Welcome to Love Romances & More, Ms. Inclán.  We are happy you could join us; please tell us a bit about yourself.  What motivated you to become a writer?   

Hi, and thank you for having me!  I appreciate being able to talk about writing and my books. 

My mother early on instilled a love for story in my sisters and me.  She read to us every single day, every evening before bed.  We received books as presents from Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny.  She was a librarian when I was growing up, and to this day, still substitutes in our local library system.  I would spend long, lazy Saturday afternoons in the library as she worked, and would check out a stack that would last me until the next week.  I thought there was nothing as absolutely wonderful as a book, and I still feel the same way.  At some point, I realized that I wanted to write one!  And when I was about twelve, I began to write.  Very, very badly.  But I started to get my stories down on paper. 

When you made the decision to try to get published, how long did the journey take? 

I was published often in college, and I had this idea that I would be a famous writer.  Well, then I had a child, worked on a degree, had another child, received another degree--then I found my teaching position.  I spent the time from about 23 to 31 really dug into that life, writing maybe a poem a year.  But then my sister died when she was 26 from complications of diabetes, and I felt compelled to write in order to help my grief and figure out the story of her life and our family life.  I started taking classes, and began to publish my poems.  I moved slowly to short stories, taking classes from Anne Lamott in Marin.  When you are publishing short stories and poems, you aren't making much--I think I was paid 300 dollars once for a story--so it was really for the enjoyment and pleasure in the writing, the excitement of having touched a reader or two along the way. 

Finally, I was in a short story writing class in Napa Valley in 1999, and I started a story that I couldn't finish.  I came home from the class on fire with the idea, knowing that somehow, this was a story I had to tell, and it was a long one.  It was a novel!  I wrote it in about six months, and that was Her Daughter's Eyes, my first novel.  Somehow, I knew I would be able to publish it, and I found an agent who sold it to NAL.  Her Daughter's Eyes was published in 2001.   From that point on, I was thinking about stories in that length. 

What advice would you give to an aspiring author? 

I think the most important things are to know that you want to write or you wouldn't be writing.  To take that energy and write every day.  To not take yourself too seriously and have a sense of humor about the process, the business, the experience, and to believe in yourself.  And the biggest one would be to have fun!  If you aren't enjoying writing your story, no one will enjoy reading it! 

What is your favorite thing about being an author?  Your least favorite thing? 

I love to bring a new story from my imagination into the light of the page.  That's the fun part.  The harder part is the temptation to worry about the business aspect of selling.  Once I send my book off to Kensington Books (my current publisher), there is really not too much I can do.  I can work with my editor, accept some reading and workshop offers, sign books at book stores, but I cannot single-handedly make the reading population of the world buy my stories.  So what can I do?  Worry about best-seller lists?  Hope that Barnes and Noble is selling all my books and ordering a truckload more?  No.  But I can write! 

How long have you been writing romance?  What other genres do you write under?   

I am relatively new to romance, having sold my first romance in late 2004 for publication in 2006. My first six novels are contemporary fiction--geared for a female reading audience--and my last novel for NAL was published in 2006 and was titled The Instant When Everything is Perfect.   

We are introduced to the world of Les Croyant des Trois in the first book called WHEN YOU BELIEVE.  How did the idea for your paranormal romance trilogy come about? 

My agent told me to branch out, so I began reading other genres.  I landed on romance, and I found the stories that interested me the most were the paranormal.  I liked the varied worlds that the authors created.  At the same time, I was reading the Philip Pullman series His Dark Materials and, of course, Harry Potter.  So with magic and romance on the brain, I came up with this world, the world of the Les Croyant des Trois.  I think that the image that really started it was of a dark, pensive man sitting at a bar, alone, isolated and angry.  That image became part of the first chapter of When You Believe, and the man was Sariel. 

The Magical Temptation series has each of three brothers Sariel, Rufus, and Felix as the hero.  Which of these characters seemed particularly vivid to you and easiest to write?    

I think they were all equally vivid to me because they are different.  Sariel is the middle, brooding brother.  Rufus the solid, kind oldest brother and Felix is the sexy, youngest brother.  They each had their place in my imagination, and I felt that they had their own stories to tell. 

Of the heroines in the series, did you feel that you identified with one of them in particular?  In what way? 

What I identify with in all of them is their independence and their sense of aloneness.  All of them haven't been able to connect with the right man--all of them have learned how to take care of themselves, too.  Miranda in When You Believe is a writer, so I was able to give her some funny writing bits from my own life.    But what I loved so much about all three was that they wanted love enough to give themselves over to it, even when it seemed dangerous or wrong. 

The first book of the series had a lyrical quality and is set in San Francisco while REASON TO BELIEVE had a substantial section set in Edinburgh.  You made the latter’s different colloquialisms and general speech seem so natural and authentic.  Did you need much research to achieve this?   

All I can say is that Google.com is my best friend.  Really--who do I want with me on a desert island?  Google!  I found all my Scottish information (even the very carefully laid out neighborhood that Fabia lives in) on Google.  The language, the phrases, the food--careful research.  The problem is, of course, getting lost in Google, but I only research when I am done with a first draft.  I put in an approximation of what I want, and then find it later, after the story's bones are put down. 

Most authors are also avid readers.  Who are some of your favorite authors and did any have an influence on your writing? 

I've already mentioned Philip Pullman and the Harry Potter as influences.  I am a professor of English, so I have been surrounded by wonderful stories my entire training and career.  Some of my favorite authors are Toni Morrison, Barbara Kingsolver, John Irving, Anne Tyler, Billy Collins, Jane Austen, William Shakespeare (I teach him every semester!). In terms of romance writers, I enjoyed Sherilyn Kenyon and Christine Feehan quite a lot (great world building and wow! amazing sex scenes!). 

Do you have a kind of writing ritual or ways to overcome writer’s block? 

I don't believe in writer's block.  You simply sit down and write.  In a few minutes, you are cured.  I do believe in fear and procrastination and anxiety, but those afflictions are cured by writing as well! 

Do you usually outline your stories or let your characters lead you where they will? 

I am not big into outlining.  I have an idea of a story, and then I let the characters take over.  Usually at the end of a writing day, I will write out a couple of lines giving me a reminder of where I was going.  But if my characters change the plot, I let them!  I find that to be very exciting and often, the most interesting aspects of the story come from allowing the characters to do what they want, when they want. 

Please describe a normal day in your life. 

I teach online and on land for both Diablo Valley College and UCLA.  On MWF, I work at home, so a day usually begins with answering emails from students and from business contacts.  Then I will putter around and drink as much coffee as I can handle.  Finally, I will sit down and write for about one to two hours.  After I write, I work on my online classes, and then I can go out and run!  I also have a wonderful boyfriend, and I will usually spend the late afternoons and evenings with him.  He has TIVO (I love TIVO) and after we go to the gym (weight workouts), we watch The Sopranos or Good Eats with Alton Brown.  I am also a Netflix user, and we can watch one of the bizarre foreign films that I've rented. 

Congratulations on your release from March 2007, BELIEVE IN ME, which is Felix Valasay’s story.  It is the final book to the trilogy.  Is it possible that you will ever venture back into that magical world? 

Though my editor is not on board with this idea, I would love to tell Niall's story (he's big in Reason to Believe) and Rasheed (from Believe in Me).  I enjoy the world of Les Croyant de Trois a great deal.  It's fun to play with the magic they have and I like the sense of community that developed in those books. 

What are you currently working on and can you share anything regarding it at this time? 

I am currently writing the second novel in another trilogy for Kensington.  The first will appear in February 2008.  This world is very different, and the characters were the ones that explained the world to me.  It was so much fun to really have no idea where they were from, and to let them show me.  

If you had it all to do over again, what would you change if anything?  Why or why not? 

Let's see:  I would have kissed Bob Weiner at the New Year’s Party in 1979.  Okay, that's not what you meant, right?  I think that most writers look at their work and see what they might have changed, but to me, that's really a very painful and useless thing to do.  I wrote it, it was published, and I've learned from the experience of having written it.  If I lament the past, I can't move into the future well.    

Is there any further information that you would like the reader to have?  Final thoughts, motto, favorite recipe? 

My favorite motto is:  Whatever works.  I think that often we imagine that we have to follow a prescribed path, but what if what is prescribed doesn't work with our individual needs and desires? So being willing to trust yourself and what you learn works for you is the way to go.  Also, it's hard when your way is no one else's way, so it's important not to compare ourselves to others, judging what we do by how someone else did it.  

Thank you Ms Inclán for sharing your time with us.  We look forward to reading more of your wonderful stories.