Author Friends: Carolyn Reilly

Are you a panster or a plotter?

Definitely plotter. I plot in excruciating detail. To me, it’s the best part of the writing process. Once I start writing, it gets complicated since English is only my second language. Thankfully, I have a fantastic team of editors, betas, and proofreaders.

Do you believe in Writer’s Block? If so, how do you kick its arse?

I don’t believe in writer’s block, but I do believe in procrastination. Sadly 😉

What book is your comfort read on a bad day? The one you go back to reread over and over. 

Oh, I wish I had the time to reread some of my all-time favorites. But with my day job, writing my own novels, and all the books on my TBR, that’s just not possible.

Describe your perfect writing space: 

Easy. Next to my horses’ pasture. Nothing soothes, relaxes, and grounds me like the sight and sound of grazing horses.

Do you write your title first or story first?

For the Deadly DNA Series it was stories first, for my upcoming Everdark Crossroads Series it was titles first.

And lastly, write a one or two paragraph flash fiction inspired by the last photo or text you got on your phone:

Why in the ever-loving hell had he agreed to visit this hilltop castle? Climbing 120+ flights of rough-terrain stairs in the pouring rain, acting as if they were petty human tourists. Three flaps of his wings would have taken them both there.

But she’d opted against it, not because the voice of reason told her. Or because she was afraid they might be discovered. No. Her point: What’s the fun in it. Really? Fun? To this day, he thought he knew her. But apparently, he hadn’t been aware of her masochistic tendencies. Wait. That wicked smile she tossed him made him think twice. Make that sadistic tendencies.

Bio:

Carolyn Reilly has been working for the German Federal Foreign Office (aka Department of State) for more than 20 years. A good part of that time she was assigned to German Embassies in civil war Lagos/ Nigeria and Khartoum/ Sudan, with the German Consulate General in New York and with German Embassies in Central Asian countries Kirgizstan and Kazakhstan. She still works part-time for the Foreign Office, but has meanwhile exchanged those restless and not exactly hazard-free postings abroad with a quieter life in the Bavarian countryside.

When she isn’t reading or writing, she enjoys spending time outdoors with her Icelandic horses. She advocates animal welfare and a percentage of the proceeds of her books goes to Farmed Animal Sanctuary Hof Butenland in Northern Germany.