Please join me in welcoming Sarah Sundin, author of the Wings of Glory Series.
Karen: It’s great to have you back, Sarah! Congratulations on your latest release, Blue Skies Tomorrow. How did you feel completing the three book series? What was your original inspiration for this series?
Sarah: Writing the final chapter was difficult and required several drafts. The Novak boys and the women they love had been my constant mental companions for almost a decade. It was hard to say good-bye, even if they did have their happy endings.
The idea for the first book, A Distant Melody, came out of a “what if” question—what if a man and woman met at an event, truly clicked, and parted before exchanging contact info? Wouldn’t it be romantic if he went through great effort to track her down? My husband and I watched a History Channel special on the US Eighth Air Force based in England which flew over Nazi-occupied Europe during World War II, and I was hooked. My great-uncle was a B-17 bomber pilot with the Eighth, so I had access to family stories plus his personal letters. My research fascinated me so much, the story expanded to become a trilogy, with each book focusing on one of three brothers.
Karen: Of the three books, which character is your favorite?
Sarah: That’s like asking which is my favorite child. I have three children, unique and lovable in their own ways. Some days I like one better than another. Don’t gasp. You do it too. But I love them equally. It’s the same with my characters. I adore them, am exasperated by them, and try to figure out how they tick.
Karen: I am sure that you found a lot of interesting facts with your research for these books. Was there anything that you unearthed that really took you by surprise?
Sarah: In Blue Skies Tomorrow, the heroine experiences the Port Chicago Explosion, where 320 sailors were killed in the largest US Home Front disaster in the war. Most of the men killed were black. I thought I understood the explosion and the mutiny trial that followed (it happened in my home county), but my research changed my mind. I knew there was a great deal of racism and discrimination at the time, but the details of this disaster really brought it home to me.
Karen: Did I hear something about you and your family going to Italy and France this summer? It must have been fabulous! Was the trip writing related?
Sarah: It was fabulous! My husband and two younger kids and I went to Provence and Italy, part family vacation, and part research for my next series. Not only did we see tourist places like Pompeii and Rome and Avignon, but I was able to see the ancient Greek (yes, Greek!) temples at Paestum on the Gulf of Salerno, where the 93rd Evacuation Hospital was based, sink my toes in the sand of the Anzio landing beaches, and get remarkably close to the active French military airfield at Istres le Tubé, where the flight nurses were based. There was something special about being able to smell the air and feel the sand and hear the cigales (the cicadas in Provence).
Karen: Sounds like a great trip! Tell us, what is your favorite aspect of the published author’s life?
Sarah: My favorite part is being able to do what I love most and call it a job. There’s so much I love—when an idea sparks, when the story flows, when a sentence sings. And when readers say that God used words I wrote to change their hearts—well, that just gives me goose-bumps.
Karen: What is your least favorite aspect?
Sarah: I’m not fond of marketing plans, and I don’t care for some aspects of promotion—it often feels like bragging to me. But it’s a necessary evil.
Karen: Congratulations on your new three book series, Wings of the Nightingale. I’ll look forward to reading all of them! Can you tell us a little about it?
Sarah: The Wings of the Nightingale series follows three World War II flight nurses who discover love, friendship, and peril in the skies and on the shores of the Mediterranean. The first novel in the series, With Every Letter, will release Fall 2012. Loner Mellie Blake longs for adventure as a flight nurse, while Army engineer Lt. Tom MacGilliver tries to overcome the legacy of his infamous father. In North Africa and Sicily, Mellie pioneers air evacuation while Tom builds airfields under fire. An anonymous pen pal correspondence helps them unlock their true identities.
Karen: Sounds like a winner. :) Thank you for stopping by to see us today. I’m sure my followers would join me in wishing you all the best with your upcoming books.
Sarah: It was a pleasure, thank you!
Giveaway Details - Please Read Carefully :)
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- Open to residents of the United States and Canada.
- Deadline to enter is noon EST, Saturday, October 29, 2011. Winner will be notified via email and will have 36 hours to respond or another winner will be chosen. Winner will be announced Monday, October 31.
Do you have any questions for Sarah? What genre do you like to read for pleasure?
Blessings,
Karen
