welcomes Miriam Newman



EQ: Welcome to EQ! Tell us a little bit about yourself! 

Miriam: I’m a multi-published author of contemporary, historical, fantasy and science fiction romance.  Before that, I wrote award-winning poetry.  After my husband’s death I fulfilled a long-held dream and went to Ireland.  While I was there my first novel, The King’s Daughter, attacked without warning. I returned to the U.S. to publish that and the sequel, Heart of the Earth.  Both were intense books and I guess my muse felt I needed a break, because she gave me a light, whimsical book in Confessions of the Cleaning Lady.  Later I wrote the spin-off, Stupid Cupid.  First published in 2008, now they have been updated and bundled!  Today I live in rural Pennsylvania with a motley crew of rescue animals and work in rescue while I write my books--punctuated by frequent trips to Ireland.

EQ: Tell us a little bit about your most recent release. 

Miriam: Confessions of the Cleaning Lady is the story of a band of feisty Irish faeries who stow away in the trunk of a pharmaceutical representative from Killarney.  He inadvertently releases them in the Pennsylvania countryside where he sets up bachelor housekeeping.  In need of a cleaning lady, Mal McCurdy is introduced to Shawna Egan, unaware that his faeries have taken up residence in her oak tree.  Shawna, who was raised with tales of the Fair Folk but never realized she can see them, learns it the hard way when she cuts down their home.  She gives them another…and faeries always repay their debts.  In Stupid Cupid, when the son of Zeus and Aphrodite bumbles into a meadow south of Killarney, he is met by a band of indignant faeries outraged by his target practice.  Soon, however, all the supernatural creatures are overshadowed by an estranged couple intent on fisticuffs!  Can Cupid effect a reconciliation between the humans?  Or is just a wee bit of intervention by the Fae in order?   

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EQ: What has been the most exquisite moment of your life?

Miriam: Standing on the Cliffs of Moher on the west coast of Ireland, 300 feet above the Atlantic Ocean, looking out over that ocean my grandmother crossed to go to America.

EQ: What made you want to become a writer? 

Miriam: I really think I was just born that way.  One of my earliest memories is trying to print a “book” on my mother’s shopping list.  Fortunately or unfortunately for my sanity and way of life, she encouraged it.  The rest, as they say, is history.   

EQ: Describe how you came up with the plot of your novel. 

Miriam: I had a neighbor at the time who was a firm believer in faeries and swore she had seen them in her woodpile—and the lady didn’t drink.  I began to wonder what would happen if a stone-cold-sober character of mine saw faeries nobody else could see.  How would she explain it?  Or would she explain it?  Would it just be her little secret?  And from that, Confessions was born.

Find Miriam Newman at these places:


Read these titles by Miriam Newman:
The Chronicles of Alcinia:  Book One – The King’s Daughter
                                             Book Two – Heart of the Earth
Spirit Awakened
Scion
Dancer Dog
The Comet
The Eagle’s Woman
Deirdre
Peace on New Earth

3 comments:

Jane Leopold Quinn said...

Miriam, your list of published books is impressive. And the cover to "Confessions..." is gorgeous. The Fae and Cupid working together? Outstanding! ;-)

Rose Anderson said...

Miriam, I just love the premise of Confessions of the Cleaning Lady! How fun. Best luck!

Miriam Newman said...

Thanks, ladies! They were very much a needed break for me.